Dream Man Page 5

  When they were both finished, he smiled, his gaze on her face, mesmerizing her. He took one of her hands in his, smoothing his thumb across her knuckles. “But my reason for inviting you out to dinner was important, Jeanie.”

  “Was it?” Her heart did extraordinary things inside her chest. Quickly, she took her hand back from him and avoided that very strange expression in his eyes. “So… so was my reason for accepting. I was just on the verge of calling you—in fact, in the very act of lifting the phone—when it rang and it was you,” she said, talking too fast but unable to slow down. “I got the most interesting request today for someone to fill a temporary job, and I thought about you immediately.” She flicked a quick glance at his face. No need to tell him that she’d done nothing but think of him since last Monday.

  “Really?” He shoved his empty plate aside and leaned on the table. “What is it?”

  “It’s right up your alley, Max. A man, at least I think it’s a man, wants someone to write—er—something for him.”

  He tilted his head to one side in that way she was beginning to find characteristic of him—and charming and wonderful. It enhanced his good looks, sent interesting shadows over his craggy face, making him even more mysterious and enigmatic and intriguing. “Something? Can you be more specific than that? How long is that ‘something’ supposed to be? Is this a serious job offer for a free-lancer, or is it for my article on odd jobs?”

  “Well, maybe both.” Jeanie considered for a moment, then laughed, that soft yet rich sound that never failed to move Max. He hadn’t thought he’d hear it tonight. That she could laugh said a lot about her strength and courage and her ability to recover from trauma. “Yes, I think definitely both,” she went on. “As to length, a couple of pages each, minimum. Maybe three or four, and he wants half a dozen of them. Maybe more, he said. It depends on how the first ones are received.”

  “First what?”

  Jeanie looked up at the ceiling, and then flashed him a twinkling smile. “Something I’m sure you’re well versed in, Mr. Mckenzie,” she said innocently. “Just a few little love letters.”

  Chapter Four

  MAX SAT UP STRAIGHT. “Love letters?” He looked utterly disbelieving. “Some guy wants to hire someone else to write love letters? Why doesn’t he write them himself?”

  “I don’t know.” She was serious now. “And maybe it’s not even a man who wants them.”

  “Not a man? Why would a woman want to hire someone to write love letters? And would they be for her to receive, or to send?”

  “I don’t know for sure that it’s a woman, either.”

  His eyes went wide. “No! Don’t tell me it’s a caged chicken!”

  She laughed. “All I have is a letter signed with two initials and a surname, and a box number as an address. If my client’s a man, maybe he doesn’t feel he knows the right words or isn’t romantic enough for the woman he loves, and he really wants to impress her. If it’s a woman, maybe she’s in love and like many other people, admittedly mostly men, can’t put her feelings into words. Or, possibly, she intends to leave them around for a neglectful husband or lover to find, to shake him up or something. Or vice-versa if the client’s a man. Or maybe he or she just wants something romantic to read in a lonely room at night, to pretend. But whoever it is, what he or she is asking is neither illegal nor immoral, so I agreed to try to find someone to take on the task. And,” she added, with persuasive smile, “whoever it is, is willing to pay well.” She quoted him the price the client had offered per page, and he whistled loudly.

  “Wow! When do I start?”

  Jeanie felt a moment’s disappointment. She had thought he would refuse at first, that she would have to persuade him. She hadn’t thought, by the way he dressed and the kind of car he drove, to say nothing of where he lived, that he was a hungry free-lance writer willing to take on any assignment at all as long as it paid a few dollars.

  “Actually,” she said, “tonight would be best. The client is in a real hurry. The letter I received asking to have this set up said the first one was needed by the end of the week. Since the letters have to come to me, and I’m to send them on, the sooner the better. Could you have one on my desk by mid-afternoon tomorrow? And after that, he wants one a day until he says to stop. I told him it would be hard to find someone willing to write love letters and—”

  “And I was kidding when I said ‘when do I start, ” Max said with a grin. “I told you I write nonfiction. I’ve never been in love, let alone written a love letter, in my life!”

  Her breath caught in her throat. “Never?”

  “Never. And I don’t intend to start now, especially not when those letters are aimed at someone I don’t know and will never know. How could I possibly say anything that a strange woman—or man—would find interesting or even pertinent? How would I start each one? ‘To Whom it May Concern: This is to inform you that I love you dearly’?”

  Jeanie chuckled. “My client said ‘Darling’ or ‘Sweetheart’ would be an appropriate salutation. And he—she’s—Oh, let’s go with ‘he’ for now because we don’t know the gender of the client, provided me with a list of clues, to give to you—the writer, that is.” She retrieved her attaché case from beside her desk in the living room, snapped it open, fished out a folded paper, and handed it to him. He took it without opening it, gazing from it to her, bemused.

  “For subsequent letters, of course, the writer will need more detailed hints as to subject, and he’ll provide that,” Jeanie went on. “You know, sort of like, ‘Darling, last night was superb. You cook the most elegant stew.’ Or maybe, ‘Angel, how I enjoyed dancing with you on the beach in the moonlight...’ ”

  He slapped the folded paper on his closed fist. “Right, and, ‘You looked so lovely in your silver lamé gown and your gum boots that it stopped my heart dead.’ ”

  “I guess you never have written a love letter,” she said. “Or danced on the sand in the moonlight. Gum boots, indeed.”

  “In this weather, I wouldn’t go to the beach without them,” he said, collecting their plates and cutlery and carrying them to the sink. Over his shoulder he asked, “Have you?”

  She paused, halfway between him and the fridge, butter dish and cream pitcher in her hands. “Have I what, written a love letter?”

  He turned, braced his arms back against the counter, and looked at her. “Danced on the beach in the moonlight—with or without rubber boots.” For some reason, he knew her answer was important to him. Maybe it all had to do with why he’d asked her out to dinner. They had to get to that, he knew. And soon.

  “No.” Her voice was as quiet as his. She opened the refrigerator, set the things down and closed the door.

  “Or written a love letter?” He took her arm and steered her through the archway into the living room, as if this were his home not hers, and seated her on the sofa. He sat beside her.

  “Or been in love?”

  “I … thought I was, once or twice. But I wasn’t. Because when it was over, I didn’t really care. I guess I’ve just never been a very romantic person.”

  “Me either.” He leaned closer to her. Her scent was elusive, but just as delicious as before, and it was starting to drive him slightly crazy again. “Have you ever received a love letter?”

  “Not since Johnny Mason passed me a note in sixth grade and asked if I want to ‘do it’ with him behind the fire station.”

  His eyes crinkled. “That was no love letter. That was a mash note.”

  “If you’ve never written a love letter, how do you know the difference?”

  He grinned. “Maybe because Johnny what’s-his-name isn’t the only sixth grader to have written a mash note.”

  “Did you invite someone to go behind the fire hall?”

  “No. Down to the marina where my dad’s boat was moored. And I was in eighth grade by then, I think. Maybe I developed a bit late. Did you?”

  “Did I what? Develop late or meet Johnny behind the fire stati
on?”

  He laughed and leaned back, one arm along the top of the sofa behind her, fingers just touching her shoulder.

  “Answer either or both, as you like.”

  “I developed on a fairly normal schedule, and no, I didn’t meet him, not behind the fire hall or anywhere else. As a matter of fact, I had to ask my sister what ‘do it’ meant. When she told me I was heartily offended and quit offering Johnny Mason my peanut butter cookies. I decided I hated him more than I hated peanut butter cookies.”

  “Good for you. Your sister is older than you are? Are you close?”

  “Very close. Our parents were killed in a boating accident when I was twelve and Sharon, just shy of nineteen. She raised me after that. She was wonderful to me. Mother, sister, best friend, all rolled into one.” She smiled. “And still is.”

  “Then I’ll have to meet her. Soon.”

  Jeanie stared at him. “What? I mean, why?”

  His hand cupped her shoulder as he turned her toward him. “I told you, Jeanie, that I had a very important reason for inviting you to dinner, for wanting to talk to you, to give you a chance to get to know me better. Didn’t you wonder even a little bit about that reason?”

  “Yes.” She swallowed hard. “I guess I did. What was it you had in mind, Max?”

  She watched his throat work. He reached up and loosened his gray-and-blue striped tie another couple of inches. “I guess … in my own way, I’m asking for the same thing Johnny Mason was. Only I want to do it right. I’d like you to marry me, Jeanie.”

  For a moment she thought he was joking or that she hadn’t heard right, but his eyes were serious, and she knew there was nothing with her hearing. She had heard his words with perfect clarity. Shock made her inarticulate and held her immobile for an instant, but then she shot to her feet and strode away from him. With the width of the room safely between them, she spun around and stared at him. “Marry you?” She swallowed with effort. “Marry you? For heaven’s sake, Max! Why?”

  He arose but did not approach her. He looked as if he wasn’t going to answer, but then he frowned and said slowly, “Why? I … I guess I don’t know why. To be honest, I didn’t expect you to ask that question.”

  Her heart hammered high in her throat, making speech difficult. “You didn’t?” she asked hoarsely. “What did you expect me to say?”

  “I realize I’m sounding more and more like an utter idiot, a real jerk, but I guess I just expected you to say yes.” His brows drew together. “Or no.”

  She was suddenly certain that no was not one of the answers he’d truly expected. Really, the man was out of his mind. And his ego made Everest look little.

  “All right,” she said. “For the record, no.”

  She returned to the sofa, not to sit but to straighten a cushion. She perched uneasily on the arm still staring at him, not knowing whether to laugh or get mad. He was the most disconcerting man she had ever met. If she had any sense at all, she’d toss him out this minute. Marry him, indeed! They had met exactly one week ago, had spent one hour in each other’s company until this evening. He had sent her flowers, she had responded with a brief, polite thank-you note. It was hardly a basis for making a lifelong commitment.

  “How could you possibly ask me something like that?” she demanded, her agitation growing. She got to her feet and paced back and forth across the room, never coming near him but never taking her eyes off his face.

  “The very first time we spoke,” she said, “we established that we both hate cages. Believe me, I haven’t changed. No matter how liberated a man might persuade himself he is, there are still too many barriers our society permits him to—expects him to—erect around his wife, his … his property. I’ve had relationships with men, Max, not many, but a couple, and the minute I told the man I loved him and we began discussing marriage, things began to change. What he planned for the future, his future, became the dominant issue. What he thought was right for us turned out to be what he wanted to do, regardless of what I might have wanted or needed. Do you know even one man who’s given up a promising career to follow his wife across the continent when a transfer meant a good promotion for her?”

  “Might I point out that you are self-employed? The only person who could transfer you across the country would be yourself. And the same applies to me.”

  “I was just using that as an illustration. As a single woman, I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. I make my own rules, just as you do. But you can do it married or single, because you’re male. That’s the way our society is.”

  Max should have felt that this was some kind of victory. His proposal had cracked her facade even more than those wild and unexpected moments of passion following her mugging. Her eyes were so big and so confused that he felt he was staring into a deep sea on a cloudy day. He wanted her desperately, and she had said a very clear and unequivocal no—was still saying it. He hadn’t anticipated that. He hadn’t foreseen her considering marriage to him as a cage. Something pretty basic inside him told him that marriage to her would be a wonderful thing, not a set of shackles but a bonding, a togetherness he had been missing and wanting for a long time without recognizing that need in himself. The fact that he hadn’t realized it until the moment he saw her said something about the rightness of his decision. There had to be some way he could make her understand, some way he could stop her running from him. He heard a gusty sigh and recognized it as his own. “Marriage wouldn’t have to be a cage. We could work around and through our feelings.” He decided she might feel easier if she thought he had a few concerns to be resolved as well. “We could try to have one of those marriages that doesn’t trap its partners.”

  She stared at him. “Do I get you right? Are you talking about one of those so-called open marriages? Where you go your way and I go mine, and we get together once or twice a week and compare notes? Or make friends with other, like-minded couples and have ‘fun’ weekends away together, and it doesn’t matter who ends up in whose bed? Tell me, have you heard of a little thing called AIDS?”

  The horror and disgust in her tone told him exactly what she thought of those ideas. It echoed his own feelings exactly. “Of course I don’t mean that kind of marriage, and not because of AIDS!” he exploded. “To me a marriage is the exclusive territory of two people, and it doesn’t include outsiders in any way. If it does, it isn’t a marriage, it’s an arrangement, and that’s not what I want for us.”

  “Forget it, Max. Forget you ever said it. I’ll do the same. Subject closed.”

  “The subject is not closed. Can’t you even consider it for a few minutes? I mean, you aren’t giving me the smallest chance to explain.”

  “So … explain,” she invited coolly, even though she knew that nothing he could possibly say would make her consider his proposal—even for a few minutes.

  He moved closer until her forbidding attitude stopped him. “From the moment I first saw you, I’ve wanted you,” he said, and then shook his head as if those hadn’t been the words he’d meant to say. “I mean, there’s something about you that I respond to so powerfully and on a level so deep that I can’t ignore it. So, I thought the only way to cure what ails me is to have you and … and you don’t look like or act like an easy—” He broke off, rubbed his hand over his face, and shook his head— “Oh, hell, I’m doing this so badly, and all I want is to tell you that I feel something for you I’ve never felt before for any woman in my entire life.”

  “A physical response?” she asked, aghast at what she was hearing. She stood, fists clenched at her sides, her gaze fixed on his face. His blue eyes no longer danced in a crinkle of smiles. They were sober, thoughtful, and slightly darkened under the shadow of his drawn brows, which emphasized his pale skin. She could see he didn’t find this conversation easy.

  “It’s more than that, I’m telling you! I don’t know what it is. I’ve responded physically to women before, naturally, but not like this. This is big, Jeanie. It’s important. So I think we should g
et married before we do anything about it.”

  Now she did laugh, but it was a sound with little humor in it. “You’re asking me to marry you because you find me physically attractive? That’s insane!”

  “Is it?” he challenged. “It is, whether we like to admit it or not, the reason most people marry. I just choose to be blunt about it, not to play stupid games and swear undying love for you. To begin with, I don’t believe in love. I don’t believe it exists—except parent for child, child for parent. But I do know that what I feel for you is important, that I care about you. If I’d had any doubts as to that, what happened tonight in the garage and my primitive desire to murder that monster who had touched you would have cleared them up. But it’s more than caring too. Maybe this intense sexuality is what people mean when they say love. If you’ve never really been in love, how can you know? You said you only thought you were. What did you feel before that you don’t feel now?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t explain it.”

  “But you aren’t denying that you feel something?”

  She was silent for a few moments, then shook her head. “No. I’m not denying that. There is a very definite … sexual feeling between us. But that doesn’t mean we have to act on it. It doesn’t mean that we are going to. We can’t. We don’t even know each other.”

  “I know enough about you. I knew enough ten minutes after we met. Maybe even thirty seconds. You stood there, backlit by the sun coming in your office window, your hair escaping in a little halo of curls, your skin all pink and gold, and your eyes filled with panic. You managed to hide the panic quickly, but I knew you so well without even knowing who you were, that I could read it in you. And I know this—”

  He moved in on her then, lifted one hand and touched the side of her face, drawing his fingertips over her cheekbone. “You have the most beautiful face I’ve seen, the most touchable skin, and you like me to touch you.”