Part 22 (1/2)
Very soon she discovered that there were worse things. One of them was confronting the streets of Rio de Janeiro alone and broke, seeing her own future in the jaded, opaque eyes of prost.i.tutes. Then Len came back with cuts and bruises on his face and said, f.u.c.k it, why not get married? It's the one thing I've never done.
She was so relieved she almost blacked out. When she could focus again, she was clinging to him, watching him as though he was fire and she was freezing. She didn't notice the other man with him until Len dragged her arms from around his neck and introduced her to Archer Donovan.
The anger in the other man's eyes struck her like a blow. Archer didn't want her to marry Len. She didn't know why, but she was sure of it. Just as she was sure that something about Archer fascinated her. He watched her with such darkness, such savage intensity, silently demanding... what?
She didn't know.
Couldn't know.
Wouldn't know.
So she turned her back on Archer and watched Len with eyes full of hope, certain that everything would turn out all right now. Yet when she dreamed that night, it was Archer's face that haunted her, Archer's silver-green eyes that followed her, Archer's hands that ignited the newly discovered fires in her body.
She hadn't understood her reaction then. She didn't understand it now. But it was real, as real as the quickening of her heart and her body each time Archer touched her.
”What are you thinking?” he asked softly.
Hannah jolted, then sighed. ”The day Len came back for me in Rio.”
He followed her glance toward the bar, where the two remaining prost.i.tutes lit cigarettes from the smoldering ends of other cigarettes. ”You wouldn't have ended up like that.”
”I was one night away from it,” she said simply.
”Len and I were both looking for you. He found you first.”
Shocked indigo eyes focused on Archer. ”He never said anything about you looking for me.”
”No, he wouldn't have.”
”Is that why you were so angry with me when you first met me? Because you'd spent the night looking for me?”
”You were innocent, terrified, and completely alone. Len never should have abandoned you. That's why I was angry. It was as close as I ever came to giving Len the fight he thought he wanted, no holds barred. All that kept me from beating him unconscious was that two of us had a better chance of finding you than one.”
In the dim light of the bar, Archer's eyes were narrowed, feral. Dangerous. Hannah swallowed uneasily. ”I've often wondered why Len came back. At first I thought it was because he loved me. But he didn't.”
”You touched everything that was good in him, Hannah. That's all anyone can ask.”
Pain drew her face into taut lines that the black wig made even more grim. ”It wasn't enough. I wasn't what he needed. I only made him worse.”
”No.”
”Yes,” she countered bluntly. ”After he was paralyzed he needed someone older, someone who needed him less and could help him more.”
”Paralysis changed Len's body, not his soul. He wasn't an easy man when he could walk. He wasn't an easy man when he went on wheels. You didn't make him what he was. You couldn't make him different. Only Len could do that, and Len didn't want to.”
”If I hadn't made him marry me ”
”You didn't make him marry you,” Archer cut in. ”No one ever made Len do one d.a.m.ned thing he didn't want to.” He glanced down toward the dim, narrow hallway where the prost.i.tute and her trick had disappeared. Nothing moved in the shadows. ”Come on.”
Relieved that they were leaving the depressing barroom, Hannah stood quickly. She made a sound of dismay when Archer turned her away from the front door. Instead, he urged her down the reeking hallway, opened the door to the men's bathroom, and looked around.
Empty.
Without a word he dragged Hannah past a stained urinal toward the single stall. What the place lacked in size, it made up for in sheer quant.i.ty of dirt.
”What if someone comes in here?” Hannah asked, jumpy as only a woman can be in a men's public toilet. ”What will he think?”
”When you change into this, he won't have to think. He'll be sure I hauled you in here for a quickie.”
While Archer talked, he rummaged in the duffel. Rapidly he pulled out a short black skirt, black lace bikini panties, and a black-and-pink striped crop top so tight there wasn't room for a bra beneath. A pair of black high-heeled sandals completed the outfit. What there was of it. Without the jacket which Archer left in the duffel there wasn't much more concealment in the clothing than in an Australian bikini.
”What is that?” Hannah asked, staring at the hot pink and black stripes.
”Clothes. Yours, to be precise.”
”I don't think so.”
”Screaming pink isn't my color,” he said blandly, dangling the stretchy top from his index finger. ”Stripes don't do much for me, either.”
”I think you'd look smas.h.i.+ng in that. Every man needs a jockstrap that looks like an embarra.s.sed tiger.”
”It's not a jockstrap.” He held it out to her. ”It's a blouse.”
”No.”
”And this is the skirt that goes with it.”
”Not until you tell me why.”
”Pink turns me on.”
”We didn't have it earlier and you did just fine.”
He smiled a remembering kind of smile. ”Yeah, we did. Imagine what we'll do now.”
Hannah hesitated, then gave Archer a smile that made him wish they were in bed. ”I'm imagining.” She reached for the b.u.t.tons on her blouse. ”Want to imagine with me?”
”h.e.l.l, yes. But I know better.”
Reluctantly he turned his back and went to the pitted sink. If he watched her undress, he would do something really stupid, like take her right here, right now, as though she was bought and paid for with a twenty-dollar bill.
A turn of the tap told him this would be another coldwater shave. Grimacing, he pulled out the disposable razor April Joy had only sent one and shaved off his mustache with swift, painful strokes. He rinsed the sink carefully before he pulled out his own disguise and looked it over.
The change of clothes began with simple and shockingly expensive black slacks and a white silk s.h.i.+rt. A Krugerand on a heavy gold chain told him that he was expected to wear his s.h.i.+rt in the European style, unb.u.t.toned halfway to his belt. He wondered if April knew that the chain would nip and gnaw at the hair on his chest.
The shoes answered his question. Though they took up most of the s.p.a.ce in the duffel, they were a size too small.
April must have laughed herself into a coma at the thought of his discomfort. She knew everything about him, including his shoe size. She certainly knew him well enough to be sure that he wasn't the type to flash a chunk of gold against his hairy chest. But once he was dressed, he would be a fit partner for Hannah's outfit: money and barely bridled s.e.x.
When he turned around, she was struggling to zip up the skirt's back zipper. He stood where he was and stared. Just stared. He had had her naked, had licked every bit of her, and still he was rocked back by the s.e.xy sway of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s beneath the tight top and the hot curves of her long, long legs.