hey had pizza and wine at her place—picnic-style, on the floor in front of the fire. They'd finished eating and were having the last of the wine before they tackled the work they'd brought in. Matt leaned forward and reached for his wineglass, surreptitiously watching her gazing into the fire, her arms wrapped around her updrawn knees. She was, he thought, an utterly captivating bundle of contradictions. A few weeks ago he'd watched her walk down the grand staircase at the opera, looking like a regal socialite. At her office today, in a business suit, surrounded by her staff, she was every inch an executive. Tonight, sitting before the fire in jeans that hugged her shapely bottom and a bulky cable-knit sweater that came almost to her knees, she was... the girl he had known long ago. Maybe that change from executive to artless girl was why he couldn't gauge her mood or guess her thoughts. Earlier, he'd thought she was upset over the mention of the women allegedly in his life, but all during their meal she'd been delightful company.

Now, as he watched her staring into the fire, he wondered about the faint smile at her lips that had appeared at odd times throughout their meal.

"What's so funny?" he asked idly, and his question unexpectedly made her eyes widen and shoulders start to shake with laughter. "Well?" he prodded, frowning, when she shook her head, folded her arms on her knees, and hid her laughing face in them. "Meredith?" he said a little curtly, and she laughed harder.

"It's you," she managed, giggling. "You, with those stockings clinging to you—" Matt started to grin even before she added merrily, "If you could have seen the look on your face!" She got herself under control, and with her head still in her arms, she turned her laughing face toward him and stole a peek. What she saw made her roll her eyes and dissolve with laughter again. "Cary Grant!" she chortled, her shoulders shaking. "Mrs. Millicent must be getting senile! You no more resemble Cary Grant than a p-panther resembles a p-pussy cat!"

"Which one am I?" he chuckled, but he already knew she likened him to the panther. Lying back, he folded his arms beneath his head and smiled up at the ceiling, utterly contented with his lot in life—for the first time in his life.

"I suppose we'd better get to work," she said finally. "It's eight forty-five already."

Matt rolled reluctantly to his feet, helped her clear away the few remnants of their meal, then walked over to the sofa, unlatched his briefcase, and took out a thirty-page contract he needed to read.

Across from him, Meredith sat down in a chintz-covered chair and took out her own work. Despite her earlier merriment, she'd been vibrantly and uneasily aware of his nearness throughout their meal. Having Matt there, behaving as tamely as the kitten she'd laughed about, was anything but amusing or soothing to her nerves. For unlike Mrs. Millicent, she didn't underestimate the threat he posed—he was that panther, patiently stalking his prey. Unhurried, graceful, predatory, and dangerous. She understood the threat he posed— and even so, she was more hopelessly attracted to him with each hour he was near.

She glanced covertly at him. He was sitting across from her on the sofa, his shirt-sleeves folded back on his forearms, his ankle propped on the opposite knee. As she watched, he put on a pair of gold wire-rimmed glasses that looked incredibly sexy on him, opened a file folder on his lap, and started to read the documents inside it.

He felt her watching him, and he glanced up and saw her staring at the glasses in surprise. "Eyestrain," he explained mildly, then he bent his head and returned his attention to the documents.

Meredith admired his ability to reach a state of instant, intense concentration, but she couldn't come near matching it. She stared into the fire, thinking about what Sam Green had told her. From there her thoughts drifted to the bomb scare in the New Orleans store, the problem with Gordon Mitchell, and the phone call from Parker yesterday, telling her that he'd have to find her another lender to make her the loan for the Houston land. All of it revolved around and around in her mind as fifteen minutes became twenty and then thirty.

Across from her, Matt said quietly, "Want to talk about it?"

Her head jerked around and she saw him watching her, the contract he'd been reading lying discarded in his lap. "No," she said automatically. "It's probably nothing. Nothing you'd be interested in at least."

"Why don't you try me?" he offered in that same calmly reassuring voice.

He looked so competent, so decisive and invincible, sitting there, that Meredith decided to take advantage of what he was offering. She leaned her head against the back of her chair and briefly closed her eyes, but her voice was a ragged sigh. "I have the strangest—the uneasiest—feeling," she admitted, lifting her head and looking at him with unguarded candor, "that something is happening, or going to happen, and it's terrible. Whatever it is, it's terrible."

"Can you isolate the source of your uneasiness?"

"I thought you'd laugh at what I just said," she admitted.

"It's not a laughing matter if you're actually sensing something you're unconsciously aware of. That's instinct, and you should pay close attention to it. On the other hand, your feeling could be coming from stress, or even from my reentry into your life. The last time I was in your life, all hell broke loose for you. You could be superstitiously fearing the same thing will happen again."

She flinched at his accurate summary of her feelings, but she shook her head at the idea that this was the source of her uneasiness. "I don't think it's coming from stress or you. I can't seem to put my finger on what's bothering me."

"Start with remembering as closely as you can—to the hour, if possible—when you first felt it. I don't mean when you stopped to notice it and think it out, but before that. Think back to a sudden feeling of restlessness, or mild confusion, or—"

She gave him a weary, laughing look. "I feel that way most of the time lately."

Matt returned her grin. "That's my fault, I hope." She caught his meaning, drew a shaky breath, obviously to warn him that he'd promised not to get personal tonight, so he returned to the subject at hand. "I meant more a feeling that something is odd—even if it seemed very good, very fortunate at the time."

His last words led her effortlessly to the way she felt when her father told her the presidency was hers, but only because Gordon Mitchell had turned it down. She told Matt about that and he considered it, and said, "Okay, good. That was your instinct warning you that Mitchell wasn't acting predictably or sensibly. Your instincts were right. Look what's happened since then: He's become an executive you can't trust—one who you suspect is taking bribes. Furthermore, he's violating established standards for your store's merchandise and openly opposing you in meetings."

"You put a lot of faith in your instincts, don't you?" she asked with surprise.

He thought of how much he was already gambling on his instinctive belief that the feelings she'd had for him before were still there—faint embers that he was trying to fan into a blaze again. He was letting himself dream of their heat, letting the need for it grow within him with every additional moment he spent with her. If he failed, his defeat would be even more devastating because he was counting so desperately on success. And knowing all that, he was still taking the full risk. "You have no idea," he said with feeling, "how much faith I place in them."

Meredith considered all that, and finally said, "The source of my feeling of impending disaster is probably easier to locate than I made it seem. For one thing, we had a bomb scare at our New Orleans store on Monday that cost us a great deal in lost revenue. That's our newest store, and it's barely breaking even. I'm personally guaranteed on its loans. If it starts running at a loss, the income from our other stores will make up the difference, of course."

"Then why are you worried about it?"

"Because," she said with a sigh, "we've expanded so quickly that our debt level is very high. We didn't have much choice—Bancroft's either had to go forward and get into the mainstream of competition or face becoming obsolete. The problem is, we don't have much money on hand to cover us now if something should happen to cause several of our stores to suddenly start losing money."

"Couldn't you borrow it if that happens?"

"Not too easily. We're borrowed up to the teeth right now for all our expansion costs. I'm worried about more than just that though." When he continued to regard her in waiting silence, she admitted, "There's a record number of shares of our stock being traded on the stock market every day. I'd noticed it in the newspapers for the past couple of months, but I assumed investors were reading about us and realizing we're a good long-term investment for their money, and we are. But," she said, drawing a steadying breath before she could make herself say the words, "Sam Green, our attorney, thinks all those shares may be going because someone is getting ready to try to take us over. Sam has contacts on Wall Street, and evidently there are whispers about a takeover attempt on us. Parker caught wind of a similar rumor in October, but we ignored it. It may be true after all. It'll be weeks before we know the names of those who've bought our stock lately. Even when we do, it may not tell us anything significant. If a company wants to keep their intention of taking us over a secret, they won't be buying our stock in their own names. They'll have other people buy it for them as well. They may even be illegally parking the stock in accounts with fake names." She caught herself and gave him a wry look. "You already know all about how it's done, don't you?"

He quirked an amused brow at her. "No comment."

"One company you started to take over a few months ago paid you fifty million just to go away and leave them alone. We couldn't do that, and we don't have the kind of money right now that it would take to try to fight a takeover. God," she finished miserably, "if Bancroft's were to become nothing but a division of some big corporate conglomerate, I couldn't bear it."

"There are steps you can take to protect yourself in advance."

"I know, and the board of directors has been discussing them for two years, but they haven't done anything really effective yet." Restlessly, she got up and poked at the fire.

Behind her, Matt said, "Is that the extent of your worries or is there more?"

"More?" she said on a choked laugh, straightening. "There's more, but what it all boils down to, I guess, is that things that never happened before are happening now, and it's giving me a generalized feeling of" doom. There's the fear of being a takeover target, and bomb scares, and now Parker can't lend us the money for Houston, so we'll have to deal with a new lender."

"Why can't he?"

"Because Reynolds Mercantile is looking for money right now, not lending big sums of it to overborrowed customers like us. I wouldn't be surprised if poor Parker isn't worried about Bancroft's being able to keep making payments on the loans we already have with him."

"He's a big boy," Matt said flatly, shoving papers back into his briefcase, "he can take the heat. If he lent you more money than he should have, it's his own fault, and he'll figure out a way to cut his losses." Every time she mentioned Reynolds, jealousy ate at him like acid, and this was no exception; his mood took a sudden turn for the worse. "You need to get a good night's sleep," he told her, and Meredith simultaneously realized that there was an edge to his voice and that he was getting ready to leave. Surprised by his rather abrupt departure, she walked him to the door, berating herself for dumping all her concerns on him.

He turned in the doorway. "What time are we assembling here for your birthday tomorrow?"

"Seven-thirty?" she suggested.

"Fine."

He stepped into the hall and Meredith moved to the open doorway. "About tomorrow night," she said, "since it's my birthday, I'd like to ask a favor of you."

"What's that?" he asked, putting down his briefcase and shrugging into his coat.

"That you and Parker talk to each other—no stony silences," she warned, "like the way you two acted before the press conference. Agreed?"

That was one mention too many of her precious Parker. Matt nodded, started to say something, hesitated, and then took a step forward and said it. "Speaking of Reynolds," he asked with deceptive calm, "are you still sleeping with him?"

Her mouth dropped open, and she demanded, "What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means that I assume you were sleeping with him, since you were engaged to him, and I'm asking you if you still are."

"Who the hell do you think you are!"

"Your husband."

For some reason the solemn finality of the statement made her heart slam into her ribs. Her hand tightened on the doorknob in a reflexive grab for support. He saw her reaction and added with a slight smile, "It has a nice sound, once you get used to it."

"No, it doesn't," she replied mutinously. But it did—a little.

His smile vanished. "Then let me introduce you to a word that has an even worse sound. If you are still sleeping with Reynolds, that word is adultery."

Meredith gave the door a shove that would have sent it crashing into its frame if he hadn't stopped it with his foot and simultaneously hauled her into the hall with his hands on her shoulders. His mouth claimed hers in a kiss that was both rough and tender, his arms drawing her tightly against him. And then he gentled the kiss, brushing his parted lips on hers in a light, exquisite touch that was even harder to resist than the other one. He trailed his lips to her ear and nipped the lobe, his whisper sending shivers down her spine. "I know you want to kiss me back, I can feel it. Why not indulge the impulse," he invited Her huskily. "I'm more than willing and completely available..."

To her horror, his teasing statements doused her anger and gave her simultaneous impulses to giggle and to do exactly what he suggested.

"If I die in an accident on the way home tonight," he cajoled softly, his mouth sliding over her cheek toward her lips again, "think how guilty you'll feel if you don't."

Pushed another step toward laughter, Meredith opened her mouth to say something duly flippant or, better yet, sarcastic, and the instant she did, his mouth captured hers. His hand clamped the back of her head, holding her mouth to his while his other arm angled down across her back, holding her hips tightly to his. And Meredith was lost. Locked to him from toe to head, possessed by his hands and mouth and tongue, she went down to ignominious defeat. Against his chest, her fists flattened, her hands sliding up his shirt inside his coat, her fingers splaying wide of their own accord, spreading against the muscled warmth of his chest. His tongue stroked intimately against hers, his mouth inexorably forcing hers to open wider, and suddenly Meredith was welcoming the invasion of his tongue, helplessly kissing him back with all the desperation and confusion rioting inside her. As soon as she did, his arm tightened, his mouth starting to move with fierce, devouring hunger over hers, and Meredith felt his own desire beginning to pour through her veins.

In sheer panic she tore free of his mouth and then his grasp. She stepped back into the doorway, her chest heaving, fists clenched at her sides.

"How could you even consider sleeping with Reynolds when you kiss me like that?" he demanded in a low, accusing voice.

Meredith managed a look of angry scorn. "How could you break your promise to behave impersonally tonight?"

"We aren't in your apartment," he pointed out, and his ability to twist everything and everyone to suit himself was the last straw. She stepped back, checked the impulse to slam the door in his face and, at the last second, she shut it with a hard snap. Once inside the protection of her own apartment, however, she slumped against the door and her head bent in anguished defeat. The mere fact that he had blackmailed and coerced her into this arrangement would have been enough to make any woman with a spine be able to withstand him for three short months. But not her, she thought furiously, shoving away from the door. Not her. She hadn't even lasted three weeks! She was spineless where he was concerned, putty in his hands. Filled with self-disgust, Meredith wandered toward the sofa, stopping at the end table to pick up Parker's picture. He looked back at her, smiling, handsome, dependable, filled with integrity. Furthermore, he loved her! He'd told her so dozens of times. Matt hadn't—not once! But was that going to stop her from surrendering her pride, her self-respect, to Matthew Farrell? Probably not, she thought bitterly. Not at this rate.

Stuart had said Matt didn't want to hurt her. Based on the way he'd swooped to her rescue yesterday, Meredith was inclined to accept that even now, when she was battered by emotions she didn't want and couldn't control. No, Matt didn't want to hurt her. For a variety of obscure and convoluted reasons, what Matt did want was to have her back with him, and that was where she'd get hurt. Matt's reputation for womanizing was legendary; he was also completely unpredictable and unreliable. The combination was absolutely guaranteed to break her heart.

She sank down on the sofa and put her face in her hands. He didn't want to hurt her... For a few minutes Meredith contemplated trying to appeal to his protective instinct—the same one that had made him move heaven and earth to help her yesterday. She could tell him honestly, "Matt, I know you don't really want to hurt me, so please go away. I have a nice life planned for myself. Don't spoil it for me. I don't mean anything to you—not really. I'm just another conquest to you, a passing fixation you have..."

She considered it, but she knew it would be a waste of time. She'd already said as much to him, but to no avail. Matt meant to fight this battle to the very end and emerge victorious—and he was doing it for reasons that were probably clearer to her than to him.

Lifting her head, she stared into the fire, remembering his words: I'll give you paradise on a gold platter. We'll be a family, we'll have children... I'd like six, but I'll settle for one.

If she told him she couldn't have children, that might make him give up his whole scheme. And the moment she realized it might, Meredith felt as if her heart would shatter, and that reaction made her furious with herself and him. "Damn you!" she told him aloud. "Damn you for making me feel vulnerable like this again."

He didn't want to be a family; he just wanted the novelty, the accomplishment of having her live with him for a while. Sexually she would bore him within days, Meredith knew. Matt was an entirely sensual being; he'd slept with movie stars and exotic models. Meredith was sexually repressed and embarrassingly inept, and she knew it. She'd felt that way eleven years ago with Matt. After their divorce it had taken two years to regain just a little of her self-esteem and the ability to feel some desire. Lisa had insisted that the only complete cure was to sleep with someone else, and Meredith had tried. She'd gone to bed with a university track star who'd been chasing her for months, and it had been disastrous. His panting and pawing had revolted her, while her reticence and ineptitude had frustrated and angered him. Even now she could remember his taunts and they made her shudder: C'mon, baby, don't just lie there, do something for me... What the hell's the matter with you anyway... How can anybody who looks as hot as you be so cold? When he tried to consummate the act, something inside her had snapped and she'd fought him off, grabbed her clothes, and fled. Sex, she'd decided, was not for her.

Parker had been her only other lover, and he was different—tender, sweet, undemanding. And even he was disappointed with her in bed; he'd never criticized her openly, but she sensed how he felt.

Meredith flopped back and let her head rest against the arm of the sofa, staring dry-eyed at the ceiling, refusing to cry the tears that ached in her throat. Parker could never have made her feel as miserable as she did now. Never. Only Matt could do this to her. And even so, she wanted him.

The realization hit her unbidden, terrifying, unacceptable. Undeniable.

In just a few days Matt had led her this far along the path of utter and humiliating capitulation. Tears of shame and futility sparkled in her eyes. He didn't even have to say I love you to make her want to throw all her plans for her life away.

Across the room, the antique grandfather clock began to chime the hour of ten. To Meredith it was tolling the end of her peace and serenity.

Matt maneuvered the Rolls out from behind two trucks that were blocking his lane, then he reached for the car phone. The clock on the dash showed ten o'clock, but he didn't hesitate to make his call. Peter Vanderwild answered Matt's call on the second ring, sounding startled and honored by this unprecedented late-night call. "My trip to Philadelphia was a complete success, sir," he told Matt on the erroneous assumption that was why his boss was calling.

"Never mind that now," Matt said impatiently. "What I want to know is if there's any way at all that there could be a leak about us buying up Bancroft's stock—a leak that would start takeover rumors on Wall Street?"

"No way. I've taken all the usual precautions to cover our identity until it's time to file the SEC papers. Their stock is climbing steadily, so it's naturally costing us more to get it lately."

"I think there's another player in the game," Matt said tersely. "Find out who the hell it is!"

"Someone else actually wants to take them over?" Vanderwild repeated. "I thought that too before, but why? They're a lousy investment right now unless you have a personal reason like yours."

"Peter," Matt warned, "keep your face out of my personal business or you'll be looking through the want ads."

"I didn't mean—that is, I read the newspapers—I apologize—"

"Fine," Matt interrupted. "Get busy checking out the rumors, find out if there really is another player, and if there is one, find out who the hell it is."

The luxury liner lifted gracefully over the heavy Atlantic swells, then glided down in what seemed to Philip Bancroft to be the most annoying, boringly repetitious movement he'd ever been forced to endure. Seated at the captain's table between a senator's wife and a Texas oilman, he listened with feigned interest to the woman who was speaking to him. "We should make port late in the afternoon, the day after tomorrow," she was saying. "Have you enjoyed the cruise so far?"

"Immensely," he lied, stealing a glance at his watch beneath the edge of his tuxedo jacket. It was ten o'clock in Chicago. He could be watching the news right now, or playing cards at the country club, instead of being held prisoner on this floating hotel.

"Will you be staying with friends while we're in Italy?" she asked.

"I don't have friends there," Philip replied. Despite the exasperating tedium, he felt better, stronger, every day. His doctor had been right—he had needed to absent himself completely from the concerns of the world and his business for a while.

"No friends in Italy?" she repeated, trying valiantly to carry the one-sided conversation.

"No. Just an ex-wife," Philip retorted absently.

"Oh. Will you be visiting her?"

"Hardly," Philip replied, and then his hand stilled in shock that he had even referred to the woman he'd thrown out of his home and his life all those years ago. Obviously, all this enforced relaxation was numbing his brain.