Tempting Fate - Caine - MacGregors 2 Part 6

"As soon as I take care of a few details."

"Have you located an office yet?"

"That's one of the details." With a frown, she ran a finger around the rim of her gla.s.s. She didn't want to discuss her problems with Caine, certainly not her doubts. Diana shrugged as though it were indeed only a detail rather than her entire life teetering in the balance. "It isn't quite as easy as I antic.i.p.ated-if I want a good location and reasonable rent."

Absently, she touched her damp finger to her tongue. "I have three possibilities to check out tomorrow."

Her unconsciously provocative gesture was arousing; Caine felt something warm moving through him but checked it. There'd be other times, he promised himself. Other places. "I might know of some office s.p.a.ce you'd be interested in."

"Really?" As she shifted toward him, her hair swung to her cheek to be quickly tossed back.

"It's on the other side of the river, within a couple of T stops from the courthouse." He drank, noting that the silk clung nicely, draping down from snug shoulders. He'd been wondering for weeks what those strong shoulders would feel like under his hands. The trouble was, he'd also been wondering how she was doing on her own back in Boston, now that she'd learned about her aunt and Justin. He'd wondered particularly after he'd heard she'd resigned her position. The concern he felt worried Caine a great deal more man the desire. "A two-story brownstone," he continued. "It's been remodeled to accommodate a reception area, conference rooms, offices."

"It sounds wonderful. I can't think why the agent I'm going through hasn't mentioned it" Unless, Diana thought as she lifted her champagne again, it was a matter of the rent being as wonderful as his description.

She wasn't going to touch the trust fund her aunt had set up for her. Her aunt, she corrected silently, or Justin? In any case, she wasn't going to touch a penny she hadn't earned on her own. "How did you happen to hear of it?" she asked him.

"I know the landlord," Caine remarked as he poured more champagne for both of them.

Diana caught something in the tone and studied him thoughtfully. "You are the landlord."

"Very quick." He toasted her.

Ignoring the humor in his eyes, she sat back, crossing her legs. "If you own such a marvelous building, why aren't you using it yourself?"

"I am. That color suits you very well, Diana."

She drummed her fingers lightly on the arm of her chair. "Why should I be interested in your office?"

"My caseload's packed," he told her, so briskly businesslike it took her a moment to make the transition. "I'm going to have to turn away some clients for the simple reason that I won't be able to give them my best in terms of time and energy."

She lifted a hand, palm up. "So?"

"Interested?" Her brows drew together as she took a deep breath. "In your clients?"

"In making them your clients," he countered.

Interested? she thought. She'd stand on her head in a snowdrift for the chance at a few choice cases. Diana resisted the urge to kiss his feet. She had to be practical. "I appreciate it, Caine, but I'm not interested in forming a partnership at this time."

"Neither am I."

Confused, she shook her head. "Then what are you-"

"I happen to have some s.p.a.ce in my building you could rent. I have some cases I'm going to have to refuse or refer. I prefer to refer them."

As yet, he hadn't completely worked out why he wanted to refer them to her. She was family-that's what he told himself. He let the stem of the gla.s.s twist between his fingers. "It's a simple matter of supply and demand."

Diana was silent for a long moment. Caine knew that though her eyes had that heavy-lidded, sleepy look, she was thinking carefully. He almost smiled. He rather liked the way she plotted her way from point A to point B. By G.o.d, she was even more beautiful than he'd remembered, and it had barely been two weeks.

He'd resisted the urge to call her, until tonight when he'd finally accepted he wasn't going to get her out of his head. Still, he'd told himself he was just checking on her, one family member to another. Her answering service had told him where to find her. He'd come on impulse, with the offer he'd just made her already forming in his brain. If she accepted, he'd have the advantage-and the disadvantage-of being around her every day. That was business, he reminded himself. Once they'd settled that, he'd begin on the nights. If she was indeed going to begin a discovering of Diana Blade, he wanted to be around for it "Caine," she began, bringing her eyes back to his. "It's very tempting, but I'd like to ask you a question."

"Sure."

"Why?"

Settling back, he lit a cigarette. "I've given you the professional one. We might add that you and I are in-laws in a manner of speaking."

"Your family obligations again," she said flatly.

"I prefer the word loyalty," he countered.

Her face cleared with a look of surprised consideration before she smiled at him. "So do I."

"Think about it" Reaching in his jacket pocket, he drew out a business card. "Here's the address; come by tomorrow and take a look."

She couldn't afford to turn her nose up at a ready-made solution. "Thank you. I will." Diana reached for the card and found her hand caught in his. Their eyes met, his confident, hers wary.

"I like the way you look in silk," he murmured, "drinking champagne with just a touch of firelight in your eyes." His thumb skimmed over her knuckles and the buzz of conversation around them vanished. "I've thought about you, Diana." As his voice deepened, intimately, she felt a thick, enervating flow of desire. Her hand went limp in his. "I've thought about the way you look," he said quietly. "The way you smell, taste. The way you feel, pressed against me."

"Don't." The word was a whisper, the whisper desire itself. "Don't do this."

"I want to make love to you for hours, until your body's weak and your mind's full of me. Only me." "Don't," she said again and pulled her hand free. Diana sat back quickly, her breathing unsteady. How could he make her feel as though she'd been ravaged , with just words? Her body was throbbing as though his hands already knew it. He knew it, she reminded herself. It was a skill he had, one he'd honed to perfection. "This won't work," she managed at length.

"No?" Seeing her struggle against need gave him a small thrill of power-and of pleasure. "On the contrary, Diana, it's going to work very well."

Diana picked up her champagne again and drank. Steadier, she brought her eyes back to his. "I need office s.p.a.ce, and I need clients." She took a deep breath, wondering if her pulse would ever slow to a normal rate again. "I also need an atmosphere of professionalism."

"The offer was and is strictly professional, counselor," he told her with a fresh gleam of humor in his eyes. "Whether you take it or not has nothing to do with other... aspects of our relationship, nor will it change what's going to happen between us."

"Can't you get it through your head I don't want any relationship with you?" she tossed back. "I don't intend for anything to happen between us."

"Then it shouldn't matter if we work in the same building, should it?"

With another smile, Caine set his card on the table beside her. "I find it difficult to believe you're afraid of me, Diana. You strike me as a very strong-willed woman."

Her eyes chilled. "I'm not afraid of you, Caine."

"Good," he said amiably. "Then I'll see you tomorrow. Fairman's just walked in, so I'll get out of your way." Rising, he brushed her cheek with a friendly kiss. "Enjoy your evening, love." Annoyed, Diana watched him walk off. d.a.m.n the man for stirring her up! s.n.a.t.c.hing his card from the table, she ripped it in two. The h.e.l.l with him, she told herself. He could take his office and his clients and jump in the Boston Harbor. Afraid? a tiny voice asked her. With a sound of frustration, Diana opened her purse and dropped the pieces of his card inside.

No, she wasn't afraid. And she wasn't going to cut off her professional nose because Caine MacGregor could drain a woman with a few soft words. She'd go to his office, Diana vowed, and drank the rest of her champagne in one impulsive swallow. And if the accommodations suited her, she'd grab them. No one was going to stop her from getting where she was going. Not even herself.

In the morning, Diana checked out two of the addresses given to her by the rental agent. The first was a positive no, the second a definite maybe.

Instead of going to the third on her list, she found herself steering toward the address on Caine's business card.

She'd treat it exactly as she had treated the other potential offices, Diana reminded herself. She would be objective, consider the s.p.a.ce and location, the rent and the condition of the building. She couldn't afford to let the fact that it was Caine's building influence her one way or the other.

With any luck, Caine would be out of the office and his secretary would show her around. The decision, Diana thought, would come more easily without him there.

She loved it the moment she saw it. The building was rather narrow, old and beautifully preserved. It had the quiet elegance found in Boston, snuggled in the midst of steel-and-gla.s.s skysc.r.a.pers. There were patches of snow on the lawn, but the tiny parking area beside it was sc.r.a.ped clean. Pale gray smoke puffed out of the chimney. As she started up the flagstone walk, Diana glanced around. There was a naked oak standing sentinel in the yard, a long, trim hedge separating yard from sidewalk. The courthouse was less than a mile away. So far, Diana reflected, it's too good to be true.

The door was thick and carved. Beside it was a discreet bra.s.s plaque: Caine MacGregor, Attorney at Law. It wasn't difficult for her to imagine a similar plaque below it with her name scrolled. Back up, Diana, she warned herself. You haven't even seen the inside yet. Still, as she opened the door, she remembered Caine's comment a few weeks before about fate.

The reception area was done in rose and ivory. Duncan Phyfe tables flanked a carved arm settee. Diana caught the scent of fresh flowers from the mix of blooms in a thin cut-gla.s.s vase. The floor was hardwood, gleaming and bare except for a faded Aubusson carpet. The mantelpiece was pink grained marble topped by a long oval minor.

Below it a fire crackled eagerly.

Style, Diana thought instantly. Caine MacGregor had style.

Behind a satinwood desk, a round-faced, middle-aged woman had a phone tucked between her shoulder and ear as she pounded the keys of a typewriter. The surface of the desk was buried under stacks of files, sc.r.a.ps of paper and legal pads. She gave Diana a wide smile, then, hardly breaking rhythm, gestured toward the settee.

"Mr. MacGregor's schedule is filled through next Wednesday," she said into the phone in a surprisingly girlish voice. "I can give you an appointment Thursday afternoon." She stopped typing long enough to dig a thick date book out from under the wreckage of her desk. "One- fifteen," she continued, shuffling more papers until she found the stub of a pencil. "Yes, Mrs. Patterson, that's his first free slot. One-fifteen on Thursday, then... Yes, I'll get back to you if he has a cancellation." She scribbled in the book, pushed it aside, then began typing again. With a faint lift of brow at the procedure, Diana slipped out of her coat and laid it on the arm of the settee. "Yes, I'll be sure to tell him. Good-bye, Mrs.

Patterson." The secretary paused in her typing long enough to replace the receiver and smile at Diana. "Good afternoon, may I help you?"

"I'm Diana Blade-"

"Oh, yes." The woman cut into Diana's explanation and rose, revealing that the rest of her body was as round as her face. "Mr. MacGregor said you might be dropping by today. I'm Lucy Robinson."

"How do you do?" Diana found her hand taken for a firm, brisk shake.

"You seem to be very busy," Diana began. "Perhaps it would be better if I made an appointment-''

"Nonsense." Lucy gave her a maternal pat on the arm. "Mr. MacGregor's with a client, but he gave me orders to show you around. I'll take you upstairs, you'll want to see your office first."

Before Diana could explain that it wasn't her office yet, Lucy was moving into the hall toward a staircase. She'd left her typewriter on, Diana noticed, and wondered if she should mention it. "Mrs.

Robinson-"

"Now, you just call me Lucy. We're not formal here, it's more like family."

Family, Diana thought with something like a sigh. There seemed to be no getting away from it.

The staircase rose, uncarpeted and without a curve. The mahogany rail gleamed like satin. Thinking of the desk in the reception room, Diana decided the housekeeping wasn't Lucy's province. The woman glided up the stairs like a ship in full sail. A hairpin was dangling from the knot at the back of her neck. "There's a conference room downstairs and a small kitchen," Lucy was saying. "There're plenty of times we don't get out of here for lunch, so it's handy. Can you cook?"

"Ah...not very well."

"Too bad." Lucy paused at the top of the stairs. "Neither Caine nor I are anything to rave about in the kitchen." She gave Diana a long look that was as friendly as it was a.s.sessing. "He didn't tell me you were so pretty.

You're a connection of his, aren't you?"

Diana took a moment to work out the conversation. "I suppose you could say so. My brother married his sister."

"Knew it was something like that," Lucy said with a nod. "Caine's office is through there, used to be the master bedroom. Yours is just down the hall here."

With a glance at the door they pa.s.sed, Diana continued down the hall.

"It's a lovely house," she commented. "Caine doesn't seem to have made too many changes in the structure to turn it into offices."

"Only took a couple of walls out," Lucy agreed. "He said he'd had enough of working in four dull walls and brown carpeting. I say when a body spends most of their day in a place, it ought to be comfortable."

"Mmmm." Diana thought about her cubbyhole at Barclay, Stevens and Fitz. The carpet had been brown there, too, she remembered. "Have you worked for Caine long?"

"I worked for him when he was state's attorney," Lucy told her. "When he asked me if I wanted to work for him in his private practice, I packed up my desk and went. Here you are." Lucy pushed open a door, then stepped back to let Diana enter.

It was too perfect, Diana thought as she walked into the empty room.

Small, but not cramped, with two sashed windows that faced east. Her heels echoed on the wood floor, bouncing to the high ceiling as she crossed to a neat, white marble hearth.

The wallpaper was silk, faded a bit but still beautiful. She could easily see the room furnished with a trim, Federal desk, a few comfortable chairs, perhaps a small Victorian love seat with a low table. She could have a shelf on the north wall for her law books. If she wanted to begin her practice with style, she would never find anything more appropriate.

"I'm surprised Caine hasn't found a use for this room," Diana thought aloud.

"Oh, he had it furnished for a while. He'd stay here instead of going home when he was working late." Lucy discovered the pin trailing onto her neck and shoved it back into place. "Then he decided it was getting too easy to spend his life here. Caine's dedicated but he's not obsessed."

"I see."

"The law library's up here," Lucy went on. "That's where he had the walls taken out. There's a powder room downstairs and a full bath on this floor. It has the original porcelain taps. Oops, there's my phone. You just prowl around" Before Diana could say a word, she was bustling back down the hall.

Lucy, Diana decided, was nothing like the sharp young secretary she had shared with two other attorneys at Barclay. There everything had been done with quiet, unshakable efficiency. And the building had had all the charm of a tomb. An aristocratic tomb, Diana reflected, but a crypt was a crypt. This, she thought as she glanced at the faded wallpaper again, was much more to her taste.

Clients could relax here, a.s.sured of a personal touch. What few clients she could claim, she added with a rueful smile. Still, the location and the atmosphere would add to her caseload as much as her skill would. When you were selling something, it paid to sell it with flair.

Mulling over the angles, Diana went back into the hall and wandered.

Surely the mahogany wainscoting was the original, she reflected. No one paneled in mahogany any longer. Opening a door at random, she found Caine's law library.

Barclay's was no more extensive, she thought with a quick flash of professional interest. A long table dominated the center of the room on which a few books were stacked. Going to one that was left open, Diana saw it was marked State v. Sylvan. Murder one, Diana mused, recalling the case from her studies at Harvard. It had been a volatile, splashy affair in the late seventies. National publicity, packed courtrooms and a long, emotional trial. Just what, she wondered, was Caine working on that he was digging for precedents here? Intrigued, she bent over the book and began to read. When Caine came to the doorway ten minutes later, she was engrossed.

He didn't speak for a moment, realizing that it was the first time he had seen her completely self-absorbed. There was the faintest line of concentration between her brows, and her lips were slightly parted.

She'd rested both palms on the table as she'd leaned over so that the jacket of her suit-a deep, vivid red this time-fit snugly over her back.

Her hair was tucked behind her ear, revealing round, fluted-edged earrings of etched gold. He could picture her in court in that outfit-or at an elegant formal tea. He knew when he stepped closer that her scent would be there, making hundreds of dark promises. Cautious, he dipped his hands into his pockets and remained where he was.

"Interesting reading?"

Diana's head jerked up at his voice, but she straightened slowly. "State versus Sylvan." She tapped the open book with a finger. "A fascinating case. The defense pulled everything but a rabbit out of its hat over the three-month trial." "O'Leary's a h.e.l.l of a defense attorney, if a bit flashy for some tastes."

Leaning against the jamb, he studied her. The light coming in the window at her back slanted across the hands that still rested on the table.

"Still, after two appeals, he lost," she pointed out "His client was guilty-the prosecution put together a very carefully structured case."

Diana ran a fingertip down the opened book. "Do you have a similar one, or is this just casual reading?"

He smiled for the first time. "Virginia Day," he said, then waited for her reaction.

The sleepy look in her eyes was replaced by quick interest "You're defending her?"