Rivals (52 page)

“No thanks. When I go riding, I prefer to have the horses under the hood of a car.”

Something crackled. Belatedly, Flame noticed the daily paper lying open on his lap. “You've been reading the newspaper,” she accused. “You said you didn't want to go because you wanted to work on the sketches for the golf course.”

His eyebrow lifted at the hint of impatience in her voice. “I can't make up my mind whether this project of yours is turning you into a shrew or a slave driver.”

“A shrew?” She frowned, faintly indignant. “How can you say that, Ellery? I have never behaved like a shrew.”

“Really?” His eyebrow arched even higher. “I think you've forgotten how rudely you berated those poor people on the phone this morning.”

“You mean those real estates agents?” She remembered that earlier sharpness of her tongue—without regret. “They deserved it. The ones who weren't waiting to hear back on the offers they'd made were waiting for a little time to go by before making another offer—so they wouldn't appear too anxious and drive up the price. Why should they care? They aren't buying the land. I am. Ben warned me that people were laid back around here, but this morning was ridiculous.”

“We are testy, aren't we?” Ellery murmured.

She started to snap an answer at him, then sighed. “Sorry. It still irritates me when I think how much time has gone by—all because they didn't want to look as though they were trying to pressure anybody to sell. Believe me, they aren't going to be concerned about that anymore.” She took a quick drink of the iced tonic water, then wandered over to the fireplace. “You managed to avoid my question about the sketches. Did you get anything done on them?”

“Even though this was supposed to be a pleasure trip, yes, I did sketch for my supper,” he mocked. “They're on the table by the window.”

Flame walked over to look at them. Altogether there were six different views—all in pencil—of the valley, its pastureland and shade trees turned into the manicured green of a golf course.

“Ellery, these are very good,” she declared as she went through them again.

“Then I won't have to go hungry tonight.”

She turned, smiling at him in amused exasperation. “Will you stop that? I'm trying to pay you a compliment.”

“Thank you.” He bowed his head in mock docility.

Shaking her head at him, she laid the sketches down, mentally reminding herself to show them to Malcom later. “Seriously, Ellery, they are good. Sometimes I think your talent is going to waste in the art department of Boland and Hayes.”

He dismissed that with a careless shrug. “Speaking of art—” He picked up the newspaper in his lap. “—have you seen today's paper?”

“I haven't had time to look at it. Why?”

“There's a small piece in here I found interesting.”

“What's that?” She crossed to the sofa and glanced over his shoulder, her attention drawn first to the article near his right thumb. “You mean the story about the tenor Sebastian Montebello guesting in the Tulsa production of
Otello
? I think I saw a poster about that some—” She faltered, her eye caught by the photograph in the left-hand corner, a photograph of Chance Stuart and Lucianna Colton. Flame stared at the warm and lazy smile on Chance's face, a smile she'd once believed he reserved exclusively for her. Now Lucianna was the recipient of it. The caption beneath mentioned a minor throat ailment that had sidelined the renowned coloratura and stated her intention of attending
Otello
—in the company of real estate magnate Chance Stuart—to see the performance of her dear friend, Sebastian Montebello.

“I wonder if it's too late to get good seats,” she murmured.

“You're surely not thinking of going?”

“Why not?” she challenged. “I'm certainly not going to stay away simply because he'll be there.”

“Heaven forbid,” he murmured.

“If Malcom and I can get seats, do you want to go?”

“My dear Flame, I wouldn't miss this for the world.”

Arriving patrons of the opera filled the foyer of Chapman Music Hall, the subdued chatter of their voices punctuated by an occasional trilled greeting. From the hall itself, Chance could hear the muted and discordant notes of the last-minute tuning of instruments by the orchestra. He took another deep drag on his cigarette and exhaled the tangy smoke in a rush. Not for the first time, he wondered why he'd agreed to come. He glanced at his watch. Eight more minutes before the overture was scheduled to start.

Beside him, Lucianna caught the slight movement of his wrist, and his downward glance at his watch. “You aren't too bored, are you, Chance darling?” she murmured soothingly.

“No,” he lied.

“I'm sorry I had to drag you here tonight,” she said, explaining again. “Unfortunately Sebastian found out I was in Tulsa. He would never have forgiven me if I hadn't come tonight. I wouldn't care, but I have to sing
Aïda
with him this fall. And I shudder to think the hell he could create for me on stage if he chose to be spiteful. It's bad enough putting up with his endless practical jokes.”

“And you're the perfect victim for them, aren't you?” Chance guessed. “You approach everything with such intensity, even rehearsals, completely immersing yourself in the role, you open yourself up to it.”

“He does it to destroy my concentration so he looks good and I look bad,” she declared, then sighed, casting him a sideways glance. “As much as I don't want to, I have to go backstage before the performance and wish him well. Will you come with me?”

“Of course. Only I think you're about to be waylaid,” he said, spotting the tall, anorexic brunette making a beeline through the crowd toward them and realizing that he should have known Gayle Frederick would be waiting to descend on Lucianna the instant she saw her. The woman fancied herself a patron of the arts. Which meant she was too rich to be called a groupie.

“Chance, how wonderful to see you.” She sailed up to him and kissed him on both cheeks with typical theatrics.

“Gayle,” he murmured in acknowledgment.

“And Miss Colton,” she gushed, turning to Lucianna. “You don't know what a thrill it is to meet you. What a night this is going to be—Sebastian Montebello on the stage and Lucianna Colton in the audience.”

“How very kind you are,” Lucianna smiled, putting on her “diva” face.

“Not at all,” she insisted. “If anything, I'm lucky. Although not as lucky as you,” she added, sliding a quick look at Chance. “I mean, here you are with the throb of every heart in Tulsa.”

“I am lucky,” Lucianna agreed, her hand tightening ever so slightly on Chance's arm.

Catching the minor stir of activity at the entrance, Chance glanced in that direction. A fine tension, different from the impatience and irritation he'd felt before, held him motionless as he found himself looking at Flame. The months and days since their first meeting at the cocktail party seemed to drop away. Again he was staring at her from across a crowded room, drawn by that arresting combination of red-gold hair and jade green eyes.

Yet, tonight she looked untouchable—somehow distant and aloof. Frowning at the change, Chance studied her closer. She was wearing her hair differently. Instead of cascading in a luxuriant mass around her face and shoulders, it was smoothed back and caught in a wide clasp at the nape of her neck. The style wasn't severe, yet its effect was to subdue the fire with high sophistication. That wasn't Flame. Neither was the strikingly chic and elegant suit of quilted copper lamé that she wore, unrelieved by any jewelry. The straightness of its long jacket completely hid the ripeness of her figure, giving Chance the impression that she had gowned herself in a suit of copper armor.

Someone moved into his vision, blocking his view of Flame. For an instant Chance tried to look through the man, then the cleft chin, the square jaw, and the iron eyes registered. It was Malcom Powell—her new lover. Chance looked at the glowing tip of his cigarette, a tightness coiling through him.

When he lifted his glance again, he caught the smile she gave Malcom…so warm, so admiring, so damned intimate. He had tried to convince himself that she had turned to Malcom out of spite—that it had been a means of getting back at him…maybe even an attempt to make him jealous. But the way she looked at Powell…With a hint of savageness he turned and stabbed the end of his cigarette in the ashtray, burying it deep in the fine white sand.

“Look, Malcom Powell and his party have arrived,” Gayle Frederick declared as Chance straightened and turned back. He stiffened in alertness when he saw they were coming directly toward them, although he doubted Flame had seen him yet. “Didn't I tell you this was a night,” the brunette added, her low voice riddled with excitement. “You know him, don't you, Chance?”

“Yes.”

Lucianna's fingers dug into his arm. “Perhaps—” she began. But Chance, anticipating her suggestion they leave before Flame and Powell reached them, silenced her with a faint shake of his head. The anger in him wanted a confrontation with Flame.

“He's visiting friends in the area.” Gayle issued the quickly whispered aside even as she turned to snare the approaching party that included, Chance noticed, Ellery Dorn. “Mr. Powell, how delightful to have you with us this evening. Let me be—if not the first, then the most recent—to welcome you to Tulsa.”

“Thank you…Mrs. Frederick, isn't it?” Powell replied with a suggestion of a bow.

“Yes,” Gayle confirmed, preening a little at his recognition. “And I believe you know the marvelous diva, Lucianna Colton, and—of course—Chance Stuart.”

“Indeed.” The gray eyes turned on him, iron-smooth and blatantly measuring.

“Powell.” Nodding once, Chance returned the look and briefly gripped the man's hand, aware of the strength and power that lay in more than just Powell's hand.

Continuing with the introductions, Gayle said, “And this is Flame Bennett from Morgan's—”

But Flame broke in. “Mr. Stuart and I have met before.”

Her coolness grated at him as Gayle swung toward him, red firing her cheeks. “Oh, dear,” she murmured, remembering precisely who Flame Bennett had been.

“It's all right, Gayle,” he said, masking his anger with a smoothness. “The ex-Mrs. Stuart has a habit of bringing up a past that is better forgotten.” Deliberately Chance held Flame's gaze. She tried to conceal it, but he saw the flash of anger in her green eyes.

“I am so sorry—”

“Don't apologize, Mrs. Frederick,” Flame inserted coolly. “It isn't necessary. Mr. Stuart isn't known for the accuracy of his memory.”

Chance turned to Powell. “Is it business or pleasure that's brought you to Tulsa?” he inquired, letting his glance slide back to Flame, and catching her slight tensing.

“I believe you could call it a working vacation,” came the smooth reply.

“Flame takes care of the advertising for you—doesn't she?” he said, pausing fractionally. “Among other things, I understand.”

His pointed barb completely escaped Gayle Frederick as she pushed her way back into the conversation. “I do hope you're considering Tulsa as a location for one of your stores, Mr. Powell. With Neiman-Marcus and Saks here already, all we're missing is a Powell store.”

“We'll see,” he replied as he took Flame firmly by the arm, a complacent and confident gleam in his eyes asserting the closeness of his relationship with her. “Shall we go, Flame darling? Ellery?” Then, to Chance: “If you'll excuse us, I think it's time we took our seats.”

As they moved away to join the line of people drifting into the theater, Gayle sighed. “How awful. I never did get to meet the handsome gentleman with them. Is he someone important, do you know?”

Chance ignored the question, turning his attention instead to Lucianna. “You said you wanted to go backstage.”

“How good of you to remember that,” she murmured somewhat archly. “Especially when I thought you'd forgotten all about me.”

“There's nothing wrong with my memory, Lucianna.” Although at the moment, he wished there was.

Flame tried to concentrate on the tenor's performance, but her glance kept straying from the lighted stage to the rows of silhouetted figures in front of her. Covertly she scanned them again. She wished she knew where Chance was sitting. The way the back of her neck was prickling, she was almost certain he was somewhere behind her.

Again she asked herself why she had let that newspaper photograph of Chance and Lucianna goad her into coming here tonight. Had she wanted Chance to see her with Malcom so he would know she had a man in her life? Or had she wanted to see for herself if all the gossip in the papers about his affair with Lucianna Colton was true—that this alleged
good
friend had become his lover again?

If it was proof of the latter she'd wanted, she'd certainly gotten it. The way Lucianna had been molded to his side, as if they were connected at the hip, and that arrogantly triumphant gleam in her dark eyes that said “He's mine”—and the possessive curve of his arm around her waist—all of it had combined to make the intimate status of their relationship blatant to the most casual observer. Had Lucianna been his lover all along—even when he'd been pursuing her? Flame went cold at the thought, hating both of them now.

Applause broke out around her. Belatedly Flame joined in as the house lights slowly came up, signaling the start of intermission. She feigned a casual glance over her shoulder. But too many people were moving about, standing, stretching, turning to chat to someone, or wending their way to the aisle. If Chance was back there, she couldn't see him.

Squaring around, Flame hesitated, conscious of an enveloping tension, then stood up, tucking her lizard purse under her arm and smiling briefly at Malcom. “I think I'll get some fresh air.”