Wildfire (3 page)

Bob placed a proprietal arm around Amanda’s waist and said, “Our table’s ready. Excuse us, Brady.”

“Of course,” Brady nodded, waving them along. “Enjoy your meal.”

Amanda was still fuming over Brady’s use of the nickname “Mandy” while Bob helped her into her seat.

“Everything all right?” he questioned, sitting down across from her.

“Fine. Why do you ask?”

“You looked a little disturbed.”

Amanda could well imagine. Unfortunately she had the type of complexion that reflected her emotions, going from pale alabaster when she was tired or anxious, to a flushed rosiness when she was angry or embarrassed. At thirty she should be well past blushing, but since she hadn’t outgrown the involuntary trait by now, there was little hope of it disappearing.

“It’s been a rough day,” she belatedly answered Bob.

Somehow it got rougher when she looked up and saw Brady accompanying a gorgeous redhead into the dining room. So much for his being crushed by her refusal to have dinner with him. Bob’s voice calling her name brought her attention back to him.

“I asked if you were ready to order.”

“Not yet.” Amanda bent her head to study the menu, but was hard-pressed to find something appetizing. Her disinterest in food had nothing to do with the restaurant’s notable cuisine; it was entirely due to Brady’s inhibiting presence. Even though a roomful of diners separated them, she was still very much aware of him.

During the course of their meal, Amanda really tried to concentrate her attention on Bob. In his late thirties, he was a successful accountant who had his own practice. With one broken marriage behind him, he was not about to rush into anything the second time around. That innate caution was what had first attracted Amanda to him.

Of course it stood to reason that they ran into Brady again on their way out. He was turning from the bar, drink in hand, when he almost collided with Bob, whose attention was focused on Amanda.

“Excuse me.” Bob automatically apologized.

“It’s quite all right.” With devilish amusement Brady’s eyes narrowed in on Amanda’s hand clinging to Bob’s arm. “It’s hard to concentrate when Mandy’s hands are all over you.”

Her shocked “Brady!” coincided exactly with Bob’s stunned “Mandy?”

Brady viewed their differing reactions with unconvincing bewilderment. “Did I say something wrong?”

Brady’s little-boy expression made Amanda long to kick him. Instead she had to satisfy herself with a curt, “Yes.”

Brady elected to ignore her, turning to Bob and confiding with man-to-man candor, “I’ve warned her about such abandoned behavior. All I can say is that she’s lucky I’m a cop. God only knows what kind of trouble she could’ve gotten herself into otherwise.” A shake of his head was meant to mark his masculine concern.

Amanda’s protest was immediate. “You’re making it sound like I was hustling on street corners!”

Brady had the gall to laugh. “A librarian? You’ve gotta be kidding! Besides, I don’t work in vice.”

“Neither do I!” she shot back icily before turning on her heels and stalking out of the restaurant, followed by a perturbed Bob.

“What was all that about?” he demanded.

“Nothing,” she snapped, residual anger still coloring her voice.

“You didn’t react as if it were nothing. Where did you meet that guy?”

“Detective Gallagher is investigating the fire we had at work,” Amanda explained briefly. “Without knowing who he was, I called college security on him when I found him in a restricted area.”

“What does this have to do with his suggestive insinuations?”

“The guard wanted to see Brady’s ID before he’d let him go.”

“You mean Gallagher was forcibly detained?”

“
One way of putting it, yes.” Amanda sighed impatiently. Bob certainly had a way with words. “The guard asked me to get Brady’s wallet, that’s all.”

Bob shook his head in amazement. “Who would’ve thought that working in a library would be so exciting?” Coming from some, the comment would have been a teasing remark, but from Bob it was an expression of genuine disbelief. In his eyes libraries were still hallowed shrines where wizened men and women bent over illuminated manuscripts. He had no concept of the complicated computerized systems that operated a modern-day learning research center.

In the week following the fire it seemed to Amanda that Brady was going out of his way to irritate her. Mocking glances, teasing inflections, and a suggestive attitude were all part of his combat kit. It didn’t help matters any that Susan and most of the other female members of the library staff talked about him continually, dreamily noting every one of his physical attributes and speculating on his sexual prowess. In a bid to retain her sanity, Amanda took to spending more time outside of her office, dealing with inter-administrative matters. Upon her return from a meeting in the business office, Amanda was informed of yet another visit by the infuriating detective.

“Amanda, where were you? Detective Gallagher was looking for you a while ago,” Beth said.

Amanda sent a hurried glance around the processing room, as if suspecting that Brady was hiding behind one of the desks, before answering in what she hoped was a dispassionate manner. “Oh?”

Beth nodded. “He said there was no message, but that he would try again later.”

“Great,” Amanda muttered under her breath, walking through to her own office and dumping the pile of computer printouts she’d borrowed from the business office on her desk.

“I’ve got to collect some statistics from Government Documents to add to our budget justification.”

“What should I tell Brady if he comes looking for you?” Beth asked.

“Tell him…” Amanda changed the fiery destination she had in mind and took a deep breath before calmly continuing. “Tell him to wait here in my office. I won’t be gone long.”

The government documents office was located down the hallway and to the right. Walking past rows of bookshelves, Amanda was unaware of what an attractive picture she presented, her honey gold hair gathered up away from her face. Her creamy butter-colored blouse was tucked into the trim skirt of her russet suit. More than one masculine pair of eyes were momentarily distracted from the printed lines of their textbooks.

As luck would have it, the document listing the statistics she needed was sitting on the top shelf. Noting the column of ants trooping across the metal support brackets, Amanda made a mental note to call Physical Plant about pest control. The subject of pest control brought Brady Gallagher to mind.

The next time they met she was determined to maintain total composure. Standing on a step stool, one nylon-clad leg stretched out behind her for balance, she didn’t bother turning around when she heard the sound of approaching footsteps. Assuming it was Beth, Amanda said, “Has the pest left yet?” It was an inadvertent lapse, a sort of Freudian slip, but Beth would understand.

Brady did not. “You wouldn’t be talking about me now, would you, Mandy?” he shot back.

CHAPTER TWO

The sight of him unbalanced her, both figuratively and literally. Amanda grabbed wildly, trying to catch something to prevent her fall. Instead, something caught her. Brady’s strong hands gripped her waist, his fingers firm and sure as he lowered her to the floor before him.

Amanda’s momentary feelings of foolishness were swamped by a more powerful pull. Her eyes were caught up in the rich brown of Brady’s gaze, her nostrils filled with the clean freshness of his masculine scent, her soul was shaken by her subliminal recognition of his touch. A current of sexual awareness was coursing its way through her, the electricity originating from his hands spanning her waist. His fingertips were resting in the sensitive hollow of her spine, his thumbs splayed across the smooth curve of her stomach. The silky thinness of her blouse only served to intensify the erotic stimulation of the moment.

The spell was finally broken by Brady’s dry observation. “I suppose this is an example of eavesdroppers hearing no good of themselves.”

“I’m sorry,” Amanda murmured huskily, willing the bumpy unevenness of her heart to stop. She felt like an absolute idiot. So much for her hopes of maintaining the upper hand in their next confrontation. Thinking of hands made her wonder how his would feel against the bare warmth of her skin, traveling the hidden byways of her body. Her mental image of such a situation left her momentarily speechless.

“Am I forgiven for my scurrilous statements at the restaurant last week?” Brady inquired, noting her heightened color with interest.

“Of course,” she managed to answer, relieved to feel his grip loosen before he let her go.

“Funny. That’s not the impression you’ve been giving. In
fact, I’ve gotten the distinct feeling that we’ve been playing a little game of hide-and-seek for the past week. With you hiding and me seeking.”

“And just what are you seeking, Brady?” Amanda demanded, stepping away from him, needing to put some space between herself and the powerful magnetism of his captivating smile. A little healthy indignation might be just the thing to cure this sudden attack of attraction, she decided.

Brady eyed her with mocking amusement before answering, “I would’ve thought that was obvious. I want you to come out with me. To prove that there are no hard feelings.”

“Thanks, but no thanks.”

“What’s the matter?” he gently taunted. “Scared?”

“Of you? No!” Her denial was firmly emphatic.

“Then prove it,” he challenged. “Or do I have to submit a financial report before you accept dates?”

Clearly he was aware of Bob’s successful status in life. The possibility of Brady suffering from envy was somehow cheering; it meant that his self-confidence wasn’t dent-proof. That supposition brought a smile to Amanda’s lips and a playful jauntiness to her words. “No, a financial report isn’t necessary, but a character reference might be nice.”

She’d meant it as a joke, but Brady turned the tables on her. “Fine. How many references would you like?” he asked, as if this were a request he was often called upon to supply.

He had to be kidding, didn’t he? Masking her confusion, Amanda smoothly replied, “Two should be sufficient.”

“No problem. See you later,” and with a wave of his hand he was gone.

He really was the most impossible man. Appealing, but still impossible. He’d probably only been pulling her leg, although she couldn’t imagine why he got such a kick out of irritating her. His presence had sharpened her appetite as well as her mind, simultaneously making both her heart and her thoughts race faster.
That
’s adrenaline, not sex
appeal,
she tried to convince herself with an impatient shake of her head.

It didn’t work. There was no getting around it. This was definitely sex appeal, this strange tugging need that left a hungry ache in its wake.
So what are you going to do about it?
an inner voice mocked. “Not a damn thing!” Amanda answered out loud.

She returned to her office to find Guy Lox, a professor in the Natural Science Department, waiting for her. He was her least favorite person on campus, thoroughly aggravating. Aggravating, however, in a different way from Brady. Even though the latter frequently infuriated her, he did have a lot of good points. Guy had none.

Guy’s face was unmemorable, the features seemingly having been picked at random and stuck together in one place. He had a short, stocky figure that was habitually garbed in mismatched and ill-fitting clothes. Unappealing though he was, Guy Lox was a powerful member of the library faculty committee and therefore someone she couldn’t afford to offend.

Today he’d stopped by to drop off a pile of requests for books he wanted ordered. Amanda would have been more tolerant had his collection development plans been serious, but they invariably already owned 98 percent of the titles he wanted while the other two percent were so far out as to be laughable. Case in point, his request for a book on a tuna psychology workshop.

“Ah, Amanda, these book requests were piling up on my desk,” Guy pompously reported. “And as I have so many other important things to finish before the weekend, I thought I’d get them out of my way.”

“Thank you,” she said insincerely.

“Not at all,” he responded with lordly graciousness. “What are your plans for the weekend?” Guy had been trying to finagle a date with her since he’d first started teaching at the college.

“I’m going to be very busy.” Amanda had honed her evasions to a fine art.

Guy responded to her no-nonsense tone by changing the subject. “I’m attending a meeting this afternoon with the dean. You know”—he lowered his voice confidentially—“I think he might appoint me to the next vacancy on the tenure committee. We see eye-to-eye on administrative matters and he often asks me for my advice.”

Guy was totally involved in climbing the internal ladder of success and consequently was often in the middle of a number of Machiavellian plots and power plays. Amanda personally thought that a better appearance and a nicer disposition would gain Guy a lot more than the kind of backstabbing he seemed
to enjoy participating in. But that was his problem; she had enough of her own to contend with.

The following week was very hectic. Two members of the library support staff quit, so they were now shorthanded. On Wednesday the circulation librarian called in sick, which meant that the remaining librarians had to rotate hourly
shifts at the
reference desk out in the main reading room. Amanda spent her hour alternating between helping bewildered students find information and reprimanding others for sneaking cups of coffee into the library.

Although NO DRINKING, EATING, OR SMOKING signs were prominently displayed throughout, Amanda still caught at least half a dozen people trying to enter with containers of coffee
or lit cigarettes.

After firmly repeating the rules so many times, she began to feel like a law enforcement officer. Most of the students were pleasant about it, but there’s always one in every crowd who won’t comply without a fight.

“Where’s it say there’s no drinking?” one belligerent girl demanded.