Jennifer Greene: Pink Satin

Greer smiled and reached over to pat his arm reassuringly. “Why am I getting the impression you think I haven’t handled the problem?” she asked wryly. “Now, I know I made a bad first impression, but I’m twenty-seven years old and have been managing my own life for some time now. Of course I’ve called the police and phone company.”

“And?”

“And nothing. The police were nice, but they take action only if the caller’s potentially dangerous. Mine’s a mere breather. They tactfully referred me to the phone company, which puts breathers in the nuisance category. Nuisance calls just aren’t worth the same attention as abusive or obscene calls.”

“So they haven’t done anything.” Ryan’s eyes darkened.

“They’ve done lots. They changed my number and gave me piles of forms to fill out. For a couple of weeks they even put a tracer on my phone; and they’re extremely sympathetic. But it is silly to get upset, you know. Crank callers, I gather, are like flashers. They get a perverse thrill out of upsetting women, but no one’s getting physically threatened or hurt.”

“Honey…” Ryan started irritably. She’d done her share; he heard that. He’d never had anyone hand him a problem that didn’t have a solution. Mountains were probably put there to climb. And where he grew up, a man didn’t abandon a woman who was seriously afraid and simply hand her some forms.

In the living room, the telephone barely trilled before Ryan leaped out of his chair and lurched for it. Before Greer had the chance to get nervous, he was barking her name from the other room.

“Someone named Daniel,” he growled as he handed her the receiver.

“Dan?” she said. “No, that was my new neighbor.” With the receiver cupped to her ear, Greer smiled into Ryan’s blue eyes, a little startled to see that the dance in them had been replaced by little chips of ice. “Sure, Friday night will be fine…” No problem, she mouthed to Ryan, the caller was a friend.

He stuffed his hands loosely into his jeans pockets, but hovered until she hung up the telephone. After that, he took on the dishes while she made coffee.

An hour later, she was curled in the old wicker rocker, and Ryan, was stretched out on the couch. Tuesday evenings were usually a boring midpoint in the week, but not this one. Greer couldn’t remember feeling as at ease and content in anyone’s company on first meeting.

He was from Maine, he told her, a simple old-fashioned backwoods town not far from the Atlantic coast. He clearly loved the place. Unfortunately, the town offered limited opportunities for a mechanical engineer; he’d worked for six years for one company, but there’d been no hope of further advancement. He was interested in starting his own firm eventually, but he didn’t have the varied experience he needed to do that just yet-and Laughlin had snapped him up after seeing his qualifications, grateful that he was willing to move to North Carolina.

Of the women in his life he said nothing, Greer noted, but the longer she listened to him, the more she was conscious that first impressions were deceiving. His looks weren’t ordinary at all. His eyes often sparkled with fine dry humor; he had an endearing crooked grin; and his body…there was something about that body that reminded her of lumberjacks or shipbuilders. Energy, vitality, the lithe way he moved…he was so clearly a physical man.

For an instant, she could picture him being very physical. A slim, svelte blonde popped into Greer’s imagination. A very sexy lady. A totally naked lady. She suited him very well, Greer mused. In a lover, he would clearly want a physically expressive woman, an uninhibited mate, a boldly sexual match for his own-

Abruptly, she swallowed, feeling a faint heat climb up her cheeks. Behave yourself, Greer. She always analyzed people on first meeting, but she rarely fantasized about their sex lives.

“…enemies?”

Greer blinked awake and rapidly reached for the half-full coffee cup on the table next to her. “Pardon?”

“Have you thought about who might be making those calls to you? What about this Daniel, for instance?”

She had no interest in returning to the upsetting topic of The Breather, but Ryan’s question made her smile. “Daniel wouldn’t swat a mosquito on his brave days. I’ve known him for several months; he’s a very brilliant accountant, but he’s unbelievably shy.”

Ryan gave a private snort. Shy was the easiest game in town to pull off for a man on the make; it immediately aroused a woman’s protective urges.

And a woman’s special vulnerabilities immediately aroused a man’s protective urges. He was having a bad case of that problem, looking at her. Greer was curled up in the chair like a kitten. Barefoot, her hair softly ruffled, her skin clear and smooth and without makeup, a sleepy, vulnerable look in her eyes…she would look very much like that after she’d just made love. His libido stirred restlessly. Moments before, he’d been certain she’d been thinking of a man, and he’d felt a sharp, unexpected surge of jealousy.

“If you’re sure it isn’t Daniel…there must be other men?” he questioned casually.

“Enemies? I have tons of enemies,” Greer said wryly. “I’ve thought about Steve McManus for one-he’s the guy I stole the cat from.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“He lived two buildings down the street, left the cat alone for weeks at a time. He knows I took Truce because I left him a note.”

Ryan cleared his throat. “Perhaps you could come up with a more dangerous enemy than that.”

“Now, just because you don’t like cats-”

“It did occur to me that McManus might have been grateful.” Ryan raised his hands defensively at Greer’s look of mock outrage. “Sorry. Of course you’re right. He must hate you for life for stealing his cat, but in the meantime…”

Greer paused thoughtfully. “Well. There’s John. My ex-husband,” she explained. “I couldn’t really call him an enemy, but he wasn’t very happy over the divorce.”

“John,” Ryan echoed irritably. There had to be a reason why he’d never liked that name. “How long have you been divorced?”

“Four years. I still see him on occasion, though.”

“You were married for a long time?”

His questions would have struck her as prying if he weren’t so obviously investigating her crank calls. For months, Greer had worried in private as to who her caller might be. She’d never discussed the problem with her family because she hadn’t wanted to worry them. Ryan was a stranger, but he was also clearly a rational, objective man. And as long as he was willing to listen…

“John and I were married for two years,” Greer admitted hesitantly, and then started talking in a rush, anxious to hear Ryan’s opinion when he understood the relationship. “The thing was, like most psychology majors fresh out of college, I was very good at taking on the misunderstood, the unwanted, the lost souls. John was one of those. Rotten childhood, parents who didn’t care…” Greer bit her lip absently and gave Ryan a small smile. “I was very sure that an understanding woman was all he needed to turn his life around. Only two years later, I wasn’t quite so fresh out of college. Perhaps he was a lost soul, but he was also incurably lazy. And very happy to be taken care of full-time in high style.” She added wearily, “I was still paying off his debts two years after the divorce. It wasn’t the best of times.”

“You think he would call you now-just to harass you?”

“No. But you asked about enemies. I’m trying to give you my best list,” Greer said wryly, then snapped her fingers. “I forgot about Andrew.”