Diana Palmer - Untameable - Merciless

“And doesn’t like flattery. I’m taking notes,” he added. He smiled at her. “How would you feel about living in Africa?”

“I am not leaving the country with you,” she said firmly.

“I have a nice little place there in Kenya, with a pet lion.”

“A lion? You got a lion?” Markie was out of his chair in a flash, looking up at the tall blond man. “Could I pet it?”

“You could even ride him,” Rourke assured him with a big smile. “He’s very tame. I raised him from a cub. Poachers got his mum.”

“Oh, that’s very sad,” Markie said. “I would feed him hamburgers, if I had a lion.”

“I don’t think they’d like it if you tried to keep him in your apartment,” Rourke assured him.

“These two guys in England did just that.” Joceline chuckled. “It was viral on the web about two years ago. Two boys bought a lion cub and kept it in their apartment, then they had to let it go to a preserve in Africa because it got so big. They went to see it, despite people warning that it was wild and would attack them. But it ran right up to them and put its paws on their shoulders and started rubbing its head against them. It even took them to see its mate.” She sighed. “I cried like a baby, watching it. They had the story on the news. Afterward, I sent a little check to the foundation that took in the boys’ pet.”

“Wild animals aren’t so very wild after all,” Rourke agreed. “Pity so many people see them as a way to quick profits.”

“Oh, I do agree,” Joceline said.

“See how much we have in common?” he asked.

“I want to go to Africa and see his lion,” Markie announced. “Can we go now?”

“Logistics aside,” Joceline told him gently, “I do have a job and you have to go to school tomorrow.”

“Oh.” He thought about that for a minute. “Can we go Saturday, then?”

Both adults laughed.

“Children make impossible things seem so uncomplicated,” Rourke remarked when Markie had gone back to his program and Joceline was serving up cups of strong black coffee. He wondered if her budget would stretch to giving free coffee to visitors, and decided that he’d bring her a pound of his special South African coffee next time he came over.

“Yes. Markie’s had a hard time of it,” she remarked with a sigh. “He has asthma and his lungs aren’t strong. We spend a lot of time in doctors’ offices.”

“There are allergy shots,” he said helpfully.

“He takes them,” she said. “And they help. But if he’s stressed or exposed to viruses, he gets sick easier than most kids do.”

“He’s a fine little boy,” he remarked, glancing at him. “You’ve done well.”

“Thanks.”

The diary was lying beside her right hand. She hadn’t let it out of her sight since they’d been in the apartment. It wasn’t really his business, but he was quite curious about what dark secrets she was keeping.

“What are you going to do with that?” he asked, indicating it.

“Tear it up and burn it,” she said at once. “It must never be read by anyone except me. Ever.”

His eyes narrowed.

“Stop speculating.”

His eyebrows arched.

“My, you can say a lot without opening your mouth,” she muttered.

“Facial expressions 101,” he replied.

“Will they come back, you think?” she asked worriedly.

He shook his head. “Either they found what they were looking for, or it wasn’t here.”

“Found …?” She was staring at him with stark horror. She looked again at the diary. It was locked. Then she remembered something she’d heard from a visitor from a covert agency, about how easy it was to pick a lock and photograph a document. Her face went pale.

“Joceline,” he said gently, reading her horror, “what do you have in there that’s so frightening?”

“A great source of blackmail if I were rich,” she said heavily. She smoothed her hand over the diary. “But I’m not rich. And I can’t imagine what use anyone else would have for it.” That wasn’t quite true. The right person could do a lot of damage with the information in that little book. She shuddered to think what a criminal like Monroe could do with it.

“You mustn’t worry,” Rourke said gently. “I’ll check around and see what I can dig out. I have all sorts of sources.”

She searched his expression worriedly. “I’m not afraid for myself. I don’t want anyone else hurt.”

“You think someone else could be?”

She swallowed. “Yes.”

“What tangled webs we weave,” he murmured, alluding to a poem about deception.

“Indeed.” She sipped rapidly cooling coffee. “We make choices. Then we live with them.”

“Do you think you made the right one?” he asked.

She smiled. “I made the only one I could.” She looked toward her son, who was oblivious to everything except the Japanese manga on the television. “I’ve never regretted it.”

“He’s quite a boy.”

“Thanks.”

“His dad died in the service, I understand?” He didn’t look at her as he said it.

“Overseas. In the military.”

“Sad.”

“Very.” She got up. “More coffee?”

He chuckled. “No, thanks. I tend to be wired even at good times. Too much caffeine can be a real killer, in my case.”

“I drink too much of it,” she confessed.

He got to his feet. “I’ll get working on those locks. Do you go back to the office tomorrow?”

She hesitated. “Well, I don’t know,” she said suddenly. “My boss won’t be there, and the only cases I’m working are his …”

Just as she said it, the phone rang.

She got up to answer it, hesitated, with her hand outstretched as if she were about to put it into fire.

She jerked it up. “Hello?”

There was a long silence.

Her blood felt as if it froze. “Hello?” she repeated.

The line went dead.

She turned and looked at Rourke with absolute horror.

He took the receiver from her, punched in some numbers, listened and then spoke. “Yeah,” he said to someone. “Do it quick. I want to know what brand of liquor he drinks in ten minutes or less. Just do it.” He hung up. Joceline was amazed at how authoritative, and how businesslike, he could be when he wasn’t clowning around.

“You have it tapped,” she whispered.

“Yes,” he replied curtly. “The minute I pulled into the driveway.”

She bit her lower lip. “I’m glad you came over.”

His eyebrows arched. His one eye twinkled. “You are? I can have a marriage license drawn up in less than an hour …!”

“Stop that,” she muttered. “I’m not going to get married.”

“But I have my own teeth,” he protested. “And I don’t even have a gray hair yet.”

“That has nothing to do with it.”

“A man with good teeth and no gray hair is a fine matrimonial prospect. I can also speak six impossibly difficult languages, including Afrikaans,” he added.

She went to clean the coffeepot, shaking her head the whole way.

ROURKE installed dead bolts and window locks. He also brought thermal curtains, heavy ones, for the windows. He didn’t tell her that a sniper would have a field day with the block of apartments overlooking hers. She wouldn’t have thought that anyone would be crazy enough to shoot at her or the boy.

That diary really puzzled him. He went out to get something to eat, and while he was out, he made two more telephone calls. Joceline would have had a heart attack if she’d heard the topic of discussion.

JOCELINE DIDN’T SLEEP WELL. She was certainly safe enough. Rourke had kipped down on the sofa in the living room, despite her protests, fully dressed. She was uncomfortable with a man in her apartment, but she couldn’t say much. That phone call with just heavy breathing had terrified her. She wasn’t afraid for herself, but she was afraid for Markie. There were good reasons that she didn’t advertise anything about his beginnings. Now they could serve to end his young life.