Anne Stuart - Cold As Ice

“Ms. Spenser?” It took a moment for her eyesight to adjust from the bright glare of the sun on the water to the dimmer light in the large room, and she couldn’t see anyone but the indistinct shape of a man across the room. The voice held a faint, upper-class British accent, so she knew it wasn’t Harry. Harry Van Dorn was from Texas, with a voice and a character to match. The man took a step toward her, coming into focus. “I’m Peter Jensen, Mr. Van Dorn’s personal assistant. He’ll be with you in a short while. In the meantime is there anything I can do to make you comfortable? Something to drink, perhaps? The newspaper?”

She hadn’t thought of the word unctuous in a long time, probably not since she’d been forced to read Charles Dickens, but the word suited Peter Jensen perfectly. He was bland and self-effacing to a fault, and even the British accent, usually an attention grabber, seemed just part of the perfect personal-assistant profile. His face was nondescript, he had combed-back, very dark hair and wire-rimmed glasses; if she’d passed him on the street she wouldn’t have looked twice at him. She barely did now.

“Iced tea and the New York Times if you have it,” she said, taking a seat on the leather banquette and setting the briefcase beside her. She crossed her legs and looked at her shoes. They were worth every penny when you considered what they did for her long legs. She looked up, and Peter Jensen was looking at them, too, though she suspected it was the shoes, not the legs. He didn’t seem to be the type to be interested in a woman’s legs, no matter how attractive they were, and she quickly uncrossed them, tucking her feet out of the way.

“It will only take a moment, Ms. Spenser,” he said. “In the meantime make yourself comfortable.”

He disappeared, silent as a ghost, and Genevieve shook off the uneasy feeling. She’d sensed disapproval from Harry Van Dorn’s cipher-like assistant—he’d probably taken one look at her shoes and known what she’d spent. Normally people in Jensen’s position were impressed; she’d walked into a particularly snooty shop on Park Avenue in them and it seemed as if the entire staff had converged on her, knowing that a woman who spent that kind of money on shoes wouldn’t hesitate to spend an equally egregious amount in their overpriced boutique.

And she had.

Genevieve steeled herself for Peter Jensen’s reappearance. Instead, a uniformed steward appeared, with a tall glass of ice-cold Earl Grey and a fresh copy of the New York Times. There was a slender gold pen on the tray as well, and she picked it up.

“What’s this for?” she inquired. Didn’t they expect her to be professional enough to have brought her own pen?

“Mr. Jensen thought you might want to do the crossword puzzle. Mr. Van Dorn is taking a shower, and he might be awhile.”

Now, how did that gray ghost of a man know she did crossword puzzles? In pen? It was the Saturday paper, with the hardest of the week’s puzzles, and she didn’t hesitate. For some irrational reason she felt as if Peter Jensen had challenged her, and she was tired and edgy and wanted to be anywhere but on Harry Van Dorn’s extremely oversize, pretentious yacht. At least the puzzle would keep her mind off the water that was trapping her.

She was just finishing, when one of the doors to the salon opened and a tall figure filled the doorway. It had been a particularly trying puzzle—in the end she’d been cursing Will Weng, Margaret Farrar and Will Shortz with generalized cool abandon, but she set the paper down and rose with serene dignity.

Only to have it vanish when the man stepped forward and she realized it was simply Peter Jensen again. He glanced at the folded paper, and she just knew his bland eyes would focus on the empty squares of the one word she couldn’t get. “Mr. Van Dorn is ready to see you now, Ms. Spenser.”

About frigging time, she thought. He moved to one side to let her precede him, and it was a momentary shock to realize how tall he was. She was a good six feet in her ridiculous heels, and he was quite a bit taller than she. He should have dwarfed the cabin and yet he barely seemed to be there.

“Enigma,” he murmured as she passed him.

“I beg your pardon?” she said, rattled.

“The word you couldn’t get. It’s enigma.”

Of course it was. She controlled her instinctive irritation; the man got on her nerves for no discernible reason. She didn’t have to play this role for very much longer, she reminded herself. Get Harry Van Dorn to sign the papers, flirt a little bit if she must and then get back to the tiny airport and see if she could catch an earlier flight to Costa Rica.

The bright sun was blinding when she stepped out on deck, and there was no more pretending she was back on the island with all the water shimmering around them. She looked up at the huge boat—not a mansion, an ocean liner—and followed Peter Jensen’s precise walk halfway down the length of the ship until he stopped. She moved past him, dismissing the executive assistant from her mind as she took in the full glory of Harry Van Dorn, the world’s sexiest billionaire.

“Ms. Spenser,” he said, rising from his seat on the couch, his Texas accent rich and charming. “I’m so sorry to have kept you waiting! You came all this way out here just for me and I leave you cooling your heels while I’m busy with paperwork. Peter, why didn’t you tell me Ms. Spenser was here?”

“I’m sorry, sir. It must have slipped my mind.” Jensen’s voice was neutral, expressionless, but she turned back to glance at him anyway. Why in the world wouldn’t he have told Van Dorn she was there? Just to be a pissant? Or was Van Dorn simply dumping the blame on his assistant as he knew he could?

“No harm done,” Van Dorn said, moving forward, taking Genevieve’s hand with the most natural of gestures and bringing her back into the cabin. He was clearly a physical man, one who liked to touch when he talked to people. It was part and parcel of his charisma.

Unfortunately Genevieve didn’t like to be touched.

But a client was a client, so she simply upped the wattage of her smile and let him pull her over to the white leather banquette, forgetting about the unpleasant little man who’d brought her here. Except that in fact he wasn’t that little. It didn’t matter—he’d already made himself scarce.

“Now, don’t you mind Peter,” Harry said, sitting just a bit too close to her. “He tends to be very protective of me, and he thinks every woman is after my money.”

“All I’m after is your signature on a few papers, Mr. Van Dorn. I certainly wouldn’t want to take up any more of your time—”

“If I don’t have time for a beautiful young woman then I’m in a pretty pitiful condition,” Harry said. “Peter just wants to keep my nose to the grindstone, while I believe in having fun. He doesn’t have much use for women, I’m afraid. Whereas I have far too much. And you’re such a pretty thing. Tell me, what sign are you?”

He’d managed to throw her completely off guard. “Sign?”

“Astrology. I’m a man who likes my superstitions. That’s why I named the boat Seven Sins. Seven’s my lucky number and always has been. I know that that new age crap don’t mean squat, but I enjoy playing around with it. So indulge me. I’m guessing you’re a Libra. Libras make the best lawyers—always judging and balancing.”

In fact she was a Taurus with Scorpio rising—her teenage friend Sally had had her chart done for an eighteenth birthday present, and that was one of the few details that had stuck. But she had no intention of disillusioning her wealthy client.

“How did you guess?” she said, keeping the admiration in her voice at a believable level.