Penthouse Suite (17 page)

“Oh, I think having Kate work for
Maverick
magazine is a fine idea,” J.M. agreed in amusement. “I’ve already made her an offer, which she turned down. Maybe now she’ll reconsider.”

But Max wasn’t listening. He simply stared at Kate as though he’d never seen her before. “And I fell in love with you, Kate. For the first time in my life I was in love.” He turned away.

“Max, wait. You’re a smart businessman,” Matthew called out, as he turned Kate toward the elevator, “but this time you’re way off base.”

Kate straightened her shoulders and allowed Matthew to propel her through the crowd to the elevator. She couldn’t believe what had happened. Max thought that she’d betrayed him—Max, the man she loved. She hadn’t even acknowledged to herself that she loved him until now. But it was true. Except there would be no happily ever after. Max couldn’t care about her and still believe that she was involved in such a terrible scheme.

Somehow she got out of the suite and into Matthew’s car. He headed away from the hotel, down
the beach highway. Tears rolled down Kate’s cheeks, and she sobbed in the silence. She didn’t know when the car stopped or how long Matthew had been waiting before he said, “Max is wrong and I’m responsible. I should have spoken up sooner, but I wanted to find out how Houston managed to pull this off.”

“I don’t understand, Matthew. What could you have done? Max wasn’t in the mood to listen to anybody.”

“The sale was contingent on approval of the mortgage holder, Kate. That’s me. I hold the mortgage on the Showboat, along with a half dozen other pieces of property along the strip. And I don’t approve.”

“You? But—” Kate’s head was spinning. Max hadn’t lost the hotel to an outsider, but she’d lost Max.

“I’ll tell Max tomorrow,” Matthew was saying, “when he’s had time to think. I’ve seen him like this once before. He was just as hurt and angry then as he is now. I took him in and helped him get through it. I’ll straighten this out too.”

Kate didn’t answer. Max didn’t trust her and that couldn’t be changed.

“Right now,” Matthew went on softly, “I’m ready for something to eat besides those little cheese things they give you at those parties to soak up the booze. I never did like my liquor contaminated with junk.”

“Where are we?” Kate looked around. They were parked in front of a cedar house made from thick beams. She could hear the sound of the sea in the distance. She allowed Matthew to help her from the car and down a flower-lined walk to an open, sparsely furnished room built out over the water.

“This is where I live,” Matthew said proudly. “You wouldn’t think an old sea pirate like me lived here, would you?” Kate stepped outside on the deck and breathed deeply. Matthew followed her.

“It’s lovely, Matthew. It reminds me of a painting of yours I saw in a little beach art shop. There was a dark-eyed little boy watching the fishing fleet just at the edge of the horizon. You could almost see the tears in his eyes. He seemed very lonely.”

“Yes. It was painted from the same spot where you’re standing. If you look out at the sea, you can see just about where the fishing fleets disappear in the dawn.”

It was dark now, and Kate had to envision the scene in her mind, but she knew how the boy must have felt. She wanted to go, too, to run away and disappear. But this time she wasn’t looking for adventure.

“Kate, about Max’s behavior tonight. I think it would help you to know why he was so angry.”

“I don’t care, Matthew.”

“Maybe not, but listen to me anyway. It’s all tied in with his mother and her drug addiction. He was just a kid when he found out. He’d built up some fantasy about her dying a tragic death. Dorothea couldn’t tell him the truth about her sister. He heard the gossip.”

“I know, she killed herself. Max told me.”

Matthew looked surprised. “One summer Max came home from school. He’d never fit in very well there and that summer he went kind of wild. He got into drugs, but he realized he was in trouble and he came to me. I guess I was too blunt about telling him that drugs were the reason his mother
committed suicide. But I wanted him to understand why he could never allow himself that weakness.

“After that, he seemed to understand why Dorothea wanted him to have a different kind of life. He set a quest for himself. He knew he could never stop people from taking drugs, but he’d keep drugs off the Strip. He’s fighting a losing battle, but somebody’s got to try.”

“I understand, Matthew. Really I do. But how could he believe that I had anything to do with it?”

“I don’t think he does. He cares about you, Kate. And when he looked out that window and saw J.M. Houston’s arm around you, he went berserk. First Max thought that he’d lost the hotel to Houston. Then Houston practically admitted that he had someone on the inside. Then he sees you with Houston. Give him time.”

“Time? I don’t think so. Letting myself care about Max was a mistake. Men like Max don’t mean to, but they end up hurting you. My own father was a man like Max. I knew that. I should never have let things go this far.”

“Kate, if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that we can’t always control our lives. We’re just like those fishing boats sitting out there. We plot our course, but we never know when we’re going to get caught up by a storm and be set down someplace we didn’t plan to be. You just have to set a new course. Now, you sit out here and enjoy the view. I’ll see about something to eat.”

Kate scarcely heard his last words. She sat down on one of the cushioned recliners, slipped out of her shoes, and leaned back. She was totally drained, more tired than she’d ever been before.
Her head ached and something tight seemed to be swelling behind her eyes. She closed them, trying to relax.

What had happened at the Showboat was like a bad dream, and she didn’t know how to wake up. She’d told Max the truth. If Max truly cared for her, he couldn’t believe that she’d betray him. But he did. Dorothea’s innocent little lie had grown and grown until now even the truth didn’t matter.

Kate stretched out, lifting her handbag up from the floor. Her handbag. She ran her fingers over it, circling the lemon.

“
You’ve just about hooked him
,” Dorothea had joked. “
just reel him in. And if the line breaks
 …”

Well, the line had broken all right. She’d lost Max and she was back to lemons. She had to go and fall in love, the one thing she’d sworn she’d never do. She was a fool, she had been from the beginning, sounding like some kind of Pollyanna, using lemons to make lemonade. How silly.

Kate opened the bag and took out the offending yellow fruit, looking at it hopelessly. Lemons were bitter. She sunk her teeth into the sour yellow skin. The taste reminded her of the look on Max’s face when he’d seen her with Houston—bitter, bitter, bitter …

“Don’t worry, Dorothea,” Matthew Blue was saying, “I’ve already blocked the sale. Houston will never get the hotel. Even Max didn’t know that it was my money that Red Garden used. I always have a clause written into the contract that gives me first option on any sale.”

“But how come none of us knew about you being the money behind the mortgage company.”

“That’s what I did with my money when I sold my boats. It was my way of helping the folks I care about. I didn’t want any credit, so I didn’t make it public.”

Kate had heard the sound of Dorothea’s voice. She opened her eyes and discovered that someone—Matthew, she guessed—had thrown a cover over her. It was late. The sky was velvet black, sequined with tiny snaps of light.

“I can’t understand why Max went wild like that. He loves Kate, I know he does.” Dorothea’s voice rose and fell, and Kate heard snatches of the conversation that rolled across her mind without invoking any emotional reaction.

“… think so too. Perhaps that’s why. After all, he was very disturbed when J.M. told him that he’d known all along just how much money the Association could come up with. Maybe all this was just too important to him, Dorothea.”

“Maybe,” Dorothea agreed.

“Everything he’s touched has turned into gold. He’s been the wonder boy, solving problems, making money, never encountering any real opposition.”

“Then he falls in love with Kate. Oh, Matt, I feel so responsible. I shouldn’t have played Cupid. I knew how vulnerable Max was. All this is my fault.”

“Well, spouting that ridiculous story about Kate being a writer for
Maverick
magazine didn’t help. When Houston turned up as the buyer, Max naturally thought Kate was the spy. It’s too much of a coincidence. What made you pick that magazine?”

“I don’t know why you say it was a natural reaction, Matt. If somebody told me Max was a spy, I wouldn’t believe it, not in your lifetime. Besides, I just made up that
Maverick
magazine stuff on the spur of the moment. I think I heard
Lucy talking about it and it just stayed in my subconscious. You know how star-struck Lucy is.”

“Well, it worked out very conveniently. You made Kate a writer for one of the most famous beefcake magazines in the world, and the owner and publisher just happened to be buying the Showboat.”

“But Kate is a handyman. She really is.”

“Lucy!” Kate whispered. She came stiffly to her feet. That had to be the answer.

The lemon, the talisman she’d carried for luck, dropped to the floor and rolled across the terrace into the water.
So much for luck
, Kate thought. She’d make her own from now on.

“Kate?” Dorothea cried as Kate slipped back inside. “Are you all right?”

“I am now. I think,” Kate answered simply. “I’ve been listening to you talking, and I believe it had to be Lucy who gave the information to Houston.”

“Lucy? Of course!” Matthew agreed. “It all fits. The offer was made after Lucy took off on her mysterious family business trip, wasn’t it. By the time Max went to New York, Lucy had already ferreted out the figures. She took them to Houston, and he approached Red Garden, demanding an answer before Max had time to work out the problem.”

“There’s just one thing wrong, Matthew,” Dorothea said. “I’m not sure Lucy is smart enough to pull off something like this. And I think that Max knows it.”

“I don’t think she came up with the idea herself. She met Houston somewhere. He was probably here scouting out the area. When Houston found out where she worked, he set it up. I doubt that Max ever took any security precautions. We’ve never needed any.”

“But isn’t that sort of thing against the law?” Kate asked, realizing that knowing the culprit wasn’t going to be enough.

“Sure, but how do you prove it? I’ll bet that Houston covered his tracks. You might get Lucy to confess. But it would be her word against Houston’s, and without proof, we won’t be able to do a thing.”

“Well,” Kate observed in a tired voice, “you saved the Showboat, so Max can quit worrying. Do you have the hotel courtesy car, Dorothea?”

“Yes. Why? At least, I think I told the poor fellow to wait.”

“I want to go back to the hotel. I have to get my things. I can’t stay there any longer.”

“Where will you go, Kate?” Dorothea asked anxiously.

“I don’t know. I’ll have to leave my car there for the time being, until I work it out.”

“I have it, Kate.” Matthew slapped the table triumphantly. “You’ll go to work for me.”

“Doing what?”

“Well, I’ve been thinking about the hotel. I’m going to exercise my option as first mortgage holder and take it over. If I’m going to operate it, I’ll need an assistant.”

“Thank you, Matthew, but I’ll tell you the same thing I told Max. I don’t know anything about business. The only business class I ever took was in computers, and I … well, that was a disaster.”

“Hell, woman, neither do I. But you know about people. You’ve worked with every conceivable kind of problem, and besides, the hotel already has a typist—two or three of them—and a manager. What I want is a trouble-shooter. And that’s you.”

Kate looked from Dorothea to Matthew and back again. “Are you serious?”

“He’s serious,” Dorothea assured her. “You’ll be furnished with living quarters, meals, and draw a salary.”

“You’re sure you’re not just feeling sorry for me?”

“Hell no, the one I feel sorry for is Max. He’s just lost the best thing that ever happened to him.”

Max. She refused to think about him or what had happened earlier. She couldn’t. Of course, she really shouldn’t accept Matthew’s offer, but maybe she could help him out for a couple of weeks until she could decide what she was going to do. At least she knew how to handle the upkeep of a building.

“Would you consider hiring me on a temporary basis, Matthew, just until you get organized and I decide what I want to do?”

“Good idea, Kate. In the meantime, you can stay here. I’ll send Dorothea back to the hotel and arrange to have your things picked up. Deal?”

“Deal,” Kate agreed, “as long as you don’t give me an official title. Just let me help out.”

Three days later, she was helping out by going over the food selections with Matthew and Dorothea in the main dining room. Matthew had already sampled every item on the lunch menu and was definite about his decision to feature local foods only.

After a moment, Kate sensed that someone had come up behind her.

“Good afternoon.”

Kate turned and gasped. The intruder was J.M. Houston.

“Mrs. Jarrett, Ms. Weston, Captain Blue.”

“What are you doing here, Houston?” Matthew demanded gruffly.

“I heard that you’d decided to play innkeeper, Matthew. I was in the area and decided I’d drop in and see if you might reconsider and accept a new offer for the hotel?”

“Houston, I don’t have a bouncer in this restaurant, but if I did, I’d have you thrown out.”

“Look, Blue, you can’t blame me for taking advantage of any information that came my way. It was just smart business.”

“Business is one thing, Mr. Houston,” Dorothea cut in sharply, “but your little deal hurt too many people.”

“I quite agree,” J.M. said smoothly. “Causing Kate grief is something I regret deeply.” He leaned over, bringing his face closer to Kate as he spoke. “If there is anything I can do to help, Kate, believe me, I’ll be glad to do it.”