so she wouldn’t miss spotting Rourke when he came in. If he came in.
The minutes dragged by and she tried not to fidget. She was used to being busy, not cooling her heels like this. But she sat. And she waited and she watched.
Several people came and went. She honestly couldn’t tell whether they were members of Rourke’s staff or visitors. Cynthia of the ugly glasses seemed to treat them all in the same way.
Nobody came to sit in one of the other chairs near Lisa, though. And after at least an hour of sitting there, she pulled out her BlackBerry. Answered a few dozen e-mails. Listened to even more voice mail messages. Her secretary, Ella, confirmed that she’d successfully rescheduled the appointments that she’d originally had on her calendar for that day.
The last message was from Derek.
As soon as she heard her brother’s voice, her teeth felt on edge. She skipped the message, neither listening to it, nor deleting it.
Her fingers tightened around the phone and she turned to stare out the windows.
How could her brother have stolen from the institute—from his own family—the way he had?
How could she not have realized? Suspected?
She should have just deleted the message. There was nothing Derek could have to say that she wanted to hear.
Not now.
Unfortunately, beneath the anger that bolstered her was a horrible, pained void that she couldn’t quite pretend didn’t exist.
“You waited.”
She jerked her head around to see Rourke standing less than a foot away. The phone slipped out of her hand, landing on the ivory-colored rug that sat beneath the arrangement of chairs. “We had an appointment.” Her voice was appallingly thick and she leaned forward quickly to retrieve her phone.
He beat her to it, though, and she froze, still leaning forward, her face disconcertingly close to his as he crouched there.
He slowly set the phone in her outstretched palm, but didn’t release it even when her fingers closed around it. His dark, dark gaze roved over her face.
She felt almost as if he’d stroked his fingers along her temple. Her cheek. Her jaw.
“What’s wrong?” His voice was low. As soft as that never-there touch.
Everything.
The word nearly slipped out and, realizing it, she quickly straightened. The phone slid free of his grasp; once again hers alone. She tucked it into her briefcase. “Other than enjoying the view for the past two hours? Not a thing.”
His expression hardened a little, making her realize—belatedly—that it had been softer after all. For a moment. Only a moment.
He straightened. “You should have rescheduled.”
Cynthia was at her desk, but that was a good thirty feet away. Still, Lisa kept her voice low. “And waste another morning?”
“For someone courting my financing, you’re sounding very waspish.”
The damnable thing was, he was right. And if he were anyone else, she would have sat there all day, happily, and still had a smile on her face when he finally got around to meeting with her.
“I’m sorry.” She rose. “It’s not you.” Not entirely, anyway. “And of course, if you would like me to reschedule, I’ll do so.”
He studied her for a moment. “I have to make a small trip today.”
Even prepared for it, she felt buffeted by more dismay.
But before she could formulate a suitable reply, he’d leaned over and picked up her briefcase. “Come on.”
He was heading for the elevator, not even stopping to speak to Cynthia along the way. Lisa had to skip to catch up with him and stepped onto the elevator when he held it open for her. “You don’t have to escort me from the building to make sure I leave,” she said when the doors closed on them. He held the briefcase away from her when she snatched at it.
“I’m sure you learned somewhere along the way that you get more flies with honey,” he observed.
“Fly strips work amazingly well, too,” she countered and folded her hands together. She was not going to play tug-of-war with the man where her own briefcase was concerned.
His lips twitched.
For some reason the descending elevator seemed to creep along, in direct contrast to the way it seemed to have shot her to his floor when she’d arrived. He turned and faced her, leaning back against the wall that was paneled in gleaming mahogany with narrow mirrored inserts. “You look nice today.”
Her lips parted. She blinked and looked up at the digital floor display above the door. Thirty. Twenty-nine. Twenty-eight. “Thank you.” He looked nice today, too. Mouth-watering nice.
Which was a direction her thoughts didn’t need to take.
“Did you sleep well?”
Even more disconcerted, she slid him a quick glance, then looked back up at the display. “Yes, thank you. My hotel was comfortable.” It was hardly The Plaza, but then she was on an expense account. Unlike her wardrobe, the cash-strapped institute would foot the bill for this little junket. As such, the room was moderately priced and not entirely conveniently located. She glanced at her watch. “My flight leaves this afternoon.”
Twenty-four. Twenty-three.
“Do you ever wear your hair down?”
“I beg your pardon?”
He pushed his hand in his trousers pocket, dislodging the excellent lay of his black suit coat. “It’s long, isn’t it?”
Eighteen. Seventeen.
“A bit,” she allowed, trying to figure out what angle he was coming from.
“I’ve never seen you wear it down.”
She huffed a little, exasperated not just with him, but with the eternal slowness of the elevator. “Since you’ve seen me only a handful of times, is that so surprising?” She didn’t like—or trust—the faint smile hovering around his lips. “If we’re going to be asking for personal information, then what was it that had you—” her voice dropped into a toneless imitation of Cynthia’s “—unavoidably detained?” She raised her eyebrows expectantly.
“My mother was in the hospital last night.”
Stricken, her eyebrows lowered. “Oh. I’m sorry.” She looked more closely at him. He didn’t look unduly upset. His suit was as magazine-perfect as always, his eyes clear and sharp; he didn’t look as if he’d spent the night in some hospital waiting room. “She’s all right?”
“A sprained ankle that they thought might be broken.”
“Oh.
