The Heart's Victory Read online

  Foxy laughed as she surveyed the portable bar. “Point taken. Well, there seems to be enough liquor here to keep an army reeling for a year. Trouble is, I don’t know how to fix anything more complicated than the gin and tonic Kirk drinks.”

  “If there’s a bottle of dry sherry, pour some in a very small glass. That shouldn’t tax your ingenuity too far. Going to join me?”

  “No.” Foxy scouted through the bottles. “Drinking makes me just a little too honest. I forget the basic rules of survival—tact and diplomacy. You know the managing editor of Wedding Day magazine, Joyce Canfield?” Pam gave an affirmative response as Foxy located and poured sherry. “I ran into her at this cocktail party a few months back. I’d done several layouts for Wedding Day. Anyway, she asked me what I thought of her dress. I looked at her over the rim of my second spritzer and told her she should avoid yellow, it made her look sallow.” Foxy crossed the room and handed Pam her glass. “Honest but dumb. I haven’t taken a picture of a wilted bouquet for Wedding Day since.”

  Pam laughed her quiet, floating laugh and sipped her sherry. “I’ll remember not to ask you any dangerous questions when you have a glass in your hand.” She watched Foxy run a finger over a high, piecrust table. “Does it feel strange being home?”

  Foxy’s eyes were dark, the green merely sprinkled over the gray. “It brings back memories. Strange, I really haven’t thought of my life here in years, but now . . . ” Walking to the window, she pulled back the sheer ivory curtain. Outside, the sun was dipping low in the sky, shooting out sprays of red and gold light. “Do you know, this is really the only place I could define as home. New York doesn’t count. Ever since my parents died, I’ve moved around so much, first with Kirk, then with my career. It’s only now that I’m here that it occurs to me how rootless my life has been.”

  “Do you want roots, Foxy?”

  “I don’t know.” When Foxy turned back to Pam, her face was puzzled. “I don’t know,” she repeated. “Maybe. But I want something. It’s out there.” She narrowed her eyes and stared at something she could not yet see.

  “What is?”

  Foxy jolted as the voice shattered her thoughts. Kirk stood in the doorway studying her with his easy smile, his hands thrust into the pockets of dun-colored slacks. As always, there was an aura of excitement around him.

  “Well.” Giving him a considering look, Foxy crossed to him. “Silk, huh?” With sisterly prerogative, she fingered the collar of his shirt. “Guess you don’t change too many engines in this.” Kirk tugged on her hair and kissed her simultaneously.

  In her heels, she was nearly as tall as he, and their eyes were level with each other’s. As Pam watched she noticed how little family resemblance they shared; only the curling heaviness of their hair was similar. Kirk’s eyes were a dark true green, and his face was long and narrow. There was nothing of his sister’s elegance or her delicacy about him. Studying his profile, Pam felt a tiny quiver chase up her spine. Quickly she glanced down at her drink. Long-term assignments and quivering spines didn’t mix.

  “I’ll fix you a drink,” Foxy offered, drawing away from her brother and moving to the bar. “We don’t dare go into the other room for another two and a half minutes. Oops, no ice.” She closed the lid on the ice bucket and shrugged. “I’ll be heroic and challenge the caterer. Pam’s drinking sherry,” she called over her shoulder as she left the room.

  “Want a refill?” Kirk asked, turning his attention to Pam for the first time.

  “No, thanks.” She smiled and lifted her glass to her lips. “I haven’t had a chance to thank you yet for putting me up. I can’t tell you how nice it is not to be sleeping in a hotel.”

  “I know all about hotels.” Kirk grinned and sat across from her. For the first time since they had met the day before, they were alone. Pam felt the quiver again and ignored it. Kirk took a cigarette from the holder on the table and lit it. For those few seconds, he studied her.

  Class, he thought. And brains. This was no racing groupie. His eyes lingered an instant on the soft pink mouth. She looks like something in a store window. Beautiful, desirable, and behind a wall of glass.

  “Foxy’s spoken of you so often, I feel I know you.” Pam immediately cursed herself for the inanity and took another sip of sherry. “I’m looking forward to the race.”

  “So am I,” Kirk answered, then leaned back in his chair and studied her more openly. “You don’t look the type to be interested in pit stops and lap speeds.”

  “No?” Pam countered as she collected her poise. “What type do I look like?”

  Kirk smoked in long, deep drags. “The type who likes Chopin and champagne.”

  Pam swirled the remaining sherry in her glass and held his gaze. “I do,” she answered, then relaxed against the cushions of her chair. “But as a journalist, I’m interested in all kinds of things. I hope you’ll be generous with your thoughts and feelings and your knowledge.”

  A smile lifted the corners of his mustache. “I’ve been known to be generous with all manner of things,” he mocked, wondering if the dewy texture of her skin was as soft as it looked. The doorbell broke the silence. Kirk rose, took the drink from Pam’s hand, and pulled her to her feet. Though she told herself it was a foolish reaction, her heart thundered. “Are you married?” he asked.

  “Why...no.” She frowned, confused.

  “Good. I never like sleeping with married women.”

  He spoke so matter-of-factly, it took Pam a moment to react. Angry color flooded her porcelain cheeks. “Of all the presumptuous—”

  “Listen,” Kirk interrupted. “We’re bound to sleep together before the season’s finished. I’m not much on games, so I don’t play.”

  “And would it shock you very deeply,” Pam returned with the coldness only a Southern-bred voice can achieve, “if I decline your generous invitation?”

  “Seems like a waste,” Kirk concluded with a careless shrug. He took Pam’s hand as the doorbell pealed a second time. “We’d better answer it.”

  Chapter 2

  Over the next hour, the house filled with people and grew noisy. As the room filled, the patio doors opened to allow guests to spill outside. The night was warm and still.

  For Foxy, there were both new faces and old friends. She wandered from group to group, assuming the role of unofficial hostess. The caterer’s proud balance had been long since shattered as trays and bowls were scattered throughout the house. People milled in every corner. Still, the breezy informality of the party was linked with a common bond. These were racing people, whether they were drivers, wives, or privileged fans.

  Flushed and laughing, Foxy answered the door to admit a late arrival. Her smile of greeting faded instantly. There was some satisfaction to be gained from seeing a look of surprise in Lance’s gray eyes. It came and went with the lift and fall of his brow. Slowly he took his gaze over the length of her. There was a look of consideration on his face, which Foxy equated with a man about to purchase a piece of sculpture for his den. Instantly the ease fled from her stance as her chin lifted and her shoulders straightened. Annoyed, she gave him the same casual appraisal he gave her.

  Both his turtleneck and slacks were black. The night apparel lent him a mysterious, dangerous look only accentuated by his leanness and reckless looks. About him was the odd air of calm Foxy remembered. It was an ability to remain absolutely motionless and absorb everything. The true hunter possesses it, and the bullfighter who survives. Now, as she knew he was absorbing her, Foxy challenged him with her eyes though her heart beat erratically. Anger, she told herself. He always makes me so angry.

  “Well, well, well.” Lance’s voice was quiet and oddly intimate over the hum of the party. He met her eyes, then smiled at her sulky pout. “It seems I was wrong.”

  “Wrong?” she repeated and reluctantly shut the door behind him rather than in his face.

  “You have changed.” He took both her hands, ignoring her sharp jerk of protest. Holding her away from
him, he let his eyes roam down the length of her again. “You’re still ridiculously thin, but you’ve managed to fill out a bit in a few interesting places.”

  Her skin trembled as if a cool breeze had caressed it. Furious with the sensation, Foxy tried to snatch her hands away. She failed. “If that’s a compliment, you can keep it. I’d like my hands back, Lance.”

  “Sure, in a minute.” Her anger and indignation rolled off him as he continued to study her. “You know,” he said conversationally, “I always wondered how that funny little face of yours would turn out. It had an odd appeal, even when it was splattered with transmission fluid.”

  “I’m surprised you remember how I looked.” Resigned that he would not let her go until he was ready, Foxy stopped struggling. She took a long, hard look at him, searching his face for any flaws that might have developed during the past six years. She found none. “You haven’t changed a bit.”

  “Thanks.” With a grin, he transferred his hold to her waist and led her toward the sounds of the party.

  “That wasn’t intended as a compliment.” Foxy had a strange reaction to his quick grin and intimate touch. The wariness remained with her, but it was tempered with amusement. Foxy drew firmly away from him as they entered the main room. It was, she reminded herself, always so simple for him to charm her. “I imagine you know just about everyone.” She made a quick sweep of the room with the back of her hand. “And I’m certain you can find your way to the bar.”

  “Gracious to the last,” Lance murmured, then gave her another measuring stare. “As I recall, you didn’t always dislike me so intensely.”

  “I was a slow learner.”

  “Lance, darling!” Honey Blackwell bore down on them. Her hair was short and fluffed and silver blond, her face pretty and painted, her body all curves and dips. She had money and an unquenchable thirst for excitement. She was, in Foxy’s opinion, the classic racing leech. As her arms circled Lance’s neck he rested his hands on her generous hips. She kissed Lance with single-minded enthusiasm as he watched Foxy’s disdainful smirk over Honey’s bare shoulder.

  “Apparently, you two have met.” Inclining her head, she turned and moved to the center of the party. And apparently, she added to herself, you can manage to amuse yourselves without me. Feeling a hand on her arm, Foxy glanced up.

  “Hi. I knew you’d stand still long enough eventually for me to introduce myself. I’m Scott Newman.”

  “Hello. Cynthia Fox.” Her hand was taken in a very proper shake.

  “Yes, I know. You’re Kirk’s sister.”

  Foxy smiled at him as she completed her study of his features. His face was well formed, just escaping fullness. His eyes were deep brown, his nose straight, his mouth long and curved. He wore his brown hair at a conservative length, neither long nor short. They stood eye to eye, as he was a few inches short of six feet. He was handsomely tanned and trim without being lean. His three-piece suit was well cut, but the jacket had been casually left unbuttoned. He was, Foxy decided, the perfect model for a study of up-and-coming young executives. She thought briefly that it was a pity he hadn’t dressed up the beige suit with a deep-toned shirt.

  “We’ll be seeing a lot of each other over the next few months,” he told her, unaware of the trend of her thoughts.

  “Oh?” She gave him her full attention as she eased out of the way of someone bearing a tray of crackers and Gouda cheese.

  “I’m Kirk’s road manager. I see to all the traveling arrangements, accommodations for him and the crew, and so forth.” His eyes smiled over to hers while he lifted his glass to his lips.

  “I see.” Foxy tilted her head, then tossed back her hair. “I haven’t been around for a few years.” Catching a glimpse of her brother out of the corner of her eye, Foxy focused on him, then smiled. He had the animated look of a knight-on-quest as a brunette hung on his arm and a small tangle of people hung on his words. “We didn’t use a road manager when I was on the team,” she murmured. Foxy remembered more than once falling asleep in the backseat of a car in a garage that smelled of gasoline and stale cigarettes. Or camping on the infield grass, waiting for the morning and the race. He’s a comet, she thought, watching her brother. A brilliant, flaming comet.

  “There’ve been a number of changes in the past few years,” Scott commented. “Kirk began winning more important races. And, of course, with Lance Matthews’s sponsorship, his career has come more into focus.”

  “Yes.” She gave a quick laugh and shook her head. “Money talks after all, doesn’t it?”

  “You haven’t got a drink.” Scott noticed the lack of glass, but not the sarcasm in her voice. “We’d better fix that.”

  “Sure.” Foxy linked her arm in his and allowed him to lead her to the bar. I don’t care one way or the other about Lance Matthews’s money.

  “What would you like?” Scott asked.

  Foxy glanced at him, then at the short, graying professional bartender. “A spritzer,” she told him.

  ***

  Moonlight shone through the young leaves. The flowers in the garden were still new with spring, their colors muted with night. Their fragrance was light and tender, only whispering of the promise of summer.

  With a mighty sigh, Foxy dropped on one seat of a white glider and propped her feet up on the other. Dimly over the stretch of lawn, she could hear the sounds of the party ebb and flow. By slipping into the kitchen and out the back door, she had escaped to steal a few moments of quiet and solitude. Inside, the air was thick with smoke and clashing perfumes. Foxy took a long, greedy breath of spring air and pushed with her feet to set the glider into motion.

  Scott Newman, she decided, was handsome, polite, intelligent, and interested. And, she admitted, ordinary. Rolling her eyes on a sigh, Foxy stared up at the sky. Wisps of dark clouds were edged in gray. As they passed lazily across the moon the light shifted and swayed. There I go, she mused, being critical again. Does a man have to stand on one foot and juggle for me to consider him entertaining? What am I looking for? A knight? Foxy frowned and rejected the choice. No, knights are all polished and shiny and pure. I think my taste runs to something with a bit of tarnish and maybe a few scratches. Someone who can make me laugh and cry and make me angry and make my knees tremble when he touches me. She laughed quietly, wondering how many men she was looking for. Leaning her head back, she crossed her ankles. The hem of her dress lifted to tickle her knee. Tossing up her arms, she gripped the slender poles on either side of the glider. I want someone dangerous, someone wild and gentle and strong and smart and foolish. With another laugh for her own specifications, she stared up at the stars. With a hazy blue light, they peeked and glimmered through the shifting clouds.

  “Which star do I wish on?”

  “The brightest is usually the best.”

  With a quick gasp, Foxy dropped her hands and searched for the owner of the voice. He was only a dark shadow, tall and lean. As it moved she thought of the steady stalking grace of a panther. Lance’s black attire blended with the night, but his eyes caught the luminescence of the moon. For a moment, Foxy felt an eeriness, a displacement of the quiet suburban garden into a primitive, isolated jungle. Like a large cat of prey, his eyes glowed with their own light and conquered the dark. Shadows fell over his face and deepened its chiseled lines. She thought Lucifer must have looked equally dark and compelling as he fell from heaven into the flames.

  “What are you wishing for?” His voice was so quiet, it shook the air.

  Suddenly Foxy became aware that she was holding her breath. Carefully she released it. It was only the surprise, she insisted, that had made her skin quiver. “Oh, all I can get,” she returned flippantly. “What are you doing out here? I thought you’d be knee-deep in blondes.”

  Lance swung onto the glider. “I wanted some air,” he told her as he stood staring down at her, “and some quiet.”

  Disturbed that his motives mirrored hers, Foxy shrugged and closed her eyes as if to ignore him. “How did yo
u manage to tear yourself away from Miss Lush Bust?”

  The sounds of the party penetrated the quiet of the night. Foxy felt his eyes on her face but stubbornly kept hers closed. “So,” he murmured, “you’ve grown claws. You shouldn’t sharpen them on someone’s back, Foxy. The face is cleaner.”

  She opened her eyes and met his. Reluctantly she admitted that she had been nasty from the moment she had seen him again. Unprovoked nastiness was out of character for her. Foxy sighed and shrugged. “I’m sorry. I don’t usually make a habit of snarling and spitting. Sit down, Lance, I’ll try to behave.” A small smile accompanied the invitation. He did not, as she had expected, sit across from her. Instead, he dropped down beside her. Foxy stiffened. Either unaware of or unconcerned by her reaction, Lance propped his feet next to hers on the opposite bench.

  “I don’t mind sparring, Fox, but a rest between rounds is always refreshing.” Pulling out his lighter, he flicked it at the end of a long, thin cigar. The flame licked and flared. Strange, she thought as she relaxed her muscles, how clearly I remember that scent.

  “Let’s see if we can manage to be civilized for a few minutes,” Foxy suggested and twisted slightly to face him. A smile hovered on her lips. She was an adult now, she reminded herself, and could meet him on his own terms. “Shall we discuss the weather, the latest best-seller, the political structure of Romania? I know”—she propped her cheek on her palm—“the race. How does it feel to be designing cars instead of racing them? Are you more hopeful for the Indy car you designed, or the Formula One for the Grand Prix races? Kirk’s done very well on the GP circuit since the season opened. The car’s supposed to be very fast and very reliable.”

  Lance saw the mischief in her eyes and lifted a brow. “Still reading racing magazines, Foxy?”

  “If I didn’t keep up to date, Kirk would never forgive me.” She laughed, a low, heavy sound.

  “I see that hasn’t changed,” Lance commented. She gave him a puzzled smile. “Even at fifteen, you had the sexiest laugh I’d ever heard. Like something stealing through the fog.” He blew out a stream of smoke as she shifted in her seat. Moonlight showered on her hair, shooting out hundreds of tiny flames. She felt just the smallest hint of his power tempting her.

  “The main branch of your company is in Boston,” Foxy began,