Love's Golden Spell. William Maltese

that is nice, isn’t it?” Christopher said. If his attention was diverted from Janet, it wasn’t for long. “Do come on over, Janet!” he insisted. “You’re not going to see this every day. And it’s one aspect of the Van Hoon enterprise that has nothing whatsoever to do with blood sport. Or is it only the killing aspects of the family that interest you?”

      She came to the desk and stood by it, drawn to the gold of Christopher’s eyes rather than to the gold of the bauble on his desk top.

      Christopher took a jeweler’s loupe from a drawer. He picked up the rock and began a thorough examination of it. For a moment, he was totally occupied, and Janet willed herself not to wish that he would find her half as exciting as he found that piece of colored stone.

      “Exceptional!” he said, putting the loupe to one side and rolling the glassy octahedron between his large and powerful fingers. How exciting those fingers would feel lovingly touching her skin, His attention shifted from the stone to Donald, Janet seemingly out of the picture. “What do you think?” he asked. “Thirty-two carats if we shoot for flawless?”

      “Rubel said thirty-four,” Donald answered. “He recommends we do it with a heart cut.”

      “Here, Janet,” Christopher said, tossing her the stone. She caught it purely out of reflex. “What do you say?”

      “What is it? Topaz?” she asked. When she and Bob were looking for her engagement ring, she had seen a yellow topaz. It wasn’t as big as this stone, though.

      Donald gave an audible intake of breath that dismissed Janet once and for all. Christopher’s golden eyes sparkled more than the uncut gem.

      “It’s a diamond, Janet,” Christopher said, shaking his head and clicking his tongue in mock disappointment. “I thought every woman knew a diamond when she saw one. Aren’t they supposed to be a girl’s best friend?”

      “It’s honey colored,” she said, putting the stone back on the velvet. Donald’s reaction, more than Christopher’s statement, told her it was indeed a diamond. She was nervous with a stone that would cut to thirty-four carats, much heavier (more valuable) than Elizabeth Taylor’s much ballyhooed ring. She rubbed hands together, renewing the warmth Christopher had passed to her through the cool crystal.

      “It’s a fancy,” Christopher said. “Impurities make it that color.”

      “They make it a damned sight more expensive, too” Donald interjected, dispelling the notion that impurities equated with inferior quality, in this instance.

      “Right,” Christopher agreed. “We are always exceedingly pleased when one of these babies turns up.”

      He picked up the telephone on the desk, his gaze on Janet. There was humor in his eyes. Again, he had made her appear foolish. “Bartlet, will you send Samuels around front with the car, please?” he said into the mouthpiece before replacing the receiver. He walked over to the door and unlocked it. “I’m afraid Donald and I have things to discuss that you’d find horribly boring, Janet,” he said. “I hope you’ll accept my apologies for cutting our evening short.” He smiled that same maddening smile. “I’ll make it up to you later, I promise.”

      “That won’t be necessary, I assure you,” Janet said, more affected by her dismissal than she would admit.

      “Feel free to take the dress with you as a consolation prize,” he called after her, making her skin turn hot with embarrassment. She knew what Donald Geiger was thinking. “You certainly look better in it than the other women did,” Christopher added. His amused laughter was still ringing in her ears when she reached the top of the stairs. She was tempted, but she didn’t slam the door of the bedroom. She refused to give him the satisfaction.

      She had no intention of keeping the dress. The tapes were all she wanted from him. By tomorrow, they would be safely on a plane for Seattle. Whatever glimmer of hope she had had of dissociating him from his despicable father was shattered.

      The zipper stuck in her hurried attempts to shed the offensive silk, and she began to panic during the following moments of struggle. She couldn’t go back to the library for help, but the alternative was to tear the dress. She couldn’t ruin something so lovely that, by her standards, was so extravagantly expensive, even if Christopher cared less.

      “Thank God!” she said, heaving an audible sigh of relief when the zipper came loose.

      She changed, knowing Christopher would be curious about the delay. He would think she had misgivings about leaving Lionspride. The sooner she set him straight on that score, the better.

      Ashanti was waiting patiently at the front door. There was no sign of Christopher. Janet was the last thing on his mind at the moment. A large golden diamond was more interesting than a busybody come to do him mischief. At least that’s the way Janet saw it.

      CHAPTER THREE

      THE ROLLS ROYCE SILVER SPIRIT was long, roomy and had all the creature comforts, including a television set and a bar. However, Janet couldn’t get comfortable. She was leaving Lionspride. Again. Nothing horrible had developed from Christopher’s stolen kiss and his insults. They merely confirmed what she had known all along: the past was over and done, never to be lived again.

      She was disappointed and knew why. She touched her fingertips to her lips. The feel of Christopher’s stolen kiss lingered somehow. She was disgusted by the pleasure evoked by the memory of his mouth on hers.

      That kiss set her up. It took her by surprise, as though hinting of worse things to come. The resulting horrors, though, were figments of Janet’s overactive imagination. Christopher had enjoyed a delicious meal. He’d played games in the darkness of the basement. He’d terrorized her with a few suggestive words and looks. Then, satisfied that he’d paid her back for her plotting against him, he’d sent her on her way. He was a king tired of his court jester, offering her a used dress in reward for stale amusements.

      She put herself in his position. He graciously consented to let her into his home. He personally greeted her, trying to make her feel comfortable. He offered her punch after her long drive from the city. He cooperated in every way, only to have it dawn on him that she was there to do a hatchet job on his family.

      Well, Janet didn’t feel guilty. Fair play was a luxury owed those who played by the rules, and the Van Hoons never did that. Their fortune originated with Petre Van Hoon’s swindling of a poor native who didn’t know a diamond from a pretty stone.

      Janet laughed—not in amusement, either. It was ironic to have witnessed Christopher drooling over a diamond just as Petre Van Hoon must have done. Christopher was no ragged vagabond with only the belongings on his back, but the same greedy gleam was in his eye. She had seen it there when he was packing her off moments after that precious stone had entered his life.

      She leaned into the luxurious leather of the seat. Ahead, the largest man-made structures in the world were piled high across the horizon. Some of the rock crystal in those enormous heaps of mine tailings were dragged from over two miles beneath the city. The foundation of Johannesburg was honeycombed with kilometers of tunnels stretching in all directions. As much traffic went on below the surface as on the streets above. All for the sake of gold.

      Christopher’s hair was gold. Christopher’s eyes were gold.

      She wouldn’t think of Christopher’s hair, or his eyes. She wouldn’t think of him, period. He had lost something in his transition from boy to man, just as Janet had lost something in her painful journey from girl to woman.

      The car stopped. She didn’t wait for the chauffeur to get out and open the door for her. She opened it herself. She wasn’t a pampered woman who couldn’t take care of herself without a paid retainer’s assistance. Those women were of Christopher’s world. She was of quite another. Those women draped themselves in animal skins that brought the leopard, cheetah, lynx and tiger to the brink of extinction. Janet wanted to save those animals. Not just the ones killed to satisfy some society matron’s twisted notion of fashion. Not just those massacred to bolster some hunter’s macho