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  “No, thank you,” she said stiffly, not meeting his eyes, but looking over his shoulder.

  He didn’t press, but stepped back. She despised him. And he hadn’t even gotten to the bad part yet. To give her time to restore herself, he needlessly studied his notes. When he had wasted as much time as he could, he approached her again.

  “Did your late husband entertain on these business trips of his, Mrs. Wynne?”

  “I’ve already told you. I wasn’t with him. I don’t know.”

  “Take a guess.”

  The defense attorney came to his feet again. “Objection, Your Hon—”

  “I retract the question,” Hunter interrupted. He ambled toward the witness box and propped his forearm over the railing in a relaxed pose, as though he and Kari were doing nothing more than having a casual chat. “When your husband was alive, did you entertain in your home frequently?”

  “Yes. Thomas had many friends. He liked to entertain.”

  His right eyebrow rose. “But you didn’t?”

  “I didn’t mean to imply that,” she snapped. “Yes, I did; very much.”

  “And you said that Mr. Wynne enjoyed entertaining.”

  “Yes.”

  “Then it’s reasonable to assume that Mr. Wynne played host when he was away as well.”

  “Your Honor, counsel is—”

  The judge held up his hand. “I think I know where Mr. McKee is going with this line of questioning, and I’d like to hear Mrs. Wynne’s answer.”

  “But again it calls for conclusion on the part of the witness,” the defense attorney persisted.

  “I’ll rephrase the question,” Hunter said obligingly. “Do you know of any specific occasions when your husband entertained while he was away?”

  Her gaze was unsteady. She didn’t know how to respond and was groping for an evasive answer. “No,” she said at last. Hunter sensed she was telling the truth.

  “He never mentioned hosting a party or dinner or lunch?”

  “He might have. I don’t remember.”

  “You don’t remember? Weren’t you ever curious as to what he did while he was away from you?”

  The question was way out of line. He knew it. And she was smart enough to know it, too, because she looked at him just as probingly as he was looking at her. “I trusted my husband.”

  He continued to stare directly into her eyes for several moments while jealousy for Thomas Wynne ate at him like gnawing teeth. Wynne had had the absolute love and trust of this woman. And he had betrayed both. So help him God, if Hunter could have choked the life out of Wynne at that moment, he would have.

  He turned away from the sight of her to regain his composure. Over his shoulder he asked, “Based on your husband’s personality, his liking to play host, his charisma, is it reasonable to assume that he entertained on his business trips?”

  He glared at the defense attorney, daring him to object. When the other man remained still, Kari answered slowly. “Yes. I suppose that’s a reasonable assumption.”

  “And since we’ve already established that all the trips he took alone were for business purposes, we have to assume that all his entertaining was for business purposes as well. Right?”

  She directed a pleading glance at the defense attorney’s table, but he was busy scribbling notes. “I guess so,” she answered softly. “Although I don’t know that for fact. And remember, Thomas had business interests other than those concerning the city.”

  Now it was going to get nasty. If there were any other way … But there wasn’t. He had no choice but to drop a ton of bricks on her head, to publicly humiliate her. Drawing a deep breath, he consulted the file again before returning it to the table. Slowly, resolutely, he walked toward the witness box.

  When he was so close that the tips of his shoes were touching it, he asked, “Did you ever hear your husband mention a business associate by the name of Gloria Patten?”

  “No.”

  “A Gloria Patten of San Francisco?”

  “No.”

  “What about a Serena Holly of New Orleans?”

  She swallowed hard, but her eyes remained unflinchingly on his. “No.”

  “A Miss Divine of New York City or a Miss Ortega from San Juan, Puerto Rico? Do any of those names ring a bell?”

  “No.”

  “Yet these are women your husband must have conducted business with. City of Denver business. Because at its expense he entertained them frequently.”

  She gasped and pressed a closed fist against her heart. “Stop,” she whispered.

  “What business do you think your husband had with these women, Mrs. Wynne?”

  “I don’t know,” she rasped.

  A low hum of response buzzed through the spectators. The judge began to tap his gavel. Hunter rounded the witness box and came to stand directly beside Kari. With her eyes wide and wary, she followed his movements. “You don’t know what business your husband had with these women?”

  “No.”

  “It must have been extensive. Think back—”

  “Your Honor, this is outrageous. The witness—”

  “Mr. McKee—”

  “Please stop,” Kari cried.

  He placed one foot on the step of the witness box. “He entertained them frequently. Every time he was in their respective cities.”

  “No!”

  “In his hotel suite.”

  “You’re lying!”

  “Your Honor—”

  “Mr. McKee, please limit your questions—”

  “In his bedroom. All night.”

  “No!” she screamed.

  She shot to her feet. She reeled. Her eyes closed. She pitched forward.

  Chapter Four

  HUNTER’S ARMS WERE THERE TO CATCH HER. HE SWEPT her up against his chest, alarmed that she weighed no more than a child. Her head lolled against his arm. She was drastically pale. Her eyelids, shadowed by fatigue to a soft lavender, lay perfectly still. The chalky lips were slightly parted.

  The courtroom had been pitched into bedlam, first by Hunter’s unorthodox questioning, then by Kari’s dramatic reaction to it. Reporters and photographers were scrambling for vantage points. Spectators were on their feet, clambering for the aisles. Bailiffs were valiantly trying to restrain them. The judge was banging his gavel and shouting for order. The defense attorney was apoplectically demanding attention.

  With the reigning pandemonium providing a diversion, Hunter carried Kari toward a side exit. “Get out of my way,” he snarled at the bailiff who ill-advisedly blocked his path. The bailiff swung open the door for him and stepped aside.

  Down the corridor from the courtroom was a small unmarked office. It had been placed at Hunter’s disposal because the main D.A.’s office was a separate building several blocks from the courthouse. It was a room where he could retreat during court recesses or use to privately receive key witnesses. He now headed toward that office with rushed footsteps. He didn’t want anyone to follow him or know where he was taking her. No one would take better care of her than he would. He went into the office, kicked the door shut behind him, and deposited her on an aged leather sofa.

  Jerking off his glasses and dropping them to the floor, he knelt beside her. “Kari? Kari?” His voice was laced with apprehension. God, what had he done to her?

  “Please wake up,” he whispered. He touched her cheek. It was cool. He laid his palm on it and stroked her cheekbone with his thumb. “I’m sorry. God, I’m so sorry for everything.”

  Her chest was barely lifting and falling with her light respiration. With fumbling fingers, he began unfastening the buttons of her jacket. When they were all undone, he levered her up. She sagged against his chest like a rag doll.

  He peeled the jacket off and heedlessly tossed it aside. Then he held her against him, tight against him, possessively and protectively against him, rubbing her back, trying to massage her into consciousness.

  Her hair had come down with his fingers entwined in it.
He pressed his face into the blond mass and breathed the flowery scent he had always imagined would perfume it. His mouth came maddeningly close to her ear. Gradually he lowered her back to the cracked leather cushions.

  His eyes were busy surveyors of her face, watching for signs that she was coming around. She lay as still as death. Her breathing was shallow.

  Tugging on his lower lip with his teeth, he indecisively considered the bow beneath her chin. His hands began to perspire. He would catch hell from her if she woke up and her blouse—

  But she had fainted and showed no signs of waking up. He caught the ends of the tie between his fingers and pulled until the bow fell away. Then he unlooped it from around her neck. The pulse in her throat was weak. He could see its meager fluttering in the small triangle at the base of her neck.

  Of their own accord, his hands went to the first button. They were pearl buttons that slipped easily from the holes. Still it was no easy task. His hands were trembling. He only unfastened three buttons, then adjusted the blouse so her throat and upper chest were exposed to air. She didn’t stir.

  She hadn’t planned on taking off the suit jacket. That he knew. Otherwise she would have worn a brassiere, and one less sheer than the camisole with the cobweb-fine lace. It was about as substantial a garment as smoke.

  He tried not to let his brain register anything, but it was photographing and filing as rapidly as his eyes were scanning. He was human, wasn’t he? And male. And what heterosexual human male wouldn’t look, wouldn’t gaze at the dusky shadows her nipples made beneath the two layers of soft, sheer fabric?

  God, she was beautiful.

  He closed his eyes for a moment to ward off the shaft of desire that speared through him. When he opened his eyes again, they fell on that dent at the base of her throat and this time he didn’t see a pulse at all. Or didn’t he want to? Was he looking for an excuse to lay his hand over her heart?

  In any event, that was what he did, gently at first, just enough to make the silky fabrics of the two garments slide together and bring his palm fully over the small mound. Soft, full, warm. Woman flesh. Her flesh. Filling his hand.

  She whimpered. The sound tore through him like a bolt of lightning. He lifted his face over hers. “Shhh. It’s all right, Kari.” He stroked her hair. “I never wanted you to be hurt. I swear I didn’t. Forgive me.”

  He lifted her against him and again pressed his face into her neck. “It’s all right. It’s all right.”

  When she first began to come to, she felt better than she had in a long time. She was being held in strong arms and the protection they offered was sublime. Warm, tender lips were moving up her neck, around her ear, along her jaw to the corner of her mouth, where they laid a gentle kiss.

  Oh, that felt good. She turned toward the masculine face; beard-rough, smelling of cologne and shaving soap and male skin. Her lips located his and pressed against them.

  He reacted instantly by tensing and pulling away. Was he going to leave her again? No! her mind screamed. She wound her arms around his neck. She wanted to be held against this large, hard body. Its strength made her feel safe. Go on touching me; kiss me, she wanted to cry out. But somehow her brain wasn’t able to communicate the command to her voice.

  Finally the lips returned. They stayed and moved over hers with tender rubbing motions. They whispered loving words, soothing, comforting words. Moaning, she opened her mouth. The wet velvet thrust of his tongue parted her lips wider until it was nestled deep inside her mouth, where it prowled hungrily.

  Strange. Thomas had never kissed her this way before. Never with this degree of wantonness. She felt this kiss all over her body. In her breasts, which tightened and tingled and strained against the powerful chest. And in her womanhood, where one hot curling sensation followed another until she thought she might explode with pleasure. Or pain. She ached to be pressed there, stroked, filled.

  She found handholds in his thick hair and pulled him closer, deepening the kiss by closing her mouth around his tongue. She wanted more, more. Plaintively she called the name of the only lover she had ever had. “Thomas, love me. Thomas, Thomas.”

  Abruptly he left her. He shook free her shackling hands. The pleasure-giving lips were withdrawn, though their moisture lingered on hers. Reluctantly she opened her eyes.

  Everything inside her went dangerously still. She wasn’t looking into the face of her beloved husband, but into the hated face of Hunter McKee.

  It was too hideous to be believed. She dared not move. If she moved, if she felt anything, then she would know this wasn’t her imagination. It couldn’t be anything but a nightmare. She couldn’t countenance it as real. But it was.

  He stood up, his eyes falling on her unbuttoned blouse. His guilt-ridden face was the giveaway. “I undid it while I was trying to revive you,” he said hoarsely, apologetically.

  A small squeaking sound involuntarily escaped her lips as she looked down at her front. Her eyes swung back up to his. Her breath, so light before, now came in great gulps. Running a hand through his hair and whispering a heartfelt curse, he turned away.

  She swung her feet to the floor and sat up dizzily. “You … you …” She couldn’t think of anything bad enough to call him. She grappled with the buttons on her blouse.

  He faced her again. “Listen to me, Kari. I’m sorry. About everything. You fainted on the witness stand. I carried you in here. I … You …” He shrugged helplessly.

  She tried to stand, but immediately her knees buckled beneath her. He lunged to catch her, but she jerked backward. “Don’t touch me,” she grated. “If you ever touch me again—”

  “Kari, please. I know you thought I was someone else. I know I took advantage of the situation.”

  “You’re damn right you did.” Her chest was now heaving with rage. “Aren’t you finished yet with humiliating me? You’re—”

  The door opened and Pinkie barreled in, looking like either an avenging angel or the duped stooge in a farce. His hair was standing on end, like an electric halo around his head. “Kari, thank God!” he cried. “I couldn’t find you.”

  “Close the door,” Hunter said with remarkable calm. “Does anyone else know where we are?”

  “No. All hell broke loose. The defense declined to cross-examine Kari, making you look like a real sonofabitch, Mr. D.A.,” he said with undisguised satisfaction. “The judge called a recess. How are you, baby?” Pinkie bent down to examine Kari’s face. His hands wandered over her arms and shoulders as though searching for wounds.

  “Just get me out of here. Please, Pinkie.” She leaned against him weakly as he helped her to her feet.

  “Is he a friend of yours?” Hunter demanded. She only glared at him as she retrieved her suit jacket. He addressed Pinkie. “Ms. Stewart isn’t well.”

  Pinkie looked from one to the other. Something was wrong here. He could smell it. He hadn’t liked the D.A.’s method of questioning. In fact he’d felt like killing him when he was firing those questions at Kari, questions that raised doubt as to Wynne’s moral character.

  But he’d also seen the way the man had risked everything, including his own reputation, by carrying her from the courtroom and out of harm’s way. McKee couldn’t be all bad.

  “Name’s Pinkie Lewis. I’m news director at WBTV. And Kari’s friend. Though lately I’ve felt more like her keeper.”

  “I think she should see a doctor. She was unconscious for some time.”

  “Let’s go, Pinkie,” she murmured.

  “Yeah. I’ll see that her doctor’s called,” Pinkie said to Hunter. “I warned her against appearing in court so soon after—”

  “Pinkie,” Kari said sharply, showing a spark of life even though she seemed on the verge of collapse.

  “So soon after what?” Hunter stalked them as they made their slow progress toward the door.

  Pinkie opened the door, but turned to eye the D.A. speculatively. He had put Kari through hell. But he looked like a guy with a conscience. Maybe
he should get back some of what he had been dishing out. “So soon after her miscarriage,” Pinkie said over Kari’s protests. “She lost Thomas Wynne’s baby three days ago.”

  Stunned into speechlessness, Hunter watched them go. Pinkie shot him a knowing look as he closed the door after them. Hunter wheeled around, digging the heels of his hands into his eyesockets. He uttered a foul expletive; repeated it with more emphasis. Then, bellowing in rage against fate, he slammed his fist into the nearest wall.

  Pinkie padded to the front door. He stood only in his socks, one of which had a hole in the big toe. His shirttail had long since been pulled from his waistband. A cigarette dangled from the corner of his lip. He held a glass of Scotch in his hand.

  He swung open the door and for a long moment stared at the man on the other side of the threshold. At last he said, “I’ll say this for you. You’ve got guts.”

  “May I come in?”

  “This isn’t my house.”

  “May I come in anyway?”

  Pinkie fortified himself with another sip of Scotch, all the time assessing Hunter McKee. Maybe it was the bouquet of yellow roses he was holding. Or maybe it was the unmistakable signs of fatigue ringing his eyes, or the haggardness deepening the vertical laugh lines on either side of his mouth. But for whatever reason, Pinkie experienced a rare twinge of sentimentality. He felt sorry for the poor bastard. He stood aside and permitted Hunter to enter Kari’s living room.

  “How is she?” Hunter asked, turning around and cutting through the preliminaries.

  “She’s not so hot right now, but she’ll be fine. The doctor instructed her to stay in bed for two weeks at home or it’ll be a month in the hospital.”

  Hunter’s hard swallow was visible. “Is she that ill?”

  “Exhaustion, both mental and physical fatigue, anemia, hypoglycemia.”

  Without invitation Hunter dropped into a chair and remorsefully stared at the floor between his feet. It was a long while before he raised his head and said, “I had no way of knowing about the … illness. I swear I didn’t mean to hurt her.”