Nan Ryan Read online

  Or so they thought.

  “… a lovely surprise for your enjoyment,” Maribelle was telling the attentive gathering. “You’re all to take your drinks and go out into the garden. I’ve arranged for the most spectacular pyrotechnic display this city’s ever seen!” She flashed a charming smile, her upswept white-blond hair shimmering like moonbeams. “Shall we?” She lifted the swirling skirts of her blue chiffon gown and gracefully descended the marble steps, a bare slender arm extended toward the open French doors across the room.

  Laughter and chatter filled the air as the crush of guests excitedly exited the spacious beige and white drawing room, eagerly rushing outdoors to pick a choice spot for watching the fireworks. Waiting politely, Ben Star set his wineglass aside and came to his feet. He unhurriedly started toward the tall French doors to join the guests as they made their way down to the manicured garden.

  But the blond, beautiful Maribelle Crocker, authoritatively ushering everyone quickly outdoors, spun about as the last ones spilled out onto the stone terrace. She anxiously pulled the doors shut behind her, leaned back, and smiled at the tall, imposing Ben Star.

  Ben smiled back. “Are you shutting them out or us in?” he asked, his voice an intriguing low, deep monotone.

  “Both.” Maribelle’s smile became flirtatious. “Them outdoors in the garden. You inside with me.”

  “And here I thought you enjoyed fireworks,” said Ben, the corners of his cruel-looking mouth lifting in an engaging half-smile.

  “Oh, I do,” Maribelle said, slowly advancing on him. “You know I do, Ben.” She stopped directly before him, lifted a pale, bejeweled hand up to toy with his silk lavender tie. “I thought perhaps while the others watch the burst of fireworks over the bay, you and I could launch skyrockets upstairs in my bed.” She smiled up at him and added, “Think I can ignite your fuse, darling?”

  Ben Star was not particularly shocked. Despite the spotless reputation enjoyed by the blue-blooded widow, he had shared Maribelle Crocker’s bed more than once in the past few weeks. But always they had been totally discreet. He was slightly taken aback that she would suggest such a tryst with a house full of guests.

  “Sounds delightful.” He was gracious. “But isn’t it a bit dangerous?”

  “Yes … dangerous,” Maribelle replied breathlessly, her large emerald eyes already glittering with anticipation. She took his tanned right hand in both her hands and led him toward the marble steps. “We’ll have to hurry so we won’t get caught.” Laughter bubbled from her berry-red lips.

  Ben Star grinned and allowed the foolish, spoiled woman to lead him up the grand staircase toward the opulent master suite. He had no objection to giving her the physical satisfaction she so brashly sought. Maribelle was a most desirable woman and a delightfully insatiable one as well. He and the beautiful blond widow had spent precious little time in conversation. He knew almost nothing about her, other than the fact that she was like dozens of other pale beauties he’d known over the years.

  She desired him because he represented the forbidden, the wild, the dangerous. She was thrilled by the notion of breaking long-lasting taboos. Titillated by the idea of giving herself to a man prohibited by the mores dictated by polite society. Aroused by the savage touch of his dark hands on her pale, perfect flesh. Guilty pleasures.

  It mattered little to Ben.

  In his arms Maribelle Crocker was a warm, responsive lover, willing to do anything that pleased him. She never failed to provide exquisite sexual pleasure, so he had no call for complaint.

  As for Maribelle Crocker, she certainly had no complaints. To her delight, the tall, dark Ben was male enough to make love on demand, and that was all Maribelle cared about. It never for a moment occurred to her that her handsome lover might also be sensitive enough to long secretly for a kind of lovemaking that went beyond the physical.

  When the pair stepped inside Maribelle’s shadowy bedroom, she dropped Ben’s hand and rushed across the room to throw the tall French doors open to the wide balcony.

  “There,” she said, turning back to him. Smiling, she reached up to release her long blond hair from its diamond-studded restraints so that it spilled about her shoulders the way Ben liked it. “We can watch fireworks while we make some ourselves. Won’t that be exciting?”

  “Out of this world,” said Ben. He moved toward her. She stood framed in the open doors, the suffused glow of the city lights behind her. “Shall I help you with your dress?”

  Tingling with excitement, Maribelle eagerly nodded and pushed her shimmering white-blond hair behind her small, perfect ears.

  “Would you, darling? Your fingers are so deft at that sort of thing.” She looked up into his dark, smoldering eyes, strangely compelling eyes which at odd moments she could almost swear were a deep navy blue instead of black. “I love the feel of your hands on me,” she added in a throaty whisper.

  Star leaned down, placed a soft, lingering kiss on the left corner of her brightly painted mouth, and teasingly bit her full bottom lip. Then he lifted his hands, cupped her bare shoulders, and gently turned her about so that her back was to him. The first of the fireworks display began as he started unfastening the tiny hooks going down the center back of Maribelle’s blue chiffon dress.

  Shouts of delight went up from the gay party crowd in the gardens below as great showers of multicolored light filled the night sky. At the same time gasps of delight filled the shadowy bedroom as Ben Star skillfully peeled his hostess’s gown and satin chemise down to her waist, then filled his dark hands with her bare ivory breasts.

  For a long, enjoyable moment the pair stayed as they were, standing before the open French doors, watching the splendid spectacle. As the blues and reds and golds exploded against the black velvet San Francisco sky, Maribelle Crocker sighed and pressed her head back against Ben’s hard chest while his hands caressed and lifted her heavy, swelling breasts, his lean; dexterous fingers teasing and toying with the large, aching nipples.

  Squirming happily against his tall, ungiving frame, Maribelle wasn’t certain which was the more pleasing sight: the magnificent fireworks in the distance or the dark, skilled hands of her lover covering her pale, naked breasts.

  Suddenly dying to get Ben Star into her bed before the wondrous fireworks display ended, Maribelle drew his hands away, turned them up to her face, kissed each palm gratefully, then spun quickly to face him.

  “Ben, make love to me. Now, darling, right now. Let’s hurry … hurry, before it’s too late.”

  Not waiting for his reply, she pushed the frothy blue skirts of her gown down over her generous hips, squirming to be free of them. Watching her with a half-smile curving his lips, Ben Star leisurely shrugged wide shoulders out of his gray linen suit coat. As he pulled the jacket off, a folded paper fell out of an inside pocket. It fluttered to the deep beige carpet. Curious, Maribelle kicked her lovely gown aside, bent, and picked up the fallen paper.

  “What’s this?” she said, and withheld it when Ben reached for it. Lips parted questioningly, she unfolded the slim document and saw that it was the current Union Pacific train schedule. “Denver, Colorado,” had been circled in red ink. Her emerald eyes frantically met his. “Darling, you’re not planning to—”

  Before she could finish her question, Ben Star silenced her with a commanding kiss. Pulling her close, he thrust a lean brown hand into her flowing white-blond tresses.

  In the shadowy light a wide silver bracelet flashed on Star’s dark right wrist. Concealed beneath that silver bracelet was a white, satiny scar.

  The scar was a perfectly shaped X.

  Chapter 2

  On that same August evening, three thousand miles across America, a young woman stood alone on the balcony of a Washington, D.C., town house. She was an exotic-looking creature. Her hair was as black as the darkest midnight, and it reached to her waist when unbound. Her skin was as pale and flawless as porcelain.

  A tall, slender woman, she wore a cool pastel gown which was th
e exact same color as her large, expressive eyes, an enchanting pale violet. Shaded by a double row of black, spiky lashes, those violet eyes darkened to purple when she was angry or aroused. Directly above those magnificent violet-hued eyes were perfectly winged black brows, which shot up with inquiry when something interested her, lifted impishly when she was in a teasing mood, and knitted together ferociously when she was annoyed or upset.

  Her small nose was decidedly patrician, but her lush, lovely mouth suggested an undeniable earthiness. With her firm chin and finely boned face, she appeared haughty and unattainable. At the same time there was about her a sense of arousal beneath the gentility, a hint of the passion that lurked below the cool exterior.

  Her name was Diane Buchannan. Miss Diane Howard Buchannan. She was unmarried, and she had just passed a very important birthday. A milestone in the life of any female: One quarter of a century.

  Diane Howard Buchannan was twenty-five years old and not the least bit nervous or apologetic about the fact that she was neither married nor engaged to be married. While society considered any woman still single upon reaching the ripe age of twenty-five sadly destined to be an old maid, Diane Howard Buchannan didn’t give a fig about such foolish concerns.

  She was perfectly content to be single, independent, her own boss. “I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul,” she was fond of quoting to doubters and worrisome would-be matchmakers. Including her well-meaning aunt Lydia, with whom she lived. Grudgingly her friends were forced to admit that the spirited, self-reliant Diane was maddeningly successful at running her own life, captaining her own ship.

  It had always been so.

  Orphaned when a carriage accident claimed the lives of her parents when Diane was only two, she was reared by her paternal grandparents, the fiery Colonel Buck Buchannan and the calm, unshakable Granny Ruth Buchannan. From the devoted, strong-willed pair Diane had learned a great deal about life and love and loyalty.

  And independence.

  So Diane Howard Buchannan stood alone in the moonlight because she chose to do so. She looked dreamily down at the silver ribbon of the Potomac as it wound its sure, slow way eastward to Chesapeake Bay and on out to the great Atlantic Ocean. From behind her, inside the roomy, well-lighted town house, the sounds of music and laughter and chatter drifted out on the still, muggy air.

  A party, with dozens of guests, was in progress. The party was for her, given in her honor. Diane knew she should go back inside, knew her behavior bordered on rudeness. But, Lord, she was bored and restless and anxious to leave. She had long since tired of Washington’s endless parties, where the conversation predictably centered on politics.

  An educated woman, the raven-haired, violet-eyed Diane was bright and sophisticated. At twenty-one she had come to the nation’s capital, her mother’s birthplace and still home to her only living Howard relative. The Howard name was an old and highly respected one in Washington. Her aunt, Lydia Howard Dansby, enjoyed a great deal of influence with the city’s powerful.

  Lydia Howard Dansby had invited her only niece, Diane, to share the imposing Howard ancestral home, with a promise to help Diane find just the correct position in the nation’s capital, if she insisted on being employed. Diane had quickly accepted, and Aunt Lydia had been as good as her word.

  For the past four years Diane had held the envied position of well-paid stenographer and trusted aide to one of the country’s most dynamic young senators. At first it had been a challenge. Now she was anxious for a different kind of challenge.

  Despite Montana Senator Clay Dodson’s urging her to stay on, Diane was leaving, and she could hardly wait to be gone. Her mind was made up. She couldn’t be swayed. Either by her aunt Lydia or the handsome senator.

  “But, my dear Diane,” the young senator had entreated when first she told him of her plans, “you can’t desert me. You can’t. Diane, I need you.”

  “I’m sorry, Clay, truly I am,” she had replied, touched by the tenderness and disappointment in his warm brown eyes, “but someone else needs me more.”

  It was the truth.

  She was badly needed by those whom she most loved, the Colonel and Granny Buchannan.

  From the time she was five years old, Diane’s paternal grandparents had owned and operated the Colonel Buck Buchannan’s Wild West Show. When she was a child, the touring extravaganza had played to sold-out houses all over America and Europe. In its heyday the show had been so successful the troupe crisscrossed the country in shiny custom-made rail cars, sailed to the Continent on the Cunard Line’s finest ships, booked the most opulent hotel rooms at home and abroad.

  Sadly that was no longer the case.

  Colonel Buck Buchannan’s Wild West Show was in deep financial trouble. Had been in trouble for the past few years. There were numerous reasons for the show’s steady decline. First, the bloom was off the rose. What had been a new, exciting spectacle twenty years ago was now familiar. The paying customers had become jaded. They had seen, dozens of times, the Rough Riders and the Mexican charros and the buffalo herds and the reenactment of the stagecoach ambushed by hostiles.

  There were no surprises to the program. No new daring acts to make the crowds cheer or gasp with excitement.

  Then, too, other forms of entertainment had become increasingly popular. The theater. The opera. The colorful P. T. Barnum’s Circus. Thomas Edison’s new kinetoscope shows.

  Most damaging of all was the proliferation of other wild west shows. When Colonel Buck Buchannan’s Wild West Show began, it was the first and only traveling extravaganza of its kind. Every performance was sold out weeks in advance, and crowds were awed and amazed by what they saw in the arena. Now there were more than two dozen similar shows, most with far better acts and more original programs than the Colonel’s.

  Worse, Diane had been hearing rumors that Pawnee Bill—owner of the moneymaking Pawnee Bill’s Wild West Show and the archenemy of her grandfather—was planning a takeover of the Colonel’s ailing show.

  Diane couldn’t let that happen. She wouldn’t let that happen!

  She would do what she had been considering for the past year. She’d give up her position in Washington, D.C., and join her grandfather’s troubled troupe. She’d add her own name and act to the bill in an attempt to beef up the take. She’d install modern business procedures. Using her D.C. connections, she’d help the Colonel search out a bank willing to lend the much-needed operating capital.

  Her violet eyes flashing with fierce determination, Diane forcefully slapped the palm of her right hand down atop the balcony railing and murmured aloud, “Yes, sirree, I’ll be there to meet that show train when it pulls into—”

  “Diane? Are you out here, Diane?” Senator Clay Dodson’s voice interrupted her reveries. “Are you with someone?” The slim blond man looked around, searching for the person or persons with whom she’d been conversing.

  Diane took a deep breath and turned to face him.

  She smiled. “No, Clay. I’m alone. I suppose I must have been thinking out loud.”

  “Well, that’s allowed,” he said, advancing on her. “However, hiding out at your own party is not.” His smile was warm, forgiving.

  “I know,” she said apologetically. “It’s so stuffy inside. I just came out for a breath of fresh air.” She gave him her brightest smile, took his arm, and added, “Let’s go back in.”

  Clay Dodson didn’t move. Just kept looking at her. Finally he said, “It is nice out here. Just the two of us. Why don’t we …”

  “Now who’s hiding out?” she said, seeing that look in his eyes that she wished weren’t there. “Come. I’m dying to make another trip to the buffet.”

  Reluctantly Senator Dodson accompanied her back inside. The party lasted for another hour. Finally the gathered group raised champagne toasts to their smiling guest of honor, and it was Clay Dodson who led them in a rousing rendition of “For She’s a Jolly Good Fellow.”

  Properly pleased, Diane blushed and s
miled and made a short, parting speech. And, surprisingly, found herself near tears as she looked around at all the familiar faces she wouldn’t be seeing again.

  Then everyone was hugging her and telling her to stay in touch, and at last day was guiding her down the steps and out into the humid Washington night.

  The young senator from Billings walked Diane slowly back to the Howard home, three blocks away. It was quite late. The street was nearly deserted. Crickets croaked in the silence, and somewhere on the river a steamer tug gave a short blast on its whistle.

  The couple leisurely strolling down the sidewalk said little. There was really nothing left to say. The senator— his brown eyes sweeping over Diane’s pale, beautiful face, that upswept midnight hair—was in a decidedly somber mood. Diane, not looking at him, was feeling just the opposite.

  She was so excited about tomorrow’s departure she could hardly keep her feet on the sidewalk, but she was considerate enough to hide it.

  At last they reached the imposing three-story brownstone that was the old Howard mansion. Dreading this final good-bye, eager to have it over with, Diane turned to Clay Dodson as soon as they reached her fanlighted front door.

  “Clay, dear Clay,” she said softly, “it’s been a wonderful four years. Thanks for everything.”

  “Diane,” came his strangled reply. “Diane …”

  Impulsively he grabbed her hand to draw her closer. Diane’s mouth flew open in startled surprise, and a folded piece of paper slipped from her grasp. It fluttered down to the stone steps at their feet. The senator’s eyes followed it. He picked up the fallen paper, unfolded it, and held it to the faint light of an electric streetlamp.

  A current Union Pacific train schedule with “Denver, Colorado,” circled in bright blue ink.

  “Diane, I wish you’d reconsider leaving—”

  Her lips stopped him from further pleading. She kissed him quickly, said good-bye, then hurried eagerly inside to pack for her long trip.