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  Deceptive Love

  Anne N. Reisser

  She was a fantastic secretary. But what made men think her willingness to share their work meant a willingness to share their beds?

  More than once Keri's mischievous green eyes, auburn hair, and sensuous body had cost her a perfectly good job. But now she was safe. She looked every inch the efficient prig, encased in an ice-cold shell. Until Dain Randolph pirated her away from her cozy niche and dragged her into the executive suite. Just one look told her that Dain meant danger-- that just one touch of his warm, powerful hands could penetrate her flimsy disguise, melt her icy resolve and her obstinate heart.

  Excerpt

  He took full advantage of her instinctive gasp of outrage!

  His mouth closed over hers and ruthlessly plundered every sweet corner. Their mouths became a fiery seal, welding them together for a timeless instant, lasting as long as infinity, and as short as the beat of a heart. When Dain lifted his mouth from hers, Keri wasn't sure she'd ever be able to draw breath again without recalling the taste of his lips.

  He laid his free hand against the side of her neck and said softly, "if I had more time..." and left her standing there bemused, in the middle of his office, the carefully typed envelopes and letters in a scattered drift around her feet.

  Dear Reader:

  We hope you are enjoying our exciting and successful series, the Candlelight Ecstasy Romances. This month we are bringing you Deceptive Love—a book for the kind of woman who knows how to respond to love, and to life.

  Copyright

  First publication in Great Britain

  ISBN: 9780440117766

  Dell edition published 1981

  Copyright © 1981

  By

  Anne N. Reisser

  Chapter One

  The phone shrilled insistently. He knocked his hand painfully against the nightstand, fumbling in the dark to cut off its shattering summons.

  "You've got to come home! That girl is wrecking my life!'

  The newly wakened man ran a weary hand over his stubbly chin and squinted at the luminous dial of the wristwatch lying by the phone. He dropped his head back on the pillow, mouthing a silent curse. It was three A.M. and he'd been in his bed for little more than an hour. Thinking comes hard in those circumstances, especially when the woman on the other end of the phone is hysterical and an ocean and part of a continent away.

  "Calm down, Denise," he advised with commendable forbearance. "Who is she and what's she done to your life specifically?"

  "She's trying to take Schyler away from me, that's what! I want you to fire her and make sure she never gets work again." An acid hatred coated each word as it spat from the phone. Denise had had more than one drink, and alcohol made her vicious.

  "Who the hell is Schyler?"

  "He's my fiancé and we've only been engaged two weeks. Now he wants to break the engagement because of that tramp. Dain, you've just got to do something!" It was a familiar demand, punctuated by hiccuping sobs, also familiar. He closed his eyes on the darkness of his room in exasperation.

  "Schyler who, Denise?" he questioned patiently. He knew only patience could extract coherence from his mercurial sister in this mood. "How long have you known him? I've only been gone four months and this is the first I've heard of a Schyler, much less one who's engaged to my sister." He was holding on to his temper with both hands. At her most rational Denise was trying. Hysterical she was impossible.

  "Schyler Van Metre, of the Van Metres . . . you know . . . Van Metre and Company and all of that." He could just picture her vague, encompassing gesture. "I met him two months ago—at a party. He just gave me the most gorgeous diamond engagement ring and now he says that since he's found this woman again he can't marry me." A pleading note, well-practiced and cajoling, entered her voice. "I want him, Dain. She works for you, so you get rid of her. That's where he saw her again, so it's all your fault."

  Ignoring the magnificent irrationality of this statement, he asked reasonably, "All right, next question: who is she?"

  "Her name is Keri Dalton and what he sees in her is beyond me" was the enlightening answer.

  "I don't know any Keri Dalton, Denise," he responded with ebbing patience. "Are you sure she works for me? All right, all right. So she was hired three months ago." He broke through the babble of sound ruthlessly. "I'll be home in a few days," he promised wearily. "I'll see what I can do then. Good night, Denise." He dropped the receiver back onto its rest, cutting off the further spate of words in mid-flow.

  Dain Randolph is coming back. Word flew through the office grapevine with the speed and degree of accuracy of all such organs. It was served as speculation with the morning coffee rolls and as established fact over the lunch hot-plate special. It meant less than nothing to Keri. No premonitory chill ghosted over her skin. No misgiving prickled the hairs at the nape of her neck as she worked composedly at her desk.

  To the office staff she was the efficient Miss Dalton, of impeccable qualifications and calm impersonality. She could have been an employee of long years' seniority, so smoothly and unobtrusively had she carved her new niche. Keri had chosen her job well and had great hopes of at last being able to settle down.

  George Simonds, her new boss, was in his mid-fifties and dotingly in love with his motherly wife. He saw Keri purely as the formidable Miss Dalton and never delved into her personal life. Mr. Simonds and Keri had no social discourse, except for the perfunctory "Good morning, Miss Dalton. How are you today?" to which she invariably replied, "Fine, thank you, Mr. Simonds. Your mail is waiting for you on your desk." Keri had set the tone firmly on her first day at work and had allowed no deviation during her three months at RanCo. She intended to allow none.

  When Keri had found it necessary to quit her fourth job, in New York, six months before, she had ruefully decided that only drastic measures were going to suffice if she ever hoped to hold a job for any appreciable length of time.

  Keri was honest with herself. She wouldn't want to be ugly, but she was more than just a body. She deeply resented the masculine assumption that a nicely curved body indicated a willing libido, especially when that assumption slipped over into her working life. Being a man's secretary did not also indicate a willingness to be his bed partner!

  So she decided: If the men she worked for could not or would not leave her alone, she would henceforth make sure that they saw nothing worthwhile, from a masculine standpoint, to distract them during business hours. She would keep her business and private lives totally separate.

  She hid her emerald green eyes behind clear-lensed horn-rimmed glasses and ruthlessly subdued her glorious titian hair in a tight French twist. Her lush figure, the source of much of her problem, disappeared under severely tailored suits of uncompromising primness and drab coloring. There wasn't much she could do about the shapely perfection of her long, slender legs except wear "sensible" shoes.

  Instead of making up, she made down. She used a lighter than normal lipstick to de-emphasize the full lower lip and curved upper lip of her cleanly modeled mouth and the outsized horned-rims overwhelmed the classic nose and high cheekbones. A dusting of sallow powder did the rest, destroying the effect of her flawless skin.

  "disguise" complete she was subtly aged to a colorless, indeterminate "over-30."

  Even her voice at the office bore little resemblance to the husky contralto of her normal usage. She had adopted a brisk, no-nonsense intonation which was polite but chill in its precision. She was a dragon of the most formidable, with a breath of ice rather than fire.

  As a masquerade it had proved satisfactory and efficacious, but she had thought it all for naught one day last week when Schyler strolled past her in the hall. She had tensed, braced for exposure, bu
t he showed no flicker of recognition on that handsome, petulant face. She had forced her legs to continue their measured pace down the long corridor until she reached the sanctuary of her office.

  She had dropped the papers she carried in a scattered drift atop her desk and slumped into her chair. Senseless to feel so shaky, to let the sight of a man she had hoped never to see again unnerve her so badly, but he had marked the final link in an unpleasant chain of experiences.

  Schyler Van Metre, scion of Van Metre and Company. Down that corridor strode her reason for retreat into protective camouflage, but it would seem, she assured herself hopefully, that he was also a testament to its effectiveness.

  She had worked for his father, executive secretary to the chairman of the board of Van Metre and Company, until father and son, between them, made it impossible for her to continue. The son had pursued her ruthlessly and the father had tried to buy her for his son. If she never heard the name again, it would be too soon! But Keri had what she wanted now—a boss who didn't see her as a woman and a pleasantly active social life totally separate from her business persona. She had the best of both worlds and she intended to keep them.

  Now, a week after her nerve-twisting confrontation, she could relax. There were evidently to be no repercussions, no word from Schyler, and best of all, no further sight of him. He had disappeared from the corridors of RanCo as mysteriously as he had appeared.

  She covered her typewriter and gathered her purse with a thankful sigh. She enjoyed her work, but it was always a relief to go home and shed her dowdy image.

  "Good night, Miss Dalton. Have a pleasant weekend."

  "Thank you, Mr. Simonds." Keri turned away so that Mr. Simonds couldn't see the mischievous smile which she was unable to restrain. Probably thinks I'm going home to my lonely apartment and my tabby cat! Maybe I should bring a basket of some anonymous gray knitting to work with me every once in a while, to reinforce the image. When she turned back she had schooled her errant expression and was able to present him with a demure nod before preceding him to the parking lot where her car awaited her, crouched like a dangerous, snarling, jungle beast, ready to roar to powerful life at the touch of her hand on the key.

  Eyebrows were always raised when she drove out of the company parking lot, but she had balked at extending her masquerade to her beloved car. The sight of the prim Miss Dalton expertly guiding her dark green Porsche among the staid Fords and Chevrolets was an anomalous sight. She had gotten it two years ago when her parents had left for a new assignment abroad.

  Her father was an officer in the army and had recently received his second star. Keri had grown up feeling at home all over the world, with a flair for languages encouraged by multinationaled playmates. She spoke French and German flawlessly, Italian and Spanish fluently, and Japanese understandably. She was familiar with many of the world's capitals and was an accomplished hostess. Rank did not awe her. Her godfather was a distinguished retired ambassador, still consulted for his expertise and shrewd analysis of political complexities. She had friends in high places and she breathed easily in rarefied air.

  Some day she might wish to travel again, in which event she would easily find a post abroad . . . her qualifications would see to that... but for now she wanted a permanent home. That had been one of the more distressing aspects of Schyler's relentless pursuit.

  She had left her previous job, and had been lured to Van Metre and Company by an exorbitant salary offer from Van Metre, Sr., because of her extraordinary qualifications. She quickly became indispensable to Carleton Van Metre, who was a bit of a snob, but overall a good boss. He also appreciated the fact that his secretary combined a cool intelligence with a stunningly lovely appearance. He did not enjoy the fact that his son had begun a determined effort to seduce his new secretary from the moment he laid eyes upon her.

  Keri didn't enjoy the fact either! Schyler had interfered with her work, hounded her at home, and generally made a miserable nuisance of himself. He was superficially handsome, but Keri quickly found him to be weak and self-indulgent as well. He was not a man she could either trust or respect—a death knell for any hopes he might have cherished of arousing her deeper interest and emotions. As the daughter of an officer whose assignments had taken him to embassy posts all over the world, she was well inoculated against the sophisticated charm which said so much and meant so little.

  She had made the intitial error, she admitted to herself wryly, in accepting dates with him on a casual basis, but he had quickly made it clear that he wished to move from the casual to the intimate with all possible speed. She refused to go out with him anymore, but he developed the disconcerting habit of appearing at her front door with no warning, or perching on her desk while she was trying to transcribe dictation from his father. Another woman might have found it flattering but Keri found it just tiresome and then actively distressing. Schyler could not, would never, be her choice of mate, and she was not a girl for a casual fling, no matter how glittering the opportunity.

  She remonstrated, she fumed, she ignored. The climax came when he asked her to marry him, which she refused to do. He was astounded, disbelieving. No girl in her right mind would turn down Schyler Van Metre of the Van Metres. He had been pursued by women since puberty, for himself and for what he had, and he'd gotten everything he wanted from them all. Now, when he wanted marriage, it was simply inconceivable that she deny him!

  It was inconceivable to his father as well. She was only a secretary! How could she deny a Van Metre when he condescended to honor her? This attitude caused Keri to mutter, sotto voice, that the days of droit de seigneur were long since dead, a sentiment she didn't utter aloud at first because she still hoped to stay at her job. Schyler's father saw her as an asset—a beautiful brood mare, a gracious hostess, and a serf properly appreciative of the honor done her. Keri endured. Some weeks of mental bludgeoning, gave her notice, trained her successor in stony silence, and left.

  Her action freed her from Van Metre, Sr., but Schyler was made of more persistent fiber. He phoned, he appeared, he dogged her footsteps. He promised that he would continue to do so until she gave in out of sheer exhaustion. Keri was unwillingly forced to believe him. The Schyler she knew through gossip and observation was not this determined, obsessed man.

  Keri closed her apartment, called her father's sister to warn her of an impending visitor, and left town. She had plenty of savings, and when she sought another job, it wouldn't be in New York, where she was likely to run across the Van Metres again, any of them!

  After several months of enjoyable idleness at her aunt's beachside cottage, Keri decided it was time to go back to work. She was determined to leave no ties with the Van Metres unsevered, so, for the first time in her life, she used the friendship and influence of her godfather for her benefit. She explained the situation to him and emphasized the reason for her unwillingness to obtain a reference from her former employer. If Schyler knew she had contacted his father for a reference, he might seek and find her again.

  Her godfather understood "all too well," he advised her with a twinkle in his eyes. "You've been beating them off with a stick from your crib days, Keri."

  "Well, I won't have to at work anymore," she retorted tartly. "I have a plan"

  She told him of her proposed transformation and he chuckled deeply. "Some smart man is going to see through to the real you without half trying, my dear. You can't hide that redheaded light under a bushel indefinitely."

  "Charles! My hair is not red," she remonstrated, carrying on a familiar, teasing argument between them. "Anyway," she pointed out, "it will make the job interview much easier. No one believes I can do what I say I can. It's time to look the part."

  "Did you have problems at your previous jobs, before Van Metre, I mean?" he asked her curiously.

  "To a certain extent," she admitted a bit unwillingly.

  "Not to the degree of nuisance value that Schyler has managed to attain, but annoying all the same. The old jokes about bosse
s chasing their secretaries around the desk don't sound so funny when you have your track shoes on. From now on I'm going to keep my private life strictly private. Absolutely no dates with anyone I work with, or for! Charles, I want a boss who's happily married and at least fifty, and he has to be someone who will take me on

  Van Metre and Company. I don't expect the same level of salary that I got from Van Metre . . . that would be hard to match . . . but I don't mind working the same field."

  "A vice-president or better, eh?" he smiled. "Fortunately, just the man springs to mind. His secretary of fifteen years recently surprised everyone by marrying a widower with four small children, and he's desperate. You'll be a thirty years ago."

  "Made to order. Bless you, Charles." Keri dropped a kiss on his bald spot. "I really know how to pick godfathers," she finished smugly. He laughed.

  So she had come to work for George Simonds and found him exactly tailored to her needs. She had had that moment of panic when she passed Schyler in the hall, but it had been nearly a week ago and if he'd recognised her, she would certainly have found him on her doorstep before now.

  All of these reflections faded from Ken's mind as the traffic jam she was trapped in finally began to break up. She gunned the Porsche through an opening which left several other drivers muttering about "women drivers" even while admiring the cool expertise which had freed her, like a cork popping out of a bottle, from the snaking line of cars.

  She parked the car in its assigned bay in the under-ground garage attached to her apartment building. Then while the elevator carried her swiftly to her floor, she freed her shoulder-length hair from its cruelly tight confinement. She shook her head to loose and fluff her hair until it swirled in comfortable disorder around her face. She shed her suit jacket, unbuttoned the first two buttons of her drab tan blouse, and stretched. She felt like a snake that had just shed a too-tight skin; for a weekend at least, she reminded herself.