Meltdown (9 page)

“I do not.”

E rolled a series of numbers across his screen.
Wednesday, 7:45
PM
—changed subject. 10:03
PM
—changed subject. Thursday, 6:18
AM
—changed
—

“All right!” Melanie nearly shouted. “I change the subject. So what? Personally, I’d say that
not
discussing Chris Sheffield is the smartest thing a person can do. I wouldn’t waste my breath discussing the man. He’s arrogant, he’s conceited, he’s obnoxious—”

He’s here
.

Melanie’s jaw dropped. “Here? In the house?”

In southeast quadrant of living room
.

Melanie looked down at her wrinkled blouse, streaked with oil, and her equally untidy-looking skirt. “Einstein, please, please tell me this is a joke.”

Why? Chris coming not funny, is it?

No, Melanie thought, it’s definitely
not
funny. She stood up and attempted to smooth her badly rumpled skirt. Corrugated steel was easier to straighten. Damn the man! She didn’t want him to see her like this. Maybe she could slip down the hall to her bedroom and change before—

“Hello,” a voice said behind her. “Anybody home?”

The sound of his voice melted through her like sweet, warm caramel. She’d missed him more than she wanted to admit to herself, and certainly more than she wanted to admit to him. Gritting her teeth, she turned to face him, hoping her slight, noncommittal smile would hold firm when she saw him.

It did—barely. Chris’s tall frame filled the room’s doorway. Melanie swallowed hard. His white, open-necked shirt and blue jeans molded to his athletic
body in all the right places. Or wrong places, depending how one looked at it. He held his hands behind him, an unusual stance for Chris, but Melanie barely gave it a thought. Her gaze was drawn to the soft humor in his eyes that stirred a sweet, honeyed ache in her heart.

She forced herself not to think about her abysmal appearance, and searched for something intelligent and witty to say. “You’re … early.”

His smile deepened. How, he wondered, could a woman manage to look so disheveled and so desirable at the same time? The sight of her more than made up for the long hours he’d put in firming up the Abilene deal in record time. “I thought I’d come back a few days early and give you a chance to chew me out.”

Melanie remembered the questions she’d had to field from the data-entry operators, and grimaced. “Only a few days?”

Chris laughed. “Okay. I deserve that. Did you miss me?”

Affirmative
, Einstein flashed.

“E missed you,” Melanie said, studying her nails. “I barely noticed you were gone.”

But you said
—

Melanie gave Einstein a swift kick in the processor, momentarily disrupting his linear programming. E’s screen cleared. “As I said,” she repeated, “I barely noticed you were gone.”

Chris stepped through the doorway, his face reflecting less than genuine concern. Melanie was lying and he knew it. It somehow managed to make her all the more endearing. “Well,” he said with a sigh, “I guess I bought this present for nothing.”

Einstein’s dish antennae swiveled toward Chris.
Present?

“Hush, E,” Melanie chided, though her heart
skipped a beat. The thought of Chris bringing her a present filled her with warm, ridiculous hopes. She couldn’t let him know that. She bit her lip, afraid to let her feelings show. She couldn’t let him think he could buy his way into her good graces with some silly, spur of the moment—

“Consider it a peace offering,” Chris said as he pulled a long, slim metal box from behind his back, and handed it to Melanie.

Her anger sputtered out like a faulty fuse. Chris had handed her a 9600 bps modem, a new age telecommunication device that would enable Einstein to send and receive information over the phone lines at an astronomical rate. With it her computer could access information from all over the world. It was so fabulously expensive, Melanie never imagined she’d be able to obtain one for Einstein.

“Chris,” she said, hugging the heavy piece of equipment to her, “I never dreamed you’d be able to … But how could you afford it? It’s so expensive.”

For a moment Chris didn’t answer. He was too busy enjoying the way she cradled the mechanical box, as if it were the most precious thing on the face of the earth. Over the years he had given presents to many woman, but none of their reactions touched him as deeply as Melanie’s did. For the first time he felt he’d made a difference to someone. A real difference. So what if the modem was expensive? Hell, he’d have mortgaged his soul to see that joy shining out of her eyes. “Then you like it?”

“Like it?” she said breathlessly. “I hoped and prayed that one day I’d be able to afford this for Einstein. Chris, let’s not wait. Let’s install it right now. It’ll make E so happy.”

Chris rubbed his chin. “I’d really like to, but I’ve got other plans.”

Her joy sputtered out. He has a date, she thought, her smile dying. Well, what did she expect? It was Friday night, his first night back in town after several days on the road. No doubt there were a number of women clamoring for his attention. And she’d bet none of them would greet him wearing a wrinkled blouse streaked with oil.

She cleared her throat, fighting to keep the disappointment out of her voice. “I hope you have a good time. You’ve earned it. But I’m planning to test Einstein’s remote terminal tomorrow and I’ll need your help. Could you come by around eight?”

Chris shook his head.

He must be planning a late night, Melanie thought. The realization twisted her emotions into a knot. Still, she was determined to be fair. “Okay, you can show up at nine. But that’s as late as I go. That remote failed in your father’s office, and I don’t want a repeat—”

“Will you shut up about the remote?” Chris said, his eyes bright with humor. “When I said I had other plans, I meant for
us
. You and me. You know—cocktails, dinner, maybe dancing.”

Melanie swallowed. There had to be something seriously wrong with her hearing. She could have sworn he’d just asked her out. “You mean, kind of like a date?”

“No, I mean exactly like a date. Honestly, for a genius you’re pretty slow on the uptake.”

That was a matter of opinion. Melanie’s mind was processing at the speed of light; it just had a great deal to take in. Chris had just asked her out. Chris Sheffield. Her midnight fantasy.

It made no sense. Men like Chris did not go out with women like her. The logical universe had just turned on its ear. Panicked, she said, “I can’t go out with you.”

“Why not?”

“I … I don’t have anything to wear.”

His smile deepened. He raked her body with a bold, penetrating gaze. “That could be interesting.”

Melanie closed her eyes, making a quick scan of the two-times table before saying, “I can’t go out. There’s too much left to do before tomorrow’s test.”

“So we’ll start at seven instead of eight,” Chris said, his persuasive eyes full of an inviting warmth. “Come on, genius. You’ve just spent a week doing solo duty on Einstein. I’ve just spent forty-eight hours convincing a Texas sidewinder to cut the first honest deal he’s signed in his life. We’ve earned some R and R. Even E thinks we should go.”

“Einstein?” She turned and looked at the monitor. There, in Day-Glo orange, was
Boogie till you bust
.

She couldn’t help laughing. “What is this? A conspiracy?”

“We just have your best interests at heart,” Chris said, flashing a grin that contradicted his words. “Face it, We won’t take no for an answer.”

No, they won’t, Melanie thought. She’d run out of excuses and wasn’t as upset by that fact as she knew she ought to be. Face it, she chided herself, you want to go out with him. You’ve wanted to go out with him since the first day—no, the first moment you saw him.

Be smart, her mind warned. This was a friendship date. Chris had asked her out as a reward for their mutual hard work. It was a friendly gesture, nothing more. The infatuation she felt for him was totally and completely one-sided.

For now, sang her heart.

She was playing a dangerous game, but as she hurried down the hall to change her clothes, she felt her elation nudge aside her inherent caution. Friendly gesture or not, this might be her one chance
to make Chris feel about her the way she felt about him. She wasn’t about to give that up. Not for all the microprocessing chips in Japan.

Melanie had always believed there was an equation for everything. But as she glanced up from her dinner to steal a look at Chris, she began to doubt her theory. Opportunity rarely knocked louder. Here she was, sitting at a candle-lit table across from the man she’d been fantasizing about for three solid months, the man who sent her pulse into a tailspin every time he spoke her name. She wanted to make him understand and acknowledge the depth of her feelings for him. And she didn’t have the least idea of how to go about it.

Chris seemed unsure of how to proceed. He’d asked Melanie out on the spur of the moment, but he wanted her to have a good time. He saw the worry in her eyes and read the exhaustion in her smile. She needed a night on the town in the worst way. She spent too much time buttoned up in those stiff, tailored suits of hers. Hell, even now she wore a high-necked blouse, though its lace edging kept it from being totally sensible.

Still, treating Melanie to a night of fun was proving to be harder than he’d bargained for. The longest conversation they’d had was when the waiter came to take their orders. Chris, who was never at a loss for words, found himself tongue-tied in her presence. All his clever social conversation seemed shallow and pointless. He wanted to find out about Melanie, the
real
Melanie. Discovering the woman who lived behind the carefully constructed wall of reserve had become important to him.

“So. You ordered oysters,” Melanie said unexpectedly.

She’d spoken. A good sign. “Yes. On the half shell.” Another moment of strained silence passed before he added, “You ordered gumbo. That’s pretty spicy, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” Brilliant, Melanie. Impress him with your scintillating vocabulary. She picked up her wineglass and took a sip, then tried again. “Actually, it’s more than spicy. It’s … radical.”

Chris smiled at her use of one of Einstein’s favorite words. Einstein. Now there was something they had in common. “What do you think E would say about this restaurant?”

Melanie had been so focused on Chris, she hadn’t noticed her surroundings. For the first time she looked around at the soft lighting and the simple yet evocative West Indies decor. The bold, primitive shapes were at once attractive and disturbing, and the strains of Jamaican reggae drifting in from the dance floor made her think of sun-drenched days and steamy nights. She took another sip of wine. “Einstein would want them to turn up the volume.”

“He would, wouldn’t he? Down in Jamaica they play reggae hot and loud, just the way E likes it.”

Melanie smiled, silently agreeing with him. “I suppose I should be thankful he hasn’t discovered reggae yet. Funny. I always imagined Jamaica would be a soft, dreamy country. Like in the song ‘Montego Bay.’ ”

“It is, sometimes. You should go there. It’s not an expensive trip from here.”

Melanie shook her head. “It’s not just the money. I can’t leave Einstein. I mean, who would watch him while I was away? Who would talk with him and keep him from getting lonely?”

“There’s always the Shopping Channel,” Chris offered, grinning.

“I’m serious. E needs intellectual and emotional
stimulation. He needs—he needs to know that someone cares.”

Lord, thought Chris, she’s talking about that hodgepodge of hardware as if it were alive. “Melanie, Einstein’s a wonderful invention, but you can’t put your whole life on hold for him.”

“I thought you liked him,” Melanie said, sounding hurt.

“I
do
like him. He’s a sparkling conversationalist, a mathematical dynamo, and he can forecast the point spread on a football game better than anything I’ve ever seen. But—”

He’d been about to say, “he’s only a machine,” until Melanie’s expression stopped him cold. Her wide, dark eyes looked into his, infinitely fragile, exquisitely vulnerable. She trusted him to say the right thing, to believe the right thing. He couldn’t betray her.

If she wanted to believe her creation was human, it was fine with him. “Tell you what. If you promise to treat yourself to a trip, I’ll watch him for you. Deal?”

She smiled, a charming, off-center smile that hit his heart broadside. Lord, she confused him. She was business to the core, then her eyes would flash a bit of magic his way and knock the pins right out from under him. He wondered what kind of woman lived behind those smoky eyes. Did she have the soul of a calculator, or was her nature as ripe as the centerfold body she concealed beneath her starched collars and sensible suits?

Whoa. Theirs was a business relationship. She had made that clear from the beginning, and he had too much invested in this project to jeopardize their relationship. Not even for a pair of bewitching eyes. He cleared his throat and changed the subject. “Would you like more wine?”

Melanie put her hand over the rim of her empty
glass. “Two is my limit. We’ve got a full day tomorrow. I want to be at my best for testing E’s remote.”

I wish she’d show me half the attention she shows that computer
, he thought. Einstein was critical to both their futures, but her constant preoccupation with her invention was beginning to get on his nerves. “Look,” he said pointedly, “if you’re so concerned with E, maybe we ought to forget about dinner and get back to him.”

“No!” The word came out with the force of a rocket, causing the couple at the next table to glance her way.
Great
, she thought miserably,
now he probably thinks I’m a total idiot
.

Chris was beyond thinking. The sight of Melanie flushed and distracted knocked him for a loop. He noticed the way her hair spilled around her shoulders, catching the candlelight like quick, moving sparks. Unbound, it changed her appearance dramatically, turning his mousy partner into a woman of soft curves and sweet darkness. The woman behind the wall …