Tell Me No Lies (15 page)

"That's like saying Lafitte-Rothschild owns a nice little winery," muttered Lindsay, looking at Catlin as though she had never seen him before. She had heard the Pacific Rim Institute mentioned in the same terms of respect as were used for Rand's more highly publicized think tank. "You really do that?" she asked, hardly able to believe that this cold, controlled, physically powerful man was also one of the gray eminences who advised kings, premiers, presidents and lesser politicos on the state of the Asian nations.

Catlin gave her a sideways glance. "I really do. Why?"

"It's so, er, respectable."

For just an instant humor replaced coldness in Catlin's expression. "And I'm not?" he asked, his mouth lifting at one corner in an almost hidden smile.

Lindsay found herself smiling in return. "Are dragons respectable?"

"When it serves their purpose, yes," Catlin assured her smoothly.

"Is this serving your purpose?"

"It must be. I'm here."

"Then-"

Catlin made an impatient gesture, cutting off the questions he knew were coming. He turned and pulled Lindsay into his arms, easily overwhelming the instant of stiffness before she remembered her role. He bent and brushed his lips over hers, but his words were an icy counterpoint to his caressing touch.

"Think before you ask me anything else, Lindsay," he whispered against her lips. "Before this is over, you're going to need someone you feel you can trust. I won't lie to you, but I won't tell you more of the truth than I have to, either. And sometimes I won't answer at all. Do you understand?"

Lindsay stared at the impeccable ruffled shirt and sleek black dinner jacket that were just inches away from her face. "Ask you no questions and you'll tell me no lies, is that what you're saying?"

"Yes."

She hesitated, then looked directly into Catlin's unusual eyes. "Have you had a lot of experience living in hell?"

"Yes."

"Then I couldn't have a better guide, could I?"

"Remember that," Catlin murmured, tightening his arms painfully around Lindsay. "When we're alone, utterly alone, you may question me if you feel you must. But out in public you may not. Ever. If you can't accept that, call Stone right now and tell him to find another sucker. Our lives may depend on people believing that you are so infatuated that you will do anything to please me. Including sell your unblemished soul." Catlin stared down at Lindsay, his expression closed, offering neither comfort nor encouragement. "The act must begin tonight."

"I thought – I thought it had begun last night," Lindsay said, her voice catching with the question she would not allow herself to ask.

Catlin said nothing. He knew that she was wondering whether he had stayed with her last night out of compassion and a desire for companionship, or simply as a calculated effort to win her trust. He also knew that she was too proud to ask. He was grateful for that, because he didn't know the answer.

He didn't want to know it, either.

8

Lindsay watched in amusement as Mr. and Mrs. Stoltz unbent and became Tom and Harriet after a few moments of listening to Catlin's amusing conversation. The pomposity of the afterdinner speaker had helped to melt the social ice. It had been all Lindsay could do not to laugh aloud herself at Catlin's more outrageous asides to the speaker's pious phrases. She wondered if Catlin were as put off by pretensions to cultural superiority as she was, or if he simply had guessed that the Stoltzes disliked being lectured to on the subject of high art by a neon-nosed politico who couldn't tell painting from sculpture without a label.

Even as the question occurred to her, Lindsay shunted it aside. In public she must accept Catlin at his word. If she tried to dissect each action, each glance, each sentiment, she would turn in tighter and tighter mental circles until she was tangled hopelessly in a sticky net of her own weaving. She couldn't promise Catlin that she would become a great actress, but she would guarantee that she would learn the essentials of her role as quickly as possible. She would laugh at his incisive observations and not ask whether he was being witty in order to get closer to Qin's bronzes or because he genuinely was enjoying the evening with her.

Besides, did she really believe there was any doubt as to what motivated Jacob MacArthur Catlin?

"What do you think, Lindsay?"

Belatedly she realized that Mr. Stoltz had asked her a question. She turned away from her brooding study of Catlin's profile and said, "I'm sorry, Tom. I didn't hear what you said."

Mr. Stoltz gave her a knowing smile. "Admiring the scenery, huh?"

"Er, yes," she mumbled, ducking her head to hide her annoyance at his genial leer. With an effort she schooled her features into their familiar expression of professional attentiveness. As she did, she wryly conceded to herself that being an actress might not be too hard after all; a variation of it was required in her daily work.

"Catlin was telling me you found a flawless Han hill-censer for him," continued Mr. Stoltz. "Old, but never buried."

"Yes," said Lindsay, sipping the late harvest Riesling that had been served with the rich cheesecake.

"Treasures like that don't come on the market very often. Wonder why the family gave it up?"

"Maybe they didn't" Catlin said matter-of-factly, turning toward Mr. Stoltz with a slight smile. "Maybe it was lost."

Catlin's expression said that a more appropriate word might be "stolen," and he didn't really give a damn one way or the other.

Lindsay bit back an instinctive defense of her own honesty as she remembered the role she had volunteered to play. On the other hand, she decided that it would seem odd if she changed completely overnight.

"I don't think so, darling," she murmured. "The papers showed that some other museum bought the censer from a refugee family early in 1920."

"And you always believe everything you see in print, hmm?" asked Catlin, running a fingertip indulgently down Lindsay's nose. He shrugged negligently, a motion that drew the fabric of his coat tightly across his wide shoulders. "All that matters is that the piece is genuine, and the museum didn't recognize it. You did." He bent and kissed her slowly on the lips. "Clever little honey cat. How did I get so lucky as to find you?"

A flush stained Lindsay's cheeks. Grimly she hoped that no one would recognize it for what it was – anger at being so obviously patronized. When she trusted herself to look, Catlin was watching her. His eyes did not reflect the smiling indulgence of his mouth. They were like candle flames imprisoned within ice – brilliant, entirely without warmth.

"You must have done something utterly marvelous in another life to deserve me," Lindsay said, her voice husky with the effort of controlling herself.

Catlin's laugh was soft, deep, as unexpected as the sudden flicker of real warmth in his expression. "Do you believe in more than one life?" he asked, watching her with the satisfied smile of a man who is sure of his hold on a woman.

"Having met you, how could I believe anything else?" she retorted throatily, smiling with more teeth than warmth.

Catlin's smile thinned as he realized that Lindsay was deliberately referring to the double life he had once led and that both of them were leading right now.

"You don't have any more Han bronzes up your sleeve, do you?" asked Mr. Stoltz.

Before Lindsay could answer, Catlin's hands moved slowly from Lindsay's shoulders to her fingertips. "Not a one," he said, turning toward the other man. "Sorry."

Mr. Stoltz's laugh was a harsh male bark. Vigorously he shook his half-bald head, lifting wisps of fine white hair. "No you aren't, and in your shoes I wouldn't be, either."

"Don't worry, Tom," said his wife, leaning forward, her sleekly cut gray hair gleaming like pewter in the light. "Catlin assured me that the Han purchase was unusual for him. His true passion is third century B.C. bronzes."

"Especially pieces from the time of Emperor Qin," added Catlin.

"Qin's dynasty lasted only fourteen years," Mrs. Stoltz said, dismissing it with a flawlessly manicured hand.

"Ah, but what years those were," countered Catlin, leaning toward the woman, his eyes intent. "In 221 B.C. one man unified all of China. One man's vision was imprinted on the face of the greatest nation on Earth. Think of it. In all Europe's history, where cultures and races were much less diverse than in China, there never was unity of government. Not even Rome managed it, though Lord knows they spent a lot of men trying. The northern cultures always evaded the Roman Peace. Perhaps all that Rome lacked was what Qin discovered – the many and bloody uses of highly mobile cavalry against heavy war chariots."

"Qin's vision didn't stop with military maneuvers," continued Catlin, picking up Lindsay's hand and absently smoothing the pad of his thumb down the soft inner skin of her wrist as he spoke.

Sensation radiated through Lindsay from the warmth of Catlin's touch. She watched him with an intensity that matched his as he spoke softly of one of the great rulers in human history. Like Catlin's words, the slow stroking of his thumb sent ripples of awareness through her.

"Qin knew that to hold his conquered lands and peoples together, he had to standardize everything from the size of axles on carts to the width of the roads to the law itself," said Catlin. "Qin did just that with a ruthlessness that has since become legend, burying rebellious Confucian scholars alive to make his point.

Nor was he satisfied with simple tyranny. He knew that food as well as soldiers had to be moved freely from one end of his huge country to the other, so that famine in the north could be balanced by the south's bounty. A network of roads was built, China's greatest river was subjected to man's control, and the Great Wall was completed, ending the barbarian raids and removing the need for warlords with personal armies to protect personal feuds."

Lindsay watched Catlin openly, making no effort to conceal her interest in both the man and his words. She was accustomed to a certain amount of scholarship in the men she dated, but she wasn't accustomed to a mind that was both educated and highly pragmatic. The combination fascinated her.

"The result of Qin's military and administrative genius was precisely what Qin had in mind – the destruction of feudal China," summarized Catlin. "Qin gave land to the peasants and then he taxed those peasants directly, erecting a framework for imperial control that endured largely unchanged into the twentieth century."

Lindsay watched as Catlin's amber eyes changed subtly, signaling a shift in his attention from his dinner companions to something much farther away in time and place. She felt herself being pulled along with him, for the intelligence and restrained passion in him as he spoke of Qin was as electrifying to her as the thumb delicately caressing the inside of her wrist.

"But Qin's greatest accomplishment," Catlin continued softly, "was his preparation for the comfort of the half of his soul that would remain on earth after his death. A million peasants, as well as the artists and artisans of an entire continent, worked for more than a decade to build the twelve square miles of grave mound that we know as Mount Li. Perhaps seven thousand life-size terra cotta soldiers were made and painted in individual detail, as well as horses and chariots and weapons. Nor did Qin stop there. Another army was cast, this time in bronze. It guarded another entrance to the grave mound. The bronzes were made in the style men came to call Qin – inlaid with gold and silver, using designs as graceful and fluid as the terra cotta soldiers were powerful.

"There must be other treasures at Mount Li, too," said Catlin, "grave furnishings in all that was precious to the Qin culture, metals and jade, ivory and fantastic silks brocaded in silver and gold. Through the centuries men have talked of a bronze map of Qin's China that was as big as a football field. The map had seas and rivers of mercury that coursed over its surface, circulated by pumps. All to amuse the soul of Qin."

Lindsay barely controlled a shiver as Catlin's thumb slid from her wrist to her fingertips, caressing them slowly while he spoke. The passion that had vibrated subtly through his words was more apparent now. His voice deepened suddenly, becoming as supple and smooth as a quicksilver river created by a long-dead emperor for the future entertainment of his own soul.

"I'd trade all the gold and silver, incense and silk, ivory and jade, all of it, for a single bronze chariot and charioteer," said Catlin. "No one anywhere, in any time or culture, attained the artistry and understanding of bronze that was achieved under Qin's reign. In Qin bronzes, there is true greatness."

Catlin turned and fixed Lindsay with his uncanny golden brown eyes. She met the glance without even being aware of it. She was aware of nothing but the emotion coiled in his voice, an emotion very like her own when she thought of man's greatness cast in enduring bronze for all the ages to share. She didn't remember that there were other people at the table, other voices in the room, an act to be conducted on a public stage. Only Catlin existed for her, and his deep voice was describing emotions she had always believed only she herself felt. It was like the moment when she had seen how confidently and yet reverently he had handled the unique Shang bronze. It was like seeing a reflection of her own soul – dizzying, confusing, almost terrifying, for Catlin was very much unlike anyone she had ever known, especially herself.

"I would give anything I own," he said, watching her. "I would give anything you asked, for one of Qin's bronze charioteers."

"If there is one to be found," Lindsay promised, her voice husky with the yearning she sensed in him, a yearning frighteningly like her own, "I'll find it for you, Catlin. It will be yours."

"Sweet Lindsay," he murmured, kissing the palm of her hand. "You are much too good for me."

"Don't tell her that," said Mr. Stoltz, horrified. "She might believe you!"

"It would be only the truth," Catlin murmured. He released Lindsay's hand as he turned back to the other couple. "What about you, Tom? You know of any Xi'an bronzes for sale?"

Lindsay could barely conceal the shock she felt. Catlin's tone was matter-of-fact again, holding none of the complex emotions that had enthralled her and made her forget where she was and who he was. With fingers that wanted to tremble she reached for her small glass of Riesling. Forcefully she told herself that she had to stop being taken in by Catlin. With him everything was an act, even passion. Especially passion.

Yet even as she told herself that, she didn't believe it. She had known too many collectors, too many artists, too many scholars, to mistake the truth of the emotion in Catlin's voice when he spoke of history and bronze, greatness and man. He might fake an attraction to her for the sake of the job, but he loved ancient Chinese bronzes as passionately as she did.

"Right, Lindsay?" asked Mr. Stoltz.

Frantically Lindsay tried to recall the conversation that had eddied about her while she thought of passion and bronze and Jacob MacArthur Catlin. Nothing came to her but the realization that, despite the certainty that he was as ruthless in his own way as the long-dead Emperor Qin, Catlin was becoming more and more attractive to her with each moment she spent with him.

"Tom claims that all rumors of Qin mortuary bronzes have ended up being scams of one kind or another," said Catlin, smiling at Lindsay like an indulgent lover.

She took a grip on her fraying concentration and smiled blindly at Catlin – blindly because she refused to really meet his eyes. He was much less distracting when she wasn't caught like a foolish, fluttering insect in their cool amber depths.

"Well, yes," admitted Lindsay. "That's true. But – "

Taking her courage in both hands, Lindsay put her fingertips against Catlin's forearm with the casual intimacy of a woman who is accustomed to a certain man. Immediately she realized that the small embellishment on the act hadn't been a good idea. She wasn't accustomed to Catlin, to feeling the heat and power of him radiating through the dress shirt and dinner jacket. It was unnerving. Before she could snatch back her fingers, his hand came down over hers, firmly holding her captive, caressing her soft skin.

"But I'm – I haven't tried all possible sources for bronzes from Xi'an," Lindsay said quickly. She rushed on, wanting to say what was necessary for the act before her distaste became too obvious. "There are other – other dealers. People I don't usually – "

Her words dried up suddenly. She looked at Catlin in helpless, painful apology.

Catlin wanted to come to Lindsay's aid, to finish the sentences that were sticking in her throat, to somehow make it easier for her to open her mouth and compromise a lifetime of work in a few words. Ruthlessly he controlled the impulse to speak for her. Nothing he could say or do would be one-tenth as convincing to the Stoltzes as the flush on Lindsay's cheeks and the strain in her voice as she offered to sell her vaunted principles for a man.

In the end there was nothing Catlin could do but lift Lindsay's fingers from his sleeve and gently kiss her palm, breathing warmth into flesh that was too cool, almost chilled. Even as he caressed her hand, he knew that he should not. It wasn't part of the act.