LITMIR.BIZ

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panting, her leg was killing her. She went to the bathroom and downed two aspirin, hoping they were going to do the trick. She decided that she was going to have to give up fashion and wear flats again.

      Matt noticed, of course, when he returned to the office three days later. His eyes narrowed as he watched her walk across the floor of her small office.

      “Lou could give you something to take for the pain,” he said abruptly.

      She glanced at him as she pulled a file out of the metal cabinet. “Yes, she could, Mr. Caldwell, but do you really want a comatose secretary in Ed’s office? Painkillers put me to sleep.”

      “Pain makes for inefficiency.”

      She nodded. “I know that. I have a bottle of aspirin in my purse,” she assured him. “And the pain isn’t so bad that I can’t remember how to spell. It’s just a few bruises. They’ll heal. Dr. Coltrain said so.”

      He stared at her through narrowed, cold eyes. “You shouldn’t be limping after a week. I want you to see Lou again…”

      “I’ve limped for six years, Mr. Caldwell,” she said serenely. Her eyes kindled. “If you don’t like the limp, perhaps you shouldn’t stand and watch me walk.”

      His eyebrows arched. “Can’t the doctors do anything to correct it?”

      She glared at him. “I hate doctors!”

      The vehemence of her statement took him aback. She meant it, too. Her face flushed, her eyes sparkled with temper. It was such a difference from her usual expression that he found himself captivated. When she was animated, she was pretty.

      “They’re not all bad,” he replied finally.

      “There’s only so much you can do with a shattered bone,” she said and then bit her lip. She hadn’t meant to tell him that.

      The question was in his eyes, on his lips, but it never made it past them. Just as he started to ask, Ed came out of his office and spotted him.

      “Matt! Welcome back,” he said, extending a hand. “I just had a call from Bill Payton. He wanted to know if you were coming to the banquet Saturday night. They’ve got a live band scheduled.”

      “Sure,” Matt said absently. “Tell him to reserve two tickets for me. Are you going?”

      “I thought I would. I’ll bring Leslie along.” He smiled at her. “It’s the annual Jacobsville Cattle-men’s Association banquet. We have speeches, but if you survive them, and the rubber chicken, you get to dance.”

      “Her leg isn’t going to let her do much dancing,” Matt said solemnly.

      Ed’s eyebrows lifted. “You’d be surprised,” he said. “She loves Latin dances.” He grinned at Leslie. “So does Matt here. You wouldn’t believe what he can do with a mambo or a rhumba, to say nothing of the tango. He dated a dance instructor for several months, and he’s a natural anyway.”

      Matt didn’t reply. He was watching the play of expressions on Leslie’s face and wondering about that leg. Maybe Ed knew the truth of it, and he could worm it out of him.

      “You can ride in with us,” Matt said absently. “I’ll hire Jack Bailey’s stretch limo and give your secretary a thrill.”

      “It’ll give me a thrill, too,” Ed assured him. “Thanks, Matt. I hate trying to find a parking space at the country club when there’s a party.”

      “That makes two of us.”

      One of the secretaries motioned to Matt that he had a phone call. He left and Ed departed right behind him for a meeting. Leslie wondered how she was going to endure an evening of dancing without ending up close to Matt Caldwell, who already resented her standoffish attitude. It would be an ordeal, she supposed, and wondered if she could develop a convenient headache on Saturday afternoon.

      Leslie only had one really nice dress that was appropriate to wear to the function at the country club. The gown was a long sheath of shimmery silver fabric, suspended from her creamy shoulders by two little spaghetti straps. With it, she wore a silver-andrhinestone clip in her short blond hair and neat little silver slippers with only a hint of a heel.

      Ed sighed at the picture she made when the limousine pulled up in front of the boardinghouse where she was staying. She met him on the porch, a small purse clenched in damp hands, all aflutter at the thought of her first evening out since she was seventeen. She was terribly nervous.

      “Is the dress okay?” she asked at once.

      Ed smiled, taking in her soft oval face with its faint blush of lipstick and rouge, which was the only makeup she ever wore. Her gray eyes had naturally thick black lashes, which never needed mascara.

      “You look fine,” he assured her.

      “You’re not bad in a tux yourself,” she murmured with a grin.

      “Don’t let Matt see how nervous you are,” he said as they approached the car. “Somebody phoned and set him off just as we left my house. Carolyn was almost in tears.”

      “Carolyn?” she asked.

      “His latest trophy girlfriend,” he murmured. “She’s from one of the best families in Houston, staying with her aunt so she’d be on hand for tonight’s festivities. She’s been relentlessly pursuing Matt for months. Some of us think she’s gaining ground.”

      “She’s beautiful, I guess?” she asked.

      “Absolutely. In a way, she reminds me of Franny.”

      Franny had been Ed’s fiancée, shot to death in a foiled bank robbery about the time Leslie had been catapulted into sordid fame. It had given them something in common that drew them together as friends.

      “That must be rough,” Leslie said sympathetically.

      He glanced at her curiously as they approached the car. “Haven’t you ever been in love?”

      She shrugged, tugging the small faux fur cape closer around her shoulders. “I was a late bloomer.” She swallowed hard. “What happened to me turned me right off men.”

      “I’m not surprised.”

      He waited while the chauffeur, also wearing a tuxedo, opened the door of the black super-stretch limousine for them. Leslie climbed in, followed by Ed, and the door closed them in with Matt and the most beautiful blond woman Leslie had ever seen. The other woman was wearing a simple black sheath dress with a short skirt and enough diamonds to open a jewelry store. No point in asking if they were real, Leslie thought, considering the look of that dress and the very real sable coat wrapped around it.

      “You remember my cousin, Ed,” Matt drawled, lounging back in the leather seat across from Ed and Leslie. Small yellow lights made it possible for them to see each other in the incredibly spacious interior. “This is his secretary, Miss Murry. Carolyn Engles,” he added, nodding toward the woman at his side.

      Murmured acknowledgments followed his introduction. Leslie’s fascinated eyes went from the bar to the phones to the individual controls on the air-conditioning and heating systems. It was like a luxury apartment on wheels, she thought, and tried not to let her amusement show.

      “Haven’t you ever been in a limousine before?” Matt asked with a mocking smile.

      “Actually, no,” she replied with deliberate courtesy. “It’s quite a treat. Thank you.”

      He seemed disconcerted by her reply. He averted his head and studied Ed. His next words showed he’d forgotten her. “Tomorrow morning, first thing, I want you to pull back every penny of support we’re giving Marcus Boles. Nobody, and I mean nobody, involves me in a shady land deal like that!”

      “It amazes me that we didn’t see through him from the start,” Ed agreed. “The whole campaign was just a diversion, to give the real candidate someone to shoot down. He’ll look like

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