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summoned all of her poise and gave him a polite little smile, deten-nined to hide the sudden coiling of fear in her stomach. I 'What do we have to talk about? It's been seven years, after all."

    He smiled, too, but his smile wasn't polite; the savagery of it sent shivers down her spine. "Then let's talk about old times," he said between his teeth. "Can't it wait?"

    "No," he said softly. "Now. I've got a lot of questions and I want answers to them."

    "I've got work to do-"

    "Just shut up," he warned, and she did.

    The elevator lurched to a halt and her stomach lurched with it. Rhy's manner made her uneasy and she didn't want to be alone with him, much less go through the inquisition she knew she was in for.

    He ushered her out of the elevator and down the corridor to his private office. His secretary looked up and smiled when she saw them, but the words she started to say were halted when Rhy hurled "No interruptions" over his shoulder as he followed Sallie into his office and closed the door firmly behind them.

    Sallie stood only a few feet away from him and blinked, trying to adjust herself to the reality of his presence. She had been forced to accept his absence and now she just could not accept his presence. He was a mirage, a figment of her imagination, far too virile and forceful to be real.

    But he stood by the door, watching her with those unnerving gray eyes, and he was very real and solid.
    Rather than meet those eyes she let her gaze drift over his body and she noted automatically the way his dark brown suit fit him impeccably, the trousers molding themselves to the muscled length of his legs. Her pulse began to beat a bit faster and she caught her lower lip with her teeth.

    "Rhy..." Her voice quavered and she cleared her throat, then began again. "Rhy, why are you acting like this?"

    "What do you mean?" he asked, his eyes glinting dangerously. "You're my wife and I want to know what's going on here. You've obviously been avoiding me. Should I have ignored your presence, as you seem prepared to do with mine? Forgive me if I was slow on the uptake, baby, but I was surprised to see you and you caught me off-balance. I didn't think to pretend that I didn't know you."

    She caught her breath in relief. "Oh, that," she said, sighing, weak now that she knew what he wanted.
    "Yes, I was avoiding you. I didn't know how you'd take the idea of my working for you and I didn't want to risk losing my job."

    "Have you told anyone that we're married?" he barked.

    She shook her head. "Everyone knows me as Sallie Jerome. I went back to my maiden name because I didn't want to use the influence of your name."

    "That's big of you, Mrs. Baines," he murmured sarcastically, moving to his desk. "Sit down, I won't bite."

    She took a chair, more than ready now to answer his questions. If he had been going to fire her he would already have done so; her job was safe and she relaxed visibly.

    Rhy didn't sit down but instead leaned against his desk, crossed his long legs at the ankle and folded his arms across his chest. He was silent while his glittering gray eyes looked her over thoroughly from head to foot and Sallie began to tense again. She didn't know why, but he made her feel threatened even when he wasn't moving. Then his silence irritated her and she said tartly, "What did you want to talk about?"

    "You've changed, Sarah-Sallie," he corrected himself. "It's a drastic change, and I don't mean just your name. You've grown a mane of hair and you've lost so much weight a good wind would blow you away. And most of all, you're doing adamned good job at something I would've sworn you'd never touch. How did you get to be a reporter?"

    "Oh, that was just luck," she said cheerfully. "I was driving on a bridge when it collapsed and I wrote it up and turned it in to the editor of the newspaper and he changed my job from clerk to reporter."

    "You make it sound almost logical for you to be

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