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life.
    To her own private disgust, Elissa felt her breath catch in her throat as his eyes clashed with hers. He didn’t look beyond her into the room full of people. It was as if he had no curiosity whatsoever about the change in his plans for the evening. His whole attention was focused on Elissa’s challenging, upturned face as she stood poised with one hand on the doorknob and one braced against the jamb.
    “A party, Elissa?” he drawled with a deceptive mildness which didn’t fool her at all. “You amaze me. I had assumed you’d want discretion to be the keyword for our little arrangement. I had no idea you intended to celebrate.” The darkness of his hair gleamed in the hall light as he waited for her response with a taunting nonchalance which rasped along her nerve endings.
    “Not a celebration, Wade,” she murmured coolly, facing him with the sum total of her self-possession. “More of an object lesson for you on the perils of leaping to conclusions!”
    “Are you sure it’s a lesson you’re trying to teach me, or did you organize all this with the idea of providing yourself with an illusion of safety while you negotiate? I thought I made it clear yesterday there’s no point in bargaining with me. I hold the high cards in this little game.” There was no threat in his words, only a calm statement of fact. Wade Taggert was very, very sure of himself.
    “And in a few minutes when you realize you were completely wrong about me there will be no need to negotiate at all,” she assured him, lifting her chin in a small, regal gesture. “Except, perhaps, when we discuss the nature of your apology. I’m assuming you will have enough integrity to want to do that, but I could be wrong. You may simply slink off into the night, unable to face me after you’re forced to admit the truth.”
    “You’re going to play this scene right out to the end, aren’t you?” he noted with mocking admiration as he stepped forward, forcing her back into the room. For the first time he glanced around at the other guests, a few of whom were beginning to notice his presence.
    Elissa was acutely aware of the astonished silence that descended briefly on the room as word went through the group that Wade Taggert had arrived. The others must be flabbergasted that she had invited the man who had denied her the well-earned promotion.
    And for the first time in years there was an awkward stretch of silence at an Elissa Sheldon party. A silence she moved instinctively to deal with before it ruined June’s celebration. Whatever her private battle with the tall, cold man at her side, her guests would not be involved.
    “Look who managed to drop by, after all, everyone,” she announced brightly, her fingers hovering lightly on the sleeve of Wade’s sweater as she forced herself to lead him forward in a welcoming fashion. When his other hand came up to cover hers, clamping it to his forearm in a possession which to others might have appeared to be only a casually polite move, she realized she was trapped. The single option available to her now was to continue with her plan.
    “Where’s our guest of honor?” Elissa demanded cheerfully, searching the crowd for June’s neat, dark head. “Ah, there you are. Come and meet your husband’s boss. Martin, I didn’t want to tell you Mr. Taggert might drop by in case he couldn’t make it…”
    “Oh, there was never any doubt that I’d get here,” Wade demurred, bending his head politely to a smiling June Randolph and releasing his grip on Elissa’s hand to take the other woman’s fingers in his. Elissa wisely used the momentary freedom to jerk her own hand off his sleeve and safely out of reach.
    “I’m so happy to meet you,” June chattered, unaware of the constraint in the room. “You’re just in time to have a piece of birthday cake. I’m going to cut it in a moment.”
    “Thank you,” Wade said softly, glancing at Martin Randolph, who stood behind his wife. “I believe