Relentless Adversary by Jayne Castle Page B

answers. He would seduce the culprit and coax the explanation out of her.
    Kelly's small fist struck the window frame in self-disgust and pain, both physical and mental. Well, she had her answer. She now knew what Locke wanted from her. To give the devil his due, he was asking for something altogether different from any of the other men in her life had asked. The others had wanted her strength. Locke wanted to defeat her. Totally.
    He had come very close tonight, she thought bitterly, turning away from the window and heading toward the bed with its ivory quilt. His strategy had been brilliant. Who could have guessed that she would have surrendered so completely to the one man who had demonstrated his strength to her instead of his weakness?
    Or perhaps it stood to reason, she decided miserably as she slipped off the robe and climbed into bed. Perhaps it was inevitable that after so many years of finding herself in the role of comforter, sympathetic ear, and female tower of strength she would succumb to the one man who pitted his strength against hers.
    She had been a fool tonight, but now she knew the full truth. The question of what to do next remained, however.
    Worrying about it kept her awake for hours. That, in itself, was significant, she thought grimly. Kelly seldom worried about a problem. She simply set about solving it.
    She was still worrying about it, however, at nine o'clock the next morning as she sat at her desk and sipped a cup of tea. Of all the possible solutions the only one that seemed practical was to go to Helen and hand in her resignation.
    The difficulty there lay in the fact that the role of martyr didn't come easily.
    Which left the option of confronting Brett. Kelly's fingers drummed idly on the desk while she considered that.
    What would Brett do? It had been several months since the incident. How did he feel about it now?
    The door opened as she was in the process of running through a variety of mental arguments, including the possibility that Locke had been bluffing when he said he could get the information he needed from the computer.
    "Good morning, sweetheart," Locke greeted her, standing in the doorway with a huge pile of computer printouts stacked in his arms. She met his green gaze over the top of the stack and said nothing, waiting.
    "You'll be pleased to learn that I have just commandeered that desk over there by the window," he went on blithely, heading for the long worktable Kelly used for certain projects. He dumped the computer printouts down onto the desk and turned back to face her with a perceptive smile.
    He was wearing his usual corduroy jacket over the casually unbuttoned shirt, and his thick black hair looked slightly windblown. He'd probably combed it before leaving home that morning but hadn't bothered to repeat the process after arriving at work. The new storm front approaching from the ocean had brought brisk winds.
    "Why?" Kelly sipped her tea and watched him the way a rabbit watches a cobra.
    "Because I have now come to the part of the business I hate most: writing the final report for management. And I couldn't concentrate down in the computer room with all the racket from the printer and the constant chatter. Besides, this will give us a chance to get to know each other a little better, don't you think?"
    He folded his arms and leaned back against the desk, one brow cocked wryly as she simply continued to sit and watch him.
    "I notice you're not running into my arms for a good-morning kiss," he observed.
    "I don't seem to feel terribly energetic this morning."
    "Ah, brooding over last night, are we?"
    "Not exactly. I'm doing some of the thinking I should have done last night." Kelly informed him coldly, her narrowed eyes never leaving his harshly carved face. She could see the memory of the previous night in his warm, green gaze and wanted to slap the tanned cheek.
    "Thinking wouldn't have done you any good last night, honey," he assured her sympathetically. "I was a