The Drifter Read Free

on the twentieth floor.
    His back was behaving itself today. When the spasms hit, he was damn near immobilized, but this morning he’d felt so good he decided to finish his original mission—to find out if Amanda was pregnant. Yet, after fifteen minutes of watching people surge in and out of the elevator, he was no more ready to ride than when he’d walked into the lobby. He glanced around, found the sign for the stairs and was halfway across the lobby when he paused. Then, with a muttered oath of resolution, he strode back to the elevator just before the doors closed, shoved them open and stepped inside.
    The trip up made his stomach pitch. He glared suspiciously at the three women and four men in the elevator with him and wondered if any of them would be prepared with a cellular phone in case of an emergency. His jaw clenched, he watched the flashing numbers above the door. When the twentieth floor appeared, he wanted to shoulder his way past the others who were getting off, but he held back, forcing himself to face the fear. Once free of the elevator, he flexed his shoulders with a sigh and a little smile of triumph. He’d ridden the damn thing.
    He stuck his head in the first office that bore the Artemis name on the door and flashed the famous Lavette grin complete with dimple. “I’m looking for Amanda Drake.”
    The receptionist, a woman in her forties, reacted as most women did when he smiled at them. Pink rose to her cheeks, and the pupils of her eyes widened. Chase had had that effect on women ever since he’d reached puberty, and it was a nice perk in a life that hadn’t presented all that many.
    â€œDo you know where I might find her?” he prompted, knowing that sometimes women took a moment to pull themselves together before they answered. According to the nameplate on her desk, this one was named Bonnie Chalmers.
    She blinked. “Miss Drake’s on extended leave,” she said as if reciting her times tables.
    Chase thought that over. There was one obvious reason for her to be on extended leave, but his trucking buddies had told him that women in this day and age didn’t slip off quietly and have babies. They demanded child support, his buddies had said, and plenty of it.
    â€œShe’s not sick or anything, is she, Bonnie?” Chase asked.
    At the use of her name, Bonnie flushed pinker. “No, she’s fine. She’ll just be out of the office for a while.”
    It was all very mysterious, Chase thought, but he didn’t know how things worked in the city. He had no doubt Amanda had a high-powered career, both from what she’d told him on that snowy night, and from the evidence of her material success. He’d noted the late-model Mercedes first. Then he’d caught a whiff of unfamiliar cologne, which he’d later identified by checking out a display in Lord and Taylor.
    Then there was the matter of her clothes. He’d had the pleasure of discovering the softness of her cashmere coat as he’d taken it off. He hadn’t been paying attention to labels when he’d removed her wool suit and silk blouse, but later, when the clothes were lying around the cab, he’d noticed names like Calvin Klein and Chanel. And her underwear...he could still get aroused thinking about those fragile scraps of lace that had to have been imported from Paris. Maybe she was in Europe right this minute, picking up more of that fancy underwear.
    He walked over to the desk. “I guess I’ll just leave her a message, then.”
    â€œThat would be fine. Do you have a card?”
    Chase laughed. “No, Bonnie. I don’t even have a piece of paper. Is there something I could write on?”
    â€œCertainly.” She whipped the top page from a notepad beside her telephone and held it out to him, along with a pen. “I’m sure she’ll be sorry she missed you.”
    Chase wished he could be as sure about that as Bonnie.