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"Come in," was the muffled response

Her sto at his desk, his head bent in an attitude of concentration over the papers spread before him Alanna closed the door and waited just inside the rooe her presence

At the click of the door, he glanced up absently, then alo darkness of his eyes narrowed for a piercing second Her heartbeat quickened under the penetrating look Then his gaze oldly on his ar the time

"Take a seat" He was already bending over the papers again as he spoke "I'll be through here in a few minutes"

Alanna hesitated A white-hot urge rose to walk over to his table and scatter his precious papers to the floor and demand that he tell her whatever it was that he was supposed to know She had waited three days for this h!

No, her coive Rolt an added advantage Thisto be strictly foro into the personalities involved, his or hers Cooling the brief surge of anger, she walked toward the half-circle of the sofa

"There's a bar on the far wall Ice is in the refrigerator below Help yourself," Rolt told her

Alanna glanced at the bar briefly and sat down on the sofa "No, thank you" The last thing she needed was to have her thinking muddled with alcohol

Instead she reached into her bag for a cigarette, an occasional habit she had acquired at college and one she was trying to break But, at thateffect of the nicotine on her taut nerves, especially now that her interthened still more

Leaning against the sofa back, she exhaled a thin trail of s, broken only by the rustle of papers from the desk and the occasional scratch of a pen on paper Rolt worked on, co Alanna couldn't do as she openly gazed at him

His expression was closed, unco interfere The blue drapes at the ere not coht froolden hue on the ca over the silk of his brown tie The angle of light brought out the amber sheen of his coffee-brown hair

The sunlight wavered as if a fil in the way of its source It intensified the tan of his skin until it appeared bronze, a ht, hovering between bright and diles of hissavage and noble, inherently ht was steadily bright His features again beca and closed

She had forgotten her cigarette during her unobserved study of hi to fall as she qui

ckly leaned toward the ashtray on the large coffee table in front of the sofa When she straightened Rolt atching her, his gaze alert and inspecting There was a mirthless curve to the molded line of his mouth He laid the pen doith an air of finality and rose froht-backed chair

"Sorry to have kept you waiting," His words ithout genuine y