“Are you all right? You sound funny.”

“I’m all right, but…” She studied the neat stack of papers without really seeing them. “Laura, I know we’ve been together for a long time, and I appreciate all your hard work, everything you’ve done for me, but…” She rubbed her forehead. “I need to let you go.”

“Let me go?”

“I-I have to make some changes.” She hadn’t heard Bram come up behind her, but his hand settled between her shoulder blades. “I know how difficult my father can be, and I’m not blaming you-truly I’m not-but I have to…make a fresh start. With representation I hire myself.”

“I see.”

“I-I need to make sure that my opinion is the only one that counts.”

“Ironic.” Laura gave a dry laugh. “Yes. Yes, I understand. Let me know as soon as you’ve hired a new agent. I’ll…try to make the transition as smooth as I can. Good luck, Georgie.”

Laura hung up. No begging. No hard sell. Georgie felt sick. She dropped her forehead to the desk. “That was so unfair. Dad established the rules, and I went along. Now she’s paying the price.”

Bram took the phone from her and set it back on the cradle. “Laura knew it wasn’t working. It was her job to do something about it.”

“Still…” She pressed her face into the crook of her elbow.

“Stop it.” He curled his fingers around her shoulders and drew her into a sitting position. “Don’t second-guess yourself.”

“Easy for you to say. You get off on being ruthless.” She pushed herself out of the chair.

“I like Laura a lot,” he said, “and she could probably have been a decent agent for you. But not as long as she served two masters.”

“My father will never speak to me again.”

“You aren’t that lucky.” He planted his hip on the edge of her desk. “So what brought about Georgie York’s nuclear winter?”

“Dad wanted to play cards. And he splashed me in the pool.” She kicked the wastebasket, which accomplished nothing except hurting her big toe and sending trash flying across the carpet. “Damn it.” She dropped to her knees to clean up the mess. “Help me with this before Chaz sees.”

He nudged a wad of paper toward her with the toe of his shoe. “Out of curiosity…Has your life always been a train wreck, or did I just happen to stumble on the scene during a particularly eventful time?”

She pitched a banana peel in the trash. “You could help, you know.”

“And I will. I’m going to help you drown your troubles in some mind-blowing sex.”

Considering the fragile state of her marriage, mind-blowing sex was probably a good idea. “I get to dominate. I’m sick of submission.”

“I’m all yours.”

A wedge of golden lamplight cut across Bram’s naked body from shoulder to hip blade. He fell back into the pillows, spent and struggling for breath. He was a beautiful, debauched angel, drunk on sex and sin. “You’re going to…fall in love with me,” he said. “I know it.”

She shoved her hair out of her eyes and gazed down at his sweat-slicked chest. The aftershocks of her last orgasm had left her soft and defenseless. She tried to pull herself back together. “You’re delusional.”

He gripped her thighs, which were still straddling his hips. “I know you. You’ll fall in love with me and screw up everything.”

She winced and pulled herself off him. “Why would I fall in love with you?”

He ran his hand over her bottom. “Because you have crappy taste in men, that’s why.”

She collapsed next to him. “Not that crappy!”

“You say that now. But before long, you’ll be leaving threatening messages on my voice mail and stalking my new girlfriends.”

“Only to warn them about you.” His side pressed warm against her skin, and the earthy scent of their bodies mingled with the crisp smell of fresh sheets. The sex had been incredible as usual, and later she would blame her pleasure-fuzzed brain for what came next. Or maybe it was simply her day for burning all her bridges. “The only thing I might…might want from you is…” She threw her arm over her eyes and blurted it out. “Possibly…a baby.”

He laughed.

“I’m serious.” She lifted her arm from her eyes and made herself face him.

“I know. That’s why I’m laughing.”

“It isn’t like it’d cost you anything.” She sat up, all her lovemaking-lax muscles constricting. “No boring visitations. No child support. All you have to do is give me the goods and fade away before the main event.”

“Not going to happen. Not in a trillion years.”

“I wouldn’t even bring it up-”

“Now that you’re good at.”

“-if you weren’t so good-looking. Your faults are all character flaws, and since I wouldn’t let you anywhere near my offspring except for an occasional public photo op, that’s not a problem. Granted, by employing your DNA, I’m risking a few damaged chromosomes from your years of excess. But it’s a risk I’m willing to take because, with that one exception, you pretty much represent the male genetic jackpot.”

“I’m weirdly flattered. But…No. Never.”

She dropped back into the pillows. “I knew you’d be too selfish to discuss this. It’s so like you.”

“It isn’t as if you’re asking me to lend you twenty bucks.”

“A good thing, because I’d only have to pay myself back!”

He bent over her and nibbled at her bottom lip. “Would you mind using that gorgeous mouth for something other than idle chit-chat?”

“Stop making fun of my mouth. What’s the big deal? Tell me.”

“The big deal is, I don’t want a kid.”

“Exactly.” She bounced back up. “You won’t have one either.”

“Do you really think it’d be that easy?”

No. It would be messy and unbelievably complicated, but the idea of mixing their genes had been growing more enticing by the day. His looks and-she hated to admit it-his intellect, combined with her own temperament and discipline would produce the most amazing child, a child she yearned to bear. “It’ll be easier than easy,” she said. “It’s a no-brainer.”

“No-brain is right. Fortunately, the rest of your body makes up for your empty head.”

“Save your energy. I’m out of the mood.”

“I’m sorrier about that than you can imagine.” He rolled on top of her and wedged her legs open with his thighs.

“What are you doing?”

“Reasserting my masculine supremacy.” He captured her wrists and held them over her head. “Sorry, Scoot, but it has to be done.”

He began to push inside her.

“I’m not using birth control!”

“Good try.” He nibbled at her breast. “But futile.”

She didn’t press the point. First, it was a lie. Second, she’d turned into a sex maniac. And third…

She forgot about the third and wrapped her legs around him.

Bram couldn’t believe it. A baby! Did she really think he’d go along with that harebrained idea. He’d always known he’d never get married, let alone have kids. Men like him weren’t cut out for anything involving self-sacrifice, cooperation, or high-mindedness. What small amounts of those qualities he could muster up had to go into his work. Georgie was the weirdest combination of common sense and wacko bullshit he’d ever known, and she was starting to drive him more than a little crazy.

He waited until after his meeting with Vortex the next afternoon before he called Caitlin with the news. “Brace yourself, sweetheart. Tree House has a green light at Vortex. Rory Keene took the deal.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“And here I thought you’d be happy for me.”

“You son of a bitch! That option only had two weeks left.”

“Fifteen days. And look at it this way. Now you can fall asleep at night knowing I won’t let anybody turn your mother’s book into a piece of crap. I’m sure that’ll be a huge comfort.”

“Go screw yourself.” She slammed down the phone.

He glanced toward the second floor. “Excellent idea.”

Between a sinus headache, a demoralizing meeting with her superiors at Starlight Management, and a speeding ticket on the way to Santa Monica, Laura was having the mother of bad days. She punched the doorbell of Paul York’s two-story Mediterranean town house, which was just four blocks from the Pier, although she couldn’t imagine him ever going there. The deep V-neck of her new sleeveless silk print Escada dress gave her some added ventilation, but she was still hot, and ringlets had begun to form along her hair-line. She began each day looking neat and orderly, but it didn’t take long before she started to unravel-a fleck of mascara under one eye, a bra strap slipping off the other shoulder. She’d scuff a shoe, tear a seam, and no matter how expensive the salon cut, her baby-fine hair always lost its shape as the day went on.

She heard Steely Dan playing inside the house, so she knew someone was home, but he wasn’t answering the bell, just as he hadn’t been answering his phone. She’d been trying to reach him since Georgie had fired her two weeks ago, the day the quarantine had been lifted.

She banged on the door, and when that didn’t work, banged on it again. The tabloids had gone into a frenzy searching out details of the quarantine, but the disclosure of Rory’s presence and the news that Vortex had taken on Tree House had cast doubt on the more hysterical accounts of screaming catfights and hedonistic orgies.

The lock finally clicked, and there he stood, glowering at her. “What the hell do you want?”

His normally immaculate steel gray hair had misplaced its part, he was barefoot, and he looked as though he hadn’t shaved in a week. Wrinkled shorts and a faded T-shirt had replaced his normal Hugo Boss. She’d never seen him like this, and something unwelcome stirred inside her.

She pushed hard on the door. “You look like Richard Gere’s corpse.” He automatically stepped back, and she slipped past him into the cool interior, which was dominated by bamboo floors, high ceilings, and bright skylights. “We need to talk.”