CHAPTER FIVE

"Robin, what are you doing?" Victoria twisted in her seat to peer out the Cooper jet window. Below them, San Francisco receded, until all she could make out was the Pacific curling into the Bay.
Robin sat in the beige, leather seat across from her, safety-belt still unfastened, despite directives from the pilot. He wore a green, cashmere sweater and olive slacks which brought out the emerald in his eyes. He linked his fingers, resting his hands on his stomach as he leaned back and, observing Victoria from beneath half-closed lids, asked, "Isn't it obvious? My goodness, I must be losing my touch. My dear Miss Morgan, I am trying to seduce you."
"Why?"
"Why?" That certainly opened his eyes, and quickly. "Well, now, there is an excellent question. I've never been asked that before. I suppose," he leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees and staring at Victoria so intently, she had no recourse but to meet his gaze. "It's because you're a lovely woman. And that's what I do with all the lovely women I meet." If Robin felt ashamed of his philandering habits, he certainly hid it beautifully.
"And do all lovely women always go along with your agenda?"
"As a matter of fact, yes, they do." He smiled, deepening the cleft in his chin, his grin rising higher on the right side of his face than it did on his left. "I'm quite charming, you know."
She felt awfully glad they were sitting. Robin's smile could melt icebergs, so what chance did her suddenly teetering legs have?
Yet, instead of admitting the effect he had over her, Victoria arranged her face in a semblance of sternness, and ordered, "Well, quit it."
"Why?" Mischief glittered within his hazel eyes. "Because I have no chance for success? Or too good of a one?"
He had a way of planting pictures in Victoria's head without saying anything specific. And not just regular pictures, either. These were the 3-D, every-tactile-sense-included variety. If he could do so much with mere words, Victoria wondered what he might achieve if she allowed Robin to access all of his fabled talents.
Not that she intended to ever find out.
Victoria said, "As long as you're still married, consider your chances for success as somewhere between none, and sub-none."
"Is that all that's bothering you? Nicole? Well, then, this is going to be easier than I thought. Nicole and I are divorcing."
In spite of herself, hope throbbed in Victoria's breast. Yet, she had to keep in mind the sort of man that she was dealing with. "Does Nicole know that?"
Robin laughed. "Very good, Victoria. I see I'm really going to have to stay on my toes around you."
"Well? Does she?"
"She does. I told her right after the Elizabeth Fund Gala."
Victoria's hope mutated into an icicle. "After the Elizab -- Robin, I -- you didn't do it because of me, did you?"
"Oh, no, of course not." Robin considered the matter further. "Well, actually, in a way, yes."
"No," Victoria shook her head, lowering her voice. "I didn't want -- the last thing I wanted was to be responsible for breaking up another woman's marriage."
"It was nothing like that. I assure you." Robin waved away Victoria's worries with one hand. "All you did the other night was remind me of what an absurdity I'd been living the last five years. I never loved Nicole. I barely liked her. And I certainly would never have married her, if I'd been sober at the time."
"But, your daughter...."
"Eve is my daughter, yes. I have mountains of blood tests to prove it. And I intend to provide for her. But, that doesn't mean I have to be chained to her mother. Nicole and I have been married for five years, and, in that time, I don't think we've lived under the same roof for more than three months at a stretch. You are not a home-wrecker, Victoria. There is no home to wreck, here."
She smiled weakly. "Still, Robin, I -- "
"What, love?"
"I don't want to be another scratch on your bedside table. I know you probably think this is old-fashioned or provincial of me, but, it doesn't matter how attracted I am to a man or how charming he is -- and you are charming, Robin, I'll grant you that. Still, I can't just jump into bed with a person I don't feel... close to."
His brows furrowed in genuine confusion. "I thought you liked me, Victoria."
"I do like you." She struggled to elucidate, feeling like an anthropologist attempting to illuminate a foreign culture. "But, I've also heard things about you. You've got quite a reputation when it comes to women."
"Oh, God," Robin said. "You've been talking to my father."
"Well, actually, Gabriel has been."
"Even better."
"Was your father lying, Robin?"
He sighed. "The great Douglas Cooper is too morally upright to ever lie. Even to protect his only son."
"Well, then, you have to respect where I'm coming from. I'm not a big fan of one-night stands with married men. And right now, as far as I'm concerned, that's all you're offering me."
"It'll be a hell of a night, I can promise you that."
She smiled. She couldn't help it. He was the most guileless, sincere rake she'd ever met. "I have no doubt about that."
"But, you're still declining my offer?"
"I am."
He clicked his tongue against his front teeth. "Fascinating."
"I do have a counter-offer of my own, though."
"Really?" He rubbed his hands one against the other. "What?"
"I'll be your friend, Robin."
It was his turn to laugh.
Victoria asked, "What's so funny?"
It took him a moment to collect himself. "Frankly, love, I've never had a female friend before. I don't usually do too well with the male ones, either."
"Oh, come on. I saw you at the Elizabeth Fund Gala. You were surrounded by people."
Robin's eyes darkened, laughter dying like disseminated smoke. "People," he said. "Not friends."
Victoria shivered, frightened by how quickly his shift in mood could alter hers. When the light went out of Robin's eyes, the sun ducked behind the clouds, plunging the cabin into twilight. It was a trick worthy of Hades, God of the murky underworld.
Robin considered her proposition. "Friends, you say? Well, why not? New experience and all that. It's probably good for the soul. Tell me, though, what is it that friends do, exactly?"
"To start with? They don't jet off to dinner in Canada."
"Is that a fact? Hm? Interesting. I guess I shall have to think of some other activity to amuse us." Robin pretended to do just that. He raised one finger in inspiration. "Do friends ever go riding together?"
"Yes." She qualified, "Though rarely through their father's executive suites."
"Gotcha. It's settled, then. We'll go riding tomorrow."
"Robin," she reminded. "Some of us work for a living."
"We'll go during your lunch hour. Surely, even Douglas grants you that entitlement. I'll pick you up. Pack some riding clothes. You can change in the car."
"I don't think so."
"Oh, alright, I'll wait. You can change in the office."
"You're a prince."
"My dear, you don't know the half of it."

Victoria decided she could very well fall in love with Robin Cooper. Not because of his looks, or his charm, or the enigmatic, dark underside to his personality which attracted Victoria almost as much as it frightened her. But because, when he took her riding the next day, he called ahead to the stables where he was boarding "her" new horse, and arranged for a Western saddle to be available, along with his own English gear. For some reason, Victoria found his gesture inexpressibly touching. And, once again, at odds with the supposedly self-centered, selfish Robin Cooper whom everybody assured her was destined to appear any day now.
Both on horseback, Robin led Victoria out of the stables, down a tree-shrouded path, and into a private meadow the size of a half-dozen football fields, its brilliantly green grass so neatly mowed, it might have doubled as a golf-course in its free time. A waist-high, wooden fence encircled the course, with tall shrubs planted at strategic intervals to obscure the fact that, on the other side of the impeccably trimmed track, was an ordinary street, complete with traffic and plebeians unworthy of entering this inner sanctum.
Victoria said, "It's like a secret world in here."
"Actually," Robin leaned forward, kneading his horse's neck. "I like to think of it as the end of the world."
"How ominous. Why?"
"Because. At the end of the world, anything can happen." He flicked his reins and sped off without a further explanatory word.
For close to a half-dour, Robin and Victoria galloped side by side, each trying to outdo the other, yet neither racing so far in the lead that they couldn't twist around and exchange exhilarated grins over just how much fun both were having.
Victoria hated checking her watch, but, responsible soul that she was, she did it anyway, slowing to a trot and regretfully tel-ling Robin, "I've got to head back. My lunch hour's almost up."
He pulled up beside her, letting both animals cool down. He shook his head. "Come on, now, love. One more time around."
"I can't."
He offered playfully, "I'll jump a fence for you."
"We've already jumped all the fences."
Robin waved dismissivly at the pristine barricades erected at regular intervals along the concourse. "I mean a real fence." He pointed to the one defining the perimeter. "Now, then, isn't that worth hanging around for?"
And, before she could answer, he galloped off, gathering speed by sprinting a preliminary lap around the track, before aiming his horse's nose right at the wooden wall.
He was out of his mind. There were so many arguments for why what he proposed was, at best, foolhardy and, at worst, suicidal, that Victoria's judgment, still dazed by the unexpectedness of his gesture, didn't know where to begin cataloguing. For one thing, the exterior fence stood much taller than ones on the inside. For another, jumping the exterior fence meant leaping into a traffic-filled street. And for a third thing, her experience with horses made Victoria suspect that these animals, bred for enjoyment, had been trained to stay within their parameters. Meaning that, in all likelihood, as soon as Robin got too close to the fence and tried to jump, his horse would halt, sending Robin barreling head first onto the grass if he was lucky, into concrete if he wasn't.
She screamed his name, trying to get him to stop. But, Robin ignored her. Catching his eye as he sped past, Victoria spied an expression that told her his stunt was no longer about impressing her. It had become something much deadlier.
When he refused to respond to her cry a second time, Victoria took matters into her own hands, digging her knees into her horse's sides, and racing across the width of the field, meaning to cut him off before he could reach the fence. She grit her teeth, ignoring the wind whipping her face and the shards of dust that forced into her eyes. She rose in the saddle, urging her horse to race faster. Robin glanced over his shoulder and spied her coming. He increased his own pace, seemingly determined to break his neck.
Less than a dozen yards from the barrier, Victoria was only a hair's breath behind Robin. She stood up in the stirrups, pitched her weight forward, and, lunging to snatch the reins out of Robin's hands, yanked his animal to the side with all of her strength.
"What the hell are you doing?" Robin demanded, voice furious.
Equally incensed, Victoria fired back, "Saving you god-damned neck from being snapped in half like a toothpick, that's what."
Both stood at the edge of the concourse, their horses side by side, Robin and Victoria face-to-face and glaring angrily at each other, while breathing heavily from the exertion.
"If I want to snap my neck," Robin's eyes blazed black, as if the traditional forest that bloomed in his irises had been engulfed by tar. "What business is it of yours?"
She shook her head, telling Robin sarcastically, "Consider it my way of saying thanks for the horse."
He looked at her then, really looked at her, eyes boring into Victoria, and making her feel quite uncertain. And quite aroused. She wondered what he was doing, and why. And what he suddenly saw in her that made Robin lean ever so slightly forward in his saddle, his face only inches from Victoria's, and, so gently and tenderly that they might have been in the midst of a dream, kiss her lips.
She responded almost without meaning to, and certainly without fully realizing what she was doing. She let him explore her mouth with his tongue, wondering how it could happen that, though their bodies were apart, she felt Robin's touch along every inch of her.
Too soon, he drew away as slowly as he'd approached her, both of them reluctant to move briskly and risk shattering their dream-like spell. Robin stroked Victoria's cheek with the back of one palm, and smiled when she, unable to help herself, tilted her head in its direction, rubbing her face gently against his hand.
Softly, he told her, "Consider this my way of saying thanks."
She blinked, puzzled, "For what?"
"For you."

Across the street, in a taxi smelling of damp leather, Nicole Simonge watched the unfolding drama and wondered who the hell that man on horseback was, because he certainly wasn't her husband. The Robin Cooper Nicole knew grew very offended when somebody tried to come between him and his self-destructive escapade of the day. She knew that much from painful, personal experience.
Nicole and Robin had been together less than a month when he expressed an interest in diving off a too-high coral-reef into too-shallow water, and Nicole countered with the comment that he was a lunatic. He did not take kindly to the observation. Robin sprang off their towel, sprinted down the beach and, without looking back, proceeded to do precisely as he'd threatened. He climbed the reef, and dove, hitting the water with a willfully thunderous splash. He didn't resurface. Nicole thought her heart would stop. She still remembered the way her breath fluttered in her throat as she weaved along the surf, searching for him, while a single thought, like the hot Riviera sun, pummeled her skull, "If Robin's dead, what's going to happen to me?" In the end, he was, of course, fine. He'd swum behind a rock, hiding from her, watching her squirm. Robin didn't appreciate Nicole's interference, and, when he finally resurfaced, he spent the next hour belittling and telling her how imbecilic she was. By lunchtime, she had endured more than enough, and, because she hadn't known Robin long enough yet, Nicole actually thought she could take revenge on him -- and not suffer the consequences.
It started out as a joke. Well, sort of. The restaurant they went to for lunch was a favorite among Robin's crowd, and so, every few minutes, another unblemished and tanned body with rings studded in rocks as pert as their breasts, wandered by their table -- just to say a quick hello, darling -- and ended up monopolizing Robin's attention by draping a gleaming, manicured hand over his shoulder. He loved the attention, even if he pretended to be indifferent, but Nicole quickly got tired of being treated like the maid -- present, yet unseen. And so, the afternoon following Robin's diving stunt, in a combination of reclaiming his attention and paying him back, when the umpteenth jet-setter prowled by them, Nicole waited until Robin was deep in conversation before slipping her hand underneath the table and reaching for the top button of his slacks. Robin's expression flickered, but, in the interest of continuing his chat, he pretended not to notice. She undid three buttons, giving Nicole access to his briefs, and beyond. Robin's eyes darted to the side, but there was no way for him to stop Nicole without it looking most awkward. She proceeded to caress him, leisurely at first, enjoying the way Robin's voice caught in his throat as he tried to carry on his exchange without letting on what was happening below the table-cloth. When it looked like Robin had regained control of himself, Nicole steeped up her assault, raking her nails along the length of him, cupping and stroking him in ever-tightening circles until she felt Robin begin to tremble. Finally, he had to gasp, covering up the cry of his climax with a fake coughing fit that sent half the waitresses scurrying for water. Taking advantage of the commotion, Nicole flashed Robin a conquering smile, and excused herself to go to the Ladies' Room, leaving him crouched alone at the table.
She'd barely completed touching-up her lipstick, when Robin stormed into the lavatory, grabbed Nicole by the arm and flung her inside one of the stalls. He pinned her against the wall, yanking up her skirt with one hand. She'd never seen him so angry. His eyes foamed, breath raw, fingers pinching her skin hard enough to leave a bruise. He wasn't, however, pressing down so hard that she couldn't, if she wanted, pull away. And yet, Nicole didn't budge. She let him grab her wrist and propel her hand down to the buttons of his fly, forcing her to consummate what she'd started. With no preliminaries, he blindly thrust inside Nicole as if she were just some object existing solely for his pleasure. At the time, she'd felt humiliated at being treated in such a degrading manner. Nine months later, when Eve was born, Nicole rated it the luckiest abuse she ever took. And, while she hardly expected Robin to be as harsh with Miss Morgan as he had been with her -- after all, Robin barely knew the bitch -- she did expect some sort of reply to her keeping him from jumping that fence. And she wasn't talking about a kiss.
Earlier than morning, Nicole had decided to follow Robin on a whim. She wanted to see for herself what -- more precisely, who -- had triggered his latest divorce threat. And so she waited outside the Fairmont Hotel, wondering how her Ukrainian taxi-driver managed to reek so strongly of sweat, so early in the day. When Robin came out, they shadowed his car, following him to Cooper Shipping. He strolled in, and exited a few minutes later, leading a woman by the elbow. Nicole did a double-take.
Victoria Morgan was not at all what she'd expected.
She'd assumed Robin's flavor of the month would be like all of his others. Plastic money, plastic grin, plastic tits. If Robin's mistresses had one trait in common, besides their short shelf-life, it was their in-your-face, knockout beauty.
So, what the hell, was that?
She was wearing jeans, for goodness' sake. Jeans and a shirt the color of turnips, tied at the waist and so loose at the top it was difficult to tell if she even had anything up there. And were those cowboy boots? What was Robin thinking? Was he going through some perverse, rustic phase when he'd latched on to her?
For nearly an hour, a bored Nicole watched them canter their horses like dusty cow-pokes. When Robin tried jumping the fence and Victoria stopped him, Nicole hoped the afternoon might finally get interesting, justifying her expenditure on the taxi. With any luck, Robin would terminate his fling right on the spot -- he'd had a week to get her into bed and a dog who looked like that, how good could she be, after all?
Nicole promised herself and Robin that, if he dumped Victoria now, she would consider doing him a great favor and dropping by his room later that night. After a week with Miss Victoria Morgan, he was probably starved for a real woman.
But, rather than going off on Victoria like Nicole expected, like he undoubtedly would have if she'd been the one to act in an identical manner, Robin kissed her. Not like he'd kissed Nicole years earlier, her back pinned against the wall, his eyes blazing a desire to penalize. But, with a gentleness so out of character, Nicole wondered if she'd been stalking the wrong man.
Who was this stranger?
Was he drunk?
No.
Nicole had seen Robin drunk too many times to attribute this irregularity to alcohol. Was he faking it? If so, whatever for? Surely, Victoria Morgan could not be worth so exorbitant an effort. Was he -- no, it wasn't possible, but, could he be -- sincere? Was this the real Robin Cooper? Had Nicole been married to the fraud all these years?
No. Ridiculous. It didn't make any sense. Why would a man deliberately act worse than he really was? What motive would he have? It had to be the other way around. The bastard, that had to be the true Robin. This charming, considerate incarnation was all for show. He was trying to impress his strumpet, hiding his real colors because Robin knew there wasn't a female soul in the world who could put up for long with the real Robin Cooper.
Except for his wife.
Nicole followed Robin and Victoria as they returned to Cooper Shipping. She told her driver to let her out at the curb, paying him the King's ransom he demanded, calculating how much money she and Eve still had left, and wondering how long they'd be able to go on living on it. When Robin didn't exit the building immediately, Nicole braved the parking garage, looking for him.
She'd always hated these places. There was something spooky about the way her footsteps echoed with every step, making Nicole wonder if she were alone, or if an army of psychopaths hid in the shadows, just waiting to pounce. She hated how cold they were and how the stench of gasoline burrowed through her clothes and hair. Most of all, she hated how they reminded her of her former life.
Nicole never heard the footsteps behind her, until she felt herself slammed against the nearest car, one greasy palm clamped over her mouth, the other holding a switchblade so tightly along her throat, it burned where he'd already nicked her skin.
A terrified whimper escaped her throat, but she knew better than to struggle. Not with a knife so close to her face. Nicole closed her eyes, her body going limp. She waited for her orders.
They came soon enough, delivered wrapped in a Southern accent so melodious, he should have been inviting her to a cotillion, not demanding Nicole's purse. She gave it up without a second thought. She doubted there were more than a few dollars left, anyway.
A reality that did not at all please her attacker. He'd had to remove the blade from Nicole's neck, so that he could bend over and pick up the purse where she'd dropped it on his say-so. Nicole turned around, eyes darting, hunting for escape. But, as soon as he realized she was all but broke, he sprung up, this time waving his knife close enough to Nicole's eyes to trigger double-vision.
"Please," she begged. "Not my face. I'll give you anything you want. Just, don't, not my face."
He smiled, pressing the tip against Nicole's jaw and slicing a quick line to the chin. She felt the drops of blood slide down her throat, and closed her eyes, paralyzed. "Please...."
She felt a sharp tug on her blouse, heard the rip of material, followed by a satisfied chuckle, and breath that smelled of turds. She braced herself, convinced that this couldn't be too much worse than some of what she'd already survived through, and anything was worth distracting him from making any more marks on her face.
He stopped. Or rather, something stopped him. One minute he was there, oily fingers closing around Nicole's breast like a vise, and, the next minute, some universal force, some hurricane gust of wind, ripped him away from her. She opened her eyes when she heard him smack the ground. He lay curled in a fetal position, groaning a string of curses that impressed even Nicole with their profusion. Hovering over him, one hand pressing his face into the cement, the other wrenching his arm behind his back, was a blond man dressed in jeans and a tan, suede jacket that might have looked expensive, if it also didn't look second-hand.
"I despise violence," he informed Nicole's mugger. "However, I am very good at it. You follow what I'm getting at, friend?"
Her assailant tried nodding, but, with his face being ground into the floor, only managed a strangled cough.
The blond man looked up at Nicole, indicating her cut. "Are you alright, Miss?"
She raised her hand to her neck, gagging at the sight of blood on her fingers, but, nevertheless, managing a strangled, "Fine."
"Just give me a sec to dispose of our friend, here, and I'll take a look at that if you'd like. I'm a doctor."
She barely heard him. Now that the danger was seemingly past, Nicole began shaking so violently, it drove all thoughts out of her head. Still, when the man said, "I'll just get the security guard and you can file a report -- " she still had enough sense left to shout, "No. Please. I don't want to file any reports." The last thing she needed, was for Robin to know she'd been here. When she finally confronted him, she wanted to be totally in control of all her faculties. Not shaken up like this.
He looked at her strangely, probably assuming Nicole was in some sort of shock and deciding that, for the moment, agreeing with her would do more good than arguing.
"Okay," he said. "Don't be scared. You don't have to do anything you don't want to do."
His words made her laugh. She couldn't remember the last time anyone had said that to her.
"I -- Thank-you, thank-you, I guess, thank-you for everything. I'm sorry, I don't know what to call -- I don't know your name."
He smiled at her. A smile so friendly that, for no reason in particular, it turned Nicole's laughter into tears.
"Scott," he said. "Dr. Gabriel Scott."