A Will and a Way

arrogant, egocentric and simpleminded.”
    “True enough. And you’re stubborn, willful and perverse. The only thing we can be sure of at this point is that one of us is going to win.”
    Sitting on the pile of discarded clothes, they studied each other. “Another game?” Pandora murmured.
    “Maybe. Maybe it’s the only game.” With that, he stood and lifted her into his arms.
    “Michael, I don’t need to be carried.”
    “Yes, you do.”
    He walked across the suite toward the bedroom. Pandora started to struggle, then subsided. Maybe just this once, she decided, and relaxed in his arms.

Chapter Nine
    J anuary was a month of freezing wind, pelting snow and gray skies. Each day was as bitterly cold as the last, with tomorrow waiting frigidly in the wings. It was a month of frozen pipes, burst pipes, overworked furnaces and stalled engines. Pandora loved it. The frost built up on the windows of her shop, and the inside temperature always remained cool even with the heaters turned up. She worked until her fingers were numb and enjoyed every moment.
    Throughout the month, the road to the Folley was often inaccessible. Pandora didn’t mind not being able to get out. It meant no one could get in. The pantry and freezer were stocked, and there was over a cord of wood stacked beside the kitchen door. The way she looked at it, they had everything they needed. The days were short and productive, the nights long and relaxing. Since the incident of the champagne, it had been a quiet, uneventful winter.
    Uneventful, Pandora mused, wasn’t precisely the right term.With quick, careful strokes, she filed the edges of a thick copper bracelet. It certainly wasn’t as though nothing had happened. There’d been no trouble from outside sources, but… Trouble, as she’d always known, was definitely one of Michael Donahue’s greatest talents.
    Just what was he trying to pull by leaving a bunch of violets on her pillow? She was certain a magic wand would have been needed to produce the little purple flowers in January. When she’d questioned him about them, he’d simply smiled and told her violets didn’t have thorns. What kind of an answer was that? Pandora wondered, and examined the clasp of the bracelet through a magnifying glass. She was satisfied with the way she’d designed it to blend with the design.
    Then, there’d been the time she’d come out of the bath to find the bedroom lit with a dozen candles. When she’d asked if there’d been a power failure, Michael had just laughed and pulled her into bed.
    He did things like reaching for her hand at dinner and whispering in her ear just before dawn. Once he’d joined her in the shower uninvited and silenced her protests by washing every inch of her body himself. She’d been right. Michael Donahue didn’t follow the rules. He’d been right. He was getting to her.
    Pandora removed the bracelet from the vise, then absently began to polish it. She’d made a half a dozen others in the last two weeks. Big chunky bracelets, some had gaudy stones, some had ornate engraving. They suited her mood—daring, opinionated and a bit silly. She’d learned to trust her instincts, and herinstincts told her they’d sell faster than she could possibly make them—and be copied just as quickly.
    She didn’t mind the imitations. After all, there was only one of each type that was truly a Pandora McVie. Copies would be recognized as copies because they lacked that something special, that individuality of the genuine.
    Pleased, she turned the bracelet over in her hand. No one would mistake any of her work for an imitation. She might often use glass instead of precious or semiprecious stones because glass expressed her mood at the time. But each piece she created carried her mark, her opinion and her honesty. She never gave a thought to the price of a piece when she crafted it or its market value. She created what she needed to create first, then after it was done, her practical side calculated the profit margin. Her art varied from piece to piece, but it never lied.
    Looking down at the bracelet, Pandora sighed. No, her art never lied, but did she? Could she be certain her emotions were as genuine as the jewelry she made? A feeling could be imitated. An emotion could be fraudulent. How many times in the past few weeks had she pretended? Not pretended to feel, Pandora thought, but pretended not to feel. She was a woman who’d always prided herself on her honesty. Truth and