Hidden Riches

corrected. “Rocks.”
    “Scotch, rocks?” Indigo’s almond-shaped eyes danced. “Of course, I should have seen it instantly. An actor—dramatic, naturally—down from New York.”
    Jed took his drink and dug out a buck for the tip jar. Sometimes, he decided, it was best simply to cooperate. “Yeah. I’m between parts,” he said, and escaped with his drink.
    The lobby of the Liberty Theater was fashioned in Gothic style, with yards of ornate plasterwork, pounds of curlicues and gremlins decorating the gilded molding. Over the doors that led into the theater itself were bronze masks of Comedy and Tragedy.
    Tonight the area was packed with people who all seemed determined to be heard above the din. The space smelled of perfumes and smoke and the popcorn that erupted cheerfully in a machine beside the concession stand.
    Dora would have told Jed that it quite simply smelled of theater.
    Guests were milling around, and the attire ranged from white tie to torn Levi’s. A group of three in somber black sat wedged on the floor in a corner and read aloud from acollection of Emily Dickinson. Through the open doors he could hear the band tear into a blistering rendition of the Stones’ “Brown Sugar.”
    The Winter Ball, Jed mused, it wasn’t.
    The house lights were up. He could see people crowded in the aisles, dancing or standing, talking and eating, while onstage the band pumped out rock.
    In the box seats and mezzanine and into the second balcony were still more partygoers, shooting the noise level toward sonic with the help of the Liberty Theater’s excellent acoustics.
    An instinct in Jed gave a fleeting thought to maximum capacities and fire codes before he set about trying to find Dora in what seemed to be the population of Pennsylvania.
    Mingling had never been his forte. There had been too many enforced social occasions during his childhood, and too many humiliating public displays by his parents. He would have preferred a quiet evening at home, but since he’d dragged himself out for this, the least she could do was be available.
    If she hadn’t left for the party so early, with the excuse of being needed to help set up and keep her mother away from the caterers, he could have come with her, kept an eye on her.
    He didn’t like the idea of her being alone when her attacker was still loose. Though he could hardly call a gathering of this size being alone, he was uneasy about her nonetheless. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be there.
    Two parties in one week. Jed sipped scotch and worked his way toward the front of the theater. That was more than he’d chosen to attend in a year.
    He squeezed between two women, was offered—and refused—a spangled party hat and gave serious consideration to squeezing his way back again and escaping.
    Then he saw her. And wondered how he could have missed her. She was sitting on the edge of the stage, dead center, in what had to be an avalanche of sound, holdingwhat appeared to be an intimate conversation with two other women.
    She’d done something to her hair, Jed noted. Piled it up on her head in a tangle of dark, wild curls that looked just on the edge of control. And her eyes, he thought, watching as she gripped one of her companions’ hands and laughed. She’d painted them up so that they looked bigger, deeper, sultry as a gypsy’s. Her lips, which continued to curve as they moved to form words he couldn’t hear, were a bold, daring red.
    She’d worn a black-and-silver jumpsuit with a high neck, long sleeves and sleek legs that fit like a second skin and should have been illegal. The silver beads splattered over it caught the stage lights every time she moved, and flashed like lightning.
    As she’d known they would, he mused. She might have left the stage, but she still knew how to lure the spotlight.
    He wanted his hands on her. For a moment that thought and the accompanying slap of desire blocked out everything else.
    Setting his glass on the armrest of an aisle seat, he pushed his way forward against the current of people.
    “But he’s a method actor, after all,” Dora said, grinning. “Naturally if he’s going to pitch the product, he’d want to catch the flu. What I want to know is what happened after he—” She broke off when hands hooked under her armpits and lifted her from the stage.
    She got a quick glimpse of Jed’s face before he covered her mouth with his. Fierce, hungry, urgent need rammed into her, cartwheeling from her stomach to her