Lady Be Bad Read Online Free PDF

from Marlayna's perspective.
She really has no alternative but to confront Noah Drake." Sylvia
squeezed Paul's arm. "She knows where she's been for the past six
years, but she needs to know what's happened to him and what
happened to them. If Marlayna doesn't get those answers, her life
will be lived in limbo. Do you want that for her?"
    "Of course not! I love that girl. Frankly…"
Blue eyes looked into brown. "… if I were going to love any woman
it would be her. But, damn it, Sylvie, she's so much better now.
She should be on top of the world. Do you want to see her come back
from Noah Drake the way she was the last time?"
    "No, but I honestly don't think Marlayna
could ever sink that low again. She's older, stronger, healthier,
sharper and in control. We've both seen how she handles herself. On
the job, she just tunes out the grinding tedium of the model's
routine and virtually ignores all the people that pick and push and
poke at her. She handles the never-ending line of fawning males
with equal aplomb."
    "And you think Marlayna can handle Noah
Drake?"
    Sylvia nodded. "I think she'll thrive on
handling Noah Drake."
    "What if your prediction about anticipation
being ninety-nine percent of the actual event proves to be
true?"
    "Then we'll be there to help her."
    Paul stared into Sylvia's perfectly made-up
face. "She means a lot to you too."
    She nodded. "We both know how shallow and
materialistic I am, but Marlayna disregarded all of that and kept
digging until she found the real human being that is Sylvia
Davies."
    He ran a hand through shaggily cut silver
hair. "Marlayna does have the uncanny ability to ignore surface
imperfections and get through to a person's heart."
    Sylvia leaned back and let her eyes sweep
over him. "You know, Paul, you're really quite a likable, almost
lovable, person." One perfectly shaped eyebrow arched in silent
appraisal. "I'm very tempted to try and convert you." She lifted
the receiver on the rear intercom and spoke to the driver. "Cancel
Giovanni's, Fred, and bring us back to my place. Then," winking at
Paul, she added, "take the rest of the night off."
     
    ***
     
    There was a quietness about the elegant
apartment that Marlayna could feel, a quiet that was neither
calming nor soothing nor safe. She left her sneakers at the foot of
the Victorian hall tree in the foyer and padded barefoot back into
the living room.
    Her eyes mapped and catalogued her
surroundings: the valuable fifteenth-century Italian accent table,
a Ming vase here, a signed master's painting there. Brass planters
and crystal lamp-bases caught and reflected the coral-tinted
sunset; the wall bookcase was filled with hand-tooled leather first
editions and a classic eighteenth century French tapestry hung
behind glass in the alcove. "It's like living in the Metropolitan
Museum of Art," Marlayna sighed.
    Living? "Visiting," came her audible
correction. She sat in perfect schoolgirl form on the edge of a
Chippendale side chair one step up in the dining room. She had
occupied this duplex that Paul had sublet for her for the last
three years and still felt like a guest. The only person who took
this place seriously was Pearl the housekeeper!
    "Perhaps if I had been 'to the manner
born.'" Marlayna lifted an invisible cup to her lips, her pinky
curving in a refined arc. Her fingers opened, letting the phantom
china shatter into oblivion. "Face it, kiddo, this house and its
furnishings are just not right for you." A melancholy expression
shadowed her face and replaced her grin when she remembered a house
that was just perfect for her.
    She and Noah had decided to rent one of the
remodeled brick pre-World War II bungalows that edged the Georgia
Tech campus. They had combined the furniture from their respective
apartments, put a fresh coat of paint and new drapes in the rental
and discovered that the eclectic mix was charmingly attractive.
    "Now that was a home!" Marlayna told the
brass unicorn she had lifted from a hand-painted