Odd, he thought, that she would take a job that would do little more than pay her room and board when she was reputed to have an I.Q. that rivalled her father's weight and enough capital to buy an ocean liner for her personal pleasure yacht. Then again, the MacGregors were a strange, stubborn lot, prone to the unexpected.

For a moment Justin stood, naked from the waist, his shirt hanging forgotten from his fingertips. His torso was dark and lean, the skin stretched taut over his rib cage, where on the left it was marred by a six-inch scar. He was remembering.

The first time he had met Daniel MacGregor, Justin had been twenty-five. A run of luck had given him enough money to buy out his partner in their small hotel on the Strip in Las Vegas. Justin wanted to expand and remodel. For that he needed financing. Banks were usually dubious about lending large sums of money to men who made their living with a deck of cards. In any case, Justin didn't care for bankers, with their smooth hands and dry voices. And the Indian in him had little faith in a promise made on paper. Then he heard of Daniel MacGregor.

In his own fashion, Justin checked out the stock wizard and financier. He gained a picture of a tough, eccentric Scotsman who made his own rules, and won. Justin contacted him, diddled around by phone and letter for over a month, then made his first trip to the fortress at Hyannis Port.

Daniel worked out of his home. He didn't care for office buildings where one had to depend on elevators and secretaries. He'd purchased his plot of land near the sea with the wealth he had earned first with his back, and then with his mind. Daniel had realized early that he could earn more, very satisfactorily, with his mind. Then he had built his home and his empire—to his own liking.

It was a huge barn of a house, with massive corridors and enormous rooms. Daniel didn't like to be crowded. Justin's first impression of him as he was led into the tower room that served as his office was of bulk… and wit.

"So you're Blade." Daniel drummed his fingers on the surface of a desk that had been carved from a giant California redwood.

"Yes. And you're MacGregor."

A grin creased the broad face. "That I am. Sit down, boy." Daniel noticed no change of expression at his use of the term, and folded his hands over his chest as Justin sat. He liked the way Justin moved; he'd judged men on less. "So, you want a loan."

"I'm offering an investment, Mr. MacGregor," Justin corrected him coolly. The chair was designed to swallow a man. Justin sat in it with an ease that only accentuated the readiness to spring. "With my property as collateral, of course."