Fortune's Proposal (13 page)

“Since when?”

She blessed the pitch darkness because it blacked out inhibition. And cursed it for the very same reason. “Since always.”

He drew in an audible breath that made her nerves knot even more. His palm slowly cupped her through the clinging lace. “Have you thought about us? Like this?”

He was killing her by degrees. All she had to do was deny it and keep some bit of herself protected.

She moistened her lips. Kneaded her fingers against his head. “Yes.” Her admission whispered through the darkness.

He made a low, hissing sound and then he was dragging the lace aside and she cried out loud as his lips found her bare, wet flesh.

Her legs nearly gave way as flames engulfed her, driving her straight up a shuddering, quaking peak.

She was still shaking when he finally straightened and she heard the rustle of his clothes. And then his hands slid behind her thighs, lifting her legs, and she cried out again as he sank into her.

No artifice. No pretense.

He was just Drew. The man she loved.

And then he uttered her name in a rough voice and she closed her eyes against the darkness as he carried them both straight to heaven.

“M
orning.” J.R. looked up when Drew headed into the kitchen early the next morning. “You're up early.”

Drew managed a grunt and headed straight for the coffeepot that his brother had already brewed. He had no intentions of telling J.R. why he was up a good hour earlier than they'd agreed upon.

Not when he wasn't ready to recognize the reason himself.

He'd made love to his assistant in a damn barn, thinking stupidly that it wouldn't ruin things. Wouldn't change things.

Maybe for Deanna it hadn't.

But the second he'd sunk into her and lost his mind in a way that he'd never lost it before, he'd known he was in serious trouble.

Trouble of the kind he'd vowed to stay away from
since he'd found his bride-of-weeks screwing the hell out of his best man.

So he pulled out a mug and started pouring some coffee. “Best we get an early start, isn't it? It's not every day we head out for a hike to find our father's body.”

J.R. grimaced. “Hell, Drew. I'm hoping to hell that's not the case.”

“And I can't stop feeling that it is.” He slammed back a mouthful of java even though it singed all the way down. “Darr's meeting us over at Nick's place with all the hiking gear?”

J.R. looked as though he wanted to say something, but then he nodded. “Then we'll pick up Jeremy at the Double Crown on our way out of town.” He poured the rest of the coffeepot into a thermos and capped it before grabbing the sturdy canvas backpack that sat on a bar stool. “Isabella packed us food last night. But you've got time to eat some breakfast before we meet up with them.” He nodded toward the thickly sliced ham that was sitting on the counter where he'd obviously made himself a sandwich for his own breakfast.

The last thing Drew had on his mind was food. But he knew they were in for a long trek and he put together a sandwich, too, that he wrapped in a napkin while J.R. stowed the makings back in the refrigerator. “Might as well get going,” he said. “Darr's always early. He'll be at Nick's already.”

J.R. nodded. He looked no more anxious for the task than Drew felt, and they quietly let themselves out of the house. J.R.'s truck was parked near the back door and they headed for it. “Where'd you and Deanna disappear to last night anyway?”

Drew managed not to choke on the mouthful of homemade bread and salty ham. “Just took a walk,” he
mumbled around the food that he had to wash down with another blistering hot gulp of coffee from the mug he'd carried along. He ignored the sidelong look J.R. gave him and stretched his legs out in the truck as he forced himself to take another bite of the sandwich and after a moment, J.R. started up the truck.

“You know, she's the smartest thing you've ever done.”

Drew inhaled a piece of bread and sat forward, coughing hard. J.R. reached across the wide cab and slapped him hard on the back.

Drew lifted his hand. “I'm fine,” he muttered.

“Except you're as antsy as a damn cat,” J.R. pointed out. “What the hell's wrong with you? You and Deanna have a fight or something?”

“No.” His jaws clamped together.

J.R. shook his head. “You always were the most cussed, stubborn one of us.”

“No. That would've been Darr or Jeremy. Otherwise they'd have gone into business with Dad, too.”

J.R. gave a short laugh. “Yeah. Maybe so.” He put the truck in motion and the headlights of his truck cut through the still, early morning, casting a wide arch over the hacienda as he smoothly backed away.

It was a damn thing to think that going on this hike—and finding whatever the hell they were destined to find—was preferable to thinking about facing Deanna.

Drew knew he'd left her confused.

Hell, he was confused.

After the most singularly erotic, mind-blowing sex he'd ever had in his life, they'd dressed and returned to the then-silent house and headed to their bedroom.

And in the soft light that had pooled over the inviting
bed and turned Deanna's green eyes to emerald as she'd shyly looked at him, clearly expecting something—a kiss, a word, a touch—he'd been terrified.

Terrified of getting into bed with her. Terrified of touching her. Terrified of not touching her.

So he'd made some fool excuse about getting himself a nightcap, and he'd walked out of the room. Same as he'd been keeping away from that room as much as humanly possible since they'd arrived.

Only this time, he knew his actions weren't forgivable.

Not after what had transpired in the barn solely because of him.

He'd never been able to satisfy any woman who mattered to him. Not his quickly ex-wife. According to Drew's father, not his own mother, either. And last night, he'd hurt the last person on earth who'd deserved it.

Deanna.

He realized that J.R. had stopped the truck again, this time in front of the barn. The barn.

“Gotta grab some rope,” his brother said as he got out of the truck. He strode over to the barn and shoved open the door.

Drew looked away.

He didn't need to look at the barn.

The memories of what had occurred there were indelibly engraved on his damned soul.

 

He was gone.

Again.

Deanna rolled onto her back on the mattress and looked at the pillow beside hers. There was a faint
indentation left from Drew's head when he'd briefly slept there. But considering the distance that had started yawning between them the second they'd left the blissful sanctuary of darkness the barn had provided, he might as well have never been in the same bed with her at all.

She tossed her arm over her stinging eyes.

What had she hoped for?

That Drew would suddenly realize that he loved her?

That just because she'd let him into her body as well as her heart, he'd feel the same?

Hot tears leaked from beneath her tightly closed eyes.

It didn't matter that she knew he was going back to the accident site with his brothers. She still felt abandoned. She'd felt abandoned when he'd all but raced out of the bedroom the night before when they'd returned from the barn.

And it suddenly felt untenable to lie in the bed that they could have shared so much more meaningfully, and she slid off the mattress and numbly went into the bathroom.

Only there, instead of the reflection of a well-loved woman, the person looking back at her through the bathroom mirror just looked…broken.

She looked like her mother.

Her mother who was, for all of her faults, alive and well while Drew and his brothers couldn't be certain of any such thing where their father was concerned.

Deanna exhaled slowly and turned away from her reflection.

She went back into the bedroom, unearthed her cell phone from the depths of her purse and turned it on.
She was a little surprised that the battery was still holding a charge since she'd forgotten to bring the charger with her to Red Rock. And even though it was still early in the morning in Texas—and two hours earlier in California—she dialed her mother's house.

After only a single ring, though, Gigi's sleepy voice—sharp with alarm—answered. “Deedee, what's wrong?”

“Nothing.” Everything.

“You're calling me at—” she heard muffled movements “—four in the morning and nothing is wrong?”

Deanna sank onto the foot of the bed and eyed herself in the tall, slanted mirror across from her. “Mom, did you ever keep a baby book from when I was a baby?”

“Of course I did. It's in the attic in the trunk along with your baptism dress from when you were six months old and my mother's wedding dress that your crumb of a father never gave me a chance to wear.” Alarm had morphed into impatience. “Deanna, what is
wrong?
You never call me like this.”

She pinched the bridge of her nose and looked away from her reflection. Considering the piles of possessions that her mother had amassed, she was stunned that Gigi knew the whereabouts of anything. Much less the fact that she'd been so wrong about the baby book in the first place. And her baptism dress? Church hadn't been part of her childhood and she couldn't recall Gigi ever talking about it.

But then maybe her mother had had her reasons. Different reasons than the basic lack of interest that Deanna had grown up believing.

“Nothing's wrong,” she insisted. “I just wanted to know, that's all.” She heard her mother's sigh. And then she went stock-still when she heard the murmur of a low,
deep voice in the background. A man's voice. “Gigi, do you have someone there with you?”

“Just a minute.” Deanna heard more rustling. “All right. I'm in the kitchen now.” Gigi's voice was much less hushed. “You've messed things up with that honey of a boss of yours, haven't you? Is that why you're calling me in the middle of the night? If you want me to tell you how to fix things, just say so.”

Was it disappointment sinking through her? Disillusionment? Or maybe it was just finally acceptance of the fact that Gigi would always be…Gigi. For good or bad.

“No, I don't need anything fixed,” she said quietly. You couldn't fix a broken heart, could you? “I just wanted to hear your voice.” Which was, she also realized, the absolute truth. “I'm sorry it's so early.”

She heard Gigi sigh noisily. “Well, it is that. I'm not sure what Frank is going to think, considering the hour. It's not as if this is an emergency or anything, is it?”

“No. No emergency.” Deanna propped her elbows on her knees, cupping the phone to her ear. That would imply something sudden, and there was nothing sudden about loving Drew and not being loved back. “Frank is presumably the voice I heard in the background?”

Gigi's voice suddenly turned girlish. “He's wonderful, Deedee. You see, I got another job. I tried to tell you this past week, but you haven't returned any of my messages.”

“A job.” She managed a smile. “That's great. Where at?”

“A law firm, naturally. Horne, Hollings, and Howard. Up in Escondido.” The town was on the northern side of San Diego.

Deanna tried not to wince. Gigi was a legal secretary.
Deanna couldn't exactly be surprised that her mother kept going back to it even if Deanna kept hoping that Gigi would break her pattern at least once. “I guess that's where you met Frank?”

“Oh, good heavens, no. Everyone who works at Triple H are women. No. I met
Frank
at the counselor's office. Don't you listen to any of my messages?”

Deanna sat up straight. “You've been going to the counselor?”

“Well, I told your boss I would when he called because
you
wouldn't talk to me.” Gigi sounded miffed again.

“What?” Deanna's voice went sharp. “Drew called you? When?”

“It was last week sometime. After you left me that completely unfeeling message. I've been to two appointments now.”

Deanna swallowed. She was far more unnerved by Drew's actions than by her mother's chastisement. He'd told her they would handle her mother together. She hadn't believed it at the time, even if it had sounded wholly appealing.

Turns out, he'd handled it all. And succeeded where she'd failed.

Her hand shook and she pressed the phone harder against her ear. “That's really great, Mom.” And it was. Even beyond her shock, she recognized that. “So, you met Frank there?” Was he another patient, or—heaven forbid—the counselor? She dreaded asking.

“Oh, he's wonderful, Deedee. I know you'll like him. He's so sensible. Just like you. He has his own business, you see. He's a plant expert, if you can believe that. Goes around putting in and taking care of the interior plants all around hundreds of office buildings in San Diego.
He just takes care of every little thing.” Gigi giggled. “Even me. And he's even helped me return the last four orders I received from the shopping channel. Wasn't that the sweetest thing?”

“Yes. That sounds very sweet.”

“All right, well, since nothing's wrong, I'm going to go back to bed now. Frank gets up early, you see.” She giggled again. “He has a lot of energy, if you know what I mean.”

Deanna was torn between a groan and a reluctant laugh. “Okay, Mom.”

“Deedee, you know how old it makes me feel to be called Mom.”

“Sorry.” Deanna exhaled. “I'll talk with you in a week or so, okay?”

“Whenever you like,” Gigi chirped. “At least now you know my news. And I hope to heaven that you're making good use of your time with your boss. Girls like you can't afford not to make a good catch. Remember that.”

Deanna grimaced. “I'll keep that in mind.”

But her mother had already ended the call.

Deanna slowly lowered the phone. The battery bar was dwindling and she turned off the power again. And then, because she still couldn't bear to linger in the bedroom a moment longer, she took a brisk shower, pulled on her running gear and quietly let herself out of the hacienda.

She hadn't been able to outrun her emotions since they'd arrived in Texas. She knew that this morning would be no different.

Moving automatically, she stretched and started out slowly. But as she neared the barn, she picked up her
pace and didn't slow once. Not even when tears started burning their way down her cheeks.

She ran until she couldn't run anymore and finally walked her way back to the hacienda. It took two hours.

But at least she wasn't crying anymore.

Because she knew that running around Molly's Pride trying to get over Drew Fortune was not going to get her anywhere. She'd fallen in love with a man who refused to be loved.

And now, it was time to go home.

 

The bedroom door was ajar when Drew went inside the house after he and J.R. got back to Molly's Pride that evening, and he wearily pushed it open, blindly heading inside.