Maid for the Millionaire (14 page)

Hooking his thumb toward the house behind them, he said, “Earning trust isn't easy, but running back to the past isn't the alternative. It's just a way of staying right where you are. Never learning from your mistakes. Never having what you want.” A strange feeling bubbled up in him as he said that. As if he wasn't talking to Billy but to himself.

He cleared his throat. “But that means you're going to have to do a thing or two to earn your mom's trust.”

“Like what?”

“Like not arguing about the curfew and coming in on time. Like telling her where you're going.” He gave Billy a friendly nudge with his shoulder. “Like getting your grades up in school.”

Billy snorted a laugh.

“So it sounds as if you agree that there's room for improvement.”

“I guess.”

Cain clasped his hand on Billy's shoulder. “Let's get you back to your mom.”

Billy rose. “Okay.”

Liz rose, too.

“But first let's go across the street and get a gallon of ice cream. What kind does your mom like?”

Billy blinked. “Chocolate. Why?”

“It never hurts to bring a present when you've made a mistake.”

 

When Liz, Cain and Billy walked in the kitchen door of Amanda's house, Amanda burst into tears.

Billy held out a brown bag to his mom. “I'm sorry, Mom. I shouldn't have been mad. I know all your rules are to protect me. I'll do better.”

Amanda took the bag and set it on the table without looking at it so she could grab Billy in a hug. Sobbing out her fear, she clung to him and wept.

Liz caught Cain's gaze and motioned that they should leave. He hesitated, but she headed for the door and he followed her.

The strangest feelings assaulted him. By punishing himself for something so far in the past he couldn't change it, he wasn't moving on. And he also wasn't learning any lessons. He was losing the one thing he'd always wanted—Liz. She was never the one to condemn him. He continually condemned himself. What if she was correct. What if—for once in his life—he gave himself a break?

She stepped out onto the sidewalk, walked to the driveway and got into his car.

Their
car.

He squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his lips together. She wanted to forgive him. Was it so wrong to want to forgive himself?

T
HE NEXT MORNING
,
Liz lay on her sofa, wrapped in a blanket, drinking hot cocoa, even though the temperature outside had long ago passed eighty.

She had awakened so sad and lonely, after a sleepless night, that she considered it a real coup that she'd made it to the couch. She'd seen the best of Cain the night before when he'd talked Billy into going home and even paid for the ice cream to take to his mother. Yet she knew he didn't see any goodness in himself. And because of that he couldn't forgive himself for the mistakes in their marriage. And because he couldn't forgive himself, he was letting her go. Freeing her.

She loved him with her whole heart and soul but if he didn't want her, then maybe it was time she got the message? She couldn't go on always being alone. Ellie dated. Her friends had gotten married. Yet she was still mourning a marriage that was over.

A soft rap on her door got her head off the back of the sofa. She didn't intend to answer it, but the knock sounded again. This time stronger.

Whoever it was wasn't going away, so she might as well answer. Rising from the sofa, she wrapped herself
in her security blanket. When she reached the door, she tugged the soft fleece more securely around herself before she grabbed the knob and opened the door.

Cain smiled at her. “You know, last night when I got home I thought about the things I said when I was counseling Billy, and it occurred to me that I was actually pretty good at talking to people.” He pulled in a breath. “Everybody but you.”

She snorted a laugh.

“So I'm going to give this a shot. This past week, I've hated myself for being such a terrible husband to you.”

“Oh, Cain!”

“Let me finish. I really let you down and I had every right to be angry with myself. But I also can't wallow in that.”

Hope filled Liz's heart. Could he really be saying what she thought he was saying? She opened the door a little wider and invited him inside. “Why don't we have this discussion inside?”

He walked into her small living room. His eyes took note of the neat and tidy room. He smiled sheepishly at her. “How am I doing so far?”

She laughed. Please, please, please let him be headed in the direction that she thought he was headed. “So far you're doing fairly well.”

“Okay, then.” He drew in a breath and caught her gaze. “I love you and I want to remarry you. I can't change who I was. But I sure as hell don't intend to be that guy anymore.”

“Now you're doing fabulously.”

This time he laughed. “I was so miserable, so angry with myself, until I remembered what I said to Billy.
Suddenly I realized that just like him I had a chance to move on, but I wouldn't if I didn't stop reaching back to the past. Punishing myself. Wallowing in grief.”

“Cain, what I told you wasn't easy news,” she whispered, so hopeful her voice rattled with it. “I think you deserved a week of confusion.”

“I don't want to lose you because of things that happened in the past. We're different. Different enough that this time we can work this out.”

“I think so.”

“Good. Because I've got some plans.” He tugged on her hand, bringing her against him.

Liz smiled up at him. He gazed down at her. And as always happened when they truly looked at each other, the unhappy six years between his brother's death and the present melted away. He looked young and happy, as he had on the flight from Dallas. His eyes had lost the dull regret they'd worn all through their marriage. He really was
her
Cain.

She couldn't pull her gaze away. Not even when his head began to lower and she knew—absolutely knew in her woman's heart—he was going to kiss her.

His lips met hers as a soft brush. It felt so good to be kissed by him, touched by him, that she kissed him back. For three years of being married to him she'd longed for this. Not the passion they'd had in their six-month long-distance relationship. They'd never lost that. But they had lost the need to be together, to connect. They lost happy, joyful, thankful-to-have-each-other kisses. And that's what this was. A happy kiss. An I'm-glad-I-know-you kiss.

He pulled away slowly. “I swear I will never hurt you again.”

“I know.” Tears flooded her eyes but she blinked them away. This was not the time for tears. Not even happy tears. “So where do you think we should start with this new relationship of ours?”

“At the beginning.” He turned her in the direction of her bedroom. “How about if I make you something to eat while you get dressed? Then we can go out on the boat for a while? Just like normal people dating.”

“Dating?”

“It's a little something people who like each other do to see if they should be married or not. It's a step we seemed to have missed.”

She laughed. “All right.”

 

He made lunch. Cheese sandwiches and soup. She changed into shorts and a tank top and they went out on the ocean for the rest of the day. The next weekend and every weekend after that for the next six months, they worked on A Friend Indeed houses during the day and attended Cain's myriad social engagements at night. They spent Christmas with her mother and sisters in Philadelphia and New Year's with his parents in Kansas.

When they returned on January second, he lured her back down the hall to his office and sat her on the edge of his desk.

Laughing, she waited while he opened the bottom drawer of his desk and pulled out a jeweler's box. “Open it.”

Obedient, but cautious since he'd already given her a Christmas present, she lifted the lid on the little box and her eyes widened. The diamond on the engagement ring inside was huge.

“This is too big!”

He laughed. “In the crowd we run in five carats is about average size.”

“The crowd
we
run in is very different from the crowd
you
ran in. We have all kinds of friends now. But I like the ring.” She peeked at him. “I'm going to keep it.”

“Is that a yes?”

“I don't recall you actually asking me a question.”

He got down on one knee and caught her fingers. “Will you marry me?”

Unable to believe this was really happening, she pressed her lips together to keep herself from crying before she said, “On two conditions.”

“I'm listening.”

“We have a real wedding.”

He nodded his agreement.

“And we stay who we are.”

He grinned. “I sort of like who we are.”

She laughed. Her heart sang with joy that communication could be so easy between them. That they could say so much with so few words, and that they really were getting a second chance.

“Then you are one lucky guy.”

He stood up, bent down and kissed her. “You better believe it.”

He broke the kiss and Liz noticed an odd-shaped manila envelope stuffed with bubble wrap in the drawer. She kicked it with the toe of her sandal. “What's that?”

“I don't know.”

 

Cain sat on his desk chair and reached down to lift out the fat envelope. He pulled out the bubble wrap and unwound it.

“That's gotta be from your dad. He's the only person I know who goes overboard with bubble wrap.”

Cain laughed, but when he finished unwinding, he found the family photo his dad had sent him the weekend Liz had come back into his life.

“What is it?”

He inclined his head, waiting for sadness to overwhelm him. It didn't. “It's my family's last picture together.”

She plucked it from his hands. “Very nice. But your sister looks like a reject from a punk band.”

He laughed. “I know.”

She turned and set the photo in front of his desk blotter. “I think it should go right here. Right where you can see it every day and be thankful you have such a great family.”

Cain smiled. She'd turned his life around in the past few months. She'd brought him out of his shell, got him working for a charity and made him happy when he wasn't really sure he could ever be happy again.

How could he argue with success? Especially when she'd said she'd marry him. Again.

“I think you're right.”

C
AIN AND
L
IZ'S WEDDING DAY
the following June turned out to be one of the hottest in Miami's history, making Liz incredibly glad she'd chosen a strapless gown.

On the edge of a canal, in the backyard of the Brill mansion, they toasted their future among family and friends this time. Liz's mom and sisters finally met Cain's parents and sister. The two families blended together as if they'd known each other forever.

Cain's parents were overjoyed that he'd gotten involved in A Friend Indeed and loved that the board of directors from the group
and
many of the women the charity had helped attended the wedding.

Though Liz's mom was happy to see Liz remarrying the man she'd always loved, she was more proud of her daughter's successful business. Her sisters were bridesmaids with Ellie and Amanda. Billy, the surprise best man, lived up to the role with a funny and sentimental toast to the two people who helped him grow from a boy with little to no prospects for the future to a guy who now believed the sky was the limit.

When it was finally time, Cain whisked Liz away. Driving with the top down in “their” beloved Porsche,
he took a few turns and got them on the road to his house.

“Why are we going back to the house?”

“It's a surprise.”

Wind blowing her veil in a stream behind her, she laughed. “Do we have time for this?”

“It's not like the pilot's going to leave without us, since he has no other passengers.” He snuck a glance at her. “Plus, I sign his paycheck.”

“True enough.” She laughed again and within minutes they were at Cain's front door.

“Is this surprise bigger than a bread box?” she asked as he opened the door and led her inside.

“You'll see.” He directed her up the steps.

Raising her full tulle skirt, she raced ahead eager to see what he'd done. “I knew there was a reason you only wanted to sleep at my condo these past few weeks.”

“Here I thought I'd pulled a fast one on you.”

She turned around and placed a smacking kiss on his lips. “Not hardly.”

He laughed and pointed her in the direction of one of his empty bedrooms. He opened the door for her and let her walk inside.

“Oh, Cain!” Staring at the beautiful nursery she could hardly take it all in. “Did you do this?”

“I hired a designer.”

“It's gorgeous.” She faced him. “But we're not…well, you know. We're not pregnant.”

He pulled her into his arms. “I know. I just don't ever want there to be any doubt in your mind again that I'm with you this time. A hundred percent. I want little girls with your eyes and little boys to take fishing.”

He kissed her and what started off as something slow and dreamy quickly became hot and steamy.

Just when she thought he'd lower them to the floor, he whispered in her ear, “We have a perfectly good shower in the master suite. We can kill two birds with one stone.”

“Two birds?”

“Yeah, we can make love and take a shower before we change into clothes to wear on the trip to Europe.”

“I thought we were supposed to change on the plane.”

He nibbled her neck. “Plans change.”

“And Dale won't mind?”

“Dale is a very patient, understanding man.”

He swept her off her feet and carried her to their bedroom, while she undid his tie. He set her down and she tossed his tie to the dresser, as he unzipped her dress. It puddled on the floor and she stepped out of it.

She stood before him in her white lace bra and panties and he sucked in a breath. “You're beautiful.”

She kissed him before undoing the buttons of his shirt. “You're not so bad yourself.”

He finished undressing and carried her to the shower.

And Dale the pilot got comfortable on the sofa in the office in the hangar housing Cain's private plane, smiling because he had a sneaking feeling he knew why his boss and his new bride had been delayed.