Ultimate Texas Bachelor (17 page)

In place of the jubilant “yes” and kiss he had been expecting, tears welled in her eyes. “Oh, Brad…” she murmured, seeming distraught.

To his dismay, she looked like she wished he hadn't asked.

She splayed her fingers across his shirtfront, his only solace the fact that she did not move away. “If you only knew how much I want to say yes. But I—I need to talk to you about something else—something important—before we discuss that.”

“Okay,” he said slowly, once again bracing for the worst.

Before she could get another word out, the door to the conference room was flung open. Lewis rushed in so quickly he was practically tripping over his own feet. He had a rolled-up magazine in his hand. He looked at Brad, Lainey, then back at Brad again. “Oh, man!” Lewis said.

Brad glared at his younger brother. “You know, Lewis, sometimes your timing really—”

“Bites. I know.” Lewis swallowed hard and shut the door behind them. “Listen, I really don't want to be the one to tell you this, but…you know how I set up that search engine on my computer for stuff about you when you first went on
Bachelor Bliss
?”

Like they needed to be talking about the parameters of Lewis's computer now? “Yes,” Brad said patiently, knowing it would be faster to just let Lewis say what he had to say than try to shoo him out.

“Well, it still pulls stuff up every time I get on the Internet,” Lewis explained.

“Terrific,” Brad muttered, even more irritated when he noticed that Lainey looked upset.

The last thing he needed was Lewis spoiling an already going-downhill-fast mood. “I really don't care what they've
written about me,” he informed his brother tersely. He sent Lewis a look telling him to leave.
Now.

“You will care,” Lewis countered, just as firmly.

Lainey extricated herself from Brad's arms and moved away.

“Especially when you find out who wrote it,” Lewis explained.

Doing his best not to deck his frustrating younger brother, Brad grimaced. “What are you talking about?”

Lewis thrust the magazine at him. “This.”

Brad unrolled it. He was not pleased to see it was a copy of
Personalities Magazine.
He swiftly became even less thrilled. On the front cover was a photo of Lainey and Brad in the grocery store. Next to it was a photo of Brad and Yvonne. Below that was a grainy photo of Lainey and Brad kissing, at dusk, on the front porch of the Lazy M guest house. Brad swore at the intrusion into his privacy.

“How did the people at
Personalities
know about us?” he wondered out loud.

“I don't know,” Lainey retorted, turning ever paler.

For some reason, Brad noted, Lewis was now staring at Lainey with a peculiar mixture of disbelief and pity.

Which made Brad hope and pray like crazy that the photographer hadn't gotten a picture of him and Lainey in his bed. Brad wouldn't put Lainey through that kind of embarrassment for the world. One thing was certain: Lewis was acting very peculiar. So was Lainey. It was almost as if they already knew something he didn't.

“The story's on page sixty-seven,” Lewis said, already making his way to the exit. Hand on the doorknob, Lewis looked at Lainey. “And boy, oh boy, oh boy, do you ever have some explaining to do.”

Lewis left the room, shutting the door behind him.

Brad looked at Lainey. She was now trembling.

“What's he talking about?” Brad demanded.

“Only one way to find out.” Lainey snatched the magazine out of his hands and thumbed quickly through the glossy pages until she reached the aforementioned page. She opened it up all the way, so they could both see. The title was written in bold red letters: “Yvonne's Secret Tryst!”

Just below that were the names of the coauthors of the article—Lainey Carrington and Sybil Devine.

Brad stared at it. Read it again. And then again.

Lainey was staring as if she had seen a ghost. She looked as if she might faint, and sat down abruptly in the nearest chair.

Wondering if it was possible—if there was another Lainey Carrington other than the woman he'd been trading secrets and kisses with—Brad moved so he could see more of what was on the page. “Tell me you didn't have anything to do with that,” he ordered grimly.

Lainey buried her face in her hands. “Unfortunately,” she said reluctantly, “I can't.”

For the second time in under four months, Brad's world came crashing down around him. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means I did. And then—” Lainey shrugged helplessly “—I didn't.”

Brad's jaw clenched. “Lewis was right. Boy, do you ever have some explaining to do.”

 

F
EELING THE BLOOD DRAINING
from her face, Lainey tore her gaze from Brad's angry expression and quickly skimmed the article. To her dismay, it was all there, even the parts about Brad and his rendition of events that she had carefully omitted from the story she had written on Yvonne and the
Bachelor Bliss
reality TV show.

Aware Sybil had obviously finished the job Lainey had set out to do, she grasped the arms of the chair.

She had to stay calm. Brad loved her. Didn't he? Belatedly,
she realized he had never once said the words. He had, however, just asked her to marry him. To commit to a life with him forever. That had to mean something, even under circumstances like these. She swallowed the ache in her throat and met his eyes, determined to do whatever was necessary to make this come out right. “I told you I always wanted to write.”

A muscle worked in his jaw. He stared at Lainey, a force not to be denied. Her hot-blooded lover had vanished and in his place appeared a cowboy who always rode away alone.

“You were out at the ranch for two weeks. You never once mentioned you were a reporter.”

“That's because I'm not, at least not officially. But when my old friend Sybil called me up and asked me to help locate you, and then do an article for
Personalities
—”

“You agreed.”

“No. Not just like that,” Lainey said with difficulty, aware he had every right to be angry with her.

“Well, at some point you sold out.”

Desperate to salvage their relationship, she defended herself hotly. “I didn't even expect you to be at the Lazy M Ranch when I stopped by!” With effort she lowered her voice to a more manageable level. “I wanted to talk to Lewis about putting Petey in the game-testing program at his company. And then Lewis asked me to help him get organized—and you walked in. And you sort of taunted me, and the next thing I knew, I said I was going to do it.”

He looked at her, sadder and even more disillusioned than before. “And then you conveniently spied on me and pumped me for info, all the while knowing you were going to betray me in the end,” he said bitterly.

“I couldn't go back—I had given my word and already signed a contract!”

“So you betrayed me, without batting an eye.”

Lainey went toward him, arms outstretched. “Listen to
me, Brad. I agonized over the situation I put us both in, and I didn't write anything about you in the article I turned in.”

He pivoted away from her. “And what about the rest of it—the tourist with the telephoto lens on his camera?” He gave her a hard, assessing look.

“I swear to you that I did not know the two of us were being photographed by
Personalities
.” But that was, Lainey admitted to herself, obviously what had happened. Lainey's sister-in-law hadn't been having her spied on—her editor had!

“Kind of damages your rep, doesn't it, becoming part of the story like that,” he observed.

Lainey didn't care about that. She only cared about Brad and how this was likely to affect him. Obviously, it had made him even more cynical and bitter, which was the last thing she had ever wanted. “I didn't tell anyone Yvonne cheated on you,” she reiterated evenly.

Brad folded his arms and looked her up and down contemptuously. “Then how did they know I found Yvonne in bed with Gil Hewitt fifteen minutes before the final show was taped?”

Lainey took a careful look at the quotes in the magazine article. Quickly, she put it all together. “Obviously, Sybil got it out of Yvonne. Probably by pretending you had already told all and asking Yvonne if she wanted to tell her side of things.” Lainey tapped the pages of the magazine. “Look, it says right here that Yvonne readily admits she only got involved with Gil Hewitt because she knew you weren't really in love with her. She even confesses there was no other woman for you, at that time, that she knew about.” Bless Sybil for that much, Lainey thought. “So at least your name has finally been cleared.”

Unfortunately, Brad did not look nearly as relieved about that as Lainey had hoped. “Yours, on the other hand, is mud,” he pointed out sarcastically. “Since it says here the reason you had to recuse yourself from the article mid-writing was that you became personally involved with me.”

Lainey took another look at the photos, of herself and Brad. No denying the intimacy between them.

“I never told anyone that,” she said emotionally. She gazed at Brad, embarrassed, miserable. “Sybil must have figured it out on her own.”

Brad stood. “So how does it feel to be betrayed by someone you thought was your friend?”

Lainey swallowed at the sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. “Not good.”

“At least we're clear on that much.” Brad pushed past her and headed for the door.

Lainey moved quickly, barring his way. The happiness they'd once shared now seemed a million miles away. “I'm so sorry. I tried to tell you…”

He scorched her with a look. “Not hard enough, obviously.”

Lainey swallowed as her knees began to shake. If only she had leveled with him much sooner! Shoring up her courage, she tried again. “I know I made a mistake, even agreeing to write the article about Yvonne, but once I had signed the contract I had to follow through.”

Brad grunted in contempt. “Your responsibility to tell me or Lewis what you were up to be damned?”

Lainey drew another breath, searched his face. There was so much more she wanted to say but she could see it was pointless. She had wounded his already badly damaged McCabe pride. “You're not going to forgive me for this, are you,” she said sadly.

The old cynicism was back in Brad's eyes, more potent than ever before. He leaned in closer, until they stood toe to toe, nose to nose. “Now you've got a clue.”

Several weeks later, Brad signed on the dotted line his attorney Claire McCabe Taylor indicated. Claire smiled as she collected the papers.

“That should about do it. You're all set. Although, given the fact you have just agreed to do two million dollars' worth of endorsements for everything from your favorite saddle soap to pickup truck, I'd expect that you'd be looking a lot happier.”

Hard to be happy, Brad thought, when he had lost the only woman he'd ever dreamed was the one for him.

“This is enough to buy into the Lazy M as a full partner and get the cattle operation up and running the way you wanted to, before all your previous endorsements fell through.”

Brad nodded, acknowledging the fact he was a much richer man. “Thanks for doing such a fine job negotiating on my behalf.”

“My pleasure.” Claire's expression gentled. She'd been married for fifteen years, had two adopted children of her own and knew the value of family. “Have you spoken to Lainey?”

Brad stretched his legs out in front of him. “Not since the issue of
Personalities
with us on the cover hit the newsstands.” That was a day that would live on in memory as one of the unhappiest of his entire life.

Claire tossed down her pen and leaned back in her swivel chair. “She cleared your name.”

“And muddied her own.” To the point Brad figured Lainey's chances of getting a magazine job—at least anytime in the near future—were nil.

Claire shrugged. “True love is selfless.”

Beginning to feel increasingly annoyed—Lewis, Annie and Travis were lobbying for reconciliation, too—Brad shot back, “She should have told me what she was up to from the very beginning.”

“Right.” Claire shot him a telling look. “And you'd have given her the time of day?”

Brad shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Guilt flowed through him. “Well, no…”

“She was a reporter on a story. She had a job to do. Getting involved with you was not in her plans.”

Brad knew that much was true. He had seen her struggling with something the entire time they were together. Suddenly it all made sense why she had cried the last time they'd made love and said they never should have gotten involved.

“She still should have stayed away from me,” he said.

Lifting a brow, Claire said dryly, “I'm sure you made that easy.” Claire leaned across her desk, determined to make her point. “Come on, Brad, who pursued whom here? Who initiated the first kiss? Or teased her into paying attention to you in that distinctly man-woman way?”

Okay, Claire had him there. Brad had pursued her with everything he'd had; he had wanted to make her his woman that badly.

“Had it been anyone else but you putting the moves on her, I'm sure Lainey would have easily kept her distance. But she didn't keep the walls around her heart up because what was going on between the two of you was stronger than any ambition she might have had for herself. So she sacrificed her
long-held goal of becoming a reporter, to do the best she could in this impossible situation she found herself in.”

Brad slowly released the breath he'd been holding. For the first time since they'd split, he felt a flare of hope. “How do you know all this?” he demanded testily.

“I talked to her last week when I represented her and Petey's interests in a meeting with Bunny, Bart and the lawyer for the trust her late husband left.” Claire paused, making sure she had his full attention. “Lainey regrets what happened more than you will ever know. But the two things she is
not
unhappy about are that, thanks to her, the truth is now out there and all future contestants of
Bachelor Bliss
know exactly what they are signing up for—and risking. And, most importantly, that your name and reputation have been cleared.”

 

“C
ONGRATULATIONS
on your promotion,” Lainey told Sybil over her cell phone as she drove.

“Thanks.” Her friend paused, then continued awkwardly. “I wasn't sure you were ever going to speak to me again.”

For a while, Lainey hadn't been sure whether that would happen, either. Then she'd thought about everything that had occurred, and decided this was a rite of passage that—however painful and instructional—she had been destined to work her way through. It was great, she knew, when someone did everything right the first time out of the gate. But a person didn't necessarily learn anything from doing everything right.

When someone made a mistake, on the other hand, especially a big one, and then found a way to rebound, a tremendous amount was always gained. Those kinds of lessons were the ones a person never forgot. She knew she would be remembering her time with Brad McCabe for the rest of her life.

“I understand why you did what you did,” she said finally as she bypassed the road to Laramie and continued driving through the Texas countryside. She knew she and her old
friend needed to have an open and honest discussion about what had occurred, and why. “I let you down. You still had a job to do.”

Sybil confessed miserably, “I had a feeling you were going to back out on me.”

“And you were right.” Lainey knew she would do the same thing again. She would always choose to protect the people she loved, even if it meant she had to forfeit—at least temporarily—career success.

“Are we ever going to be friends again?” Sybil asked finally.

Lainey smiled as she drove past Annie and Travis McCabe's ranch. “We never stopped,” she said quietly, thinking about a friendship that had spanned twelve years and gotten Lainey through some rough times. She and Sybil were on different life paths now, but they were still connected and always would be. “You gave me a chance you probably shouldn't have. I kept things from you I had no right—as a reporter under your direction—to suppress. You then did what you had to do and managed to uncover the rest of the story in very little time…and gave me partial credit, to boot.” Lainey smiled again at the end of her recitation of events. “I'd say we're even when it comes to mistakes made and lessons learned.”

Sybil sighed, relieved. “You are something, you know that?”

Lainey just wished Brad thought so, too.

She ended her conversation with her old friend with promises to be in touch soon, and turned her SUV into the Lazy M.

Lewis had assured her, when she had agreed to come out and unpack the last five boxes at the ranch house, that Brad would be in town meeting with their mutual lawyer, Claire McCabe Taylor. However, when Lainey walked into the ranch house, she saw Brad McCabe slouched on the stairs.

For a moment her heart seemed to stall. He was just so
handsome, so ruggedly male. So obviously waiting for her. She eyed him cautiously, unsure of his mood. And suddenly, Lainey couldn't risk another encounter that ended badly. She had barely survived the last.

She took several steps backward, reached blindly for the doorknob behind her. “I'll come back later.”

He unfolded himself and stood with a lazy, determined grace that jumbled her emotions all the more. “Don't go.”

Lainey stared at him, not sure whether to laugh in joy or burst into tears. She only knew that she had never felt more worried or uncertain or full of bittersweet anticipation in her life. And Brad, darn his stubborn, unforgiving heart, was to blame. As their eyes met she drew a deep, bolstering breath, pretended an insouciance she couldn't begin to feel. “I'm not up for another browbeating, so…if you're planning to tell me what a lousy woman-friend I was to you…”
Or an even lousier reporter…

He swaggered toward her. As he closed the distance, she could smell the spicy scent of his aftershave lotion and the cool mint toothpaste he favored.

His brown eyes were shrewdly direct as they locked on hers. Triumphant, almost. “You were more than that to me.”

Had she been? Lainey lifted a brow, realizing in that instant that he wasn't the only person who had changed. She had, too. No longer was she going to allow herself to have expectations put on her that could not possibly be met. She dropped her shoulder bag on the floor beside her and folded her arms across her chest, more than ready to do battle with him if that was what he wanted. “You didn't seem to have any trouble ditching me,” she pointed out.

“I was a fool,” he stated matter-of-factly.

“And now you're not?” she asked, a little sadly, aware her throat ached and her knees were shaky and she'd never had so much at stake in her life.

“Only if I lose you.” His eyes darkened with sensual intent. His voice dropped a notch. “I don't intend to lose you.”

She wanted this. But she had to make sure it would work this time before she leaped in heart-first. “I'm not perfect, Brad.”

“I know—” he told her gruffly, his voice catching. “Neither am I.”

Tears gathered behind her eyes. She drew a tremulous breath, forced herself to go on. “I have to know…if we ever…resume—”

“I'm looking for a lot more than a resumption, Lainey,” he interrupted hoarsely. He stroked her face, cheek, lower lip, until she trembled from his tenderness.

“I need to know that I don't have to be perfect,” Lainey continued with a gulp, forcing herself to find the courage to go on despite the fact he obviously was ready and willing to continue their romance. She looked deep into his eyes, knowing this was all-important if they were ever going to be truly happy together. “I need to know that I've got room to make mistakes.” She needed reassurance that if she screwed up, he would still love her and want her. That their life together wouldn't be bordered by endless conditions and rigid expectations.

He regarded her soberly, and she saw the love she felt reflected back. “As far as I'm concerned, the only person who needs forgiveness in this situation is me,” he told her in a low voice laced with love and hope. “Lainey, you were—are—everything to me. I'm the fool for taking so long to realize that I love you just the way you are, and I always will.” His mouth lowered to take hers in a possessive kiss.

“Oh, Brad.” She wrapped her arms about his neck and kissed him back sweetly. The warmth and strength of him cured everything that ailed her. “I love you, too. So very, very much.”

Contented moments passed as they simply held each other.

He stroked her hair. “I'm sorry it took me so long to forgive you.”

She cuddled closer and drew aimless patterns on his chest. “I understand. What I did was…unforgivable.”

“No,” he corrected, lifting her face to his, “you did what had to be done. You helped put the truth out there—about everything. And you were right, the truth does set you free.”

“You really do understand,” Lainey marveled. Better yet, he understood—and admired—her determination to set the record straight.

They shared another longer, more leisurely kiss. Relief flowed through her in great, calming waves.

“So, speaking of the facts…you promised me several weeks ago you were going to give me an answer to the question I popped.” Brad took a familiar velvet box from his pocket.

Lainey grinned with the promise of the future as he showed her a beautiful diamond ring. “The answer, cowboy, is yes!”