Up Close and Personal (7 page)

He walked back to her bed and sat down beside her. “We’ve things we should talk about.”

She sighed and pushed her heavy fall of hair back behind her shoulders. “If this is another goodbye speech, I’ll skip it, thanks just the same.”

A twist of temper lodged in the center of his chest, but he deliberately smothered it. “Not a speech, damn it. I’ve only just learned I was to be a father. I don’t even know what to think of that. How to feel.”

“It’s over, Ronan. It didn’t happen. You don’t have to say anything to me about it.”

“I do,” he insisted. “I just don’t know
what
.”

Infuriating to not know. He was accustomed to being in control. To having the upper hand. And in this, he hadn’t a clue. He was as lost here as he might have been if someone had dropped him in the middle of Kansas.

“Then let me,” she said and scooted off the bed, as if she needed physical as well as emotional distance from him.

She walked to the bathroom, plucked her robe off the back of the door and slipped the sapphire blue, satin garment on, tying it at the waist. The fact that the material gaped enough to give him a glimpse of one creamy breast was something he was sure she wasn’t aware of.

“I’ve had a lot of time to think about this. About
us
,” she said, walking toward him, but stopping a few feet from him. “If I hadn’t lost the baby, we would have had a connection between us forever, Ronan.”

“And a marriage,” he told her flatly.

She was surprised at that; he saw it in her eyes. She waved it away though and said, “Doesn’t matter now anyway, but my point is, there is no baby. So there is no connection, Ronan. We’re just two people who happen to be really great in bed together.”

He wasn’t sure why he felt he’d been insulted, but the sting was there nonetheless.

“There’s more.”

“Is there?” She laughed and shook her head. “No, there isn’t, and you don’t have to pretend for me. You left because you didn’t want more.”

“That’s not entirely the way of it,” he insisted, though a voice inside told him she had it
exactly
right.

“Ronan.” She stepped closer, stopping close enough for him to reach out and grab hold of her, but he didn’t because her eyes were still cool, dispassionate.

“Ronan, when I lost the baby, it made me realize something important.”

“Aye? And what’s that?”

She smiled and gave a little shrug that dipped the fabric of her robe even more. Almost enough to expose one pink nipple. His insides fisted in response.

“I
want
a family. Children. A husband. Forever.”

He gritted his teeth and slipped off the bed, moving past her to grab up the clothes he’d torn off just moments before.

“Don’t look so worried,” she said on a choked off laugh. “I’m not nominating you for the position of husband.”

“Laura—” He looked at her and it took every ounce of his will not to go to her, snatch her up and toss her back onto the bed, where everything between them made sense.

“I said I want a husband. I didn’t say
you
were the guy.”

Maybe she hadn’t said it, he told himself, but she had thought it at one point or another in their time together. He’d seen it in her eyes.

“I’m not,” he assured her, “though if I were…”

“No ifs,” she told him. “I don’t need you to placate me. Or to patronize me. I just need you to understand that this…” she waved a hand at the rumpled bedclothes behind her “…won’t happen again. I’m not made for affairs. That’s just not who I am. I thought I could do it, have sex with you and keep it simple. But nothing about you is simple, Ronan.”

“Doesn’t sound like a compliment,” he said, tugging his jeans on.

“Didn’t mean it as one.” She walked to him and when she was close enough, she went up on her toes and kissed him, just a slight brush of her lips to his. Then she stepped back, tightened the belt of her robe and swung her hair back from her face. “
That’s
goodbye, Ronan. Whatever we had together died along with our baby.”

What the bloody hell could he say to that without sounding like a moron?

He’d come here full of fire and righteous fury and he’d leave here satisfied in body and muddled of mind. Did all women have this ability to wreak havoc on a man?

Or was it just Laura?

He looked into her blue eyes and read regret shining there, along with the goodbye she’d just proclaimed. And he knew, that for today at least, they were done.

Six

T
he stone patio felt rough, cold and damp against his bare feet. He wore only jeans, hitched low on his hips. The icy wind pushed at him from the sea as if slapping at him. Ronan didn’t mind. He needed the cold. It made him sharp. Cleared out the fog in his mind and the heaviness inside him.

He lifted one hand to rub his fist against the center of his chest, in a futile effort to ease the ball of ice settled there. Taking a long pull on his beer, Ronan walked to the edge of the patio, dropped one hand to the wood railing and stared out to sea.

The waves rolled in and crashed on the cliffs below. Moonlight skittered in and out from behind a bank of clouds and intermittently turned the surface of the ocean to a bright silver. From next door came the muted sounds of a stereo and there was a distant hum of traffic from the highway above and behind the house.

His fist tightened around the long neck of the beer bottle and his eyes narrowed even further as he looked not at the scene in front of him, but at his own memories of the day.

Since the moment Laura had dropped her bomb on him that morning, nothing had made sense.

Which was the problem, he thought grimly, taking another long drink of his beer. Following Laura home, ending up in her bed, hadn’t steadied him. If anything, it had only fed the imbalance he felt. As if the world as he knew it had been cut out from under him. As if the stones beneath his feet were no more substantial than the insistent wind tearing at his hair.

A child.

Laura had been pregnant. With
his
child. And it was gone. How was he to deal with that? He saw her again, in memory, standing beneath the shade of a tree, spilling her secret, and he standing there like the village idiot, as if he hadn’t a mind to think or a tongue to speak the words crowding his mouth. But what could he say?

He still didn’t know what to think of it. But he knew what he thought of what had happened after. The slow boil of Laura facing him down and telling him goodbye. The coolness of her gaze. The polite, distant tone of her voice. She’d shut him out. Shut him down. As bloodlessly, he was forced to admit, as he had shut her down a couple of months ago.

“But this is different,” he insisted to the shadows crouched at the edges of his patio.

How it was different didn’t matter. What mattered was that
no
woman had ever walked away from Ronan Connolly before today and damned if he was going to let Laura be the first.

“Be damned if I will,” he assured himself, words snatched away by the wind as soon as they were uttered.

There was more between them yet to be settled. The electrifying heat when they came together was still there, so they weren’t finished with each other. Not at all. He’d let her go too early. His mistake.

“But I can fix that.” A slow smile curved his mouth as he lifted his beer for another sip. And standing in the wind-tossed darkness, a plan built in his mind.

* * *

Laura’s eyes were gritty and her head was pounding from lack of sleep.

So when Ronan walked into the real estate office, she took a deep breath and held it, half hoping she’d simply pass out. She was in no way ready for another confrontation with the man who had invaded her thoughts all night.

Heck, if she tried—which she wouldn’t—she would still be able to feel his hands on her. Feel the hot, thick slide of his body into hers and—

Oh, God.

“Uh-oh,” Georgia muttered, loud enough that Laura heard her from across the room.

Ronan’s lips quirked, which told her that he, too, had heard Georgia. Great. Just fabulous.

Still, she couldn’t blame her sister, since Georgia had been Laura’s sounding board all morning while she raged about Ronan and figuratively kicked herself for going to bed with him again.

“Good morning, ladies,” Ronan announced, Ireland singing in his voice. His gaze swept the room in an instant, as if to assure himself that no one but the Page sisters were in the office.

He looked good, she thought, which was completely unfair. If she’d been awake all night, unable to sleep, then he, too, should look haggard and irritable. But no, in his black jeans, thick Irish sweater and his hair carelessly wind-tossed, he looked more like he had stepped off the cover of a magazine.

She frowned up at him when he crossed to her desk, planted both hands on the sleek wood surface and leaned in.

“We have to talk,” he announced.

“Um, I think I’ll go for coffee,” Georgia said, jumping up from her desk like she’d been shot.

“Don’t you dare,” Laura warned, fixing her sister with a glare designed to keep her in place. There was simply no way she was going to be alone with Ronan this morning. She was still too…affected by their time together last night. The sad truth was, she didn’t trust herself with him just now.

Her mind might be coolly logical about keeping him at a distance, but her body had other, more interesting ideas.

“Is there something you needed?” she asked, looking up into those amazing blue eyes of his.

One corner of his mouth tipped up. “Well, now, an interesting question.”

Laura cringed. She’d walked into that one. “Ronan, we’re busy.” She picked up a manila file folder from her desk as if to drive that point home.

“As am I, Laura,” he assured her, pushing up from the desk and shoving his hands into his pockets. “’Tis why I’m here.”

Across the room, Georgia was making faces at her and jerking her head as if to shout,
For heaven’s sake, just talk to the man.

Easy for her to mime.

Laura inhaled sharply and said, “Ronan we said all we had to say yesterday. You have the answers you wanted, so why are you here now?”

“Oh,” he assured her with a wink, “I’ve not learned nearly enough. But I’m here on another matter entirely. This visit isn’t personal, Laura. ’Tis business.”

Business?
Georgia mouthed.

Laura ignored her sister and focused on the man in front of her. Lord knew it was no hardship to look at him. But when she caught the gleam in his eyes, she started to worry.

“I’ve come for your services—” he smiled at her “—your services professionally speaking, of course. I want you to find me a house to buy.”

For one heart-stopping second, she was excited at the thought. She’d helped him find places to rent both for his business and his residence when she first met him. But he hadn’t been looking to buy then, wanting to take his time and scope out the area.

Her commission on the kind of home Ronan would be interested in buying would be enormous. More than enough for a down payment on their building, a voice in her mind whispered. Too bad, she thought, that he wasn’t serious. He was up to something, she knew, and it had nothing to do with buying a house.

“No,” she argued, in spite of the way her sister was tugging at her hair in frustration. “You don’t want to buy a house, Ronan. You’re trying to drag me into some kind of game, and news flash—I’m not going to play.”

He was only interested in making her crazy, and the way her head was spinning and her blood humming, she had a feeling he was well on his way to succeeding.

He gave her a frown, pulled his hands from his pockets and crossed his arms over his chest. “I’ve no interest in games, Laura. I’m here as a buyer and I’m willing to start the looking now. Are you so willing to turn away my business for the sake of your pride?”

“My
pride
?” She slowly rose to her feet so she could meet him glare for glare. “You think this is about my pride?”

“What other reason could it be? Unless of course you don’t trust yourself with me…”

She actually
saw
red. Her vision blurred and temper had her heartbeat jittering frantically. Just because she’d been thinking only moments ago that she didn’t really trust herself to be alone with him was no reason for
him
to think it. The man’s ego was enormous.

“Laura…” Georgia was jabbing a finger at the doorway to the office kitchenette, no doubt wanting to talk about this.

Laura shook her head.

Ronan hid a smile, but not before she saw it. He was enjoying himself, damn it.

He spoke again, and Laura glanced at her sister in time to see Georgia clutching her throat as if she were choking.

“The cliff house is fine for a rental,” Ronan was saying, “but I want something permanent.”

Her eyes narrowed on him in suspicion. “Why? You’ll be going back to Ireland.”

One dark brown eyebrow lifted. “And spending plenty of time here as well. Cosain is growing. I’ll need to have a base in California as well as in Ireland.”

Laura dropped one hand to the phone on her desk and clicked her fingernails against the back of it in a rapid tempo that mimicked what her heartbeat was doing. When his gaze dropped to her nervous fingers, she stilled them.

Torn between the temptation of a huge commission and the urge to throw him out, Laura could only stare at him. She was angry, too. He couldn’t get to her any other way, so now he’d decided to wave a check at her.

“You use your money to get what you want?”

His gaze narrowed on her. “Is there a reason I shouldn’t? And is it, Laura, that you don’t so much have a problem with me offering it as you do with yourself wanting to take it?”

“I don’t like being bought.”

“I’m buying a house, not you.”

She flushed, temper rising. He had her, damn it, and he knew it. Laura couldn’t afford to be offended. She and Georgia needed that money to set their own world right and turning it down would cost her sister. Not something Laura was prepared to do.

He would know that, too, the bastard. When they first got together, they’d spoken of their families. He knew how close she and Georgia were. How they were struggling. He hadn’t, he’d said at the time, been able to empathize, as the only family he had were his cousin Sean and Sean’s mother. But he could sympathize.

Now, he was using what he knew against her and doing it damned well, too.

Silence spun out in the room for several long moments and hung there, caught in a web of tension so thick Laura could hardly draw a breath. Neither of them shattered the spell. It was Georgia who finally spoke up.

“If you want my opinion,” she said.

“Really don’t,” Laura snapped.

“Well, I’d be interested,” Ronan said.

Georgia didn’t need much encouragement. Ronan smiled as she came around her desk and walked across the room to stand beside him. She barely looked at him though, keeping her gaze fixed on her sister.

“Are you nuts?” she asked.

Laura heard Ronan’s snort of laughter as she said, “Excuse me?”

“Well, come on,” her sister said, “business isn’t great enough to turn down any prospective buyer.”

“He isn’t a buyer,” Laura argued. “He’s using his money to manipulate me.
Us.
”

“Manipulate’s a harsh word,” he insisted. “I need a house. You sell houses. Seems simple enough to me.”

“There you go! It’s settled.” Georgia took Laura’s arm and pulled her up from her chair. “So why don’t you two head out for some coffee? Ronan can tell you what he’s thinking of and meanwhile I’ll print out some likely prospects in the Laguna area. You like the cliffs, right?”

“I do. Reminds me of home.”

“Great, good.” Georgia picked up Laura’s purse and handed it to her. “So go on now, I should have ten or twenty listings for you by the time you get back.”

“They shoot traitors, you know,” Laura murmured.

“Hey, it’s Tuesday,” Georgia said, herding Laura and Ronan to the door. “Carmen always makes cinnamon rolls on Tuesdays. You can bring me back one.”

Ronan was on the street in the sunshine blinking a moment later, thinking that Georgia would have made an excellent bodyguard. She took charge, and apparently, since she had ignored her sister’s fury, the woman was fearless as well.

“You use your money like a club,” Laura said hotly. “Have you ever noticed that?”

“It’s not a club, but, aye, I have used it as a weapon before. And will again.” He used what he had to win. Always had. Always would.

“You seem proud.”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” He stepped onto the sidewalk after her. “I’ve got it. What good is it to stand about and
not
use it?”

“You don’t play fair.”

“I play to win and you know that very well,” he said, catching her gaze with his.

She blew out a breath. “Are you serious about this?” Laura asked, tucking her purse under her left arm.

“I am,” he said. Dead serious. This was the perfect plan. After all, he would need a house here. He despised renting and hotels didn’t suit him. And the added benefit to the protracted house hunt he had in mind was the time Laura would be forced to spend with him.

He wasn’t done. Not by a long shot. The knowledge that this woman had actually carried and lost his child had still not completely sunk in. But if she thought the connection between them was severed, she was wrong. She wouldn’t be turning her back on him. Locking him out of her life. Her bed. Not yet, anyway.

Damned if he would be tossed aside. The explosive sex they’d shared the night before had only served to convince him that he’d made a mistake in ending what was between them so soon. He wanted her. She wanted him. He’d have her back in his bed, where she belonged, and when he finally decided he’d had enough, then and only then, would they be over.

She watched his eyes as if searching for a trick, a trap. But she would find nothing there he didn’t want her to see. He knew well how to keep his own secrets.

Finally, Laura nodded and started walking. “Fine, then. We’ll go have coffee, talk about what you want and then I’ll take a poisoned cinnamon roll back to my sister.”

He laughed and she shot him a wry grin. “Okay, not poisoned.”

“Is it so hard then, Laura, to work with me?”

“Not if that’s all you want from me.” Her red heels made a pleasant clicking sound against the sidewalk. “I am a professional, after all.”

“Exactly what I was thinking,” he told her, and took one moment to indulge himself in admiring her. That thick, blond hair hung in a tumble of waves past her shoulders. She wore a red blazer with a white shirt and black skirt that stopped a few inches above her knees. A lovely woman with a glint in her blue eyes that told him whatever he had in mind, she was ready for it.