Worth the Risk (23 page)

Hannah woke slowly and stretched, feeling every sore spot. The night before came back to her. The fire. Stephen doctoring her, holding her, looking edgier than she’d ever seen him. She rolled on the smooth chocolate-brown sheets. Stephen’s bed, but she was alone. She took in his room. Dark beige walls and carved black wood under a high ceiling. The skylight above the bed, letting in the morning.

There were voices at the front door and she strained to hear. Stephen’s and a woman’s.
Lexie
.

She rushed out just in time to see him closing his front door. “Who was that?”

“No one.”

“It was someone.”

He crossed the room in quick strides and laid his hands on her shoulders.

Fear gripped her chest and her mind raced to the worst. “Tell me.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry. It was just business. I already called the hospital. Lexie’s stable. Improved.”

“Okay.” She let out the breath she’d been holding. Took another. “Okay. I need to go there.”

“I’ll drive you.”

She touched the soft cotton of Stephen’s T-shirt hanging to her knees. “I have to go home first. I need clothes.”

“I like you in that.”

She tried to smile, but the fire and the fear invaded. “No. I need to go home. I need to see the horses. I need to see Winnie. She’s probably scared and I just left last night and…”

“Hey.” His hands moved up to cup her neck.

She felt her burning eyes fill with tears. “I’ll get my car and…”

“Shh.” He kissed her soft and sweet, giving her something wonderful to replace the awful. Then he didn’t say anything for several seconds, just studied her like he was trying to make a decision. Finally, he took her face gently and pressed another kiss to her lips.

“Give me a second to change. You want some water?”

“I can get it.”

“Okay. I’ll be right back.”

She wandered through the massive A-frame she hadn’t noticed last night. It was a work of art, all redwood and glass. A masterpiece on the side of a mountain.

She’d never been here before. Hadn’t really thought about it, or why. She had the horses to take care of, he had a business to run. But she thought about it now as she walked through, passing a series of prints on the walls. All buildings. Singapore. Dubai. Hong Kong. She wondered if they were all his.

She ran a hand along a wooden bookcase, coming to a picture of a striking blonde laughing into the camera, blue water behind her. Perfectly gorgeous in a tiny bikini, something she’d never wear, showing off miles of perfectly sun-kissed skin, something she’d never do.

“I’m ready.”

Startled, she bobbled the photo, trying to put it back, and he took it from her hands. “Your fiancée?”

“Yes.”

“She was beautiful.”

He looked at it a moment, then set it back in its place. “Come on. Let’s go.”

He’d skipped a shower and thrown on jeans and a T-shirt. He’d have to come back to get ready for work, she thought, walking out to his truck. For some reason that seemed significant, like her mind was thinking of so many things, she couldn’t weed out the important from the unimportant.

His truck smelled like smoke when she climbed inside and it turned her stomach with the blast of reality. The barn had burned. The horses had barely gotten out. They could have died. Lexie could have. She could have.

“You’re missing work,” she said as he slid in beside her and turned the key.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll have to go into the office for a while, but just to clear my schedule. Cancel any trips.” He reached across and took her hand. “We’ll get this sorted out.”

She nodded, still completely confused about what had happened, why, and how it could all be sorted.

“You need to eat something.” His fingers clenched around the steering wheel. “I should have made you eat something, damn it. You never even ate dinner.”

“Neither did you.” She gave his hand a squeeze. “I’m fine. I’ll eat something before I leave.”

Her mind was a jumble of thoughts as they drove. She needed to call the owners of the horses she boarded. Tell them what happened. They were her responsibility and they could have died. It made her sick. She’d need to call out a vet to look them over.

“I’ll check on insurance,” he went on. “Try to get that moving. In the meantime I’ll get someone out there to build something temporary. Hell, I’ll build it myself.”

He sounded angry, but in charge. All she could do was nod, with the lump in her throat threatening to choke her. Because it might not matter. It might all be taken from her anyway. In a way she felt like it already had been.

She needed clothes, didn’t even have on pants, so Stephen drove straight to her cabin. The drive through the woods was interminable and her heart hurt.

He pulled to a stop and she opened the door, ready to jump out, but at the last minute leaned over and kissed him. As bad as it was, it was easier because of him. “Thank you.”

She grabbed the door handle to jump down and her bare foot brushed against something on the floorboard on her way out. Thinking it might be something he needed, she reached for it before it fell.

A rose. A single red rose broken off at the stem. A little shriveled around the edges but not dry.

Something pricked at the back of her mind as she stared at it, unable to let it go.

New truck. One rosebud. No flowers.

Stephen cleared his throat. “I went to Tracy’s grave yesterday. My fiancée.”

Her brain was already so full and twisted up but…Tracy.
Trace.
Her heart fell, crashed to the bottom of her stomach.

“I took flowers.”

She made herself meet his eyes because he sounded like he’d done something wrong, and he hadn’t. “That was a good thing to do. I’ve um…I’ve got to change and…” The rose dropped from her fingers and onto the seat. “I’ll talk to you later.”

She closed the truck door and ran. Got inside, and thanked God twice when she heard the sound of him driving away. Because she couldn’t have held back the tears any longer.

Tracy. Trace.
His entire company. Everything he wanted. Everything that he lived for, that had saved him.

She’d been saved by a place. Stephen had been saved by the memory of the woman he loved. Maybe still did.

Stephen drove away from her feeling like he’d been kicked in the chest. Still raw after last night and now…that bruised look in her bloodshot eyes killed him. Was it just the fire? Her worry for Lexie?

No. The way she’d picked up that rose. The way she’d looked at it, then at him with understanding. But she didn’t understand anything.

He went home, showered, dressed, and headed to work, his mind circling the issues. There were things he needed to take care of. Meetings to cancel or reschedule. Hannah would need him this week and he’d be there. And he’d do something about this damn land requisition. He wondered what the city’s stance would be now, after the fire.

But more than anything was the way they’d left things. He couldn’t let her think…whatever it was she thought about Tracy, because that wasn’t it. He loved
her
. He loved Hannah. He’d known it, wasn’t sure why the words hadn’t come out sooner. Maybe because he’d fought it for so long.

At the last second he turned right instead of left toward the city. Screw it. He’d see her now.

Stephen parked his truck and got out, the smell of charred wood hitting him in the face. Seeing it in the light of day was…not worse, but sadder. What had once been serene now looked like a mini–war zone. The front of the barn was open to the elements, the roof partially gone. After the scene last night he was surprised by how much of the structure still stood.

The ground he walked across was marred and torn by heavy fire truck wheels. The paddock fence to the right of the barn was partially broken by the same. Winnie came across the lower pasture, blond mane and tail blowing around her caramel body. Thank God she hadn’t been hurt.

He imagined Hannah out there, flying across the field, her hair flowing behind her. A white light against the backdrop of the world, and yet sometimes…she seemed barely there, like she could blend right into the sunset. Like if he blinked she could be gone. He knew what it was to blink and someone be gone. He leaned his forearms against the wooden rail, dropping his head with the weight of the thought. He didn’t want to lose again.

“Hey.”

Stephen whipped around to find Luke, wearing a tool belt and carrying a two-by-four.

“You looking for Hannah?”

“Well, I’m sure as hell not looking for you,” Stephen said, joking.

Luke grinned. “I figured. She’s not here. She went to the hospital to check on Lexie.”

Of course. If he’d thought, he’d have known she’d be at the hospital. But he’d wanted to see her now. Wanted to touch her and hold her now. “You need some help?”

“From you, playboy? You’re dressed for a boardroom, not a barn.”

“Yeah.” He smiled down at his black suit pants, his dress shoes. “I just…”

“Wanted to see her. I get it.”

Stephen nodded.

“She just texted me she was going by the feed store. Should be back in a couple of hours.”

Stephen glanced at his watch. He wanted to talk to her, ached to tell her how he felt, but he also needed to touch base with Dave before his partner caught a plane. “Tell her I came by and I’ll be back. Tell her I had to take care of something but I need to talk to her.”

“Sure, man. Or you could call her.”

He could, but…damn, he wanted to see her. Look in her eyes. Besides, he had a few more things to take care of. “This needs to be done in person.”

Luke shrugged. “Whatever.”

“Hey, man. What’s up?” Dave poked his head in the doorway to Stephen’s office.

Stephen pushed aside the contract he’d been trying to review as Dave entered. “Hey.”

“You look like shit. Again.”

“There was a fire last night at Hannah’s barn.”

“Damn. Was anyone hurt?”

“Lexie, a woman who works at the barn. They both went in to get the horses.” He shook his head. “I think she’s going to be okay. Severe smoke inhalation. She’s in the hospital.”

“And Hannah?”

“She’s fine. Shaken, but fine.”

Dave nodded slightly like he was taking in the information. “The horses?”

“All survived. Thank God.” Because that would have killed her.

“Hmm. Well, that’s too bad. Listen, I need to talk to you about the Carson-Maxwell deal. They’re not quite ready to move, but I think if I gave them more numbers, worked some projections maybe three additional years out, they’d come on board.”

“I don’t know.” Stephen blinked at the sudden subject change. “Give me a couple of days to look into it.”

“I’m on it and it needs to be done now.”

“I said I’d look into it,” he countered with more heat than he’d meant.
Fuck.
“Sorry. I’ve got a lot going on right now.”

“Yeah, I can see that.”

Frustrated, he tapped the keyboard, suddenly remembering another meeting he needed to cancel. He hammered out an email for Dee before realizing Dave was still standing there. And staring at him. “Was there something else?”

“Was there something else?” Dave’s face twisted. “Was there something
else
? I’m your partner, not your fucking assistant that you dismiss when you’re busy.”

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

“The hell you didn’t.”

Stephen leveled a gaze at Dave, studied him. There was something in his eyes, something maybe he’d seen just a flash of before, but now it burned hot and steady. “You have something to say?”

“Are you about to blow a major deal because you’ve
got a lot going on
?”

“What the hell is your problem? Is it still about Hannah’s property? I told you no on that because—”

“You told me
no
? Really?” Dave’s laugh held no amusement. “You told me no like I’m a fucking five-year-old? Who do you think kept this place going while your head was buried in a bottle?”

Okay. Stephen rubbed at his forehead. So that’s where they were going. “And I owe you.”

“You more than owe me. You were
useless
to this company! Then when you finally get your shit together you come back in here like you own the place.”

“That’s because I do,” he said clearly, making sure there was no misunderstanding.

“You bastard. You’re going to throw that in my face?”

“I wasn’t, no.” Stephen gave him a cool stare. “Not until you brought it up.”

Dave’s voice rose and he pointed at himself. “I helped build this as much as you did!”

Not true and Dave knew it, which made his outburst even more absurd. But Dave had always been after power, fed off it. It had served Trace Development well, but he’d been foolish to think a man like that wouldn’t turn around at some point. Take a bite out of the hand that fed him. “So what? You want a raise?” Not that he’d ever get it. He hadn’t built a Fortune 500 company by rewarding employee dissonance. Not even from his second-in-charge.

“I busted my ass,” Dave went on. “Covered yours. But you always come out on top, don’t you? Women line up to fuck you. Men shit themselves to shake your hand.” Dave paced around the room before coming back to Stephen’s desk. “How do you think your little cowgirl would like to know what you’re really like, who you really are? I mean
her
of all people.”

Stephen stood, struggling for control at Dave’s mention of Hannah.

“Yeah, I did a little research. Too bad about your girl. Such a tragedy.” Dave tsked like someone had dropped an ice cream. “You do seem to be a magnet for tortured women.”

Dave casually crossed to the bar. “I wonder how comfortable she’d be around you if she knew the truth. After all she’s been through.”

“What truth is that?” Something inside him twisted painfully and a heavy feeling settled in his gut, because he knew.

“That you’re a sick fuck. That you’ll never get over losing the one woman you’ll ever love. That you’d rather maim and torture her killers than have her back.” Dave said it all calmly, gladly.

There’d been a few times he hadn’t drunk alone, but with Dave. And a few times he’d let his mind spill open, let all his thoughts and perversions spill out.

And yes. He’d said all that. Even meant it in that moment. “And you’d tell her?”

Dave gave a sick laugh. “Nah, what the fuck do I care.”

When Stephen said nothing, Dave smiled, gave him some kind of mock salute, and left.

Stephen let out a heavy breath. How could he explain to Hannah that the hatred that boiled inside was a living, breathing thing? Something that had grown until it had a life of its own because he hadn’t wanted to face the loss?

Because that’s what it came down to. He’d chosen anger instead of grief until it hadn’t been a choice anymore. How could he tell her all of that and in the same breath tell her he loved her?

He wasn’t the man she needed. Worse, he was afraid he was exactly the man she
didn’t
need.

And he was terrified that when she found out the truth, she would agree.