He rose to his feet again. “I’ll be right back.”
She felt frantic, suddenly, after what she’d just been so foolish as to reveal to him. What if he didn’t come back? She’d sit here, her skin turning pruney, as all the bubbles melted away. And then, finally, she’d have to get out of the water, put on her robe and slink back to her own room.
She grabbed for him, an awkward, desperate move. “No. Wait, I—”
He knelt again, caught her hand, kissed it a second time. “Hannah. I won’t be long. I promise you.”
She realized she believed him. He honestly intended to come right back. She felt doubly foolish, to have reached out for him like that. With great dignity, she retrieved her hand and sank into the bubbles up to her chin. “Take your time.”
He rose again, then lingered, watching her, looking way too amused. He really was pretty incredible, the way he could stand there without a stitch on, everything showing, and find her amusing.
“Well?” She quelled a sudden urge to cross her eyes at him.
He had the nerve to chuckle. “All right. I’m going.”
She was so busy being dignified, she didn’t even watch him walk away that time.
He was as good as his word. He came back just moments later, a fat crystal glass in either hand. “Two fingers of good whiskey. It’ll heal all your ills.”
She rubbed the beard of bubbles that had attached itself to her chin. “I am not a drinking woman.”
“You’ll drink this.”
He came down into the water with her. She thought again what a perfectly beautiful man he was, so big and powerfully built, and yet lean. He had such a fine, economical grace when he moved.
He handed her the whiskey. She sipped, made a face and set it on the wide edge of the tub. He settled in and took a sip himself.
And he watched her.
He was waiting. For her to tell him more. And, against her better judgment, she found that she wanted to tell him more. Whatever happened tomorrow, in the bright and too-revealing light of day, tonight she wanted to give him everything. Whatever he wanted of her.
Her body.
Her passion.
Her one sad and awful little secret.
She picked up her glass again, knocked back another sip. She did it too fast, and ended up coughing as the whiskey seared its way down her throat.
“Relax.” Cord guided a loose curl behind her ear. “All right?”
She coughed again. “Fine.” She’d heard that whiskey was supposed to give a person a little false courage—maybe make a tough situation easier to face. It didn’t seem to be helping her all that much. She set the glass down for good.
And she began to talk.
“The summer I turned seventeen, I got a break. A really big break—or at least, that was what it seemed like at the time. I got fostered by a family in Tulsa. A rich family. They didn’t even need the money the state pays out for foster kids. They wanted to help out, to do their social duty, you could say. And the woman, my foster mother, she told me when she met me, before she picked me to come and live in her house, that she’d always wanted a daughter. She had two sons, one in his twenties, out on his own by then, and one my age, at home. I went to live with them in May, as soon as school was out. I remember my first sight of the house they lived in….” She stared into the middle distance, remembering.
Cord prompted, “Big?”
Hannah shivered, then sighed. Idly she ran her hand over the water’s surface, flattening bubbles as she went. “Not so big as Stockwell Mansion, but big enough, to an orphan from Oologah. Fifteen rooms, I think it had. A beautiful house, two stories, with columns in front.” Hannah leaned her head back against the tub rim and closed her eyes. “My foster mother took me right upstairs to my new bedroom. It had Country French furniture and blue-and-pink striped wallpaper and I thought it was the most beautiful room I’d ever seen. And then, while I was standing in the middle of that room, oohing and ahing my little heart out, my foster brother appeared in the doorway to introduce himself.”
Hannah felt the water move. Cord’s leg brushed hers. She thought he might say something. But he remained quiet. She kept her eyes closed. It was easier that way.
She said, “He had blue eyes. And thick, dark hair. And when he smiled at me…”
Cord did speak then. “Love at first sight?”
“I thought so at the time. What did I know? I was only seventeen. I’d never even been on a date with a boy. I thought I was in love and I thought he loved me. We started…meeting, in secret, late at night. His room. Or my room. We took crazy chances. And, hard as it is for me to believe now, we never got caught.”
“Until you got pregnant.”
She sat up in the water and looked at him. She saw no judgment of her in his eyes.
And Hannah was right.
Cord wasn’t judging her.
He already hated the boy she had given her love to. But he felt only tenderness toward Hannah, toward the sweet, hopeless innocent she must once have been.
“Yes,” she said, her pretty face flushed—from the heat of the water, or perhaps her remembered shame. “By August, I couldn’t ignore the signs.”
He knew what she would have done. “You told the boy.”
She nodded.
“And he…?”
“At first, he said he loved me. That he would marry me. But then…”
“Then what?”
“We told his mother.”
“What did she do?”
“She blamed me. Called me a lot of real ugly names, went on about how she’d given me so much, treated me like a daughter—and look how I was paying her back. He was there, the boy, when she said all those horrible things. And he…he didn’t defend me. He never spoke up, even once, to admit he’d been part of it, too. She said I seduced him. And he just sat there, looking guilty. Looking like he thought that what she’d said was probably right.” Hannah wrapped her soft arms around herself and absently rubbed at the film of bubbles that were melting on her shoulders.
The green eyes were far away, lost in old hurts. “She arranged to have him sent away, to go to school back east. And she sent me away, too. To a halfway house for unwed mothers. I ran away from that place twice. But in the end, I…well, I made peace with my situation, I guess you could say. I was seventeen and I had a baby inside me and I realized that the best thing I could do for my baby would be to stay in the halfway house until she was born.”
“And then?”
“And then give her up to a loving mother and father, who would raise her to have everything I lost when I was nine—the attention, and the laughter, the sharing…everything you get in a real family.”
“And did you do that?”
She nodded, still absently rubbing her pretty, pale shoulders. “I made them let me meet the new parents before I would sign any of the papers. They were good people, gentle, kind people. And they were willing to keep in touch with me, to tell me how Ella Marie was doing—that was her name, my daughter’s. Ella Marie…” Her mouth was trembling.
Cord couldn’t stand to see that, the way her soft lips trembled, the stark pain in her eyes. He set his empty glass on the edge of the tub next to her almost-full one. Then he gathered her into his arms.
She resisted at first, but then, with a soft exhalation of breath, she gave in and laid her head against his chest. They floated there, in the cooling bath, with the bubbles slowly dissolving around them.
He stroked her damp hair, her nape, her velvety shoulder.
Finally she said, “Three months after I gave her away, Ella Marie died.”
Cord held her tighter, placed a kiss in her hair.
“It was a SIDS death.” He felt her breath against his chest. “And I know…it’s not logical for me to blame myself. I know that it wasn’t my fault. It was nobody’s fault. But somehow, I’ve always felt that I could have made a difference, that I should have kept her. That I was her mother and if I’d been there, she would
have lived…”
Cord had no damn idea what to say to her. He kept thinking of the boy who had betrayed her: a rich boy, with dark hair and blue eyes.
And he also thought of Becky. He was learning that it didn’t take long for a baby to claim her place in a parent’s heart. He’d only known he was a father for three weeks. Becky had lived in his rooms for less than two. And yet, if something were to happen to her now, if he were to lose her, she’d leave a huge, ragged hole at the very center of his world.
He whispered, “Hannah. You’re right. It wasn’t your fault…”
She squirmed in his arms, pushing at his chest until he released her enough that she could look into his eyes. “Oh, Cord. I know that. In my mind. It’s my heart that just can’t seem to get the message.”
He stared at her sweet, damp face with the little wisps of soft hair curling at her temples and he wanted to make everything right for her.
He probably shouldn’t have offered. But he was who he was. “Do you want them to pay?”
“Pay?” She sat up straighter. “Who?”
“The boy who got you pregnant—though I guess he’s a man now. And his mother. That whole family.”
She put her hand to her throat. “You mean…hurt them?”
“Just give me a name, Hannah. I’ll see what I can do.”
“But I don’t…you’re talking about hiring some kind of hit man, or something?”
He let out a laugh. In spite of the tough times she’d been through, in some ways she remained a total naïf. “Murder is a little too…obvious for me. No. I was thinking more on a financial level. I have connections in Tulsa. It would take time, of course, but I can probably arrange for an eventual…how should I put it? A reversal of fortune?”
She gaped. “A reversal of…you are kidding me.”
“Hannah, I promise you. I don’t kid about money. But it wouldn’t be fast, you have to understand. It could take years.” He paused. She continued to stare at him. So he added, “Just give me their names.”
“No.” She scooted away so fast that water and bubbles splashed over the rim of the tub. “I really don’t want that.”
He fought the urge to yank her back into his arms. “You’re certain?”
“Yes. I…it was a long time ago. And I truly don’t believe in holding grudges. Besides, I wasn’t a total victim in what happened. That woman had trusted me. I should have stayed away from her son.”
“Are you trying to tell me he didn’t pursue you?”
“No. He pursued me. And at first, I tried to resist the attraction. But in the end, I said yes to him. I met him whenever we could sneak away. I did wrong. What they did, they have to work out between themselves and God.”
“Come on. Don’t tell me you wouldn’t like to see them pay just a little—for the way that they hurt you, for Ella Marie…”
She sat up so straight, the top curves of her breasts emerged from the water. He could see the tempting nipples, firm and sweet and pink. “No. It was a long time ago and I have honestly forgiven them. And it’s certainly not their fault what happened to my little girl. I told you. It’s myself I have a hard time forgiving.”
“You don’t even wonder where the boy is now? If he’s happy? If he’s married someone else, had children with her?”
An enchanting chestnut curl had drooped too close to her eye. She swiped it away. “Cord. He wasn’t the person I thought he was. Why in the world would I care what he’s doing now?”
He couldn’t help smiling. Clearly she carried no torch for the idiot who’d betrayed her. It was what he’d wanted to hear.
He shrugged. “All right. Have it your way.”
“Well.” She gave him one of her huffy looks. “Thank you very much.”
“Come back here.”
She glared at him.
“Please.”
Her expression softened. She glided to him again.
He wrapped his arms around her good and tight. They were silent again, drifting there.
Finally he muttered, “I really am so damn sorry, Hannah…”
She didn’t say anything. For a moment, he wondered if she had even heard him.
But then she looked up. Her eyes asked for kisses.
He hadn’t had a lot of practice at giving comfort to a woman. But he knew how to please, how to distract, how to make her forget…
He covered her mouth, very lightly, with his own. She sighed, an inviting sort of sound. He deepened the kiss, sliding his tongue between her slightly parted lips. She moaned and shyly allowed her tongue to spar with his.
He let his hand slide down, over her wet, willing curves. When he found her, she gasped. But she didn’t say no.
On the contrary, she whispered a sweet, impassioned, “Yes…”
He kissed that yes right off her soft mouth as his hand continued its pleasurable task below.
Chapter Fifteen
In the morning, Cord woke first, just as the sun was rising.
For a few pleasant seconds, he didn’t move. He watched Hannah, thinking that she looked so soft and defenseless in sleep. She lay on her side, the covers sliding off her shoulder, her fist tucked into the curve of her chin.
There were tender dark circles beneath her eyes.
He smiled to himself. He had tired her out.
She needed rest. Lots of it.
Because tonight, or whenever the next opportunity presented itself, he intended to tire her out all over again.
Careful not to wake her, he slipped from the bed and tiptoed around the big room, drawing all the curtains. When his gaze fell on the baby monitor, near the hall door, he realized he’d have to take care of Becky right away, before she woke and started squalling and Hannah jumped up to run to her.
He went to a bureau to grab a T-shirt and boxers. In the walk-in closet, he found chinos and a pair of moccasins. Swiftly and silently, he pulled on the clothes. His office was equipped with a full bath. And he kept several changes of clothes there, so he could worry about getting himself more appropriately dressed for the workday once he got downstairs. Scooping up the monitor, he left the bedroom suite and strode down the hall to Becky’s room.
When he opened her door, she greeted him, letting out one of those cute little questioning cries of hers. He fed her and changed her and amused her for a while, taking her to the play mat on the floor, which had a mobile with rattles and bright balls dangling from it. She went back to bed with no fussing about an hour and a half after he’d entered her room.
He stood out in the hall for a few minutes, with the monitor turned up all the way, trying to decide how long she would let Hannah sleep if he took the monitor back to the bedroom suite. He could, after all, simply carry it downstairs with him and come back up if Becky needed him.
He decided to chance putting it back—mostly because he knew that when Hannah woke alone in his room, the first thing she’d do would be to look for the monitor. If it wasn’t there, she’d have a moment of pure panic, before she rushed to Becky’s room to make certain the baby was okay.
He wanted Hannah to get some rest—not have a coronary.
And the more he thought about it, the more it seemed advisable that he leave her some kind of note. He didn’t want her to decide he’d deserted her, any more than he wanted her to worry about Becky.
So he detoured to the small desk in the sitting room opposite the nursery, where he spent several minutes trying to figure out what to write.
Once he’d settled on a few succinct lines, he went back down the hall and ducked inside his door just long enough to put the monitor back where he’d found it and the note under the monitor. He saw, when he went in, that Hannah was still sound asleep. Good. With any luck, it might be an hour or two or even more, before Becky disturbed her.
Tonight, when he kept Hannah up late all over again, he wouldn’t feel quite so guilty about it.
When Cord got downstairs, it was still early enough that his secretary and the four others he kept o
n permanent staff in the offices had yet to arrive for work. He entered his private office, rang for Emma to send him coffee and croissants, then went to the closet to see about clothes. Once he’d picked out the day’s wardrobe, he proceeded to his private bath, where he showered and shaved.
When he emerged, his breakfast was waiting. He sipped coffee and ate two buttery hot croissants.
At eight-thirty on the nose, his secretary, Audrey Caseman, a model of efficiency with steel-gray hair and a sweet granny’s smile, stuck her head in his door and asked him if he wanted to dictate those letters he’d mentioned they needed to get out of the way first thing today.
He started to tell her to bring in her notepad when the phone interrupted him.
It was the house line—his father’s line. Damn. The old man must be giving the nurses a hard time again. He signaled Audrey to wait a moment and picked up the phone, already mentally rearranging his schedule to allow for some time in his father’s rooms.
“I’m calling a family meeting.” It was his father’s voice. “Get the rest of them together and come to me now.”
What the hell? He hadn’t heard the old man sound so good in weeks—sharp and cool. Perfectly coherent.
“You there, Cord? You hear me?”
“Yeah, Dad. I hear you.”
Caine made a rumbling sound deep in his throat, a sound reminiscent of thunder before a big storm. “Then get the others and get in here. Now.”
“Are you…all right?”
“All right?” his father growled. “You’re asking me if I’m all right?”
Cord said nothing. What was there to say?
And Caine answered his own question, anyway. “No, damn you. I am not all right. I have cancer. My doctors tell me it has metastasized to the point where I have very few major organs left unaffected. At this precise moment, however, I am in full command of my faculties. I have something to say to you—and to your brothers and sister. I want to say it now. Is that clear to you, Cord?”
Cord decided he needed another opinion as to what the hell was going on. “Dad. Is Gunderson there?”
The Tycoon's Instant Daughter Page 15