Harlequin Desire February 2013 - Bundle 1 of 2: The King Next DoorMarriage With BenefitsA Real Cowboy (Kings of California)

by Maureen Child

  Then he went looking for her.

  The little ball in the center of the mattress was quiet, so he eased onto the edge of the bed. “I didn’t know they were going to make such a big deal out of it.”

  Nothing.

  He tried again. “Talk to me, honey. Scream at me. I don’t care, as long as you don’t keep up this deep freeze. This is all a big misunderstanding. I can fix it.”

  “Fix it?” The lethal whip of her tone sank into his skull, which was already sloshy with alcohol and the beginnings of a headache. She sat up, and the light from the bedside lamp cast half of her scrubbed face in shadow. “You’ve done enough fixing for today, Machiavelli. I’m tired. Go away and sleep somewhere else.”

  “Ouch. I’m in that much trouble?” He grinned, and she didn’t return it. So, jokes weren’t the way to go. Noted. “Come on, darlin’. I messed up. I shouldn’t have taken people to the site. I’ll find another hotel for your shelter if that site’s compromised. It’s not worth getting so upset over.”

  “Do I seem upset?” She stared at him, and her dry eyes bothered him more than the silent treatment. Unease snaked through his gut.

  “No.” He’d wandered into the middle of uncharted territory full of quicksand. This had all the trappings of their first official fight as a couple. Except they weren’t really a couple—yet—and, technically, they argued all the time. “Does that mean you’ve already forgiven me?”

  She palmed her forehead and squeezed. “You really don’t get any of this, do you?”

  “Yeah, I get it.” Somehow, his plan to come up with the operating expenses for the shelter hadn’t happened as envisioned. “You’re ticked because I tried to tap sponsors for the shelter site, and now the location is compromised. I’m in real estate, darlin’. I’ll find another one. A better one.”

  “I’m sure you will. Eventually.” She lay back down and covered her head with an arm, blocking his view of her face. His firecracker’s fuse was noticeably fizzled. How could they get past this if she wouldn’t yell at him?

  “Cia.” He waited until she peeked out from below the crook of her elbow. “I should have talked to you before talking to the money. I’m sorry. Let’s kiss and make up now, okay?”

  “No. No more kissing. This isn’t only about the shelter.” Her voice was steady, a monotone with no hint of the fire or passion she normally directed at him. “It’s about you running the show. You say I have a choice, but only if it’s a choice you agree with. I’m not doing this anymore. In the morning, I’m moving back into my condo.”

  “What? You can’t.” This situation was unraveling faster than he could put it back together. But whatever happened, he couldn’t let her leave. He wiped damp palms on the comforter and went with reason. “We have a deal. Six months.”

  The arm came off her face, and bitter laughter cut through the quiet bedroom. “A deal, Wheeler? We have a deal? Oh, that’s rich. We have a deal when it’s convenient for you to remember it. Every other waking moment, you’re trying to alter the deal. Presenting alternatives. Trying to give me money. Talking about babies with your mother and seducing me into believing you really understand me. It’s all about the deal, isn’t it? As long as it’s the best deal for you. What about what I want?”

  He swore. Some of her points could be considered valid when viewed from a slightly different perspective. But her perspective was wrong—the tweaks to the deal were good for everyone. “What do you want?”

  “A divorce! The same thing I’ve wanted since day one. I fail to understand how or when that fact became confusing to you.”

  “It’s not confusing.” He refused to lose control of the conversation. She needed him, and his job was to help her realize it. “I know that’s what you think you want. But it’s not.”

  “Oh, well, everything is so clear now. Are you aware of the fact that you talk in circles most of the time? Or is it deliberate, to bewilder your opponent into giving up?”

  “Here’s some straight talk for you. We’re good together. We have fun, and I like being with you. You’re fascinating, compelling, inspiring and all of that is out of bed. In bed...” He whistled. “Amazing. Beyond compare. I’ve told you this. No circles then. No circles now. Why can’t you see a divorce is not what you need?”

  “Do you hear yourself?” she asked so softly he strained to pick up the words. “Your whole argument was about why a divorce is not what you need. My needs are foreign to you. And you’ve spent the last few months fooling me into believing the opposite, with the dresses and taking care of me and pretending you were interested in the shelter because you wanted to help me.”

  “I do want to help you,” he snapped. God Almighty, she pushed his limits. Stubborn as a stripped screw. He forced his tone back into the realm of agreeable before he gave away the fact that she’d gotten to him. “You’re mad because it was mutually beneficial? That’s what made the original deal so attractive. We both got value out of it. Why is it so bad to continue the tradition?”

  “All lies! Matthew left and now you’re hot for a wife who’ll give you a baby. You’re too lazy to go find one, so you thought, ‘Hey, I already have a wife. I’ll hang on to her.’”

  Lazy? She was more work than a roomful of spoiled debutantes and jaded supermodels. Yet there was not one woman he’d want long-term besides Cia. They were compatible on every level, and the thought of living his life without her—well, it wasn’t a picture he liked. Why else would he be talking about it? “I get the feeling anything I say at this point would be wrong.”

  “Now you’re onto something. There’s no defense for any of it, least of all compromising the shelter site. If a woman’s abuser finds the shelter, he might kill her. Do you understand how horrible your cavalier attitude is? Do you have any clue how it made me feel when I realized what those men were talking about?”

  “I’m sorry. I do understand how important discretion is. It was a mistake. But I stand by my offer to find another site.”

  “How magnanimous of you,” she said with a sneer. “I’m not stupid, Wheeler. You got me all excited about it, then oh, no. Bring in the entire upper crust of Dallas, so everyone knows where the shelter is. Oops. You sabotaged that site, hoping to buy time to talk me out of the divorce. Maybe accidentally get pregnant in the meantime.”

  Was she listening to anything he had said? He’d apologized twice already. “Compromising the site might have been the result but that was not my inten—”

  “Betrayed. That’s how I felt when I stood there listening to my entire world crumble around me.”

  Everything with Cia was a hundred times more effort than it needed to be, which he knew good and well she did on purpose to keep everyone at bay. But why was she still doing it with him? Hadn’t they gotten past this point already? “That’s a little melodramatic, don’t you think?”

  There came a tear, finally, sliding down her cheek. “Melodramatic? You broke my heart, Lucas!”

  “What?” Every organ in his chest ground to a halt, and he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the lone tear laden with despair and hurt.

  No. No way. This marriage was about the benefits, both physically and business-wise. She needed his unique contribution to the relationship. Period.

  He’d been one hundred percent certain she was on board with that. Hurt and feelings and messiness weren’t part of the deal. And when the deal fell apart, he walked away. Usually.

  But he was still here.

  She dashed away the teardrop, but several more replaced it. “Surprised me, too.”

  All of this was too fast. Too much to process. “Whoa. What are you saying?”

  “Same thing I’ve been saying. Since you have to file for the divorce, I have no power here. Therefore, I’m leaving, and I have to trust you’ll eventually find another potential mother for your next generation, at which poin
t I’ll get my divorce. Clear enough for you?”

  “No.” He shook his head. “Back up, honey. Now you’re talking in circles. I didn’t make you mad—I hurt you. How did that happen?”

  “Because I’m an idiot.” Her eyes shone with more unshed tears. “I had expectations of you that you couldn’t fulfill. You’re not the man I thought you were.”

  “Wait a minute. What did you expect?” He was still reeling from the discovery she’d developed feelings for him and hadn’t bothered to say anything.

  What would he have done with such information? Run in the other direction? Run faster toward her?

  Actually, he didn’t know what to do with it now.

  “I expected you to be honest, not hide your real agenda.” She snorted. “Dios, how naive am I? I walked right into it, eyes wide open, certain I could hang on to my soul since you weren’t asking for it. You gave and gave, and I never saw it for what it was. An exchange. You slipped under my guard, and the whole time, you were planning to exact payment. You betrayed me, not once but twice, with alternatives and then with sponsors. You don’t get a third chance to screw me over.”

  When thunderclouds gathered across Lucas’s face, Cia was too tired to care that she’d finally cracked his composure.

  “That’s enough,” Lucas declared. “I listened to your mental origami, and let me tell you, I am impressed with your ability to fold facts into a brand-new shape. But it’s my turn to talk. Are you in love with me?”

  She almost groaned. Why did he have to go there? “That’s irrelevant.”

  He tipped her chin up and pierced her with those blue laser beams. Scared of what he’d see, she jerked away and buried her face in the pillow.

  Great. The entire bed smelled of pine trees mixed with her lotion.

  “It’s not irrelevant to me,” he countered quietly. “I’d like to know what’s going on inside you.”

  So would she. Thoughts of babies and long-term should not be so hard to shove away. The hurt shouldn’t be so sharp.

  “Why?” she mumbled, her face still in the pillow.

  He growled in obvious frustration, “Because I care about you.”

  She rolled over and said, “You have a funny way of showing it.”

  “Really? I’d argue the exact opposite.”

  “You can argue about it all day long. But you’d be wrong. You like to take care of me. That’s different than caring about me.”

  He snapped out a derisive laugh. “Maybe we should start this whole conversation over. We suck at communicating unless it’s ‘more,’ ‘faster’ or ‘again,’ don’t we?”

  No, they didn’t have any communication problems when they were naked, which was exactly what had gotten her into this mess. Intimacy with Lucas could never be divorced from emotion. Why had she pretended it could be? “Which is why we’re done with that part of our relationship.”

  He sighed. “Look, honey. I messed up. But I’m here, talking to you, trying to fix it. And you still never answered the question. Are you in love with me?”

  “Stop asking me!” she burst out, determined to cut off his earnestness and dogged determination to uncover the secret longings of her heart that she didn’t understand and did not want to share. He had enough power over her already. “It’s just warm feelings for the man I’m sleeping with because he’s superawesome in bed, okay? It doesn’t change anything. You’re not in love with me. You’re still on the lookout for a baby factory. And I need a divorce, not all of these complications.”

  “Complications are challenges you haven’t conquered yet,” he said, and the tension in his face and shoulders visibly eased.

  Her tension went through the roof.

  Of course he hadn’t fallen all over himself to declare his undying love. Not that she had expected him to after she’d backtracked about her broken heart.

  In matters of the heart, they were cut from the same cloth—excellent at emotional distance and not much else. The divorce deal was perfect for them both.

  “I’m not up for any more complications or challenges, thanks. Can we cut to the chase?” She sat up and faced him. “Are you going to file for divorce or not?”

  He held her gaze without blinking, without giving away his thoughts. “No.”

  Her eyelids snapped closed. He’d finally made his move. Checkmate. “You can’t do this to me, Lucas. Please.”

  “I can’t do what? Give you what you really need instead of a divorce you’ll regret? You’re a vibrant, beautiful woman, yet you aim to shrivel up alone for the rest of your life. That’s not right.”

  He ran a hand through her hair, letting it waterfall off his fingers, and his touch, so familiar, nearly caved in her stomach.

  Being alone had never been her goal. Avoidance of suffering had been the intent, but she’d done a shoddy job of it, hadn’t she? The tsunami of agony hadn’t just drowned her; it had broken through every solid barrier inside, allowing sharp-edged secret dreams to flow out, drawing blood as they went.

  “Cia, I’m offering a long-term partnership, with advantages for both of us. We already know we like each other. The sex is great. We’ll figure out how to do your shelter without the trust fund. Together, we’re unstoppable. Why can’t you consider it?”

  “Because it’s not enough. There’s a reason why I’ll be alone for the rest of my life. I don’t know how to do long-term.” He started to respond, but she cut him off. “And neither do you. Sex isn’t enough. Liking each other isn’t enough.”

  He hurled out a curse. “What is enough?”

  Love.

  Oh, God. She wanted something he couldn’t give her. Something she didn’t know how to give him. No wonder she couldn’t answer his questions.

  She shied away from relationships because she had no idea how to love a man when living in constant fear of the pain and loss sure to follow. She had no idea how to love without becoming dangerously dependent on it.

  Her parents had been in love. Until Lucas, she hadn’t remembered all the long glances and hand-holding. The accident had overshadowed the history of their lives before that one shattering, defining moment. If they had lived, would she be having an entirely different conversation about the magic ingredients of a long-term relationship?

  Would she better understand her own heart and demand Lucas know his?

  “I can’t tell you,” she said. “You have to figure it out on your own.”

  He pressed the back of his neck with stiff fingers. “Fantastic. An impossible puzzle with no correct answer. Why can’t this be about what looks good on paper?”

  Sacar los ojos a uno. He was bleeding her white.

  “It’s all about how things look with you.” She should have seen that before. Appearances were everything because skin-deep was all he permitted. Nothing could penetrate the armor he kept over his heart. “As long as it looks like fun, you’re on board, right?”

  “That’s not fair. I never said a long-term marriage would be a big party. I don’t know what it’ll look like, but I do know I don’t want what we have to be over.” Gently he gripped her shoulders, and for a moment raw tenderness welled in his eyes. It made her pulse stutter and wrenched a tendril of hope from inside her. But then he said, “And I know you need what I bring to this relationship. You need me.”

  “No.” She looked straight at him as her heart broke anew. His entire offer hinged on dependency, the certainty that she was willing to be dependent. Not because he wanted to be with her. “Need is dangerous. It creates reliance. Addiction. Suddenly, you can’t survive without the thing you crave. What happens when it’s gone? I don’t need selfishness disguised as partnership. I don’t need someone who doesn’t understand me. I don’t need you, Lucas. Let me go.”

  Pain flashed across his face. Finally. This conversation had gone on for far too long
. She’d run out of arguments, ways to get him out of the room before she went completely insane and begged him to figure out how to give her what she wanted.

  “Yeah,” he said and cleared his throat. “Okay. It’s for the best.”

  As he slid off the bed and gathered some clothes from the dresser, she twisted off her rings and set them on the bedside table. The light scorched her eyes. She reached out and snapped it off, staring at the now-invisible rings until she had to blink.

  At the door of their bedroom, he stopped. Without turning around, he said, “I’ll help you pack in the morning. It’ll work in our favor to separate now so it won’t be such a surprise when I file for divorce.”

  Then he did turn, and his gaze sought hers. The hall light created a shadow of his broad shoulders against the carpet and obscured his face. “Is there anything I could have offered you that would have been worth reconsidering the divorce?”

  Her throat cramped with grief. If she tried to talk, she’d break down, and every time she cried, he held her and made her feel things she shouldn’t. Feelings he couldn’t return.

  When she didn’t answer, he nodded and left.

  In the darkness, she whispered, “You could have offered to love me.”

  Thirteen

  The divorce papers sat on the edge of Lucas’s desk, where they’d sat for a week now, without moving. Cia’s loopy script was buried on the last page, where he couldn’t see it. The papers lacked only his signature, but he couldn’t sign. It didn’t feel right. Nothing did. Certainly not his big, empty house, where he’d aimed to remove all traces of the previous couple who’d lived there and had succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.

  Cia was everywhere. Sitting on the counter in the kitchen, eyes black with passion as he drove her to a brilliant climax. Walking down the stairs with careful steps, wearing a dress that had taken him an hour to find because none of the others would put appreciation on her face the way this exact one would.