‘Why, here, dear.’ Logan’s mother smiled impishly.
‘Oh, I didn’t... I wasn’t...’ Kat stumbled. She certainly hadn’t been meaning Zula when she’d mentioned a fairy godmother.
‘I’m teasing.’ The older woman laughed, before turning to her beloved grandson. ‘Gramps is just finding the car, but we’ll be leaving soon. Shall we drop the trophy off at home for Daddy and you can get your overnight bag?’
‘I’ll walk you to the gates, Mom.’ Logan put his arm around his mother, who batted his arm away good-humouredly.
‘I can walk myself, I’m not decrepit yet. You just concentrate on saying your goodbyes to Jamie.’
Kat watched them wordlessly. Something about the way they interacted crept under her skin and wound through her, making her think of her own family. Had she done the wrong thing by pushing them away all this time?
She’d believed moving away had been for the best; that it would hurt too much watching them so happy with their own families. Now she was beginning to wonder if being part of them might actually have helped her to heal instead.
‘Fine. Have a good weekend trip.’ Logan offered his mother one final hug. ‘I know Jamie has been really looking forward to it.’
‘So have we.’ Zula smiled. ‘Hope you have a good shift at the hospital tomorrow. And you too, Kat, dear. Well done on the race.’
As the older woman strode elegantly ahead, ready to flag down her husband, Kat followed behind with Jamie and Logan.
It had been a nice day and Logan’s parents were so welcoming, it had almost been like being back with her own loving family. Almost.
Ahead of them, a little girl was being swung between her mother and grandmother as they walked around, and Jamie stopped abruptly and spun around with excitement.
‘Swing, Daddy?’
‘I don’t know, buddy...’
Logan glanced at Kat discreetly, not putting her on the spot but giving her the opportunity to decline.
‘Swing?’ the little boy pleaded.
‘Sure.’ She grinned, ignoring the unexpected pang in her chest as she thought of the times Carrie, too, had watched children being swung between two parents without ever being able to enjoy it for herself.
Did the little girl’s biological parents do that now that they had her back?
Was Carrie’s life better with them this time around? It had to be because no one had been in touch with her in the past year. And that was a bittersweet notion.
‘Come on, little man.’
Shaking off the momentary melancholy, Kat held her hand out for an excited Jamie to grasp, then counted down with Logan as they swung the boy high into the air between them whilst he shrieked with delight. And as Logan turned to mouth a word of thanks to her, she told herself it didn’t send a tremor of pleasure through her.
She told herself she was imagining this...bond that was budding between them. And, still, as they passed an older lady creeping slowly along the path towards them, Kat couldn’t help returning the woman’s indulgent smile with a wide grin of her own.
Right up until the old lady spoke.
‘I have to tell you, dear, that you have a lovely family.’
‘I... Oh...’ A thousand answers chased through her head.
What was she supposed to say? That this wasn’t her family at all?
‘I—’
‘Thank you,’ Logan cut across her, flashing his trademark charming smile at the woman as they continued past.
It was all Kat could do not to drop Jamie’s hand. Her face felt tight—rictus—with the effort of not crumbling. The effort of keeping Jamie swinging, as though her chest wasn’t cracking, was almost unbearable.
As though she didn’t want to curl up in a ball right there on the pathway.
But, somehow, she kept going. The silence a deafening howl between them.
‘Hey, buddy, is that Nana and Gramps just ahead?’ Logan stopped a few moments later as a car pulled up just by the park entrance.
Relief rushed through Kat. Surely the timing couldn’t be more opportune, she decided as Jamie dropped their hands and begin to careen ahead of them across the grass to his grandparents.
Tentatively, Kat tried to breathe again.
Out. In.
‘She didn’t mean anything by it,’ Logan said quietly, as she snapped her eyes open to realise he was watching her carefully. ‘That woman, I mean. She couldn’t have known that we aren’t a family.’
And even though, logically, Kat knew that he was trying to make her feel better, it only made the pain sear all the hotter inside her.
We aren’t a family.
The words echoed even louder as Jamie shouted a final goodbye and waved alongside his grandparents and Logan waved back.
The fact was that Logan, and Jamie, and the little boy’s grandparents were a family. She was the only outsider here. The one who wasn’t part of them. The one who didn’t have a family—at least, not one she saw any more.
Through her own choice. And not, as she’d always pretended, because they were scattered all over the globe. They were living their lives. Having families of their own. And she hadn’t been able to bear it after losing Carrie.
A fresh lance of pain stabbed through her, almost crippling her. Reminded her how utterly broken and lost and defeated she’d felt when the little girl had been taken from her.
For the little girl’s sake, she’d clung to the hope that Carrie finally had her own, true family back. But for her own sanity she’d decided that she could never again go through that torture of loving a child so deeply, only to completely lose them.
But rather than protecting herself, was she really just hanging onto the pain?
Kat wasn’t sure that she could tell any more. Confusion threatened to overwhelm her.
‘I know that woman didn’t mean anything by it.’ She would have preferred it if her voice didn’t sound so clipped, so distant, but it was better than giving in to the emotion she was only barely keeping at bay right now. ‘Still, people should watch what they say, and not make assumptions.’
He eyed her again and she tried not to squirm under the scrutiny.
‘Do you really hate the idea of kids that much?’
Her chest kicked. Hard.
How could he read her so well in one sense and yet not at all in another?
‘I don’t hate kids at all.’ She reached tentatively for each word.
‘I didn’t say you hated kids,’ he corrected calmly. ‘I’ve seen you deal with plenty of children in the hospital, and you’re a natural. I asked if you hated the idea of them.’
She wanted to answer but she couldn’t. She couldn’t even think straight.
‘You’re wonderful with Jamie, too. But there’s something...guarded about you. I can’t figure it.’
How was it that someone who had known her for barely a couple of weeks could read her better than the colleagues she’d worked alongside for months?
It was simultaneously thrilling and daunting.
It made some secret, mutinous part of her want to stop desperately trying to contain all the bubbling emotions that seemed intent on spilling out all over her, and just...talk.
She could feel the logical, superior part of her brain battling to smother it. To regain control. And it was succeeding.
But not before her tongue let loose for a moment.
‘I don’t hate the idea of kids. I...’
Can’t have them.
She trailed off, horrified at the way the admission hung there, tainting the air. Casting a bleak shadow on what was meant to have been a fun day. Ruining it.
Only Logan didn’t look like his day was ruined. He looked very much as though he was interested. Worse, he looked as though he cared. And she didn’t think she could stand to see the compassion in his gaze.
It made something inside her shift when she needed it to stay as resolute as ever.
As she stood there, wondering what she could possibly say next, the sky darkened, there was an ominous rumble, and the rain dropped straight from the heavens down on top of them. Soaking them right through.
And still she didn’t move. She didn’t care.
Not until Logan grabbed her hand and ran towards the park’s glass pavilion.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
LOGAN DIDN’T CARE much for what was going on deep inside his chest.
This low heat. The dark hunger that seemed to scrape away at him every time he was with this one woman. Weakening and exhilarating him all at once.
The Santa Dash was over and they should be going their separate ways, yet he couldn’t tear himself from Kat even now. He could tell himself all he liked that it was merely about the sexual attraction but he knew it wasn’t true.
She’d been about to tell him something out there, before the rain had started. Before she’d clamped her mouth closed and made it clear that she regretted uttering a single word. It was ridiculous how badly he wanted to know what that something was. That was emotional connection, rather than physical.
It was as though it was another piece to the backward puzzle that was Kat Steel. The kind of jigsaws that Jamie and his nana did together, where the picture wasn’t the one you saw on the box but merely the other side of the so-called camera. A clue. A hint. But not the real person.
It should concern him that he wanted, so badly, to put that puzzle together and understand who Kat Steel really was. A wiser man would have walked away.
But he wasn’t sure he’d been a wise man for the past six years or so. Ever since that last tour of duty. He felt as though he’d been lurching from one thing to another. Isola Verde, bodyguarding. Sophia.
For Jamie’s sake he’d known he needed to ground himself. And since returning to Seattle he’d felt more like his old self. It would be foolish of him to pretend that the time he’d spent with Kat—ice-skating, Christmas decoration hunting, going on runs—hadn’t also played a part.
She’d helped him without realising it. Now he found he wanted to help her, too.
‘Kat—’ he began, but she cut him off quickly.
‘Don’t.’ Her eyes were fixed on his shoulder, staring at it intently as though she could see right through the skin and bone.
He tried to stop himself from hooking a finger under her chin and tilting her head up, but it was impossible. He needed her to look at him. To see him.
It made no sense.
‘Please,’ she choked out.
Reluctantly, he moved his hand from her chin. The questions squatted heavily in his chest. As if it didn’t tear him up to bite them back.
She looked so vulnerable. So broken. She looked the way he had felt six years ago. If only he knew why, maybe he could help her.
But to what end?
Logan’s mind raced, and he was helpless to stop it.
Did she really hate kids so much that she couldn’t bear even a stranger to think that Jamie was her own? And, if so, what did it even matter to him?
It didn’t matter to him.
Thrusting his hands into the pockets of his hoodie, Logan marched to the glass panes and stared out at the heavy grey-black sky. Clearly, somewhere along the line he’d given Kat the impression that he wanted more from her than anything they’d agreed, and she was panicking.
He didn’t know why that notion should generate this...feeling in him that if he hadn’t known better he might actually have mistaken it for hurt.
But it couldn’t be. Of course it couldn’t be. Because he was no more looking for more from Kat than she wanted from him—they’d agreed no strings, and that suited him just fine.
And if a part of him was balking at the idea, then he was determined to dismiss it as the misguided notion that it was.
Now he just needed to convince Kat of that.
‘I’m not asking you to be Jamie’s family,’ he ground out, not sure why he was still speaking. ‘He has a family. He has me.’
‘I didn’t think, for even a moment, that you wanted me to become anyone’s family.’
Her voice was sharper and higher than usual. Clearly she didn’t quite believe him. In hindsight, crashing her charity run only to then drag her along when he was with Jamie, as well as his parents, had been too much. Understandably, it had sent the wrong message when they’d only ever agreed to being casual.
‘We agreed no strings, and that hasn’t changed for me.’ Gallingly, the words almost stuck in his throat. ‘I presume it hasn’t changed for you?’
God, how he hated those shutters across those expressive eyes of hers. And was it only his imagination that had him wondering if she hesitated just a fraction too long?
‘Kat...?’
‘Of course not,’ she threw out abruptly. ‘No-commitment fun, that’s what we said.’
‘So why let some random comment from a stranger get to you?’
She glared at him, her teeth worrying at her lower lip. He had to fight to drag his gaze away. But it was the misery in her eyes that seemed to reach into his chest cavity and pull.
‘Forget it.’
‘Happy to,’ he managed breezily.
For what seemed like an eternity they stood opposite one another. Not speaking. The only sounds were of the rain pounding off the glass and their breathing.
‘I should leave,’ she choked out at length, spinning around to stalk to the door. Rain be damned.
She didn’t just mean this pavilion. Kat was ready to walk away completely.
And a wiser man would have let her.
Instead, Logan found himself crossing the space between them, his hands reaching for her shoulders, compelling her to turn and face him.
‘What the hell’s going on, Kat?’ She snapped her head up at his tone but didn’t pull away. ‘We’ve been having fun, haven’t we?’
He waited for an answer, but when she didn’t speak he carried on. Her proximity was making his blood heat. Hotter, thicker than ever.
‘Nothing heavy,’ he ground out, no longer sure who he was trying to convince. ‘Just enjoying each other’s company, like we said?’
‘Yes,’ she admitted reluctantly.
‘So what’s all this about? Some stupid comment from someone who doesn’t know us from Adam?’
Her eyes scanned his, and he got the sense that a million thoughts were racing around in her head.
And he hated that he ached to know every single one of them. Without realising what he was doing, his hand encircled hers and he found himself stroking the skin on the back of her smooth hand. So much for this very conversation being about reinforcing the fact that they didn’t owe each other anything like that.
‘I like spending time with you, Kat. And you like spending time with me, too.’
It wasn’t a question, but with a faint bob of her head she answered it anyway.
A strange sense of victory punched through him. She still wanted to be with him. She just didn’t want the additional complication of Jamie.
It was the wake-up call he hadn’t even realised he’d needed.
He never should have allowed her to become so entangled in his son’s life. He never would have if she hadn’t been the one to have found Jamie that day in the park. Or if she hadn’t brought Terrence to their home that night.
But that was then.
As long as he kept things just to the physical chemistry between them now, they should be okay. And if a tiny part of him whispered that he might want more after all, he was quite prepared to crush it until it was dust.
He’d been there with Sophia—letting his heart rule his head—and look what had happened. How her abandonment could have hurt Jamie. He would never put his son through anything l
ike that again.
Not that he would compare sweet, kind Kat to the charming but calculating Sophia.
Nevertheless, keeping Jamie’s life drama-free had to be his priority. From now on he needed to keep his private life and his family life in separate and distinct compartments. Jamie was his everything. Kat was simply fleeting fun—as she’d just reminded him.
And whilst he shouldn’t have needed the reminder in the first place, he wasn’t prepared to risk blurring those lines again. He would take this one night together then he would let Kat go.
One more night and then he would get back to the real world.
* * *
The pavilion was cold but dry, and they’d been in there for the past five minutes, deliberately not speaking. Kat couldn’t get warm.
She should have walked away when she’d been feeling strong. When the hurt from Logan’s comment about not needing her in his family had still been raw. When it had reminded her of exactly how it had felt to be rejected by Kirk.
Only Kirk was the last person on her mind. It was a shock to realise that she’d barely even thought about how unwanted he’d made her feel ever since she’d met Logan.
It wasn’t the same, she knew that, but being sexually desired by a man like Logan eased any number of perceived scars left by someone like Kirk. So much so that Kat had begun wondering if she had ever really loved her ex-fiancé at all.
Had she stayed with him all those years because she couldn’t imagine her life without Kirk? Or because she couldn’t imagine a life with anyone else?
‘It’s dying down now,’ Logan said suddenly, peering out of the rain-drenched window. ‘We’ll be able to get out of here in a moment.’
But it wouldn’t have mattered if there had been a storm going on out there, it wouldn’t have come close to the one raging inside her right at that moment.
She was still painfully aware of her hand in his. The way his thumb was stroking the back of hers. And that dark, hungry look in his eyes.
Her stomach flip-flopped. He wanted to kiss her, there was no mistaking it. And she, heaven help her, was willing him to.
‘The rain has stopped,’ he murmured, leaning his head in that fraction closer.
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