10 Ways to Steal Your Lover

by Dee Tenorio

  Her grandmother snorted in approval. “You can say that again, thank God.”

  Kane hoped like hell the wink the older woman threw in his direction was actually aimed over his shoulder to Craig.

  “The point is that Kane and I were under the influence of something and we’re still trying to sort out what all happened. We’re going to do just that. Sort it out. Together. Alone.” She aimed her pointed tone at her father, whose mouth turned into a hard frown. “If you could just look past the situation, you’d remember that you like Kane. A lot. And you love me. I know that you were all worried about us—”

  “You. We were worried about you,” The Colonel ground out. “He told your mother you belonged to him. For all we knew he’d kidnapped you and was forcing you to stay with him.”

  Hands still up, Delilah turned to Kane, one brow raised, her mouth pursed. “You told my mother I belonged to you?”

  “I think the word I used was mine. And I said it to you, if you’ll remember. You mother just has ears like a bat.”

  “How dare you!” Dinah huffed but no one paid her much mind.

  Delilah took a breath as if to answer, then seemed to think the better of it and turned back to her father. “Daddy, come on. Who in their right mind would believe Kane would kidnap me and make me stay with him?”

  “Those two.” The Colonel answered drolly, not looking at either the sad sap trying to get off the floor or the one acting like a sentinel or something by the window.

  Turning again, displeasure across her face, Delilah glared. “Do you tell everyone that story?”

  “Gramps told them.” Kane shrugged. “I told you he was proud of it.”

  “Dad—”

  “No, Delilah. I’m not standing for it. This whole situation is ridiculous enough without you having a drunken elopement on top of it. Get your things, you’re coming home with your mother and me.”

  “We weren’t drunk!” Delilah snapped.

  “No, that’s right, you were high. I’m sure that explanation will go over great with your grandmother.”

  “I don’t have a problem with it,” Rainbow chimed in.

  “You don’t have a problem with anything,” The Colonel retorted. “And you aren’t her only grandmother. Whether you believe it or not, some people have a capacity for shame.”

  “Oh, I believe it.” Rainbow replied drolly. “Your mother’s capacity for shame must be huge by now.”

  “Look, we understand the potential for embarrassment for your family.” Kane stood, pulling Delilah closer, tucking her against his side to get the Colonel’s attention before the older man lunged at his spectacularly unwise mother-in-law. “If we decide to keep this marriage, that decision will be between the two of us and how it happened doesn’t have to go any further than this room. We’ll have a real wedding, one we’ll pay for and one your family won’t be embarrassed about. But that’s something we’ll decide later. For now, I’ll allow you a certain leeway because this is a shock for you and because she’s your daughter, but I’m going to have to insist that you speak to her a little more calmly and with a little more respect.”

  “You’re going to insist?” The Colonel’s nostrils flared and his body went impossibly more rigid. “Boy, I was killing people with my bare hands before you learned to piss by yourself and you think you can insist on how I speak to my own daughter?”

  “No, sir, I’m insisting on how you speak to my wife. And you’ll do it or you’ll leave.” He felt Delilah’s nails bite into his wrist, which she’d grabbed a moment ago, ostensibly to shut him up, but he wasn’t going to back down on this point. Her father wouldn’t respect him and he wouldn’t respect himself.

  The tense moment strung out until Kane was sure he felt it in his nuts, his gaze sealed to the older man’s. Finally, the oxygen screaming in his own lungs, the Colonel blew out his breath in a huff and spun away.

  “Oh Kane, I like you so much right now,” Rainbow murmured into the silence. “Welcome to our gene pool!”

  “Shut it, Rainbow.” The Colonel barked and too her credit, Rainbow finally did. But she still smiled like a cat that ate the canary.

  “You didn’t have to do that for me,” Delilah whispered, for his ears only. “He won’t forgive you for it anytime soon.”

  “Yes, I did.” Everyone else in the room disappeared as he brought his hand to her cheek, his fingertips stroking her jaw. “Remember rule one?”

  She smiled, turning her cheek into his touch. “What if I want to claim rule one for you?”

  His heart clenched. “I’d love it if you tried.”

  “Do the two of you mind?” The Colonel broke the spell. “We are still in the room.”

  Delilah looked away first. “I don’t see what you being here has to do with anything.”

  Craig finally entered the conversation. “I think he’s talking about me, Del.”

  All eyes turned to the windows, where Craig stood with his hands in the pockets of his jeans. He didn’t look angry, which would be a relief if he wasn’t staring at Delilah so intently. “I think we need to talk, kiddo.”

  Every instinct Kane had told him not to let her do it. Not to let her go. He might have listened to it if it were remotely his choice. Delilah worried at her lip for just a second, squeezing his hand gently once, then she slipped away and Kane had the horrible sense that this wouldn’t be the last time he’d have to feel her disappear from his grasp.

  Chapter Ten

  Craig thankfully didn’t reach for her hand or put his own on the small of her back as he led Delilah to the sunken dining room. She hadn’t investigated this part of the suite yet, so it felt strange pulling out the black padded and high-backed chair and slipping over its firm surface. Craig pulled out the captain’s chair cattycorner to her and sat, his handsome face somber, black hair falling over his perfect brow and his dark blue eyes searching her face for…she didn’t really know.

  She should be feeling something, looking at him. She’d lived with him for three years. Planned to tie her life to his. At least a throb in her heart. Even her sense of guilt was little more than a shadow in her mind. No matter how she spun it, waking up this morning with Kane had felt like freedom and waking up the day before, preparing to marry Craig, had felt like a life sentence. It didn’t take a genius to add up what that meant.

  “I’m sorry you had to find out like this, Craig, I really am.”

  “Find out about what, exactly?” Not a harsh question. Soft. Almost musing. “That you’re in love with my best friend or that you married him?”

  Delilah gaped, not remotely able to formulate an answer to that.

  Finally, Craig’s familiar smile creased the dimples in his cheeks. “You really don’t remember anything, do you? About the church?”

  She clamped her mouth shut with an audible click and Craig actually laughed softly.

  “You can’t imagine what it was like getting a call from Jesse this morning that Kane had kidnapped you and was holding you ransom.”

  “He said what?” God, she was going to have to do something about that horrible shriek of hers. How is it that she’d never heard herself make that noise before today and now she couldn’t seem to stop?

  “Your mother must have warmed up to her story by the time she got to Jesse.”

  “You think?” She would not bang her head on a table again. She wouldn’t.

  He leaned in conspiratorially, “How exactly did your mother get a hold of Jesse. He never gives that number away.”

  As if he couldn’t guess. Her father had more contacts than LensCrafters. “If you don’t know, trust me, it’s best for everyone involved.”

  Craig gave that a few seconds consideration before shrugging. “I tried to tell them that Kane would never kidnap you but by then Jesse had already mentioned

  Kane’s Gramps old story and the hunt was on. We’ve been to at least a dozen casinos looking for you. We’d just about given up when someone sent Jesse a link to a video of TK Hughes gettin
g knocked on his ass by a guy at a roulette table.”

  “I never thought of Jesse as this helpful before.” Funny and a little irresponsible with himself, sure, but not helpful. Especially not to authority figures like her parents. In fact, she kinda figured her parents would give him hives on principle. She’d have to help him back with a gift basket full of X-lax chocolate muffins. Or better yet, one of Rainbow’s special teas.

  “That’s only because you’ve never had to spend more than a few days at a time with him. Trust me, Jesse takes a sick kind of pleasure out of helping us get caught when we do something stupid.”

  “And when he does something stupid?”

  Craig shrugged again. “Jesse’s too slick to get caught doing stupid things.”

  “But you’re not,” she surmised and his smile turned faded.

  “No, I’m not.”

  “What happened, Craig? How’d we end up like…this?”

  “Pretty simple, really. I saw a beautiful girl and I wanted to keep her, as long as I possibly could.” He took her hand in both of his. “I think I knew about ten seconds after I introduced the two of you that there was something there, even if I didn’t want to admit it to myself. On paper, we fit so well together. We were everything the other person was supposed to want or need. It should have worked. But the longer we were together, the less happy you were. Except when Kane was around.”

  Delilah fit her palm over his, bowing her head. “I did love you, Craig.” Once, though it seemed a very long time ago.

  “Just not enough. Not like you love him.”

  It was hard, but she shook her head.

  “You know what really sucks? Most guys only have to go through this once.” He scrubbed a hand over his face like he was exhausted. “You’re rough on the ego, kid.”

  She shook her head at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I’m talking about the truth. I realized it finally last night over a bottle of whiskey.”

  “Oh Craig…”

  “I’ll admit, it wasn’t what I planned to be doing on my wedding night, but it did give me a lot of time to think about what I was doing with my life. What I should be doing with it. The truth of it is that I didn’t love you enough either. I care about you. I love you, but not like he does. Like he will.”

  The scoff escaped completely without thought. “How do you know that? I’m not even sure I know if what’s happening between us is going to last.”

  Craig’s stare this time was almost painfully intense. “Yes, you do. You knew it yesterday. And I know you do because you called me into your bride room and gave me back my ring so you could be with him. Because you trusted him that much.”

  Delilah lifted her head, studying his face for a lie, but it wasn’t there.

  “You said you couldn’t face a future where you felt like—”

  “—someone’s knick knack instead of his partner,” she breathed, the haze in her mind parting just the tiniest bit. She’d felt so sure then, for the first time in her life, that she was making the right decision. She’d turned to the dressing table for the ring he’d given her, looking up at Craig’s sad—but oddly not surprised—expression in the mirror. “Because when I’m with you, I’m just something. But when I’m with him, I’m someone.”

  “Someone who matters, if I remember correctly.”

  Delilah could only nod. Like Kane had said earlier, everyone on his ranch had a purpose. She’d be a necessary part of his world, his life. And he’d be a necessary part of hers. Truthfully, he already was…

  “I can’t even be mad at you for picking Kane. If you’d met him first, it wouldn’t even have been a question. The two of you practically snap in place when you’re together. You always have. I feel kind of dumb for not letting myself see it before. If I hadn’t gotten in the way, you’d probably be on your second or third kid by now, living happily ever after on his ranch.”

  It took serious effort not to blush at that, her mind automatically remembering how fast Kane could set her on fire.

  Craig dropped her hands like she was a hot coal. “Okay, well, I don’t want to know about that. It’s one thing to know you’re with him, I don’t want to know how happy you are to be there.”

  Delilah couldn’t help a laugh. “Sorry.”

  “No, you’re not.” But he didn’t sound angry.

  The masochist in her couldn’t help but ask, “Why aren’t you mad at us, Craig?”

  His shrug wasn’t what she expected. “What’s to be mad about? You were faithful right up until the end. Just because you ran off with my best friend less than ten minutes after you dumped me…”

  She narrowed her eyes at him. “I’ve known you a long time, Craig. Too long for you to think I’d believe that lame excuse for a guilt trip. Try again.”

  His self-derisive chuckle was a little more realistic. “I’ve known things weren’t right between us for a while. At least a year. Last night, I finally admitted why. On some level, I think I knew you were in love with Kane. Or at least suspected it. But I didn’t want to let go. The illusion of being in love almost meant more to me than my best friends. Once that illusion was gone, the only thing left was the truth. You can’t be mad at the truth.”

  “That’s not possible. I haven’t been in love with Kane for a year.” She wasn’t that horrible of a person, was she?

  Craig didn’t seem to agree. “I said at least. When you two weren’t avoiding each other like the plague you were staring at each other. It got to the point where I felt like I was the third wheel.”

  She picked at an imaginary speck on the table. “I’m so sorry, Craig. I really am. I never realized…”

  “You can’t help who you fall in love with, Delilah. Any more than you can help who you don’t fall in love with.”

  Looking up, Delilah caught something in his expression she’d never seen before. Regret. She’d never known him to look back at anything and think he’d made any mistakes. “You don’t have anything to apologize for, Craig.”

  “Neither do you. We wanted to love each other. We tried. Some things just aren’t meant to be. I can be good with having tried.” His forced chuckle made her chest ache. “Eventually.”

  She understood that. She’d wanted to love him, too. “Life would have been a lot easier if we could just decide to be happy, wouldn’t it?” Her mother would have the banker son she’d always wanted, her father wouldn’t be constantly trying to correct her mistakes. He certainly wouldn’t be trying to cut her husband’s favorite parts off with a laser glare anyway. And she’d be satisfied with a life where she wasn’t the most important part of her husband’s heart.

  Craig shook his head. “Actually, I think that’s exactly what you did. You just didn’t do it with me.” Leaning forward slowly, he pressed a kiss to her forehead.

  “Keep him happy, okay? The both of you deserve it.”

  Before he could pull away, she pulled on his collar and dragged him back in for a hug. The familiar feel of him, his cologne and his warmth, enveloped her. But it didn’t make her feel anything but grateful. “You’ll find the right woman, Craig. She may not be what you’re expecting, but you’ll find her. You deserve to be happy too.”

  “Especially after this. Holy shit, I had no idea I was so magnanimous.” Craig patted her back while she laughed into his shoulder. “For now, how about I drag your family back to their hotel before your Dad decides your grandmother deserves a federal execution.”

  “Oh, God, would you please?”

  Craig laughed and headed back out to the group sitting too quietly in the living area. If thought she heard him mutter, “I swear, I deserve a goddamn medal,” she decided she didn’t need to ask about it. She had more important things to figure out.

  Like what she planned to do about her husband.

  ***

  Kane stayed in his spot, perched on the arm of the couch, his gaze locked with his possible-future father in law. Peripherally, he was aware of Jesse—who was d
oing his best to get up and back into his cool-eyed, untouchable rocker persona. Yeah, Kane wished him luck with that. In fact, he hoped the bastard had ripped his tight leather pants wide open from this.

  The Colonel finally sighed. “You’re dead set on her, aren’t you? Even if she chooses not to stay with you.”

  Kane didn’t want to dignify that question with an answer. The second part just had his fists tightening and his teeth grinding.

  McGavin shook his head, settling next to his wife with a crisp hike of his slacks. “So it doesn’t bother you at all that she was about to marry your best friend when you two took off together?”

  Kane shook his head. “It only bothered me when she was going through with it. Even then, if marrying Craig would have made her happy, she would never have found out how I felt.”

  The Colonel’s gaze was frank and assessing. Kane never heard what conclusion the man came to other than, “You forget that I saw the two of you together before the wedding, son. Believe me, she knew. Anyone with half a brain knew. Why do you think the Nutty Professor over here doped her up? Even she could tell Delilah and Craig didn’t belong together.”

  “Why thank you, Heath,” Rainbow said through a smirk, folding her hands on her lap. “Nice to see you giving credit where credit is due.”

  The Colonel’s expression of exasperation was tempered only by the clear exhaustion on his face. “I don’t know if I’d call it credit, but you’re welcome to it, Rainbow. Fact is, I’m tired of keeping up with the insanity the women in this family seem to enjoy piling on my lap. Welcome to the family, kid. Hope you brought your own Prozac.”

  “Heath,” Dinah chided, a note of clear embarrassment giving her the slightest warble.

  Her husband wasn’t in the mood for it, though. Maybe he’d just been pushed too far. Maybe relief that his daughter was safe had given way to a volcano of anger.

  Kane wasn’t sure, but it wasn’t good. None of it.

  “Don’t Heath me, Dinah. The three of you are insane. Your mother’s a danger to society, you’re so caught up in who you think you’re supposed to be I almost don’t know you anymore and you’ve turned our daughter into an over-educated ornament going from one man to another like—”