by Linda Turner
That was all it was, she assured herself. He looked at her and saw the girl from a past he wanted to forget, a girl who’d eagerly absorbed all the ancient knowledge the reservation had to offer. And every time her eyes fell on his chiseled features, she was reminded of the silent, brooding boy who’d walked alone across land that she loved.
Decades later, he was still walking alone, and it was that, more than anything, that tore at her heart. Everyone needed someone to talk to, to forget their troubles with, to vent to, and Gavin seemed to have no one, not even family. Long ago, he’d walked away from the people who could have at least offered him emotional support now, and there was no way to turn back the clock. He was in the worst trouble of his life, and he had no one.
Except her.
That caught her by surprise, and she immediately tried to reject the idea. She hadn’t been kidding when she’d told Janet that they were barely friends. He hadn’t asked for her help and didn’t want it. She would do well to remember that.
But all the way back to the clinic, all she could think of was Gavin and the look on his face at the Hip Hop when he’d heard the things being said about him. With every snide remark, his expression had grown colder and more remote, and all Summer could think of was that he must have suffered the same verbal abuse everywhere he went from the day he was charged with Christina’s murder.
Dear God, how had he stood it?
Haunted by the image of his loneliness, she slept little that night. He was innocent. Deep down in her heart, she knew that as surely as she knew that he wouldn’t thank her for interfering in his life. Still, she couldn’t worry about that. She didn’t care if he ended up hating her guts, she had to find a way to help him. The question was…how?
The answer came to her with the rising of the morning sun. Already hard at work at the hospital, her eyes sandy from lack of sleep, she was examining a newborn in Pedi ICU when an idea popped full-blown into her head. Stunned by the very outrageousness of it, she stopped in her tracks and told herself it would never work. He would think she’d lost her mind, and she couldn’t say she’d blame him. So would everybody else.
Sure she was suffering from sleep deprivation, she tried to dismiss the idea and concentrate on her work instead, but she was fighting a losing battle. The idea stuck like a burr to her imagination, and with no effort whatsoever, she could see it working. She could help him. All she had to do was explain the idea to him and persuade him to give her a chance.
Yeah, right, she thought derisively. When pigs could fly. Don’t even think about going there, she warned herself. Even if he didn’t laugh in her face, he would never go for it. If she wanted to save them both some grief, she’d forget the whole thing.
She should have. It would have been the wisest course of action. But she didn’t, unfortunately, always do the wise thing. Instead she followed her heart and dared to take a chance. The decision made with no conscious effort on her part, she found herself heading for his house at the end of her shift and knew she had no other choice.
His house wasn’t in one of the more affluent subdivisions of Whitehorn—as a resident at the hospital, he could afford little more than a tract house at this point in his career. But it was still obvious to Summer as she pulled up before the brick and glass contemporary structure that he’d left his past—and the reservation—far behind. Wincing at the coldness of the place, Summer almost turned around right then and there to head for her clinic. This was never going to work.
But she couldn’t bring herself to drive away, not when this might be her only chance to save him from a life in prison. Her heart in her throat, she stepped from her car and slowly started up the walkway to his front door. With every step, the knots in her stomach tightened with trepidation. There wasn’t a doubt in her mind that she was doing the right thing, but that didn’t make her task any easier. Because she knew that if Gavin accepted her offer, her life would never be the same and neither would his.
Two
He wasn’t thrilled to see her. In fact, he was downright rude. Scowling at the sight of Summer Kincaid on his doorstep, Gavin made no move to invite her inside but stood blocking the threshold as if he was going to slam the door in her face at any second. “What do you want?” he growled.
That wasn’t the greeting she’d hoped for, but Summer supposed she couldn’t blame him for being less than hospitable.
“I need to talk to you,” she said quietly. “May I come in?”
He didn’t budge an inch. “No. I’m not in the mood for company.”
That much, at least, was obvious. His chiseled jaw as hard as granite and his brown eyes nearly black with hostility, he was primed for a fight and ready to take on the world. If she’d been smart, Summer would have apologized for disturbing him and waited until another time to approach him with her proposal. But she’d had to psyche herself up just to get this far, and if she didn’t speak her mind now, she was afraid she never would.
So she stubbornly held her ground and looked him right in the eye, silently daring him to throw her off his property. “I’m sorry about that, but I’m not leaving until I’ve had a chance to talk to you. We can do it right here on the doorstep in front of God and everyone or you can invite me inside. The choice is yours.”
Irritated, Gavin arched a dark brow at her. He’d talked to her more in the past two days than he had in the past two years, and he had to admit he was surprised by her obstinacy. She was a quiet little thing and usually didn’t say much. But something had lit a fire under her, and if the glint in her eye was anything to go by, she’d shout whatever she had to say to him to the rooftops if he didn’t give her a chance to speak to him in private.
He shouldn’t have cared. The whole world already knew just about everything there was to know about him—she couldn’t possibly have anything to say that couldn’t be posted across the front page of the Whitehorn Journal. Or at least, he didn’t think she did.
Frowning down at her, he hesitated, then with a muttered curse, he jerked the door open wider. “All right,” he said harshly. “Come in and say what you have to say. But make it quick.”
Then get out.
He didn’t say the words, but Summer heard them nonetheless. Another woman might have been offended, but she refused to take his hostility personally. She’d wanted an opportunity to speak to him and he was giving it to her. Nothing else mattered.
Slipping past him through the door, she stepped into the living room, only to stop short. She supposed she had to give him credit. With inexpensive glass and chrome tables and what appeared to be a few good pieces of secondhand modern furniture, he’d created a surprising sophistication without spending a lot of money. If there were no plants, no warm colors, none of the softness needed to turn a house into a home, she doubted that he cared. After all, he wanted acceptance in the white man’s world, not warmth.
Following her into the room, Gavin said roughly, “Well? What is it you barged in here to say? Spit it out and let’s get it over with.”
Jerked back to her reason for being there, she hesitated, not sure how to begin. Too late, she realized she probably should have given more thought to her proposal, but at the time she’d come up with it, it had seemed like the perfect plan to exonerate him. Now she wasn’t so sure.
Heat singeing her cheeks, she tried not to squirm as he pinned her with a gaze that was as hard as nails. “I’ve been thinking about the trial—”
“You and everyone else in town,” he drawled. “What about it?”
“I think I can help you.”
His eyes narrowed sharply. “How? Have you heard something? What do you know about Christina’s murder?”
“Nothing!”
“Then how the hell do you think you’re going to help me?” he demanded impatiently. “By being my friend and standing up with me in court the way you did at the Hip Hop?” He made “friend” sound like a dirty word. “Thanks for the offer, but I don’t think the jury’s going to give a damn about h
ow many so-called friends I have when the prosecution has evidence placing me at the murder scene. So if that’s all you came for—”
He turned away, dismissing her without even hearing what she’d come there to say, and something in Summer just snapped. She’d meant to lay the groundwork for her offer before she actually made it so she wouldn’t completely shock him, but he’d taken that opportunity away from her.
Left with no choice, she blurted, “The jury might not care about your friends but I bet they’d be impressed by a wife who believed you and stood by you through all this.
“Especially,” she continued when he jerked back around to face her with a scowl, “if that wife was from one of Whitehorn’s leading families and was a well-respected member of the medical community.”
“I don’t have a wife,” he said flatly.
“No, you don’t,” she said simply. “But you could. Think about what that would say to a jury. After you were accused of a horrible murder, a woman with an impeccable reputation pronounced her love for you and married you. No woman in her right mind would do that unless she thought you were truly innocent.”
If he was impressed with her reasoning, he didn’t show it. His brown eyes suspicious, he said, “Just what exactly are you suggesting?”
“That we get married.”
The words just seemed to pop out of their own accord and hang in the air between them like a blinking neon sign. And too late, Summer realized just how forward they sounded. Horrified, she hurriedly said, “Don’t misunderstand—I’m not saying that I’m in love with you! How could I be? We hardly know each other. Any marriage between us would be one strictly of convenience.”
“Of course. I never expected anything else.”
At his dry tone, she blushed to the roots of her hair. “This isn’t about sex,” she said stiffly. “It’s about helping you.”
“Which you seemed determined to do, and I can’t for the life of me understand why.” Frowning, he studied her with puzzled eyes. “What’s in this for you?”
Not surprised that he’d so quickly reduced things to the bottom line, she didn’t insult his intelligence by pretending she was a saint sacrificing herself just for the sake of helping him. “Your help in my clinic on the reservation for one year,” she said bluntly.
“In exchange for marriage?”
She nodded. “Also for one year. You know I’m not the type to flaunt my family connections, but you have to admit that marriage to a Kincaid can’t do anything but bolster your standing in the community. And that just might help clear your name. Once the trial’s over and you’re vindicated, my family connections will help when you go back to court to regain custody of Alyssa.”
She made it all sound so simple. All he had to do was marry a Kincaid, and his life would magically return to normal. His name would be cleared, people would look at him in a different light, and he could go on with his life as if Christina’s death and the subsequent murder charges leveled against him had never happened. And the price of a ticket to this fairy tale was only a one-year marriage of convenience to a woman who didn’t love him any more than he loved her. And his help at her clinic, he reminded himself. After all, it was only fair that she get something out of the arrangement, too.
Stunned, he should have laughed in her face. That was what any sane man would have done. He was already in enough trouble—he didn’t need to take on more by agreeing to a marriage that by its very nature was doomed to failure. And what would it really accomplish, anyway? True, the Kincaids were a powerful family in Whitehorn, but it wasn’t the family that was on trial. It was him, and few people seemed inclined to cut “that Indian boy from the wrong side of the tracks” any slack. He didn’t think marriage to a Kincaid would change that.
But can you be sure of that? a voice in his head wondered. Summer Kincaid is well liked and respected. If she pretended to be in love with you and married you, people just might start to wonder what she saw in you and if they might have misjudged you. Granted, it’s a long shot, but at this point, it’s the only chance you’ve got. You’d be a fool to turn your back on the only person who’s helped you from the very beginning. Thanks to her intervention, her uncle hired Elizabeth Gardener to represent you, and now she wants to help you again. Why are you hesitating?
That was a good question. Aside from himself, he also had to think of Alyssa and how this might benefit her. If, through some miracle, he was able to actually clear his name, he still might have to fight to get his daughter back. He’d have a much better chance of winning that fight if he had a wife the likes of Summer Kincaid by his side to act as Alyssa’s mother. And he wasn’t losing his daughter, damn it!
Considering all that, he should have jumped at her offer like a drowning man being thrown a lifeline. But if the events of the past year had taught him anything, it was to look a gift horse in the mouth. Not everyone who appeared to have his best interests at heart did.
“I’ll think about it,” he said stiffly, “and get back to you.”
She nodded. “Just don’t take too long. For this to work, we’ve got to convince people that we’re really in love, and we can’t do that overnight. With your trial only a few weeks away, we don’t have a lot of time.”
No one was more aware of that than he. Ever since the trial date had been announced, he’d felt as though there was a guillotine over his head, waiting to fall. And it scared the hell out of him. “I should have an answer by morning.”
That was the best he could do, and she had no choice but to accept it. “Then I guess I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” she said stiffly. “You can reach me at the hospital until two, then I’ll be at my clinic.”
She walked out without another word, leaving Gavin staring after her with a frown. He’d thought he’d known who and what Summer Kincaid was, but now he wasn’t so sure. Why was she going out of her way to help him? What did she really want from him? Would she really go to such lengths to get help at her clinic or was that just an excuse to get involved in his life? Until he had some answers, he wasn’t making a decision about anything.
Self-doubt didn’t hit Summer until later that night when she was getting ready for bed and had nothing to distract her from her own thoughts. She’d actually asked Gavin to marry her. Dear God, what had possessed her? He must think she was desperate, or out of her mind, or both, when nothing could have been further from the truth. When she’d made the suggestion, she hadn’t thought of anything beyond helping him out of the awful bind he was in. But now she had to wonder what she was going to do if he actually agreed to marry her. She’d made it clear that there would be no sex, but they would still have to live together, still have to act the happily married couple. She’d never been an actress, never had much use for pretense. How in the world was she going to pull this off if he said yes?
He wouldn’t, she assured herself quickly. His back was already to the wall—if he’d thought marrying her would help him, he would have said yes in a heartbeat. Probably he was trying to find a way to let her down easy and spare her feelings. He’d call in a few days, thank her for the offer, and politely tell her he didn’t think it would work. And that would be the end of that.
She’d done everything she could to help him, she told herself as she pulled on her pajamas and turned back the covers to her bed. If he insisted on going through this all alone, there was nothing she could do.
Resigned to the fact that she would, in all likelihood, watch him be escorted off to prison, she was about to crawl into bed when her doorbell rang. At nine-thirty at night she seldom had visitors. Unless it was someone who didn’t have a phone coming from the reservation with a medical emergency.
Concerned, she hurriedly pulled on a robe and rushed to the front of her small, two-bedroom house, flipping on lights as she went. She hoped it wasn’t Hannah Eagle. Six months’ pregnant, she’d had three other pregnancies that had ended in miscarriages. It would kill Hannah if this one did, too.
But when Summer quickly
unlocked her front door and pulled it open, it wasn’t Hannah’s husband John standing on her porch. Instead, she found herself face-to-face with the last man she expected to seek her out at that hour of the night. Gavin Nighthawk.
“Gavin! What are you doing here?”
“I need to talk to you,” he said huskily. “I apologize for showing up without calling, but I was driving around and somehow just ended up here.” His eyes dropped to the thin material of her gown and robe. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”
She was respectably covered—there was no reason for her to be embarrassed—but in the harsh glare of the porch light, she could feel a painful blush climb into her cheeks. Instinctively, before she realized just how telling the gesture was, she started to reach for the overlapping neckline of her robe to check to see how low it was. But his gaze followed the movement and with a silent curse, she dropped her hand and forced herself to not fidget.
“Actually, I was just going to read for a while before I went to bed,” she replied, standing stiffly in front of him. “If you’d like to come in, I’ll change into something more suitable and make some coffee—”
“I’m not staying that long,” he said quickly, stopping her before she could push the door wider. “I just wanted to let you know that I’ve been thinking about your proposal all evening, and I’ve decided to accept it.”
Stunned, Summer blinked, unable to believe she’d heard him correctly. “You have?”
Nodding grimly, Gavin could well understand her surprise. He hadn’t realized he’d made a decision until he’d found himself pulling up in front of her house. “I have to admit, I’ve had my suspicions of you. I don’t know why you offered to do this—or why you believe I’m innocent when no one else does. But I don’t have time to worry about whether you’ve got some kind of hidden agenda or not. My only concerns are clearing my name and getting my daughter back. I have a better chance of doing that with you as my wife than I do standing alone. So if your offer is still good, I’d like to accept.”