Westmoreland's Way

by Brenda Jackson

  Pam nervously bit down on her bottom lip. She hadn’t invited Dillon to dinner the first night because they had planned their secret meeting that night at the academy. And she hadn’t invited him the past two nights because she had needed time to get herself together after their night of passion.

  “No,” she finally said. “Like I said, Dillon has a lot to read. He said as much the last time he was here.”

  “So you will invite him back?”

  Pam’s stomach knotted. Again, three pairs of eyes focused on her. “Yes, I’d invite him back but it’s up to him whether he would come. Like I said, there’s a reason why he came to Gamble and it’s not to keep us entertained.”

  As if satisfied with her answer, her sisters resumed eating their dinner and the conversations then revolved around what had happened at school that day. She was glad their interests had shifted to other things, although hers remained on Dillon. Every time she thought about that night and all the things they’d done and shared, she would get all flushed inside, her body aching for a repeat. There was no doubt in her mind that if she were to see Dillon now, her body would weaken. If he were to make an attempt to kiss her, or even remotely suggest he wanted to take her to bed again, she would not be able to resist him.

  She hadn’t talked to him or seen him since that night. He had left a message for her on the answering machine yesterday indicating he’d decided to change hotels and had checked into one in Rosebud. Unlike Gamble, the neighboring city of Rosebud had a number of cell towers in close proximity so there was always a signal. She understood that he would want to stay connected to the outside world since he was a businessman.

  He had provided the name of the hotel, which was only a ten-mile drive from Gamble. She had thought about calling him back to let him know she’d gotten the message, but had eventually talked herself out of it. She knew she would see him again, because eventually he had to return the journal. She was hoping that by then she wouldn’t be thinking so much about how his kisses had felt on her lips, or just how good he’d felt going into her body. And then, how she’d felt when he was inside of her. She tightened her thighs together at the memory.

  She licked her lips and then picked up her glass to take a sip of her cold tea, needing to relieve her suddenly hot throat. She forced her thoughts to shift to what Gwyneth thought she’d overheard about Fletcher’s plan to send her sisters away. She’d ask Fletcher about the rumor when he called later that evening. She figured that he would be calling before she left for her evening class at the academy.

  Halfway through dinner the phone rang and she pushed her chair from the table and crossed the room to answer it. “Yes?”

  “How are things going, Pamela?”

  A part of her wished she could feel some excitement, some fluttering of sensations anywhere in her body at the sound of Fletcher’s voice, but that wasn’t happening. Her heart slammed painfully in her chest at that realization. “Everything is fine, Fletcher. How are things with you? Is that problem in Bozeman getting corrected?”

  “Yes, in fact, I have good news. I might be back in Gamble this weekend instead of next Tuesday.”

  She swallowed deeply and tried to put a smile in her voice. “That is good news.”

  “And do you know what would make me extremely happy, Pamela?”

  She dared not try to guess. “No, what?”

  “If you’ve decided on our wedding date by the time I return. I know you prefer waiting until February, but I want to marry this year, so a Christmas wedding is what I prefer.”

  All of a sudden she felt her stomach drop. Christmas was next month. “I can’t possibly get things together by then.”

  “What do you need to do other than show up at the church? Besides, I hate to bring this up, but I’d like to satisfy that mortgage on your home as soon as possible. That’s one of my wedding gifts to you.”

  Pam’s eyes narrowed. In his own passive-aggressive way, Fletcher was reminding her of the reason she had agreed to marry him. “I’m sure you want that matter resolved and done with as soon as possible, right?” he added.

  “Yes, of course.”

  “So will you have a date for me when I get back to Gamble?” he asked.

  She stole a glance at the dining room table where her sisters were chatting away. They had happy looks on their faces and she was determined to keep it that way. They were smart, all three of them, and she’d made a promise to herself at her father’s funeral to do whatever it would take to make sure they got the best life had to offer.

  “Pamela?”

  She breathed in deeply. “Yes. I’ll have a date for you but I won’t promise it will be this year.”

  He didn’t say anything for a moment and then she heard the frustration in his tone. “Let’s start with the date and I hope it’s one we will both agree to.”

  Knowing he was probably about to ask her about Dillon, she quickly jumped in to say, “Nadia is bothered about something, Fletcher, and I’m sure it’s all a misunderstanding, but I thought I’d mention it anyway.”

  “What?”

  “She thinks you’re sending her away when we get married. I assured her that wasn’t the case and—”

  “That has crossed my mind.”

  Pamela stopped talking in midsentence. Her hand tightened on the phone. “Excuse me?”

  He must have heard the cutting anger in her tone. “Calm down, Pamela. It’s not what you think. You have smart sisters and I think they’re getting a wasted education going to that public school in Gamble. As you know, I went to a private school and I received a top-notch education. The best. And I know you want Nadia and Paige to get accepted into a good college. Going to a private high school will not only assure them a good education, but also entrance into the best colleges. That’s what you want, right?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “And just think, they would be associating with people who will benefit them in the long run.”

  “Yes, but I’m not for sending them away from home,” she whispered, so her voice would not carry to the dining room. She had just assured Nadia that she wouldn’t.

  “I know, which is why I’m looking into schools in Cheyenne. That’s not too far away,” he said, as if she would be glad to hear the news.

  She moved away from the kitchen and into the living room, which would afford her more privacy. “As far as I’m concerned, if it’s not here in Gamble then it’s too far away.”

  “But we’ll be looking out for their futures. There’s a wonderful private school there that has excellent living facilities and great security.”

  Pam tried to keep a ripple of anger from consuming her. “You should have talked to me about this first, Fletcher.”

  “It was going to be another one of my wedding gifts. I know how much your sisters’ futures mean to you.”

  Pam closed her eyes. “We can discuss this more when you return.”

  “I don’t understand why you’re upset. I’d think it would be what you wanted. At least I believe it’s what you told me you wanted that day you accepted my marriage proposal.”

  Pam couldn’t say anything. Was it really fair to get upset with him when she had said those things?

  “If that’s not what you want, Pamela, then no sweat. I want to do whatever makes you happy,” he said in a throaty, low voice that did nothing but frustrate her even more.

  “I know, Fletcher, and I appreciate everything you’re doing, but we’ll need to talk about this when you get back.”

  “Okay, baby. Have a good evening. And by the way, is Dillon Westmoreland still in town?”

  She could actually hear the coldness in his voice. “No, in fact Dillon has left town,” she said. What she’d just said really wasn’t a lie because Dillon was no longer in Gamble. Fletcher didn’t have to know he had merely moved to a hotel in neighboring Rosebud.

  “I guess he got what he came for and decided to move on. That’s good. Maybe we won’t be seeing the likes of him again anytime so
on,” Fletcher said cockily.

  She frowned, not liking Fletcher’s attitude. “I suspect he will be returning at some point since he still has my great-grandfather’s journal.” She figured she might as well prepare him now so he wouldn’t go into cardiac arrest when he did see Dillon again.

  “He can keep the damn journal for all I care. I just don’t like the man.”

  Pam inwardly fumed. The journal was not his to decide whether Dillon could keep it or not. “Goodbye, Fletcher.”

  “Goodbye, Pamela, and I hope to see you Sunday.”

  Dillon smiled at all the voices he heard in the background of his phone conversation with his brother Micah. Micah, a graduate of Harvard Medical School who was only a couple of years younger than Dillon, was an epidemiologist with the federal government. Everyone often joked about Micah being the mad scientist in the family.

  “So how long will you be home, or did you just drop in long enough to attend this weekend’s charity ball?” Dillon asked Micah. His brother was known to travel all over the world doing work for the government. He had lived in China for an entire year during the bird-flu epidemic.

  The charity ball he was referring to was the one the Westmoreland family hosted every year to raise money for the Westmoreland Foundation they had established to aid various community causes.

  “I’m here for the ball and I’ll be home at least through New Year’s. Then I’m off to Australia for a few months.”

  “Good to hear. I plan on flying in for the ball this weekend,” Dillon said. A part of him really wasn’t ready to put distance between him and Pam, even for a short while.

  “I heard Sheriff Harper talked you into taking his sister Belinda as your date,” Micah said in a teasing tone.

  Dillon rolled his eyes. “It was either that or have Bane spend a night in jail for trespassing on the Newsomes’ property in the middle of the night.” He wasn’t sure he appreciated his brother finding his predicament with Belinda so amusing. His brothers and cousins knew Belinda had had her eye on him as husband number three for about a year.

  “So how is the investigation into Raphel’s past coming along?”

  “I’m finding out more and more information about our great-grandfather every day,” Dillon replied.

  Micah chuckled. “Just as long as it’s nothing that can come back to haunt me with the State Department. I can barely handle the fact that he ran off with those other men’s wives.”

  Dillon smiled. “I told you the real deal about Raphel and Lila. He did it to protect her.”

  “Yes, but we still don’t know what was up with him and the second one, Portia Novak. It should be a rather lively discussion at Thanksgiving dinner this year and will be the first time in a long time everyone will be home.”

  After a few more minutes of conversation with Micah, the phone was passed around to the rest of his brothers and cousins. Everyone wanted to know what information about their great-grandfather he’d been able to uncover so far. He didn’t tell them everything he’d found out, but he felt he’d told them enough for now.

  It was close to six in the evening when he finally said goodbye to everyone and hung up the phone. He glanced over at the journal he’d been reading over the past two days. He was surprised no one in the Novak family had taken the time to ever read the journal. If they had they would have learned just why Raphel had taken Portia away, and why Jay had given him his blessings to do so.

  He glanced around the hotel room. It was totally different from the one he’d had in Gamble. It was a lot more spacious and the furnishings were early American instead of Victorian. Although CNN was alive and well on the big-screen television and the reception for his cell phone was perfect, he would be the first to admit that he missed the huge bathtub at the Gamble hotel. But he needed to be in a hotel that had fax and Internet service. His firm was working on a huge multimillion-dollar deal and he needed to be available if a last-minute snag developed.

  And he needed to be someplace where if Pam wanted to pay him a visit, it wouldn’t make the six o’clock news.

  He walked over to the window and looked out. It was cold outside but nothing like it had been the night he’d met Pam at her drama school. He sucked in a deep breath when he remembered that night and how it had changed his life. He hoped she’d gotten his message about changing hotels. The one in Gamble was closer to her place, but this one was only ten miles away.

  She hadn’t returned his call so a lot of things were going through his mind right now. Had she broken their rule about not having any regrets? Had Fletcher made it back to town? He didn’t have answers to those questions, but the one thing he did know for sure was that if he didn’t hear from her tonight, he would be making a trip into Gamble to see her. He still had her journal and tomorrow would be a good time to return it.

  On the drive from Dream Makers back home later that night, Pam was trying, really trying, not to recall her conversation with Fletcher earlier that day. She was even trying, as hard as she could, to give him some slack and believe he had her sisters’ best interest at heart when he’d made the decision they should continue their education in Cheyenne and not in Gamble. But for him not to have discussed it with her was totally unacceptable.

  He of all people knew how close she and her sisters were. Did he honestly think she would let them go off and live at some private school, leaving their family and friends behind? And as far as she was concerned, there was nothing wrong with public schools. She’d gone to one and had done pretty damn well.

  She reached out to turn up the dial for the heat a little. It was cold, although it wasn’t as cold as it had been the last night she’d driven home from the academy. That was the night she had spent almost three hours in Dillon’s arms. She couldn’t help but smile just thinking about it.

  She had talked to Iris but hadn’t told her best friend a single thing. She hadn’t needed to. According to Iris, there was something in the tone of her voice. She sounded relaxed. It sounded like she’d taken a chill pill. Pam chuckled as she remembered the conversation.

  She passed a road sign that indicated the exit to Rosebud was coming up. She immediately felt a pull in the lower part of her body and it wasn’t a gentle pull. It was a voracious tug. She tried to keep staring through her windshield, determined to keep her eyes on the road and to drive straight home. She then began experiencing flutters in her belly and her nipples pressing against her shirt felt sensitive.

  The physical reactions her body was going through just knowing she was an exit away from Rosebud made her release a quiet moan. The hotel where Dillon was now staying was less than five miles from the interstate.

  Dillon had given her his hotel room number when he’d left the message, but had made it seem as if he’d provided the number for informational purposes only. As if he’d wanted to assure her the journal was still safe and in good hands. Now she couldn’t help wondering if perhaps he’d had an ulterior motive. Was he hoping to see her again, although she’d made it clear that what they’d shared that night was a one-night stand?

  But the biggest question of all was why she was contemplating getting off at the next exit. And she knew the answer without thinking really hard about it. She was thinking of doing so because she needed to see him.

  She needed to be with him.

  She sighed deeply and as she took the exit to Rosebud she refused to question her sanity any longer. She was merely enjoying an indulgence that would be denied to her forever once she married Fletcher.

  Dillon lay in his hotel room in the dark. He had dozed off, after eating a meal that room service had delivered and taking a bath. The television was on but he wasn’t watching it. Instead his thoughts were on the woman he wanted.

  He wondered what she was doing. Did she think about their night together as often as he did, or had she put it out of her mind? He had just shifted positions in the bed when he heard a knock at the door. Assuming it was housekeeping coming to turn down the bedcovers and to make sure h
e didn’t need anything else before they retired for the night, he slid out of bed and into the jeans he’d placed on the back of the chair.

  He opened the door slightly, just enough to make out his visitor and, when he did, sensations tore into him and forced air through his lungs. He quickly opened the door wide.

  He refused to ask Pam what she was doing there. For a second he seriously doubted he had the ability to utter a single sound, so they stood there for a long moment and stared at each other, speechless. He did glance down at her finger. She had taken the ring off again. He looked back up into her eyes and felt his pulse rate increase.

  Then she broke through the silence and smiled. “Are you going to invite me in?”

  “Baby, I plan to do a whole lot more than that,” he muttered thickly, his gaze not leaving hers.

  He took a step back and she entered his hotel room. He closed the door behind her.

  “I guess you’re wondering why I’m here,” she said in a quiet tone.

  He shook his head. “We’ll talk about the why’s later. Right now I just want to hold you. Make love to you. I’ve missed you.”

  “And I’ve missed you, too,” she said honestly, wondering how she could miss him so much after two days, when she hadn’t missed Fletcher at all and he’d been gone nearly twice that long.

  Knowing they didn’t have a lot of time on their side tonight, she took in his solidly muscular, naked chest and the way his jeans rode low on his hips. They were unsnapped and the zipper was barely up, which meant he had slid into them rather quickly. She hoped he was ready to slide out of them just as fast.

  Feeling her heartbeat almost out of control, she shifted her gaze from him to glance around the room. Her great-grandfather’s journal sat in the middle of a wingback chair.

  She returned her gaze to him, knowing he’d been watching her intently and was probably waiting for her to make a move. She decided to do so. Moving away from the door she crossed the room to him and, the minute she stood in front of him, his arms easily slid around her.