by Floyd, Jacie
Her heart pirouetted with joy, but her ever-present fear reached out and stomped all over the emotion. “Why?”
“There’s something important we need to discuss.”
She hesitated. “I doubt that. We agreed a long time ago that we wouldn’t—”
“Would you be willing to meet with me Friday night?” The interruption marked a rare breach of his perfect Southern manners.
“This Friday?” Kara bit the inside of her cheek. Their periodic conversations always required her to perform a careful balancing act between desire and deceit. Seeing him in person would render that trick impossible. She hadn’t been dodging him for three years just to let him stroll back into her life now. Tapping the eraser-end of a pencil on her desk, she attempted to maintain a breezy tone. “How will that work? I leave Connecticut and you leave California at a designated time and hope we bump into one another somewhere in the middle of the country. Kansas, perhaps?”
“That’s one possibility.” She pictured him smiling before continuing. “But I’m willing to go the distance.”
She pulled in several deep breaths, her thoughts racing. “You plan to come here? Friday, huh? Great. Just let me check my schedule.” Randomly flipping the pages of her desk calendar, she groped for inspiration. “Oh, no! I’m sorry. I almost forgot. I’ll be out of town this Friday.”
“What, again?” He made a clicking noise with his tongue against his teeth. “I hate to hear it.” He didn’t sound disappointed. He sounded skeptical. “It’s amazing how you’re always out of town when I have business in New York. Is this a trip you can postpone? I really need to see you.”
“I’d postpone it if I could, but I can’t. I have plane tickets. And reservations. I’m going—” Desperately, she flipped through the stack of mail she’d brought in earlier. Electric bill, nope. Invitation to join a health club, no help. Offer for a free cruise. Yes! “—on a cruise. To the Caribbean. With a friend. I’m sorry.”
Her guilty conscience finally strangled her disjointed ramblings and brought them to a halt. The fabrication must be stone-cold obvious to someone with Wyatt’s razor-sharp acuity. God, how many times had she imagined meeting him face to face and revealing the truth? Too many to count, but she could never make herself go through with it. She had too much to lose.
“That sounds like fun.” His framed likeness on the wall mocked her. “I’m sorry I won’t get to see you, Kara mia.”
“I’m sorry, too.” Sorry, sorry, sorry. How many times had he used that word since they’d last been together? How many times had she used it?
“Then I’ll see you the next time I’m in town?”
“Absolutely! I’ll look forward to it.”
“No, I think you should count on it.”
The heir to the Maitland fortune could charm the pants off a nun if he tried, and he was accustomed to getting his way in most situations. The pointed comment sounded very much like a threat. Or maybe that was her overburdened conscience talking again. “I sure will.”
“I have a couple of reasons for coming to New York this week, but one of them is that I want to talk to you about your son.”
Kara’s vision clouded. Stretching out a hand to steady herself, she switched the phone from one ear to the other and wiped a sweaty palm against her jeans. Her heart thudded sickeningly against her ribs. “My son?” She managed to squeeze out those two small words from a throat constricted like a vise.
“You said once that Adam’s death had seemed so pointless.” Wyatt’s delivery was quiet and careful as he tiptoed into one of their many off-limit topics. “I’ve been trying to think of a way to change that.”
Bitterness honed Kara’s pain with a sharp edge. “Nothing you do or say can change it. Discussing it again serves no purpose.”
He may have cursed under his breath before speaking more diplomatically. “You don’t know that if you won’t listen.”
Before she could reply, another voice, one located much closer than California, beckoned her from the baby monitor on her desk. “Mo-om. Mom-mee.”
“I can’t listen to anything you have to say about my son. I won’t listen.” There. She’d admitted it. “I’m sorry, but I have to go.” She covered the phone’s mouthpiece to muffle the sound of Sean sneezing in the background.
“You can’t keep avoiding me, Kara. I’ve been patient long enough.” Wyatt’s words arrived with more steel than he normally he needed to employ.
“We’ll talk again soon. As soon as I get back from the cruise.” Her son’s voice through the speaker became more demanding. Raspier. She leaned forward and strained to hear, frantic now to get off the damned phone. Did he sound congested? Had he seemed feverish before his nap? She needed to check his temperature. Immediately.
“Have a good trip.”
“Thanks. You, too.” She opened her mouth to apologize yet again, but closed it. Words wouldn’t comfort either one of them unless they included her full confession. And forgiveness on both sides. And that was out of the question.
She’d made her choices long ago. Too late to second-guess those decisions now.
“Wanta get up.” Sean followed the announcement with a cough.
“Thanks for calling.” Kara’s hand clutched the phone for one more regretful moment before she cut the connection.
She hurried to her son, but memories of another set of amber eyes accompanied by a whisky-smooth voice under a starlit sky haunted her thoughts.
In his university office, Wyatt Maitland shoved his chair away from his desk and tossed his phone aside.
“Damn.” He moved to stand in front of the window overlooking the annoyingly sunny California campus. The calendar said it was October, but he couldn’t tell by looking. Fall… winter… spring… it didn’t matter. All the seasons looked the same here in the land of perpetual sunshine.
He should have followed his original inclination and shown up on Kara’s doorstep unannounced. But that would have violated the terms of their agreement. The stupid agreement he’d insisted upon when they met. The stupidest agreement he’d ever constructed in his life. “When it’s over between us, it’s over,” he’d said, presumably for his own protection. No regrets and no recriminations. They’d agreed to the stipulations with a handshake, a kiss, and a weekend of sizzling sex, the memory of which still managed to heat his skin from the inside out.
Of course, that had been before she knew his family owned the company responsible for the deaths of her husband and child. Hell, he hadn’t even known it himself at the time.
During the past three years he’d deluded himself into thinking he could win her over again. If he could recapture her trust, she’d eventually forgive him. But she’d proven as elusive to pin down as bipartisan politics or a simultaneous orgasm.
But things were about to change.
He’d devised a new strategy to overcome the past and right old wrongs. He intended to tell her about the plan face-to-face. But could any reparation ever be enough to mend the damage his family had done?
Kara was the only woman he’d ever known who hadn’t wanted anything from him. Before and after she learned the awful truth, she hadn’t tried to take advantage of his name, his money, or his family’s far-ranging influence. And deep down, her increasing emotional distance during their phone conversations made him worry that she needed his support more than anyone else ever had.
Her continued evasions raised concerns that she’d reverted to the wounded-sparrow persona he’d first known. That she’d once again cut herself off from life, friends, and love, even though she assured him that she hadn’t. And if that were true, then his other worry—that she was seriously involved with someone else—chilled him to the bone.
He wished it hadn’t taken him so long to admit she meant more to him than some pleasant memories he could store away for the winter like patio furniture.
If she still wanted to have a baby, he could at least consider it, and not reject the idea with some off-the-cuff comment lik
e he had when she’d suggested it before. Not that he wanted to have a child anytime soon, of course, but eventually...
Wyatt Maitland, family man.
The concept boggled his mind, but he’d work on getting used to the idea. After getting to know his troubled nephew, Xander, in the last few years, he’d realized this parenting thing might be more rewarding than he’d first suspected. And he’d also realized there might be more than one area of his life that lacked substance.
But since Kara had once again run away from the idea of meeting with him like a frightened doe from a hunter, he was finished playing by the rules. Time to resort to his fallback plan. Not one he embarked on without a few qualms, but anything was better than continuing to stand idly by, waiting for her to rescind their agreement, and come to her senses about seeing him. His patience had reached its limit.
Before giving himself time to decide against it, he grabbed his phone and punched the number of one of his two best friends. One of the few people he trusted.
After Dylan answered and they traded insults for a few minutes, Wyatt got to the point.
“I need the phone number of a woman who lives in New York.”
“That’s a pretty general category,” Dylan said. “Can you be more specific or should I just pick one for you?”
“You know I don’t want your leftovers.”
Dylan chuckled. “Then what’s her name?”
“Remember that crazy, wild girl who went with us on a motorcycle trip through Europe?” The woman who had eventually fixed him up with Kara Enderley, but Wyatt wasn’t sharing that information. Not even with Dylan.
“Yeah, we stayed a few days at her uncle’s chateau on the Riviera. Regina Viviano? The one who jumped from your bike to mine, mid-trip?”
Of course, his friend would give Wyatt a hard time before giving him the phone number he wanted. “Not how I remember it, but, yes, that’s one.”
By the time he finished with Dylan, they’d made plans to meet in New York on Friday, and Wyatt had the telephone number he wanted.
He weighed the phone in his hand just as he weighed the decision to make a call he’d promised Kara he would never make. But the time had come. He had to do it.
“Regina? This is Wyatt Maitland.”
On Friday evening, Kara closed the heavy door of Manhattan’s Rothschild Gallery against the drizzly autumn rain. After checking her coat and umbrella, she squared her shoulders and pushed her way through the damp crowd milling around the mammoth room filled with towering sculptures. Jostled and elbowed from one corner of the room to the other, she muttered under her breath and wished she’d stayed home.
Everything had been off-kilter since Wyatt’s call on Tuesday. Her editor had pushed up the publication date of her art history manuscript. Her dreams at night had contained an emotionally confusing mix of hot, erotic scenarios and searing, incomprehensible loss.
And to make matters worse, Sean’s nagging cough had been diagnosed as a minor respiratory infection, just as she’d feared. The resulting stuffy head and sniffles had made him cranky all week. So tonight, she’d waited too long to tear herself away from him to get here on time.
Normally, she arrived for the media preview of a new show before the general public trooped inside. Otherwise, like now, it was almost impossible to block out the swirling opinions of the less-than-knowledgeable masses who attended every hot new exhibit.
The escalating level of cocktail chat prevented her from recording a lot of observations on her phone. In the morning, she’d come back for a more careful study of Samantha Davenport’s creations. Some of the California sculptor’s pieces seemed naggingly familiar as they soared in majestic relief toward the stark white of the vaulted ceiling. But Kara’s advance research indicated that the Rothschild had nabbed the artist’s first New York showing.
As Kara wove through the gathering, she scanned the crowd for her agent. Also her best friend, Regina had agreed to meet her here prior to dinner at their favorite Italian restaurant, but the vivacious woman had never been known for her punctuality. With one eye on the door instead of on her destination, Kara bumped into a sturdy figure dressed in black.
“Dylan! Hello.” She greeted the staggeringly handsome and wealthy Dylan Bradford with a touch of caution. Even though his family patronized the arts, Kara found him too smooth and good-looking for his own good. His wealth and high-profile name kept him from moving in her usual social circles, but he had his share of charm. More obvious and less subdued than Wyatt’s, but still, pretty lethal. “When was the last time you attended a new artist’s opening? Samantha Davenport should be honored.”
“Kara, love.” Dylan gathered her in for a hug and a kiss. Too late to avoid the inevitable grope, she planted her hands against his rock-solid chest and pushed herself away from the determined player. He’d pursued her with erratic levels of interest from the day of their first meeting. Normally, the attention amused her. But this evening, she was on edge and not in the mood.
Sometimes, late at night during a vulnerable or lonely moment, she grappled with the temptation to accept the next offer he made for some down-and-dirty, no-holds-barred sex. But he represented nothing but temporary—and if rumors could be believed—spectacular relief. In the end, he wasn’t the one she wanted, and she’d wind up lonelier than before.
He accepted the rebuff with a flicker of amusement in his dark and smoldering eyes. “I had started to regret the impulse. Seeing you here makes it almost worthwhile.”
“Almost?” she questioned with feigned indignation.
“Well, you know how I hate these crowds—unless it’s for one of my own causes or protégés.” He plucked two glasses of champagne from a passing waiter’s tray and handed her one. “But an old friend asked me to come and be supportive.”
“And you did as you were bid?” She raised her eyebrows and studied the generally self-absorbed prince of society as she sipped the bubbly. “I’m impressed. I want to meet the person who can bring you into line with just a request.”
He leaned forward to speak into her ear. “Let’s just say, there are favors owed that can never be repaid.”
“Blackmail or bribery, huh? I should’ve guessed.” Kara returned him to arm’s length and surveyed the room for Regina.
“If I had seen Samantha Davenport beforehand, I would’ve complied without the arm-twisting.” He downed his drink and nodded at someone across the way. “Have you met her yet?”
“No. What’s she like?”
“Judge for yourself. She’s standing with Irma over by the fountain.” He nodded in the artist’s direction. “Ebony waterfall of hair… long, shapely legs… voluptuous breasts you could balance a plate on. And she’s dressed all in black. Just my type.”
“If she’s breathing, she’s your type.” Kara shifted to get a glimpse of the paragon he’d described.
The beautiful sculptress towered over the diminutive gallery owner and leaned into a tall, well-built male who choose that moment to join her. The man placed an arm around her waist, and the woman relaxed into his embrace. An all-too-familiar twinge of longing twitched between Kara’s shoulders as she witnessed the couple exchange the simple gestures of affection.
Get over it. She turned her attention to Samantha’s escort. Apparently Wyatt’s phone call had lodged him stubbornly in her thoughts. If she looked at Samantha’s companion in a certain way, this rare specimen of supportive male resembled Wyatt a bit.
Resembled him a lot, actually.
Hmmm. The companion stroked the sculptress’s cheek with long-fingered, expressive hands. Just like Wyatt’s. Hands that had caressed, comforted, and excited Kara with urgent, silent eloquence.
And the man’s dark hair—with a hint of curl—fell stubbornly forward at the temples. Just like Wyatt’s. He thrust it off his forehead with an impatient shove and turned to the side, revealing a profile she knew all too well.
Kara gasped and pressed a hand to her chest to suppress her heart’s uneven
thumping while she drank in every detail of Wyatt’s all-too-real, all-too-recognizable presence. She took one eager step in his direction. And then another. A smile touched her lips.
And then she remembered.
Despite the compelling attraction that pulled her toward him, several horrific facts unfurled through her brain and kept her rooted to the floor.
She didn’t want to see him.
She especially didn’t want him to see her.
She told him she’d be out of town. On a cruise.
“Oh, God.” She thrust her glass into Dylan’s hand and dove into the crowd. Ignoring the toes she stepped on, she plowed a path across the black marble floor.
“What’s wrong?” Dylan followed hard on her heels.
She brushed a trembling hand across her forehead, but didn’t slow. “I’m not feeling well. If you see Regina, tell her—”
They reached the entryway and her friend materialized by her side. “Tell her what?”
“I have to leave.” Kara pushed onward, toward the door.
Regina grabbed her arm and pulled her to a stop. “But what about dinner? I have a yummy surprise for you.”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t stay. I’ll explain tomorrow.” Kara shrugged off her friend and cast a worried glance over her shoulder. Wyatt no longer stood beside Irma and the female sculptor. He could be anywhere. He could be headed her way.
“It’s pouring outside.” Regina stepped forward and blocked the door. “Where’s your coat? You’ll need an umbrella.”
Kara pulled a claim check out of her purse and swapped it for Regina’s dripping tiger-striped umbrella and raincoat. “You take mine. I’ll take yours. We can trade back later. Sorry about dinner.”
She dashed out the door, plunging into the cold, wet darkness, desperate to protect the safety of the world she’d created for herself a little while longer.
Chapter Two
Wyatt scanned the crowd for Regina Viviano and listened with half an ear as Irma Rothschild made predictions about Sam’s almost certain success.