by Floyd, Jacie
“She is.” Ironic that his mother should be the first to know of his intentions. Maybe this was the start of a new understanding between them.
“Then I wish you well.” She patted his hand, a blatant gesture of affection on her part. “But if you don’t want to work for the company, what do you want to do? I’ve never believed you find teaching all that fulfilling.”
“You guessed that, did you?” Her insight surprised him. He had thought she only cared that he wasn’t doing her bidding. He hadn’t realized she read him so well. “You’re right. I like teaching, but I won’t make it a lifelong commitment.”
“Will you ever make a lifelong commitment to anything? Besides that woman?”
He ignored the stab at Kara, knowing Mother was still adjusting to the idea. But he jumped at the opening she’d given him. “Now that you mention it, I do have an idea I’d like to talk over with you. Remember the problems Xander had a few years back with alcohol? Well, what I’d like to do now is...”
Wyatt explained his desire to set up a center for troubled teens. He would resign from Wyatt Enterprises and accomplish this plan on his own if need be, but he hoped his mother would help. Rosalie suggested he stay on the board of Wyatt Enterprises and head a foundation capable of funding all their philanthropies under one umbrella. “We’ve primarily been patrons of the arts in the past, but I don’t see why we can’t shift our focus to social issues. You’ve already taken the first step with the Adam Enderley Foundation. It’s a natural progression.”
Excitement surged through him about his new prospects. “If the rest of the board and the other family members agree, it would be the end of my professional indecision.”
“They’ll agree.” Rosalie’s words sounded more like a promise than a prediction.
He could continue living in Connecticut without breaking his ties to his family and Wyatt Enterprises. He could do something he considered meaningful, but not have to play an active role in the family business unless he wanted to. The best of all possible worlds.
Optimistic about the future, Wyatt took leave of his mother with a kiss on her cheek and strolled out to the foyer to see if Kara had arrived yet. Just as he reached the entryway, Jonah swept open the front door and admitted Kara and Allie. With luggage in hand, Kara looked tired from her stay in Indianapolis, rumpled from her trip, anxious about Sean, and breathtakingly beautiful, in spite of it all.
“How are you, Jonah?” Kara paused only long enough to be civil. “And how’s Sean?”
“He’s a fine little boy, Ms. Kara.” Jonah took the suitcase from her.
“Thank you, but—” She broke off the sentence and turned toward Wyatt who watched her from the foot of the stairs. “How is he?” Hurrying towards him, she stretched out to him. “Where is he?”
He took her hands and kissed her quickly before she could object. “He’s fine. He’s sleeping.” Looking past her to Allie, he said, “Thanks for picking Kara up.”
“No problem, brother dear.”
“Can you stay for a minute?” he asked her. “I need to talk to you, but I better take Kara up to see Sean before she wrings my hands off.”
“I can wait. I’ll be in the kitchen with Izzy, putting some finishing touches on our plans for tomorrow’s party.”
“Where would you like Ms. Kara’s luggage, Mr. Wyatt?” Jonah asked.
“Ask Izzy what room she wants to put her in,” he said over his shoulder as he led Kara up the stairs. “Someplace close to me, please.”
“I want to stay with Sean.”
“Okay,” Wyatt agreed, “but he’s been sleeping in my room, so it might be a tad crowded.” She stiffened beside him and he regretted teasing her.
“Why aren’t you with him now?”
“Do you normally sit by his side when he’s sleeping?” Even she didn’t go that far in her vigilance.
“I do when he’s sick,” she shot back. “What if he wakes up, disoriented and scared, and doesn’t know where he is?”
He let her words and sharp tone float past him and focused instead on the concern from which they sprang. Reaching his bedroom, he paused. “Then Izzy would send for me.”
“Oh.”Her indignation deflated like a leaky balloon. “He’s not alone?”
“No.” Wyatt gave her a reassuring hug. “And neither are you.”
Kara reached for the doorknob, but he stopped her. The kiss he had taken in the foyer had been all too brief, and he wanted to distract her before she communicated her fears to Sean.
Before her next breath, his mouth descended on hers with single-minded determination. Soothing her quickly turned into wooing her, and then he forgot everything else as he gathered her into his arms. He held her against him, conveying his passion, his desire, and his love, not stopping until he had won a response.
When he broke the kiss, they sagged against one another, and Wyatt rocked her back and forth in his arms. Both of their hearts thumped erratically. “Calmer now?”
Pressing her hand to her chest, she smiled.“Not hardly.”
Later that evening, Kara sat in a pool of light by Sean’s bed with an open book. The pages may as well have been blank for as much attention as she paid them. Her rueful thoughts settled on her sleeping child. He’s fine. He’s fine. She’d been repeating the words like a mantra all day. The knowledge made her almost weak with relief. He would have been fine without her. Neither he nor Wyatt had needed her... But they had seemed happy to see her.
Hovering at yet a second bedside in as many days brought back the conversation she’d had with her father. Love was worth any amount of risk he’d said. By trying to contain her feelings and control every event, she blocked herself from more pleasure than pain. Her parents had always known that secret. She and Mike had known it once, but until Wyatt had returned to her life, she had purposely denied it.
Did the two of them have a future together? Did Wyatt even want one? He’d implied as much. She wasn’t sure what he intended, but she was ready to go wherever her heart might lead. She wouldn’t turn away from him again.
The door eased open and her heart skipped a beat as Wyatt entered. “Has he been asleep long?” He placed a tray on a table before going over to press his palm on Sean’s forehead.
“About an hour.” Why had Wyatt returned earlier than expected? “How was the dinner party?”
“Elegant. Boring. The usual.” He took the book from her and pulled her toward the table. “Izzy said you didn’t eat. Don’t let worry about Sean and your mother ruin your appetite.”
Taking the seat he held for her, she peeked up at him as he stood by her side. His hand lingered for a moment on her shoulder. “Trying to think of a good way to apologize is more likely the culprit.”
He shrugged out of his suit jacket and pulled his tie loose. His features above his white dress shirt were inscrutable shadows in the dim light. “Who do you need to apologize to?”
“You.”
Dropping into a chair opposite her, he smiled and leaned his chin on his hand. “Well, this is an odd turn of events. I half thought you’d want a strip off my hide for letting Sean get sick.”
“I overreacted and shouldn’t have blamed you. It wasn’t your fault.” Rather than look him in the eye, she let her gaze wander. His love of literature was revealed in this room that had been his as a child. A wide assortment of books shared space with other mementos and trophies. She’d felt very much at home here today. More so than anywhere else in the house.
“Fault is not an issue.” He picked up a spoon, seemingly more interested in the peach cobbler he’d brought than in her apology. “Some things aren’t preventable.”
“Chicken pox is.” She kept her voice low so Sean wouldn’t be disturbed.
Her comment stopped Wyatt with a spoonful of cobbler suspended above his bowl. “What?”
“There’s a vaccine for chicken pox now.”
“I wondered about that.” He continued with his task of devouring the dessert unfazed by what
she considered her big confession. “Danielle asked me if he’d been immunized, but I didn’t see anything about it in the reams of medical records you sent with him.”
Still too ashamed to face him, she shook her head and hunched her shoulders. “Not every pediatrician recommends it. There’s a chance a child could break out with a rash or run a fever, and I wouldn’t take the risk until I looked into it more. So it was my fault. I should have let him have the shot.”
“Kara, it was no one’s fault.”
“It was my job to keep Sean safe, and I didn’t.” The failure continued to eat away at her.
Wyatt reached out and encircled her with his arm. “I don’t mean to criticize, but sometimes your protectiveness goes beyond safety. And sometimes,” he continued when she would have broken in defensively, “being overly cautious is more detrimental than normal prudence.”
She much preferred to flay herself over her own mistakes than to have them pointed out by others. Especially by Wyatt. She straightened her shoulders and pulled away from him. “I think I’ve been making progress.”
“You have,” he agreed, ignoring her indignation. “And I’ve played a big role in that.”
“You’ve played a role?”
“Yes, and I have some ideas about ways to continue the improvement.” Clearly, he didn’t recognize the dangerous ground he tread or he would have resorted to some caution and prudence of his own. “We both want what’s best for Sean even though our methods vary.”
Okay, she’d give him that much. And truly, hadn’t she been thinking the same thing herself? “I know. It isn’t fair to smother Sean because I can’t deal with my past. I haven’t even tried to deal with it.” She bit her lip, nervous about putting into words the decision she’d made. “I’m going to look into grief therapy when I get back home. I should have a long time ago.”
“That should be helpful.” He nodded his approval. “And I think Sean would also benefit from having a more consistent balance between the two of us, between the amounts of time we spend with him. You know, sharing the responsibility more.”
She eyed him skeptically. “How could we be more balanced?”
“We could share custody. We could live together.” He gave her a look she couldn’t really interpret in their darkened corner. Was this a solution rooted in hope or practicality?
She stared, uncertain how to react to the very unlover-like suggestion. “It may sound hypocritical after we’ve already lived together once, and I’m not ruling it out, but is that the example we want to set for him?”
He winced. “Even if we got married first?”
“Married?” If he had started speaking Swahili, she wouldn’t have been more surprised. “You want to get married?”
“Sure.” Rather than look at Kara, he sliced a geometric pattern through a peach slice. “Don’t you think that would be good for Sean?”
Her heart jolted to a stop with his first answer and tripped over itself in anger over the second. Clutching her hands in front of her, she forced herself to remain outwardly calm. “I think it’s good for Sean to know both of his parents love him and want what’s best for him, but I would never marry just for his sake. Marriage is difficult enough when the people involved love one another. I’m afraid it would be impossible if they don’t.”
He stopped playing with his dessert and fixed her with a sharp look. “Who says I don’t love you?”
To Kara’s way of thinking, this conversation had gotten out of hand. She had the urge to dab her napkin in her water and press it against her flushed cheeks. “You didn’t say you did.”
Ready to run, hide, or take a flying leap out of the window, she restricted her movements to standing up with all the dignity she could muster. “In the past three months you’ve proposed an affair, dating, getting to know one another better, living together, and now marriage with never a word about love.”
As her volume rose, Wyatt stood. He glanced over to check on Sean and then opened an exterior door. Afraid he’d read her mind about taking a flying leap, she breathed a sigh of relief when he merely led her onto a verandah. The fresh air cooled her cheeks. Lifting her face to catch the breeze, she noticed the moon had bloomed in full circle above them. A million stars decorated the sky like sparkles on a party hat.
He caught her chin and shifted the angle of her face until their gazes locked. “‘Doubt that the stars are fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never doubt I love.’”
She relaxed her stance, but wouldn’t let herself believe his easy flow of words. “Who said that?” She turned her face away from him a second before his lips touched hers.
He kissed her cheek and trailed his lips down the curve of her jaw to the weak spot below her ear. “Shakespeare.”
“Why should I believe him? It’s not his ability to make a commitment that I’m worried about. Although from all reports, he failed spectacularly in that area.”
Incredulous, he pressed his fingertips to his chest. “You’re worried about my ability to make a commitment?”
“Despite your impressive vocabulary and intelligence, I don’t think you know the meaning of the word.” She moved a step away from him. “You’ve never made a full commitment to anything in your life. You use teaching as an excuse to distance yourself from your family. You play with the family business like it’s a custom-designed Monopoly game that bores you. You make up arbitrary rules with escape clauses to define what does and does not constitute a relationship just so you can walk away at will.”
He pushed his hair off his forehead with both hands, then inhaled and exhaled deeply. “Maybe what you say has been true in the past, but I’m doing my best to change that. Would it interest you to know that Mother and I have called a cease-fire?
“Maybe.”
“Now that we aren’t laboring under cross purposes, we’ve agreed on a new position for me in the company. One that has my whole-hearted interest as well as her endorsement.”
“How did that happen?”
“Being a parent has helped me see her side a little better. Being with you again made me realize what’s important in my life and that the constant battle of wills with my family was pointless. And I wanted to prove to you and Mother, and even myself, that I’m not quite as aimless as I seem.” Looking out across the sculpted garden, he crossed his arms. “I’ve gone about this all wrong. But I do want us to get married, for the three of us to be together.”
After a moment, he took her hands in his. The depth of emotion she saw in his eyes, the expression on his face, and the curve of his lips foretold his feelings before he spoke of them. “No one else appeals to me the way you do or fills my soul, enhances my days, enlivens my nights, or haunts my thoughts. If you want poetry, I’ll write sonnets. If you want flowers, I’ll grow a rose garden. If you want commitment, I’ll get married. I promise to dedicate my life to chasing the shadows out of yours, making you laugh, and keeping you happy for as long as you let me stay by your side.”
As he paused for breath, she saw the self-doubt, the rare insecurity that sprang from the unfamiliarity of revealing himself through words of his own.
“Is that enough for you? Is that what you want? If you don’t say something soon, I’ll start feeling very foolish. And very distraught.”
Her heart filled with joy, and her love for him spilled out. Before she allowed herself to throw herself into his embrace, she felt compelled to ask one question. “If you feel this way, why did you say you wanted to get married for Sean’s sake?”
“I thought it was the best chance I had of getting you to say yes.” He used a knuckle to caress her cheek. “Was I wrong?”
She laughed and threw her arms around him. “Wrong, wrong, gloriously wrong.”
He lifted her up, swinging her around in a dizzying whirl. “I definitely love you. Never doubt that.”
Before the whirling ended, his mouth found hers. The heat and power of his kiss reinforced his words, underscoring his d
evotion with the forces of passion and truth. His lips molded to hers, coaxing, stroking, and encouraging. When they were both breathless and weak with desire, he asked, “What about you?”
“Mmmm,” she said as he nuzzled her neck. “I don’t have your way with words, but I love you very much.”
He lifted his head and grinned. “It’s about time you admitted it.”
She gave the hair at the nape of his neck a playful tug. “I don’t know why it took me so long to realize it.”
“The love was always there, that’s why we could never make our good-byes stick. Even after I knew how I felt, I wasn’t sure you’d ever be ready to take a chance on me.”
“I’m ready now.” With the simple declaration, she reflected his certainty, finally free of her past, her guilt, her fear. “Whenever you are.”
He crushed her to him, capturing her mouth and body, and making her head swim. Kara dimly heard a moan and a whimper. At first, she thought it came from Wyatt. Then the sound turned into a definable word.
“Mommy?”
They sprang apart. Wyatt groaned in frustration as he withdrew his hand from Kara’s breast.
“Mommy?” Sean repeated and then, “Daddy?”
“Just a minute, honey,” Kara called and helped herself to one last kiss before straightening her clothing. She looked at Wyatt warily, trying to judge his reaction to the interruption. Being a parent could play hell with one’s love life. She hoped he realized it. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. He’s my son, too.” Wyatt helped her with her buttons then pulled out the tail of his shirt before they turned to join Sean. Together. “Later we can pick up where we left off.”
“But Sean—” She cut herself off and remembered. The future would start now. “Will be fine without us for a little while, won’t he?”
Epilogue
Standing in front of the panoramic window of The Hansett Museum where Wyatt and Kara had first met, he held Sean and waited with Dylan and Ryan in front of the small group of guests. When the harpist began to play, he drew in a breath as Kara stepped forward. Nothing fancy, she had decreed, over his mother’s protests. Kara had wanted their wedding to be simple, meaningful, and soon. He wanted whatever she wanted as long as her wish list included a honeymoon.