Mystery Heiress

by Suzanne Carey

  Aware that her departure was imminent, a number of the nurses who’d cared for the plucky little girl and grown fond of her had crowded into her room for the occasion. “Don’t forget us!” and “Come visit us anytime!” were two of the injunctions Jess heard as the head nurse presented her daughter with an enormous stuffed dog.

  “This doggie can stand in for the one you left in England, until you see him again,” the woman explained as Annie gave him a hug and Jess recorded the moment with her camera.

  Understandably tired by the time they reached the cottage and she saw her welcome-home sign, Annie didn’t object to being tucked beneath the covers. Jess had plenty of time to make chili and chocolate cake for the party, and pack a few boxes with the belongings they’d collected for their move.

  Annie was up, reclining on one of the lattice-print couches with an afghan over her knees, when the Todds and their children, who were dressed for Halloween as an Indian princess and a pirate, came over around 6:00 p.m.

  Rebecca showed up a few minutes later, bearing picture books for Annie and a loaf of homemade bread. But there was still no sign of Stephen, who’d phoned to say he was running late. I wonder if he’s busy with a patient—or still keeping his distance, though the biggest stumbling block to our relationship has been removed, Jess thought.

  Caught up in dealing with a newly admitted thalas-semia patient, Stephen finally managed to leave the hospital around the time Jess, Annie and their guests were sitting down to dinner in the cottage’s kitchen. This is a perfect example of what Jess will face if she agrees to spend her life with me, he thought with a rueful shake of his head. Still, he planned to ask. If she could forgive the way he’d waited out the rigors of Annie’s treatment before proposing, maybe he could forgive himself.

  They’d almost finished eating by the time he arrived, after stopping at his house to collect the diamond he’d bought for Jess nearly a month earlier. She greeted him with a hug—light and undemanding, the way all her hugs had been since their talk during the darkest days of Annie’s allergic reaction. I want more than that from her. A lot more, he thought, the ferocity of his longing bursting through the fetters he’d placed on it. I want to make love to her all night long, until we’re both gasping for breath.

  Doing his best to push down the tumult of emotions in him until the proper moment came for him to reveal them, he planted a kiss on Annie’s forehead and greeted the Todds and Rebecca before disappearing to use the washroom. About to return to the kitchen and partake of the meal Jess had prepared, he happened to glance into her bedroom. And saw the boxes she’d packed for the move he knew nothing about.

  As a result of his vacillation, she’d decided to return to England without a word to him!

  Jess could tell something was wrong the moment he returned to the kitchen and took his place at the table. Ostensibly hungry, and in an agreeable if somewhat keyed-up mood when he’d arrived, he refused her excellent chili to brood over a mug of black coffee and take very little part in the conversation.

  Even Annie noticed it. “Are you all right, Dr. Steve?” she asked with something of her customary verve. “Or do you want Mummy to take your temperature?”

  Clearly aware of the undercurrent that had developed between Jess and Stephen, Rebecca and the Todds bade them a premature good-night as soon as the meal was over and they’d helped clear the table, despite Chelsea’s and Carter’s objections. Yet Stephen wasn’t able to accost Jess about his discovery just yet. First she had to help Annie brush her teeth, change into pajamas and get back into bed for some quiet time with one of the books Rebecca had brought her.

  “All right, let’s have it,” she demanded, returning to the living room. “You’ve been glowering at me like a thundercloud since you arrived.”

  She looked so beautiful standing there with her hands on her hips, in her lapis wool slacks and matching sweater, with fire glinting in her big brown eyes and roses blazing in her cheeks—like some spirited English damsel of old, confronting her angry Viking lover. He longed to sweep her up in his arms and tell her exactly how it would be with them. They’d marry the moment they could get a license. She and Annie would come to live with him. Herkie would be shipped from London by air express.

  “Not quite since then,” he pointed out.

  “So…tell me.”

  “You might say I’m a little upset by the prospect of you and Annie returning to England,” he growled. “When I saw those boxes in your bedroom—”

  Jess’s eyes widened. “Actually—” she suddenly sounded very cool and British “—I’ve rented an apartment near the hospital. Though Lindsay and Rebecca urged me to, it didn’t seem right to stay here indefinitely after assuring the Fortune family I wanted nothing but bone marrow for my daughter. You ought to know I have the good sense not to take Annie away from you and Minn-Gen so soon after her transplant.”

  As she spoke, Jess was fully aware that she wasn’t telling him the whole story. Another very important reason she planned to stay was related to her feelings for him. With some of their problems resolved, she was hoping he’d ask her to marry him.

  It’s now or never, Stephen realized. If I hesitate, I’ll lose her. The amazing thing was, he didn’t want to hesitate. Or procrastinate for any reason. In essence, his grief over the breakup of his first marriage was history. He loved Jess and Annie with all his heart. Though he’d never be entirely healed of his son’s death, restricting his life to work and sleep was hardly a fitting memorial to David.

  Annie needs a dad, he thought. Jess needs a husband. And, oh, how I need them! Confronting the possibility that he might lose them had conjured up the image of a desert in his head.

  His voice husky with emotion, he speculated that she might not need the apartment. “I hope you didn’t put down a big deposit,” he said.

  Jess got extremely quiet at that. “Why?” she ventured after a moment.

  “Because you’re going to marry me. You and Annie will live with me, at our house. I’ve got a ring for you in my pocket, and a heart full of love for you and your precious daughter….”

  With a little rush of relief and happiness, Jess threw herself into his arms. “There’s nothing I’d like better,” she confessed. “Are you sure you mean it?”

  “Ah, darlin’…” Feeling as if he owned the earth, the moon and the stars, Stephen tugged her close. Just to hold her that way, and know they belonged together, was like water after thirst, balm for what had wounded him.

  “Let’s get the license tomorrow,” he proposed, his head filled with a cavalcade of images: the three of them playing in the snow, him and Jess making love by the fire, waking up in the same bed with the woman he loved all warm and smooth next to him under the covers. He wanted to give her everything he had. Everything he was. A child, maybe even soon. He or she would be David and Annie’s little sister or brother.

  Though he couldn’t know it, he sensed that Jess was thinking similar thoughts. “I wish you could have known my son,” he said, adding in a complete non sequitur, “I want to give you a baby.”

  The idea suited her to perfection. “I’d love to have your child,” she answered. “And to get the license tomorrow, though not necessarily in that order. There’s just one thing…”

  Secure in her affection, Stephen invited her to name it.

  Her voice was soft and dreamy. Yet it resonated with a lusty note. “I’d like to postpone the ceremony until Annie can walk down the aisle with us,” she said. “But I don’t want to wait that long to make love to you. Got any ideas?”

  Epilogue

  As Stephen dialed Mrs. Larsen’s number with the objective of asking her to stay with Annie for an hour or two while he and Jess “ran some errands,” Nate was stopping by the jail so that Jake could sign some papers. To the brothers’ amazement, they were getting along better than they had in years. When Nate produced the necessary documents, handing them to a bailiff to be checked and passed through, Jake signed on the dotted line without
a ruckus.

  “Maybe we’ve just needed a wall of glass between us,” Jake quipped when Nate remarked on it.

  To his surprise, his sibling responded by confessing how worried he’d been about him. “You’ve been a thorn in my side for years,” he admitted. “And yet I love your ornery hide.”

  The reward for his honesty was a wry smile. “That goes double for me, little brother,” Jake said. “Sitting in my cell, I’ve had plenty of time to think about things. And I’ve decided you should take a bigger role in managing the executive affairs of Fortune Industries, the way you’ve always wanted. If I manage to get out of this mess, I plan to spend more of my time doing something related to the medical career I wanted and gave up so long ago. I’ve decided to found a children’s medical mission to third-world countries.”

  Impressed with Jake’s humanitarian plans and relieved that they’d be able to cooperate more fully over the business, Nate congratulated him. “You really have grown in this situation,” he said with a shake of his head. “I hope I can do your confidence in me justice.”

  The moment was bittersweet. Both brothers knew that Jake was facing the fight of his life to prove his innocence.

  When he returned home, Nate phoned Sterling and told him of their conversation. “I never thought I’d be saying this,” he conceded. “But I think things are going to flow a little more smoothly between us.”

  As always, Sterling reported his words to Kate, who had invited him for a late supper at her penthouse apartment. Holding hands afterward as they gazed at the crazy quilt of lights spread out below against the velvet of Minneapolis, they speculated softly about what the future might hold.

  “It’ll be touch and go. But I think Jake will get off and the mystery of my attacker will be solved,” Kate predicted. “It’s a matter of accretion. Too many clues that point elsewhere are piling up.”

  With all his heart, Sterling wished he could make that outcome happen for her—that he wasn’t such a pessimist.

  “I hope you’re right, kitten,” he said, leaning his head against hers. “Nothing would make me happier than to see you happily ensconced in the heart of your family again.”

  Still as beautiful as a girl to him in the subtly irridescent lounge coat she’d worn for their tête-à-tête, Kate tossed him one of her more mischievous looks. “Are you sure about that, old dear?” she asked.

  Her need to remain hidden, yet have an agent in the sphere of her family to do her bidding, had brought them closer than he’d ever dared hope. Yet he realized that, for the time being, nothing earthshaking would come of it. Maybe when Jake was free and they’d found the real murderer…

  “You know me…I’m never sure of anything,” he answered, giving her a little squeeze. “Let’s just say it’s my most selfless wish. As for the selfish ones, we needn’t talk about them yet.”

  MYSTERY HEIRESS

  Copyright © 1997 by Harlequin Books S.A.

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-7323-2

  Special thanks and acknowledgment are given to Suzanne Carey for her contribution to the FORTUNE’S CHILDREN series.

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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