by Dani Wade
No matter his family’s class growing up, Kane had a pride and expectation of quality that had shone through consistently. His quality of character had come through again in the fallout from the gossip about their original contract. From the gossip Marjorie had shared, when questioned at a cocktail party the other night he’d refused to speak about contracts that were nobody’s business but the parties involved.
At least Kane was protecting her. The same couldn’t be said for her stepmother. Presley’s threat to once more talk to their lawyer seemed to have kept Marjorie quiet—for now.
“What’s taking so long?” Marjorie asked from her elbow, startling Presley. She hadn’t realized Marjorie had joined her.
“It’s nothing. Just some business papers.”
Her stepmother studied the envelope, but Presley knew she wouldn’t know where it was from, since the Harrington name didn’t appear on it. She set the package on a side table and went back to the dining room as if it were truly unimportant, but it wasn’t as easy to put the contents out of her mind. Still, she forced herself to wait until Marjorie had finished eating and retired to her room for the evening. She had a lunch date the next day that it would take her all night to prepare for, she said.
Presley still couldn’t imagine putting that much thought and time into her appearance, even if she was enjoying her new clothes. Mrs. Rose had helped her build quite a closet full. Though she wasn’t looking forward to any social events any time soon. She imagined whatever she wore from now on would be examined and talked about, but she refused to go backward.
She’d just have to learn to deal with it with a straight face.
Her hands trembled as she took the envelope to the privacy of her office. Why? She had nothing to be concerned about. She’d fulfilled her obligation to Kane per their contract and returned everything to him in full. Why he was contacting her now, she had no idea.
But this was business. She needed to suck in her emotions and handle whatever needed to be done.
The first thing she noticed as she dumped the contents onto her desk was the check she’d had delivered to Kane on Monday. Only now it was stamped with a big black “Void” across the front.
Her heart started to pound in earnest. If he was refusing her payment, then he must want something else. Although what that something would be, she couldn’t imagine. She’d given him his freedom. He should be grateful.
She picked up the sheaf of papers and began to read the top page. The impersonal Ms. Macarthur on the Harrington Farms letterhead didn’t bode well.
Receipt of your cashier’s check surprised me, even though you warned me it would be arriving. In truth, the money does not interest me, so I am returning it to you in the form of a voided check.
Why? Why would the money not interest him? Unless he thought there was some other way she needed to fix whatever damage might come to his business after the weekend’s revelations made the rounds.
In the interest of opening further negotiations, I’m having my lawyer deliver a new document for you to consider. Not a contract, per se. More of an agreement.
This is the only agreement I am willing to entertain, with mild adjustments at your discretion. I will only accept this document if it is returned by you, in person, at your convenience.
Sincerely, Kane Harrington
What kind of jerk thought he could dictate the terms of their further business dealings after humiliating her in public? Presley flipped to the next page with such force that the cover letter tore.
It is the wish of Kane Harrington to enter into a romantic agreement with Presley Macarthur that includes, but is not limited to, living in the same home, discussing business and personal interests with each other, being seen in public together, and, in general, allowing all intimate activities that would be acceptable and agreed upon between two people who wish to spend their lives together. This agreement may or may not include marriage, at Ms. Macarthur’s discretion, but Mr. Harrington would prefer that a permanent romantic agreement occur in order to publicly acknowledge his devotion and love for her.
In acknowledgment of previous behaviors, Mr. Harrington agrees not to bring undo public attention to Ms. Macarthur in any way except during a wedding ceremony, should both parties agree. Should their previous contract ever be mentioned to him by interested parties, he will explain in no uncertain terms that their business arrangement was for the couple’s mutual benefit and was of no concern to anyone but the two of them.
It is Mr. Harrington’s responsibility to support and encourage Ms. Macarthur, but to in no way make her decisions for her. He agrees to only come to her defense when she is not able to defend herself, and to discuss disagreements in a calm and approachable manner, rather than dictating.
Mr. Harrington acknowledges that Ms. Macarthur is a smart, sexy woman who has years of knowledge and business acumen on her side. He will trust her to use that knowledge to her benefit and for her safety, and he will do his best not to infringe on that in any way.
It is Mr. Harrington’s utmost wish to spend the rest of his life with Ms. Macarthur, loving her and caring for her to the best of his ability, in hopes that she will help him to become the best man to meet her needs and desires for all of eternity. He requests that she support him during all of his future business decisions, offering her knowledge as he builds Harrington Farms to the scale he and his brother have always dreamed possible.
All previous agreements between Mr. Harrington and Ms. Macarthur are furthermore null and void, requiring no further obligations to be fulfilled.
The rest of the page went on with more details that blurred through the tears in her eyes, but it was the last bit, handwritten across the bottom, that struck her the most: Presley, I admit I’m hopelessly addicted to you—your strength, your common sense, your professional expertise and most of all the way you give me your all when you are with me. I want to be brave, to move on from the past into the most incredible future I could imagine—a future with you. Be brave with me. I need you... Kane.
* * *
It took Presley an entire day to respond to Kane’s package—and Kane felt every minute from sunrise to sunset in the depths of his soul.
When he glanced out the window of his office at Harrington Farms and saw her truck in the driveway, his heart stopped for a beat. Part of him wanted to know her answer. Part of him didn’t want to know if the answer was negative. He could just live in this anxious limbo for eternity, right?
When EvaMarie showed her into the room, Presley’s expression didn’t offer him any glimmers of hope. Her poker face was pretty good. She held the envelope he’d had James Covey deliver lightly in one hand. Despite inheriting an incredible sum of money, Kane was a realist. His life had been hard, often struck by tragedy. He had a feeling today would be the hardest of them all.
In business, he could always push through and turn things around. On the personal side, Kane knew life didn’t work that way.
“I received your package—” she started, but that wasn’t where Kane wanted to begin.
“Before that, please accept my apology.”
He must have disrupted a script in her head, because Presley blinked for a moment. “What?” she asked.
“Before we go any further,” Kane said again, “I would like for you to accept my apology.”
Another slow blink.
“I did not mean to embarrass you or harm you, Presley. I realize my instincts to protect you had those unintended consequences, and I’m very, very sorry. No matter what happens today, I hope you know that.”
“I do, Kane,” she said, sounding dishearteningly formal. “I know you saw what was happening and only wanted to protect me from further harm. Thank you.”
“I never would have said any of that if I had realized I had an audience.”
She nodded, her pale cheeks flus
hing beneath his gaze. It was the first sign of emotion he’d seen. That was a little encouraging, at least.
Then she lifted the envelope. “This told me a lot. But it also brought up some questions.”
“How so?”
“Kane...” She glanced away, her delicate throat working. “I want to believe, because of this, that my fears are unfounded. But I can’t quite let them go.”
He clenched the edge of his desk, desperate to go to her. To wrap her up in his arms and prove to her that fears didn’t matter, that the past didn’t matter. But that wasn’t what she needed—and for once he wasn’t letting his emotions push him into action.
With a deep breath, he let her lead by saying, “What can I do to help?”
“Tell me, Kane. I need to know that I wasn’t just a fun bonus to a business deal you needed. That I wasn’t just a doll to be dressed up to make you look good. A woman you would have defended no matter who I was personally.”
Damn. “I’m sorry, Presley. I won’t tell you that.”
Her businesslike mask was stripped away in an instant, and Kane saw the blatant pain he’d caused her in full color. But he couldn’t back down now.
“I won’t tell you that because you know, deep down, none of that is true. It never has been. We may have started this as a business arrangement, but it turned into something else quicker than wildfire.”
His unexpected answer grabbed her attention, pulling her focus back to him. “Before I knew it, I was in love with a tomboy who knows horses inside and out, a daughter who is doing her best to fulfill her father’s last wishes, and a woman who is as beautiful outside as she is on the inside.”
This time he let himself stand, let himself circle his desk and take the seat next to her. Tears welled in her eyes as she leaned toward him. “I can’t change who I am, Kane.”
“I know.”
“I don’t want to spend my life with someone who can’t accept me the way I accept me. My father—he gave me a life of opportunities to explore my own interests. Horse camp and 4-H club and jeans, but there was always a persistent undercurrent of pressure to be more like the other girls. The casual remarks that told me he wished I had preferred cotillion and cheerleading.”
“And you shouldn’t have to live like that,” Kane said.
He brushed away the single tear that trembled on her cheek. Then he pushed aside a few strands of the gorgeous blond hair she’d left loose around her face.
“I felt that, at Mrs. Rose’s, you saw me,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “You helped me find what worked for me, instead of dressing me up to fit your image. I was just...” She shrugged weakly. “I was afraid to trust that experience when so many people told me it couldn’t be right.”
He cupped his hand against her cheek. “Presley, I can’t spend a lifetime reassuring you that you’re the woman for me. My presence, my fidelity, my love are all the proof you need. You’ll simply have to trust me, give me time to prove it to you.”
There was no holding back from meeting her lips with his, a kiss that was just as much a pledge as it was a pleasure.
“Just like you can’t spend a lifetime reassuring me that your every decision will keep you safe and sound. I have to trust that your knowledge and skills will bring you home to me safely.”
“I don’t want you to live in fear,” she murmured against his lips.
“I’ve been there enough,” he agreed, “and I’m ready to move on.”
“I do understand, though.”
Pulling back, he held her glistening gaze for long moments. “Understand what?”
“Why you behaved like you did. I just didn’t see it at the time.” Her deep breath gave her next words the air of a confession. “You wouldn’t have been so upset about the jump if you didn’t care. You wouldn’t have defended me so fiercely, without thought to who was listening, if some pretty strong feelings weren’t involved.”
“How do you know?”
Her smile captured his heart. “Because I feel the same way.”
Kane couldn’t hold back. His lips covered hers as he sought both to take and be taken. Her soft surrender empowered him. Yet he strove in every way to please her, to show her the love he’d never thought to experience after a lifetime of pain.
When they finally came up for air, Kane was surprised to hear Presley say, “I think our agreement needs a new clause.”
“What’s that?”
“That whenever fear starts to take hold, we have to tell the other immediately.”
He liked that plan. “Sounds good.”
“And we have to find the best way possible to calm those fears and move past them, without letting them rule our world.”
If he wasn’t mistaken, judging by the increased color in her cheeks and the sexy arch of her brow, the little negotiator in front of him had some pretty interesting ideas how to do that already. He liked this plan more and more.
“I’ll have James draw that up immediately.” He stood, anxious to be closer to her, to feel her body against his own. “Do you have any other demands?”
She stood as well. “Only one.”
“What’s that?” he asked, not surprised that his voice had deepened with her nearness.
“We go somewhere more private—” she glanced around his office with a blush and a shy smile “—and spend the next few hours exploring exactly what else this merger might need to be successful. Every possible avenue should be explored.”
Yes, ma’am. “Good plan. I have a few ideas we should definitely discuss.”
Epilogue
A year later
“Push, girl. Push!”
Mason’s cheering scraped over Presley’s nerves, followed by the more soothing, soft encouragement offered by Kane. “Come on, girl. You can do it.”
The men stood side by side, coaching, sweating and just generally making a mess of themselves. Any woman could have told them it wouldn’t help.
“I think she knows what she’s doing,” Presley said through clenched teeth. Being this close to a birthing while her own belly was swollen with her first child set her on edge for the first time in her life.
Mason smirked at her over his shoulder, not realizing how close to physical injury that put him. “Woman’s intuition and all that jazz, huh?”
Presley wasn’t amused. “You say that during labor and you’ll likely find yourself kissing the floor,” she assured him.
“You wouldn’t do that to me, would you, love?” he asked, eyeing EvaMarie as she rubbed a hand over her distended belly in slow circles.
“Maybe...” She smiled sweetly, but there was a slight menace beneath the surface Mason didn’t seem to notice. “You remember those films they made us watch in birthing class, right?”
Mason grimaced. “Don’t remind me.”
“There are certain parts you better remember pretty darn well, buddy,” EvaMarie said. Presley had a feeling he’d be needing that knowledge sooner than he realized. If she wasn’t mistaken, EvaMarie had been having contractions for the past two hours, at least. Mason had been too focused on the horse to notice.
Kane eyed Presley’s matching tummy with a wary expression. “Is it too late to change our minds?”
“You bet, mister,” Presley said.
The horse in the stall beyond the men whinnied, reminding everyone why they were actually here in the stables in the early hours of the morning. Mason yawned wide. “I could use some coffee,” he said.
Presley glanced over at EvaMarie. “Oh, you’re definitely going to hurt him in the delivery room,” she said.
EvaMarie gave her a knowing look.
“Here it comes,” Kane interrupted.
; They rushed to the half door, peering inside as the mare made her final push to get her baby into the world. A vet watched from inside the stall, and Jim stood next to him. They weren’t taking any chances with this mare or her foal.
She was special.
She was also a very good mommy, moving right away to free her baby from his sac and ensure all was well. As the four of them stood long minutes later watching the foal struggle to his feet for the first time, Presley’s eyes filled with tears. “Look at that,” she breathed.
The foal was the spitting image of his sire.
Kane rubbed her aching back. “Sun’s first foal here at Harrington Farms.”
Bending over with a little difficulty, EvaMarie lifted wineglasses and two bottles from a cooler nearby. “Time to celebrate,” she said.
Mason filled the men’s glasses with champagne while Kane did the same with a nonalcoholic version for the women. They all shared bright smiles as the gentle sounds of the mother and baby getting to know each other wafted around them.
“To new beginnings,” Mason said as they lifted their glasses for a toast.
“And a future without fear,” Kane added, resting his hand on Presley’s tummy.
They clinked glasses and drank, knowing that they were doing everything they could to make both of those pledges come to pass. Before their glasses were even empty, EvaMarie gasped, jerking her hand so the last of her drink spilled to the floor.
“Sweetheart, are you okay?” Mason asked.
The women shared a look, then Presley started to giggle. Watching Mason go through this was going to be quite amusing.
“What’s so funny?” Kane asked.
Presley eyed her brother-in-law with a touch of glee. “I think someone is going to experience an up-close version of labor a little sooner than he thought.”