Sinful

by Joan Johnston

  Eve wished he hadn’t asked. “I think so. I hope so.”

  “You don’t sound very sure.”

  “What do you want me to say, Connor?”

  He was silent for a long time. Finally he said, “If you agree to marry me, Eve, I promise I will do everything in my power to make you happy.”

  Eve wondered if that included loving her as much as he’d loved Molly. But she didn’t ask.

  Chapter 10

  “I ABSOLUTELY FORBID it!”

  “I’m engaged to marry Connor Flynn, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

  Eve’s heart was battering against her chest as she confronted her father. She hadn’t gotten the chance to break the news to him gently. One of his cronies had called to guffaw about the fact that one of his daughters was marrying one of those wild Flynn boys. King had called her and demanded an explanation.

  Eve had refused to talk over the phone. From past experience she knew her father was far more likely to be lenient—that is to say, she was far more likely to get her own way—when he could see her slumped shoulders and repentant tears while her voice cracked with regret. Except, in this instance, she felt a great deal more confrontational than contrite.

  “Let me come with you,” Connor offered when she told him what had happened. “We should broach him together.”

  Eve recognized the humor of the situation. Connor was talking as though King stood atop a castle wall that had to be knocked down to reach him. “I wouldn’t put it past my father to aim a shotgun at you to keep you out of his house,” she replied. “Let me do this. I know my father. King Grayhawk doesn’t like to be thwarted, but he can be made to see reason.”

  When she arrived at Kingdom Come, alone, Leah met her at the kitchen door with her balled fists on her hips and said, “What have you done? King’s on the warpath.”

  “I’ll talk to you later,” she answered, pausing only long enough to throw her coat on a wooden rack inside the back door. She headed straight to the library and found her father sitting in his favorite cowhide chair behind an ancient, spur-scarred oak desk, a whiskey in hand.

  Eve had often faced her father across that desk as a quivering child. King’s word was law, and when the law was broken, punishment was quick and certain. She’d realized at a young age that King was far less likely to be upset if it was somebody else’s laws she’d transgressed. So long as she obeyed his rules, she could pretty much do as she pleased.

  Unfortunately, his most important rule was Stay away from those Flynn boys, and she’d broken that law with a vengeance.

  “Please, Daddy,” she said, placing her hands flat on his desk and leaning toward him, “won’t you listen to why I got engaged?”

  He shooed her away with his free hand as though she were a bothersome fly. “Your reasons don’t matter. I refuse to be related in any way, shape, or form to that conniving scoundrel who’s done his best to make my life a nightmare ever since I divorced his sister.”

  Eve settled in the sturdy leather chair in front of King’s desk, which was purposely low enough to make whoever sat in it feel like he was a supplicant to the throne. “I’m engaged to marry Connor because his children need a mother. I don’t love him.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” he said, slamming his emptied whiskey glass on the desk so hard the ice cubes clinked against the crystal. “What the hell kind of marriage is that?”

  “The practical kind,” she retorted. “In case you’ve forgotten, I no longer have a home. I no longer have a place to range my mustangs. I need both, and Connor’s offered to provide them.”

  “So he’s buying your cooperation?”

  Eve’s face flamed, but she kept her voice steady as she said, “We’re each getting something we want. And I love his children.”

  “But not their father?” King queried.

  When she didn’t reply, he said, “Don’t do it, Eve. I’ve been down that road. I promise you, you’ll regret it.”

  It was the first time her father had revealed any sort of regret over his multiple marriages. Even so, she wasn’t sure if he meant she’d regret marrying Connor, or that he’d make her regret marrying Connor.

  “There’s nothing more you can do to hurt me, Daddy.” The angst in her voice made it plain that he’d already done enough to hurt her plenty.

  Eve saw the frustration on her father’s face when he realized he had nothing to use for leverage to get her to obey him. She had no trust fund he could control. He’d already kicked her out of house and home. Matt had forced her to move her mustangs off the ranch. There was no other pressure he could bring to bear to enforce his will.

  Eve suddenly noticed two small feet sticking out from under the curtains that were pulled back from the large picture window behind King. She pointed and said, “Were you aware we have company?”

  “What?” King swiveled his chair around to face the curtains and frowned at the pair of small cowboy boots that stuck out from beneath them. “Come out and show yourself, boy.”

  For a moment, Matt’s son didn’t move. Then he shoved his way out from behind the forest-green brocade drapes and stood with his hip cocked so the shorter leg held most of his weight. He was dressed in a miniature version of western gear, including a long-sleeved western plaid shirt, Levi’s held up by a tooled leather belt, and ostrich cowboy boots.

  “How long have you been hiding back there?” King asked, his voice stern.

  “A little while,” Matt’s son replied in a quavering voice. “I was playing hide-and-seek.”

  “With whom?” King demanded in a booming voice.

  “Nobody,” the boy admitted. “I just like to hide and see how long I can stand still before I’m discovered.”

  “It’s not polite to eavesdrop on a private conversation,” King said. “Does your father approve of this kind of behavior?”

  “He doesn’t like it. But since he’s gone most of the time working, and Pippa is usually busy, I get away with a lot of stuff.”

  Eve wondered if the six-year-old knew how much he’d revealed in that little speech. A father gone most of the time working? A sister too busy to keep an eye on him? He sounded like an abandoned child. It seemed Matt was following in King’s footsteps in more ways than one.

  King reached out a hand. “Come here, boy.”

  “My name isn’t ‘boy.’ It’s Nathan.”

  Eve watched the smile flicker across her father’s lips before he said, “Come here, Nathan.”

  The boy took two halting steps that put him even with King’s knees before King picked him up and sat him on one.

  “Do you know how to ride horseback, Nathan?” King asked.

  The boy nodded. “But I don’t ride anymore.”

  “Why not?”

  “I got thrown and broke my leg. That’s why I limp.”

  “Would you like to go riding with me sometime?” King asked.

  Nathan shook his head. “I’m afraid of horses. My dad says I’m foolish. That you have to face your fears. But I’m too scared to ride.”

  Eve met her father’s gaze above Nathan’s head. How often had she heard You have to face your fears from her father’s lips? More times than she could count.

  “You have any objection to cleaning out stalls?” King asked.

  The little boy looked at King with wide eyes. “No, sir.”

  Eve noticed the appended “sir” and recognized that form of address as something else she’d grown up with. King had wanted that label of respect added to every response. Eve had never done it, not if she could help it. She’d answered “yes” and hesitated, waiting for King to demand the “sir.” Half the time he let it slide, because that was easier than making an issue of the fact that she was defying him.

  Maybe there was a reason she was considering marriage to a Flynn when none of her sisters had dared. Eve had a sudden thought. Was that why Leah had ended up with a broken heart? Because she wasn’t ready to defy King and marry a Flynn? Knowing
Leah as she did, it seemed far more likely that Aiden had backed away, unwilling to fight his father to marry a Grayhawk.

  Eve wondered how her marriage to Connor would affect all the bad blood between his siblings and hers. Make it better? Make it worse? The possibilities were mind-boggling.

  Eve realized she’d lost track of King’s conversation with Matt’s son.

  “You’re big enough to have a job,” King said to Nathan.

  “I am?”

  King nodded. “From now on, every morning after breakfast, I want you to show up at the stable.”

  The little boy’s wide eyes were focused steadily on King. “Why?”

  “Because it’s going to be your job to help muck out the stalls.”

  “I’m too little—”

  “You’re six, right?” King said.

  “I will be in April,” Nathan replied. “That’s why I’m not in first grade yet.”

  “What about kindergarten?” Eve asked.

  “Dad said I didn’t have to go back to kindergarten again this year. I can just start first grade in the fall.”

  Eve thought that was shortsighted. Nathan might not need what he would learn in kindergarten, but he would have met kids his own age with whom he could play and become friends, so he wasn’t so alone in a new place. Unless Matt didn’t plan to be here that long. Was there any chance he didn’t plan to stay the whole year? Could Matt have come here for reasons that had nothing to do with claiming the ranch?

  Eve was still examining that novel idea when she heard Pippa yelling for her brother.

  “Nathan! Where are you?”

  The library door flew open, and Pippa stopped cold in the doorway. Her jaw dropped when she saw where Nathan was sitting. “You’re supposed to be playing in your room,” she chided. “Come on. Let’s go.”

  Without a word, Nathan slid off King’s knee and headed for the door. When he got there, he stopped and turned back to King. “Are you gonna be there?”

  “Be where?”

  “At the stables, to show me what to do.”

  “Of course,” King said. “How else are you going to learn how to do it right?”

  Pippa put a hand on her brother’s shoulder and ushered him from the room without saying another word, closing the door quietly behind her.

  “Are you seriously going to muck out stalls tomorrow morning with that little boy?” Eve asked.

  “That little boy is my grandson, and that’s as good a way as any to spend time with him. He’s going to need to be able to ride if he’s going to take over this ranch one day. The more time he spends around horses, the sooner he’ll get over his fear of them.”

  Eve stared at her father in disbelief. “Do you really believe Matt’s going to stay? That he won’t sell this place the moment it’s his?”

  “Mark my words: He won’t sell. My family’s been on this ranch for generations. A Grayhawk should be running it when I die.”

  “What about me? What about Taylor or Vick? What about Leah, for heaven’s sake? Didn’t you think one of us might like to run the ranch?”

  He looked stunned, as though the idea had not, in fact, occurred to him. “I figured you’d all get married and be mothers and—”

  “What century are you living in?”

  “This one!” he snapped. “Are you or are you not about to get married and become a mother?”

  He had her there. Eve glared at him. If she hadn’t been desperate because of King’s deal with Matt, she might not have ended up in the situation she was in. Honestly, she wouldn’t have wanted to run the ranch, but she felt sure Leah would have jumped at the chance. And if one of her sisters had ended up owning the ranch, she knew she would always have been welcome there.

  Which wasn’t the case now.

  It hurt to know that her father favored Matt and his son over his daughters and stepdaughter. She felt envious of the six-year-old who was going to muck out stalls with her father. It sounded dumb, but King had never done anything remotely like that with her or her sisters.

  It must have been the bout with cancer that had changed him. All this talk about ranching dynasties and inheritances and having a Grayhawk at Kingdom Come had started up after he’d come face-to-face with his mortality and survived. But he had survived, so why all this planning for a future when he wouldn’t be around?

  She blurted, “Is the cancer back?”

  “What makes you ask that?”

  “I notice you didn’t deny it,” she said, over the sudden constriction in her throat.

  “Don’t worry about me,” he said, again avoiding the question. “Worry about yourself. Think long and hard before you marry Connor Flynn. That man has problems you can’t imagine.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Why do you think he’s running that ranch of his as a refuge for troubled vets?”

  Eve was shocked that her father knew Connor had a ranch, let alone that he’d planned it as a sanctuary for veterans. “He has a kind heart,” Eve said.

  “He killed his best friend.”

  Eve’s stomach clenched. She didn’t contradict her father, because she couldn’t. She’d known Connor had been a tortured soul since returning home, but she hadn’t known why. “Where did you hear that?” she asked in a measured voice.

  “I have my sources. Just be careful, girl. Connor Flynn is a man fighting demons.”

  She rose without another word and left the library. Who was King Grayhawk to be accusing Connor of being a disturbed veteran? If anyone had been acting crazy, it was her father.

  Eve raced toward the kitchen and the certain hope of comfort from Leah. She was fighting panic by the time she shoved her way through the swinging door. She opened her mouth to complain about King and snapped it shut again.

  Leah wasn’t alone.

  Chapter 11

  TO EVE’S DISMAY, Leah was standing in the middle of the kitchen floor arguing with Connor, who was still wearing his coat. Brooke and Sawyer weren’t with him.

  “What are you doing here?” She’d been regretting her decision to leave Connor at home and wishing she had his strong arms around her, and suddenly, there he was.

  Connor whipped his head around, took one look at the tears swimming in her eyes, and said, “What the hell did he do to you?” He scowled as the first tear trickled onto her cheek. “I should never have left you to face your father alone.”

  Connor opened his arms, and Eve walked right into them, seeking the comfort he offered. She slid her arms around his waist and pressed her nose against his throat, loving the feel of his solid strength supporting her and the intimacy of his bristled cheek against her skin.

  This was what she’d imagined it might be like all those years when she’d stood on the sidelines wanting what she couldn’t have. The reality was even better than she’d imagined.

  “Are you all right?” he whispered in her ear.

  “I’m fine. Where are the kids?” she asked as she leaned back to look into his concerned eyes.

  “I left them with Aiden and Brian.”

  From the corner of her eye, Eve saw Leah wince at the mention of Aiden’s name. Eve felt a wave of compassion for her sister but remained in the circle of Connor’s arms.

  Connor continued, “When I dropped the kids off my family was still in the dark about our engagement. I figured we could give them the news when we pick up the kids.”

  Eve’s heart sank. She had no desire to be cordial to that male wolf pack, but since she was now engaged to one of them, she couldn’t very well show up snarling. This marriage business was getting really complicated really fast. She made herself step back, so Connor’s arms fell away. “We’d better go.”

  Connor grabbed her coat from the rack and held it so she could put her arms into the sleeves, a courtesy she’d seen him perform for Molly on countless occasions. His gaze remained on her face as he adjusted the collar. Eve felt warm all over. She hadn’t realized that once Connor felt committed he would treat her
with all the care and attention he would have given to her if she were already his wife.

  She felt like a traitor to her family, because she liked one of those awful Flynn boys a lot. Okay. Fine. She loved one of those awful Flynn boys. Only he wasn’t awful. Not anymore. Not to her.

  Eve saw the frown on Leah’s face and knew her sister thought Connor was acting, that his behavior was false, that no Flynn could be trusted. Eve couldn’t allow such doubts to take hold. She had to give all of herself to Connor and believe that, in the end, he would be able to love her. Otherwise, this marriage was doomed from the start.

  Connor was reaching for the doorknob when Matt pushed the door open and stepped inside the kitchen. The shoulders of his shearling coat were layered with snowflakes, and he pulled off his Stetson and slapped it against his jeans to rid it of the snow caught on the brim. He stopped cold when he saw who’d come to visit.

  “Well, well. How are you, Connor?”

  The two men did one of those male embraces where they bumped shoulders and slapped each other on the back, big smiles on both faces.

  “Long time no see,” Connor said. “I figured I’d let you get settled before I gave you a call. How are you, Matt?”

  Matt shot a look at Leah and Eve before he said, “Not bad.”

  Eve had been expecting animosity, but the two men had greeted each other like old friends. Then it hit her. Matt’s mother and Connor’s father had been sister and brother, which made the two men cousins. It had never occurred to her that her elder Grayhawk siblings might not share King’s aggrieved attitude—which had become her attitude, and that of her sisters—toward Angus Flynn and his sons. She’d never considered the fact that, before her father divorced Jane Flynn, the cousins might have been close.

  “Are you two friends?” Eve blurted.

  Connor turned to her and said, “Matt’s mom—my aunt—was living with us—” He cut himself off, hesitated, then finished, “At the end. Matt shared many a supper at our table.”

  Eve shot a look at Matt. It was the first information any of them had gleaned about Matt’s life before he’d left home. No wonder Angus was so angry at King. Apparently he’d been a witness to his sister’s deterioration and, very likely, her death.