The Boss Man's Fortune

by Kathryn Jensen -

  "You're probably reading far too much into her decision."

  He let out a long breath. "Maybe. But now there's this thing happening between us, Katherine, And I—" He moved her away from him just enough to look down into her eyes "—I still believe trust is crucial to any good relationship. And I don't know that I can trust you."

  His words scraped her very soul raw.

  Katherine swallowed and blinked up at him, willing herself not to cry. "I'm not the sort of person who runs around telling lies and deceiving people. It's just that I ran out of ways of dealing with my family. I had to separate myself from them."

  She watched his eyes for any sign of judgment or blame, but his expression was carefully neutral.

  "So what's your next move?" he asked, brushing his lips absently against her temple. His touch sent delicious shivers through her.

  "I promised Den I'd call them, and I will. Soon."

  "You could always fly home just for a short visit, to reassure them you're still the daughter they know and love."

  She shook her head. "No. Not yet. If I go back, I might not have the willpower to leave again. I have to finish what I came here to do—prove I can survive without a parachute supplied by the Fortune money and name."

  He drew her back against his chest and stroked her hair. When she looked up, he kissed her with such tenderness, she felt herself drifting toward a place they'd been before. An exciting, wild, delicious place.

  She hoped that he wouldn't leave her that night. He might stay in this beautiful room with her, and they'd make love all the night long.

  But he grasped her upper arms and firmly set her back from him.

  "Ian?" she whispered.

  "No. We can't do it, Katherine, not with this between us." He touched the tip of her nose. "Not that it won't tear me apart to walk out of here, with you looking so damn—" he winced "—edible."

  "But—"

  His eyes hardened. "Accomplish what you need to do. I'll be around to help you but only if you ask."

  "But what about us? You and me?"

  He shook his head. "I can't get seriously involved with a woman who's just visiting my life while she discovers her own. The woman I'm looking for must be willing to become a Danforth and help me make a family."

  She felt empty inside. Dead. She couldn't speak.

  He continued gently. "I understand that's not what you're looking for, Katherine. It's what you're running from."

  He gave her a pained look. Then he was going out the door, closing it behind him.

  "But," she whispered, "I love you."

  * * *

  Nine

  « ^ »

  Ian pulled on shorts and a T-shirt, grateful when the morning sun rose to join him. Sleep had been nearly impossible. He'd agonized the night away in the room that had been his as a boy and was kept for his use whenever he visited the estate.

  Another man, he told himself, wouldn't have walked out of Katherine's room last night. Another man would have said to hell with the future. If Katherine wanted him for short-term gratification, then why not?

  But he suspected a fling with Katherine would inevitably become more than that, and he knew only too well how hurtful a relationship could become when the people involved didn't agree on the important things in life, like marriage, children and honesty.

  Those were the deal breakers.

  Still it had been three in the morning before he stopped contemplating a quick sprint down the hallway to her room. Four o'clock before he'd finally fallen into a short, troubled slumber.

  By seven he was ready for a run, figured he'd beaten everyone else out of bed. But as he approached the kitchen intending to check out Florence's preparations for breakfast, he could hear laughter coming from the kitchen.

  Curious, he pushed through the heavy oak door to find Katherine on the phone, a cup of coffee in her free hand. His father's cook, Florence, was shoving a plate with a toasted English muffin and mound of orange marmalade in front of her.

  Katherine looked up when he came in but kept talking. "I know. I realize the disaster I've caused in the newspapers, and I'm sorry I worried you and Mom." When she looked up at him, she grimaced. My father, she mouthed, and suddenly she looked so very young his heart ached. Twenty-two. It seemed forever since he'd been that age.

  "Do you want anything now, Ian?" Florence asked.

  "Thank you, nothing for the moment. I'll be back for a big breakfast." If he couldn't satisfy one hunger, he'd work on another. Ian gave Katherine a thumbs-up for good luck.

  Thirty minutes later, he was back from a two-mile jog along the shore. Sweating and famished, he snatched up the towel he'd left on a peg just inside the kitchen door and slung it around his neck.

  "Now don't you come dripping yourself all over my clean kitchen floor," Florence said. "It's unsanitary with all this food out." She shooed him straight through the kitchen and into the hall. "Come back when you're cleaned up. Breakfast will be on the table."

  "Yes, ma'am," he said, catching a brief glimpse of Katherine laughing at him as she continued murmuring responses into the phone.

  * * *

  Katherine waited until Ian returned before she started in on her own breakfast, even though her muffin would be cold. She had asked Florence to let them eat in the kitchen; it felt cozier here than in the immense formal dining room. Ian sat across from her at the long, wooden trestle table, his plate piled with fried eggs, grits golden with melted cheese, biscuits fresh out of the oven and thick slices of grilled ham.

  "So, how'd it go with your folks?" he asked.

  "I was on the phone for over an hour." She shook her head, sipping the orange juice she'd helped Florence squeeze only minutes before. "They passed the phone around. I had to talk to my brothers after I'd spoken with Mom and Dad, then with my grandparents. I've been scolded enough for a lifetime."

  "They weren't glad you called?"

  She crunched into her muffin then sipped her coffee. It was the way she liked it—strong, with real cream and two sugars. The marmalade tasted homemade, tart and just sweet enough.

  "It's not that. They just think I'm an idiot for doing what I did." She sighed. "I guess it was pretty childish of me not to stay and work things out, but I got so tired of it all."

  "Maybe now they'll realize you have a breaking point. They might ease up if you went back."

  This was the second time he'd mentioned her going home, and her stomach clenched at his words.

  "Do you want me to leave, Ian? Is that what you're saying?"

  "What I want isn't the point. You need to find whatever makes you happy. Maybe you don't realize what that is yet."

  "Maybe," she murmured.

  It made her sad to think that Ian could so easily suggest her leaving. Wouldn't he miss her even a little? What had happened between them was special to her. Yet he seemed to be able to put their intimacy out of mind so easily.

  "Morning all!"

  Katherine looked up from her plate to see Dennis stride with irritating exuberance into the room. "You look well rested."

  "Slept like a baby. Maybe because I hadn't gotten more than a wink or two in days."

  "I know the feeling," Ian muttered.

  Katherine shot him a questioning look, but he merely shook his head.

  "Took a while, though, to get to sleep." Dennis seated himself at the table with them and poured coffee from a silver carafe. "Your other guest kept me up. Poor, confused woman. Who is she?"

  "Other than you, Katherine and me, no one else was in the main part of the house last night," Ian said, shooting a sly glance toward Florence.

  The woman seemed to be struggling to hide a smile.

  "What?" Katherine asked.

  "The young gentleman apparently was visited by our resident ghost." She placed a plate of crisp bacon on the table, and both men dove for it.

  Katherine laughed. "No, really."

  "Really," Ian said casually. "Although I'm surprised she appeared to Denn
is, here in the house. To my knowledge all her other visits have been outside, on the grounds or on the road to Crofthaven."

  Dennis stared at him, then turned to his sister. "He's pulling my leg, right?"

  "I don't know." She eyed Ian solemnly.

  Ian grinned at her mysteriously, forked up a bite of egg then bit off the end of a thick slice of bacon. "Many properties in and around Savannah have ghosts."

  "Did she speak to you?" Florence asked. Dennis looked thoughtful but didn't stop eating.

  Katherine couldn't remember a time when anything had got in the way of a Fortune man's appetite. "Actually, she did say something about going farther? Or maybe it was, 'fetch father.' I couldn't quite get it."

  "That's her all right," Florence crowed. She finished putting the food on the table, untied her apron and came to join them for her own breakfast.

  Katherine frowned. "Are you sure you weren't just dreaming?"

  Dennis polished off his first cup of coffee and poured himself a second. "She came into my room twice. I thought she must be one of the maids, or Ian's sister."

  Katherine munched her muffin, feeling a little left out. "I've never seen a ghost before."

  "Stay in Savannah for long, and you get to feelin' you might trip over 'em they're so plentiful." Florence chuckled.

  Dennis turned to Katherine. "Are you going to stick to your promise to call Mom and Dad?"

  "Already did," Katherine assured him smugly. "I have witnesses."

  He looked surprised. "What did they say?"

  "That I should come home immediately."

  "Are you going to?"

  "Not a chance." She sat back in her chair and sipped her coffee contentedly. "I like Savannah, ghosts and all. And I love working for Danforth's. Back home, I'll always be Mom and Dad's little girl. Here, I'm whatever I choose to be!"

  "Here, you're poor," Dennis stated.

  She made a face at him. "Only temporarily. I'll work hard, save my pennies, move up in the company as I gain experience."

  Dennis laughed. "Watch out, Ian. She'll have your job!"

  She held her breath, waiting for his reaction.

  His gaze settled on her, a mixture of admiration and something she couldn't quite read. "I expect your sister can do anything she sets her mind to."

  * * *

  The next day Dennis spent sight-seeing and reported his discoveries to his sister and Ian that evening when they returned from the office.

  Ian took them out for dinner in old Savannah. Elizabeth on 37th Street

  took Katherine's breath away. Standing on the front porch of the old mansion and looking out over its lush garden, she found it hard to remember she was in the middle of a thriving modern city.

  Inside, the decor was perfectly Southern in the oldest, most gracious style. And the food was pure bliss. Both of the men ordered herb-encrusted, grilled steaks as thick as Katherine's fist. She had trouble choosing but finally decided on a rich seafood soup chock-full of shrimp, scallops and local fish.

  As they were leaving the restaurant, Katherine felt as though she was being watched, but when she looked up and down the tree-lined street, no one seemed to be paying particular attention to her.

  Still she felt strangely uneasy. It was the way she'd felt when Jaime Hernandez had looked at her in Ian's office. She climbed into the front passenger seat of Ian's car. "Have you been contacted recently by the cartel?"

  "Not since our meeting in my office," Ian said.

  Dennis leaned forward from the rear seat. "What's this all about?"

  Ian sighed. "The company has had some trouble with a group from Colombia that would like us to buy our coffee beans from them. We strongly suspect they're linked to organized crime. The FBI was called in after a bomb went off in our headquarters here."

  Katherine winced. She'd hoped he wouldn't mention the explosion. It wasn't the sort of thing her brother or parents would find reassuring.

  "And this is the place you've chosen to work?" Dennis asked Katherine.

  "That all happened before I started working for Danforth's. Besides, everything's under control now," she assured him.

  "So now I'm supposed to go back to Arizona and assure Dad and Mom that you're perfectly safe, happy as a lizard on a sunny rock?"

  "Well, I am," she said, and it struck her that it was true. She was happier than she ever remembered being.

  Only one thing was missing.

  Ian.

  And it seemed to her that her chances of winning his trust might have run out.

  * * *

  Katherine delivered Dennis to the airport late the next afternoon. She had dreaded this moment. Not because he was leaving, but because his departure would leave her alone with Ian, and she didn't know what to say to him.

  She desperately wanted to ask him what he was thinking about them. Was there a them? He had given her little or no hope that they could ever be together in a way she found acceptable. Perhaps because she had been so outspoken about not wanting to get seriously involved, he'd decided there could be nothing at all between them.

  His attitude totally irritated her. Couldn't he at least give her time to think about it? Did they have to be an all-or-nothing couple? Whatever happened to having fun, dating, getting to know each other … falling in love? Slowly. She had always assumed marriage was years away for her.

  She drove around the city, reluctant to return to Crofthaven to pick up her overnight bag. Now that Dennis had left, Ian would expect her to return to her own apartment. Abraham would soon return from campaigning.

  This might be her last chance to clear the air with Ian, but she had no idea what to say to him.

  It was dark when she turned into the tree-lined avenue that led to Crofthaven. The oyster-shell driveway crunched beneath the tires of the little third-hand car she'd recently leased. Few lights were on in the house, but a faint golden glow came from the upstairs window she knew to be Ian's room. She parked and let herself in the front door.

  None of the usual staff seemed to be around. With an aching heart, she silently closed the immense oak door behind her and climbed the stairs from the foyer, still unsure of the right words, still hoping for Ian's understanding.

  Did she love him? Absolutely. Did he love her? He'd never said so. Without love and a partnership based on equal rights, she couldn't commit herself to a relationship. Even with this strong, brilliant and exciting man. If marriage was the bottom line for him, how could she surrender all she'd fought for, just to become another woman buried in a powerful family of males?

  She must tell Ian this. She must make him understand.

  She would also tell him how much he mattered to her, if she could only find the right words.

  Her fingertips rested on the doorknob of his room for minutes that felt like an eternity, before she worked up the courage to turn it. Only at the last second did she realize how presumptuous it was of her not to knock. She tapped with her free hand as she cracked open the door to a place full of male smells. His body, his aftershave, the pungent waxy scent of shoe polish.

  "Yes?" Ian's deep voice, thick and distant with preoccupation.

  She slowly moved into his room. He was sitting at his desk, the green glass of the lamp shade glowing in an otherwise dark room. He was in a T-shirt and briefs but didn't seem flustered by her appearance in his room. His face was cast in a soft wash of light, and he glanced up briefly, then back to the papers resting on the embossed leather desk blotter.

  "I don't want to disturb you," she began hesitantly, "but I think we should talk."

  "You do?" He didn't even spare her a glance this time.

  She cleared her throat, which suddenly felt scratchy and tight. "I owe you an immense apology."

  "We've already settled that. You did what you had to do. Family relations can be complicated."

  "There's more to it than that, Ian. When it all started, I didn't know you. I didn't think that pretending to be someone else would matter to someone who hired me fo
r a few weeks. I mean, how could I know how I'd feel about you. About us."

  "Us," he repeated, his voice as sharp as glass shards. "Katie, I—" He shook his head, finally standing up to face her. He looked strained, his eyes as sad as a disappointed child's. "We want different things. That won't change. To be honest, I see no future for us."

  She very nearly cried out her denial. "But that's just it! Maybe we need to give ourselves a little more time to see if what we think we want is really what we do want." She bit down on her lower lip, determined not to lose all self-control. "That wasn't very eloquent, was it?"

  "No," he said bitterly, "but I get the gist of it. You want to keep your options open."

  It sounded so shallow, the way he put it.

  She drew a shuddering breath for strength. "Ian, I want to be careful not to make the wrong decision. Can't we please take things slowly and see what happens?"

  "No." He came around the desk and took her hands in his. "I'm past the age of experimentation, Katherine. I'm not interested in trial relationships. I'll date casually for business purposes, for relaxation, and to keep my family off my back. But dammit, I won't get emotionally shackled to a woman who doesn't know what the hell she wants!" He dropped her hands and stepped away from her. "Losing my heart isn't an option for me."

  "Well, it wasn't with me, either," she whispered, tears finally winning the battle. "But I have—"

  He frowned at her as she struggled to keep her chin high. His voice suddenly turned gentle. "Katherine, don't say things you don't mean."

  "I do mean it. Unfortunately," she sniffled. "Guess I didn't realize it at first. I never intended to care for you like this. I didn't want the man I someday fell in love with to be like you."

  "Thanks a bunch," he grumbled.

  "Listen to me!" she cried out in frustration. "You're what I've been running from!"

  "This just gets better and better." But a wry smile tipped up the corners of his lips.

  He was making fun of her, yes, but this was better than his sullen mood moments earlier.