by Gina Wilkins
He blinked. “Redhead?” he repeated.
She shrugged. “I heard you left with a tall, beautiful redhead. Your boss, I suppose?”
Case suddenly smiled, his teeth ferally white in the shadows. “Is that what this is about? You thought I’d dumped you for another woman? Maddie, you—”
He took an impulsive step toward her. She backed away hastily, holding both hands up to ward him off. “Don’t touch me,” she warned, trying not to sound as desperate as she felt. If he kissed her again now... “I don’t want you to touch me, Case.”
He sighed, but remained where he was. “It wasn’t what it looked like, Maddie.”
“I don’t care.”
“Of course you do.” His gently indulgent tone set her teeth on edge. Now he’d convinced himself that this whole thing was a case of wounded feminine pride, she realized in frustration.
“I don’t care,” she repeated very distinctly. “It doesn’t matter to me why you left. The important thing is, we didn’t go through with it. I’m not your wife, thank God, and I never will be.”
“You gave me your word, Maddie.”
“And you gave me yours!” she snapped before she could stop herself. “I was there. Where the hell were you?”
She snapped her mouth shut, but realized it was too late. She’d already as much admitted that she hadn’t changed her mind that morning in Cancú. Damn it.
“Are you aware,” Case said quietly, “that this is the first time you asked me why I wasn’t there?”
She tried frantically to regain her composure. “That’s because I don’t particularly care why you weren’t there,” she said airily. “I’m only glad you saved me from making a huge mistake.”
“It wouldn’t have been a mistake. And it won’t be a mistake this time.”
“There is no this time. It’s over. I’m not going to let you charm me this time, Brannigan. I have plans, and I’m not changing them just because you’ve suddenly shown up again.”
“We’ll talk about those plans of yours later—among other things,” Case said a bit ominously. “First, I’m going to tell you why I had to leave you in Cancú. And you’re going to listen, damn it.”
She decided she might as well humor him for now. And besides, she really wanted to hear this explanation. How did he intend to explain the tall redhead? His sister? He’d better not try that one!
She crossed her arms in a deliberate imitation of him and leaned against the wall behind her. “Fine,” she said. “Let’s hear it.”
He didn’t look particularly pleased with her attitude, but he let it go. “I told you I worked for the government,” he began.
“Yes. I suppose that was a fantasy, too?”
“Damn it, Maddie!” Case stopped and drew a deep breath. “Just be quiet and listen, will you?” he said more quietly.
More shaken by his violent outburst than she wanted him to see, Maddie swallowed and nodded.
He continued with obviously strained patience. “It wasn’t a fantasy. I work—I worked for the government. DEA—Drug Enforcement. It’s a thankless, dangerous job, but I enjoyed it. For a time. When I met you, I was on leave. I was tired, burned-out. Ready for a change. I went to Cancú for a vacation, and to decide what to do with the rest of my life. But I told you some of this then.”
She nodded. She’d believed him then. Later, she’d wondered if it had all been lies. Now...now she just didn’t know what to believe.
“Anyway,” he went on when she remained silent, “Jade—the redhead—”
Of course her name was Jade, Maddie thought in despair.
“Jade was a business associate,” Case explained. “Another agent. She and I didn’t work together often, and didn’t get along particularly well when we did. She showed up in Cancú to tell me that my former partner—and one of the only close friends I’ve ever had—had been captured by drug dealers in the Colombian jungle and was being held as a political hostage. Someone had to go get him—and I was the best they had.”
He said the words without bragging, so matter-of-factly that Maddie couldn’t help accepting them. She didn’t question that Case had been the best at whatever he’d done; she’d learned firsthand that he could be amazingly persistent when he set his mind to something. Convincing her to marry him, for example. “What happened?” she asked, intrigued despite her resistance.
“I got him out,” Case said grimly. “Not exactly in the same shape he’d been in before. He’s still in rehab. Probably will be for a few months yet. But he’s alive.”
Maddie looked down at Case’s legs, thinking of the limp he’d developed since she’d seen him last. “You were injured.” Her voice wasn’t quite as steady as she would have liked.
“Yes. There was some doubt at first whether I would walk again.” His voice was curiously uninflected.
She caught her breath, but remained silent.
“I couldn’t contact you, Maddie—at first because I was out in the jungle tracking down my friend, and then because I was hospitalized in serious condition. I couldn’t—I didn’t want to call you until I knew I wouldn’t be an invalid. I wouldn’t have come to you in a wheelchair,” he added stiffly. “But I never stopped thinking of you, I swear it. As far as I was concerned, our engagement was on hold, not over. As soon as I’d recovered sufficiently, I came for you. I called once, but you weren’t home—so I decided to surprise you.”
“You did that,” Maddie murmured, trying to take in everything he’d told her.
Could she possibly believe him? He’d told his story simply, without embellishment, but there was a heavy undercurrent in his flat voice. Regret. Bitterness. Pain.
Whatever had happened, he’d suffered. And her heart twisted for him. But she couldn’t give in that easily. She kept thinking of the things he hadn’t said.
“Why do you want to marry me, Case?”
He seemed to stumble for a moment, searching for an answer. “I realized when I met you in Cancú that I had grown tired of the life I’d been leading. I told you I had no family, that I grew up in foster homes and institutions after my mother died when I was seven. I never even knew who my father was. I went into law enforcement when I was still a teenager and spent the last fifteen years on the move, never in one place long enough to put down roots, never sure I would live through the next assignment. I don’t want to live that way anymore. I’m ready to settle down, start a family. With you.”
She couldn’t speak for a moment. A large lump had settled in her throat, blocking whatever words she might have found.
Apparently taking her silence as a signal for him to continue, Case made a sweeping motion with one hand. “I like what I’ve seen of your town, your family. This looks like a great place to raise kids. We can find a place of our own—a house and some land. I have money, enough to support us until I find a new source of income, and—”
“Case,” Maddie broke in swiftly, desperately. She couldn’t listen to any more, couldn’t hold on to her composure much longer. “Stop, please. Nothing has changed. I’m not marrying you.”
“Maddie—”
His voice was liquid seduction. She steeled herself against it.
“No,” she said sharply. “Don’t. I won’t fall back into your arms this time. You look at me and you see a convenient little woman to play house with you and bear your children. Well, forget it. I want a life. I’ll be thirty in a few months and I’ve been away from this town you find so attractive only once.”
She stopped only long enough to draw a deep, shaky breath. “Maybe you’re tired of excitement and adventure,” she said, “but I’m ready to find some of it. I’m going to travel through Europe, try new things, live on the edge. I want to see Ireland and Greece and Portugal and the Czech Republic, all the places I’ve read about but never thought I’d visit. And not just the tourist stops—I want to go into the villages, the countryside, the places where the real natives live. And then maybe...maybe I’ll take up mountain climbing. Or skydiving.
Something really adventurous. And I’m going to do it alone.”
Case was shaking his head. “You don’t know what you’re saying. Those countries aren’t safe for a single woman to explore alone, especially a woman who’s only left her safe, secure small town once. You can’t just blithely wander into foreign villages where you don’t know the language or the customs, hoping you’ll be as safe there as you are in Mitchell’s Fork. Trust me, Maddie, I’ve lived that so-called adventurous life you’re fantasizing about. You’d hate it. It’s not what you want, not what you need.”
“I’ll decide what I want, and what I need,” she snapped. “I don’t need you to tell me.”
“I am telling you,” he retorted, his own temper starting to fray. “You’re a damned lucky woman, Maddie Carmichael. You have a family who loves you, friends, a home. You wake up every morning knowing there’s a good chance you’ll live to see the end of the day. You don’t have to constantly look over your shoulder, wondering who’s holding a knife poised at your back. You have it all here. Why would you want to walk away from it?”
“That’s just something I’ll have to figure out for myself, isn’t it?”
“If you want adventure, you can damned well find it with me,” he said.
His incredible arrogance both amazed and infuriated her. “What is it going to take to convince you that it’s over between us?”
His hands fell heavily onto her shoulders. “Nothing will convince me of that,” he said roughly. “I’ve waited too long for you, Maddie Carmichael. I’m not going to give you up so easily.”
“You—”
Her angry words were smothered by his mouth on hers.
4
SOMETIME DURING that long, heated kiss, Maddie realized that she would never be able to convince Case that she wasn’t still attracted to him. That she didn’t still want him.
She was. And she did. It was all she could do not to drag him behind the nearest bush when he kissed her—which was why she’d been trying to avoid this.
Just as Case finally, reluctantly, released her mouth, she came up with a desperate plan.
“All right,” she said, jerking herself out of his arms with such haste that she almost toppled backward. “I can’t convince you to go away, so I won’t even try.”
“Does this mean the engagement is still on?” Case asked warily.
“No.” Her answer was unequivocal. “It simply means I can’t make you leave Mitchell’s Fork. Obviously, you have every right to be here. I’d be willing to bet, however, that within a few weeks, you’ll be so bored you’ll run screaming for that excitement and adventure you claim you no longer want.”
“And I would bet that you’re wrong,” Case retorted smoothly. “But what about us? Are you going to keep running every time you see me?”
“I,” she said, “am going to go on with my life. I have a great deal of responsibility here, and I intend to honor that obligation. But, as soon as I know Dad can get by without me for a while—probably another four or five months, at the most—I’m taking the money I inherited from my mother’s parents and I’m going to Europe. Alone.”
“Don’t waste your money on that bet. It isn’t going to happen.” Case spoke very softly, but there was implicit challenge in every syllable. “If you want to go to Europe, you’ll be going with me.”
Maddie opened her mouth to argue, but before she could speak, the front door opened.
“Maddie?” Her father stood in the doorway, looking curiously from Maddie to Case. “Grampa’s getting eager to open his presents,” he said. “Everyone’s waiting for you.”
Maddie pushed her hair out of her face and turned toward the door. “I’m coming.”
Case moved to follow her. She spun on one heel. “Hold it.”
Case hesitated. “Are you asking me to leave?”
“No. My father invited you to join us for dinner and I won’t be so ungracious as to renege on the invitation. There is one condition, however.”
He sighed and nodded. “No mention of our engagement.”
“Our nonexistent engagement,” she corrected.
Case only gave her a bland smile. “Whatever you say, Maddie.”
She thought briefly of smacking him right across his arrogant, all-too-talented mouth. And then, she decided seethingly, she really should do the same to her father, who was grinning like a mule eating cactus, as Aunt Nettie would say.
“Shut up,” she muttered, passing her father with a defiantly lifted chin.
“I didn’t say a word,” he assured her.
“You didn’t have to,” she answered with a long-suffering sigh.
* * *
TRUE TO HIS WORD, Case was on his best behavior during dinner. He chatted easily with Mike and Uncle Dan, listened attentively to Grampa’s ramblings, talked cars and motorcycles with Jeff and blatantly charmed Anita, Lisa and Kathy. As though sensing that Nettie wouldn’t be so easily beguiled, he treated her with a respectful deference that quickly won her approval.
Everyone seemed impressed that Case had been a DEA agent. Mike, Dan and Nettie approved of anyone who enforced the law and made an effort to fight the illegal drug trade. Anita, Lisa and Kathy were drawn to the romantic illusion of a dashing government agent, risking his life for the safety of law-abiding citizens.
Jeff, of course, thought Case Brannigan was about the coolest guy he’d ever met.
By the time Frank set the glowing birthday cake on the table for dessert, Maddie was glumly aware that everyone in the room thought she was crazy for continuing to deny her engagement to Case. She could almost hear them thinking that it wasn’t as though she’d had any more exciting offers.
In deference to Grampa’s limited breath, Frank had placed only one candle in the center of the massive chocolate cake. Grampa blew it out proudly, then beamed as everyone sang “Happy Birthday”—even Case.
The presents were brought over and opened with great ceremony. Grampa acted as delighted by the practical underwear he received from his sister, Nettie, as he was by the expensive, deliciously soft cashmere sweater Dan and Anita had bought him. He seemed especially touched by Maddie’s gift. The watercolor she’d painted had been taken from an old photograph of Grampa and Grandma Carmichael on a picnic. Grampa had been dashingly dressed in a crisp, high-collared shirt, suspenders and a straw boater, while his beloved Annabelle wore a lace-trimmed muslin dress and a flower-bedecked straw hat to shade her fair complexion from the sun.
“I remember this day so clearly,” Grampa said wistfully, holding the little framed painting between gnarled, trembling hands. “Thank you, Maddie, girl.”
Maddie leaned over to kiss his lined cheek. “You’re welcome, Grampa. I’m glad you like it.”
“It’s very good, Maddie,” Case said a few minutes later, while the others chattered around them. “I didn’t realize you were such a talented artist.”
She flushed. “Thank you. But it’s just a hobby.”
The doorbell chimed softly from another part of the house. Frank held up a hand when Maddie automatically moved to answer it. “You stay put,” he said, already moving out of the room. “I’ll get it.”
Jeff had already lost interest in the birthday party. He turned back to Case. “Were you chasing drug dealers when you hurt your leg, Case?”
“I guess you could say that,” Case replied after a slight hesitation.
“Were you shot?”
Again, Case paused, throwing a quick, questioning look at Maddie. When she didn’t intercede, he nodded. “Yeah. I was shot. In the back, and my left thigh.”
Maddie felt the breath leave her lungs in a hard rush. She hadn’t allowed herself to dwell on how Case had been hurt, how he’d ended up in that hospital. Hearing him say the words so bluntly caused a sharp pain to rip through her, almost in sympathy with the agony he must have felt. Shot. Oh, God.
She hoped she kept her reactions from her face. She was aware that everyone in the room seemed to be watching her. Everyon
e except Jeff, who was still utterly fascinated with Case. “Did you ever shoot anyone?” he asked avidly.
“Jeff,” his mother and grandmother both murmured repressively.
Everyone else seemed to be waiting for Case’s answer. Maddie understood, of course. Case Brannigan was definitely a novelty in these parts. An exotic, rare animal striding through an ordinary barnyard. No one in this room had ever met a government agent before, a man who’d seen the world, risked his life, lived adventures the people of Mitchell’s Fork experienced only through movies and daydreams.
Maddie, for one, was tired of living vicariously through Hollywood adventures. She was ready for a few adventures of her own. She didn’t know what, exactly, she wanted to do—but she knew she wanted to do something. Something daring. Something bold. Something the old Maddie Carmichael would never have considered.
“If you don’t mind,” Case said quietly to Jeff, “I think I’ll let that question pass. There were many parts of my job that I didn’t enjoy, and don’t care to dwell on. Let’s just say I did what I had to do, okay, sport?”
Which, of course, answered Jeff’s question quite effectively.
“Well,” a new male voice said from the doorway. “Isn’t this interesting. Who’s the dangerous stranger, Maddie?”
Maddie gasped and whirled. “Jackson!” she said, suddenly remembering why he was here. “Oh, heavens.”
Jackson Babbit lifted a quizzical dark eyebrow in response to her flustered greeting. Thirty-three years old, twice-divorced, Jackson was considered the local playboy—a reputation he’d rightfully acquired. A successful farm equipment salesman, he liked to pattern himself after popular country-western star Marty Stuart. Jackson wore his near-black hair longish and painstakingly styled, moussed and sprayed so that not a lock was out of place. He favored flashy clothes—like the bright red shirt, tight black pants and highly polished, elaborately stitched Western boots he was wearing now—and expensive jewelry. A gold chain glinted at his throat, and two diamond rings sparkled from his manicured hands.