by Brenda Novak
“I have a sand rail, son. You don’t need anyone else to take you,” Terry said. “I’ll come get you next weekend. We’ll go there together.”
“What about me?” Mackenzie demanded.
“And me?” Alyssa added.
“You girls are still too young,” Jaclyn said. “Daddy will take you when you’re older.”
The girls moaned about being left out as Jaclyn helped them into the car and buckled them in. “So you’re coming next Friday?” she asked Terry, pausing before climbing into the passenger’s seat.
“Yeah. I’ll be there in the afternoon sometime.”
Jaclyn hesitated. Next Friday was her thirty-second birthday. She didn’t expect Terry or anyone else to remember that, but she wanted the children with her. She didn’t exactly relish the idea of spending her birthday alone. But after what the children had been through the past few weeks, not getting to see their father, she decided to grin and bear it the best she could. She could always celebrate on Sunday, when they returned.
“I don’t get off until five,” she said.
“It’ll be around then.”
“Okay.” She closed her door and waited for Cole to start the car, then rolled down her window. “See you next Friday.”
Burt and Dolores waved to the children as the truck pulled away. Mackenzie and Alyssa responded enthusiastically, but Alex sat in silence until the ranch was well behind them.
“My dad said he knew you in high school,” he suddenly said to Cole.
“Feld’s a small town,” Cole said. “For the most part, everybody knows everybody else.”
“He said he didn’t like you then and he doesn’t like you now.”
“Alex, you know better than to repeat something like that!” Jaclyn cried, but she could tell by the look on her son’s face that he didn’t intend to offend Cole. He was working something out in his mind, probably trying to decide, after hearing all that the Wentworths had said, what Cole signified in their lives—so he’d know where to place his loyalties.
“Did you like my dad?” Alex asked.
“I had a lot of things going on in high school. I didn’t pay much attention to your dad,” Cole replied. His answer was both diplomatic and kind, considering what he could have said, but Alex immediately saw through it.
“That’s a no.”
Cole didn’t attempt to correct him. He didn’t say anything.
“Why not?” Alex pressed.
“Honey, it’s not polite to put someone on the spot like that,” Jaclyn said, hoping to bring the conversation to a close. “He and your dad might not have been the best of friends, but we’re all adults now and capable of looking past our differences. What happened in high school doesn’t matter anymore.”
“It does to Dad,” Alex countered. “He said Cole wanted to marry you in high school, but he didn’t get you then, and he won’t get you now.”
Jaclyn struggled to stem her outrage. “Your dad has no right to say that,” she replied.
“He said if Cole married you, it would be over his dead body. That’s what Dad said,” Mackenzie added.
Embarrassed, Jaclyn closed her eyes for a brief second and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Thank you for sharing, kids.”
Mackenzie beamed proudly, obviously taking her words at face value, but Alex ignored her. His eyes were still fastened intently on Cole. “So are you gonna? Marry her, I mean?”
Cole smiled. “We wouldn’t want to upset your father, now, would we?”
“WHAT is that?”
At the sound of Chad’s voice, Cole turned to see his brother walking up the driveway behind him, staring at the sand rail he’d just parked in the garage of one of the houses still under construction.
“What do you think it is?” Cole asked.
His brother’s puzzled expression was barely discernible in the dark. None of the streetlights had been put in at Oak Ranch yet, and it was nearly ten o’clock.
“Looks like a sand rail to me. But I can’t imagine what my workaholic big brother would be doing with a toy like that.”
“I took Jaclyn and her kids to Feld last night,” Cole said.
Chad’s eyebrows lifted. “You did?”
“Yeah. The kids wanted to see their dad.”
“That was good of you.”
Cole ignored the undercurrent in his words. “I saw Granny Fanny.”
“How is she?”
“Same as always. Still cussin’ like a sailor.”
Chad shook his head and chuckled. “She’s somethin’.”
“When did you get back from Sacramento?”
“Just a few hours ago. Thought I’d stop by and tell you about the lots.”
“Are we going to want ’em?”
“They’re looking pretty good. I think we can get into the project for a good price, too.”
Chad went on to describe the location of the subdivision, the lay of the land, how much it would cost to bring in the utilities, and how much more he thought it would cost to build in California as opposed to Nevada, but Cole was having a difficult time concentrating. He kept seeing Jaclyn in his mind’s eye.
Jaclyn sitting next to him at the hot tub. Jaclyn riding asleep in his truck. Jaclyn’s eyelids closing as he kissed her. Jaclyn laughing in the sand rail.
“Cole? You want me to come back tomorrow?” Chad asked.
“Hmm?”
“Your mind’s a million miles away. I thought maybe you’d rather go over this stuff later.”
Cole sighed. “Sorry, I’m just tired.”
“You know what I think?”
“Do I want to know?”
“I think your new secretary has baked bread in your house one too many times,” Chad said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
His brother grinned. “You’re falling, buddy, big time.”
Remembering the day he’d found Rochelle on the bathroom floor, Cole felt a sudden wave of panic, not because he was afraid of falling for Jaclyn but because he was afraid of her falling for him. What if she set her heart on him the way Rochelle had? And what if he didn’t return her feelings? He couldn’t deal with the guilt associated with those kinds of problems again. And he couldn’t face raising more kids, not after failing Rick so miserably.
“You’re wrong,” Cole insisted, scowling.
“Am I?”
“Yeah. Jaclyn has three kids and too many ties to Feld. I’m not getting involved with her.”
Chad glanced at the sand rail and laughed openly at this statement. “Oh, yeah? Well, I have news for you, then. You already are.”
RICK HELD HIS BREATH in anticipation as he crowded in with the other students to check the list of grades Professor Hernandez had just posted on his office window. English was his worst subject, and this latest essay had been particularly difficult. It was on Homer’s The Odyssey, a story he found painfully boring and pointless despite what the critics said. How could he expect to do well when this was the first formal writing he’d ever done, and he hated what he was writing about, besides? He thought Telemachus should have taken a firm stand at the very beginning and kicked out the men who were loitering at his house waiting to take his father’s place. So what if he was young? Rick and Cole had been young when they’d had to take charge of their house, too.
But Rick doubted his sentiments would go over very well with his soft-spoken, poetry-loving professor. So he’d pretended to see the masterpiece everyone else saw and forgot about Telemachus as he muddled through an essay delineating Odysseus’s heroic qualities.
Parish, Perego, Perrini… Rick’s eyes trailed along the dotted line, then followed his name to find a C in the grade column—and let his breath out. He’d passed. He hadn’t exactly excelled, but it was early in the semester yet, and he’d passed.
“So how’d you do, Perrini?”
Rick turned to find a young woman who’d asked him out the first week of school standing behind him with one of her girlfriends. A trim brun
ette with stylish glasses, a quirky smile and a knockout figure, she was certainly attractive, but she was too young for him. That was one of the problems with going back to school at twenty-eight, especially at a community college. Everyone else was almost a decade younger. “I passed,” he said simply. “What about you?”
“I passed, too.”
Her blond friend made a strangled sound and rolled her eyes. “You passed? You passed, Abby?” she echoed, then she looked at him. “Abby got an A. Abby always gets an A. If you ask me, it’s pretty sickening.”
Abby’s face colored, and she glared at her friend. “Stop it, Caitlin. I have to get an A. I wasn’t serious about high school and blew my chance to get a scholarship. I’m trying to make up for lost time.”
“I understand you’re properly motivated,” Caitlin replied. “That’s not the sickening part. The sickening part is how easy getting good grades is for you.”
Rick had turned Abby down when she’d asked him to dinner a week ago, but he felt his interest level rising now. The study group he’d joined wasn’t really working out. They spent more time talking than they did studying, and he wasn’t attending school for its social aspects. He wanted a study partner who was dependable and serious, and if he had his guess, Abby was both. Age wasn’t an issue when it came to learning.
“Do you belong to a study group?” he asked.
“No.”
“Would you be interested in studying with me?”
She hitched her backpack higher on one shoulder. “No,” she said and walked away, leaving her friend gaping after her.
“I guess she hasn’t forgiven you for turning her down,” Caitlin explained with a helpless shrug, then hurried to catch up.
HER BIRTHDAY WAS TOMORROW. If she didn’t do something about it, she was going to spend the evening alone.
Jaclyn glanced nervously at Cole, then tossed the fettuccine she was making for his dinner in her special pesto, sun-dried tomatoes and grilled chicken sauce, and dumped it onto a plate. He liked pasta, and he looked relaxed sitting there at the table, reading the Preliminary Title Report on the Sparks project. They’d just received loan approval from Larry at Reno Bank & Trust, so he was in a great mood. Now was probably a good time to ask him to spend the evening with her tomorrow night, but she’d been wanting to do it all week and hadn’t managed to find the nerve. What made her think today would be any different?
“I’m taking off,” Margaret said, poking her head into the kitchen.
“You’re getting out of here late tonight. It’s almost five,” Cole said.
“I had some calls to make. I think I’ve got another buyer on the hook for Little Acorn Court. Nice family, two kids. They’re going to let me know tomorrow.”
“That’s great. You’re selling houses like crazy.”
“You’re giving me nice houses to sell. Anyway, I’ve changed the sign out front to Closed.”
“Thanks.” Cole buried his nose in his reports again.
“Smells great in here, Jaclyn,” Margaret said.
“It’s pasta with garlic and sun-dried tomatoes,” she said. “Would you like to try some?”
“No, I’m meeting a friend for dinner. Save me some, though. I’ll have it for lunch tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
Margaret trudged away, leaving Jaclyn to stew some more about her birthday. Last year she’d turned thirty-one only a few months after leaving Feld, and it had been one of the loneliest days of her life. She didn’t want to repeat the experience. She wanted to go out to dinner and see a movie or go dancing, and she wanted to do it with a man, preferably Cole. Which meant she had to ask him, right? But how?
If she mentioned it was her birthday, he might think she was hinting for a gift or a card or something. If she didn’t mention that it was a special occasion, he might think she was pursuing him.
“Ouch!” she cried, burning her hand on the hot pan she’d stuck in the sink.
Cole looked up in surprise. “You okay?”
“Yeah, fine. Just a little burn,” she said, taking an ice cube from the freezer and holding it on the red mark until the pain went away.
“You’ve been pretty quiet today,” he said. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing.”
“Terry still coming to get the kids tomorrow night?”
“Yeah, last I heard.” Now, her mind prompted. Ask him now. He’d just brought up tomorrow night, giving her the perfect opportunity. But she couldn’t bring herself to say any of the lines she’d rehearsed. They all sounded too much as though she was asking him out, probably because that was exactly what she’d be doing.
“Jackie?”
“Yeah?”
“Is something else burning?”
“Oh! The garlic bread!”
Roiling smoke filled the kitchen as Jaclyn opened the oven door. She grabbed a hot pad and quickly removed the bread, but it was already too charred to eat.
“It’s ruined,” she said in disgust, slamming the pan down on the counter. What the heck was wrong with her, anyway? Why wasn’t she keeping her mind on her work, where it belonged, instead of daydreaming about a night out on the town with her boss?
“Jackie, are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Cole asked, coming to stand behind her. “You seem…I don’t know—preoccupied.”
Jaclyn could feel his warm breath on her neck and knew he was close. It was all she could do not to fling herself into his arms. “I’m sorry,” she said, fighting tears.
“For what?”
“For ruining your dinner and wasting your food.”
“It’s only bread, okay?”
It was only her birthday. What did it matter if she sat home alone? “Okay.”
“Is something else wrong?”
Other than the fact that she couldn’t quit thinking about him? That she knew he wasn’t good for her, that marriage wasn’t part of his life’s plan, and she wanted him, anyway?
God, was she turning into another Rochelle?
“No.” She ran some cool water into the sink to ease the sting of her burn so she could finish the dishes and go, but he slid his arms around her waist and pulled her back against him.
“Tell me what you’re thinking,” he said.
For a moment Jaclyn closed her eyes and let him hold her. She wanted to forget about the dishes, her job, her birthday—especially her birthday—and simply turn in his arms and lift her face for his kiss.
But Rochelle’s words, that day Jaclyn had run into her in Feld four years ago, kept echoing in her head: He cheated on me…cheated on me…cheated…and it broke my heart.
Jaclyn knew about broken hearts. She’d experienced the same kind of betrayal and devastation. Which meant she’d be a fool to ask for more of the same, right?
Right.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said softly, slipping out of his arms. Then she grabbed her purse and left, not allowing herself to look back.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
COLE ROLLED OVER and punched his pillow down so he could see the time. Damn. It was three in the morning. What was wrong with him? Why was he having such a difficult time sleeping? Work used to keep him up. He’d plan his next project for Perrini Homes, go over profit-and-loss statements in his head, or get up to make a note on something he didn’t want to forget. But he couldn’t blame tonight’s insomnia on business. Jaclyn was the only thing on his mind. He kept reliving the moment he’d pulled her into his arms at the sink. She’d felt like heaven and smelled so good. He’d nearly slipped his hands up under her shirt. He’d wanted to caress her soft, creamy skin and had been almost positive she’d allow it. But then she’d changed. She’d stiffened, pulled away, left.
Why the turnaround? Was it Terry? Was she still in love with her ex-husband? Was it the divorce? Had she been hurt too badly to get involved in another relationship?
Or was it him?
Trailer trash. The crowd she’d hung out with in high school hadn’t thought much of him. M
aybe, deep down, Jaclyn had a problem with his poor background, too. Or maybe she just didn’t find him appealing, for whatever reason. In any case, she’d made it clear that she wasn’t interested in a physical relationship without the possibility of marriage. And he wasn’t interested in anything that included the expectation of it.
So they were at a standoff and needed to forget about each other. Simple. Except that they worked together and couldn’t avoid contact, which meant it wasn’t going to be easy. Especially when there were times marriage didn’t seem like such a bad trade for spending the rest of his nights in Jaclyn’s arms. Who else would he rather be with? No one. No one had ever affected him the way she did. And her kids were good kids, not nearly as difficult as Rick had been. Surely he could grow to love them….
Cole groaned. Loving them wasn’t the problem. It never had been. He simply couldn’t risk failing Jaclyn the way he’d failed Rochelle.
Kicking off the blankets, he went to the kitchen for a glass of water, then sat at the table in the dark, wearing nothing but his boxer-briefs. The weather had been completely clear for weeks. He couldn’t remember the last rain, it had been so long ago, but a storm was definitely brewing now. Clouds scuttled across the face of the moon, the wind whipped at the young trees in the yard, and it was a little chilly, even in the house.
He wondered what it would feel like to crawl into Jaclyn’s warm bed and make love to her while lightning flashed outside and thunder rumbled in the distance, and knew immediately that he had to start thinking of something else or he was going to drive himself crazy.
Maybe he should call someone. Laura. An old friend. Rick.
Cole eyed the phone. He’d purposely left his brother alone for more than a month now, hoping he’d return on his own. But he hadn’t heard from Rick, and Cole felt as if he was drifting away from everything he’d always known. He needed an anchor to remind him of the decisions he’d made before meeting Jaclyn. He’d wanted to build Perrini Homes into something so big his brothers would never again suffer the kind of want they’d known growing up. And he’d wanted to reclaim his life and live it free from the challenges and failures associated with marriage and raising children, right?