She wanted to press his head there, to work all the buttons of her blouse free and let him explore and taste and drive her even more wild...
Wind blew off the lake, spitting raindrops against the glass, clicking and popping like pebbles. The sound jarred her from the moment and that warning bell clanged louder.
She was in love with him.
The cold, harsh realization soaked through her, every bit as brutal and relentless as that hard rain out there.
She was in love with Ben Kilpatrick—and had been for some time, maybe as far back as those years when she would watch him treat his sickly younger sister with such gentleness and caring. Watching the sweetness of his interactions with Maddie earlier in the evening had reminded her of it, one more tie binding them together.
What had she done?
She wanted to sink to the floor of her foyer, throw her arms around Rika and weep. Her heart already ached in anticipation of the pain that seemed to be waiting outside her little lake house, ready to swoop in the moment he drove away from Haven Point.
Oh, it would be so tempting to throw all her caution to the wind, to grab his hand and lead him to her bedroom, where they could spend every hour remaining to them wrapped around each other while the rain whispered against the roof.
She obviously didn’t have the best track record in the common-sense department, at least when it came to Ben, but somehow she knew making love with him would only make the inevitable pain so much worse.
Sensing the shift in mood, he pulled away, his gaze searching hers. That beautiful mouth that could work such magic tightened now and he eased away. “This is the part where you tell me you want me to leave, isn’t it?”
Oh, she didn’t. She wanted him to stay here forever, wrapped in her arms and her love. “It’s not a matter of what I want,” she began.
“The hell it’s not,” he burst out, his eyes hot, aroused and suddenly angry. “It’s been about what you want since the moment I walked into town. You want a shiny new Caine Tech facility for this damned town you love so much and you can’t see anything beyond that. Because you can’t have it, you won’t consider anything else between us.”
She inhaled sharply at his words. Because they stung—and because, okay, she sensed some element of truth to them she wasn’t quite ready to face—she parried the thrust and lashed out in return.
“At least I care about something! I’m not some cold, insulated billionaire so afraid of being hurt that I wall myself off from anybody who might get close!”
Something flared in his eyes, something she almost thought might be hurt. “Cold? You think I’m cold?”
No. He was hot, sizzling temptation.
“I think you’re like some kind of...Vulcan. The only difference is, you have emotions, you just refuse to show them to the world.”
A muscle flexed in his jaw and she wanted to weep. She was a fine one to talk to him about hiding emotions when she was lashing out so he wouldn’t realize she loved him.
She folded her hands together to keep from reaching for him again, from pushing away that strand of dark hair falling in his eyes, from kissing away his sudden frown.
If Joe Kilpatrick were still alive, she would like to take him out on that Delphine to the deepest part of the lake, hog-tie him and toss him overboard for what he had done to a little boy who had only ever wanted the love of the man he thought was his father.
“You’re wrong. I feel things, deeply,” he said, his gaze suddenly intense.
What did he feel? She felt breathless, suddenly, like that moment just before that first dive into the lake in spring, when she knew the waters would be painfully cold.
She opened her mouth, suddenly frightened and exhilarated all at once, but before she could ask him, her cell phone rang, vibrating the little table in the foyer where she had set it when she first unlocked the door.
She stared at it as if it were a rattlesnake and then looked back at Ben. His expression was once more shielded, the mask firmly in place, and she suddenly wanted to cry.
“I have to take it. It’s Dale. It could be an emergency.”
Coward, that little voice in her head taunted. She knew she was using the phone call as an excuse, seizing on the first one that came along.
“Someone else can take care of it, can’t they?”
“I’m the mayor.”
“And that’s the only thing that matters to you, isn’t it?”
She didn’t answer, she only gazed at him wordlessly.
After a moment, when the phone continued to ring, he made a rough, frustrated sound.
“You’d better answer it,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to keep you from something important.”
He turned and stalked from her house, closing the door hard behind him.
* * *
ANGER AND FRUSTRATION seemed to coil through him like barbed wire as he stomped back to his place.
He had left the damn umbrella in her entryway and the rain poured down like crazy, cold and unforgiving. By the time he made it the short distance to his rental house, he was soaked to the skin and freezing.
He didn’t care. A little outward misery was the perfect match for the storm raging inside.
When he unlocked the door, Hondo barked his hey-where-have-you-been? greeting and planted his haunches next to Ben for a little love. Ben gave him a perfunctory scratch, then headed immediately into his bedroom to rip off his rain-soaked shirt.
He didn’t know what to do with this turmoil raging inside him, this jumbled mess of raw feeling he wasn’t sure he even wanted to look at.
At least I care about something! I’m not some cold, insulated billionaire so afraid of being hurt that I wall myself off from anybody who might get close!
How did she see him so clearly? He had spent so many years not revealing his emotions, exhibiting a cool, contained facade to the world. He had found it invaluable in business, that ability to use logic and reason.
He suddenly remembered being eleven years old, a desperate boy who used to pretend he had a Teflon super suit that deflected every barb, every criticism.
Now he realized how ridiculous that was.
The suit had deflected nothing. Every hurt had shoved its way under his skin and sometimes he still felt as if it quivered around him with every step.
He picked up his shoe and hurled it at the wall. Not surprisingly, he didn’t feel any better.
Through the anger and frustration, he was aware of something deeper. An aching, completely unexpected sense of loss.
It was only thwarted sexual arousal, he tried to tell himself. Somehow the words weren’t any more believable than the ridiculous idea that Joe’s steady criticisms had bounced harmlessly off his Teflon skin.
He had feelings for McKenzie, unlike anything he had known for another woman. Yes, she was exuberant with her emotions. Very different than he was—which was no small part of her appeal to him, he realized. She was sweet and funny, with so much love to give the entire world. She was patient with cranky old men, she pulled in friends wherever she went, she cared passionately about her community and her neighbors.
He had seen her compassion firsthand, when she used to be one of the few friends to visit Lily during those last days, this big-eyed, dark-haired girl with the ready smile and the infectious laugh. She had brightened Lily’s world immeasurably, just with her visits.
Tenderness seemed to unfurl inside him like new aspen leaves in springtime.
Yes, she loved Haven Point. Of course she did. She wanted so desperately to belong. Xochitl Vargas, who had changed her name to fit in with her father’s family when she had been left with nothing.
His chest ached suddenly and he sat down hard on the bed. Hondo immediately moved in, resting his head on Ben’s knee. He petted the dog, yet another th
ing he had to let go of so he could return to his real life.
When the hell had his world become so complicated? Before he came to Haven Point, everything had seemed so straightforward. He loved his job working with Aidan Caine and he was good at it. He thought he was happy in California, working long hours and running the company he and Aidan had founded.
Suddenly, he had to deal with a father he hadn’t known about, a dog he didn’t know what to do with and a woman who had somehow crawled into his heart when he wasn’t looking.
She thought he didn’t let himself feel things deeply. Ha. He was a jumbled mess of emotions. Now the only problem was figuring out what the hell to do with them all.
* * *
HER PHONE RANG shortly before dawn—just an hour after she finally fell asleep.
She reached for it in a blind panic and knocked it off the bedside table where it had been charging. By the time she could turn on the lamp to find it on the floor, the blasted thing had rung four times and the call was about to go to voice mail. She managed to answer just in time.
“Yeah. Hello?”
“Mayor. Sorry to wake you. It’s Dale again. We’ve got a problem.”
“Is it Lake Road again?”
His reason for calling last night—she could only think of it as a fortuitous interruption before she said or did something she would deeply regret—had been to inform her about a section of asphalt on the road circling the lake that had begun to erode away from all the water. A section of shoulder about ten feet long by two feet wide had crumbled and would need major repairs.
“I only wish. This is big. Really big.”
She sat up in bed, alarmed by the gravity in his voice. At the movement, she stifled a groan. Her whole body seemed like one big ache, a combination of too little sleep and too much stress.
“What’s going on?” she asked after clearing the sleep from her voice so she didn’t sound like a trucker with a six-pack-a-day habit.
“I just got word from the Corps of Engineers. The Elkwood Dam is critically unstable and they’re worried it’s going to breach. They’re doing the best they can to fix the situation but they wanted to warn all the downriver communities that the Hell’s Fury might be rising to dangerous levels within a matter of hours.”
She sat up, now fully awake as cold dread seized her. There were thirty homes and businesses along the river within her city limits that would be impacted if water levels rose—and more upriver from them.
“How could this happen?” she demanded.
“Beats the hell out of me. I know it passed the last inspection last month. I read the report myself. Could be there was a structural anomaly they didn’t know about, could be all the rain we’ve had that’s weakened something. Doesn’t matter, when you get down to it. The river is rising, either way.”
All those houses, all those people. Eppie and Ronald lived along the river, with Hazel in her little house next door. The Smiths. The Pipers. Wynona. Her mind went through each house, cataloging the potential disaster for people who already had troubles, thinking of the ramifications.
“What do you want to do?” Dale asked. He was looking for guidance from her. The owner of a floral shop.
She pushed away the quilt, ignoring the chill. As much as she might want to stay here in her warm bed curled up under the covers with Rika asleep on the floor beside her, she didn’t have time to indulge her heartache right now.
She could do all that later, after Ben left Haven Point for good. Right now, people depended on her. She drew in a breath. She could do this. This was one of the reasons she had agreed to accept the nomination last fall, so she could help when the people of Haven Point needed her.
“Call Chief Gallegos and Chief Emmett and everybody else on our emergency management team. Have the police and volunteer fire departments start going door to door to the houses on the river, letting people know what’s going on and helping them evacuate. At this point, it’s people and pets first, then belongings. Let’s mobilize everybody we can to start filling sandbags. Scout groups, church congregations, the Haven Point High School football team. I’d like to see everybody who’s physically able helping out.”
“Got it.”
“Meanwhile, I’ll call Anita and have her set up a command center at city hall. We can use the city council meeting room and the conference room next door. I’ll be in as soon as I can. A half hour, tops. Keep me apprised if you hear anything new from the people up in Elkwood.”
“Got it. Thanks, Mayor.”
To her surprise, she actually heard a note of respect in his voice, for the first time ever, but she didn’t have time to dwell on it. Not when her town was threatened by outside forces.
* * *
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, she walked into chaos. Her office was filled with people, each of whom seemed to be on a cell phone having different conversations.
It wasn’t yet 7:00 a.m. but the city employees and the emergency management team were on the job, taking care of business.
Anita was at her desk, with her office phone at one ear and her cell at her other and writing something on a pad in front of her at the same time.
“Right. Yes. That’s great. Thanks.” She hung up the cell phone and held the other phone away long enough to jump up and hug her when McKenzie neared.
“Don’t interrupt your call,” she demanded.
“I’m on hold,” Anita said. “Hell of a thing to wake up to, right? I got here as soon as I could. I barely had time for mascara.”
Anita always looked perfectly made up to McKenzie, who had managed only a shower and a quick braid.
Anita handed her a stack of notes. “We’re getting calls from the media already. Word is out about the potential breach and they want the human-interest angle from the downriver towns. I’ve already fielded two calls and I’m sure there will be more. Somebody will have to take point on that.”
“Why didn’t you talk to them? Everybody knows you’re the one who really runs this town. I’m just the figurehead.”
Anita gave a modest shrug. “They want to talk to the mayor, not the mayor’s secretary. Makes better copy that way.”
“Returning media requests will have to come second—or third or fourth. Where are we on the sandbag operation?”
“I’ve been contacting all the quarries in a twenty-mile radius and they’re sending dump trucks full of sand to the elementary school parking lot. That’s where we’re going to fill them up, since it’s the closest public building to the river. Do you really think it will do any good?”
Again, that yawning sense of inadequacy threatened to swallow her whole. “I have no idea. We have to do something, though.”
Anita squeezed her shoulder. “We’ll get through this. You’ll see. Haven Point is tough.”
She wished she had a little of her friend’s optimism. Right now she felt helpless and overwhelmed by the pressure suddenly bearing down on her shoulders.
She wouldn’t let it be destroyed, no matter what she had to do.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
HE NEEDED TO BE back at work.
Feeling muddle-headed and numb after only a few hours of sleep, Ben stood at the wide windows overlooking the deck, sipping at his coffee and watching the rain drizzle down. Everything was gray—the lake, the mountains, even the lovely landscaping around the rented lake house.
His restlessness was like an itch just between his shoulder blades that he couldn’t seem to reach no matter what he used to go after it.
He needed to be back at Caine Tech, where he felt in control of his world, in his element. That was the problem here. Something about the rugged vastness of the mountains, the sheer, wild beauty of the lake, left a man feeling exposed and vulnerable.
Since he had come to town, he had been buffeted by memories he didn’
t want and emotional entanglements he didn’t need. His mother, Joe, Warrick. McKenzie. Hondo. They all circled around inside his brain, leaving him a little dizzy.
The day stretched ahead of him, too rainy to go hiking, too dismal for the boat. If he didn’t have this damned dinner to get through with Lydia and Warrick, he would be out of here and back home in California by evening.
He would just have to do his best to focus on catching up with work so he would be up to speed Monday back at Caine Tech. If the clouds cleared, he would call the marina and arrange to have someone drive the boat back there so he could hitch it to his SUV.
Maybe when he returned to San Jose, he would sell the Delphine. A few acquaintances had already offered far more than she was worth. He wasn’t a Kilpatrick. Why hold on to something that was just one more emotional entanglement, one more connection to his past?
He sighed and stepped away from the window just as Hondo gave his low-throated bark and hurried to the front door seconds before it rang.
Why did he even need a doorbell, when he had an alert German shepherd?
He headed for it, aware of the ridiculous part of him that half hoped and half dreaded it might be McKenzie. He wasn’t sure he was up for another confrontation with her but he hated leaving town with bitter words between them.
Instead, when he opened the door, he was shocked to see Russ Warrick standing there.
His father.
Some threads from that tangled mess of emotions he kept trying to shove down seemed to tug free—sadness, anger, betrayal, all coated in that damned awkwardness. He didn’t have the first idea how to deal with this man he had always admired and respected.
He could at least be polite and let the man in out of the rain. “Dr. Warrick. This is a surprise. Come in.”
“I can’t stay. I’m headed to the community center to fill sandbags. I just wanted to apologize in person that we’re going to have to cancel our dinner plans. I was hoping we would have the chance to talk about...everything. But in light of this town crisis, I think we had better take a rain check. No pun intended, believe me. I wanted to let you know, earlier, rather than later, in case you wanted to change your plans and take off for California today and I thought it would be better to do it in person instead of over the phone.”
Redemption Bay_Contemporary Romance Page 25