Vows & a Vengeful Groom

by Bronwyn Jameson

  Eyes wide and appalled, she sat up straight and stared at him. “Are you crazy? My brother was taken thirty-two years ago. Despite all the investigations and all the reward money my father offered, there were no leads that didn’t peter out a mile down the road. How could you suggest that he’s alive?”

  “I don’t believe it any more than you do, but Howard refused to give up hope. That was his one weakness. His inability to let that go.”

  “His inability to let go,” she said fiercely, “was always his weakness.”

  She had a point. And if his reason for being on that plane was tied up in his vengeance against the Hammonds, then it had turned into a fatal weakness.

  “What about you?” Ric lifted a hand and threaded a loose tress of hair behind her ear, leaning in to follow with his lips. “Are you able to let go of the past? To start again here and now? Will you stay?”

  Ten

  R ic couldn’t talk her into staying Sunday night, but before he finished kissing her goodbye he had convinced her to fly to Janderra with him on Monday afternoon. With the crucial board meeting on Thursday and concerns about the still-depressed share price spreading edgy malcontent through some factions of the company, this wasn’t the best time to be out of the office. But he didn’t want Kimberley there, or at the Vaucluse house, when the police brought in the bodies. For once Ryan agreed with him.

  They took off late afternoon in the company’s Gulfstream, and this time she sat beside him and accepted the comforting grip of his hand at takeoff. Although she didn’t miss the chance to point out, “I’m not a nervous flyer, you know that. It’s just that last flight from New Zealand, I couldn’t get out of my mind that we were flying over the same stretch of water where the jet went down. That I could look out the window and see—” She blew out a rough laugh. “Silly, because given the expanse of the Tasman the odds would be miniscule.”

  “Not silly.” Ric lifted their linked hands and pressed a kiss to the delicate skin on the inside of her wrist. “FYI, I’m using this excuse to hold your hand. Humour me.”

  “FYI, humouring you is not part of my job description.”

  “Can be added. It’s fluid.”

  She gave him a look.

  “So, how did you spend your first day?”

  “Meeting staff, reading annual reports, getting the lay of the land. There’s been a lot of change, a lot to catch up on.”

  A helluvalot. And businesswise he would allow her to catch up. As for everything else, he stood by what he’d told her in his bedroom. There and then they’d let the past go. They were starting over. “Did Max get the formalities sorted out?”

  “Ah, Max, a bright spot in the middle of all those balance sheets,” she said with a grin. “The man should come with a warning.”

  Ric’s gaze narrowed. He knew Carlton’s reputation as a charmer. Everyone east of the Great Divide knew, but hell—

  Laughing at his grim expression, Kim shook her head. “Relax, Perrini. He didn’t offer to hold my hand or anything. We just met over coffee and talked for a while. He was very helpful, clueing me in on staff politics. Oh, and he recommended Holly McLeod as my assistant.”

  “Good choice.”

  “I met her and I agree, except I don’t need a permanent PA.”

  “You are entitled,” he said, “as an executive and a director.”

  “Which doesn’t mean I need to take up the perk,” she retorted. “I will utilise Holly when necessary. She impressed me already, putting together a dossier on the jewellery show at short notice.”

  “Have you had a chance to look at it?”

  “Briefly.”

  Something in her expression focussed Ric’s attention on her face instead of his contemplation of how much she’d changed. Ten years ago she’d taken every perk as her due as a Blackstone. He approved this change. Very much. “Problem?” he asked.

  “Briana Davenport,” she said, a frown between her brows and in her voice. “The model used in all the promotional materials for the show. I haven’t worked out if she’s a problem or an opportunity yet.” After a moment’s hesitation she asked, “How well do you know her?”

  “I’ve met her at a number of functions and from everything I’ve seen and heard, we couldn’t have chosen a harder-working or more amenable model as ‘the face of Blackstone’s.’ Are you concerned because she’s Marise’s sister?”

  “Precisely. I’m worried about what spin the media might put on that, now that they’ve started chewing over the juicy prospect of a Howard-Marise affair.”

  Ric swore silently and succinctly. “You saw that column, then?”

  “It’s my job to see columns like this morning’s,” she said matter-of-factly, shaking her head at his question. But he saw the anger darken her eyes. “It’s also my job to think about future ramifications. What if Briana sells family secrets to one of these gossip magazines?”

  “She wouldn’t do that. She isn’t the type who chases attention.”

  “She’s a model…she’s a Davenport. Are you sure about that?”

  “Briana may be Marise’s sister,” Ric said with conviction, “but that is where the resemblance ends.”

  Kimberley made a mental note to call Briana Davenport on their return from the outback, to arrange an informal meeting where she could form her own opinion. Then she turned her focus to the trip and to renewing her opinion of the man at her side. Until now she’d acted impulsively, in succumbing to his kiss, in going to his home, in falling into his bed, but from here on she needed to be honest with herself about where this was leading and what she expected from their relationship. And the first step to honesty was acknowledging that Perrini could never be a casual lover. He was her ex, her boss, the only man who had ever owned her heart…but was he the same man ten years later?

  Today he was more relaxed than she’d seen him since her return from New Zealand, and she liked to think that present company had something to do with his upbeat mood. They’d always connected in conversation, in ideas and interests, which stimulated their exchanges—both verbal and physical—with an extra element of excitement. That hadn’t changed.

  But the following day at the mine, as she watched him roll up his sleeves and don hard hat and boots to go onsite at the gaping open pit, she realised that his laid-back demeanour might have as much to do with Janderra itself. This was a Perrini she’d never seen before, equally at home addressing the site managers or leaders of the indigenous community or climbing into one of the huge ore trucks to chew over the concerns of the mine staff. Recalling the day in the boardroom when he’d told her that this was the heart and soul of Blackstone’s, she wondered about his heart and soul.

  When Kimberley first met Ric Perrini, she’d judged him as the perfect Blackstone representative, as eye-catching and expensive and charismatic as the stones at the company’s foundation. Now she was intrigued by his hidden facets—and by the original, rough diamond from which he’d been hewn. What drove his ambition, his love of the beautiful and the exclusive, his loyalty to a man who’d manipulated him into an ill-fated marriage? By the end of their first day at Janderra, Kimberley’s curiosity had not only been reignited. It flamed blue-hot with her need to know.

  Tracy Mattera, one of the mine executives, had invited them to a barbecue dinner at her home in the Janderra township. Having met the all-business, khakis-and-boots-wearing Tracy at the mine site, Kim hadn’t pictured her as a mother. So it came as something of a surprise when they were greeted at the door of an unprepossessing, ranch-style home by another version of the thirty-something woman.

  This Tracy looked younger, softer, prettier in shorts and bare feet and freshly washed blond curls, with a baby perched on one hip. She greeted Kimberley with cool politeness and Perrini with a big welcoming smile, and Kimberley gained the distinct impression the other woman had pulled back from greeting him with even more enthusiasm.

  That initial prickle of knowledge was barreled over by another stronger rush of female r
esponse when Perrini scooped the toddler from Tracy’s arms and swung her high in the air. The sound of the little girl’s giggles, the sight of Perrini’s wide grin, the fierce tug of longing as their eyes met over a mop of baby-soft blond curls, arrowed straight to her heart and to an emptiness deep at her woman’s core. And it only intensified when a little boy of six or seven shuffled into the room, skinny legs weighed down by full-size cricket pads, bat and ball in his hands. Tracy’s expression clouded. “Oh, Cam, no backyard cricket tonight. Ric has brought a…friend.”

  “Kim won’t mind,” Perrini said easily, and still tense from that awkward introduction she didn’t realise his intent until her arms were filled with wriggling baby girl. She didn’t mind—the proposed game of cricket, the baby, anything—but she had been caught off guard and that unpreparedness must have shown on her face. Uttering a hasty apology Tracy reclaimed her child.

  “Please, I don’t mind,” Kimberley reassured her, but it was too late. With a cool smile Tracy hurried off to fix them drinks and Kimberley was left feeling oddly bereft after one token moment of sweet-scented baby in her arms. Hugging her arms lightly she looked up and her gaze collided with steady blue perception.

  He’d paused at the ranch slider, one hand tossing and catching the well-used red cricket ball, the other resting lightly on Cam’s shoulder but his attention was fixed entirely on her, catching her unguarded, her emotions stripped bare. For a moment she thought he would say something, but Cam tugged at his shirt, recapturing his attention, and they continued on to the backyard, a picture of man and child that reached into her emotional heart and squeezed it like a vise.

  “You were quiet tonight,” he said later, driving back to their accommodation. For a second she felt the sidelong touch of his gaze, felt its perceptive impact shiver through her. “Should I have warned you about the kids?”

  “I’m that transparent?”

  “Usually, no.”

  But at that one moment, yes. Since then she’d had plenty of time to collect herself and to prepare an answer that, while not the complete truth, wasn’t a lie. “I am going to miss Blake. Tonight I realised just how much.”

  “I wondered if I’d done the wrong thing thrusting Ivy on you.”

  “Only from Tracy’s viewpoint.” Then, when Perrini looked puzzled, she shook her head. Men. Perceptive one second, clueless the next. “She didn’t exactly approve of me, did she?”

  “She didn’t approve of you breaking my heart,” he said lightly. “Give her time. She’ll get over it.”

  He was kidding; she knew it in her mind and yet that didn’t stop her heartbeat thickening with a longing. Follow his lead, she cautioned herself. Keep it light. “I gather you’ve been friends a while?”

  “Twenty years, give or take. We started at the mine together, the same day, same shift. I’ve known her kids since birth.”

  Another part of his life she’d known nothing about. The knowledge irked. “It might have helped if I’d known some of this history beforehand.”

  “Helped, how?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe if I’d known you were close friends I wouldn’t have been taken aback when she all but kissed you at the door and when you grabbed hold of Ivy. Instead I was left wondering about your relationship—”

  “You thought I might be their father?” he interrupted, his voice a rough rasp of astonishment.

  “No. No, that didn’t even cross my mind. I meant your relationship with Tracy. I thought you might have been lovers.”

  “You were jealous?”

  “Yes,” she admitted after a moment. “If she knows you better than I do, then I’m jealous of that.”

  “You know me.”

  “No,” Kimberley countered, shaking her head. “Whenever I’ve asked about your background, you provide the minimum of facts with a what-does-it-matter shrug. What do I know about you? You were born in Italy, and came to Australia with your mother when you were a baby. You grew up in West Australia. After your mum died, you worked to pay your way through university. One of those jobs was here at the Janderra mine. And after finishing your business degree you got an entry-level job in the marketing department at Blackstone’s.”

  “That’s my background, not me.” His words might have been deliberately dismissive, but the determined set of his features and the long sidelong glance he cast over her face were anything but casual. “If you want to know me, move back to Bondi. Live with me. Work with me. It’s as easy as that.”

  “No, that’s easy for you. Tell me just one thing,” she continued quickly when his blue gaze snapped in protest. “Why did your mother come to Australia? Why did she stay, when she had no family here? That must have been difficult for her, especially as a single mum.”

  “Just one thing?”

  His tone was dry, one eyebrow lifted in sardonic query, but Kimberley wouldn’t be put off by semantics. “One thing in several parts,” she justified. “Why Australia?”

  “My father was Australian. Mum came out here to find him.”

  “And did she?”

  “Apparently.” He hitched a shoulder, the what-does-it-matter gesture exactly as she’d described. “I was too young to remember. That didn’t work out but Mum decided to stay. She had no reason to go back to Italy.”

  “She didn’t have any family?”

  His mouth thinned with impatience or irritation. “There is Perrini family, but they didn’t approve of the pregnancy or her decision to keep me. They wouldn’t have welcomed her back.”

  Perrini family. That she’d never known about, that he’d never mentioned. Family that had cut him out. Her heart beat hard with renewed curiosity and with silent empathy. “Have you met any of your family?” she persisted.

  “No. Nor do I ever want to.”

  Kimberley turned in her seat, better to study the hard set of his profile. “You aren’t curious about your grandparents and…are there uncles, aunts, cousins?”

  “I called once, when Mum was dying. Her father didn’t want to know her, he didn’t want to know me. That’s not family.”

  “Your grandfather,” she murmured on an appalled breath. “Is he still alive?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t care. The only relevance is how that little episode taught me to appreciate family that does care.”

  “Like the Blackstones?”

  “Like Sonya. Like Tanya and her kids.” His eyes were Antarctic cold, but beneath the frosty expression was more, the kind of emotion that told her this mattered. Very much. “Just so you’re clear—I’ve never aspired to be a Blackstone. If I wanted that kind of a family, one that picked and discarded its members like Howard has done with his family, then I have Pappa Perrini in Turin.”

  The previous night she’d insisted on sleeping alone in her room, citing Perrini’s words—which annoyed him to no end—about keeping their business and personal relationships as two separate entities. Tonight he showed her to her door and after a kiss that claimed complete possession of her mouth and her heart, she took his hand to lead him inside. Something snapped tight and intense in his expression.

  “No,” he said, low and rough-edged. “Not tonight. I am not a man to be pitied.”

  It’s for the best, she told herself as his retreating footsteps echoed through the hollow corridor of the executive accommodation complex and found a matching resonance in her heart. If she called him back, if she made love to him now with her emotions so exposed, he would question her motives and any words of love that crept from her tongue.

  Instead she stripped and showered and fought the impact of his rejection by chewing over all she’d learned, her heart analyzing the impact of his family’s callous abandonment. He’d only been fifteen, damn it, and watching his mother—his only parent, the only family he knew—dying of cancer. No wonder he’d never mentioned his family. No wonder he’d reacted so heatedly when, in the dustup of their marriage, she’d accused him of wanting to become a Blackstone. No wonder he’d bonded with Sonya and retained a
strong friendship with Tracy, both single mothers doing a wonderful job with family, just as his own mum had done.

  She couldn’t help wondering if his ambition—his near ferocious drive to succeed—stemmed from a need to prove himself to an old man in Turin who’d not thought his grandson worth knowing. And when she left her bed and wavered by the door, wanting to go to him, to hold him, to make love with the whole man she now recognised for all he’d overcome and all he could be, she heard his closing words and her hand dropped away from the doorknob.

  Pity was not something Perrini’s pride would ever accept, and the next morning she sensed a barrier—a subtle coolness in his eyes, a focus on last-minute business he conducted alone—that prevented her broaching the subject until they were airborne on their return to Sydney late in the morning. And then she had to lean across the table between them and place her hand on the papers he was reading and weather the irritated slice of his frown.

  “This won’t take a minute,” she assured him, lifting her chin and meeting the blue reserve in his eyes. “Thank you for bringing me out here. You were right—Janderra is the heart and soul of the business.”

  He inclined his head in acknowledgement. “Is that all?”

  “I wanted to thank you, also, for sharing what you did of your past…although you were wrong to claim it irrelevant. It all matters. It all made you the man you are and you were right—that is not a man to be pitied.” In his eyes she saw the look of rejection, and quickly she leaned forward to trap his hand beneath hers on the tabletop. “Tell me one thing before you pull away. This last week—when you kissed me in the boardroom, when you pulled me into your foyer last Saturday morning—was your desire driven by compassion or pity over Howard? Is that why you wanted me?”

  “You know it wasn’t.”

  “Then can you accept that I wanted you last night? That I want you now?”

  Something shifted in his expression, his eyes flared with heat, and Kimberley’s heart breathed a heavy sigh of relief.