“I’ve rented out another room.”
It was the last thing she’d expected him to say. She regarded him incredulously. “You’ve rented out a room,” she repeated. “When did you have time to do this?”
“Actually, Mrs. Jeffers took care of it for me.”
Katie sucked in a deep breath. No wonder they’d been engaged in such a hush-hush conversation this morning, before Mrs. Jeffers left with Robby. Katie had foolishly assumed they were talking about keeping a close eye on Luke’s son. Instead, it had just been another one of Luke’s conspiracies with one of her boarders.
“I suppose you paid her off, too.”
“She did me a favor, that’s all,” Luke responded.
“How sweet of her.”
Luke regarded her warily. “I thought it was. Don’t you want to hear about the new tenant?”
“Oh, by all means,” she snapped. “Assuming you think it’s something I need to know.”
“Now, Katie...”
“Oh, for heaven’s sakes, get on with it, Luke.”
“Okay, it’s Henrietta Myers. You remember Henrietta. She leads the church choir. Mrs. Jeffers says she’s getting on in years and feels she can’t keep up with things at her own place.” At her lack of reaction, he continued in a rush, “Anyway, she’ll be moving in here at the end of the week.”
Katie slammed a knife through the grapefruit in a blow that just about bounced the fruit off the counter. She did, however, manage to keep a tight rein on her temper.
“I wasn’t aware anyone had moved out. Exactly which room did you give her?” she inquired testily. Surely he hadn’t tossed one of the others out to accommodate Henrietta.
“Mine,” Luke said and calmly took a sip of his third cup of coffee of the morning.
“Yours,” Katie repeated slowly. Of course. She should have guessed as much.
He nodded and reached for another piece of toast.
“Okay. That’s good. That’s very good. Another paying resident is always welcome. And I’ve always liked Henrietta, even though she is something of a busybody.” She slanted a look at Luke, who seemed very pleased with himself. “Just one question. Where do you and Robby intend to sleep?”
“I thought I’d turn the attic into a room for Robby.”
“Okay,” she said. “Right now it’s jammed with junk and doesn’t have any insulation, but I guess that could work. And you?”
“I was planning to move into our room,” he said, spreading a thick layer of strawberry preserves on his toast.
Katie smiled at him. Beamed, in fact. “When pigs fly,” she said cheerfully.
“Now, Katie.”
“Don’t you `now, Katie’ me, Luke Cassidy. We had a deal, in writing. If I need to, I’ll get it so you can read it again. It was very clear on this. You and I will not sleep together. Period.” She shrugged. “Seems to me you’ve outsmarted yourself. Maybe you’d like to try out the hammock. You seem to be partial to it.”
His blue eyes blazed. “I am not sleeping in the damned hammock.”
She shrugged indifferently. “Whatever.”
“Katie, I think you’re carrying this crazy rule of yours to extremes. How will it look to the judge if we’re in separate bedrooms?”
She glowered at him. “That is not my problem. You should have thought of it before you made the bargain. Maybe if you’d told me everything that was going on, we could have come to different terms.”
“Why can’t we do that now?”
“Because it’s too late. A deal’s a deal.”
“You’re just being stubborn and mule-headed,” Luke accused. “What difference could it possibly make whether or not I sleep in your room? We’re married, for goodness’ sakes. It’s hardly improper.”
“Propriety was the last thing on my mind when I drew up that contract,” she retorted. “You wanted a business deal. You got a business deal.”
Luke suddenly reached out and snagged her hand. Before she could prevent it, he’d hauled her onto his lap.
“And now I don’t,” he said softly. “I want a marriage, Katie, a real one.”
Katie struggled to free herself before she could succumb to that coaxing note in his voice. “Well, I don’t.”
“Liar,” he whispered, his breath fanning across her cheek.
“That’s certainly the way to win my heart,” she retorted. “Calling me a liar really makes my pulse race.”
He grinned unrepentantly. “Something I’m doing makes it race,” he pointed out as his fingers settled at the base of her throat.
“It is racing because I am furious.”
“I suppose that could be one reason,” he conceded, brushing an unexpected kiss lightly across her lips. He nodded in satisfaction. “Now that really seems to kick it into gear. I wonder what a real kiss would do.”
“I wouldn’t try it if I were you,” she warned.
“Oh?” he said, sounding amused. “What will you do? Last time, you kissed me back.”
“Last time I didn’t know the man kissing me was a low-down, conniving jerk.”
The accusation had him grinning. “Sure, you did. You just didn’t want to admit to yourself that you could fall for anyone with less than perfect personality traits.”
That much was true. Under the circumstances, she didn’t consider her feelings for Luke to be something to be proud of. She wouldn’t admit that to him if he tried to torture it out of her. At the moment with his lips barely a hairsbreadth away and his fingers caressing the sensitive bare skin at the base of her throat, it seemed a sweet, dangerous torture was definitely on his mind. Katie was not about to submit to it willingly.
Twisting unexpectedly, she broke free and stood over him, resisting the urge to wrap her arms protectively around her middle. “This can’t happen again,” she said emphatically.
Luke, blast him, just laughed. “Oh, but it will, Katie. I can guarantee it.”
She glowered at him. “Then you’re going to have a bigger problem than Tommy’s return on your hands,” she snapped and fled before he could say or do anything to weaken her already wavering resolve.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“Well, if it isn’t little Katie. Just look how you’ve grown up.”
Alone in the backyard where she’d been weeding the vegetable garden, Katie shivered as the sleazily sensual tone and the voice registered. She knew without even looking that they belonged to Tommy Cassidy.
At one time she had tried valiantly to get along with Tommy because Luke had cared so deeply about his brother. But she’d never been blinded to his flaws as Luke had once been. The most offensive had been his tendency to regard all women as targets for his sly innuendoes and advances. Apparently he hadn’t reformed.
Before responding to him now, she drew in a deep breath and considered exactly how she ought to deal with Luke’s brother. Coolly polite seemed like the right approach under the circumstances. She certainly didn’t want to do or say anything that would worsen the situation.
“Hello, Tommy,” she said, turning slowly until she was face-to-face with the man responsible for Luke’s distress and, indirectly anyway, for her marriage. She wasn’t sure yet if that was something she ought to thank him for or not.
Feigning a nonchalance she was far from feeling, she deliberately continued watering the plants. She didn’t want Tommy getting the idea that his arrival had startled her or that she viewed it as being of any consequence. Besides, if he really got out of line, she could always hose him down.
“It’s been a long time,” she said.
“Not long enough, isn’t that what you’d like to say?” he challenged with a considering gleam in his eyes.
Those eyes were a faded shade of the same blue as Luke’s. In fact, everything about Tommy seemed to be a second-best version of his older brother. Maybe he recognized that. Maybe falling short in any comparison was the real problem between him and Luke.
“Why wouldn’t I be glad to see you?” Katie contradicted,
forcing a smile. “You’re family now.”
Tommy’s laughter was tinged with bitterness. “Yeah, right. I’m sure you’ll invite me over to spend the holidays this year.”
“You’ll always be welcome here,” Katie insisted, then gave him a warning look. “As long as you don’t do anything to hurt your brother or our son.”
For an instant he seemed taken aback by her directness. “Oh, so you’ve claimed Robby,” he said after a lengthy pause. “I wonder what Betty Sue would have to say about that.”
“I’m Robby’s stepmother,” Katie corrected. “I’d never try to take Betty Sue’s place.”
“Saint Katie,” he said derisively. “Maybe you and old Luke are a match made in heaven after all.”
Ignoring his sarcasm, Katie said, “I’m sure the court will see it exactly that way.” Suddenly tired of the game, she looked Tommy straight in the eye. “Why are you doing this? What’s the point? You’re only going to hurt Robby.”
“He’s my boy,” Tommy said in much the same possessive way he might stake a claim to a car or, in years past, to a bicycle or a toy.
“From what I hear you didn’t care much about that fact six years ago.”
“Don’t believe everything you hear.”
“Are you saying you didn’t run off and abandon Betty Sue when you found out she was pregnant?” Katie asked.
“Oh, I left,” Tommy conceded. “But I thought better of it and came back. By then, though, old Saint Luke had taken off with my woman. He didn’t leave no forwarding address. Guess he was afraid if I showed up, she’d leave him for a real man.”
Katie didn’t believe for an instant the scenario of betrayal Tommy was painting. How dare he cast Luke as the bad guy, she thought, when he’d been left behind to deal with another of Tommy’s debacles.
“Luke Cassidy is more of a man than you’ll ever be,” she snapped, losing her fragile grip on her patience exactly as she had sworn to herself she wouldn’t.
Tommy shook his head, his expression filled with pity. “What kind of real man would take another man’s leavings?”
Stunned by the crude remark, Katie simply stared, then said softly, “I wonder how the judge will react when he hears how highly you think of this son you claim to love?”
Gesturing toward the street with the hose and not one bit concerned that she had splattered Tommy in the process, she glared at him. “I think you’d better get out of here, after all.”
Tommy didn’t budge. “I came to see my boy and I’m not going anywhere until I do.”
“He’s not here,” she said, thanking God that Mrs. Jeffers hadn’t brought Robby home from the park yet. “If you want to see him, you’ll have to call Luke and make arrangements with him.”
“And exactly where would I find my saintly brother? Inside? Surely he hasn’t gone off and abandoned you in the middle of the honeymoon,” he said nastily.
Exhibiting astonishing restraint, Katie refused to rise to the bait. “He has an office in the new building next door to the bank. You’ll find him there.”
Tommy appeared ready to offer some gloating observation on that, but before he could, Luke appeared around the side of the house. Taking in the situation at a glance, he strolled directly to Katie’s side. As if it were the most natural thing in the world, he slipped an arm around her waist and dropped an affectionate kiss on her cheek. “Hey, darlin’, I see we have company.”
All at once Tommy didn’t seem quite so sure of himself. His cocky demeanor visibly faltered for an instant, showing a fleeting glimpse of vulnerability. Suddenly thoughtful, Katie wondered if Luke recognized it. A glance at his expression told her nothing.
It hardly mattered because the change in Tommy’s manner didn’t last. Within seconds his jaunty, arrogant facade was back in place, leaving Katie to wonder if she’d only imagined that hint of uncertainty.
“Hey, big brother, your new bride and I were just getting reacquainted.”
He managed to add a suggestive note to the comment that struck Katie as dangerous given Luke’s already taxed patience with him.
“Is that right?” Luke said.
Luke studied Katie’s face intently as if looking for some sign that there’d been trouble between her and his brother. She wasn’t about to add to the stress of the situation by declaring that Tommy Cassidy was deliberately showing signs of behaving even more despicably than she’d thought possible.
Nor did she want to discuss the startling hint of compassion she’d felt for him minutes earlier when she’d spotted that uncertainty in his eyes. His attitude and the faint evidence of an inner turmoil struck her as being very much at odds. She wasn’t certain yet which was the real Tommy. She did know that they all needed time to find out for sure.
Hoping to buy some of that time, she said mildly, “Tommy was on his way to your office to see about making arrangements to see Robby.”
Katie felt Luke’s entire body tense.
“Sorry, that’s not possible,” he said flatly, leaving no room for compromise.
Color flooded Tommy’s cheeks. “Dammit, you can’t keep me away from my boy.”
“I can and I will, unless a judge tells me I have to do otherwise,” Luke replied matter-of-factly.
Tommy’s mouth twisted and his expression turned ugly. “You’ll be sorry, Luke. When the shoe’s on the other foot and you come begging to see Robby, I’ll remember this day, and I’ll see that you regret turning me away.”
Katie decided enough was enough. Tempers were bound to escalate into a nasty scene if this went on much longer. Swallowing her own anger, she said, “Maybe you both should cool down. Why don’t we go inside and talk this over like reasonably mature adults?”
“There’s nothing to talk over,” Luke declared.
“Nothing,” Tommy agreed.
“Well, isn’t that just peachy,” Katie retorted. “Who’s going to suffer because the two of you are too pig-headed to compromise? I’ll tell you who. A little boy who doesn’t deserve any of this. Robby’s the innocent party here, and I won’t have him turned into the victim of your two giant-size egos. Now get inside, sit down and talk or I swear I’ll hose you both down until you cool off.” She waved the garden hose in their direction to emphasize the point.
Luke stared at her for the space of a heartbeat, then unexpectedly he grinned, a gleam of admiration in his eyes. The tension in his shoulders eased a bit and he looked at his brother. “Persuasive, isn’t she?”
Even Tommy seemed amused by her threat. When he smiled, the resemblance to Luke was startling.
“A regular hellcat,” Tommy agreed.
“Shall we go inside?” Luke asked.
“I don’t see that we have a lot of choice. I for one don’t relish getting soaked to the skin.”
Katie watched with satisfaction as they walked off together. She didn’t hold out a lot of hope that the negotiations would be peaceful, just that they wouldn’t kill each other. Maybe, given enough time, they would remember what family was supposed to be.
* * *
Luke sat across from his brother at the kitchen table and wondered for the zillionth time how Katie had managed to get the two of them inside. Surely neither he nor Tommy had actually felt threatened by that spray of water she’d been waving around. Maybe they both knew in their guts that she was right, that it was time to start talking calmly before this entire custody mess got completely out of hand. At any rate, he had to admire her audacity in forcing them to the bargaining table. If only she had come inside to keep peace, he thought as he studied Tommy warily.
Because he couldn’t decide what to say, Luke got to his feet, went to the refrigerator and grabbed a pitcher of iced tea. Holding it out, he asked, “Want some?”
Tommy shook his head. “You got any beer in there?”
Luke pulled a bottle out and handed it to him without comment. He kept his opinion of drinking before noon to himself. When Tommy saw Luke watching him swig down a huge gulp, he said defensively,
“It’s hot as blazes out there.”
“Sure is,” Luke agreed readily. Determined to stay on neutral turf, he asked, “So, tell me, are you still working over in Birmingham?”
Tommy shook his head. “The job was a dead end. I thought I might go to Alaska. I hear you can make great money up there and it’s gotta be cooler than this. I’m tired of being steamed like a piece of broccoli from May through October.”
“Pretty damned cold up there come February, especially for a little boy,” Luke said.
The comment seemed to startle Tommy, as if he’d forgotten all about the fact that he claimed he wanted his son with him. His reaction only confirmed Luke’s suspicion that what Tommy really wanted was a financial stake either to get him started in Alaska or to keep him from having to work anywhere for a while.
“But I’ll bet he’d love all that snow,” Tommy finally countered. “You ever seen snow, big brother? Oh, wait, what am I thinking about? You probably go skiing at least twice a winter in Aspen, don’t you?”
“I’ve never been skiing in my life,” Luke retorted. “Besides, what the hell does that have to do with anything?”
Before Tommy could snap out a reply to that, Katie strolled through the door. She glanced hopefully from one to the other, but apparently she didn’t like what she saw.
“Haven’t you two settled anything yet?”
Luke scowled. Tommy glared.
“Terrific,” she commented wearily. “Now you’re not even talking.” Suddenly she brightened. “Then again, maybe that’s an improvement. I’ll do the talking.”
“Give it a rest, Katie,” Luke warned quietly. “I think Tommy has made himself clear here. His terms are unacceptable.”
“What terms?” Katie said.
“Money.”
Tommy shot to his feet. “I never said a damned thing about wanting your money.”
“But that’s the bottom line, isn’t it? That’s what the crack about Aspen was all about, right? You want what you think I have. You just don’t want to be bothered working for it they way I did.”
For an instant Tommy’s outraged expression gave way to something sad and lonely. Luke was taken aback by that stark look in his brother’s eyes. Was there even a remote chance that he’d gotten it wrong after all?
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