Making a futile effort to brush the mud from his shirt and slacks, Curt made his way back to the château.
Katie questioned him with troubled eyes.
“He’s gone and I’ve got the film. He won’t bother us again.”
“How can you be sure?” she asked.
“Let’s just say ol’ Bernie and I had a heart-to-heart chat. From now on there’ll be one less paparazzi dogging my steps.”
Kathryn wiped a streak of mud from his cheek with her fingertips, wishing she could eliminate the sadness from her heart as easily. The realization that dreams have to end had suddenly struck home. “Are you hurt?”
“Who? Me? The original superjock?” His smile was a weak imitation of his usual heart-stopping grin. “Give me a couple of minutes to clean up and make a few phone calls. By the time I’m through, this trip of ours will have been erased from living memory.”
“Erased?”
“Completely forgotten. The press will be able to dig all they want, but this weekend in France won’t have happened. You weren’t here and neither was I. Not driving around in a limousine. Not at the hotel or having dinner. And not here at the château. It didn’t happen.” He gazed at her so intently, and she wondered if he was feeling regret for the weekend...or for the fact they would have to deny they had shared the most romantic, passionate weekend she could imagine. “No one will be able to link our names together, Katie. I promise you that.”
Kathryn knew she should be pleased by Curt’s efforts to keep her name and picture out of the tabloids. And she was. But that didn’t mean she would ever forget this weekend with Curt. Each moment was indelibly etched in her memory and would always be there when she needed to remember what it was like to freely love someone...and be loved in return.
But now the dream was over. Kathryn couldn’t possibly live in the fishbowl that delineated Curt’s public life. Because of his position and wealth, she doubted the press would ever allow him the kind of privacy she needed as a barrier against prying eyes.
* * *
THERE SEEMED LITTLE to say on the tiring flight back to Los Angeles, and even less conversation occurred during the taxi ride to Rudy’s hospital. Contemplating her future consumed all of Kathryn’s energy.
“What do you mean, we aren’t going to see each other again?” Curt demanded in a low, angry voice.
Kathryn hurried down the hospital corridor toward Rudy’s room, making a real effort not to let any part of Curt’s body brush against hers. Not even accidentally. The resolve she’d so carefully, thoughtfully made on the flight home would be too easily shattered if he were to touch her once again.
“Last time I checked,” she said, “you had a pretty good grasp of the English language. We’re going to see Rudy, hopefully have a chance to meet Antoinette and then we’re going to go our separate ways.”
“No.” He snagged her by the arm. “After what we had together in Paris—”
She whirled on him, her body responding in unwelcome, heated ways to the feel of his hand. “Don’t you remember? The weekend didn’t happen. It was all an illusion. And it’s better that way.”
“Why? Tell me why, damn it! We can work things out. I won’t let them put your picture in the paper.”
He was in her face, so close she couldn’t look away, couldn’t breathe without filling her nostrils with his spicy scent, couldn’t think, yet she knew she had to remain clearheaded.
“How can you guarantee that, Curt? By paying off every photographer in the country? Nobody has that much money.”
She wrenched herself free of his grasp and shoved through the door to Rudy’s room. There was no possible way Curt could understand. Only a woman could comprehend the pain of being the subject of vicious gossip—the vindictive words that flayed a person’s soul, the mean-spirited conversations that placed a lasting brand on a person’s spirit. As much as she might wish it were otherwise, Kathryn simply couldn’t put herself in that position again.
The tender scene she discovered in the hospital room easily excused the tears in her eyes.
“Madame Bilou?”
The older woman had to force her loving gaze away from Rudy to respond to Kathryn’s greeting. In spite of her silver hair and a face laced with wrinkles, there was a youthful glow to Antoinette’s cheeks, as one might expect when a woman of any age was in love.
“My dear,” she said. “You must be Kathryn. Rudy has told me so much about you and I am so grateful...” Without finishing her thought, she extended a slender, veined hand across the hospital bed. “Merci. For being his friend. For making it possible for me to be at his side when he needed me.”
Awed by the frail delicacy of the woman, Kathryn said, “Actually, it was Curt’s idea and his plane. I can’t take the credit for bringing you to the States so quickly.”
She nodded graciously, then shifted her attention to Curt.
With European panache, he bent over the back of Antoinette’s hand, brushing a kiss. “Madame, now that I have seen you, I can understand why Rudy has waited for you all these years.”
A flush rose up her cheeks. “You are most kind, young man.”
Kathryn leaned over to kiss Rudy on the cheek. “How are you?”
“Never better, my chérie. My Annie, foolish woman that she is, has consented to marry me when I am released from the hospital. The doctors say we will be able to set the date soon.”
“I’m happy for you, Rudy. For both of you.” She fought the painful press of tears that threatened to spill over onto her cheeks. A chance lost is one you may never have again. After all these years, Rudy and Antoinette were lucky to have found each other. Kathryn didn’t expect she’d be given a second chance with Curt. Yet abject terror of what others might think, of what being in the spotlight would mean, imprisoned her as surely as the bars of a cage.
“We want you to be there, chérie,” Rudy said. “When we marry.”
“I know no one else in America,” Antoinette admitted, almost shyly. “I would hope you would stand with me?”
“Of course.” Emotion thickened in Kathryn’s throat. “You two need to have some time together. I just wanted to be sure...”
Kathryn couldn’t deal with such overwhelming happiness, such enduring love. She bolted from the room on a wave of panic. She was going to lose Curt. Her heart was breaking, yet she couldn’t face what loving him would mean. With all of his wonderful attributes, he was still a millionaire playboy, the apple of the tabloid’s eye. She couldn’t change him, and wouldn’t if she had the chance.
He caught up with her halfway down the hallway.
“You can’t leave. Not like this,” he insisted, keeping pace with her hurried footsteps. “I won’t let you.”
“You’re too bossy, Creighton. You ought to do something about that irritating habit.” She kept on walking, her eyes straight ahead, praying he wouldn’t stop her with his hand, or a soft word, because she wasn’t sure she could resist his magnetic personality, his overpowering masculinity. Not when she wanted to bury herself in his embrace, forget the reasons why they had no future together.
He planted himself in front of her. “Where are you going?”
“I’m...I’m going to see my father.” She looked up at Curt with an expression she knew was stunned. She didn’t know where those words had come from, yet she knew they were true. The time had come for her to face her past.
“I’ll come with you.”
She shook her head. “I have to do this on my own.”
His hand slid along her neck and his fingers wove into her hair at her nape. “You don’t have to do this alone. I can be there for you.”
“Not this time, Curt.”
“Afterward...what about us?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted, vacillating between wanting to follow her heart and knowing she ought to listen to the warnings in her head. “I simply don’t know.”
“A few minutes ago you were giving me a straight no. I’ll take a maybe as an improv
ement.”
She wrapped her fingers around his wrist. “I can’t make any promises, Curt.”
He lowered his head, crushing her lips with a kiss he hoped she’d remember for a long time. Loving someone was harder work than he had anticipated. He had to let her go even though every instinct in his body shouted at him to never let Katie out of his sight.
He tasted the sweet flavor of her mouth and let her taste him, hoping this kiss wouldn’t be their last. She was right to recognize that some things simply couldn’t be bought. She was one of them. Yet he’d willingly give her every dime he had if she would be his.
With matching sighs, they broke the kiss.
“You’ll call if you need me?” he asked, surprised he could find his voice past the thickness in his throat.
She nodded, but without a great deal of conviction.
“I’ll wait.” For as long as Rudy had waited for his Antoinette, if he had to.
With a small sound that might have been a sob, Kathryn slipped from his grasp and hurried down the corridor.
Curt waited for a few minutes, holding on to some crazy hope she’d reappear through the door she had just exited. He closed his eyes and pictured her in Paris. Her beautiful smile, her excitement. The way her hair had caught the rays of the setting sun. The passion with which she had made love.
God, but he wanted a chance to have a thousand more weekends like that—in Paris, or London, or New York. Even right here in L.A. It didn’t matter where, as long as he was with his sweet Katie.
When Curt finally left the hospital, he was met in the parking lot by Tom Weston and two uniformed police officers. A shimmer of unease sped down his spine.
“What’s up?” he asked his attorney.
“Just do what this officer tells you, Curt. Don’t say anything without me being present and I’ll have you out on bail as soon as I can.”
* * *
BY THE TIME Kathryn crested Gorman Pass and headed down into the San Joaquin Valley, she missed Curt desperately. Flying along the highway, she ached with wanting him. As she passed almond trees that had dropped their leaves in gentle mounds of gold that stretched the length of the orchards, she thought about Curt’s infectious smile, the way his cheeks creased and how his eyes sparkled with amusement...or darkened with passion. She remembered his wit and charm.
Traveling the main street of Waverly she tried to conjure up the faces of the boys she had dated, but the only image that came to her was Curt. He was no groping, fumbling adolescent who made love as if it was a speed race. With Curt, time was endless, a series of wonderfully weightless moments that blurred into a cloud of sensual delight. He had loved her with practiced skill, almost with reverence. Her every erogenous zone had been explored by him with precise accuracy.
And she knew him almost as well.
He was funny and smart. He offered shelter to wannabe starlets and kept a factory open in a small town in Alabama for sentimental rather than profitable reasons, honoring his mother’s memory. He liked to fly kites and drive fast. He was, quite simply, a good man. Probably the best she’d ever met.
And darn it all, she loved him.
She’d never felt anything more strongly than she did the empowering emotion of her love for Curt.
It didn’t much matter what anyone else thought, or if every time she glanced at a tabloid she’d see her own face staring back at her. She wasn’t going to sneak around trying to hide her relationship with Curt. Let others gossip all they like. She was going to love Curt Creighton for as long as he wanted her. She only hoped it would be for a lifetime.
But the truth was, she realized with considerable trepidation, she didn’t know how Curt felt about her. So much of the time his attitude seemed cavalier, that of a confirmed bachelor playboy. Yet she’d seen glimpses of his more serious side, that part of his personality that was even more appealing than his sexy grin.
A long time ago she’d been misled by guys who whispered a few sweet words in her ear...and by her own need to be loved. Curt’s whirlwind efforts to seduce her might offer no more commitment than an adolescent’s inexperienced gropings.
Dear God, how would she ever know for sure?
* * *
THE IVY-COVERED HOUSE where Kathryn had grown up was two blocks from Main Street, the biggest home on the block. She remembered how carefully her mother had tended the garden and her father’s pride of ownership, the way he’d repainted the white trim around the windows almost every year. After her mother’s death, Kathryn’s father had seemed so distant, so unable to give her the love she needed that she had foolishly searched elsewhere. Maybe he’d always been that way. Or maybe, she considered for the first time, he’d been dealing with his own grief and simply didn’t know how to handle a teenage daughter.
She pulled her VW Rabbit into the driveway beside the old weeping willow tree that shaded the house. Taking a deep breath, she headed for the porch.
The screen door burst open and a young woman with strawberry-blond hair appeared. A youthful twenty-five-year-old, she hesitated at the top step. “Kathryn?”
“It’s me, all right. Your prodigal sister home at last.” Smiling, she opened her arms wide. How she’d regretted leaving her sister when she’d been young and motherless, and wouldn’t have if their father hadn’t barred her from the house. “My goodness but you’ve grown up, Alice. Whatever happened to your braces?”
With a laugh, Alice flew down the steps and into Kathryn’s embrace. “And what happened to those tight jeans and those awful cutoff tops you used to wear that gave Dad such a fit? In that suit, you look like you just stepped out of a corporate boardroom.”
“It’s my dress-for-success look so I can impress Dad. I outgrew those particular jeans years ago.” She’d outgrown a lot of things, Kathryn realized, without even being aware it had happened. Most importantly, she’d outgrown her need to please her father, or even to rebel against his dictates. She was finally her own person—and hoped her father could accept her that way.
Perhaps the seed of her independence had been planted when she’d been forced to go out on her own. Surely the roots had grown through all the struggles Kathryn had faced. But it was Curt, she realized, who had finally allowed the seed of self-assurance to bloom. How odd, now that she had found a full measure of self-confidence as a woman, she would need Curt all the more, knowing she was finally a match for him.
After she and Alice had thoroughly scrutinized each other, Kathryn asked, “Where’s Dad?”
“Inside. He’s been a nervous wreck ever since you called to say you were coming. I think he’s scared.”
“Scared?” Kathryn was the one who had spent years frightened of this moment. Until now.
Alice nodded. “Afraid you’re still mad at him, I suppose.”
She hooked her arm at her little sister’s elbow and they walked up the steps together. “No, not mad. Not anymore.”
He was standing in the entryway—thinner than she remembered, his long-sleeve sport shirt hanging from narrow shoulders. The gauntness in his face emphasized his Roman nose. What little hair he had left was almost solidly gray. He’d grown old while Kathryn had been away, and she could see years of regret etched in the lines of his face. Opportunities lost.
“Daddy.” The word caught in her throat.
“I’m sorry, Kathryn. I’m so very sorry.”
Relief cleansed years of hurt like a wave washes away unwanted debris from a beach. “It’s all right, Daddy. Everything’s all right.”
“You weren’t gone a half hour before I realized how wrong I’d been to send you away. I went looking for you. I scoured this whole town. You’d vanished. Thank God...”
Through the blur of her own emotion, Kathryn saw the tears in her father’s eyes before he hugged her. He wasn’t the intimidating man he used to be. Or maybe she’d grown up enough to accept her father with all of his human frailties. Still, it felt good to have his loving arms around her again after all these years.
&nbs
p; * * *
THEY TALKED LONG PAST midnight—about Alice studying to get her secondary teaching credential at Fresno State University and having a gentleman friend who owned his own business, about the financial problems facing a local bank, and about Kathryn’s work and law-school studies. They talked about the baby she’d given up for adoption and where she might be.
Sometimes they laughed. A couple of times they cried. Mostly they tried to relive the past twelve years in a single evening.
The next morning, Kathryn’s father and sister were already eating breakfast when she got up. As she poured herself a cup of coffee, she glanced past her father to the television.
To her surprise, the familiar face of Curt Creighton, looking grim and haggard, gazed back at her. For an instant she thought she was hallucinating.
“...millionaire playboy has been arrested,” the announcer said.
She turned up the volume.
“What’s wrong?” her father asked.
“I need to hear this.”
“The alleged attempted rape and brutal beating of Ms. Kellogg is said to have occurred over the weekend, although no specific details have been released as yet. Through his attorney—” a picture of Tom Weston flashed on the screen “—Mr. Creighton has denied the allegations but has not offered an alibi as to his whereabouts during the time in question. In a recent court case, Ms. Kellogg—”
Kathryn snapped off the TV. “That woman’s crazy! Nobody will believe Curt would do a thing like that. He wasn’t anywhere near—”
“You know Curt Creighton?” Alice asked, her voice excited. “A guy with that much money? And a hunk, too?”
“Not only do I know him, I’m his alibi. We spent the weekend together.” She felt an instant punch of unease as she glanced at her father, worried about his disapproval, then shrugged off the sensation. Old habits die hard.
“Wow!” Alice exclaimed. “You’ve come a long way, Sis. Where were you?”
“We were in France helping out a friend.” But, she suddenly realized, Curt had fixed it so their trip would be darn hard to prove. Obviously he was trying to keep her name out of the paper or he would have already offered his alibi. In the process he was jeopardizing his freedom. If that wasn’t proof of his love, she didn’t know what would be.
How To Marry A Millionaire (For Richer, For Poorer) Page 16