The Texas Billionaire’s Bride

by Crystal Green

  But what else was he going to do? Keep going backward instead of moving on?

  When he didn’t react right away, Melanie stopped touching him, starting up the car instead and then backing it out of the driveway for the spin he wanted her to take.

  And although her acceptance of this latest present gratified him, it was the afterburn of her fingers on his skin that kept him going.

  Move on, he thought as he gave himself over to the idea.

  Because if he was ever going to do it, the time was now.

  Throughout the drive around the neighborhood, Melanie finally accepted that this car was hers, and she acknowledged the magnitude of this bonus that Zane had given her.

  But she was even more overwhelmed by his other gift: the truth about Danielle.

  “I loved her so much that, when she died, it killed most of me, too,” he’d said, and the confession still seared her, like a brand that would always be there.

  She hadn’t expected him to forget about Danielle anytime soon, but when he said that…?

  The words still lingered, becoming darker with the reality of how difficult it would be to love a man with such ghosts.

  Then again, she was used to difficult, wasn’t she? Couldn’t she be up to the challenge of telling him that she loved him enough to work with his demons?

  As she aimed the car back into the driveway of his townhouse, she knew she would never even get the chance, because that would mean coming clean about her own truths.

  But, dammit, she was doing so well as this new person—a decent person—who’d helped Zane and Livie. Couldn’t she continue as Melanie the nanny?

  Couldn’t she avoid beating him back down again by slamming him with the truth of her own past?

  She’d gotten in too deep; yet, she wanted to be here with all her heart and soul. The new Melanie was good for him and his daughter.

  He used a remote to open the door of the stand-alone garage, and she parked next to his personal ride—a black Jaguar that he didn’t drive much. Since he’d already done away with the vehicle she’d been driving before, that left room for her.

  For Melanie Grandy, the woman who would do almost anything for him.

  Almost.

  While she got out, he shut the garage behind them, and she began to walk toward the regular door, which stood opposite the townhouse.

  But then he slid his arm around her waist, turning her to face him and keeping her from going anywhere.

  The contact made her circuits go haywire.

  “Zane, what are you—”

  He stopped her with a soft kiss, and she held on to his arms, leaning into him, helpless.

  Every nerve ending seemed to short out, sparking her skin as he kept his mouth against hers while she talked.

  “What are you doing?” she murmured.

  “Kissing you.”

  Oh, not a good idea, she thought as she went pliant under another kiss—soft, tender. She was going to be a pool of nothing in another second.

  When he came up from her, he smiled, and there was something like hope in his eyes.

  And that hope kept her in his arms, because she hadn’t seen such a thing in him before; she knew that she helped to put it there.

  “There’s no need to remind me that we said we wouldn’t have anything more to do with each other.” He pressed his mouth against her ear. “But dammit, Melanie.”

  No, dammit, Zane.

  Their discussion in the car had been an opportunity to relieve himself of feelings he’d been containing for a long time. And when Melanie had touched him, comforting him, he’d probably seen that as…

  Well, she wasn’t sure. She hadn’t meant to escalate anything, only to make him feel better.

  But now, as he ran his lips around her ear, heating it with his tight breaths, she thought that his body was taking the place of the other gifts. He was expressing his thanks in a much more physical way that she wasn’t able to resist.

  Yet she had to.

  “We should stop,” she said, knowing where their kiss had ended up the last time.

  Hardly stopping, he pressed his lips against her jaw, her cheek, working his way back toward her mouth.

  As she nearly swayed under the flow of feeling, she recalled when he’d told her about being with no other women since Danielle. She’d been shocked, but it also made such sense. Zane had been closed; but now, with her, he could release everything he’d kept back.

  She’d been the one who brought that out in him. The new Melanie Grandy.

  Didn’t that count for anything at all? Shouldn’t that allow her to enjoy his kisses, his…

  His everything?

  Guilt still reared up and made her draw away, even if her body hated her for it.

  But he kept a hold on her hands. “I keep thinking about the first time with us. I can’t forget.”

  “Same here, but…”

  Lord, there were too many “but”s to bring up.

  “Hey. You just got shyer on me. You do that sometimes.” He tipped a finger under her chin. “What’re you all about, Melanie Grandy?”

  A flush shot through her, from neck to chest. He wanted her to talk about herself, didn’t he?

  Oh, no.

  “You’re the one who interviewed me,” she said. “You’ve already got the answers.”

  “Hardly.”

  As much as she wanted to stay away from the subject altogether, she knew that Zane wouldn’t be happy until she offered him a little bit of her.

  Yet, what would she do when he wanted more?

  She couldn’t think about that right now. “I’ve always been a tad shy, even though you might not know it.”

  “No, your bashful streak is there, all right.”

  He skimmed his fingers over her cheek, and she almost lost it.

  “I was just never the dating-around type, I suppose.” She shrugged, willing to tell him this much, but intending to skip over the section of her past where she went on a few innocent dates, all right, but she’d done it mainly to avoid going home to that double-wide trailer. “There’re only a couple guys of note. One in high school—puppy love.”

  “Was he your first?” Zane asked, looking amused.

  She was glad to see that this conversation at least cheered him, taking him far away from the memory of Danielle.

  “Yes,” she said. “I thought he was it for me. But it didn’t turn out that way after he went off to college.”

  “I was with a few girls in high school before Danielle came along. Then…”

  The shadows started coming back, and she fought to fend them off.

  “My second ‘big thing’ was a guy in Vegas,” she offered.

  And…yes: success.

  The shadows fell away from his gaze and she smiled, encouraging a growing light in his eyes again; it caused that love she’d named only yesterday to swell up through her chest, making her feel elevated.

  He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. “What about that guy in Vegas?”

  “He wasn’t the one.”

  The words just hung there, as filmy and sticky as a web to avoid.

  But he seemed to get caught in it, maybe even translating her message as it was meant to be: Zane was the one—a man like no other. Yet there was no way she could say it out loud.

  With a passion that made her pull in a breath, he held her against him, reaching over to lock the garage door at the same time.

  Oh, no.

  Oh, yes.

  She wanted this more than anything, and once again she was starting to forget all the reasons they’d stayed apart.

  “You know about the Fourth of July charity event at Tall Oaks?” he asked, as he inched her shirt out of the shorts she was wearing.

  She nodded, unable to do anything else.

  “I’d be happy if you’d be by my side to help me see to the details,” he said, running his thumbs up and down her stomach.

  Although she could hardly think at all, she thought he mi
ght be asking her to be a hostess.

  Was he?

  Did he want her to be out on the lawn at Tall Oaks with him and all his friends and family?

  Half of her panicked, but the other half was encompassed and embraced in a way she’d never felt before.

  “Be there with me,” he said, moving in back of her, one hand staying on her belly. “And be with me here, Melanie. I’m ready for it. I swear.”

  But was she ready?

  As his hands traveled up to cup her breasts she gasped, leaning back against him.

  Such a bad idea, she kept thinking, but only because she was still hiding so much of herself from him. Yet, if he only knew who she’d been, he would drop her.

  And from this height, she wouldn’t be able to stand the fall.

  He kissed her neck, sending lightning bolts of heat through her, and soon he had her clothes off, exploring every inch of her body.

  His, she thought. She was all his.

  She turned around, helping him with his clothing, too, as he backed her toward the backseat of her new car.

  Suddenly, she felt like a teenager—giddy and fresh and a little afraid of what was going to come next.

  But it was that newness that made her think that this could work—that they were both starting out together in a different direction. That they were going to try their damnedest to turn everything around and be the family they’d both been lacking.

  As he eased her down to the backseat—the upholstery leather soft, smooth and creamy—he used his fingers to prepare her, even though it didn’t take long, because she was already there.

  And after he got a condom out of his wallet, slid it on and then slipped into Melanie, she cried out, softly, joyfully.

  Whole. This is what it’s like to have every missing part come together.

  All those parts swirled, whirling up and blasting through everything in their path, as the two of them moved together, blazing, zooming, driving…

  Delivering her with a crash to that new place she’d been hoping for.

  Chapter Ten

  As the Fourth of July approached, Melanie, Zane and Livie returned to Tall Oaks to see to the last of the party details for the annual Dallas Children’s Hospital charity event.

  Although Melanie claimed the guest room again, she didn’t stay there at night.

  Rather, she spent every hour possible with Zane, just as they’d been doing ever since that day when they’d decided they couldn’t stand to be apart.

  Everything else had fallen into place after their reunion: Livie continued to grow closer to her nanny, and there were even times when Melanie felt more like a mother to her than a caretaker. And unlike her “previous life,” Melanie now felt financially secure—or actually, she felt secure, plain and simple.

  It all had to do with the fact that she was in love with Zane, though neither of them had said it yet.

  But she felt it, and that was a good enough start.

  On the afternoon of the charity event, Melanie flitted around anxiously, checking with Mrs. Howe regarding how they would handle people who wished to tour the Victorian mansion, and putting her head together with Scott, the cook, about catering arrangements, then going over logistics one more time with Zane’s assistant, Cindy.

  Initially, Melanie had approached the situation with an acute awareness that nannies didn’t usually take over like this. But if the others thought it odd, no one said anything, maybe because they saw that Melanie only wanted to be as helpful as she could.

  With everything in place now, she calmed herself by giving one last inspection to the house and, finally, the sitting room: the pastoral oil landscape on the wall, the organ in the corner, the bars of Sassy, the canary’s, cage.

  Maybe the bird had picked up on the change in the household, because it was singing at the moment, tweeting away and making Melanie laugh.

  She glanced around the new and improved interior of Tall Oaks. There hadn’t been enough time to restore the paintings on the ceilings, but the rest of the place gleamed more than it had before.

  Danielle would’ve been proud, Melanie thought, feeling a connection with the woman, although Zane had told her that his first wife had only used Tall Oaks on some weekends. He’d sold their main house following her death.

  The notion smoothed out Melanie’s smile until Livie bounded into the room.

  The little girl was already set to celebrate, and she was so cute, with that light dusting of freckles over the bridge of her nose and the dimples she’d started to show more and more, that she could’ve melted the polar ice cap. She wore a prim pink sundress, her dark, wavy hair in a low, understated ponytail. Her outfit matched the occasion—a fancy Texas cocktail party, complete with steaks and all the trimmings.

  “I smell like sunscreen,” Livie said.

  “You’ll need it out there.” Melanie wiped at a streak of white on Livie’s cheek. “Even if we’re going to be in those big tents most of the time, I want to make sure you’re covered.”

  “And when are you getting ready? I can’t wait to see you. You’ll be the prettiest lady there.”

  Although Melanie thanked Livie, she highly doubted it. The cream of the social crop would be present today, and her stomach kept turning at the thought of mingling with them and having them realize that, truthfully, she didn’t really belong.

  Had she only been fooling herself with Zane, while they’d stayed pretty much to themselves in Dallas? Would any of these new, genuinely elegant people see an area of her own personality that hadn’t been polished enough?

  Would they know where she’d really come from?

  But when Livie took her nanny’s hand, leading her toward the stairs and her room to get ready, Melanie thought that where she’d been didn’t matter as much as where she was now.

  When they came to the upstairs guest room, Melanie said, “Did you put sunscreen on your arms, Livie?”

  The child wrinkled her nose and marched off toward the bathroom where the lotion was kept. “Aw, Ms. Grandy.”

  “Aw, Livie. Please do it. I’ll be checking.”

  She grinned at the girl, then closed her door just after Livie returned the smile and marched down the hallway.

  That left Melanie alone with the blue cocktail dress that hung from a hook inside the closet door. It was one of the pieces Zane had purchased for her during the makeover, and there’d been no occasion to wear it since.

  Yet, now Melanie sloughed off her regular-girl shirt and shorts, going to the dress, slipping into it. Then she fixed her hair as the stylist had taught her during the makeover, applying cosmetics just as carefully, too.

  As she stood in front of a full-length mirror, going over herself as she’d gone over the final arrangements for the party itself, she heard her door open, then close.

  Zane eased up behind her, holding her to him, and her body went crazy with heat.

  “I’m not going to be able to take my eyes off you,” he whispered into her ear.

  The sight of him snuggling with her in the mirror made her weak in the knees. “You’d best try, Zane. Among the other guests, you’ve got a hoard of business associates who paid a thousand dollars per ticket.”

  “Forget business.”

  He kissed her in the sensitive place between her ear and neck, and although she trembled, she knew he wouldn’t forget business. He’d taken some unprecedented days away from the Dallas office, but he still brought contracts and other stacks of paper with him.

  It was almost as if work was the one thing he couldn’t leave behind at all.

  Yet, he would come out of that, she thought, optimistic until the end. She was going to make sure he saw that his workaholic nature was to blame for his hiding away from Livie, and that he would never go back there again.

  It was still something to work on, but they would succeed, just as she’d always tried so hard to do herself.

  He was watching her in the mirror, and she reached back to brush her fingertips over his cheek.<
br />
  “I wish we had more time before we have to go down to the party,” she said.

  “Same here.” He kissed her jaw. “You’re perfect, so perfect, Melanie, but I can’t help thinking that there’s just one thing missing.” He smiled against her neck. “Where’s that bracelet?”

  She’d accepted all his gifts by now, and she went to fetch this one from a drawer, taking it out of the box and bringing it back to him so he could help her with the clasp.

  In front of the mirror, he took the bracelet, coaxed the diamonds around her wrist and, oh, dear Lord, the lovely weight of them shimmered, just like the future she’d always aimed for.

  “And…” he said, taking another small box out of his suit pocket.

  He lifted the lid to reveal a pair of diamond earrings.

  She should have been over the moon for them, and she smiled as if she were, but she couldn’t stop thinking about how he was still offering these gifts, when all she wanted was to hear a simple “I love you” instead.

  Melanie held back a sigh. She wouldn’t push it, because when that day came, she would come face-to-face with having to tell him about her past. She didn’t see how any kind of life-long relationship could survive without that happening.

  She would have to make a choice—one she was struggling with even now—because the last thing she wanted was to lose him.

  Which, thanks to her, might happen either way.

  As fear clutched at Melanie, Zane turned her toward the mirror, clipping the earrings on her lobes, then resting his hands on her shoulders.

  “How did I get so lucky?” he asked.

  “I’m the lucky one.” Meaning that with a profundity that shook her, she leaned her head against his.

  They stayed like that for a moment, before he guided her away from the mirror and toward the door.

  “My family’s in the dining room,” he said. “They’re looking forward to meeting you.”

  Melanie wound her arm through his, trying not to be nervous. She wondered exactly what he’d told his dad and brothers about her, because she and Zane hadn’t broached the subject yet. There’d been a lot of last-second prep for this event, a lot of time spent with Livie.