by Gina Wilkins
But Trent wasn’t Preston, a tiny voice reminded her.
Leaving the kitchen sparkling behind her, she moved into the bedroom. The bedclothes were unusually tangled—as if he’d spent a restless night too. She swallowed hard before stripping the bed and spreading clean sheets over the thick, firm mattress. She tried to keep her attention focused on her work, tried to think of this bed as just one of the many she stripped and changed each day, but it wasn’t easy.
This was Trent McBride’s bed.
By the time she finished cleaning and left Trent’s house, she was exhausted. And she still had a full day’s work ahead of her.
It caught her completely by surprise when she ran into Trent at the law firm late that afternoon. They arrived at almost the same time, Annie toting her cleaning supplies, Trent carrying a thick roll of what appeared to be building plans. There was an awkward moment at the entrance when neither of them seemed to know what to do or say, and then Trent reached out to open the door for her.
“Thank you,” she said.
He nodded and followed her in.
Trevor and Caleb were standing by the coffeemaker in the lobby. They looked up and smiled when Annie and Trent entered. After a round of greetings, Caleb motioned toward Trevor’s office. “We’ll have our meeting in there,” he told Trent. “Get yourself a cup of coffee and come on in. Annie, when you’re ready to work in there just kick us out.”
“Feel free to have some coffee yourself, Annie,” Trevor added. “Or there are soft drinks in the fridge, if you prefer.”
“Thank you, but I’m fine. I’ll just get to work.”
Trevor took a small step closer to her, studying her face with a perceptiveness that made her self-conscious. “Are you feeling well, Annie? Forgive me, but you look tired.”
Aware of Trent’s somber gaze on her, she made an effort to smile. “Thank you for asking, but I’m fine. Really.”
“You should take it easy this weekend,” Caleb advised, his tone kindly paternal. “Get some rest.”
She turned her smile on him. “I will,” she promised, though her weekend was already heavily scheduled.
Nodding in satisfaction, Caleb preceded his sons into Trevor’s office. Trevor followed; Trent lingered for a moment in the lobby, still frowning at Annie. “You look like hell. Are you trying to work yourself into the hospital?” he growled.
She straightened defensively, her chin lifting. “I’m quite capable of taking care of myself, thank you.”
“Yeah? You wouldn’t know it from looking at you.”
She hadn’t left her father and Preston only to allow another man to boss her around. “Go to your meeting, Trent. I have a job to do.”
Far from satisfied, he spun on one heel and stalked into his brother’s office. Feeling as if she’d held her own with him at least this once, she busied herself with her work.
The meeting broke up just before Annie finished cleaning the rest of the offices and bathrooms. Caleb and Trevor told her good-night as they left. Trent followed them out in stony silence. Only then, allowing her shoulders to sag a bit, did Annie clean Trevor’s office and call it a day. She gathered her things and headed out to the parking lot, just wanting to get home, find something to eat, then crash.
A hand fell on her shoulder just as she reached the back of her car. She started and almost dropped her gear. “Darn it, Trent, you nearly gave me a heart attack,” she complained, recognizing him with a mixture of relief and consternation.
“We aren’t finished with our talk.”
Annoyed that he was still growling at her—just who did he think he was, anyway?—she opened the trunk of her car and hefted her things inside. “Maybe you aren’t finished, but I am. I have things to do.”
“Another house to clean? A couple of piano lessons to give?”
“I might even give my car a lube job and rotate the tires when I’m finished.”
“Cute.”
“Thank you.” She opened her car door without looking at him. “Good night, Trent.”
He reached out to take her arm, holding her in place. “Damn it, Annie, wait a minute.”
“Why? So you can tell me again that I’m working too hard? Kiss me one minute and yell at me the next? I don’t think so.”
“Will you just calm down? All I’m saying is—”
Stress and weariness combined to make her reckless. “Maybe I don’t want to calm down. Stop telling me what to do.”
“Now you’re being completely unreasonable. I’m trying to convince you that if you don’t slow down, you’re going to collapse. How much work will you get done then?”
“Maybe it is unreasonable,” she agreed stubbornly, “but it’s my choice to work as long and as hard as I want. I am perfectly capable of setting my own hours and gauging my own endurance. I don’t need you or my father or anyone planning my life or my hours or my future or—”
His face was very close to hers now. As her voice rose, his had grown softer. “Just because I care whether you work yourself into an early grave—”
“And don’t say I should listen to you because you know what’s best for me. If you knew how many times I’ve heard that—”
“Fine,” he snapped. “Go ahead and kill yourself. I don’t know why I bothered to worry about you.”
Annie opened her mouth to snarl back at him, then suddenly froze. It abruptly occurred to her that their faces were an inch apart, that he had crowded her against the car and now stood so close she could feel the angry heat radiating from him. He was perturbed with her because he cared about her, he had said. As a friend…or something more?
Her silence made him study her suspiciously. “Well?”
She wondered what he would do if she just reached out and pulled his beautiful, frowning mouth to hers. If she threw caution to the wind again—the way the new Annie Stewart was prone to do—and kissed him exactly the way she wanted to kiss him right now. The way she had kissed him last night.
“Stop staring at me,” he muttered, looking suddenly uncertain.
She lifted her gaze from his mouth to meet his eyes. Probably because she knew how he always reacted to the word, she murmured, “It’s really very sweet of you to be concerned about me, Trent.”
Behind his glasses, his eyes narrowed while he tried to decide how to interpret her sudden mood change. “I thought I’d proven to you once and for all that there’s nothing sweet about me.”
“You keep trying,” she conceded with a faint smile. “But, despite all evidence to the contrary, you haven’t completely convinced me yet.”
He laid a hand against the side of her face. He wasn’t smiling. “If you had any sense at all, you’d stay away from me.”
“I’m not the one who was lurking in the parking lot for a confrontation,” she reminded him.
“I wasn’t lurking. I was…waiting.”
“Because you were concerned about me. That’s very—”
He covered her mouth with his before she could say the word sweet.
She didn’t wrap her arms around his neck this time, but placed her hands on his chest, curling her fingers into his shirt and pulling his lips to hers. It only took a little accommodation to make it work between them—physically, at least. She didn’t know if there could ever be anything else for them, but for now it seemed like enough.
After a long time, Trent slowly lifted his head. “Since I know how you feel about me making suggestions for your own good, I guess I shouldn’t remind you again that you really should stay away from me.”
“If you did, I’d only have to tell you again that I make my own choices,” she replied, her hands still resting on his chest.
He nodded as if he’d expected her to say something like that. “Annie, I think you should know that this—”
Her attention was suddenly distracted by a dark vehicle sitting in an empty parking lot across the street. She didn’t know what had made her look that way, but she thought she recognized the car as the one she’
d seen on the road outside Trent’s house.
Noticing her gaze, Trent asked, “What’s wrong?”
“That car across the street—the black one. Do you know who it belongs to?”
Since the vehicle was on his right side, out of his range of vision, he had to turn his head to look. As he did, the car pulled away, disappearing down the otherwise empty street. “I didn’t recognize it,” he said, looking at her again. “Why?”
Feeling a little foolish, she shook her head. “It’s nothing. Just my imagination, I guess.”
“No, that’s not enough explanation. What’s going on?”
“I thought I saw the same car sitting outside your house when I left the other day. The driver sped away then, too, when he saw me looking at him. It could be a different car, I suppose.”
His hands tightened on her forearms. “Someone was watching you while you were alone at my house?”
“I didn’t say that. I said there was a car that looked a lot like that one parked outside your house when I left.”
He was scowling again, but this time his displeasure was not directed toward her. “Maybe we should call Wade.”
She looked amazed that he’d even made the suggestion. “And tell him what? That I saw a car? I doubt the police chief is going to waste his time on something so trivial.”
“I don’t find it at all trivial that someone might be following you around. Do you know who it is? Is there any reason you know of that someone could be watching you?”
“Trent, you’re overreacting. Nothing has happened. It’s probably not even the same car. I shouldn’t have even mentioned it.”
“Yes, you should have. And if you notice anything else at all suspicious—if you have any reason to be concerned—I want you to tell me, you understand? Do you have a cell phone?”
“No. I’d rather spend the money redecorating my house for now.”
He shook his head. “You spend a lot of time driving around town alone. You need a phone for safety reasons. We’ll look into getting you one first thing next week.”
He was doing it again. Making decisions for her, telling her what she should do, as if she wasn’t capable of taking care of herself. Just as too many men had done before him, beginning with her father. Maybe it was her diminutive size that made them think of her as incompetent. “In my next life,” she grumbled, “I’m going to be at least six feet tall.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about your mistaken assumption that I want or need your protection. I want to be your friend, Trent, but I don’t need a hero.”
The word made his jaw harden. “I’m no damn hero.”
She’d stumbled into his insecurities again. Maybe Trent had been treated like a hero at one time—maybe he’d even subconsciously gotten into the habit of thinking of himself in that way—but that had been before the accident. Maybe she should just end this conversation before she put her other foot in her mouth. “I’m hungry. If you’ve finished lecturing me, I’d like to go home now.”
“We could stop at Cora’s—”
She shook her head, deciding to quit while she was at least holding her own, if not ahead. “Not tonight, Trent. I’m really not up to being watched and whispered about tonight.”
“Then I’ll follow you home. Just to make sure you get there all right. And before you start arguing, remember that I have to go that way, anyway.”
She shrugged. “Then I can’t stop you, can I?”
His smile was grim. “No. You can’t.”
She was very aware of him following her as she drove home. He pulled into her driveway behind her, but didn’t get out of his truck. He merely waited until she had unlocked and opened her front door, and then he backed out and drove on. She didn’t try to detain him. She needed some time alone to think.
Did she really want to fall for a man who was rude, moody, temperamental and domineering? No.
Had she fallen for a man like that? She was terribly afraid that she had.
IT TOOK TRENT a long time to fall asleep that night. He did so only after calling himself every synonym for fool that he could remember. When the telephone rang at one in the morning, he jerked awake, his heart pounding as he fumbled for the cordless telephone on the nightstand. Calls at this hour were never good. “What?”
“Trent?” There was a quiver in Annie’s voice. “I’m sorry, I—”
“Annie, what’s wrong?”
“I—God, I feel like an idiot, but I think someone’s prowling around my house. I keep hearing someone at the back door, but I don’t see anyone out there.”
He was already out of bed, reaching for his glasses and his jeans. “Have you called the police?”
“Yes. There was another break-in at the other side of town, and I was told it would be a few minutes before anyone could get here. They said for me to keep the doors locked and wait.”
That was one of the disadvantages of living in a small town, Trent thought with a scowl. The police force was small, particularly in the middle of the night. “I’m on my way.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
He hated to disconnect, but he had no choice. “Sit tight,” he said gruffly and pushed the button. He was dialing Wade’s home number even as he shoved his bare feet into his shoes and pushed one arm into the sleeve of a shirt. Wade answered on the first ring, sounding clear and alert even though he’d probably been sleeping.
Still moving toward the door, Trent quickly outlined the situation. “I’m on my way there,” he concluded, snatching up his truck keys.
“Don’t be a hero, Trent. You don’t know what you’ll run into.”
“Just get your guys over there.” Trent turned off the phone and tossed it in the general direction of a table on his way out the door.
A police car was sitting in Annie’s driveway when Trent squealed to a stop there. Apparently, the police had arrived immediately after she’d called him. He jumped out of his truck and ran to her door. She opened it just before he reached it, indicating she’d been watching for him.
“The officers are searching the woods around the house, but they haven’t found anyone,” she told him, her voice taut with tension.
He laid a hand on her shoulder, searching her face. “You’re all right?”
“Yes. Just shaken. I’m sorry I disturbed you, Trent. I shouldn’t have called, but when I heard the police were on the other side of town—and your house is so close and I—”
“Be quiet,” he said, pulling her roughly into his arms. “If you hadn’t called me, I’d have been furious.”
She burrowed into his chest. “I really can take care of myself, you know,” she mumbled.
“You did the right thing,” he assured her gruffly. “You kept your head, called the cops and called me. That’s taking care of yourself.”
A Jeep with a flashing blue light on the dash parked in front of the house and a man jumped out and moved toward the porch where they stood. Trent looked over Annie’s head. “Hey, Wade. Thanks for coming.”
Wade Davenport, the solidly built, tough-faced police chief stopped beside them. “Ms. Stewart, are you all right?”
She pulled out of Trent’s arms, shoved a hand through her tousled hair and then tightened the belt of the short plaid robe she wore over blue pajamas. “I’m fine, thank you. You’re Chief Davenport, I assume?”
“Yes, ma’am. Can you tell me what happened?”
“Two of your men are searching my property, but they haven’t found anything yet, as far as I know.”
“Did you ever see anyone lurking around?”
“No. I kept hearing someone—or something, I suppose—moving around the back of the house, but I didn’t see anyone when I looked out the windows. When I heard scratching on the back door, I called the police, and then I called Trent.”
“I’ll go check around and see if I can find my men. Trent, maybe you should take Ms. Stewart inside.”
Sounded like a good plan to
Trent. “Let us know what you find.”
He ushered Annie inside and led her to the couch. “Sit down. If there’s anything out there, Wade will find it.”
“I’ve heard there have been some burglaries around town lately, but they’ve been taking big things. Boats, ATVs, motorcycles—I hardly have anything to steal.”
Trent settled beside her and took her hands in his. Her fingers were like ice; he tightened his around them to warm her. “Annie, is there something you haven’t told me? Are you sure you don’t know who could be following you around, spying on you? It seems too coincidental that this happened the same night you told me you thought someone had been watching you.”
She stared down at their linked hands, her face revealing little. “I really don’t know who it could be.”
“You’ve never told me exactly why you moved here. You said that you needed a fresh start. Why? What were you running away from? Why are you estranged from your parents?”
“I moved here because Uncle Carney left me his house. My father wanted me to sell it, but I decided to make it my home, instead. My father was furious with me for my decision and we haven’t spoken since.”
“And your mother?”
She shrugged, her eyes suddenly so bleak that Trent automatically tightened his hands around hers. “My mother follows my father’s lead. Always. I’ve talked to her by telephone a couple of times, but all she does is try to convince me to ‘be reasonable’ and listen to my father.”
“So there’s no reason at all for anyone to be watching you?”
“Not unless…”
“Unless?” he prodded when she fell silent.
“My father is a very…determined and controlling man,” Annie said, seeming to choose her words carefully. “It wouldn’t be entirely inconceivable that he would hire someone to keep tabs on me—but I think it’s doubtful that he did.”
“You think your father could have hired someone to spy on you?” he asked, wondering how her family had gotten so far off track.
“I said it wasn’t likely. He’d probably assume I’d get tired of living here, or that I’d run out of money and come begging for his forgiveness.”