Читать книгу Flirting with Trouble - Elizabeth Bevarly - Страница 10

After placing their order in the café, Marnie studied Daniel from the other side of the table and tried to figure out how to tell him she was representing Louisa.

Oh, hi, Daniel. Great to see you after all these years of not knowing where you were or what you were doing after you dumped me. But, listen, here’s the thing. It’s kind of a funny story, actually. That woman who shot and nearly killed your father? The one who wants to send him to jail? I’m supposed to make her come out smelling like a rose and see that your father is the one who ends up looking like the criminal. So how the hell are ya?

Somehow, saying something like that just didn’t seem like good PR.

Technically, she thought, she hadn’t lied to him. She was in Hunter Valley on business, and she had read about Sam’s shooting in the newspaper. In fact, everything she’d said to Daniel tonight had been true. It just hadn’t been exactly straightforward.

But, hey, he hadn’t exactly been straightforward with her eight years ago, had he? After spending a wonderful week together, he’d pretty much told her she mattered less to him than his horses. And in that same week, she’d begun to feel like Daniel Whittleson might just be The One. Her response to him was so much stronger than with other men. Other men with whom she’d spent significantly more time. She and Daniel had felt good together. They’d felt right. She’d been so sure he shared those feelings. The way he had looked at her. The things he’d said. The way he’d made her feel…

And seeing him again, Marnie realized she’d never quite stopped feeling those things for him. If she didn’t think about the way their time together had ended, she could almost imagine it was eight years ago, and the two of them were back at her condo on the beach, laughing and feeding each other shrimp and sharing the last bottle of beer in her refrigerator.

Except that Daniel didn’t look like the young, up-and-coming trainer she remembered from back then. Eight years had woven a few threads of silver into his black hair and carved faint lines around his espresso-colored eyes. Eight years had toughened his complexion to a rich bronze and roughened his hands deliciously. The years had broadened his shoulders and roped the muscles of his forearms where he’d pushed up the sleeves of his sweater. She wasn’t sure, but he seemed an inch or two taller, because she didn’t recall him being quite so…overwhelming.

A ribbon of something hot and electric uncurled in her belly as she looked at him, but it wasn’t the same heat and electricity she remembered from San Diego. She’d wanted Daniel with a young girl’s desire back then, all urgent and needy and intense. Looking at him now, she felt desire kindling again, but it was different this time. It went deeper and pulled harder and somehow felt even stronger than it had before.

How could that be? she wondered. How could she still want him? She told herself she was remembering an idealized version of him and all the good times they’d had, conveniently forgetting the very real hurt he’d left her with.

She gave herself a good mental shake. Daniel Whittleson had abandoned her. He’d hurt her. When didn’t matter. He couldn’t be trusted. Even if she forgave him for what had happened in San Diego—and she wasn’t sure she had—chances were good he hadn’t changed. If she didn’t remember anything else, she told herself, she’d damned well better remember that.

Still, she couldn’t deny that the years had wrought more than physical changes in him. He didn’t smile the same way he had then. Granted, he must have had the scare of his life finding out his father was shot. But it was more than that. There was a caution in him now that she sensed had been there for some time. And the wariness in his eyes when he looked at her hadn’t been there before. As if he wasn’t sure he could trust her.

Then again, she thought, he couldn’t trust her. Because she wasn’t being honest with him.

Straightforward, she corrected herself. She just wasn’t being straightforward.

“So what kind of work brought you to Hunter Valley?” he asked after the waitress brought their coffee. His voice still bore that trace of an accent she remembered. Not quite Australian, not quite English, not quite American, either. It was a mix of all the places he’d lived and worked, something that made him seem slightly exotic.

She chose her words carefully. “I work for Division International. It’s a San Diego PR firm.” There. That much was true.

He looked puzzled. “Public relations?”

She nodded, but didn’t elaborate.

“But your degree is in business. You told me you wanted to run an equestrian camp for at-risk kids. Take them out of depressed urban areas and put them in the countryside where they could get sunshine and fresh air and learn to ride. You said you had some trust fund money you were going to use for the start-up.”

She curled her fingers around her coffee mug, suddenly feeling a little chilly inside. “That was a long time ago,” she told him.

“It wasn’t that long.”

“Yeah, Daniel, it was.”

A lifetime ago, she thought to herself. Back when she’d been happy and felt fortunate and wanted to share that happiness and good fortune with the rest of the world.

“What happened to change your mind?” he asked.

She sighed. “Not long after you…Not long after San Diego,” she quickly amended, “my father’s business failed. We lost everything.”

Daniel lowered his coffee cup. “Everything?” he asked.

“Everything,” she told him. She glanced up to meet his gaze, found that she couldn’t hold it, and looked back down. “To pay Dad’s creditors and survive the financial loss, we had to liquidate everything. Including my trust fund, my car and Blue Boy.”

“Your horse,” he said.

She nodded.

“But you really loved that horse.”

“I did,” she agreed. “But he was worth more than twenty thousand dollars, so…”

“He had to be liquidated,” he finished for her.

“Yeah.” She tried to smile. “He was bought by a very nice man, though, as a gift for his daughter’s tenth birthday. So Blue Boy ended up with a little girl who loved him. And he loved kids.”

“He wasn’t with you, though.”

“No, he wasn’t.”

Daniel said nothing for a moment. “You had to give up a lot when your father lost his business.”

Marnie nodded. “Yeah, but losing Blue Boy was the worst of it.”

“You sure about that?”

“Totally.”

“No more big house or fancy convertible,” he reminded her.

“No.”

“No more condo on the beach.”

“No.”

“No more life of leisure.”

As if she’d ever really enjoyed that anyway, Marnie thought. “No.”

“No more dreams of equestrian camp.”

“No,” she said sadly. “Which was the second-worst thing to lose.”

He was silent again, and she suddenly wished like hell she knew what he was thinking.

“Well, at least you still had your friends,” he said.

“Yeah, at least I had that.” Hardly. It was amazing how quickly people abandoned a person when she hit a rough patch. Of course, Marnie supposed she could argue that if they’d abandoned her when she really needed them, they weren’t friends in the first place.

And really, she didn’t miss them. Not anymore. It had been difficult at first. Terrifying, actually. She and her parents had felt dazed and displaced and wondered if anything would ever feel normal again. But her father had emerged from bankruptcy with a newfound sense of purpose and, with help from friends who invested with him, started a new business from scratch. It was significantly smaller in nature than his previous one had been, but he was enjoying himself more. Her mother had become his assistant in running the small vineyard they’d purchased three years ago. It would be turning a profit for the first time this year, a very modest one, and Marnie hadn’t seen her parents so happy in a long time. In many ways, they seemed happier now than they’d been when they were on society’s A-list.

Marnie, too, had found some small degree of happiness after losing everything. No, she wasn’t following the dream she’d originally mapped out for herself, and there were times when her job drove her crazy. But she’d convinced Hildy at Division to take on a handful of small accounts that weren’t as profitable to the company but were still worthwhile—like her parents’ business—and she enjoyed working with them. The big fish on Division’s client list might be the ones who paid Marnie’s salary, but it was the small fish who brought her satisfaction. Maybe someday she’d have her own PR firm and work with causes she considered worthy. And maybe then, she’d be as happy as her parents were.

“I know public relations might seem like kind of a strange occupation for me,” she said now, “but it’s actually a good fit. I like people, and Division liked the fact that I knew so many, some of them very prominent. I’ve been doing it for more than five years now.” She sat up and lifted her chin a little defiantly as she added, “And I’m good at it, too.”

“I don’t doubt it for a minute,” Daniel said. “I’m sure you could do whatever you put your mind to.”

“Thank you.”

“It’s just that you seemed so focused on the camp for kids, that’s all.”

Marnie really didn’t want to talk about this right now. So she said, “It’s good to see you again, Daniel.”

Oh, damn, where had that come from? She really hadn’t meant to say anything like that. She really hadn’t meant to feel anything like that. But she’d be lying if she didn’t admit that she was still attracted to Daniel. The moment she’d turned to see him in the waiting room, her heart had begun to hammer, and heat had pooled low in her belly. And when he’d uttered her name in that low, soft way he used to…When she looked at his hands and remembered what they had felt like skimming over her bare skin…When she looked at his mouth and recalled the way he’d kissed her and tasted her, and all the places he’d kissed and tasted…

She halted the memories from forming, but not before they ratcheted up her body temperature a few degrees. Daniel Whittleson had been an incredible lover, had scorched her with his touch and enflamed her with his words, until she’d been unable to think about anything but him, until she could only feel him surrounding her and burying himself inside her, and…

She closed her eyes, hoping to put an end to both her distant memories and her current desires. There was no way she could allow herself to be attracted to Daniel again. It would mean risking her heart all over again, and then there was the difficult position her job had put her in.

But when she opened her eyes again, her resolve was nearly shattered. Because Daniel was looking at her as if he felt the same pull from the past that she did, as if he were remembering the same things she was remembering, as if he wanted and needed her now as much as he had then.

Very softly, he replied, “It’s good to see you, too, Marnie.”

And something inside her broke open, releasing all the feelings she’d wanted so desperately to keep locked up tight.

Oh, Daniel, she thought. Why did we have to meet again now? Why here?

She searched for something, anything, to say that might dispel the almost palpable awareness that lay between them. But all she could come up with was a very lame, “So. You, uh…you work for the Prestons. That must be interesting. They’ve bred and trained some pretty amazing horses.”

At first, she feared he would only continue to look at her with that same soulful yearning she felt so keenly herself. Finally, though, he nodded and said, “I like it very much, actually. Thomas and Jenna are good people. The whole family is.” He was thoughtful a moment, as if he still wanted to talk about himself and Marnie, then, thankfully, added, “Their son Andrew has taken over as business manager of Quest. Their son Brent is head breeder. Robbie’s turning out to be a top-notch trainer after years of Jenna and Thomas worrying he’d never figure out what he wanted to do with his life. And Melanie just made history as the first female jockey to win the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness. Quest Stables is a wonderful place to work. And Kentucky’s a gorgeous state.”

Marnie forced a smile she hoped looked genuine. “I imagine it’s very different from some of the other places you’ve lived. I mean, a guy who followed his dad to jobs in Australia and England and Canada when he was a teenager, settling in a quiet state like Kentucky? Who would’ve guessed?”

“It’s different from those places in some ways, yeah,” he agreed. “But I like it as well or better than any of them.” He hesitated a moment before adding, “Though it always feels good to come back to Australia. I was born here, even if I moved back to Ohio with my mom before I started school, so I guess, technically, it’s home.”

They spent the next hour in companionable conversation, only skimming the surface of whatever they might actually be thinking or feeling, at least on Marnie’s part. But she was grateful for it. For now, at least, they both seemed willing to let whatever lay in the past stay there. She’d worry about the future when it came. And she’d worry about the past some other time. For this evening, she was content to just reacquaint herself with Daniel. Even if it was only superficially. And even if it wouldn’t last.

Gosh, just like old times.

After finishing dinner, they returned to Sam’s hospital room to check on him, but he’d just been given a sedative and the nurse said he was expected to sleep through the night with no change. Daniel double-checked to be sure the hospital had his cell number, then said he’d be at his father’s house if there were any developments.

He turned to Marnie. “Where are you staying?”

“I’m staying here in Pepper Flats, actually,” she said. “At the Wallaroo Inn.”

“How long will you be in town?”

Not an easy question to answer, Marnie thought—honestly or dishon…uh, not straightforwardly. As long as it took to clear Louisa’s name and ensure that the Fairchild Gala went off without a hitch. Hopefully, that wouldn’t take long. But how was Marnie supposed to answer him honestly without revealing the nature of her job? And why was she putting off telling him when he was bound to find out anyway? Especially since his question provided her with a perfect opening?

“I…” She hesitated a moment, telling herself to just spit out the truth and be done with it. Instead, she heard herself say, “Not long.”

And she hoped like hell that Louisa did what Marnie told her to do so they could put this all behind them and Marnie could go back to San Diego. Otherwise, she’d just told Daniel a lie. The only lie she’d ever told him, and she hoped it was the last one.

“I’m staying at my dad’s place,” he said. “He has a spread called Whittleson Stud about a half hour from here. Can I give you a lift back to the hotel? Or do you have a car?”

“I have a car,” she told him. “But I took a cab to the hospital because I didn’t want to have to navigate the town my first night here after such a long flight.”

He looked at her with surprise, and at first, she didn’t know why.

“You just got here today?”

She nodded reluctantly.

“And you came to the hospital before doing anything else?”

She nodded again, even more reluctantly. He was going to think there was something suspicious about that.

Instead, he smiled and that ribbon of heat unfurled in her once more. But it was replaced by guilt when he added, “That was nice of you, Marnie. I didn’t realize you thought so highly of my dad.”

Yeah, that was her, she thought. Always thinking of her clients’ shooting victims first.

“The least I can do is give you a ride back then,” he offered. “No sense paying for a taxi if you don’t have to.”

Marnie knew she should decline, but the prospect of spending a little more time with Daniel won out. “Thanks,” she said. “I appreciate it.”

For perhaps the hundredth time in as many minutes, Daniel asked himself what the hell he thought he was doing. This time, though, he did it twice—one what-the-hell for driving Marnie back to her hotel, and another what-the-hell for insisting he follow her up to her room to make sure she arrived safely. A woman traveling alone couldn’t be too careful, he’d told her. Even in small towns.

But he knew that was only part of the reason. In spite of having spent the last eight years trying to forget about her, he realized he was still powerfully attracted to Marnie Roberts. Maybe even more than he’d been in San Diego. He’d been a kid in San Diego, uncertain of himself and not especially confident where women were concerned. He’d always told himself that was why he’d fallen so hard for Marnie in the first place—because he’d been so inexperienced, and she’d seemed so sophisticated. But his experiences since then had only made him realize tonight just how special Marnie Roberts was, and how lucky he’d been to meet her when he did.

Not much had changed in that regard, he thought. She was still special. And he still felt lucky to have met her.

The dazzling, effervescent girl had blossomed into a stunning, elegant woman. As they’d chatted tonight, Daniel had been transfixed by her. By the changes in her. She seemed so much more confident, so much more poised than she had been before. Stronger. More seasoned. More womanly. She appealed to him in ways she hadn’t before. Probably because he’d changed so much himself.

Now, as he stood behind her and watched her slip her key card into the lock of the hotel-room door, he didn’t know what to say. What to do. How to act. He watched as the little green light flashed, followed by the click that said everything was okay. But nothing felt okay. And instead of signaling a go-ahead, the green light seemed to be a warning of some kind. Whether it was trying to warn Marnie or him, he couldn’t have said.

The room was dark when she pushed the door open, and she mumbled something about having wished she’d turned a light on before she left.

“I’ll get it,” he volunteered. And before she had a chance to decline, he was pushing into the room past her, trying not to notice the soft swish and click of the door as it closed behind them, throwing them into darkness.

Well, not complete darkness, he realized, since the curtains were open and the scattered lights of Pepper Flats lay beyond—not as bountiful as they would be in a big city, but glittery enough to look as if someone had tossed a handful of diamonds onto a black velvet background. He and Marnie were, however, utterly alone.

And before he realized what he was doing, Daniel heard himself say, “Marnie, I’m sorry about the way things turned out in Del Mar.”

She said nothing at first, only strode across the room and stared out the window beside him. Although he couldn’t see her well in the darkness—he still hadn’t switched on a light…but then, neither had she—he imagined her expression was probably much the same as it had been in the hospital waiting room. A little preoccupied, a little anxious, a little confused.

Finally, very softly, she said, “Are you?”

He expelled a long breath. “Yeah. I am. I shouldn’t have left you that letter the way I did. I should have explained things to you face-to-face.”

“Yes, you should have.” She hesitated before adding, “Is that the only reason you’re sorry?”

She wasn’t going to make this easy, was she? Then again, he didn’t deserve for her to make it easy. Hell, he’d brought this on himself by wading into the past in the first place, when he should have remained rooted in the present, where they had both seemed content to stay all evening. In spite of that, he added, “No. That’s not the only reason. I also should have explained things better than I did.”

Still staring out the window, she said quietly, “Oh, I think you explained pretty well. Your horses meant more to you than I did. End of story. It was good that you told me when you did, instead of leading me on.”

“Marnie, that—” He halted abruptly, before he made things even worse. Was that what she’d thought after reading his letter? That she’d meant less to him than the animals he trained? Just the opposite had been true. That was why he’d had to leave the way he did—because Marnie was becoming so important to him, she was making him forget all the reasons he needed to succeed. But if that was the way she’d been feeling all this time, she wasn’t going to change her mind just because he told her otherwise.

Ah, hell, he thought. Why had he even taken them down this road? Hoping to salvage what he could of the conversation, he said, “That week just didn’t end up the way it was supposed to. I…”

Finally, she turned to look at him, but her face was still in shadow, telling him nothing of what she might be thinking or feeling. “You…what?” she asked, her voice completely void of emotion.

“I don’t know,” he said honestly. “What happened between us in San Diego…It just came out of nowhere. I was totally unprepared for it.”

“I wasn’t prepared for it, either, Daniel.”

“I wasn’t looking to get involved with anyone,” he said.

“Neither was I.”

“I was just starting out in my career.”

“I hadn’t even begun mine.”

“And I just wasn’t ready, that was all.”

She was silent for a moment more, then repeated, quietly and carefully, “That was all?”

He knew it sounded lame, but he nodded anyway. “Yeah. I was just a kid eight years ago, Marnie. We both were. Can’t I just say I’m sorry and let it go at that?”

She made a sound that was something between a humorless chuckle and a tsk of resignation. “You know, even without the apology, I had let it go, Daniel. Until I saw you tonight. And then, it was like I relived that whole week in ten seconds’ time. But what was really strange was that, by the time we finished dinner, I’d almost forgotten about how it ended in San Diego. It felt like we were back there again, a few days before the end, and everything was fine.”

Wow, she’d felt that, too? He’d experienced the same thing. That was why he’d offered to drive her back to her hotel, why he’d wanted to walk her to her room, why he’d apologized for what had happened, as if it were some minor transgression that could be excused with a heartfelt I’m sorry. And it was why—

Well. It was why he suddenly wanted to do a lot of things he knew he had no business doing. Which was all the more reason he couldn’t do any of them.

“But we’re not back there, are we?” she asked more softly. “And we can never go back there again. It’s ridiculous to think otherwise.”

She was right. He knew she was. But he wasn’t ready to leave it behind just yet. She would probably only be in Hunter Valley for a little while. He might not see her again after tonight. So he turned to stare out the window again, thinking it might be easier to talk to her if he weren’t looking at her. And he searched for the right words to say.

“You know, when you think about it, the two of us never really learned that much about each other that week. I knew you were rich and had just graduated from college and what you wanted to do with your future. But I didn’t know much about your life’s experiences—what made you the way you were.”