Читать книгу No Ring Required - Laura Wright - Страница 15

Twenty minutes later, Ethan entered the crumbling stone gates of Days of Grace Trailer Park. As he drove past the shabby office, muscle memory took hold and his BMW practically steered itself to the curb beside number fifty-three. The one-bedroom mobile home his father had sold just before his death looked as though it had been remodeled, as though someone were really trying to make the place a home, with fresh paint, a nice carport and fenced garden.

“About damn time,” Ethan muttered, opening his window a crack before killing the engine.

It was ironic. At sixteen, he couldn’t have gotten out of this park fast enough. He’d had big dreams, big plans, and he’d sworn to himself he’d never be back. But here he was, drawn to it like scum to bathroom tile. How was it that he felt infinitely more comfortable parked outside his father’s trailer than at his home or office? Why was it that he could breathe here? The air was stale and slightly mildewed; nothing had changed.

He shoved a hand through his hair. He should have expected Mary to lie to him. People were never honest, never to be trusted—including himself. Why the hell hadn’t he learned that in all this time? Maybe because he’d thought himself worthy of a family, good enough to make a child with a Harrington.

A large man in his early thirties wearing a baseball hat and ripped jeans came out of the house. When he spotted Ethan, he lifted a hand in a wary hello. Wasn’t the first time the guy had seen Ethan parked there, but he’d never called security. No doubt the guy knew he could’ve handled the situation himself if things got out of control. After all, he was pretty big.

Not looking for any more trouble today, Ethan gunned the engine of his sports car and took off back to his self-made world.

Mondays were usually Mary’s best day. She was well rested, coffeed-up and excited to get back to work. Today, however, she felt as though a semi had been driving back and forth over her body all night long. She felt jittery and exhausted at the same time—a wicked combination.

As she walked into the office, her hand shook a little around the double espresso she carried. The first person she saw was Olivia. The startlingly pretty brunette was sitting at the receptionist’s desk—something she liked to do before Meg, the receptionist, got there at nine. “Hey there, Miss Kelley,” she said in a chipper voice. “You’re here early.”

“And I’m not the only one.”

“I have some phone calls to return. I wanted to get to them early.” Olivia’s eyes narrowed as she stared hard at Mary. “Did you get any sleep last night?”

Mary sighed, placed her plastic coffee cup on the reception desk. “I think somewhere between four and six I dozed off.”

“Work…or—” Olivia hesitated, bit her full bottom lip “—something else?”

For a moment Mary contemplated blowing Olivia’s mind with the entire story of Ethan Curtis and her. She just wanted to unburden herself with a girlfriend for a few minutes, emotionally puke and have Olivia figuratively hold her hair back. But for good or bad, the partners of NRR just didn’t go there with each other—though Mary wondered if any of them wanted to but were afraid to ruffle the feathers of their business.

“I was working late,” Mary said at last. “The captain is very demanding.”

Olivia laughed at that, her dark eyes filled with mirth. “He seems like a semidecent guy, despite the millions and the bawdy reputation.”

“He is, actually. Did I tell you he’s donating all the proceeds from the regatta gala to charity?”

“Would it be uncharitable of me to say that he should?”

It was Mary’s turn to laugh, though the sound felt a little forced. “Ivan’s all right. Not much going on upstairs, though.”

“What a shocker,” Olivia said sarcastically. “Inherited wealth?”

“Yes.”

Olivia rolled her eyes as she stood up and headed into the kitchen. “Do you want something to eat? I made blueberry muffins, and, not to toot my own horn or anything, but both attorneys offices downstairs came up to ask where that amazing scent was coming from.”

Mary’s stomach rolled rudely at the thought of food and she headed toward her office. “Maybe later.”

“Okay. Oh, hey, Mary?”

“Yeah.”

“Mr. Curtis called.”

Mary felt a tremor of nervous energy move through her, and suddenly she felt unable to breathe. She hadn’t spoken to him since Saturday, since her breakdown in the parking lot.

She poked her head out of her office and gave Olivia a weak smile. “Let me guess. He no longer requires my services.”

Wielding a saucepan in one hand and an egg in the other, Olivia looked perplexed. “No. Actually, he asked if you could come by his house today at four-thirty.”

“What?” There was no way she had heard Olivia correctly.

“Four-thirty,” Olivia repeated. “His house.”

“Oh. Okay.” Well, sure. Why should he make the trip to her office to can her when he could do it in person? Her heart pounded so hard in her chest the movement actually hurt.

“Is he an inheritance jerk, too, Mary?”

Mary shook her head. “No, self-made all the way.”

Olivia nodded. “I thought so. He always sounds down-to-earth when he calls. That’s pretty refreshing.”

Mary went back into her office on unsteady legs and dropped into the chair behind her desk. She had to be ready to hear whatever he had to say. There was no doubt he was going to fire her, but what if he wanted to tell her that he was bringing her father back up on charges?

The queasy, dizzy, anxiety-ridden feeling she’d been having since yesterday came back full force, and she put her head down on her desk. Her eyes remained open, and even in the semidarkness of her self-made tent, Mary saw what she’d collapsed upon. The plans for Ethan’s nursery—a nursery she hadn’t even begun. With a groan she pushed the plans off her desk and into the trash can.

Ethan’s housekeeper, Sybil, who Mary had only seen twice before—right before the staff and caterers arrived for a party—answered the door with a vexed expression. “Hello, Ms. Kelley.”

“How are you, Sybil?”

The woman released a weighty breath. “Mr. Curtis is in the game room. Let me show you the way.”

“Game room?” Mary repeated, following behind the housekeeper. She’d been in Ethan’s house several times and she’d never seen a game room.

Glancing over her shoulder, Sybil rolled her eyes. “It’s where he goes when he’s brooding.”

Brooding? Mary tried not to register the shock she felt. First of all, she couldn’t imagine Ethan showing anyone his emotions—it just wasn’t his style. And second of all, did he know that the woman he paid to run his household talked about him this way? She’d bet not.

They passed the dining room and library, then rounded a curve into a hallway that Mary had never ventured down, or even remembered seeing. When they came to a door, Sybil knocked once, then said to Mary, “Here we are.”

“Should I just go in?” Mary asked when she heard no answer.

Sybil nodded. “He’s expecting you.”

After the woman walked away, Mary gripped the knob and pushed the door open. For a good thirty seconds after entering the large room, Mary thought she’d just stepped into kid’s fantasyland, Chucky Cheese. But since she didn’t smell pizza or see a large, furry gray animal with whiskers, she knew she must be in Ethan’s game room.

The room was a perfect square, with one wall devoted to windows that faced the backyard and lake. It was as if the room was meant to have a screen or drape down the center as a divider, as the right side was completely devoted to every arcade game imaginable. Being a fan of arcades from way back, Mary recognized skeet ball right away and smiled wistfully. There was also basketball, air hockey, pound the squirrel, racecar games and many more she saw but wasn’t familiar with. Then there was the left side of the room, which couldn’t have been more different. It was an office, with a very modern desk and furnishings in charcoal gray and chrome, and in the middle of it sat Ethan, reading the newspaper.

She had an urge to turn around and leave before he saw her, but instead she walked into the room and parked herself beside the foosball table. “Quite a setup you got here.”

Still hidden behind the New York Times, Ethan muttered a terse, “These are all the things I couldn’t afford when I was a kid. I wanted to have them now.”

Mary Kelley was no genius, but she sure understood his meaning: he’d had nothing growing up and was hoping to give this to his child. The child he’d thought was coming. The child he’d blackmailed a woman into creating with him.

She got it, and she felt Sybil’s pain, and she, too, rolled her eyes. Why couldn’t he have been in his library beside the bar drinking like any normal pissed-off male?

She fiddled with the handles on the foosball table. “Do you play?”

“I rarely play games,” he said, still masked by the Times.

Neither did she, and she was having quite enough of this one. “Listen, you wanted to see me.”

“Yeah.” The paper came down with a snap, and Mary saw his face for the first time since they’d stood outside the doctor’s office and she’d told him the truth. As he stood and walked over to her, he looked like a determined, really angry devil, his black hair slightly spiky and his blue eyes fierce with a need to hurt. He stood close, stared into her eyes and said in a punishing voice, “I have never felt such disgust with anyone in my life.”

It was a strange thing—in that moment, spurred on by those words, Mary’s nerves suddenly lifted and she was no longer afraid of what he was going to do about her and her father. The only thing she felt in the moment was the need to strike back. “I know that feeling. I had it about a month ago. But we were standing in your office, not your playroom.”

His eyes blazed. “What you did was beyond low.”

“You’re right.”

“And you have nothing to say.”

“Just this. Need I remind you that you basically forced me into—”

“I never forced you to do anything,” he interrupted darkly. “It was your choice—”

“Choice?” she repeated. Was he kidding? “What choice did I have? Tell me that?”

“You could have walked away.”

“And left my dad to…what? Go to jail. Never.” She glared at him. “But you don’t understand that kind of devotion, do you? You’ve never loved anyone that much—so damn much that you’d make a great sacrifice for them.”

His gaze slipped to her belly.

She shook her head, not about to pity him. “No, Mr. Curtis. That wasn’t a sacrifice. That was a need to be met, a blue-blooded medal to hang around your neck to make you finally feel worthy.” His nostrils flared, and he looked dangerously close to exploding, but Mary wouldn’t back down. “At least the child would’ve belonged to the old-money club, right? And maybe you, too, by association? No, it doesn’t work that way.” She was yelling now, frustrated at him, at herself. “They don’t care about association, they only care about blood. Can you get that through your thick skull?”

When she stopped ranting, they both stood there, face-to-face, breathing heavily. His eyes had lost some of their heat and she wondered if she’d finally gotten through to him. But he didn’t answer her, not that she expected him to. He had too much pride. Instead, he did as all highly successful business persons do—he went for the jugular.

“You’re wondering if I’m going to file charges against your father now, aren’t you?” he said evenly, his tone cool.

Mary wasn’t about to deny it. “Of course.”

“I’m not.”

Shock slammed into her and she actually stuttered. “Wh-why?”

With a casual shrug, he left her and wandered over to the air hockey table where he picked up a paddle and examined it. “I’ve decided to close that chapter.”

Mary couldn’t contain her relief. Her father didn’t have to worry about court or jail ever again. She wasn’t about to thank Ethan, but she could feel the tension drain from her body and she sagged against the foosball table.

“But I do want something from you.”

Ethan’s words sent a shock of alarm through her tired limbs. “What?”

“Mackinac Island.”

Oh, no. The trip to the beautiful Michigan island. She was supposed to have planned a party there, served as hostess, but how could that ever happen now? “You want me to recommend someone to take my place, right?” she asked hopefully.

“No.”

“You can’t be seriously considering—”

He slammed the paddle down and glared at her. “Believe me when I say I would rather bring a python with me on this trip. But your reputation has preceeded you, and I need that party to go off without a problem.”

No way. She couldn’t. There was too much between them. She shook her head. “No.”

“You owe me.”

“I owe you nothing,” she assured him, straightening up, forcing her legs to hold her weight and not buckle.

His voice dropped and his lips thinned dangerously. “Don’t think I wouldn’t reconsider opening that paternal book again if I have to.”

She shook her head, knowing she was cornered. “You’re really good at blackmail.”

He lifted one sardonic eyebrow. “I’ll protect my business any way I have to.”

“Clearly.”

“Just as you would, Mary. Mine is administrative business and yours would be personal business.”

The idea that they were in any way alike made Mary’s blood jump in her veins, but she knew when her choices were few. “This will be our final business endeavor together.”

He nodded. “After the last guest has left my party, Ms. Kelley, you and I can pretend that we’ve never met each other. How’s that?”

“Perfect.”