His body fit intimately against hers, and the realization that she loved him hit her like the proverbial ton of bricks. For weeks she’d been denying it, burying her feelings, telling herself her emotions were on the rampage because she’d been without a man for so long. But now, with his arms around her, his lips devouring hers, his hands possessive, she knew she’d lost her heart to him and she doubted she’d ever retrieve it.
He lifted his head to stare into her eyes. “God, I missed you,” he said hoarsely as he captured a handful of her hair and twined his fingers through the thick, red curls. Her heart seemed to crack.
“I saw you this morning,” she pointed out, thinking of their goodbye kiss on the front porch at one-thirty.
“That was a long time ago.”
“Mmm. Too long,” she admitted. “I missed you, too,” she admitted.
“I could tell.” He slapped her on the rump playfully, but let his hand settle over the curve of her hip.
“Could you?” She wound her arms around his neck and licked her lips provocatively. “How?”
He groaned. “You’re wicked, woman.”
“And you love it.”
He laughed and kissed her again. “I have half a mind to carry you into the house, throw you on the bed and ravage you until you beg for mercy.”
“The half a mind part, I believe.”
His eyes flashed. “Well, I guess I’ll just have to prove it to you.” Quickly he scooped her up and threw her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.
“Hayden, no!” she cried, laughing as the blood rushed to her head and her hair nearly swept the ground. Hershel yipped and bounded in excitement, trying to lick Nadine’s face. “Please, put me down!”
“You asked for it.”
“No, I—Hayden, oh, come on—”
He started packing her up the back steps to the door. “How much time do we have before the boys get home?”
“They’ll be here any minute.”
“Liar.”
“It’s…it’s the truth!”
He set her on her feet, but his arms still surrounded her and he kissed her again. Already breathless, her heart pumping, she kissed him back and playfully darted her tongue between his lips.
“You’re asking for trouble.”
“Am I gonna get it?” she asked.
He chuckled. “You are bad.”
“Only with you.”
“It better be only with me.” His eyes sizzled electric blue just as the sound of shouts and bicycle tires crushing gravel reached her ears.
“See,” she taunted.
Hershel gave an expectant bark and streaked down the lane toward the coming noises. With a sigh, she touched a finger to his lips. “I don’t think we’re alone anymore.”
His mouth curved sardonically. “I’m a patient man, Nadine. I’ll wait.”
John’s old bike rounded the corner, and Bobby’s smaller two-wheeler was right behind him. Before the bike had stopped, John had leapt off his seat, letting the bicycle fall into the yard.
“What’s for dinner?” John demanded as Hershel jumped and barked.
“A surprise.”
“Uh-oh.” John pulled a face, and Bobby, leaning his bike against the garage, wrinkled his nose.
“Let’s go to McDonald’s,” Bobby suggested.
Nadine shook her head. “No way. I’m not driving back to Coleville tonight. Besides, you like pasta salad—”
“Yuk!” John said. “I hate salad.”
“This is different. It has chicken and cheese and—”
“And it’s still salad,” John said.
“We can have Kentucky Fried Chicken,” Bobby, ever the fast-food junkie, suggested.
Nadine was starting to fume. “I said we’re not going to—”
“I’ll take you out.”
Nadine turned on Hayden, as if she’d heard him wrong. “But the boys have homework and—”
“You need a night off. Besides, I’ve bummed more than my share of meals around here.”
“Come on, Mom!” Bobby cried.
“Yeah, let’s go.”
Nadine glared at Hayden. “Why do I have the feeling that I’ve been conned?” she asked, glancing back to the boys. “I wasn’t kidding about the homework.”
“We’ll do it. Okay? When we get back!” John said.
“Before the TV goes on.”
John rolled his eyes before racing after Bobby into the house.
“Lighten up about the homework,” Hayden suggested.
“So now you’re telling me how to be a parent?” she asked, though she wasn’t angry. “What makes you such an expert?”
“I was a kid. A kid who was expected to get straight A’s, a kid who was supposed to be the best football player, baseball player, chess player and leader of the debate team. My folks wanted—no, make that expected—me to be the smartest kid in my class.”
“Were you?” she asked.
His grin turned devilish. “Until about seventh grade. Then I became the biggest hellion.”
“I bet your parents were proud,” she teased, before she saw the storm clouds gathering in his eyes.
“I doubt that was the word my father would have used to describe anything I did.”
Before she could say anything else, the boys had thundered out of the house. They all piled into Hayden’s Jeep and he drove into town.
Hayden took them to a small restaurant in the mall near the tricinemas. For the first time in their lives the boys, seated on one side of the booth, were encouraged to order anything off the menu as Hayden insisted this night was his treat. Nadine tried to protest, but he wouldn’t hear of it, and in the end, John and Hayden each ordered a steak, Bobby stuck with a hamburger and Nadine chose grilled salmon. The boys were in heaven.
“Why can’t we do this all the time?” John asked as he struggled to cut his steak.
“Because it’s not practical,” Nadine replied.
On the seat of the booth between them, Hayden folded his hand over hers. “Sometimes it’s better not to be practical.” His fingers fit into the grooves between her own and she tingled a little.
“Everyone should keep his head,” she said. “And think of the consequences of what they’re doing.”
“We’re just eating,” John pointed out. “That’s no crime.”
“But we can’t do it all the time because we can’t afford it.”
“He can!” Bobby said, pointing a fork at Hayden.
“That’s right,” John chimed in, focusing on Hayden. “Katie Osgood says you’re the richest man in Gold Creek. But Mike Katcher thinks it’s Mr. Fitzgerald.”
Nadine was horrified. “John, it’s not polite to—”
Hayden held up a hand. “I don’t know about my local status and I really don’t care. My father was a very wealthy man. I inherited a lot from him, but it doesn’t mean a whole lot to me.”
“Well, it should,” John said. “Money talks. That’s what my dad says.”
Nadine wanted to drop through the floorboards of the restaurant.
“He does. Dad is always talking about money,” Bobby added as the waitress approached. Luckily the subject was dropped.
Hayden let the boys order dessert and the conversation stayed light as John plowed into apple pie with ice cream and Bobby picked at a huge piece of six-layer chocolate cake.
Upon instruction, both boys thanked Hayden and he made a point of telling them to call him by his first name.
This is going much too fast, Nadine thought, and realized that it wasn’t just her heart that would be broken when Hayden left. The boys, too, would miss him. For their own sakes, she had to make sure they didn’t get too emotionally attached to a man who would soon retu
rn to his life in the city.
Later that night, as she was tucking Bobby into bed, she smoothed his hair from his forehead and gave him a kiss. “See ya in the morning,” she said before turning out the light.
“Mom?”
“Hmm?” She looked over her shoulder at the top of the stairs.
“Are you going to marry Mr. Mon—Hayden?”
She froze, hoping that Hayden, in the living room below, hadn’t heard her youngest son’s question. John leaned over from the top bunk and stared at his mom, waiting for her answer. Her throat felt like sandpaper, but she shook her head.
“Why not?” Bobby wanted to know.
“He hasn’t asked her yet, you dope.”
“It’s more than that. I…Hayden…we…well, we live in different worlds.”
“But you like each other,” Bobby pointed out. “He’s here a lot.”
“Liking each other is not enough.”
John propped his head up with his hand. “If he asked you, would you say ‘yes’?”
That was a tough one. “I don’t think so.”
“Aw, Mom!” Bobby said with a sigh. “If you married him we could have everything we wanted. New twenty-one-speed bikes, a big house, a boat that goes real fast like his—”
“And an airplane. Like Mr. Fitzpatrick. Katie Osgood says—”
“I don’t care what Katie Osgood says,” Nadine snapped at John. “Now, you just close your eyes and go to sleep, and that goes double for you,” she added with a smile for Bobby.
Quickly she descended the stairs. “Trouble?” Hayden asked as she reached the first floor.
“Nothing serious,” she replied, as he took her into his arms and placed a kiss upon her forehead. She melted willingly against him and wished she could think of a way to protect herself and her children from the great void that would appear in their lives when he locked the doors of the manor across the lake forever.
* * *
SELL OUT TO Thomas Fitzpatrick. The offer was tempting. Uncle Thomas hadn’t pulled any punches, which surprised Hayden as he studied the buyout offer. Thomas wanted all the mills and was offering a decent price, if not top dollar. The deal was neat. All Hayden had to do was sign on the dotted line and make an announcement at the next board meeting. Since he owned controlling interest, no one could raise a stink. So why was he hesitating?
Because of Nadine. If he sold the mills and put the summerhouse on the market, he would be closing the door to Gold Creek forever and turning his back on Nadine and her children. He smiled as he thought of the boys. The older kid, John, was a handful. Bright and cocky, he was sure to give his mother more than her share of gray hairs, and the younger boy…he was difficult in his own way—a kid who struggled in school and was always at the mercy of his older, stronger brother.
They didn’t know how lucky they were, he decided. If only he’d had a brother or a sister with whom he could have shared his problems, confided his darkest secrets and beat the living tar out of when he’d been angry.
The phone rang, and he picked up on the second ring. He nearly slammed the receiver back into its cradle when he recognized Wynona’s wheedling voice. “Hayden? Thank God I caught you.”
The irony of her words settled like lead on his shoulders. “What do you want, Wynona?” he asked without much interest.
“I want to see you again. We need to talk.”
“Talk to Bradworth.”
He could almost feel her seething through the wires. “There are things we need to discuss. Important things. Things that I don’t want to confide in a lawyer.”
“Guilty conscience?” he mocked, and he heard her swift intake of breath. He didn’t feel the slightest bit of remorse.
“I’m coming to see you.”
“Won’t do any good, Wynona. I’m leaving town.”
“But—”
“Goodbye,” he said, and slammed down the receiver. The phone started ringing again, but he didn’t bother answering, just took the stairs two at a time and started planning a weekend away from Gold Creek and the mills and Thomas Fitzpatrick and contracts. Away from the guilt.
But not away from everything. He planned to take Nadine and her boys with him.
* * *
SAM CLAPPED HIS hands and yelled up the stairs to the loft. “Come on, guys. Chop! Chop!”
“Give them a break,” Nadine reprimanded. “It was the last day of school today. They’re wound up.”
“Good. We got lots to do.” To the rafters, he called, “Hurry up.”
“Coming!” John hollered down.
“So what’s the rush?” Nadine asked. She didn’t want to sound suspicious, but Sam wasn’t usually so anxious to be bothered with the boys. Not that he was a bad father, nor neglectful. He just wasn’t usually so attentive.
In a clatter of footsteps the boys hurried down the stairs. After quick kisses to Nadine’s cheeks, John and Bobby, their overnight bags slung over their shoulders, were herded out the back door toward Sam’s waiting pickup. The passenger door opened with a loud creak just as Hayden’s Jeep pulled into the drive.
“What the hell?” Sam said under his breath. “I wonder what he wants.”
“He’s coming to see Mom,” Bobby offered and started waving enthusiastically. “He comes all the time.”
Sam sent Nadine a sharp glance over his shoulder. “Is that right?”
“Well—”
“And he takes us fishing, and riding in his boat, and to fancy restaurants,” Bobby added.
John, sensing the change of atmosphere in the air, didn’t add anything to the conversation.
“He said he’d take us skiing, too.”
“Bobby, I don’t think Dad wants to hear everything that Mr. Monroe has talked about.”
“He said we were supposed to call him Hayden,” Bobby corrected, and Nadine had to grit her teeth.
Hayden parked next to Sam’s pickup and stretched out. Taller than Sam by nearly three inches, with broader shoulders and harsher features, he looked hard-bodied and tough. “Hayden, you’ve met Sam, I think.”
“At the mill,” Sam supplied, his eyes narrowing a fraction. “And a long time ago. Company picnic, or something.”
Hayden extended his hand, but Sam ignored it.
“Is there something you want?”
Hayden offered a practiced smile. “I just came to see Nadine and the kids.”
Sam bristled a little, and Nadine wondered again where his sudden sense of fatherhood had come from. “Well, you’d better say ‘hello’ now because the boys are leaving with me. For the weekend.”
Hayden’s lips stretched into a wide grin, as if he harbored a secret he wouldn’t share. “Have a great time.”
“We always do,” Sam said stiffly as he climbed into the cab of his truck and roared off.
“What was that all about?” Hayden asked.
“You know perfectly well, Hayden Monroe. I think it’s called marking his territory. The boys were going on and on about you and all the things you’ve done for them and Sam got his fatherly hackles up.” She glanced at the disappearing truck. “About time.”
“So,” Hayden asked, placing his hands on her waist, “does that mean you’re free for the weekend?”
“It means I’m alone.”
His grin turned positively evil. “Not anymore. I’m taking you out—”
“Where?”
“It’s a surprise.”
“I don’t like surprises.”
“You’ll like this one,” he guaranteed.
“Hayden, I don’t think—”
“Humor me. Believe me, you won’t be disappointed.”
* * *
HE WAS RIGHT. Three hours later, as the Jeep rounded a final curve through the
pine trees in the mountains, Nadine held her breath. Lights glowed through the windows of a rambling, three-storied lodge. Built of cedar and pine, with a wide porch, the building was settled in a thicket of pine trees and nearly twenty miles from the nearest small town.
Inside, the walls were raw wood, aged dark without a hint of varnish and covered with paraphernalia of the Wild West—saws, wagon yokes, axes and picks, even a full-size canoe. Wagon-wheel chandeliers offered flickering light. “I was afraid you were going to take me somewhere stuffy.”
“Me?” he laughed. “Never.”
They were seated near a bay window decorated with a cedar garland and sprigs of pine and mistletoe. Soon a waiter poured the wine Hayden had chosen, then took their orders. A hurricane lantern flickered on the cloth-covered table and reflected in the glass. Nadine sipped her wine and talked with Hayden before noticing, through the window, snow beginning to fall in thick, heavy flakes.
“If this keeps up, we could be trapped here all night,” Hayden teased.
“I don’t think so.”
“Would it be so horrible?” he asked, the light from the lantern reflecting in his warm blue eyes.
“I’m a mother. I have responsibilities.”
“The kids are with their dad. And your answering machine’s on. If there’s a problem, you’ll know about it.”
“Why Mr. Monroe, I think you’re trying to seduce me,” she teased, and her pulse jumped.
“Count on it.” Her throat went dry as he touched his glass to hers with a soft clink, then finished his wine in one swallow.
They talked through courses of Caesar salad, French onion soup, stuffed trout and raspberry mousse. Hayden told her he’d found a buyer for the sawmills and that he was considering the offer. Her heart felt as if it had been pierced by a sharp needle as she considered the fact that he might soon be gone, perhaps before the first of the year. A coldness settled in her stomach and seeped through her limbs. All along she’d known that he would leave, of course, but she’d never let herself think about the date; it had seemed a long way into the future, some indefinable time that she would worry about come spring…or maybe summer. But now? She managed to pretend that his talk of selling the sawmill didn’t bother her, that she was sophisticated enough to deal with the inevitable fact that they would soon be separated by time and distance, but the small puncture wound in her heart seemed to rip a little more with each of her breaths.