After dinner, Holly went upstairs to study, and Lydia refused Maren’s offer of help with the dishes. “Come on,” Kyle invited, “let’s go for a walk on the beach.” The look of longing in his clear gray eyes couldn’t be denied.
Dusk was beginning to settle on the calm waters of the Pacific. Frothy waves broke against black rocks before running toward the beach. Purple shadows lengthened against the white sand and darkened the clear water.
The twilight was breathless. The usual breeze from the ocean had disappeared, but the smell of saltwater lingered in the quiet air.
“I’m glad you came,” Kyle admitted, taking Maren’s hand in his as they reached the bottom of the cliff. “I had a sneaking suspicion you might not show up.”
“Why?”
He shrugged his shoulders and stared out to sea. “Maybe it’s because you keep running away from me…” Serious doubts clouded his gaze. He watched the flight of a solitary gull as it circled above the waves, and then, as if dragging himself out of a distant pain, he looked down on her and smiled. “What do you think of Holly?”
Maren returned his grin, and a dimple enhanced the smooth contours of her face. Her dark brows arched at the question. “I think she’s a handful.”
“That’s evasive.”
“And the truth.”
Kyle frowned as he pushed his hands, palms facing outward, into the back pockets of his gray corduroy slacks. “I suppose you’re right,” he conceded reluctantly. “She hasn’t had much of a chance.”
They started walking near the edge of the tide. “You blame yourself,” Maren said quietly, guessing at the burden of guilt he silently bore.
“I’m her father.”
“But she has a mother…”
At the mention of Rose, Kyle’s head snapped upward. Anger, like a bolt of lightning, flashed in his eyes. “Not much of one,” he said through clenched teeth, and then, as if to quell his storming rage, he shook his head and pushed his fingers through his thick hair. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “Rose and I haven’t seen eye to eye, not since day one.”
He sighed in exasperation. “My marriage was doomed from the start,” he admitted, letting his thoughts revolve backward to a time in which reality consisted of twangy guitars, managers and night after night in towns he’d never heard of. “When I met Rose, I was only mildly successful…still playing for peanuts. I’d had one song that had made a move up the charts, I think.
“Rose’s career was just beginning to take off, and I was flattered that she would even notice me.” He paused, as if looking for a reason for his actions. “I was young, and I didn’t have my head screwed on right. Anyway, we got married, and the media loved it—not to mention the public relations people.” He frowned in disgust. “If I’m fair about it, I’d have to say that marrying Rose was the single most important thing I did to advance my career.”
“You got married for your career?” Maren asked, masking the disbelief in her voice. Knowing Kyle as she did, Maren would never have thought he could do anything so callous.
“I didn’t think of it that way, not at the time. I convinced myself that I really cared for her. She acted like she felt the same. As I said, it was mutually beneficial.” He squinted into the gathering sunset, and his mouth turned down in disgust with himself.
Maren swallowed with difficulty. “You weren’t in love?”
Kyle shook his head. “Who knows?” His jaw tensed. “I’d say not, wouldn’t you?”
“I didn’t know you then.”
“You wouldn’t have liked me if you had.” His voice was flat and emotionless. “I don’t think I liked myself, and after a few months, I didn’t have any use for Rose. The feeling was mutual.” He sighed contemptuously and stopped walking. “I suppose that was my fault, too.”
“I don’t understand,” Maren replied, not knowing what to say.
He stretched out on the sand and studied the tide. Maren sat quietly next to him. “Neither do I,” he admitted. “That whole period of my life doesn’t make much sense.” His gray eyes drilled into hers, and she noticed the pain of fifteen lonely years. “The marriage brought us national attention, and we did everything in our combined power to use it to our advantage. It worked. Suddenly the public couldn’t get enough of our music. Record sales skyrocketed, and our egos didn’t suffer much, either.”
Maren reached for a handful of sand and let the sparkling granules sift through her fingers. “If you were having trouble, why didn’t you slow down?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the marriage wasn’t that important. We were arguing all the time, and then Rose turned up pregnant.” Kyle’s eyes narrowed in disgusted agony at the memory. “You should have seen her when she told me. She’d been to the doctor in the morning. When she got in to the studio where I was working, she threw some prescription at me and shouted out the news. ‘Well, now you’ve done it. I’m knocked up. What’re we going to do about it? ’As if there were any question.” He pounded his fist angrily into the sand.
Maren’s eyes reflected her despair. Why would any woman react so negatively to having Kyle’s child? To Maren, there could be nothing more precious than the thought of carrying Kyle Sterling’s baby. Her stomach knotted at the picture Kyle was painting.
“I talked her out of the abortion, and I think Rose was relieved. When Holly was born, she even showed a little interest in the baby. I thought everything might work out, and I tried to convince her to give up singing to stay home with the child. That was my mistake. Rose threw a fit, and told me if it was so important, I could stay home and take care of the kid.”
“And you didn’t like the idea?”
“I thought it was ridiculous—and now I wonder. Maybe I was wrong. I’m sure Holly would have been better off with me. I should have known that Rose wasn’t cut out to be a full-time mother. She needed the night life, she loved the fame and she was addicted to the glitter.”
“And you weren’t?” Maren asked cautiously.
“I don’t know.” He grimaced as if studying a puzzle he couldn’t begin to understand. “I guess I was too hard on Rose. I didn’t want her to go back on tour because I couldn’t stand the thought that Holly would be raised by a complete stranger. I thought that a child needed to be with her mother, no matter what. The trouble was that Rose was being pushed by her manager. He wanted her to work longer hours, take more tours, rush through another album.”
Kyle stood and stretched his long frame as he squinted into the sunset, as if he were searching for the answers to his life. “Maybe things would have been different if Rose had allowed Lydia to look after Holly. Since Lydia had helped raise me, I knew that she would take good care of my child. Lydia had always loved Holly. But Rose would hear none of it. In Rose’s estimation, Lydia wasn’t good enough for Holly.”
Maren stood next to him, and he let his fingers touch the soft strands of her hair. It shimmered in the dusk, framing her face in delicate coppery curls. Her brow was lined with anxiety as she listened to his story.
Kyle felt compelled to tell her about himself; he felt inexplicably drawn to her as he had never been drawn to a woman. The complexities of his life didn’t interfere; nor did he care for the moment about Festival Productions, pirated videos or sales agreements. All he wanted was for Maren McClure to understand and trust him. And he needed to trust her, though he knew it would be a mistake. Her incredible blue eyes sought his, encouraging him to continue.
“I guess the fights increased after Lydia left. Rose and I had nothing left in the marriage except our child. We stuck it out because of Holly.” His voice had taken on a new dimension, and his quiet rage was replaced by scorn. “A couple of years later—Holly was about three at the time—I caught Rose with a member of the band, a kid about eighteen. Their affair had already been going on for a few months, and I had suspected as much, but it still came as a shock to me.
“Rose indignantly demanded a divorce, and I agreed. The only thing I wanted was custody of Holly. Rose fl
ipped. I don’t really understand why. Maybe Rose’s motherly concern was deeper than I suspected. Anyway, Rose refused to give up Holly. We argued, and she promised that if I fought her, she would give me a vicious custody battle that would throw us and our child onto the front page of every scandal sheet in the country.”
“So you gave in,” Maren guessed in a hushed voice. Tears burned at the back of her eyes and threatened to spill. The agony on Kyle’s rugged features was deep and tortured. How long had he borne the scars of a past he couldn’t change? The emotions he expressed reached out to Maren, and she wanted to soothe him, comfort him, hold him to her breast and whisper words of solace to him long into the night.
“I hate to think of it as giving in,” he replied. “I did what I thought was best for Holly, and I’ve regretted it ever since.” His voice quieted. “You might have noticed that Holly and I don’t get along very well.”
“I don’t think it’s as bad as you make it.”
“Only because we’ve made tremendous strides in the last couple of weeks.”
“Because she’s been living with you?” Maren asked.
“Or because Rose rejected her!”
Maren’s heart stopped. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that now, right after the kid’s latest surgery, Rose decided to leave her high and dry!” The anger burning in his eyes sparked.
“If you don’t want to talk about it…”
“But I do!” He clutched her shoulder in a death grip. “I’ve been trying to tell you about Holly for a long time.” Seeing the startled look in her eyes, he released her arm. “Oh, hell! What do you care?”
“I do care, Kyle,” she reassured him, touching the tips of her fingers to his chin. Her voice was low and husky. “I think I care too much…” Her blue eyes caressed his. “I want to know everything about you,” she admitted.
Kyle rubbed his temple. The quiet of the night was disturbed by a rush of wind off the sea. Its breath, now cool with the night, ruffled Kyle’s dark hair. “You know about the car accident?”
“I read about it.”
“Then you know that Rose was at the wheel when the car skidded into oncoming traffic?” His voice was deadly.
“Yes,” Maren whispered. According to the newspaper article, Rose had been speeding in the rain. The oil-slickened streets had become dangerous for ordinary traffic. When Rose applied her brakes at a tight corner, the Jaguar had slid and slammed into a car heading in the opposite direction. At the time of the article, no one expected Holly Sterling to survive.
“Rose’s carelessness nearly killed my daughter!” Kyle’s teeth clenched, and his hands balled with his barely controlled rage. His eyes had turned vengefully dark.
“But I thought that Holly recovered.”
“She has—but not thanks to Rose.” His voice was flat and self-condemning. “Or maybe that’s my fault, as well. Even after her first stay in the hospital, she wasn’t completely well. Her most recent surgery was to correct a problem with scar tissue in her uterus.”
“But she’s all right now?” Maren asked hopefully, thinking of Holly’s future.
“We’re not sure. Right now, everything looks fine, but if Holly starts having problems again, she might be forced to have a partial hysterectomy.”
Maren swallowed back the lump forming in her throat. The thought of a fifteen-year-old girl suddenly facing a future without the ability to bear children was devastating. Shadows of pain darkened Kyle’s eyes. “And you blame yourself,” she thought aloud.
“Holly’s my child, Maren. I should never have let Rose get custody.”
“Oh, Kyle—”
“I should have protected her!”
“You couldn’t have known…”
“But I did know, damn it! I knew Rose wasn’t fit to care for her, but I let it happen. I didn’t fight hard enough for my child. You said it yourself, I gave in, and I never intend to give in again. I’ll never let Holly suffer at the hands of her mother anymore. I let Rose and her threats about causing a scandal intimidate me. I should have let the gossip columnists write whatever they damn well pleased and fought for my kid!”
“We’ve all made mistakes,” she offered.
“Maybe so. But that was the last one I’ll make concerning Rose.”
Maren let the silence speak for itself. Kyle needed time to let go of his anger. No words from an outsider could still the storm of emotions raging within him. She watched him noiselessly and waited until she noticed the tight muscles in his jaw softening.
“Now that Holly is living with you,” she said, touching him on the forearm, “maybe things will be better.”
“This is only a temporary arrangement,” Kyle replied. “Rose was offered the lead in a movie about a country-western singer. It’s being shot on location in Texas, and that’s why Holly’s here. Even though Holly had barely recovered from her last surgery, Rose took off for Texas the moment she was offered the part.” He let his forehead drop into his hand and rubbed his brow. “I’ve asked my attorneys to start proceedings for me to gain permanent custody of Holly.”
“Does Rose know that?”
“Not really, but she must suspect…she knows how I feel about that kid.”
Maren was hesitant. “And what about Holly. What does she want?”
“I don’t know.”
“Have you asked her?”
“Not yet. I thought I’d wait until my attorney tells me how good my chances are of getting custody.” He placed a comforting arm over her shoulders and tried to relieve some of the genuine concern in her eyes. “Don’t worry—somehow I’ll make it work,” he promised, kissing the top of her head. “I believe that if you want something badly enough, you can get it.”
They walked back toward the steps. Above them, high on the cliff face stood the proud hacienda. Warm lights illuminated the windows and invited them back inside.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ONLY A FEW INTERIOR lights welcomed Maren into the dim rooms of the hacienda. Once in the hallway, Kyle wrapped his arms possessively around her waist and pulled her tightly against his lean frame. “Stay with me tonight,” he suggested huskily. “I want to make love to you until dawn and wake with you still in my arms.” His lips brushed her eyelids, and her blood began to race in her veins.
“But what about Holly…and Lydia?”
“Holly’s already asleep, and Lydia’s gone for the night. It’s only you and me.”
“Kyle—”
“Stay with me.”
It was impossible to deny what she, too, needed so desperately. “How could I possibly refuse?”
“Would you want to?”
Seductive indigo eyes held him transfixed. “Never,” she whispered. His mouth captured hers hungrily, and his palms pressed urgently against her back, kneading the soft muscles until she moaned in expectation. The light fabric of her cotton blouse was a frail barrier to the warmth of his touch.
As if on cue, he lifted her from her feet. One arm supported her back, while the other captured the bend of her knees as he carried her upstairs. She twined her arms about his neck content to bury her head in his shoulder and hold him dearly. He smelled so tantalizingly masculine. The scent of him mingled with the tangy odor of the sea, awakening feminine urges deep within her.
He didn’t hesitate, but carried her into the master suite. Softly kicking the door shut, he strode across the room and through another door to deposit Maren in a sunken tub made of gray marble and rimmed in blue tile. When she began to feebly protest, he shook his head and smiled, conveying to her how desperately he wanted to please her. After deftly unbuttoning her blouse, he slid it off her shoulders. Slowly he unfastened her bra and placed the flimsy garment atop the shed blouse.
Her nipples, ripe with desire, hardened under his watchful stare, and she had to suck in her breath when his fingers touched her abdomen and lightly brushed against the waistband of her jeans. Slowly, sensually, he slid the zipper down before lowering the pants o
ver her hips and down the length of her legs. Her skin heated when his fingertips brushed against her, and she moaned in contentment when, at last, he removed all of her clothing. She lay naked in the tub, peering into his eyes as his gaze roved restlessly over the soft contours of her body.
He turned on the faucet, and the tub began to fill. The touch of his eyes was far hotter than the water in the tub. Without looking away from her elegant form, Kyle reached for the sponge and submerged it in the water. Maren shivered as the water crept slowly up her skin.
Gradually he squeezed the sponge over her breasts before lathering them with soap. His hands slid invitingly against her skin, teasing her nipples until the breasts became swollen with desire. Maren shifted in the water and closed her eyes with a soft sigh. She felt her breasts becoming engorged and the nipples becoming taut under the wet caress of his hands. A warm tide swirled in her bloodstream, starting in the deepest part of her and rushing upward through her body in ever-increasing fervor. She moaned his name.
Kyle slowly washed her hair and her back, letting his fingers graze the soft flesh of her buttocks. Her eyes were only half open, the indigo irises observing him through the veil of her thick black lashes. Her auburn hair clung to her face in wet ringlets, making her appear innocently seductive. Her rosy skin gleamed from the water. Long slender legs, high firm breasts and a face that was as vulnerable as it was strong enticed him.
She smiled lazily upward, and her blue eyes twinkled playfully.
“You’re a witch,” he muttered, as he leaned over the tub and his lips found hers.
“And you love it,” she murmured, returning his heated embrace.
He stripped off his clothes and tossed them aside before wrapping his arms around her waist and dragging her from the bath. Water spilled over the sides of the tub as he pulled her upward and pressed her warm body against his.
His tongue probed her mouth, and he groaned with the savage need ripping through his loins. Gently he carried her to the bed and using the weight of his body, forced her against the cool coverlet. Her body moved against his fluidly. The dewy water acted as if it were oil, allowing his muscles to glide over hers. He couldn’t wait. Capturing her eager lips with his, he ran his anxious fingers down the slippery hill of her breasts, past her abdomen, to gently part her legs.