All Night Long (20 page)

Luke opened his menu. “Contrary to popular opinion, some things do change.”

She smiled. “Maybe on this side of the lake. Not over in
Dunsley, at least not as far as I can tell. It’s scary how little that town has changed.”

“We came over here to get away from Dunsley for a while. What do you say we talk about something else?”

“Good idea.” She gave the menu her full attention. “I think I’ll have the sautéed shrimp and the avocado salad.”

“I’m going for the spaghetti. Same salad.”

“I don’t see any Elena Creek Vineyards wines on the list,” she said.

“Check out the Rain Creek selections. It’s the label Elena Creek Vineyards uses to market some less expensive blends.”

“I know that label. I can actually afford Rain Creek wines. I especially like the sauvignon blanc.”

“Rain Creek was my brother Hackett’s idea. He wanted to go after the mid-range customer, but he had a heck of a time convincing the Old Man and Gordon to buy into the idea. They liked the exclusive image they’d cultivated all these years. So Hackett came up with the idea of using another label. It’s worked well.”

“What do you think about using another label?”

He shrugged. “Not my problem. I decided long ago that I wasn’t going to be an asset to the family business. After I got out of the Marines, I let the Old Man and Gordon talk me into giving it a shot, but it was a disaster.”

They gave their orders to the waiter. When the young man left a heavy silence enveloped the table. Irene seemed absorbed in her glass of wine and the view of the night-darkened lake.

Luke wondered if he had made a serious mistake when he suggested that they change the topic of conversation. Maybe she found him hopelessly dull and boring if they weren’t discussing the problem in Dunsley. He wondered what she talked about when she was with other men.

“Looks like rain,” he said, digging deep for inspiration.

“Mmm, yes.”

Dig deeper, pal. You’re losing her here.

He reached into the bread basket and selected a breadstick.

Inspiration finally struck.

“I have to put in an appearance at the Old Man’s birthday celebration tomorrow night,” he said. “I could use a sidekick.”

She gave him a blank look. “Sidekick?”

“Date,” he corrected quickly.

“You need a date to go to a birthday party?”

“Trust me, we’re not talking a small family get-together. The Old Man’s birthday is a major social event in Santa Elena. Every winemaker in the valley and a lot of people from the town will be there. You’d be doing me a very big favor.”

“Sounds like fun,” she said. “I’d love to go with you.”

He suddenly felt remarkably more cheerful. “Thanks. We’ll drive to Santa Elena tomorrow afternoon. The party will run late, so we might as well spend the night at the Santa Elena Inn and return to Dunsley the following morning.”

“Just one thing,” she said.

“What?”

“Why will I be doing you a big favor?”

He turned the wineglass a little between his fingers, deciding how much to tell her. “I’ve already explained that my family has been worried about me for the past few months.”

“Yes.”

“I think that if I show up with you, it will reassure everyone.”

“Ah,” she said. “Got it. You think that if you arrive at the party with a date, your relatives will think you’re moving past the PTSD thing and getting back to normal.”

He took a swallow of the wine and slowly lowered the glass. “Unfortunately, it’s a bit more complicated than that.”

“How much more complicated can it get?”

“Like I said, when I got out of the Marines, everyone was very anxious for me to return to the family fold. What can I say? Seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“In other words, you subscribed to the notion of getting back to a normal life. What’s wrong with that?”

He looked at her. “Lady, I’m a Marine. I don’t just subscribe to notions. Once I decided to go for normal, I committed myself one hundred percent to the mission. I established the goal and devised a strategy for achieving my objective. I then proceeded to execute that strategy using a very precise timetable.”

She winced. “Uh-oh.”

“Uh-oh is right. Turns out being normal is a little trickier than it looks. One of those nuance things, I guess.”

“What happened?”

“Well, I was doing okay for a while,” he said judiciously. “Making real progress. Met my first objective just fine. Took the job in the family business. It was boring as hell, of course, but I did it. Went to lots of meetings. Read the company financials. Entertained some clients. But I ran into a little trouble with the second objective.”

“Which was?”

“I decided that part of the definition of being normal meant getting married and starting a family.”

She watched him with a veiled expression. “Jason said something about an engagement that did not work out?”

“Dad’s partner, Gordon Foote, has a daughter. Katy. She’s a couple years older than Jason. Her parents were divorced when she was in her teens. She spent most of her time with her father, and that meant she grew up in the wine business, surrounded by Danners. She works in the public relations department. I’ve known her all of her life.”

“You asked Katy to marry you?”

“In hindsight, I can only say that it seemed like a perfectly logical move. Katy seemed to think so, too, because she accepted. The family was thrilled. But something was missing.”

“Such as?”

He moved a hand. “Romance. Passion. Sex.”

“Sex was missing from your relationship?”

“A few friendly kisses and hugs and that was about it. So, being a trained, strategic thinker, I decided that the problem was too much family. Figured we needed some
time to ourselves. Long walks on the beach. Dinners by candlelight. You know the routine.”

She looked thoughtful. “Actually, I don’t think of romance as a
routine,
exactly.”

He ignored the interruption, determined to finish what he had started. “I asked Katy to go away with me for a long weekend at a secluded inn on the coast.”

“Something went wrong?”

“Almost immediately, I realized that we had made a major mistake. Katy agreed. We went home and told everyone that we had called off the engagement.”

“Sad but not exactly a disaster. Where’s the problem?”

“The problem,” he said evenly, “is that everyone, including Katy, assumes that the reason I called off the engagement is because I was unable to perform my duties in the bedroom.”

Irene stared at him, clearly torn between shock and laughter.

“Oh, dear,” she whispered.

“You think being slapped with a diagnosis of PTSD is hard to overcome? Try getting stuck with the Erectile Dysfunction label.”

L
uke brought the SUV to a halt in front of Irene’s well-lit cabin, switched off the engine and got out.

Irene watched him walk around the front of the vehicle to open her door. Scary anticipation and an unfamiliar excitement fizzed through her. Would he kiss her again tonight?

This was ridiculous. She was acting like a teenager on her first big date. Except that she’d never felt like this on any date in her life, she reminded herself.

The door opened. Before she could negotiate her way out of the front seat, Luke’s hands settled around her waist, snug, secure and powerful. He lifted her out and set her lightly on the ground as though she were weightless.

He walked her toward the front porch, not saying a word. The suspense was threatening to steal her breath. He took her key and opened the front door.

“The drive to Santa Elena takes about an hour,” he said. “We’ll need time to check into the inn, meet the family and get dressed for the big event. What do you say we leave here at fifteen hundred hours?”

She stepped over the threshold and turned to face him. “What is that in real time?”

His mouth kicked up wryly at one corner. “Three o’clock in the afternoon.”

She folded her arms and propped one shoulder against the door frame. “Got news for you, we’re going to have to leave here a lot earlier than that.”

“Why?”

“Because I need to do some shopping. A couple of friends at the paper packed up some clothes and overnighted them to me. But there’s nothing in the box that will work for a fancy evening. We’ll have to leave around noon, I think. There’s bound to be some nice shops in the vicinity of Santa Elena.”

“Shopping time, huh?” He nodded agreeably. “Okay, you got it. We’ll take off right after lunch. Speaking of food and since we’re both into breakfast, can I interest you in my very special French toast tomorrow morning?”

His smile was so slow and so wickedly inviting that she was amazed she did not dissolve into a puddle right there in the cramped little entranceway of the cabin.

A whole bunch of butterflies took flight in her stomach. Was this his way of announcing that he wanted to spend the night? If so, she would have to make a decision. Right now. Oh, Lord, she wasn’t ready for this. It was too soon.

“Yes,” she heard herself say before she could rationalize her way out of it. “Breakfast sounds good.”

Luke nodded, looking satisfied, leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the mouth. He raised his head almost immediately. “My place. Zero seven-thirty. That’s plain old seven-thirty
A.M.
to you.”

“Somehow I think I would have figured that out.”

And then he was walking away across the porch and down the steps. She stood in the doorway, nonplussed and more than a little chagrined. So much for her making the big decision, she thought.

He paused at the foot of the steps. “Lock your door.”

There was a suspicious gleam in his eyes, she decided. He knew full well that he had left her off-balance.

“Okay,” she said sweetly, “but I’m not sure why I’m
bothering. There certainly doesn’t seem to be much of a threat around here tonight.”

He grinned. “You never know.”

She closed the door and locked it. Eye to the peephole, she watched Luke climb into the SUV.

The vehicle’s lights came up, slicing into the darkness. The heavy engine rumbled to life. The SUV moved slowly, ponderously, out of the drive, heading toward Cabin Number One.

Damn. He really was going to leave.

“Son of a—” She broke off, wryly amused by her chaotic reaction to Luke’s abrupt departure. She told herself that she ought to feel greatly relieved. It was far too soon to go to bed with a man she barely knew. She had issues that were bound to complicate things, anyway. Sooner or later they always did.

Better to focus on tomorrow night, instead, she decided. Luke had mentioned staying at an inn. Was he thinking one room or two? Should she shop for a new nightgown tomorrow along with a new dress? And what about her issues?

She turned slowly away from the door, her brain swirling and her senses tingling with the anxiety of anticipation.

The sight of the darkness spilling out of the bedroom hallway did not immediately register.

Her autonomic nervous system, set to a level of hyperawareness seventeen years earlier, responded instantly, however. It flashed into full panic mode before her conscious mind had finished processing the data.

She froze in mid-step and mid-breath, trying to control the fear sparking through her.

The light in the bedroom was off. She knew she had left it on. She always left a light on in every room at night.
Always.

Maybe the overhead fixture in the other room had burned out.

Get a grip. It’s an old cabin. Old wiring. Old bulbs.

Somewhere in the river of darkness that flooded out of the bedroom, a floorboard squeaked.

W
hat he had glimpsed in those spectacular eyes was feminine disappointment, Luke mused, easing the SUV along the lane back toward his cabin. He was sure of it. Irene had recovered quickly but not quickly enough to conceal her reaction to his oh-so-gentlemanly departure.

She had definitely been willing to do some more fooling around tonight.

Problem is, lady, I’m too old to play games. The next time we get close it’s going to be all or nothing, and we both know that tonight is too soon for you.