Delightful: Big Sky Pie #3 (13 page)

“Deceased.”

Ice had reached for his sandwich, but the single word stayed his hand. Their eyes met. He searched her face, his look assessing, as though seeking some clue as to how much her sons’ father had meant to her. He said, “I’m sorry. It has to have been hard on you and your two little boys.”

Harder than anyone knew. Harder than she would tell him. “More so on the boys than me.”

The assessing gaze continued. “Do you mind if I ask how…”

“I don’t mind. Donnie was a champion bull rider. Always taking risks, always onto the next thrill.”

“I’m sorry,” Ice repeated.

“Don’t be. Not for me. Lucas was three at the time, Logan five, but Donnie and I had divorced a couple of years earlier. He was onto his third bride, a barrel racer, younger, prettier, more exciting…”

“No.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“She couldn’t have been prettier or more exciting, not possible.” The look in his eyes was fierce, as if he wanted to fight anyone who disagreed with him.

Something warm, like affection, meandered through her heart, chipping away at her composure.
Don’t fall for Ice. Don’t be in love with him. He’s not the man for you or for your sons.
“Thank you, but I’m over it.”

He lifted a skeptical brow. “Really?”

Okay, maybe betrayal was one of those things she might never put completely behind her, but she shrugged it off, not wanting Ice to know how sensitive she could be.

“I married Donnie Lovette for all the wrong reasons.” Andrea shoved aside her empty soup bowl, leaned back in her chair, and explained about her mother’s cancer diagnosis shifting her priorities. “I needed to grab hold of something alive and wild. I was too young to know the dangers of doing that and wouldn’t listen when Dad tried to talk me out of it. I thought I knew more than he did.”

Ice nodded. “Teenagers, huh?”

“Exactly. I was crazy about Donnie, obsessed maybe, but he cheated on me practically from the moment we exchanged our ‘I dos.’ He needed to prove his manhood all the damned time.”

Ice winced as though she’d struck a nerve. “Some men are like that.”

“At least you admit it.” She smiled. “I knew it the moment I laid eyes on you.”

This seemed to surprise him. “Then why did you sleep with me?”

“Ah, well, that’s my flaw. I like men like you and Donnie. You’re great in bed, and I haven’t wanted anything more than that for a while now. Just the occasional tumble with a man who knows what he’s doing, and who isn’t a selfish lover.”

“Thanks.” Although he didn’t seem to be taking this as a compliment. In fact, it seemed to make him sad. Or mad. “So there isn’t a special guy…”

“Only my sons,” she said, sipped some wine, and added, “but lately I’ve been thinking it’s about time I did start seriously dating. Maybe I do want to fall in love and marry for all the right reasons.”

“Marriage.” He shuddered.

“Don’t worry, I’m not talking about you.”

Now why did that seem to insult him?
He should be cheering. Probably some lingering concussion confusion.

“I’m glad we cleared that up,” he said. “Because I don’t want to mislead you into thinking what we did, that we, well, that it could ever be…”

Any secret hope she’d harbored that something between them might lead to a happy ending shriveled and died. She’d be damned, though, if he’d see how much what he’d just said hurt.
Change the subject, switch it to his life.
“What was it that went on with your parents, the big scandal Rita Grace mentioned that broke up your family?”

He glanced away from her, trailed his spoon through his soup, and avoided her gaze. “You could find that out on the Internet.”

“I probably could, but I’d rather you told me.”

I
ce had never spoken to anyone about the awful thing he’d done that had destroyed his family, not to counselors, or schoolmates, or his business partner. The very reason he’d been hidden away was so that he wouldn’t. Or couldn’t. Just the thought of someone finding out filled the little boy he’d been with such shame that he’d banished the memory to a black hole somewhere deep inside. Any attempt to release the demon over the years brought on gut tremors and cold sweats.

He drew a ragged breath, bracing for the onset of the usual symptoms, followed by a complete emotional shutdown, but after a minute of pretending he hadn’t heard Andrea’s request, the only thing he felt was a slight trepidation. No internal shudders. No sweaty palms and clammy skin. Andrea sipped her wine, glancing at him, giving him time to figure out whether or not he could open up to her. Damn. What was it about her that he was even considering telling her?

Was it the compassion in her voice when she spoke about her sons? Or his feeling that she was the mother he’d wanted his mother to be? A mother who wouldn’t blame a child for an adult’s betrayal? Or maybe it was how open and honest she was. He heard himself saying, “It was my seventh birthday. My father gave me a kid’s digital camera. It was the single greatest gift I’ve ever received. I’d always wanted to be a director, you see, like my daddy.”

Andrea tilted her head to one side, listening, a tiny smile in her eyes as if she were imagining him as a boy, receiving the gift of a lifetime.

Ice’s gaze snagged on a tiny drip of wine near the corner of her luscious mouth, at her tongue darting out to catch it. Desire distracted him for a moment until she asked, “What did you photograph?”

The question brought him back to his story, and he hesitated. His mouth felt as dry as the flour in the bins at Big Sky Pie. The first part was easy; the next was his undoing. He took a gulp of water, telling himself to rip off the bandage. Get it out. All of it. “I was pretending that I was shooting locales for my big, upcoming film. I wandered all over the mansion and grounds, snapping anything that struck my fancy.” He took another pull from the water bottle. “I even went out by our Olympic-sized pool—which I was strictly forbidden to go near on my own—and sneaked into the pool house.”

To this day, every time he heard Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You,” it threw him back to that moment. “My dad was there with, I thought, my mother.”

He watched Andrea leap ahead mentally, already connecting the dots. “Oh, no.” He didn’t deny or confirm. A lump formed in his throat, and he feared if he stopped the story right now that he wouldn’t finish. “The door into the dressing room was open a crack, and their reflections filled the big mirror over the bar. They were
wrestling
on the floor of the dressing room. I was seven, sheltered, and didn’t realize what was actually going on. I snapped a few shots. Then bored with that, I went back outside and on to more interesting exploring and picture taking, a wild rabbit eating Mother’s prized roses, the butler washing Daddy’s car—in my imagination a spy toying with the brakes.

“Later that evening, I begged my mother to put the photos I’d taken on the computer. Even though she was still getting ready for her trip, I knew she’d do it. She’d always indulged me, saying that she couldn’t deny me anything because I looked so much like my daddy, and besides, it was my birthday.”

Andrea seemed to sense how difficult this next part would be. Her hand covered his, and the warmth seeped into him, letting him know he wasn’t taking this journey into the past by himself. He didn’t have to face the old demon alone. He didn’t let anyone get close. Not ever. Somehow this sexy blonde whom he’d known for such a short time had slipped through the moat and over the castle walls to touch him emotionally, to make him care about her.

“You don’t have to tell me the rest if it’s too painful.”

“No, I want to tell you. I want you to know.”

“Okay.”

He cleared his throat, trying to dislodge the lump. “As you’ve no doubt guessed, the woman with Daddy wasn’t my mother. It was my nanny.” The ache in his head returned with a swift arc across his skull. “I didn’t understand the sexual implications, of course, I just knew my parents were screaming at each other, and that it was my fault. Daddy left the house after telling me that I had ruined our family and robbed him of his Golden Ticket.”

Andrea gasped. “He told you that? He blamed you for
his
indiscretion?”

“He did. I didn’t understand any of it. I ran crying to my mother, but she was too wrapped up in her own devastation and couldn’t bear to look at me. The thing she’d loved, my resemblance to my father, was now my curse.”

“Oh, my God. Excuse me if I don’t like your parents. How could they do that to you? Logan resembles his father, too, but that’s not his fault, and it doesn’t change how much I’ve always loved him. He’s not Donnie. You weren’t responsible for your dad’s mistakes You didn’t betray your mother.”

It was the first time anyone had gone all warrior woman on his behalf, and the effect was startling. A fissure cracked across the frozen plain covering his heart, splintering the icy shell. A tiny rivulet of something warm slipped through the rift to pool deep inside him. He was disoriented and rattled at this new development, but the feeling didn’t leave and seemed to be growing stronger, warmer.

He scooted his chair back and stretched his legs. “The family lawyers stepped in. I was whisked off to a private boys’ school, my name legally changed in an effort to keep me off the radar of reporters and newscasters looking for a scoop.”

“Both of your parents walked away from you? At age seven? On your birthday? That is so many kinds of wrong, I can’t even find words…” Her face was crimson with fury, her eyes full of disbelief and sorrow and pity.

The last wasn’t something he wanted. Not from her. “Please, don’t pity me. Pity is a useless emotion. I know. I’ve spent a lifetime feeling sorry for myself.”

“No one had a better right.” She shook her head. “Have you reconciled with either of your parents?”

They had reached out to him over the years, but he’d kept his distance. He couldn’t bridge the chasm of the lost years; he didn’t need his parents any more than they needed him. They’d both remarried several times and had other children, a half-brother and two half-sisters that he’d never met. Including Ariel Whittendale. “No, I…”

That seemed to infuriate her even more. “I can’t believe a mother would—” She broke off, seeming to realize she was rubbing salt into the wound, hurting him. It did still hurt, but the pain was as much a part of him as his blue eyes. “Why did you even move back to California when you graduated?”

“My granddad, the one whose last name I was given, left me a ton of money, which I inherited when I turned eighteen, along with a beach house in Malibu. It was one of the few places that held nothing but happy memories for me. I moved in and remodeled it.”

“I’ve never even seen the Pacific Ocean in person.”

“It’s amazing.”

“I’ll take your word for that. So how did you end up back in the movie industry if you were avoiding your dad?”

“I never got over the desire to be a director. I met Bobby at UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television. We hung out together. Surfed. Kicked back. Then one day, he suggested we should start our own company. I liked the idea of making my own mark in the same industry as my parents.”
Thumbing my nose at them.
Ice yawned, and pain split across his head again. If he didn’t lie down soon, he would fall down. Telling Andrea about his childhood woes had drained the last of his energy. He shoved aside his half-eaten sandwich. “I need to lie down or I’ll pass out in my soup.”

 “I should take you to the hotel.”

“I’ll be lucky to make it down your hallway.” He wanted to crawl back into her bed and spend the night with her wrapped in his arms, but now he recognized how selfish it would be to take advantage of the protective instincts he’d roused in her. She wasn’t like any woman he’d ever met. She wasn’t after fame. Or fortune. She didn’t count happiness by the numbers in her bank account. She was what he’d been looking for his whole life and had come to believe didn’t exist—an honest, genuine person. Someone he didn’t need to lie to about who he was. Someone who liked him for himself. Warts and all.

Unfortunately, he didn’t deserve that kind of woman. He was a rolling stone, better off without ties or anchors. Free to do whatever appealed at the moment. And at this moment, she appealed more than he could control. But he had to. For her sake. She wanted a husband, a father for her kids. He wasn’t that man. And she would only be hurt if he pursued this unrelenting desire he felt for her, if he let her start to care about him, if he started to care about her. “Would you let me crash on your couch, please?”

She blinked, looking surprised, and maybe disappointed by the request. She gathered the dishes from the table and put them into the sink. “You can sleep in Logan’s room. He’s tall for his age, and I got him a regular-sized bed for him to grow into.”

She dried her hands and offered to help him.

“I can manage,” Ice said, afraid if she touched him that his resolve would melt away and they’d end up in bed. Reminding himself that not making love with her was the best thing for her, he followed on wobbly legs as she led him to a bedroom across from the hallway bathroom. The walls were painted dark blue with stars on the ceiling, and the large twin bed had a spaceship bedspread and sheets. She snatched a pile of clothes from the floor, apologizing. “Logan is the messy one.”

Ice smiled. “If I can tolerate Bobby’s slovenliness, I can manage one night in here.”

As soon as she left, he shucked his jeans and climbed into the bed in his boxer-briefs and T-shirt and was asleep moments after his head touched down on the pillow. He vaguely recalled Andrea checking on him once or twice during the night. Doctor’s orders, he presumed.

When he finally opened his eyes, morning light spilled through the thin curtains. For several moments, he felt that disoriented sense of being in an unfamiliar space, of not knowing where exactly he was or what day it was. Not a hotel room. The bed wasn’t as wide as he preferred. He had a hard-on from dreaming all night about a blond temptress, and from waking up wanting her. He sensed someone else in the room. He turned in anticipation, expecting to meet a pair of beautiful brown eyes and a heart-stopping smile.

Instead, the gaze that met his belonged to an irate, blue-eyed kid with dark hair. His erection fizzled.

“Who are you?” the boy demanded. “Why are you sleeping in my bed?”

Ice stretched and grinned as he recalled exactly where he was. “I’ll bet you’re Logan.”

“Maybe.” He grew leery. “What’d you do with my mommy?”

“What?” Ice tossed back the covers and swung his legs off the bed. “Isn’t she here?”

Logan leaped back, eyes wide. “Grammy!”

Big Sky Pie looked as normal as any other day except for the hateful Health Department Closure placard in the window. Andrea let herself in, locking the door behind her. Instead of the aromatic fragrances that usually met her—fruits and spices and the earthy scent of dough—there was an underlying odor of disinfectant. It was a smell she knew well. But there was also the rich aroma of fresh-brewed coffee, and after the night she’d had, she might need the whole pot.

Maybe she shouldn’t have walked out and left Ice there by himself, but she couldn’t face him this morning. He’d poured his heart out to her, shared his most painful secret, broke every protocol of the one-night-stand ethic:
No emotional involvement.
She’d ached for him after hearing what his parents had done to him, had taken him into her heart as she would a man she loved. She’d crossed the line into a serious, no-going-back bond with him.

By choosing not to spend the night in her bed, he’d made it clear that he didn’t want her to care about him in any permanent way. Why did that hurt so much? She’d known how he felt all along, and yet somehow she’d thought…Oh, hell, she’d spent half the night trying to figure out what she thought. She didn’t want Ice. She did want Ice.
I love him, I love him not.
The end result was that her common sense had declared war on her emotional reasoning, and she was more confused than ever.

She took a long sip of coffee, welcoming the hot punch through her middle, the sudden jolt of caffeine. A vision of Ice filled her mind, but it was not the image of him asleep in Logan’s bed with the astronaut bedspread tucked under his chin. Instead it was the way he looked at her as they were making love, the way he’d clung to her afterward as they recovered from their breathless joy. This haunted man had touched her heart, had claimed a part of her that would forever belong only to him.

That was the real reason she’d left him alone. With the concussion subsiding and his rational thinking restored, he might regret having opened up to her, so she’d given him the chance to walk away without any obligation or explanation or regret. He could always get a ride back to his hotel by phoning a cab or his partner.

As she made her way to the coffee counter, she heard voices coming from the depths of the pie shop. The cold room maybe? Or the office? She carried her mug into the kitchen. Molly and Quint sat at the work counter, heads together, deep in discussion. Every surface in the kitchen, from cabinet to appliance to floor, gleamed, not one sign that it had ever looked any other way.

Quint gave her a cockeyed grin. “Lovette.”

“Good morning, dear.” Molly looked up, a smile of welcome lighting her eyes. “How’s Lucas doing?”

Considering all she must be dealing with, Molly’s first concern is for me and mine? Amazing. I want to be just like her when I grow up.
“A little better every day. Thanks for asking.”

Andrea set her purse on the work island and grabbed a stool. She had a couple of incredible older women in her life. Her mom had been taking the boys to school when she’d checked in this morning, and now this. She took a sip from her mug, glancing from one McCoy to the other over its rim. “So what’s going on? Anything new since last night?” She directed this last to Quint.