Falling for Mr. Wrong (17 page)

…

“So what do you think?” Marie bit her lip as she surveyed the large, schoolhouse-style structure in front of them. The building had a sharply peaked roof with a bell tower on top, crisp black shingles on the roof, and exterior walls of dark red. Twenty or so children ran around in the fenced side yard, screaming, in the way children had, at nothing. Simply for the joy of it. “They run three preschool classes and two kindergartens. There are three more rooms they aren’t using, including one that I think would be perfect for a nursery. It’s got its own bathroom and kitchen, and a small private area where mothers could nurse.”

“It looks great, but I don’t understand,” Kelsey said, frowning. “I thought Gentle Hands was doing well. You’d stop running it and work here?”

“Oh, no.” Marie spun around. She wore a long, multitiered white skirt, and the move sent it spinning around her hips like a great, frothy cloud. “I wouldn’t work here. I’d buy the business.” She clasped her hands together in a Julie Andrews-like gesture that had Kelsey laughing. “My office would be here at the school, which we’d run like a normal day care, but I would also offer nanny services for those who wanted them. I could even have temporary nannies to look after the day care kids at home when they were sick. It would be a huge help for the working parents.”

“That does sound pretty—” Kelsey broke off as her friend grabbed her hand and jerked her toward the stairs.

“They said I could come by and walk through today. Let’s go.”

Inside, the walls were covered with brightly colored paintings, painted tiles with imprints of tiny hands and feet, and a mural of sea creatures that stretched down the length of one entire hallway.

“How did you hear about this?” Kelsey asked, fingering the outline of a big toe on one of the tiles.

“The owner called me because we’ve worked together for years. I always send my girls to her when they want to try working with older kids, and she always calls me when one of her parents has an emergency. She wants to retire. She’s owned the business for twenty years and is ready to give it up and move to Florida.”

An efficient-looking woman with a head of white hair neatly coiled into a chignon met them in the hall. “Can I help you?”

“I’m Marie Fague. I called Carmen about coming by today to walk through the building.”

“Oh, of course. Do you mind waiting in the office?” The white-haired woman gestured to a sign a few doors down. “I believe she’s visiting one of the classrooms. I’ll go buzz her on her radio.”

Marie nodded. “No problem.” As soon as the other woman was out of earshot she whispered to Kelsey, “I want a radio.”

Kelsey laughed. “I’m not sure that’s a great reason to buy a business.”

“Whatever. I won’t mention that to the bank.”

They stopped just before the office, by a door that had been left open, revealing a tidy classroom full of children sitting at tables. They looked around three or four years old, and were doing a variety of activities—some painting, some playing with Play-Doh, others building with Legos.

“Don’t you just want to run in there and pinch those adorable little cheeks?” Marie cooed.

“Not really,” Kelsey said. “But a small, terrified part of me does want to run screaming back to the car.”

Marie crossed her arms over her chest. “You are seriously screwed up.”

“This is news to you?” Kelsey said drily.

“Look, my friend, I’ve let you get away with this whole ‘fear of children’ thing long enough. You’re great with kids. You are. I’ve seen you teaching at the climbing gym and I’ve seen you with Oscar, who now thinks you’re his best friend. The Bencher kids adore you. Hope’s having a heck of a time trying to compete with all the activities you did with them. So can we just drop this nonsense already?”

Kelsey ducked away from Marie’s piercing gaze. It wasn’t right that someone who resembled Shirley Temple should have such a frightening stare. “The Bencher kids are different,” she mumbled. “And Oscar still makes me nauseous.”

“Did you ever ask yourself
why
holding a baby makes you sick?”

Kelsey turned her back to the room full of small creatures. “I think it’s their heads. Or their necks. Or the combination of the two.”

“No,” Marie walked around into the hall to face her. “That’s not it. And you know it.”

“Do we really have to do this right now?” Kelsey glanced down at her watch. “I’m meeting Tank at the gym in half an hour. I should probably get going.” She’d been climbing with Tank all week so she could avoid talking to her father. He seemed to be avoiding her as well, sending long e-mails instead of calling, and leaving boxes on her doorstep instead of bringing them inside as he normally would.

Her friend’s hand stole through the crook of her elbow and steered her farther down the hall, out of view of the classroom. “Yes, we do. You’ve been avoiding this conversation as long as I’ve known you. When will you just admit that it’s because you want one? That’s why they make you sick. It’s not because they have wobbly heads and smell funny, although I will admit that both of those things are true. It’s because you know damn well that you want a family, and you want kids, and you’ll never have them living this crazy, vagabond life.”

Kelsey’s jaw dropped. “That’s absolute nonsense, Marie. You’ve known me for ten years. How can you say that? I’ve never wanted a family or kids. Never.”

“You’ve never
let
yourself want those things,” Marie corrected. “There’s a difference.”

“I travel too much for a family,” Kelsey replied, trying to sound reasonable. She’d had numerous variations of this conversation with Marie over the years, and she’d always been able to cut it off in the past. But today something felt different, and an uneasy sensation tightened her stomach.

“So don’t travel so much.”

Kelsey cleared her throat. “Now you’re just being silly.”

Marie shook her head, sending red corkscrews flying. She grabbed Kelsey by the shoulders. “Don’t go to Nepal. Please. I know you don’t want me to say this but I love you too much to keep my mouth shut anymore. I don’t want you to go, Kelsey, and I don’t think you want to go either.”

Kelsey shook off Marie’s hands. “Cut it out,” she said, looking up and down the hallway. “They’re going to think you’re nuts.”

Marie’s eyes narrowed with determination. “No way. You’re my best friend and I’m not giving up on this. I let you go once and I’m not doing it again.”

“I’m not going to die up there,” Kelsey insisted, though they both knew she couldn’t promise anything of the sort. “I’m coming back, Marie. You don’t have to freak out on me.”

“But you’re making damn sure that no one will care if you don’t, right? No one except for me.”

“Marie—”

“Listen, I’ve known you a long time, and I know how you operate. You push people away, especially guys. I can’t tell you how many lovesick fools I counseled in college who desperately wanted to date you. But you didn’t give them the time of day.”

“I was busy,” Kelsey protested. “I didn’t have time for guys.”

“You make yourself busy so you can avoid having relationships.”

“It’s just because I’m traveling so much that—” Kelsey tried again.

“Forget it,” Marie interrupted. “I know you too well. And in case you’re wondering, I can see you doing it to Ross, too. I can see you pushing him away, and it’s breaking my heart because any idiot can tell that you’re in love with him. Now I know you don’t want to hear this but I’m going to say it anyway. No one’s forcing you to climb that damn mountain. It’s your decision and no one else can make it for you. Which means you’ve got to figure out if you’re ready to treat your life like it’s worth living, and go after this incredible guy who really seems to like you, or if you’re going to throw your life away like your dad is trying so hard to do.”

Kelsey froze.

Marie winced. She softened her voice, as if realizing she’d gone too far. “Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

Kelsey spun around, unable to look Marie in the eye. “I should go.”

“No, wait, don’t go like that. Let me explain, I—”

Kelsey shook her head and walked back down the hall, forcing herself not to run.

Any idiot can see you’re in love with him…

The words rang in her mind, tolling like a bell, illuminating the one thing she wanted most to pretend wasn’t true.

In love with him…

Could she possibly have been so stupid? Could she
really
have let herself fall for the man most destined to break her heart?

Throw your life away like your dad…

Resolutely, she jerked open the door of the school, ignoring Marie’s voice calling her name. There was so much to block out, so many words to fear. Her arms and legs worked mechanically, turning the key in the ignition, taking her away from everything. She would
not
think about her father, or the way he stared at pictures of Annapurna, or the giant crack in the ice that had swallowed her mother, or Ross, or babies, or any of it.

She didn’t have time for second-guessing and questioning the decisions she’d made years ago. She had a job to do, and that job was saving her father’s life from whatever stupid, thoughtless mistake he was going to make on his way up the mountain. It wasn’t the life she would have picked for herself. Marie was right about that. But she’d known since she was thirteen that it was the life she was meant to live.

And that life didn’t include Ross Bencher.

Chapter Eighteen

He hadn’t gone to the rock climbing gym in the hopes of seeing her. At least, that’s what he told himself. He was there because Luke had been dying to show off his skills to his Uncle Brit and Aunt Tori, and Julia had jumped up and down in that adorable way that she had and proclaimed that the visit to the Slippery Rock was an
excellent
idea.

Ross didn’t know the first thing about climbing gyms. Still, the kids assured him that Hope had taken them last week and you didn’t have to know anything to be there. As they walked through the glass front door, Ross felt as if he was trespassing on another world. Loud music assaulted them first, and then the smell of mats, feet, and bodies.

And then he saw her. Dangling off the edge of a huge boulder that had been constructed out of particleboard and plaster.

Kelsey. Her lean body exposed in form-fitting pants and a tiny tank top cut to expose her shoulders, the narrow edge of her waist, and the curve of her spine.

Damn it, why had he come?

Tori, in her usual Tori way, swore in amazement. “What the hell is
that
? Is that even a human being? Is she really hanging upside down by her fingers?”

She did look eerily superhuman, poised as she was on the under-hanging side of the boulder, moving gracefully from hold to hold as the muscles in her back rippled. She wasn’t terribly high off the ground—maybe fifteen feet or so—but the angle of her body was positioned in a way that it was difficult to look at her and not shake your head in amazement.

“That’s Kelsey!” Julia cried out. “Kelsey, Kelsey!”

She did not turn to look, and Luke punched his sister in the arm. “Shut up. You’ll break her concentration. That’s a 5.13 climb, dummy.”

“What does that mean?” Brit asked, gaping at Kelsey as she rounded the edge of the rock and moved farther up the wall.

“It means if you keep looking at her like that I’m going to make that nose of yours even more crooked than it already is,” Tori replied, matter-of-factly.

“They rate climbs with numbers,” Luke said, “ and 5.14 is the hardest. Only a few people in the world can do 5.14s. Kelsey’s one of them.”

“But this is a 5.13? So it’s easier?” Brit was wearing a backpack that held Paddy and an assortment of clip-on toys. His T-shirt had a smear of orange squash across the front, and his normally well-groomed hair stood up from his forehead. Ross wondered, looking at him now, if it was possible that this was the same man who had once been dubbed “The Slayer” for his record of loving and leaving women.

“A little bit. Still basically impossible for anyone else.”

“And how exactly do you know this paragon?” Tori asked. “Because I’ve got to tell you, I don’t like her.”

Julia put her hands on her hips and frowned. “That’s not very nice, Aunt Tori. Kelsey was our babysitter. She showed Luke how to climb. And she went camping with us and taught us how to set up our tent. She’s our friend now, so you shouldn’t say mean things about her.”

Tori swung her gaze to Ross, instantly alert. Ross had the bad, bad feeling that color was rising in his cheeks under that steady regard. “You took the babysitter camping with you?” she asked. “As in, overnight?”

“It’s a long story,” he replied. “I was worried we would get lost and never be heard from again.”

“Kelsey, is it?” Brit mused, looking speculatively between her and Ross. “She went camping with you?” His searching gaze made Ross clench his teeth. “A wise choice, surely. She looks very knowledgeable.”

“Oh, she knows everything about the woods,” Julia said. “She’s going to Ne…Ne…where is she going again, Daddy?”

“Nepal,” Ross filled in. It was bad enough to have his sister-in-law dissecting him with her giant, doe-like eyes. The last thing he needed was his brother getting in on the act and connecting the dots from their earlier conversation.

“What’s she doing in Nepal?” Brit asked Julia, ignoring Ross’s glare.

“Climbing a really big mountain,” Matt said, matter-of-fact. “She’s famous. I think someday I’ll go to Nepal and climb Mount Everest. That’s the tallest mountain in the world. Did you know that, Dad?”

Ross nodded. Mount Everest was taller, yet considerably safer to climb, than Annapurna. He’d much rather Matt set his sights on it.

“Your babysitter climbs mountains in Nepal?” Tori repeated. “That sounds dangerous.”

Julia shook her head. “Kelsey can walk on her hands. It’s not dangerous for her.”

Luke started to interrupt but Ross cut him off before he could speak. “Look, she’s at the top.”

Kelsey stopped briefly to touch the upper edge of the particleboard wall before starting back down. The kids were waiting in a loose semicircle when she jumped lightly to the foam mats below.

“Hey kids,” she said, panting lightly. A damp V darkened the front of her bra top, which gave Ross a much better view of her cleavage than he wanted at precisely that moment. Her snug black pants were dusted on the hips and backside with chalk.

For just a moment, her gaze met his. Electricity surged between them. Ross could feel Tori and Brit watching and assessing the extra-long moment of awareness. “You all here to climb?” she asked, deliberately turning away and looking down at Luke.

“Yep,” Luke said. “My aunt and uncle are visiting. We thought they might want to see it.” He gestured vaguely in the direction of Brit and Tori, his attention already diverted to the walls in front of him.

“Hey, Kelsey,” Ross said casually. “Funny seeing you here.” He wondered if it was possible to convey
No, I haven’t been sleeping with this woman
simply by the tone of his voice. “This is my brother Brit and his wife, Tori. They’re visiting from New York.”

Kelsey waved a hand in their direction and gave a rueful laugh. “Don’t mean to be rude, but I’m covered with chalk.” Indeed, the skin on her fingers was almost entirely concealed by white dust.

“No problem,” Brit said, as if he encountered this problem all the time. “Nice to meet you.”

Tori smiled, though to Ross’s eyes, there was a hint of scheming in her gaze. “The kids told us you were their babysitter. Is that something you do full time?”

“I was filling in for a sick friend,” Kelsey said.

Ross cringed. Even though entirely true, her statement sounded completely fabricated. “It was a terrible situation,” he broke in. “Food poisoning, through the whole ranks of the nanny agency.”

Tori’s eyebrows rose. “Really? How unfortunate.” She linked her arm through her husband’s and gave a tug. “Lovely to meet you—we’ll let you and Ross catch up. Luke is desperate to show us his moves.”

Brit waved behind him as they walked away, and Ross let out a long breath. He wondered how long it would take his brother to fill his wife in on their earlier conversation—assuming he hadn’t already.

“How are you?” he asked, knowing he sounded stupid and uncomfortable, but having no earthly idea how to communicate with her in this goddess-like incarnation, surrounded by people in the noisy gym.

“Tired,” she said, wiping her hands together. “I was just leaving.”

She didn’t look him in the face. Her voice sounded tense, or sad, or…something. Ross wasn’t sure entirely what, but it made him want to stop right there and kiss her in front of everyone, claiming her for his own. Of course, he knew that was ridiculous, because she didn’t belong to him, and in a week, she would be gone.

“Don’t leave because of us,” he said.

“It’s not, it’s…” She shifted from foot to foot. He realized her hands were shaking.

Ross took in the tiny movement with concern. “Is everything okay?”

“Oh yeah, everything’s fine. I’ll see you later, all right?”

He paused, unable to let her go. With a vague wave, she started to move away from him. But then another figure approached from the front entrance, and her face fell.

“Damn it,” she muttered.

A man headed in their direction. He could only have been Kelsey’s father, his body cut from the same plank of muscles, his eyes the same deep brown.

He didn’t stop as he passed by, just raised his hand in acknowledgment. “Kelsey.”

Ross would have recognized that gravelly voice, and the precise note of disappointment, anywhere. “Mr. Hanson,” he called out, having not the foggiest idea what he was about to do. “Hang on a minute.”

Mick turned slowly around. “Can I help you?”

Ross nodded pleasantly, extending his hand. “I wanted to introduce myself. My name is Ross Bencher. We almost met last week.”

Kelsey’s eyes had widened to swallow up most of her face. She opened and closed her mouth twice, but no sound emerged.

Mick stared at Ross’s hand, then back up to his eyes. He made no move to reciprocate the gesture. Ross dropped his hand, not surprised. “I just wanted to let you know that your daughter did a wonderful job babysitting my kids. She’s a very special person. I hope you know that.”

“Of course I know that,” Mick snapped. “She’s my daughter.”

At that moment, Ross enjoyed every one of his seventy-two inches, and the knowledge that his biceps were easily twice the size of the smaller man in front of him. With deliberate arrogance, he crossed his arms over his chest and looked down at Kelsey’s father. “I wonder if you do,” he said, leaving just a hint of a threat in his voice. “I thought it might be worth reminding you.”

Kelsey’s palm flew to cover her open mouth. She made a tiny squeak as her father’s mouth tightened. For a moment, it looked as though he might say something, but instead he stomped away, not looking back at either of them.

“What the hell was that?” she said through her teeth, when Mick was out of earshot.

Ross wasn’t quite sure he knew, which made answering difficult. “I don’t like the way he treats you,” he said finally.

“I don’t really give a rat’s ass what you think about it,” she snapped back. “He’s my father, and our relationship is my business.”

“But
our
relationship is my business,” Ross said, gesturing between them, suddenly uncaring that Brit and Tori were somewhere nearby, probably watching every moment of their interaction. “And I’m sorry, but
you
are my business. I’m not going to stand back and watch him treat you like crap. I won’t do it.”

She made another strangled sound deep in her throat. “Great. Because what I need in my life is one more overbearing man. There is no us. There’s no relationship. I’m leaving at the end of week and that’s the end of it. You know it, and I know it. So let go of whatever guilt you picked up about me. I’m just a girl you slept with. That’s all.”

“That’s not true,” he said, grabbing her arm and holding it so she couldn’t run away. His words felt like as if were being ripped from somewhere deep inside his gut. “It’s more than that.”

“I see. Are you ready to introduce me to the kids as your girlfriend, then? What about your brother, do you want to tell him we’re dating? What happens when I leave? Will you tell the kids to miss me while I’m gone? Have you changed your mind about what you want for them? About what they deserve? Because I haven’t. I know what it’s like to lose someone, Ross, and I refuse to do that to your kids. It’s not worth it.”

He hadn’t expected to have this conversation and felt as though his mind was working too slowly in response, but words came out anyway. Unplanned words. Words he wasn’t sure he could believe he was saying. “Then don’t go. Stay here with me. Get a job in Colorado. Climb and run and do all the things you love. Just don’t do them on a rock that has a forty percent mortality rate.”

“It’s thirty-three,” Kelsey said, her voice wobbling a little. “And it’s too late.”

“Too late for us?” Ross asked. He took her hand, feeling it tremble in his grasp.

Kelsey jerked away. “Stop it. Please stop. My dad and I have one more chance. After that the sponsorships and the money will dry up. So we’ll give it another go, and then I’ll be free.”

“You say that like it isn’t a choice.”

“You don’t understand,” she hissed, looking over her shoulder at Mick, who was stretching by one of the climbing walls. “I can’t just desert my dad like that.”

“Kelsey, listen to yourself.” Ross grabbed her shoulders. “This isn’t just about your father. This is about you. Ever since your mom died, you’ve appointed yourself caretaker for him and it’s wrong. It’s wrong for you to do it and it’s wrong for him to let you. Because the fact is that when you say it’s not worth it, you’re really saying that
you’re
not worth it, and that’s just not true.”

She jerked her arm away. He didn’t know what else to say, and the one thing his gut was telling him to do—haul her into his arms and tell her he wasn’t going to let her go—was as untenable as it was irrational.

“We knew what our future held right from the start, Ross.”

“Maybe we were wrong. Maybe we could be more.”

Her eyes welled up, and she blinked rapidly. “You heard my dad that day. He might have been acting like a jerk, but he was right. We can’t have relationships. We just can’t. It clouds our decisions, makes us too cautious. You know when you get hurt? It’s when you hold back. I can’t hold back. Not now.”

He wanted to argue with her, but there was no room for doubt in her voice. No wavering or indecision. And what could he say? That he wanted her to hold back? That he wanted to stand in her way, no matter the cost?

He didn’t reply.

“Good-bye, Ross.” She met his gaze for a brief, painful moment before she turned around to leave.

And then he let her walk away. And wondered if he would ever see her again.

…

He was working on his computer later that night when the little bubble popped up on his screen to indicate that Jenna was online. He considered logging out—after fending off questions from his brother and sister-in-law for the better part of the evening, the last thing he wanted to do was talk to anyone—but she had been trying to get a hold of the kids for a few nights, and he couldn’t in good conscience ignore her.