Guarding Kelsey ((Books We Love Romantic Suspense)) (12 page)

"I will."

She sighed every time she waved a piece of the rare steak in front of his face and popped it in her mouth.
She hoped to make him lose his appetite but she soon learned that nothing ruined his ability to enjoy food.
She wondered if he put as much passion into everything he did.
Imagining his technique in bed brought on a heat wave.
She pressed her knees together tightly and squirmed in her chair.
No doubt about it.
She’d lost her mind.
If she
weren’t
careful, her heart would follow.

"Now, be a good little woman and clean up while I take a look at your research on the computer," Wolf said when they finished eating.

Her jaw dropped.
Wolf certainly knew how to break a romantic fantasy.
He had better be joking or he would be wearing the dishes.
"Your mother should have named you
Porky;
you're such a chauvinist pig."

"Didn't your mama ever tell you not to bite the hand that feeds you?" he asked.

"No.
My mama told me to marry a rich man and consolidate our net worth.
That’s my mother view of sound romantic advice."

Wolf exhaled deeply.
"Then I'm safe.
I haven't got anything you'd want."

His words cut despite his light tone. Would she constantly need to defend herself to him?

“How do you know what I want from you?
You haven’t stopped judging me long enough to find out.”

"I don’t judge you."

She cut off his denial. "Yes you do.
You look around here and you make judgments on my lifestyle.
This was my father's house. It reflects his tastes and values, not mine."

* * *

Kelsey collected the dishes and left Wolf sitting at the table with his mouth hanging opened.
Had he made blanket judgments about her values based on her status?
Kelsey Winston was way out of his league and he resented her.
Right now, he had something her money couldn't buy.
She needed his protection.
But once the case ended, she could go back to life as usual. They might inhabit the same city, but they moved on two different social planes.

He’d already seen what happened when his parents tried to bridge the two worlds.
They not only made themselves miserable, more often than not, he’d gotten caught in the crossfire.
Until the day he died, his father had been in love with a woman who had hated everything about being a cop’s wife, from the salary he made to the hours he worked.
In fact, she’d hated the life so much she’d walked out on her husband without once looking back.
Wolf had followed in his father’s footsteps career wise.
He didn’t have to repeat the mistakes of the old man’s life as well.

Despite Kelsey’s claims that the money meant nothing, that she wanted to make her own way, her values had never been tested.
The simple truth remained that she had the money to fall back on for any whim her heart desired.
How the hell could anyone compete with unlimited wealth?
More importantly, why did he have the idiotic notion to try?

Chapter
Six

After a restless night of tossing and turning, Kelsey was in no mood for a visitor.
Thanks to Wolf
, her
nerves were tightly coiled, her thoughts scattered and confused.
Men!
Who could figure them out?
First she'd found one who'd only wanted her for her money.
Now she'd begun developing an attachment to a man who didn’t want for the same reason.
Could her string of bad luck get any worse?

And to top off her morning, her mother stopped by, unannounced.
Elisabeth breezed into the Park Avenue condo as if she owned the place.
A former model, Elisabeth Carlyle Parker Worth could marry her way up the social ladder but she'd never obtained the class associated with those born into wealth.
Her rudeness towards Detective Martinez bordered on crass.
Embarrassed, Kelsey shot an apologetic shrug towards the officer but he seemed unconcerned, even sympathetic of her plight.

Elisabeth gave her daughter an obligatory kiss in the direction of her cheek. "What is going on here?" she demanded on her way into the living room.

Kelsey followed her mother into the room and flopped down in a chair.
"How have you been Mother?"

Elisabeth tapped her manicured finger against the glass
tabletop
.
She'd just come from the beauty salon, Kelsey knew, because her mother had a habit of flashing her newly applied nail-tips around like a diamond ring.
Elisabeth had a twisted idea of what impressed others.
A hundred dollar manicure was her basis of good taste.

"Would you please explain why there is a police officer at the front door screening your visitors," Elisabeth demanded.

"It's called protective custody."

Elisabeth grunted in disgust.
"I just knew it!
One of those sleazy low lives you've been interviewing has tried to harm you.
Give up this ridiculous obsession of yours and take charge of your legacy before you uncle bleeds you dry."

Kelsey cringed.
Only ten a.m. and her day sucked already.
She'd been up until almost two in the morning, supposedly working on her paper, although more often than not, she’d been watching her live-in bodyguard watch her.
She needed her mother's criticism now like she needed the flu.
"Please don’t start today."

Elisabeth glanced towards the door and back to Kelsey.
"Is that the best they could send?
Don't they know who you are?"

"Mother!" Kelsey snapped, incensed. Elisabeth's snobbery even out-classed her bigotry.
How ironic.
Before a photographer had turned her into a semi-successful fashion model, she’d been a college
dropout
, working the cosmetics counter of a department store in Pittsburgh.

Elisabeth started to say something but thought better of it.
Apparently, she wanted something.
She smiled graciously at Kelsey and dropped her tirade. "So, what have you been doing since my last visit?"

"Working on my thesis.
I spoke to Grandma and Pops this morning.
They're really enjoying their vacation," Kelsey said.
A feeling of warmth spread through her.
Her grandparents were a model of constant and unconditional love in her life.
"When was the last time you called?"

"Honestly, Kelsey.
Sending them on a Hawaiian vacation at their ages.
It's a waste of good money."

"If you ever celebrate a fiftieth wedding anniversary I'll send you too. Otherwise, it's my money wasted, so don't worry about it.
What about you?
What have you been up to?"

Elisabeth ran a finger along the side of her face to push back an errant strand of platinum blonde hair.
Her hand trembled.
Why? Her mother was normally so cool and poised.
"Michael wants to come live with me.
He's not getting along with his father."

"That will be nice for you," Kelsey mused.
Michael was Kelsey’s half-brother, although she’d never met him.
Her mother had relinquished custody of him, too, in one of her divorce settlements. And his father, bitter over the divorce, had not allowed her to forge a relationship with the boy.
It had taken Kelsey years to understand that deserting her children was her mother’s failing, not hers.

Elisabeth scowled. "Nice!
Where are we going to live, Kelsey?
I've been staying at the Kingston Hotel.
It's no place for a teenager."

"Talk to his father.
He should pay towards his son's upbringing."

"How?
He claims he lost it all in the stock market, although he can afford his new
very young
bride and baby.
He doesn't pay me alimony anymore."

Kelsey couldn't hold back a laugh and her mother glowered at her.
"I'm sorry.
But you've been married again since then.
What did you expect?"

"This is no laughing matter Kelsey."

Her mother was right.
The situation was actually sad.
At least for the teenage boy who probably didn’t understand his mother any more than Kelsey had.
"What do you want me to do?"

"I was thinking
.
." Elisabeth began.

Kelsey groaned.
Whenever
her mother started thinking, it meant an argument with Uncle Daniel.
They hated each other.

Elisabeth continued.
"The penthouse in the New Jersey complex is empty.
It would be perfect for Michael and me.
He is your brother after all.
It’s close enough for you to come visit us."

Kelsey bit her tongue.
Elisabeth had made no attempt to bring the two siblings together, despite the many times Kelsey had asked.
Yet, now, when her mother wanted something, she dangled Michael up like bait.

She’d suffered too much pain because of her mother's selfishness.
Still, Elisabeth was her mother and Kelsey was too weary to argue. "I'll tell Uncle Daniel.
When do you want to move in?"

Elisabeth sighed in relief.
"As soon as possible."

No matter what the circumstance, asking favors of the daughter she'd literally given away, took a certain humility normally lacking in Elisabeth’s character.
They might be a thoroughly dysfunctional family, but they were family.

"Would you like some coffee?"

"That would be lovely.
Do you have any of that special blend your father used to keep here?"

Kelsey nodded and went to the kitchen to make the coffee.
She’d just finished when Wolf stumbled down the hall with his eyes half closed and his nose in the air.
Intent on reaching the source of the heavenly aroma, he apparently missed Kelsey's stunned mother staring at a man who had obviously spent the night in the apartment.

Wolf lifted one of the cups off the tray and took a sip. "Thanks dear, I needed that," he joked.

He did hear the horrified gasp coming from the living room and nearly spit out the second mouthful.
He spun around quickly and stopped dead in his tracks.

Kelsey's sorrow dissolved in a fit of unconstrained laughter.
She wasn't sure who was more shocked.