Mine Until Morning (39 page)

No Second Chances

Except for that tone in his voice, a gentleness she’d never heard before, and yes, an edge of desperation, too. Whoever the woman was, she was special to him.

Walker had given up being a courtesan. What would Simon give up for his lady?

That ache started in Isabel’s chest again.

What would she give up for Royce?

Her own hard edges smacked her in the face. When she thought about it, really allowed a little self-examination, she was forced to admit she hadn’t given up a thing for Royce. She’d asked for acceptance, received it in abundance . . . and given nothing in return. Not even honesty. She’d always held things back. Since she hadn’t said she wouldn’t date and he hadn’t asked her not to date, well, then, dating her clients was fine. Yet Royce had done everything she asked, including Noelle. Because she wanted it. Isabel had refused talk of the future, didn’t show enough caring or concern to even ask about his girls, their colleges, majors, hopes, dreams. That bothered her, how she’d cut out such an important part of his life. Then suddenly, when he’d had a little trouble accepting a past that she’d lived with for thirty years, she’d thrown him out. Simon, Walker, and Royce weren’t the ones who couldn’t change for a chance at love and happiness. She was. She was afraid to change. After all these years of thinking she was so strong and self-confident, Isabel had to admit she was a coward. She claimed she wasn’t ready for a deep relationship, but the truth was that it terrified her. After all these years, she was still afraid of getting hurt again.

The phone was still in her hand. She dialed her travel agent. It was time to go to Royce instead of always making him come to her. It was time to return to the place she’d been running from for thirty years. It was time to go home.

PROSPERITY WAS LITTLE MORE THAN A DUST SPECK ON A LONG, flat stretch of highway an hour and a half north of Oklahoma City. Thirty years ago, when Isabel left, it had been less than a dust speck. The town square had been spruced up, old-fashioned benches of wood and wrought-iron curlicues, streetlamps with an antique look, planter boxes along the sidewalk, and parking meters. Downtown Prosperity was middle America whitewashed and painted with a bright facade. She’d taken a red-eye flight, and the morning was still early, a 250

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bit before eight. It was breath-in-the-air cold, but dry, whatever snow they’d had now dirty piles of hardened slush along the highway. A street sweeper ambled down the empty curb, and business owners, bundled up against the wind chill in mufflers, gloves, and hats pulled so low only their eyes were visible, cleaned yesterday’s dirt from the sidewalks. She didn’t recognize the names of the shops or the people. She hadn’t expected to.

Royce’s manufacturing plant was on the other side of town. She’d looked up the address to find out if it was still where she remembered and called the main number yesterday to be sure he wasn’t traveling this week. Maybe she should have had the courage to actually call him. The route took her past her old street. The trailer park was gone, replaced with small starter homes. Oddly, her belly crimped. She should have been glad she didn’t have to see the dump. Vindicated, as if she’d outlasted it, something. Yet the fact that it was gone was more of a reminder of everything that was gone. Maybe you couldn’t get anything back. Just as she’d thought that first night all those months ago when she’d seen Royce in San Francisco, maybe there were no second chances.

Isabel curled her fingers around the steering wheel, holding it tight until her knuckles turned white.

When Royce left her key on the hall table, perhaps that was all there was.

TRACY, HIS SECRETARY, HELD THE DOOR OF HIS OFFICE CLOSED. “There’s some lady out there who wants to talk to you,” she stage-whispered, which totally negated the whispering.

Royce pushed his keyboard away and sat back in his chair. “Who is she?”

“I don’t know,” she once again whispered. Tracy had lived in Prosperity all her life, raised a family, and when the kids went off to college ten years ago and never returned, she came to work for him. She wasn’t a Fortune 500 executive admin, but usually she was competent.

“Did you ask her?”

Tracy raised her eyebrows to the bottom of her gray bangs. “She won’t give me a last name. Just tell him Isabel would like to see him,” she mimicked. His ears began to buzz with the rush of his blood. She’d come home. For him.

“Send her in.”

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Tracy cocked her head as if she expected him to tell her who the woman was. When he didn’t, she opened the door, then swept out a hand indicating entry.

Isabel wore tight jeans, fur-lined boots, and a thick Scandinavian sweater under a suede jacket long enough to cover her butt.

“I’ve never seen you in jeans.” It was the most inane greeting, but he was afraid of saying too much in case he actually started to beg. She closed the door. “It’s cold here. Jeans seemed appropriate.”

Obviously she remembered the ass-numbing winters. “Have a seat.” Tell me what you want. Please.

After taking the chair opposite, she hugged the suede coat tighter as if he kept his office too cool. “I’ll make this brief.”

He realized her businesslike manner was nerves. He’d never seen her nervous, either, not this woman. “I have time.” He glanced at his watch. “No meetings until ten.”

“Oh.” She rolled her lips, smoothing her lipstick. Then she crossed her legs the opposite direction. “All right. I was wrong. I had a date on Wednesday night, and I shouldn’t have done that. Not after what we’d shared.”

His fingers tingled with pins and needles as if they’d been asleep.

“Instead of dealing with the issue, I just accused you of being ashamed of me.”

“What I said came across that way.”

She waved a hand at him. “Look, what I do is not your normal run-of-the-mill job. You can’t tell your friends or your family. I understand that.” She leaned forward, put her fingertips on the desk. “But I’m not here to tell you that I’m going to give up Courtesans.”

A fist closed around his lungs and squeezed all the breath out.

“But we can make this work. I don’t have to take clients.”

She didn’t have to sleep with other men. A chip of ice broke off his heart.

“You claimed you can never be vanilla again.”

She sat back, wrapping the coat tight again, as if he’d actually caused the chill in the room. “I loved what we did with Noelle and Dax. I’m not saying I don’t want to do stuff like that. But only with you.” Then she shrugged. “But I don’t need it the way I need you.”

Warmth stole across his skin. He realized he hadn’t been warm since he left 252

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her, and it had nothing to do with Oklahoma in January. “I need you,” he whispered.

She dropped her voice, too. “I just can’t stop managing Courtesans. I don’t know how to let that go. Melora saved me.” She swallowed, her eyes moist with emotion. “I told you that I was out on the streets, that she found me. But I didn’t tell you I was hemorrhaging. I knew I’d lost the baby, but it just wouldn’t stop bleeding. Melora, she came to the ugliest, seediest parts of town to find us, girls in trouble, to help us. She took me to the hospital. Then she took me into her home, her life. She made me who I am. And she passed everything on to me.” She held him, her gaze steady. “Someday, I need to pass it on, too.”

He closed his eyes a moment, thinking of her alone, bleeding. Trembling with emotion, he could feel her terror and bewilderment. He’d wanted to hate her for running away without telling him, for the years of guilt she’d left him with, for cutting him out, not trusting that he’d believe in her. For the guilt he felt even now. Yet overriding it all was horror for what she’d endured, her stepfather’s touch, the months she’d spent alone. And admiration for the woman she’d become. On the plane trip home, he’d actually experienced the wonder of imagining her rounded with child. His child. In the end, though, with all his musings, guilt, and anger, he realized the pointlessness of it all. If she’d stayed, he wouldn’t have his girls, and he couldn’t trade them for a life with her any more than she could give up Courtesans.

“Please tell me how we can work this out,” she said softly. The here and now. That was what they had. “I can take anything except thinking about you fucking another man while I’m out of town.”

Her eyes seemed to get bluer as she gazed at him. “I don’t need that.”

“Yes, you do.” He rose, skirted the desk, tipped her chin with his finger. “Tell me how long you’d last without touching another man.”

She clasped his hand, held his palm to her cheek. “The question is how long I’d last without touching you. I’ve loved you since the first time I saw you play football in high school. When I knew I was going to have a baby and it wasn’t yours and I thought you’d never be able to forget or get over it, I wanted to die.” She closed her eyes briefly. “But you came back. I’ve had thirty years to get other men out of my system. Now there’s only you.” She dropped her voice to less than a whisper, a mere feathering of words across her lips. “You’re the one, Royce. You always were.”

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Royce went down on his knee beside her. “Here’s how we can work it out.”

He kissed her fingertips. “Courtesans is your business. My family doesn’t need to know what you do. With the girls at college, I can just as easily make my base in San Francisco. But you will meet them. You will meet my parents. I’m not going to hide you as if I’m ashamed of you.”

Royce wiped a tear from beneath her eye with his thumb. “Hey, you never cry.”

“You’ve just never seen me.” Isabel couldn’t help it. She wasn’t a crier, but then, she’d never before gotten everything in the world that she desired. “I want to meet your girls. I can only imagine they must be the most perfect little creatures with you as their dad.”

He laughed. “They’re not little, and they’re not perfect. But you’re going to love them.”

She put a hand to his cheek. “I love you.”

“I never stopped loving you,” he said. “Both of us need to let go of the past. It’s only important because it made us who we are. This is a new beginning that’s not rooted in what we had. No expectations.”

She had no words. Instead she kissed him until her heart wanted to burst. God, how she’d missed his kiss.

Royce pulled back. “I’ve been thinking”—he rubbed his nose to hers, then put his lips to her ear—“that what we did with Noelle and Dax was pretty damn fun.”

She pulled back to look at him. “It was?”

His eyes sparked. “Fuck yes.”

She laughed, the first laugh she’d truly felt in days. He sounded so like Dax that night. “And?”

“We shouldn’t limit our options.”

She smiled at him, trailing her thumb along his bottom lip. “Where you’re concerned, I have no limits.”

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jasmine Haynes
has been penning stories for as long as she’s been able to write. With a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, she’s worked in the high-tech Silicon Valley for the last twenty years and hasn’t met a boring accountant yet! Well, maybe a few. She and her husband live with Star, the mighty moose-hunting dog (if she weren’t afraid of her own shadow) plus numerous wild cats (who have discovered that food from a bowl is easier than slaying gophers for their dinner). Jasmine’s pastimes, when not writing her heart out, are speed-walking in the Redwoods, watching classic movies, and brainstorming with writer friends in coffee shops. Jasmine also writes as Jennifer Skully and JB Skully. Please visit her at www.jasminehaynes.com and www.jasminehaynes.blogspot.com. She loves to hear from readers.

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