Redemption (21 page)

She shook her head. “No, I don’t—” but before she could finish the sentence, he had covered the distance between them and tilted her chin up to face him.

His eyes seemed to take in every detail of her face as he spoke to her. “You see, I have this strange inability to feel hatred at the same time I feel something else. I don’t know what it is between us, Claire, but it’s there, pulling us together every time I’m around you. Whatever it is nearly destroyed us ten years ago, but I’m a lot smarter now. Believe it or not, I’ve learned a thing or two about the value of patience. I want you, just as much as I ever did, but I intend to wait this time. When I’m sure no one will be hurt by what we do together—and that includes our son—then I’m going to put moves on you, lady, that you’ve never seen before.” A dangerous glint of passion had replaced the tender light in his eyes, a look she couldn’t mistake any more than she could take a breath.

She stared transfixed, as his face came closer and his mouth captured hers in the most gentle of kisses.

She didn’t move, not a muscle, while his lips gently explored hers. Warm, inviting, reminding her of something she had made herself forget.

The front door slammed, and Claire jumped.

“Hey, Mom! Matt!” Tripper’s voice echoed in the hall, accompanied by the sound of paws clicking on the wood floor.

Matt lifted his head, though his gaze still held hers. He gripped her arms lightly, his thumbs tracing little circles on the ribbed knit of her sweater.

Her eyelids dropped. Her skin felt over-sensitive where he touched, burning her through the sweater. “Stop it!” she hissed. “I refuse to be your—your plaything while you’re here!”

Matt just grinned. “We’re in here, Tripper,” he called.

Sadie’s nose had already told her where to find both her master and her feeding dish, and she came bounding into the room. Claire recovered her poise, unobtrusively removing her arms from Matt’s grasp just as Tripper walked into the room.

If he noticed the flush she could feel on her face, he said nothing. “Hey, Mom, can Matt stay for dinner?” he asked, aiming a hopeful look at her.

“Sorry, kid, I can’t.” Matt squeezed his shoulder, then explained, “I’ve got to go view the dailies in an hour. But I’ll take a rain check.” He glanced at Claire, a grin dancing in his eyes. “What about this weekend? I was hoping I could come over some time, maybe take a run with Sadie. I noticed there were some jogging trails around here.”

“Sure,” Tripper volunteered before Claire could speak. “I have basketball practice Saturday morning, but you could come over after that.”

“Actually, I was thinking about Sunday. You guys go to church or anything?” He looked at Claire as he spoke.

She found her voice at last. “No, we’ll be here. Call before you come, though.” She gave him a warning look, one he couldn’t fail to interpret.

“Sure. I’ll call you—soon,” he promised. Then, touching her arm in an oddly intimate farewell gesture, he turned, nodded to Tripper, and left.

After Tripper was in bed Claire made herself a cup of tea, then settled on the couch in the family room. An iPad was tucked, forgotten, in one corner of the couch. She had bought it to entertain Tripper during their long trip cross country, but instead, the hours had been filled with endless questions, some of which Claire had been hard-pressed to answer. Though she could forecast financial futures with some degree of accuracy, the geological origins of the Badlands were beyond her scope.

Tripper had forgiven her lack of knowledge, she remembered now with a smile. She had felt so close to him during those days spent on the road. Closer than she had ever felt to anyone.

Even his father…

She sipped the tea, then wrapped the string of the teabag around her finger and let it drip into the cup, as long-buried memories trickled back into her consciousness.

She had trusted Matt Grayson once. No, it was more than trust. She had looked up to him, admired him. Their brief friendship contained more than a hint of hero worship. Then the friendship turned to desire, on both their parts.

The quickness with which she had fallen into Matt’s arms made her shudder in embarrassment now.

Though she had purposely blocked the memory of their time together, she knew he hadn’t seduced her. That was the worst part. She had been willing, all too willing. The names she had been called ever since she could remember had been accurate.
Slut, whore
…

Her hand shook as she placed the cup of tea on the table beside the sofa. Those words clung to her memory like bits of tissue paper, bitter reminders of every wrong thing she had ever done, some as innocent as wearing cosmetics for her senior portrait.

She still remembered how Reverend Porter had punished her when he saw the proofs, sent to his office at church.

Her face had been bruised, her hair streaming wet from the near-drowning he’d forced on her in the church baptismal, but her mother hadn’t asked any questions. Deborah Porter supported her husband Roy’s efforts to cleanse their adopted daughter of her sins.

A cold shudder twisted inside her. She drained the last swallow of tea. She wasn’t about to dredge up any more of the fecund sludge that constituted her childhood memories. It had all been buried years ago, when she boarded a bus at the end of her senior year in high school and left Paradise, Texas, behind her forever.

Chapter Fourteen

A
RRIVING
A
T
C
LAIRE’S
H
OUSE
a few weeks later, Matt found her sitting at the kitchen table, surrounded by piles of neatly folded clothes. Her head was bent, and her dark hair fell loose to her shoulders, the ends curling slightly. She wore stretchy ivory pants and a sweater that looked as if it were covered in wisps of cat hair.

She turned to greet him, and the domestic look was abruptly shattered. Silver wireframes were suspended business-like on her nose, and a stack of printouts was piled on the table beside a brace of perfectly aligned towels.

Catching sight of the seven-digit numbers that marched across the columns of the page, he frowned. “I hope that’s not our bill,” he said, taking a seat across from her.

She looked up at him. “No, it’s our earning projections for next year, broken down by store. We’ve got sort of a competition going on, to see which store can increase their sales the most. Personally, I’m rooting for our Market Street location,” she said, tapping her pencil on the first column. “The improvements we’re making there should bring in the customers in droves.”

He tilted his head, admiring the utterly charming picture she made. He found it hard to view her now as the hard-bitten executive who had pounced on him in Kaslow’s boardroom. The reading glasses made her eyes appear slightly larger, and he wondered if he was the only one who ever noticed the touch of vulnerability there. Certainly she tried very hard to hide it, but his director’s vision was honed to see the faintest hint of an expression. Beneath the cool smile she presented to the world lurked the pain of a wounded animal, constantly on guard for further abuse.

That thought surprised him. Had he really inflicted that much pain on her years ago? Inadvertently, of course, but nevertheless, abandoning her to the press must have seemed like the ultimate betrayal to the young woman she had been.

A familiar feeling of tenderness washed over him, and just as he resolved to make it all up to her, she looked at him and said tartly, “If you’re memorizing that in hopes of doing a little insider trading, I should remind you the conviction carries a long prison sentence.”

He jerked his thoughts back to the present and smiled. “The only punishment I’m going to get today is out on the jogging trail. Looks like the last traces of snow have melted. I thought I’d take Sadie with me—and Tripper can follow along on his bike, if there isn’t too much mud.” He turned to Tripper, who had joined them, having finally managed to rein in an exuberant Sadie. “How about it? Can you guide me through those trails out there?”

“Yeah, and I know a shortcut through the woods. I can show you the fort David and I made!”

“Cool. I used to make forts,” he told Tripper. “I’d hide my sister’s dolls there and make her pay ransom to get them back.”

He glanced at Claire, who gave him a bland smile.

“Remind me to lock up my dolls—I haven’t budgeted for ransom this year.”

Ten minutes later, the two of them set off for what Claire knew would be another father-son bonding experience. They were becoming common these days, as Matt spent as much time as he could with them. Fortunately, Tripper now viewed him with less awe, though he still thought it the ultimate in cool to have a friend who could get him into the Lakers’ locker room.

Claire had relented, allowing Matt to take Tripper to the game last weekend, after being assured that no camera would make it past Matt’s bodyguard. Tripper needed to spend time doing the “guy” things she had never really gotten the hang of. If it had been anyone else, she would have been grateful for the attention Matt was showing Tripper.

He instinctively seemed to know how to relate to kids, viewing the world with a boyish pleasure, which Claire found oddly enchanting. No amount of boyishness, however, could mask the seductive glamour of his grin. Or the sharp intelligence that lurked just under the “aw shucks” demeanor, a perceptiveness Claire was learning to avoid. She sometimes had the feeling he could see right through her, a thought that sent shudders along her spine. Some secrets weren’t meant to be shared, especially not with glamorous movie stars.

Sighing, Claire dragged her thoughts back to her work.

An hour later, the trio returned, covered in mud. Thankfully, they had left their shoes at the front door, Claire noticed as Matt and Tripper padded noisily into the kitchen where she was preparing dinner. Spotting the muddy calves just inches from her spotless floor, she frowned, raised one hand, and said sternly, “Hold it right there. No one gets in my kitchen until they’ve passed inspection.” She pointed her broccoli spear in the direction of the bathroom. “Out.”

Matt looked down sheepishly. “Sorry about that. We’ll clean it up; I just wanted to see if it was all right to give Sadie a bath in the downstairs bathroom.”

Claire glanced down at the mud-flecked dog, greedily lapping up water from her bowl. “Of course you can. Tripper, find some towels—better yet, get that old blanket in the spare room,” she said, inwardly cringing at the thought of those muddy paws traipsing over her carpet. The extra money she had paid for stain proofing was turning out to be a wise investment.

Twenty minutes later, she looked up again as the damp dog emerged prancing from the bathroom, followed by two equally damp males. They had both stripped to the waist, and Claire couldn’t control a quick jolt of appreciation upon seeing Matt’s trademark torso. For years she’d avoided the sight of all that tanned skin stretched over rock-hard stomach muscles in magazine layouts, and now here it was in her kitchen.

She swallowed and said to the chicken sprawled in the Pyrex dish: “If you’d like to clean up, Tripper can show you where to find extra towels and shampoo. Oh, and you’re invited to dinner.” She risked a glance and found a knowing glint in his eye.

Tripper looked up from the floor where he was toweling a wriggling Sadie. “She’s making chicken with orange sauce. That’s her best thing. You’ll like it,” he promised.

Claire smiled. “Tripper’s our resident food critic,” she said. “I’ll warn you, though, his tastes lean toward peanut butter and jelly on toast.”

“I was going to offer to take you two out, but a home-cooked meal sounds better.” Then, glancing at the title of the cookbook open on the counter, Matt added, “Although I wasn’t aware French cooking was the sort of thing executives specialized in these days.”

She laughed. “It’s not. Sunday just happens to be my day for cooking. The rest of the week we rely on convenience foods.” She opened the door of the oven and slid in the dish, hoping the heat from the oven would account for the flush on her face. “This will be ready in half an hour,” she told them. “And Tripper, I’d like you to take a shower as well. That will save you the trouble tonight.”

“Oh, Mom, can’t I just go swimming later?”

“No, I don’t have time to watch you this afternoon,” she said, wishing Matt would hurry and remove his chest from her line of vision.

“But Matt could come with me,” Tripper said hopefully, gazing up at Matt. “Do you like to swim? There’s an indoor pool here, but Mom doesn’t know how to swim,” he explained.

“You don’t swim, Claire?” Matt asked, surprise in his voice.

Claire’s mouth tightened. “I never learned,” she said shortly. “Now, if you two would kindly remove yourselves from my kitchen, I would appreciate it. Now. Scoot,” she warned, giving the two her best no-nonsense look.

Matt just grinned and said to Tripper, “Moms have issues when it comes to dirt. Let’s get cleaned up, then I’ll race you in MotorStorm.”

“You’re on!” Tripper whooped, and they both disappeared.

Claire sighed with relief. Between Tripper’s casual confidences and Matt’s partial nudity, her nerves were well on the way to being cooked.

Matt lingered after dinner, enjoying the rare chance to relax. As he threw another log on the fire, the photographs on the mantle caught his attention. “When were these taken?” he asked as Claire joined him, a bowl of popcorn in her hand.