The Tycoon (70 page)

He felt as if somebody had whacked him across the knees with a ball bad. He stepped back and sank to the wicker love seat across from her desk.

“…don’t want you around us. No way would I want the influence of a charlatan on my child….It’s bad enough she’ll have your genes. We’ll get by without you. I want you to go back to Fort Worth and leave me alone.”

“No,” he said, finding his voice. He sprang to his feet. “No. You don’t mean that.”

“I do mean it.”

Suddenly, she dropped to her chair seat, grabbed her trash can and wretched into it.

Stunned, Drake rounded the end of her desk, snatched tissues from a box on the corner of her desk and tried to help her wipe her mouth. “Shannon, my God, what’s wrong? Do you need a doctor?” He straightened and called for Chelsea, who appeared in the office doorway. “She’s sick,” Drake told her.

The receptionist dashed away and returned with damp paper towels. “I’m okay, Chelsea,” Shannon said, dabbing at her forehead and mouth. “Honest. I’m okay now.”

“Are you sure?” Chelsea asked. “Do you want some water. Some Seven-Up?”

Other women came from somewhere and appeared in the doorway, all of them looking at him with a jaundiced eye.

“I’m fine, y’all,” Shannon said to them. “Please. Just go back to work.”

To Drake’s relief, they faded away. He rounded the end of her desk, placed his hands on her shoulders. “Look at me, ” he said softly. “Shannon, you’re it for me. I’ll do anything to be with you. I’d do anything for you. Don’t you get that?”

She shoved a wad of tissues against her nose. “I want you the hell out of my life.”

He pulled her up and against him, wrapped his arms around her. He squeezed his eyes shut as emotion almost overwhelmed him. “Shannon, I—I’ve fought it. I didn’t figure it out at first. I know I’ve been clumsy, stumbling around, but I—”

She wasn’t responding, he realized then. She was standing still as a statue. Rigid, even. He set her away. The fire in her eyes roasted him. “Get out of my office,” she said.

He stepped back, staggered by the ice in her voice. He stared at her for a few beats, but her expression remained unchanged. Hurt and unable to find words, he walked out.

Chapter 40

Drake had never been so lost. His heart had never hurt so much. He paced in front of his desk. He still hadn’t recovered from the initial shock of learning she was pregnant. He thought they had been careful, but he would try to figure out how it had happened later.

At the moment, he had to figure out how to solve the problem at hand, which was Shannon’s rejection. He had been taught—and believed—that success came as a result of problem solving. He couldn’t think of when he had faced a dilemma  he couldn’t solve, rarely failed to persuade someone to agree with him.

He had intended to propose before he learned she was pregnant. If that new development hadn’t occurred, he believed she would have accepted. Now that she was going to have his baby, she wouldn’t speak to him. The irony of that contradiction would be almost humorous if his heart wasn’t involved.

Outside, rain poured. He paced more. He had to make her understand there was nothing between him and Tammy, that none of the women he had ever known had been important since he met her. That was a tall enough mountain to climb, but equally important to Shannon, he had to make her understand that he had not schemed against her in a business deal. But how? What could he say?

His assistant came in with a steaming mug of coffee. “You okay in here?”

He accepted the coffee. “Just trying to understand women,” he said with a bitter laugh.

“Good luck,” Debra said. “I don’t think you’re the first man who’s ever fallen into that trap.”

She turned and started for the door, but he stopped her. “Tell me something, if a woman won’t talk to you, how do you get through?”

She shrugged. “You need something irresistible.”

“Like a diamond ring?”

“Lord, no. Something that’s soft and sweet and helpless. Like a kitten or a puppy.”

He frowned. “An animal?”

“All girls are suckers for kittens and puppies.”

He had never had a kitten, but he liked puppies himself. “A puppy?”

His assistant shrugged. “It’s one of those nurturing things. You surely must know women need something to love and take care of.”

He thought about Shannon’s remarks about her grandmother’s cat. He had never heard her say she hated pets. “I guess I’ve been a little dense in that area.”

“You need to narrow your focus, bossman. I just happen to know that the city pound has one of those adopt-a-pet programs going on right now. All week on TV, they’ve been showing the ones that are about to be put down. I just hate to see that.”

“You’re trying to tell me something.”

She shrugged. “I’m just saying…”

The idea was worth considering. He knew Shannon was a strong woman with a formidable will, but he also knew she had a soft heart. “Where’s the pound?”

“Over on the east side, by the Loop.”

He walked over to the coat closet and pulled his jacket. “I’m leaving for the day,” he said.

She gave him a thumbs up. “Remember. Something little and cute and helpless.”

“I’m not little and cute, but in this situation, I’m damn sure helpless.”

He trekked back to his condo, shoved the diamond ring he had bought in his pocket and

headed for the pound.

He reached Camden mid-afternoon. In his backseat, he had a dog-collar, a dog sweater, a doggie bed, doggie toys and a bag of Puppy Chow. In a fiberglass pet carrier, the cutest female half-grown puppy he had ever seen slept. She looked like a stuffed toy. He had found her at the pound, in line for euthanasia. The keeper at the pound said her name was Prissy, she was a Bichon Frise and he believed her to be a purebred. She was the last of a whole litter an owner had brought in.

He didn’t hesitate. From there, he’d had her checked out by a veterinary friend and paid extra to have her moved to the head of the line to be groomed at a pet grooming shop. Now she was clean, fluffy, snow-white and perfect. At Pet Smart, he bought a big red bow. He stopped in a gas station outside the city limits of Camden, tied the red bow around Prissy’s neck and attached the velvet pouch that contained the ring box. God, she was cute.

At Shannon’s office, he was told by the receptionist she had gone home. The girl had been reluctant to give him directions to Shannon’s grandmother’s house, but when he showed her the puppy and told her his intent, she cooperated.

He parked out front of an old Victorian mansion, gray with white gingerbread trim, a white picket fence and a trellis that probably had roses growing over it in the summertime. Maybe even yellow roses. He gathered the loot and his will power and made his way to the front door.

Shannon answered the door and stood there with a blank expression on her face. She eyed him up and down. “What’s all this?”

“Please let me come in.”

Her eyes misted. “Please don’t do this. I don’t want to be upset. It’ll worry my grandmother if she sees me upset. She doesn’t know what’s going on.”

“Please, Shannon. A business meeting. No upset.”

Her chest rose and fell with a huge sigh, but she invited him in and led him to a formal parlor that looked like something out of an old western movie. She was still dressed for work in a sharp green suit and high heels. She looked beautiful, but she would be even more beautiful if he could just put a smile on her face. He set his packages on the floor.

“What is this?” she demanded, looking at them. Just then, Prissy barked. “Is that a dog?”

He opened the pet carrier and lifted the puppy out. She began to fidget and lick with her little pink tongue and strain toward Shannon. In spite of the tension, Drake smiled. “Look, Shannon, she loves you.” He stepped nearer, putting Prissy within Shannon’s reach and capturing her eyes. “As do I. Honest to God, I do.”

His profession of affection went ignored, but she didn’t ignore Prissy. She hesitated, then reached out and rubbed Prissy’s head with two fingers. Drake took advantage of the moment. “Her name’s Prissy.” He placed the dog in her arms. He could see her open up, could see that maybe, just maybe, he had hit a homerun. Prissy played it to the hilt, snuggling and licking and squealing.

Shannon fingered the black velvet pouch tied to Prissy’s collar. “What’s this on her neck? I said I didn’t want you to bring me a present.”

“It isn’t a present. Just look at it.”

“I don’t need gifts,” she said, but she untied the pouch and peeked inside. She looked up at him, not fooled. A jeweler’s ring box was hard to disguise.

“Just open it. Just look at it. See what you think. I’ve had it for a couple of weeks.”

Without letting go of Prissy, she eased down to the edge of a fancy little red sofa’s cushion. He wanted to sit down beside her, but the sofa looked so fragile, he feared it wouldn’t hold his added weight. He took a seat across from her a few feet away. Her breath caught when she opened the box. She looked at him. Prissy looked at him, too and gave a puppy bark.

“We can make it, Shannon,” he said softly, trying to hold her eyes with his.

She started to say something, but he raised his palms, stopping her. “I know what you’re going to say. You’re going to say we haven’t known each other long enough, but how long is long enough? If I didn’t believe we belong together, I wouldn’t be here now.”

She sniffled. “I have a hard time dealing with the surprises you keep throwing at me. I told you from the beginning I don’t want to be hurt. And our arrangement was no sharing.”

He sighed. “It was a goofy agreement designed to fail. I knew that.”

“You seem to have an awfully long list of admirers.”

“All I can say is I can’t erase the past. Neither can you. I swear to you, there hasn’t been anybody but you since the minute I saw you at that TCCRA party. You’re all I think about, Shannon. I want to grab onto the future we can have together. I’ve never felt that way about any other woman.”

Prissy let out a snore that belied her size and changed the tenor of the conversation. She had snuggled on Shannon’s lap and gone sound asleep. “This is a house dog,” Shannon said. “I don’t know if I can have it. You know my grandmother has a spoiled cat.”

“If it doesn’t work out, I’ll take her.”

She nodded. “I’ll see.” Then she got to her feet, tucked Prissy under her arm and handed the ring back to him. His heart sank.

He stood up, too, only a foot away from her. Every part of him wanted to take her in his arms. He stepped to a small table beside a chair and placed the ring box on it. “I’m going to leave this right here. When you get time, maybe you’d like to try it on. It’s a size seven.”

She looked down at her hands. “I don’t have any rings. I don’t know what size I wear.”

Hope inched forward within his chest. Maybe she was tempted. “Not a problem. If it doesn’t fit, we can have it fixed. I love you, Shannon. And I’m excited about the baby. What do I have to do to show you?”

“I don’t know right now. I’m still trying to come to terms with it myself. I guess I can let you know.”

****

Training Prissy and Arthur to live together took much of Shannon’s time the next few days. Prissy was enthusiastic; Arthur was sarcastic. Drake called every day just to chat, something he had never done.