“So let’s go.”
“Okay, but—” Kelsey straightened her shoulders. “I’ll drive.” She should have known it wouldn’t make any difference how matter-of-factly she made that statement, Connor would see through it.
Judging by the look in his dark eyes, he did see—straight through to her heart. “Sounds like I need to work even harder.”
“Connor—”
“It’s okay,” he interrupted. He stepped closer, and Kelsey tensed, half in preparation to defend her decision and half in anticipation of his approach. But nothing could have readied her for Connor cupping the back of her neck and pulling her into a kiss.
To her dismay, it ended before it even began. A quick press of lips again her own, and then it was over. And Kelsey had to clench her hands into fists to keep from grabbing the front of Connor’s T-shirt and demand that he do it again. That he do it right.
As he pulled away, he gazed at her flustered—heated—face and smiled. “I never could resist a challenge.”
“Are you sure this is right?” Kelsey asked.
Connor’s directions to Todd’s meeting had brought them to a Scottsdale neighborhood that rivaled her aunt and uncle’s when it came to exclusivity, opulence and sheer expense. The winding roads led them past multileveled mansions surrounded by artfully arranged desert landscapes, sparkling water fountains and wrought-iron gates.
They were practically the first words she’d spoken since they’d dropped off Emily’s pictures earlier. Kelsey had been grateful to focus on the straightforward directions of right, left, north and south rather than try to traverse the dangerous path her heart was traveling down.
Catching a street sign carved into a boulder, Connor said, “Turn here. This is it.”
“Nice place.” Irony filled Kelsey’s voice at the understated description. The two-story home had a circular entryway, decorative columns, and floor-to-ceiling windows.
When she tapped on the brake, Connor insisted, “Don’t stop.” With a glance out the back, he said, “Okay. We should be good here. Go ahead and turn around.”
Kelsey glanced in the rearview mirror. Thanks to a neighboring oleander hedge, she could barely see the house. Hopefully Todd wouldn’t notice the two of them lurking in her car a block away. After turning the car to face the house, she asked, “Now what?”
“Now we wait.”
Kelsey sighed. “I don’t think I have the patience for being a private eye.”
Connor’s lips quirked into a smile. “That’s okay. I’m not planning on changing careers and becoming a wedding coordinator, either. Besides, it’s almost six.”
“Todd will be late,” Kelsey predicted. “He’s always late.” Tardiness was one of her aunt’s pet peeves. A sign, according to Charlene Wilson, that showed a person believed his time more important than those around him. Somehow, though, she smothered her annoyance when it came to Todd.
“So he isn’t perfect after all.”
“I never said he was.”
Connor made a thoughtful sound but hardly embraced her words. No surprise. She wasn’t the one Connor wanted to impress. He was determined to prove her aunt and uncle wrong about Todd. But would that really be enough to make Connor let go of the past? Would Connor ever believe he was good enough, or would it take being good enough for Emily for him to see his own worth?
She sighed and sank lower in the seat, not wanting to think too hard on the answer to that question. Seconds later a car rounded the corner, and Kelsey impulsively grabbed Connor’s arm. “Look!”
Her heart skipped a beat at the feel of his warm skin and muscle beneath her palm. When he leaned closer for a better look, her pulse quickened.
A woman sat behind the wheel of the luxury car, and Kelsey wondered if Connor might get his proof. Neither of them spoke as they waited for Todd’s arrival and the meeting to unfold. Ten minutes later, Todd’s SUV pulled up. When he climbed from the vehicle and casually glanced in their direction, Kelsey gasped.
“Relax,” Connor advised. “He can’t see us.”
As she focused on the scene outside, Kelsey frowned in confusion. Todd flashed a smile at the woman as he walked up the driveway, but when he reached out to shake the woman’s hand, the gesture was not only platonic but professional.
Connor swore. “I don’t believe it. That woman’s a Realtor. There’s a lockbox on the front door.”
Sure enough, the brunette led Todd to the front door, where she opened the small box and pulled out a key. With a flourish she turned the handle and waved Todd inside. Since Emily hadn’t mentioned a new home, Kelsey wondered if the place was a wedding gift. Despite her questionable opinion of the man, she couldn’t help feeling impressed by the romantic and extravagant gesture.
“We should go.”
“Just—wait,” Connor ground out.
A few minutes later Todd and the Realtor exited the house. Judging by the smile on the woman’s face, Kelsey assumed the meeting had gone well. She shook Todd’s hand again, nodded enthusiastically over whatever he said, and waved as he drove off.
“That’s that,” Kelsey said as she reached for the ignition. Connor stopped her with a touch, closing his hand over hers and slipping the keys out of her grasp before she ever realized his intention. “Connor, what—”
“Come on.”
Connor kept a firm grip on Kelsey’s hand as they walked toward the house despite her repeated tugs and her sharply whispered protests. As long as he had the keys, she couldn’t go anywhere without him. So why exactly was she trying to pull away? The better question: why was he still hanging on?
“Connor! Stop! We’re going to get caught!”
“Doing what? You know, I’m really starting to wonder about this guilty conscience of yours.”
“You should,” she muttered, “considering I didn’t have one until you came along.”
The front door opened, and Kelsey dug in her heels deep enough to leave divots in the grass. The Realtor looked surprised, but only for a moment. Professional smile in place, she asked, “Are you two interested in the property?”
Kelsey’s grip tightened on Connor’s hand. A quick glance in her direction revealed a panicked look that screamed busted. Fortunately, he had a bit more experience when it came to covering his butt, as well as any curvaceous female backside he dragged along for the ride.
Flashing a smile, he said, “My fiancée and I were driving through the neighborhood and noticed the lockbox. We don’t have an appointment, but—”
“Oh, I’d love to show you around.”
The inside of the house lived up to the exterior’s elegant promise. Gorgeous views, a wide-open floor plan and every upgrade imaginable—travertine floors, granite countertops, stainless-steel appliances. The decor matched the surrounding desert with golds and browns and a hint of green.
“The house is beautiful,” Kelsey said, once she’d realized the Realtor wasn’t going to accuse them of trespassing.
“It’s only been on the market a few days,” the Realtor said as she concluded the six-bedroom, four-bath, media-room tour back at the front entry. “Another couple is interested in the property for their first place.”
“Right. ’Cause this is the perfect starter home,” Connor muttered.
Kelsey opened her mouth, ready to insist she didn’t need a mansion, only to remember she and Connor weren’t engaged. They wouldn’t need a starter home or any other kind.
“Out of curiosity,” he said, “can you tell how much the other couple is offering?”
The woman’s smile was both sympathetic and hopeful. “I don’t think money was an issue, but I have several other properties I’d be more than willing to show you.” She pulled a card from her pocket and held it out to Connor. “Give me a call, and I can give you a list of houses that might fit your lifestyle.”
Connor managed a nod, but as they walked out of the house, he crushed her card in his hand. “Fit my lifestyle,” he bit out. “Not to mention my budget.”
His body thrummed with frustration, and Kelsey expected him to chuck the card into the street. Finally he shoved it into his pocket and stalked toward her car.
Kelsey didn’t bother to ask for her keys back when Connor automatically went to the driver’s-side door. Instead, she slid into the passenger seat. Trying for a practical tone, she said, “We already knew Todd has money.”
“Yeah, we did,” he said with a grim twist to his lips. “I’m starting to think the guy might be perfect after all.”
“No one’s perfect,” Kelsey insisted. “Everyone has their faults and—”
“And the Wilsons certainly saw mine.”
“You were a kid,” she argued. “You can’t believe what happened back then has anything to do with the man you are now.”
Muttering what sounded suspiciously like “Don’t be so sure,” he cranked the engine and peeled away from the house.
Kelsey slapped a hand down on the armrest, but her tight grip slowly loosened. Despite his obvious frustration, Connor kept the car under perfect control. Within minutes they were on the freeway, but the turn he took wouldn’t lead to her house.
Streetlights flickered on as daylight faded, marking the way toward an older part of Phoenix. They passed an abandoned drive-in, a boarded-up gas station and liquor store, the only business likely to thrive in such a depressing neighborhood. She could have asked where they were going, but as they drove by houses with peeling paint and duct-taped windows, lawns choked by weeds and neglect, she already knew.
A few minutes later Connor braked to a halt, gravel crunching beneath the wheels. He didn’t say anything or make a move to get out of the car. With both hands still gripping the wheel, he stared at the trailer park across the street.
Kelsey had seen plenty of mobile home communities before. Manufactured homes, they were called now. Houses laid out in neat rows, with flower beds and swimming pools like any other nice, little neighborhood.
This was not that kind of place. The dirt lot, with its haphazard trailers and junkyard of vehicles, made the use of the term park an irony. The murmur of the engine was the only sound until Connor gave a sudden, harsh bark of laughter. “This is it. Where I came from. Who I am.”
“No, it isn’t.” Unlocking her seat belt, Kelsey shifted on the seat to face him. The fading sunset glowed in the distance, casting his profile in bronze. “This isn’t you any more than where I grew up makes me who I am.”
“You’re a Wilson. You’re—”
Connor cut himself off, giving Kelsey the chance to interject, “I am a Wilson. But I’m not Emily. I’m not Aileen. And I wasn’t raised like them.”
“I know. On the outside looking in,” he said, as he turned to look at her. Face-to-face, Kelsey could see the gold flecks in his green eyes. “That’s what I thought when I first met you. The Wilson outsider.”
That insight, pointing how she’d always felt—a part of and yet apart from her family—made Kelsey feel as if Connor knew her better than anyone. His words and the tenderness in his gaze crept inside her chest and wrapped around her heart. Somehow, being on the outside didn’t matter so much when he was there with her. “You were right,” she said softly.
But if he could somehow see inside her, Kelsey felt she was starting to do the same and getting to know the real Connor. His coming back to Arizona had to do with more than simply disliking Todd or even with proving her family wrong. His return had to do with a guilt inside him. As if by stopping the wedding, he could somehow make up for a past he could not change.
“And maybe that’s why I can see you so clearly. This isn’t who you are, Connor,” she repeated. “Maybe it’s who you were, but that’s all. I’ve seen who you are now. You’re a good friend, a good man—”
A sound rose in Connor’s throat, part denial, part despair, and he jerked open the car door as if desperate for escape. Kelsey winced as he slammed it behind him, but she didn’t hesitate to follow. He couldn’t shut her out that easily!
“Connor, wait!” She scrambled out of the car after him, trying to keep up with the long strides that carried him across the weed-and-trash-strewn lot. She gasped as her foot hit an uneven spot on the heaved asphalt. She took a tottering step, arms windmilling for balance, but gravity won the battle, and she hit the ground.
“Kelsey!” Connor swore beneath his breath. “Are you okay?”
With a close-up view of the weeds and trash littering the trailer lot, Kelsey felt a moment’s relief that she hadn’t landed in a black, greasy puddle inches from her face.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, even as Connor leaned down to help her up. Flames of heat licked at her. Some from the heel of her hand that had scraped across the pavement, some from the blazing heat bouncing off the black surface, but mostly from the sheer embarrassment of Connor witnessing her utter clumsiness. “Really, I—” She sucked in a quick breath as he took her hand to pull her to her feet.
Beneath his tanned skin, Connor went pale. “You’re hurt.”
Taking a hesitant glance down, she breathed out a sigh of relief. “It’s nothing. Only a scratch.” A few thin lines of blood showed through the abraded skin on her palm, but other than the slight sting, she was fine.
Running his thumb gently across the scrape as if he could heal by touch alone, Connor said, “I never should have brought you here. It’s my fault.”
“It was an accident that could have happened in front of my own shop! It is not your fault.” Gentling her voice, she added, “You’re not responsible for every bad thing that happens. I don’t know why you feel that way, but Connor, looking for dirt on Todd won’t change things. Especially when—” she took a deep breath, reluctant to say the words but knowing she had to “—when it doesn’t seem like there’s anything to find.”
“There is,” he said flatly, refusing to consider failure. “Jake’s still following a lead in St. Louis, and I’m not giving up here. I know guys like Dunworthy. He can only keep up this golden boy B.S. for so long. He’s gonna slip. The closer it gets to the wedding, the more pressure there’s gonna be, and he’ll slip. I know it—”
“In your gut,” Kelsey finished with a sigh. She turned her hand within his. Even through that light touch, she could feel the tension tightening his shoulders and arms and radiating down to the fingers she linked with hers. As gently as she could, she suggested, “Maybe it’s time to stop listening to your gut.”
“I can’t.” He gritted the words out of clenched teeth.
“Why not?”
“Because the last time I didn’t listen, a woman was nearly killed.”
Connor reached over and cranked the car’s air conditioner to full blast, even though he doubted the frigid air would help. Sweat soaked the back of his neck, but it had little to do with the outside temperature despite the hundred-plus heat. The relentless sun, which bounced off every shiny surface to pinpoint on him as if he were a bug trapped beneath a kid’s magnifying glass, had nothing on Kelsey’s questioning glances.
He felt as if he was burning up from the inside out…all thanks to four little words.
You’re a good man.
Kelsey had looked him straight in the eye with those words, her soft voice packing the same punch as a sonic boom. He didn’t deserve that kind of faith. He’d disappointed too many women in the past: his mother, Emily, Cara Mitchell…
The more Kelsey trusted in him, the more he longed to believe in that trust, the worse it would be when he finally, irrevocably, let her down.
He sucked in a lungful of air, the heat threatening to suffocate him. He needed space—space to breathe, space to run, space that wasn’t filled with Kelsey’s cinnamon scent, her concerned glances, her soft voice…
“Connor…”
She was going to ask him what happened with Cara. His grip tightened on the passenger armrest, inches from the door handle and escape…even if escape meant paying the price for hitting the ground running at forty miles an hour.
No, telling truth w
as better. More painful, maybe, but at least Kelsey would realize he wasn’t the man she thought he was.
“One of the first things I learned after opening my business was that you don’t turn down work. You might not like the job, you might not like the client, but if it pays the bills, you take the job.”
Kelsey slowed for a red light. Freedom beckoned, but Connor kept his hand on the armrest. “I didn’t like Doug Mitchell. I didn’t like the job, even though catching cheating spouses has always been part of the P.I. business. My gut told me he was bad news, but I didn’t listen.”
Silence filled the car, and Kelsey’s gaze was as tangible as the trickle of sweat running from his temple. “What happened?” she murmured.
“I did what I was paid to do. I followed Cara Mitchell. To the grocery store, the salon, the gym…It was tedious, boring,” he added, reminded of the conversation they’d had waiting for Dunworthy’s meeting. “And I thought maybe Doug was wrong. That he was worried about nothing and his marriage was one of the few that would make it.”
His hand cramped, and try as he might, he couldn’t loosen his grip. His fingers seemed to have melded into the padded vinyl. “But then, one Tuesday, Cara drove south on the freeway. And I kept thinking it was Tuesday, and Tuesday was art class. So why was she going in the wrong direction? Before long, she ended up at a motel and when this guy opened the door, I thought here we go. I was wrong, and Doug was right.”
“So she was having an affair?”
“Sure seemed that way,” he said with a grimace. “Meeting some guy, staying behind closed shades, and leaving an hour later with her hair mussed and her makeup smudged…What else would you think?”
“What did you think?”
“I—I didn’t know. It was suspicious, sure. But it wasn’t proof, you know? Not one hundred percent take-it-to-the-bank proof. And in my gut I didn’t believe it. Maybe I’d gotten too close. It happens, P.I.s falling for their marks, but that wasn’t it. I wasn’t attracted to Cara Mitchell. But I guess I—liked her. Respected her. She smiled at kids in the store, took the time to talk to little old ladies. She told cashiers when they gave her back too much change! I just didn’t believe she was having an affair. But her husband wanted an update. He was the client, and he paid to know what I’d seen.”
Once Upon a Wedding Page 13
