Courting Catherine

by Nora Roberts

  stop himself, Trent reached out to touch her hair. “I couldn't just leave him there.”

  “Of course not.” She looked up and saw that she was all but in his arms. His hand was in her hair, his eyes on hers.

  “Catherine—”

  The pup yipped again and had her jolting back. “I'll take him in. He must be cold, and hungry.”

  “All right.” The only place left for his hands was his pockets. “Why don't I run down and get the milk?”

  “Okay.” Her smile was strained as she backed to­ward the steps. She turned and, murmuring to the puppy, dashed inside.

  By the time Trent returned, the stray had a place of honor by the kitchen hearth and the undivided at­tention of four beautiful women.

  “Wait until Suze and the kids get back,” Amanda was saying. “They'll flip. He sure goes for your liver pat€, Aunt Coco.”

  “Obviously a gourmet among dogs.” Lilah, al­ready on her hands and knees, leaned her nose against his. “Aren't you, cutie?”

  “I'm sure he should have something more bland.” Coco was also on the floor, charmed. “With the proper care, he'll be very handsome.”

  The pup, amazed at his good fortune, raced in cir­cles. Spotting Trent, he gamboled over, tripping over his own feet. The women scrambled up, all asking him questions at the same time.

  “Hold on.” Trent set the grocery bag on the table, then crouched down to scratch the pup's belly. “I don't know where he came from. I found him when I was walking along the cliffs. He was hiding out Weren't you, boy?”

  “I suppose we should ask around, to see it any­one's lost him,” Coco began, then held up a hand as her nieces voiced unanimous dissent. “It's only right But it is up to Trent, since he found him.”

  “I think you should do what you think's best.” He rose to pull the milk out of the bag. “He could prob­ably use some of this.”

  Amanda already had a saucer and was arguing with Lilah on the proper amount to give their new guest.

  “What else did you get?” C.C. poked at the bag.

  “A few things.” He moved his shoulders, then gave up. “I thought he should have a collar.” Trent pulled out a bright red collar with silver studs.

  C.C. couldn't hold back the grin. “Very fashion­able.”

  “And a leash.” Trent set that on the table, as well. “Puppy food.”

  “Uh-huh.” C.C. began to go through the bag her­self. “And puppy treats, rawhide bones.”

  “He'll want to gnaw,” Trent told her.

  “Sure, he will. A ball and a squeaky mouse.” Laughing, she squeezed the rubber toy.

  “He should have something to play with.” He didn't want to add that he'd searched for a dog bed and cushion but hadn't come across them.

  “I didn't know you were a softie.”

  He glanced down at the happily lapping puppy. “Neither did I.”

  “What's his name?” Lilah wanted to know.

  “Well, I...”

  “You found him, you get to name him.”

  “Do it quick,” Amanda advised him. “Before Li-lah sticks him with something like Griswold.”

  “Fred,” Trent said on impulse. “He looks like a Fred to me.”

  Unimpressed with his christening, Fred plopped down with one ear in the saucer of milk and went to sleep.

  “Well, that's settled.” Amanda gave the pup one last pat before she rose. “Come on, Lilah, it's your turn to take a shift.”

  “I'll give you a hand.” Instincts humming, Coco hustled her two nieces out of the room and left C.C. alone with Trent.

  “I'd better go, too.” C.C. started for the door. Trent laid a hand on her arm to stop her.

  “Wait.”

  “What for?”

  “Just... wait.”

  She stood, battling back hurt. “I'm waiting.”

  “I—how's your hand?”

  “It's fine.”

  “Good.” He felt like an idiot. “That's good.”

  “If that's all...”

  “No. I wanted to tell you...I noticed a rattle in the car when I drove down to the village.”

  “A rattle?” She pursed her lips. “What kind of rattle?”

  An imaginary one, he thought, but shrugged. “Just a rattle. I was hoping you could take a look at it.”

  “All right. Bring it in tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “My tools are at the shop. Is there anything else?'

  “When I was walking, I kept wishing you were with me.”

  She looked away until she was sure she had rebuilt the chink he'd just knocked in her defensive wall. “We want different things, Trent. Let's just leave it at that.” She turned toward the door. “Try to get your car in early,” she added without looking around. “I've got an exhaust system to replace tomorrow.”

  Chapter Eight

  C.C. fired up her torch, flipped down her faceplate and prepared to cut off the tail pipe on the rusted exhaust of a '62 Plymouth.

  The day was not going well.

  She wasn't able to get the scheduled family meet­ing off her mind. No other paperwork on the necklace had shown up, though they had gone through reams and reams of receipts and old ledgers. She knew, be­cause of Amanda's refusal to talk, that the news wasn’t good.

  Added to that had been another restless night. She heard Fred's whimpering and had gone to check on him only to hear Trent's low murmuring soothing the puppy behind his bedroom door.

  She'd stood there for a long time, listening.

  The fact that he'd taken the stray into his room, cared enough to comfort and nurture only made C.C. love him more. And the more she loved, the more she hurt.

  She knew she was hollow eyed this morning, be­cause she'd made the mistake of looking at a mirror. That she could handle. Her looks had never been a major concern. The bills she had found in the morning mail were.

  She'd been telling the truth when she'd told Su-zanna the business was doing well. But there were still rough spots. Not all of her customers paid promptly, and her cash flow was too often merely a trickle. Six months, she thought as she cut through the old metal. She only needed six months. But that was too long, much too long to help keep The Tow­ers.

  Her life was changing, changing fast, and none of it seemed to be for the better.

  Trent stood watching her. She had some battered hulk of a car up on the lift and stood under it, wield­ing a torch. While he watched, she shifted aside as a pipe clattered to the floor. She was wearing coveralls again, thick safety gloves and a helmet. The music she never seemed to be without jingled from the radio on the workbench.

  Surely a man was over the edge when he thought how delightful it would be to make love on a concrete floor with a woman who was dressed like a welder.

  C.C. changed positions, then saw him. Very care­fully she shut off the torch before she lifted the shield of her helmet.

  “I couldn't find anything wrong with your car. Keys are in the office. No charge.” She flipped down the shield again.

  “C.C.”

  “What?”

  “How about dinner?”

  She pushed back the shield and eyed him warily. “How about it?”

  “I mean...” With a leery glance overhead, he stepped under the car with her. “I'd like you to have dinner with me tonight.”

  She shifted her weight. “I've had dinner with you every night for several nights.” She flipped the shield down. Trent flipped it up again.

  “No, I mean I want to take you out to dinner.”

  “Why?”

  “Why not?”

  She lifted a brow. “Well, that's very nice, but I'm a little pressed tonight We're having a family meet­ing.” She pulled down the shield again and prepared to relight the torch.

  “Tomorrow then.” Annoyed, Trent pushed the shield back up. “Do you mind? I like to see you when I talk to you.”

  “Yes, I mind because I've got work. And no, I won't have dinner with you tomorrow.�
��

  “Why?”

  She blew out a long breath that ruffled her bangs. “Because I don't want to.”

  “You're still angry with me.”

  Her eyes, which had begun to heat, went flat. “We settled all that, so there's no reason to go out on a date.”

  “Just dinner,” he said, finding he couldn't let go. “No one's calling it a date. One simple meal, as friends, before I go back to Boston.”

  “You're going back?” She felt her heart drop to her knees and turned away to rattle through some tools.

  “Yes, I have meetings scheduled for the middle of the week. I'm expected in the office Wednesday af­ternoon.”

  Just like that, she thought as she picked up a pipe wrench and set it down again. I've got meetings scheduled, see you later. Sorry I broke your heart. “Well, then, have a nice trip.”

  “C.C.” He laid a hand on her arm before she could hide behind the shield again. “I'd like to spend a little time with you. I'd feel a lot better about everything if I was sure we parted on good terms.”

  “You want to feel better about things,” she mut­tered, then made herself relax her jaw. “Sure, why not? Dinner tomorrow night is fine. You deserve a send-off.”

  “I appreciate it. Really.” He touched her cheek, started to lean toward her. C.C. pulled the shield down with a snap.

  “Better stand back from the torch, Trent,” she said sweetly. “You might get burned.”

  Family meetings with the Calhouns were tradition­ally noisy, argumentative and drenched with tears and laughter. This one was abnormally subdued. Amanda, in her capacity as adviser on finances, sat at the head of the table.

  The room was silent.

  Suzanna had already put the children to bed. It had been a little easier than usual as both of them had exhausted themselves with Fred—and vice versa.

  Trent had excused himself discreetly, directly after dinner. It hardly mattered, C.C. thought. He would know the outcome soon enough.

  She was afraid everyone knew it already.

  “I guess we all know why we're here,” Amanda began. “Trent's going back to Boston on Wednesday, and it would be best all around it we gave him our decision about the house before he left.”

  “It would be better if we concentrated on finding the necklace.” Lilah's stubborn look was offset by the nervous way she twisted the obsidian crystals around her neck.

  “We're all still looking for the papers.” Suzanna laid a hand on Lilah's arm. “But I think we have to face the reality that finding the necklace could take a long time. Longer than we have.”

  “Thirty days is longer than we have.” All eyes turned to Amanda. “I got a notice from the lawyer last week.”

  “Last week!” Coco put in. “Stridley contacted you and you didn't mention it?”

  “I was hoping I could get an extension without worrying everyone.” Amanda laid her hand on the file she set on the table. “No deal. We've been chip­ping away at the back taxes, but the hard fact is that we haven't been making enough headway. The in­surance premiums are due. We can make them all right, and the mortgage—for the time being. The util­ity bills over the winter were higher than usual, and the new furnace and repairs to the roof ate up a lot of our principal.”

  C.C. held up a hand. “How bad is it?”

  “As bad as it gets.” Amanda rubbed at an ache in her temple. “We could sell off a few more pieces, and keep our head above water. Just. But taxes are due again in a couple months, and we'll be back where we started.”

  “I can sell my pearls,” Coco began, and Lilah cut her off.

  “No. Absolutely not. We agreed a long time ago that there were some things that couldn't be sold. If we're going to face facts,” she said grimly, “then let's face them.”

  “The plumbing's shot,” Amanda continued, and had to clear her tightening throat. “If we don't get the rewiring done, we could end up burning the place down around our ears. Suzanna's lawyer's fees—”

  “That's my problem,” Suzanna interrupted.

  “That's our problem,” Amanda corrected, and got a unanimous note of assent. “We're a family,” she continued. “We've been through the very worst to­gether, and we handled it. Six or seven years ago, it looked as if everything was going to be fine. But... taxes have gone up, along with the insurance, the re­pairs, everything. It's not as though we're paupers, but the house eats up every cent of spare cash, and then some. If I thought we could weather this, hang in for another year or two, I'd say sell the Limoges, or a few antiques. But it's like trying to plug a hole in a dam and watching others spring out while your fingers are slipping.”

  “What are you saying, Mandy?” C.C. asked her.

  “I'm saying.” Amanda pressed her lips together. “I'm saying the only realistic choice I see is for us to sell the house. With the offer from St. James, we can pay off the debts, keep most of what's important to all of us and buy another. If we don't sell, it's going to be taken away from us in any case within a few months.” A tear trickled down her cheek. “I'm sorry. I just can't find a way out.”

  “It's not your fault.” Suzanna reached out for her hand. “We all knew it was coming.”

  Amanda sniffled and shook her head. “What buffer we had, we lost in the stock market crash. We just haven't been able to recover. I know I made the in-vestments—”

  “We made the investments.” Lilah leaned over to join hands, as well. “On the recommendation of a very reputable broker. If the bottom hadn't fallen through, if I'd won the lottery, if Bax hadn't been such a greedy bastard, maybe things would be differ­ent now. But they're not”

  “We'll still be together.” Coco added her hand. “That's what matters.”

  “That's what matters,” C-C. agreed, and laid her hand on top. And that, if nothing else, felt right. “What do we do now?”

  Struggling for composure, Amanda sat back. “I guess we ask Trent to come down and make sure the offer still stands.”

  “I'll get him.” C.C. pushed away from the table to walk blindly from the room.

  She couldn't believe it. Even as she walked through (the huddle of rooms, into the hallway, up the steps with her hand trailing along the banister, she couldn't believe it. None of it would be hers much longer.

  There would come a time very soon when she wouldn't be able to step from her room onto the high stone terrace and look out at the sea. She wouldn't be able to climb the steps to Bianca's tower and find Lilah curled on the window seat, dreaming out through the dusty glass. Or Suzanna working in the garden with the children racing on the lawn nearby. Amanda wouldn't come bolting down the stairs in a hurry to get somewhere, do something. Aunt Coco would no longer fuss over the stove in the kitchen.

  In a matter of moments, the life she'd known was over. The one to come had yet to begin. She was somewhere in a kind of limbo, too stunned from the loss to ache.

  Trent crouched beside the fire where Fred snored on the bright red cushion in his new wicker dog bed. He was going to miss the little devil, Trent realized. Even if he had the time or inclination for a pet back in Boston, he didn't have the heart to take Fred away from the children, or from the women, if it came to that.

  He'd seen C.C. tossing the ball for the pup in the side yard that afternoon when she'd come home from work. It had been so good to hear her laugh, to see her wrestle with the dog and Suzanna's children.

  Oddly it reminded him of the image he'd had— daydream, he corrected. The daydream he'd had when his mind had wandered the night of the séance. Of him and C.C. sitting on a sunny porch, watching chil­dren play in the yard.

  It was foolishness, of course, but something had tugged at him that afternoon when he'd stood at the door and looked at her tossing a ball to Fred. A good something, he remembered, until she'd turned and had seen him. Her laughter had died, and her eyes had gone cool.

  He straightened, studying the flames in the fire. It was crazy, but he wished with his whole heart that she would flare up, just once
more. Throw another punch at him. Call him names. The worst kind of punishment was her steady, passionless politeness.

  The sound of the knock on the door had Fred yip-ping quietly in his sleep. When Trent answered, find­ing C.C. on the other side of the threshold, twin twinges of delight and distress danced through his system. He wouldn't be able to turn her away this time. It wouldn't be possible to tell her, or himself, that it couldn't be. He had to... Then he looked into her eyes.

  “What's wrong? What's happened?” He reached out to comfort, but she stepped stiffly away.

  “We'd like you to come downstairs, if you don't mind.”

  “Catherine—” But she was already walking away, her stride lengthening in her hurry for distance.

  He found them all gathered around the dining room table, their faces composed. He was astute enough to understand that he was facing one combined will.

  The Calhouns had closed ranks.

  “Ladies?”

  “Trent, sit down, please.” Coco gestured to the chair beside her. “I hope we didn't disturb you?”

  “Not at all.” He looked at C.C., but she was star­ing fixedly at the wall above his head. “Are we hav­ing another séance?”

  “Not this time.” Lilah nodded toward Amanda. “Mandy?”

  “All right.” She took a deep breath and was re­lieved when Suzanna's hand gripped hers under the table. “Trent, we've discussed your offer for The Towers, and have decided to accept it.”

  He gave her a blank look. “Accept it?”

  “Yes.” Amanda pressed her free hand to her quiv­ering stomach. “That is, if your offer still stands.”

  “Yes, of course it does.” He scanned the room, his gaze lingering on C.C. “You're certain you want to sell?”

  “Isn't that what you wanted?” C.C.'s voice was clipped. “Isn't that what you came for?”

  “Yes.” But he'd gotten a great deal more than he'd bargained for. “My firm will be delighted to purchase the property. But...I want to be certain that you're all agreed. That this is what you want. All of you.”

  “We're all agreed.” C.C. went back to staring at the wall.

  “The lawyers will handle the details,” Amanda be­gan again. “But before we hand things over them, I'd like to review the terms.”

  “Of course.” He named the purchase price again. Hearing it had tears burning in C.C.'s eyes. “There's no reason why we can't be flexible on the timing,” he went on. “I realize you'll want to do some kind of inventory before you—relocate.”

  It was what they wanted, he reminded himself. It was business. It shouldn't make him feel as if he'd just crawled out from under a rock.