Glass Slippers and Unicorns

by Carole Mortimer

  ‘But my fatal charm proved to be irresistible,’ Mike leered.

  ‘If you’re referring to the fact that you carried me off to bed a week after we met and refused to let me out until I married you then I suppose you could call it that,’ Marie said drily. ‘But if you’re talking about our first date when you took me to a baseball game, forget it!’

  ‘She loves me really,’ Mike confided in Darcy.

  ‘It was either marry you or die of starvation,’ his wife maintained derisively.

  Darcy was fascinated by the affection this whole family seemed to have for each other, if slightly overwhelmed by it. Whenever she went home her parents showed their steady quiet love for her, but as only children themselves, too, their family was a small one.

  She could feel the situation starting to slip away from her, the automatic defence mechanism that had become so much part of her life the last two years, whenever things became too much for her, blocking out her surroundings and the lighthearted banter continuing between the Hunter family as she stared sightlessly at the glittering pool.

  ‘I think I’ll take Darcy for a walk around the lake.’ Reed’s softly spoken words penetrated her world of silence. ‘Darcy?’ he prompted.

  She looked at him vaguely. ‘Lovely.’ She stood up, the clatter of china as it hit the ground telling her what she had done. Her dinner plate had been resting on her knees and she had stood up without giving it a second thought. ‘I’m so sorry.’ She hastily bent to pick up the plate and the pieces of food that had been on it, her face bright red as she looked up to see Reed holding out the knife and fork to her. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she told Diane again as her concerned hostess came over.

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Diane dismissed lightly. ‘There’s no harm done.’

  Maybe not to the plate, but to Reed finally seeing her as a woman there was; she had just reminded him that she could become so absent-minded she forgot there was a plate balanced on her lap. No one forgot they had a plate on their knees! But she just had.

  ‘Maybe I should have warned you about them,’ Reed frowned as they strolled over to the lake’s edge. ‘I’m overwhelmed by them sometimes, so God knows what they do to people who don’t know them!’ He gave a rueful grimace.

  ‘You’re overwhelmed?’ Darcy echoed disbelievingly.

  He shrugged, giving her a sideways glance. ‘After you’ve been away from them for a while they can seem like a blanket, warm and comfortable at first, and then it becomes suffocating. Do I sound ungrateful?’ He frowningly quirked dark brows.

  ‘Probably like most older brothers in a family of four,’ she teased. ‘It must be quite a responsibility.’

  His brow cleared a little as he looked at her admiringly. ‘That’s very astute of you; no one else has ever realised that’s exactly how I feel at times. It was part of the reason I made the break away ten years ago. Diane and Mike, even Linda most of the time, are quite happy to stay in the close family circle. I decided I wanted more from life than that.’

  ‘Did you get it?’

  ‘No.’ He gave a self-derisive snort. ‘I still worry about all of them, even though I’m over four thousand miles away!’

  ‘But you’ve always seemed like such a loner.’

  ‘Until something like this happens,’ he acknowledged grimly. ‘That’s when I feel like putting my head down and pulling the blanket around me until it’s all over.’

  This was a side of Reed she had never seen before, the less than confident Reed, the mere man beneath all the power and money. She liked him all the more for showing her this side of himself, loved him all the more.

  He stared out across the lake, the deep red setting of the sun having left a beautiful pink haze in the sky. But the beauty of it was lost on Reed, as his next words confirmed. ‘Pulling that blanket around me wouldn’t do a damned bit of good this time,’ he rasped. ‘Not when there’s a damned great hole in it!’

  The placing of her hand on his arm was wholly instinctive. ‘Reed—’

  ‘Let’s not talk about that any more now, Darcy.’ His arms were pure muscle about her waist as he pulled her up into him, their warm flesh seeming to sizzle into one as her slender height melded with his power, heat of a different kind coursing through them as he slowly lowered his head. ‘Don’t forget, we’re the floor show!’ he muttered savagely.

  If only the touch of his mouth on hers had matched his tone and manner she might have had some small chance of resisting the onslaught, but as he kissed her with slow, languorous passion she stood no chance! Floor show or not, she stood on tiptoe to return the caress, her arms curved sensuously about his neck as she allowed herself the luxury of entangling her fingers in the curling dark hair at his nape.

  With the slight pressure of her hands in his hair his mouth hardened on hers, plunging them both deeper into the heated glow that threatened to burn out of control—and take both of them with it. Reed couldn’t manufacture this response, the hardness of his arousal pressed against her stomach, just to convince his family of their intimate relationship!

  ‘Reed!’ She gasped for sanity as his hand closed possessively over her breast, the instant hardening of her nipple against his palm giving the lie to her protest. But she wasn’t about to give an X-rated display to his family.

  Reed looked at her dazedly for several seconds, and then a cold remoteness glazed his eyes. ‘You see,’ he rasped. ‘Body chemistry takes over. I have to talk to Diane about tonight’s sleeping arrangements!’

  ‘Reed!’

  His eyes were narrowed as he turned to her, looking completely unapproachable.

  ‘Not in front of all your family, please,’ she groaned, embarrassed colour in her cheeks.

  ‘You would rather they continued to think we’re lovers?’ he derided.

  Darcy walked past him, her head held high. ‘I don’t want them to think we aren’t!’

  Reed chuckled softly as he fell into step beside her. ‘You’re right, Diane would be on the telephone to Linda and Mike first thing in the morning if we asked for separate bedrooms.’

  ‘And would you enjoy seeing me humiliated in that way?’

  His mouth tightened at the quiet query. ‘I’ll think of something,’ he finally grated.

  ‘Good—because I’m definitely not sleeping in the same bed as you!’

  She had been tempted; God, how she had been tempted. But to hear that flesh-quivering, bone-dissolving, skin-tingling desire she had felt in his arms reduced to ‘chemistry’ had been enough to show her she would be making a mistake to believe it would mean any more than that to Reed. Chemistry. Huh!

  ‘Reed is throwing us all out.’ Mike softly interrupted her thoughts as she made her way back to the house some way behind Reed. ‘He says the two of you are tired and he doesn’t want us partying while you’re both trying to sleep. If I were him I’d forget all about the sleep,’ he added teasingly.

  Darcy looked over at the patio where Reed seemed to be organising the departure of his family with all the finesse of a drill sergeant! ‘I’m sorry.’ She gave Mike an embarassed smile. ‘I’m so tired I’m sure you wouldn’t disturb me if you all stayed.’

  Mike looked at her with warm eyes. ‘No, Reed is right—we should never have all come here like this tonight. But Reed bringing a girl home was too unusual to miss.’

  ‘And you all wanted to take a look at me in case I disappeared as suddenly as I arrived!’

  ‘Something like that,’ he grinned. ‘We’ve been debating for years about what sort of woman he would eventually fall in love with—’

  ‘I’m sure none of you guessed it would be someone like me!’ she mocked.

  ‘None of us thought he had this much sense!’

  Sense? This boisterously close family could really imagine Reed would fall in love with someone like her! ‘We aren’t serious about each other—’

  ‘Reed is always serious,’ Mike cut in broodingly. ‘Deadly serious.’

  ‘Maybe about his work—’ />
  ‘About all things that matter to him,’ his brother corrected. ‘We’ve missed him here the last few years.’

  Darcy looked at him frowningly, seeing only sincerity in the clear blue eyes. Reed appeared to be the anchor this family needed to stop it floating away. A family had to separate, go its own way, grow, but inevitably a close family like this one would drift back together again; Reed had been fighting that since his move back to London. Seeing him here with his sisters and his brother, she was sure he needed them as much as they needed him, that his enforced solitude would soon be at an end. None of his family wanted to live in his pocket, but it was important for them to know he was close if they needed him. Or he needed them. Reed seemed to have omitted to realise it was a two-way need.

  ‘Marie is ready to stop your golfing trips for a month if you don’t stop flirting,’ Reed drawled as they joined the rest of the family.

  Mike pulled a suitably chastened expression. ‘Anything but the golf!’ He put a hand up to his heart as if he had been mortally wounded.

  ‘I don’t think that was the right answer, Mike,’ Reed drawled at Marie’s disgusted snort.

  His brother groaned, his moment of seriousness seconds earlier as he spoke to Darcy completely erased. ‘My other pleasure in life is getting virtually impossible.’ He looked pointedly at his wife’s rounded body.

  ‘Michael Hunter!’

  ‘I didn’t say I disliked the situation,’ he placated his wife as they walked down the driveway to their car, opening the door for her with a flourish. ‘It’s just that golf is my only physical outlet now.’ He winked at the people standing in the driveway as he closed the door on Marie’s reply.

  ‘We had better be going too, Wade,’ Linda drawled once Mike and Marie had driven away. ‘Reed’s obviously sick of the sight of all of us already!’

  ‘I don’t blame him for wanting to be alone with Darcy.’ Her husband put his arm lightly about her shoulders. ‘I remember a time when you couldn’t wait to get home!’

  Darcy looked at the couple sharply as she sensed the underlying bitterness behind Wade’s remark. Obviously things weren’t as cosy as they appeared in the O’Neal household.

  ‘That was before you couldn’t wait to get out of it,’ Linda returned in brittle tones, getting in behind the wheel of the black and gold Trans Am, the engine roaring into life as she waited only long enough for Wade to fold his long length in beside her before accelerating away.

  ‘What the hell was all that about?’ Reed frowned darkly.

  ‘Linda and Wade have fallen out, that’s all,’ Diane dismissed, the smile she gave not quite reaching her eyes. ‘It happens in the best of marriages.’

  ‘Yours?’ Reed looked at her with narrowed eyes.

  ‘Heavens, no.’ Diane’s rebuttal was genuinely scornful, her arm draped through the crook of her husband’s. ‘Chris and I are very happy together.’

  Reed stared after the tail-lights of the Trans Am. ‘Surely the trouble between Linda and Wade can’t just be her desire to move to Miami?’

  ‘Who knows. Leave them alone to work it out, Reed,’ Diane encouraged, pulling him back into the house. ‘They will, you know.’

  ‘Do they argue a lot?’

  ‘I told you, all married couples do. Now let’s see about transferring your luggage to another bedroom,’ she organised briskly.

  Darcy and Reed’s move to a room with two single beds instead of the tempting double was done with the minimum of fuss—and no questions asked.

  ‘What did you tell them?’ Darcy asked awkwardly as she lay in the bed across from Reed’s, the blush in her cheeks evidence that she had been completely aware of his nakedness as he slipped off the robe and climbed into bed—her own bedclothes pulled up to her chin. Of all the things she could have forgotten to pack it had to have been her nightgowns!

  Reed shrugged uninterestedly. ‘That it didn’t bother me but that you always prefer to sleep alone this time of the month.’

  ‘You didn’t!’ she gasped.

  He looked at her with puzzled eyes. ‘Why not?’

  She put her hands up to her suddenly burning cheeks. ‘Oh, Reed!’ she groaned her embarrassment.

  ‘Honey, every woman of child-bearing age has them,’ he reasoned softly.

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘It was all I could think of at the time; could you have thought of anything better?’

  ‘No. But—’

  ‘What do you think is really wrong between Linda and Wade?’ he asked suddenly.

  Both of them were naked beneath the sheets, they had just been calmly discussing one of woman’s more delicate bodily functions, and he wanted to talk about the problem between his sister and her husband!

  But they were here to discover who was betraying his confidences, and any friction between members of his family had to be suspect. Darcy just wished it could be different, and she knew Reed was hoping it would be someone outside the family that was responsible—even if the possibility were very remote. He wasn’t a man who told just anyone of his business interests.

  ‘It’s probably nothing important, as Diane said,’ she dismissed.

  ‘She didn’t say that.’ He shook his head. ‘She said they would work it out. That seems to imply that they always have in the past. That doesn’t sound like a happy marriage to me.’

  ‘Reed, Wade was your friend long before he married Linda,’ she reasoned.

  ‘He’s also my lawyer over here,’ he revealed abruptly. ‘I wonder if a price can be put on friendship?’ His thoughts were distracted as he settled down on to the pillows, one arm flung back behind his head.

  Darcy heard him sigh several minutes later, having come up with no reply to the pained question. She glanced at him. His eyes were closed, his chest moving steadily up and down in deep sleep.

  So much for chemistry!

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘HE said he had to go and see some old friends.’ Diane grimaced at her across the breakfast table. ‘I thought the two of you were on vacation together.’

  ‘We are.’ Darcy smiled tightly, having woken up to find the bed across from hers empty, his sister telling her he had breakfasted and gone out over an hour ago. She realised that these ‘old friends’ of Reed’s were probably people who could tell him what was going on over here, but that didn’t make his just leaving her here to cope any easier to accept.

  ‘You mustn’t mind him,’ Diane encouraged indulgently. ‘He hasn’t been home in such a long time.’

  ‘I really don’t mind,’ she dismissed.

  ‘That’s good.’ Diane nodded her relief. ‘Now, are you sure I can’t get you some pancakes or waffles to go with that coffee and toast?’

  Her stomach did a somersault just at the thought of them after the terrible night she had just spent, lying awake long after Reed, only half sleeping then as she tried to maintain a hold on the bedclothes. She would have to do something about getting a nightgown today!

  ‘I hope last night didn’t tire you too much,’ the other woman said, watching her as she stifled another yawn behind her hand. ‘Once Linda and Mike decide to do something, nothing will stop them.’

  ‘I enjoyed meeting them all. Really,’ she reassured firmly as Diane still looked doubtful.

  ‘Reed wasn’t too happy about the situation,’ Diane grimaced.

  ‘I’m sure you misunderstood him. Did he happen to say when he would be back?’ She sipped her coffee with a nonchalance she was far from feeling. While she liked Diane, and was fairly sure the two of them were going to get on together, she was always a little shy with new people, didn’t make friends all that easily. Reed could at least have asked her if she would like to go with him this morning instead of just leaving her to the tender mercies of his sister.

  ‘Before lunch,’ Diane shrugged. ‘If that’s any help,’ she added.

  It was only ten o’clock now, and that could mean any time until one o’clock!

  ‘Did you know Reed before you
became his secretary?’ Diane sat down opposite her.

  She had been expecting this friendly curiosity—and dreading it. Damn Reed! ‘No,’ she answered unhelpfully—and then felt guilty as she saw the disappointment in the other woman’s eyes. ‘I met him for the first time when I went for the interview. I—We realised a short time ago that we were attracted to each other,’ she invented.

  ‘Is it—serious, between the two of you?’ Diane asked with feigned casualness.

  Darcy’s mouth quirked. ‘You mean, are my intentions towards your brother honourable?’

  ‘Jeez, did I sound that bad?’ Diane winced. ‘I must be out of practice.’

  ‘I gather Reed hasn’t brought many women home by the reaction his family has had to me?’

  ‘Now who’s being obvious?’ Diane laughed softly.

  She grimaced. ‘Why don’t we just tell each other what we want to know and save ourselves a lot of time?’ she agreed.

  By the time Darcy had finished her breakfast and helped Diane clear away she had learnt that Reed had never introduced one of his women to his family before, hence the uncontained excitement about her arrival. She knew she had disappointed Diane by informing her that she and Reed had only a casual relationship, that they were just taking a holiday together while Reed visited his family.

  ‘Are you sure that’s the way Reed feels too?’ Diane frowned.

  She nodded. ‘We’ve just been having a good time together, keeping it light.’

  ‘I thought—We all thought—Did he give you that necklace?’ the other woman probed interestedly.

  Darcy gave her a puzzled look, surprised at the change of subject. ‘Yes. But—’ She picked up the unicorn in her palm, glancing down at it as she saw the gleam of satisfaction in Diane’s eyes at her answer. ‘It was a birthday present,’ she revealed slowly.

  ‘It’s lovely,’ the other woman acknowledged lightly.

  ‘Diane?’

  ‘Yes?’

  That feigned innocence was making her wary. ‘Diane, what—’

  ‘As we have a few hours before Reed gets back, would you like to go shopping?’ Diane interrupted briskly. ‘There’s a really good mall at Altemore Springs. About twenty minutes’ drive away.’