Billionaire Bachelors: Gray

by Anne Marie Winston

  Tonight he intended to ask her to have dinner with him somewhere away from the house. Preferably in the next day or so. That was the only way he could ensure they would have plenty of time to talk—and God knew they were going to need it after he told her about his heart transplant.

  She opened the door to his knock, but Patsy and Michael were right behind her, so he contented himself with giving her hand a quick squeeze.

  Dinner was pleasant, and afterward he got to help with the little guy’s bath time routine again. This time, he got in on the water squirting action, and he was the one with the soaked shirt. When he looked over the baby’s head at Catherine, he could see in her eyes that she was remembering what had happened between them after the first time.

  He stood silently as she put Michael down, then followed her into the hallway. God, he wanted her. She started toward the stairs but he snagged her hand and pulled her back, catching her to him while he held both her hands behind her back in one of his much larger ones. The position arched her firmly against him and she squeaked in surprise as he brought his mouth down hard on hers, seeking her participation with his tongue and exploring the curve of hip and breast with his free hand.

  “I want you,” he breathed against her mouth. “Come home with me tonight. Sleep in my bed. Wake in my arms.”

  “I—I can’t,” she said in an agonized whisper.

  And he knew she couldn’t. He would never expect her to leave Michael overnight, even if Patsy was in the house.

  “I’ll come over for a little while,” she whispered against his mouth.

  He wanted her to. He didn’t want her to. It annoyed the hell out of him that they had to sneak around like this.

  Later, he barely remembered the rush across the garden path to his door. He led her through his darkened cottage to the master bedroom, tearing away both her clothes and his own without turning on a light. He was going to tell her soon about his transplant, but tonight…tonight he had to have this memory.

  The bed was big and soft, moonlight casting a weak glow among the shadows. Gray realized his hands were shaking as he pulled her to the bed, then caught her against him for a deep, stirring kiss. Catherine responded completely, pressing her smooth, bare curves against him, her small hands sliding up into his hair to hold his head down to her.

  Finally, he couldn’t wait any longer. He rolled to his back, pulling her astride him, groaning aloud as her legs settled on either side of him, her soft, humid woman’s flesh snugly covering his turgid, aching shaft. “Take me,” he urged hoarsely. “Take me now, sweet thing.”

  Catherine responded by shifting her body to her knees. Leaning forward slightly, she brushed her breasts over his chest as she caught his mouth with her own. At the same instant, he felt himself slip into position at her heated portal, and before he could move, she dropped herself down in one short, sharp motion, thrusting him deep into the slick, clinging channel.

  He nearly came off the bed at the intensity of the sensation, and he had to force himself to stillness as she began to move above him. When she nearly placed her hands on his chest he came to his senses just in time to catch them and thread his fingers through hers, letting her brace herself on his hands, her lovely features intent and alight with her own pleasure. Watching her in the shadowed room, knowing he was giving her pleasure was an amazing aphrodisiac and he felt control eluding him.

  Quickly he took her by the hips, yanking her down hard and holding her in place as he began a pounding jackhammer rhythm that brought him to the edge within moments. When he felt her begin to shatter and buck above him, her inner muscles milking him in the unmistakable spasms of fulfillment, he couldn’t prevent his shout of satisfaction.

  Later, he held her in the curve of his arm, one of her legs laid possessively over his, her small hand enclosed in his resting on his chest. He felt giddy with pleasure but it faded as he remembered what he had to do. He was going to have to tell her soon. They weren’t always going to be making love in the dark, or partly clothed.

  Making love. It was so easy to admit. He loved her. Probably had loved her since the first time he’d seen her across that ballroom, possibly even since the moment Mike Thorne’s heart had begun to beat in his chest.

  But all that didn’t matter. What did matter was what he did with the future he’d been given.

  Acting on impulse, he said, “Let’s go out to dinner tomorrow night.” He would get a ring tomorrow, ask her to marry him. Everything else would work itself out. It had to.

  Then he realized she hadn’t answered him. Her body had stiffened slightly. Pulling himself up on one elbow, he tried to gauge her expression but it was too dark. “Catherine?”

  “Why don’t we have a quiet dinner here?” she suggested.

  He was perplexed. “Why? I’d like to take you out, let someone else pamper us.” He dropped his voice. “I’d like to have you all to myself for a few hours.”

  “I…” She hesitated, and unease blossomed within him. “I’d really rather not go anywhere. We can be alone here.”

  “You don’t want to be seen with me in public, do you?” he asked incredulously.

  “It’s not that—”

  “Then go to dinner with me.” It was a challenge.

  She remained stubbornly silent.

  “I don’t get it,” he said finally. “You claim it’s not that you don’t want to be seen with me, but you’ve made every excuse in the book not to go anywhere that we could be noticed.” He tried not to let anger color his voice. “I know I’m not exactly a blue blood, but I thought you cared.”

  “I do care,” she cried. “But people said terrible things after I married Mike and I couldn’t bear it if they started again.”

  “What kind of terrible things?” He still didn’t get it. “I was a gold digger,” she said bitterly. “I married him for his money, I snagged a rich husband, I did all kinds of immoral things to get him to marry me. If they said those things then, just imagine what a field day they’ll have when everyone finds out—” She stopped abruptly.

  “Finds out what?” This was the key, he was sure of it.

  “That we’re nearly insolvent,” she said heavily.

  Of all the things he’d expected her to say, that wasn’t even on the list. “You’re…having money problems?”

  “Mike had money problems,” she said, a fierce flare of anger in her tone. “I have no money, just the problems he left me with.”

  Suddenly, he saw it all clearly. The coupons, the job, selling Mike’s horse, all the damn house and yard work she’d been doing. “What did he do?” he asked harshly. God, her father had been a gambler who’d given her childhood hellish moments. He felt fury rising, hot and choking. How could Mike have done something similar?

  “It wasn’t really his fault,” she said defensively. “You know how bad the economy was. I don’t know all the details—he made some bad investments. All I know is that when he died, we had next to nothing. Even his life insurance had lapsed.”

  He was too shocked to speak.

  “You can’t tell Patsy,” she said quickly. “Please. She doesn’t really know how bad it is. I’ve tried to make her understand that we have to be careful with our spending but—”

  “She hasn’t made much of an effort,” he said grimly, recalling Patsy’s blithe dinner invitations. At last the horrified expression on Catherine’s face made sense. She’d probably been mentally calculating how much it would cost to feed someone his size!

  “She can’t help it,” Catherine said, and it infuriated him that she felt she had to defend her mother-in-law. “She’s never been in a position to worry about money. It’s hard for her to grasp how serious the situation is.”

  “She’s going to have to,” he said firmly. “You’re doing a hell of a job, but you can’t do it without making her cognizant of the sacrifices she has to make as well.”

  “Don’t you dare say anything to her,” she flared, apparently guessing his intentions. “She’s
my family; I’ll deal with her as I see best.”

  “Even if it runs you into the ground,” he said scathingly.

  Her whole body stiffened, and she pulled completely away from him, sliding out of the bed and fumbling around for her clothes. He let her fumble while he hunted up his own shirt, aware as always of the scar that cleaved his chest. Finally, shirt and pants dragged on, he reached over and snapped on a lamp beside the bed.

  Catherine blinked in the light, but her motions didn’t slow for an instant. “I’m going back to the house now,” she said in a distant, implacable voice.

  “Catherine.” He reached for reason. “We have to talk about this.”

  “There’s nothing to talk about.”

  “The hell there isn’t.” Desperation was a sour taste in the back of his throat. “You’re willing to sleep with me but you won’t be seen with me because someone might think badly of you? That’s nuts!”

  Her face froze. “It is not. I have to protect my son.”

  “Your son could not care less what people might say right now,” he shot at her, “and by the time he is old enough that it might matter, nobody will remember or care anymore.”

  “In a few years,” she said, “I might be able to get my finances to the point that I wouldn’t feel like I’m taking advantage of your wealth.”

  “That’s what this is really about, isn’t it?” He was furious. “Your perceptions of what people might think. The way you feel. My God. You’d actually consider waiting years to marry me because of ridiculous reasons like that?”

  Her face, already porcelain in the scant light of the single lamp, drained of all color. “Marriage?” she whispered.

  “What the hell did you think I was offering you?” he said, his voice a sharp blade that made her flinch when it landed. “A long-term sexual arrangement? Thanks but no thanks.” He stepped around her and held the bedroom door open. “I’ll walk you back.”

  They hadn’t spoken in three days. Catherine knelt in the grass by one of her shaded perennial beds, adding some colorful impatiens and other annuals to give it color now that the spring’s riotous show of blooms had ended.

  Michael played a few yards away from her, kicking a bright yellow ball through the grass. He’d already looked at her beseechingly several times and asked, “Mac?”

  And each time, a fresh arrow of pain struck her heart.

  Gray wanted to marry her.

  Every time she thought of the fight they’d had, tears welled in her eyes again. She felt as if all she’d done over the past few days was battle tears.

  He wanted to marry her. At least, he had until he’d realized how stupid and hung up she was about her money problems. Which, now that she really thought about them, weren’t as big a deal as she’d believed. As she had chosen to believe, she thought, angry at her own mulish tunnel vision.

  Especially not in light of the fact that she might just have ruined her chance at happily ever after with Gray. He—

  “Michael!” Gray’s voice was a distant shout. “No!”

  She whirled, realizing that she’d been planting with a vengeance, unaware of how much time had passed. Michael was all the way down at the bottom of the yard—standing on the apron around the sunken swimming pool. The swimming pool which she hadn’t had filled this summer because it was too costly to keep open. The swimming pool which, she saw in horror, was plainly visible through the large gate that stood wide open. Had she left it open after she’d trimmed the bushes inside yesterday? She couldn’t be sure but she was very afraid she might have.

  She rose as Gray came from the direction of the cottage, running at full speed toward the edge of the pool. But even then it was too late. Her son took one toddling step forward and pitched over the side of the pool with a startled shriek that almost instantly cut off into a silence even more frightening than the sight of the fall.

  “Micha-ae-el!” She hadn’t known she could scream like that.

  Gray reached the pool before she did, vaulting over the side, and she could see him as he bent. He straightened immediately. “Call 9-1-1,” he ordered her.

  “Is he breathing?” She stopped in her tracks, torn between the need to go to her baby and the knowledge that Gray felt he needed expert medical attention.

  “Hurry!” His voice cracked like a whip and she leaped into action, racing back toward the house to place the call.

  “Patsy!” she screamed as she entered the house. Her mother-in-law appeared just as the emergency dispatcher came on the line, and she saw Patsy’s face crumple as the older woman realized what had happened. After relaying the initial information, she thrust the phone at Patsy as she rushed back out the door, grabbing two beach towels on the way. “They want someone to stay on the line. You can’t go too far from the base or your reception will break up.”

  She didn’t remember running back down the length of the yard, scrambling into the shallow end of the pool beside Gray—thank God he’d only fallen three feet instead of twelve!—who was kneeling with his hand on the little boy’s wrist. Keeping track of his pulse, she realized as she saw him check his watch.

  Michael was frighteningly still, his little body limp. Blood seeped out from beneath his head and she made an agonized sound when she saw it.

  “Don’t move him,” Gray said sharply when she went to gather him into her arms, so she settled for covering him with the beach towels despite the warmth of the day.

  After that, time passed with agonizing slowness. Michael was breathing, but showed no signs of consciousness. “Come on, little buddy, wake up,” Gray said at one point, but the child didn’t rouse. In what were probably mere minutes but seemed like forever, an ambulance was there, screaming right down the lawn as Patsy hurried along in its wake.

  The medical technicians were calm and efficient, relaying information to a base as they immobilized her son’s neck and took vital signs. They got out a backboard and gently moved Michael on to it. Gray held his head, his expression as agonized as she knew her own must be.

  As she scrambled into the ambulance and it screamed out on to the road toward the hospital, she saw Aline in the driveway. Patsy was already in the car and Gray snatched the keys Aline tossed him just before he slid into the driver’s seat.

  The ambulance attendants were just unloading Michael when Patsy and Gray came rushing in. A nurse stepped in front of them as they all moved forward. “Parents only,” she said. “There’s a waiting room right over there.” She pointed to a small room.

  Catherine felt Gray hesitate, and she slid a glance up at his drawn features. “I need you,” she said, not caring how it sounded or what he thought.

  Immediately, he slipped an arm around her and said, “Let’s go.”

  “I’ll wait,” Patsy said.

  They followed the nurse to the cubicle. When the nurse pushed aside the curtain and showed them in, the doctor was already stitching a wound on the back of her son’s head. There was blood everywhere and Catherine put a hand over her mouth with a moan.

  “I should have been watching him more closely.” Her voice broke. “I was distracted and—”

  “It was an accident,” Gray said firmly. “That little stinker is fast. And smart. I bet he waited until you weren’t looking.” He paused. “He’s a tough little peanut. He’s going to be okay.”

  The words almost shattered the rigid self-control she was maintaining. “Mike used to talk all the time about having some little peanuts of our own some day,” she informed him, trying to smile.

  Gray’s face froze for a moment and the thought chased across her mind that it bothered him when she spoke of Mike. His tone was neutral as he said, “Let’s see what the doctor has to say.” He led her around to where she could lean over and comfort Michael, and everything faded except concerns for her baby, who began to calm down as soon as he saw her.

  “He can’t feel this,” the doctor explained as he quickly closed the cut. “Looks like he just split it open when he fell. He’s going t
o have a terrific bump there, though. When we’re done here, they’ll be taking him upstairs to radiology for some head scans.”

  “Do you think he’s concussed or has a skull fracture?” Gray asked.

  “There are no indications so far that he suffered any further injury,” the doctor assured them. “But given the distance he fell—I understand he fell several feet on to concrete?—it’s precautionary.”

  Gray asked several more questions that she only partly registered, preoccupied as she was with comforting her son. They let her stay with him when they took him up for the scans, while Gray went back out to the waiting room to update Patsy and reassure her.

  Six hours later, Michael was discharged after a short observation period revealed no additional concerns. Gray drove them home and carried the little boy inside, and she heard the emotion in his voice when he kissed her son’s forehead and said, “We’ll play ball in a few days, little buddy. I promise.”

  She followed him out into the hallway. “Thank you. He’ll look forward to that.”

  Gray paused at the top of the steps and turned toward her. There was pain in his eyes. “I’m moving out. I’ll come back and play ball with him, but I’ll be out of the cottage this week. Please extend my thanks to Patsy.”

  “But…is your house ready?” She hadn’t expected this.

  “No.” He shook his head. “I’ve gotten another condo.”

  “Because of me?” she asked baldly. “Gray, you don’t have to go. I—”

  But he had already turned and started down the stairs. “I can’t do this. Can’t you just let it alone?”

  No, she thought. She couldn’t. Not when it was her future—and his—at stake. He’d said he wanted to marry her. He couldn’t just turn off the feelings that went with that, could he?

  Nine

  She didn’t have an opportunity to get away until the following morning when Patsy said, “Have you thanked Gray yet for all his help yesterday?”