"No." She hated dashing the hope in his voice.
"She'll call you honey. I'm sure she's fine."
Katie wanted him to believe that because she was no longer sure she did. She didn't want to worry her father by telling him about the bug Rick had found in her house or the tracking device planted on his car or the unidentified man who'd shown up at his office yesterday.
"I'm coming down there. I can leave my conference."
"No," Katie said firmly. "There's no need."
"I think we should hire someone."
"I did." Her gaze skipped to the hot tub, her mind flashing an image of Rick rising out of the water like a nude, ancient warrior. "Daddy, it's Rick."
Silence. "Rick Powell?"
She hesitated. "Yes."
"I thought he went off to fly jets."
She explained he'd left the Air Force and moved back to Oklahoma to be near his parents.
"And he's now a private investigator?"
"Yes."
"Hmm." Pleasure warmed her father's voice. Though he'd supported her, he'd never agreed with her decision to end her engagement. "Are you doing all right? Are things going okay with him, the two of you?"
"Yes." She smiled. At least as fine as she could be, anyway.
"Shouldn't he know something about Grace by now?"
"It's going to take a little while, Dad. Especially since I have no idea where Grace and Tommy might've gone." She filled him in on all the steps Rick had take, from putting Grace's photo on the Internet to calling the FBI for any information or leads on Henderson.
"Sounds like Rick knows what he's doing," her father said.
"He does. And there's really no need for you to come."
"You think I'd be in the way?"
"No, but there's no telling how long this will take. I'm able to take some personal leave. You're not. Besides, by the time you get here, we may have heard from her."
"I've sent you some money. You can put it toward his fee."
"No, Dad--"
"Too late, hon. It's already in the mail. I want to help. Grace is my family, too."
"I know, but I think I've got it under control."
"I never had any doubt."
She smiled.
"All right, I'll stay, but you call me the second you hear anything about your sister."
"Yes, I will."
"And Katie?"
"Yes."
"This is not your fault."
"I know, but--"
"No buts."
"Okay." She smiled, wishing she'd already found Grace in some tropical bar somewhere, not running from a guy who could be connected to the mob. She hated for her dad to worry. "Maybe I'll hear from her today."
"Please call me, Katie. For any reason."
"I will. Love you."
"I love you, too."
She disconnected, staring blankly out the glass door. A dull throbbing built in her head. It wasn't enough that she was fighting these swirling, unwanted emotions about Rick, but this worry over Grace chewed at her insides like acid.
Kit rubbed at the sudden sting in her eyes. Where was her sister, anyway? If she could know Grace was all right. If she had an inkling that she and Rick might find her soon. Or hear from her.
Katie wasn't sure how long she could stay with Rick without doing something stupid, something... physical. Smart had been nowhere around ever since she'd hooked up with him again, especially yesterday.
"Breakfast is ready." His voice was tight.
She turned and found him watching her from the kitchen doorway. His jaw was rigid, his eyes sharp as lasers.
"Come eat."
With a frown at his commanding tone, she passed the sofa and laid her cell phone on the end table.
Balancing two cups of coffee and a small glass of orange juice in his hands, he walked to the table while she sat down. She forced her gaze from the ripple of muscles across his bare belly to the plate in front of her, heaped with eggs and sausage. Two slices of wheat toast sat on a saucer next to her plate, complete with a small jar of blackberry preserves. Her favorite.
The ache inside her drilled a little deeper at the fact that he'd remembered, at the sudden way he'd closed himself off from her. "This looks great. I'm starved."
He slid into his chair and stabbed a bite of eggs. "You should've let him come."
She looked up in surprise. This was about her father? "I didn't want to worry him. I've got everything under control."
He muttered something under his breath. "That won't stop him from worrying. Grace is his daughter."
She frowned at the sharpness in his voice. "Why are you getting all worked up?"
"Because maybe he needed to do something, to feel as if he were helping."
"But there's no need. I-"
"You wouldn't let him help, just like you never let me help."
She dropped her fork. "What are you talking about? You're helping me right now."
"That's not what I mean. Why do you have to solve every crisis, Katie? Take responsibility for everything in the family?"
"Because I'm... supposed to."
"No, you're not," he said pointedly. "Grace, and only Grace is responsible for her actions. Your dad sees that. Why can't you?"
"Just because you're helping me find her doesn't mean my family is any of your business."
"The hell it doesn't! Isn't this why you really walked away from me? Because you can't let go? Because you can't let anyone help you?"
Anger and hurt exploded inside her. "No, I walked away because of your 'I'm in charge' attitude, because you made decisions without even consulting me. Just like our engagement. You assumed I'd marry you, pick up and leave my family. You never asked me."
"At the time, I thought you loved me. I thought you wanted to be with me, no matter where."
"I wanted to be asked."
He dragged a hand down his face. "I know. That was stupid and wrong of me. I thought if I could just get you to go with me, sweep you off your feet..." He shook his head. "It doesn't matter now."
"It does matter. You thought if I left with you that I'd stop caring for my family."
"Of course not," he snapped. "But I did think that maybe Grace would start running her own life.
"She needed me."
"So did I."
"You did not!"
His gaze shot to hers. She saw pain and a vulnerability in the dark depths before they went opaque.
She sobered, picked up her fork, put it down. "I never felt that you needed me."
"I did. But I couldn't give you what you needed."
"That's not true."
"Why were you always pushing me away?"
"I...wasn't." Had she done that?
"Then why didn't we work out?" His gaze met hers. There was no rancor in his voice, just an earnestness that made her chest hurt.
"Because you wanted to make all the decisions without me."
"I wanted to help you. Yes, I made a mistake by trying to control things so that you had no responsibilities, but that's because you already had too many."
Flustered by the idea of something she'd never considered, she stammered, "I was perfectly capable of making my own decisions."
"I wasn't trying to make your decisions. I was just trying to make things easier for you."
"You thought I'd just go away with you, leave my family."
"But not because I wanted you to abandon them."
She saw a loneliness, a reserve in his eyes she'd never seen, and the truth of what he'd said hit her with enough force to stall the breath in her lungs. She had always pushed him away. She hadn't ever recognized that he might need her because it wasn't the consuming kind of need her sister had for her.
The regret in his eyes tore at her. She speared a piece of sausage, chewed. "Why didn't you explain this to me then?"
"It wouldn't have mattered," he said tiredly. "You saw things the way you had to see them. I think you just couldn't stand to give up some of that responsibility."
"What do you mean?"
"Because if you did, you'd have to give up the guilt you feel over your mom's death."
She bit down hard on a piece of toast. "You don't know what you're talking about."
"And if you did give it up, who'd take care of Grace? Who'd be there to mother her? Your mom's death wasn't your fault, Katie."
Hurt stabbed deep. "I'm not going to talk about this with you."
"You're right. Things didn't work between us. Let's just leave it at that."
"So here we are."
"Right. Here we are."
Their eyes met.
The uncertainty she felt was mirrored in his dark gaze. The moment stretched between them, then he turned his attention to his plate; she did the same.
With a tightness in her chest, Katie realized how much she'd hurt Rick ten years ago. She'd leaned on him so many times for comfort, then felt strong enough to handle things on her own. He'd seen that as rejection. She'd never meant it that way, but it didn't change the fact that he felt it. She'd seen the bleak truth in his eyes.
And he couldn't know that her dad had been pushing her for years to make Grace stand on her own. He'd finally quit, Katie realized, two years ago when they'd both thought Grace was really going to straighten up. What would life be like if Katie had to take care of only herself?
She had wondered about it before, gotten a little taste of freedom for the last two years, and she liked it, but at the first sign that Grace was in trouble, she'd jumped right back in with both feet. The possibility of living only for herself opened up a window for Katie she hadn't let herself look into until now. A window with Rick.
He finished his breakfast and rose, then took his dishes to the sink and rinsed them off. When she moved beside him, he opened the dishwasher, sliding the dishes inside while she wiped the table. The tautness in his shoulders, the wariness she picked up from him pricked at her.
We just didn't work out. Had he really closed the door to their past? Hadn't he ever wondered, just once since she'd asked for his help, if things were really over between them?
He closed the dishwasher. "Let's go out to my folks."
Katie's eyes widened. "I'm sure I'm the last person they want to see."
"They probably aren't even there. They've been camping at Grand Lake."
And what Dave and Vina Powell were home? Unease curled through her. She hadn't seen or talked to Rick's parents since her and Rick's broken engagement. "What about Grace?"
"We've both got cell phones. Uncle Dwayne knows to call mine if he finds anything in the FBI database about Hernderson. I also gave that number to Tommy's parole officer and everyone else we've talked to."
"True," she murmured. Of course, being cooped up inside this house with Rick, trying to ignore the want humming through her body, would be more agonizing than risking a meeting with his parents. Fresh air and open space might help restore equilibrium.
"We'll ride horses or walk or fish, whatever you want. Let's just get out of here. This waiting is getting to both of us. If it weren't for that visit form Mr. Mysterious yesterday, I'd even let you have a little time to yourself."
"All right."
"Good. Once we get back from there, we can swing by and check on Tommy's former cell mate. He's due in from the harvest today."
"Okay." The admission he'd made a few minutes ago about trying to shield her from more responsibility had ignited a realization that slowly grew inside her. He was quickly becoming the same steady presence in her life he'd been when they were lovers.
Her pulse skipped at the thought of all the times she'd made love with Rick. They'd never had trouble with the physical part. It would be easy to give in to the attraction still very much alive between them. Just the thought of being with him again quickened her pulse.
He understood her; he always had, except she hadn't seen it. What about now? Was there any hope they might have another chance?
CHAPTER 7
Almost an hour later, Rick stood in the barn on his parent's property. Frustration sawed through him, as it had since his conversation with Katie at breakfast. He should've kept his mouth shut. Pointing out Katie's responsibility to her family was not only none of his business, it was futile.
Only Katie could change the way things were in her family, and she wasn't inclined.
She stool at the stall door behind him, watching quietly with those big eyes. The blue-gray depths were clear, interested, but he remembered how they'd gone dark with desire yesterday.
He shoved away the mental image and tightened the cinch on Apple, the palomino mare he'd chosen for Katie to ride. Chacha, the younger mare, was full of herself today; Rick would ride her.
Katie moved behind him, stroking Apple's nose and talking softly to the mare. He glanced back, noting the way Katie's jeans gloved her tight little rare. Rick determinedly pulled his gaze away. There was no way he could've stayed with her in the house.
All he'd thought about since yesterday at the shooting range was how close she was to his bed, how she'd feel beneath him.
He'd hoped that, out here busying himself with the animals, he wouldn't be so aware of her. He didn't want to feel this frustration, didn't want to feel anything. She'd proved once again that when there were problems, she would still push him away, still wouldn't let him help her. She hadn't changed, and he wasn't interested.
He figured if he told himself that a hundred times, he might believe it.
She murmured to the mare, and her voice slid over Rick like silk on skin. Reminding him of her hands on him yesterday, the feel of her breath whispering against his lips. Her soft floral scent flirted in and out of the more potent smells of horse and hay and saddle leather.
He shouldn't have told her how he'd tried to shield her from more responsibility, shouldn't have tried to justify his take-charge attitude. It didn't matter. None of it did. All that mattered was finding Grace and staying away from Katie until they did. He wanted her, and no matter how much that fact ate him up, it was still a fact.
Even as irritated as he was, he couldn't dismiss the changes in her he'd noticed, though her overdeveloped sense of responsibility to her family wasn't one of them. She seemed more dissatisfied with Grace, more willing to speak her mind to him, more vulnerable than he'd even seen her. Those differences intrigued him, planted maverick thoughts in his mind to see just what else might have changed.
In college, he'd always been the one to lend an ear, to try to soothe away any troubles, but he'd never let her do that for him. At the time, he thought he would appear weak to her. Instead she told him at breakfast that she believe he'd never needed her.
Well, it was better for her to continue believing that. He wasn't going to let her hurt him again, and opening up to Katie had hurt written all over it.
"This mare looks just like the one I used to ride."
"You rode Beauty. This is her foal, Apple." Down the stable horse snorted, and Rick grinned. "There she is, saying hello."
Katie turned, then moved down two stalls to where the mare stood.
He pulled another saddle blanket from the weathered wooden wall behind him and shouldered his way past Apple, who had her head buried in an oat bucket. Chacha, a black-and-white paint, sidestepped, then butted his chest with her nose.
"Yes." He scratched a spot behind her ear, then placed the yellow-and-red striped blanket on her back. "You can run today."
Just outside the stall, he heard Katie speaking softly to Beauty, and the sound torched something deep inside him, something could and sharp that he refused to define. He needed a lead in this case so he could track down Grace and Katie could be on her way. That's where he needed to keep his mind.
He tugged the saddle from the same wall that had held the blanket and settled it onto Chacha's back.
Katie stepped inside the stall, bringing that nibble-me scent with her again.
Apple blew out a breath and moved toward Katie, nudging her jeans-clad hip for a treat.
"Nothing for you yet, baby," Katie cooed as she ran a hand down the mare's neck.
Rick clenched his jaw, tried not to remember how she's grabbed onto him yesterday as if he were the only shelter in a twister.
Chacha bumped him with her rump in protest, and he realized he'd yanked a little too hard on the cinch around her middle. "Sorry."
He patted the mare, then turned to Katie. "Go ahead and mount up. "I'll need to adjust the stirrups for you."
As she swung one trim leg over the saddle, the seat of her jeans pulled taut across her rounded bottom. His body tightened.
Disgusted, he yanked his gaze away and moved beside the mare to find Katie smiling at him.
"What?" He reached for the stirrup strap, unbuckled it and threaded it up two notches.
She laughed, a soft, lively sound that pinged across his nerves. "Remember the first time you brought me out here?"
He remembered a hot and desperate session in his car, which was probably not what she meant. "Yeah."
She patted Apple's neck. "I did all right on the ride until we were on the way back here and Beauty realized we were headed for the barn."
Rick grunted, hoping she would stop with the memories before she worked her way to the one where he'd started. He stepped around to her other side, reached for the strap.
"She took off like a shot, scared me out of my wits."
"You were howling like a wet cat."
She swatted at him. "I was not. "I was... startled."
He grinned. Without thinking, he reached up and wrapped his hand around her calf to place her foot into the stirrup. Firm muscle flexed beneath his palm.
He froze. So did she.
He wanted to slide his hands up, cup the heat between her legs just like that saddle was.
"You didn't catch up to me until she'd stopped in the barn."
Katie's voice was strained, as if she were forcing the words. Hell, he knew he would be.
He clenched his jaw against the memory, but still it flooded in. He'd run his hands over her, making sure she was all right, and she'd fallen full into him, laughing, kissing him hard and deep. Her hands and mouth had been eager, inviting.
"The horse wasn't as rough on me as you were," she said in a shy, tentative voice. "You grabbed me so tight, I could barely breathe."
You're Still the One Page 9
