“He’s all yours.” Cassie pulled out the front of her kimono, examining the large wet spot from Emily’s drool. She could smell formula in it and didn’t find that as lovely as Tori did.
“Let me guess. It’s silk,” Tori said.
“Got it in one. Is there a good dry cleaner in town?”
“Why don’t you just borrow something washable of mine? If you take it to a cleaner here, it probably won’t be done by Sunday when you go home.”
Home. That was what Manhattan was to Cassie.
She’d be back in her world in just three more days.
But she’d have Reid first.
There were rare days when Reid thought that a guy really could get what he wanted, if he wanted it badly enough—or worked hard enough toward it as an objective.
That Friday morning proved to be one of them.
He’d never believed that wishing on a star would make any difference to anything, much less that if he could dream it, he could do it. In Reid’s world, achievements came at a high price, if at all. He’d learned to work hard. He’d learned to prepare for success. He might have wished for it, too, even though he knew that didn’t matter. What mattered was that he did the groundwork and the strategizing. Some efforts bore fruit, but in his experience, that happened in the endeavors that mattered less to him personally. The goals he really cared about invariably dissolved in his hands.
He was used to it.
He was over it.
But in some tiny corner of his heart, he hadn’t stopped hoping for more.
Experience had also taught him not to count on success until he held it in his hands. The night before, Cassie had made him an offer and they’d made a deal. Until she walked into his house and was naked in his bed, Reid wasn’t going to believe it would happen.
He’d gotten up early, tired of battling his insomnia. He’d never been a person who needed much sleep and was convinced that he’d been born that way so that he might survive to adulthood. If so, it had worked.
Usually, he went down to his gym, or swam some laps in his exercise pool. On this spring morning, he laced on his shoes and went out for a run to meet Cassie. His heart was thumping before he even started to run. He was a little bit early, which was better than being late. It was the first time he’d run in a long time, and his knees reminded him immediately why running was a bad idea. It was still a bit dark, so no one would see him if his knees gave out beneath him.
Cassie wasn’t on the trail.
Reid ran a little faster. He got to the end of the street and didn’t see her. He was disappointed, but not quite ready to turn back. He continued down the street to Nick’s place and was stunned by the wave of relief that swept through him when he found her doing stretches beside the garage. He smiled and forgot all about his knees. With the right motivation, Reid could run forever.
And that motivation was right in front of him.
Looking fabulous in black Lycra, her hair bound up in a swinging ponytail of blond silk.
He ran a little faster toward Cassie, picking up his pace and improving his posture, wiping every bit of the grimace off his face. There had been a time, he reminded himself, when he’d loved running.
“Morning,” he called as he approached.
Cassie spun around and smiled. She surveyed him quickly and her smile broadened. “Morning.”
Reid stopped beside her and did a few stretches himself. He felt her looking and was glad to be as toned as he was. “It’s a great morning for a run.”
“Just cool enough,” Cassie agreed. She slanted a glance at the house, then met his gaze. “Didn’t you say there was a trail?”
“Right by the river.”
“Show me?”
“You bet.”
They shared a conspiratorial smile and they set out today, naturally matching pace with each other. He was glad that she wasn’t determined to sprint, as he could last a while at this speed. He ignored his knees and concentrated on his companion. No make-up at this hour and he stole several quick looks at her face.
“You look serious,” she said. “Do I have toothpaste on my face?”
“No. I can’t decide if you’re prettier with lipstick or without.”
“No, no, no,” she said, shaking her head. “Don’t go there. It’s too early for false compliments.”
“What about genuine ones?”
She gave him a look. “We have an agreement.”
“A negotiation.”
“And I’m leaving Sunday night. I might never come back again. You don’t need to bother with sweet talk.”
“It’s not sweet talk. It’s honesty.”
She smiled. “Then I’ll give you some back. You’re in great shape.”
“So are you.” Their gazes met and held for a hot moment and Reid thought about sprinting. “Are you coming back any sooner than in fifteen more years?”
“Probably not.”
“Ah, it went well with your family then.”
Cassie laughed. “It went terribly. I don’t know what’s wrong with Ally.”
“Something new?”
“Yes. I expect to get grief from my mom.”
Reid didn’t ask. “Here’s the trail.” He indicated the gap in the trees that was the start of the river trail. “Right where it’s always been.”
Cassie preceded him, her gaze darting over the trail. “But it wasn’t this wide before, much less paved.”
“I guess the elves have been busy in the night.”
Something in his tone must have caught her ear because she looked at him again. “Did you have this paved?”
Reid nodded. “It’s safer for the kids on their bikes.” He pointed upward. “And there are lights with solar panels so the path is lit in the evenings. Safer for people walking alone.”
“It was always a good shortcut to downtown.”
He kept running, thinking of all the other things that had happened on this trail or close to it in his memory. If Cassie didn’t know about them, he wasn’t going to tell her.
The level of the water was already dropping from its spring high, and the trees were coming into leaf. Birds called and it was easy to forget that there were houses in close proximity.
“Why did you come back here anyway?” Cassie asked eventually.
“Where else was I going to go?”
“Anywhere! You got away, like I did.”
“Going to college wasn’t an escape.”
“Didn’t you think so? I sure did. It was my chance to run and never come back.”
“You can’t run away from who you are.”
“But you can run away from what you dislike.”
This time, he slanted the sidelong look her way. “Why did you hate it here so much?” As far as Reid could see, Cassie’d had every advantage as a kid. There was nothing for her to flee.
“It always felt so confining here, as if there couldn’t be a future for anybody beyond that of their parents. Everyone was supposed to grow up, take over the family business, marry the boy or girl next door, have babies, move into the family home and so on. Everyone just stepped into their parents’ shoes and carried on, generation after generation after generation.” She made a face and sounded more bitter than he expected. “It’s depressing me just saying that. There was no room for dreams.”
“You know my feelings about dreams,” he reminded her, noting that she didn’t seem to find his view offensive.
“Goals then. Aspirations. Any idea of becoming someone other than your parents. I hated that.”
Reid had, too. “But your family had a good life and a nice house, financial comfort. Isn’t that a good dream?” He knew he would have done anything for that life and legacy.
Cassie grimaced. “It’s small. I wanted big. I wanted to take a flight somewhere as if it was no big deal. I wanted to visit other countries and try other things. I wanted to do things no one in Montrose River had apparently ever imagined doing.”
“Did you do them?”
Her smile was mischievous. “Some of them.” Then her eyes widened. “And some of them were done to me,” she added quietly. Reid pretended not to hear that, although he was intrigued.
He especially noticed her change of mood. She seemed more pensive now, as if he wasn’t even with her.
“Why’d you come back at all?” he asked.
Cassie took a deep breath. “I thought that if I was Emily’s godmother, I could offer her another perspective. Not now, really, but when she’s a teenager.”
Reid nodded. Wanting to make a difference to kids was something he understood. “So, was it worth it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you must have given up something to get what you wanted, something besides living in Montrose River, something that mattered to you. That’s usually how it works.”
She considered him, her expression inscrutable. “Is that how it worked with you?”
“No. I didn’t get what I wanted, even though I did give up something important to me. Life doesn’t always play fair.” He was proud of himself for not sounding bitter.
She stopped then and turned to look at him, propping her hands on her hips. “What are you talking about? You’re rich and successful. You own at least half of the town. What else could you possibly want?”
Reid smiled and averted his gaze. “Something other than that, obviously.” He kept running.
They ran together in silence for a few moments, and he was soothed by the sound of the river.
“So, what did you want?” Cassie asked finally.
“Does it matter?”
“It does if you didn’t get it.”
“Did you get what you wanted?”
She frowned a little, thinking about that. “A lot of it. Some things I didn’t want once I had them, like the job with the Rockettes. Some things I didn’t even know I wanted, like the partnership at F5. But I have financial security, which is one kind of success, and I’m not reliant upon anyone else, which is freedom.”
“And what do you do with your success and freedom?”
“I live the life I want to live. I’m happy.”
“What else?”
“What else is there?”
“What’s the mark you’re going to leave on the world? How will anyone know you’ve been here after you’ve gone?”
“There might be a headstone,” she said with a smile. “All the Wilsons gather again in the family plot over at the cemetery.”
“So you will be coming back to Montrose River one day.” He noticed how she grimaced and wondered if she actually would. “Is that good enough?”
“I’m guessing it wouldn’t be for you.”
“No. I don’t even care if there is a marker. They can cremate me and cast the ashes into the wind.”
“Because you’re making a difference by keeping the Shop ’n Save open?” She caught her breath and touched his arm. “Sorry. That sounds bitchy. I don’t mean to be. It just doesn’t seem to be a good enough reason to stay here.”
“What you mean is that a little grocery store in a little town doesn’t matter in the greater scheme of things,” Reid replied evenly. “And I think you’re wrong.”
“How so?”
“It’s a place to make a difference. Change begins on the ground floor, not in the penthouse. Change starts with food.”
“With food?”
“Why do you think Lionel works for me?”
“Lionel.” She looked blank for a moment, then her eyes lit. “The kid who dropped the pickles?”
“That’s him. No one has ever trusted Lionel with anything, as far as I can see. He’s not brilliant, but he’s not stupid, either. He’s a good kid with a good heart whose mom buys him such horrible clothes that he has doubts. That makes him clumsy sometimes. It keeps him from making friends, because he’s afraid to talk to people. He needs a confidence infusion, and if he got one, that might make all the difference in the world to his future.”
“Even at the cost of broken jars of pickles.”
“No one said that making a difference was a winning financial proposition in the short term.”
She smiled. “You seriously hired him just to feed his confidence?”
“I offered him a job. He didn’t even apply.” Reid’s knees were killing him, but the end of the trail that was near his house was in sight. “I just thought it might matter if someone believed in him.”
Because everything had changed for Reid when Marty chose to believe in him.
“I like to help the kids with hidden promise,” he continued when he knew he should have just shut up.
“Does Lionel have hidden promise?”
Reid shrugged. “I haven’t found it yet, but it’s got to be there. Maybe it’s buried deep.”
“But if you didn’t see his promise, why did you hire him?”
He gave her a hard look, hoping to end the conversation. “He reminds me of myself.”
Cassie was incredulous. “Lionel?”
“Lionel,” Reid agreed.
“I have to admit that I never saw you as a do-gooder.”
“I never was.”
“Midlife crisis?” she teased and he smiled.
“Not quite there yet,” he replied. “The thing is that when I got that same job at the Shop ’n Save, it changed my perspective completely.”
“They always said you were bad to the bone, just like your dad,” she said quietly.
“Maybe not quite all that way,” he said just as they emerged from the trees, glad he could sound offhand about it. “My mom always said you should leave the world a better place when you leave it than when you arrived. That’s what I’m trying to do.”
She studied him, and he knew she was going to ask another question, probably one he didn’t want to answer.
“There,” he said, pointing to his own door. “Race you to the back door.” He took off before Cassie could argue with him. He heard her footfalls behind him, catching up to him, and kept running through the pain.
They went around the house and Reid stopped beside the kitchen door, bending over to brace his hands on his legs and catch his breath. His knees were on fire.
Cassie came to a panting halt beside him. “You’re pretty fast for someone who trashed his knees.”
“Call me the Bionic Man.”
“Titanium?”
“The best.”
She propped a hand on her hips to survey him, even as she caught her own breath. “I can’t believe you’re supposed to go running, even so.”
“I’m not. I haven’t run in a couple of years,” he admitted. “Swimming is my exercise of choice.”
She narrowed her eyes and tilted her head to watch him, looking perplexed. “Then why are you running this morning?”
“To meet you.”
“You risked your knees to run with me?” Cassie frowned but he could see that she was pleased. “That’s insane.”
“Is it?” Reid took a step closer to her and noticed how she caught her breath. Her eyes got sparkly as she held his gaze and she flushed a little bit. “So, here we are. Are you really coming in?”
She smiled. “Wild horses couldn’t keep me out,” she murmured, then backed him into the wall and kissed him.
What a house.
Cassie tried to hide her astonishment and thought she did a pretty good job. Of course, real estate was cheaper in Montrose River than in Manhattan, but still, Reid’s place was fabulous. It looked like a French château, the roof soaring and the windows huge. The lot had to be ten acres, with sweeping lawns surrounded by mature trees. It was close enough to the river that he’d be able to hear the water flowing in spring, but high enough that there’d never be any risk of flooding. They’d run across landscaped grounds, past the massive front door, and around a four-car garage to the back door, where there was a huge greenhouse over what had to be an indoor pool.
And then there was Reid. Seeing him in shorts and a T-shirt reaffirmed all of her susp
icions about how much he worked out. The man was gorgeous and fit.
Never mind a lot more interesting to talk to than anyone she’d met in a while.
And oh, could he kiss. Cassie flattened him into the wall, wanting all he had to give. His mouth locked over hers, his tongue doing the same magic it had done the day before, and she nearly swooned. She was going to come fast again, like a complete amateur, and she didn’t even care. She wrapped her arms around his neck and surrendered completely.
He made a little sound of frustration and she heard his keys jingle, then he broke their kiss and tapped a code into the control panel beside the door. Cassie couldn’t help but see it and she memorized it, already thinking that she might come back in the middle of the night for more of Reid.
Then he caught her chin in his hand, smiled down at her with what could only be satisfaction, and kissed her again. It was Cassie who moaned this time. She felt her knees go weak, but Reid scooped her up and carried her into the house. She kicked her feet playfully, wondering where they were going and not really caring. He ran up some stairs and she had the idle thought that it might be a stairway to heaven.
He put her down finally and she opened her eyes to find that she was on a bed in an otherwise empty and massive bedroom. Reid was tugging off his T-shirt and Cassie sat up to shed her clothes, too. She wriggled out of her running gear and kicked off her shoes, then felt Reid staring at her. She turned and did a little staring herself.
What a gorgeous man he was. He was tanned pretty evenly all over so she guessed there was a tanning bed in the house or a place he could lie naked in the sun unobserved. There was a tattoo on his upper arm and she recognized it as the mascot of the college team he’d played for. More importantly, he was all lean strength, so muscled and fit that she wanted to feel him all over. Or oil him up and have him photographed.
He was also huge and hard. On impulse, she leaned over and kissed the tip of his penis. Reid groaned and Cassie couldn’t resist. She gripped his thighs and took him into her mouth, teasing him with her lips and the tip of her tongue. He swayed a little on his feet, his fingers locking into her hair.
“Not like this,” he said, his voice strained. “Not the first time.”
Some Guys Have All the Luck Page 8
