by Gina Wilkins
Not yet, anyway.
But he didn’t blame Eric for asking. If some guy with unclear motives came sniffing around Mari, Geoff would want to know if there was anything to worry about. He was still considering finding Bryce Collins and making a few not-so-veiled threats.
He and Eric talked about business for a few minutes. Geoff asked about Hannah, and then Eric took his leave, obviously having more questions to ask but not sure how to phrase them. Geoff was left to pace his office, business completely forgotten as he considered the things Eric had told him about Cecilia.
Cecilia had only been back from lunch for an hour when she was summoned to a telephone. Patting the knee of a young woman who was in the early stages of labor, she promised to check back in soon. And then she found a quiet corner in which to take her call. “Hello?”
“Hello, CeCe.”
The nickname was the one only her brother used, but the deep, amused voice was Geoff’s. “You’ve been talking to Eric.”
“Yes. It was a very…illuminating conversation.”
“That sounds rather unnerving.”
“Don’t worry. He didn’t tell me anything that would embarrass you.”
“That’s a relief.” Cecilia glanced at her watch. As much as she enjoyed talking with Geoff, she had a lot to do. “How are you feeling?”
“Fine. But I need a favor from you.”
“A favor? What is it?”
“I need you to join me for dinner this evening.”
She smiled. “That doesn’t sound so—”
“At my grandmother’s house.”
Cecilia sank into the nearest chair. “Oh.”
“It’s sort of a command performance. My grandmother heard about the bike wreck, and she wants to see for herself that I’m okay.”
“That’s certainly understandable. But—”
“I need you there, Cecilia. Someone has to protect me.”
“Why do you need protection from your grandmother?”
“She’ll be much less likely to yell at me about the motorcycle if you’re there. Not to mention that she could hardly try to fix me up with all her friends’ granddaughters if I have a date.”
“I don’t know, Geoff. I’m really not very comfortable with the idea of having dinner with your grandmother. What’s she going to think about us—being there together, I mean?”
“She’ll think I’ve brought one of my nice friends along to entertain her. She’ll be delighted. My grandmother loves entertaining.”
“But I—”
“Did I mention that I’m pretty sore today? I’ll hide the bruises, of course, but my grandmother’s sure to notice how stiff I am unless there’s something to distract her.”
The man was shameless.
When she didn’t immediately respond, he sighed lightly into the phone. “Don’t worry, Cecilia, I won’t pressure you into going if you would rather not. It isn’t as if you owe me any favors.”
Completely shameless! Of course she owed him a favor. A rather big one, at that.
“All right. I’ll go.”
“Great.” He seemed to have absolutely no remorse about pretty much blackmailing her into accepting. “I’ll pick you up at seven.”
“Yeah,” she grumbled as she hung up the phone. “Great.”
Why, oh why, had she let him talk her into this?
Geoff arrived at Cecilia’s house a bit earlier than seven o’clock. As it was, he’d had to make himself kill a little time before leaving his condo. His eagerness to be with Cecilia was a bit daunting, since it seemed so uncharacteristic.
He could list plenty of things that were different about this relationship from the casual and temporary affairs he had enjoyed in the past. The way he counted the minutes he was away from her. The way he savored each one he spent with her. The way he woke thinking of her every morning. Hell, the way he found himself grinning at nothing in the middle of a busy afternoon.
He’d been accused of being a little slow when it came to relationship issues, but even he could figure out that there was more than simple friendship involved in his feelings for Cecilia.
Even his eagerness to have him join her at Myrtle’s was a little suspect. He usually tried to keep his girlfriends away from his matchmaking grandma. While the excuses he had used with Cecilia about deflecting Myrtle’s attention were all legitimate, they didn’t fully explain his compulsion to invite her. Cecilia seemed to fit with his family. He and Myrtle would both enjoy having her there.
This was definitely getting complicated. Especially when he considered how reluctant he was to think about leaving town again in a couple of weeks. For the first time he would be leaving behind someone other than family whom he would greatly miss.
He wasn’t expecting to spot Cecilia standing in the front yard next door to her house, involved in a visibly tense confrontation with Brandy and the notorious Marlin. Keeping his eye on that scene, he climbed slowly out of his car.
He couldn’t hear the words, but he heard the voices—Marlin’s arrogant and furious, as usual, Brandy’s tearful and pleading, also as usual, and Cecilia’s firm and authoritative. Geoff hesitated, unsure whether to get involved or stay right where he was for now.
The decision was made for him when the argument turned violent. Marlin must have said something about leaving, because Brandy launched herself at him, obviously trying to hold him there. He shoved her, making her fall backward on the grass. Cecilia immediately rushed forward, and Marlin whirled, one arm cocked back as though to strike her.
Brandy cried out, “Marlin, no!”
Forgetting his sore muscles, Geoff sprinted in that direction. If that thug laid a hand on Cecilia…
Some last-minute shred of common sense—or maybe a glimpse of Geoff charging toward him like an enraged bull—made Marlin drop his arm and turn toward his truck. Geoff caught up with him at the door of the ugly vehicle. “You must be Marlin.”
A scowl darkening his rather greasy face, and a bully’s cowardice reflected in his eyes as he faced the man who was older, taller and in peak condition—except for a few recent dings and dents, Geoff thought ruefully—Marlin responded wittily. “Yeah. So?”
“My name is Geoff Bingham.” Pausing a beat to let the significance of the last name sink in, Geoff added, “I’m a friend of Cecilia’s, and of Brandy’s. And if I hear that you’ve laid a hand on either of them, I will make your life a living hell.”
Marlin blanched a bit, but he tried not to lose his blustering defiance. “You can save your threats,” he snarled, jerking open the driver’s door of the truck. “’Cause I don’t plan to see either of them ever again.”
Brandy broke into wails as Marlin drove away. Geoff moved to assist Cecilia in helping the girl to her feet.
“I thought he was going to hit you,” Brandy told Cecilia.
“I thought so, myself, for a moment,” Cecilia said, brushing a strand of red hair away from Brandy’s tear-dampened face. “Of course, if he had, I’d have been forced to pound him into the ground.”
Brandy hiccuped in surprise at Cecilia’s unexpectedly fierce response. “You…you would?”
“Honey, I’ve told you before. No man—or overgrown brat of a boy—has a right to put his hands on you in anger. Ever. And I promise you, no guy is ever going to do so with me. Not twice, anyway.”
“Why do you think he backed off?” Geoff tried to keep his tone as light as possible under the circumstances. “Bullies are all cowards under the surface. If they can tell someone’s going to fight back, they swagger off.”
“He said he wasn’t ever coming back,” Brandy said, sounding forlorn.
“Actually, he probably will—the next time he needs a cheering section. Or a punching bag,” Geoff said bluntly. “You’re the one who’s going to have to be strong and send him away. Even if it means calling the cops to escort him off the property.”
“He really can be sweet, if he could just learn to control his temper.”
Geoff trie
d to hide the impatience that would serve no purpose at all in helping get through to her. “Brandy, you’re an attractive, intelligent girl. You don’t have to put up with being treated the way he treats you. You deserve better.”
Brandy looked from Geoff to Cecilia again. “I thought I loved him. And maybe I still sort of do, but when I saw his face when he turned on you, well, he looked like a stranger. A scary one.”
“You were seeing who he really is, Brandy,” Cecilia told her firmly. “And I agree wholeheartedly with Geoff. You deserve better.”
Brandy drew a deep, unsteady breath. “Yeah. Maybe.”
“Remember the talk you and I had last week?” Cecilia asked, brushing a hand over the girl’s hair again. “When I told you about that very nice counselor at the clinic? Her specialty is talking to girls and women who have been involved with abusive men. She can help you understand why Marlin thought he could treat you that way and help you see why you deserve so much better. You’re hurting inside, sweetie, and she can help you. Will you let me make an appointment for you?”
“I don’t know. I’d feel funny talking to some stranger.”
“I know the counselor Cecilia’s talking about, Brandy. She’s very nice. I would talk to her in a New York minute if I had a problem I needed help solving.”
Brandy looked at Geoff then, first with skepticism and then with slow consideration. “You would? Really?”
“Really.” It occurred to him that she was accepting his input because he was a confident-sounding male. Because she still lacked the confidence to trust her own judgment. Perhaps counseling could give her the self-assurance she needed to prevent her from falling back under Marlin’s control—or that of some other abusive man in the future.
“Why don’t you go back in the house and wait for your grandparents to come home,” Cecilia suggested. “Lock your doors, and if Marlin comes back, don’t let him in. No matter what he says, Brandy. Because he isn’t sorry and he doesn’t love you. Not if he’s so willing to hurt you.”
Shoulders slumped, Brandy twisted her hands in front of her. “He won’t be back tonight. He’s too mad, and he wants me to be miserable without him for a night or two. It’s what he always does.”
“Good. Instead of being miserable, you can enjoy your new freedom. Call Lizzie and go buy a new outfit without worrying about whether Marlin will like it. Smile again, Brandy. You’re only seventeen. Enjoy it.”
“Let me walk you to your door.” Geoff crooked his arm and gave Brandy a smile.
She looked at his arm, at his face and back at his arm again. And then, very tentatively, she laid her fingertips on his forearm.
He bade her good-night at the door, advised her again to talk to the counselor, then waited until he heard the door lock behind her before he turned back to Cecilia.
He had quite a few things to say to her, but not here. “Are you ready to leave?”
“Yes.”
Only then did he notice that she was dressed for dinner in a sleek black-and-white summer pantsuit. “You look very nice.”
She smoothed her hands down the front of her outfit in a nervous gesture. “Thank you.”
Belted into his car and on the road to his grandmother’s house, Geoff wondered how to start yelling at Cecilia without sounding like Marlin. “You do realize that interfering in domestic-violence situations is extremely dangerous, don’t you?”
“I heard Marlin screaming at Brandy again, and I just couldn’t stay out of it. I went running over there without stopping to think about it.”
“And it almost got you punched by the little punk. You should have called the police.”
“He didn’t punch me,” she pointed out. “And if he had, he would have found himself in more trouble than he ever expected. As my brother would tell you, I’m not as delicate as I might appear. I was married for two years to a guy who thought being male gave him some sort of natural superiority. He kept pushing it a little further until I packed my bags and told him to go to hell.”
“I’m not questioning your spunk, Cecilia. You’ve proven enough times that you have plenty of that. But the fact is, you’re a small woman, and he had four inches and a good thirty pounds advantage over you. He could have hurt you.”
The thought of Marlin’s fist connecting with Cecilia’s face made Geoff’s hands white-knuckled around the steering wheel. “Damn it, Cecilia, you should have called the police. Putting yourself in that situation was—”
“Reckless?” she murmured. “Irresponsible?”
He started to retort, then bit back the words. Okay, he got the allusion. He had asserted that she had no right to judge or criticize his actions; he had no more right to yell at her for her decisions. It was just that…
“You scared me,” he admitted.
“Imagine that.”
He gave a deep sigh. “Okay. Point taken.”
Though she didn’t respond, a sideways glance let him see her rather smug smile.
After another moment he spoke again. “Brandy’s still got some major problems, you know. She’s still liable to take Marlin back when he comes around again, playing the victim and telling her how nobody else understands him.”
“I know,” Cecilia said with a sigh. “I’m not expecting miracles. I just want to try to get her some help.”
“I hope she appreciates it someday.”
“If she could only figure out that she doesn’t need a man to make her happy and fulfilled. I’m hoping that if she gets nothing else out of the therapy sessions, if I can talk her into going, she’ll come away accepting that.”
Geoff didn’t know what it was about that speech he’d heard before from Cecilia that particularly bothered him this time. Okay, sure, he could accept that she didn’t need a man. She had certainly proven that.
But that didn’t mean she couldn’t accept a man into her life as a partner, did it? An equal. Someone who valued her, respected her, acknowledged her strength and offered his own when hers wavered. Just as she would do for that fortunate man if she—
If she loved him.
It was the first time the word love had entered his thoughts in connection with Cecilia. At least consciously. And it shook him all the way down to his nervous-bachelor toes.
Chapter Fifteen
As nervous as Cecilia had been about the dinner with Geoff’s grandmother, it was a surprisingly pleasant and stress-free evening. From the moment she stepped into Myrtle Bingham’s marble-tiled foyer, she was welcomed like an old friend of the family.
Myrtle was eager to hear all the latest news from the clinic, and Cecilia tried to oblige during dinner in the quietly elegant dining room. She left out most of the problems they had been experiencing at the clinic lately, of course, but she had plenty of anecdotes that kept her hostess entertained.
Cecilia thought that she could certainly be excused for feeling as if she were dining with a legend. After all, Myrtle was the one who had founded both the midwifery clinic and, later, the school. The hospital and future research center had both evolved from her early vision of quality health care for this poverty-stricken area.
Myrtle had also been active in funneling some of the Bingham fortune into the public library, the popular public recreation center and other facilities that were so widely used by the residents of Merlyn County. Surprisingly enough, there were still people in the area who resented the Binghams. For their money, their influence, the old history of Gerard’s business ruthlessness and Billy’s ceaseless womanizing.
Myrtle, as she insisted on being called despite Cecilia’s initial discomfort with the familiarity, was still active in the community. With the energy of a woman half her age, she worked tirelessly for her pet charities. She seemed to be almost girlishly excited about serving as the spokeswoman for the new hospital public relations campaign.
“Lilly makes things so much fun,” she added, a trace of Boston still detectable in her voice after more than five decades spent in Kentucky. “Have you gotten to know her
yet, Cecilia?”
“No, not really. I’ve, um, been rather busy since she was introduced at the reception.” She deliberately avoided looking at Geoff as she spoke.
“So has my grandson, apparently,” Myrtle said, giving him a look of fond reproach. “I’ve hardly had a chance to see him since he’s been in town.”
“Hey, you’re the busy one,” he reminded her.
“Yes, I try to stay involved in the community. While you, of course, are out crashing your motorbike and scaring your poor family half to death.”
Cecilia stifled a smile at the elder woman’s prim rebuke. Geoff squirmed in his seat like a kindergartener in trouble, then obviously regretted the movement. She suspected that he would have winced, but he didn’t want Myrtle to see him display any discomfort. It was only because Cecilia had gotten to know him so well that she spotted the telltale twitch in his cheek.
“It was only a minor accident,” he protested. “Dad probably exaggerated when he told you about it. You know how he’s been lately.”
Geoff must have been delighted that his grandmother was immediately distracted. “What has gotten into that son of mine lately, anyway? He’s been so cranky.”
Cecilia almost giggled. Cranky seemed like such an unlikely adjective to be applied to the distinguished and dignified man she knew as Ronald Bingham.
“He’s made poor Lilly’s job so difficult. He has challenged every idea she has presented.”
Geoff shrugged. “She seems to me like the type who can hold her own against Dad—or anyone else.” Then he added with a smile, “Much like Cecilia.”
“Then they’re both women after my own heart,” Myrtle said firmly.
Geoff and Cecilia shared a quick smile across the table—one that Cecilia realized Myrtle had observed with a smile of her own.
“Cecilia’s not after anyone’s heart, Grandma. She claims they’re much too high-maintenance organs.”
“Oh, I really do like this young woman.” Myrtle beamed at both of them. “I hope my grandson will bring you to have dinner with me again, Cecilia.”
