An Inconvenient Obsession

by Natasha Tate

  Dismissing the memories that brought an unwelcome softening of his resolve, he hauled in a breath and stepped over the threshold. No longer the servant, no longer barred entry to the sacred enclave of the privileged, he entered the house as its owner.

  He expected it to feel better.

  He expected a sense of triumph. Of victory.

  So why did an odd sense of unease rob the satisfaction he should have felt? Why couldn’t he revel in his plan, so well-conceived and flawlessly executed that he was exactly where he’d planned to be?

  “Ethan,” Cate said, interrupting his thoughts. “How is the house so clean?”

  “I had it taken care of last week.”

  “Last week?” Cate followed him up the narrow flight of stairs and into her room, a frothy combination of white cotton, bleached pine furniture and sisal rugs. “But you didn’t even bid on the island until two days ago.”

  “I knew the island was up for auction and I knew it would be mine. I didn’t care about the cost.”

  She stared at him in stunned silence.

  “You remember Leon from Flatt’s Village, don’t you? I called him and he sent his daughters over to get everything ready.” He moved into the room she’d always used and lowered one of the suitcases to the floor.

  “That’s not mine,” she said.

  “I packed it for you,” Ethan told her. “You can’t wear that Cinderella costume all day.”

  “When did you get my things?”

  “I didn’t. I went shopping.”

  “Without knowing my size?”

  He stared at her, his chest full of predatory knowledge. “I know your size.”

  A blush tinted her skin a delectable pink and she averted her gaze.

  “I told Dad he gets the master suite, so for now, I’ll take this room.” He strode across the narrow hallway and into what must have been for guests. It, too, was decorated in simple, clean lines that welcomed the soft breezes from the sea. Like Cate’s, it boasted a king-sized bed with enough room beneath its waist-high mattress to host a small dinner party. Sheer white curtains billowed inward from tall windows, and he detected the faint bite of salt water in the air. Turning, he noticed that he could see Cate standing at the foot of her equally white, equally tempting bed from his doorway.

  He wondered which set of sheets they’d be messing up first.

  “Cate?” he called, swinging his own suitcase onto the bed and then turning to face her. “You up for a swim?”

  She froze, raising startled eyes to his. “What?”

  “A swim. Would you rather go now or later?”

  Biting her lower lip, she shook her head. “Neither. I don’t have a suit.”

  “Yes, you do.” He gestured toward the suitcase he’d packed for her. “I threw in a couple of bikinis that should fit.”

  He unzipped his luggage and leaned to snag the blue trunks and a white T-shirt he’d packed, then turned to find Cate’s face blanched of all color.

  White as the sand outside, she looked ready to faint. “Cate?” he asked, striding across the hallway and into her room. “What is it?”

  She started. Stretched her mouth into a thin, scared smile. “Nothing.”

  Ethan regarded her quietly, unnerved by the fear that widened her eyes and made her lips go pale. He reached for her cold, trembling hand and lifted it between them. “Cate.”

  “It’s nothing.” Shallow breaths lifted her ribs in rapid succession, doing nothing to alleviate her stricken expression. “I just don’t want to go swimming.”

  His eyes narrowed as he studied her face. “You love swimming.”

  “Not anymore,” she said, trying to tug free as she stared over his shoulder toward the doorway. “But you go on without me,” she insisted. “I’ll be fine here.”

  He refused to release her, trying to reclaim her focus. After a gentle jostling had no effect, he tipped her chin until she met his eyes. “Does this have anything to do with your accident?” he asked softly.

  Cate’s eyes widened and she yanked away from him, jerking backward and whacking her elbow against the thick bedpost. She winced and pulled her elbow into her cupped hand. “What does my accident have to do with anything?”

  “You tell me.”

  “There’s nothing to tell,” she said, retreating behind the bedpost and the wall of white mattress between them. “And even if there were, I wouldn’t want to talk about it.”

  “Why not?” he asked, following her around to the side of her bed.

  She inched even farther away. “Because it’s none of your business.”

  Seeing her wary expression and the telltale signs of her avoidance, Ethan felt frustration rise within his chest. She was hiding from him. Throwing up barriers of half truths and lies. Still. Narrowing his gaze, he studied the taut lines of her face. “Weren’t you the one who said you hated lying to me?”

  Pink stained her throat and cheeks as she avoided his eyes. “I’m not lying.”

  Her denial turned his frustration to a simmering anger. “No?”

  “No.” She lifted her chin, angling her face and torso until all he could see was her profile. “Keeping a secret isn’t the same as lying.”

  “The hell it isn’t.” He stepped closer, trying to compel her confession by invading her space. “I want the truth. All of it.”

  “No.” She squared her shoulders and turned even farther. Lifting one arm, she placed her small hand flat against the mattress. As if that narrow, sculpted limb created a barrier he wouldn’t dare to cross. “I gave you my virginity and I let you bully me into coming here when I didn’t want to come. But I won’t give you this, so don’t ask.”

  “Don’t ask?” he ground out, plucking her hand from the bed and spinning her to face him. “After all the lies you’ve told, you think I’m just going to back off now?”

  She stiffened and then stumbled back, wrenching her wrist from his grasp. “Yes!”

  He followed her, crowding her against the wall while her expression filled with distress. “No.”

  Her nostrils flared while her eyes darted frantically in her efforts to avoid his. “Stop it!”

  Anger beat hard within his chest, deepening his voice into its most dangerous register. “Tell me.”

  Desperation, sharpened by a hint of fear, colored her tone as she bellowed, “Why are you doing this to me?”

  “Because I have to know, damn it!” He slammed his palm against the wall beside her head. “I deserve the truth!”

  “Fine!” Cate shouted. “I nearly died! Are you happy now?”

  Ethan felt the air freeze in his chest and his body went numb. As much as he’d told himself he wanted revenge, the thought of a world without Cate in it made him go cold. “What?”

  “You heard me.” Inhaling sharply, she lifted her chin and knotted her fists against her thighs. “At times, it hurt so bad, I wished I had.”

  He wanted to haul her into his arms, to wrap her up next to his chest, absorb her pain and promise to keep her safe forever. But he remained still. Tense and waiting. “Why?”

  After another shuddering inhale, she continued, “Because you were gone.”

  The admission caught him by the throat. Paralyzed his lungs.

  “After you left, I didn’t care about anything anymore. I loved you and you were gone, so what did it matter? Winning or losing, living or dying, I didn’t care.”

  Worry and fear and regret coiled deep in his gut, an uncomfortable mix of emotions he hadn’t expected. Hadn’t wanted. Lowering his tingling fingers, desperate to give her comfort, he reached for her tight, bunched shoulder. “I didn’t know.”

  “Don’t.” She lurched sideways, the thin shield of strength she’d erected seeming almost as fragile as the delicate bones of her body. “I can’t handle you touching me right now.”

  His hands dropped to his sides, knotting into impotent fists against his thighs as he watched her battle her vulnerability to him. Hearing that she’d grieved over him, that
she’d loved him enough that she hadn’t wanted to live without him, made him realize he’d built his revenge on quicksand.

  After she’d sent him away, he’d told himself Cate had never cared for him. That she’d dabbled with the boy who was beneath her, then grown tired of stringing him along. He’d felt like an inconvenience. An embarrassment. And even after she’d confessed her reasons for sending him away, he still hadn’t believed her. He’d chafed under the conviction that he’d been her first charity project gone awry.

  He’d never considered that she might have actually loved him.

  Or that sending him away had hurt her as much as it had wounded him.

  The idea that he might have been wrong all along made him lose his bearings and set his compass all askew. He reeled, disoriented and aching with a loss he couldn’t articulate. “I’m sorry,” he finally managed.

  With her arms wrapped tightly across her ribs, Cate nodded while her chin trembled beneath the defensive knot of her mouth.

  Silence spun out between them as he waited, his fists clenched and his lungs aching. “Tell me what happened.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “WHAT would be the point?” Cate inhaled, feeling raw and seared and exposed. “It’s in the past.”

  “I want to understand.”

  “Fine.” Unable to meet his eyes, she stared at the wide plank flooring between her feet. Mustering her courage, knowing full well that the truth would make her vulnerable in a way she’d never been before, she didn’t quite know how to start. Yet she pressed forward, girding herself against the pain of her revelation and his reaction to it. “The jumping accident you asked about, the one I had the month you left …”

  His expectant silence urged her to continue.

  “It wasn’t as minor as I led you to believe …” Her hands knotted, the fingernails pressing against the tender flesh of her palms. “It was worse than you could imagine …”

  He waited wordlessly as her uneven breaths beat the air between them.

  “To escape my grief over losing you, I took a jump I shouldn’t have on one of Father’s horses.” She pulled her lips in and inhaled unsteadily before she resumed. “We didn’t make it.”

  “What happened?”

  “We had to put the horse down. And I … well, sometimes I think they should have done the same to me. I crushed my pelvis, damaged multiple internal organs and cracked several vertebrae. According to all the medical professionals, it was a miracle that I wasn’t killed or paralyzed.”

  Risking a glance at Ethan, she saw that his posture had grown even tenser. His knuckles had gone white and he seemed to be tilted slightly forward, his eyes a blaze of blue fire in his taut face.

  “But the trade-off for my survival was that I had to undergo countless surgeries and years of excruciating pain.” Unable to continue while looking at him, she yanked her gaze aside once more. “Some days, it hurt so much that I wanted nothing more than to give up. I didn’t care about walking or living or eating. I didn’t care about anything. But about a year after my accident, Mrs. Bartholomew convinced me I should keep trying. That it’d be worth it to live.” The memory of that bittersweet day washed over her, and her eyes blurred.

  “What did she say?” he asked in a hoarse voice.

  Cate hiked her chin, swallowing back a surge of tears she refused to shed. “She showed me an article about you. She’d found it online in some obscure London paper, and though it didn’t offer many details, it gave me hope. It made me realize I hadn’t been wrong about you. You were succeeding. My sacrifice had made it possible for you to be happy. And reading that, knowing that you were living the dream I wanted you to have, made me feel like it had all been worth it. The pain. The loss. Everything. You were happy, and that was all that mattered.” Her words trailed off into silence, though her gaze grimly refused to release his.

  Ethan made a suffocated sound, breathing as if someone had knocked the wind out of him.

  “Nothing about my body works the way it’s supposed to anymore, even though it might look like I’m perfectly fine.” The knot of revelation tightened within her gut, a paralyzing fear momentarily stalling her tongue. When he started to move toward her, she rushed to finish. “It took me another three years just to learn how to walk independently and I have horrible scars. Dozens of them.” She turned, so she wouldn’t have to read the truth register in his eyes, and swallowed hard.

  “It doesn’t—”

  “I never thought I’d see you again,” she blurted, unwilling to hear the sympathy in his voice. “I knew you were in Europe, making your millions, achieving your dreams. I never thought you’d know, or that it would even matter. But then you came to New York, to the auction, and I told myself that being with you—even if it was only for a little while—was worth the risk. I knew you hated me. Knew you wanted to hurt me. But still, I rationalized that if I could hide the truth from you and be with you just once, I could create one last good memory of us. Together. I could finally know what I’d waited a lifetime to know, even if it meant losing you all over again.”

  His hand came to rest on her shoulder and she lurched sideways, away from the burning heat of his touch.

  “But I was wrong. After we made love and I realized how I still felt about you, I knew the danger was too great.” She struggled for breath, swallowing fiercely. “But you wouldn’t stay away, would you? You convinced me, with your words and your mouth and your hands. I told myself I could handle your rejection and your hatred. I thought I could keep myself safe. But it was a lie.”

  “I don’t hate you.”

  “I thought I could do it. I really thought I could. But your pity? Your disgust? Here, in the only place I’ve ever been truly happy?” She twisted her hands against her cramping stomach, the certainty of his response already tightening her chest and throat. “I’m sorry, but I can’t.”

  The intensity in his eyes scalded her as he shook his head, reaching for her.

  Scared of what would happen if he touched her again, she jerked backward, avoiding him. “You make me forget the risks. When you kiss me, it’s too easy to delude myself into believing I can handle the pain …” She hesitated, her heart thudding wildly. “But I …” Fear crowded her chest, closing in on her hitching breaths. “I can’t bear to see your reaction, to watch your desire turn to pity …”

  Ethan reached for her again, his eyes flashing with stony resolve, and this time he moved too fast for her to escape him. Swiftly, Cate flung her hands between them, gripping his wrists to hold him at bay. “Don’t!”

  The muscles beneath her fingers turned to granite, his shuttered expression concealing his thoughts.

  “Please don’t,” she whispered. “I know you want new memories and I know you feel like I owe you … but I can’t.” Tears scalded the backs of her eyes. “It hurts too much.”

  He processed her words for a moment in silence, then slowly twisted his forearms until her fingers could no longer hold him. She fought a wave of fear, swallowing against the salty tears that gathered in her throat. He pressed her hands down, anchoring them against her thighs, then stepped close enough to brush his chest against hers. She felt herself blanch, then redden, her body flushed with fear and worry and wanting.

  “You think I pity you? That I’ll turn from you in disgust?”

  She nodded clumsily, biting the insides of her cheeks while he backed her against the side of her white bed. Anxiety dampened her face and neck, cooling her heated skin.

  Ethan exhaled, one hand rising to align with her jaw. He tipped her face and waited. “Look at me.”

  When she finally did, she saw that her confession seemed to have solidified the layer of icy anger within his blue gaze. Where she’d expected only pity, disgust and rejection, she read banked fury and heated rage. He leaned down until his face hovered mere inches from her own. “Do you honestly think I’m so shallow that I would desire you less simply because of a few scars?”

  Trembling, she closed her eyes
and pressed her lips hard against the urge to cry. “You haven’t seen them.”

  “Then show me.”

  “No!”

  “Yes.” Reaching for her hips, he pressed his thumbs against the twin ridges of misaligned bone. Her body jerked and his hands went still. “Does that hurt?”

  She shook her head miserably. As much as she wanted to lie to him, she couldn’t. Not anymore.

  “Show me.”

  Her skin burned beneath her dress while perspiration collected on her hands and upper lip. “I can’t, Ethan … please don’t … .” The sweet torture of his hands against her damaged body was more than she could bear. But she didn’t know how to fight him. How could she, when he was all her heart had ever wanted? Miserable and scared, she remained stiff and upright as he slowly pulled her close and bowed over her shoulders, splaying both hands over her back.

  “I’m sorry you had to go through it alone,” he breathed, his fingers warming her through the rumpled velvet of her dress. “I wish I’d been there for you.”

  The urge to weep surged anew within Cate’s throat, but she swallowed hard to keep it contained. “I wanted you to be,” she mumbled against his curved shoulder. “Apparently, when I was out of my mind with painkillers, I talked to you. Mrs. Bartholomew told me I begged you to come back. I even, on occasion when the pain was too much, dreamed you held me. They told me it was the drugs talking.”

  He lifted his head, his lungs working in ragged, unsteady pulls. Slowly, his hands resumed their circuit from shoulder to waist and back again. “So this is why you didn’t want to be with me,” he said in a low voice. “This is why you pushed me away.”

  She dipped her chin in a single, curt nod.

  “You don’t have to hide from me. Ever.” Ethan leaned to kiss her with soft, satiny caresses of lip and breath that skimmed her brow, her cheek and the corner of her mouth. She stiffened when he reached for the zipper beneath her left arm, but forced herself to remain still as his fingers moved inexorably from rib to hip. The costume unfurled like the casing of a ripened fruit and tumbled to the floor, a tent of boned blue velvet against the beige sisal rug.