Or did Mickey somehow reach out from the grave to get his attention? Mickey who'd been more brother than cousin to him, and had accepted him just the way he was.
A sense of loss cut through Sam. Maybe if he hadn't run off to Europe to escape yet another of Stuart Carrington's attempts at turning him into a corporate clone, life wouldn't have taken the turn it had. Maybe if he'd followed suit of the cousin who'd been a big brother to him, Mickey would have stayed with Carrington Corporation. Maybe Mickey wouldn't have followed his ill-thought out example, wouldn't have rebelled and married a woman his father disapproved of…and died.
That's what had happened, right? Mickey had taken a page out of his younger cousin's book of rebellion. Mickey, the responsible one. Mickey, the honorable one.
Mickey, the golden boy for whom things always went right…until the day he died.
Sam studied Mickey's widow. Stuart had told him Mickey's son needed rescuing from Dixie Rae's clutches. But his cousin had chosen to marry this woman who wasn't tall and willowy or anything like the women Sam remembered Mickey dated. This woman was petite and voluptuous, like some sexy cherub with all the cushioned invitation of a Reuben's woman. Not Mickey's style.
Then again…
Dixie Rae was doll-like, almost fragile in a porcelain doll sort of way. It made Sam want to protect her, not unmask her. Is that what had appealed to Mickey?
Then she laughed.
She threw back her head, the light tangling in the strawberry-blond curls that defied restraint, and laughed a full, lusty laugh. It reminded him how easily she'd used her sexy voice to lure him in, then interrogate and intimidate him, how ready he'd been to buy anything she said for a chance to lose himself in her soft curves. So much for the fragile doll.
Protect her, hell. This woman could have manipulated Mickey him into turning his back on his family. Maybe he should stick around and give her enough rope to hang herself.
#
Dixie knew she shouldn't be amused. She was one disaster away from bankruptcy—away from losing her livelihood and her grandmother's home. She didn't want to think about what that might cost her son. But she was so relieved the guy prowling her darkened porch hadn't been another of her father-in-law's legal lackeys that she couldn't contain herself.
"Sorry, Sam," she chirped, shooing the dog out from between them. "But a woman can't be too careful these days."
She offered him her hand. "I'm Dixie, and the little tyke who thinks he's a wizard, is your second cousin, Benjamin."
"So I gathered," he said in a tight voice, his hand meeting hers in an uncertain handshake.
The Carringtons weren't a touchy-feely bunch, Dixie reminded herself. Even Michael had been a tad formal in the beginning. But, given Michael's description of Sam, she hadn't expected Sam to bear that particular family trait…Sam of the worn-in-all-the-right-places jeans. The latter was definitely not the norm in Carrington dress codes.
She settled back on her heels, planted her hands on her hips, and studied him. "Imagine, mistaking a fellow family exile for a process server."
"Get many of them on your doorstep, process servers, that is?" He wiped dog drool from his neck and frowned at his palm.
Dixie bit the insides of her cheeks to keep from laughing. "Not lately. But a while back, every time I turned around, some guy was handing me a legal document."
"Most of them from Stuart Carrington, no doubt," he grumbled.
"All of them from Stuart Carrington," she said, paying way too much attention to the lean hip against which he wiped his damp palm.
"Bully the opposition with legal brawn. That's Uncle Stu's style."
"Spoken like a man who's experienced Stuart's wrath first hand," she retorted, unsure of what she was trying to evoke from Sam Ryan.
"In spades," he returned, shoving his hands into the front pockets of his jeans and dropping his chin so he peered at her through thick eyelashes fringing heavy eyelids.
There. That sad, hungry look. That's the telltale sign she'd been looking for in Michael's cousin…the wounded Sam Michael had told her about, the litmus test of the real Sam. That lost boy look made her want to reach up and smooth down the tuft of hair moussed with Bear's saliva.
Of their own volition, her fingers slid through the thick, dark hair that was a tad shaggy. Michael's hair had always been close-cut. Nor did Michael have a full bottom lip like Sam. And Michael's eyes were blue and clear as a cloudless sky while Sam's were…
Surprise glinted from the eyes the color of strong coffee. What was she doing noticing Sam's eyes and hair…and lips?
Lips that were now tugging an uncertain, crooked smile. Not at all the typical straight-laced Carrington.
"Do I pass muster?" he asked.
She pulled her hand away, his hair slipping between her fingers, tickling. It'd been a long time since she'd run her fingers through a grown man's hair, too long.
She hadn't realized how much she'd missed that kind of contact until now. Though that wasn't what surprised her. Twenty-eight year old widows had plenty of life yet to live. But, did the first man to kick-start her hormones have to be her husband's cousin? A cousin-in-law was definitely off limits, especially one that was more brother than cousin to Michael.
Especially one who'd boycotted hers and Michael's wedding. But then all the Carrington clan had been a no show. That had hurt Michael; though he'd forgiven Sam. He'd been an ocean and half a continent away when they'd impromptly wed. And strangely, she suspected she understood why Sam had missed Michael's funeral. Still, why would he show up now?
#
"Tell me Stuart sent you here with an olive branch," she said, her tone closer to the one she'd used when she'd sent her son off into the house.
Sam gaped at Dixie. She'd just slipped her fingers through his hair and looked up at him as though he were the answer to her prayers.
"Olive branch?" he questioned, confused by the mixed signals this woman put out.
"Yeah. A peace offering." She bent and plucked up his helmet. "A gesture demonstrating Stuart has given up trying to take my son away from me." She handed him the helmet that, in the moonlight now slipping between them, turned a dove gray. "Did Stuart send you here to mediate peace between us?"
This was just the kind of question a conniving gold-digging woman asked. Wasn't it?
"Aren't you the direct one," he said, vying for time to…to what? Come up with the right answer?
"Comes from a lifelong habit of having nothing to hide." The cornflower blue eyes narrowed at him. "How about you, Sam? Why the evasiveness?"
What could he tell her that she'd believe without revealing his true purpose for coming to her restaurant—her home—that he'd come to dig up dirt on her as a means back into the good graces of his family?
He braced the helmet to his hip and rubbed the back of his neck. A reasonably true explanation came to him and he peeked at her. "Blame it on road weariness."
"Sure. But, did Stuart send you here or not?"
Just his luck, Mickey had married a woman with the focus of a homicide detective. Indeed, looks were deceiving.
"And before you answer," she said in without a hint of flirtation, "You should know I rank liars right up there with process servers."
Having run out of time for further debate, Sam sighed. "I think Stuart has exhausted every legal means at the disposal of his considerable wealth." True enough.
"That's something." She drew her arms across her stomach. "But no olive branch, huh?"
"He didn't send me here with an olive branch." Absolutely true.
"Thanks for the warning."
Is that what he'd just done, warn her? If Stuart found out, the old man would filet him.
Make that, when Stuart found out. There were no ifs where the senior Carrington was concerned.
"Then what's the deal, Sam? Surely you didn't come here looking for a hideout."
He glanced at the Ducati a mere dozen yards away. Escape or…
He shrugged
. "Just passing through, I guess."
"And thought you'd stop by for a visit?"
The dubious note to her question snapped his attention back to Dixie. He expected to see condemnation in her eyes, something that damned him for dropping by now that it was too late to ever see Mickey again…or for Mickey to see him. Instead, he found a sadness in her eyes that edged on pity. Damn, but he couldn't get a fix on Dixie Rae, and that made her almost as lethal to his wellbeing as his uncle.
"Guess I came too late," he said, regretting the words before they were completely out of his mouth, knowing he was too late for a lot of things.
"Never too late to visit," she said, snagging him by the arm and tugging him toward the corner of the porch. "Ben is going to love getting to know his second cousin."
"I'm not staying," he said, dragging at her pull, hell-bent on saving his own hide. "I heard you ran a restaurant. Thought I'd stop for a bite to eat. Meet you and Ben."
"Great." The seductive lilt was back in her voice. Did she mean bite to imply more than food? The restaurant kitchen may be closed but mine isn't."
Sam eyed the closeness with which she hugged his arm as she towed him along the side porch, felt the intimacy as his arm pressed into the cushioned side of her breast. She sure had a familiar way about her, maybe too familiar. The modus operandi of a gold-digger?
But the Mickey he'd known would have been too smart to get snared by a woman who used sexual wiles to trap a man. He was certain of it.
Dixie Rae raised a Cheshire cat grin at him. "If you're not too fussy, we can find you a place to sleep."
"I'm not staying the night."
"But it's late, already past Ben's bedtime. If you don't stay, how will he get to know you? Besides, you're tired. Road weary, you said."
She had him with that.
"Unless it's our sparse accommodations that are scaring you off."
A "yes" would gain him freedom. But a "yes" would also be a lie, and something warned him Dixie Rae could spot a lie at a hundred paces.
"I don't travel first class near as much as you might think," he said, not sure why he was admitting anything about himself to a woman who might be holding her child, Mickey's son and Stuart's grandson, as collateral against a trust fund.
"Sorry I can't offer you the guestroom," she said, blinking up at him. Or had she batted her lashes at him?
"We had to rent it out," she continued as she hauled him around the back of the house. "Can't afford the luxury of an empty room these days."
Stuart had said she'd spent her way through everything Michael had left her, that she'd even lost the Chicago restaurant Michael had bought for her. Maybe she could read a lie so well because she was a master at telling them?
They stepped into the light slanting across the porch from the back door, illuminating a speculative look in Dixie Rae's eyes. Was she sizing him up for what worth he might be to her?
Before he could be sure what he saw in her expression, boyish hoots blasted them and the expression in Dixie Rae's eyes softened.
"Sugar high," she said above the din, any hint of calculation gone from her features…if there'd been any there in the first place. "He went to a birthday party this afternoon. My Cousin Annie's girls turned twelve. You'll meet them tomorrow. Annie waitresses for me and her girls help watch Ben."
Babysitters barely twelve years old? Was that old enough to be responsible for a four-year- old? He'd never been around kids younger than him so he didn't know.
Beyond the rusty screen, Ben wheeled about a small sitting room, a towel tied around his neck flaring back from him. Was letting the kid over-indulge bad parenting? Is that what he was supposed to reveal…if he stuck around?
Dixie ushered him across the threshold into the pandemonium she declared their private quarters. A couch, television, two over-stuffed chairs and a dated assortment of side tables crowded the boxy room. The kid bounced around the space like bubbles in a pot of boiling water.
"It's best to let him burn off the energy before trying to put him to bed," Dixie explained, leaning into Sam in what he considered a too familiar way.
He didn't know whether to question that flirtatious nature or her parenting skills. Not that he felt qualified to judge the latter. Though there did seem to be good rationale to letting the kid burn off his high. Maybe had his own high-energy childhood not been stifled, he might not have screwed up so much.
Or maybe he'd have turned out a lot worse.
"Scoot on over here, Ben," she called, the lilt of her voice Sam's nerve endings.
Do not walk. Run.
"Come meet Cousin Sam," she said.
The kid glanced off one stuffed chair, ricocheted around the coffee table, and scrambled up onto the arm of the couch where he tipped a smudged face up at Sam. A pair of blue-gray eyes studied him from beneath tawny lashes, Mickey's eyes.
For the second time since arriving at The Farmhouse, the breath went out of Sam as though he'd been punched in the gut.
"I'm the wizard," Ben declared, drawing a makeshift cape over his narrow shoulders.
Mickey's kid.
Dixie bumped her cheek against Sam's shoulder. The scent of cinnamon enveloped him. "He's been fixated on the Wizard of Oz ever since seeing it."
And how long ago was that? Sam wanted to ask, needing to know how long she'd allowed her child to fixate on some mythical land and its fanciful characters—needing to know if that was normal or lax parenting…or worse. What if the mother really was using the kid to gain her own ends, to gain control of the trust fund that would one day be little Ben's?
But Mickey had chosen her. Sensible, perceptive Mickey.
The kid smeared a grimy finger across the silver dome of the helmet tucked under Sam's arm. "Are you the Tin Man?"
The Tin Man who went to Oz for a heart. Sam's chest tightened. For the life of him, he couldn't feel his heartbeat.
Heartless to spy on a mother. Heartless to prove her unfit. Heartless to cost a child the only parent he had left. Sam knew what it felt like to grow up without parents. He knew what it was like to be left with no one but a stern uncle to share the anger and a nanny to wipe away the tears.
What would Mickey do—Mickey who'd had enough heart for them both?
Watch out for the kid. That's what Mickey would do—what Mickey had done for him. Perfect Mickey who had loved him in spite of all his failings.
But he didn't have Mickey's integrity, Mickey's smarts, or Mickey's charm. What passed for Sam Ryan charm was better labeled sham. He'd connived his way out of more than a few tight spots and into a few choice positions…including his share of beds.
Was that what Stuart had in mind when he'd offered Sam a way back into the good graces of the family? That he bed the curvaceous Dixie so he could play the morality card? But it would take a string of documented bed partners before any court would take a child from his mother, and surely Stuart could get that list without him.
Dixie was laughing at her son calling him Tin Man. Not the head-thrown back kind of laugh she'd given out on the porch that had dispelled the illusion of china doll fragility. No, this one was far more subdued, but still came from deep enough that the side of her breast bobbed against the side of his arm.
Sam shifted uncomfortably. Had Stuart enlisted his aid because he thought it would take a con to catch a con? Is that how Stuart thought of him, a conman?
Disappointment pulled at Sam's shoulders. He'd hoped for more. He'd hoped Stuart might finally have seen whatever it was Mickey had always managed to see in him. Maybe then he could see it, too.
Sam stared into the Mickey blue eyes looking back him from Ben. Not a hint of an answer reflected from those eyes. Just Mickey's kid, scrubbing a grubby finger against his helmet. Did the kid really need his help?
Maybe if someone had helped him when he'd been dumped on the doorstep of a stern uncle he'd be able to read the signs.
Aaah, but someone had helped him. Mickey.
Mickey, whose kid might w
ell need his help now. And if that meant bedding the kid's mother to get close enough to her to dig up dirt on her…to make sure he was alright, so be it.
Sam sighed. For a guy who'd spent a lifetime avoiding responsibility, he'd gotten himself hip deep in it this time.
CHAPTER TWO
"How about that bite to eat?" Dixie asked.
"Bite to eat." The lips almost too shapely to belong to a man flexed an uneasy smile. "Yeah. Sounds good."
In spite of the hint of apprehension, there was a definite suggestive note to Sam's voice that took her back to her truck-stop waitress years; years when she went to school by day and slung hash by night, weekends and every off-school holiday. That's how she'd paid her way through college…and where she'd met Michael. Back in her truck stop days, she'd made use of the skills she'd learned under the merciless tutelage of four teasing brothers to keep the gropers at bay and banter with the harmless flirts. She figured Sam fell somewhere into the harmless flirt category.
She looked him in his puppy-dog-brown eyes. Damn, but why did he have to have such sad eyes? That was trouble. Blatant sexuality she could easily resist. But vulnerability did her in. Just ask anyone who'd ever dumped an unwanted animal on her doorstep. She'd been called everything from a soft touch to a sucker.
She preferred to think of herself as a mother hen, which would be the safest approach to Michael's cousin, provided she could keep the lid on the libido the all-too-appealing Sam seemed to have nudged to life while she figured out what brought him to The Farmhouse.
Ben hopped down off the couch and lapped the room while shrieking like a banshee. She urged Sam forward through the room littered with party-favors. "It'll be quieter in the kitchen."
She steered him ahead of herself into the private kitchen at the far end of the narrow room and toward the table and chairs tucked under the stairs. "Have a seat, why don't you?"
"Been on my backside most of the day," he said.
Don't even look at his backside.
"I'll stand, if it's all the same to you," he finished and faced her, stopping so close to her she couldn't ignore the cool freshness of the outdoors wafting off his clothes, his hair, his skin.
Finding Home (St. John Sibling Series Book 2) Page 2
