The Best Bride

by Susan Mallery

  “Have it your way,” he said. “I’m outta here. I just thought you’d want to know that Wilson Porter dropped all charges.” He turned on his heel and started to leave. Behind him, the door creaked as Sandy opened it wide.

  “What did you say?” she asked.

  “You heard me.” He kept on walking.

  “Wait, Kyle. Maybe you’d better come inside.”

  He paused at the top of the stairs. It would be so easy to keep on going. Leaving was what he did best. He knew all the things to say, how to make it easier for everyone. He was good at saying goodbye. What he wasn’t good at was staying or giving his heart. He wasn’t good at taking emotional risks. So far, the one time he’d really tried, he’d managed to screw everything up. He hurt so bad, it was hard to breathe. He’d had to arrest Lindsay, and Sandy didn’t want to see him. The pain of staying sure made leaving look good.

  But he loved her. He hadn’t wanted to, he’d thought he could avoid those feelings forever. But they’d crept up on him when his back was turned. Somehow, the adolescent crush had matured into something lasting. Something he would never get over. Walking away guaranteed it wouldn’t work out. At least by staying, he was giving them both a chance. Didn’t they deserve that?

  He turned and crossed the porch in three long strides. Without looking at her, he entered the house and continued into the living room. Once there, he didn’t know if he should sit down or not, so he walked to the open window and stared out at the darkness.

  He heard her footsteps on the hardwood floor as she came in after him. “What happened?” she asked.

  “You tell me,” he said, still staring out the window. The nighttime beyond made the glass more like a mirror. He could see the reflection of the sofa against the wall, and the pictures above it. Sandy stood just inside the door. She’d folded her arms in front of her waist and was looking at him in confusion.

  “When did it go bad?” he asked. “Was it wrong to want you to send the children to camp? Is that what you’re punishing me for?” He shrugged, not waiting for an answer. “Maybe. I’ll admit my feelings were selfish. I knew they would enjoy themselves, but my primary concern was being alone with you. I thought that’s what we both wanted.”

  He waited for a moment, but she didn’t say anything. He continued. “You told me a while ago that I didn’t take responsibility for my actions. That I was used to skating through life on my looks and charm. I thought about it and decided you might have a point. Not in terms of my career. I’m good at what I do there, but in my personal life.” He drew in a breath. “I’ve always been afraid to commit. So rather than risk being left, I would leave first.”

  “Kyle, this doesn’t have anything to do with what happened today.”

  “No?” He looked at her reflection in the window. She wasn’t watching him anymore. She was staring at the ground. Was it because she didn’t want to listen to what he had to say or was it because she feared the truth? “You wanted me, too, Sandy, and don’t say you didn’t. You were just as eager to become lovers as I was.”

  “I know,” she said miserably. “Now I’m paying the price for that. I was so caught up in myself, I didn’t think about my children.”

  “That’s a crock and you know it.”

  Her head snapped up. “You’re not a parent. How would you know—”

  “Having a child of your own doesn’t give you instant access to magical skills, so quit acting like it does,” he interrupted. “I might not have raised kids, but I’ve been around them my whole life. I see messed-up ones on the job just about every day. You make it sound like you were out with me while the house burned down. Chances are, even if we’d never met, you still would have sent the kids to camp. They wanted to go.”

  “Lindsay didn’t.”

  “Lindsay’s practically a teenager. She doesn’t want to do anything.”

  “That’s beside the point. I sent her and look what happened. She met those two girls and she got involved in shoplifting. If I hadn’t sent her—”

  “She might have met them here. At the mall or the park. You can’t protect her from everything. At some point, Lindsay has to make her own choices. We both know that. She made a bad choice this time, but she learned a cheap lesson. With the charges being dropped, she won’t even have to deal with the consequences.”

  Sandy planted her hands on her hips. “She spent the afternoon in the sheriff’s station. She was taken away in a patrol car. Those are consequences.”

  “You sound like you’re defending what she did.”

  “Of course not. I hate that she was a part of that. I can’t even think about it.” She moved over to the sofa and sank onto the middle cushion. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’m not making any sense, am I?”

  She rubbed her temples and sighed. “Maybe we should start over,” she said. “Everything happened so fast. I got swept off my feet by you, and you couldn’t resist the challenge. Maybe we’ve both learned our lesson, too. I can’t be one of your women.”

  He turned to face her. “Is that what you think this is about?” he asked, keeping his voice low when he really wanted to shout at her. “You still think I keep a revolving door at my place. You think I’ve got fifty women at my beck and call and you were just some pit stop on the road of life. Don’t you?” he demanded.

  “Well, it’s obvious that I’m not your type.”

  He stalked across the room until he was standing just across the coffee table from her. “What is my type?”

  She blinked. “Well, someone young, I would imagine. And pretty. A blonde, maybe, or a redhead.”

  He jerked his head as if she’d slapped him. In a way, she had. “Is that what you think of me? That all I care about is how pretty she is and how her hips sway when she walks?”

  Sandy flushed, but didn’t look away. “Yes.”

  He clenched his teeth. He’d been eating himself up alive trying to figure out if he was worthy of her, if he was willing to take the risk, when she saw him as a male bimbo, interested in nothing but appearances. “And that’s all this is,” he said, motioning with his arm. “This whole damn thing was nothing but playtime for you. A chance to live out your fantasies. To get it on with one of the infamous Haynes brothers. You never cared about me at all.”

  Lord, he sounded like one of the many women he’d dumped. With a bitter flash of insight, he realized he was finally getting his. In a world of cosmic justice, his bill had just come due.

  “Of course I care about you, Kyle. As a friend. But any other kind of relationship is unrealistic.”

  “Why?”

  “Even if you claim I’m yours, you’re not my type.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re not responsible.”

  He leaned toward her. “We’ve covered this ground before. But I think you’re using it to hide behind. You’re afraid, Sandy Walker. You’re damn afraid. Not just of me, although I must leave you trembling in fear. Worse than that, you’re afraid of yourself. You don’t want to have to feel things. Emotions frighten you. You’re afraid of being rejected, and of falling in love, of making another mistake, so you keep yourself safe from life. You hide the fact that you’re a coward and you call it being a good parent.”

  She sprang to her feet. “I don’t have to listen to this.”

  “Yes, you do, because I’m not leaving until I’ve said it all.”

  She glared at him, her chest heaving. He hated that he could smell her sweetness. It diverted him from his anger and purpose. He wanted to pull her close and kiss her until they both forgot what they were arguing about, but he couldn’t. He knew this might be his last chance to get through to her. He had to give the moment everything he had. He had to be honest and avoid the cheap tricks and smoky mirrors.

  “So say it and go,” she told him.

  “There’s been something between us from the moment you came back to Glenwood,” he said. “You can deny it all you want, but it’s been there. Call it chemistry or kism
et, I don’t care.”

  “It’s just sexual attraction,” she said disdainfully. “So what?”

  He wanted to remind her that the sexual attraction she wanted to dismiss had made her weep tears of ecstasy in his arms. That she’d moaned his name night after night, when they’d been together. He wanted to make her feel the heat again, bring her close to paradise, then demand that she discount all that her body told her was real. Instead, he decided to risk it all by going for the heart. That’s what this was really about. Sandy didn’t want to admit she believed in love.

  “So it was there,” he said. “And it was just the beginning. We both know there’s something else. Something even more powerful.”

  “I don’t know that.”

  “Then you’re blind as well as a coward.” When she stiffened and opened her mouth to speak, he held up his hand to silence her. “I’m not done. When I am, you’ll get your turn. I’ll admit it’s always been easier for me to leave than stay. I didn’t want to risk rejection, so I did it first.”

  “Admirable,” she said sarcastically. “I’m so glad to have you as a role model for my children.”

  He ignored her. “It stopped being easier to leave when I met you. I didn’t want to walk away because I couldn’t imagine being without you and the children. I changed for you, Sandy. Even if this doesn’t work out, I’m glad I did it. I like the man I am now better. I know I did the right things for the right reason.”

  She continued to stare at him, but her expression softened. Her arms relaxed and dropped to her sides.

  “I thought we might try working it out as a family,” he said, wishing it was going to be that easy. But it wasn’t. He could feel it in his soul. Still, he had to say the words. He had to make the confession, all of it, not just the parts she would want to hear.

  “All my life I’ve felt inadequate,” he said. “My dad never taught any of us what it was like to be a good man. My brothers and I have fumbled with that, coming up with what felt right to us. We never knew what it was like to live in a stable home or have parents who cared more about us than they did about their latest conquest or how unhappy they were. All my life, people left. My mother left, my brothers left, the stepmothers left. Even you left.”

  “I went to college,” she said, sitting back down on the sofa. “I didn’t know how you felt about me.”

  “I’m not saying you should have stayed, I’m just pointing out the fact that everyone I’ve ever cared about has left me. So I decided I wasn’t going to let that happen again. Next time, I was going to do the leaving. I did. Over and over again. Until it became a habit and I didn’t remember how to do anything else. Until you.”

  She brushed her hair out of her face. “Kyle, I don’t think I can deal with this now.”

  “That’s too bad, because I’m going to say it. It would have been easier not to get involved with you and the kids. I knew what I was up against. But I couldn’t resist. I didn’t want to care, but I do. I didn’t want to fall in love with you, but I have.”

  She stared at him as if she’d never seen him before.

  “I had this fantasy that it would all work out,” he said. “I wanted to ask you to marry me, but I know now you’ll find an excuse to say no. You’ll use that imaginary yardstick of yours to measure my intentions and find them lacking.

  “You’re never going to find anyone who loves you more,” he told her, “but you might find someone who you think fits your picture of an ideal mate. I’d like to wish you well on your search, but right now it hurts too bad. Frankly, I hope you never find him. I don’t think you will because he doesn’t exist. You don’t want a man, Sandy. You want an excuse to ignore the fear. Loving someone means opening yourself up. You complain that you don’t want all the responsibility, but you don’t want to give anyone a chance to do it their way. You’re so afraid of mistakes, you won’t even try anymore.”

  “You’re wrong,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m not like that.”

  He shoved his hands into his pockets so she couldn’t see he was shaking from emotion. “Yes, you are. You’re exactly like that. No one will ever love you more than I do. I know the worst about you and I still want to be with you. I want to be there for the kids. I want to watch them grow and pick them up when they fall. But it wouldn’t work, because I would let them make their own mistakes, and you would want to make sure they never had the chance.”

  “What does that mean?” she asked.

  “I didn’t go to Wilson Potter and ask him to drop the charges, Travis did.”

  “What?” Her voice rose. “You wanted Lindsay to go to jail?”

  “She wouldn’t have gone anywhere, but yes, I thought she should learn from what she’d done. Travis thought she’d learned her lesson already.” He shrugged. “Who knows, maybe Travis is right. I just thought you should know what really happened. I didn’t want you thinking I’d gotten her off. I don’t want you to be grateful to me.”

  “Well, good, because I’m not.” She stood up and walked to the door.

  He headed for the front door, then paused. “It could have been great between us,” he said quietly. “I would have loved you forever. But all you can see is your own narrow version of the truth. I’ll never be able to fit in that definition.” He glanced at her one last time, memorizing her features, wondering what he could have done differently.

  He stepped out into the night. He was glad it was dark. At least in the shadows, he could pretend to hide from the pain.

  * * *

  Sandy drew her knees to her chest and rocked back and forth. It was late, well past midnight, but she wasn’t sleepy. Who could think of sleeping at a time like this? Her world was crumbling around her and she didn’t know how to make it stop.

  Questions, images and words filled her mind. She was torn between pain and rage. How dare Kyle say those things to her? How dare he tell her that Lindsay deserved the punishment she got? How dare he say she was afraid to love, that she used her high standards to keep the world at bay?

  He’d asked her to marry him. Actually, he’d only taunted her with a proposal, mentioning it, then withdrawing it before she could refuse him. Marriage. She’d never thought about that. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. Of course she’d thought about getting married. She’d fantasized about a civilized arrangement with someone much like herself. Someone who understood the importance of being responsible.

  She could see them sharing the Sunday paper, then going over their schedules for the coming week. But when she tried to picture the man’s face, she could only see Kyle and he would never allow her to organize much of anything. No doubt he would grab the part of the paper he wanted and go watch the game on TV. But when she walked in front of him, he would pull her onto his lap and kiss her into oblivion, making her forget her lists and schedules, everything but the joy of being with him.

  She’d never thought about marrying Kyle. Why? Because what she’d said was true. That she’d always pictured him with young pretty girls, not a mature woman like herself. But was that about Kyle, or was that about her?

  She shifted on the sofa, feeling uncomfortable at the thought of having to face her own inadequacies. It wasn’t Kyle, she admitted in a painfully, honest confession. She didn’t think he was that shallow. It was her. She was the one with the stretch marks and not-so-perky butt. She was the one who used her organized life-style to convince herself and the world that she wasn’t lonely and didn’t desperately want someone to share her heart with.

  Had Kyle really said he loved her? A single tear slipped down her cheek. She brushed it away impatiently. What was she crying about? So he loved her? So what? It didn’t mean anything. He wasn’t the right one.

  Who better?

  The question came unexpectedly. She didn’t have an answer. Who better, indeed. Who would love her more fully, more honestly? He hadn’t had to tell her that Travis had been the one to approach the store manager about Lindsay. While she was here, alone, and there was no one to hea
r her confession, she was willing to admit she agreed with Kyle. It would have been better for Lindsay to face the full consequences of what she’d done. In the station she, Sandy, had reacted without thinking. She’d been scared and the fear had made her say ugly things. She’d wanted to blame someone other than herself and Kyle had been convenient.

  She closed her eyes and remembered the first moment she’d seen him riding up on his motorcycle. He’d stolen her breath away. When he’d turned out to be kind, good to her kids and possibly interested in her, she hadn’t known what to think. She hadn’t had enough self-confidence to believe it was real, so she’d made sure it wasn’t. She’d pushed him away at every chance because she’d been afraid he was playing with her. Ordinary women like her didn’t get that lucky. They didn’t attract the Kyle Hayneses of the world. She hadn’t wanted to believe he was different, so she’d convinced herself he was just like Thomas. Even when everything he did proved otherwise. She hadn’t been willing to take a step of faith, so she’d lost her one chance at happiness.

  A soft sound on the stairs caught her attention. She opened her eyes and turned toward the noise. Lindsay crept into the room.

  With her long hair loose around her shoulders, and a sleeveless cotton nightgown falling to her calves, her oldest child looked closer to six than thirteen. Big brown eyes, Thomas’s eyes, stared at her.

  “What’s wrong?” Sandy asked.

  Lindsay hovered by the edge of the couch. She twisted her fingers together. “I couldn’t sleep. Are you still mad at me?”

  “No.” Sandy held out her arms. “I’m not.”

  Lindsay dived onto the sofa and cuddled next to her. Her firstborn, the one who tried so hard to be grown-up and mature, buried her head in her mother’s shoulder and sobbed.

  “I’m s-sorry, Mommy,” she said, her voice broken and contrite. “I didn’t mean to do anything bad. I swear I didn’t. I swear.”

  “I know.” Sandy stroked her hair. “Hush, baby. It’s going to be all right.”

  “It’s not, but I’m going to do everything I can to fix it. I want to, Mommy.”