by Caro Carson
It would take a minor miracle.
* * *
The heavily used trail around Lady Bird Lake was dotted with humans of all shapes and sizes. College students who ran with effortless youth. Hipsters who sat on rock walls and shared earbuds. Children who were too slow, middle-aged couples who drifted from one side of the path to the other as they conducted business on their phones and elderly people on a mission to stay fit. Braden passed them all as he ran, dodging each human obstacle as he pounded through Zilker Park in the afternoon sun.
The temperate Austin winter hadn’t kept anyone away. Braden veered right to pass a cluster of seniors, then straight ahead to thread the space between two young men who ran fast, but not faster than Braden. He was driven by the need to leave them all behind, as if by clearing all these obstacles on the reddish-brown, packed-earth path, he’d clear all the obstacles that had suddenly appeared in his life.
“Are we in a race I don’t know about?”
Quinn sounded angry. Braden slowed down. He shouldn’t leave his brother behind, not after he’d asked Quinn to meet him for a workout. A lap around the park with his brother had seemed necessary for his sanity.
The morning had started with a bang. An Austin city official had leaked word of the PLI research facilities. Braden had demanded explanations from the key players, and then he’d debriefed the rest of PLI’s research division over secured cyber connections. Afterward, he’d had to countermand his own order to cancel the pentagab study, thanks to his mother’s involvement and Lana’s interference. Determined to stay on his schedule, he’d visited the specific jeweler in Austin he’d had in mind, but none of the engagement rings seemed right for Claudia, an illogical and absurd problem that had dogged him in New York, as well.
To top it off, Claudia herself was calling him with an almost creepy frequency, demanding to know exactly why he hadn’t returned to New York when he’d planned to. Braden wanted to marry Claudia because she was independent and stable, yet last night’s one lousy phone call, his one mention of the name Lana, had caused Claudia to morph into a neurotic, suspicious person.
“What the hell?” Quinn yelled from behind him.
Braden slowed down just enough for Quinn to come alongside him again. “Bad day,” he said, hoping that sufficed as an apology.
Quinn grunted, as if that explanation made perfect sense.
They ran in sync and in silence for several strides. They were nearly back to the parking lot where they’d left Quinn’s motorcycle and Braden’s rented sports car, and hard breathing kept the conversation short and to the point.
“Personal bad day,” Quinn asked between strides, “or professional?”
“Both.”
“Need help?”
“I wish.”
It wasn’t Quinn’s problem that when the jeweler had asked Braden which ring reflected his bride’s personality, Claudia’s image hadn’t come to mind. Braden had pictured Lana, damn it, Lana in a shop on their lunch break, wearing scrubs and modeling white veils for him. Every time he’d said he liked one, she’d plucked it off and laughed, assuring him it was not the one she’d already bought and hidden from him, so they wouldn’t face bad luck if he saw her in it before their wedding day.
He wondered what her veil would have looked like. He’d never seen it. Had she returned it to the shop after she’d dropped the ring in the mail?
What the hell did it matter?
Braden sprinted, full out, the rest of the way to the finish.
He was still bent over, hands on his knees and gulping air, when Quinn jogged past him to flop on the bench of a picnic table. He stretched his arms across the battered green boards of the table. “Well, that was fun.”
Braden stood up tall, walked a few steps away and kicked at the base of an oak tree. “Why did you hire Lana?”
Quinn gave him the Dad look, the lift of one eyebrow. “It was Montgomery’s idea.”
“It was a bad one.”
“Not for West Central. Lana was a hell of a bargain. She’s going to help our bottom line more than Montgomery did or ever would. Speaking of bottom lines, I realize that West Central is probably an insignificant slice of your portfolio, but did you read the annual report?”
There it was again, that subtle implication that Braden no longer cared about things the rest of the MacDowells cared about. “It was Dad’s hospital. Of course I read the report.”
“And?”
The fact that Quinn would ask sent a red flag up in Braden’s mind. “It looked fine. Fairly robust for the current state of hospitals. You didn’t think so?”
“I wanted the board to call the CEO in for more details. He needs to account for some of those numbers.”
“What did the rest of the board say?”
“They have happy ears. They heard the CEO say what they wanted to hear.” With an angry push on the planks of the picnic table, Quinn got to his feet. “Montgomery’s a sloppy bookkeeper at best, so when he recommended Lana, I didn’t think twice. I know she’s meticulous. Ethical. It was easy for me to endorse her to the rest of the board. I’m sorry if it’s caused a problem for you, though.”
Braden shook off his concern, but he had nothing to say. He didn’t know what the problem was himself.
“You two have a fight?” Quinn asked.
“Nope.” Braden squinted up at the remains of a kite, still stuck in the leafless branches of a tree long after the annual kite festival had passed. “I’m buying Claudia a ring.”
“The woman I met in New York?” Quinn half sat on the edge of the table and crossed his arms over his chest, showing all the signs of settling in for a longer discussion.
It was undeniably gratifying. Braden hadn’t been home for more than a few days every year, but his brother was still his brother. “She’s the one. Thought I’d do it at the ranch, over Valentine’s weekend. I want to ask her in front of the family. Last time, with Lana, it was all private. We kept it a secret for a few months, you know, before we let the rest of the world in on it.”
“No, I didn’t know that.”
“I don’t want to make the same mistakes twice. I don’t want this ring returned.”
“What exactly was that mistake?” Acting as if it were an everyday question, Quinn started untying his shoe, because he’d threaded his motorcycle’s key through the laces.
In the business world, in Braden’s world, when mistakes occurred, they were analyzed. There were after action reports, recommendations to modify business practices, steps taken to ensure that the same mistake was never repeated. But with his first engagement, Braden had gotten none of that. Lana had simply decided she didn’t want him for a husband after all, and he had no idea why.
That had to explain why he was so crippled when it came to picking out an engagement ring for Claudia. She seemed perfect for him, but Lana had seemed perfect for him also, once upon a time. He’d given Lana his heart and soul. He couldn’t pour those resources into another losing proposition.
He was a businessman who never made the same mistake twice, and until he learned exactly what had gone wrong the first time, he didn’t risk a second commitment.
“I’m asking because I really don’t remember why you two broke up,” Quinn said. “Where did you and Lana go wrong?”
Braden clapped his brother on the shoulder. “That is an excellent question. I’m spending one more night in town. Lana has owed me an answer for six years, and tonight, I’m going to get it.”
Chapter Seven
It’s a business meeting, not a date.
Still, Lana opened every cardboard wardrobe box in her newly rented apartment, looking for the perfect outfit to wear for dinner with Braden. Dinner together as professionals, not as old lovers who hadn’t seen one another in years. Not as that, no matter what Myrna believed.
Her assistant had delivered the short message from Braden: Viejo Mundo, eight o’clock. Then Myrna had given Lana a rave review of the latest restaurant to enter Austin’s al
ready-impressive restaurant scene.
“A date at Viejo Mundo is something special, Dr. Donnoli.”
“It’s not a date, but it better be something special. Our department is going to be hurting unless I hit a home run tonight.”
“A home run?” Myrna, gray-haired and grandmotherly, had giggled. “When I was your age, nice girls didn’t go past first base on a first date—but it’s not your first date with Dr. MacDowell, is it?”
“He prefers Mr. MacDowell, and this is strictly business.”
The problem was, none of Lana’s business attire seemed suitable. She opened her last cardboard box and pulled out a high-collared dress. Too stuffy. He might think she’d become a dried-up old prune since she’d left him.
Maybe true, but he doesn’t need to know.
She let a camisole slip dress slide to the floor. Too sexy. He might assume she was trying to find a bed partner for the night.
Not true, but he pretty much ruined me for any other man. He definitely didn’t need to know that.
In the end, she settled on that time-honored standby, the little black dress, worn with her hair down, her makeup carefully natural and her jewelry subtle. Professional. Her shoes were low-heeled pumps, practical in case she got called in to cover for a physician at the hospital.
Her portfolio was filled with two copies of all the research assets she’d compiled. Her mission tonight was twofold. Not only did she need to keep pentagab alive, but she needed to nail down another study—or two, or three—with PLI this year. Business news channels had been buzzing today with rumors that PLI would build their own research facilities right here in Austin. Her department needed to get all the contracts and all the funding they could before that happened.
As she dressed for dinner, she felt alive in a way she hadn’t felt in ages, which she took as a positive sign that she’d made the right choice to change jobs. The prospect of negotiating with the president of PLI tonight was exciting in a way her career in D.C. had never been. The fact that the president in question was Braden MacDowell was unfortunate, but so far, they’d managed to interact in a professional manner. Mostly.
Lana had to drive herself to the restaurant, further proof that this was not a date. But when she arrived, the hostess started leading her past clusters of tables, all candlelit like a mysterious Mayan fantasy, until it became obvious that Lana was being led to a table for two, tucked into an alcove. It was semiprivate, just the table, two chairs and a window with the dark night beyond.
Braden had already arrived, looking terribly handsome in the dim lighting that would make reading her spreadsheets difficult. He was wearing a business suit again—or had been. His jacket was discarded over the back of his chair. His tie was missing. His sleeves had been turned up a few times, exposing wrists and forearms. When he stood to pull out her chair, the polished cotton of his shirt slid over the muscles of his shoulders.
She knew just how he would look, shrugging out of that shirt and tossing it onto their bed.
The hostess reached behind Lana to put the menus on the table, forcing her to inch closer to Braden. It was intimate, this closeness, bringing instant awareness of how athletic he was. How physical he’d always been, raised on a ranch, a lover of sports. A lover of her.
This setting was much too much like an intimate date. That, she couldn’t allow. Her heart needed shielding from Braden, and tonight, her career was going to provide it.
“Hello, Braden.” Staying on her feet, Lana offered him her hand for a polite handshake, pasting her best let’s-get-down-to-business smile on her face.
Braden shook her hand, of course, since she’d stuck it out in front of him, but he didn’t let go of it. She could feel his gaze on the skin her dress left bare. Her arms, her legs, her modest décolletage. The collar of his shirt was unbuttoned, exposing a tanned throat. She’d snuggled the side of her face into him there a hundred times.
She’d known him for years. She’d worn his ring. And for six weeks, she’d been accidentally pregnant with his child.
Business. That was why she was here. Not to stir up old memories and old hurts. She seated herself, dismissed the hostess with a polite smile and prepared to steer the conversation.
“Thank you for meeting with me. I’m glad we were able to set this up before you returned to New York. I needed this day to get a handle on my department’s—”
“I won’t be living in New York full-time. I’ll be commuting from here.”
“So the rumors today were accurate? PLI will be building a research center here in Austin?”
He gave her an impersonal, professional smile. “I can neither confirm nor deny those rumors at this time. Wall Street will just have to keep guessing.”
It was surreal, to know that her ex had the power to influence a company’s value on the stock market. “If the rumors turn out to be true, congratulations. It will be wonderful news for the city of Austin. Your company has a reputation for excellence.”
She let the professional platitudes roll off her tongue, but failed to stop when a personal thought entered her stream of consciousness. “I’m sure your mother will be pleased that you’ll be home more often.”
And how awful for Lana, to wonder if she’d run into him every time she left the apartment. She’d taken the position at West Central knowing that Braden MacDowell was headquartered in Manhattan. It was too late to reconsider. Her pulse picked up speed at the thought of seeing Braden again and again after tonight, around town, around the hospital.
He watched her intently. “Did you learn anything new about my mother’s involvement in the pentagab study?”
And by that, she knew he meant is my mother seriously ill?
“No, I’m sorry. Not yet.”
“Don’t drag your feet on it.”
Her moment of sympathy ended in a flash. “I find it offensive that you’d even suggest such a thing. Patients are depending on me. They need this drug—” She cut herself short, caught in the middle of her old patients first mantra.
“Patients like my mother, for one.”
“You can’t think I would drag my feet because your mother is involved?”
His silence was telling.
It hurt her terribly. No wonder he’d let their engagement end without a fight. He assumed she was the lowest kind of person. Maybe last night she’d entertained a little thought of petty revenge—let him stand in the hallway in front of a locked door—but that hardly meant she’d let a woman’s health decline just because that woman was related to her ex.
Wounded, Lana explained herself as forcefully as she could without raising her voice in the quiet restaurant. “It’s because Marion is involved that I found the time today to rule out another class of side effects—pentagab has practically no dermatologic effects, you should be happy to know—and I find it extremely offensive that you think I would ever let Marion suffer from a mystery illness if I could help it. I wouldn’t let anyone suffer, let alone—”
At the start of her defense, Braden had almost instantly held up a palm, and he was still making a slow-down motion.
Lana rushed on. “—let alone someone I care about personally. The fact that the patient in question is your mother is more likely to motivate me than deter me. Marion was always—she was always—”
Lana paused to struggle for the words to describe a woman who’d treated her like the daughter she had not become. Marion was the perfect mother in Lana’s eyes, the kind of mother she could never be: self-sacrificing, devoted to her family to the exclusion of all else. A good mother. An ideal mother.
“Marion was always lovely to me. I would never use her to get to you. I wouldn’t use any patient’s suffering for—”
“I get it. Patients come first for Lana Donnoli, even when they are related to me.”
Especially when they are related to you.
She’d known it today, as the columns of numbers and letters had danced on the page before her eyes, that she was trying to help Braden. S
he never wanted to make his life harder, only easier. Still. Their engagement had left that indelible mark in her heart.
Braden touched her portfolio with one dismissive tap of his finger. “You realize that when you’re done with that analysis, I’ll kill the study. Even the pediatric one.”
She lifted her chin. “We’ll see.”
“There’s nothing to see. That drug does not work in adult migraines. There’s no saving something ineffective. Unless...” He began slowly shaking his head at her. “Unless the brilliant Lana Donnoli, smartest kid in the class, finds something no one else has. My God, Lana, are you still trying to be Superwoman? You’ve taken it on your shoulders to single-handedly save a drug, haven’t you? You don’t even work for the company that makes it.”
“I don’t see why you are getting angry about this.”
“Waste makes me angry. You are wasting your effort to prove that pentagab works for something, anything, in the adult population so that it will be available for that tiny amount of pediatric migraine sufferers. You are that stubborn.”
“Since you are so concerned about dollars and cents, I would think you’d be delighted that you’ve got me working for free on the PLI payroll.”
“I know you, Lana. You’ll sacrifice sleep and food and everything else, trying to make it happen.”
“So what? That won’t hurt you this time.”
This time.
Lana abruptly fell silent, horrified that those words had slipped out. This time, there would be no consequences if she overdid it. But once, it had cost Braden a chance at fatherhood. She knew it, even if he did not.
This time, and every time for the rest of her life, she could work as long and as hard as she liked, and miss as many meals as she could stand, and there would be nothing for Braden to lose. If the work in question benefited PLI, then he could only profit.
“Did you review the derm effects before or after you got some sleep? Did you sleep at all?”
