by Shirley Jump
“Two weeks?” Paul’s eyes widened. “How the hell did you manage that?”
“I, uh, offered to pay for the substitute. The principal was arguing about the cost of that until I said I’d pony up the cash. Seems small towns have small budgets when it comes to substitute teachers.”
“Small towns have small budgets for everything, Kane.” Paul turned the envelope over in his hand, staring at it, incredulous. “You have got to be kidding me. This is too much.” Then he shook his head and slid the envelope across the bar. “We can’t accept it.”
Kane slid it back to Paul. “You saved my ass in college a dozen times. This is just a small way to repay you, to say thanks.”
“Hey, all I did was help you study for some tests.”
“No. You helped me have a life. Outside the Lennox name. That saved my sanity. Down the road it brought me here, and that saved me a second time.”
“I call it even, Kane, after you talked to Jackie and convinced her saving money will make her a millionaire.” Paul grinned. “Heck, I would have been happy just to have Jackie see the value of a savings account, but you’ve got her talking 401ks and 529s for our kids. You’re a miracle worker.”
Kane chuckled, then sobered. “I found something in Chapel Ridge, Paul, that taught me a lesson. Something I wanted to share with you. That’s what this is really about.” Kane cupped his hands around his coffee and stared into the dark liquid. “The years will pass so fast, Paul, your head will spin, and you’ll wish you took the days off when you could. So do it now, while someone else is footing the tab.”
Paul opened his mouth to protest again, then stopped. “Okay. But only because Jackie would kill me if I said no.”
Kane laughed. “Good.”
“What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Are you just going to go back to being Kane Lennox, or are you going to have a life when you get back to New York?”
Kane snorted. “You know my father, Paul. What do you think? Nothing will make him happy but me being at work twenty-four hours a day.”
“Why do you try so hard?” Paul asked. “I don’t want to tell you how to live your life, but why do you worry so much about what your father thinks?”
Kane spun the coffee mug back and forth. “It’s complicated. He’s not a bad man, just…difficult.”
Paul bit his lip, closing the subject of Kane’s father. “What are you going to do about Susannah?”
“Do? Nothing.”
Paul snorted. “Right. I heard from my groomsmen what happened at the altar last night. Seems you two have a few feelings for each other. They said they felt like they were watching a real wedding.”
Kane’s mind rocketed back to that moment, to Susannah, standing beneath the jeweled light of the stained glass. To her smile when he pledged his love. Real or not, for a moment, it had been believable. Then she had run out of there, and avoided the rehearsal dinner. Avoided him. Making it clear that what had happened at that altar hadn’t been real to her. Or if it had been, it had been a real nightmare. “Well, we were just acting.”
Paul gave him a light elbow jab. “Maybe you’re in the wrong industry. Everyone in the pews said it was worthy of an Academy Award.”
Kane thought again of the envelope. Of the warning from his assistant. His father would never approve of Susannah, and that would leave the two Lennox men even more divided than they already were. How could that do any of them, or for that matter, the company, any good? “And maybe I just need to remember my place.”
Beneath the family yoke.
“Reggie is sure going to miss you,” Cecilia Richards said, taking her Pomeranian from Susannah and giving the freshly groomed, caramel-colored dog a cuddle. “Are you sure I can’t talk you into staying in town? Where else will I find a groomer who’s as patient with my sweet little boy as you are?”
Susannah smiled. Mrs. Richards’s “sweet little boy” had a temperament that usually required a muzzle and hazardous-duty pay. The Pomeranian had a hatred of all things water, and made his displeasure about his baths well known from the minute he arrived at The Sudsy Dog. Tess refused to go near him. Susannah had always been the only one who could calm Reggie enough to get him through the experience. “I’ll miss him, too,” she said, giving Reggie a pat and a little treat. The Pom wagged his tail, probably out of relief that the ordeal was finally over.
“You are coming back, aren’t you? You aren’t going to go to the other side of the world and stay there?”
Susannah sighed. “Yes, I’m coming back. In three weeks.” As much as she didn’t want to return, her bank account was only so deep, and what would be left after her trip to Paris was needed for an apartment rental.
“Oh, good.” Mrs. Richards gave her dog a little nuzzling kiss, then pouted. “But who will take care of my Reggie until then?”
“Tess would be glad to.” Tess would kill her for saying that, but the girl had agreed to take any emergency appointments while Susannah was gone. The shelter dogs had all been adopted or fostered for Susannah’s absence. Virtually every last detail had been attended to. Her suitcase was packed. Her last appointment was leaving, thanking her one more time as she got in her car with a growling, barking Reggie. All Susannah had left to do was clean up the shop, make her last deposit, and lock the doors.
Then after the wedding tonight, she was free. Free to finally live her own life. Free to fulfill the dream her mother and father had never had a chance to see.
As Mrs. Richards and Reggie pulled away, Susannah headed back inside The Sudsy Dog. She turned the shop sign to Closed and went into the washing room. In a few minutes, she had the tub cleaned, the supplies put away and everything put in order.
She hung up her apron and looked around at the silent rooms. She was done.
Her gaze strayed to the Arc de Triomphe poster. Tomorrow night, she would be there. Stand in that very city, seeing those sights. But for the first time since Susannah had made the decision to go to Paris, the thought didn’t fill her with the same sense of joy.
“Paris is a beautiful city, especially in springtime.”
She whirled around and found Kane standing behind her. Dark jeans hugged his hips, outlined his powerful legs, while a white button-down shirt stretched across his chest, beneath a black leather jacket. He’d left a couple of buttons undone, enough to give her a teasing view of the chest she knew existed beneath. A crazy part of Susannah wanted to undo every last button, place her hands against his skin, and do what she hadn’t done that day in the laundry room. Feel him beneath her. Taste his skin. And take this beyond a couple of passionate kisses. “What are you doing here? I thought you’d be with Paul today.”
“I was, but he’s all set for a while.” Kane closed the gap between them, his purposeful strides making quick work of the small room. His gaze connected with hers, and the temperature seemed to rise, the tension in the room double. “He had his doubts about long-term commitment, but they passed.”
Doubts. She’d had those ever since she’d met Kane Lennox. Doubts about who he was. Why he was here. Whether she should get involved with him. And now, doubts about whether she would forget him once she left town. For a woman who hadn’t wanted to leave behind any strings, she suddenly felt very tied to this man.
Most of the lights in the shop were off, leaving only the late-afternoon sun’s rays. The last golden light of the day cast a romantic veil over the room, washing Kane with soft highlights, almost like he, too, were part of the scenery that hung on her walls.
“That happens.” Were they even talking about Paul and Jackie? Desire coiled in Susannah’s gut. She tightened her hold on the brush in her hand, twisting the handle against her palm.
Kane closed the gap. His gaze dropped to her mouth, then back to her eyes. “He realized he didn’t want to go on without her.”
“Good.” The word escaped her on a breath.
“What happened to you last night?” Kane asked.
“I didn’t want to go to the party. I, um, wasn’t feeling well.” Liar. She’d felt fine. She’d been disconcerted by him. By what had happened back in the church. And really afraid it would show on her face when he looked at her in the restaurant.
“You know what I mean.” He tipped her jaw. “What happened at that altar?”
“We…” Her voice trailed off. Why lie? Why pretend? They both knew something had shifted last night, something big. “That was more than just acting, wasn’t it?”
He nodded. Slowly. “I know we don’t know each other well. And I know how insane that sounds. But you are the first woman I have ever met who sees me for me. Just me. And that—” he smiled “—is the sexiest thing I’ve ever experienced.”
Her heart trilled, her pulse raced. She tried to keep the feelings tamped down, away from showing. “Well, that saves me from wearing high heels.”
He laughed, then drew her into his arms. “I mean it, Susannah. You are…everything I always wanted and never even knew existed.”
Now the emotion burst onto Susannah’s face in a wide smile. Her arms went around Kane, and he drew her to him. She fit against him perfectly, like a lost diamond fitting into its setting. Beneath his shirt, she heard his heartbeat, the steady thump-thump matching her own. “You found that here, in Chapel Ridge, Indiana? And not in New York?”
“Exactly.” He leaned down and brushed his lips against hers, tender and sweet, a slow, easy kiss. “But I don’t want to lose this. I…I want you to come to New York with me. Right after the wedding.”
She backed up, out of his embrace. “What?”
“Come to New York with me. I can rent you an apartment, rent you space for dogs and cats.” He grinned. “Whatever you want.”
New York City. The epicenter of the country, where everything happened, all the activity came in and went out. She’d be out of this small town forever. Away from its expectations, away from her responsibilities.
But…would she be trading up? Or trading laterally?
She replayed his words in her head, and heard the empty pockets in the sentences. Had he left those gaps on purpose, or was she simply missing something?
“I don’t want that, Kane,” Susannah said. “I want…more.”
“What? A house? That can be arranged. A car? I’ll take care of it.”
Things. He was offering her things. Every single tangible item—
Except his heart.
“No, Kane. I don’t want you to pay for me. For one, it’s too expensive—”
“I can afford it, I assure you.”
“For another, I want to achieve something big, on my own. I want…” She searched for the words she had yet to find, had yet to have time to find. “I want to see the world. Be my own person. Get out from under the shadow of Chapel Ridge. Of being the older Wilson sister. I can’t do that if you’re funding my move and my life.” She drew in a breath and met his gaze. “I don’t want to be something you treat like a pet you’re boarding at an apartment nearby. If I’m living with a man, I want it to be because I married him.”
He turned and let out a low curse. “You want everything.”
“It’s my right, isn’t it? To want a full life? And what’s wrong with that?”
“I can’t give you everything. I have…expectations of my own.”
“What kind of expectations could there possibly be, Kane? I mean, you told me you work in a jewelry store, right? I understand if you work long hours and don’t have a lot of time to devote to a relationship. That’s, like, the story of my life.”
He didn’t meet her gaze. Susannah should have taken that as the first sign, but she didn’t. That silly bird of hope kept trying to fly in her chest. “It’s more than that. My job is beyond demanding. And that has to come first.”
“Work comes first?” she repeated, dumbfounded. “This from the man who has been lecturing me all week about taking time off to have a life of my own?”
“I’d be offering you a life, Susannah. A different one from what you have here.”
And then she knew. There was no possibility of this dream ever taking flight. A bittersweet smile curved across Susannah’s face, and disappointment sank heavy and sour in her stomach. She’d thought she’d known him, but it turned out Kane Lennox had been a stranger all along. “Tell me what the difference is, Kane. In New York, you’d simply be paying me to be with you instead of paying me to teach you to fish.”
She rose on her tiptoes and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, then turned and walked out of The Sudsy Dog. Before she could change her mind and take what he was offering.
Which, really, was nothing she wanted.
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE stretch black limo pulled up in front of The Sudsy Dog, drawing Susannah up short. Except for the occasional funeral, prom or wedding rental, limos never drove through Chapel Ridge. And they never stopped in downtown, in front of the dog-grooming salon.
“Susannah, wait!” Kane called after her, exiting The Sudsy Dog fast on her heels.
She didn’t want to stop. Didn’t want to deal with anyone, not when her heart was breaking and all she wanted was to retreat to the solitude of her home.
As Kane caught up to her, his hand touching her arm lightly to keep her from leaving, a well-dressed man stepped out of the luxury car. Susannah heard Kane curse under his breath, and realized this was no ordinary limo. And no ordinary visitor.
The man in the suit had distaste and barely restrained fury written all over his features. He buttoned his jacket as he walked toward Kane, not saying a word, simply glaring. First at Kane, then including Susannah, too.
“What a surprise,” Kane said, his body language reading the exact opposite. “Susannah, this is my father, Elliott Lennox.” This man was Kane’s father? What was he doing here? And in that car? Beside her, Kane had gone tense, on guard. “Father, this is—”
“Don’t act like you don’t know why I’m here,” the other man cut in, as sharp as a razor. He turned to Susannah and a charming smile took over his face. If she hadn’t just seen it herself, she’d think the earlier fury was imagined. There were layers here—layers between the two men, layers in the two men—that Susannah couldn’t see. “Excuse me, miss, but this is between my son and me. If you could give us a moment?”
Everything about Elliott Lennox screamed “get away,” even with the polite smile. Susannah had no desire to stand in the middle of this tense standoff, and was about to step away when Kane put his hand on her arm again. “No, she won’t,” he said, his tone just as sharp, insistent.
Elliott scowled. “Kane, don’t drag some vacation dalliance into the middle of our family business.”
Vacation dalliance? The words hit Susannah like a verbal slap. She opened her mouth to tell him off, when she remembered her place. Downtown Chapel Ridge was neither the time nor the place to stage a scene with Kane’s father.
“Don’t call her that.” Kane’s tone was even, controlled, but a growlish undertone lay beneath his words. “Susannah deserves your respect.”
Elliott let out a breath of impatience and ran a hand through his silver hair. He had the same height and similar bearing to Kane, but everything else about him, from his clear disdain for the town to his instant hatred of her, seemed like he had DNA from a whole other country. “Enough of this. You’ve had your fun, now come back to work. For God’s sake, you can’t keep carrying on like this. What do you think the media will say if they find out you’re here in the backwoods, living like a heathen?”
“Mr. Lennox,” Susannah cut in, “Chapel Ridge is a small town, certainly nothing that would create some media firestorm for anyone on vacation. And I can’t believe the jewelry store can’t live without Kane for a few days.”
A smirk took over Elliott’s face. “Is that what you’ve told people around here? That you work in a jewelry store?” He took a step away from his son and toward Susannah. “Don’t you know who he is?”
Kane’s eyes narrowed. “Don�
��t.”
“This man is Kane Lennox, of the Lennox Gem—”
“I’m warning you.”
“Corporation,” Elliott went on, ignoring his son. “He is one of the richest men in the world, CEO of one of the biggest companies in the world. That is, if I and the rest of the board don’t decide to fire him for this little embarrassment he put us through.” Elliott waved at her as if she alone comprised the embarrassment he mentioned.
Then the sentences began to assemble in Susannah’s mind. Kane Lennox. CEO. Lennox Gem Corporation.
One of the Lennoxes.
Not a jewelry store worker at all.
Susannah’s jaw dropped and she stared at Kane, who started to voice an explanation, then stopped when he read her expression. The words added up, one at a time, building blocks suddenly forming into a recognizable shape. Everything Kane had said over the last few days. All the half-truths he’d told, the way he’d acted, the way he’d seemed out of place.
And then his offer—
His offer to put her up in an apartment in New York. His “vacation dalliance,” taken back home to the big city. As what, his mistress? While he married some society beauty, someone who would help him expand his corporate reach?
“You…you bastard,” she said, the betrayal hitting hard, slicing through her heart. “How could you?”
“Susannah, I have an explanation.”
“You lied to me. Everything you said was a lie.”
“Not everything, no.”
“Oh, did he tell you he loved you? Or make you some ridiculous promise?” Elliott said, then snorted. “Please, Kane, don’t toy with people like that. Let this poor woman be. She’d never fit in with your life and you know it.” Elliott crossed to the limo and opened the door. “I’m getting back in the car. If you were smart, you would, too.”
Elliott did as he said, leaving the limo door open. Waiting for Kane and his decision. Go back to New York, leaving Susannah behind. And forget this silly vacation dalliance forever.
