A Sweetheart For The Single Dad (The Camdens Of Colorado Book 8)

by Victoria Pade

  He also didn’t want the underlying desperation he’d felt all through last night and this morning. That urgency that made him feel as though he had to maximize every minute they had together and burn every word she said, every vision of her, every kiss, every touch, into his memory to have something of her, of being with her, to hold on to until the next time.

  If there was a next time.

  That was also something he’d been worrying about since he’d left her this morning. They were just supposed to take it step by step without any guarantee that once one step was taken, there would be another.

  But what else could they do?

  He hadn’t known what he’d expected going into last night. He’d known there was nothing Lindie could say to convince him to accept Camden Incorporated as a client. Or to convince him to stop exposing the downside of their stores coming in. But he’d also hated the idea that once that matter was settled they would go their separate ways and never have anything to do with each other again.

  So he’d asked where his rejection of her offer left them. As if she might have some solution.

  But she hadn’t. Saying they should just go one step at a time wasn’t a solution to him. And certainly following her into her bedroom hadn’t been.

  It had just been what they’d both wanted.

  But now they’d had that and he still wanted her—physically and in every other way.

  God help him, he still wanted her so much that he knew this was no passing thing. No lark. This was serious.

  But it shouldn’t be.

  She wasn’t a demanding diva drama queen like the women he’d been drawn to in his first forays into relationships. Honestly, that had been a pleasant surprise, given that she was a Camden. But she also wasn’t like his easygoing, undemanding, obliging mother, either. She wasn’t someone uncomplicated who would give him the kind of marriage his parents had. She was stubborn and headstrong and determined.

  From the very beginning, that first Thursday at the center, when he’d caught her buying candy for the Murphys, she’d done what she’d set out to do regardless of his disapproval.

  Then with the Murphys again at the hospital—if he hadn’t threatened to send her home in a cab, if she hadn’t been weak and drugged, he doubted he would have been able to keep her from taking those girls home with her that night.

  There was also Harm and her idea to get him listed as a provider on Camden Superstore’s dental insurance. He’d glossed over the suggestion when she’d initially made it but she’d just gone ahead and done it without so much as letting him know she was going to.

  No, none of it had been selfish or self-serving—it had all been selfless and generous of her. But it sure as hell wouldn’t make his life easy if she was an intricate part of it and still went around doing whatever she wanted whether he liked it or not.

  Which put her somewhere in between the demanding diva drama queens he knew to stay away from, and what he believed would provide him with a relationship that could have a good give-and-take and a happy, harmonious run.

  On the other hand, he realized as he sailed along the interstate, Lindie’s stubbornness and willfulness was exposed mainly when she was focused on fixing things. Otherwise nothing he’d challenged her to, nothing he’d thrown at her when it came to pitching in at the community center, had shaken her or caused her to dig in her heels. She’d been a good sport. She’d worked as hard as he had, as hard as everyone else had—that was something he did want in a life partner.

  And, dammit all, she really did care.

  Again, because of who she was, he’d figured she wouldn’t. But she did.

  And she let him know it.

  So really, he realized, he didn’t have to worry about her not being up front about things—the way it had been with the last three women in his life. And maybe if that left him dealing with more drama or conflict than his father got from his mother, he’d take that—and whatever minor disharmony might come out of it—as a trade-off. Because the more he thought about it, he decided that he would rather contend with the occasional disagreement than worry that Lindie was suppressing her true feelings or going along with things she didn’t really want.

  At least he’d end up knowing what she was being stubborn or headstrong about so he could deal with whatever he needed to.

  And, sure, while there was no doubt that Lindie got carried away before thinking things through—as with her willingness to take in the Murphy girls—he had to admit that he liked that she was so tenderhearted. He admired that in her. It was something else he hadn’t expected of a Camden.

  There were a lot of things he admired about her...

  He liked the way she’d devised the plan to send a free meal home to those in need without it seeming like charity. And to even teach the kids the skill of cooking in the process and the importance—and satisfaction—of helping out parents who were overworked.

  He liked the way she’d handled Eric and Tyler’s obvious crushes on her—using their attempts to impress her to get them to work all the harder, to contribute in ways they might not have otherwise.

  Plus, she was beautiful and sweet and kind and funny and smart and accomplished. She was strong and secure. She stood up for herself. And she was sexy as hell.

  It was no wonder he was in as deep as he was.

  But that still didn’t change the other complications. The even bigger issue of who she was, he reminded himself as he drove.

  Being involved with a Camden would not please his clients.

  He could probably weather some of the displeasure and spin a connection with a Camden as a way for him to get some inside information that he could use for their benefit. But he was still likely to lose one or two of them. And maybe one or two of the people who worked for him, too.

  So certainly getting involved with Lindie wasn’t a good business move.

  But this wasn’t about business for him. And he’d meant what he’d told his father—his job couldn’t be his whole life. He had a right to more.

  And if he weighed the loss of a couple of clients, of any amount of his business, against having—or not having—Lindie? Having her won out.

  But there was still his dad.

  His father was only marginally supportive of the idea of this relationship. He’d let Sawyer know he was wary. And Sawyer was sure that any connection with a Camden would be a reminder to his dad of the lousy thing the Camdens had once done to him.

  He wasn’t thrilled to be the one to bring that reminder home.

  Plus there was her family.

  The Camdens weren’t getting what they wanted from him—for him to cease and desist his protests against their opening new stores, for him to work for them rather than against them. He was still going to be their adversary. How would it be if he was an enemy in their midst? Or would he not be allowed in their midst at all? Lindie was clearly close to her family. Would she end things with him to avoid their disapproval?

  He took a deep breath, then blew it out slowly, feeling a wave of defeat because those things were all true and none of them paved the way for him to be with Lindie or for her to be with him.

  So even though he’d worked out that she actually might be the right kind of woman for him, the answer to how he could have her and the future he wanted was that he still couldn’t.

  But he wanted her.

  More now as he got off the highway, as he neared where he could turn to get to his own loft or keep going toward Cherry Creek to get to her house.

  To her.

  Something in him just couldn’t let go of the idea of getting to her. Of being with her. Again and for more than just another night.

  So much more than that. That’s what he had to have; he knew it with sudden and clear certainty.

  He had to have forever.

  Oh, yeah, it was definitely serious.

  He was head over heels for her.

  It was there in him, just waiting to be recognized, and now he did.

 
He not only wanted her, he wanted what his parents had—with her. The kind of love and caring and closeness. The kind of companionship. The kind of long life together through good times and bad.

  “On an island where there would only be the two of us?” he asked himself out loud, facetiously.

  But Lindie wasn’t the only one with a streak of headstrong stubbornness. He had to admit that he had a pretty strong dose of it, too. And now that he’d found Lindie, he couldn’t not have her because of things that were outside of them. Not when what they had when they were alone, what they shared, was so damn terrific. Not when it was everything he’d been looking for his whole damn life.

  His dad might have reservations, but by the end of their conversation he had accepted the idea that Sawyer might be getting involved with a Camden. And Sawyer knew his parents; he knew that they would never treat Lindie rudely or badly if he brought her around.

  Plus he had faith that they would warm up to her when they got to know her the way he had, when they learned what kind of person she really was. They would grow to like her, to love her, to accept her. And maybe then to forget about her being a Camden.

  But he was going to continue being Camden Incorporated’s opponent.

  What was he going to do about that? he asked himself as he drove past the turnoff into the heart of Denver and headed farther along Spear Boulevard toward Lindie’s house.

  There wasn’t a fix for his continuing to oppose Camden Inc.

  Which stood to reason, he decided, because if there was any solution beyond him taking them on as a client Lindie-the-fixer would have come up with it. And she hadn’t.

  But maybe if it couldn’t be fixed, they could still navigate it. Or just live with it.

  If she was willing.

  He knew it might be asking a lot of her—to let him into her life when he might not be let into her family.

  But it was still something he knew he had to ask. Because he couldn’t refuse himself the best thing he’d ever found.

  The person who had somehow come to mean every bit as much to him as his son did.

  There was no way he could refuse himself Lindie just because all the pieces didn’t quite fit.

  He just wanted—needed—her too much to let anything stand in his way.

  * * *

  As Lindie drove home from her grandmother’s weekly dinner she was glad to have Sunday over with. For a day that had started out so well, it had definitely turned sour.

  In Sawyer’s arms. In the shower with him. Making love. That had all been such a good beginning to the day.

  Just thinking about it helped for the fleeting moment that she let herself relive it.

  But then she remembered that at the end of that shower, when it had seemed as if they might have a little more time in bed together, Lang had called to say he was on his way over.

  Instantly that had meant no more time in bed together. No more lovemaking. Not even a long, lingering goodbye with promises of phone calls or arrangements to see each other later. Instead she’d had to basically shove Sawyer out the door because she hadn’t wanted his car to even be on her block when her brother got there.

  Just one quick kiss and he was gone. Literally only minutes before Lang arrived.

  Lang, who was followed by Dane, so that they could both tell her the latest news from Idaho. Sawyer was gaining so much ground in his campaign against them that the development team that had initially approached them about building a superstore was now having second thoughts. They were considering pulling their support and siding with the naysayers.

  If they did that, Camden Inc. could be looking at costly court battles and delays required to fight their way in now that land had been bought, money invested and contracts in place.

  Her brothers had insisted she do something to stop Huffman Consulting through Sawyer.

  Do I tell them now or later? Lindie had asked herself.

  Then she’d decided to let them know that there was nothing she could do. That Sawyer had given her his final decision on Saturday night and would not take them on as a client or stop his efforts against them.

  From there word had traveled within the family and by the time she’d walked into GiGi’s house for Sunday dinner everyone knew. And everyone wanted to talk to her about it. To make sure she’d pointed out this or told Sawyer that. To suggest other tactics that might be taken.

  And while it was clear that Sawyer was who they were upset with, while no one was angry with her, it still weighed heavily on her that the family fixer had failed to fix the family’s biggest problem.

  It was enough to make her feel terrible on its own. She had always viewed problems from all angles until she could find a solution. Or hammered at them until she could break the problem down into manageable pieces.

  But this time? There was no solution and the problem couldn’t be managed.

  And to top it off, she’d literally been in bed with the man who was responsible for her failure and for their current and future business problems.

  That knowledge brought with it an unbearable guilt and an even more overwhelming sense of disloyalty than she’d had before. It also made her worry about what reaction she might face if anyone ever found out just how far things had gone between her and Sawyer personally. Would they think she’d crossed over to his side and actually done something against them all?

  It was just awful. And everything put together led her to feel as if she had no choice but to never see Sawyer again—let alone sleep with him again.

  The thought of never seeing him again—or sleeping with him again—had bottomed out her mood completely and turned a day that had begun great into a mess.

  She was definitely glad it was over.

  Although she still felt completely rotten about everything.

  Maybe some sleep would help. She didn’t know how it would help, but she did know that she was exhausted and overstressed and she just wanted to climb into her bed, pull the covers over her head and stay there for at least the next twelve hours.

  But that wasn’t going to happen because when she turned onto her street she saw Sawyer’s SUV parked in front of her house. With him sitting behind the wheel waiting for her.

  How was it possible to feel so good and so bad at once?

  Take away everything else, everyone else, and Sawyer was exactly who she wanted to have waiting for her to get home. He was who a part of her had been secretly longing for since the minute he’d left this morning. He was who her body ached to be up against again.

  So seeing him there waiting for her was good.

  But recalling where the rest of this day had gone, how disappointed her family was that she hadn’t succeeded in getting him to work for them or in no longer opposing them, how embarrassing it was that she was the only one of them so far not to have found a way to make amends, and having to face the fact that she really did think she had to tell Sawyer they couldn’t go on seeing each other was bad.

  All bad.

  All very, very bad.

  She pulled into her driveway and turned off the engine, getting out of her car as Sawyer got out of his.

  He looked so much cheerier and more energized than she felt. And so great even in just jeans and a heather-gray T-shirt.

  She wanted to walk right into his arms, to lay her head to that powerful chest and let him be the wall that blocked out the rest of the world.

  But all she did was smile faintly and say, “Hi, stranger,” as they met at the bottom of the three steps leading to her front door.

  He glanced up and down her street. “Is the coast clear?”

  “It had better be since you’re here,” she answered as she unlocked her door and led him inside.

  Her dogs greeted them both enthusiastically. When they’d calmed down and allowed Lindie and Sawyer farther into the entryway, Sawyer said, “Rough day or did I just not let you sleep enough last night?”

  Apparently he’d heard the weariness in her voice.

  “R
ough day,” she answered.

  She slipped her purse off her shoulder and set it on the table beside the door, putting her hands in the pockets of her tan jumpsuit to keep from reaching for him.

  “I hope yours was better,” she said, motioning for them to go the living room and trying not to think about their last time on that couch.

  “Well, I wasn’t the best dad I’ve ever been today,” he confessed. “I think I sort of shortchanged Sam because it was you I really wanted to be with.”

  “Poor Sam.”

  “I don’t think he noticed. To distract him, I went a little overboard and bought him some robot-thing he’s been asking for. After that he really didn’t want me to bother him so he could play with it. It was mostly just that I felt like I wasn’t being the best dad...” He shrugged. “But because it was you who was on my mind, it led me to some revelations as I drove back here after dropping him off, and I wanted to talk to you about them.”

  “Wow, revelations,” she repeated, knowing—because it felt so wonderful, so right—that she shouldn’t let him take her hand when he did.

  “One thing I wanted to tell you that isn’t a revelation is that because of what you did getting Harm on your dental insurance he’s decided to give his practice six more months to pick up rather than look for a buyer now.”

  “Because he’s hoping to get a better price for it later or because if business picks up he won’t move Sam to Vermont?”

  “That was unclear,” Sawyer admitted. “But for now I’ll just hope if business picks up they’ll stay. Regardless, I’ll be glad for another six months with my kid close by.”

  “It’s not a lot but I guess it’s something,” she said, thinking that it was such a small win it didn’t really count.

  “It’s something I appreciate,” he said, squeezing her hand.

  “And then the revelation you had was that my ideas might be better than you thought and you decided to take on Camden Inc. as a client, after all?” she said, pretending hope she didn’t feel.

  “That conversation is over, remember?” he reminded gently. “No, what came as a revelation was that taking things a step at a time is not going to do it for me because I want to have a whole lot more of you than that.”