She’d crack the family in two and force Lucy and Tom to take sides. And she didn’t want that. She liked Tom, she wanted his good opinion, and she was sure to lose that if Tom’s best friend refused to break bread with her.
And, sooner or later, Diana would find out.
She began to understand, dimly, the core of Lucy’s concern.
Richard held all the winning cards. She’d leave in a matter of weeks; she had only this short time to rebuild her relationships with her family. One thing she’d learned with Cam was that an estrangement, once begun, had a life of its own. She couldn’t rely on Richard to cauterize the wounds their words had inflicted on each other, because he had too much to gain. He needed protection against the attraction shimmering between them, far more than she, and time was on his side. All he had to do was wait her out, and he could go back to the life he’d built, safe from her, from the dangers she’d brought with her.
She reminded him. Of Diana. Of Francie.
And like them, she wanted him.
She closed her eyes.
It lay there, a darkness in her heart. No longer the shining, romantic infatuation of young Laura, dazzled by the laughing young man who’d taught her to dance one long-ago summer. Ah, Richard of the charming smile, the easy word, the kind gesture to heal a hurt young girl’s heart!
And now Richard, quiet, cold, devastated by the mysterious rift in his marriage.
And Laura St. Bride, not a shy teenager any longer, but a woman responding to the man he had become, dancing in his arms and dreaming of the touch of his hands.
A sudden thought slammed into her, and Max yowled in protest as she straightened.
The night she’d come back, Richard had seemed genuinely happy to see her. He had comforted her, teased her, brought her up to date – and all the while, he’d scarcely mentioned Diana. She remembered her impression that he was a widower at heart, that Diana no longer claimed him.
But all that ease had vanished as soon as he asked her to dance and she stepped into his arms.
As soon as they stepped from old friends to man and woman.
A shield, Laura thought in wonder. He’s using Diana as a shield.
And had Lucy sensed that? Lucy, who knew Richard so well. Now, alone, in the middle of the night, she read Lucy’s mind as she had not earlier: that a one-sided infatuation held no inherent dangers, but this attraction lay on both sides.
But of course he wanted her, Lucy had said. She reminded him of Diana.
Laura stared down at her hands, her left curled around her cat, her right stroking his fur, and concentrated her choices. The left – safety, her sisters’ goodwill, Tom’s approval, a chance to heal the wounds of her disappearance. A return to Laura Abbott. And the right – and she allowed herself to savor the lush fullness of Max’s fur against her fingers – on the right, beckoning, the unknown darkness of Richard Ashmore, and a memory of her body against the heart of a man who wanted her and rejected the wanting.
Either/or. Lucy had made it plain that she could not have both.
She smiled down through the night at her cat, and continued to run her right hand along his spine.
~•~
Laura planned her approach carefully. Twelve years of living with Cameron St. Bride had taught her the value of strategic planning.
Her timing should be well nigh impeccable. Unless Richard’s habits had changed as much as his personality, he was still an early riser, and she remembered enough of country living to know that he’d have chores around the estate before he left for his office. The presence of his Lexus, standing in the circular drive in front of the Folly, proved her right; she backed in smoothly and blocked his way out.
She smoothed her hair down as she approached the door. She’d taken special care with her appearance that morning. Richard had relaxed around her when she appeared the most like Laura Abbott, the least like Cat Courtney, so maybe he’d respond to the jeans and camp shirt and Alice in Wonderland hair band.
Or maybe he’d kick her right off Ashmore Park the moment he realized she’d hacked the code for the security gates.
Laura breathed in deeply, squared her shoulders, and lifted her hand to the door knocker.
He opened the door before she had to knock twice, and for a second she simply stared at him. The doorstep sat below the threshold, so that he loomed over her and knocked all her purpose clean out of her mind. She thought, with the part of her mind that wasn’t scrambling to remember why she’d come, that he looked tired and ill. His eyes were creased with exhaustion, the silver glints at his temples picked up by the blossoming morning sun. He looked remote and not at all happy to see her.
He broke her paralysis with a sneeze.
“Laura.” Even the sound of her name gave him away; his voice held the faint nasal tone of a cold that refused to give up and go away. “What are you doing here?”
Unwelcoming, but she’d expected it. “I came to talk to you,” she said over the punctuation of another sneeze. She felt her confidence rising. She’d cared for Cam when he was ill, and even if Richard matched him in sheer bloody-minded irritability, he couldn’t possibly be a bigger baby. “May I come in?”
“What? Oh, of course. Sorry.” He stood aside as she entered but made no move to shut the door behind her. He continued to stare at her; maybe she’d overdone it with the Alice hair band. “How did you get in? I didn’t hear you buzz from the gate.”
She laughed to put herself at ease. “I hacked your password, that’s how. Your birthday? Piece of cake.”
Reluctant admiration flitted across his face. “It used to be Julie’s,” he admitted. “I suppose this comes from being married to a computer guru? Did he hack his way into the Pentagon?” He heard his words. “Sorry. I didn’t mean that.”
“No.” She was careful not to let her relief show. “He was too conservative for that.” She slipped her shoulder bag strap down her arm and let her purse drop on a small Chippendale table beneath a hall mirror. “How is Julie? Did you catch her cold?”
“She’s fine, and yes, I did.” He didn’t shift his eyes from her, even as she placed her keys on the table beside her purse, taking care not to mar the polished surface of the old wood. She used the mirror to adjust the hair band, putting off the confrontation for another minute.
He appeared in the mirror behind her, and their images, hers superimposed over his, carved away at Laura’s resolve. Oh, God, it stretched there again between them, that taut, vibrating string of attraction. She didn’t want to see it, not after a sleepless night of coming to terms with herself. Richard’s eyes met hers in the mirror, and she saw the embers of anger still burning beneath the surface politeness.
Lucy had been right. In fury too often bloomed the seeds of desire.
Laura said quickly, “Are you okay?”
“No.” His honesty surprised her. “My head is splitting. I’ve got a presentation in Charleston tomorrow, so I’m eating aspirin and working at home to get over this.” He waved a hand out towards the main part of the house. “Is there something I can do for you, Laura?”
The moment of truth. And how like Richard to maintain those cool, exquisite manners, when he so clearly wanted her out of his house and out of his sight. She turned around to face him, as she would have faced a hostile critic, and found that he stood close to her, violating her space.
Deliberately, too. She saw that in his face.
“Yes,” she said clearly. “You can let me apologize.”
He’d braced for another frontal attack, she saw, and her words had ambushed him from the rear. Try as he might, he couldn’t disguise his surprise.
Swiftly, Laura moved to press home her advantage.
“I don’t want us to be enemies, Richard.” Now that she’d started, she felt confident. He was just another audience, after all, the most important she ever remembered, but to be wooed and won like any other. “I pushed too hard last week, and I apologize. I said—” and here she let her voice falter, ever s
o slightly, to convey vulnerability, “I said some unforgivable things, and I’m sorry—”
“In other words,” said Richard bluntly, staring her straight down, “Lucy’s talked to you.”
“Yes, she did.” So, blast him, he was going to be stubborn and bloody-minded, holding her off with every resource he possessed. She must pose more of a threat than she had dreamed. “You don’t know me very well, Richard, or you’d know that Lucy’s influence goes only so far. I don’t roll over and play dead for anyone.” Oh, please, that’s all you do. “But I see her point. We have to get along because—”
“Because otherwise Lucy can’t have her grand family reunion dinner,” interrupted Richard again, and folded his arms with an air of real impatience.
Where had his famous manners gone? He’d come too close now; she fought off the intimidation of his height. A dozen retorts flooded into her mind, a dozen light-hearted threats to carry out if he didn’t stop interrupting her, but she stopped before they ever reached her lips. He wanted that, he wanted her to laugh, make him laugh; he wanted a superficial end to their quarrel, so they could retreat forever to their old relationship.
The last thing in the world he wanted between them was honesty.
She said softly, “No, not for that. I’ve no desire to cause one of those Southern feuds that go on for generations, and I’ll do what I have to do to patch this up. But not because it spoils Lucy’s seating arrangements for family dinners. My reasons are much more selfish than that.”
She’d caught his attention now; she held the string of desire in her hands, drawing it into a cat’s cradle. He was paying attention to her; he couldn’t divine her intentions. She saw the recognition of that in his face, and a cautious respect.
Good. You’re finally listening to me.
“First,” said Laura before the steady gaze of his eyes robbed her of her resolve, “I want to see my niece. I’ll behave myself, Richard, you needn’t worry about that. I won’t say a word about you and Di, and I won’t talk about Francie. I won’t promise never to mention her, she was important to me, but you can rest assured I won’t discuss your relationship with her.”
Richard settled back, seemingly to relax, but they both read it for the partial concession it was. He said mildly, “I don’t mind you seeing Julie. I’ve said that all along. She wants to meet you – in fact, she should be in from the stables any minute now, if you care to wait.” He inclined his head towards the next room. “Shall we go have a seat while you set forth the rest of the terms of my surrender?”
With that one decisive stroke, he stripped her of her advantage. She cursed herself even as she stared at him.
He said gently, “That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? You came back to Virginia to settle things, and I stand in your way. Very well, Laura, I don’t think you’ll be denied. What else do you want?”
Oh, Richard, you stand there, so confident that I’ll never bring it out in the open between us. You know me of old, you know I’d rather die than tell you how I feel about you. And you’ll never speak, because I’m too dangerous. I’m the one woman in the world you mustn’t feel anything for.
He had gone ahead of her, stepping down into the living area, so confident that she would follow his lead that he could comfortably turn his back on her.
She held caution in her hands, a fragile vessel of old, and in one second she dashed it to the ground and shattered it into a thousand glittering pieces.
She smiled at his back and pitched her voice low and husky. “You’re right, Richard. I came back to settle unfinished business.” She counted off two beats. “Like you.”
He stopped then, and slowly, very slowly, he turned around.
She stopped then. The wariness of his face warned her away, warned her that she’d gone too far again. She saw that he wanted nothing to do with her, that given his choice he’d rip apart the gossamer attraction shimmering between them. In her direction lay all the perils of desire, all the threat of pain.
She saw, too, that he would do nothing to stop her.
For that one moment, he stood open to her.
You remind him of Diana.
She couldn’t do it to him. This man needed badly to be brought to his knees, but she had lost the heart to do it. She wanted him, and he wanted her (or the ghost he saw in her), but she had loved him too much to use it against him.
She gave up.
“I want to stop fighting with you.” To her ears, she sounded subdued and defeated. “We used to be friends, Richard. Can’t we be again?”
“Of course.”
His voice had lightened in his triumph; he was a kind victor. And why shouldn’t he be gracious, crossing the entry way to her, reaching out for her hands? He’d won. She had defeated herself; he knew she’d never approach him again.
Numbly, she accepted the tender of peace on his terms.
“Apology accepted,” he said. “And I apologize too, Laura. Diana’s your sister, and you’re right to care about her, and equally right to blame me. God knows, if anything had happened to you, I certainly would have held your husband accountable.” He still held her hands, lightly, impersonally, too much the friendly brother. “Let’s put this behind us.”
No, Laura thought resentfully, letting him guide her down into the main living area, let’s not. And I thought Lucy was manipulative.
One last skirmish before she surrendered. She had strength enough to last her for that.
She said pleasantly, “Tell me, Richard. Do women always fall into line so easily? Or am I just a special case?” She tasted satisfaction as he turned around sharply. “I’m properly penitent, and frankly I plan to stay that way. Lucy’s made it clear that I have a lot to lose if I don’t. That works out well for you, doesn’t it?”
For a moment, his mask dropped. She saw a flare in his eyes, not quite anger – in the old days, even two weeks ago, she might have thought it a certain rueful admiration.
For a moment, they stood as equals.
“Yes,” he said, “it does. Be very clear in your mind, Laura. I will do whatever it takes to protect my daughter and myself from the past. And you, darling,” he touched her cheek, “you’re the past.”
And with that, he broke her.
Chapter 13: Girl, Eavesdropping
RICHARD INVITED HER TO WAIT FOR JULIE, but her niece did not appear as expected. Laura spent a few fruitless minutes alone in the enormous great room, flipping blindly through a magazine, while Richard retreated to his office in the corner and rang the line out in the stables.
“She must have taken one of the horses out,” he said. “She often rides in the morning. Do you want to go out there? You know the way, or I can take you.”
“No, thank you.” Not even to escape Richard was she going to exile herself out to the stables. “I know you’ve got work to do. Why don’t I just explore on my own, and you get on with what you need to do? I haven’t seen the house yet.”
She expected him to forestall her – surely, after all that had passed between them, he did not want her roaming through his house – but to her surprise, he merely nodded, sat down at a massive desk, and turned to his computer.
Why shouldn’t he trust her, though? Laura Abbott had proved tractable enough. He knew he could control her.
As soon as Richard looked sufficiently engrossed in his work, Laura rose to explore his fortress.
She went first to the music room, separated from the great room by the etched glass wall that she had glimpsed the night she had sat by the trees and watched them. Be honest, stalked them. Julie’s baby grand sat in the middle of the room, its black lacquer gleaming in the light from the atrium doors. In the corner of the room stood a concert harp. Laura raised her eyebrows. That was a new instrument for the Abbotts.
The music room connected through French doors to a huge library with a staircase leading to the second floor, through another set of French doors to the entrance hall, and across that to a formal dining room. As soon as she
saw it, Laura knew instantly where her call had ended up on Christmas Day. This, not the dining room at the old house, must have been the scene for the traditional Christmas dinner. What a gorgeous room – a trompe l’oeil mural on the one long wall, opposite a panoramic window, gleaming formal table, the old Ashmore china and crystal in the china cabinet. The chandelier spilled light over the center of the table, perfectly situated to catch the reflection from the marble fireplace on the far wall.
She’d loved her dining room in Plano, but this cast it into the shade.
Still, it seemed very formal for a single father and his daughter. Maybe he entertained a lot.
She stepped through the doorway into the kitchen, and now she was frankly envious. This was the kitchen she’d wanted in her house, and Cam had kept promising that they would get around to remodeling, but they never had. Terry would consider that he’d died and gone to heaven. Huge, with beautiful gray cabinetry, lighter gray granite tops, gleaming copper pots and pans hung on racks above a stove, an enormous island, all the built-ins, including a subzero large enough to live in, a butler’s pantry that went on forever, a staircase that led to the second floor, a long oak table and chairs – when she bought a house, she was going to have a kitchen just like this, even if she had to tear down the rest of the house to get it. She’d have to steal Richard’s plans.
Maybe she should hire him to design it for her.
No wonder he had girlfriends. Any woman who saw this would fall in love just for the kitchen. But no, Lucy had said that he never brought his lady friends to the house.
Even the utility room – this was a room designed around what it actually took to run a home. She’d never been able to get Cam to understand why she wanted a mud room, or a separate area for laying out sweaters so that they could dry flat. But this house had it all.
All Who Are Lost (Ashmore's Folly Book 1) Page 27
