A Conflict of Interest (8 page)

“You’ve helped me before. And Mom. Let me help you.”

“No. Thanks for offering, Bryony. And for calling. I needed to hear you believed in me.”

“I always will. I’d better go. I think I smell smoke from the kitchen. Happy Thanksgiving.”

Her favorite holiday. A day for family—or for lovers, she thought, with memories of Jake dancing in her mind’s eye. Thinking of him only made her feel uncertain. They’d both used his daughter as a barrier to feelings that felt untimely and impossible. It was no way to act about family.

“I love you, Bryony.”

“Yeah?” They hadn’t said those words much as children. Maria had tried to change that after she left for college. It still didn’t come easily to Bryony. “I love you, too,” she said. “Keep fighting.”

“I am.”

She went back to her dinner with a happier heart. She even turned on the Macy’s parade in time to see Underdog taking to the sky. If a beagle in a cape could be a superhero, she could at least find the power to make a living until she got her career back.

“I
HAVE ENOUGH
for both of us, Leila. Please come home for Thanksgiving dinner.” Jake waited, hearing only silence amidst the static on his cell. He’d invited Leila to dinner at regular intervals for over a week. She’d ignored his calls and the cards he’d slipped into her mailbox and inside the screen door of her rented town house.

Just as he pulled the phone away, she spoke up. “Stop calling me, Dad. I don’t want to talk to you.”

“It’s a special day. Can’t we call a truce?”

“No.”

“I don’t want you to be alone.”

“I’m with my roommates, my friends. They’re more
my family than you and Mom ever were. They don’t keep secrets.”

“Maybe we were wrong, but I’ll talk to you about anything now.”

“Has it occurred to you that Maria’s living without any pay? She still has office rent and a house payment and probably malpractice insurance. It’s the end of the month.”

“I’m sure she has savings, Leila.” He said it so casually because he was so damn concerned he might be wrong.

“She’s barely in her thirties, and she doesn’t charge nearly what the other therapists in town do. I know.”

“I didn’t start the investigation, and I can’t try to stop it. Even if I did, I’d make more trouble for her.” Especially after the library dance.

“Maybe,” his daughter said, considering.

He allowed himself a silent fist pump. Anytime she didn’t immediately reject every word out of his mouth was a triumph.

“I still don’t understand why you didn’t talk to me first. Even if you’d wanted me to respect your privacy, you’re covered by my insurance while you’re in college. You could have gone to any doctor.”

“Dad, you’re a clod. I kept on seeing Maria, not because she was cut-rate, but because she helped me. She’s helped a lot of people, kids I know, too, without doing anything inappropriate. She deserves more support from her clients and from the people who hold the power in this town. She’s only lived here for two years, and I know she’s done a lot of work on her house. How much could she have saved?”

“What do you want me to do, Leila?”

“Maybe you should take her that Thanksgiving dinner.”

She hung up on him before he could answer.

“Are you kidding?” he asked his dead phone.

But maybe she made sense. Maybe Leila had just given him an excuse. He hadn’t called Maria since the fundraiser. He’d felt embarrassed. She’d been angry, thinking he was seducing her to get answers to Leila’s problems. True, he’d been grateful to get her help, but he’d touched her because he couldn’t go another second holding her close and not giving in to long-suppressed need.

As he repacked the dinner he’d bought for himself and Leila, he admitted he wanted to see Maria again. And maybe Leila would give him points when he showed up at her house, covered in giblets, to report Maria had thrown their dinner back in his face.

After he packed everything inside the warming bag the store had given him, he somehow had cranberry sauce and yeast rolls left over. Instead of trying to work the Rubik’s Cube puzzle of wedging them in, he took a plastic bag and tossed the sauce and bread inside.

Just before he left, he grabbed a bottle of brandy for his aunt who lived close to Maria. He took her brandy every year for the holidays. She had a heart condition and she could only tipple a little, so she made the bottle stretch.

In the car, he had to turn on the radio to drown out the warning voices that shouted he might be asking Maria to douse him in gravy. He wouldn’t even blame her if she wreaked a little havoc. He deserved it for making a spectacle of her in front of half the town.
Maybe letting her assault him with his store-bought dinner would be penance enough to prove he couldn’t help wanting her.

He drove past Leila’s town house. So many cars were nosed into the parking lot that the sheriff and all his deputies would be kept busy writing tickets all day. At least she wasn’t alone.

His aunt Helen wasn’t home when he knocked on her door. Often, she and her cronies met for the holidays. At an age where several had lost spouses, and many of their children had left Honesty for more cosmopolitan pastures, they kept one another company.

Maybe making sure Maria didn’t spend today alone might not be such a farfetched idea. He left the brandy in Helen’s mailbox with a note then drove down the street to Maria’s little green house.

Her yard was tidy, her paint fresh. He stared at the windows that looked like made-up eyes with their diaphanous curtains and drapes.

Her home welcomed him, even if she might not. Two years ago, this house had been a run-down blight in Helen’s neighborhood. After it had been sold, but long before he’d learned Maria was the new owner, he’d driven past this place with growing envy.

She’d transformed it into a home. Cozy and warm—and probably closed to him.

He grabbed the dinner stuff from the backseat and headed up the sidewalk, his heart beating like a kid’s on his first date. Not giving himself time to think about right or wrong, he punched the small, glowing doorbell.

The curtain nearest the door flickered. Then nothing happened.

He could ring again, or stand here like a neon “I’m the guy who made a fool of himself with the woman who lives here” sign. As if she saw it that way, too, Maria snatched the door open. She grabbed his bread bag arm and yanked him inside.

He stumbled into a wide family room, glimpsing scarred wooden floors and a few pieces of expensive chintz, overstuffed furniture.

“What are you doing here?” Maria asked. “Aren’t people talking about me enough?”

“I could be a good cover for you.”

“That’s a hell of a thing to say after the other night—” She broke off as he grinned. “You’re joking.”

Nodding, he glanced toward the door. “I am. But maybe I should park my car in your garage. Or at my aunt’s down the street.”

“Helen’s your aunt?”

The change of subject was almost too easy. He couldn’t have managed it better if he’d done it with a plan. “You know her?”

“With the dogs?” Helen’s Afghan wolfhounds were more like hooligan teenagers. “I didn’t put your names together,” Maria said. “You ought to walk those dogs for her.”

“I’ve tried to get her to take them to obedience school. To her, they’re just ‘rowdy, delightful children,’ and she can’t admit the truth even to get help.”

“They’re a menace. She’s pretty fragile, you know.”

“I’ve warned her they’ll break her hip one day.”

“How subtle of you. I can’t imagine why she didn’t take your advice.” Maria looked at the bags. “What’s that?”

“Dinner.” He sniffed. Hers smelled a lot better than the victuals he’d paid for. “But you don’t need any, do you?”

“Why would you bring me dinner?” Pale color stained her cheeks. “You don’t think the other night meant anything?”

He stared at her slightly open, shiny, moist lips. Maybe he could make her take that back.

“We’ve already established I don’t pretend for the sake of politeness,” he said. “It meant plenty, and you should admit it.”

“Kissing you was a mistake.”

“You wanted more than kissing,” he said, restless, looking for a place to set his bags. “So did I. I’ve thought about it every night since. And most of every day. Not even Leila could call me detached at this point.”

Maria ducked her head. She clasped her hands in front of her and, when he wanted to demand she face him to admit she cared as much as he, she squared her shoulders and obviously faced her demons. “You should leave.”

He clearly cared more. “Maybe we could share our food,” he said, trying to be kind. “Yours smells better than mine.”

“Please tell me this isn’t about your daughter.”

“Please stop assuming I’d treat you like that. Leila did suggest I owed you dinner, but I think she meant I owed you more.”

“You came because she told you to?” She folded her arms but then let them drop. A slow smile curved her lips. “Wait. You actually spoke to her?”

“You sound glad.” Fortunately, his hands were still full of dinner, so he couldn’t touch her. They might have ended up anywhere but at a table. “You make me think I might not be foolish to hope she’ll give me another chance.”

“You must have offered her dinner, and she turned you down?”

He nodded. “I’m being honest. Does that count for anything?”

“Did you bring pie?”

“I ordered it with the rest of this,” he said, laughing, falling a little in love with the light in her green eyes. “I don’t remember what kind I asked for.”

Maria sighed and ran her hands down the curve of her hips. He nearly dropped Thanksgiving dinner on her floor. “I like it all,” she said, as if that were a bad thing.

He maneuvered both bags under his left arm then put out his right hand. “Truce?” he asked, feeling betrayed by his own husky tone.

She hesitated, a pulse throbbing at the pressure point in her throat. “Truce,” she said, her whisper pure seduction.

She turned in front of him without shaking his hand. He let out a breath. If he didn’t lose his job and his sanity over this, he’d be the luckiest man alive. He’d been so sure—of everything—all his life. How had he lost his way the moment he’d first touched Maria?

T
HEY POOLED
their dinner. Maria ate bits of both, though neither seemed to have much taste. Instead, she found herself noticing the way Jake flexed his fingers as he lifted a bite of roll to his mouth, or his Adam’s apple bobbing as he choked down some dry meat. Hers, or the store’s? She’d lost track.

Jake carried out a more scientific examination, scooping first her mashed potatoes then a spoon of the store’s onto his plate. His thoughtful sampling focused all Maria’s attention on his mouth. “Yours are better,” he said.

“I doubt it,” she said, wondering why they were comparing the quality of each other’s mouths. Remembering mashed potatoes was the subject under discussion, she felt herself blush.

Jake had the gall to look amused, though his fork shook as he lowered it to the table. “Did you look at the pie?”

“Pumpkin. My favorite.”

“Mine, too.”

“Yeah.” He moved and somehow his plate leaped toward the edge of the table. They both reached for it, but her hand only covered his. As she met his gaze, she re
membered how alone they were—and look how they’d behaved the other night in front of a crowd.

Metaphorically, she held tight to her sense of responsibility. “Careful,” she said, trying to infuse her voice with something other than longing. “I may have to sell that china for food.”

He slid it farther into safety. “You look more hopeful, Maria.”

“I got a job.”

He caught her wrist with touching happiness. “What job?”

She laughed at his surprise. “You thought no one would hire me?”

He shrugged, and this time they both laughed, not because anything was funny, but because being together was right. For now, Maria told herself. For now.

He sat back. “I like feeling comfortable with you.”

“That’s a big confession from a guy whose heart has never been near his sleeve. What do you mean by comfortable, exactly?” As soon as the words left her mouth, she knew she’d opened a big door that should have remained bolted shut. They had no business taking stock of a barely begun relationship when his daughter needed her, and Maria still wasn’t sure if Jake thought she had seduced Griff Butler.

“I mean, I want you and I want to know you better, and I wish you could see it’s okay to feel the same way.”

Maria was no coward, but she hadn’t jumped off too many cliffs—without a bungee cord, anyway.

“It was one dance and a few kisses,” she said.

“And today. Dinner on a holiday.”

“Don’t read anything into that. Your daughter ordered you over here. She probably thinks you’ll feel sorry for me and compromise your rather infamous moral code to get me out of trouble.”

“Infamous?”

“
Fabled
might be the better word, but you’re confusing me.”

“If I came around this table and took you in my arms, what would you do?”

Probably give in to any idea he could spin out of thin air. “I might use you to forget my problems.”

The first hint of doubt manifested itself in the ghost of a frown. “Are you?”

Hell, no. “I don’t lie to myself.” She managed a smile. “Though I wish I could lie to you.”

His smile was all smug male. “I’m glad you can’t.”

“I’ll get that dessert.”

“We’re still eating dinner, Maria.”

She looked at his plate then at her own, still full of Thanksgiving turkey and all the fixings. The air snapped with inappropriate conversation. When she stopped to wonder why they were rushing toward decisions best left unmade, she recovered her reason.

“Why did you really come today, Jake? Leila gave you permission, but you don’t do anything you don’t want to do.”

“I wanted to see you.”

“Even though you half believe I slept with a kid I was supposed to be helping?”

“Why do we have to talk about that?”

She put her fork and knife on her plate. “I don’t believe you’re capable of looking at me without thinking of it.”

“Because Leila says I’m so locked into doing the right thing?”

“I’m not breaking any more confidences. Besides, that’s the one thing that’s easy to read about you. I can see you didn’t want to make that call, but you would have if someone hadn’t beaten you to it.”

“Around the courthouse I hear that someone was Buck Collier. See? You and Leila don’t know me the way you think you do—I can even gossip.” He stirred his potatoes, making them more mush than mash, until he seemed to reach a decision. “It’s bad enough that my daughter thinks I’m cold, but I’m startled how much it really hurts that you assume it without even knowing me.”

“Tell me the truth,” Maria said. “Tell me the things you’re afraid to say to Leila.”

He moved so suddenly in his chair she thought it might fall over. “You think I’m afraid?” he said, clearly incredulous.

She wavered on the edge of another precipice. Digging for insights about Jake might be the most dangerous risk she’d ever take. Her heart ached for the distress that cut his face to the bone, but she didn’t want to care about him. Reclaiming her life and her reputation had to be her first concern. She was no Keaton woman who let a man compromise intelligent decisions.

She rose to distance herself from Jake and his secrets, but he misunderstood.

“It was Kate,” he said. “She couldn’t stop having affairs, and I couldn’t stand it anymore.”

Maria turned her head. “Your wife cheated on you?”

As if he were startled, he smiled. “Thanks for look
ing as if you can’t believe it. She cheated with a vengeance.”

“No one ever said a word. Not to Leila.” She sat again. “Not to me.”

“I’m a decent guy. I’ve never set a foot wrong—although maybe that was because of Leila. Kate had been with other men since before Leila was born. It was like a compulsion, but how could I explain that to Leila?”

“You couldn’t.” She went to him, sensing years of control, nights and days full of disappointment and wondering why he wasn’t enough. “It wasn’t you,” she said.

He shoved his chair back. “I don’t want to discuss this with you.”

She knelt beside his chair. “You aren’t ever going to be in my care,” she said. “I couldn’t be your therapist now if I wanted to be. And I don’t, but I can tell you, your ex-wife has a problem, and you aren’t it.”

“I don’t doubt myself because Kate couldn’t make do with me.”

“Jake.” Maria took his face between her hands and made him meet her eyes. “Listen to me, and believe. I want you so much I can’t think of anything except how good your hands would feel on me. I dream about you.”

His smile was more delicious than any dinner anyone had ever made. He touched her face, his fingertips gentle, trembling.

“You’re a kind woman.”

“You’re nuts.” She had to convince him he didn’t have to separate himself from life because he hadn’t been able to singlehandedly repair his broken marriage. “You don’t have to pretend to anyone else, ever, that you don’t care.” She reached for his hand.

His composure fled. He looked naked. Maria leaned into him, seeking his mouth and the heat that made his self-imposed detachment a thing of the past.

He groaned, and pulled her to him. It was not so much a kiss as a meeting of souls, a joining of bodies frustrated only by the clothing and the space that barely remained between them. He put his forehead against hers and undid the top buttons of her shirt.

She would never be able to treat Leila again. As much as Maria regretted failing the girl, that bridge had burned. Yet she still wasn’t sure Jake trusted her.

He kissed her, slowly, thoroughly, spinning her senses almost out of control. He lifted his fingers to the next button on her shirt. She took a deep breath.

He pressed his lips to her breasts, swelling over the top of her bra.

All rational thought fled.

Her nipples ached as he opened his mouth and she felt his hunger. She breathed in the scent of him, rubbing her cheek against his hair. Without thinking, she slid to the floor, pulling him with her, still kissing him, tugging the hem of his T-shirt out of his jeans.

She slid her hands across his stomach, sighing at the scratch of sparse male hair and hot skin against her palms, breathing in as he inhaled, too. His mouth covered her nipple through her bra, and she closed her eyes as sensation raced through her body.

But then she reached the button on his jeans, and common sense screamed back into her head. She froze.

“Please,” Jake said against her breast.

She managed a groan. Pleasure and a “no” wrenched from every aching sinew. This was wrong, and she
couldn’t tell herself that it wasn’t. No matter how much she wanted to.

“Jake. Jake, I—” She staggered to her feet. “I’ll do the dishes. Are you still hungry?”

“Are you out of your mind?” He sat back on his heels. His hair was ruffled, and his heavy-lidded, startled eyes weakened her.

While he stayed where he was, she grabbed at plates, cutlery, anything except Jake. In the kitchen, she put the dishes on the counter and gripped the cool granite to keep from falling.

“Maria?”

The way he said her name was as potent as a kiss. She’d never wanted any man as badly. At last she understood why her mother and sister had made so many bad decisions.

“Maria?”

“Stay over there.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m not trying to be a tease.” Maria focused on the essential question between them. “I don’t know if you believe me about Griff.”

“What I think doesn’t matter.”

“It does to me.” She turned away from him, back to the dishes. “And it should to you, before you sleep with me.”

Silence stretched between them, filled only with the sound of Maria washing the dishes.

“That trial just won’t end for us, will it?” he asked.

“Griff is free. Whatever he’s done, he’s free and clear.”

“You’re not.”

She shook her head. “I don’t mind it with most people, except when I think I might lose my home and starve to death.” She glanced at him. “But I feel bad when I know you want sex, but you don’t trust me. Though at least you don’t lie about it.”

“It’s not just sex, Maria.”

“You should go.”

“Things are confused between us.”

“You should still go.”

S
OMETIME AFTER DARK,
Maria woke on the couch to find her living room glowing with twinkling colors. She hauled herself to a sitting position, flinging hair out of her eyes. What on earth?

She staggered to the windows. She tried twice before she pulled the right cord on the blinds and managed to open them all the way. The movement must have startled Jake, who looked up from furtively opening his car door.

Over every shrub, he’d strung lights. Small, starlike bits of color twinkled from all over her yard. Maria smiled.

She ran to the door to find Jake still waiting, wariness on his face. “Thanks,” she said.

He nodded toward her neighbors’ yards, all lights and Santas. “You needed something.”

“They’re beautiful.” She went as far as the bottom porch step in her turkey-stamped socks. “But you didn’t have to say you were sorry.”

He crossed to her. “I am sorry you misunderstand me.”

“I don’t, though, Jake. You made my house look happy, but you still can’t say you believe me.”

“I believe in you. Everyone makes mistakes.”

“I didn’t.” She backed up a step.

Jake caught a handful of her shirt and pulled her down to kiss her in front of everyone and their puffy snowmen. “I did, and I’ve hurt you, but now I have to find the truth about Griff Butler. I’ve asked Tom Drake for the case files.”