Addicted to Nick (2 page)

She shook her head, as much to clear her stunned senses as in reply. “We've never met, but I recognize you. From photographs. Your father showed me photographs.”

“You recognized me instantly from a couple of pictures?”

More than a couple. T.C. felt herself color as she recalled how many…and how often she'd pored over them. Good grief, she had actually freeze-framed a video of his sister's wedding on one spectacular shot. It was a wonder she hadn't pegged him as Nick the Gorgeous One in the total dark!

“I take it you aren't a burglar. Do you work here?” He glanced down at where Ug lay at his feet—almost
on
his feet—and grinned. “Let me guess. You're security, and this is your guard dog.”

T.C.'s heart did a slow motion flip-flop as the effect of that lazy drawl, the warmth of that slow grin, rippled through her body. She couldn't help her automatic response. How could she
not
smile back at him? How could she watch one quizzically arched brow disappear behind the thick fall of his hair and
not
think about combing it back from his face?

Belatedly she realized that the brow had arched in question. Asking what? Something about her working here? “Um…I'm the trainer. I train Joe's horses.”

His expression changed from quizzical to startled in one blink of his dark lashes. “
You're
Tamara Cole?”

“That's me.”

He inspected her with unnerving thoroughness, starting at her boots and working all the way up her legs and body. When he arrived back at her face, he let out a choked sort of snort that sounded like equal parts disbelief and suppressed laughter, and the warmth suffusing T.C.'s veins turned prickly with irritation. She knew she wasn't looking her best, but that was no reason for him to shake his head and grin as if he couldn't quite believe what his eyes were telling him. She folded her arms and regarded him as coolly as the hot flush of mortification allowed. “What are you doing here, Nick?”

“Apart from being attacked by a crazy little horse-training woman dressed in pajamas and boots?”

“I mean,” she said tightly, as he continued to grin down at her, “I've been waiting to hear from someone for weeks and weeks, but I didn't expect
you.
Last I heard, you were lost in the wilds of Alaska.”

The grin faded. “Who told you that?”

“George mentioned it. After the funeral.” She shrugged off the memory of that short, unpleasant meeting.
Who-told-who-what
didn't matter when important questions remained unanswered. Like, what was Nick doing here, and why had he arrived unannounced in the middle of the night? “You should have let me know you were coming.”

“I've been trying to do that for the last six hours.” With disturbing accuracy he homed in on her telephone and picked up the receiver she'd left off the hook. “I don't suppose this has anything to do with the constant busy signal?”

“I must have bumped it. Or something.”

He stared at her for a full ten seconds, then gestured with the instrument in his hand. “Is this on the same line as the house?”

T.C. cleared her throat, told herself it was ridiculous to feel such a sharp frisson of apprehension at the sight of a
phone, at the thought of it being able to ring and ring and ring…. “Yes. There's only the one line.”

“Then if it's all the same to you, I'd prefer we keep that line open.” As he cradled the receiver, the meaning behind his words gelled. If he needed a phone, he must be staying.

“Why are you here, Nick?” she blurted. “I expected George, or that solicitor with the bullfrog eyes.”

The corners of Nick's mouth twitched. “We used to call him Kermit.”

T.C. tried to ignore the mental image of Kermit in pinstripes but failed. And as they smiled in shared amusement, as she had done so many times with his father, T.C. knew why Nick was here. It made perfect sense that Joe would leave the place of his heart to the son of his heart, the one he had spoken of with such obvious love.

It also explained the delay. Nick—self-indulgent, freewheeling Nick—had disappeared on some wilderness skiing jaunt the day his father was hospitalized. Joe lingered ten more days, but Nick didn't come home.

As she collected Ug from the floor and hugged the dog's furry warmth close against her chest, T.C. felt the tight twist of pain for the man who had been her boss, her mentor and her savior—and the strong sting of resentment for the son who had let him down.

Nick watched as a sheen of moisture quelled the sea-green intensity of her gaze, and he felt a sharp kick of response, a need to ease the pain he glimpsed in those spectacular eyes. He actually took a step forward, but she nailed him to the spot with a fierce look that reminded him of his bruised ribs and scraped shin. He gave himself a mental tap on the head.

What was he thinking?

Jet lag must be kicking in if he thought she needed comforting. The pale cap of baby-soft hair, the cute little nose, the huge eyes—they were all a deception. This little
firebrand had a tough streak a mile wide. His gaze slid to her lips for at least the tenth time since he'd flicked the light switch. Full and soft, with a distinct inclination to pout, there was absolutely nothing tough about them. They looked downright kissable…until they tightened savagely. Nick cleared his mind of all kissing-thoughts as he cleared his throat. “So, Tamara…”

“What did you call me?”

“Tamara. That
is
your name, isn't it? Or would you rather I kept on calling you
sweet hands?
”

“You can call me T.C.”

“That's hardly a name, just a couple of initials. I think I'll stick with Tamara.”

Her lush lips compressed into an angry bow, and Nick felt a sudden spike of stimulation. It was the kind of buzz he'd chased across continents, from challenge to challenge and from woman to woman. The kind he hadn't felt for too many years, and he didn't understand where the feeling was coming from.

Apart from her mouth and the way those big eyes sparked green fire, Tamara Cole didn't come close to his type. He liked women who slid out of bed with silk clinging to their curves. He liked women who knew they were women. Must be jet lag—that was the only explanation. That and the fact that George had got her all wrong. From his description, Nick had imagined big hair, a big blowzy body, an even bigger attitude. She surely had the attitude, but her blond hair was cropped boyishly short, and, frankly, there wasn't a whole lot of body.

Just a nice little handful.

He allowed that sensory memory to drum through his blood for a whole minute before he reminded himself how deceptive appearances could be. George was a prime example. Just because Tamara Cole didn't fit George's description of the shrewd opportunist who had wriggled her way into Joe's life as well as his bed—just because the
very thought had caused his earlier guffaw of amusement—didn't mean she hadn't done just that.

“Why are you here, Nick?”

Her question cut into Nick's reverie, and he pretended to consider it as he strolled over to her bed, tested the mattress, sat and swung his legs up. He picked up her pillow and propped it between his head and the wall.

“Why am I here?” He regarded her bottom lip through half-closed eyes, and the low-grade buzz in his veins intensified. “I'm here to meet you…
partner.
”

“P
art-ner?” T.C.'s voice cracked midword, so the second syllable came out squeaky. She tried to control her trembling legs but failed miserably, and the nearest storage trunk came up to meet her backside with an audible thump, jolting Ug from her arms. “What do you mean by
partner?
” Her voice sounded as weak as her knees felt.

“Standard definition. Two persons, sharing equally.”

Oh, no. Joe, you didn't. You couldn't. You wouldn't.
“Sharing what…exactly?”

“This place.”

T.C. swallowed, ran her tongue around her dry mouth. “You're saying Joe left me half of Yarra Park?”

“And everything on it, four-legged and otherwise. You have a problem with that?”

“Of course I do. It's too much, too…” Her throat constricted around the words, and she had to stop, to swallow twice before she could continue. “I don't understand. Why
didn't he say something? Why hasn't
anyone
said anything?”

“There was a clause in the will…. Joe requested that I come here and tell you.”

That made about as much sense as the rest of it.

T.C. shook her head slowly.
Oh, Joe, why did you do this?
She jerked to her feet and must have walked to the window, because she found herself staring into the aluminum-framed square of night. She forced herself to look beyond her stunned senses, beyond the thick emotion that constricted her chest and blurred her vision.

Why?

Her boss had been a steady, almost ponderous, thinker—this couldn't be some whim. He had also been devoted to his large family to such an extent that he had often lamented spoiling them with a too-easy lifestyle. Staring into the dark, she recalled their hostility the day of Joe's funeral, and for the first time she understood where it had come from. She had been in that same place. She knew how it felt to be overlooked in favor of a virtual stranger. “I imagine your family has a problem with it,” she said slowly.

“You could say they're less than thrilled with our little windfall.”

T.C. whirled around. “Don't call it that! I didn't expect anything. I don't
want
anything.” She spread her arms wide in an imploring gesture. “Why did he do this, Nick?”

“Gee, I don't know, Tamara. Some might assume it's because you were
very
good at your job.”

Heat flooded T.C.'s cheeks, then ebbed just as rapidly. Surely he couldn't mean what that suggestive drawl implied…could he? Stunned, she stared at him, taking in his laid-back posture, the mocking half grin, and the heat returned in a flash of red.

“Yesss!”
The word came out a long, low hiss as she
advanced on him. “I
am
very good at my job—that's why Joe employed me—so I hope you're not insinuating I earned this
windfall
doing anything besides training horses.” She reached down and wrenched the pillow from behind him, then seriously contemplated koshing him over the head with it.

“Hey, take it easy. I said
some
might assume.”

The
some
most likely encompassed the rest of Joe's family but apparently didn't include Nick—that was why he had been so taken aback when he learned her identity. What had he called her?
A crazy little horse-training woman in pajamas and boots.
The thought of anyone wanting to bed
that
must really have tickled him.

Not having to prove the nature of her relationship with Joe should have delighted T.C., so why did she feel so…slighted? Annoyed with her contrary feelings, she tossed the pillow aside. It didn't matter what Nick Corelli thought of her; it mattered that he was lounging on her bed, treating Joe's bequest with a complete lack of respect.

“What about your part in this, Nick? What did your family make of that?”

“They shared the rest of Joe's fortune.” He shrugged negligently. “I guess I got the consolation prize.”

Hands on hips, she took a step forward and looked down on him with all the scorn that comment deserved. “You feel you deserved a prize?”

He tipped his head back against the bare concrete wall, eyes narrowed, expression no longer amused. “Meaning?”

“Meaning where were you when your father needed you? When your brother and sisters took turns sitting by his hospital bed for days on end? It was
you
he wanted there, Nick.
You
he asked for. And where were you? Oh, that's right, you had some dinky mountain to ski!”

Slowly he unfolded his long frame and rose to his feet. His eyes glittered darkly, a muscle ticked at the corner of his mouth, and without conscious thought T.C. took a step
back. But when he spoke his voice was cool and flat. “George told you that?”

She swallowed, nodded, wondered what nerve she had struck.

“Did he tell you how much effort he put into finding me? That he didn't even bother leaving a message with my service?”

“He shouldn't have had to find you.”

“I should have known Joe was sick…how?”

T.C. flushed. Joe hadn't told a soul about his diagnosis. No one had guessed until it was too late.

“I'm sorry, Nick.” And because the words sounded totally inadequate, or maybe because the dark emotion in his eyes—the hurt, anger, regret—echoed somewhere deep within, she reached out and placed her hand on his arm.

“Yeah, well, it's history now.” Nick shrugged off both her apology and the touch of her fingers. He didn't need her awkward attempt at sympathy any more than he needed his own sense of frustration at what might have been. Both were pointless. Abruptly he swung around, away from the mix of compassion and confusion that gleamed in her eyes. He needed something else to focus his frustration on, and he found it right before his eyes in the stark concrete walls, the uncarpeted floor and make-do furniture, the clothes discarded atop packing trunks.

“Why are you living here?”

She shook her head slightly. “What do you mean?”

“George said you used to live in the house but you'd moved out, I assumed to somewhere off the farm. Why the hell would you move out of the house into this rat-hole?”

“I didn't feel right staying in the house,” she said stiffly.

“Couldn't you find anywhere better than this?”

“I didn't have any—” She stopped abruptly, changing tack with a forced casualness that didn't fool Nick for a
second. “I needed to be here, near the horses. It's no big deal.”

“George should have told me you were living here.”

Except how could he, when Nick hadn't given him a chance?
When he'd grown so frustrated by the man's smoothly evasive replies that he threw his hands in the air and walked out, jumped in his car and drove straight here?

He scrubbed a hand over his face and wondered what had happened to his logic, which seemed to have gone missing…probably to the same place as his usual even temper. He adopted a more reasonable tone before he continued. “If I'd known you were living here, I wouldn't have been surprised to see your light.”

“So that's why you came down here.” Her smile was edged with relief, as if she'd needed an explanation…or because the conversation had taken a safer turn. “Something woke me, but I wasn't sure what, so I turned the light out again. When I heard you outside, it scared about a year off my life.”

“Sorry about that. I guess we both had the wrong handle on each other.”

Whatever the reason for her smile, it sliced a swathe through Nick's irritability, made it possible for him to smile right back at her. And he found something in her expression, in the slow color that highlighted her cheekbones, that reminded him what sort of a handle they'd had on each other in the close darkness of the breezeway. Her hands sliding over his shirt, touching his jeans. His hand on her belly, her breast. Heat licked through him like wildfire, doing more than sear his blood vessels. It surprised the hell out of him.

Jet lag, he reminded himself as he shoved his hands in his jacket pockets and cleared his throat. “You want to pack a few things—what you need for tonight?”

She stiffened visibly. “I beg your pardon?”

“You're not staying here.”

“I'm perfectly comfortable here.”

Her mutt, which had fallen asleep on the foot of her bed, chose that moment to whimper and twitch. Nick snorted. “Your
dog
isn't even comfortable here.”

“Must we discuss this now?”

“No. We can discuss it later…
after
we've moved you.”

When he started toward her, she held up a hand. “Look, it's the middle of the night. I don't want to fight with you, and I don't want to have to make up another bed. Okay?”

Nick dragged a hand through his hair. Unfortunately he could see her point. “Fine,” he conceded. “But tomorrow you're moving out of here.”

“Shouldn't sorting out this ridiculous bequest be our first priority?”

Nick frowned at her choice of adjective.
Unexpected,
yes.
Unusual,
maybe.
Overly generous,
definitely. “You think it's ridiculous?”

“It makes no sense.”

“You can't think of any reason why Joe would leave you a million-dollar bequest?”

All the color leached from her face as she stared back at him. In his world, a million dollars didn't turn a hair; to Tamara Cole, the figure was obviously staggering. Buying her out would be as simple as writing a check, Nick realized. So where was the satisfaction that always accompanied knowledge of a sure thing, a deal all but closed? As she continued to stare at him, wide-eyed and unblinking, he noticed she looked more than stunned. She looked as dead beat as he felt.

“Sleep on it, green eyes,” he advised as he headed to the door. “We'll talk later.”

“Nick.”

He stilled, one hand on the doorknob. Now why should the sound of his name on her tongue cause his pulse to pound? All his responses seemed shot to bits tonight.

“I'm sorry about before, about mistaking you for a burglar.”

Nick turned, caught her looking at him with that same expression as before, the one that made him think about hands in the dark and the sweet little body hidden beneath unflattering flannel. He stared back, a slow grin on his lips and a fast burn in his gut.

“I'm not.”

 

After the door clicked shut, T.C. rested her overheated face against the cool windowpane and one hand against her overstimulated heart. No man's smile should be allowed to have such an effect, and especially not a man so out of her league.

It wasn't fair, but it wasn't unexpected.

From his photos, she knew the man was gorgeous, from Joe's stories she'd learned of his charm, but nothing could have prepared her for Nick Corelli in the flesh. Nothing could have prepared her for that blue gaze sliding over her like a silk blanket, warming her, sensitizing every cell in her skin, as he murmured “I'm not.” As if he had enjoyed their tussle in the dark, as if the surge of attraction she had felt so intensely was mutual. As if a man who could take his pick of the glamorous, the beautiful and the smart, would be interested in her.

As if!

With a snort of derision, she turned her face against the windowpane and looked outside in time to see the house windows light up one by one, marking his progress through the entry hall into the living area, and then on to the bedrooms. A tug of alarm pulled her hard up against the glass. Which would he choose?

“Please. Not my room, not my bed,” she breathed. “It's enough knowing you're in my home.”

Whoa!
When, precisely, had she started calling Joe's house her home? Sure, she had lived in it the past five
years, but only because Joe insisted, only because he was the kind of man who brooked no argument.

“You think a house like this deserves to be empty? You think I want to come here to an empty house after a whole week spent with too many
idioti
for any one man's patience?”

The backs of her eyes pricked at the memory of Joe's words, and she pressed her lids tightly closed. She hadn't cried once in those god-awful months since she'd finally learned of her boss's terminal illness, and she wasn't going to start shedding tears now.

If you don't want to be treated like a girl, don't cry like one.
That came straight from her father's concise book of lessons, right after
There's only one thing a man like that could want from a girl like you.

She had been young and reckless when she learned the harsh truth of her father's words. She had given that one thing to a rich, smooth-talking, heartbreaker named Miles Newman, and after he laughed at her words of love and moved on to the new stable girl, she'd dried the last of her girl-tears and thrown away the handkerchief.

Never again would she trade her self-respect for something she mistook for love. Never again would she mistake the flashfire of physical attraction for something more. Oh, she wanted there to be somebody—a special person to share her life, to love and to cherish—but she didn't need the palpitations and the heartache and the tears. She needed strength and stability. She needed respect and understanding and companionship. Until she found a man with those qualities, she would make do with her own company.

Except at this moment her own company was making her edgy and unsettled. She swung away from the window and started to pace her room, but that activity did nothing to ease her restlessness. The quarters she had accepted as adequate now felt cold, dank and claustrophobic. The clutter she stepped over and around every day now looked like
a sad chaotic mess. She jammed her eyes shut and cursed Nick Corelli for this new perspective, then cursed herself double-time for caring. His opinion of her living conditions shouldn't matter one blue-eyed damn. But when she opened her eyes they were focused on her bed, and she could still see his long denim-encased legs spread across it. She could still imagine his body heat seeping into the covers.