It Had to Be Fate (An It Had to Be Novel Book 3) (16 page)

His lips tilted into a slow, knowing grin. “Maybe I stole one more thing from you. Your sanity. You’re delusional,
chérie
. Marie has procured a powerhouse legal team. They say I’m practically guaranteed a win. Let’s just make this easier on all of us, shall we? Move to France and I’ll be reasonable. Stay here in this Podunk pit and you’ll lose the boys. It’s your choice.”

She hadn’t intended to accept the legal help offered earlier, but Tomas left her no choice. She’d find a way to pay Zane back . . . someday.

“You chose Marie over your boys. Now you’ll just have to learn to live with the consequences of your actions. Because I have Roger Wells on my team,
chérie
.”

Tomas blinked in confusion. “But we sent the papers—”

“I just spoke with Roger this morning.” She stood and opened her office door. “I have to get back to work now. If you’d like to see the boys this afternoon you can, but they’re on restriction for the mine incident until next Saturday. They are not to leave the hotel grounds. If you take them from my home, I will consider it kidnapping and have your butt thrown in jail. Have a nice day.”

Tomas’s jaw tightened as he slowly stood. “You
have
changed, Casey. Into a bitter, lonely
bitch
! No man will ever want this
new woman
you’ve become.”

After he stomped out, she slapped the door closed behind him. Then kicked it for good measure.

It wasn’t until she’d dropped into her chair that she finally allowed her pent-up tears to fall.

Had she turned bitter?

The lonely part was sort of true.

No, she wouldn’t let him get under her skin like she’d allowed in the past.

She focused on the reservation software on her computer screen in an effort to shake off her mood. But her thoughts kept circling between what Tomas had said and what Dax had encouraged her to do earlier. Was the damage already done? It seemed Tomas’s lawyers thought they had all they’d need to seal the deal from the e-mail loop, and now they had a picture of her and Zane together on top of it. But they hadn’t counted on her hitting back as hard as she would. She picked up her phone and found Roger’s number in her recent calls.

An hour later, when she’d hung up after talking with her new lawyer, she let out a long breath. She looked forward to his phone call the next day after he reviewed her file. She wasn’t going to lie down without a fight. Her kids needed her in their corner.

That done, she needed to get back to work and let her lawyer do what he did best.

While she tried to focus on e-mails, Tomas’s words kept whispering in her ear.
Bitter, lonely bitch.

She didn’t need to be lonely. Zane wanted her. And she wanted Zane, dammit! He was a good man, and his reputation would stand once he got the situation with his brother figured out. Whatever that might be. No lawyer, no matter how high powered, could prove the truth wrong.

And she’d made her decision.

She’d keep their relationship a secret, but looked forward to being with Zane. A kind, caring, sweet guy. Meg was right. Even if she and Zane only had a few weeks, Casey deserved to be with a man who made her smile.

Z
ane was tweaking the chorus of the new song he’d written for Meg’s wedding when Casey suddenly appeared before him. She had a deep crease in the middle of her forehead as her lips formed the word “Hi.”

He smiled at the pleasant interruption, then tugged his headphones off and let them dangle around his neck. “Hey there. Did you hear the good news? The baby isn’t mine.”

“That’s great, Zane.” She nervously wrung her hands. “Could I, ah, talk to you about something?”

“Sure.” Her uncertain tone made him lay down his earphones. He crossed to her and wrapped her up in a hug. “What’s the matter?”

She slipped her arms around his waist and hugged him back. “Nothing. I’m just wondering if you’d still be interested in having . . . a relationship with me?”

His heart did a backflip. But the look on her face made his grin quickly fade. “You don’t look very happy about it. Are you worried about Tomas?”

She shook her head. “Tomas can threaten me all he wants. And I promise I’ll pay you back for Roger Wells’s fees just as soon as I can.”

“Roger wasn’t supposed to tell you. But I’m glad you’re going to let him help.”

“He didn’t tell me. I just figured it was you being you. I was especially grateful Roger had called me before Tomas dropped his bombshell.”

“What did he say?”

“Either I move to France and open a B and B practically in his girlfriend’s backyard, or he’d take the boys. His lawyers have guaranteed him a win. It’s just another form of his bullying ways, but it’s not going to work this time. The boys are much better off here and I intend to keep it that way.”

When tears formed in her eyes, an arrow of pain shot straight through his heart.

“Good for you. Roger will kick his ass.”

“Let’s hope. So, do you still want to sleep with me?”

“More than I can tell you.” He lifted her chin with his finger and stared into her eyes. He hated all the pain that lingered there. “But I’d rather you seemed a little more excited about it.”

She opened her mouth, then snapped it shut and looked away. “Tomas has a way of making me feel bad about myself. It angers me even more that I always seem to let him.”

“Are we sleeping together to get back at Tomas?”

“No!” She blinked at him for a moment. “I’ve wanted to sleep with you since shortly after we met. But no one else can know that we’re together.”

He was going to be her secret “sleeping with a rock star” fantasy? Women used to tell him that all the time. It was insulting.

She obviously still had open wounds after her conversation with Tomas, though, so he reeled in his quick flare of temper. “Just how will this work? Should I be ready to pleasure you whenever you can find the time to sneak over here?”

“No, I didn’t—that came out all wrong, dammit!” She laid her forehead on his chest. “I really like you, Zane, and I want to be with you. But I’d rather not give Tomas any more ammunition to use against me. I was hoping you’d be okay with keeping our relationship just between the two of us for now. I didn’t mean to make it feel cheap.”

He clasped her by the arms. “And I want to try a
real
relationship, for a change. If that’s going to cause you trouble with your ex, then I’m willing to keep it to ourselves
temporarily
. So you need to decide what you want, and what having it will mean in terms of the boys.” He pulled her back into a hug.

Her response was a nod against his chest.

She was quiet for so long, he didn’t know what to do. “You okay?”

“Almost. I think what I really needed from you was this hug. For now, anyway.” She gave his waist a quick squeeze. “How about you give me another chance to do this better—if you’d still be interested in sleeping with me, that is?”

Relief washed through him that he wasn’t just a fantasy come true, that she actually liked him for who he was. “Of course I am. Besides the fact that I
really
like you too, any guy with a pulse would be interested in sleeping with you, Casey.”

She sighed. “That’s not what Tomas told me a few minutes ago.”

Zane rubbed his hand up and down her back. The guy really had done a number on her. He’d like to make him pay for it. “Did you notice Tomas accused me of sleeping with
his wife
last night? He’s probably jealous, and said something spiteful just to hurt you.” His brother, Nick, was the worst at spewing out that kind of hate.

“I don’t know about the jealous part, but he’s a master at being spiteful.”

He hated how Tomas treated her. Casey deserved better.

She was quiet for a few more moments, then she blurted out, “Wait. I have an idea.” Casey leaned back and smiled her usual smile again. “Do you have a GPS app on your phone?”

“No, but I can get one. Why?”

“There’s a place I recently found while hiking. I’d like to share it with you.” She stood on her tiptoes and brushed her lips against his ear as she whispered, “Naked.”

“I’m on it.” He reached for his phone so fast it made her laugh.

She turned and walked to the door. “I’ll text you the coordinates in a bit. I’ll rearrange my lunch hour and bring us a picnic. For after. See you at twelve thirty.”

“Can’t wait.”

After she walked out the door, he smiled like a fool while the new app loaded. How was he supposed to go back to writing music for three hours until it was time to go? All he could think about was Casey—naked.

Casey walked into the hotel’s kitchen and asked Dax, “Do we have everything on hand for one of your famous Sweetheart Picnics?”

“Not all, but I can go to the store.” Dax stopped his chopping. “Which guest is it for? The young couples usually like spicy oysters but the older ones prefer boring chicken salad with their champagne.”

She pointed to herself and then laid her finger across her lips.

Dax chuckled. “We’ll go with the sexy version then. It’ll be ready by noon.”

“Thanks, Dax.”

Casey went to the lobby and checked on Jeannie, her young and always texting desk clerk. She was her cousin’s kid, so Casey tried to be extra patient with her. “Can you take your lunch break early today? Be back by twelve fifteen?”

Jeannie stopped texting and looked up. “Sure. But why?”

“Ummm.” Yeah, why? She rarely took real lunch breaks.

Before Casey could come up with an excuse, Jeannie’s face lit up. “Oh, it’s personal stuff, right? I saw Tomas is back.”

“Yeah. Thanks. So I’ll come man the desk at eleven fifteen?”

The phone rang so Jeannie nodded as she answered it.

That done, Casey headed back to her office to get the GPS coordinates together for Zane. She’d stumbled upon the spot on a long hike earlier in the summer when the kids were in France. Afraid she’d forget exactly where it was, she’d marked it on her phone. But she’d never made it back since then. Mostly because on her way out she’d seen the “No Trespassing” signs. She’d had no idea the waterfall was on Grant land, not her father’s.

After she sent the instructions to Zane, she laid a hand on her stomach to calm the butterflies that swarmed en masse. She’d been the “good girl” her whole life. She’d never trespassed on purpose before, and Zane would be only the fourth man she’d ever slept with.

With her hand still on the little pudge her tummy made, she said aloud, “And why, oh why, did I eat half a chocolate cake the other night?”

Zane pedaled the mountain bike alongside the main road outside of town, and would have normally enjoyed the pine-scented air and the tall trees, but he couldn’t focus on anything but Casey. Naked. He needed to force the stupid grin off his face.

Kip had called another news conference, so his reputation was back on the mend and he was about to sleep with a beautiful woman, so his grin was justified, but he probably looked like an idiot.

The best part was that the few townspeople he’d passed had smiled and waved. He was back in their good graces. Why that mattered so much to him amazed him, but it did.

With his cell phone handy, he followed the instructions Casey had sent. He searched for the tree with a sign that said “Grant Industries” in big letters, then followed a dirt path that ran into the thick stand of trees. After a few more feet, he almost missed another mountain bike leaning against a tree trunk. He stopped his bike and leaned it against the wooden post of the barbed-wire fence that blocked his way. He looked left and then right for a gate, finally spotting a metal sign hanging on the wire per Casey’s instructions and walked toward it. He pulled up short when he read it. “Trespassers will be shot first and prosecuted later.”

Probably just to keep kids out.

Casey had left two sticks jammed between the wires that left enough room for him to crawl through. Once on the other side, he engaged his GPS app again and let it show him the way.

After a short walk through a grassy meadow with yellow and red wildflowers up to his knees, he headed into a bank of more trees. When he thought his heart would give out from pounding in anticipation of finding Casey, his cell finally proclaimed he was almost there. The sound of running water grew louder with each step. After a few more feet, the trees cleared again and he looked up from the phone in his hand.

Foamy white water cascaded down a twenty-foot outcropping of rocks and ended up in a quiet pool at the bottom. Casey had laid out a blanket and a picnic basket on the grass near the small shore. Where the grass ended, waves gently lapped against the coarse sand. And in the middle of the perfectly clear water, Casey floated on her back, her hair fanned out above her head, eyes closed, soaking up the sun.

Naked.

That stupid grin was back again as he sat down and yanked off his shoes and socks. Next came his shorts and boxers in one fell swoop and then his shirt. He picked up his shorts and found a condom, reconsidered and grabbed two just in case, and laid them on the blanket before he dove into the ice-cold water.

He surfaced next to Casey and instead of saying something about how gorgeous she was as planned, he gasped for air. “Holy crap, this is cold! Talk about shrinkage.”

Casey treaded water and sent him one of her sexy smiles. “You’ll get used to it. Glad you made it.”

“Me too.” He shivered. “So were they serious about the shooting part back there on that sign?”

“Yep. Did you hide your bike off the path like I did? I forgot to tell you that part.”

“No. I laid it against the fence.” Looked like the cold water just became the least of his problems. “Should I go back?”

“Don’t you dare. I can’t wait any longer for you, Zane.” Casey moved closer and wrapped her soft arms around his shoulders, her fingers gently caressing the nape of his neck. “You look very sexy wet.” When she kissed him, he couldn’t care less if he got shot anymore.

He pulled her cool body against his chest and ran his hands up and down her back. When she wrapped her legs around his waist, he cupped her soft bottom in his hands. As the water slowly rose to their necks, he reminded himself to kick so they wouldn’t drown.

Their long, slow kisses and what the cold water did to her breasts pressed against his chest drove him wild.

When they leaned back for air, she unwrapped her legs from his waist and slid a palm slowly down his body. Her hand soon found how truly needy he was. When she gave a soft squeeze, he saw stars.