The Doctor's Runaway Fiancée (10 page)

Now Andrew wondered if that concern for her privacy had been a cop-out. It had hurt to think of the life she'd once led. Perhaps he didn't want to be reminded of it. The problem was, to know her, he needed to know her secrets.

“Tell me about what you remember when your father left.” It was only the first of many questions he planned to ask. Discovering what made her tick was what this trip was all about. And Andrew wasn't leaving until he knew all of Sylvie's secrets.

Chapter Twelve

S
ylvie wished she'd insisted Josie drive her home. But even as the thought crossed her mind she realized this might be the perfect opportunity. After she shared more about her background, if Andrew couldn't see just how unsuitable they were for each other, well, then he didn't want to see.

But she didn't want to share those painful memories in the car. Neither did she want to do it over dinner or pretending to relax with a glass of wine. “Stop the car.”

He didn't quite slam on the brakes, but she did jerk forward in her seat as he wheeled the van to the side of the road and shifted into Park. “What's wrong?”

The worry in his eyes matched the concern in his voice. His gaze anxiously searched hers.

“I'm fine.” The way her heart raced at his intense scrutiny made it a less-than-honest response, but she wanted to reassure him. “I want to walk.”

Andrew sat back, stared at her as if she'd lost her mind. “You want to
walk
home?”

“No.” Sylvie gave a little laugh, which sounded strained even to her own ears. “I just want to...walk.”

He glanced down the busy ribbon of concrete. “Along the highway?”

“Hardly.” She gave a halfhearted chuckle. “If we walk on the roadside, everyone will think the van broke down and want to give us a ride.”

“If you say so.” The puzzlement remained on his face. “If not down the road, where is it exactly you want to walk?”

She gestured off to the right, to a relatively flat span of ground made up primarily of dirt and scrubby plants. The mountains loomed far in the distance.

She saw his gaze drop to her shoes. Okay, they weren't hiking boots, but they were flat and comfortable. “I need to get out and move.”

His gaze searched her and he shrugged. “Lead the way.”

After a couple of minutes, Sylvie stumbled across a dirt trail of sorts winding its way through the brush. She wasn't sure what to think when Andrew took her hand but found the support steadied her.

“Any memories of my parents together were of them fighting.” She kept her gaze focused straight ahead. “When he left, things were...quieter.”

His fingers tightened around hers, but Andrew remained silent.

“It took me a while—quite a while, in fact—to realize that the man with the red hair who sometimes lifted me high in his arms to touch the ceiling was never coming back.” She lifted one shoulder and let it fall. “Though there was no more loud arguments, my mother was so angry. She bad-mouthed him all the time.”

They walked for a couple of minutes in silence.

“What was hardest...” Sylvie paused and swallowed hard against the lump that had formed in her throat. “...was when she told me it made her sick to look at me.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Sylvie saw Andrew's jaw clench. “Because you were his child?”

“That was probably part of it,” Sylvie admitted. “I also looked like him. My hair wasn't as red as his, but our facial features... Well, it was easy to tell I was his daughter.”

“The sins of the father...” he murmured.

“Exactly.” Sylvie heaved a sigh. “For the next five years, I heard more times than I could count that my father was a coward who didn't even have the guts to tell her to her face he was leaving.”

“Then she did the same thing to you nine years later.”

“She did,” Sylvie confirmed in a matter-of-fact tone as she climbed a small incline, Andrew still beside her. She tried not to think that she'd done virtually the same thing to Andrew three months ago.

“Tell me about when she left.” Though uttered in a conversational tone, it was more of a demand than a request.

Thinking back to that horrible day, Sylvie felt her heart twist, but for only a moment. She reminded herself it had been a long, long time ago. She'd moved past the hurt and anger that had permeated her life for so many years of her childhood.

Once again Andrew appeared content to wait.

Sylvie paused at the top of a mound of dirt too small to be called a hill. For a second she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. She loved the scent of pine. “I came home from school and she wasn't there. That wasn't all that unusual. But the apartment appeared less...cluttered. It took me a while to realize that was because her stuff was gone.”

“She'd moved out.” His voice was soft, dangerously so.

“Yes.” It was amazing to Sylvie that she could still choke up over something that had happened so many years ago.

“What did you do?”

“I waited for her to come back.” A humorless smile lifted Sylvie's lips. “I may have only been an eighth grader, but I was pretty good at taking care of myself. Even when my mother was around, she'd get involved with the latest boyfriend and I'd be on my own until that relationship fell apart.”

Andrew cursed under his breath.

“I made myself peanut butter sandwiches for dinner. There wasn't much food in the apartment, but if I was careful, I could make it last. Look.” She pointed off in the distance where several deer grazed. “I suppose it's silly, but seeing wildlife up close still gives me a thrill.”

His gaze settled on the animals. “It is pretty cool.”

They remained where they stood for a few seconds, until the deer, obviously having caught their scent, bounded off toward the mountains.

“How long did you manage on your own?” he asked in the same conversational tone as she once again began to walk.

“Nearly two weeks.” She couldn't keep the pride from her voice. “I washed my own clothes, made the meals—again, mostly peanut butter sandwiches—and got myself ready for school each morning.”

“That's amazing.”

The admiration in his tone made her smile, though what she'd done had been simple survival, certainly not anything praiseworthy.

“I did what I had to do.” Her tone was matter-of-fact. “Any other kid in that situation would have done the same thing.”

“I doubt that,” he said. “You must have been frightened.”

“Mostly at night,” Sylvie admitted. “We didn't live in a great neighborhood and the apartment building... Well, let's just say many of the residents weren't pillars of the community.”

“Who discovered your mother had left?”

“The landlord. He stopped by, demanding the rent. I got rid of him several times by telling him my mother wasn't at home, but that only worked for a couple of days. The man was a real bulldog.” She gazed off into the distance, wondered if the chill she'd feel if she stepped onto those snowcapped slopes would equal the chill that had her now shivering in the bright sunshine. “They looked for her and eventually found her, but she told them she'd ‘moved on.' I spent the next five years in a variety of foster homes, some good, others not so great. That's the story. Aren't you glad you asked?”

Sylvie didn't look at Andrew, didn't want to see the pity she knew she'd find in his eyes.

“That's quite a story.”

“There are many who have it worse.”

“You're a strong woman, Sylvie Thorne.” The admiration, however misguided, warmed away some of the chill.

“I'm sorry I didn't speak with you before I left.” The apology was spoken so softly that she wondered if he'd even hear. She'd cleared her throat, ready to repeat the words, when he spoke.

“I was surprised.”

Three simple words that said so much by what they didn't say.
I expected better of you.

“I still believe leaving was best, but—” she gave a bitter-sounding laugh “—that's probably what my mom and dad thought when they walked out on me. I handled it poorly. You deserved better.”

“We both deserved better.”

She nodded, the tightness in her chest making speech difficult at that moment.

“You obviously didn't know me well enough, didn't trust me enough, to feel as if you could share whatever concerns you had with me.” His gaze searched hers. “There's still more you're not telling me. Like the reason you picked that night to walk.”

While Sylvie wanted to be completely honest, what would be the point in bringing up the conversation with his father? No point, she told herself. “I—”

Andrew pressed a finger against her lips. “No lies.”

She stiffened.

“Let me say simply that I hope when I'm ready to leave, you'll trust me enough, you'll have enough respect for what we've shared, to tell me everything.” The smile that lifted his lips didn't reach his eyes. “If that happens, I'll consider this trip a success.”

* * *

“Tell me again about this event.” Andrew held open the car door for Sylvie, despite the fact that he knew she didn't expect it.

She slipped into the car he'd rented, a new SUV with leather seats and a moonroof that she was going to request he open on their drive into Jackson.

“What do you want to know?” She waited to speak until he was behind the wheel and the garage door had silently lifted.

“The name Jackson Hole Fall Arts Festival tells me some of what to expect, but not all.”

“You want the entire scoop,” she said with an easy smile tossed in his direction, “not just a spoonful of information.”

“Exactly.” Andrew wasn't sure why she appeared so relaxed, but he was grateful.

After their conversation this afternoon, a part of him had expected her to pull back. Instead she seemed more relaxed than she'd been since he first arrived. It was as if some kind of weight had been lifted from her shoulders.

The story she'd relayed troubled him, made him want to hit something, and he wasn't a violent guy. The thought of leaving a little girl alone...

“My sister's daughter, Anne Elizabeth, is nine,” he heard himself say.

If Sylvie was surprised by the abrupt change in topic, it didn't show. “I never met her.”

“Corinne and her family had been living in London. They'd only been back in the States for a couple of weeks before I left to come here.”

“She was doing something with your European division, right?”

Sylvie had obviously listened the times he'd discussed O'Shea Sports.

“Corinne runs the company's European division.” Andrew pulled into a space nearly a mile from the downtown area. Though he didn't know everything involved in this arts festival, he'd heard enough to know that the Palates and Palettes Gallery Walk going on this evening was very popular and he was unlikely to find a closer spot. “She's a dynamo.”

“Is she back to visit?” Sylvie met him on the sidewalk as he rounded the front of the SUV.

“For now. She and her husband want to move back to the States.” Andrew took Sylvie's arm as they started down the sidewalk toward the downtown district. It was automatic. While he'd never been into handholding before, in the time that he and Sylvie had been together it had become second nature. “She'd like to be the next COO of O'Shea Sports. She came to try to convince my father to change his mind.”

“Change his mind?”

“I'm assuming the position as of October 1.”

Sylvie stopped, just stopped in the center of the sidewalk, her face a study in confusion. “I knew your father was hoping to convince you to take that job, but you already have one. You're a doctor.”

“My father is adamant that an O'Shea male succeeds him.” Andrew made no excuses for his father's antiquated ideas. God knew, he'd tried his best to get his dad to change his mind on this matter.

“Do you want to do it?”

“It's expected.”

“That isn't what I asked.”

“I owe it to my father, to the family.” Andrew pressed his lips together. If not for him, Thomas would be at the helm and everyone would be happy.

As he'd expected, the traffic on the sidewalk began to increase exponentially the closer they came to the downtown shopping area.

“I'd say I can't believe we never talked about this.” Sylvie's lips quirked up in a wry smile. “Except we didn't do a lot of talking back in Boston.”

“It wasn't all about sex,” he said, a bit indignant over the accusation.

“I'm not blaming you.” Her eyes sparkled. “I was as hot to hop into the sack as you were.”

An older woman with silver-gray hair and a black cane with a shiny silver handle turned an assessing gaze in their direction. After only a second she smiled and turned back to her companion, an older gentleman with a neatly trimmed goatee wearing a beret.

“Back to the topic at hand.” Sylvie slowed her steps to put some distance between them and the older couple. “Was taking over the company always in your plans?”

This would be the time to bring up Thomas. Andrew had always felt guilty for not speaking more of his brother. Though what had happened wasn't a secret, the accident wasn't something often brought up in his family. It was just too painful.

Andrew didn't want to go back down that road, not tonight. The evening was off to a good start. And Sylvie was in an upbeat mood. Later, they could discuss it.

“Is that one of the galleries we should check out?” Andrew gestured with one hand, hoping she'd let it go for now. “Judging by all the people streaming inside, it appears to be a popular place.”

“It's very popular.” Sylvie pulled a brochure from her purse. She read for a second, then glanced back at him. “They're featuring the works of a big-time Montana wildlife painter.”

Andrew couldn't help it—his lips twitched. He rubbed his chin as they stopped and stepped to the side. “Big-time, eh? Is that what it says in the brochure?”

She swatted him with the rolled-up piece of paper. For a second it was as if the past three months away from each other had never been. “If you want the exact words, Mr. High Society, I'll read them to you.”

Somehow Andrew managed to keep a straight face. “I'd appreciate that courtesy.”