If I Trust You (If You Come Back To Me #4) (6 page)

He caught her and spun her around in his arms so quickly all her breath rushed out of her lungs.

“You share control of DuBois Enterprises with me until any information comes to light that refutes that claim, Deidre.” He shook her gently, a look of profound frustration tightening his features. “You can’t claim to be Lincoln’s daughter and then insist there are no consequences to that claim.
Of course
I’m going to communicate certain essentials about your stance on being named as one of Lincoln’s heirs to John Kellerman.”

“I heard what you said,” she said, horrified to feel tears spill down her cheek. “The only thing you care about is my cooperation. Your being here in Harbor Town, the Christmas tree, the photos, last night...
all
of it is just your way of getting what you want out of me. You’re using me.”

“
No.
Didn’t I tell you what happened between us last night has got absolutely nothing to do with DuBois Enterprises?” he grated out. He clamped his eyelids shut briefly and then focused on her again. “Damn it, Deidre, don’t you have the smallest inkling of the repercussions of Lincoln giving you half of the controlling interest of his company?”

Doubt swamped her as she sensed the depth of his frustration, but she gave him a halfhearted glance of defiance. “I’ve told you I don’t care about DuBois Enterprises or Lincoln’s money. I just...wanted...a father.”

His grasp on her upper arms tightened. He brought her closer to him, until she felt anchored by his stare. His fierce, gray eyes seemed to be the only thing keeping her from succumbing to a wave of dizziness. “Sometimes we don’t get precisely what we want, Deidre.”

“You think I don’t know that?” she cried.

“Sometimes we get less than we bargained for,” he continued as if she hadn’t spoken. He leaned down over her until their stares and their mouths were aligned just inches apart. “Sometimes we get
more
. That’s what you got. More. Do you have any idea how many people DuBois Enterprises employs?”

She blinked at his unexpected, harsh question.

“No,” she whispered.

“Over sixty thousand employees across the world. Every single one of those people has family members who depend on them. DuBois itself is the customer for hundreds of other companies that also employ thousands of people. So while it’s real simple for you to brush off DuBois Enterprises as irrelevant, it’s not so easy for me and the hundreds of thousands of people that depend on it every single day of their lives to do the same.”

His voice rang in her ears. She just stared at his rigid face, speechless.

“I’m sorry if you thought I broke a confidence by telling John Kellerman you’d already had the genetic testing. I’m sorry that it wasn’t clear to you that I was previously Linc’s sole heir,” he said hoarsely. He leaned down until his forehead touched hers. Deidre’s breath burned in her lungs at the contact of his skin against hers. “I’m
not
trying to take advantage of you. It’s just that the circumstances here are a lot bigger than you or me.”

A silence stretched. She couldn’t seem to inhale a full breath.

“I’m sorry,” she said, the perception of her selfishness breaking through her emotional chaos like a hot knife. It only added to her distress. “I...I hadn’t been thinking of it in that way. To me, this whole situation with Lincoln is—”

“Intensely personal,” he muttered, his breath brushing against her cheek. He’d sounded so grim, it shocked her when he pressed his lips against the corner of her mouth. She shuddered with emotion and a wave of physical weakness. “I understand that, too. Better than I had in the beginning. Every time you told me you could care less about DuBois Enterprises, that you only wanted to know your biological father before he left this world, you meant it literally. I get that now. But that doesn’t take away from the fact that there’s a much bigger, wider picture here, Deidre.”

Tears coursed down her cheek. The edges of her vision were darkening. “I wish Lincoln had never changed that damn will,” she mumbled through leaden lips.

His arms encircled her and he brought her hard against him. When he squeezed her tight, more unwanted tears spilled out of her eyes. He opened his hand at the base of her spine, and she had the disorienting thought he knew she had a tattoo there, although that wasn’t possible—was it? Her vision swam before her eyes. His caress struck her as focused...cherishing...possessive. He spoke next to her ear, the sensation of his warm breath on her skin and the sound of his roughened voice increasing her uncontrollable trembling.

“What’s done is done. We’ll deal with the consequences. I just want you to know that I’m not your enemy. Please believe that. If you’re truly Linc’s biological daughter, if Lincoln wanted you to have partial control of his company and if he was of sound mind when he made that decision, then I will make
sure
that legacy is passed on to you. I would fight anyone tooth and nail who challenged your claim if all those things are true,
including
John Kellerman. So there’s no reason to feel threatened by me telling Kellerman about the genetic testing or that you’ve expressed interest in the Vivicor acquisition.” He leaned back and stared down into her face. She blinked the tears out of her eyes so she could see him better, but he remained blurry. Deidre had the vague impression that he looked alarmed, but she couldn’t understand why.

“Deidre?
Deidre
—”

Her knees gave way. He uttered a curse as she collapsed and he caught her in his arms.

* * *

Nick watched her face anxiously as he carried Deidre down the hallway. Her eyelids fluttered, but she remained conscious. He’d nearly had a heart attack when he felt her legs give and she’d slumped in his arms. She was sick—weak—and he’d been barking at her like a rabid dog. He realized how upset she was at what she’d perceived to be a betrayal on his part. Nick had been wound up, as well. He’d been so caught up in trying to get her to understand his point of view that he’d remained utterly insensitive to the fact that she was about to faint.

He lowered her to the edge of the bed. She placed one hand on his shoulder and straightened into a sitting position.

“Lie down. I’m going to call a doctor.”

“No,” she said, sounding fatigued but firm. “It’s just low blood sugar. I haven’t been eating much over the past few days. And I’m a little tired.” Something about the defiant, if weary, tilt of her chin instinctively told him she wasn’t used to being the one receiving care. Deidre was usually the caregiver. She was the fighter. This couldn’t be easy for her. He understood her need for independence, but she’d better get used to some help, in the short term, anyway.

“I’ll be right back.”

He returned a moment later with a large glass of milk and a box of granola bars. “I called your sister at the Family Center. I figured she should know you weren’t feeling well. She says she’s coming by, but I told her you’d be resting. Eat a couple of these to get some fuel into you,” he directed, unwrapping a bar for her.

She seemed too tired to argue. Her petite frame slumped at the edge of the bed. She ate the food he gave her mechanically, swallowing it down with several gulps of milk. She shook her head weakly when he handed her the last of the second granola bar.

“Why don’t you lie down? Do you want some tea?”

She shook her head and managed a weak smile. “You’re a regular Florence Nightingale.” Some color was returning to her cheeks.

In fact,
too
much color.

“Are you all right?” he asked, noticing the light sheen of sweat on her forehead.

She nodded. “I’m hot,” she whispered. “It’s one of the symptoms of low blood sugar. It’ll pass in a minute, now that I’ve eaten.”

He matter-of-factly reached for the bottom of her sweater and drew it over her head. She looked a little stunned when he tossed the garment on the end of the bed, but apparently the cool air on her skin felt too good—or she was too exhausted—to protest. He knelt and removed her leather boots, forcing his gaze to remain on his task. A few seconds later, he stood and lifted the sheets, easing her limp form beneath them. Her eyelids grew heavy the second her cheek hit the pillow.

“You need a nice, long nap,” he said, tucking the sheet around her shoulders and drawing the comforter to her waist. “I knew you’d hardly been eating while you were at The Pines, but I had no idea you’d been wearing yourself out like this. I should have guessed. The staff told me you hardly left Linc’s side in the days before he died.”

“It was where I wanted to be,” she whispered. Her gaze flickered up to meet his. He abruptly stilled. She, too, looked frozen, unable to glance away. Staring down into Deidre’s eyes could make a man feel like he was sinking...falling. The seconds stretched. He felt his body sway slightly, as though he were being drawn to her like a magnet.

“Go to sleep, Deidre,” he said gruffly.

She rolled on her side, her back to him. He stood next to the bed, watching her long after her breath became even and peaceful.

He walked out of the room, shutting the door behind him carefully. One hand remained on the knob. He stretched his arm and palmed the frame above the door. He leaned there, unmoving.

“Nick?”

He blinked. Colleen Kavanaugh and a tall, dark man stood in the hallway. How long had he been leaning there, lost in thought? He hadn’t even heard them enter the cottage.

“She ate a couple granola bars and drank some milk. She’s sleeping soundly,” he said, straightening.

“Are
you
all right?” Colleen asked him, a strange look on her face.

“Yeah. Of course,” Nick replied. He walked past the concerned-looking couple to the kitchen. He didn’t want their voices to wake Deidre. He automatically shook Eric Reyes’s hand when Colleen introduced them.

He wondered what Colleen had witnessed on his face as he stood there at Deidre’s door. She couldn’t possibly know he’d been reliving the moment when he’d whisked Deidre’s sweater over her head, exposing inches and inches of flawless, smooth skin and graceful, sloping shoulders. The vision of her naked, lithesome arms had made him want to do something crazy. The bra she’d worn beneath the simple sweater had surprised him a little, it was so feminine and pretty. Deidre was the epitome of feminine and pretty, granted, but she was so no-nonsense, he’d have pegged her for being the practical-lingerie type.

Instead, black lace had encased small, thrusting, firm breasts. When Colleen had called out to him, he’d been fantasizing what it’d feel like to run his mouth along the edge of that lace and feel the warm, sweet swell of flesh against his lips.

He shook his head as if to clear it.

“You’re a doctor?” Nick asked Eric, who nodded.

“Do you think Deidre should go to the hospital?”

“From what I understand from Colleen and her brothers, Deidre is typically a strong woman. She’s probably just dehydrated and run-down. We’ll get some fluids and food into her when she wakes up. You know what stress and grief can do to a person. If I suspect it’s anything more serious—”

“You’ll call me,” Nick said. He dug in his jeans pocket for his wallet. “Do me a favor and call me either way. I’d like to know how she’s doing. Here’s my number.” Colleen looked taken aback but accepted his card.

“I’m sure it’s just exhaustion,” Colleen said, “but I’ll keep you updated.”

“Thanks,” Nick said before he headed for the door.

He wasn’t sure what exactly had hit him as he’d stared down at Deidre as she lay on that bed, but he knew one thing for sure: he wanted her too much to control it, regardless of the strange circumstances...no matter the possible consequences.

* * *

Deidre awoke three and a half hours later to the smell of chicken broth. She sat up, feeling disoriented when she noticed she was just wearing her bra and pants. The vision of Nick’s fierce stare as he’d looked down as she lay in the bed flashed across her mind’s eye in vivid detail.

Other memories stampeded across her brain. Nick talking so coolly on the phone about her to John Kellerman.
As for the rest, I’m not certain right now,
she remembered him saying. She’d been moved deeply by Nick’s desperate entreaty to understand his position, but it hurt to know firsthand he still had his doubts about her.

She clamped her eyes shut in regret as she recalled the rest of their charged encounter. She’d
fainted.
Well, almost fainted anyway. She’d never fainted in her life. And Nick had taken her to bed and partially undressed her.

Once again, she thought of the way he’d looked when he’d stared down at her, his desire naked and exposed, a clear reflection of what must have been in her own eyes.

She placed her hand over her heart when it gave a strange throb.

After a moment, she sighed and drew on her sweater. She ran a comb through her hair and exited the bedroom.

“Are you all right?” Colleen asked anxiously when she walked into the kitchen. Her sister was standing at the stove, stirring the contents of a pot. Eric lowered the newspaper he’d been reading as he sat in the breakfast nook.

“I’m fine,” Deidre said, embarrassed. “I’m sorry to have interrupted your day. You haven’t been here the whole time I slept, have you?”

Colleen waved her hand dismissively and reached for a bowl. “Never mind that. How are you feeling?”

“Still dizzy?” Eric asked, standing and coming toward her.

Deidre shook her head, pausing when Eric reached to touch her brow. “I haven’t got a fever,” she said, embarrassed. “I feel fine now. It was my blood sugar. I didn’t have an appetite this morning.”

“I’ll willing to bet you haven’t had an appetite for weeks. Stress,” Eric mumbled as he stared at the clock on the wall while he took her pulse.

“This has all been too much for you. And you haven’t been sleeping well,” Colleen fretted as she ladled some soup into a bowl. “Sit down and eat this.”

“Yes, Mother,” Deidre teased with a smile. When Eric finished taking her pulse, however, she went and ate her soup like a perfect patient. She hated being perceived as weak. Seeing the concerned expression on Colleen’s face was enough to make her mend her ways and take better care of herself.