hers. He hadn’t said another word after
she’d rejected his latest offer, just settled
back in his chair. That was Cabe Dawson
for you. Slow. Thorough. Immovable.
Would he be that intense in bed?
Cabe had simply held out one big hand,
and the lawyer had forked over the will
without so much as a peep. Ten minutes
later, they were still waiting while Cabe
silently reviewed its contents. Rose
wanted to get going, wanted to see the
inside of the place again.
Her
place.
“Look,” she tried again. “I just want to
go over to the house. Take a look around.”
No way Cabe hadn’t read the will before,
so there was just no telling why he wanted
to read through the whole thing again.
Right now. Unless he was simply enjoying
making her wait—which was a distinct
possibility.
The lawyer looked alarmed. Cabe just
looked at the will in his hands. Maybe he
was holding a grudge about last night,
although he’d always been more of a swift-
and equal-retaliation type.
“All you have to do is give me the key to
the house,” she pressed. “And I’ll be on
my way. ”
The lawyer looked at Cabe, and she
sucked in a breath, reminding herself she
wasn’t ten any more. “The key?” she
prompted.
Cabe finally looked up. “She wants her
key, Mitch. Give it to her.” He shot her
another of those inscrutable glances she
remembered so well. “You should have
asked last night. You lose yours?”
“Something like that.” She’d been too
busy pulling him into the water to
remember the key.
Pulling open a drawer, the lawyer
rummaged around as if he was glad to be
busy. When he finally slid a little manila
envelope across the desk to her, she tore
the sealed flap open impatiently, dumping
the familiar key chain into her palm. The
key was attached to the little pink rabbit’s
foot she’d bought Auntie Dee one year.
The fur had worn away on one side, where
Auntie Dee would rub it before she got
onto the bus that took her on senior trips to
the local Indian casino. The fur tip was
permanently matted from a run-in with a
diet soda, and there were other injuries as
well. The little pink token had become a
road map of precious moments of Auntie
Dee’s life.
Wrapping her fingers around the rabbit’s
foot, she fought back tears. She might be
late, but she was home for good now.
All she had left of Auntie Dee was this
worn-out rabbit’s foot, too many regrets,
and a house. She’d lost her one true family,
she realized in a rush. She hadn’t fully
acknowledged
just
how
strong
the
connection was between her and Auntie
Dee until it was too late. Now Auntie Dee
was gone, too.
The lawyer slid a little plastic-wrapped
package of tissues across the desk to her as
if
that
could
fix
this
enormous,
insurmountable problem.
“I miss her,” she said out loud.
Cabe got to his feet, placing the stack of
papers back on the desk. “We all do.
Auntie Dee was a good woman.”
Bending over the desk, he signed his
name next to hers on the last page of the
will and then slid the stack of legal
documents back to the lawyer. “She was
proud of you,” he said quietly. “Real
proud. She talked all the time about how
you were learning to be an architect. She
didn’t get the chance to go to school
herself, so it meant the world to her that
you went.”
She looked down at her hands. She’d
gone, all right. Almost clear to the other
end of the state. As far away from this man
as she could get because he was just the
last in a long line of little failures on her
part. Lost in the memories, she almost
missed his next words.
“We’ll get an appraisal,” he suggested.
“Find out what the house is worth, and I’ll
write you that check.”
Like hell he would.
“I’m not going
anywhere, Cabe Dawson, but out to my
house.”
“We’ll talk about it,” he said, his tone
warning her that there was no negotiating
room on this one.
She let him grab her suitcase and steer
her outside and toward his truck. Just like
that, he was taking over her life. Deciding
what was best for her. She was
hyperaware of his large, warm body
beside her. And that was the problem,
wasn’t it? Cabe was just doing the right
thing, looking out for her. Being protective.
When he looked at her, he didn’t see Rose
Jordan. No, he saw a problem needing
fixing—and she was done being just
another item on his to-do list.
“We’ll get the place appraised right
away, and I’ll write you a check,” he
repeated, and a slow burn got going in the
pit of her stomach. There he went, taking
care of her. Making decisions. She’d lived
on her own long enough to appreciate the
sentiment, but she wanted to stand on her
own two feet. She looked down at her new
cowboy boots. Even if her feet were
killing her.
“No.” She tossed the word out, and, sure
enough, Cabe Dawson hadn’t changed.
He pushed his Stetson back on his head
and looked her over. “You sure about that
answer? Because I’m willing and able to
write a check, Rose.”
She didn’t want a check—she wanted a
house. A
home,
her heart whispered, and
another chance to get things right.
“I want to see my house, Cabe.”
“Fine,” he said, shaking his head, as if
her agreeing to his terms was just a matter
of time. “You want to see the place, I’ll
take you there.”
“I have a car,” she pointed out, but he
just shook his head again and opened the
passenger door of his pickup. Since this
was a battle she clearly wasn’t going to
win, she got in. Carefully closing the door
behind her, he went around the pickup and
slid into the driver’s seat. It was going to
be a really silent ride out to Auntie Dee’s.
Cabe never had been one for chitchat, but
now he appeared to have given up on
talking altogether. His hands on the wheel
shouted “capable, in control.” He knew
where he was going and why, just like he
always had.
“We could have taken my car,” she said,
just to needle him. Cabe didn’t like others
to drive him. Sure enough, he shot her one
o f
those
looks and jammed his Stetson
down on his head. She’d forgotten how
very large and immovable he was.
It didn’t matter.
He wasn’t going to get his way this time.
The house was waiting for her, heat-
soaked and dusty. Rose could almost
pretend she’d never left, that the last few
years hadn’t slipped by. Even with the
miles she’d put between herself and Auntie
Dee’s place, she’d thought about the older
woman every day. She’d needed to stretch
her wings and figure out who she really
was, and Auntie Dee had understood.
Now she needed to come back home.
She got the truck’s door open and
hopped down from the pickup before Cabe
could even kill the motor. He’d been a big,
silent presence next to her on the ten-
minute drive out here. Whatever doubts he
had—and she was sure he had plenty—he
was keeping them to himself for the
moment. Knowing Cabe, of course, he was
probably just waiting for her to figure out
the truth for herself.
The house redefined
fixer-upper.
As she crossed the yard, she waved to
the contractor she’d asked earlier to come
by to check out what work would need to
be done immediately. Cabe had taken so
long reading the will that the other man
was almost finished with his external
inspection.
The sun’s heat was a sensual weight
beating down on her bare shoulders. It was
almost shocking to step onto the porch and
into the cooler shadows. Cabe, of course,
followed her inside the house as if he
owned
the
place,
the
floorboards
squeaking noisily with each step he took,
but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Had
he always been this sexy? Cabe looked
both familiar and unfamiliar. Somehow, he
seemed even bigger, even harder, than she
remembered. And last night, he’d seen her
naked.
The wave of mildew and must that hit
her when he finally shouldered open the
kitchen door—it stuck, of course—wasn’t
a good sign. Cabe flipped light switches.
Nothing. Of course. No electricity. When
she ran the tap, however, there was water.
“You’ve got a good well here.”
Mentally, she arranged the house,
placing the furniture she’d left in storage in
repainted, cleaned-up rooms. So what if
Cabe was more concerned with support
beams and wiring and whether or not the
place was up to code? This was the one
place she’d felt at home in her life. Hell,
this was the only place she’d
had
a home.
Still, as the inspector took her point by
point through a damning litany of critical
repairs, Cabe was a silent, solid presence.
He didn’t say anything. Hell, he didn’t
have
to say anything. He was right, just like he’d always been. The house wasn’t
really livable and might not even be
salvageable. How long had it been this
way growing up and she just hadn’t seen?
She squared her jaw. She’d overcome
worse odds. If she wanted her home back,
she’d do whatever it took. Sweat equity
had to be worth something. Even if it
seemed likely that she’d still be hammering
and sawing when she was ninety.
Finally, the contractor shut the lid of his
laptop. “I’ll e-mail you the final report,”
he said, pocketing the check she handed
him. He shook her hand and then took the
hand Cabe extended. “You be careful in
here,” he said, clearing his throat. “This
house needs work.”
“I can handle it,” she said, projecting a
confidence she didn’t quite feel.
Yet,
she
told herself. She knew how to design
houses. Surely, she could learn how to
make home repairs.
“Lots of work.” Cabe’s voice was
deliberately dry, but it still had that little
growl that always started her thinking
about sex.
“You listen to your boyfriend here.” The
contractor nodded toward Cabe. “He’s
right.”
Watching the man go, she’d have bet
those words had horrified Cabe. She
wasn’t the kind of woman he admired.
Cool, put-together brunettes were more his
style. As soon as he’d done what needed
doing here and the estate was wrapped up,
he’d get back to work, and they would only
see each other from a distance. Things
would go back to the way they’d been
before.
Cabe would go back to the way he’d
been before.
God, she knew she shouldn’t wish things
were different. Cabe Dawson was the kind
of hard, disciplined, determined man who
knew precisely where he was going in life
and how he was getting there. He was all
wrong for her. None of which explained
the heat blossoming inside her as she
watched him move around her kitchen,
testing the cabinet doors.
Wanting Cabe Dawson was crazy.
Sunset had color streaking the horizon
and roused raucous commentary from the
nesting birds in the cottonwoods. She’d
always loved this pretty time, when the sky
softened up and things got ready to hunker
down for the night. The morning glories
twining up the chimney had already closed
up in anticipation of the darkness. For a
moment, sitting on what was left of the
house’s wraparound porch, she could
pretend she’d gone back in time. It was
harder to see at dusk that, while the porch