STORM: A Standalone Romance (9 page)

"Well, that's one way to keep warm."

              Cara pulled on her jeans, her back turned to him. She wasn't certain what time it was, but the rain outside had let up some, which meant it was time for her to journey back out and get the help that Simon needed. The man watched her dress, eyes lidded contently, hair askew. She supposed endorphins resulting from sex had probably helped to numb the pain in his leg. Still, she had other things to worry about, like food and hydration. It seemed absurd to feel so concerned about the latter when there was plenty of water falling outside, and she wasn't particularly thirsty herself, but Simon had been out here since morning.

              She bent down for a quick kiss, and Simon's hand came up to scoop the back of her head in for something more. Cara lost her balance, and nearly fell into him with a muffled laugh; he kissed her heatedly, fervently, and she had a hard time pulling away from him again.

              "I'm going to get
help,"
she stressed. "I'm not leaving forever!"

              "I'll die without you," Simon reminded her as she pulled her hood up and moved toward the cave entrance. Cara turned back long enough to make a show of rolling her eyes at his one-man show, but his earlier words still hung between them. He had said she brought him back to life, right before they had made love. In fact, his words might have been the catalyst for Cara's sudden and inexpressible need for him.

              "Hang in there," she said more sincerely, and her face softened. She watched Simon's soften in turn, and felt staggered by how handsome she found him in that moment. He was so good at firing her up—in more ways than one—that it was easy to forget just how attractive he was in their down moments together. She fought a sudden inclination to stay, and instead turned back to the dreary world outside and exited the cave.

              Her trek across the lawn was a lot easier now that she didn't have an additional weight to haul beside her. The flooded ditch was a little more treacherous, but now that she knew she could make the jump, Cara barely hesitated. She wound up and vaulted over the gushing water, grasping onto the opposite bank to pull herself the rest of the way up. There had to be a bridge, she thought, maybe located somewhere farther down the road—she didn't want to waste time locating it now, but she felt sure someone back at the house would know a better route to Simon. She could only hope the servants got out onto the grounds at least as often as their employer did.

              She jogged back down the empty road. She passed Simon's car, and then her own, before turning off into the driveway. She was halfway up the drive when it suddenly occurred to her to feel angry at the party that was likely to receive her at the door. How long had she been gone for? Had the police been called? Or did they just assume she had magically fixed her car and gone on her merry way?

              She had her answer as soon as she arrived back on the doorstep. She must have been gone at least an hour, possibly more, but the servants and staff looked as if they had barely moved from milling about the foyer. They swarmed her upon entry, giving Cara scarcely enough room to pull her boots off and doff her hood. Any ungenerous feelings she had been experiencing for them on the way up died when she realized how genuinely worried they had all been.

              "I found him," she panted. "His car went off the road about a quarter mile north, just up the road. He managed to climb out of the ditch, but then…" Her throat clenched suddenly as she remembered finding Simon alone and injured. "…He's been hurt pretty badly. I managed to get him to a cave located out in the field. Does anyone know where I'm talking about?"

              "I do!" One of the groundskeepers put up his hand, and a few followed suit. Melinda was already on the hall phone, calling for what Cara hoped was an ambulance.

              "He was conscious when I left him," she continued. "He was coherent, but I'm afraid he's been out there a long time. He's going to need food and water when the medics arrive, and I think he's broken his leg." She swallowed the lump back down again. "I
know
it's broken. So they might need to take him to a hospital."

              "He isn't going to like that," one of the maids mentioned. Cara nodded to express that she knew.

              "I don't think it's anything that can be helped. He was going into town anyway this morning, so hopefully he can think of it like…a change of vehicle."

              "The roads are clear." Melinda had returned from her phone call. "The medics are on their way. Oh, I wish he hadn't fired the old doctor!" Then, composing herself, "I'll put in a call for two tows. If that's all right with you?"

              Cara nodded distractedly, pushing the hair out of her eyes. She had completely forgotten about that. Now that the roads were drivable, she really had no reason to remain at Simon's estate—at least, not unless he gave her one. The thought that he might extend some sort of invitation warmed her some. It wasn't just a passing wish—she
knew,
with complete confidence, that Simon would want to see her again as much as she wanted to see him. Clearly they would have a lot more complexities to deal with than they would in a more normal situation, but they were both strong-willed people. They would make it work.

              Two of the maids seized her then and helped to herd her upstairs. Cara relaxed gratefully beneath their attentions, but she wouldn't feel out of the woods until Simon was safely out of the
literal
woods. Still, she wasn't helping him any by allowing herself to drench his carpets and slowly get hypothermia. She was undressed and dumped into a hot bath almost immediately upon entering her room. She felt too tired and too exhausted to notice or care that she was being waited upon. It wasn't something she had ever thought she would get used to, but the female members of the staff who had assigned themselves to her worked quickly and efficiently, and then promptly made themselves scarce.

              She was out again in ten minutes, feeling clean and revitalized and ready to lend herself to the 'Save Simon' effort. She exited the bathroom fully dressed and toweling her hair dry.

              She was surprised to find Melinda, the housekeeper, sitting on her bed.

              Cara drew the towel away from her blond tresses, and was just wetting her lips to say something, when something else happened to draw her attention. She noticed her camera equipment and various other items she used for her major unpacked and lying out on the bed beside Melinda, all ordered neatly, all decidedly
not
where she had left them squirreled away in her duffle bag. She felt the color rise to her face, but tried to control her anger.

              "I didn't go through your things," the housekeeper said offhand. "When the servants brought your luggage up from your car, they saw fit to let me know what you were carrying with you. A reporter, are you?"

              "I'm a journalism major." Cara kept her voice level, when all she really wanted to do was ball her towel into a fist and throw it at the woman until she got out. She didn't take kindly to people invading her privacy, but then again, this wasn't her home. Perhaps it was only natural that they would go through her things as insurance that she meant their employer no harm… Then again, she couldn't imagine Simon signing off on such a bald-faced intrusion of privacy. Even if he
did
listen in on other peoples' phone conversations. "That equipment was bought and paid for by the school. I'm only renting it, because I can't afford my own."

              "Would you like to be able to afford your own?" Melinda asked pleasantly. "Because I have an idea, you see…oh, but I wouldn't want to get into it
just
yet. Not before I told you more about the master, Simon Banning. Aren't you curious about the man who has been hosting you?"

              "Has the ambulance arrived yet?" Cara interrupted. Melinda looked momentarily startled, before shaking her head no.

              "They're about twenty minutes out, by my reckoning. Some of the boys have already gone out to locate Mr. Banning. You were very heroic, you know, coming to his aid like that. It seems a shame that your efforts should go unrewarded."

              "Simon already told me all about himself," Cara put forward bluntly. "All of it. The accident, the lawsuit. Everything."

              "He told you who he was?" Melinda inquired curiously. "How much he was worth? He told you he was a billionaire, did he? That he can afford to spend close to half a million a day, for the rest of his natural life, and never run out?"

              Cara managed to remain standing for several moments after this revelation; then she sat down, hard, in the armchair beside the window. Melinda's mouth compressed into a tight line of sympathy.

              "Oh, I see. Then I suppose he didn't tell you…
everything."

              "What do you want?" Cara murmured quietly. "I know you didn't come here just to chew the fat on Simon. I sure as hell know you didn't enter my room, unannounced, and root through my things, uninvited, just to remind me to pack lighter the next time."

              "Mr. Banning has told you things about himself, yes, but he hasn't told you the full story. Not as
I
can tell it." Melinda crossed her legs beneath her house frock and jogged her ankle conversationally. "And I've been wanting to tell this story for a while, Cara, dear. It's so expansive! So interesting! And I'm sure there are a lot of people across the pond who would be interested in knowing Mr. Banning's whereabouts. He pulled a bit of a vanishing act, you know, when he came all the way out here to disappear."

              "You want to rat him out," Cara surmised. "You want to publish a tell-all. You want me to interview you for a story and share the commission."

              "Journalism…" Melinda repeated thoughtfully, as if she hadn't heard a single detail of what Cara was proposing. "I wonder what a degree like that costs?"

              Cara stilled. She had been very close to opening her mouth, and informing the woman
exactly
what a degree like that cost—more than she was likely to be able to pay back in ten, maybe fifteen years. She was pursuing it out of love, and with the complete understanding that she might never find a job that would render her financially stable enough to recover from early student loan debt.

              A picture was starting to form in her mind, and Cara turned her head away in shame as she was forced to entertain it. A story on Simon Banning… What might a piece like that go for? Thousands?
Tens
of thousands? How much would a publication in his own country be willing to pay for an expos
é
? An exclusive? What might that do for her career?

              It would not only launch it; Cara felt sure that it would make it. She was only twenty, and most journalists twice her age could only dream of the opportunity she was presented with. It was once in a lifetime.

              But it was trash. It could be as truthful as could be, but it was exploitative, pure and simple. Even worse, it would be written at the expense of a man she cared for, whom she truly believed was incapable of the wrongs he thought he had committed. Simon already had enough sharks to deal with in his life, and the Great White was currently staring at her from across the room with black, ravenous eyes. Cara adjusted her skirt discreetly, before folding her hands in her lap.

              "No, thank you," she said. "I am not that kind of journalist, and I am not interested in that kind of story. You might try your luck with the
National Inquirer
. In fact, I would say a woman of your caliber would be better off going to work for them."

              Melinda's face, the gentle, compassionate face that Cara had trusted instantly upon her arrival at the mansion, twisted into something ugly and unrecognizable. She was forced to watch, horrified and fascinated, as the woman before her transformed into someone else completely. Her evolution was made all the worse when Cara realized that this was
exactly
who Melinda had been all along. So much for her investigative instinct—she should have sensed the housekeeper's deception the moment she set foot through the door. She would have to be more careful in her parsing of peoples' character traits in the future.

              "Be very careful how you navigate the next few minutes, my dear," Melinda warned her. "What I'm offering you may never come again in your life, and I'm only offering it once. Now is the perfect time to have a perfectly reasonable discussion, with Mr. Banning out of the house."

              "No thanks," Cara said again as she rose. "I'd appreciate it if you left my room now, Melinda. I can see that I am going to have to repack my things."

              The housekeeper continued to sit, frozen, with a barely repressed look of astonishment, until Cara crossed to the bed deliberately and yanked her camera bag off the duvet. She conveyed her contempt with every movement, until the elder woman had no choice but to admit defeat. Melinda rose and moved to the doorway, before pausing to turn back into the room.

              "We'll see how he likes you, won't we?" she said nastily. "Yes, we'll just see how much Mr. Banning likes you in the days—no,
hours
—to come. He can only expend so much of his time on a common, thankless whore."