Too Grand for Words (BookStrand Publishing Romance) (31 page)

“Steven!”

“Forever, Moira, you and I, forever.”

Chapter Eighteen

It was the end of June when he took Moira from the only life she knew. After stealing her from her work, they stayed a couple weeks in British Columbia to figure out the logistics. Between handling his business, calls to his lawyers to start the immigration paperwork, and a lot of pleasure, she showed him her province. Seeing it through her eyes made the British Columbia he’d visited many times before so much more beautiful.

They travelled to the Okanagan, the wine country of her province, which rivaled many of California’s grapes. She didn’t stop there, and they crisscrossed the highways and back roads, ending up in the astounding sunsets of the Sea-to-Sky Corridor on the majestic mountains of Whistler. Then she hauled him onto a British Columbia Ferry and took him to Vancouver Island.

The Ferry never ran aground or had a collision, but in the first week of being together they’d attended two car accidents, an old man who had a heart attack while they were having dinner, and they got stuck in an elevator for two hours.

Every time something happened, she gave him a worried look, and he calmed her fears, but the thought about finding that witchdoctor in Africa crossed his mind a couple of times. It was uncanny, but he stood by his belief that she was in the right place at the right time to help, not cause the incidents.

In their final week, they spent a couple of nights in the downtown core of Victoria with its English charm and fantastic restaurants, playing tourist. For him it was a novelty. Not as many people recognized him there, and he found that Canadian women in general had grace and manners. Although a few still leered, most simply gave him a warm smile.

On their last evening in Victoria, she took him to a place called Butchart Gardens. They toured the gardens, and just before sunset they crested a small knoll to look down into what was called the “Sunken Garden.” The sight overwhelmed him. He’d heard of the gardens before, but he was glad she was with him when he saw it for the first time. Her home, her spectacular British Columbia was a place he knew they would come back to often. Even their license plates boasted “Beautiful British Columbia.” There wasn’t any doubt in his mind, and the most beautiful woman he had ever known had been born and raised here.

Even though it just about killed him, he agreed that she needed to travel between LA and Vancouver to help during the summer season at her center. After several rounds of negotiations, and making love to convince her, he got her to agree that September would be the cutoff. After that, California would be her home.

* * * *

Her first moments in Los Angeles recalled a dark echo in his mind with the warning Dane had laid at his feet about her life changing. Instead of getting her from the jet to the car and the highway, they had to stop at immigration. Although his lawyers did a lot of the quick work before their arrival, it still meant going to the main terminal. That’s when things went wrong.

He hadn’t told Moira that the reporter that had seen them together in Las Vegas had sold his story. Their picture had popped up in a few places, but because they hadn’t been seen together after that, the story fizzled.

The paparazzi, as she had so eloquently put it, didn’t pop out of cactus, but they always hovered around LAX looking for a sellable picture. The second they hit the terminal floor, they were surrounded.

“Hey, Mr. Porter, who’s that?” Reporters and photographers started to yell, tightening the circle around them.

He immediately pulled Moira into his arms to protect her. “Don’t listen to what they say, ignore them.”

“How the hell do I do that?” she whispered harshly. The frenzied crowd closed in on them.

“Who is she, Steven? Come on, tell us. That’s the same woman who was with you in Vegas, isn’t it?”

A husky woman threw herself in front of them, stopping Moira from going forward. “What’s your name, ma’am?” She stuffed the microphone in her face, which visibly shocked Moira.

“Hey,” she bellowed. “Have you ever heard of personal space? Get that thing outta my face.”

Not even fazed a little, the reporter stood her ground. “How do you know Steven Porter?” she shouted at Moira, even though she stood right in front of her. “Are you Steven’s next little conquest, or do you think you can last?”

Moira looked like she wanted to belt the woman. He held her tighter just in case. It only took a second before even he couldn’t move through the crowd. Big mistake, one he wouldn’t make again. Nobody got in his way when he walked through a set of reporters, but Moira made them crazy.

“Listen, folks, we’re going that way, now you can move or I can run over you,” he said with a warning tone. He used his arm to push at the crowd, but they clustered around them. Security came running from every direction.

The female reporter glared at Moira with story-seeking hungry eyes. “Are you two an item? How long have you been involved with Mr. Porter? You know he’s got a string of women. What makes you think he’ll stay with you?”

The questions came from every direction as security came charging into the tight cluster, pushing them back.

“Where are you going, sir?” A man almost as big as he was, who appeared in charge of the security team, broke through to them.

“Immigration.”

“This way.” He motioned to his men to keep the crowd away. They formed a barrier while shouts from the reporters flew at them.

“Why do you need her to go to immigration? Mr. Porter, Mr. Porter?” they yelled.

Moira remained calm, but the way she gripped his waist told him she was plenty scared. “Sweetheart, I’m sorry I should have anticipated this.”

She gave him a tight smile. “Is this what you go through all the time?” she asked. She held onto him tightly as he guided her toward the safety of the immigration office.

“No, not really. This hasn’t happened before, not like this. It’s you they want to know.”

“They didn’t want to know me five minutes ago, Steven,” she said sarcastically.

He laughed and leaned over to kiss her cheek. “Okay, so it’s my fault.”

While Moira worked with immigration, he got on the phone and called a security team of his own to manage their exit. Two hours later, they drove toward Malibu with an entourage.

Several cars created a barrier between them and the media who had jumped into a cavalcade of vehicles to follow them.

“This is nuts, Steven.”

“It’ll settle down. You know how the media is.”

“They’re like bloody animals. Why didn’t we have this problem in Vegas?”

“The airport is one of the worst places because they congregate there looking for celebrities. In Vegas, we moved around a lot, and there’s thousands of visitors. It’s easy to get lost in the crowd. Except of course, when we got caught after the fire.”

She nestled back in her seat. “Yeah, I saw the pictures, too.”

“You did!”

“Mandy showed me, she’s always buying those Hollywood rags. She nearly popped a vein when she saw a picture of us after the fire.”

He remembered the byline, “
A different kind of mistress for Porter. Not his usual flavor,
” it read. At the time, it had pissed him off, and it still did. If he ever saw that reporter again he
would
grab him by the throat.

She broke into his thoughts. “Mandy kept flopping down those magazines, showing me pictures of you, alone, going to events, at least most of them,” she said, her words dwindling.

By the tone in her voice, he knew she’d probably seen the photo with Delta Carlton. She was a new and up-and-coming actress, not to mention extraordinarily beautiful and nice. Delta’s head wasn’t filled with overstuffed dreams or glamour.

During the two months that lapsed between seeing Moira again, he had tried, once, to bounce back to his old life. Delta went to the opening of a new movie with him. He’d even got as far as her bedroom door afterwards, and then his heart lurched. Delta was a nice woman, with a great body, and she wanted him. He could have done it, his dry spell between the sheets wanted him to do it, but his heart started to talk, as did his mind. Obviously, neither of those two parts of him had given up on Moira. “You saw the pictures of Delta and I together?” he asked.

“Uh-huh.” She folded her hands tightly in her lap. “Mandy showed me those, too. She thought she could make me jealous enough to call you.”

Mandy was A-1 in his books. “Moira, I couldn’t touch another woman, not after knowing you. Do you believe me?”

Moira held her curls aside as they tried to fly across her face. “I don’t know,” she said seriously. “It doesn’t matter. I didn’t think I would ever see you again. I expected you to find someone”—she paused—“else.”

He was always going to be truthful with Moira. He’d almost lost her because of what he’d held back before. That would never happen again. “I tried.”

She bit her bottom lip, but remained silent.

“Moira, I stood in Delta’s bedroom door, and I saw you in my mind. I saw your face. I realized I didn’t want anyone else but you, and I left.” He turned off the highway and started to climb the winding narrow road into the Santa Monica Mountains where his estate sat. “I love you, Moira, and I know the next while is going to be a big change for you, and I know you’re doing it for me.”

Looking in the side mirror at the cars that followed them she said, “Well, I hope you’re right about the media settling down. I don’t think I’d feel very good being attacked picking up some chicken at the grocery store.”

Dane’s words came flashing back to him.
You’ll have to cage her, and she’ll hate that.
He couldn’t do that to her, but he’d have to, for a while. Even if she hated the idea, he would have to hire a personal security guard or three, until the excitement wore off. She wouldn’t be happy about it.

They climbed higher into the mountain range, and then he slowed near the top and turned into his driveway. They waited while large iron gates clicked open, and slowly slid apart. He parked the car, and she remained silent for a moment staring at his sprawling, twenty-thousand-square-foot house. When she got out of the car, she looked to see the see the reporters stopped on the other side of the enormous gate and walls that surrounded the compound.

She thrust her hands on her hips and said, “What the hell do you need all this square footage for, show-off?”

He couldn’t stop himself from laughing. Only Moira would give him hell for having an estate that most women would go giddy with joy knowing was going to become theirs. Truth was, he didn’t have a good answer. But for as long as he lived he would remember that first day and night.

The second she stepped into his house, she made it a home. She moved from room to room, checking every corner. He introduced her to Margarite who had taken care of his estate for more than ten years. When Moira slipped away from the kitchen to investigate the rest of the house Margarite gave him a big smile and a wink.

“I like her, Senor Porter,” she said, nodding her approval.

“I like her, too, Margarite.”

“No, senor.
Y necesito sentir
.”

He nodded his understanding. “You’re right, Margarite. It is real love, and the love ever after.”

After keeping a low profile for a few hours, they finally ventured out and spent half a day at a quayside market, buying fresh produce and loaves of bread. She went nuts in the place, filling her arms with bundles of fresh flowers and more fresh fruit than they could possibly eat. People stared, but luckily, reporters didn’t hang out at the produce section, and they could wander without being bothered.

She made dinner that evening, and they ate on the large verandah with an endless view of the Pacific as the sun set the water to flame.

Moira said, “Okay, so I like it, but those colors in the bathroom have to change.”