“Last night—” Heat rushed up her neck and across her cheeks. The bane of a redhead. She raised a hand to her eyes. “I can’t lie to you, Jake. I won’t. Yes, last night was beyond amazing. Beyond anything I’ve ever experienced.”
He stared at her, confusion in his eyes. “Then why are you running away?”
“Because it was beyond amazing.” Her voice drifted to a hushed whisper.
“Women.” He swiped at a pebble with the side of his shoe. “Luce, that just plain doesn’t make any sense.”
“It does. Think about it a bit.”
“Oh, yeah. I will.” His expression grew hard and resentful. “I’ll think about it tonight. When I’m by myself—wishin’ you were back in my bed.”
He held out his hands, palms up. “What if all this had been for real? I know I’m not in the same class as you. I don’t have the money your daddy and ex-fiancé have. But would marrying me be that terrible?”
Pain laced through her, and she dropped her lashes quickly to hide the hurt. Not in the same class as her? She could have screamed in frustration. Heck, no, he wasn’t. He was heads-and-tails above her. Jake worried about strangers. He went where he was needed and tried to make a difference in people’s lives without expecting a thing back. She and Jake in the same class? No. She’d never be as good a person as him. How many honest, hardworking people in had paid through the nose to Darling Enterprise to cover the cost of her aborted wedding? Her frivolous gown? Not knowing about it beforehand didn’t absolve her of the guilt. It only made her negligent.
Would marrying him be that terrible? Oh, if he only knew. If only he’d ask her to marry him for real. Ask her and mean it. Want it.
She thought back to the very businesslike dinner and proposal from Donald. The jerk had asked her to marry him as a matter of course. He’d approached it the same way you’d ask someone to sign a merger contract.
Yet she’d said yes to that bozo and was telling Jake no. But Jake’s proposal was pretend, she reminded herself. It was, for all intents and purposes, a business arrangement too. A week’s engagement in return for help on the interstate.
Both men needed her. But neither wanted her, Lucinda Darling, for herself.
The first engagement held no more emotion for her than it had for Donald. Her heart hadn’t been involved. The second? It was smashing her heart to smithereens.
Far better for both of them if Jake didn’t realize that.
Early on, she’d learned to erect a protective shield that kept anyone from getting too close. It was hard to let anyone penetrate that. If she let him through her barricade, all the way in, and found out it wasn’t her, but the heiress, he wanted, she might never recover.
But this was Jake. He wouldn’t do that.
She couldn’t take the chance.
She slid on her sunglasses, shielding her eyes both from the sun and from Jake’s prying gaze. Then she dug deep for Ms. Darling, the boardroom diva who could play hardball without blinking.
Two kids on sleek bikes whizzed down the sidewalk, jabbering a mile a minute to each other, and she watched them with envy. Had she ever been that free?
She waited till they passed. She had to choose her words carefully, knowing they’d write “the end” to any relationship between them. She needed to lie to Jake. It wouldn’t be just a little white lie this time. No, this one had to be a whopper. Had to be believable. Had to be a dream-slayer.
She crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s not working for me, Jake. I can’t pretend anymore; I hate the deception. This white lie of ours started out teensy, innocently, but it’s grown. It’s involved too many others, and I can’t go along with it any longer.”
She gestured toward the house, Jake, then herself. “You asked what if this was real. Well, it isn’t. None of it.” Her voice sounded tired even to her own ears. “It’s not my life. Next week, you’ll be back at work. So will I, doing what I have to do.”
His face hardened. “Even if that means stealing the homes and businesses of the shrimpers and fishermen in the Gulf.”
“No! I had nothing to do with those loans, the deals that went down there. You know me better than that.”
He shook his head. “I thought I did, but now I’m not so sure.”
“Jake—”
“Look, Luce, I intend to take Donald down. I want him.” He cracked his knuckles. “So damn bad, I can taste it.”
“I understand that.”
“I don’t think you do. I wanted him before. Now—” He huffed out a breath. “Now it’s like some sort of primal obsession. I need to take him down both for the shrimpers and for what he’s done to you.”