Ramsay(31)

I'd dressed and stumbled to the widow's walk, wondering at the women who  had stood on a structure just like this and felt their own despair,  their own desperate loneliness. I'd turned and there he was as if he  were the answer to a question, as if he'd somehow known I needed . . .  someone. And maybe it wasn't just someone I needed. Maybe I needed him.  And maybe that was another reason I was so damned scared.

Because I had a feeling needing Brogan Ramsay again was going to ultimately break my heart.                       
       
           



       

I turned back to the water. "Do you know why this is called a widow's walk?"

He leaned a hip against the rail and took a sip of wine. "Because they  offer an unimpeded view of the sea. Women would walk them as they looked  out to the water waiting for a glimpse of their husband's ship. And  often, their husband would never return."

I nodded, again picturing the nameless, faceless woman who might have  walked one very similar to this long ago, her dress billowing in the  wind, a handkerchief balled in her fist, tears streaming down her face  as she waited for her beloved. "I studied history in college." I paused,  taking a sip of wine. "It's always been the women who have had it the  hardest, you know. We're always the ones who have to wait-for your ships  to arrive, your wars to end, your pride to be soothed, for your bodies  to be returned from some battlefield, some foreign land. We're always  the ones stuck while you men fight for the things that are so important  to you for reasons we can't understand. We wait, and we wonder, and we  hurt."

He tilted his head, his eyes searching mine. "The men have been the ones  to fight the battles, to be killed, wounded, scarred, captured."

I shook my head. "Waiting. The waiting, the uncertainty, the not  knowing. It's the greater heartache, the greater torture. Can you  imagine, coming here night after night, pacing . . . pacing, being so  powerless to do anything except wait? Like a slow death . . ."

Brogan was looking at me in that intense way he had, as if he was trying  to figure out the things I wasn't saying to him. And truthfully, I  didn't know if there was anything I wasn't saying to him, or why I was  suddenly so filled with pain for the women who had suffered the fate I  was describing. Maybe I was just . . . emotionally distraught,  overburdened.

"What did you want to do with a history degree?" he finally asked.

I shrugged, letting out a pent-up breath. "Teach most likely. I hadn't  decided when it became clear I was needed at the company. I earned my  degree, but I never really used it." I took a sip of my wine.

"It wasn't always your intention to work there."

"No. It was my intention to babysit Stuart." I sighed, the weight of  that truth falling off my shoulders. "I've obviously done a piss-poor  job."

"No, Lydia. You singlehandedly kept that company running in the  black-even if it was always just barely. I've looked into the books."

I looked at him sharply. But of course he had. He was trying to fix  things, trying to create a future for the company my brother had almost  run into the ground. Of course he needed the details of exactly how that  had happened, other than Stuart's penchant for gambling. Speaking of  which, "Do you count cards, Brogan?" I asked the question that had  crossed my mind several times since I found out Stuart had lost our  company to him in a poker game.

He paused, a frown furrowing his brow, but then answered, "Yes."

Surprised, I turned my body toward him. "I didn't think-"

"You didn't think I'd admit to it after winning De Havilland Enterprises  from Stuart in a card game? Why not? It's not as if I even work at it.  It just comes naturally. I think it'd be more effort not to count  cards."

"Is it really fair to gamble then? Isn't that-"

"Cheating? I don't believe so. But maybe we disagree."

Did I disagree? Not exactly, I guessed. He was only using his God-given  talents. Still, if Brogan hadn't contributed to Stuart's downfall, would  he, could he have eventually turned his life around? Or was I the fool  for continuing to hope for that? By continuing to bust my own ass to  keep our heads above water so he didn't have to? In truth, maybe Stuart  had been headed for ruin with or without Brogan's involvement. Take care  of your brother, Lydie.

"Will you show me?"

"Show you?"

"How you count cards."

He frowned, tilting his head, his tongue running over his teeth, just as  the landscape lighting flickered on below, casting him in an aura of  gold and drawing my attention to the blue of his eyes. Funny, in his  office that day, I had described them to myself as icy, but I'd never  thought them icy before then, and I didn't tonight. It was said eyes  were windows to the soul, and if it was true, that soft, soft blue spoke  of things I was almost frightened to acknowledge. And God, he was  breathtakingly handsome-his masculine beauty was almost painful to look  at because it made me want to possess him, and I didn't think that was  wise. It hadn't been then, and it probably was less so now. "We'd have  to play a game for me to show you."

"All right."

He nodded his head toward my room. "Let's go inside." I followed him off  the widow's walk. The night was closing in, the sky turning a deep,  twilight blue as the first stars appeared.                       
       
           



       

Brogan placed the wine bottle and his glass on the top of the dresser  and I followed suit. "I'll go get a deck of cards." He left the room,  and I sagged down onto the bed. What I should probably tell him was that  I was going to sleep. But I didn't want to sleep. I wanted company. I  wanted his company.

He returned a few minutes later, having changed into a pair of jeans  that rode low on his lean hips and a black T-shirt that showcased his  broad shoulders and muscular chest, and he was wearing his glasses. I  sat up on my knees, and he joined me on the bed, sitting on the very  edge. He'd grabbed our wine glasses and handed me mine. I took a sip and  set it on the bedside table. He placed his on the wooden bench at the  end of the bed.

Without a word, he took the cards out of the box and shuffled them  effortlessly, his eyes remaining on my face as his hands fanned and  folded the cards as if by magic. I couldn't help laughing softly. He  raised a dark brow.

"What are we playing for?"

I gave him a wry smile. "You've already bankrupted my family. Plus, it  would be a fool's bet on my part. You just admitted you count cards."

"I wasn't talking about betting money."

"What then?"

He shrugged. "Truth or dare."

"You'd end up getting all my truths and dishing up all the dares."

"How about if we play a game completely based on luck then? I'll still  count cards, but it won't offer me any rewards. I'll just know what's  coming. Winner gets to choose whether he or she wants a truth or a dare  from the other."

"I thought in truth or dare the loser got to choose what they were willing to give up."

"I've never thought that was very fair. Why should the loser get to choose their fate?" His smile was lazy.

I thought about it, sucking on my lower lip. My heart was thumping at a  quickened pace, and I wasn't sure I wanted to admit that what I felt was  . . . excitement. I wasn't sure about the dare part, but I wanted  Brogan's truths. This was my chance to get a few. "Okay."

He simply nodded, fanning the cards out once more and folding them back  together. He placed them on the bed and nodded to them. "Cut?"

I did and then he picked them up and began dealing. "What are we playing?" I asked.

"War."

I raised a brow. "I thought we'd already played war."

He chuckled. "Oh no. Those were just the battles, Mo Chroí." But he  tilted his head and looked up at me in that sweet, teasing way he'd done  when we were teens that had always made my stomach do somersaults. It  still did.

I watched him as he dealt the cards, noted the very slight scruff  already on his jaw despite that he'd been clean-shaven that morning, the  way his inky black lashes created shadows on his cheeks, even under the  lenses of his glasses, the strong line of his jaw, the slight cleft in  his chin, the way he held his mouth in that rigid way. And yet, I knew  how soft it could be, the warmth of his lips, exactly how his tongue  tasted-that exotic male spiciness that spoke to everything feminine  inside of me. I wondered if he tasted the same everywhere, wondered at  the flavor of his most intimate skin. I felt wetness pool in my  underwear and achy pressure settled between my thighs at my own  thoughts.