Fit for a King (28 page)

224

Diana Palmer

Fit for a
King

225

“Wait!"

But she
hung up, trembling all over. So now she
knew. Bess was living
with King.

She
almost let it go at that and made her plans
without trying again.
But that was the coward's way
out. She phoned his office, only to be told
that he
wasn't in and they didn't know when to expect him.
She left
word, but the secretary didn't sound reliable.
As soon as she hung
up, she wrote a terse note and
dropped it in the mail, addressed to his
Oklahoma
City office. Perhaps he could find time to read it, she
thought
unreasonably, and went back to her designs.

She'd
finished her collection, mailed the completed
designs to Angel
Mahoney and picked out a nice town
near St. Augustine to move to. She
packed her things,
careful not to let her parents see the baggage. She'd
leave in
the morning. It had been over a week since
she'd mailed that
note to King, and she was sure he'd seen it by now. Perhaps he didn't want any
complications and was going to ignore it. That wasn't like him, but men in
love weren't always rational, she guessed. He'd wanted Bess for a long time,
and now he had her. It wasn't his fault that he wanted to look
ahead and
not behind him.

Warchief
was quiet these days, almost as if he
knew he'd lose his home if he kept
being noisy. He purred at Elissa and talked to her, but he'd stopped
making
such wild noises at dawn and dusk. She won
dered if he was
sick.

Heaven
knew, she was. The morning sickness
hadn't let up, and she was beginning
to feel pregnant. Her slacks were tight, and her breasts were sensitive.
She
grinned at all the little disadvantages. None of
them mattered,
because she was going to have a baby
and love it so much that it would
feel as wanted as
she always had.

She
settled down to bed that night, leaving her par
ents sitting up to
talk. There was a full moon and a
scattering of stars, and she closed
her eyes with a
sigh. King would be seeing that moon out his window
in
Oklahoma, probably with Bess lying beside him.
She hoped Bess would
be kind to him. Tears stung
her eyes. Instead of getting easier, bearing
the knowl
edge that she'd never see King again was getting
harder
every day. But she'd better get used to it, she chided herself. Forever was a
long time.

About two
o'clock in the morning, she and War-
chief were awakened by a thunderous
knocking on
the front door. With a white chenille bathrobe thrown
hastily
over her nightgown, she rubbed her sleepy
eyes and stumbled to
the door, calling, "Who's
there?"

"Kingston Roper," came the gruff reply.

She
fumbled the door open. With his jacket slung
carelessly over his
arm, his tie hanging haphazardly
around his neck, and his face hard and drawn
and in
need of a
shave, he looked haggard and weary but

226

Diana Palmer

devastatingly
handsome. And Elissa wouldn't have
cared if he'd been covered in mud.

"Come
in," she said, fighting down the impulse to
throw herself at
him, trying to appear calm when her
heart was beating her to death and her
breath was
stuck somewhere below her collarbone.

He stood
looking at her as she shut the door again,
his eyes dark and
troubled and oddly hungry. He
didn't move, as if riveted to the spot,
staring.

"What
was that noise? Oh, hello, Mr. Roper,"
Tina said, smiling at
him from the door of their room
off the living room. "You look exhausted. Elissa,
there's some decaffeinated coffee you can reheat,
and some of that cake I made. You can put Mr. Roper in
the spare room if he's staying. Good night,
dear."

She closed
the door again, and King turned back
to Elissa.

"I'll
heat the coffee if you'd like a cup," she said
quietly.

He
searched her face, looking for any sign of wel
come, but there was
none. His eyes dulled. He'd
hoped so desperately that she might have
missed him
even a fraction as much as he'd missed her. He'd
stayed
away deliberately, denying himself the sight
and sound and feel of
her all this time to try to make her miss him, to make her see the light. And
he knew
that it hadn't worked. He looked at her and thought
he'd die of emptiness if she
sent him away. He fol
lowed her into the
kitchen without another word, as
cold inside as an empty tomb.

King sat down in the
chair Elissa indicated and
watched her move around the kitchen, slicing
cake
and heating
cups of coffee in the small microwave
oven.
She looked delicious. Glowing. Wait a min
ute—didn't they say that pregnant women glowed?
He took a slow breath, feeling warm all over with
the
possibility of it, with
possession in his eyes as they
followed
her. He'd win her back somehow. He had
to.

"I didn't expect you," she said.

"I
went back to the office tonight to check some
figures," he
said as she placed mugs of steaming cof
fee on the table,
along with saucers and forks and slices of cake. "I've been in Jamaica,"
he added,
glancing up.

"Have
you?" She nibbled at her cake.

Diana Palmer

"Your
cottage had a young redhead in it," he re
marked. "She
said her parents had bought the cottage
from you. Warchief
was gone, too."

"I have him here,” she
said. She took another bite
of the cake,
still without looking at him. "You found
my letter tonight, I guess?"

"Buried
in a stack of bids," he confirmed. He left
half his cake uneaten
and leaned back in the chair
with his coffee cup in his hand, studying
her. "Was
that note the best you could do?" he added. "A
terse
'Need to talk to you when you have time. Best
wishes, Elissa'?"

She
flushed. "I'd already tried your ranch and your
office. Nobody seemed to know where you
were."

"Nobody
did, for a while," he said. He didn't
mention that the past
few weeks had been pure hell.
His temper had become so vile that it had
already
cost him two of his best junior executives. So much
for
testing that absence-makes-the-heart-grow-fonder
business, he thought
angrily. She didn't look any the worse for wear, but he sure as hell did. He
stared at her coolly. "Are you having any morning sickness?"

She almost dropped the coffee cup.

"Well,
why else would you bother to contact me?"
he chanced. "It
wasn't out of love. You told me how
you felt when you left," he said
curtly, his dark eyes
glittering at her across the table.
"The only possible
reason was that I'd made you pregnant. So here
I

Fit for a King
                     
229

am." He didn't
mention that he'd practically bought an airline to get here that fast.

"There
was no rush," she said. "I've got every
thing worked out. My
parents know," she added
softly. "They didn't make accusations or
rage at me
or even try to shame me. They said..." She bit back
tears. "They said people are human."

"Oh,
God," he whispered roughly. Though he
himself was
delighted—surely she'd reconsider and marry him now—he hadn't thought about how
her
parents would take the news. He wasn't surprised that they'd stand by
her, though. They were good people,
and they loved her.

"It's all right. I make
more than enough money to
take care of
myself and the baby. And you can visit
if
you like," she told him. "But I'd rather you waited
awhile," she said, lifting tired eyes to his.
"I don't
want people gossiping,
and it's the last kind of com
plication
you need right now."

He stared
at her blankly. Bess said Elissa had
called, so didn't she know that Bobby
and Bess were
back together? "It's my baby," he said simply.
"I
want to take care of you both."

"I don't need taking care
of, thank you," she said
with forced
calm, remembering that he hadn't bothered to make a move toward her in seven
weeks and
that Bess was now living
with him.

He exhaled angrily, leaning forward to pin her with

230

Diana
Palmer

Fit for a
King

231

his dark, quiet eyes.
"I'm responsible for you," he
said. "This is
all my fault."

"I'm
not blaming you," she replied. "That isn't
why I contacted you. I
gave my word that I would, if it happened."

He stopped
breathing for an instant. "That's the only reason you got in touch with
me?"

Her
eyebrows arched with practiced carelessness.
"What other
reason would I have had?"

He wanted
to throw something. "You loved me
once," he
growled.

"Oh, I've gotten over
that," she assured him, rising to put the empty cups into the sink and
praying
that he wouldn't see through the
fiction of what she
was saying to the
agony underneath. She swallowed
down
tears. "It was just infatuation. I was pretty na
ive, you know, and you were very experienced. Any
girl
can lose her head with a sexy man. I just hap
pened
to be a little too naive. You see—" She turned
to tell him a few more choice lies, but he wasn't
there.
Seconds later, she heard the
front door open softly
and close. Then a car engine roared once, and she
heard the vehicle drive away.

It had no sooner
pulled away than the phone rang. What a night, she thought miserably. At least,
thank
God, she'd kept her composure. King hadn't guessed how she'd grieved
for him, and that was something.
He'd leave her alone now, and she and the baby

would be each other's
world. King wouldn't have to
sacrifice his happiness with Bess on Elissa's
account.

She
lifted the receiver on the second ring, hoping
her parents hadn't
been disturbed again. "Hello?"
she said, wiping away a tear.

"Elissa?"

It was
Bess. Elissa glared at the telephone. "If
you're looking for
King, you're too late. He's on his
way back to you—I made sure of
that—and you don't
have to worry. I won't bother him again. The baby
and I will
manage just fine."

"Baby?" Bess sounded shocked.

"King
will tell you all about it, I'm sure. It's no concern of his anymore."

"Please don't hang up," Bess said suddenly.

“I can
imagine what you have to say to me, but—''
Elissa began
quietly.

"No,
you can't," Bess interrupted softly. "I'm
sorry. I'm so sorry. I've loused things up
for you and
Kingston, and I almost
destroyed my own marriage,
all
because I couldn't tell Bobby the truth, couldn't tell him what I really
wanted. Elissa, Bobby and I
aren't
getting a divorce. I finally got up enough nerve
to swallow my pride and say what I felt, and now we're staying together.
I was sure Kingston would
have told
you by now. He was the one who convinced
me to talk to Bobby," she added, stunning Elissa into
silence. "I tried to tell you when you phoned
that