Christmas Conspiracy (14 page)

Parris snorted. “Boy, you’re never gonna make it as a Casanova with those lines.”

Logan glared at them both. “We haven’t exactly worked things out yet.”

“The way you’re headed, you may be permanently in the doghouse. I suggest you get inside and sweep her off her feet, Logan. You do know how do that, or should I teach you?”

“I seem to remember things weren’t all that easy with Amanda there for a while.”

“But I got my head out of my butt and told her I loved her. Are you willing to do the same?”

Logan had no pithy answer.
Was he? Did he love Kat?
His emotions were all in a turmoil. He didn’t want to make another mistake.

At that moment, a shout drew his attention. A black body bag was lifted out of the well. He wanted to keel over. He walked across the yard and stood beside Debra as the workers slid his mother’s body into the back of the coroner’s van.

“Do you need a moment,” she asked, touching his arm. He stared at her hands and realized that they didn’t offer comfort, not like Kat’s did. He shook his head. “Just get me an answer.”

She nodded and climbed in beside the body.

Logan went numb as he watched the vehicle leave. How had this happened? The antlike workers continued to process the scene. Logan needed…he needed Kat.

“Watch them for me,” he said to Blake, indicating the forensic teams and other workers. “Just, keep things going…”

“I’ll be here doing my job, Carmichael. Now go do yours.”

Logan crossed the yard and climbed the steps to the house. Kat had disappeared from the window. He entered and Gretchen stood in the doorway, her face creased with a frown. She nodded her head into the living room. “She’s that way. Good luck.”

“Thanks,” he said, hovering at the entrance.

Kat sat on the floor next to the large stone fireplace, arms wrapped around her knees, staring into the flickering flames. She appeared lost in thought, and unbelievably sad. When his boots sounded on the wood floor, she stiffened and didn’t turn to face him.

He knelt beside her and touched her shoulder.

She edged slightly away.

“Kat, there’s nothing between me and Debra.”

“But there was.”

“Briefly.”

“I could tell. She seems like she’d be perfect for you. A doctor. Smart.” Kat glanced at him from beneath her lashes. “She’d fit in here.”

He turned her slowly until they were directly across from each other. “She’s not a jigsaw puzzle piece and we make better friends than anything else.”

Kat pointed to the painting above his fireplace. “That’s a famous picture, isn’t it?”

Logan nodded.

She exhaled in frustration. “Look, Logan. I’m glad you know about Hayden and Lanie, but I don’t belong here. We have really different backgrounds—”

“Yeah, you’re a princess and I’m a rancher whose father murdered his mother.”

“Don’t be obtuse,” she snapped. “When this all gets straightened out with Leopold, we’ll work out visitation rights and…and…”

“You’ll just go away.”

“It’s for the best.”

She could stab him in the heart without even trying. Logan met her determined gaze. He didn’t like the stubborn glint. Not one bit. But more than that, her words stung. Hard. He’d never treated her like less. He’d done everything in his power to show her he cared. He needed her, and she just wanted to throw everything away.

“Honey, I may be obtuse, but I don’t think it’s for the best. Not for me, anyway.” The words echoed in his memory. Had his mother and father had this same conversation? Was history repeating itself? “What if I don’t want you to go, Kat? What would you say to that? What if I want you and the kids to stay with me? What if I think your jigsaw piece fits just fine?”

She stared at him, and he could swear hope flared in her eyes.

“You can’t mean that,” she whispered. “Oh, God, Logan. I can’t make a mistake. What if it doesn’t work out?”

He went all in, gambling more than his father ever dared. He caressed her arms, trying to loosen the tension vibrating from within her. “Something is growing between us, Kat. Something powerful. We owe it to ourselves to find out where that will go.”

She shivered at his touch. “What if chemistry and feelings aren’t enough? I can’t afford to be wrong about us. If the kids think we’re going to be together, and we don’t make it, they’ll be devastated. I have to consider these things. I’m their mother.”

“And I’m their father.” Logan stood and faced her. He’d lost his family. He’d lost Kat once, too. He could not bear to lose his children. “This ranch is their legacy. They’ll be the sixth generation of Carmichaels raised here. I didn’t fight to keep this place for my grandmother and my mother to not have my children enjoy their birthright.”

He crossed his arms in front. “So, what’ll it be? Fight or flight? Or can we just move on to the kiss and make up part?”

When she hesitated, Logan just shook his head, disappointment souring his throat. “Think about it and decide what you’re going to do. I’ll be upstairs in my bedroom. Just know that if you really decide to go for this, once you’re inside that room, you may not be coming out for a while.”

Chapter Seven

Kat couldn’t speak. Her entire body froze with uncertainty. He’d asked her for much more than one week forgetting the world outside. He wanted more. Possibly everything.

Logan stared her down, gauging her reaction as the effects of his challenge ricocheted through her. She swallowed but couldn’t hold his gaze. Something indefinable crossed his expression. Hurt? Disappointment? Grief?

“If you change your mind, you know where I am. I have some things to check on.”

He left her standing alone in the room and climbed the stairs, disappearing from view. Kat took a deep breath. What was she supposed to do? She wrapped her arms around herself and shivered.

“What in heaven’s name are you thinking, girl?” Gretchen’s voice pierced the large room. “Do you need an engraved invitation?”

Kat whirled around and faced the slight housekeeper, the woman’s frown as intimidating as the unknown future. “You were listening?”

Gretchen laughed. “Of course I was listening. I’m the housekeeper. That’s part of my job. You don’t think this group of testosterone-driven men could handle saving the world without my guidance, do you?” She stepped closer. “Now it’s your turn. What’s your intention toward my boss? Make it good, because I’ve helped him get over you once, and it was ugly. I won’t have him put through that kind of pain again. His romp with you left him devastated and volunteering for every suicide mission available—and he almost succeeded three years ago in Germany.”

“The coma?” Kat asked, shattered that her children could have lost their father before they ever knew him, that she could have lost Logan.

“The very same, so think hard before you walk away from him this time.”

Kat frowned. “You don’t understand. I’m not trying to hurt him. I’m trying to protect everyone.”

“That’s horse manure and you know it. You’re protecting yourself. You’re afraid to accept all of Logan. Who he is—what he was.” Gretchen planted her hands on her hips. “Do you think I’ve been a housekeeper all my life?”

“I don’t know.”

“Sure you don’t,” Gretchen said, “but I grew up in a house bigger than this one. My father was rich…and the man I married at twenty-one was wealthy enough to make Logan look like a pauper.” Gretchen grabbed a dish towel from the laundry basket she’d set on the chair and started folding. “Do you think less of me because I now keep house for a living?”

“Of course not!” Kat denied. “A lot of people’s circumstances change.”

“Ah, but mine didn’t.” Gretchen set the towel down. “I was a pampered girl, and I enjoyed the money and freedom wealth gave me. I could still be living that same privileged life, but after my husband died and my dearest friend disappeared, I chose to be here on this ranch, watching over her son. For damn sure, the boy’s drunken father wouldn’t take care of him.”

Kat stared at Gretchen, seeing her in a new light.

“Life is all about choices. Logan Carmichael is a good man. The best. But because you doubt yourself, you let him walk out of this room with his heart breaking in two.”

“His heart isn’t broken.” Kat choked. “It can’t be. We don’t know each other well enough.”

Gretchen clicked her tongue. “Maybe that’s the real problem. You really don’t know anything about him, do you?” She gestured around the room. “He pulled this place back from the auction block. It wasn’t so great or fancy looking by the time his father nearly destroyed it. Logan Carmichael knows how to go hungry and be afraid in the night, but you won’t let yourself see that part of him. You can’t see past the trimmings of what is here now.”

Shame struck deep, and Kat tried to turn away.

Gretchen cut her off. “Logan is a hero. While you thought he was drinking champagne, he was probably crawling on his belly through hellholes you and I can’t even begin to imagine. He’s lived and hunted amidst squalor and danger, tracking evil men and stopping them, while the rest of us enjoyed the safety he won at such personal cost. Three years ago, he came within inches of being listed on the CIA’s memorial wall. Because he was distracted by a broken heart.”

Kat choked back a cry. “It’s not possible.” Could he care that much?

“You honestly think a man like that gives a rip about where you come from? To him, money is nothing but a means to help make the impossible possible. To make something good happen for others. But deep down, family and this ranch mean everything to him. He left the CIA to come back and save the Triple C because it was his mother’s. Even when he was angry at her, he honored her memory.” Gretchen whisked another dish towel to fold from the pile. “In caring for her only son, I’ve done the same. Now that his mother’s body has been found, he’ll need even more. He needs you.”

Kat shrank under Gretchen’s tirade. “What if it doesn’t work out?” she whispered. “I have to protect my children.”

“Then show them you’re brave enough to take a chance on a man who’d give up his life for you and your kids.”

Kat looked at the stairs, then hesitated.

Gretchen cursed. “You know, maybe you called it right the first time. Maybe you don’t merit him. That man deserves to be happy, and if you’re too scared to grab the brass ring when it comes up and smacks you in the face, maybe you should just slink out of here when the danger’s gone. You’ll only have the whole rest of your life to regret it.”

Gretchen stalked into the kitchen, not looking back.

Kat stared after her, then up the stairs. Well, that Irish temper made her feel about one inch tall. And the truth of it, Gretchen was right.
She was a coward.

She’d have to shove these doubts away. She’d fought to get into nursing school. She’d negotiated to change her work schedule for school, something she’d never thought she could do. She’d stood up to a king. Why was she so frightened now?

Because you might love him. Because he’s everything good you were afraid to dream of having in your life.

Kat touched her lips, the memory of Logan’s kiss, of his arms around her. She’d never forgotten how he made her feel during that magical week they’d shared. Alive. Beautiful. Treasured. She’d never felt like that since she’d walked out that door…until he returned. Offering her protection. Offering her freedom. Offering himself.

Logan had saved her and their children. He said he wanted her. Every part of her longed to be with him. To see if the magic was real. To see if they might make something beautiful by merging two lives where only pain existed now. Could she risk it?

How could she not?

Kat lifted her chin, put her hand on the banister and climbed the stairs, a flutter of excitement starting deep within. Oh, Lord, she was shaking and he hadn’t even touched her.

But he would.

The second floor was quiet.

Heart beating at a frantic pace, she walked down the hallway to the children’s room. She eased open the door. They still slept quietly, napping after the strenuous day. Love for them filled her heart, and she closed them in with a soft click, knowing her decision about their father was right. They deserved the chance to have him in their lives…forever. And she wanted the brass ring. For once in her life, she dared to think she could have it all.

With trembling hands, Kat opened the door to Logan’s bedroom, stepped inside, then shut them in.

Logan didn’t turn his head, though the tension in his shoulders told Kat he knew she was there. He sat on the edge of his bed, a dusty shipping trunk at his feet, the lid opened, tilting askew. A small box rested on his lap.

“I didn’t think you’d come,” he said quietly.

Kat crossed the room and sat next to him on the bed, her thigh touching his. “Gretchen reminded me what I risked losing,” she said. This was not the reception she’d expected.

“Sorry about that. Gretchen has had the run of the ranch for a while and is not famous for holding back her opinions on things.”

“No, she’s very good at sharing those,” Kat said diplomatically, troubled that Logan seemed so distant and closed off again. “I got the impression she knew your mother well.”

“They were best friends.” Logan pulled a piece of paper from the small box on his lap, then unfolded the letter gently, his hands unsteady.

“I found this note hidden in my mother’s desk the day she disappeared,” he said, not looking in Kat’s direction. “It’s not dated, so I don’t know when, or how, she planned to give it to me. The letter makes it clear she was leaving my father, at least temporarily.”

Kat read the words, written in feminine script, over his shoulder. The letter itself had small imperfections on it, as if tears had dampened the paper, then dried. Logan traced those uneven areas with his finger. Were the tears Logan’s or his mother’s?

Dearest Logan,

I know the fighting bothers you, and I’m so sorry. I’ve decided it’s best if I leave for a while. Your father needs to cool off, and so do I. Try not to rile him too much.