Dawn Stewardson (6 page)

When she stood up and smiled expectantly at him, the sudden flip of his stomach took him by surprise. She might be a good-looking woman but she sure hadn’t caused him any of
those
kinds of feelings before.

It couldn’t be that, he told himself, getting up and starting in the direction of the bedrooms. He simply hadn’t changed a bed with a woman before.

Must have just been a little embarrassment or something. That’s all.

L
AUREN HAD ALREADY SEEN
the boys’ rooms, which, when Eagles Roost was first built, had been the three guest bedrooms. But Grace hadn’t taken her down to the far end of the bedroom wing. She’d merely pointed toward it, referring to it as “Sully’s space.”

It turned out to be both larger and less Spartan than Lauren had expected—a suite that stretched across the entire end of the lodge, consisting of a large bedroom and private bath, plus an adjoining study that Sully used as his office.

“That’s a separate line from the one in the lounge,” he told her, gesturing toward the phone on the desk. “After the first couple of times I caught kids listening in on the extension, a private line started seeming like a necessity.”

She nodded, but her attention was actually focused on the books that covered one entire wall of the study. Most of them, she could see, were far too recent to have belonged to the original owner.

“Otis keeps telling me,” Sully said, “that wall’s going to fall down if I buy many more books. But I prefer reading to television.”

For a moment that fact surprised her. Then she realized it probably explained why he was so well spoken for someone without the best of formal educations.

By the time her sixty-second tour of his rooms was over, she’d decided that while the tycoon who’d built Eagles Roost might have wanted a rustic retreat he obviously hadn’t wanted to do without his creature comforts.

The bedroom furniture consisted of gorgeous old cherry-wood pieces; the lighting in the room was muted. On the far side of the bed there was only a diffuse glow from a small, electrified railway lantern that served as a bedside lamp. Near where she was standing, a brass floor lamp spread a pool of light over a comfortable-looking leather armchair and matching footstool.

While Sully was getting a set of sheets from the dresser, Lauren peeked at the book lying open on the chair. It was a recent courtroom thriller, and seeing it started her worrying about Elliot again.

Reminding herself he’d said the odds on his ex-client actually trying anything were really low, she did her best to force her worry away.

“Here,” Sully said, handing her the sheets. “You take care of these while I strip the bed.”

The moment he leaned over to begin, she realized that offering to help the boys pack the Plavsics’s car would have been a whole lot wiser than offering to help with this. There was something about being in Sully’s bedroom with him that made her uncomfortable.

She wouldn’t go as far as to say she was attracted to him, but she couldn’t deny being very aware of him. And aware that her initial impressions of him had been way off base.

He wasn’t totally obnoxious, after all. He was simply, as Grace had told her, an unusual man. Which accounted for why he’d required a little getting used to. But it hadn’t taken her very long to realize that under his tough-guy exterior was a man who really cared about people.

It was obvious in his dealings with the boys. And seeing that made her feel even worse that she hadn’t written a stronger recommendation to support his program.

She put the top sheet and pillowcases down on the bedside table, then looked at him again, telling herself there was no reason in the world to feel uncomfortable about being in here with him. After all, he hadn’t shown the slightest interest in her as a woman. In fact, it went far beyond that. The man had hated her from the moment they’d met.

Or, more likely, he’d hated her even before they’d met—from the moment he’d received her letter.

“There we go,” he said, tossing the balled-up sheets onto the floor and looking across the bed at her.

His gaze started a fluttering in her stomach, which made her suspect those deep brown eyes could work magic on most women.

Fortunately, she thought, handing him the clean bottom sheet, she was made of sterner stuff.

When he flicked the sheet across the mattress, she reached for her side of it and did her best to keep her eyes off him as she smoothed and tucked.

Her best wasn’t very good, though. Each time he bent forward, his dark hair fell over his forehead. Each time it did, she was ridiculously tempted to reach over and brush it back.

That disconcerting magnetism of his was just too strong to ignore in the confines of the room, and she was glad the bed was between them—although she was extremely conscious that it
was
a bed. His bed.

She picked up the top sheet and partially unfolded it, then handed Sully his edge. When she did, her hand brushed his and the contact sent a little thrill racing through her.

Lauren silently chastised herself. Her attempt to deny the obvious was downright pathetic, so she might as well stop trying to tell herself she wasn’t attracted to Sully.

Passing him a pillowcase, she kept her eyes on his arms, deciding it was hardly surprising that a man like Jack Sullivan was catching her eye. After all, she’d never before met such a handsome man—her ex-husband definitely included.

Sully picked up the blanket and glanced over at Lauren. She didn’t notice, though. She looked as if her thoughts were a hundred miles away.

He’d been doing his best to keep his eyes off her, but now he let himself watch as she absently smoothed the pillowcase even though it was already smooth.

She looked so pretty it started that strange feeling once more. He ordered himself to stop looking but his eyes seemed to have developed a mind of their own.

Telling himself he was crazy, he tried to force them from her. There was no point at all in admiring something he couldn’t have.

“Lauren?” he finally said. When she looked across the bed he was momentarily lost in the blue of her eyes.

Before he could say anything more, he heard the front door bang shut and the sound of footsteps in the lodge.

“Sully?” Billy the Kid hollered. “Sully, where are you?”

“In my bedroom,” he called, feeling a distinct sense of relief that the boys had come back in.

Tough as it was to believe, in mere hours he’d somehow gone from being convinced Lauren was a total wing nut—not to mention a major pain—to being attracted to her. Which meant the smartest thing he could do was keep from being alone with her again.

“Oh.” Billy appeared in the doorway and stopped dead, causing a pileup of the other kids and Roxy behind him. “Oh…you’re in your bedroom with
Lauren.
”

One of the twins giggled. Sully couldn’t see if it was Tony or Terry, so instead of saying anything he simply glared at the whole bunch of them. That only elicited a second giggle.

Billy, who was doing a poor job of trying to suppress a smirk, looked at Lauren and held out the small suitcase he was carrying. “Mrs. Plavsic said to give you this.”

“Thank you, Billy. I’ll just put it here on the bed.”

Her words produced yet another giggle from the hallway.

Sully glanced at her, decided she was getting flustered, and looked back at the boys. “All right, guys,” he said sternly, “that’s enough. Lauren can live without that kind of childish behavior, so I think you’d all better head to your rooms and get ready for bed.”

“Aww…Sully,” Freckles said. “It’s not that late. And it’s summer vacation.”

“Go,” he ordered. “Say good-night to us, then go. You can read for a while if you want.”

The five of them mumbled “good-nights” and reluctantly trudged off in the direction of their rooms.

“Well, I guess that leaves just you and me,” Lauren murmured.

Terrific,
he thought. Not three minutes ago, he’d decided the smartest thing he could do was keep from being alone with Lauren again. So what a brilliant move he’d made by sending the boys to their rooms.

Things were even worse than he’d realized. Being around Lauren Van Slyke was so distracting he couldn’t think straight.

A slight misunderstanding

S
ENDING THE BOYS TO BED
,
Sully decided after he and Lauren had been sitting in the lounge for a while, hadn’t been a disastrous move after all.

Despite the disconcerting feelings he kept having, it was nice being alone with her like this, without any anger or tension between them. She was easy to talk to—easy enough, in fact, that he seemed to have been doing all the talking.

He’d been telling her stories about the various kids who’d stayed at Eagles Roost, and he was absurdly pleased that she seemed so interested.

He mentioned a few more things about his current boys, then said, “It must be your turn. I’ve told you everything about myself.”

She laughed at that. “Sully, you haven’t told me a single thing about yourself. I think you’d rather tell me about Roxy’s background than your own.”

He smiled, but she was right. There wasn’t much in his past he wanted to talk about—certainly nothing before the time he arrived at Eagles Roost. “Well, let’s see,” he said. “Roxy’s mother is a rottweiler who belongs to a friend over near Watertown. And her father was an amorous Saint Bernard. Obviously, they didn’t produce a litter of lapdogs, and even in the country big puppies aren’t too easy to find good homes for.”

“So you took Roxy.”

“Actually, I took Roxy and one of the males. But he got shot by some fool hunter.”

“Deep down, you’re really a softie, aren’t you,” Lauren said quietly.

He gazed at her for a moment, suddenly wanting to kiss her. He didn’t try to, though. He wasn’t any crazier about rejection than the next guy, and he knew that was what he’d get. The upper-class princess might have met the ex-con, but that didn’t mean she wanted any advances from him.

“Nobody’s ever accused me of being a softie before,” he finally told her. “And if I am, it’s deep,
deep
down. But now it’s definitely your turn,” he added quickly.

“Where should I start?”

“Oh, how about something easy, like where you live.”

“I have a condo on Fifth Avenue, overlooking the park.”

He was just starting to wonder how many millions an apartment overlooking Central Park was worth when she added, “I bought it after my divorce—kind of a fresh start, something that was mine alone.”

“You’ve been married,” he said. “I didn’t know that.”

She shrugged. “It wasn’t much of a marriage. We were just two people who convinced ourselves we were right for each other when we weren’t.”

She didn’t elaborate on that, so he asked, “And your family?”

“Well, my parents are…parents.”

He nodded, but he knew her parents couldn’t be anything like his had been—his unknown father and screwed-up mother.

“And I have a sister, Marisa, who’s three years older than I am. She’s an artist, studied in Paris and the whole bit. My brother, Elliot, is two years older than her. He’s a partner in a law firm.”

“And?”

“And?” she repeated.

“And the minute you mentioned him you got a strange look in your eyes.”

She exhaled slowly. “Elliot’s a
criminal
lawyer. And we’re all awfully worried about him at the moment. He has an ex-client who’s threatened to get him. And the man was released from prison yesterday.”

“He thinks the threat’s for real? Not just so much talk?”

“He says that’s probably all it is, but he’s pretty upset. The man threatened to harm him
or
someone he loved. And he has a wife and two little boys.”

And a little sister, Sully thought, wondering if Lauren was in any danger. The thought that she might be started an uneasy feeling creeping up his spine—and made him awfully glad Grace had insisted she shouldn’t drive home in the dark.

Lauren wanted to change the subject, because every time she thought about Elliot’s situation it made her anxious all over again. But she was hesitant to ask Sully any personal questions when he so obviously didn’t like talking about himself.

“Sully?” she finally said, deciding he could always tell her to mind her own business. “Would you mind if I ask you something I’ve been curious about?”

“Ask away,” he said.

“Ever since I read in my file that you inherited this place, I’ve wondered who left it to you.”

He eyed her for a minute, then said, “I’d almost forgotten how much personal information about me Matthew Grimes gathered.”

She simply shrugged, not knowing what to say. The fact that Sully had a prison record hadn’t come up in conversation, and she couldn’t help wondering if he’d just now realized she knew about it.

“Well,” he said at last, “when I first came to Eagles Roost, I was twenty-one years old and straight out of prison. A man named Frank Watson was operating the place as a fishing lodge, and I ended up working for him. I was only going to stay a few months, but…well, Frank was getting too old to run things by himself, and the longer I stayed the more he came to rely on me.”

“So you never left.”

“Right. Then, when he died, I discovered he’d left me the place. He was a widower, with no children, and…we’d gotten pretty close over the years.”

“Ahh,” she murmured.

“Giving me Eagles Roost,” Sully added so quietly he might have been talking to himself, “was the greatest thing anyone ever did for me.”

Lauren’s throat suddenly felt tight. He’d said so little, but she could tell how much Frank Watson had meant to him. And how much it meant that Frank had cared about him.

He squared his shoulders, and she knew that was the end of his telling her anything personal. Then he glanced at his watch and said, “I hadn’t realized how late it was. I guess we should turn in.”

“I guess,” she agreed, although she would’ve been happy to sit here talking for a lot longer. Which was strange, considering that mere hours ago, if anyone had told her she’d end up liking Jack Sullivan, she’d have told them they were crazy.

Of course, if anyone had told her Sully would end up liking her, she’d have told them they were downright certifiable. But she was almost positive his feelings had done the same about-face hers had. So, in a way, it was really too bad that after she left in the morning they’d probably never see each other again.

“S
ULLY
?” S
OMEONE SAID
groggily.

He woke up in pitch blackness and an unfamiliar bed.

“Sully?” the someone said again.

Freckles, he realized. He was sleeping in Freckles’s room because Lauren Van Slyke was sleeping in his bed.

“Sully, the phone’s ringing.”

“Great,” he muttered, feeling around for his robe. There was no bedside clock in the room, but it was obviously the middle of the night. So who was calling?

Telling Freckles to go back to sleep, he rolled out of bed and promptly stumbled over Roxy. Finally making it to the hallway, he stood waiting to hear whether he wanted the line in the lounge or the one in his office.

The next ring told him it was the phone in the lounge, so he headed along the dark hall and into the room, momentarily blinding himself when he switched on the lights.

“If you stop ringing before I pick up,” he muttered as he neared the phone, “I’ll kill you.” He grabbed the receiver mid-ring. “Hello.”

There was a moment of silence, then an unfamiliar male voice asked, “Is this Jack Sullivan?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Mr. Sullivan, this is Roger Van Slyke, Lauren’s father. I apologize for bothering you so late, but I understand my daughter drove to Eagles Roost this afternoon.”

“Yes. Yes, she did,” Sully admitted, wondering what was up and why it couldn’t have waited until morning.

“Well she hasn’t arrived back at her apartment,” Roger Van Slyke went on. “My wife and I have gotten no answer there all evening, and we haven’t been able to reach her on her cell phone. So needless to say, we’re very worried.”

“Yes… Yes, of course.” Sully ran his fingers through his hair, trying to wake himself up. “I can see why you would be, sir, but Lauren’s fine. She just had a little car trouble, and it got too late for her to drive back tonight, so she decided to stay here.”

“I see. She decided to stay there…with you.”

Sully suspected he’d just learned who had taught Lauren her Ice Princess tone. Her father’s voice hadn’t had much warmth in it to begin with, and with that remark it had turned cold enough to freeze Fiji.

“Yes, sir,” he said evenly. “She decided to stay here with me and the five boys. And my teacher and housemother,” he added, figuring there was no reason to mention that Otis and Grace lived in a separate cottage.

“I see,” Roger Van Slyke said again. “Well, I’d like to speak to my daughter, please.”

Sully glanced in the direction of the television and checked the clock on the DVD player. “Sir, it’s three o’clock in the morning.”

“I’m well aware of the time, Mr. Sullivan. Now, if you wouldn’t mind getting Lauren…?”

He hesitated, thinking it made absolutely no sense to wake Lauren. But since the man’s son was under a death threat he was probably hyperanxious.

“I’ll go get her, sir.” Setting the receiver on the end table, he headed back to the hallway. He flicked the light on this time, and its dim glow stretched ahead of him.

When he reached his bedroom door, he quietly tapped on it. There was no response, so he knocked a little louder—then tried calling Lauren’s name.

There was still nothing. He hesitantly cracked open the door and called, “Lauren?”

“Sully?” Freckles said from behind him. “Sully, what’s going on?”

“The phone call’s for Lauren, that’s all. You go on back to bed.”

As Freckles turned away, Sully decided that if he stood out here calling for much longer he’d wake the rest of the kids. So he pushed the door open a few more inches and started across the room.

The light from the hall was too faint to help him see, but he could easily navigate his own bedroom in the dark, and all he had to do was make it over to the floor lamp.

When he got to where it should have been, though, it wasn’t there. He felt the chair…then the stool…but where in blazes was the lamp?

“Lauren?” he said into the darkness. “Lauren?” He inched his way toward the bed, until his leg finally touched the mattress. Then he gingerly reached down to where he was sure Lauren’s shoulder would be. He touched her as gently as he could.

And Lauren came awake screaming.

“Oh, God!” he muttered, frantically trying to think of what to say. Screaming women were not his specialty. “Lauren, it’s me,” he tried. “I was only trying to wake you.”

Apparently, she was screaming too loudly to hear him, because she didn’t stop. And if she didn’t stop within the next few seconds, the kids would all wake up and hear her. Or, worse yet, her screams were so loud they might carry to the phone and her father would hear her.

Quickly, he leaned down over her and covered her mouth with his hand. Just as quickly, she bit him—hard.

“Yeoww!” he hollered, yanking his hand away. An instant later, excruciating pain sent every ounce of air whooshing from his body.

“Oh, God!” he moaned as the pain doubled him over onto the bed. Lauren had kneed him in the groin. And she kneed as hard as she bit.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she yelled.

Vaguely, he realized she was trying to pull the sheet around herself and sit up. She couldn’t do that, either, though, because he was slumped on top of her.

“Get off me!” she ordered. “Get off me and get out of here!”

He managed to drag himself off her and roll onto the floor, but the only way he’d be able to get out of here at the moment would be to crawl.

“I don’t believe this,” she hissed down at him through the darkness. “I simply do not believe this. You should be totally ashamed of yourself, you…you barbarian.”

Over her words, he could hear Freckles saying, “Sully, what’s wrong? Why’s Lauren so mad?”

He tried to answer, but hadn’t gotten enough of his breath back to manage words.

Then Roxy started trying to lick his face and sit on him at the same time while the rest of the boys came thundering into the room. For some crazy kid reason, one of them had come armed with a flashlight. The beam of light bounced around, finally settling on him.

“Sully?” Billy said. “Why are you on the floor? How come you’re all bent over like somebody just kicked you in the…ohh.”

“Ohh…” the other boys echoed.

“I…I…” he tried to say.

“There’s someone on the lounge phone,” Freckles offered. “For Lauren. That’s why Sully came to wake her up.”

There was a long silence. Then Lauren said, “Really?”

A second later, she switched on the lantern beside the bed and stared down at Sully.

“It’s your father,” he gasped out. “He wants to be sure you’re okay.”

O
NCE
L
AUREN REALIZED
that Sully hadn’t come into the bedroom with rape and pillage on his mind, and that she’d completely overreacted, she tried to apologize and help him up from the floor.

He wasn’t interested in either her apology or her help, though. First he groaned, then he glared, then he firmly waved her off. So, guiltily leaving him slumped where he was with Roxy sprawled across his feet, she tugged on her borrowed robe and started for the lounge—even though talking to her father was the last thing she wanted to do. She didn’t know how he’d discovered she was at Eagles Roost, but she knew he wouldn’t be happy about it.

All five boys came along with her, although she wasn’t sure if Sully had waved them away, too, or if they just doubted she’d be able to spot the phone by herself. At any rate, their little parade was about halfway across the lounge when the front door opened and Grace came hurrying in, Otis right behind her. Both were bleary-eyed and wearing nightclothes.

“I saw the lights on and knew someone must be sick,” Grace explained, her eyes flickering from one boy to the next. “You’re all fine, though, aren’t you, so it’s Sully. What’s wrong with him?”