Hers to Choose (Cannon Cousins) (25 page)

“And there was a guy,”
Alex repeated, leaning against the cabinet.
“And?”

“And...” she shrugged,
looking down. She hated to reveal to Alex how much of a loser she had tangled
up with, what that said about her. “I met him just after college. We
married,
I thought it was a forever thing, you know, kids
someday, a nice house. We both worked, had some money to play with, savings for
a house. Or, I thought we did.

“But then, it came out
that he had been embezzling at his work, plus all our savings were gone. Thousands
dumped on gambling and coke. I don’t know if there were other women. It was
like he had a whole other life. Charges were
filed,
it
cost a fortune to get him out of it. I should have let him rot in jail, but at
first I believed in him, couldn’t believe what we had was all a lie. He and
I—the domination thing…it was part of our life that I didn’t question him. So I
borrowed against the farm to save him.”

She laughed hoarsely,
embarrassed that the whole sordid tale had spilled out. If Alex ever doubted
how dumb, how gullible and weak she was, this should pretty much prove it.

“Damn, Bryn, that’s
rough.”

“I despise him now, such
a selfish pig. I feel so stupid. I should have known.” She shook her head. “I’m
just glad he’s not in my life.”

“So that’s what’s behind
your general attitude about men?”

She shrugged with a quick
smile and inclined her head, then turned on the water and made long work of
cleaning potato off the beaters. He would surely have no respect for her now.
When she glanced up at him, he had turned to lean back against the counter with
his arms crossed, staring into space.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to
dump all that. I don’t like to think about it. It makes me feel like nothing.”
She re-tossed the vinegar slaw, pulled the rolls out of the oven and started
carrying things to the table.

“Do you want me to slice
the ham?” he called after her.

“Yes, that would be
perfect.”

She breathed a sigh of
relief that he hadn’t made any further comment. Somehow they were seated at the
table and eating, but she hardly knew how it tasted. The reciprocal question
burned a hole in her brain. She had to ask.

“So how
about you, Alex?
Did you...do you...I mean, maybe it’s none of my business, but…is there a woman
in your life?”

“Yes,” he said with a
slight smile, “you could say that. It’s a strange relationship, but something I
feel intensely about.
Complicated.”
He raised his
eyebrows and shifted position. “By the way, Dan sends his regards.”

“Oh, thanks.” She wanted
to cry. In fact, a knot formed in her throat and kept her from swallowing the
mouthful of food that had turned to straw in her mouth. He had someone, and he
changed the subject to Dan. “Well,” she managed to whisper then cleared her
throat. “I hope he’s doing better.”

“He’s definitely better.
Pretty amazing, actually, how much he’s improved,” he said.

He had an odd expression
on his face, not that she looked at him very long.

“Bryn, I…” He cleared his
throat. “The first thing I needed to discuss with you is about your land.” He waved
his fork in the air. “It’s a prime location here. I’ve talked about this with
Dan. He agrees this is a perfect investment for us right now. If you’re
interested, I can go into detail.”

He had someone else. And
he didn’t want to talk about it. She had been an accidental encounter, a
diversion on a brief outing from his regular life, an outing meant to heal Dan.
He was here not because he wanted to see her, wanted to build a relationship,
for god’s sake, you fool, but for business.
Business
! She tried to focus
on what he was saying, but the words kept slipping out of her mind faster than
she could process their meaning.

“You want to buy my
land?” she managed after a silence.

His expression registered
surprise. “All of it? No, no, not at all. That’s not what I’m talking about.”
He had finished eating and stood up. “Do you want me to take your plate?”

She looked down at the
plate, nearly half of her food still there. “Yes, I’m not very hungry.”

“I didn’t mean to upset
you,” he called over his shoulder. “I thought this would be great for you.”

“I’m sorry,” she
murmured. Whatever might have been, she needed to get past it. She took a big
drink of her water.

“I know you’re attached
to this land,” he continued, sliding back into the chair across from her and eagerly
pursuing his discussion. “This project would use only a hundred acres, less if
you want. And it would be the strip along the road, assuming you have the kind
of frontage I’m thinking about. Do you have a survey?”

“I don’t know.
Probably.
There was something with the deed when I inherited
the place.”

“That would be a big
help. But you don’t have to find it right this second. The point is, the land
use would be minimal and along the edges so we don’t have to get into building
a lot of roads. And this is tentative until we know about water lines, building
codes, and zoning. But if you put up the land for a small initial down payment,
then we would build the structures and get it ready to sell, and then when the
property sold, you’d get the balance of your land price plus a percentage of
the overall sale.”

Her brain slowly shifted
while he talked. What he was offering was nothing less than the answer to her
desperate questioning about how she could live. The accounting side of her
brain clicked on.

“How many acres do you
think per unit?”

“Five
at the least, maybe ten.”

“So
anywhere from ten to twenty houses?”

“Yes, but not all at
once. We’d do them one or two at a time, keep our crews busy, and then have
money coming in from the first ones before we start more.”

She tried to guess how
much money he was talking about, but she didn’t know enough to estimate. “What
kind of price per acre are you thinking?”

He smiled. “Oh, I think
at least three thousand, depending on water lines. And that’s low end. Are you
on a rural water system here?”

“Yes, there’s a line that
comes along the road all the way up.”

“Great!” He eased back
the chair. “Want to sit at the couch?”

“Oh! I forgot dessert.
Could I bring you a slice of lemon cake?”

“Yes, absolutely, a big
one,” he grinned.

She stood aimlessly in
the kitchen for a few minutes before turning to dessert plates and a knife for
the cake. She cut a thin sliver for herself and massive piece for Alex. The
lemon icing crumbled perfectly along its sugary edges as she lowered it to the
plate. She gave herself a few minutes to put away the ham and other leftovers,
wipe off the stove, and set the dirty dishes into the sink. Maybe tomorrow she
could bake the gingerbread.

The
Negroni
roar had started to subside, leaving a raw feeling in her forehead. If she let
herself, she could easily dissolve into tears. Stupid move number one, she had
let herself dream about a relationship with Alex. Stupid number two, she had
let herself have feelings. When, when,
when
would she learn? She rubbed
her arms, sliding the soft fuzzy sweater against her skin. Straightening her
shoulders, she flipped off the kitchen lights, picked up the plates and went
back to the living room.

Alex’s face had an excited
expression as he talked about his plans, how the houses would be designed to
fit the land—the slope, the woods, whatever unique features could be accented.
As little of the natural beauty as possible would be disturbed in construction,
so that buyers would feel they had slipped into a timeless piece of virgin
woodland. He evidently had been researching the market, knew about price ranges
and optimum square footage and a litany of other details that spilled from his
mouth while he talked.

She wanted his mouth, his
hands,
his
eyes burning into hers. But he was offering
what seemed like a stunning future of financial independence with almost no
effort or sacrifice on her part.
A hundred acres at a minimum
of three thousand an acre—that was three hundred thousand dollars.
She
kept recalculating, thinking it was too good to be true.

“I don’t want you to feel
pressured about this. Take your time to decide, if you want time,” he said
finally, scraping the last of the cake from his plate and gazing at her with an
intense expression. “Are you wondering what’s going to be required of you in
all this?”

“Yes, I...it seems…maybe
I’m dreaming?”

He laughed. “You’ll have
work
to do. We can’t be down here to oversee the
construction, go back and forth to county planning offices and all the other
agencies that will require permits and approval for these projects. We don’t
expect you to suddenly know how to do this—we would be in constant contact, one
way or the other. You’d work more closely with our contractor as far as the construction
goes, but even contractors can drift off track if someone doesn’t show up on a
regular basis. There’s a lot to deal with —have you ever been around anything
like this, any kind of construction?”

She shook her head. So he
would set things in motion and then go back to business as usual in St. Louis,
maybe visit on occasion to make sure she and the contractor were doing things
right. She watched his mouth as desolation swept over her. The sooner she could
escape to her bedroom, the better off she would be.

“The construction
shouldn’t be that complicated. Once you and I decide on the sites you prefer,
I’ll take photos to work with while I finalize the designs. I totally trust this
contractor to do things right, so it’s not like you’ll have to second guess the
work.”

“That’s good,” she
murmured, trying to be enthusiastic and failing miserably. “I wouldn’t know.
But yes,” she said briskly, “this is a wonderful idea, Alex. I can’t thank you
enough for coming up with this. I—it’s been a struggle to figure out what to do
here. I don’t want to leave the place, but I seriously doubt that the random
hunting gig is going to support me.”

A shadow crossed his
face. “I don’t like...I mean, maybe it’s not a great idea for you here alone to
host hunting gigs. It could be dangerous, you know.”

“Oh,” she managed a half
laugh, her mind flashing on Brent Thompson. “I don’t see why anyone would
bother me...”

“Bryn...” he stopped
himself, tapping a finger on the coffee table. “Okay, I know you want to take
care of yourself. And I want to respect that.” He leaned back in the couch and
wiped his hand across his forehead. “I’m glad you like this idea. I’ve got some
preliminary drawings in the car. I don’t want to rush you—can I trust you to be
honest about what you want?” His stare locked with hers.

“Yes, of course,” she
answered, feeling slightly dishonest that she didn’t tell him she had begun a
slow death knowing he loved someone else. Obviously that’s not what he meant.
He seemed completely focused on the project.

“So tomorrow, if you’d
like, we can take a look at your survey and walk some of the property, try to
get a feel for how this might work. Does that sound okay?”

“Yes, it sounds good.”
Was that it? It was nearly nine o’clock, and he looked tired. She felt utterly
destroyed, hardly enough energy to carry
herself
to
bed. Maybe she would sleep in her clothes. In spite of all her precautions, she
had hoped they would be sleeping in her bed, collapsing together after blissful
hours of lovemaking. Now she realized that wasn’t even remotely possible.

“I’ll bring some
bedclothes for the couch,” she said.

For a moment, he didn’t
move. She couldn’t read his expression. He kept his eyes down as she stood up.
Then he stood up and for a moment she thought she felt energy surge between
them. But he was on the other side of the coffee table and had made no effort
to get close to her, and the only reasonable interpretation was that anything
between them now lay utterly and irrevocably in the past.

“Thanks,” he said
tiredly.

Sometime during the night she roused
slightly and realized he had gone to the bathroom. He paused in the dark beside
her bed before returning to the living room. She kept her breathing regular so
he didn’t think he had awakened her. Then, in spite of the consuming exhaustion
she felt, she lay awake for a long time with tears leaking down her temples.

The next morning she had
dark circles under her eyes and saw no reason to cover them up. He looked a bit
ragged himself as he sat at the kitchen table with a coffee mug clutched in his
big hands. His dark hair whirled in all directions and whiskery stubble lined
his jaw. Her body yearned for him. She kept a tight rein on herself as she
shoved eggs around in the skillet. She set the eggs, fried potatoes, bacon, and
toast on the table and sat down to join him.

“Thanks for breakfast.”
He started eating.
“Still raining.
Are you up for
walking around in this?”