The Texan's Tennessee Romance (20 page)

“You’re welcome. Are you sure you have everything?”

“Yes. I’ve been through the cabin three times. There’s nothing left of mine in there.”

She watched him swallow as he nodded. “Okay then.”

She had already said her goodbyes to her aunt and uncle and to Molly and Kyle. She’d done so that morning before she’d returned to the cabin to load the car and say a more private farewell to Casey.

Putting that moment off just a bit longer, she knelt to pet the dog who sat at Casey’s side, gazing up at her in what she would have sworn was anxious confusion. “You’re going to be fine, Buddy,” she said, her voice thick. “Casey’s going to take care of you until he leaves and then you’re going to live in Kyle and Molly’s backyard. You’ll like it there. The kids will love you and play with you. You’ll probably even like playing with Poppy.”

Buddy whined, sensing something in her voice he didn’t like. She rested her cheek on his head for a moment, then rose, ordering herself not to cry over parting with a dog. She wasn’t even a dog person, she reminded herself.

“You’re sure he’ll be okay?” she asked Casey.

He nodded, his face grim. “I’ll make sure that he is. I’m taking him to the vet tomorrow for his shots and then I’ll introduce him to Kyle’s family. You know they’ll love him. He and Kyle already get along very well.”

“I know. I just…”

“He’ll be fine, Natalie.”

She forced a smile. “Yes, of course he will be. Much better than living in the woods this winter, scrounging for a meal.”

“Definitely better. Kyle and Molly have that big, fenced backyard and I’ll buy a comfy, warm doghouse before I leave. He’ll probably become Kyle’s dog, since Kyle’s never really bonded with Poppy.”

She assured herself that was the best thing that could happen for Buddy. Kyle would take excellent care of the dog.

“I guess I’d better go, then,” she said, shifting the keys again. She had a little over a four-hour drive ahead of her. She wanted to unpack, get a good night’s sleep, and be prepared to stalk into Herb Schroeder’s office first thing in the morning with the evidence that he had allowed himself to be thoroughly fooled.

She couldn’t say she was looking forward to that confrontation, but she did anticipate seeing the look in his eyes when she presented him with the excellently documented evidence Andrew had put together for her. And when she left Herb’s office, she intended to head straight for Thad’s.

“You’ll call me after you talk to them, right? I want to know everything they say.”

She nodded. “I’ll call you.”

She had offered to pay Andrew for his services at the going rate for a private investigator, but he’d refused, telling her he owed her this for his earlier, unauthorized invasion of her privacy. It wasn’t even as if it had been all that difficult a case to solve, he’d added bluntly, making her feel a little stupid for letting Beecham dupe her for so long.

Like Casey, Andrew had expressed curiosity about what Herb said when she showed him what Andrew had found. He had also offered to talk to Herb personally if Natalie had any problems convincing the senior partner of the validity of her evidence. The reputation of his family firm back in Dallas was impeccable, and nationally respected, he’d added. He didn’t expect any trouble from her bosses once they heard who she’d had on her side.

Casey placed his hands on her arms, rubbing slowly up and down as he gazed into her face. “I know you said you didn’t want to talk about us until after your meeting with Schroeder…”

“Casey—”

“Is this really goodbye?” he insisted. “You’re just going to go back to Nashville and forget about me?”

“I’m not going to forget about you,” she told him quietly. “Ever. You got me through a very rough time. I will always appreciate that.”

“You still think of me as a nice diversion?” he asked roughly.

She couldn’t quite meet his eyes. “You know it was more than that.”

“But you’re still leaving.”

“I have to, Casey. You know I have to clear my name. And you have a career to get back to in Dallas.”

His hands gripped her shoulders. “You were more than a diversion to me, Natalie. A hell of a lot more.”

She moistened her lips. “You said yourself you’ve been going through a tough time. You’ve been questioning your career and your goals, and you’ve recently broken up with your girlfriend.”

“You’re not a rebound affair, either,” he said roughly. “Damn it.”

“It’s just not a good time for either of us to try to make this into more than we’ve had,” she whispered.

She was sure that when he got home, back with his family and friends and the career he wanted despite the doubts he’d encountered lately, he would be relieved she hadn’t tried to hold on to him. Besides, she knew herself too well. If she succeeded in getting her position back, or even if she found a job with another firm, it wouldn’t be long until she was right back to her old ways of working too long and too hard, letting everything else in her life take second place to her career. That was no way to maintain any relationship, much less a long-distance one.

All of which sounded very logical. Very believable. But she suspected that the main reason she was running from Casey was fear—as much as she hated admitting that, even to herself. She’d been let down by too many people she had trusted lately. She wasn’t ready to take the risk of being hurt that way again while she was still stinging from the last time.

It would hurt less to break it off now than to wait until his passion fizzled in the reality of too much distance and too little time.

“I’ve got to go,” she said, steeling her resolve. “I’ll call you tomorrow, I promise.”

He nodded grimly. “Drive carefully.”

“I will.”

He lowered his head and kissed her until it was all she could do not to melt into a puddle at his feet. She had to put a hand on the car to steady herself when he finally drew away. “It wasn’t a diversion,” he said again, gruffly.

She looked into the rearview mirror as she drove away. Casey stood there watching her leave, his hand on the head of the dog who sat rather forlornly at his side.

For only the second time since she had been fired from her job, Natalie felt tears escape her eyes and trickle slowly down her cheeks.

Even in the relatively short time that had passed since he’d returned, he’d accomplished a great deal in billable hours and out-of-court settlements. Because money had a way of soothing all fears in this business, he figured any remaining concerns about him would soon dissipate.

Tugging at the silk power-tie knotted at the throat of his tailored dress shirt, he walked off the elevator on his condo floor and sighed wearily. He’d had a great day, work-wise. Accomplished a real coup of a settlement with a case that could have stretched on for months. He should have been celebrating, but instead he was just…empty.

The feeling would go away, he assured himself. It was probably caused by the gloomy weather lately. Or post-holiday malaise—not that he’d particularly enjoyed the holidays this year, though he’d made an almost superhuman effort to conceal that from his family and friends.

He stopped walking when he saw someone sitting on the carpeted floor beside his door. “Aaron? What are you doing here?”

He didn’t bother asking how his cousin had gotten into the secured building.

Aaron looked pointedly at his watch. “New superhero movie? Seven o’clock? The two of us were going to catch it tonight while Andy was busy with that surveillance job?”

“Oh, damn. I forgot. I’m sorry, I—”

“Forget it. Throw on a sweatshirt and some jeans and we’ll go grab a burger.”

“Yeah. That sounds good. Give me ten minutes.” He unlocked his door and preceded his cousin inside.

“So how did your day go?” Aaron asked casually, glancing around Casey’s immaculately decorated, fashionably neutral living room.

Casey pulled off his tie and shrugged out of his jacket. “It was good. Negotiated a very profitable settlement that could have gotten sticky.”

“Congratulations. That must have felt good.”

“I guess.” He was already unbuttoning his shirt as he headed for the bedroom.

Aaron tagged after him. “You don’t sound exactly elated. Tired?”

“Yeah, I guess so.” Bone tired, he thought, pulling a pair of jeans and a Texas Longhorns sweatshirt out of the closet. Soul tired. Heart tired.

“Dude, you’re killing me.”

Tossing his shirt on the bed, Casey looked questioningly at his cousin, who was leaning in the bedroom doorway. “What are you talking about?”

“I can’t stand to see you this glum. You’ve been this way ever since you got back from Tennessee, though you’ve done a really good job of hiding it.”

Casey tugged the sweatshirt over his head. “I’ll get over it.”

“Get over what?”

“You’re the one who started this. What do
you
think?”

“I think you didn’t really want to come back from Gatlinburg,” Aaron said bluntly.

Turning his back to the doorway, Casey swapped his suit pants for comfortably faded jeans. “Does anyone ever really want a vacation to end?”

“It’s more than that, Case.”

Turning back to his cousin, Casey released a long sigh. “I miss Natalie,” he admitted, the first time he’d said it out loud since he’d parted from her almost two months earlier. “I even miss the dog.”

“Have you tried calling? Natalie, not the dog.”

“I haven’t spoken to her since she called to let me know she’d gotten her position back with the firm in Nashville.”

“How do you know she isn’t missing you, too?”

“She’s the one who said it wouldn’t work between us. If she’d changed her mind, she knew how to reach me.”

“So you’re just going to spend the rest of your life trudging back and forth to work, pretending to be happy?”

“Give me a break, Aaron. I’m trying, okay?”

Aaron smiled sympathetically. “You’re trying too hard. It shouldn’t be this difficult.”

“So what do
you
think I should do?” Casey challenged, seriously hoping for an answer.

“I think you should figure out what it takes to make you happy. And then do it.”

“You make it sound so damned easy.”

“I never said it was easy. Heck, I’m still trying to decide what
I
want to do for the rest of my life. I just know it’s got to be something that makes me look forward to getting up in the morning. Something I can be proud of. Something that reflects who I am and what makes me happy.”

Aaron had always been the more philosophical of the cousins. The one more prone to expressing his thoughts and emotions. The one who was always the most curious about what was around the next corner, most open to experience and change. Which probably explained why he’d tried half a dozen different jobs already in his short working life, Casey thought wryly. But Aaron always seemed to know what he wanted, even if he hadn’t quite found it yet. Casey realized he should try a bit harder to emulate his younger cousin. He needed to figure out once and for all what
he
wanted—and then go after it, despite the risk of disappointment or failure.

But did he really have the courage to walk away from his life here again? For good this time?

She was also fortunate that the cabin had been available for this impulsive weekend visit. She wouldn’t have put it past her aunt and uncle to rearrange any existing reservations on her behalf, but Aunt Jewel had assured her that they really had gotten a cancellation for the cabin. She’d sounded delighted when Natalie said she’d like to spend a couple of nights there to celebrate her thirtieth birthday.

Natalie felt a little guilty for treating herself to a solitary birthday celebration. Her mother had wanted her to come to Mississippi for the occasion, but she had demurred. After all, she’d spent Christmas there with her mother and stepfather, and though she’d had a pleasant enough time, she wasn’t eager to go back so soon.

Instead, she was going to spend her thirtieth birthday torturing herself with painful memories, as she had been for the past lonely weeks. She’d spent entirely too much time looking at the photographs she had taken of Casey, missing him, wondering if he was missing her. She’d rubbed the little broken-heart-shaped rock she’d picked up by the creek until she’d practically left fingerprints embedded in the smooth surface. And sometime during the past month or so, she had decided it was time for a major life change. She needed an evening of relaxation, a quiet walk in the woods, and a soothing soak in the hot tub to brace herself for all the questions to come.

Except for the random patches of snow, the cabin looked exactly as she remembered it. She bit her lip as the memories swept over her, making her wonder if she had made a mistake coming back here.

She slid out of her car and shut the driver’s door, deciding to bring her bags in a little later. She had taken two steps toward the front door of the cabin, when the sound of a dog barking stopped her in her tracks.

Surely that wasn’t…?

Drawn irresistibly toward the sound, she rounded the end of the cabin and looked toward the stream at the back of the property. Her breath caught in her throat when she saw the reddish-brown and white dog loping toward her, his tail wagging in frantic welcome. “Buddy?”

The dog stood on his back legs, propping his front feet against her as he tried to lick her face. Laughing, she leaned down to hug him, not even caring that he was getting mud all over her jeans and coat. “What are you doing here?” she demanded, as if he could answer. “I hope you haven’t run away again.”

“Actually, he’s with me.”

She looked up slowly, her heart starting to pound so hard it made her a little dizzy. Keeping a hand on the dog to steady herself, she straightened, looking at the man who smiled at her from only a few feet away. “Casey.”

“Hi, Natalie.”

“I…can’t believe you’re here. I wasn’t expecting you.”

“I know. I hope it’s a good surprise.”

“But—how did you know?”

He laughed briefly. “Do you really have to ask? Molly told me you were going to be here.”

“Oh. Of course she did. So, why…?”

He took a step closer, his eyes locked with hers, the expression in his eyes achingly tender. “Damn, but I’ve missed you,” he said roughly. “I was planning to come to Nashville next week to see you, but when Molly told me you were coming here, I knew this was the right place to find you again.”

“You were coming to Nashville?” She was having a hard time thinking clearly, probably because of the shock of having him near her again. So close she had only to take a couple of steps to be in his arms. Almost quivering with the desire to take those steps, she asked, “Why?”

“Because I’ve missed you so much it’s been tearing me apart. I had to find out if there was any way I could change your mind about giving us another chance. You thought I was in a vulnerable place the last time we were together, maybe on the rebound, not in a position to know what I wanted. And maybe I wondered if you were right. Maybe that’s why I left without fighting harder to change your mind, because I needed to know for sure what I wanted.”

He shook his head firmly. “Well, it’s been almost two months now, Natalie, and my feelings haven’t changed. I still want to be with you. I’m prepared to do whatever it takes to convince you of how good we are together, even if it means moving to Nashville and finding a position there while you make up your mind.”

“That…wouldn’t do you any good,” she said unsteadily.

His eyes darkened and he seemed to brace himself for rejection. “You’re telling me there’s no chance?”

She swallowed, shaken by the raw emotion she saw in his face. “No. I’m telling you I don’t live in Nashville any longer. Or I won’t, after my lease runs out at the end of next month. I’ve already turned in my resignation at the firm.”

Frowning, he asked, “You quit?”

She nodded. “I quit.”

What might have been hope brightened his eyes again. He took another step closer. “Why?”

“Because I wanted more out of life than working myself into the ground to satisfy people who had been so willing to believe the worst of me. People who didn’t really care about me outside the money I could make for them, who only accepted me back among them because they were afraid I’d cause trouble for them if they didn’t. I still want a rewarding and satisfying career, and I want it to be in the field I’ve trained for—but I don’t want that to be the only thing in my life. I want more.”

“Funny,” he said huskily. “I’ve been thinking much the same way lately. I’m tired of being a drone in a corporate hive. I want to walk my own path.”

“Is that path wide enough for two?” she asked in a whisper.

He closed his eyes for just a moment, then opened them again and reached for her. “Oh, yeah.”

She emerged from the kiss a long time later, flushed and tousled and happier than she could ever remember. “I was going to come to you,” she confessed. “I debated whether to call you or just show up in Dallas, but I’d finally decided on the latter. I wanted to see your face when I asked you if you still felt the same way I did.”

He looked delighted by her admission. “You were coming to Dallas?”

“I already have the plane reservations.”

Laughing, he hugged her tightly. “You can use them, anyway. I want you to meet my family.”

The thought of meeting all those people he had described to her made her mouth go dry, but she nodded. “I’d like to meet them.”

He covered her mouth with his again. Buddy bounced around them, happily welcoming them back.

After finally emerging for air, Natalie smiled down at the dog. “He seems happy to see us.”

“He is. Kyle said he’s given them no problems and he seemed content enough living with them, but he went nuts when he saw me. It was almost like he was asking what took me so long to come back for him. He seems to feel the same way about you, judging by how happy he looks to see you.”

“I’m glad to see him, too.” She ruffled the dog’s silky ears. “I missed you, Buddy. Maybe you’ve turned me into a dog person, after all.”

“Hey, Nat?” Casey asked, his voice husky again.

She smiled besottedly up at him. “Yes?”

“I’m freezing. Want to go inside?”

“Okay.” She reached up to stroke a fingertip down his cheek. “We could check out the hot tub again. Just to make sure it’s still working correctly, of course.”

“I’ve always liked the way you think,” he murmured, catching her hand and placing a kiss against it. He tucked her snugly against him as they turned together toward the cabin, then looked back over his shoulder. “Come on, Buddy.”