| |
S-T-U-P-E-F-I-E-D
Claire hung behind Ryder as he strode down the hall toward the dining room. In an effort to make up for her solo ice-skating venture—as far as he knew anyway—Ryder promised he’d take her horseback riding tomorrow and spend the next day exploring the area, maybe even a little hiking, if the weather cooperated. Hopefully, they could spend as many day trips away from this haunted mansion as possible.
Before today, she hadn’t seen him in a week. His toothbrush had migrated about the bathroom, plus the ebb and flow of the laundry pile, so she knew he was coming home each night. Not that she had been much more available.
As she’d already learned to expect in the cavernous mansion, the dining room was ostentatious. If the ceilings weren’t so high, she’d feel claustrophobic thanks to the ominous crystal chandelier that hung precariously overhead. In earthquake territory. It was the sort that came crashing down in thriller movies, crushing the villain because the hero was too honorable to kill him directly. She shivered at the thought and averted her gaze.
From what must be the kitchen, a slim, graceful woman in expensive-looking slacks and a silk top glided toward her. “You must be Claire. I’m Patricia.” Not Pat or Patty, but Patricia. Her presentation matched the house, down to the platinum hair.
Claire shook a sturdy, firm hand. Brain surgeon, she reminded herself. As soon as Patricia released her, Claire stuffed her hands in her pockets to hide her fidget. She painted a polite smile across her face and remembered all those manners her parents had drilled into her. Not that the Dabney house was formal, but her parents insisted she at least know how to behave. Claire made a mental note to call home later with profuse thanks.
“Thank you so much for having me. You have a beautiful home.” It didn’t matter what the home looked like, you always compliment it to your host or hostess. She may be awkward, but she knew how to fit in. Sort of. Pay a respectful compliment or keep your trap shut.
Patricia waved her hand and rolled her eyes nonchalantly. “Aren’t you sweet.” Oh boy. Condescension, here we come. Why did everyone always call her sweet? Annoying, really.
Behind her, the raspy bass of a former smoker clearing his throat caught her attention. “Claire. Bill Stellan. Welcome to Foothills.”
She turned to see Ryder’s stepdad. He looked a little more human than his wife. More relaxed, she supposed. With crinkled eyes and weathered skin, he still embodied the forester he’d begun his career as. No longer out in the field, his belly and cheeks were rounded from a more sedentary lifestyle.
She followed along and sat in her assigned seat next to Ryder. Surprisingly, the family all sat at one end of the colossal table. Must be so they didn’t need to holler across the huge table to ask for the salt.
Claire was just lowering her napkin to her lap when he walked in. Her skating partner. The hockey player. The one that got away.
Dammit, don’t think like that.
Luck, fate, Aphrodite, whoever was currently messing with her life, was pissing her off. Things with Ryder were complicated enough.
Part in panic and part in crushing exhilaration, her heart fluttered wildly in her chest like a stampeding herd of bison. Not that she’d ever heard bison stampede in real life. Dressed in casual jeans slung low on his narrow hips, a fitted black t-shirt, bare feet, and surfer blond hair tousled playfully, he sauntered in like an actor on the cover of a magazine trying to show his bad-boy side. He was clearly the black sheep of the Mallory family. Damned if it didn’t make her like him even more.
Biting her lip, she tried to hide her response. To suppress the massive grin of joy that her hormones were thrusting out in all directions, declaring that everything was going to be okay.
The second he saw her, the air rushed out of the room like she was being sucked into the vacuum of space. Might be less painful, at least, inevitably imploding at the force of the extreme pressure change.
His gaze rested on her for a moment. His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat.
Good. He was as miserable and thrilled as she was. Maybe that frivolous romance novel hadn’t been wrong after all? At least she didn’t have to travel back to the ancient Highlands to find him.
Hopefully, no one noticed their matching flushed cheeks, or would at least assume it was because of the blazing, oversized fireplace. At least she wasn’t freezing in the winter weather anymore, but the man was dangerous to her health, inducing premature hot flashes.
He sat in his assigned seat across the table, flicked his napkin as he lowered it to his lap, and leaned back in his chair, adopting a poker face and pretending he was completely at ease. In the blink of an eye, she ceased to exist, moment gone. Like her presence didn’t cause every nerve in his body to fire at once, urging him to take her hand and run for the hills together.
Of all the...
Fuck.
It was her. First woman he’d asked out in months. First woman to ever make him yearn so deeply he ached down into his soul. That made him even think that word, soul.
After being teased too many times, he’d stopped letting the corny side show. But he was a romantic at heart. Only Zane even had a clue, exchanging romance novels with him like a horny book club.
Neither a Mallory nor an impassioned lawyer should stoop so low as to express deep feelings, particularly with regards to concepts as nebulous and personal as romance. Accustomed to masking any sort of meaningful emotions, as he’d silently refused to ignore them anyway, he hid it well.
As usual, he’d more than missed his opportunity. Fate was downright kicking him in the balls this time. Was he a serial killer in a past life?
Sitting across from him, she held her shoulders primly high in the oversized dining chair. Perfect manners, dressed in a delicate sweater... she was not what he had pictured for Ryder. Brains and a quirky sense of humor. She didn’t match his brother at all. But she was the forever-type of partner, not to mention fucking gorgeous with silky brown hair, mysterious eyes, and lush lips that... there was no way his brother was going to be stupid enough to give her up.
Patricia cleared her throat. “Grady, aren’t you going to introduce yourself to our guest? This is Claire.” Her prominent blue eyes bugged and her head tilted toward Claire meaningfully as she admonished her adult son for his boorish behavior.
“Hi Claire,” he managed to say without rasping. Here he sat, physically aching with jealousy, and he didn’t even know her name until this moment.
Equally uncomfortable, Claire smiled, but her pouty lower lip tucked between her teeth. “Hello, Grady.”
Conversation bounced around the table, dull and polite. His parents were skilled in the art of conversation. Although they would fit in better in the heart of Seattle, or more appropriately, somewhere East Coast, he suspected they enjoyed being the upper crust of their confined society.
Claire seemed to take the entire awful dinner in stride. Ryder poured her a huge glass of red wine, which she politely took a small sip of with a grimace, then abandoned. Grady glanced away when she caught him observing her distaste, biting his tongue to mask his amusement.
She smiled as she chewed the tiniest bite of Brussels sprouts he’d ever seen. Her face pinched as she fought a strong gag reflex while she swallowed the repulsive excuse for a vegetable.
Patricia tried to talk about surgery, knowing Claire would also have surgical interest, but she couldn’t seem to help repeatedly redirecting the conversation back to how brain surgery was so much more complex than setting a fracture.
Bill attempted to bring the conversation back to a more universal topic, but seemed to make things that much more uncomfortable. “So, Claire. I hear you work with large and small animals. You’d be in high demand around here.”
At this, she perked up. She wiped a nonexistent drip of beurre blanc sauce from the side of her mouth. “I saw dozens of large-scale farms on the drive in. What a great place to practice veterinary medicine.”
Bill beamed, proud of his hometown. “The Kittridge place down the road just went on the market. You two should take a look.”
Patricia’s eyes lit up like a matched pair of blue moons.
No one had mentioned the Kittridge place to Grady. Closer to his parents than he was comfortable with, but he really liked the house and the land. More of a homey-ranch style and less of the out-of-place-sterility that this place exuded.
Ryder swallowed the bite of salmon down what must have been a suddenly dry throat before responding, as evidenced by his huge eyes and coughing choke. “We’re not moving to Foothills. Or any small town. No offense, but the life’s not for me.” Silence tunneled around the table as everyone stopped chewing midway through their current bite, aside from Ryder, who chased his bold statement with a swig of his wine to dislodge the salmon.
Grady looked across the table to Claire. Her eyebrows were raised in false support of her fiancé, and she was working her bottom lip in her teeth again.
Grady shifted his focus to Ryder. “Not big enough pockets in Foothills?” Smug asshole. What did Claire see in him?
“Grady. Not at the table.” Of course. One must always use excellent manners at the dinner table. “Six months of living with that troublemaker, Asher, spending your free time at the brewery with that other one, and you’ve developed the manners of a sailor.” She tsked her disappointment. As usual.
“Mother—”
“I know,” she huffed, then folded and refolded her napkin. “I’m still upset that pretty Sophie chose him over you.”
Grady cringed, hating how adeptly his mother sniffed out gossip. “That’s not how it happened—” It totally was. “—They’re great together and are two of my best friends.”
“Well.” She nodded, taking a definitive sip of wine, the red expertly paired with the meal. “Did you ever call Miss Perry like I suggested? She’s so well-traveled and is already transforming the high school foreign language department. And Haley and she were always so close. Imagine, if you and she married, then maybe Haley would come visit more often.”
“No, I didn’t ask her out. And you could fly down to visit Haley, and not expect her to be the one to reach out.”
“Don’t think I didn’t hear how Trace passed you over for that... that football player after Haley moved away. But from what I hear, she’s looking to settle down.”
Tongue firmly embedded between his teeth, Grady shoved back from the table. “I think I’ll pass on dessert,” he said as he pushed away from the table, grabbing his plate and backing away toward the kitchen. “Seahawks kickoff in ten if anyone is interested.” He may have abhorrent manners, according to his mother, but he knew at least his stepdad would enjoy a good football game.
