singularly dedicated in her goals where the institute was concerned. Agreeing to his terms had been her only option.
He wished that the elation could edge out the disgust if only for a moment or two.
“Where’d Lisa go?”
He looked over at Tricia, who’d walked around to the front of the house. “She has to catch a flight back to Boston.”
After she’d agreed, she’d asked him about the rest of his plans.
And even though he had more than a few, he hadn’t been able to heap them on top of her slightly bowed shoulders. So he’d lied. He’d told her that he would contact her later and they could iron out the details.
Her lips had twisted. But when she’d pushed off the bench, she’d stood tall and slender in front of him when she’d told him that she would use his limo then, after all.
Because she had work to get back to.
He knew there was no doubting that.
Even with him throwing money at the institute, it was going to take some real work to recover from the mess that Derek Armstrong had left behind.
He shoved his hands in his pockets, willfully pushing all thoughts of the man out of his head. He looked at Tricia. “What did you think of her?”
His sister—only two years his junior—looked up at him. “What do you think I thought? She looks like Taylor.”
He turned to look back at the curving drive, though the limousine had already passed from sight. That had been his first thought, too, when he’d seen Lisa in Shots. That she looked like his faithless ex-wife. But the next time he’d seen her—when Ted and Sara Beth had eloped—he’d realized how superficial that first, startling resemblance had been. Oh, Lisa was still slender and leggy. A blonde with brown eyes and a face that was arrestingly sculptured with a reserved demeanor that just begged to be smashed.
“She’s not Taylor,” he told his sister. She might be an ice princess, but Lisa had a brain. And dedication, which she’d proved just that afternoon.
The only dedication his ex had was to herself.
“Well, obviously, I know that,” Tricia said, rolling her eyes. “Just make sure you remember it.”
“What else did you think of her?”
She eyed him more closely. With all the suspicion of a sister who’d endured plenty from him throughout their childhood. “She seems nice enough. A little cool, but I think that’s probably because she’s shy.”
“Shy?” He shook his head, dismissing the notion. Lisa had confidence to spare. There was no room for shyness there. “Not a chance.”
His sister huffed. “Why’d you ask if you’re going to ignore what I think, anyway? Trust me. The woman has a shy streak a half mile wide. You just don’t see it ‘cause you’re a guy. All you see are those long legs of hers and those big brown eyes.”
He saw a lot more than that. He saw the means to his future. One that, for a long while, he’d given up on ever having.
He never thought he’d be in the position of hearing his own biological clock ticking, but that was where he was. There was a helluva lot of macabre irony that the situation caused by Derek Armstrong was now providing Rourke with the means to succeed in the one thing he’d ever failed at.
Or maybe, it was simply poetic justice.
Elation edged ahead at last, and Rourke dropped his arm over his sister’s shoulder. “How fast do you think you can put together a wedding?”
Lisa stood on the front porch of her parents’ home and took a deep breath. She’d barely landed in Boston when her cell phone started ringing with messages, but it was the one from her mother that had brought Lisa here this evening.
Nobody ignored Emily when she summoned you to a family dinner.
Not even when one had, just that day, been coerced into agreeing to marry a devil.
Blowing out a breath, she pushed open the door, entering the foyer where the scent of furniture polish and fresh flowers greeted her. Knowing that her mother wouldn’t appreciate her arriving with briefcase in hand—tangible evidence that she was a businesswoman and not a society wife—she left it on the floor next to an antique console table that held the cut-crystal vase filled with flowers and walked through the house that she’d grown up in.
She found everyone already in the drawing room. Her mother was sitting on the settee, her typical glass of sherry in her hand. Surprisingly, Gerald was out of bed and sat in his wheelchair next to the settee, sipping amber liquid from a squat glass of his own. Paul and his fiancée, Ramona, were standing close together near the bay window that overlooked the back of the estate. Her blond head was tilted close to his dark one and they seemed lost in their own world.
Derek was notably absent, for which Lisa was painfully grateful.
She was pretty certain that in her present mood, she would have lost her control altogether if she’d had to see him just then.
It was going to be difficult enough trying to sell the idea of her sudden “romance” with Rourke Devlin as it was.
She went to her father first, bending over him to kiss his cheek. “Daddy. It’s good to see you up. You’re looking well.” And he did. His shoulders weren’t as broad and strong as they’d been before he’d become confined to his wheelchair and his face wasn’t as fiercely handsome as it had once been, but he was still an impressive, dauntingly intelligent man.
And right now, that intelligence was peering out at her from her father’s eyes. “You don’t,” he said bluntly. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing!” She straightened and managed a laugh. “Just too much to do and not enough hours in the day. That’s what you always used to say,” she reminded.
He lifted his glass, watching her over the rim. He didn’t look convinced, but she turned quickly for her customary air-kiss with her mother.
“You’re late,” was the only observation her mother had for her.
“I’m sorry.” She looked over the back of the settee to find her brother watching her, his eyebrows lifted a little.
She could well imagine he was curious about the results of her New York trip. She shook her head ever so slightly, glancing back at her mother. “You know I was in New York for most of the day. I had to stop at the institute when I got back.”
Emily’s lips pursed. “I suppose that’s why you didn’t have time to dress more appropriately for dinner.”
She was long used to her mother’s disapproval and ignored it in favor of going to the gleaming wooden bar on the far side of the room. “I thought Olivia and her clan would be here, too,” she said to no one in particular.
“She and Jamison had another function tonight.”
And of course those functions would be important enough not to earn Emily’s trademarked sniff of displeasure. “Too bad,” Lisa
