thought Ry was kissing her because he wanted her. His kiss had been a lie. All he was doing was teaching her a lesson, doing his duty—his cursed brotherly duty—and warning her away from Nathan Beldon. She was furious that he’d had the gall to accuse her of being a tease. Hurt that he would think of her that way.
So what if his kiss had made her blood boil. He wasn’t offering her a darn thing but grief. Nathan… Nathan had been sending all kinds of signals that he was offering more. And Ry Evans or no Ry Evans, she owed it to herself to find out exactly how much more.
She pressed ice-cold water to her eyes, repaired her makeup, then ran a brush through her hair. Quickly exchanging her dark blue sweater for a Val-entine-red silk blouse, she grabbed her car keys, and headed for Nathan’s apartment across town. It was still early evening. It was still Valentine’s Day. And she was not going to spend the rest of the night alone. She was going to go to Nathan, apologize again and make it impossible for him not to take her to bed.
Roman Birkenfeld stood, reached for his trousers and tugged them on. Behind him Marci lay sprawled and spent in the middle of his rumpled bed. There was a bruise on her left cheek he couldn’t muster enough conscience to be sorry about. He hadn’t asked her to come over here. It wasn’t his fault she’d been a handy outlet for his fury when he’d returned from the park, his pants soaked with champagne and smeared with caviar.
It was Evans’s fault. The interfering, clod-kicking yokel had crossed a line tonight. No one humiliated Roman Birkenfeld. He felt the rage boil up in his blood all over again, just thinking about how the slow-talking and slow-witted Texan had managed to thwart yet another attempt to get to Natalie Perez through Carrie Whelan.
He’d almost had her. Almost gotten her to take him home, when Evan’s filthy mutt had attacked him.
Seething with building fury, he stalked into the living room, snagged his cell phone and dialed.
“Give me a report,” he ordered when Jason Carter answered the phone. “And you’d better have something good to tell me about my money.”
He waited with growing impatience as Carter, one of the muscle men he’d hired to help him track down the money, handed the phone to Tommy Stokes.
“Nothing new, boss,” Stokes said stoically when he came on the line. “We know one of those Cattleman’s Club guys who’s been protecting Perez took the money to their prissy rich man’s club, but we haven’t figured out a way to get to it.”
“You break into the damn place, is how you do it,” he barked back, at the end of his tolerance with the entire situation. “How hard can it be to get past a few prissy—wasn’t that your word—cowboys?”
“You said you wanted to keep it low-key,” Stokes said defensively.
“We’re past low-key, you moron. I need that money. And I need it yesterday. Now, find it and bring it to me or your miserable lives aren’t going to be worth living.”
He punched the end key before Stokes could utter a response, then tossed the phone angrily against the wall. Damn Natalie Perez. Everything had started unraveling when she’d gotten wise to his black-market baby ring.
He raked his hands roughly through his hair, forced a calming breath. And told himself he wasn’t coming unglued. He was still in control. It hadn’t been his fault that he’d fallen so far behind in his payments to the Atlantic City boys. He’d just had a streak of bad luck at the casinos. That’s why he’d started the baby theft in the first place, to pay off his gambling debts.
“Okay. Don’t think about that now,” he told himself aloud. “Think positive. Stokes and Carter will get the money.” The half million in the diaper bag represented all of his hard work—the cumulative amount from the sale of several babies over several months. Once he recovered it, he’d get the heat off his back… and then he’d make a few people pay. Natalie Perez would be first; Ryan Evans, however, was rising to the top of his short list like a bullet.
He was pacing the room, thinking of ways to deal with him when his doorbell rang. He was so lost in thought he didn’t even think. He just opened the door.
And stared straight into Carrie Whelan’s anxious face.
“Nathan,” she said hesitantly. “Can… can I come in?”
Before he could stop her, she shouldered around him and into the apartment.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, her hands clenched together in front of her. “It was horrible… what Ryan did. I came to… well… to tell you that if you still want to spend the night with me—”
Her voice trailed off as her eyes strayed, then opened wide and held on a spot just beyond his shoulder.
He knew without turning around what—or who—she saw. He turned, looked over his shoulder and saw Marci standing in the doorway, wearing only his shirt and a catlike smile of triumph.
“Whoops,” Marci said with a laugh and disappeared back into the bedroom.
He drew a deep breath and turned back to Carrie who looked as if someone had just gut punched her.
“Carrie… I can explain,” he said quickly, confident he could put a spin on this that the gullible little ingenue would buy.
“Not necessary,” she said stiffly, and turned for the door.
He snagged her arm, angry all over again, at Marci, at this stupid little doe-eyed girl and the time and effort he’d had to put into winning her over. “Please,” he said, sounding appropriately desperate. “Let me explain. It’s not what you think.”
“Nothing,” she said with a pathetic lift of her chin, “ever is.” Then she practically ran out the door.
Seething, he damned her rotten timing and his bad luck for getting caught in a little recreational sex. And then he turned back to the bedroom… blood in his eyes.
Carrie’s hands trembled as she raced across the parking lot and punched her keyless remote to unlock her car.
Eyes wide, blinking back tears of humiliation, she peeled out of the lot and onto Hanover Street.
And then she just drove.
Wanting to deny what she’d just seen… even considering turning around and letting Nathan make his explanation.
And then she got a clue.
There was no explaining… no matter that Nathan had snagged her arm and begged her to let him.
What was there to explain? He’d just gotten out of bed. With his nurse… Mary somebody. Maid… Mary. Made… Mary. A hysterical laugh burst out. Mary made quite a statement standing there in nothing but her bed-mussed hair and Nathan’s rumpled shirt.
“What, do I have a sign on my back, or something?” she asked skyward. “Humiliate me. Lie to me. Fool me. I love the abuse. Pile it on. I can take it.”
And then she wasn’t laughing anymore. She was crying. Damn it, she was crying again! Like she never cried. Like she hadn’t cried since that awful time when her parents had died. Huge, racking sobs flooded her vision and made her throat ache and made her feel spineless and pathetic. Because
