Better Than You (The Walker Family Series Book 3) (16 page)

20
.

D
elta spent New Year’s eve in Mike’s office, the whole eighteen story building dark around them, the blinds pulled all the way up on their cords, fireworks bursting red and green and white and gold over the midnight skyline, the champagne in their Solo cups warm and fizzing. Two days later, she went to see her father.

“He’s
balancing his checkbook,” Mrs. Miller informed her at the door, which meant he wouldn’t be in a good mood. Delta squared her shoulders and went to his study anyway.

His silver head was bent over his desk, the gold college ring on his right hand glimmering in the sunlight as he punched numbers into his calculator. He still went through every withdrawal and deposit one by one with calculator and, sometimes, pen and paper, a system she couldn’t very well fault given how successful
he’d been. She knew he heard the soft brush of her heels against the rug, because he heard everything, but he didn’t acknowledge her at first.

“Hi, Dad,” she greeted as she settled onto the tufted leather sofa across from his desk.
As the backs of her legs hit the leather, a sudden, sun-faded memory splashed across the back of her mind. Her knees on the rug, her slight, six-year-old fingers hiding M&Ms in the button tufts, sunlight playing across the colored candy shells. The Walkers didn’t know it, though Mike was starting to:  she’d been a little girl just like all other little girls, even though the house around her had been grand. “Checkbook?” she asked, and crossed her legs at the knee.

“Hmm,” he
acknowledged.

“Did you and Mom have a nice trip?”

“Your mother got sunburned and then refused to leave the room because she looked like a lobster,” he said dryly. “I spent the whole week listening to her bitch and moan.”

“So it was better than last year’s trip,” she said with a small smile she quickly wiped away.

“Suppose it was,” he conceded, and finally lifted his head. He gave her the careful, assessing look he might give a potential business partner. The sunlight deepened the wrinkles streaking back from his eyes – the products of years of tanning and frowning. “I take it you spent your holiday with that boy of yours.”

Boy
was not meant as an endearment. Greg he’d called a
man
; Mike was a
boy
. He was at least ten years younger than Greg, but Dennis didn’t know that; he’d deemed him less than worthy for other reasons.

“With Mike, yes,” she said.
“That’s why I’m here to see you, actually.”

“If you’re running away with him and want money to live on, don’t bother asking,” he said, and his gaze fell back to the scratch paper he worked his figures on.

“Dad,” she sighed, “you know he isn’t a pauper.”

“What I
know
.” His head came up again, anger bubbling beneath his calm exterior. “Is that you have a bad habit of settling for men who don’t even deserve to occupy the same room as you.”

She wasn’t sick and weak and in the hospital this time, wasn’t surprised. She’d steeled herself for this very
conversation. “Bad habit?” she asked. “I haven’t done anything habitually. I made a mistake years ago – with, I might add, a boy you and Mom loved at the time – and you can believe that not a day goes by that I don’t worry I’ll make a mistake like that again.

“I don’t have a problem with ‘men’,” she continued. “I had a problem with Brody when I was sixteen. And his coldness meant I had a likewise problem with the equally cold
Lucas two years ago. And with your favorite, Greg. I don’t have a bad habit, Dad, I have a bad pool to pick from.”

His frown deepened, the lines on his fac
e becoming fissures. “Greg is – ”

“Greg is a very successful lawyer looking for a very expensive piece of arm candy. That’s all I was to him.”

“You would have been well taken care of,” Dennis countered. “You couldn’t hope for better – ”

“I don’t need
to be taken care of financially.” Delta squared her shoulders against the back of the sofa. “I have money. I want to be with someone who can offer me more than that.”

“Do you realize how ridiculous you sound?” he asked.

“Do
you
realize how ridiculous
you
sound?”

He gave her a look that had always sent the staff running. Delta kept her spine stiff and waited. “God,” he finally breathed and glanced away from her, taking his chin in his hand. “Sometimes I wish you were more like your mother.”

“No, you don’t,” she said, and thought he almost smiled.

“No. But I could distract you with something shiny and be done with this conversation.”
He glanced at her sideways and the smile she thought she’d seen crept into existence. “I should be flattered, I guess. You’re more like me – you know what you want and go after it.”

“I don’t think you’re giving Mom enough credit. She wanted a rich husband and she got one.”

“True.” He sighed again and some of the carefully held tension in his face and shoulders left him. He looked older. Tired. Wistful maybe. “I remember,” he mused, and she knew he was about to wax nostalgic, “you as just a little thing, hiding candy in the buttons of that sofa.”

A warm, welcome strand of emotion uncurled in h
er chest; they shared the same memory.

“You used to call me ‘Daddy’,” he said sadly, “you were this perfect lit
tle part of me. And then you…” He didn’t say it, but she knew what it was she’d done. The warm wine. The awkward tumble of shame and anxiety and excitement to be skin-on-skin with her high school sweetheart for the first time. The test stick. The panic. The clinic. The grief she’d poured into her pillow.

She swallowed hard. “That didn’t change who I am.”

He ran a finger across the rim of an empty crystal tumbler in front of him. “Do you really believe that?”

Her eyes fell to the rug, to the toes of her high-heeled boots.
“No,” she said quietly. “I didn’t used to be frightened all the time.”

“Are you afraid now?”

She knew he wasn’t speaking in general terms. Was she afraid of her new relationship? Of the tight ball of sentiments that kept expanding in her chest, drawing her in closer to Mike? That’s what he wanted to know. “A little,” she admitted, which was only half true because she was
a lot
afraid.

“Sometimes fear is our
subconscious trying to warn us away from things,” he said in his patented, paternal voice full of what he thought was so much wisdom. When she’d been younger, hiding candy in sofa buttons, impressionable and impressed, he’d used that voice on her and she’d nodded along in complete agreement. Now, no matter how frightened she was, it had no effect on her.

She picked her eyes back up from the floor and met his. “Mike’s not a mistake,” she said, and putting it into words for the first time solidified it in her mind. He wasn’t. He really, really wasn’t. “I think…” she felt a smile tugging, “I think he might love me.”

“Thinking isn’t knowing,” Dennis warned.

“Thinking is better than anything I’ve ever had before.” She took a deep breath. “Please, Daddy, don’t make it hard for him to love me.”

He regarded her a long moment, finger lapping the tumbler’s rim four times, before he finally exhaled, shoulders dropping. “Something else you have in common with your mother: I could never refuse you anything.”

21
.

“W
hen you find a girl who’ll have you, marry her,”
had been the sum total of the advice Randy Walker had given his boys when it came to women. He’d never said anything about wealthy girls with intimacy issues. No, in that area, Mike was on his own. He’d never been the brain child of his family, but he thought he did okay. He could get his wealthy girl to smile, to laugh, to sigh and roll her eyes, and to lean against his shoulder too. To hold his hand and fall asleep on the drive home, to call him
sweet
and bake him cookies and say his name in all the ways it counted.

He knew he loved her in February: steam leaving the mug of cof
fee in her hands in thick curls; her hair a snarled mess around her shoulders; the morning on the other side of the window bitter and windswept; her face lovely, pale, and lonely in a way he didn’t understand. She sat in the chair in his bedroom, in his shirt and a pair of socks that went up to her knees, gooseflesh on her slender legs. A copy of
Oliver Twist
had been open across the arm of the chair.
“I think it might snow today,”
she’d said, and he’d been completely in love with her.

He thought she might have loved him
back in March: in from the rain; his clothes stuck to his skin; the umbrella showering the hardwood of her entry hall; the dinner she’d planned forgotten when he’d helped her out of her jacket and she’d been shivering with cold. That day, when she’d pushed his wet shirt back off his shoulders and stretched up on her toes to kiss him, he was sure there was something new shining deep down in her coffee-colored eyes.
“You’re so cute,”
she’d said, and he’d known: she loved him.

It w
as different with her. Even when the chemical high of firsts had faded, it was replaced with something that still nearly blinded him. Something bright and hot. Something he was afraid would slip through his fingers if he didn’t latch onto it tight. His family didn’t love Delta. His best friend didn’t either. But Mike loved her, and when the separate houses and separate names got to be too much, he decided to do something about it.

On an overcast afternoon in May, the sky churning overhead and promising a storm, he stood in front of a display case in what had become his favorite jewelry store and let his eyes move across diamonds.

“This setting is really popular right now.” The saleslady reached into the case and pointed at an oblong stone set in a ring of smaller diamonds, its band thick and platinum. It looked like something Mariah Carey would have picked out. She smiled up at him. “It’s one of our bestsellers.”

She might have known what was selling, but she didn’t know his girl. “I’m not interested in popular,” Mike said, and earned a wide-eyed look. “She’ll want something all her own.”

**

“Miss Brooks?”

Almost six months on the job and the timid sales associate in need of a makeover was still timid and still in need of a makeover. She stood at one of the registers, phone in hand, covering the mouthpiece, and waved to catch Delta’s attention as she passed.

“There’s a Mr. Davison who’s asking for you. He’s called
four
times.”

Delta sighed
and checked her watch – it was silver with dainty pink crystals: a birthday gift from Mike. She had only an hour left until she was off for the night, and she had offered to make dinner for Mike; he’d requested a night in and she was making sides to go with the steak and chicken he would grill. The last thing she wanted was to deal with some irate customer and get stuck on the phone after her shift was over. But she said, “I’ll take it in my office,” and went there, bracing herself for a whole batch of apologies and promises to “straighten things out.”

“This is Delta Brooks,” she answered as she propped a hip against
the corner of her desk.

“Miss Brooks.” T
he male voice that greeted her didn’t sound irate in the least. “Tim Davison with Saks.”

Saks.
Her mind went reeling back to a conversation she’d had with her father months before:
“I could put a call into someone in a corporate office…”

He’d put in the call.
And not to Nordstrom corporate, but to
Saks
.

“I…I…why are you calling me?” she said, too shocked to come up with anything more polite.

“Well.” There was a smile to his voice. “I hear that if I’m looking to bring new young managers on board, you’re the woman to talk to.”

Stunned, she listened to the blood rush through her ears, and to the job he offered her in New York.

**

Delta was running a knife through a head of romaine lettuce when she heard the door to her apartment open. She’d left it unlock
ed and Mike let himself in and then turned the deadbolt. She watched the sliced lettuce unfurl in curly ribbons and tried to still the sudden thundering of her pulse. How was she going to tell him about Saks? About the likelihood she’d be moving to NYC and…doing what? Leaving him behind? Taking him along? He might be able to find another job, but he might not. She should take the job, shouldn’t she? Hadn’t she always wanted to keep climbing that ladder until she was a daughter her father could be proud of?

“I got you chicken cutlets,” Mike said as he stepped into the kitchen, and it startled her for some reason. “Is that alright? I figure you’ll just slice it up and put it on your salad anyway.
”

Her hands stilled on the knife as he drew up next to her and she lifted her face, trying for a smile, to receive the kiss he dropped on her lips. “That’s fine,” she assured when he pulled away, and went back to her salad, too preoccupied to keep any sort of pleasant expression on her face.

He loved her. That was all she could think every time she conjured up an image of the New York skyline. She could tell that he did: it was in his green eyes and all over his angular, stupid Captain America face and in the awkwardly sweet way he tucked her in next to him on the couch. He loved her and she wanted him to fight for her to stay almost as much as she expected him not to.

“What else are you making?” he asked, and one of his big arms came around her
shoulders and across her chest while she worked. “I smell bread.”

“You smell green bean casserole,” she corrected. “It’s in the
oven. Actually.” She fought the urge to squirm, his hug not appreciated as she contemplated telling him about Saks. “Could you go ahead and start the meat? We should be ready to eat otherwise.”

It suddenly felt too domestic and comfortable – her tossing their salad together while she watched him through the doors out on her balcony, grilling their dinner and whistling to
himself. It had become too easy: the homey sort of peace that made Georgia, and everything safe, too hard to give up. She didn’t know what it was like to feel this because she’d never let herself relax, hadn’t ever let her guard down. And now, because of Mike – his grilling and whistling, his bad jokes and determination to burrow his way under her skin – she had a decision to make where there should have been none.

The French doors opened before she expected them to. “
Ummm…” Mike started, and she glanced over to see him in the threshold with a big wet stain splashed across the fronts of his khakis. “This isn’t what it looks like,” he said, his grin sheepish, blushing. “I might have…kinda spilled the whole cup of melted butter all over myself.”

“I see that,” she said with a snort.
“Alright.” She set her salad aside. “Get out of them and I’ll throw them in the wash before the grease sets.”

He blinked at her, the empty measuring cup that had held the butter in one hand, grill brush in the other. “And stand out here in my boxers?”

“My neighbors will enjoy the view.”

He rolled his eyes, but set cup and brush aside and ditched his pants.
“You just like to keep me naked is all.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’m nothing but man-meat to you, am I?”

“I couldn’t have said it better myself.”

“You could at least pretend I’m funny.”

“That would ruin all
my
fun, though.”

Delta stood up on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Be quick with this meat and we can move on to man-meat sooner,” she whispered against his jaw before she dropped to her heels and gathered up his khakis.

“Don’t tease me,” he called to her back as she headed into the kitchen.

“Wouldn’t dare,” she called back, and turned into the hall and out of sight.

She had a washer and dryer hidden behind a pocket door in the short hall that led to her guest bedroom. They were two of her must-haves when it came to apartment living; she’d made plenty of concessions in her lifestyle since leaving the nest, but communal laundry wasn’t ever going to be one of them. Delta draped Mike’s pants over the top of the dryer and reached for the bottle of OxiClean stowed on the shelf above. He’d managed to get both legs with the butter, all the way down to the knees, and she poured a liberal amount of detergent on the stain, not too optimistic about the Dockers ever looking the same again.

A lump in one of the front pockets caught her eye and as the washer started to fill with cold water, she reached for whatever it was. Her fingers brushed velvet and then curled around what w
as an unmistakably square box.

Her heart leapt halfway up her throat with a little gasp just at the feel of the box. “No,” she breathed, not sure if it was terror or elation that gripped her lungs and squeezed tight until her head started to swim. Slowly, she withdrew her hand and
the blue velvet box she held with white-knuckled fervor.

“You’d of course have to relocate to New York,”
Tim Davison had said over the phone just hours before,
“but it would be a wonderful opportunity.”

Delta took the box in both shaking hands and felt a hot flush steal over her. Breathless, she cracked the lid open wide and the light caught something sparkly nestled against the velvet.

A wonderful opportunity
.

The diamond was square-cut
, a great big nugget of shine, on a simple, smooth, delicate platinum band. It was classic. Timeless. Flawless.

“Oh, no,” Delta repeated, and a lump formed in her throat.

Saks wanted her. Mike wanted her. Saks offered her a salary. Mike offered her a ring. Saks was a wonderful opportunity…but…

“Aw, shit,” he said behind her and she whirled around to face him, her shaky pulse becoming even more erratic.

Mike’s face was a tense mix of startled and worried, boyish and masculine and more than she could look at and retain any sort of composure. Her eyes started to glaze over and she blinked hard, gaze dropping to the ring she held.

“This clearly isn’t the way I wanted to do this,” Mike said. “I was at least
gonna wear pants.”

“Mike,” she said, and didn’t know what else to say after that. She was so blindsided, she couldn’t put a label on the swell of emotion that was sweeping through her. She wanted to rake her claws down his face and rail at him for his poor timing, for attaching himself to her in a way she couldn’t ignore until he was this very real conflict in her choice to leave. She wanted to shove him, to scream at him, to punish him for making her feel this way. But she wanted to see what the ring felt like on her
finger, too. Wanted to kiss him; to press her face to his chest and let him hold her and tell her how worth it it was to give up ambition for love. She wanted to be certain, to be sure, that all the tender, budding things she felt for him were the beginnings of something deeper and truer and more important than anything else in her life. She wanted all of that at once and choked on it.

“I wanted to plan it all out,” he said more quietly. “I wanted to do it the way you’d want to remember it.” He’d wanted it to be perfect for her. Up to some standards he thought she held in regards to proposals.

“Mike,” she repeated, and her voice cracked; her hands shook so hard she couldn’t hide the tremors. She didn’t actually want to claw his face or to scream at him; she just didn’t know how to handle the overwhelming knowledge that a man, that
this
man, loved her enough to want to marry her.

He sank to one knee in front of her, in his boxers and socks, and she would have laughed at him if his expression hadn’t been so serious and terrified. He reached up and put both hands on her hips and she was grateful to be stabilized, even if he was shaking just a little bit too.

“Since you’ve already seen it.” He wet his lips and tried for a smile. “Might as well go for it, huh?”

All she could do was
stare at him.

“Okay, so, here goes.” He cleared his throat. “
I know I’m a total broke-ass compared to your family. And I know you’re too good for me. But I…I
love
you, sweetheart.”