Her First Vacation (28 page)

Today, school would get out early. They should have gone a
full day, but there was a cold front coming through this afternoon, and the
decision had been made to send the children home early instead of risking
getting caught in a sudden snowstorm. They were about to go home for Christmas
break anyway. Everyone knew no one would be doing anything important today. So
as lunchtime rolled around, Claire helped her children gather their things into
their packs. She bundled them into their coats and mittens, then laughed as the
bell finally rang, and they all screeched with glee. She walked to the front
door of the school, watching as her class dispersed to their various buses. She
waved at them as they took their seats, unconsciously dodging the other
youngsters that scrambled through the cold to get to their buses. Finally, the
elementary was empty, except for the few children who were lucky enough to have
parents that picked them up. Claire was watching the buses pull away when she
felt someone move up behind her. She turned to look up into the gaze of the
assistant principal.

“Another Christmas.
It amazes me
how quickly they get here. Before you know it, we’ll be taking spring break and
then, it’ll be summer again.”

Claire nodded. “I know. When the year starts, it always seems
like there’s so far to go and then, suddenly, it’s over, and I’m left feeling
like I was caught up in some kind of whirlwind that moved through time in the
blink of an eye.”

He laughed. “Thirty-five little whirlwinds
is
more like it.”

Claire smiled. “I did choose elementary.” She pulled her
face into a mock frown. “What was I thinking?”

They both laughed, until a cold burst of wind caused Claire
to shiver suddenly. He reached out to touch her.

“It’s too cold to be out here without your coat.”

She felt it, then. She heard it. The interest in his eyes
was unmistakable. She felt an instinctual urge to back away, but told herself
not to. Derrick Chalmers was a good man.
A steady, decent
man.
He was in education because he truly cared about children. He understood
her passion for her work, and he admired it. All in all, he was exactly the
kind of man she should be looking for.
The perfect
prospective husband and father.
They’d gone out a few times. Had dinner
and coffee and talked about work and countless other things. She liked him a
great deal. She respected him. So why, she silently screamed at herself, didn’t
she want him?

He put his arm around her, and she let him pull her to his
side and shelter her from the cold. She could feel his
warmth,
smell the scent of his aftershave. He was handsome enough that more than a few
of the women at the school, single and
otherwise,
had
shown obvious interest in him. There was even a hint of something in his eyes
when he looked at her that suggested he might know enough about a woman’s body
to give her pleasure if she ever allowed him to really touch her. She just
couldn’t understand why she didn’t snatch him up while she had the chance. She
shivered again, and Derrick nodded toward the door.

“Come on. The kids are all gone, and we should be too. It’s
Christmas break, for heaven’s sake.
Time to go home and kick
back for a few days before getting back into the grind again.”

She smiled up at him. “Careful or I might begin to think
you don’t love your job.”

He grinned.
“Wouldn’t want to give you
the wrong impression.
You know I love having five hundred children underfoot
all day. Along with a thousand parents and a few thousand grandparents and all
their aunts and uncles and cousins and-”

She cut him off with a laugh.
“All right,
all right.
I get the picture. You need a break as much as the kids do.”

He turned, his arm still around her shoulders, and opened
the door. “What I need is a nice bottle of wine, some soft music, and someone
to share it with.” They were stepping across the threshold as he spoke. “Care
to join me?”

Claire lifted her gaze to his and felt a rush of something
very close to anger. Damn Colin for touching her so deeply. He’d made it
impossible for her to look at any other man objectively. She told herself to
accept Derrick’s invitation. He wasn’t just asking her to share his wine, she
knew. He was hoping she’d agree to share his bed. He’d certainly made no secret
of the fact that he was attracted to her. What made it all the more terrible
for her was that he’d been friendly with her even before she’d made her
stunning transformation from shabby to chic. He’d even asked her to have coffee
with him once the year before. She’d been so stunned by the offer, that she’d
refused him outright without even considering he might actually want to spend
some time with her. So here she stood with a good man asking her for something
she knew she couldn’t give him. She drew a slow breath.

“Derrick-“

He shook his head. “You don’t have to say it. I can see the
answer in your eyes.”

She felt her face pull down into a frown. “I’m sorry,
really I am. I like you.
A lot.
But I just can’t let
it go any further.”

He nodded, his eyes full of understanding she knew she
didn’t really deserve. Finally, he lifted his hand and cupped her cheek. He
bent forward and lightly brushed his lips against hers, then pulled back and
gave her a genuine, if somewhat sad smile.

“I hope he appreciates what he has in you.”

She frowned.
“Who?”

“The man who holds the keys to your
heart.”

She was momentarily too stunned to say anything. She felt
the tightness in her throat and the moisture gathering in her eyes. She blinked
quickly to clear the tears before they could even form. She forced herself to
shake her head.

“I’m afraid he doesn’t.”

“Then he’s a damned idiot.”

Claire could only nod. “Yes, I believe he is.”

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

Colin forced his hands to loosen their grip on the steering
wheel before he left permanent indentions in the leather. He didn’t even bother
to tell his jaw to unclench. There was no point in asking for the impossible.
He should have known better than to think he could just walk back into Claire’s
life after five months and find her waiting for him like some faithful little
dog. Not for the first time, he cursed his own stupidity and stubbornness. For
five months he’d fought to forget her, to pretend that he wasn’t dying a little
bit every day that he was away from her. He’d quit his job, over much
resistance. He was the best, they said. No one could get as close as he could.
They’d give him more money, more time off, whatever he wanted if he’d just
stay. Through it all, the only thing he could think about was how much he hated
being a career liar. He was sick to death of never being honest with anyone and
more than a little queasy at the thought that Claire had somehow reached past
all the lies and found the truth.

In her bed that night, she’d touched his soul. She’d forced
him to love her the way a man is supposed to love a woman. Honest and raw and
pure. No lies, no pretense. Try as he might, he couldn’t make himself forget
it, either. No
amount of alcohol wiped her from his mind, and
forget
other women. He’d tried. After three months of cold showers and
hot dreams, he’d finally ordered himself to get out and find another woman.
Any woman who might somehow take his mind off Claire, even for a
few minutes.
He’d gotten drunk enough to take the edge off his
inhibitions and set his sights on a pretty little blonde who was built like a
Playboy centerfold. The closest he got to her, though, was a kiss. A single
touch of their lips, and he’d had to push her away.
Because
she had too much skill with her lips and teeth and tongue.
She’d
practiced the art of seduction, and it turned his stomach. He walked out of the
bar only minutes later, his body tight and hard with the memory of Claire’s
innocently erotic responses to him.

It had taken him another two months to finally admit that
he couldn’t keep going like he was. He had to go see her. To tell her he was sorry
for the way he’d acted. Hell, maybe he’d even come there to tell her that he
loved her. As he’d driven into the school parking lot, he wasn’t sure what he
intended to say. And then, the bell had rung, catching him by surprise even
before he could get out of his car. The school buses lined up in front of the
building should have clued him in, but he’d been too lost in his own world to
realize what they meant. He’d watched as hundreds of screaming, laughing kids
streamed out the doors and onto the buses. He’d been watching them, feeling an
odd crush of emotion on his chest, when he saw her step through the door. After
that he couldn’t do anything but stare.

She was more beautiful than he remembered
,
if that was possible. Her hair was pulled back from her face, held in place by
clips, but it fell free down her back. She wore a pair of charcoal gray slacks
that made her legs look like they went on forever and a bright red sweater that
boasted an embroidered Christmas tree on the front. She looked like the teacher
she was. Still, he felt heat and hunger slam into him with so much force that
it made him dizzy. She was laughing as she waved to some of the children. He
watched as she wrapped her arms around herself against the cold that she didn’t
even seem to consciously feel. Her cheeks were flushed from the cold or her
laughter, he didn’t know which. All he knew for certain was that he’d never
wanted anything in the world more than he wanted to run to her. He was reaching
for the door handle when the man walked up behind her.

He stood too close, invading her personal space with a
casualness that set Colin’s teeth on edge. She turned and smiled up at him, and
the annoyance turned to something darker. With each second that passed, Colin
felt himself tensing up. Each smile they shared, each laugh seemed to tighten
the coil of anger inside him. Then the man put his arm around Claire’s
shoulders, and she let him. She didn’t pull away, didn’t act like it made her
uncomfortable. As quickly as the anger had come, it vanished, leaving the
tension behind. He watched as they walked back into the building, clenched his
jaw tightly as the man kissed her. Then sat there, staring at the place they’d
stood after they’d both walked away.

He’d lost her. He’d been a stupid, idiotic fool, and he’d
lost her to another man.
A man who clearly worked at the
school.
Another teacher.
Someone
who could share her love of education and children.
Someone who would
give her the nice, safe, secure life Colin knew she deserved. They made an
attractive couple. He was as tall as Colin, in good shape. They’d have
attractive children together.

Instantly the anger returned.
No, not
anger.
Jealousy.
Dark and
ugly and too powerful to be denied.
He wanted Claire for himself. He
wanted to give her the babies he knew she craved. He wanted to be the one she
shared her dreams and problems with. He wanted to be the one she wrapped her
long legs around every night. He tightened his grip on the steering wheel again
as teachers began to slowly filter out of the building. He’d been a fool to let
her go. He knew that now. But he knew he wasn’t going to just walk away this
time.
Even if she had another man in her life.
Colin
would just have to convince her that he was the man for her. He could do it.
He’d seen the way the other man kissed her.
Chaste and restrained.
Their lips had barely touched before he was pulling away. Colin knew Claire
wanted more than that. She deserved more. Beneath those conservative wool pants
and that cheerful sweater he’d be willing to bet she was still wearing her sexy
lingerie. She was a passionate woman who’d never be happy with any man who
didn’t have enough passion to match her. Colin felt a grim smile touch his
mouth as he reached to start the car and pull out of the lot. Passion was the
one thing he knew he had plenty of.

Claire stood in the middle of her bedroom, surveying her
appearance in the full-length mirror mounted to the inside of her closet door.
The dress was a deep burgundy. It hugged her body tightly enough to show her
contours without being tastelessly revealing. The short bolero jacket would
keep the cold from bothering her on her trip from her car to the house. The
slit up the side was just high enough to show a nice flash of leg when she
walked. Her hair was loose, falling around her shoulders in soft curls. She’d
considered putting it up, but had decided not to bother. The party wasn’t that
formal.

She felt a sigh building in her chest as she found herself
considering, again, calling up her mother and begging off. She didn’t want to
go to a party tonight. She’d been looking forward to it for weeks, but now she
just wanted to curl up with a good book and pretend she wasn’t wishing Colin
was by her side. For years she’d skirted the fringes of her mother’s parties.
She’d watched all the people in their beautiful clothes as they laughed and
danced and ignored her as if she didn’t even exist. She’d hidden herself in the
kitchen, playing the role of organizer so that everything ran perfectly. This
was the first time she was truly going to be a part of the festivities. It was,
in short, a long time fantasy come true. And she didn’t care. If she never went
to another party as long as she lived, she didn’t care. She felt her eyes fill
with tears and let them fall this time. It was Christmas, her favorite holiday
of the year, and the only thing she really wanted was the one thing she knew
she could never have.

Colin nearly didn’t stop when he saw the cluster of cars
dotting the drive leading to the home Claire shared with her mother and sister.
Obviously, they were entertaining. Just as obvious was the fact that what he
had to say to Claire wasn’t something to be discussed in front of an audience.
She wouldn’t appreciate him making a scene in front of her family and friends.
But he couldn’t make himself keep driving. He’d damn near gone insane in the
few hours that had passed since he’d seen her at the school. He had no way of
knowing how serious her relationship with the other man was. A big party like
this was just the sort of place some men would think a proposal would be
romantic. Colin couldn’t handle the thought that she might actually say yes to
the potential proposal. Rationally, he knew he was making some crazy leaps, but
there was just enough chance that they might be right to make his palms sweat.
So he pulled his car in behind the last car in line along the curb and got out
into the snow-flecked dusk.