Lovers at Heart (31 page)

Max smiled at the pretty woman. “Hi.”

Rachelle put her hand on Ryan’s shoulder. “Max, I’m so glad that you finally reached out to Ryan. He’s told me a lot about you. I know how much you meant to him. He’s worried about you for years.”

He talked about me?
“Oh, well.” Max didn’t know what to say. “I guess I’ve worried about me, too.” Honesty won again.

“Rachelle and I met when I was in the inpatient facility. She was a nurse’s aide then. She’s an RN now, and she works at the hospital in town.” He smiled up at her with pride.

The love in Ryan’s eyes for Rachelle made Max think of Treat and the way he looked at her, touched her, and so wonderfully completed her.
I need to find Treat
.

BY DINNERTIME TREAT was exhausted. His father was feeling infinitely better and practically needed to be tied to his chair to follow Ben’s order to rest. Every time his siblings turned around, their father was trying to get outside to the barn. Josh finally lured him inside by offering to watch a rodeo with him, and Treat sat on the front porch, watching Rex park the tractor in the barn.

They’d worked from sunup to sundown, and they still had evening chores to take care of. He had to give Rex credit. Rex was still running on full steam while Treat was sucking down coffee just to get a second wind.

The screen door opened behind him. “You still alive out here?” Savannah sat beside him on the top step.

“Barely. I had forgotten how labor intensive it was to run the ranch. I don’t know how he does it.”

“Yeah, he’s pretty tough. So are you, you know. Everyone is tough in different ways.”

“I guess.” Treat looked at Savannah. The spark in her hazel eyes had dulled. He’d assumed it was from his father’s health issues, but he remembered what his father had barked at him in the hospital. “Everything okay with you? What was Dad talking about with Connor? Do I need to pummel him for you? Because I’m wondering if Rex might be a better person for that job.”

She wrapped her arm in his and laid her head on his shoulder. “No one is better for that job than you. You’ve always been my protector.”

The weight of her against him reminded him of Max. He’d called her two more times, and he was kicking around the idea of showing up at her apartment. He just wasn’t sure that hounding her was the right thing to do.

“Way to skirt the question, Vanny.”

She sighed. “It’s complicated.”

“Isn’t everything?” Treat had replayed the night before Max left over and over in his mind, like a movie stuck on rewind, and he still couldn’t figure out what Max was so afraid of. Every relationship meant compromise. He wasn’t closing down shop. He was simply not going to acquire more overseas resorts. And now that he’d formed a plan, he wasn’t even giving that up. He was just changing how he’d do business in the future.

“Yeah, I guess. Do you remember what Mom and Dad’s relationship was like when you were younger? Before Mom got sick? I was too young to really remember. All I remember are trips to the hospital, being quiet when she needed to rest, and celebrating when she was feeling well. That would last a few days, a week, and then she was resting again.”

Treat had often wondered how much his younger siblings really remembered about their mother. Hugh had been an infant, and he knew Josh had also been too young to remember, but Savannah had been four when their mother got sick, and he’d avoided talking about their mother, in fear of upsetting her.

“She was the most beautiful woman who ever lived, Vanny. She had this light about her that’s so hard to describe. Mom was always happy. She used to yell at Dad when he’d try to toughen you up. I can still hear her.” He raised his voice an octave. “
Hal, she’s a girl. G-I-R-L. She doesn’t need to know how to climb onto a roof and bang a nail. That’s what men are for.
” He laughed at the memory.

“She did?”

“Oh, yes. You were always treated like a girl by Mom. She’d want to dress you in frilly pink dresses and make your hair all pretty, and Dad would say she was raising a sissy.”

Savannah pulled away from him and scrunched her nose. “Pink dresses? I can’t even imagine. I loved growing up as a tomboy. I always thought Dad did such a good job with us.”

“He did. So did she. She loved us like we were all precious. Even when we were bad. She would give it to you like fire for about a minute, and in the next breath, she was laughing and joking like you were a blessed angel who could do no wrong.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. You know it was Mom who started the whole backyard grilling thing, don’t you?” He watched Rex approach. His jeans stretched tight across his massive thighs, and his hat was still pulled down low. He looked every bit like the quintessential cowboy.

“I never knew why we did it. It’s all I’ve ever known.”

“It was Mom.”

Rex stepped onto the porch and sat beside Savannah. “What was Mom?”

“She was the one who started the outside barbeque tradition,” Savannah answered.

Rex took off his hat and ran his hand through his thick, collar-length black hair. He set his hat back on his head and wiped his face with his hand. “Remember that? She said we were only nourishing our bodies if we ate inside all the time and that we also had to nourish our souls.”

A warmth softened Rex’s hard exterior, and for a brief moment, Treat saw the sweet little boy Rex had been before their mother became ill. “Because that’s what the sun, wind, snow, and rain were for,” Treat added.

“I wish I’d known her then, like you guys did.” Savannah tried to push the frown from her lips.

“You’re just like her.” Rex touched his sister’s shoulder, then headed for the door. “You doing night chores with me?”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Treat answered.

After the door closed, Treat and Savannah remained on the deck. It was nice, just being with his family, without donning a suit and tie, without needing to be “on” all the time. Treat had a lot to figure out, but he’d instinctively set up his resorts to function well without him on site, so he wasn’t worried. He’d always made sound business decisions.
If only I could figure out what to do about Max
.

“Why did Max leave?” Savannah asked.

Treat picked up a rock from the lower step and tossed it into the yard, wondering if he was so transparent that Savannah could read his thoughts. “I’m not really sure. I’m still trying to figure that out myself.” He wiped his palms on his jeans, wishing he could talk to Max.

“I really thought, after she came here, and then tracked you down at the Cape, that she was
the one
, you know?” She scooted closer to him again. “I want that for you. I want you to be with someone who adores you. Someone who would go anywhere to be with you.”

“Then that makes two of us. Only I want Max to be that one. No one else. Just Max.”

“So, why don’t you go find her? Tell her?”

Savannah was goading him, and Treat knew it. She’d love nothing more than to spur him into action and stake claim on being the impetus for his actions forever. He smiled at her and touched her nose like he had when she was little. She smiled up at him. Her long auburn hair blew away from her face with the late-afternoon breeze, and for an instant, she was the spitting image of their mother.

“She wanted the distance between us. I can’t keep pushing myself on her,” he answered.

“Treat, you’re such a fool. All men are. No matter what we say, we want the night in shining armor. We want Richard Gere riding up in his white limousine. We want Leonardo DiCaprio to tell us that he’ll never let us go.”

Why did Treat feel like she was talking about what she wanted and not necessarily Max or other women?

“Not when they tell you otherwise, Savannah. Don’t women want respect? Don’t they want us to respect their space so they can think clearly?” Savannah’s energy was finding its way into his body, and he was actually wondering if he was wrong. Maybe he should go after Max.

“Nope. We want you to read between the lines.”

“Read between the lines? She didn’t leave much for interpretation.” Treat had dissected every word Max had written, and still he came up empty as far as figuring out what to do.

“Trust me, big brother. Every woman wants her man to read between the lines, and because of that, she leaves a bread crumb trail.”

“Savannah, do you want Connor Dean to follow your bread crumbs?”

A shadow passed through Savannah’s eyes. “I’m not sure. Most of the time, I think I do. Sometimes, though, I’m not sure if I’m only setting myself up to be hurt.”

“Please tell me you don’t mean physically hurt, because I’d hate to be known as the guy who killed Connor Dean.”

“He’s a butterfly, really. He’s not a fighter.” She pulled her hair over to one side.

“Well, you are a feisty thing. Is that the problem? That he’s not a fighter?”

“It’s just schedules and craziness.” Savannah took his hand. “Let’s analyze you instead. What exactly is the problem? What did Max say? I know you listened to her. You’re the best listener there is. Besides Josh, I mean. He’s really the best.”

Treat poked her arm. “She said I’d resent her if I changed the way I did business.”

“And you said you wouldn’t, but she’s convinced you will.” Savannah rose to her feet. “Oh, brother of mine.” She pulled him up by his hands. “You, my dear, are missing something. She definitely left a bread crumb trail for you to follow. You just have to find it.”

“I’m a very wise and wealthy man, you know,” he teased as they walked inside. “I’m pretty sure that if there were a bread crumb trail, I’d see it. In fact, I’d have seen it before she realized she left it.”

Savannah opened the refrigerator and began taking out food to cook for dinner. “Don’t fool yourself. You’re wise when it comes to business, but maybe not so wise when it comes to the mysterious ways of women.”

“KAYLIE, I NEED YOU.” Max was almost back to Allure when she realized what she needed to do.

“Why, Max, I never knew you were into blond women,” Kaylie joked.

“This is serious. I need help, and I need it now. I know I’ve been a big old pain lately, and I’m sure Chaz is not going to be pleased, but I need your help, Kaylie.”

“Oh my God, you’re serious.” Kaylie’s voice softened. “What happened?”

“Nothing. Well, something. Something big. But I can’t go over it now. Can you meet me at the mall?”

“You hate shopping.”

“No shit. That’s why I need you. Please, Kaylie? I hate myself for sounding like a desperate, needy woman, but I am, so will you meet me before I change my mind?”

The situation with Ryan could not have been anticipated, but, Max realized as she drove home, it couldn’t have gone any better, either. The pieces were starting to fall into place, clearing a path for her to understand what she had misconstrued years earlier. Ryan hadn’t been in control of his actions when he’d hurt her, and he hadn’t made a cognitive decision to do so. And although she felt horrible for what he’d gone through, the fact that he hadn’t been in control made her release from the guilt even more clear.

She’d been nurturing self-imposed guilt for all these years. The reasons that he’d hurt her had nothing to do with compromises they made in their relationship. She could no more take responsibility for causing his actions than she could for Treat wanting to change the way he ran his business in order to make their relationship work.

She’d messed up big-time, and now she was dead set on making things right.

“Be there in fifteen,” Kaylie said.

“Meet me at Victoria’s Secret.”

“WHO ARE YOU and what have you done with Max?” Kaylie looked around Max’s right side; then she peered around her left side. She spun in a circle with her hand shading her eyes; then she lifted up Max’s arms and looked beneath them. “Max? Where are you?” she teased.

“Shut up before I change my mind.” Max had purposely never stepped foot in a Victoria’s Secret store before. She’d stayed away from places that encouraged the idea of women being seen as playthings. But now, as she walked through the brightly lit, far-too-pink shop, with half-naked mannequins donning barely there, sexy lingerie, she saw it all much clearer. The lingerie wasn’t about being a plaything; it was about owning—and enjoying—her sexuality, not exploiting it.

Max was bound and determined to own Treat-worthy, seductive, take-me-all-the-way attire.

“Max, I’m scared,” Kaylie teased.

“I’m getting Treat back, and I want a wardrobe that will turn him on. All of it, from my head to my toes.” She looked at Kaylie with a serious face and said, “Kaylie, make me hot.”

“Girlfriend, just saying that makes you hot.” Kaylie dragged her to the rear of the store, where she fingered through racks of lacy lingerie, holding up corsets and camisoles, lace bras and barely visible thongs. “What are we talking here, a few nights, a weekend? Seasonal?”

Max held up her credit card. “Whatever it takes. Whatever you would wear, I want to wear. Then we’re going to buy clothes to go on top of the naughty bits.”

“Max, you’re talking about a lot of cash. Are you sure?”

Max rolled her eyes. “I’ve never been more sure of anything in all my life. Besides, I’ve had the same jeans and shirts for years. I have a five-digit savings account that I’ll never spend. For Treat? Definitely worth it.”