Marry Me Again (The Second Chance Love Series, Book 1) (17 page)

As if it were that easy. She shook her head sadly.

"Tell me," he urged.

"I want Sammy to have a brother or a sister, maybe both. When I was little and went to visit my friends' houses, I used to think it would be so wonderful to have brothers and sisters to play with, to have a big, noisy, crowded house full of kids. I wanted Sammy to have that, wanted me to have it, too, but it's just not going to happen."

"Come on. You've got a few good years left. There's plenty of time for you to have more children."

It sounded so simple when he said it—just find someone and have more children—as if husbands-to-be stood on every street corner, waiting for her to come along and pick one.

"No." She'd admitted this much to him. She might as well tell him the whole thing. "It didn't work for us. It won't work with Brian and me. It's just not going to happen. I'm never going to get married again, and that means no more children."

"You and Sammy aren't going to Naples with Brian?"

"No," she admitted.

Tucker put his other arm around her and squeezed her once. Then, when she didn't protest, he did it again.

He was glad her head was on his shoulder, because he couldn't help the huge grin that spread across his face, and it wouldn't do to have her see it. He didn't want to frighten her off.

"You can't give up, Rebecca. You never know when you're going to find exactly who you've been looking for, and he'll probably want a house full of kids, too."

"I don't think so."

Tucker stayed there and simply enjoyed having her this close. He hadn't said anything to her, because he wanted to be sure this time. Too much was at stake to mess it up, not again. But it had been weeks—agonizing, wondrous weeks—and the feelings only got stronger with each passing moment.

He'd figured out what he'd been looking for all these years, what he needed to fill up that black hole where his soul was supposed to be, and it wasn't just Sammy.

It was Rebecca, too.

He closed his eyes and a smile spread across his face again. He liked saying her name and letting the memories wash over him. Rebecca.

He hadn't been the kind of man she'd deserved or needed all those years ago. But this time, he would be. This time would be different. This time, it was going to work.

"Rebecca?"

"Hmmm?" She was still right there, resting against his side with her head on his shoulder.

He pulled away, just enough so he could look down into her eyes. "I wish I could have given you that six years ago."

And then he held his tongue. He'd have time enough to beg forgiveness for the past and make promises about the future.

Chapter 10

A month later, Rebecca squeezed her Acura sedan into a space in the downtown parking garage and reluctantly headed for the Clairmont Hotel.

She was nervous.

The state's Environmental Regulatory Commission was one of the few agencies left that hadn't decided yet whether to issue a permit needed for the water-bottling plant to move forward.

As luck would have it, two new members had just been appointed to the commission. And while Rebecca had been away on business this past week, she'd heard that the commission also had a new deputy chief counsel.

Her mission today was to figure out where those people stood on the project.

Rebecca didn't care for the direction the state's environmental agencies had taken under the present governor, and she was afraid that anyone he appointed would be predisposed to come down on the side of jobs over all else.

She finally reached the main entrance to the hotel and started searching the lobby for directions to the proper meeting room.

She had reason to be worried about the new members. Two votes could be enough to swing the commission in the wrong direction. And the attorney could be just as critical. His tolerance for legal risks and his willingness to fight would go a long way toward determining whether the commission stood up and fought or rolled over to industry.

She finally found a sign that told her the reception was being held in the Parker Room. It was supposed to be a party to say goodbye to the old commission members and welcome the new ones, but she intended to work.

Parker Room? Since the hotel had been renovated, she'd been lost inside it.

"Excuse me?" she said to a man whose back was turned. "Do you know where the Parker Room—"

Rebecca never got the rest of it out. The man turned around, and she was face-to-face with Tucker Malloy.

Tucker the lawyer. Sleek, custom-made suit that hugged his strong, sleek body. Shiny designer shoes and matching briefcase. Tucker the consummate businessman.

She hadn't seen
him
in a long time.

And she'd forgotten this side of him in the last few months, when her attitude toward him had softened so much, when the past had been pushed further and further away, and the present—God, the Tucker of the present was scaring her to death.

"Hi," he said, smiling confidently, a little wickedly. He was up to something, and he'd turned on his charm full-blast.

At one time, she would have basked in it. Now she wanted to run from it. She wanted to run from him and from all the changes he'd brought to her life.

It seemed hard to believe now, but a few months ago she had been fairly content with her life. She had no great surprises, no great sorrows, except for those buried in her past, no great worries with which to contend. Her life had an order, a predictability, a stability that she found comforting. And she'd still been able to pretend on some level that one day she'd marry Brian and they'd be mostly happy together.

Tucker had taken all that away from her. She just hoped he wouldn't take away her hard-earned self-respect, as well.

"Hi." She had finally found her voice. "Going to the reception?"

"Yes," he said. "You, too?"

"Yes."

He put his hand at her back, guiding her around the corner. "They've really turned this old hotel around, haven't they? The room's this way."

He steered her toward the wide, curving staircase that led to the second floor.

"What are you doing here, Tucker?" she asked when they were about halfway up the staircase.

"Same as you—working."

Working?
She had a sinking feeling. He was probably doing the same thing she was doing—checking out the new commissioners.

She hadn't seen Tucker at any of the other meetings or seen his name on any of the papers, but that didn't necessarily mean anything. The bottling company had an army of attorneys, and her ex-husband was one of them—again.

He'd work for anyone who paid his outrageous hourly rate. He didn't care what they did or what they wanted him to do for them. He'd do it with a passion, if they paid him enough money. She'd never understood that. Not that he could do the work, but that he could do it with a passion equal to any other job he took. It seemed his enthusiasm could be bought quite easily.

Which had made her wonder about the intensity, the passion with which he'd seemed to pursue her so long ago.

"I can't believe you're doing this," she said, although it shouldn't surprise her. Why would she think he'd changed?

"Doing what?" He smiled when he said it—almost as if he were taunting her.

So what if his conscience finally sent him looking for the son he gave up years ago? And if he seemed genuinely troubled by what had happened in the past and honestly interested in trying to make amends?

Did that mean he'd really changed?

Because he'd claimed to understand that awful emptiness seeping into her soul? Because he'd held her in his arms and for a while the loneliness went away?

"I can't believe you're working on this project."

It came out more loudly than she expected, and as they reached the top of the stairs, a half-dozen people turned to stare at them.

Tucker didn't say a word, something that infuriated her, and he knew it, too. He walked to the bar and ordered a drink, while she seethed.

Years ago, they'd had some of their most outrageous fights about this issue. Rebecca had been fighting against the project. Tucker—who had a reputation for taking on the state's environmental agencies and winning—was one of the lead attorneys for the paper mill.

He'd defended the project passionately, relentlessly, tirelessly, as he did all his cases.

He could have argued the other side just as easily, just as passionately; it didn't matter to him. He didn't see a right side or a wrong side. He saw only the side he represented. And he would represent anyone who had enough money.

Lawyers, he explained to her cynically, were a lot like high-class hookers. They took the money; they performed a service—whatever the client wanted. That was what his job was all about, he'd told her once when they'd argued long past midnight and into the morning.

And it had all come so clear to her then. Little else mattered to him as much as the money. Life was a game to him, and he kept score with the dollars in his investment portfolio.

The self-doubting side of her had reared up instantly, sure that he'd made one of his biggest investments of all in her. After all, her father had money. Even better, he had built a prestigious Tallahassee law firm, but he had no heir, only Rebecca, who had no interest in the law.

Rebecca watched Tucker lean against the makeshift bar and take a sip of his drink.

He was such a gorgeous man, so smooth, so polished, so at ease with himself and his surroundings, yet with a hint of mischief in his smile and a glint of cynicism in his eyes, which simply made him all the more attractive.

She'd never understood what he'd seen in her, couldn't understand it even today. But she suspected it was the money, the power, the prestige that he'd found at her father's law firm.

It all made sense, after all. He'd started working for her father's firm soon after they'd met, and had been told soon after they'd married that he was on track to make partner one day.

Yes, it all made sense.

Except it didn't explain what he was doing here now, trying to get close to Sammy. Trying to get close to her.

Rebecca glanced back up at him, saw him watching her with those big, sexy brown eyes.

What did he want from her?

He tilted the drink back and let the last swallow trickle down his throat, then set the glass down on the counter.

She waited, coming closer, while he ordered another and started in on that one.

"Drinking again?" She couldn't help the bitterness that crept into her voice. They'd fought about his drinking, as well.

She'd thought he drank too much, even though she never saw any marked change in his behavior from it.

He set the glass down too hard, and the pale liquid sloshed dangerously near the top of the glass.

"Just like before?" He taunted her with it. "Just like I always did? "

"Yes."

"It's been six years, Rebecca."

So it had. But lately, it had felt like yesterday. Those times, those memories seemed so close, so vivid, both the good times and the bad.

She didn't want to relive those days, and yet here she was, so close to him, her life so tangled up in his. She didn't know how she could bear it or how she could escape from it.

He did that to her, just by being here. He didn't have to lay a hand on her. He just had to be here.

"You know," he began, drawing her back to her treacherous present, "I could hardly believe it when someone told me you raised eight million dollars for a new genetic research center at the hospital. It just doesn't sound like something the woman I used to know would be able to do. After all, you used to be nervous at the thought of giving a dinner party for six."

Yes, she had. She had always been sure that she'd never measure up. It seemed as if she'd always been trying to measure up to someone's idea of what she should be, always putting up some sort of front for someone and worried that they'd see behind it.

Well, she wasn't anymore. She'd managed, finally, to grow up.