The Proposal & Solid Soul (32 page)

She glanced over at Chance, and as if he felt her gaze on him, he turned to her. From the heated look in his eyes she could tell he, too, was remembering what they’d done that Sunday afternoon in her kitchen.

Kylie settled back in her seat. This was going to be one long and extremely hot ride home.

I
T WAS TIME FOR
P
LAN
B.

Marcus and Tiffany wasted no time putting it into
action. On Tuesday they had Donovan Steele’s full attention as they filled him in on the failure of Plan A. “So as you can see, Uncle Donovan, we need your help.”

Donovan leaned back and looked at the both of them. Marcus had contacted him on his cell phone asking that he meet them after school on the football bleachers.

Donovan shook his head. “Let me get this straight. The two of you aren’t girlfriend and boyfriend? You aren’t madly in love? And you only pretended you were to get your parents together?” he asked incredulously.

Both Tiffany and Marcus nodded. “That’s right,” Marcus said. “Tiffany and I are best friends and we thought it was a good plan. Things were going along smoothly but something happened that weekend the two of us left town.”

Donovan lifted a brow. “And what do you think happened?”

“We don’t know but before we left they were beginning to like each other a lot, but now we’re not sure how they feel.”

Donovan had heard the story from Bas and Morgan but he wasn’t about to share the information with these two. “So what do you need for me to do?”

“Help us,” Tiffany said.

Donovan was confused. “Help you do what?”

It was Marcus who answered. “Carry out our plan to get our parents together.”

Donovan crossed his arms over his chest, not believing what they were asking of him. He loved his nephew but was he willing to incur his oldest brother’s wrath? “I think you had better tell me about this plan first.”

Marcus nodded. “I’ll let Tiffany explain things since it’s her idea. But I think it’s a good one.”

Donovan doubted it was all that good but decided
to listen anyway. Twenty minutes later a smile touched his lips. He hated to admit it but he liked their idea, although it could use a little tweaking here and there to make sure neither Chance nor Kylie panicked and got the police involved. There was no doubt that Chance would be mad in the beginning, but in the end odds were he would be a very happy man. “Okay, count me in. I’ll help but only on one condition.”

“What?” Marcus asked.

“That you modify your plan somewhat.”

Marcus and Tiffany quickly agreed.

Donovan then smiled and said, “Now, I think that this is the way we should handle things….”

L
ATE
F
RIDAY NIGHT
K
YLIE
glanced over at the clock on her nightstand the moment the telephone rang. It was almost midnight. She suddenly got a funny feeling in her stomach. Was it Chance? The last time she had seen him was Sunday night when they had all gone to the movies.

Deciding that answering was the only way to determine who her caller was, she reached out and picked up the phone. “Hello?”

“Mom?”

Kylie shot straight up in bed. The voice sounded like Tiffany’s, but there was no way her daughter could be calling her when she was down the hall in her bed sleeping.

“Mom? Are you there? It’s me.”

Kylie jumped out of bed to her feet. “Tiffany! Where are you?”

“Mom, I’m fine.”

Kylie angrily began pacing her bedroom. “Fine, nothing! Where are you, young lady? No one gave you permission to leave this house. How dare you pull something like that!”

“Mom, please calm down. I’m fine. Marcus and I are together.”

“What?” Kylie screamed at the top of her lungs,
before collapsing in the wingback chair in her room. “What do you mean you and Marcus are together? It’s after midnight. No one gave you permission to—”

“Mom, Marcus and I have been thinking.”

Kylie gripped the phone tightly in her hand. “Thinking? The two of you have been thinking? Fine, then think at your own houses. I want you home immediately!”

“Not until you and Mr. Steele promise to become friends again.”

Kylie frowned. What was Tiffany talking about? “Listen, honey, Chance and I are friends. You need to come home.”

“The two of you didn’t act like it Sunday night. You barely said two words to each other. If Mr. Steele is going to be our in-law one day, then the two of you are going to have to get along.”

Kylie threw her head back and began silently counting to ten, not believing the conversation she and her daughter were having. “Look, Tiffany, I don’t know where you are but I want you to end this call right now and come home. Better yet, tell me where you are and I’ll come and get you.”

“No, Mom, I can’t do that. Marcus and I aren’t going to do anything we shouldn’t, so don’t worry about that.”

“But I am worried about that! You’re only fifteen, it’s after midnight and you’re out somewhere with a boy when you should be home sleeping in your bed. How dare you tell me not to worry!”

“Then maybe I should ask you to trust me, and to also trust Marcus. We’re in a safe location and we won’t do anything that you and Mr. Steele will be ashamed of.”

“That’s not the point!”

“It is the point, Mom. You and Mr. Steele are going
to have to trust us. Marcus and I figured the reason the two of you can’t get along is because you don’t trust each other and you don’t trust us.”

Kylie struggled to keep her voice calm. “I do trust Chance and I’ve tried to stop being so uptight and to start trusting you more, but I see doing so was a mistake. You either come home within the next thirty minutes or I’m calling the police.”

“Mom, please don’t. All it will do is cause unnecessary embarrassment for me and Marcus.”

“Tough! The two of you should have thought of that sooner.”

“Mom, I’m serious. If you call the police then we won’t come back. All we need is time to talk.”

“And just what do the two of you have to talk about that you had to sneak out in the middle of the night to do it?”

“We need to talk about you and Mr. Steele and your inability to get along.”

“We can get along!”

“Then you sure fooled us. You
were
getting along, then something happened. We don’t know what but the two of you sure acted like you were avoiding each other on Sunday.”

“Tiffany, I—”

“Good night, Mom. We’ll call you in the morning and tell you our decision.”

Kylie’s stomach dropped to the floor. “Your decision about what?”

“About whatever we decide. Marcus has to call his father now. Goodbye, Mom. I’ll talk to you in the morning, and I promise Marcus and I won’t do anything.”

Before Kylie could open her mouth to say another word, there was a resounding click in her ear.

K
YLIE QUICKLY SNATCHED
up the phone the moment it rang again five minutes later knowing it was Chance.

“Kylie, you okay?”

His deep, husky voice had a comforting effect on her. “Oh, Chance, what are we going to do?”

“You didn’t call the police, did you?”

“No.”

“Good. I got a chance to talk to the both of them and—”

“Can you believe what they’ve done? Just wait until I see them. I’m going to—”

“Calm down, Kylie.”

“Calm down? My child is out somewhere after midnight and you want me to calm down?”

“Yes. My child is out there, too. One good thing is that they’re together.”

“You think that’s a good thing?”

“I trust Marcus, Kylie. He won’t let anything happen to Tiffany. And he gave me his word that they won’t do anything they aren’t supposed to do.”

Kylie glanced out her bedroom window. A fist tightened around her heart knowing her little girl was out there somewhere. “Yes, that’s the same thing Tiffany said,” she murmured quietly. “And you’re right, we’re going to have to trust them.”

Kylie was quiet for a long while, then she said, “Did Marcus tell you why they did it?”

“Yes, he told me.”

“I thought we acted pretty normal on Sunday night,” she said.

“Yeah, but I guess they still picked up on something.”

“Well, even if they thought we weren’t on the best of terms, it wasn’t any of their business!”

“Oh? You finally agree with me about that?”

Kylie frowned. “I’m serious, Chance.”

“I’ve always been serious about that.” He then asked, “Where are you now?”

“In my bedroom.”

“How about going downstairs and putting some coffee on. I doubt if either of us will get much sleep tonight and if we’re going to worry, we might as well do it together. I’m on my way over.”

“All right. I’ll have the coffee ready when you get here.”

C
HANCE MADE IT TO
K
YLIE’S
house in less than ten minutes. She met him at the door with a cup of steaming hot coffee.

As if it was the most natural thing to do, he leaned over and kissed her lips. “You okay?” he asked quietly, after taking the cup from her hand and following her into her living room, where he sat down on the leather sofa beside her.

“Yes, I’m okay. But I’m still worried about them, Chance. I didn’t think to ask how they were getting around. I assumed Marcus took his car.”

Chance nodded after taking a sip of his coffee. “Yes, he has it. Boy, he’s going to be grounded for life.”

“So is Tiffany and she hasn’t started driving yet. And just to think I had considered surprising her with a car for her sixteenth birthday. She might as well kiss that surprise goodbye.”

“And they pulled this just to make a statement that they didn’t like the way we acted on Sunday. If that doesn’t beat all,” Chance said.

“Yeah, I guess it means a lot to them for us to get along.”

“But it’s not like we argued or anything, Kylie.”

She inhaled deeply. “I know, but I guess they were watching us more closely then we thought. You have to admit we were rather distant to each other.”

“Yes, we were,” he readily admitted. “And I didn’t like it.”

She met his gaze and said, “Neither did I.”

After a few moments of silence she added, “Do you think we’re doing the right thing by not calling the police?”

“Yes. But I did contact my brothers. There was no way I could not let them know. At least I was able to reach Bas and Morgan. Evidently Donovan is still somewhere out on the town and he isn’t answering his cell. But I’ll talk to him tomorrow. And I notified my cousins, as well, in case Marcus contacts them.”

Kylie nodded. “I forgot about your basketball game in the morning.”

Chance shook his head. “Yeah, but there’s no way I’m going to go anyplace until the kids come home.”

“They will come home, won’t they, Chance?”

When he heard the trembling in her voice, he set his cup on the table and wrapped his arms around her shoulders. It felt good to hold her again. “Yes, they’ll come home. When they get hungry, they’ll be back.”

His words made Kylie smile. “Yeah, Tiffany definitely likes to eat.”

“And so does Marcus.”

Kylie cuddled deeper into Chance’s warm embrace. It felt good to be held by a man who cared about her. A man who’d told her he loved her. A man she knew she could depend on. “Where do you think they’ll sleep tonight?”

Chance shrugged. “Either in the car or at a hotel.”

Kylie pulled back and looked at Chance. “Are they old enough to get a hotel room on their own?”

“It depends on where they go. To some hotel owners, money and not age is the determining factor.”

Kylie really hadn’t wanted to hear that. More than anything she had to remember that Tiffany said she and Marcus wouldn’t do anything. She had promised.

“Come here and lay beside me. You must be tired.”

She automatically did what he suggested without thinking twice about it. He stretched out his legs on the sofa to accommodate her and gently held her as they lay side by side. Before he had arrived, she had changed out of her nightgown into a pair of silk lounging pants and top. Heat curled through her when he wrapped his arms around her. It felt good knowing she wasn’t alone now.

“Try to get some sleep.”

“I don’t think I can, Chance. I want my baby home.” A few moments later, sleepily she said, “Did I ever tell you about the first time I let Tiffany sleep somewhere other than her own bed?”

“No, I don’t think that you did.”

“She was two and my parents had finally acknowledged that they had a grandchild and wanted some bonding time. At first I wasn’t going to let her go but then Lena convinced me that I should. I barely slept that entire night knowing she wasn’t in the house. I finally was able to sleep only after going into her room and stretching out on the floor beside her little bed. Now isn’t that pathetic?”

“No, it sounds to me like you were a mother who had missed her child and needed the connection.” After a few moments he added, “It works like that for adults, too, you know.”

She lifted her head and met his gaze. “Does it?”

“Yes.” He reached out and stroked her cheek with one finger. “You slept in my bed that one night but that’s all it took for me to get used to your presence. All this week I found myself reaching out, as if you were still there, wanting that connection.”

Kylie’s stomach knotted when her gaze slipped to his mouth and she remembered how that mouth had driven her crazy in so many different ways. She remembered the taste of it, the feel of it. She also remembered something else. The amount of love she had in her heart for this one particular man.

“Oh, Chance.” She reached up and tightened her arms around his neck at the same time she leaned up for his kiss.

With agonizing slowness he took her mouth, claimed it, branded it. His tongue made love to her mouth. The more it did, the more she became fully aware of the steady, strong arms holding her. They were protective arms. They were arms that would shield her from any storm, whether raging or mild. They were arms that would always be there to hold her when she needed to be held. It had been late in coming but she realized that now.

Moments later when he lifted his mouth she let out a satisfied sigh. “Thanks. I needed that.”

He looked at her and smiled. “So did I.”

Determined to maintain control of the situation he then said, “Now let’s try to get some rest so we can be well-rested to give our kids hell when they come back home.”

“Yes,
our
kids.” Kylie said the words as if they suddenly had new meaning to her.

As he pulled her closer she settled against his
comforting muscular form and believed that from this time forward somehow everything was going to be all right.

“M
OM
?”

“Dad?”

Chance slowly opened his eyes. Had he been dreaming or had he actually heard Tiffany’s and Marcus’s voices? The first thing he noticed was that he was stretched out on the sofa with Kylie lying beside him, her head resting on his chest. That would not have been so bad if his hand wasn’t possessively cupping her bottom or one of her legs wasn’t entwined with his. Even her hand was resting pretty darn close to the fly on his jeans.

He sucked in a deep breath, letting the scent of her fill his nostrils. She was still asleep, but he could remember a time that weekend when he had patiently waited for her to wake up so that he could—

“Dad?”

“Mom?”

Chance swallowed as he slowly glanced across the room and his gaze lit on two pairs of curious eyes. He blinked. No, make that three.

He quickly sat up and the movement startled Kylie out of a sound sleep. “Chance, what’s wrong?” she asked sluggishly, slowly coming awake.

He shifted his gaze from the three sets of eyes to her still-drowsy ones. “Wake up, sweetheart, the kids are back,” he whispered.

She blinked. “What?”

“The kids are home.”

She was off the sofa in a flash. He had to catch her to keep her from stumbling. “Tiffany! Marcus! We’ve
been so worried about you,” she said, hugging them so tight Chance wondered how they were able to breathe.

Then as if it finally hit her what they had done, she stepped back, placed her hands on her hips and gave them one hell of a fierce frown. “The two of you have a lot of explaining to do.”

“Seems they aren’t the only ones,” Donovan Steele said in a low voice, after clearing his throat.

Kylie jumped and jerked her head around. She hadn’t seen Chance’s youngest brother standing at the edge of the foyer. “Where did you find them?” she asked, tossing her mussed-up braids over her shoulders.

Before Donovan could answer, Tiffany said, “He didn’t find us. We were with him the entire time. We spent the night over at his house.”

“What?” That loud exclamation came from both Kylie and Chance at the same time.