Winter Blockbuster 2012 (38 page)

If it was to happen it would be ended properly. Formally. Legally. Civilly.

They would remain business associates—even friends.

He didn’t want to lose her friendship because of an outburst. And there was no reason for their liaison to end… even if their marriage did. The passion they shared was magnificent. He wasn’t risking losing that. His preference was for their relationship to continue as it was… with no mention of children.

He would give her time to realize that what he spoke was nothing less than the truth.

Laurel was a mature woman. She would come round.

By the time lunch time came, she would have calmed down. Then he could comfort her—if that was what she really wanted. Or they could make love.

Right now he needed some rest. Shutting his eyes against the bright sunlight, Rakin drifted off to sleep satisfied that he had handled the problem in the best way possible.

Laurel let herself out a side door and stepped out into a walled garden she hadn’t seen before.

It was an orchard. Even before she caught sight of the bright globes of fruit, the fragrance of orange blossom on the warm desert air confirmed it. The sweet scent evoked visions of her wedding to Rakin.

Their first kiss under the bridge in the gondola, the moment when her growing awareness of him as a man had crystallized into passion.

A passion that had culminated into the pain she felt now.

Well, she’d certainly made up for her reticence in the past. She’d had the fling of a lifetime. And now it was over.

It was time to come back down to earth and pick up the pieces of her life. Her real life. Not this romantic fantasy that she’d been playing out with Rakin. Laurel clenched her fists and moved into the dappled sunshine between the trees. Deep in her heart, under her anger at herself—at Rakin for disappointing her—pain splintered into sharp, piercing shards.

She ached. With disappointment. With loss. With loneliness at the idea of facing the future without Rakin.

The knowledge was growing that her escapade—her walk on the wild side—was over.

If there was one thing that had solidified in the past hour, it was the knowledge that Rakin did not love her, would never love her. But she’d fallen in love with him.

Big mistake.

His proposition had never contemplated that—nor had she ever expected to fall head-over-heels in love with a charming stranger. He’d made her laugh. He’d encouraged her to experience the adventure she’d craved and launch herself headfirst from her safe existence.

She’d taken risks and been rewarded by joy. But now she was also living through more pain than she’d experienced in her life.

If this was what love was like, she wasn’t going to endure it.

One thing last night had proved to her was that she wasn’t the genteel Southern lady who could be trapped in a loveless relationship—even if she loved her husband. Uncurling her fists, Laurel reached for a spray of blossoms from the closest tree. Once she’d plucked it, she bent her head and inhaled scent of the crushed sprig. She’d been Rakin’s bride, but she would no longer be his wife.

A pang shook her as she remembered laughing with him in the Liberace Museum in Vegas. That moment when she’d clutched his hand on the roller coaster and her stomach had fallen away when the train had dropped into a void. Just as her father had appeared so handsome and witty to her mother, Rakin had appealed to everything she’d thought she needed with his sense of humor, his readiness to lead her to the adventure she craved.

But it was a mirage.

It could never be real—because he didn’t love her.

Her pride would not let her stay. Beg for whatever he could offer. She had to leave. Today. She would go back to the life she knew, the life with her family and The Kincaid Group.

A life that was safe…

Laurel dismissed that fleeting rebellious thought that she was running away. There was nothing for her to stay for. Rakin had made that abundantly clear.

She would walk away with her head held high.

By the time Rakin came down for the midday meal Laurel was gone.

“She told me it was a family emergency,” his grandmother explained as Rakin stood glaring at his grandparents in the great anteroom in the palace. “You were still sleeping. I organized one of the royal drivers to take your wife to the airport. She was sure everything would be sorted out in a couple of days.”

Sorted out in a couple of days?
She’d been buying him time, so the transfer of his grandfather’s stock into his name would go through and not be canceled.

Hands on hips, he fumed inwardly. “You didn’t consider checking with me?”

“Family emergencies are women’s work—not for you and
your grandfather to trouble your heads about.” His grandmother stared at him with bewildered eyes.

He wouldn’t have wanted Laurel to face an emergency alone—if there truly had been one.

“Is something the matter, Rakin?” This time his grandmother’s tone was laden with hesitation. “Is there something wrong other than a family emergency? Laurel appeared so happy last night.”

Rakin let out his breath in an impatient sigh. “What could possibly be the matter?”

He swung around on his heel. His bride had been happy—until his meddling grandmother had started talking about heirs. Now she’d interfered again—and helped Laurel escape.

Maybe he was jumping to conclusions. Perhaps there was indeed a family emergency. The first step was to make sure that there was no family crisis, that she had indeed fled.

And that meant a call to Eli.

Which brought an unwelcome thought. She’d walked away without a backward glance from her engagement to Eli because she didn’t love him. Rakin had been so certain he never wanted marriage… a wife. But now that his wife had run from him, making it clear that she felt nothing for him, he was surprised to discover he wanted her back.

There was no other woman he wanted more than his wife.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

S
UNDAY
afternoon Charleston welcomed Laurel back with warm, scented arms.

At the Kincaid mansion on Montagu Street, Pamela, the family housekeeper, opened the front door and greeted her with an enormous hug.

Instantly Laurel felt the pent-up tears pricking at the back of her eyes.

“Now, now my child. Why the tears?” Pamela drew her in and shut the door behind them.

“I’ve missed you all,” Laurel said truthfully.

Halting at the foot of the white-carpeted, marble stairs that curved upward, Pamela told her, “Miss Elizabeth is upstairs. That nice detective just left.”

“Detective McDonough?”

Pamela nodded. “That’s the one.”

“Has any progress been made with Dad’s murder?” Laurel couldn’t stop a flare of guilt. In the past two weeks she’d barely thought of her father’s murderer.

“You’ll need to ask your mother that.” Pamela still hadn’t started up the stairs. “What I can tell you is that we’ve made a start on packing up your father’s clothes.”

Her poor mother. Laurel exchanged a long look with the housekeeper. “How is she handling it?”

“Much better than I expected. How about I go and make a pot of coffee and let you see for yourself?”

Upstairs, Elizabeth was kneeling on the floor beside a pile of clothes and carefully placing a folded cable-knit sweater in a box. She stilled as Laurel came in. “Laurel! What are you doing here?”

“I’ve come home.”

Elizabeth glanced past her to the doorway. “Where’s Rakin?”

“I came alone. He’s still in Diyafa.”

“I’m surprised he let his new bride go off alone so soon.”

Laurel sought for a way to break the news. Nothing could blunt the truth. Finally, she said baldly, “I’ve left him, Mom.”

“Oh, my dear!”

Elizabeth was instantly on her feet. She folded Laurel into an embrace filled with warmth and the familiar scent of lavender.

Laurel closed her eyes, drawing comfort from her mother’s arms. She felt like a little girl who’d rushed into the house to find her mother after roughhousing with RJ had led to scraped knees. In those days her aches had been fixed with a bandage and a mother’s make-it-better kiss.

This time it was her heart that ached—and that couldn’t be fixed so easily.

“Do you want to talk, my dear?”

The sympathy nearly undid her. Opening her eyes, she inhaled deeply and stared over her mother’s shoulder. Did she want to talk? It came to her that there was probably no one who would understand what she was going through better than her mother.

After all, like Laurel’s marriage to Rakin, her mother’s
marriage to her father had originally been brokered for business. Until Reginald had swept Elizabeth off her feet. Laurel shuddered. And, in a case of history repeating itself, she too had fallen for her convenient groom.

The major difference was that Reginald had convinced her mother he loved her. While Rakin made no such promises of devotion. In fact, he’d made it brutally clear that he didn’t want a wife… or a child.

“There’s not a great deal to say,” she told her mother. Laurel sank down on the edge of the bed. “Come sit next to me and tell me what you’ve been doing while I’ve been gone.”

“That lovely Nikki Thomas has been to visit me—and she’s been talking to the police, too.” Elizabeth gave a gentle sigh as she settled down on the bed beside Laurel. “In fact, the detective just left. His suspicion is firmly on Jack Sinclair. As you know, the only problem is that Sinclair has an alibi—his office staff say he was working late that night.”

Laurel laced her fingers through her mom’s. “But surely that doesn’t count? I mean, he could’ve bribed them to say that.” Laurel couldn’t believe the police were no further with the matter than when she’d left for Las Vegas. Her mother had been right; it hadn’t been necessary to stay. “And then there’s also the small matter of his car parked in the lot near the TKG offices.”

“But he denies parking his car there, too.”

“How very strange.” Laurel paused. “He must be lying. What does Nikki think?”

“She says she still wants to do more research—but she’s determined to find the culprit.”

Laurel had been too. She thought about the final item on the List. No. 10:
Find Dad’s Murderer
. The toughest task of all. And she’d made no headway on that. Laurel brushed her hair off her face with her free hand. Nikki would probably
do a far better job solving the case than she ever could—so long as Nikki didn’t let her heart rule her head.

“If the police aren’t getting anywhere, maybe Nikki’s going to be the best person to crack Jack’s alibi.” She gave Elizabeth’s hand a squeeze. “The sooner he is arrested, the sooner you’ll be able to get your life back together.” And once Jack Sinclair was arrested, any chance that he’d be elected President of TKG at the June meeting would be scuttled for once and for all. Laurel knew that not only her mother, but she—and her siblings—would all breathe a sigh of relief.

Her mother interrupted her thoughts. “I’m getting my life together now. I’ve asked Kara to help get my marriage to Cutter planned. We’ll probably be married in a month or two.”

“Oh, Mom, that’s such good news.” Sadness touched Laurel. She certainly hoped that her mother would have better luck with marriage than she’d had. Just thinking about her marriage—the problems—was enough to make Laurel feel like sobbing her eyes out on her mother’s shoulder.

As dusk fell, Laurel stayed on at the Kincaid Mansion to attend the weekly family gathering. Even though they were very surprised to see her, her family’s support was immediate. Matt was there with Susannah—Flynn had wandered off to discover whether Pamela had any treats in store for him. RJ and Brooke were coming later.

Secure in the bosom of her family, amidst their concern, their love warmed her.

Lily and Daniel had eyes only for each other.

Kara was utterly radiant, so beautiful, and exchanging secret looks with Eli, the two of them clearly in their own world. Laurel envied them the intimacy. That was the kind of marriage she wanted—and it was not the kind of experience Rakin would ever provide.

But one thing stood out as they were finishing the meal that Pamela had prepared for the family—the relationship between herself and Eli had changed. He was her brother-in-law now… no longer her best friend. The ability to talk to him with the old ease had gone forever.

And besides, how could she talk to him about Rakin? It would be unfair. Rakin was his other best friend.

Yet Eli looked wretched, and she soon discovered why.

“Rakin called me,” he told her from his position across the table from her.

“Rakin called you?” Laurel stared at him. “When?”
Why?

“He seemed to think we had some kind of family emergency. He wanted to make sure everyone was all right.”

She glanced away, her face warming, and a twinge of guilt twisted her heart. “I didn’t think he’d care,” she muttered. “I suppose that means his heart isn’t a block of ice.”

“Rakin has a heart,” Eli told her.

“You think?” Her mouth twisted as she glanced at him. “I’m not so sure.”

It didn’t need Eli’s slanted look to know that she was being unfair. Despite her bitterness, Laurel knew he had a heart. After all, she’d seen glimpses of his kindness to children and the elderly. What Rakin didn’t have was space in his heart for
her
. And that would never change.

“This is my fault.”

Laurel waved a dismissive hand. “Nonsense. Don’t blame yourself for introducing us, Eli. We would’ve met sooner or later.”

“You don’t understand.”

Laurel’s heart dropped like a stone at the haunted darkness in his eyes. “What don’t I understand?”

Eli looked around. Everyone else was engaged in conversation.
He lowered his voice. “I suggested to Rakin that he marry you.”

“
You
suggested?” Laurel fixed her gaze on the new brother-in-law who had been such a close friend for most of her life and who she had until not long ago thought she knew better than any other man on earth. “When?”

“After you jilted me.”

“Why would you do such a thing? Why?” It was a cry from the heart.