Even so, the out-of-the-blue question spoiled Wade’s mood. Davis embodied everything he hated about the rich. “Why would I want to admit to a thing like that? Were you hoping that if I was in a mellow mood, I’d forget all about what he did?”
“Not forget,” she insisted. “I thought you might consider being fair.”
“Fair?” he scoffed. “Was it fair of him to abandon a woman who was pregnant with his child? I imagine Cassie didn’t consider that fair.”
“Cole didn’t know about the pregnancy,” Lauren reminded him patiently. “His father and Cassie’s mother saw to that. And Cassie was just a kid. She was scared, so she ran away.”
“Cole sure as hell knew it was a possibility, unless you’re saying he was too dumb to know where babies come from.”
“Wade,” she protested.
His frustration with the topic mounted. “Why are you pushing so hard for this, especially tonight, when we have other things we could be celebrating, like Miss Molly’s recovery?”
“It’s important to me that you get along with my friends.”
“Okay,” he said with a resigned sigh. “I can understand that and I can be polite when the circumstances call for it. But that’s all I can promise where Cole Davis is concerned.”
She lifted a hand and rested it against his cheek, her expression a mixture of sympathy and regret. “Cole is not the one who left you all those years ago,” she said quietly.
“Dammit, I know that,” he all but shouted. “Never mind.” He whirled around and walked away.
“Wade, where are you going?”
“I don’t know,” he said without breaking stride. “Someplace that isn’t here.” Someplace where a woman he was beginning to love wouldn’t be nagging him to relinquish the bitter hold his past had on him.
Lauren watched Wade walk away and sighed heavily. She had to get through to him—not just about Cole, but also about letting go of all the demons that haunted him. Otherwise, the two of them didn’t stand a chance, not once he learned the truth about her.
Picking up the kitten, she stroked the soft fur absentmindedly. “What am I going to do about him?” she asked the kitten and Miss Molly. Neither of them offered any answers—at least none she could interpret.
As she walked away to return Good Golly to the office, Miss Molly snorted in protest. Lauren regarded her with amusement.
“I’ll bring the kitten back in the morning,” she promised. “If I leave her with you overnight, I’m afraid you’ll lick her to death. Now go eat some of your oats.”
For the first time in memory, the horse actually did as Lauren had requested, poking her head into the feed bag.
But her success with Miss Molly was small comfort as Lauren sat on the porch back at Wade’s waiting for him to return. When he still wasn’t back by midnight, she went up to the main house to sleep in her own bed.
After a few restless, wasted hours of trying to sleep, she was in the kitchen before dawn and had the coffee brewing when Karen wandered in.
“How nice to see you at my kitchen table for a change,” Karen said, regarding her with curiosity. “And even better, there’s coffee. As soon as I get my first sip, I’ll ask what you’re doing here, so be prepared.”
Lauren had been ready for the cross-examination from the moment she’d come downstairs. She knew she wasn’t going to get away with any evasions, either.
Karen tipped up her cup, drank, and studied Lauren over the rim. “You look like hell,” she noted eventually.
“Thanks so much.”
“Didn’t you get any sleep?”
Lauren shook her head.
“I guess you’ve gotten a little too used to sleeping in Wade’s bed,” Karen suggested. “So what brings you back up here? Did you two have a fight?”
Lauren thought back over the scene in the barn, then nodded. “I guess you could call it that. I was pushing him about something I thought was important. He got mad and walked out.”
“Not exactly a give-and-take,” Karen said.
“Not exactly.”
“Want to tell me the issue?”
“I want to, but it’s Wade’s private business. He already thinks I discuss our relationship too much with my friends.”
Karen’s eyes widened. “Who else would you discuss it with, if not us?”
“I think his point is that I shouldn’t be divulging any intimate details at all. It’s a privacy thing with him. Ironically, I can understand where he’s coming from.”
“Because you’ve had most of your life the last ten years splashed on the front page of the tabloids,” Karen concluded.
“Exactly.”
“Does he know about that?”
“Not unless he’s keeping it to himself. I don’t think he has a clue what I used to do before I returned here.”
“And now you’re afraid that secret is going to come back to bite you in the butt,” Karen guessed.
“Oh, yeah, big-time,” Lauren said fervently.
“Maybe I gave you the wrong advice about that,” Karen said guiltily.
“No, the advice was perfectly sound. It’s just that there were things neither of us knew, things that might make it difficult for Wade to accept me once he knows the truth.”
“Then tell him and face the music. Lay all your cards on the table before he finds out some other way. Frankly, I’m amazed someone hasn’t let something slip before now.”
“Me, too,” Lauren admitted. “But is this the best time to spill everything, when he’s already upset with me?”
“There might never be a good time. And Wade does care about you—the real you—doesn’t he? You are sure of that now, aren’t you?”
“Not that I have a lot of reason to trust my own judgment, but yes. Unless he’s the biggest con artist of all time and has known who I was from the beginning, then Wade doesn’t want anything from me except me. He doesn’t even seem to think I have two nickels to rub together. The money, by the way, is another issue. He thinks he has very valid reasons for judging all the wealthy to be decadent
