“I’m sorry. I didn’t think about any of that,” he admitted candidly. “I was just trying to prove that your feelings for me haven’t changed.”
“I never said they had,” she said. “I just told you I was no longer going to act on them, that our relationship wasn’t healthy the way it was. Kissing me to prove some stupid point is hardly likely to get me to change my mind.”
“Again, very sorry,” he said contritely. “If you let me in, I’ll write it a hundred times on a piece of paper. That’s what Mrs. Brinkley made me do when I misbehaved in class.”
Heather bit back a smile. “Then I’m surprised you had time to do anything else.”
“It was a challenge,” he admitted, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.
When she didn’t budge, he sobered. “Why don’t you want me in your apartment?” he asked. “The truth, please.”
Heather hesitated, then opted for candor. “It’ll make it too hard. This apartment is mine and little Mick’s. You’ve never been here. I don’t see you everywhere I look. If I invite you in, all that will change.”
Connor immediately looked chagrined. “I should have thought of that. Heaven knows, I see you in every square inch of our townhouse. It drives me crazy sometimes. Everywhere I look there’s some picture with a special memory tied to it.”
Heather was surprised that he actually got it, even more surprised that he was willing to admit it. When she’d left, he’d feigned indifference. Oh, he’d asked her to stay, argued with her about her reasons for leaving, but in the end he’d shrugged off her actual departure. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but not that. It felt good to know that her absence wasn’t something he’d gotten over easily.
“Thank you for understanding,” she said. “This transition is hard enough. Learning to find my way with your family without letting them overpower me is tricky. They’re everywhere. I need some space that’s just mine.”
“A Connor-free zone,” he joked, though there was sorrow in his eyes when he said it.
“It won’t always be this way,” she said. “At least I hope it won’t.”
“We’ll find a way to make sure it isn’t,” he told her, then framed her face with his hands and kissed her forehead. “I’ll be back next weekend, Heather.”
Startled, she could only stare before she finally found her voice. “Next weekend? But I thought…”
“What? That you’d be safe here for weeks on end? Sorry, but I’ve discovered a sudden need to be around family. And as my father has taken to pointing out at every opportunity, I have a son who needs to spend time with his dad.”
“You could have little Mick for the whole weekend,” she said, unable to keep a desperate note from her voice. “I could send him to Baltimore with Abby on Friday morning.”
“His life has been disrupted enough. His home’s here now. Since Mom and Dad are heading for Paris this week on that delayed honeymoon of theirs, I’ll have the house to myself. Little Mick and I can be bachelors for a couple of days.”
He almost looked as if he expected her to argue, but Heather simply nodded. “Fine, but if I hear about you introducing our son to beer, poker and wild women at his age, you’ll be in a heap of trouble.”
A startled expression passed over Connor’s face, but then he laughed. “I think that’s one worry you can cross off your list,” he assured her. “When we’re not fishing or hanging out with the other kids, I have a stack of cases needing my attention. It’ll be a very low-key weekend.” He held her gaze. “Feel free to stop by at any time, day or night, to check it out.”
“Oh, I’m sure I can trust you,” she said, resolving not to get within a hundred yards of Connor next weekend, especially in private and after dark, when her willpower tended to be weakest and his charm most devastating.
He regarded her innocently. “You don’t think I’d try to seduce you, do you?”
“I know you’d try,” she said tartly. “The bigger question is what I’d do about it.”
“Now you’re just taunting me,” he joked.
“Sadly, I’m not.” She knew the admission had been a mistake, when she spotted the immediate glint in his eyes. Stepping back inside her apartment, she said, “Goodbye, Connor,” then closed the door very firmly behind her.
It was several minutes before she heard his footsteps going down the stairs. Something told her he’d been debating knocking on her door once more and trying to press the advantage she’d foolishly given him by admitting the power he still had over her.
The more important question, though, was how she was going to manage to avoid him next weekend. Or, worse, whether she even wanted to.
CHAPTER 9
Megan had clothes strewn all over the bed as she tried to decide what to take with her to Paris. Mick sat in a chair, observing the scene with the kind of masculine amusement that could set a woman’s teeth on edge.
“Don’t you dare laugh at me,” she muttered. “I can still decide to stay right here. The truth is, I think this is a bad time for us to be going away, even though the thought of Paris in April is just about the most romantic thing I can think of.”
“You don’t want to go because of Connor and Heather,” Mick guessed at once, proving that he was more attuned to the family nuances than she’d given him credit for being.
“Mick, I just don’t like the way things stand between those two,” she said, sitting down on the side of the bed clutching an armload of lingerie. “At this rate, I’m very much afraid they’ll never find
