“I’m frightened too,” she murmured through her tears. “But we’ll manage. Together, like it used to be. Just the two of us. I’ll take care of you. I love you. I love you so much.”
Bryan stopped in the doorway, everything inside him going still at the sight. He had intended to barge in and sweep Rachel away from the books for a walk around the grounds. He wanted to show her that there was more to her life than worrying about money. But it looked as if she didn’t need him to tell her that at the moment.
He knew he should have stepped back out into the hall and allowed Rachel and Addie absolute privacy, but it seemed important that he see Rachel this way-as a loving daughter, as a caring person, not embarrassed by her mother’s illness, but heartbroken for a loss that could never be replaced.
Or perhaps what was truly important was the feeling coming to life inside himself, the feeling he had denied over and over the past few days. He was in love with Rachel Lindquist.
He did step back then, as if the realization had come in the form of a physical blow. He let himself out of the house and strode quickly toward the fence that ran along the cliff’s edge, breaking into an athletic lope that ate up the distance. When he reached the rusty iron railing, he stopped, sucking in great deep gulps of sea air. In each hand he grasped a spear point that decorated the top of the wrought iron pickets, twisting at them so that the oxidizing metal flaked against his palms.
Without really seeing it, he stared out at the ocean. The gray-blue waves rolled in, one after another. Fishing boats dotted the misty horizon. Gulls keened and swooped along the rocky beach below.
How had it happened so fast, he wondered. He hardly knew anything about her. Except that she loved a mother who had shunned her for five years, and she’d had dreams broken, and she tasted of need and sweetness. And when the moon shone in her eyes, he could see how badly she needed to believe in rainbows and how afraid she was to reach out for one.
It didn’t seem possible that he could have fallen in love when he had just opened up enough to offer Rachel his help. He had meant only to reach out to her, to offer her a little respite from her worries. But in opening up he had not simply given, he had received. He could feel again. Now Rachel’s pain would be his pain, her fears would be his fears.
“I don’t know if I’m strong enough to go through that again,” he whispered.
He thought of Rachel holding her mother, whispering assurances through her tears. Love was the most powerful thing in the world. It could endure time and turmoil, hurt and heartache, pride and pain. Love was magic.
Bryan’s broad shoulders rose as he drew a deep breath, filling his lungs with cool air, and a deep, abiding calm settled inside him with the kind of acceptance that comes only from the heart. It might not have been smart or logical for him to love Rachel Lindquist, but love her he did, and if he could give her magic, he would.
SEVEN
“ ‘I love a maiden fair with sunlight in her hair. Her beauty was so rare, but she did scorn me,’ ” Bryan sang as he trailed along behind Rachel and Faith Callan like a wandering troubador.
They were systematically working their way through Drake House, making an inventory. Faith, who had experience with antiques, was identifying each piece, then Rachel looked the item up in a dealer’s catalog, and they tried to arrive at a fair market value. Bryan tagged along behind them, jotting down their findings in the inventory book. Addie followed them to each room, then stood in a strategic spot and glared at them as they went about their business.
She wasn’t taking it well at all, he thought, stealing a surreptitious glance at the older woman. The peace mother and daughter had made the day before had already been wrecked. Addie was sulking in the corner of the room near the window, her mouth pinched into a line as she twisted the end of her braid. She dug a hand into the patch pocket of her cotton housedress, pulled out a long stalk of celery, and began to munch on it angrily.
Bryan knew Rachel had explained to her that the antiques would have to be inventoried and sold because they needed the money, and Addie had seemed to comprehend the situation, but that didn’t mean she had to like it. He couldn’t blame her. Her independence was being taken away from her bit by bit. A proud woman like Addie wasn’t likely to accept it with a smile.
Still, Bryan thought with a sigh, he had promised to try to ease this transition for both Addie and Rachel. Drawing in a deep breath, he broke into song again.
“ ‘She was a maiden fair with sunlight in her hair. Her name was Addie.’ ”
Addie scowled at him and gave him a loud raspberry, spraying bits of celery out at him.
“I think she likes me.” Bryan grinned, and winked at Faith. “What do you think?”
Faith giggled, dark eyes twinkling. The sun streaming in the window caught in her mop of burnished curls, turning them more red than gold. She poked Bryan in the ribs with the eraser end of her pencil. “Behave yourself, Hennessy, or we’ll send you out to do some real work.”
“You could have brought along my darling godchildren,” he said with a hint of reproach. “They would have kept an eye on me.”
“No doubt. Lindy would make you toe the line. You know how she bosses Nicholas around.”
“He’s just biding his time,” Bryan said. “In another few years he’ll be towering over her. We’ll see who the boss is then. I can give him some pointers on diabolical brother-type revenge.”
Rachel listened to their good-natured bantering. It was clear that Bryan and Faith were as close as brother and sister. There was a special understanding between them, evident when they smiled at each other. She envied them that. She had never felt that kind of kinship with anyone, not even with Terence.
As she was thinking it, Bryan turned and regarded her with the same warm expression, the same keen knowing in his blue eyes. There was an invitation in his gaze, an invitation for her to share that kind of special friendship with him.
Temptation pulled at her. A part of her wanted badly to accept. It would have been nice to have a friend to lean on, but another part of her flatly denied her that option. She had to take her responsibilities on her own shoulders, because she knew from experience she couldn’t count on a man like Bryan to give support forever.
Not that she blamed him. She couldn’t see how anyone in his right mind would want to take on the task she was facing if he didn’t have to. Why would anyone ask to share that kind of pain?
The word love passed fleetingly through her brain, but she dismissed it. She had given up on the idea of romantic love, just as she had given up on the notion of rainbows and happy endings. She couldn’t afford romantic fantasies any more than she could afford to lose sleep over the erotic dreams she’d been having lately.
Bryan Hennessy was proving to be one big distraction from the things she needed to concentrate on most. One big, handsome distraction…
She stared at him as he made a note in the book he cradled on his right arm. He wore faded jeans that hugged his lean male body in all the right places. A polo shirt clung to his strong shoulders. The color matched the blue of his eyes in a way that made Rachel’s breath catch. Glossy strands of tawny hair fell across his broad forehead.
His glasses were slipping down his nose. Without looking up from his work, he reached up and pushed at the wire bridge with the middle finger of his left hand. It was a gesture she’d seen him perform a hundred times, and yet, for some inexplicable reason, this time she thought it was curiously sweet.
Her gaze focused on his hands, and longing rippled through her. Those big hands were strong, yet so gentle, almost as gentle as his lips had been against hers. She’d dreamed of those hands caressing her every night. It seemed like eons had passed since he’d touched her, kissed her. It had been three days. She probably could have said how many hours and minutes had passed.
It irked her that she’d spent so much time thinking about it. She had told herself she couldn’t get involved with Bryan Hennessy. That should have been the end of the longing. Since their argument, she had avoided him as best she could, considering they were living in the same house. She had been as cool toward him as possible without being out and out rude.
And still he was sweet to her. The growing bouquet of roses on her dresser was testimony to that. There was one waiting for her on her pillow every night when she went up to bed. It seemed only a sweeter gesture when he
