You’ll Find Out

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

A week in the Florida sun had brightened Mara’s disposition and outlook on life. She and Angie had spent the time playing on the beach, making sand castles, and hunting for treasures cast upon the white sand by the relentless tide. They played keep-away from the waves and watched as tourists, dressed in gaudy colors, lapped up the sun’s warm golden rays. It was a wonderful time for mother and daughter to become reacquainted, without the shroud of Peter’s illness cloaking them in its black folds.

The sun had tanned their skins, and Mara looked robust and healthy once again. A sparkle had returned to her cornflower-blue eyes, and two rosy points of color enhanced the natural arch of her cheekbones. Angie’s hair had bleached to a lighter hue, which seemed to imitate the long, golden tendrils of her mother, the brighter shade deepening the color of her near-black eyes. The little girl seemed healthy and happy, and it was with more than a trace of hesitation and dread that Mara returned home, back to the ancient clapboard-and-brick house that she and Peter had shared, and back to the offices over the manufacturing plant of Imagination Toys, located in the heart of the industrial section of Asheville.

Months had passed since the funeral, and the mountains surrounding Asheville had warmed with the summer sun. The white oak trees lining the drive displayed their lush, green leaves, and the air was laden with the scent of pine. Already the large dogwood tree in the backyard had lost its petals, and only a few remaining flaming azaleas and purple rhododendron blossoms lingered on the branches.

Summer had come, and for the first time in several years Mara felt free. Free from the disease that had ravaged Peter but had bound her to him, and free from the hypocrisy of a loveless marriage. The days were long and warm. Although Mara spent many hours working at the office, she always managed to put aside a special time of the day to spend alone with Angie. During the day, while Mara was working, Peter’s mother, June, watched carefully over her three-year-old granddaughter, but in the late afternoon and evenings, when the soft breeze of twilight whispered through the pine boughs, Mara and Angie were inseparable. It was this time of day that Mara found the most precious. She loved being with her curly-haired, slightly precocious daughter and found Angie’s bright smile and eager young mind a continued source of contentment. And Angie, for her part, seemed to thrive on the love she received from her mother and grandmother.

Mara’s days at the plant were more difficult than her quiet evenings at home. There was an almost unbearable undercurrent of tension between Mara and her sister-in-law. After returning from her vacation, Mara had agreed to let Dena run the advertising department. Mara had hoped that the added responsibility would satisfy the fiery Dena. She reasoned that if she gave Dena a fair chance to show her talents, perhaps Dena would work harder and pull with Mara instead of always against her. In the beginning Dena had seemed content, but as time passed she began getting bored with the job, realizing that it was little more than an empty title—a placebo to satisfy her ego. All of the major decisions concerning Imagination Toys were still handled by Mara. She had taken over the job slowly, as Peter’s illness had forced him into inactivity.

Also, despite Mara’s efforts to the contrary, the company was still losing money. Several larger corporations had expressed interest in buying out the controlling interest in Imagination, but Mara had steadfastly refused their offers. The last thing she would allow to happen was to prove Dena correct and be forced to sell the family business. The toy company had been started by Peter’s great-grandfather, and each successive generation of Wilcox family members had lived comfortably from the profits. That was, until the company had begun losing money under Peter’s mismanagement. Now the recession was complicating the problem, but no matter what, Mara wouldn’t let the company fail, or so she promised herself.

One larger corporation based in Atlanta, Delta Electronics, was persistent in offering to buy out Imagination. Mara had never spoken to the owners directly, but each week she had received several inquiries from Delta’s attorneys. Just last week Mara had spoken to Mr. Henderson, counselor for Delta, and hoped that he had understood her position about the sale—that there would be none. Henderson wasn’t easily put off—in fact, he was persistent to the point of being bothersome—but this week was the first in several that Mara hadn’t opened a formal-looking envelope from Atlanta. Mara congratulated herself; it seemed as if Mr. Henderson had finally gotten the message.

She stretched in the chair. It was late Friday afternoon and shadows had begun to lengthen across her tiny office. As she sat at her desk she cast a glance out the large window and at the sun lowering itself behind the wall of Appalachian mountains. Long, lavender shadows climbed over the colonial and modern rooftops of downtown Asheville. The familiar view of the skyline and the charcoal-blue mountains shrouded in wispy clouds was calming after what had been another hectic week at the office. Her eyes moved from the window to the interior of her office. She smiled lazily to herself and ignored the small pile of paperwork that sat unfinished on her desk. Slowly she let her hands reach behind her neck and lift the weight of her tawny hair from her shoulders. Still holding her hair away from her neck, she slowly rotated her head, hoping to relieve some of the tightness from her back and shoulders. It had been a long, tiring day, punctuated by arguments with Dena, but it would soon be over. The antique wooden clock on the wall indicated that it was nearly six o’clock, and Mara looked forward to going home and spending a long, quiet evening alone with Angie.

Mara let her eyes drop from the face of the clock to roam across the interior of the office. Although she was now legally president and general manager of Imagination Toys, the tiny room was somewhat austere. She had allowed it to be cut down in size from the immense room that it had been while Peter ran the company. The plant needed more work space and less administrative office, she had determined, and therefore allowed the room to be divided into workable office space. The same room that had housed only Peter before was now able to provide a work area for a secretary and two salespeople, and still allow Mara room to move. The only luxury that she insisted upon was that she keep the large window with the view of the mountains she loved.

Mara would have liked to have refurbished the office, but that was one extravagance that would have to wait, along with a list of more important and necessary items. As it was, the budget couldn’t be stretched to cover the new three-needled sewing machines that were needed for the dolls, nor would it allow for a new shipment of higher grade plastic for colored building blocks . . . or fabric, or an upgraded puzzle saw—the list seemed to be endless. At the very bottom was interior design for Mara’s office.

The velvety tones of her secretary’s voice on the intercom scattered her thoughts. “Mrs. Wilcox?”

“Yes?” Mara inquired automatically, not letting her eyes waver from their silent appraisal of the office.

“There’s a gentleman to see you . . . A Mr. Kennedy.”

“But I don’t have any appointments this afternoon.” Mara began, before the weight of Lynda’s surprise announcement settled upon her. In a voice that was barely audible, Mara spoke into the transmitter, her attention drawn to the little black box on the corner of her desk. “What did you say the gentleman’s name was. . . Kennedy?” Mara’s mind began to whirl backward in time. She sucked in her breath and then chided herself for her breathless anticipation. After four years of living with the truth, why did she still feel a rush of excitement run through her veins at the memory of Shane? A dryness settled in her throat.

Mara could hear a confused whisper of conversation coming from the other end of the intercom. Then Lynda’s voice once again. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Wilcox, but Mr. Kennedy insists that he has an appointment with you. He’s with . . . just a minute . . . Delta Electronics.”

Kennedy . . . Kennedy . . . Kennedy, the name repeated itself in Mara’s mind. It had been so long since she had allowed herself to remember Shane—his dark eyes, the deep resonate timbre of his laughter, the warmth of his touch . . .

“Mrs. Wilcox?” Lynda asked uneasily through the intercom. “He says it’s urgent that he speak with you . . .” Lynda was becoming unnerved by Mara’s hesitation and Mr. Kennedy’s persistence. “Mrs. Wilcox?”

Mara tried to quiet her suddenly hammering heart and gather the air that had escaped from her lungs in a gust at the memory of Shane. “Delta Electronics?” Mara repeated. She didn’t bother to mask the interest in her voice.

“That’s correct,” Lynda agreed quickly, relieved to hear the usual ring of authority back in Mara’s voice.

“I’ve already responded to Delta’s law office. Mr. Henderson understands exactly how I feel, but if it would make Mr. Kennedy feel any better, I’ll be glad to see him. Please show him into my office.” Mara’s fine, dark, honey-colored brows drew together in concentration. Why was this Kennedy so insistent—hadn’t Henderson conveyed her message properly? She tapped her fingernails nervously on her desk and then straightened the collar of her blouse.

The knowledge that one of the representatives for Delta Electronics was named Kennedy had shaken her poise. Not that Kennedy was an uncommon name, by any means. Yet each time she heard it, she became distracted by vivid visions of the past and long-dead emotions would try to recapture her.

Not knowing the reasons for her actions, Mara let her fingers sweep all traces of her personal life from her desk, the family portrait of Mara and Angie, a Lucite cube with snapshots of Angie as a baby, and a few scraps of construction paper that were Angie’s first unsteady attempts at art. As Mara’s nerves tightened, she pushed all the mementos of her life into her desk drawer and turned the lock, thinking at the time that her actions bordered on paranoia, all because of a common surname.

Satisfied that no tangible evidence of Angie was visible, she placed a friendly, though slightly strained, smile on her lips. She stood up to meet the man who had already shaken her poise and felt a queasy uneasiness in the pit of her stomach.

The door swung open and Mara managed to stifle the scream that threatened to erupt from her throat. Her eyes widened in disbelief, and she clasped an unsteady hand to her breast as her knees began to give way.

“Oh, God,” she whispered hoarsely. “Oh, dear God . . .”

She found it impossible to breathe as Shane Kennedy, the man she thought dead, entered the room. In an instant, four years of Mara’s life dissolved into thin air. Her heart began to clamor unreasonably in the confines of her rib cage, and she knew that she desperately needed some fresh air. Her eyelids fluttered closed for a woozy instant. Was it really Shane, or merely a mirage that her willing mind had created—a trap of her subconscious? Her legs were still rubbery, and she braced herself on the edge of the desk, letting the strong mahogany support her weight. Her face blanched with the shock of seeing him again, and though she tried heroically to pick up the pieces of her poise, she found it impossible. Her fingers dug into the polished veneer of the desk and her vision became distorted with tears that had been hidden away for four years.

Time hadn’t been particularly kind to him. Although his strong masculine looks were still intact, he seemed hardened and weathered. A touch of gray lightened his otherwise jet-black hair, and there were deep lines of strain running across his forehead. Though dressed impeccably in a lightweight jute-colored business suit, the tanned texture of his skin suggested that he spent much of his time outdoors. His face was angular, as it had always been, but it seemed more proudly arrogant than she remembered. In that one breathless instant, when their eyes met, all time seemed to have stopped. And though he didn’t smile, a quiet surge of recognition and remembrance lighted his eyes. Mara swallowed with difficulty and tried to quiet her thundering heart, hoping to God that when he extended his hand to hers, he wouldn’t notice that her palms were damp.

“Dear God, Shane;” she murmured. “Is it really, you?”

“Mara,” he began, walking more closely to her desk. The voice was the same deep-timbred tone that had haunted her nights. “It’s been a long time—too long!” He reached for her outstretched hand and closed his over it warmly. Mara felt as if she might faint. She looked into his eyes. They were as black as she remembered, but different, somehow, as if they had witnessed sights that no man should see. In their ebony depths she visualized pain and agony.

“Shane?” Mara whispered, weakly, and her voice cracked with the dry emotion of four dead years. “But . . . your father told me . . . I thought that . . .”

“You thought that I was dead,” he finished for her, and his voice held no hint of emotion.

Her face became ghostly white from the shock of seeing him, and her weak knees gave way. Pulling her fingers from the strength of his grasp, she braced herself on the desk and lowered herself onto the chair. Shaking her head in disbelief, she lifted her face to meet the power of his gaze. Dresden eyes reached out for his. She wanted to run to him, to let him fold her into the security of his strong arms. She longed to touch every inch of him, to let her trembling fingers confirm what her eyes were seeing—that he was alive and not just a part of a distant memory. She felt compelled to tell him her most intimate secret and cry the tears of yesterday. But she couldn’t. Her voice remained still as the severity of his gaze held her pinioned silently to her seat.

Mara let her head rest heavily on the palm of her hand, and her golden blond hair fell over one shoulder as she tried to calm herself and deal with the fact that he was here, with her, after all of this time. Shane was alive! She looked up at him again, letting her eyes travel upward to meet his. Tears that had been pooling in her large eyes began to run unchecked down her cheeks.

An ache, deep and primitive, spread through Shane. What was it about Mara that made him want to cup her chin in his hand and whisper promises to her that he couldn’t possibly keep? Why, still, did he feel an urge to protect her, even though she had wounded him once before?

“I didn’t mean to startle you, Mara. As a matter of fact, I would have preferred that my attorney handle this entire affair,” he said, knowing his words to be false. He avoided her probing gaze and straightened the cuff of his sleeve. A knife twisted in her heart as she realized that he hadn’t even wanted to see her. He had only come because his attorney had been ineffective. “But you proved just as stubborn as I remembered,” Shane continued. Then a quiet cough caught his attention, and he remembered the receptionist who had led him into Mara’s office. The girl’s face burned with embarrassment over witnessing the unusual and intimate reunion between the stranger and her employer.

Shane’s chilling statement indicating that he would rather not have seen Mara personally helped her find a portion of her shattered composure. She managed to dismiss the receptionist, to the girl’s obvious relief. “Thank you, Lynda, that will be all.” Lynda nodded curtly and hurriedly left the room, carefully closing the door behind her.

Mara closed her eyes for a moment and tried to get a grip on her tattered emotions. He was here, after four long years. He’d been alive all the time, her mind reminded her, and a cool sense of betrayal mocked her. Where had he been these past four years? What had he done? Why had his father lied to her? And why had he supported that lie by not returning to her as he had promised? Why would he let her believe him dead, only to resurrect himself now?

The air in the small room was charged with electricity, and the unanswered questions loomed between them like an invisible barrier. For several seconds there was a heavy, uneasy silence, as if the questions about the past were insurmountable.

“Why?” she finally asked him, and somehow found the resolve to look directly into his frigid dark eyes. “Why did you let me think that you were dead . . . all of these years . . . all of these years?” her voice became a hoarse whisper. There was disbelief and anguish in her question, and she felt the strain of unwanted tears once again filling her eyes. Unashamed, she brushed the tears aside.

Her poignant question and tortured expression were too much for Shane to bear. Knowing it to be a mistake, he stalked over to the desk and leaned across it to bring his face only inches from hers. Without hesitation, he let his finger touch the curve of her cheek and cradled her delicate chin in his hand. She felt herself tremble at his familiar touch, and a tear slid down her cheek. His eyes were dark, cloudy, but when she looked more closely, she could swear that she noticed a tenderness and a yearning hidden in the ebony depths of his gaze. As he whispered her name, letting the warmth of his breath touch her face, she thought she could melt into him. “Mara . . . there’s so much to say . . . so many questions that have to be answered”—a confused look stole across his features—“but I don’t think that this is the right time, nor the right place. You and I we need time, alone together, to sort things out.”

His words were soothing to her raw nerves, and his caress was enticingly familiar. She closed her eyes, tender memories returning in full force.

As the words came out of his mouth Shane mentally cursed himself. He should never have come back again. Never! But as the months had passed he had found it more difficult day by day to stay away from her. And so he had come, with the flimsy excuse of purchasing her toy company for bait. He had come back, and now he found himself caught in the web of her charms once again. Even now she was so innocently alluring, so sensitive, so perfect. His hand slid easily against the silken texture of her neck. His thumb found the erratic pulse in the hollow of her throat and lingered, and with his free hand he pushed aside the golden curtain of her hair that had partially hidden her face. Although he paused long enough to look into her eyes, Mara knew that he wanted to kiss her, and the knowledge warmed her. Perhaps the last four years weren’t wasted. Her pulse began to quicken, and when his eager lips found hers, she felt a ripple of desire shake her entire body. His lips, warm and inviting, seemed to touch her soul and set her body on fire, just as they had always done. She knew that he wanted her still, even after hiding for the last four years.

When he dragged his lips from hers, disappointment shadowed her features, but as her blue eyes found his she recognized a raw and naked passion smoldering in his gaze. And there was something else, an incredible anger—deep and ugly.

“Why are you here?” she asked. Her senses were dazed, numbed by his touch, but she had to understand the resentment and wariness that seemed to control him.

“I wish I knew,” he answered quickly. And then, as if denying the naked truth in his voice, he suddenly stood up and tugged at the hem of his suit coat. “Didn’t my attorney get in touch with you? I thought that he had made my position clear. I want to buy Imagination Toys!” The intimacy of the moment before was shattered.

“You?”

“Let me rephrase that; Delta Electronics is interested in your company.” His voice was still husky with passion, and as if to cool the intensity of the moment, he walked over to the window and stared at the mountains. One of his hands was plunged deeply into his pants pocket, pulling the expensive weave of his tailored suit away from his body. As the coat stretched backward his shirt tightened against his flat, taut stomach. Even though he was fully dressed, Mara was reminded of his slim, well-muscled build. Four years hadn’t changed the masculine strength of his physique, nor the stirrings in her own body at the sight of him.

“And you own Delta Electronics?” Mara guessed, trying to keep her mind on the conversation while her thirsty eyes drank in every inch of him.

A curt nod was the only response as Shane continued to stare at the distant mountains. When Mara didn’t immediately continue her questions, he paced back to the desk. His austere gaze prompted her.

“Oh, Shane,” she murmured, but his face remained tense. She swallowed with difficulty, and said, with as much professional aplomb as possible, “I’m sorry. But as I told your counsel, Mr. Henderson, the company is not for sale.” She tried to quell the anger that was beginning to boil within her. Anger that he had left her, anger that he had come back into her life without so much as an explanation or an apology, anger that the only thing he wanted from her was the Wilcox family business, and anger with herself for still loving him. She had dreamed about him, relived the violent nightmare of his death, but never had she realized how desperately she still loved him . . . a love that was just as it had always been—unreturned. And now the cold betrayal. He had left her without so much as a second glance, until now, when he wanted something.

“Isn’t the price high enough?” he asked, breaking into her thoughts.

She shook her blond head and lowered her gaze to meet his directly. “It has nothing to do with money. The company is not for sale. Period! Now, if there’s nothing more . . .” She left the sentence dangling between them and without words invited him to leave. Her throat tightened at the thought that he would walk away from her, but she knew she had no choice—she was much too vulnerable to him. And, after all, what he wanted from her was business—pure and simple. She needed time to think things out and get her tangled thoughts in order. As much as she feared being separated from him, she knew it was the wisest course of action. She had to find the courage to tell him those things that he would need to know, now that she knew that he was alive.

His dark eyes narrowed, he rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully, and he paced restlessly before her. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“Like what?” she asked, perplexed.

“You’d like to be able to just turn me down and send me packing,” he accused. “Well, it won’t work.” A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “I want this company, and I intend to have it!”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that!”

“But I’m not selling . . . remember?” Mara’s temper was barely under control. “I don’t see how you think you’ll be able to persuade me to change my mind!” Despite her strong words, she felt herself beginning to tremble.

“Maybe I won’t have to,” Shane mused, pulling thoughtfully on his lower lip. “As I understand it, you didn’t inherit all of the stock of the company. You don’t even have controlling interest. Perhaps some of the other members of the Wilcox family would be interested in my proposition . . .” he suggested.

A picture of a triumphant Dena entered Mara’s mind. Unconsciously she pursed her full lips, and her eyes held steadily to Shane’s. “Am I to assume that you’re threatening me?” she asked in a voice that she hoped showed no strain of emotion. His dark head cocked with interest. “I really don’t know what it is that you expect of me,” she accused, tossing up her hands in exasperation. “First, you come marching in here, right from the grave, I might add, and nearly shock me to death. And, secondly, you try to intimidate me into selling something to you that is definitely not for sale! I don’t know how I can make my position any more clear! The company is not for sale.” Her eyes had turned to chips of blue ice. “I’m sorry if my response disappoints you!”

Shane laughed, and the familiar sound destroyed all of Mara’s resolve. “You haven’t disappointed me, Mara. I thought that maybe you had changed, but I was wrong. Thank God!” The severity of his gaze eroded, and for the first time that afternoon Mara saw kindness in his eyes—the kindness that she remembered.

He reached for her hand and held it lightly in his. “It’s good to see you again,” he whispered honestly.

“But Shane . . . why?” She tried to ignore the tingling of her fingertips where they touched his. “Why?”

“Shh . . .” He placed a sensitive finger over her lips to quiet the questions that were uppermost on her mind. “Have you had dinner yet?” Shane asked, still holding her fingers.

“At six o’clock in my office?” Mara inquired, feeling the tension begin to leave her body. “Not hardly.”

“Then let’s have it together.”

“Now?”

“This evening.”

Mara began to shake her head. Everything was happening too quickly and she was beginning to feel claustrophobic, caught in the same emotions that had trapped her four years ago. He was pushing, and she needed time to think. It was too easy to fall under his magic all over again. She ached to fall into the seduction of his onyx eyes, but she couldn’t allow it. It was too late.

“Why not?” he asked smoothly. Too smoothly.

“I . . . I have plans tonight.” It wasn’t a lie. There was Angie to consider. Shane’s hot hand closed more firmly over hers, and she felt as if she were beginning to melt. “And,” she withdrew her hand shakily, “I don’t think that it would be a very good idea . . .”

“Why not?” he interjected. His dark eyes deepened as they found the blue of hers.

“You sound like a broken record . . .”

“Well?”

“I’m . . . really . . . very busy,” Mara stammered, and knew in an instant that it sounded very much like the lie it was.

“Trying to maintain the image of the suffering widow?” Mara’s back stiffened, but a crooked smile slashed wickedly across Shane’s tanned face. For a moment, Mara could see him as she remembered: younger, softer, and . . . warmer. That was it. Even when he grinned, she could sense a brooding coldness lying under the surface of his smile.

Unconsciously, Mara rubbed the warm spot in her palm that could still feel his touch. “It has nothing to do with images,” she retorted. “I really am swamped.”

“Oh?” his dark eyes moved over the top of her desk, which was barren except for a few shipping invoices.

“Yes,” she replied hastily, feeling a compulsion to explain. “We’re a little late with some of our shipments. . .”

“I know that!”

Mara’s eyes met his in a clash of black and blue. Just how much did he know? She continued, a little breathlessly, “Then, of course, you understand that I’ve got a million and one things to do.”

“Name one,” he suggested laconically, and dropped himself into a chair opposite the desk. He propped his chin up with his folded hands and a slight glint of amusement touched his eyes.

Mara breathed deeply and wondered fleetingly why she was even participating in this absurd conversation. “Well, for one thing,” she began, slightly goaded but refusing to back down on her lie, “it’s almost the end of August, our busiest season. I’ve got Christmas orders that will have to be shipped, and very soon.”

“Isn’t that what the shipping department is for?” he suggested wryly.

“Everyone pitches in!”

“Including the president?” A black eyebrow cocked suspiciously.

“Including the president!” Mara’s eyes snapped for an instant before she erected the cool facade on her face that suggested total authority. She straightened her shoulders and unconsciously inched the defiant tilt of her chin upward.

“Is that the way Peter ran the company?” Before Mara could think of a suitable response, Shane continued. “And just how is it going?”

“How is what going?” she asked, trying to keep up with his twists in the conversation. The scent of familiar cologne wafted toward her, tantalizing her. Pleasant memories came thundering back, unwanted.

“The business! Now that dear old Peter is gone—by the way, my condolences—how is the business managing?” His tone was sarcastic, and once again angry fires blazed in his ebony gaze.

“Just fine!” she lied again. Why did she feel that she had to lie to him, to defend her position? The thought continued to nag at her and she vainly tried to push it aside.

“Is that so?” He looked at her skeptically as if to say “convince me.”

“Of course it is!” Mara emphasized, a trifle irritably. Just who did he think he was, waltzing into the office without an appointment, shocking the living daylights out of her, dredging up old memories, and making her feel a burning need to explain her life to him? Shane’s eyes dropped to her hands, and she realized that she was twisting the wedding ring that she still wore on her right hand. Scarlet crept up her neck as she let her fingers drop beneath the desk top and out of his line of vision. Once again, his gaze hardened.

“Well, then, if everything is going so smoothly, there’s no reason that you can’t have dinner with me, is there?”

Trapped! He had tricked her, and they both knew it. She had let him corner her all too easily. Mara breathed more deeply and tried once again to dissuade him. Her most winning smile neatly in place, she responded. “Look, Shane, just because the company is doing well doesn’t mean that there isn’t any work to be done. Quite the contrary. The busier the toy company is, the busier I am.” She stretched her palms upward in a gesture that said more clearly than words, “any fool can understand that simple logic.” “Besides which, I told you that I’m busy tonight.”

“And you can’t fit me into your busy schedule?”

“Exactly.”

Shane’s eyes seemed to darken to the color of midnight. “Then I take it you’re not interested in my proposition?”

Mara pushed her hair away from her face and looked away for a minute. What did he mean? “Proposition?” she repeated. “What proposition? I already told you that the company is not for sale!” She tried to keep the interest in her voice at a minimum. She could sense that he had another offer, and she hadn’t spent the last four years learning the business from the ground up to blow it at this point. Perhaps he was willing to invest some capital in the company, for a minority interest. In any event, she had to find out what his proposition was. Obviously, Shane Kennedy wanted something from her, and very badly. Her heart stopped at the thought that perhaps he wanted her, but she quickly banished the traitorous idea. She wasn’t a fool, and she realized that he hadn’t waited four years to pick up what he had once thrown away so ruthlessly. No, this was only business, she reminded herself, but a part of her longed for more. She would have to try and maintain her cool disinterest until she heard all of the facts.

In answer to her question he replied, “The proposition that I’m going to make to you over dinner.” His voice had deepened an octave, and Mara had to stifle an urge to let herself remember a younger time when they had shared a smile, a kiss, a caress . . .

“I thought the question of dinner was settled,” she heard herself retort.

“Not until you agree to have it with me.”

Mara was becoming exasperated. Even though the man seated across from her was devastating her senses, she knew that she had enough complications in her life at the moment and that she didn’t need to add Shane Kennedy to the list. It was he who had left her. Mara knew herself well, and she realized that she was still just as vulnerable as the day that they had said their farewells. Four years hadn’t muted her senses or her imagination; her racing pulse gave witness to that fact. Several years may have come and gone, but no man had ever touched her the way that Shane Kennedy had. No man, including Peter. Mara turned crimson at the thought, feeling guilty and apprehensive. Why was Shane back? Did he know about Angie? The thought frightened her. Why did she feel that there was more than just his interest in the toy business that had prompted Shane to return to Asheville—and to the mountains where they had first made love?

As she looked pensively over to the man that had once been her closest friend and most intimate lover, she wondered if he could read her thoughts. Could he ever realize just how desperately she had loved him and how many nights she had found herself dreaming of him? Ever since Peter’s death, Shane’s image had become more clearly defined on her tired mind. Unconsciously, she wetted her suddenly dry lips with the tip of her tongue.

Shane maintained his composure, though Mara’s unintentional provocation had bothered him. A thin smile played over his lips as he rose from the chair and took her hand in his. “Please have dinner with me, Mara,” he whispered, and at the moment he breathed her name, she knew it was useless to argue. More than anything in the world at this moment, Mrs. Mara Jane Stevens Wilcox, recently widowed wife of Peter Wilcox, wanted to spend time with the only man she had ever truly loved: the father of her child.

“All right, Shane,” she agreed, with the first sincere smile of the day. “I’d love to have dinner with you . . . and to listen to your proposal.”

“Proposition,” he corrected with a mirthless smile, and Mara found herself wondering if she had made a bitter mistake. He’s changed, she decided. He’s changed very much.