Christmas at Bravo Ridge

Smiling.

He’d just helped her ruin her life—and he was smiling.

She breathed in deep and let it out slowly. She reminded herself that there was nothing to be gained by yelling at him, or by slapping that ridiculous smile right off his face. He’d only given her exactly what she’d asked for.

What he’d made her ask for…

A hot flush flowed up her cheeks as she remembered the way he had made her say yes. He hadn’t even left her the comfort of blaming him. He’d made her admit she was willing. More than willing. He’d made her admit she wanted it. Bad.

“Matt.” She spoke softly, her teeth firmly gritted.

He didn’t answer, didn’t turn his head her way, didn’t even open his eyes.

She got up on an elbow and gave his shoulder a gentle shake. “Matt.”

That was when he started snoring. A soft, contented sort of snore. And he was still smiling.

She watched in outrage as he turned to his side facing the far wall. He tugged the covers up under his chin with a happy little sigh. Oh, how she longed to shake him some more. And not gently this time. The least he could do was to stay awake and talk to her about the whopper of a mistake the two of them had just made.

But no. He was sleeping peacefully. And she was left to stew on her own.

She pushed back the blankets and jumped to her feet. He didn’t move—and she hadn’t left the bed all that carefully, either. She stood there naked, glaring down at him, thinking about how much she longed to wake him up and tell him what a total jerk he was for kissing her in the first place when he knew damn well that she was an engaged woman. And not only for kissing her, but for not simply stopping when she said no. For kissing her long and hard, until she was willing to say anything to get him to keep kissing her.

And then, most of all, for the rest of it. Which had been fabulous. Damn it.

Corrine put her hands to her burning cheeks. Somehow, that was the worst of it, that she had liked it so much. That she’d pulled him back down on top of her and started ripping off his clothes. That when he was inside her, she had sunk her teeth into his shoulder and cried out at how good it felt.

That she had come.

Twice.

No. She wasn’t going to wake him up. If she did, she would definitely end up yelling at him. And that would wake Kira and that wouldn’t be good.

So she scrambled around gathering up her clothes, which strangely had ended up flung into all four corners of the room. Her panties were out in the upstairs hall, for crying out loud. One of them must have thrown them there. The door was wide open, the overhead light still on.

God. Kira. She could have so easily gotten up and come down the hall and seen them. Corrine covered her face and whimpered in self-disgust at the very idea. But only for a moment. Whimpering, after all, wasn’t going to do any good. She’d done what she’d done and now she was going to have to figure out what to do next.

She thought of her mom, her stomach knotting in sadness and longing. Kathleen Lonnigan had been the soul of practicality. If she was there now, she’d probably say something like, Well, baby. That was stupid. But time only moves forward and there’s no one yet that can change the past. Right now, you just put one foot in front of the other. Keep moving forward and do what needs doing.

So all right. It was one-foot-in-front-of-the-other time. She went and got the panties and put them on and then put on everything else. She turned off the light and closed the door quietly as she left the room. On tiptoe, she went down the hall and checked on Kira, who was sound asleep. The sight of that—of her daughter sleeping—made her feel marginally better. No kid who had just seen her parents naked could sleep so peacefully, smiling like a little angel.

Corrine went downstairs. She cleared away the mess from the wine-tasting party. By the time she finished that, it was after four. She trudged up the stairs again to her own room, shed her clothes for the second time that night, pulled on her favorite sleep shirt and dropped into bed. Lucky for her she was really, really tired. Too tired, even, to stare at the ceiling and think about how much she despised herself.

She rolled to her side, tucked her hands under her head and slept.

When she woke, it was daylight. Matt was standing over her, wearing the khaki trousers and wool sweater she’d ripped off of him the night before, looking worried. At least he was holding out her favorite mug and a delicious trail of coffee-scented steam was curling upward from it.

Corrine started to reach for the mug, but then she looked at the clock. It was nine forty-five. She let out a screech and threw back the covers.

“Relax.” He steadied the mug with his free hand. “I gave her breakfast and took her to school.”

She blinked. “You did?”

The worried look became a sheepish one. “I figured it was the least I could do.”

“You’re late for work.”

“Yeah.”

“You’re never late for work.”

He shrugged. “I called the office. They’ll get along without me until lunch time.”

Corrine flipped the covers back over her bare legs and plumped the pillows so she could lean against them. “Give me that coffee.”

“You promise not to throw it in my face?”

“Don’t tempt me. The coffee. Now.” With care, he handed it over. “Thanks,” she said grudgingly.

He backed up and sat in the chair in the corner. For a minute or two, they just stared at each other. He seemed to have no more idea of what to say than she did.

But in the end, he spoke first. “Look, as far as I’m concerned, it was the wine, that’s all.”

She wanted to believe him. She wanted that so badly. And hey, it probably was just the wine as far as he was concerned. Something he could blow off as lowered inhibitions and bad judgment.

For her, well, it was much worse. What they’d done called everything into question. It made her a liar on too many levels. To Bob—and somehow even worse than that, to herself.

She sipped the coffee. “Yeah. A big mistake, all that wine.”

He raked his fingers back through his spiky brown hair. “Stupid.”

She sipped again. “Beyond dumb.”

Another silence. Then he said, “And no one has to know about it. We can agree that it never happened.”

Easy enough for him to say. He wasn’t the one with an engagement ring on his finger. The closest he’d ever come to an engagement was his on-again, off-again relationship with Tabby Ellison, the daughter of one of Aleta’s Phi Beta Something-or-Other girlfriends from college. Tabby was beautiful and rich and traveled in the same social circle as the Bravos. She would have made Matt a very suitable wife. If only Matt wanted to settle down.

But he didn’t. Never had. Matt wasn’t a ladykiller type or anything. He just didn’t particularly want to get married. He wasn’t ready for that, he said, seeming to mean that he would be. Eventually. Maybe that was true. And in four or five years, whenever that “right” time finally came around, he and Tabby would have a country club wedding and then Tabby would produce a couple of little darlings destined to grow up rich and very spoiled.

“Corrie, did you hear me?”

She puffed out her cheeks as she sighed. “Yeah. I heard you. And I can’t do it. I can’t pretend it didn’t happen. Bob has to know.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.” He made a low, pained sound in his throat and rubbed at his temples.

She felt a certain…tenderness toward him. Okay, he’d started it last night. And he’d been more than happy to finish it after he got that yes out of her. Then he’d dropped off to sleep instead of staying awake so she could yell at him.

But this morning, he’d fed their daughter and driven her to school. And then he’d come in here to deal face-to-face with the mess they’d just made. He hadn’t tried to slink away. She had to give him credit for that at least.