Harden

“Oh, hell, I’ve ‘never,’ either,” he said irritably. “Not like that.” He had to fight for breath. He stared at her, fascinated. “That can’t happen again. Ever.”

She swallowed. She’d known that, too, but there had been a tiny hope that this was the beginning of something. Impossible, of course. She was a widow of barely one month, with emotional scars from the loss of her husband and child, and he was a man who obviously didn’t want to get involved. Wrong time, wrong place, she thought sadly, and wondered how she was going to cope with this new hurt. “Yes. I know,” she said finally.

“Goodbye, Miranda.”

Her eyes locked with his. “Goodbye, Harden.”

He turned with cold reluctance and opened the door again. He could still taste her on his mouth, and his body was taut with arousal. He paused with the doorknob in his hand. He couldn’t make himself turn it. His spine straightened.

“It’s too soon for you.”

“I…suppose so.”

There had been a definite hesitation there. He turned and looked at her, his eyes intent, searching.

“You’re a city girl.”

That wasn’t quite true, but he obviously wanted to believe it. “Yes,” she said.

He took a slow, steadying breath, letting his eyes run down her body before he dragged them back up to her face.

“Wrong time, wrong place,” he said huskily.

She nodded. “Yes. I was thinking that, too.”

So she was already reading his mind. This was one dangerous woman. It was a good thing that the timing was wrong. She could have tied him up like a trussed turkey.

His gaze fell to her flat belly and it took all his willpower not to think what sprang to his mind. He’d never wanted a child. Before.

“I’ll be late for the workshop. And you’ll be late for work. Take care of yourself,” he said.

She smiled gently. “You, too. Thank you, Harden.”

His broad shoulders rose and fell. “I’d have done the same for anyone,” he said, almost defensively.

“I know that, too. So long.”

He opened the door this time and went through it, without haste but without lingering. When he was back in the car, he forced himself to ignore the way it wounded him to leave her there alone with her painful memories.

Chapter 3

Evan was waiting for Harden the minute he walked into the hotel. Harden glowered at him, but it didn’t slow the other man down.

“It’s not my fault,” Evan said as they walked toward the conference rooms where the workshop was to be held. “A venomous woman hater who comes downstairs with a woman in an evening gown at eight-thirty in the morning is bound to attract unwanted attention.”

“No doubt.” Harden kept walking.

Evan sighed heavily. “You never date anybody. You’re forever on the job. My God, just seeing you with a woman is extraordinary. Tell me how you met her.”

“She was leaning off a bridge. I stopped her.”

“And…?”

Harden shrugged. “I let her use the spare room until she sobered up. This morning I took her home. End of story.”

Evan threw up his hands. “Will you talk to me? Why was a gorgeous girl like that jumping off a bridge?”

“She lost her husband and a baby in a car accident,” he replied.

Evan stopped, his eyes quiet and somber. “I’m sorry. She’s still healing, is that it?”

“In a nutshell.”

“So it was just compassion, then.” Evan shook his head and stuck his big hands into his pockets. “I might have known.” He glanced at his half brother narrowly. “If you’d get married, I might have a chance of getting my own girl. They all walk over me trying to get to you. And you can’t stand women.” He brightened. “Maybe that’s the secret. Maybe if I pretend to hate them, they’ll climb all over me!”

“Why don’t you try that?” Harden agreed.

“I have. It scared the last one off. No great loss. She had two cats and a hamster. I’m allergic to fur.”

Harden laughed shortly. “So we’ve all noticed.”

“I had a call from Mother earlier.”

Harden’s face froze. “Did you?”

“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” his brother said. “She’s paid enough for what she did, Harden. You just don’t understand how it is to be obsessively in love. Maybe that’s why you’ve never forgiven her.”

Evan had been away at college during the worst months of Harden’s life. Neither Harden nor Theodora had ever told him much about the tragedy that had turned Harden cold. “Love is for idiots,” Harden said, refusing to let himself remember. He paused to light a cigarette, his fingers steady and sure. “I want no part of it.”

“Too bad,” Evan replied. “It might limber you up a bit.”

“Not much hope of that, at my age.” He blew out a cloud of smoke, part of his mind still on Miranda and the way it had felt to kiss her. He turned toward the conference room. “I still don’t understand why you came up here.”

“To get away from Connal,” he said shortly. “My God, he’s driving me crazy.”

Harden lifted an amused eyebrow. “Baby fever. Once Pepi gives birth, he’ll be back to normal.”

“He paces, he smokes, he worries about something going wrong. What if they don’t recognize labor in time, what if the car won’t start when it’s time to go to the hospital!” He threw up his hands. “It’s enough to put a man off fatherhood.”

Fatherhood. Harden remembered looking hungrily at Miranda’s waist and wondering how it would feel to father a child. Incredible thought, and he’d never had it before in his life, not even with the one woman he’d loved beyond bearing…or thought he’d loved. He scowled.

He had a lot of new thoughts and feelings with Miranda. This wouldn’t do. They were strangers. He lived in Texas, she lived in Illinois. There was no future in it, even if she wasn’t still in mourning. He had to bite back a groan.

“Something’s eating you up,” Evan said perceptively, narrowing one dark eye. “You never talk about things that bother you.”

“What’s the use? They won’t go away.”

“No, but bringing them out in the light helps to get them into perspective.” He pursed his lips. “It’s that woman, isn’t it? You saved her, now you feel responsible for her.”