If only she hadn’t decided to come home early.
Tori looked back down at her fresh sheet of paper. The blank squares were taunting her. Picking up a new pencil, she took a deep breath and tried something different. How would she design a house for both her and Wade to live in?
She started with his office. It had an entire wall of windows that opened up on a view of the valley below like the ones overlooking Times Square in their hotel suite. On the opposite wall were floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. A see-through fireplace connected his office to the great room. Both spaces would have twelve-foot ceilings and huge panes of glass. One panel would slide out to let them onto the deck. She sketched in a hot tub where they could sit together in the evenings, talk and drink wine.
Wine… Tori started sketching a dream kitchen with a staircase that led down into a wine cellar. Her pencil moved feverishly now, the rooms flowing together perfectly. Nearly an hour passed before she sat back and looked at the design.
This was the house she wanted. The one with Wade in it. Her gaze moved over the second-story guest bedroom that was right off the master suite. It would be perfect for a nursery. She could just see the ivory-and-green wallpaper, the mobile over the crib. The sunlight that streamed in would provide the perfect amount of natural light. Wade could sit in the rocking chair and read bedtime stories.…
That was the thought that brought the tears to her eyes that she’d fought for days.
Tori grasped the corner of the sketch, ready to rip it off and trash it with the others, but she just couldn’t. This was the house she wanted.
The rumbling sound of a car pulling onto her property pulled her attention away from the design. Unable to see from her seat, she got up and walked over to the window.
The corner of a red hood with a BMW logo nearly sent her heart into her throat. She stumbled back against the sink, gripping the counter to keep her knees from giving out under her. Wade had returned to New York a week ago. Why was he here now? To apologize? To offer her more money? Her mind raced with different options, but she shook each one aside. The only way to know for sure was to go out there and find out.
Glancing to her right, she picked up the shotgun and went to the door. She was in love with him, but she was still angry and hurt by what he’d done. He needed to know that.
Tori swung open the door and stepped down into the snow. A snowstorm had blown through the day after she came home, blanketing the property in white and making it impossible for her to look around and search for clues about what he was after.
When she turned, Wade was standing near the hood of his SUV, his arms raised in surrender. In one hand was a bundle of tulips wrapped in florist paper. “Don’t shoot,” he said with the smile she’d missed.
She raised the gun and studied his face. He looked older, more tired than she remembered. Hopefully he’d had as bad a week as she had. Knowing he might have suffered without her helped soothe her pride a bit. “What do you want?”
“I came here to make you an offer.”
It took everything Tori had not to pull the trigger and cover his body in painful welts. An offer? Here she was, designing their home, decorating their damn nursery, and he came here focused on the same old agenda.
“You’re too late,” she said. “I wouldn’t sell you this land for every dime you have. Flowers won’t help, either.”
Wade nodded. A flicker of amusement in his eyes sent a flame of irritation through her veins. “That’s fine. I’m not here to buy the land.”
Tori frowned. “If you don’t want my land, what do you want, Wade?”
“I want you.”
The intensity in his expression was undeniable. His green eyes were burrowing into her. It made it hard to breathe. He wanted her. Her. Not the land. Not what was hidden on it. Her. Her heart leaped in her chest for a moment, but she refused to so much as blink on the exterior. She wasn’t going to let him off that easily. “I’m not interested in any more dinner dates. All I got out of that was indigestion and rug burn.”
A smile curled Wade’s lips. Instinctively she wanted to smile back, but she wouldn’t.
“That’s okay,” he said. “I’m not here to ask you on a date. I’m here to tell you that I’m in love with you.”
Tori’s hands started trembling, the shotgun unsteady in her grasp. She stood there with her mouth open but without words as Wade came closer.
“Let’s just set this down, shall we?” He eased the gun from her hands and laid it in the snow a few feet away. “I’d rather not have our love story turn into one of those tragic tales.” Wade handed her the bouquet of tulips. They were her favorite flower. She hadn’t ever told him that.