She tried to conquer it, tried to quell the shaking and hold on to control. Tried to find her equilibrium and act like a rational human being when he’d just knocked her back after three months of learning to live without him.
“What are you doing here?” she asked with growing defensiveness. “And like that? If someone barged into your board meeting you’d have them arrested.”
“Not if it was you.” He narrowed his gaze on her mouth. “Why is your accent so strong?”
The sound of his voice, the leading words he’d said, made her heart lurch. She could barely stay on her feet. “Living here does that. And I’m teaching that girl to speak like a native so they won’t crucify her for being American. I’m her dialogue coach.”
Nic ran a hand across his hair, then dried it on his thigh. “Frankie said you were on a film set in Ireland. I didn’t know if that meant you were acting... Can we go somewhere to talk?”
Seriously? She bit down on her lip, shocked by how badly she wanted to go anywhere with him, but self-preservation reminded her to keep her feet on the ground. “We’re in the middle of a scene,” she pointed out with forced patience.
“Do you like this job?”
His penetrating gaze had an effect that was nothing less than cataclysmic. She had missed those blue eyes, that stern expression, the way he looked at her like he really wanted to hear what she had to say.
“I do. I get to tell people off if I think they’re pushing Milly too hard and she’s a doll. I’m not sure what will come next. Frankie’s looking into an Italian film. But for the moment I have a roof over my head.” She tried to make it sound like it was all sunshine and roses, not hinting at how badly she’d been missing him.
“About that... A roof, I mean.” He cleared his throat and his hand went into his pocket. “I’ve done a few things.” The mixture of arrogance and sheepishness in his tone made Rowan tense.
“What things?” she asked with low-voiced foreboding.
His hand came out of his pocket and he set a key next to where she was involuntarily clutching the edge of the sink. Recognition hit in stages as she processed the bronze shape, the familiarity of it, the way its sharp angles seemed worn down—and the possessive longing and sense of privilege it inspired only now, after she’d given it up.
“What—?” She couldn’t believe he’d come all this way to tell her the house was rubble. That would be too cruel.
“It’s yours, Ro.”
“Rosedale?” The magnitude of the gift was too much. She had to clap a hand to her mouth to keep her suddenly wobbling chin from falling off. At the same time the tears that filled her eyes stung with loss. She couldn’t face that big, empty house without him in it. “I can’t,” she choked.
“You’d rather I destroy it?” He reached for the key.
She was quicker, snatching it up and holding it in a protective fist against her heart, realizing when she caught the glimmer of smug satisfaction in his eye that he’d been bluffing. He was far quicker than her when he wanted to be.
“Why, Nic? Something in Olief’s will?” She couldn’t believe it.
He dismissed that with a brief movement of his head. “No, this is my decision. Olief made provision for your mother, but left everything to me. And you must have seen a copy of Cassandra’s will by now?”
Rowan hitched her shoulder, dismissing it because it was exactly as she had expected. Gowns and empty purses. Jewelry she didn’t want to sell.
“About the gowns—I’ve had emails,” she began with a concerned frown.
“I know. I’ve...done something else. I went to see your father.”
“What?” Dread poured into her, making her want to sink through the floor and disappear. One pained word came out. “Why?”
“Cassandra was meant to be taken care of, and he was still married to her. It seemed right to make sure there was something in place for him. Don’t look like that, Ro. It wasn’t bad. I liked him. I see where you get your sense of humor. And I was there first thing in the morning, so he was relatively sober,” he allowed with a diffident shrug. “I’ve purchased his building, so rent will never be a problem again, and hired a caretaker to go in every day. A man who will cook and clean and has a background in addiction rehabilitation. We had a heart-to-heart, your father and I, about losing parents and that maybe you don’t need to face that again any time soon. I don’t know if it will make a difference, but...”
“That’s incredibly generous, Nic,” she said to his shoes. “I’ll pay you back—”
He took a firm hold of her jaw, his warm thumb covering her lips to still them as he drew her face up so he could look into her eyes. The impact of his touch, his closeness, the deep eye contact was earth-shattering.
“Don’t you dare.”
“But—” She was coming apart inside, fighting the urge to shift her lips into his palm and kiss him. “I don’t want to owe you,” she whispered.
“You don’t want to be my mistress. I know that. None of this comes with a catch. I’m not trying to buy you, Rowan. I just want to know you’re looked after, not breaking your leg or—” A completely uncharacteristic agitation seemed to grip him. He took his hand from her face to rub it over his own. “I want to know you’ll be at Rosedale sometimes and I might have a shot at seeing you, that you’re not out of my life forever.”
“You want to see me?” A very fragile hope, one she’d had to tamp down on a million times, began to twine up from the depths of her heart.
He reached into his pocket, drawing out a small velvet box that he set next to the sink with almost confrontational determination. “I want to marry you.”
Rowan was so stunned she reflexively backed away until her legs hit the edge of the bench and she sat down in a clumsy heap, her head falling into her hands as she tried to deal with all he was throwing at her. The key dug into her closed fist. Too much to process. Now a ring?
“All right, just see me,” he rushed out gruffly. “That’s enough. Just be in my life, Rowan. Even if it’s like it used to be—a few times a year. Whatever you want. Just don’t make me live with this loneliness that hits every time I think of that house without you in it. I can’t go near Rosedale, but I can’t knock it down and obliterate the only good memories I have.”
“Nic...” Her voice didn’t want to work, catching and quavering in her throat while her icy fingers shook against her numb lips. Her heart pounded as though she’d been running for her life and now she was cornered. Not safe, but maybe...just maybe...
“Do you love me?” she risked.
His face tightened and started to close, but before he could withdraw into the unreachable man she could only dream of from afar Rowan threw herself at him, wrapping anxious arms around his rain-dappled coat and big, unyielding body.
“You don’t have to say it. This is enough.”
“I want to say it,” he said tightly, as though struggling with a great burden.
She squeezed him tighter. “It’s okay. It’s enough that you’re here. I love you. I always have.” Joy flooded through her as she finally admitted it to herself, to him—
Hard hands caught her upper arms and pushed her away. He held on to her, but his incredulous and furious expression scared her. “You’ve always loved me?”
Oh, she’d made a terrible, horrible miscalculation—opening her heart like this and assuming a bit of nostalgia on his part was anything like the soaring love she felt. Sickened, she could only stand there dumbfounded.
“Then why did you leave me?” he asked in a voice of abject despair.
Shock gave way to a slam of relief, followed by heart-rending regret.
“You can’t just rip a man apart like that,” he rebuked.
“But you hated me for years. You only asked me to stay as your mistress,” she reminded him with a spark of offense. Her pique crumpled as her view of a shared future with him struck a brick wall. “And since I can’t give you a baby, and you want one—”
He groaned in a release of frustration and despair, hauling her against him under his wet overcoat and into the shelter of his warmth and strength. “I have been fighting letting you under my skin every second of my life. I knew you’d destroy me if I did, and you have. I hate trying to live without you, Ro. I need you in my life. And, yes, I will always wish we could make babies together. But we’ll make our family whatever way we need to. If it’s only us, that’s enough. I love you.”
His arms crushed her, making it hard to find enough breath to talk, but she wouldn’t have it any other way. She was shaking so hard she needed him to hold her up.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you. I didn’t think I could,” she managed.