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“Lane,” Patrick said sternly. It was totally clear that his sister was warning Darcy off, even though he knew that Darcy didn’t need any warning because she wasn’t interested.

  “I didn’t mean that you would leave Darcy high and dry,” his youngest sister reasoned. “Because, of course, she’ll go directly from here right to another job, right?”

  He didn’t answer at first. It occurred to him how quickly time was flying by.

  Amy and Cara came closer. Patrick noticed that Lane was tugging at a strand of hair. It was an old habit and a sure sign of a guilty conscience. “I mean, you’ll make sure Darcy has a good place to go, won’t you, Patrick?” she asked.

  “Because you always taught us that we needed to care for our employees’ feelings,” Cara cut in.

  “And we know that you’ve already found at least temporary jobs for everyone else who’ll be left with nothing to do when you’re gone,” Amy added.

  “Darcy, I apologize,” Lane said. “Those things I said—that was mean of me and…not okay. I didn’t mean to be so flippant. But I naturally thought that Patrick would—”

  “She’ll have the best,” Patrick finally said. “I promise you that. I look after my own.” But, of course, she wasn’t his own, he thought as he carried his nephews into the house, fed them there and kept them there. He didn’t want to leave Darcy alone with his sisters, but he couldn’t bear to see how torn up she was when the boys were around.

  His sisters did have a way of blurting out whatever was on their minds. Almost as much as Darcy did.

  Maybe he should have asked them to find out if she was falling in love with Jared.

  But maybe he didn’t actually want to know that.

  “These muffins are decadent, Darcy,” Amy told her. “I—I apologize, too. We’ve been rude. Thoughtless. It’s just that…”

  Darcy turned to face Patrick’s middle sister. “Thank you for the compliment. And don’t worry. I know you’re concerned that I might have some sort of crush on Patrick, but that’s not going to be a problem.”

  Amy blushed.

  Cara rushed forward. “What Amy meant was, yes, we’re concerned about Patrick, but not in the way you think. He gave up so much for us and never, ever made us feel that he was sacrificing his happiness, not even when he got called home from the prom because one of us had gotten in trouble. But we knew he had to want more. Now he can have more, but…we’re also worried that without at least one of us to fuss over, he’ll be lonely. And we have female friends—not just Angelise, but others, too, who’ve been waiting for the chance to date Patrick. We’ve been making plans and—”

  And. Cara didn’t have to say more. Darcy Parrish hadn’t been in the plans. She almost wanted to laugh. Wasn’t that just the very thing that had tripped her up all her life? Either she hadn’t been in someone else’s plans and had messed with their situation, or life had thrown her a curve that hadn’t been in her plans. But that had to change. She didn’t want to be remembered as a negative in Patrick’s life, someone who showed up at the wrong time and messed things up for him and kept him from meeting the perfect woman.

  Heaven knew she wasn’t the perfect woman, and by perfect Darcy wasn’t thinking about her legs. She was thinking about those two little boys and how right they had looked snuggled up in Patrick’s arms, how he should have some children of his own to cuddle and spoil and raise and love. Her heart hurt at the thought.

  Slowly she shook her head. “You don’t have to worry. I’m not going to have a romantic entanglement with your brother,” she said quietly.

  The three of them nodded, though guilt still seemed to register in their eyes. They ate their breakfast in silence, then picked up their plates, said a subdued goodbye to Darcy and walked toward the house. As they neared the graceful white building, Darcy thought she heard them rattling off names of women.

  Five minutes later, Patrick came out to where she was cleaning up the area. “I was just going to call Peter to help me get all this inside,” she said.

  “Will I do, instead?”

  She looked up into those compelling green eyes. Yes, he would do, a small, wistful voice inside her shouted. He was the kind of man that every girl dreamed of, wasn’t he? Even smart-mouthed girls from the wrong side of the tracks who couldn’t possibly ever have someone like this?

  “I don’t know,” she said, pasting on a grin to lighten the mood and hide her wistfulness. “Let me see your muscles.”

  Patrick raised a brow. He turned and struck a mocking pose. It was meant to be silly, but oh, he did have a fantastic set of muscles.

  “Okay, I think you can handle a few utensils. At least light ones,” she teased, hoping she didn’t sound breathless.

  “Yes, but the question is can I handle you?” he asked as they gathered some of the gear and headed toward the house.

  “Handle me?” Darcy hoped she didn’t sound breathless.

  “Able House. What’s going on there? I meant to talk to you earlier but I didn’t want to have this conversation in front of my sisters. The thing is that when I showed up at Able House yesterday I could tell that something was wrong. People kept looking at me and whispering, but when I asked them to tell me what was happening, no one would say anything. Eventually I heard someone whisper your name, but by then I knew trying to get information from them wasn’t going to work. So, I’m taking my questions straight to the source. What’s going on with you, Darcy?” They had entered the house and he had put the things he’d been carrying down. He leaned closer.

  She stopped breathing. What was going on with her? Him. This. This ridiculous, silly, unacceptable longing she felt whenever he got too close. After she’d just told his sisters—

  “Nothing’s going on with me,” she said solemnly. And she meant it. She willed it to be true.

  “Then what’s wrong at Able House?”

  Darcy considered ignoring the question or lying, but now that he had asked her directly…

  “Tell me,” he said, his voice a rough whisper. “I can help. I’ll try to help.”

  “No, you can’t, Patrick. You can’t fix everything for us. You’ve done so much, but…”

  Darcy flung her arm out. “You can’t make everything right for us. All of us know that. Some battles can’t be won. We know it. We live it, and…we’re so incredibly grateful to you for what you’re doing, but…”

  “I don’t want your gratitude,” he said, his voice low and dark and husky.

  “But you have it,” she told him. “I can’t stop that.”

  He was close now. So very close.

  “I hate it that someone might have wronged you in a neighborhood where I set you up.”

  “It’s just one or two people.”

  “But it wouldn’t have happened somewhere else.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I think I do. I’ve lived here all my life. There are always a few people who don’t like young children or dogs that don’t have pure enough bloodlines or—”

  He didn’t have to finish. There were two neighbors who just weren’t happy about Able House and probably never would be.

  “I’ll talk to them again,” he said. And he would come away frustrated and feeling guilty, because Darcy knew the kind of person they were dealing with. She’d dealt with them in that school and on her job from time to time. She’d seen the lack of acceptance in her former fiancé’s expression.

  “Don’t do it,” she said, reaching out to catch Patrick’s wrist. “It just isn’t worth it.”

  “Darcy.”

  “Promise me,” she said.

  He stared into her eyes for so long that she was afraid she would lean toward him, signal him, show him how drawn to him she was.

  Instead he looked down to where she clasped his wrist. He covered her hand with his, turning her hand so that her palm was up. Then he brought her hand to his lips and kissed that most sensitive center of her palm.

  Desire shot through her so fast she couldn’t contain i
t.

  He kissed her palm again, his lips soft and warm.

  “Don’t let me do more than this,” he said. “I want to kiss you, but if you tell me no, I won’t.”

  Darcy sat there just a breath away from Patrick. He had replaced his lips with his thumb and was tracing long, slow circles on her skin. She could barely sit still, could barely keep from moaning.

  When more seconds than she could count had passed and she still hadn’t spoken, he turned to her, leaned toward her. His lips were close. If she leaned forward just slightly, she would be against him. She could kiss him, feel him, feel right.

  “Tell me no,” he told her again.

  She reached up and threaded her fingers through his hair. “No,” she said, even as she pulled him down to her and touched her lips to his.

  She kissed him greedily, tasted him, savored him.

  He didn’t touch her. Only a low growl escaped him, but his body was rigid, hot, tense.

  Darcy kissed him again. She wanted more. She wanted…she wanted…

  “Please,” she said. “Please, yes. Just one kiss.”

  “Thank you,” he said on a groan and pulled her to him. He dropped to his knees so that he was slightly below her and he nuzzled his mouth against hers. Then he covered her more fully, licking at the seam of her mouth, exploring her carefully, hotly. He was making her insane.

  He cupped her face in his palms and replaced his lips with his thumb, discovering the shape of her mouth, making her shiver with his light, teasing touch. His hand drifted lower, to her chin, her throat. Wherever he touched, he followed up with a trail of kisses that left her aching for more.

  “I—Patrick—I—”

  “I love the way the scent of cinnamon and vanilla clings to your skin. I want to breathe you in. Deeply. You make me want things,” he whispered against her skin. “Things I didn’t even know I wanted before. And I know I should stay away. I want to stay away, but—”

  As he spoke, his lips continued on their fiery path until his mouth was against that oh-so-sensitive line where her injury had occurred, where sensation was always more intense, a line of demarcation that—

  Patrick kissed her there and Darcy’s mind went blank, then turned hot, needy and—

  Oh, he’d just said that he wanted to stay away. She’d just promised his sisters that she wouldn’t do this, want this, be this way and yet…

  Patrick kissed her, his touch shaking her to the core.

  His sisters would bring other women. Angelise. More. He would do this with them, too, she thought and knew that it was true.

  Something broke inside her. Something hurt. What was she doing? “No more.”

  Her voice barely ranked as a whisper, the sound was so soft, but Patrick stopped. Immediately. He was breathing hard, his green eyes were glazed with desire so heated that Darcy could barely look for fear she’d reach out and grab him again, but he stopped. Completely.

  “We can’t,” she said, biting at her lip. “I’m sorry. I keep doing this, but—I have to be whole when this is over. So do you. And you—I—this might leave a scar, unfinished business. I don’t want any unfinished business in my life. It’s more than I can handle.”

  Slowly he nodded. He reached out and gently righted her clothes, even though she hadn’t registered till now just how disheveled she was.

  “I’ll try not to let this happen again,” he said, “but you must know by now that you have a tendency to make me lose my self-control.”

  “You might have noticed that I was the one who grabbed you.”

  “But you didn’t want to.”

  “No.”

  “As I said, I’ll try to make sure it doesn’t happen again.” Just as if he could control the whole thing. And maybe he could. He’d been put in charge of the care and feeding and rearing of three sisters when he’d only been nineteen. Control had been a part of his life for so many years.

  And wasn’t that part of what his trip was about? Do some good, do some business and let loose of all that stunning control?

  Yet, here he was, promising her that he would take care of things once again. He would police himself and her as well. And he would take the blame if anything went awry.

  His sisters were right. Entirely right. He needed lightness and fun and a woman who wasn’t going to always be making him feel the heavy responsibility of maintaining control. With the right kind of woman, he could let loose. He could give one hundred percent and he could be happy.

  “You don’t have to make sure it won’t happen. I’ll do that,” she said.

  He had risen and the quick frown he cast her way, the rigid line of his jaw, didn’t bode well for her power grab. She needed a distraction, a change of topic.

  “Got to go.”

  “We’re not done yet, Darcy. Things aren’t settled.”

  “Yes. They are. And I have to figure out what treat I’m making for that benefit for the children tomorrow. No time to waste. I’ve got lots of work to do. Things to decide. Supplies to purchase.”

  He let her flutter a bit. Then he stared her down until she stopped.

  “It wasn’t a whim,” he told her. “Not something I do lightly. I want you to know that.”

  She didn’t want to know that. She didn’t want to think about it. Thinking meant longing, and longing meant admitting that he was just one more thing she couldn’t have. No, not that. Not just. He was so much more than just one more thing. He was major.

  “If things were different. If I weren’t your benefactor and if—”

  Darcy let out a small, fierce cry. She reached up as if to press her fingertips over his lips. No, she so didn’t want to hear that. If things were different and they tried to make this something more than it could ever be, then…

  I’d be another responsibility to him, she thought. He would never have that carefree time he craved and needed. He would never have that easy fling with a woman, because much as she liked herself, Darcy knew that nothing about her was easy.

  “Things aren’t different,” she said carefully, trying not to look too deeply into his eyes. Then, as quickly as she could go, she escaped.

  A part of her wished that he would follow her, but he didn’t. And she knew that it was for the best. Sometimes doing the right thing felt…wrong. This business of training herself not to want Patrick’s touch was going to take some time.

  The next time Darcy saw Patrick was the next day when he came to load his van and take her to the fund-raiser.

  “Have you spoken to Eleanor?” she asked, trying for some light conversation.

  “Yes. An hour ago.”

  “Oh, things must be taking off, then.”

  “Yes, I think so. She did tell me to let you know that a few more children than she had originally told you about had been added.”

  Was that an evasive look on his face?

  “Oh,” she said. “How many more will there be?”

  For a second Patrick looked uncomfortable. “Let’s just say that Eleanor was a bit distraught and Eleanor is pretty much unflappable.”

  Darcy felt panic creeping through her chest. “So…how many exactly did you say?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “I know. Patrick,” she drawled, trying to look stern.

  “Let’s just say…too many.”

  The panic grew. She gave him an exasperated look. “Let’s just be really exact. I need to know if I have enough supplies and if I made enough to go around.”

  Patrick swore beneath his breath. “All right. I was trying to save you from panic. Fifty more.”

  Fifty? There had already been two hundred on the original list, and—

  “Okay. All right. I can handle that many,” Darcy said, trying to convince herself. “I’m not panicking.”

  Liar. Panic was beating at her like a bird’s frantic wings. It was speeding up, taking over. What was she going to do about that?

  “Okay, let’s see. Well, fifty more? Hmm, Patrick, I’m definitely going to go throw up
now. You might not want to stick around for this. I can guarantee that it won’t be pretty.”

  And just like that, he was on his knees in front of her, smiling up into her face. “I’ll help you,” he said. “I’ll stay beside you all the way. You’re going to be so great. They’ll absolutely love you.”

  “You’re a very brave man kneeling in front of a woman who just told you she was going to be sick.”

  “Well, what can I tell you?” he asked with a wink as he rose. “I’m a risk-taker.”

  He was. She knew that. She knew about the skateboarding and the bungee jumping and the skydiving. He loved the challenge.

  And she was not a risk-taker. She might have a smart mouth, but that was all a self-defense move, a mask to hide behind. She admitted it, and Patrick probably knew it as well.

  He also knew something else. He knew how to distract a woman perfectly. She was no longer feeling sick or worrying about how she was going to come through for two hundred fifty children.

  Instead she was worrying about how she was going to manage to get through the afternoon. Patrick had said he was going to be beside her the whole way.

  Darcy pressed her palms over her chest and concentrated on breathing in and out. And she began to count to two hundred fifty. By the time she reached that magic number, she was hoping common sense would have returned and her panic would have subsided.

  There was, after all, nothing to worry about. This was a totally public event. She wasn’t going to drag Patrick down and kiss him again. What could possibly happen?

  CHAPTER NINE

  DARCY was amazing, Patrick thought, watching her at work. The fund-raiser was in a big, beautiful new building and she was closed up in the kitchen, secluded from the area where hundreds of children had gathered. Eleanor had been more than willing to transfer this to a venue with an open-air kitchen so everyone could watch Darcy work her magic. Instead this place was totally utilitarian and sterile, and probably most people would have found the setup a bit boring. Demanding. Not at all fun or energizing. But Darcy was glowing.

  Just an hour earlier, the countertops had been groaning beneath the weight of what had seemed like thousands of finger sandwiches decorated with colorful cream cheese frostings, various pitchers of pink and green and blue smoothies and fruit cups topped off with whipped cream and star sprinkles. There had been home-baked potato chips and a dinosaur centerpiece surrounded by a wall of cheese cubes.