Can’t Say No

Chapter Twelve

Bree shook her head with a nervous little laugh. “First I lost my voice, and now my hearing seems to be going. I could have sworn you just said-”

“Marry me.”

Stunned, Bree tried to search his face in the dim light, but Hart’s eyes seemed to be shuttered beneath thick dark lashes. “You’re not serious,” she said.

“Of course I’m serious. You already know I love you. Whether you like it or not, you’re in love with me. I don’t really see that we have any other choice.”

“Hart.” Maybe he was joking. Of course he was joking. But being Hart, he would give her a really wretched demonstration of his sick humor when her emotions were in an upheaval and she couldn’t think straight. And that “You already know I love you” hurt. It hadn’t occurred to her before how badly she wanted to hear those words…but not said lightly, or accompanied by an offer of marriage.

Bree kicked out at the mosquito netting, and after thoroughly tangling herself in the white cloth managed to twist free and stand up. Hart bunched the cloth into a huge white pillow and leaned back against it, watching her. She couldn’t figure out the strange tension that seemed to grip his features; Hart was never tense. His voice was certainly as teasing as ever as he remarked, “You adore me, you know.”

“You’re full of peanuts. And-among other things-you just spent an entire dinner totally absorbed in another woman. Not to mention the beauties I saw bustling around your place like a harem of slaves.”

Astonishment shone from his eyes. “What on earth are you talking about? What harem?”

“Hart,” Bree said lowly, “you’ve had more women helping you fix up your place than a hive has hornets, and most of them looked like jailbait.”

A faint smile creased his cheeks. “Because they are.”

“Wonderful.”

“Reninger has six granddaughters. I told you about him-the man I went to dinner with, the night we…uh-”

“I remember,” she said stiffly.

“They’ve been friends of the family for years. I always see them when I’m on vacation.” He added mildly, “I diapered most of the girls a few years back.”

“They certainly haven’t needed that recently.”

“Beauties,” Hart agreed. “The two oldest are twins, seventeen, and they both definitely fill out a bikini. Nubile or not, I usually manage to control myself where children are concerned. And hard as it is to believe, I’m just too old to take on two at a time, much less six. Because most of the time they come en masse-”

“All right, Hart.” Bree could feel a flush of embarrassment heating her cheeks.

“Actually, they always help me set up house when I come here on vacation. And my mom usually houses the whole Reninger troop for a few weeks in August-”

“I get the picture,” Bree muttered uncomfortably.

“Sure?” Hart asked dryly.

“Very sure.”

“And as for my absorption in Marie over dinner, my sweet nitwit, I wouldn’t have had to pump her if you’d been a little less stingy talking about yourself. Getting information out of you is like pumping a dry well. But if you read any more than that into the attention I gave Marie, I’m going to be insulted. I happen to have,” he informed her, “much better taste in women.”

He didn’t give her much chance to answer before his tone changed. The lightness was suddenly gone, and his eyes held a quiet watchfulness as his finger traced her cheek. “Bree,” he said quietly, “you persist in imagining racy scenes in my background. I’m not saying I haven’t been around, but fidelity happens to be one of those old-fashioned values I could never quite shake. You’ll be stuck keeping me happy, honey, don’t doubt it. And I certainly don’t plan on giving you any reason to look elsewhere for someone to keep you satisfied in bed.”

Flushed and nervous, Bree raked a hand through her hair. She suddenly knew he was serious, and the old Bree sneaked to the surface, the Bree who was terribly afraid of foundering in unfamiliar waters. “Hart,” she said haltingly, “you don’t marry someone just because you love them. There have to be other reasons. Sane, rational reasons. Sensible reasons.”

He was silent.

“We argue all the time,” she reminded him.

He said nothing.

“We haven’t known each other very long. We don’t have anything in common. I don’t even know where we’d live!”

Still he said nothing.

“And my life is a mess-haven’t you been listening? I-”

“Yes, I’ve been listening,” Hart interrupted quietly, “but I’ve never seen your life as a mess, Bree. All I saw was that you’d taken a turn you didn’t like and were backtracking toward a different path. Perhaps,” he added lightly, “I misunderstood a great deal. Because I never much gave a damn where we’d live. Or about ‘sane, rational reasons,’ either.” He sat up, ducking his head for a moment, and when he raised it there was a lazy grin on his face, typically Hart, swiftly erasing any hint of an earlier emotional turmoil. “You can put your smile back on, red. Nobody’s upset. And anyway,” he said firmly, “it’s time for breakfast.”

He pulled her to her feet, and for a moment Bree stood absolutely still. Then she reached for her jeans and tennis shoes. She’d hurt him. She’d rather break all four limbs than ever hurt Hart. She’d never meant to be insensitive; she’d tried to treat the subject of marriage lightly because Hart treated everything lightly…but not this. She could see from the quickly masked vulnerability in his eyes that he’d simply known no other way to ask her…or that maybe she’d never given him much of a chance.

“Corn Flakes at your place or mine?” Hart’s teasing grin was the same, only his eyes looked different. Hollow and weary.

“Hart-”

“Yours. Then you’ll get stuck with the cleanup. Come on, lady.” He gathered up her sleeping bag and the netting, motioned her to hurry up tying her shoes and then flung an arm loosely across her shoulders as they started from the woods, all devil-may-care. “We’re going to make wine today,” he said swiftly.

“Wine?” There was such a huge lump in her throat that she could barely talk. Her hands were trembling. Hart loved her. Could he really? He’d already dropped the subject as if it had never been mentioned. Bree didn’t want to drop it, but she didn’t have the least idea how to reopen the door she’d just closed in his face.

Hart stopped to turn and chuck her under the chin. Very gravely, he turned up one corner of her mouth and then the other as if he could order up a smile. “Cherry wine,” he continued. “There’s no reason to look all upset. We’re going to have a very good time. I picked up an antique press a few days ago, and I want to put it to use.”

Bree surfaced, forcing the smile he was so insistent she wear. She searched his eyes and found there only a shuttered determination that she didn’t know how to handle. Vaguely, her mind registered what he’d been talking about. “Hart, don’t be an idiot. Where on earth are you going to find cherries at this time of year?”

“I’ll get the cherries. And the sugar and the yeast. All you have to do is provide the brawn, honey.”

He wasn’t joking. Three hours later, Bree’s yard looked like a winery. A sticky winery. Hart had brought down two lawn chairs from his place. And two wooden barrels. And a hundred pounds of cherries.

The wine press stood in the center of the mess, an innocent-looking contraption. One poured a bowl of cherries into the machine and turned the crank, and voilà, cherry juice was supposed to stream out into the waiting sterile bowl, and the pits and cherry skins were all supposed to remain inside.

It wasn’t working. The pits and cherries remained inside, just as the cherry-press inventor had intended. But most of the cherry juice, as far as Bree could tell, was all over her. Wearing a fresh pair of white jeans-definitely a foolish choice of attire-and black halter top, she whipped back her hair with the side of her wrist and glared at Hart.

“How did you miraculously produce that clean white shirt?”

He grinned at her, his fingers still buttoning the shirt. “I picked up a pile of shirts from the local laundry yesterday, and left them in my car. And since the other shirt seemed to be a little sticky-”

“Very little,” Bree said ominously.

“You’re obviously much better at this than I am.”

“The question is how I let you talk me into this to begin with.”

“I must have asked you real nice?” Hart peered down into the bowl, batting aimlessly at a few buzzing bees that had grown interested in the sweet project. “Think of the delicious brew we’ll have later on,” he coaxed. “Look, I’ll take another turn-”

“You will not.” The last time he’d had a round at the cranking job, cherry juice had ended up all over the lawn. He’d been banished to the lawn chair. Wearing a pair of cutoffs and now a fresh white shirt, he barely looked as though he’d been in the first skirmish, much less the war.

“Bree-”

She gave him a suspicious look. The last of three. It would be just like him to act useless just to get out of doing any serious work. She knew Hart.

And her heart was so damned full of love for him that she was very close to crying, and had been all day. Hart would get her involved in some asinine activity simply to get her mind off her troubles. He’d done it before. She was only beginning to realize how often. “Take off your shirt,” she ordered briskly.

“My shirt? Why?”

“Just give it here. This isn’t working. We’ve used fifty pounds of cherries, and at best, we’ve got a cup of potential wine. If you’re going to do something old-fashioned, Hart, you’ve got to do it right. Strip,” she ordered flatly.

“Honey, if you’re in the mood, all you have to do is say so.” Slowly, Hart unbuttoned his shirt, grinning at her.

“Dream on.” He was going too slowly; she positioned herself in front of him and unbuttoned the shirt herself. The last button didn’t want to undo, probably because her heart had decided to suddenly go manic. His denim cutoffs were so old they were more white than blue; they fit snugly on his hips and snugly on the…front of him. Sunlight climbed all over his chest. That close, Hart smelled like Hart, that definitive man smell, creating wanton thoughts and vagrant wishes and a bold, blatant ache in Bree that utterly, totally distracted her.

Hart’s fingers abruptly tickled under her chin. “You want me to lick off all that cherry juice?” he murmured. “I’ll bet you have it all over you, Bree. It’s dribbled down your shirt-”

She flushed. “It hasn’t either.” Her fingers all but tore the shirt from his shoulders. “Now, into the cabin you go. I want clean feet. Sterile feet. And bring out the big flat pan in the cupboard by the stove. We’re going to crush the cherries the French way, Mr. Manning-”

It was her turn to sit back in the lawn chair with a glass of lemonade. She wrapped some cherries in the clean white shirt; Hart’s job was to stomp them until he’d squeezed the juice out into the pan.

“If you don’t stop laughing-” he warned.

She couldn’t stop. She wasn’t in the mood to laugh; she was still in the mood to cry, but he looked so silly. He started to whistle the theme from Zorba the Greek, and that didn’t help. Nothing helped. She felt her mood lighten in spite of herself. She kept watching Hart for the least sign that he was upset or even that he was willing to talk again, but the minute he felt her eyes on him he’d say something insulting, and then she’d insult him back, and then they’d be laughing again…

It was an hour later before they had enough cherry juice to pour into the crocks, and then it was simply a matter of adding sugar and yeast. Except that Hart poured in too much sugar. Bree stood back for the torrent of muttered four-letter words that followed.

“Which couldn’t matter less,” she scolded him. “You don’t think anyone would be crazy enough to drink this?”

“I’ve got news. You’re drinking at least half,” Hart said flatly.

“Only if there’s a hospital nearby.”

“Look, the brewing process will destroy any germs-”

“Hart. There are undoubtedly creatures in that juice. We’ve drawn every insect from at least five hundred miles around. Between your feet and the bugs-”

“I suppose you think my feet will add an unpleasant taste?”

Hart sounded injured. Bree felt injured. Her cranking shoulder felt like a candidate for a sling; she was so physically tired she was dizzy-how many years was it since she’d had a full night’s sleep, anyway?-and somewhere deep inside her, there was another ache.

Laughter suddenly died, for no reason at all. She lifted her head, and suddenly Hart’s eyes were there, as midnight-blue as when she’d first seen them, but different. Love was there. Hurt was there. A depth, an enigmatic softness, a blue sky turned into night.

And he was looking back at her. She could almost see what he did, an utterly bedraggled woman without makeup, cherry juice on her nose, a halter top clinging to her, red hair flowing in a curling tangle all around her. She had to have circles under her eyes…but she felt beautiful, the way he looked at her. So incredibly beautiful…

She wrenched her eyes away from his only because she heard a car, and even then the station wagon had pulled into the yard before she turned around.

The station wagon was familiar. So was the man who stepped out of it. Tall, dark and attractive, he was dressed in a conservative summer-weight suit, his shirt crisp. He peeled off his sunglasses when he spotted her. “Bree?” He sounded unsure as he gave the bedraggled lady in the yard a quick once-over.

Helplessly, Bree whipped her gaze back to Hart, who had stood up. For a moment, he just looked weary, and then he turned an ironic smile on Bree. “Don’t tell me,” he said dryly. “The fiancé. I should have known the troops wouldn’t stop with just two visits. The last of the battalion arriveth to take you back to sanity, is that it, Bree? And doesn’t he look nice.” Hart cast him another look. “A little tame for you, I would think, but still true-blue dependable.”

Bree cast him a desperately unhappy look. “I broke my engagement, Hart. Before I met you. And I didn’t ask him here-”

Hart wasn’t paying attention. He was striding past her with an arm extended. Richard, to give him credit, didn’t blink an eye at the sticky handshake, just offered Hart and then Bree a rather bewildered smile.

“Darling? I barely recognized you…”

Darling, nothing. Richard, would you please go away? Bree’s heart moaned, but Hart was gathering up his shoes, picking up the mosquito netting from beside the chair. There was an I’ve-had-it air about him that frightened Bree.

“Bree? You’re all right? You’re talking now? Your parents said-”

“I’m fine. I…Just a minute, would you?” Bree’s eyes zipped away from Richard back to Hart. Dammit, he was striding out of the yard without another word. At a dead run, she caught up with him, snatching at his arm.

“Just wait a minute,” she said heatedly.

Something was wrong with Hart’s expression. The warmth was gone, replaced by a coolness that seemed impenetrable. He unhooked her hand from his arm and very softly brushed back a wisp of hair from her cheek. “There’s nothing to wait for, Bree. There-” he cocked his head in Richard’s direction “-is sane, rational marriage material if I’ve ever seen it. Exactly what I think you’re looking for, honey. You’d better think things over pretty damn carefully before you reject him again.”

“I-”

But Hart was heading for the woods, and Richard was coming toward her with a boyishly embarrassed expression.

“Bree? Did I interrupt something?”

Richard was attractive and kind and intelligent and good-natured. But at times he could be remarkably obtuse.

“The minute your parents told me you’d regained your speech, there was no question I was coming down. I never really believed you meant to end our engagement, Bree. You weren’t yourself. Here, darling…”

Richard forked a sliver of prime rib onto her place, smiling at her. Moments before, he’d stolen a chunk of the veal cutlet she hadn’t touched so far. It was an old habit between them, tasting each other’s dinners when they were out. The kind of habit that defines the intimacy between two people.

Once upon a time, she’d thought those little habits could sustain the relationship. She picked at her food; there was very little point in eating it, since each bite made her ill. She hadn’t felt she had any choice but to accept Richard’s invitation to dinner; he’d meant too much to her, once upon a time, and like Marie, he’d come a very long distance to see her.

And Hart’s cutting sarcasm had hurt. Richard wasn’t “nice” as in boring; he was “nice” as in a very good man. As the waitress cleared the table and poured coffee, he smiled at her across the table. The smile was an affectionate, don’t-worry, everything’s-going-to-be-fine smile. Richard was not only a good man; he was soothing to be around and always had been. Totally unlike Hart.

“Your vacation’s done you good, Bree,” Richard said quietly. “You’re brown, and you don’t look nearly so tired.”

“Thank you.” Bree carefully stirred two spoonfuls of sugar into her coffee and then stared down at it. She never took sugar. Taking a breath, she faced Richard’s soft brown eyes. “I wish you had told me ahead of time that you were coming-”

“I could have called,” he agreed. “But I was eager to see you. I don’t want to push you into anything, Bree, but I came to return something to you.” He took a small, square box from his pocket and set it gently on the table.

Bree recognized the ring box and remembered well the night he’d given it to her. He’d been so terribly nervous; Richard abhorred emotional scenes, and she’d tried to make it easier for him. He’d set it up with champagne and soft lights, and she’d felt like saying no such fuss was necessary. They’d both known where the relationship was going; both had cautiously tested the way for months. They’d discussed their favorite foods, their common interests, how many children they wanted, what kind of house they wanted to live in.

She remembered that strange instant of panic when she’d first opened the box to that diamond solitaire, all alone in its fourteen-karat-gold setting. She’d felt the crazy sensation that she was pinning herself down to a lifetime of being alone in a misleadingly safe and beautiful setting, but she’d pushed the sensation aside and kissed him.

But that was how she’d looked at things then. Safety had seemed so important. One didn’t make major decisions about one’s life based on crazy, wild, romantic, combustible feelings…

Dammit. What was Hart doing now?

“Darling?” Richard’s voice was coaxing, very gentle.

Bree felt like brushing back that shock of dark hair from his forehead as she would for a child. “I can’t take the ring back,” she said softly. “It’s not because I don’t care for you. I always did and I always will, and I wish you the absolute best. But it wouldn’t work, Richard, not the right way. I really can’t be the wife you truly want-”

“Of course you can.” Richard leaned forward, his dark eyes as soft as a spaniel’s. “Please, Bree. Listen to me. We have absolutely everything in common. I tried to understand your wanting a period of time alone down here-and I’ll still try to understand, if you want more time to yourself. I waited to come because I didn’t want to upset or push you, but if you want me to wait a little longer…”

No, Bree thought wretchedly. You dear man, you would never have pushed me.

Richard would have let her go on not talking; Richard would have agreed to a vacation in the Arctic if she’d asked; Richard would have let her hibernate for a year if she’d wanted to. Richard didn’t like arguments and had always had the endearing quality of wanting to please. So unlike Hart. Hart took hearts and shredded them up in his free time. And if she’d tried an itty-bitty hibernating nap with Hart, he’d have kicked her out of bed…well, maybe not bed…but he’d certainly have shouted at her to get on with her life. There was just no rest with Hart. He was unsettling and upsetting…

And she was in a terrible hurry to get back to him.

Bree gently pushed the ring box toward Richard, hating the hurt in his eyes, hating herself for being the cause of it. “Time won’t change things,” she said gently. “Please accept that. I can’t take it back, Richard, and I’m terribly sorry I’ve hurt you-”

“Now, Bree. Let’s talk about this,” he insisted.

One of Richard’s few faults was that he had such a thick skin. Helplessly, Bree watched the waitress serve a second cup of coffee and then a third. Richard started to talk computers, knowing from time-honored habit that shop talk inevitably calmed her down.

She tried to listen, feeling she owed him that much. She tried to smile, and her mind tried frantically to stop thinking about Hart. It didn’t work. The only thing in her head was how he’d walked off in such a final way. Maybe he was packing to leave now. It was like him, to sever a relationship as quickly as he’d established it. He wasn’t a patient man. He was an irrational man, with a thousand really maddening qualities. He expected people to change overnight. He had no tolerance at all for people who didn’t shout about what they wanted from life, who didn’t go after it, who didn’t run full speed after what made them happy…

“…I can understand your not wanting to work with Marie. I always thought she gave you the short end of the stick, Bree. There’s an opening in the company I work for. I know I could get you in, and-”

“Richard?” Bree interrupted quietly. She looked him square in the eye, stopped trying to smile and took a deep breath. Being nice was so much…nicer. It was just a pity that being nice didn’t always work. “No,” she said simply.

Silence echoed across the table for a good sixty seconds. Bree finally broke it by reaching down to pick up her purse.