Johanna Lindsey - Angel

“You know I’ll have to wait again now, before I can get a divorce.”

His shoulders moved in a slight shrug. “What’s another month?”

He wanted the divorce. How dared he sound indifferent about when they got it?

But he wasn’t finished. “Why didn’t you start the process already?”

“I’ve been too busy.”

He turned to look at her then. “Too busy to sever our ties? You should have found the time, honey. Leaving me with rights that I can’t resist taking isn’t doing either one of us any good.”

Now he sounded annoyed. Cassie grew defensive. “What are you doing here, Angel?”

“Now, that was going to be my question,” he replied. “Why aren’t you home by now, tucked away on your ranch where I can’t get to you?”

He’d managed to “get” to her tonight, which reminded her. “And that’s another thing. Just how did you get in my room tonight?”

“I get my answers first, Cassie.”

“Why?”

“Because last I looked, I was bigger and stronger than you — and the husband always gets his answers first.”

He sounded altogether too smug for her to take that lying down. “Where’d you hear that nonsense?”

“You mean it isn’t true?”

“Not in any family I know of, but particularly not in mine.”

“You’re talking about your mama, but you’re nothing like her.”

“I can be if I put my mind to it.”

His answer was a doubting grin and a finger that came over to flick at her nose. “Your lying hasn’t improved lately, has it?”

Cassie gritted her teeth. “You’ve only seen me dealing with people I’ve wronged. You haven’t seen me deal with people who wrong me.”

“Like me, Cassie?” he asked softly.

She could feel the heat climbing up her cheeks. “If I’d felt you wronged me, Angel, I would have done something about it.”

“Like what?”

“You wouldn’t like my spur-of-the-moment answer, so give me a minute to think about it.”

He laughed. “I’ll concede you think you can be as formidable as your mama, so we’ll go by stubbornness instead. I can outwait you, honey, right up until your mama comes knocking on the door.”

She opened her mouth to call his bluff, but on second thought, she decided she’d better not. She didn’t want to see him and her mama squaring off again if she could help it, and he was just stubborn enough to let it happen.

“What was that question you wanted answered?” she asked with ill grace.

His expression changed abruptly, all playfulness gone. “Why aren’t you home where you belong?”

“When my mama wants to go shopping, we go shopping,” she explained with a shrug.

“In the dead of winter?”

“She figured since we were already a long way from home, a little detour wouldn’t hurt.”

“And St. Louis was her choice?”

“No, it was mine.”

“That’s what I figured. So what I want to know is, how’d I get put at the top of your meddling list?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked cautiously.

“You know exactly what I mean.”

She sat up, her eyes widening incredulously. He couldn’t know. It simply wasn’t possible…

“How did you find out?”

“Your detective figured I could supply him with more facts than you did, so he paid me a visit tonight.”

“The man is absolutely amazing,” she remarked in awe. “To locate you in a city this size, when he didn’t even know you were here—”

“He knew,” Angel cut in sourly. “We came in on the same train.”

“Oh,” she said, a bit deflated. “Well, still—”

“Forget ‘still,’ ” Angel interrupted curtly. “Whaf d you hire him for, Cassie?”

“Because I didn’t think you’d make the effort again to find your folks yourself.”

“You don’t owe me any favors.”

“I figured I did.”

“How’s that?” he demanded. “Or are you forgetting what I took from you?”

“No,” she said quietly, her cheeks hot again. “But you aren’t aware what you did for my parents. They called a truce of sorts that night you locked them in the barn — at least, they’re talking to each other again.”

Angel snorted. Belaboring who owed whom was pointless. “Let me put it this way, Cassie. I don’t want you hiring detectives on my behalf, so I took the liberty of firing Kirby on your behalf.”

She took exception to that. “Now what�d you do that for? Don’t you want to find your folks?”

“I only want to know who they were. That’s why I’m here. But I’ll be the one to find that out. You got that?”

“But Mr. Kirby can help.”

“I’ll give you that much, which is why he works for me now, not you.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I don’t think I like your high-handedness one little bit, Angel.”

“Too bad.”

“And what do you mean, you only want to know who they were? You are going to go and see them, aren’t you, when you find out where they are?”

“No.”

That answer so surprised her, her irritation with him dissolved instantly. “Why not?”

“Because we’re nothing but strangers. I don’t remember my father. I barely remember my mother. I doubt I’d even recognize her. And it’s not as if she raised me.”

“She nurtured you for five or six years.”

“And then lost me.”

She heard the bitterness, loud and clear. “You blame her for that? That old man took you up in the mountains where no one could find you. Your mama was probably out of her mind with grief—”

“You don’t know—”

“Neither do you,” she interrupted in return. “So find out. What can it hurt? At least let her know you didn’t die all those years ago. More than likely that’s what she ended up thinking.”

“You’re meddling again, Cassie,” he said in sharp warning. “This isn’t your concern.”

“You’re absolutely right,” she replied stiffly, her irritation back in full force. “And this isn’t your bedroom, so why don’t you get out of it?”

“Finally a suggestion I can happily agree with,” he shot back angrily as he threw off the covers and grabbed his pants from the floor. “And let me give you one in return. Get your butt home if you don’t want me using the spare key I have to this room again.”

“I’ll be gone by morning,” Cassie assured him.

“It is morning.”

“Then by afternoon.”

“Good!” he said, and leaned over to give her a hard, unexpected kiss before he swept up the rest of his things and was gone.

Cassie stared at the black bandana he’d missed in his rush to get out of there because it was half covered by the blanket. She reached down for it and raised it to her lips, still moist from his.

She’d made him angry again, though that was nothing new. For some reason, they seemed destined to part that way. So why the kiss this time, as angry as he’d been? He’d done it without thought, like a longtime habit — like he couldn’t help himself. For the life of her, she couldn’t figure him out.

Their baggage came down first and was taken out to the coach waiting to take them to the train station. Angel only made note of it because he was watching for their departure. Five minutes later, Cassie and her mother descended the stairs and went straight to the front desk to settle their bill. The mother looked like she’d take anyone’s head off who looked at her wrong. Cassie didn’t look too friendly herself. But Angel wasn’t planning on approaching them. He’d just wanted to make sure they were leaving today.

He’d waited nearly eight hours to find out. Cassie had obviously gone to sleep after he left her. He had spent the day sitting on a sofa in the lobby, watching the stairs, tired, and hungry, since he’d used all the money he had on him last night to bribe that spare key out of the desk clerk.

He’d gotten only a few hours of sleep last night before Kirby showed up at his door. He hadn’t been back to bed since — for sleeping. He hadn’t been back to his room, either, to clean up, so his cheeks were shadowed with stubble, his hair was still tangled from Cassie’s fingers, and his shirt was minus the buttons to close it with.

The management had come by twice to ask him to leave. He was frightening their guests. Two men had come by first in their fancy suits. Four had come the second time. He’d told them all the same thing. He wasn’t leaving until his wife did. Apparently they’d decided not to press it, though they’d checked the registry to verify that he had a wife there. But he wouldn’t have minded if they’d pressed it some. He was in that kind of mood.

Divided. He wanted Cassie gone, but he knew by tonight he’d wish she were still where he could get to her, instead of miles away. He was still irritated at her for meddling again, yet he wished they hadn’t parted angry with each other this time. He could rectify that right now before she left, but he wouldn’t, because it was better for her if she stayed mad at him. Then she wouldn’t waste any more time in ending their marriage.

Until she did that, he couldn’t go back to Cheyenne. That would be too close to her, and last night had proved he couldn’t be that close without doing something about it. She’d never get her divorce that way. She’d end up having his baby instead.

The thought went through him with a jolt, and the realization that came with it was worse. He wanted her to have his baby. It was the one way he could have her for good, with no more talk of divorce, and he might as well own up to it. He wanted that meddling woman for his own more than he’d ever wanted anything else.

But that wasn’t what she wanted. And if d be a rotten thing for him to do, to wish his baby on her. So whoever said he was a nice guy?