Fevered Hearts (4 page)

“But what do the doctors say? Can you relearn to walk?”

Liam tore his gaze away and focused on the blurred glass of the window a few feet away. “They say I might be able to.”

“Have you tried?”

By the slump of Liam’s shoulders, Ward knew the answer was no. Irritation overrode any pity he held for his former lover.

“How do you expect to overcome this if you refuse to try?” he asked.

Liam shoved a finger in his face. “Don’t preach to me about things you know nothing about.”

“I know how it feels to be Ivy,” he murmured.

“Jesus.” Liam twisted away and refused to speak or look at Ward again.

Finally, Ward broke the silence. “I didn’t come by to find all those fliers outside or to give you a hard time. I came for some advice.”

At that, Liam swung his gaze back. “About?”

“I need some names of people who will plant that hillside the jackass manager Jeff had cleared.”

Liam grunted. “I wondered about that.”

“Yeah, I fired the man this morning, so it won’t be happening again. But I need to rectify it before—”

“Before you start getting hate fliers plastered all over your office and vehicles?”

The corner of Ward’s mouth twitched upward. “Somethin’ like that.”

“As you can see, I’m not a reliable source. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be in this predicament. The people we hired to replant took the money and ran without doing the work.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah. And we’re up to our ass cracks in trouble. Contracts aren’t going through because no one wants to take a chance on us and face bad press for themselves.”

“At least you don’t have contracts sitting around and not enough time to look at them.” Ward traced the seam of his jeans, his awareness of the man seated across from him coming back with a vengeance now that their tempers had cooled. Probably because their arguments were always a sort of foreplay for them.

Liam’s eyes warmed too. “Sounds as if we’re both in a mess.”

Suddenly, a clear path seemed to spring up in front of Ward—an answer for both of them.

“I just had a thought.”

“Just that one?” The teasing note captured Ward all over again. Fuck, he’d fall for this man time and again if only to hear that intimacy in Liam’s voice.

Ward huffed out a laugh to cover his overwhelming want. “Shut up, ass. I was thinking that you have problems here at Mattson and Bose Timber has problems too. What if we combine them?”

Liam shook his head. “What are you talking about? Making our problems bigger is what it sounds like.”

“I’m talking about throwing everything into a pot and stirring it together. It makes sense. I need help in the office, you’re in the office. I need to fulfill contracts, you need the contracts.”

“How the hell would that work?”

“A merger. We work together. We don’t make any legal changes, but we start a sort of co-op. Lean on each other.”

Liam scuffed his knuckles over his jaw, and the rasping sound raised every hair on Ward’s body. “And we take on each other’s problems too.”

“That’s right. Such as the planting problem.”

“And the wife problem.” Liam’s words were solemn.

Ward jerked. “What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Liam said slowly, a far-off expression claiming his rugged features, “that I have a wife who needs to be satisfied, and you have a cock that works. Until I get mine in working order again—if I can, that is—we’d form a merger.”

Ward shoved his chair back so quickly that it shot into the wall. “What are you fucking saying?”

Liam relaxed back in his wheelchair, looking more comfortable than Ward had seen since returning home. “I want you to make love to my wife, Ward. Show her that she’s beautiful and sexy and important.”

“It will make her feel important for her husband to give her to another man?” Ward’s mind spun, and he wondered if he’d really been the one to take a blow to the head, not Liam. But the thought of touching Ivy’s sweet little curves, of tilting her face up and staring into her eyes before kissing her tender lips, did things to Ward’s insides that he couldn’t begin to name.

“By giving her pleasure through you, it would show I care, yes.”

Ward smacked a palm off the desk. “You can’t mean it. You’re high on painkillers, aren’t you?”

Liam folded forward and dissolved into laughter. “No. I’m dead serious, man. I’m asking you for help in satisfying my wife until I can take over.”

“Why don’t you do the things you can to make her happy and give her pleasure? Finger her, lick her pussy. Hell, compliment her on those gorgeous legs.”

Nodding, Liam seemed to contemplate what he was saying. “I can do that. And I will. But I need some time to get back into the game. In the meantime…”

“Ivy would never go for something as screwed up as this.”

Liam placed his hand over Ward’s, meeting his gaze. “She will. I’ve seen the way she looks at you.”

“What way is that?” Ward’s stomach rose and fell twenty stories in a matter of seconds.

Turning Ward’s hand over, Liam threaded their fingers. The warmth of the caress, the gesture itself, was Ward’s undoing. “She looks at you the same way I do.”

For the fourth time in a row, Ivy dropped a knitting stitch. If she didn’t stop daydreaming and get her mind on her task, her Fair Isle sweater was going to look like a thrift store mistake.

She fought to find her rhythm again while listening to the lively banter of the women in her knitting group. The week had been long and miserable, with late nights as juries deliberated on difficult cases. And Liam had been edgier than usual.

A body filled the doorway between the living room and the entry. A big male body that sucked all of the air out of Ivy’s lungs.

“Ward, what are you doing here?” Juls asked in an accusatory way.

The man’s gaze alighted instantly on Ivy. And held.

She swallowed and tried to tear her gaze away, but she couldn’t do it. He held her prisoner. Maybe it was his low-slung, battered jeans or the white T-shirt molded to his chiseled chest.

Or maybe it’s the way he’s looking at me.

Damn it, she couldn’t react this way to him.

She stuffed her knitting in her bag and gained her feet, purposely avoiding Ward’s stare. “I’ll just…get some coffee.”

But as she blazed a trail to the kitchen, she realized she’d made the wrong choice. There was safety in numbers. While she sat amongst the other ladies, Ward would never dare to pick her out and speak to her.

The heavy fall of his boot on the tile floor sent prickles down her spine. Awareness sank deep into her core and continued on, lower. Suddenly the acknowledgement that Ward was quite like Liam had been a year and a half ago settled into her mind.

Tears stung her eyes.

“Ivy.” Ward stood a few steps away, leaning against the counter.

Don’t look at him. He’s as bright as the sun that Liam was—that Liam could be if he had any drive to help himself.

She knuckled a tear away.

Ward released a low breath and moved toward her. Every muscle in her body tensed, prepared to run. She shouldn’t even be here in this room with him.

Twisting away, she said, “I need to get home to Liam.”

Ward shot his hand out and wrapped his fingers around her forearm. The thick, tanned digits against her skin felt unbearably erotic. She yanked free of his grasp.

“I want to talk about Liam,” he said.

In the living room, the voices rose and fell, with Juls’ at top volume as she told a humorous tale of her workplace. Several women sniggered throughout the story. Ivy couldn’t have felt more removed if she’d just crash-landed a mother ship.

Ward reached for her again, but she backed away. Stealing a glance at his face, she watched pain ripple over his handsome features. “I’m not going to hurt you, Ivy. I just want to talk about your husband.”

“And your friend.”

“Yes.”

Her throat clogged off. Would Ward understand the trauma she still lived with every day—her shock that Liam had been injured was as strong as her husband’s. Each day she asked herself why him, why the man who loved life, who had so much going for him? And why the hell didn’t that same man dig in his heels and fight for his old life?

For her?

Tears dropped rapidly from her eyes, too fast to stop their flow. Horrified, she plastered her hands to her face.

“Fuck, sweetheart, I’m sorry.” In one step, Ward was with her, drawing her into his embrace. She let him sway her against his broad chest and press her face into his shirt. She sniffed against her sobs, catching the soap-and-water scent and underlying tang of a man who’d worked hard.

Ward’s hand was warm and firm on her nape. “Don’t fight it, Ivy. I’ll listen to you cry.”

Her tears let loose in a wheezing, choking torrent. Had anyone ever said that to her before? Even when Liam was lying in intensive care, fighting for his life, no friend or family member had allowed her to grieve.

The hard knot she never allowed to loosen stretched and snapped. She shook in Ward’s arms.

He ran his palm up and down her spine.

“What about that coffee?” Juls’ voice trailed off as she obviously walked in on her brother holding his friend’s wife.

Ivy tried to pull away, but Ward simply turned her around, blocking her body from Juls or anyone else that might come looking for food or drink.

“What the hell?” Juls asked.

“She’s upset about Liam. Now get out.”

Ivy froze, too turned on by his guttural tone for her own good. She prayed Juls would go even as she wished she’d stay to keep Ivy from making more of a fool of herself.

Juls’ footsteps retreated, and Ivy quivered.

A second later, Ward’s voice rumbled beneath Ivy’s ear. “He’s a stubborn ass of a man.”

Unexpected laughter bubbled up her throat, and she snorted it out. “He is!”

“He can get up and walk if he wanted. If there’s a chance, he can do it.”

“I know. But he won’t. He doesn’t c-care anymore.”

“I think he does.”

She rocked on her feet. “What do you mean?” Bracing a hand on Ward’s chest, she pushed, giving herself a few inches of space. She looked up right into his eyes. The electric shocks between their gazes she expected. But the tender look sent her into a wild spin again.

Dragging a breath through her lungs, she pushed harder to get away. He locked her against him, holding her immobile.

“Liam talked to me a few days ago, Ivy.”

“About?” She moved her hand, feeling springy chest hair beneath the cotton of his shirt.

“About a lot of things. In fact, we’ve been talking every day this week, several times a day.”

“Tell me.” Her voice trembled.

Ward’s brow creased, and he lowered his lips to her forehead, leaving one soft kiss that she felt as sharply as a lover’s first caress. “We’ve talked about work. Discussed the future of the businesses.”

“But Liam isn’t even working.”

Ward tensed, each muscle hard and defined against her.

“What’s going on, Ward?”

He scrubbed a hand over his face. “It’s not my business.”

“You opened the sealed vault. Let’s see what’s inside.”

“Why didn’t he tell you?” he asked, almost to himself.

Pain and betrayal ricocheted around the walls of her heart. Tearing free, she stumbled across the kitchen. The back door overlooked a small garden. The knitting group often sat outside until the light faded too much for them to work. There was also a stepping stone path leading around the house to the driveway.

Ivy shoved through the door and tried to slam it in Ward’s face.

“Dammit, Ivy! We need to talk.”

As she strode through the garden, he followed on her heels. She got the feeling that he could overtake her at any time, but he was allowing her space. When she reached the corner of the house, though, he reached for her.

“Stop! I’m married.” Liam would kick his ass. They might be at a low point in their marriage, but she could still tell him everything.

Even if he hasn’t told me he’s working again.

She took off running, tearing around the house on high heels she was so accustomed to wearing that the spikes were an extension of her. Behind her, she caught his muttered, “Goddammit!” but kept running.

By the time she reached her car, she was crying again. Confusion warred with want, which infuriated her. Why the hell didn’t Liam tell her he was working?

She threw herself behind the driver’s wheel and tossed her long hair out of her face just as Ward opened the passenger door.

She glanced at him.

His voice filled the space, low and determined. “I’m not going to let you drive away upset. Please. Let’s just talk until you’re calmer.”

Her heart beat frantically, fluttering like a wild bird in the palm of a predator’s hand. Under his brooding gaze, she felt more trapped than in his arms. She didn’t move, and he reached over and twisted the key in the ignition.

She backed out of the driveway, breathing hard around her confusion. It had been a long time since anyone had taken control. Until now, she didn’t realize how much she needed to let go of it. “Juls is going to wonder what’s going on.”

“It’s none of her damn business.”

“I left my bag there.”

“We’ll get it later.”

The way he said “we’ll” was so intimate, new tears stung her eyes. Damn Liam to hell for his failure to show her any affection!

“Turn right.”

Ivy obeyed and headed down the gravel lane toward the main road. She tightened her fingers on the steering wheel until her knuckles grew white. “Liam’s been going into the Mattson Hardwoods office, hasn’t he?”

“Yes.”

Why hadn’t she known? He hadn’t thought it important enough to mention? She bit her lower lip until she felt the skin separate. The iron taste of blood coated her tongue.

“And here I thought that since he’d looked at me more recently, and because he’d actually laid a…a h-hand on me…that things were getting better between us,” she cried.

Ward brushed a lock of her hair away from her face, his touch scorching to the pit of her stomach. “Things are looking up, Ivy. Hear me out.” He caught a tear tracking down her cheek with his thumb.