Marriage by Mistake (13 page)

Dean opened his menu and forced his gaze
downward. "Please, order whatever you like." Meanwhile, he
reflected that his usual type of companion    a Felicia
Thurgood type    would have launched into a detailed
critique of the production by now. She would have made astute
comparisons between Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland.

All Kelly could say was that she was
shivery.

Simplistic and uneducated. The very kind of
statement that should have helped turn him off. Dean scowled at his
menu and wondered why it didn't.

Maybe because she was just being honest and
unpretentious, a voice whispered inside? Giving him her real
feelings?

Genuine?

Dean slapped his menu closed.

Cued by the action, a nearby waitress turned
her head. "Oh, I'm sorry, sir. Are you ready to order?"

Dean shook his head. Kelly was no more
genuine than    than anybody else. "Oh, I mean yes, we're
ready," Dean told the waitress, then shook his head again. "That
is, are you ready, Kelly?"

His wife looked baffled. "Sure, I'm ready."
Raising her eyebrows, she put on a smile and turned her gaze toward
the waitress, who seemed a severe sort. "I'd like an orange spice
tea, please. Oh, and no rush. I can see you're busy. "

The waitress visibly relaxed, the harsh lines
smoothing from her face. "It's a madhouse tonight. Thanks. And what
for you, sir?" She turned to Dean.

He blinked. He couldn't remember when he'd
been with a woman who actually noticed, or cared about, the
feelings of a waitress. "Ahem. I'd just like coffee. Black,
please."

"Very good." The waitress made no comment on
their lack of interest in the fabulous desserts, but collected the
menus and hurried off.

Dean gazed past Kelly to a table with four
chattering college students. So, his wife had been considerate. And
she
seemed
genuine. That didn't mean she actually was either
one of those things. He was not going to be taken in by the woman.
He was not.

"So," Kelly said, "you haven't said what you
thought of it yet."

"Of it?"

"The opera." There was a laugh in her
voice.

"Oh, yes, of course." Dean pulled in his
lips. Nobody had to indulge him. He was always on top of a
conversation. "A respectable production. Naturally, I've seen
better."

"Really?"

"Well, at the Met..." He waved a hand,
remembering a particular version of Rigoletto, with Beverly Sills
and Luciano Pavarotti. He'd felt transported   

Shivery, perhaps.

He frowned. "It's hardly ever like that."

"I would think not," Kelly agreed. "Tonight
was    fantastic enough."

Their eyes met. And Dean felt the strangest
thing. Something like...connection.

No. He flicked his gaze away. There was no
connection between them. Ridiculous. And Kelly hadn't felt shivery
from the opera. She was just doing what her kind were good at
doing, reaching in, calculating what would please. It was only for
the purpose of gaining the upper hand, toe-holding an advantage.
She meant to eventually place herself in a position to get what she
really wanted.

Whatever that turned out to be.

Dean pressed his finger against the edge of
his spoon. They would have their refreshment and go home. Evening
over, mission accomplished. Not a complete success, but not a
disaster, either. He was not entangled in her web.

The harried waitress returned with their
drinks, set them down with a smile, and immediately hurried off.
"Thank you," Kelly tried to call after her, but she was gone.

Kelly glanced over at Dean and shrugged,
smiling. He pressed his finger harder against the spoon edge. She
turned her attention to her miniature hot water kettle and peeked
inside before glancing up at Dean again. "It's funny, you know.
We've done this before."

"Gone to the opera?"

"No." She picked up a sugar packet. "Sat
talking late at night over tea and coffee."

Dean stared at her and calmed a quick leap of
dismay. Well yes, according to
her
, and his credit card
report, they'd done this before. At 'Nat's'. Allegedly, they'd sat
talking for hours. But he couldn't have divulged anything terribly
intimate during that time; she would have used it against him by
now, tried to pry further in. "I hadn't thought of that," he
drawled, and leaned back in his chair.

She tilted him a smile. "You had coffee with
cream, before."

Dean snorted.

"You did."

Dean shook his head. "Cream is full of
cholesterol."

Kelly's smile curved. "You like it."

Dean slid her a glance. "Maybe." He told
himself it was no big deal she knew this much about him, but
couldn't help adding, "It isn't good for me."

At that they both stopped. Kelly's smile
faded. Dean's face froze. He could tell she was thinking the same
thing he was: about the other things he liked that weren't good for
him; things like the acts that took place in his recent night
dreams. Amazing, athletic, erotic acts. Acts that made him want far
too much.

She caught her lower lip in her teeth. "Well,
that was then," she said.

The hell it was
. It was as if the
thing were sitting right there between them, big as a pink
elephant, the night they had spent together, the intimacies that
had occurred.
She
could remember. Dean could only guess. But
neither one of them was going to bring it up. At least, Dean hoped
she wouldn't.

He cleared his throat and scrambled for
another topic, anything, to keep the pink elephant from talking.
"Since we have the opportunity, perhaps we should speak about
Robby."

"Robby?" She appeared understandably
confused. The topic came straight out of left field.

But Dean persisted. He was going to avoid the
pink elephant and at the same time get back to a topic he'd
completely dropped since Monday. "Yes, Robby. You have a problem
with that?"

Slowly, she shook her head. "No. In fact, I'm
glad you brought him up."

"You are?" Dean shot her a stern look. She
shouldn't imagine he was going to let her off the hook. "You've
been spending time with him," he accused.

"Yes." She looked down and smiled. "And I've
gotten to know him a little bit, I think."

"Have you, now?" Dean was feeling better
already. The pink elephant had nearly faded and he was on solid
ground again. High ground.

"I don't know why anyone would complain about
his behavior," Kelly remarked. "He seems to act pretty much his
age."

"Yes, well." Dean laughed. "He always
straightens up and flies right when he's living with me."

Kelly gave him a strange look. "Really?"

Dean tapped a finger on the edge of his
coffee cup. "He knows I won't put up with any nonsense."

"
Really
." Kelly lifted her hot water
and poured. "I find that very interesting." She set down the
kettle. "I imagine he doesn't get good grades at boarding school,
either."

"You got that right."

"And yet he's smart."

Dean snorted.

"Hey, he managed to hypnotize you."

Dean's eyes narrowed. "Your point?"

Kelly sighed. "My point is that he just needs
the right kind of motivation. If he could live at home I think it
would make a huge difference." Saying which, she looked directly at
Dean.

His brows curled. "Home? Living at 'home'
would be a little bit difficult. Kirk has no permanent
address."

"Kirk?" Kelly sounded baffled. "Who's
that?"

"Who    ? That's Robby's
father."

"Oh." Kelly frowned. "You call your father by
his first    ? Never mind." She shook her head. "It's not
like he has anything to do with it."

"He doesn't?"

"Oh, hardly. I meant with you. Couldn't Robby
live with you?"

It took Dean a full minute, staring at her,
before he grasped her meaning. Then his brows shot up. "With me?
You think Robby should live with
me
?"

She smiled. "Uh huh."

Dean smiled back. It was so...nonsensical. At
the same time, he felt the moral ground beneath him shift.

Meanwhile, Kelly leaned over the little
table. "He needs a steady influence, a solid foundation. Someone he
can count on."

"With me," Dean repeated, and laughed. But
the ground beneath shifted some more.

"Granted, it would help if you moved," Kelly
went on. "Into a normal house, you know."

"Excuse me?"

Kelly rolled her eyes. "Something under ten
thousand square feet. Picket fence. Shaggy dog." She sighed.
"Although I have to admit it's nice having someone else cook and
clean."

Dean blinked at her. "You imagine me living
in suburbia?"

"Why not?"

Dean just looked at her. Everything she was
saying was absurd, and she had to know it. He was supposed to move
to some tract house and play the doting father? To Robby? At the
same time, he couldn't help wondering where she put herself in this
picture. "No," he said, too loudly.

"No?" Kelly shook her head. "All right,
forget the part about the normal house. It isn't important. What's
important is that Robby can rely on you."

Dean's eyebrows jumped. "Exactly."

She smiled. "Then we agree."

"No." They agreed on nothing, and never
would. The woman was    from another galaxy. Dean leaned
forward. "The idea is that Robby has to learn to rely on himself.
He can't depend on me    or on anybody else, for that
matter."

Kelly's eyes widened. "He's nine years
old!"

Dean leaned back. "So?"

"So?" Kelly's lips parted.

Dean crossed his arms. "There's no better
place to learn self-reliance than boarding school. I started when I
was six."

"Six," Kelly said softly.

"Right." Dean lifted his chin. He'd been sent
off to boarding school at age six, right after Kirk had divorced
his second wife, the one Dean had let himself grow fond of. Sending
him away had been one of his father's few good decisions. Now
Dean's jaw tensed. "Going to boarding school taught me
self-reliance. Discipline. Self-control. The rewards of applied
persistence." And it had kept him from growing fond of any future
frivolous stepmothers.

"Oh," Kelly said. There was a lost look on
her face.

Dean's eyes narrowed. "What?"

She gave a slow nod. "I think that's what
you
learned at boarding school."

"Right. That is    " He stopped
short. "Oh no. Robby isn't so different from me. He can learn the
same lessons from school that I did."

"Discipline, self-control, and the rewards of
applied persistence."

"That's right."

Kelly shook her head. "I think you really
believe what you're saying."

Dean's jaw clamped shut. She was acting
condescending. Of him!

She looked up, an odd smile on her lips.
"Tell me, Dean, when did you have a chance to be a little boy?"

His brows came down slowly. "Excuse me?"

"When did you ever get to let somebody else
be in charge, take a break?"

Dean's frown turned into a glare. What was
she talking about? Why on earth would he ever want somebody else to
be in charge?

Kelly kept her odd smile. "When did you learn
to let go?"

Let go
? Dean scowled. But he couldn't
deny that her words conjured up an image of Kelly herself, naked
and moaning beneath him. He wrapped one hand around his too-hot
coffee mug. "Let go?" he queried icily. "I wasn't aware one needed
to
learn
to do that."

"Neither was I." Kelly looked down to dunk
her tea bag. "Until now."

CHAPTER NINE

As she gazed out the car window on the drive
home, Kelly supposed she could have handled that better. It wasn't
diplomatic to tell a man that his entire life philosophy was
lacking. It put rather a damper on an evening. But darn it, she
didn't want Dean to think he could impose his terrible life
philosophy on Robby! Discipline, self-control, and the rewards of
applied persistence.

It was the philosophy of a man who'd had to
make do as a child    a man who couldn't even see what he
was missing: any real happiness.

Kelly looked out at the streetlights dotting
the darkness and felt an ache in her chest. Sent away at age six!
It was obvious Dean had never known a moment's emotional security.
Nobody had ever taught him it was okay or safe to care.

Kelly snorted softly to herself. What Dean
needed was someone to impose a new philosophy on
him
.

In the darkness, Kelly went very still. Oh,
no. No, no, no. She hadn't just thought that. She hadn't. Yet she
drew in a sharp breath.

"Something wrong?" Dean spoke for the first
time since they'd left the parking garage in Boston.

Kelly cleared her throat. "Um, no. Nothing's
wrong." And it wasn't! She hadn't just thought about trying to
impose a new philosophy on Dean. Doing something like that
   Well, for one thing, it wasn't her place. And for
another, the man wasn't the least bit open to such a thing. He was
quite satisfied with himself just the way he was.

Of course, he didn't even know
who
he was
.

Kelly choked.

"Swallow the wrong way?" Dean looked over.
Their eyes met briefly. Briefly, because Kelly jerked her gaze
away.

Good Lord.
Dean
knew who he was.
She
was the one confused. She kept thinking she saw 'her'
Dean under there.

Oh, but you have
.

Kelly clenched her teeth. She hadn't. She
hadn't! But the little voice inside chattered otherwise. She
had
seen moments, instants in time. There'd been moments
of...connection.

No! Kelly scowled and shook her head to get
rid of the tightness in her chest. All right, maybe there'd been
moments. So what? They were only moments. Did she imagine she could
string them together to recreate the gentle, caring man she'd known
for two days in Las Vegas?