Holly rolled her eyes. “Don’t be silly, Em. Ryan is Chris’s best friend, so of course, Dad invited him to stay. He made a special point of asking him. Why? Don’t you like him?”
Careful, Em, Emmaline warned herself. She turned what she hoped was a placid smile on her younger cousin. “How can I dislike him? Except for that brief meeting a few weeks ago, I’ve barely even met Ryan Benedict.”
Holly frowned at her cousin. “But I know you, Em. You’re trying too hard. There is something wrong, isn’t there?”
Against her will the memory of that meeting forced itself into Emmaline’s memory. Her uncle had called her into the living room to drink a toast to the business partnership his company had just entered into with Chris and Ryan’s company. The first person she had seen had been Ryan. With that dark hair, lean GQ looks and military bearing that was still with him years after he had left the service. He had turned those navy-blue eyes on her, and her breath had caught, a fact that had irritated her to no end.
She was not the kind of woman who allowed herself to be swayed by a man’s looks or magnetism, having learned all too well how dangerous that kind of thing could be.
Then Holly and Chris had announced their engagement, the result of a courtship that had begun two months ago when Holly had gone to St. Louis with Gilbert to check out C&R Technologies and had met Chris. Holly had spent a lot of time in St. Louis since then. Emma and barely seen her and had only met Chris once or twice. Not that it mattered.
Suddenly Chris had shaken Uncle Gilbert’s hand, pounded him on the back and hugged him, and then everyone in the room was kissing and hugging. Emmaline, who had never been a very physical kind of person, had found herself standing next to Ryan, looking up at him as he gave her a wicked grin. “May I, Ms. Carstairs?” he had said. His voice had been low and husky and dangerous, as if he was inviting her to remove all of her clothing rather than to share in Holly and Chris’s celebration. In the next second, while she was getting her bearings and without waiting for her to answer, he had lightly placed his lips on her cheek. Idiot that she was, awkward with this very physical man, she had jerked, turned and just for a second his mouth had brushed against the corner of her lips.
The room and all its occupants had fallen away. Her skin burned. She’d wanted to…she didn’t know what she had wanted to do, but it surely involved placing her hands on him, having him place his hands on her. Rational thought had proven impossible.
Later she had reminded herself that it had been a celebratory kiss, no more. A meaningless gesture of the kind that people took part in every day. But that was later.
In the brief time when Ryan Benedict was touching her lips, accident though it may have been, heat had rushed through, her breathing had gone rough and shallow, her mind had gone blank. She had the horrifying suspicion that she might have actually swayed toward him, maybe—please, no—even placed a hand awkwardly on his chest.
For half a second after he stopped touching her, a crazy thought had gone through her head. He would make beautiful babies, and she wanted a baby.
Immediately reality had stepped in. What on earth was she thinking? After all these years of fighting to keep her emotions in a jar, she was not going to allow herself to act girlish and irresponsible now.
She had already done that. At a hotelier’s convention several years ago she’d met, dated and fallen for a man who claimed to want her, but who had really wanted her to help him with Uncle Gilbert’s business for his company. So…hadn’t she learned about men who pretended to care but didn’t? Hadn’t her mother been betrayed by her weakness for Emmaline’s faithless father? Emma wasn’t going to make those kinds of mistakes. If she wanted a baby, there were ways. Pursuing a man, especially one like Ryan who probably had women lining up to sleep with him, wasn’t one of the ways.
“Em?”
Emmaline realized that her fists were clenched and she was gritting her teeth. She looked at her cousin. “I’m sorry, Holly. What?” she asked, as casually as possible.
“Are you really okay? I just suggested that you might not like Ryan, and you practically disappeared on me. It’s not—that is, I saw him kiss you and the way you looked afterwards—”
Emmaline quickly shook her head. “That was nothing.”
Holly looked unconvinced. “Em…”
“Holly,” Emma managed to say. “Don’t even go there. You know that I gave up the hunt for the right man the way other women give up wearing their hair in pigtails. I’m beyond that stage of my life and I’m happy about it, so you don’t have to worry about me, okay?”
“You sound like you’re ancient.”
Emmaline managed a laugh. “Where men are concerned I am. But seriously, I’m sorry if I zoned out on you. There’s so much going on now that we’ve decided to renovate the hotel. I’ve been…brainstorming new decorating ideas,” she said, pointing to the book her uncle had unexpectedly given her the other day.
She was sorry about the white lie, but she truly didn’t want Holly to worry, which brought her to another thought. Holly’s recent engagement had made Emma realize she needed to concentrate on her own goals. She would be more alone now, and she did want a child, someone who would belong to her and to whom she would belong. Just as soon as Holly was married, Emma hoped to begin checking into the possibility of adoption.
“Em, can I ask a favor of you?” Holly said, a trace of worry in her voice, her pretty brow bunched.
Emmaline looked at her cousin, waiting.
“Ryan is like a brother to Chris. If there’s anything about him that’s bugging you…well…”
Immediately Emmaline felt like a jerk. Holly might be her cousin, but they had grown up like sisters. Emmaline had never let anyone hurt Holly, and she wasn’t about to start now, especially when she was the culprit.
Emmaline shook her head. “Don’t worry, sweetie. Ryan Benedict may be a bit more overt than I’m used to, but I’m very good at adjusting.”
She smiled at Holly to reassure her, but Emma still had reservations. Because if Ryan had noticed her reaction to him, he would know that she was susceptible to him, and that kind of knowledge was how her former boyfriend, John, had betrayed her. According to her mother’s diaries, being unable to control her feelings for her husband was why Danielle Carstairs hadn’t foreseen him abandoning her. So Emmaline had good reason to give Ryan Benedict a wide berth.
Still, Holly and Uncle Gilbert had every right to invite Ryan to stay here.
“Any moment now,” Holly said, glancing down at her watch. “In fact, I’ve go to go get ready. “Oh gosh, I’ve got to run. Chris just called on his cell and said that the trip from company headquarters in St. Louis hadn’t taken that long and they were running ahead of schedule. They’ll be here any moment now, and I’m not ready. I don’t want Chris to see me looking like a hag.”
Which was one thing her petite, blond cousin could never look like, Emmaline thought. But she was glad when Holly immediately left the room. It prevented her cousin from seeing the shocked expression on Emmaline’s face.
“Any minute now?” Emmaline whispered. That certainly didn’t give her any time to mentally prepare herself.
She blew out a frustrated breath and glanced down at the book she had carried upstairs: Shakespeare and His World. How thoughtful of Uncle Gilbert, he had a fondness for Shakespeare, and so did she.
Why did she have the feeling that Shakespeare would have been amused by her situation? “Well, I’ll just have to keep things light. I’ll pretend I’m one of Shakespeare’s actors and act as if nothing ever happened,” she said as she stepped into a drab black dress that she found in the back of her closet. Because she wasn’t about to let Ryan Benedict know that she even remembered touching him.
He was only here for