Chapter 12
After Harmony left him in the trees, Aiken stayed away from home longer than he planned. He couldn’t face her. He could only do her and himself a favor by keeping clear of her. Her presence drew him to her. He couldn’t fight it. He had to struggle with all his strength to pry himself away from her, and every time he did it, it got harder. One of these days, he would fail, and it would be all over for both of them.
He stayed at the greenhouses long past quitting time. Boyd had to threaten him with a pay cut if he didn’t get in the truck and come home for dinner. “You’re giving Ma an ulcer. Don’t you know that? When are you gonna learn to think of others?”
“I am thinking of others. That’s why I’m not going.”
Boyd collared him and shoved him in the truck. “You’re going, and you’ll put on a clean shirt and comb your hair before you come to the dinner table.”
“Yes, sir.” That’s the price you paid for having an older brother born to be Alpha. You did as you were told and liked it.
Aiken brooded all the way home, but when they got there, they found the womenfolk already seated at the table with Floyd, Jasper, and the boys. Harmony sat between Marla and Clarissa. She cast a stony glance at Aiken. He could read nothing in that face.
Jasper pursed his lips at his two sons. “You boys sit down to your dinner before it gets cold. Your Ma didn’t work all day to waste food.”
Boyd sat down, but Aiken headed for the stairs. “I’ll wash up and change my shirt first.”
He changed his shirt and washed his hands and face and neck, and he wetted and combed his hair the way Boyd told him to. He would have done it anyway. He would have done it for Harmony.
He took his usual seat next to Boyd. He found himself sitting directly across from Harmony, but he kept his eyes on his plate when Boyd served him. The less said between the two of them, the better.
Conversation resumed. Jasper and Boyd talked business until Beatrice interrupted. “There’s a whole table of people sitting here who don’t want to hear about your spreadsheets and budget forecasts.Why don’t you talk about something else until you’re alone?”
“Sorry, Ma,” Boyd replied. “Have you heard Shaw and Dana Cunningham are having a baby?”
Harmony’s head shot up. “Really? When is it due?”
“I just heard the news, so I guess it will be due in about nine months.”
Marla straightened up. “I forgot to tell you, Harmony. A letter came for you today.”
“A letter—for me? But no one knows I’m here.”
Marla handed it over. “Here it is.”
Harmony studied the envelope. “It doesn’t have a stamp. It must have been hand delivered.”
“I found it in the mailbox like that,” Marla replied. “Open it.”
Harmony ripped open the envelope. Her eyes skimmed the page. “It’s from Laird Kerr. He’s inviting me to dinner at his house tomorrow night.”
The Dunlap family exchanged glances. Aiken watched Harmony reading. “What else does he say?”
“He says he heard I was staying with the Dunlaps for a few days, and he thought he would take the opportunity to extend the invitation. He thinks he can shed some light on the case I’m investigating.”
“What case is that? I thought you cleared the Kerrs.”
“I did. As far as the accusations go, I have nothing further to investigate.”
“So what’s he talking about?”
“If you ask me,” Aiken chimed in, “he’s looking for an excuse to invite you over.”
Harmony waved the paper. “But why?”
“Can you think of any reason he would particularly want to see you? What’s so special about you that he would invite you over to his house?”
“It doesn’t make any sense, especially after the way his wife reacted to me. Maybe I shouldn’t accept the invitation. I don’t want her blowing up again. It was bad enough having her accuse me of flirting with her husband. I can only imagine what she would do if she thought I was having an affair with him.”
Marla and Clarissa laughed out loud, and some of the other Dunlaps smiled, but Aiken stared across the table at Harmony. Just looking at her made him understand how Laird felt. Lucky old Laird. He could spend the evening staring into Harmony’s gentle brown eyes and admiring her open countenance and straightforward demeanor. He didn’t have to worry about anybody but Celia making a fuss about it, and no one took Celia’s accusations seriously.
Aiken couldn’t even do that. He couldn’t even look at Harmony because he really did want her. He wanted her with all his heart and all his bear soul. He wanted all of her, all the time, forever. He couldn’t even have dinner with her without suffering the most excruciating pangs of heartache and torment.
Harmony put the invitation down and went back to her food. “I better call him after dinner and explain. I’d love to go, but I don’t want to offend Celia.”
“I think you should go,” Aiken blurted out. “He might have something to tell you, and Celia might not be around.”
“Something to tell me—like he wants to leave Celia and run away with me? I don’t think so.”
A ripple of laughter went around the table.
“I mean it could help solve the mystery of why he’s so taken with you.”
“Him inviting me to dinner hardly means he’s taken with me. He’s just being polite. He’s following up on our conversation at his house.”
“You don’t understand. Laird Kerr would never invite an outsider to dinner at his house—never—no matter what Celia said. I saw the way he acted toward you. He wants something from you, or he wants you to do something.”
“Like what? What could he want with a total stranger?”
“I don’t have a clue, but it must be something pretty important if he went this far.”
She looked back and forth between the letter and Aiken. He studied her radiant face for the thousandth time. She was special. He couldn’t deny that. She could fascinate him, even now after a week of living in the same house with her.
What was it about her? Would he ever puzzle out the mystery? She was human. He shouldn’t be attracted to her. The bear in him should want someone of its own kind. Bruins never mated with humans. They were a different species.
Not only were the two groups reproductively alien to each other, they usually didn’t find each other attractive at all. Bruin men found human women fragile and flighty, while Bruin women found human men shallow and coarse. The bear gave a Bruin depth, soul, and warmth.
Harmony had all that and more. She had everything a Bruin had. Her soul extended deep beneath the surface. He’d seen it a dozen times.
Nothing more passed between them that night. Everyone pondered the mystery, and Harmony worked on her case notes on both families. Aiken kept his distance until she came downstairs the following evening with her notebook under one arm and her handbag under the other.
Aiken stood up to meet her. “All set?”
She nodded. “I’m nervous.”
“Don’t be. Laird loves you. You have nothing to worry about.”
Harmony blushed that mesmerizing blush that melted him into his boots. “Don’t say he loves me.”
“Let me drive you over there, Harmony.”
“Your mother planned to drive me.”
“She did, but I asked her to let me take you instead. I want to talk to you before you see the Kerrs.”
“All right.”
He opened the front door for her and handed her into the Boyd’s big shiny red Land Cruiser. He purred down the back road and around to Kerr Homestead. Neither said anything until he parked in the front driveway.
“So what did you want to talk to me about.”
“I know you plan to leave soon to go back to town.”
“I can’t stay at your house forever.”
He winced in pain at the words. “I know. I just want to tell you that you have nothing to worry about from me. I won’t do anything to bother you again.”
She pressed her lips together. “Is that what you brought me out here to tell me?”
His knuckles turned white on the steering wheel and he glared through the windshield at the Kerrs’ house. “I just don’t want you to worry that I’ll make trouble for you. I’ll leave you alone.”
“You always have left me alone, Aiken. You’ve never made any trouble for me, and you never bothered me.”
He grumbled under his breath in a painful effort to get the words out. “It’s hard, you know. It’s hard living under the same roof with you and holding you at a distance. It will be easier when you go back to town.”
“Easier for you, maybe. It won’t be easier for me.”
His head whipped around. “Why not? You won’t have to worry about me anymore.”
Her voice rose in spite of her best efforts to keep it under control. “I never worried about you, Aiken, and I don’t want to leave. Leaving your house is going to be the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. You told me you loved me, and I love you, too. You’re the one who says we can’t be together. I never had anything to do with keeping us apart. I want to see you and talk to you, even if there’s nothing happening between us. I want to be around you, and I want to be around your family and around Bruins’ Peak. I don’t want to be anywhere else.”
He stared at her in the light of the dashboard. His voice cracked. “You know I feel the same way, but it has to be this way. I just thought it would be easier if I stayed away from you.”
“Don’t think that. If you see me in town, don’t think you have to keep away. I want to talk to you and to know how you and your family are doing. I don’t want to hold you at a distance or become strangers with you.”
His chin sank onto his chest. Why did this have to be so all-fired hard? Why couldn’t he love someone of his own kind? Why did she have to be so infuriatingly nice? He couldn’t push her away, no matter how much he wanted. to. “All right. I won’t.”
She watched him brood for a while. She put out her hand and touched his arm. Every touch of her hand made his hair stand on end, but he didn’t pull away. He couldn’t move toward her and he couldn’t move away from her. He was trapped, pinned like a bug to a board. “Are you all right?”
He closed his eyes and turned his head away, but still he sat with his hands crushing the steering wheel. “Whatever happens, whatever I do, I love you, Harmony. Don’t ever doubt that. If I keep my distance, it’s only to protect you—and myself. I never wanted to do anything to hurt you. I swear it. If I can’t talk to you in town, I still love you. God, you don’t know how much I love you! You’ll never know how much this is killing me. I can’t do this.” His hand flew to cover his eyes.
She slid across the seat and grabbed his shoulder. “Let me help you, Aiken. Let me know what is wrong. I can’t watch you like this without trying to help you.”
He groaned under his hand. “God, I only wish you could help me. I wish like anything I could turn to you for help. I would give anything to take you in my arms and beg you to help me and never let me go. Every hour of every day is a torture because I can’t do that.”
She moved right up close to him and put one arm around his shoulders. “I’m here. I’m here. Whatever it is, we’ll deal with it. Just don’t turn away from me.”
He clamped his eyes shut. He let himself to lean against her, even when he couldn’t turn his head or open his eyes to look at her. “All right. All right.”
“I can’t stand seeing you like this. I care about you too much.”
They sat in the dark for a while, just leaning on each other. Aiken’s heart churned in agony, but he couldn’t move his arms to embrace her. An insurmountable barrier kept them apart.
“You better go.”
She squeezed his shoulders and kissed the side of his head before she popped the door open and slid out of the truck. She slammed it closed and ran up the steps to the Kerrs’ front door.
He watched through the windshield until she vanished inside the house. The truck’s headlights beamed on that door, but he didn’t drive away. This was it. This was the living end of Aiken Dunlap, Esquire.
Bruins mate for life, and Harmony McGillis was his life’s mate. He couldn’t be with her, so that was the end of his life. After she went back to town, he would find a way to kill himself. That was the only way to end this misery.
He sifted through the possible methods he could use. Hanging—no. Blowing his brains out with a shotgun—too messy. Besides, he might miss and make himself into a permanent vegetable. Slitting his wrists—too unreliable. That method was for teenage girls starved for attention. Starvation? He permitted him a wry smile. That would break his mother’s heart.
He kicked the truck into reverse and hummed back down the road to his own Homestead, but the thought of suicide gave him some modicum of relief. He wouldn’t have to face the rest of his life alone, without the one woman who could make it bearable—literally.