Fortune's Valentine Bride Part 6

Wendy was right, she thought. Men could be so thick sometimes.

"She doesn't want to see you hurt and she thinks that Brittany will rip your heart out and use it for a coaster." She paused for a moment, weighing the wisdom of saying the next part. She decided to plunge in. "The way she did the last time."

"No, she didn't," Blake protested, instantly coming to the absent woman's defense. "We broke up because of a misunderstanding."

Katie looked at him innocently as she asked, "You misunderstood why she was lip-locked with another man when you'd brought her to the party as your date?"

He was far from happy that had gotten out. Annoyed, he asked, "Has Wendy been talking to you?"

Katie pressed her lips together. She recognized her misstep the second she'd made it.

Holding up her hands in surrender, she gingerly backed away from the topic. Men, Wendy had told her, didn't like having their faults and mistakes pointed out to them. Even the big ones. Especially the big ones. Having grown up without any siblings and not really having any sort of a dating life to speak of, her experience when it came to the games people played with one another was severely limited. She believed in honesty, but obviously not everyone always saw it as the best policy.

"Sorry," she apologized. "Not my business." She lowered her hands. "Maybe I just got my details wrong." She had almost said "facts" instead, but that too would have wound up bruising Blake's ego.

He was too good for the likes of Brittany, but she couldn't say that, either. All she could do was hope that Wendy's plan for her to distract Blake while supposedly teaching him how to win Brittany would ultimately work.

And if it didn't, if she did too good a job and actually helped him with this pursuit, well, at least she was going to have a wonderful time as the understudy.

It wasn't much, but then, she'd never really asked for very much, she thought as she got into the pa.s.senger side of Blake's car.

Glancing in her direction, Blake waited for her to buckle up, then took off.

There wasn't much conversation to speak of.

The moment Wendy saw her brother and Katie walking into her bedroom, she knew something had changed. She could see it in their body language. It was there, in the expression on her friend's face and definitely there in the rather shaken look in her brother's eyes.

Something had happened and she knew she wasn't going to be able to find out what until she could get Katie alone to question her.

And that, apparently, wasn't going to happen until after they had dinner. Blake, once he started talking to her, gave every indication that he was more than willing to stay until long after the cows came home.

She couldn't chase him off without really alienating him. Frustrated, Wendy struggled to find some kind of compromising middle ground. It was everything she could do not to burst while holding her questions in check.

So, the three of them had dinner in the room that now held her a prisoner day and night. Because of her condition, Marcos had hired a housekeeper, a pleasant-faced older woman named Juanita, and the woman had served them a dinner that had come straight from the kitchen of Red, the restaurant that Marcos managed. Marcos himself was there now, which meant there were only the three of them for dinner.

Less than halfway through the meal, Wendy began to give the performance of her life, murmuring about how fatigued she'd felt all day, but, as sometimes happened because she was "stuck in bed," she'd been unable to really sleep.

"But now, after having this meal that my loving husband sent over from the restaurant," she said, pausing to stifle yet another yawn, "I think I'll probably be able to drop off like a brick." Her eyes shifted toward her brother. "If I fall asleep midsentence, you'll forgive me, right, Blake?"

"Better yet," Blake told his sister, shifting out of the way as the housekeeper collected the last of the dishes and cleared them away. "I'll get out of your hair and let you go to sleep." Leaning over the bed, he kissed Wendy on the cheek. "You get some rest and I'll see you in the morning when I swing by to pick up Br-eh, Katie." He looked at the woman who had unexpectedly set off such a chain reaction within him this afternoon. He was still trying to sort out just exactly what had happened and what it all ultimately meant. For now, he nodded at her as if everything was still the same as it had been just this morning. "I'll see you tomorrow, Katie."

Katie returned the nod, debating whether or not to walk him out, then deciding it was best if she didn't. The drive here from Scott and Christina's ranch had been a little awkward and forced. Both of them were careful to tiptoe around the elephant that was stuffed into the car with them. They both needed a little break to regroup, she thought.

Maybe by tomorrow, things would get back to normal-whatever that was now.

"Right, tomorrow." Even as she said it, she could feel her lips tingling ever so slightly from the memory of this afternoon.

As both the housekeeper and Blake walked out of the room, she turned to look at Wendy. Giving her a quick, preoccupied smile, she told her best friend, "I'll see you tomorrow."

Turning to leave, Katie was surprised to hear her exceptionally sleepy friend declare in a firm, emphatic and no-nonsense voice, "You get back here, missy. You're not going anywhere until you tell me absolutely everything."

Turning around, she stared at Wendy. Three minutes ago, the woman had been all but wilting. "What happened to being so tired you were afraid you were going to fall asleep midsentence?"

Wendy laughed, clearly surprised that Katie hadn't seen through the act. "And you believed me?" she asked, amused. "I said that for Blake's benefit. I mean, I can't ask you questions about what's going on with him sitting right there, so I wanted him to leave. But I knew that if I asked him to, he's so sensitive, his feelings would really be hurt." She sighed, shaking her head. "Blake still brings up the fact that I said he was hovering every chance he gets." She shifted her attention back to Katie, whom she had expected to see through her little act immediately. "G.o.d, Katie, aren't you paying attention?"

Second-guessing was just not the way she usually operated. "I thought I was, but I guess that I obviously wasn't." Katie shrugged. "Sorry."

Wendy waved away the apology as she shifted closer to the edge of her king-size bed. She wasn't interested in apologies, she was interested in why both her friend and her brother had looked off center when they'd walked into her room.

"Okay," she declared, then ordered, "give."

Katie stared at Wendy, confused. "Give?" she repeated.

"Yes." Suppressing an exasperated sigh, Wendy carefully enunciated her request. "Give me the details. Tell me what happened." When that didn't prompt an immediate outpouring of information, Wendy elaborated. "You and Blake both walked in with really weird expressions on your faces, like you'd both been standing on a mountaintop, watching a sunrise when you clearly were expecting to see was a sunset. What happened between the two of you?" she repeated, this time in a far more firm, demanding voice. "Spill it. All of it."

Her eyes all but pinned Katie in place, where she was going to remain until she told her what she wanted to hear.

"I took your advice," Katie began slowly. "I started to teach Blake ballroom dancing."

Wendy winced a little at the image that conjured up. "Blake has two left feet."

"So he said. Actually," Katie admitted, "given what I thought was going to happen, he wasn't all that bad."

Wendy was still waiting impatiently for something that would explain the dazed expressions she'd seen.

"Okay, well, it wasn't his feet that put that stunned expression on your face," Wendy concluded. Her eyes narrowed. Her hormones had her emotions all over the map and patience was in very short supply. "Are you going to make me beg?" she wanted to know.

"Of course not," Katie protested.

"Then tell me!" Wendy ordered, surrendering the last shred of her quickly failing patience.

Part of Katie felt almost silly saying this at her age. The other part felt almost as if she was betraying Blake by telling tales out of school. It took her a moment to calm herself.

Then, taking a deep breath, Katie said, "He kissed me."

Wendy's eyes almost fell out of her head. And then, the next minute, she was grinning so hard her face looked as if it ran the very real danger of splitting completely in two.

Chapter Seven.

It took Wendy a second to collect herself. Her excitement over what was clearly a significant break-through for Katie and Blake was having an unexpected-and unsettling-side effect. She felt twinges, strong twinges that were reminiscent of what she'd experienced when she'd suddenly gone into premature labor.

Taking a breath in slowly, Wendy grasped the blanket on either side of her and offered up a silent prayer as she waited for the sensation to pa.s.s. Less than two minutes later-it felt like a lifetime and a half-it finally pa.s.sed. But by then, she was perspiring and feeling somewhat light-headed. It took concentration on her part to keep the large room from spinning around wildly.

The next moment, she saw Katie peering at her face uncertainly. "Wendy, are you all right?"

Katie's voice seemed to echo in her head as she heard her best friend ask the question.

Wendy took another second before she answered. She didn't want to alarm Katie by sounding out of breath when all she was doing was lying here.

"I'm fine, Katie, just really excited about that kiss," Wendy lied. Wanting to get the focus back where it belonged, she pressed for some kind of details. "All right, Blake kissed you. Then what?"

Katie wasn't sure just what it was that her friend wanted to hear. "I kissed him back."

The contractions, now gone, took a backseat to impatience. "And?"

"And it was wonderful," Katie confessed wistfully. Her words were accompanied by a heartfelt sigh.

Wendy knew Katie too well to think her friend was trying to be coy or draw things out. Katie obviously didn't understand what she was asking her. So Wendy verbally sketched an outline and waited for her to fill it in. "And what happened after he kissed you and you kissed him back?"

The rise and fall of Katie's slender shoulders was guileless. "We came here."

Wendy enunciated each word through gritted teeth. "And nothing in between?"

"Well, yes," Katie conceded. It was a given, since she hadn't rented a car here, but nonetheless she added, "Blake drove."

Wendy pressed her lips together, suppressing a guttural sound of pure frustration. Pinning Katie with a look, she knew very well that her best friend wasn't teasing her-she was dead serious in her recitation. Clearly there were some things missing from Katie's education, despite her graduation from a top university with honors.

There was no delicate way to ask, so she didn't bother trying. Instead, Wendy bluntly asked, "Katie, do you know how to flirt?"

A defensive look crept into Katie's normally warm brown eyes. "Flirting wasn't a prerequisite for my degree."

Well, that answered that, Wendy thought. She'd thought that perhaps, because it had been a while since she and Katie had seen one another and people did change-she was living proof of that, transitioning from a party girl to a doting homebody-that Katie had developed some feminine wiles. Obviously she hadn't, but that was okay. That was what Katie had her for. "So the answer's no." Wendy shook her head and struggled to suppress a sigh. "Settle in, Katie," she instructed, pointing to the edge of her bed. "You and I have work to do."

Katie's radar went up. Wendy was going to try to change her and, while that kind of a breezy, flirtatious manner suited Wendy to a T, it just wasn't her, Katie thought. Wendy could effortlessly have men eating out of her hand-before she'd met Marcos, she'd had men eating out of her hand.

But flirting to Katie meant leading someone on just to satisfy her own ego-if she actually had one-and she didn't see the point of that. Still, she didn't want to sound ungrateful.

"Wendy," she began a little hesitantly, "it's not that I don't appreciate what you're trying to do for me, but-"

Wendy was very good about reading between the lines and knew where her friend was heading with this. However, the sad fact of life was that nice girls did finish last more times than not, and a little something extra to help tip the scales never hurt. She knew just what to say to make Katie come around.

"You'd rather he wound up with that spoiled Southern belle?"

Katie shook her head. Brittany would just use Blake all over again. They both knew that.

"No," she said with feeling.

Wendy had expected nothing else. With a smart nod of her head she declared, "All right then, case closed. You're learning how to flirt."

It was obvious Katie had no choice in the matter-there was no known record of anyone ever winning an argument with Wendy, at least not directly-so Katie surrendered. She settled in and listened to what her friend had to say. She had no intention of putting anything she was about to be told to any active use, but listening to Wendy was a great deal easier than arguing with her and refuting anything she had to say. So, in essence, Katie silently chose to take the high road.

Mercifully, Wendy was brief and succinct. The lesson involved mastering alternating looks of adoration and out-and-out s.e.xy expressions. There was also mention of a s.e.xy walk, complete with a gentle, come-hither swaying of the hips, but since Wendy was bedridden, the instructions were all verbal rather than visual.

And just when Katie thought Wendy had exhausted her subject, her friend suddenly pounced on the topic of clothing.

Pressing her lips together, Wendy looked reprovingly at what Katie was wearing. "Does everything you packed look like that?"

Caught off guard, Katie looked down at what she had on. It was a navy blue skirt with a matching jacket, beneath which she had on a light pink blouse. It was crisp, subdued and professional. Katie saw nothing wrong with it.

"What's wrong with what I'm wearing?" she wanted to know.

Wendy didn't want to hurt her feelings, but there was a great deal at stake here-for all three of them. If Blake hooked up with Brittany, Katie would be heartbroken and Wendy herself would be in danger of being sent away for justifiable homicide. Brittany had always rubbed her the wrong way.

And then, of course, down the line Blake would be dumped and his ego would take a beating, never mind his heart. As far as she was concerned, it was crucial that Katie win this battle for her brother's affections.

"Nothing," Wendy agreed, "if you're bucking for Marketing a.s.sistant of the Year. But if you want to be noticed as a woman, you need something softer and maybe just a tiny bit slinkier."

"I came to work, Wendy," Katie pointed out, "not to slink."

Wendy's eyes met hers. "Yes, but the 'office' is a room in my brother Scott's ranch."

Katie had no idea where Wendy was going with that line. "What does that have to do with anything?" she wanted to know.

"Blake improvised," Wendy pointed out. When the light apparently didn't dawn for Katie, she added, "You do the same." She could see she still wasn't getting through. Or, if she was, then Katie was resisting what she was being told. Wendy pointed toward the double doors on the other side of the room. "Open my closet, please," she instructed.

She didn't want Wendy's clothes. She liked her own just fine. "Wendy, I-"

"Don't argue with a pregnant woman." Wendy pointed toward the closet again, this time more regally, like a queen commanding her servant. "Open my closet," she repeated more firmly. "You and I wear the same size, or did before I became as big as a house," Wendy observed ruefully. She wanted this baby desperately. Loved this baby desperately. But she absolutely hated being pregnant. "Pick out something more feminine."

"Why?" she asked warily.

"Just do it," Wendy ordered wearily. "If I can't get you to flirt-and don't bother denying it," she interjected quickly, "I can tell by the look in your eyes that you're not going to do a thing I just tried to teach you to do-I can at least get you to stop hiding how pretty you actually are."

Now that just wasn't true, Katie thought. Where did Wendy get these ideas? "I'm not hiding anything," Katie protested.

Wendy didn't want to waste time waltzing around words. "All right, not setting your features off to their best advantage. Better?"

This was all useless, Katie thought. If Blake didn't want her as herself, then maybe there was no point in pursing this any further. She couldn't maintain a facade indefinitely, even if it meant having Blake in her life instead of his daydreaming about the likes of Brittany.

"Wendy-"

Knuckles digging into the mattress on either side of her, Wendy drew herself up in her bed.

"Do I have to get up and find clothes for you?" Wendy wanted to know. "Because I will." To ill.u.s.trate her point, she threw back the covers from her bed and began to swing out her legs.