Holding the Dream (Dream Trilogy 2)

"Don't try to confuse the issue," she spat out, slamming her hands on the counter.

"Far be it from me to confuse the issue with facts. Keep going."

"Then it was the let's-get-Kate-healthy campaign. Hospitals, damn doctors, medicine."

"I suppose it would be confusing the issue again to point out that you had an ulcer."

"I was handling it. I could have gotten myself to the doctor just fine on my own. Then you're cooking and feeding me all this healthy stuff. 'You've got to have a decent breakfast, Kate. You really should cut back on the coffee a little.' And before I know it I'm eating regular meals and exercising."

Byron ran his tongue around his teeth, stared down at his plate. "I'm so ashamed. Setting this diabolical trap for you. It's unforgivable."

"Don't you get glib with me, buster. You bought puppies. You tuned up my car."

He rubbed his hands over his face before he rose. "Now I got the dogs and fixed your car in order to blind you to my evil plot. Kate, you're making a fool of yourself."

"I am not. I know perfectly well when I'm making a fool of myself, and I'm not. You set everything up in clever little stages until I'm practically living here."

"Honey," he said with a mix of affection and exasperation, "you are living here."

"See?" She threw up her hands. "I'm living with you, without even realizing it. I'm cooking meals, for God's sake. I've never cooked for a man in my entire life."

"Haven't you?" Touched, he moved forward, reached for her.

"Don't you do that." Still blazing, she retreated behind the island. "You've got a hell of a nerve confusing things like this. I told you you weren't my type, that it wasn't going to work."

His patience straining, he rocked back on his heels. "The hell with types. It has been working, and you're perfectly aware of just how well it works with us. I love you, and if you weren't so damn pigheaded you'd admit that you love me."

"Don't you assume my feelings, De Witt."

"Fine. Then I'm in love with you. Deal with it"

"I don't have to deal with it. You have to deal with it. And as far as your half-assed proposal of marriage—"

"I didn't propose marriage," he said coolly. "I told you I want you to marry me. I didn't ask you. Just what are you afraid of, Kate? That I'm a replay of that jerk Thornhill who used you until something more appetizing came along?"

She went cold. "Just how do you know about Roger? You've been poking around in my business, haven't you? And why am I not surprised?"

It was no use biting his tongue now. Better, he thought, to play it out "When someone is as important to me as you are, her business is important to me. Her welfare is important to me. So I made it my business to find out. You mentioned his name to Kusack, I've kept in touch with Kusack."

"You've kept in touch with Kusack," she repeated. "You know it was Roger who set me up."

He nodded. "And apparently so do you."

"I just figured it out this afternoon. But at a guess I'd say you've known a bit longer and didn't find it necessary to mention it to me."

"The trail led back to him. A personal clash between the two of you, access to your office. He made phone calls to New Hampshire around the time you were told about your father."

"How do you know about the phone calls?"

"Josh's investigator accessed the information."

"Josh's investigator," she repeated. "So Josh knows, too. But still no one thought it necessary to pass any of this handy information along to me."

"It wasn't passed to you because you'd have stormed right up into Thornhill's face and blasted him." The way, Byron admitted, he'd wanted to take Thornhill's face apart with his fists. "We didn't want him tipped off before the investigation is complete."

"You didn't want," she shot back. "Too bad, because I've already blasted him and ruined your neat plans. You had no right to work around me, to take over my life."

"I have every right to do whatever I can to protect you, and to help you. And that's what I've done. That's what I'm going to continue to do."