Casey had seen the expression he wore in his movies, and for a second it was exciting to think of. But then she saw the man. She had shared a lot with him, from their lonely childhoods to being entangled with a man who plagued his family. In a short time Casey had become enmeshed with Tate’s friends, his family, his very life.
The movie-star image fell away and she saw the man she’d come to care for deeply. She lifted her arms to him.
The smile he gave her seemed to show that he understood. He stretched out on the bed beside her and pulled her into his arms, her head on his shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I was wrong.”
“Shhhh,” he said. “It’s all right.” He stroked her hair.
“I thought you hated me.”
“I could never do that.”
She pulled away to look at him. “But you were so angry at me!”
Tate gave a little laugh. “I was. I haven’t had a lot of women tell me no. It was a shock to me.” She put her head back down on his shoulder. “I’ve committed to this play and I have to honor that. But the second our performances are done, I’ll be going back to L.A.”
“Oh. I see,” Casey said. “L.A. Want me to close up the house here for you?”
“No. Don’t take my head off again, but I want you to go with me. But if you don’t like that idea, I will come here as often as I can.”
Casey let out her breath. “You really meant what you said.”
He shook his head in disbelief. “Of course I did! What is it about Haines that makes perfectly sane women like you and Nina believe him?”
She knew it was a rhetorical question, but she answered anyway. “Probably his faked displays of emotion. He says everything with tears and angst, like it’s coming from the very depths of his soul. You say, ‘Baby, my jet’s running. Wanna go with me?’?”
Tate laughed. “I think I’ve been in L.A. too long, because those words are guaranteed to get any other woman there.”
Putting his hand under her chin, he tipped her face up to look at him. He was serious. “Acacia, I like you very much. I like the way you see through the outside of me to what’s underneath. I like that I can be myself with you, that you have no preconceived ideas of what I should be. I like your enthusiasm for life. I especially love our bodies together.”
He took a breath. “I want you to go to L.A. with me to see if you can tolerate my odd life. I made up my mind about you at the first, maybe on that day when you yelled at me about the pie. I’ve had to wait for you to decide what you want.” He paused for a moment. “Will you go with me?”
“Yes,” she said. “I will.” Her head went back to his shoulder.
“Good, but we have to keep it quiet. I’m afraid Haines will take his anger out on Emmie and Nina.”
“Can’t something be done to stop him? Can’t lawyers help?”
“What he does is immoral but not illegal. You can’t imprison a man for using words to ruin lives. Not even for lying constantly. It’s not illegal to give a pretty girl a gift and tell her it came from his grandmother.” Tate sighed. “Why is it that women fall for bad boys, then get angry when they turn out to be bad boys?”
Casey listened more to his tone than to his words. “You’re really worried, aren’t you?”
“Yes. He’s getting worse. He’s obsessed with the idea that I have ruined his life. I’m going to stop paying him soon, which means that he’s either going to have to get a job or figure out a way to get someone else to support him. I dread whatever he’s going to do.” Tate took a breath. “I don’t want to stir him up while Emmie and Nina are here. And you. What he did with that girl…”
“Rachael Wells.”
“Right. Her. That was defamation of character. When I get back to L.A., and Nina and Emmie are safe on the other side of the country, I’m going to get some legal advice. There has to be something I can do to stop this man’s vendetta against my family.”
“Does he do this to all your girlfriends?”
“No, but he knew I didn’t really like any of them.”
For all the horror of what Tate was saying, she couldn’t stop her smile. She ran her leg between his thighs. “I’ll keep us a secret. In the last weeks, my acting ability has improved so much that now I’ll be able to make people believe that I can’t bear the sight of you.”
Tate made a sound that was half laugh, half groan.
She rolled on top of him, her face scrunched into a deep frown. “Are you saying I’m not a good actor?”