he eased open the door and faced a seriously riled woman.
“You know, most people would have gotten mad and called me a name or two if I’d accused them of attempted extortion,” he commented.
Her scowl got worse. “Believe me, I considered a little name-calling.”
“It’s not too late.” He suppressed a wince when lightning zigzagged across the sky. The thunder followed, so loud that it vibrated the roof of the portico. “A lot of people go for jackass, but it’s a little overused. How about SOB? It’s short and to the point.”
She stared at him. “If you’re trying to be funny, or charming, you’re failing.”
“What I’m trying to do…” He had to stop because he had no idea what the heck he was trying to do. Yes, he did owe her a semiapology, but he was going beyond that. He was now somewhere in the uncomfortable realm of attempting to soothe her ruffled feathers.
But she was right.
He was failing.
Huffing, he looked at his household manager, Lena, who was standing in the gaping doorway of the estate. “Have a car brought to the front,” Ryan instructed. And because of the storm, he really hated this next part, but after what he’d just put his visitor through, it was something he felt he had to do. “I’ll drive Ms. Nash home.”
“No, thanks,” he heard Delaney say. “I’ll call a taxi.” Her statement wasn’t a suggestion.
Ryan reached across her and placed his hand over hers when she went for the phone nestled between the seats. Not the brightest move he’d ever made. The close confines of the car were, well, close.
Her breath met his.
And Ryan took in more of her than he’d intended. Nothing minty fresh but surprisingly appealing. There it was again. Attraction.
No, wait.
Lust.
He preferred that term. Good old basic lust. It kept things on a purely physical level.
“We’re over twenty miles from San Antonio,” he explained. “On a country road, no less. It’s dark and storming. It’ll take a taxi a half hour or more just to get here. I could have you home by then.”
He waited for her to debate that.
He also pulled back his hand, and the rest of his body, since being so close really didn’t seem like a good idea. Even if it sort of felt right.
Strange.
Why did he have this sudden need to comfort the woman? All she’d done was bring turmoil to his life.
As if he needed more.
Ryan didn’t believe her speculation about what had gone on at the fertility clinic. Not that he thought she’d made up the whole thing. No, she was experiencing too much distress for that. The person he doubted was this Dr. Keyes, and before the night was over, Ryan would find out any- and everything he could about the man.
“Well?” Ryan pressed when one of the servants drove a car beneath the portico and parked directly behind Delaney. “You can have a ride, or you can wait. Your choice. My advice is to put aside your resentment and take the ride. That way, you can get home to your son as soon as possible.”
That defused the argument he saw in all those shades of green in her eyes, and for the first time since he’d made the offer to take her home, Ryan knew she truly was considering it.
“Thank you,” she mumbled.
And then she looked directly at him and repeated the words in a sincere voice.
That impressed him. Why, he didn’t know, and Ryan was tired of trying to rationalize his reaction to her. Plain and simple, they just weren’t making sense. But then, lust rarely did.
Delaney got out and followed him to the other vehicle. “I’ll arrange to have my car towed.”
“No hurry.” Ryan waited until they were both inside before he continued. “My driver has the night off, but if he can fix it in the morning, I’ll have him bring it out to you.”
She gave him a considering stare and fastened her seat belt. “Let’s get something straight. I appreciate the ride—I really do—but I’d prefer if you didn’t try to be nice to me.”
Ryan nodded, actually understanding, and he started the car and drove away.
Sheesh.
His heart actually started to race.
“Well, I suppose I could try to accuse you of a few more crimes,” he joked. Not because he felt jovial but because his voice partly covered up the sounds of the storm. “That’d keep things from being nice.”
She folded her arms over her chest. “I’d prefer no chitchat, either.”
Okay. So his diversion had struck out for both of them. “Fair enough. After all, we’re not exactly in a chitchat relationship, are we?”
“No,” she quickly agreed.
But they were in some sort of relationship. An odd one but a relationship all the same. That strangeness had begun with her impromptu visit and had bumped up a few notches with her reaction to Adam’s picture.
“For the record, I don’t believe the technology exists for cloning a human embryo,” Ryan said. “And even if it did, why would a clinic steal the DNA needed for the embryo? Egos being what they are, I’m sure there would be plenty of volunteers who’d want to replicate themselves.”
He waited, going back over his argument and hoping it made sense.
“You’re right,” she said, sounding relieved. But not totally convinced.
Ryan was on the same page with her.
If, and it was huge if, the medical staff wanted to cover up an illegal cloning procedure, they might use whatever DNA they had available. Plus, they might not want to use genetic material that could be traced back to anyone specifically. In other words, it possibly made sense to use a deceased donor.
Hell.
That put a rock-hard knot in his stomach. He couldn’t bear the thought that anyone had used his son for medical experiments. It reopened the nightmare all over again. The pain of losing Adam and his wife was suddenly as fresh, as brutal, as it had been that stormy afternoon of the accident.
He tried—and failed—to stop the memories. The slow-motion, dreamlike feel of the call from the hospital. His frantic arrival. Ryan remembered the sterile smell, the look of pity on the ER doctor’s face. First, the doctor had pronounced his son dead, and then fifteen minutes later, his wife had lost her own fight for life. The entire time lapse between that first call and those last words was less than an hour.
And in those minutes, Ryan’s life had changed forever.
“I’m sorry,” he heard Delaney say.
For a second he was afraid he’d voiced his grief aloud and that she was offering him sympathy. He could handle a lot of things, but sympathy wasn’t one of them. He preferred her venom to that.
“I shouldn’t have come,” she continued. So no sympathy. At least none expressed anyway. Merely a further explanation of her visit. “Not without proof, and proof is something I’ll never get, because this has all been just a really bad scare.”
A really bad scare?
Not exactly his take on things.
A scare maybe for her because, as a parent, she’d no doubt wonder if the hypothetical cloning had done anything to harm her son. However, for Ryan the whole ordeal hadn’t been as much of a scare as it had been a huge setback to his healing. For one moment, one too-short moment, he’d considered the possibility that Adam was alive, that he’d been given a second chance.
A chance that