“Good doggies,” she said, staying clear of the intimidating pair while at the same time putting distance between her and Landon.
After commanding, “Release”—a word which sent the dogs plopping back down before the fireplace—he led her up the sweeping limestone staircase.
The bedroom they entered at the far end of the hall was spacious, sparsely furnished, decorated in a black-and-white palette that went heavy on the black and sparse on the white. A guest room, she supposed.
But a string of unexpected words popped into her head.
“If you want to sleep with someone, you’ll sleep with me.”
Her stomach twisted as though she’d just taken a plunge on a roller coaster, and she had trouble shaking off the thought of sharing that very big bed with the very big man standing to her right.
There was no denying there had been some serious vibes going on between the two of them back in the conference room. But Beth had to concentrate on what was important: getting David back.
Her life was a mess and she’d taken fretting to a whole new art form. She didn’t need more worries.
Hopefully, Landon wasn’t getting any bed-sharing ideas.
She peered up at his hard profile. Of course he wasn’t. Landon was in it for the little black book, and for what she could tell him about Hector.
He’d entered the room first and pulled off his jacket as she followed. “This is your room.” His jacket fell with a thud atop a corner chair. “Unless you want to sleep in mine.”
She wasn’t sure if he was kidding or not and didn’t have time to decide. “I’ll keep this one, thank you.”
His white cotton shirt pulled attractively across his shoulders as he calmly held out his hand. “The book? Do you mind if I have a look now?”
“Yes, I do mind, actually.”
He wiggled his fingers. “Come on. Give it over, Bethany.”
She frowned. “I said you could read it when you married me, didn’t I?”
His eyes sparkled in amusement. “We’re more than halfway there—the sooner I see what that bastard’s after the sooner I can skin his ass on a platter.”
The thought of Hector laid out like a dead pig on a tray was too lovely to deny. It brought butterflies to her stomach. “All right, but only the first two pages. You can read the rest after the wedding.”
She waited for Thomas to bring up her suitcase, then extracted the black book from the outside zippered compartment. “Okay, so let’s talk about our plan. I want Hector to be left with nothing. Absolutely nothing.”
Landon’s lips twitched, and when she noticed she felt herself respond. Damn, how did he do that? Every time he smiled she found herself smiling back like a dope.
After handing over the black leather book, she followed Landon’s stealthy movements as he hauled a chair out from behind a desk and sat. He calmly paged through it.
“So why did you marry him?” he asked.
“I was young and pregnant.” Beth plopped down on the edge of the bed, suddenly uncomfortable in her skirt and jacket. “And all right, yes, stupid.”
He flipped to the second page and didn’t raise his head, his hard, aquiline profile unreadable.
“I used to wonder why he’d want to marry me,” she admitted with a shrug. “I felt so flattered. He would call every day and ask to see me. Then I guess he saw what a good daughter I was to my parents. He wanted an obedient, biddable wife—like all men desperate to feel powerful want someone meek.”
Landon looked up, and when his lips smiled and did that eat-your-heart-out thing again, she felt a strange elated sensation.
“You were biddable, Beth? What happened?”
She burst out laughing. “Oh, stop it.”
“Did you ever let him medicate you, Beth?”
She frowned at the question, at the hard edge in the word “medicate”. There had been times when Hector had diagnosed her “problems” she needed to grow up, and get serious, and act like his wife. Apparently, he hadn’t had any pills for Beth’s ailments. “Hector specializes in chronic pain—and nothing of mine ever ached except my pride.”
And now she’d grown up, hadn’t she? Now she’d put all her efforts into acting like someone’s wife—Landon’s.
His finger slid down a page, and he read a name out loud. “Joseph Kennar. He’s one of our reporters.”
“He’s bought.”
Landon appeared anything but surprised. “Everyone’s for sale unfortunately.” He continued reading, his eyes sharp as the point of a knife on the page. “Macy Jennings. Another one of our reporters.”
“Also bought.” Then she added, with a bit of disgust at herself because she could not, for the life of her, explain why she told him all this. “Hector would do anything to ensure he had the best reputation. He wanted to treat anyone that was rich and powerful, and keeping his name clean in the media guaranteed this. But I suspect Hector did more with Macy than just exchange money and favors.”
“And you let him?”
She let him? Had she? Just so he left her alone? “Well I…I guess I ignored him. I thought that…for David I would tolerate it.” God. Stupid stupid stupid. What would Landon think of her?
“But then?”
He seemed so inordinately interested in her that she was grateful his head was still bent over the book. Otherwise, his questions and his unyielding attention would be too much. Still, she felt so stupid over what she’d tolerated.
“But then I couldn’t do it even for my baby,” she admitted. There. All right, that wasn’t bad, that she had finally found her courage and left the sleaze. She’d sold David on the “new adventure” he and Mommy would take, and he’d been excited.
She seized the nearby pillow and clutched it to her chest, suddenly needing to hold on to something. Every time she thought of David her stomach lurched as if she’d been poisoned.
“I left Hector a year ago and took David with me, and I found a job at a flower shop. Hector made contact weeks later. He apologized, said he wanted me back, but all I wanted was to be free. Of him. I filed for divorce and when he found out, he ranted and threatened, said I wouldn’t see a dime. He was right, I didn’t. But I was still happy. Just me and David and Mom. But then he filed for custody.”