Grumbling under his breath, Joe worked his jaw furiously as if there were a hundred hot words in his mouth that he was fighting to keep inside. Finally though, he grudgingly agreed. “Fine. I won’t say anything. But I think you’re making a mistake here, Rafe. One that you’re gonna regret real soon.”
“Maybe,” he said and shifted his gaze back to the enclosed patio where Katie was working in her temporary kitchen. Even from a distance, she was beautiful, he thought. But it wasn’t just her beauty calling to him. It was the shine of something tender in her eyes. The knowledge that she had wanted him, desired him, without knowing who he was. She didn’t want anything from him and that was so rare in Rafe’s world that he couldn’t let her go.
But his heart wasn’t involved here and it wouldn’t be, either. He had tried love. Tried marriage and failed miserably at both. Kings didn’t fail. It was the one rule his father had drummed into all of them from the time they were kids.
Well, his divorce from Leslie was going to be the only time Rafe King failed at anything. He wouldn’t risk another mistake. Wouldn’t give Fate another shot at kicking his ass.
“Whether or not I regret anything,” Rafe told Joe quietly, “is not your business. You just do your job and leave Katie Charles to me.”
“Fine. You’re the boss,” Joe said after a long minute of silence. “But King or not, you’re making a mistake.”
Joe walked off to the kitchen where Steve and Arturo were jokingly arguing about the plastering job. Inside her temporary kitchen, Katie was busy working on another batch of her cookies and the delicious aromas wafting from the oven wrapped themselves around him. Rafe stood alone in the sunlight while his mind raced with possibilities.
Maybe Joe had a point. But being with Katie, keeping his identity a secret, didn’t feel like a mistake to Rafe. So he was going to stick with his original plan. Once a decision had been made, Rafe never liked to deviate. That was second-guessing himself and if he started doing that, where would it end? No.
Better he take the fall for his own decisions than have to pay for unsolicited advice gone wrong.
Seven
Emily O’Hara was waiting for Rafe outside Katie’s house late that afternoon. Again, he was the last man to leave and he had lingered even later than usual, half hoping Katie would get back from the store before he left. He wanted to talk to her. Hell, he admitted silently, that wasn’t all he wanted.
Since Katie wasn’t home, he was surprised to find her grandmother leaning against his truck when he walked out front to leave. She wore a hot-pink oversize shirt over a white tank top and white pants. Huge red-framed sunglasses shielded her eyes, but when she heard him approach, she pushed them up to the top of her head.
Idly filing her nails, she looked up at him as he got closer and gave him a tight smile that should have warned him something was up. But, he reminded himself, if there was one thing Rafe knew, it was women. Granted, he didn’t have much experience with older females, but how hard could it be to pour on some charm and win her over?
Besides, Katie’s grandmother had seemed nice enough when he first met her. What could possibly go wrong?
“Mrs. O’Hara,” he said, giving her a guileless smile designed to put her at her ease, “Katie’s not home.”
“Oh, I know that Rafe. It’s Tuesday. My girl always goes grocery shopping on Tuesdays. I’ve tried to shake up her world a little, but she does love a schedule.” She straightened up, tucked her emery board into the oversize purse hanging from her shoulder and cocked her head to look at him. “Wait, maybe I shouldn’t call you Rafe at all. Maybe you’d prefer it if I call you Mr. King?”
Rafe flinched and a sinking sensation opened up in the pit of his stomach. This he hadn’t expected at all. She knew who he was. Had she told Katie? No, he thought. If she had, he’d have heard about it by now. Hell, Katie would have come at him with both barrels blazing. So the question was, why hadn’t her grandmother given him up?
“Rafe’ll do,” he told her and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “How long have you known who I am?”
She chuckled. “Since the moment my Katie introduced you as Rafe Cole.” Shaking her head, she ran one finger along the hood of the truck, looked at the dirt she’d picked up, then clucked her tongue and rubbed her fingers together to get rid of it.
“See, Katie’s a good girl, but she’s single-minded. At the moment, she’s so focused on her business that she doesn’t see anything else. Sadly, her pop culture knowledge is lacking, too. If she’d read the celebrity magazines more often, as I do…” She paused to give him another one of those cool, measuring stares. “Then she would have recognized you, too. Though I will say, you look different in jeans than you do in a tux at some fancy party.”
Inwardly, he groaned. Stupid. He hadn’t even thought of that. He’d been in one of those weekly tabloidesque magazines only last month. Photographers at the Save the Shore benefit had gotten shots of him squiring an actress to the affair. Not that he and Selena were a couple or anything. After one date, he’d known that a man could only talk hairdos and tanning tips for so long.
Sliding his hands from his pockets, he folded his arms over his chest in a classic defense posture. Emily might appear to be a sweet older lady, but the glint in her eye told him that he’d better walk soft and careful. But Rafe was used to sometimes-hostile negotiations with suppliers, so he was as prepared for this confrontation as he could be. Bracing his feet wide apart, he waited for whatever was coming next.
“So, not going to deny it at least,” she said.
“What would be the point?”
“There is that.”
Curious now, Rafe asked, “Why haven’t you told Katie?”
“Interesting question,” Emily acknowledged with a small smile. “I’ve asked that of myself a time or two in the last couple of weeks. But the truth is, I wanted to wait and see what you were up to first.”
“And?”
“Still waiting.” She wagged her finger at him as if he were a ten-year-old boy. She took a step or two away from the truck, walking from sunlight into shade. Her sandals clicked on the concrete driveway. When she turned to look at him again she asked, “So instead of keeping me in suspense, why don’t you do us both a favor and tell me what’s going on? Why are you pretending to be someone you’re not?”