Plus, there was something else.
She’d been damned secretive about why she was turning away from him. He had to wonder why. As much as he desired her, admired her, Tanner couldn’t get past the fact that she was an unknown variable. He liked order in his life for the simple reason that, as a child, his life had been chaos. With rules, order, there was no room for disarray.
No room for pain or betrayal.
But you got a dog, his mind argued.
Hairy was different, he assured himself. A dog learned the rules and mostly kept them. But a woman like Ivy? Hot then cold? He couldn’t count on what she’d say or do from one moment to the next. She didn’t even believe in rules. Life with Ivy would be nothing but disruptions.
He thought about the feel of her skin, the taste of her mouth, the heady sensation of claiming her body with his and told himself that maybe chaos had its place. Then he’d come back to his senses and realize that sex would only cause problems. Better to maintain an even keel. Keep their relationship as platonic as she seemed to want it.
“Probably best all the way around anyway,” he muttered.
He just wished he could stop thinking about her every damn minute.
Reaching down to pat the dog, Tanner then leaned back in his office chair and fired off an e-mail to the programmers at his company. He was almost finished with the preliminary sketches of the characters for the new game and as he thought it, he glanced at the woman he’d drawn only that morning. Ivy’s face stared back at him from the page. Her eyes, her nose, her mouth, swollen from his kisses. Her image held a flashing sword in the air and the wings that spread from her back were alive with power.
First, she had become Lady Gwen. Now, he mused, she was Aurelia the Avenger.
He was in bad shape.
“Damn it,” he muttered, shaking those thoughts and more from his mind. He was starting a new game. Something he usually thrived on. Building characters, creating scenes, devising the ins and outs of the rules to be followed. Rules. Games, like life, needed rules. But Ivy kept shattering his.
He rubbed the back of his neck with one hand and grumbled under his breath. He’d met Nathan’s deadline, his company was about to become the hottest thing in computer gaming and still, he was sitting here like he was in mourning.
What the hell was going on?
Why, Tanner wondered, did he feel as if there was something left undone? Something…wrong.
Ivy put the finishing touches on the chocolate cake she’d made for Tanner and told herself that this just couldn’t go on. The last few days had been so hard, she simply couldn’t let it continue. She had to tell him the truth. Had to get everything out into the open. She was walking around with what felt like two hundred pounds on her shoulders. On her heart.
She just wasn’t built for lying.
Her grandfather had been so right, she thought, suddenly wishing Pop were sitting in his favorite chair at home, so she could go and talk this over with him. But he and her mom were both in Florida, happily building the new Angel Nursery. She’d talked to them both a day or so ago and had managed to hide her own misery in the face of their happiness.
She didn’t need to worry her family long-distance. Besides, she’d dug this hole for herself, it was going to be up to her to dig her way out. Ivy only wished she knew if Tanner cared for her. Heaven knew the man was so shuttered and closed off, it would take an act of God for him to admit it, but if she could believe those feelings were there, she could live without the words if she had to.
Maybe.
But even if he did care for her, would it last once he knew the truth? From what little he’d told her about himself and his family, she knew that he didn’t trust many people. So when she admitted to tricking him deliberately, she couldn’t imagine that he’d take it very well.
Understatement.
She groaned and set down the frosting knife. The last few days had been so hard, being around him and not touching him. Desire flared inside her every time he came anywhere near her. To be so close and yet so far away from him at the same time, tore at her in a way she’d never imagined possible. But it was more than just the wanting, she told herself grimly. It was Tanner himself. Loving him and not being able to tell him so was the hardest thing she’d ever done.
She remembered that last heated conversation and the words she’d said kept haunting her. I’m a coward. She hadn’t liked the sound of that. Or the way it felt. She’d never run from anything in her life, damn it and she wasn’t going to start now.
Ivy had thought this all over for days and she had finally reached a major decision. She was through lying. She was through playing games and keeping secrets. It was no way to live.
She loved Tanner King. After David died, Ivy had never expected to fall in love again, but now that she had, she refused to hide from it. Refused to chance losing it because she was too afraid to admit that she’d made a mistake.
She’d seen from the first day that Tanner had a trust issue. Why else would he shut himself off from everyone and everything? Work in a small room in his house and never get involved with anyone? It was all about trust. And how could she expect Tanner to trust her when she was lying to him every moment she kept quiet about the truth?
“So, no more lies,” she said softly, liking the sound of it. No matter what happened to her and Tanner now, she would at least know that she’d been honest with him.
When her cell phone rang, Ivy was grateful for the respite from her own crazed thoughts. She glanced at the caller ID, then flipped the phone open and said, “Hi Dan, what’s up?”
Her farm manager said, “Didn’t want to bother you while you were at King’s place, but Ivy, there’s a problem with the decorative bridge you wanted across the creek in time for the Harrington wedding.”
“What?” she asked, barely managing to stifle a groan.
Dan Collins started talking fast and Ivy frowned as his words sunk in. There was a huge wedding scheduled for the coming weekend and everyone at Angel Christmas Tree Farm was working hard to make sure it came off without a hitch. The happy couple was from San Francisco and the bride was the daughter of a very wealthy man.
The wedding was bound to make the society pages of the city’s largest newspapers and with that kind of word-of-mouth, Ivy’s neophyte wedding business could really take off in a hurry. She couldn’t afford to have any mistakes.
“Okay, so you’re saying the lumberyard ran out of white cedar?” she repeated. “How is that possible? Having wood available is their job!”