Fortune's Valentine Bride Read online

  “I know he thinks he’s never going to walk again and in his mind, that makes him half a man. It’s insane to think that way, but to be honest,” he told Katie, dropping his voice, “if I were in Javier’s place, I don’t know if I’d be thinking any differently.”

  Katie took Marcos’s hand, as if to somehow physically transfer her own feelings to him. “He is going to walk again, Marcos. He really has to believe that,” she insisted. And then she looked at him for a long moment. “You have to make him believe that. A positive attitude is really important in this kind of a case. And besides,” she said, never wavering, “miracles happen every day, so why not for Javier?”

  Marcos searched her eyes and realized that his wife’s friend wasn’t just saying something to make him feel better. “You honestly believe that, don’t you?”

  Katie nodded with conviction. “From the bottom of my heart.”

  Right now, he was willing to cling to anything, as long as it helped Javier get back on his feet. “I suppose, maybe miracles do happen,” Marcos said, his tone just a wee bit guarded. “If you hadn’t been there for Wendy and the baby last night, I might have lost them both.”

  She didn’t like to dwell on that. Negatives were things she preferred to banish from her thoughts. “Instead, they’re happy and healthy,” she said cheerfully. “If you’d like me to, I could go and talk to Javier, make him see that there’s every reason in the world to believe that he’s going to get better. All it takes is patience and time—” she offered.

  Touched, Marcos kissed her cheek. “No, you’ve already done more than enough for the Mendoza family,” he told her, emotion brimming in his voice. “Dealing with my brother is my job. Tell you what. Why don’t you head on to Wendy’s room? I know she’s dying to see you. You should go now, before everyone else gets here and it gets too noisy and too crowded.”

  “Crowded?” she repeated, a little confused.

  He nodded. “Last I heard, they were all getting ready to fly back out here. Together.” He liked Wendy’s family, but if he were honest, he preferred them in small doses. This did not promise to be a small dose. “It’s going to be standing room only around her bed.”

  “By everyone, you mean her brothers and sisters, right?” she asked cautiously. She knew what Wendy’s father was like and it had been difficult tearing the man away from his desk long enough to attend the wedding.

  “And her parents,” Marcos added.

  Katie made no attempt to hide her surprise. “You’re kidding. Her father’s coming?”

  She would have expected Wendy’s mother to want to come, but the woman rarely did anything on her own and her husband was all but married to his job. In her opinion, the foundation was his real wife and Wendy’s mother was more like the mistress he had on the side.

  Marcos laughed shortly, glad he wasn’t the only one who felt that way.

  “Surprised me, too. John Michael Fortune leaving his office twice in the space of a little over a month—I expected the Second Coming to happen before that. Just goes to show you, you really can never tell the kind of power a newborn baby has,” he said with a laugh.

  Marcos looked a lot better now than he had when she had first seen him in the hallway, Katie thought, a sense of satisfaction sweeping through her. Her work here was done.

  “Then I’d better go see Wendy quickly,” she agreed, starting to leave.

  Marcos nodded, turning back to the nursery window. “Tell her I’ll be along after I finish visiting with my daughter.”

  “I’ll tell her.”

  That really was one lucky little girl. Marcos was going to make a great father, Katie thought.

  She smiled to herself as she went down the hallway, reading off the room numbers until she came to Wendy’s. She knocked on the closed door. But rather than stand on ceremony, waiting for a verbal invitation to come in, Katie pushed open the door and went in. After last night, she and Wendy had crossed a new threshold. The intensity of their relationship had deepened by several remarkable layers.

  Wendy looked really pleased to see her. Blake, who was also in the room, was the one who was surprised.

  “I thought after last night, you’d be sleeping in, recharging your batteries, that kind of thing,” he told her.

  The dream still very fresh in her mind, her pulse launched into double time at the very sight of Blake. Katie fervently hoped that a flush hadn’t crept into her face, giving her away.

  She did her best to focus on the present—and reality—not a wishful dream that hadn’t a chance in hell of coming true.

  “I don’t need much sleep,” Katie informed him almost stiffly. After all, he’d been through the same thing she had and now here he was, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Why did he think she would be anything less than that? Did he think of her as some fragile cream puff? “I helped Wendy deliver a baby, I didn’t carve out the Grand Canyon with a soup spoon,” she pointed out crisply.

  Blake shrugged. Men were supposed to be heartier than women, but he knew better than to say that out loud. Besides, it was apparent that Katie was every bit as hearty as he was.

  And then something occurred to him.

  “Hold it. Since I pick you up every day and I’m here, just how did you get to the hospital?” Katie was extremely levelheaded and practically frugality personified. He couldn’t see her calling a taxi to bring her here. So then, how had she gotten here? There was no public transportation that would have brought her from Red Rock.

  “Magic,” she retorted, remaining mysterious for exactly half a second before she confessed to Wendy. “I borrowed your car. You did tell me I could use it,” she reminded her friend, mentally crossing her fingers and hoping that it was still all right.

  Wendy put her hand on top of Katie’s and smiled warmly. “After what you did last night, everything I have is yours,” she said with feeling.

  Relieved, Katie laughed. “Marcos might have a different opinion about that. Borrowing your car to come see you is all the payment I want,” she told Wendy.

  “Well, I’ll leave you two alone to talk,” Blake told his sister. “I’m going to go take another look at my niece and then head back to Red Rock.”

  “But you’ll be back later this evening?” Wendy asked hopefully.

  Blake knew exactly what his sister was really asking. “You mean when the Fortune family descends en masse? Sure, I’ll be here. Wouldn’t miss seeing the expression on the old man’s face when he looks at his granddaughter for the first time.” Although, he thought, his father would have undoubtedly been happier if the first grandchild had been a boy, born to one of his sons. “He’s probably bringing a tiny little desk and chair for her so she can get started working for the company by the time she learns how to sit up.” He lapsed into a deep voice, doing a fair imitation of their father. “‘No time like the present, Wendy. You’re never too young to start on the right path.’”

  “Your father’s not as bad as all that,” Katie protested, coming to the man’s defense. When her own late father had faced ruin, it was the senior Fortune who had found a position for him in his own company. She would always be grateful to him for allowing her father the chance to restore his dignity and his pride.

  “Oh, yes, he is,” Wendy and Blake told her in unison.

  Not wanting to argue with her friends, Katie relented. It still didn’t change the truth, in her eyes. She knew that John Michael had a great deal of difficulty in expressing his feelings, but in that he was not unlike a lot of other men, especially those in his generation. The bottom line was that he was coming, and that meant a great deal.

  With a shrug, Katie retreated, saying, “Can’t argue with both of you.”

  The look Blake gave her sent a shiver up her spine that she had a great deal of difficulty in masking. “Sure you can,” he q
uipped as he went out the door. “And probably will.”

  Wendy pushed a button and the top portion of her mattress pivoted forward, allowing her to almost sit up. “So,” she asked eagerly the second Blake had closed the door behind him, “how’s it going?”

  For a split second, Katie had let her mind stray back to her dream. She shook herself free when she heard Wendy’s voice and looked at her friend. “What?”

  Wendy rolled her eyes. “This so-called Project Brittany of his.”

  Katie was surprised that Wendy even wanted to talk about that, given the little miracle lying in the incubator down the hall. But her friend was looking at her eagerly, obviously waiting for some sort of a progress report.

  She shrugged. “I was going to show him how to cook today, but I’m not sure if that’s still on, given the circumstances.” She looked at Wendy pointedly.

  “Circumstances?” Wendy echoed.

  How could Wendy even ask? “You, the baby—ring a bell?” Katie asked, her eyes meeting Wendy’s. How could she even think of anything else? If she’d just had a baby…but then, that was never going to happen to her. She was probably just going to be “fun Aunt Katie” and wind up dying alone, while eating her dinner standing over her kitchen sink.

  She didn’t expect Wendy to become indignant and raise her voice. “Don’t you dare stop because of me. I want you there, shoulder to shoulder with Blake until my empty-headed brother realizes that you are three times the woman that Brittany will ever be.”

  Katie shook her head. Maybe this was just a futile battle and she was fooling herself that she could get Blake to see the light.

  “I don’t know about that, Wendy,” she confessed honestly. “Brittany’s a socialite, she moves in your circle.”

  Wendy instantly came to her defense. “And you are a real person who doesn’t need a circle. Now, please,” she entreated, “if you’re not going to do this for yourself, do it for Blake.”

  Katie frowned. Had the delivery wiped out Wendy’s short-term memory? “Blake wants Brittany, remember?” she said with a note of dejection.

  “No, my brother only thinks he wants Brittany,” Wendy corrected. “And if by some horrible prank of nature, he managed to temporarily—and I stress the word temporarily—get her, what he’d wind up getting is cotton candy.”

  “Cotton candy?” Katie repeated. Just what was that supposed to mean?

  Wendy nodded her head. “No substance, just air and sugar. And she’ll break his heart on top of that,” Wendy predicted. “She did it once, she’ll do it again. That’s one leopard who is not changing her shallow spots.” She moved closer to Katie, taking her hand and saying earnestly, “Trust me, my brother needs a good woman in his life—and as far as I can see, there’s only one good woman in this mix and it’s you, Katie.” She sighed, suddenly feeling exhausted. Leaning back on her pillows, Wendy released Katie’s hand. “So go, get back to Scott’s and get back to work. Save my stupid brother from himself and the stupidest mistake he could ever possibly make.” Her eyes narrowed. “Kill her if you have to. You have my permission.”

  The atmosphere had been deadly serious—until the last two sentences. The tension dissipated and Katie laughed, shaking her head.

  “Don’t be shy, Wendy,” she said in a coaxing tone. “Tell me what you really think.”

  “Go!” Wendy repeated, a slight grin on her lips as she pointed toward the door.

  Katie saluted as if she were a dutiful little soldier. “Okay.”

  “And don’t forget to call me and tell me how it’s going,” Wendy added, raising her voice as she called after her departing friend.

  “Will do,” Katie promised, just as the door closed behind her. “Provided there’s something worth reporting,” she added under her breath.

  Blake looked up in surprise from the desk where he was making notes to himself. He hadn’t heard her knock—she probably hadn’t, he decided—but he had sensed rather than heard her the second she’d entered the makeshift office. It was, he thought, as if he’d somehow gotten attuned to Katie.

  But then, why not? They’d worked together for over two years now, hadn’t they? You got used to a person’s habits and the scent they wore after two years, he reasoned. Provided, of course, that they wore a scent, he added wryly.

  Out loud, to cover his surprise, he said, “I didn’t expect to see you here today.”

  Katie put her purse down. “Why not? It’s another ‘work’ day, right? Since you’re here, you obviously didn’t take it off,” she pointed out. You’re that eager to win the wrong girl, she added silently while maintaining a smile on her lips.

  Blake nodded at the paper on his desk. “I thought I’d polish up that love letter you wrote for me. You know, add my own touches to it.” He looked at her with just a little bit of hesitation. Or was he being thoughtful of her feelings? She caught herself wondering before dismissing the thought as merely wishful thinking. “You don’t mind, do you?”

  She shrugged. “It’s your love letter.” God, had that sounded as awkward to him as it did to her?

  To her surprise, he pushed the letter aside. “I can work on that later. So, you have anything new in mind?” he asked her, sounding every bit like an eager student.

  Oh, God, this man is so wasted on Brittany, she thought in despair. “I thought today I’d teach you how to cook.”

  “Cook?” he repeated, then frowned. Deeply. “Is that really necessary? I mean, isn’t the saying, ‘The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach,’ pretty clear that it’s the woman who does the cooking? Not that I think that Brittany could boil an egg,” he confessed.

  She’d probably set the house on fire if she tried, Katie thought. “That saying was popular when women were regarded as second-class citizens. Times have changed,” she reminded him. “Now, if you don’t think you’re up to it…” She let her voice trail off.

  Nothing got him more motivated than a challenge. “Bring it,” he said.

  Katie nodded her head with a smile. I fully intend to, Blake. I fully intend to.

  Chapter Eleven

  “No, no, you stir the flour slowly into the consommé, you don’t beat it as if you’re some outraged supermodel, out for revenge,” Katie protested.

  On her way over to Scott Fortune’s house, she had stopped at the store to pick up a few ingredients for the proposed cooking lesson. She’d decided to get Blake started by having him prepare beef Stroganoff, thinking it was a relatively easy recipe.

  Apparently she’d thought wrong.

  One second, she’d turned away for one second to retrieve the mushrooms from the refrigerator and when she’d turned back again, it was to see Blake all but attacking the pot, which now contained the carefully diced-up beef, the consommé and supposedly the evenly distributed quarter cup of flour.

  “But it’s all lumpy,” Blake complained in frustration. He was unsuccessfully trying to change the consistency of the flour—which was beginning to look like dumplings at this stage—by hitting each small lump with the flat of his spatula. “It’s not supposed to be lumpy, right?”

  She suppressed the desire to laugh and solemnly said, “Right.”

  That could have been avoided if he’d poured the flour in slowly, stirring as he went, the way she’d told him to. But he had obviously just upended the measuring cup and tossed all four ounces in at once. Still, there was no point in mentioning that to him now. Now was the time for damage control.

  “You stir like this,” Katie told him, covering his hand with her own and moving the large spatula rhythmically inside the pot. “Get the feel of it?” she asked.

  He turned his head, looking back over his shoulder at her. She was directly behind him, less than a hair’s breadth away.

  As close as the next heartbeat, he real
ized. “Yeah, I feel it,” he murmured.

  His breath seemed to graze her skin. Or was that just the steam coming up from the Stroganoff? The spatula in the pot wasn’t the only thing being stirred, Katie couldn’t help thinking. Belatedly, she released his hand and drew her own away.

  Getting her heartbeat regulated took another minute or so longer.

  She forced her mind back on the task at hand and looked down into the pot.

  “See, the lumps are disappearing already.” She raised her eyes to his, a pleased smile on her lips. “We’ll make a chef out of you yet,” she promised. Now was the time for corrections, she decided. “And next time, make sure you pour the flour in slowly. It won’t form lumps that way.”

  “Next time,” he muttered, wondering to himself if there really had to be a next time. This winning Brittany back campaign seemed like a great deal more trouble than he’d first anticipated. Oh, he didn’t mind the wining and the dining—if dining meant eating out—and he could even take in stride the dancing and writing love letters. But this cooking business—well, he wasn’t all that sure he really wanted to go that route.

  He knew without having to ask that his father had never had to cook anything for his mother to win her over, or to get her to marry him. But then, his mother was far more easygoing than Brittany. And although even now she was a very pretty woman and must have been even more so when she had first caught his father’s eye, he knew for a fact that his mother had never been drop-dead gorgeous like Brittany.

  Blake resigned himself. Winning a special woman required going the extra mile—or more—and this was definitely that extra mile.

  Standing beside him, her hair inadvertently brushing against his bare arm—he’d rolled up his sleeves when they had started this—Katie looked into the pot. She nodded, pleased.

  “Looks like it’s really coming along,” she told him, referring to the consistency that they had finally achieved.

  Why her praise really pleased him he wouldn’t have been able to explain to anyone, not even himself. But it did. “Thanks.”