“Fine. I’m going to be sore tomorrow, though.”
“Try a hot bath tonight. It works wonders.”
Great. Now she could add thinking about him in a tub to her list of fantasies. If only she were his type, she might have a chance. But she wasn’t. Stone was the kind of man who would date women who—
She frowned. She had been in his house nearly four months, and to the best of her knowledge he didn’t go out with anyone. Evelyn had died over three years before. Was he still recovering? He must really have been in love with her.
“Did you live here with your late wife?” she asked.
Stone took a drink of water and nodded. “Evelyn is the one who found this house. She adored it. When we moved in, she did a lot of the decorating herself. She’d grown up pretty poor. They lived in a trailer park, but she spent a lot of time at my place. She said that gave her ideas and she’d been dreaming about the perfect house for years. So when we bought this one, she already had most of the rooms planned out.”
Cathy was surprised she wasn’t jealous of his relationship with Evelyn. She supposed it was because to her the woman wasn’t real. They’d never met and there was no trace of her in the house. No pictures, no mementos that she knew about.
“Where did you meet?” she asked.
Stone settled on a workout bench and rested his elbows on his knees. The water bottle hung loosely from his hands. “Through some redistricting, the kids from the trailer park came to our elementary school. Talk about mixing the haves and have-nots. Evelyn sat next to me in class, and I was instantly smitten. We ate lunch together, and by the end of the first day of third grade we were fast friends.” His gaze drifted from her to a past she couldn’t see. “Nothing ever changed that.”
“I’m surprised your parents approved of your relationship.”
He shrugged. “Me, too. But as long as I did the appropriate ‘heir’ things, they left me alone. Benign neglect and all that. Evelyn was my real family. After high school, we went to the same college. She was on scholarship. She was amazing. So damn bright. She never let me get away with anything.”
Cathy leaned against the wall. She could hear the love in Stone’s voice. That hurt a little. No one had ever loved her that much. Not even her parents.
“You miss her,” she said.
“Yeah. It’s better now, but I do miss her. She was my best friend and we’d been together so long, I didn’t know what the world would be like without her.” He straightened. “I’ll never be able to replace her. Not that I’d try. She was unique.”
Cathy nodded. Theirs would have been a special marriage, she thought. The years of friendship would have added a dimension to their love. No doubt the transition from friends to romantic partners had been exactly right.
She finished her bottle of water and placed it in the trash. She was a fool. All his kind acts, all her daydreams, even her change in circumstances couldn’t shake the truth. She was living in a dreamworld.
It was a very nice dream, she reminded herself, and for now it was enough. She was here to do a good job and learn as much as she could. She wanted to grow as a person. But everything came with a price. For her, that price was falling for her boss. A man who was still in love with a woman who had been gone for three long years.
Chapter Eleven
Cathy paused at the bottom of the stairs. As usual her heart was pounding. She was getting used to the sensation. She worked with Stone every day and managed to act and even feel completely normal. But as soon as something happened to upset their routine, or they moved out of the comfortable employer/employee relationship—like tonight—she was a walking, breathing set of vibrating nerves.
“You’ll be fine,” she told herself as she smoothed her hair back from her face. She’d had it trimmed recently and she loved the way the soft, highlighted waves fell around her face. After her cut, she’d paid for a second makeup lesson and even bought a few products. Daily practice had made her confident about her abilities to duplicate what the makeup artist had done. Her dress was new, one of several things she’d purchased to flatter her trimmer figure. She still jogged regularly, and a few weeks of weight lifting had done their bit to tone her body. If she held her arm just right, she could even see a little muscle definition.
All in all, this was the best her life had ever been. If she could just get over what seemed to be a permanent set of nerves, everything would be fine.
She heard footsteps in the foyer. Ula walked slowly toward her holding something long and dark in her arms. The housekeeper stopped in front of her.
“You look very beautiful,” she said as she smiled at Cathy.
“You’re too kind.” Cathy felt herself blushing.Beautifulwas definitely an exaggeration. She looked pretty good. Although compared with her old frumpy, chubby self, the transformation could realistically be called amazing.
“The dress is lovely.”
Cathy glanced down at the rust-colored knit dress she wore. It had long sleeves and was fitted through her waist and hips. Then the fabric flared out a little before softly falling around her calves. There was a low scoop neck in front and an even lower scoop in the back. The color brought out the red highlights in her hair and made her eyes as green as a cat’s. The style flattered her figure and made her grateful for all the miles she’d logged.
“Thanks,” she said. “I fell in love with it at the store. I’ve never really owned pretty things and I couldn’t resist.”
“Mr. Ward will be most impressed. To that end, I have a contribution to make. It’s a little chilly tonight, and I thought you might like to borrow this.”
Ula held out a stunning hunter green velvet cape. The lining was silk, and a darker green. Cathy stared in disbelief. “Ula, it’s wonderful. But you can’t mean to lend it to me. It’s too fabulous.”
The older woman shrugged. “I never wear it. Besides, it’s your twenty-ninth birthday, and you deserve something special.”
