LITMIR.BIZ

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seen the headlines in the paper, she had been deliriously happy, her heart brimming with her love for Case.

      She started at the unexpected thought. Love? She slowly relaxed, realizing it was true. She had fallen in love with Case. She didn’t know the precise moment when her feelings for him had grown to that point, but she knew without a doubt that she loved him.

      But did he love her?

      “Case?” she asked hesitantly.

      “Hmm?”

      “Do you love me?”

      He drew back to look at her in puzzlement. “Where did that come from?”

      Though as frightened to hear his answer as she had been embarrassed to ask the question, she had to know. “You’ve never said it. I just wondered.”

      He stared at her a long moment, then smiled and hugged her to his side again. “I’d never marry a woman I didn’t love.”

      Case punched in the security code to his penthouse and strode inside.

      “Well, look what the cat dragged in.”

      He stopped short when he saw Creed stretched out on his sofa, then scowled. “What are you doing here?”

      “Just checking on you, big brother. Since you didn’t return to the estate last night, I thought you might have stayed here.” He gave Case’s rumpled clothing a pointed look. “But seeing as how you’re wearing the same clothes you had on last night, I assume you spent the night with your new fianceé.”

      His scowl deepening, Case peeled off his dinner jacket and tossed it over the back of a chair. “So what if I did?”

      Creed folded his hands behind his head. “That was quite a bomb you dropped on us last night.”

      “Yeah. I imagine it was.”

      “I knew you were determined to close the deal with Reynolds, but I never dreamed you’d go so far as marry his daughter in order to gain control of Reynolds Refining.”

      Snorting a laugh, Case stripped off his shirt. “Who said anything about marriage?”

      “You did. I heard the proposal myself.”

      Case dropped his shirt and headed for his bedroom and the bathroom beyond. “There’s a mighty big gap between engagement and marriage.”

      “What?” Creed bolted from the sofa and hurried after him. “Are you saying you don’t intend to marry Gina?”

      Case twisted on the faucet in the shower. “I won’t have to.”

      Scowling, Creed braced a shoulder against the doorframe. “Maybe you better explain.”

      “Once Reynolds hears of the engagement—which I assume he has by now, thanks to whoever leaked the story to the newspaper—he’ll go along with the merger.”

      “Why would he do that? He’s already told you he’s changed his mind.”

      “His only objection was his desire to leave his daughter a legacy. Since Gina and I are now engaged, there’s no reason for him to delay any longer. He gets the money and, by marrying me, his daughter gets the company and the legacy he wanted for her … or so Curtis will think.”

      Creed held up a hand. “Wait a minute. In order for Reynolds’ daughter to obtain partial ownership, the two of you would have to marry.”

      His smile smug, Case unzipped his fly. “Which is the beauty of my little plan. I don’t have to marry her. I just have to make Reynolds think that I am. Once the merger is complete, I’ll break the engagement. Dakota Fortunes will own Reynolds Refining and I’ll still be a single man.”

      Creed wagged his head sadly. “Brother, that’s low. Even for you.”

      “Really? I think it’s rather magnanimous.” Case let his slacks drop and stepped out of them and into the shower. “Gina doesn’t want the company. Never has.”

      “But you proposed to her,” Creed reminded him. “I doubt she’ll thank you for breaking the engagement.”

      Case caught the shower curtain in his hand. “Not at first, maybe, but she will eventually. Now, if you’ll excuse me,” he said and jerked the curtain into place, blocking his brother, as well as the guilt he was trying to heap on him. “I prefer to shower alone.”

      He waited until the bathroom closed behind Creed, then snatched up the bar of soap and began to lather his chest.

      Gina would thank him, he told himself. She’d never be happy married to a man like him. She was much too sensitive, too … fragile a woman to survive marriage to a man like Case. She needed someone who would dote on her, someone less selfish, less ambitious. Someone who would love her for who she was, not for what she brought to the bargaining table.

       Do you love me?

      With a groan, he slumped forward, bracing his hands against the tiled wall, hearing again the uncertainty in her voice, the hope, the need, when she’d posed the question. And how had he responded?

      He hadn’t. He’d cleverly dodged her question, using the evasive tactics he’d honed razor sharp in the business world.

      Creed was right, he thought miserably. His treatment of Gina was low, even for him.

      While Case was dealing with his guilt, Curtis Reynolds sat at the head of the table in his spacious dining room, reading the morning paper. As usual, he was alone, a fact that had begun to bother him of late.

      When he’d first read the morning’s headline, he was shocked to discover that his daughter and Case were engaged. But his shock had quickly given way to satisfaction.

      About time his daughter married, he told himself, as he sipped his coffee—though, sadly, it was too late for him to gain anything from the union. He would’ve liked to have had grandchildren. Preferably a boy, but at this point in his life, he would’ve welcomed a girl.

      Reminded of the disease that was quickly eating away at his body and his life, he sat his coffee cup down and sank back in his chair with a weary sigh. Odd how mortality changed a man, he thought glumly. A year ago he wouldn’t have given grandchildren a thought. Now that he was facing death, the things he’d once considered so important had lost some of their shine. More and more often he found himself thinking about his wife, his daughter, and the mistakes he’d made with both, rather than the business he’d dedicated his life to building.

      Stretching out a hand, he dragged the newspaper from the table and to his lap, the picture of his daughter in full view. She’d developed into a beautiful woman, he thought with a smidgen of pride … and more than a little regret. Not the beauty her mother had been, but an attractive young woman, none the less.

      How long had it been since he’d seen her last? he wondered. Ten years? Probably closer to twelve. The summer before she began college, she’d made a brief visit home. He remembered the visit well. The flash of temper she’d displayed when he’d told her he was leaving on a business trip the day after her arrival. But he’d seen hurt in her eyes, as well. The disappointment. And that’s the memory that haunted him now.

      It hadn’t at the time, he thought sadly. He’d dismissed the guilt, just as he had each time he’d witnessed similar reactions from his wife. He’d done so by telling himself that his business was important, that all the time he spent building Reynolds Refining was for his family, his wife and daughter. Hadn’t he provided them a cushy life? A regal home, a respected place in society, the finest of everything money could buy?

      But now that he was facing his mortality, he realized the mistakes he’d made, all that he’d lost, just as his wife had tried to tell him so many times in the past. He was fifty-seven years old, still young really, but alone in the world. He’d driven his wife to suicide by allowing his ambition to supercede her needs and destroyed whatever chance he might’ve had at a relationship with

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