Page 14 of Courting Catherine
“I don’t know anything about flowers,” she told him.
“Or about simple courtesy.”
Her chin angled. “Now listen, buddy.”
“No, you listen, buddy.” His hand snaked out and snagged her arm. “Let’s walk. The children might still be within earshot, and I don’t think they’re ready to hear any of this.”
He was stronger than she’d imagined. He pulled her along, ignoring the curses she tossed out under her breath. They were off the terrace and onto one of the meandering paths that wound around the side of the house. Daffodils and hyacinths nodded along the verge.
He stopped beneath an arbor where wisteria would bloom in another month. C.C. wasn’t certain if the roar in her head was the sound of the sea or her own ragged temper.
“Don’t you ever do that again.” She lifted a hand to rub where his fingers had dug. “You may be able to push people around in Boston, but not here. Not with me or any of my family.”
He paused, hoping and failing to get a grip on his own temper. “If you knew me, or what I do, you’d know I don’t make a habit of pushing anyone around.”
“I know exactly what you do.”
“Foreclose on widows and orphans? Grow up, C.C.”
She set her teeth. “You can see the gardens on your own. I’m going in.”
He merely shifted to block her path. In the moonlight, her eyes glowed like a cat’s. When she lifted her hands to shove him aside, he clamped his fingers onto her wrists. In the brief tug-of-war that followed, he noted—irrelevantly, he assured himself—that her skin was the color of fresh cream and almost as soft.
“We’re not finished.” His voice had an edge that was no longer coated with a polite veneer. “You’ll have to learn that when you’re deliberately rude, and deliberately insulting, there’s a price.”
“You want an apology?” she all but spat at him. “Okay. I’m sorry I don’t have anything to say to you that isn’t rude or insulting.”
He smiled, surprising both of them. “You’re quite a piece of work, Catherine Colleen Calhoun. For the life of me I can’t figure out why I’m trying to be reasonable with you.”
“Reasonable?” She didn’t spit the word this time, but growled it. “You call it reasonable to drag me around, manhandle me—”
“If you call this manhandling, you’ve led a very sheltered life.”
Her complexion went from creamy white to bright pink. “My life is none of your concern.”
“Thank God.”
Her fingers flexed then balled into fists. She hated the fact, loathed it, that her pulse was hammering double time under his grip. “Will you let me go?”
“Only if you promise not to take off running.” He could see himself chasing her, and the image was both embarrassing and appealing.
“I don’t run from anyone.”
“Spoken like a true Amazon,” he murmured, and released her. Only quick reflexes had him dodging the fist she aimed at his nose. “I should have taken that into account, I suppose. Have you ever considered intelligent conversation?”
“I don’t have anything to say to you.” She was ashamed to have struck out at him and furious that she’d missed. “If you want to talk, go suck up to Aunt Coco some more.” In a huff, she plopped down on the small stone bench under the arbor. “Better yet, go back to Boston and flog one of your underlings.”
“I can do that anytime.” He shook his head and, certain he was taking his life in his hands, sat beside her.
There were azaleas and geraniums threatening to burst into bloom around them. It should, he thought, have been a peaceful place. But as he sat, smelling the tender fragrance of the earliest spring blooms mixed with the scent of the sea, listening to some night bird call its mate, he thought that no boardroom had ever been so tense or hostile.
“I wonder where you developed such a high opinion of me.” And why, he added to himself, it seemed to matter.
“You come here—”
“By invitation.”
“Not mine.” She tossed back her head. “You come in your big car and your dignified suit, ready to sweep my home out from under me.”
