A Kiss, A Dance & A Diamond. Helen Lacey

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СКАЧАТЬ brown eyes that he was about to get the telling off he figured was a decade and a half in the making...

      * * *

      Don’t do it...

      Nicola chanted the words to herself over and over. She didn’t want to make a scene. She didn’t want to spend any more time in Kieran O’Sullivan’s presence. But damn, it was hard. He was still too gorgeous for words...six foot two and a half, broad shoulders, brownish-blond hair that still flopped over his forehead when he tilted his head, glittering blue eyes and dark lashes. And the whiskery shadow across his jaw was too attractive for words. Not exactly a beard, but enough to give him a kind of rugged sexiness. She wished he’d grown up to be bald and pudgy. She wished he hadn’t decided to permanently return to Cedar River. She wished he hadn’t been so kind and considerate with Marco and that her nephew hadn’t actually responded to him—which was way more than he did with most people. She wished a whole lot of things. And in that moment she wished she could turn on her heels and leave the hospital as quickly as she could.

      But she couldn’t.

      She had Johnny and Marco to think about.

      A deep surge of grief coursed through her entire body when she thought about her older brother, Gino, and sister-in-law, Miranda. She loved her nephews but worried she wasn’t measuring up in the parent department. And along with running the restaurant and her father’s swiftly declining health, she had enough on her plate without adding an old boyfriend into the mix.

      But...she was mad.

      Seething.

      Kieran O’Sullivan had no right coming back to town! He’d set the rules on graduation day. He wanted a life and a career away from Cedar River. He didn’t want any ties. He didn’t want a girlfriend. He didn’t want to get engaged. He wanted to be able to screw around in college. He wanted his freedom.

      She should have seen it coming. In the weeks before graduation, he’d been distant and closed off and had avoided her like the plague. Ever since she’d suggested they make a real commitment to one another before heading off to separate colleges. And then, on graduation day, he’d dumped her, saying he didn’t want to be tied down...by her or Cedar River.

      But now he was back.

      And suddenly, all her pent-up rage, despair and resentment was pointing in one direction. And even though she knew that being angry was illogical after so many years, she couldn’t help it.

      “You’re a real jerk,” she said and waved her hands. “You know that? Why did you have to come back? Egoista, bastardo di cuore freddo!” she cursed in Italian, feeling her skin heat more with each passing second and fighting the urge to take a swipe at his handsome face. “Ti odio!”

      I hate you...

      They were strong words, and she knew he understood them. But he didn’t flinch. Didn’t speak. Didn’t do anything other than take her ranting at him as though he’d been expecting it. And that amplified her anger tenfold. She didn’t want him to be compliant and agreeable and ready for her insults. She wanted him to respond so she could go in for another round. And another. Until she was spent and done with all the pain she still harbored from her broken, seventeen-year-old-girl’s heart.

      “I know,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry.”

      Nicola tilted her chin. “Your apology is about fifteen years too late.”

      “I know that, too.”

      Nicola drew in a sharp breath. Typical of Kieran to be so damned agreeable! “I’ll take Marco to our usual doctor,” she said flatly. “That way I won’t have to see you again.”

      “If that’s what you’d prefer.”

      God, he was so compliant. “I think we both know what I’d prefer, Doctor.”

      “That I’d stayed away?”

      “Exactly.”

      “It’s my hometown, Nicola...just as much as it is yours. And I’m pretty sure it’s big enough for both of us.”

      Nicola glanced around, arms crossed, temper surging. “It doesn’t feel like it right now.” She sucked in a long and steadying breath. “However, I do appreciate you looking after him tonight.”

      She wasn’t about to tell him that it was the first time she’d seen Marco really respond to someone new since his parents had been killed. And of course she wasn’t surprised that Kieran had a great bedside manner. He’d always been too damned charming for his own good!

      “We don’t have to be friends, Nicola,” he said evenly. “But we don’t have to be enemies, either.”

      “I don’t want us to be anything,” she shot back. “Except strangers.”

      “You’re my sister-in-law’s friend,” he reminded her. “This is a small town, and we’re bound to run into one another occasionally. I prefer we weren’t at war when we did.”

      He was right. Her longtime friend Kayla had married Kieran’s brother, and they’d just had their first child. They would definitely cross paths.

      But she resented that he was so cool, so logical...so incredibly infuriating about the whole situation.

      A typical O’Sullivan trait. They were the wealthiest family in town. And the most entitled. They owned commercial and investment property and several businesses, including the hugely successful O’Sullivan’s Hotel. The eldest brother, Liam, ran the hotel and most of the other holdings, while the younger brother Sean was a movie and music producer in LA. Their sister, Liz, had passed away a few years earlier from some kind of heart thing, leaving behind three young daughters. And there was another brother, too, called Jonah, who they’d just discovered existed and was the reason his parents were now in the middle of a divorce.

      And then there was Kieran—the brother who’d left to pursue his dream of a medical career. And he’d got exactly what he wanted. He was smart and charming and too good-looking for words. He’d once been her closest friend, her lover, her future. Now, all she felt was hurt and rage when she thought of him. Nicola tried to wrap up her temper and put it away where it belonged. But it was so hard.

      Pull yourself together. He’s not worth it.

      “Can we go now?”

      Johnny’s voice. Jerking her back into the land of good sense and logic.

      Nicola crossed her arms and moved quickly toward him. “Of course,” she said to her nephew. She glanced briefly toward Kieran. “Thank you for your help.”

      She didn’t look at him again as she walked back into triage, quickly ushering both boys back through the corridor. And did her best to ignore Kieran. But he watched her. She could feel his gaze burning through her as she left. She made a quick stop at the pharmacy to fill the painkiller prescription and then headed home, her thoughts consumed by the last person she wanted to think about.

      She was embarrassed that she’d lost her temper. But, hell and damnation, he pushed her buttons! He always had. In high school she’d been desperately in love with him.

      After graduation day, she’d hated him.

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