Christmas Secrets Collection. Laura Iding

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СКАЧАТЬ his wife hadn’t died, too.

      “She’s alive and well, happily remarried, with the children she always wanted.”

      That was a relief. It was too bad that their marriage hadn’t lasted. But at least his wife hadn’t died on him, too. “What happened—I mean, that you’re not still together?”

      “She wanted kids. I didn’t. And then, when we were married barely a year—this was about four months before my father died—she got pregnant.”

      “Whoa. I had no idea you had a child.”

      “I don’t.”

      “Well, then …?”

      “The baby’s heart didn’t develop properly. She was born prematurely and they couldn’t save her.”

      “Oh, Dax. I’m so sorry …”

      Gruffly, he commanded, “Don’t be sorry for me. Be sorry for Nora. It was terrible for her. She never forgave me.”

      “Wait a minute. It was your fault that your daughter died?”

      “I didn’t want children. I didn’t want them ever, I realize now. Being a dad is just not what I’m looking for, not what I’m cut out for. Nora knew it. And we had agreed to wait a few years, until I thought I was ready. But then she got pregnant. I wasn’t happy about it. And I told her so—after which I realized what a complete ass I was being, and apologized. I put a smiling face on it, told her it would all work out. And then I tried to accept that a baby was coming, that I had to settle down and learn to be the father I’d never wanted to be. She knew what was really going on inside me, knew that no matter how hard I tried to accept what was happening, I felt trapped.”

      “And so, when she lost the child …”

      “She resented me. And I really can’t say I blame her. No, I didn’t cause the baby’s death. But Nora knew damn well I wasn’t looking forward to being a dad—plus, she couldn’t understand the sudden change in me after my father died. She used to say I had a strange, far-away look in my eyes. As if I wanted to be anywhere but with her, with the baby she was having. And she was right. It wasn’t anything she’d done. She was a beautiful, kind, loving woman. It just turned out we wanted completely different things out of life.”

      “And after the divorce … that was when you began to travel the world?”

      He made a low sound, a thoughtful sort of noise deep in his throat. “At first, I traveled to console myself, to get past the guilt of failing at my marriage, of losing that baby I never really wanted, the little girl who died without drawing breath. I was trying to escape the reality of how completely I had disappointed Nora—and myself. But soon enough, I was traveling because I loved it so much.

      “After the pain and loss faded, that was a great time for me. I would live in the finest luxury resorts one week and disappear into the wilds the next.”

      “So where does Great Escapes come in?”

      “Eventually, I realized I did have a need for productive activity, for work that matters to me. Remember that ne’er-do-well uncle of mine?”

      “I do.”

      “He’d taken me to San Antonio a couple of times during my Texas visits. And I’d loved it there. So I moved to SA, started the magazine. No, it doesn’t make me any richer. My investments do that. But it’s a job tailored exactly to my talents and my affinities. I travel the world and I write about it in Great Escapes.”

      Zoe was still certain that if—when—they got back home, they would, as agreed, go back to their strictly professional relationship. She needed not to get her hopes up that Dax might turn out to be the man for her in any long-term way.

      Still, she couldn’t stop herself from asking, “So … you ever think you might get married again—say, when you’re ninety and too old for anything but rocking in your rocking chair and loving some lucky old lady?”

      “Never again,” he said softly. But he meant it.

      “Children?”

      “Without a wife?”

      “Well, it does happen.”

      “Not to me. I’m no family man—married or otherwise. I know myself better now, know my limitations, know what I want from life. Marriage and/or a family … it’s not going to happen.”

      She felt a small twinge and recognized it for what it was: regret. In spite of her determination not to, she had been nurturing some small spark of hope, for a possible future with him beyond this, and beyond Great Escapes. She could see now that it really wasn’t to be.

      The small spark flickered and died.

      And she told herself she wasn’t disappointed. She’d known going in that he wasn’t marriage material. And besides, a husband was the last thing she was looking for at this point.

      So it was all good. Wicked good.

      The next day was Monday, their anniversary in the clearing. A whole week and they had survived to celebrate it.

      Again, Zoe carried her cameras everywhere. She took at least as many pictures as she had the day before.

      After dinner, as darkness claimed the sky, Dax produced a carefully packed bottle of Scotch from one of his suitcases. It was to have been a gift for Ramón Esquevar.

      “I think,” Dax said, “that under the circumstances, Ramón will understand if we open it without him.” The label said it was aged fifty years.

      It went down hot and smooth and smoky. “Delicious,” Zoe said. “I can’t believe I’m sitting here in the jungle with you, drinking Scotch that’s almost as old as my mother.”

      He laughed and asked her about her family, about what it was like growing up a Bravo. She described each of her brothers, her sister, her half sister, the various spouses and children.

      A slow smile curved his tempting mouth. “And now, I want the real dirt. I want to know what makes Zoe Bravo tick.”

      It didn’t even occur to her to hold back—not here, not now. “I’m the family’s ‘free spirit,’ the one who never figured out what she wanted to do in her life. I used to be perfectly happy about that, about getting by off the income from my trust fund, about not being tied down to earning a paycheck, not having that ingrained need to make a so-called ‘success’ of my life. I had no issues with simply moving on if something—like school or a job—started getting tiresome.”

      He picked up on the operative words. “Used to? Past tense?”

      She treated herself to another slow sip of Ramón Esquevar’s excellent Scotch. “Yeah, it finally got old. It got so when my dad called me his little free spirit, I wanted to punch his lights out. I knew then—like you, when you created Great Escapes—that I needed to find work I could stand doing on a daily basis.”

      “And now you have.” He raised his tin cup.

      She tapped hers against СКАЧАТЬ