Wrangling the Redhead - By Sherryl Woods Page 0,69
sold your house in Los Angeles? For that matter, why are you still living here with us?”
Lauren flinched at the question. Hurt and flustered, she simply stared back. “I…”
Instantly apologetic, Karen reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze. “Sweetie, I am not asking that to hurt your feelings or to suggest for one single minute that you’re not welcome here. I’m just saying that anyone looking at this situation—even me—has to wonder if it’s not temporary. That house in California, Jason’s constant calls—it looks to an outsider as if you’re hedging your bets.”
In fact, there was a picture of that very house accompanying the article that began on the tabloid’s front page and filled two more pages inside. Wade must have looked at it and thought the same thing that Karen was daring to say. With all of that waiting for her in California, why would she ever consider a life with a man who lived in a cottage on another man’s land?
“Oh, God, what have I done?” she asked with a moan.
“Nothing that can’t be fixed,” Karen said optimistically. “If you’re sure about what you really want.”
“I’m sure,” Lauren insisted. She wanted the life she’d had the last couple of months with Wade. She wanted kids and a ranch and friends she could count on. It was so much more than she’d ever found as a celebrity.
But how could she make him believe that, how could she make him see that the life she’d left behind, the one she’d hidden from him, meant nothing to her?
Words wouldn’t do it with him any more than they had with Jason. Nor could she count on empty promises. She needed a grand gesture. Something he would see as irrefutable evidence of her intentions.
And she was pretty sure she knew exactly what it should be. She looked across the table at Grady and Karen.
“Is the Grigsby ranch still for sale?” she asked, knowing that Otis Junior had been anxious to get whatever he could for it at the same time he’d sold off the horses. She feared he might have found a buyer just as eager to steal the property from someone to whom it only represented a leftover nuisance from a life he’d long ago abandoned.
Her friends exchanged a look, then nodded.
“How about Midnight?” she asked. “Would you sell him to me?”
A grin spread across Karen’s face. “Absolutely.”
“Hey, wait a minute,” Grady protested. “That horse—”
His wife cut him off. “That horse is Lauren’s wedding gift to Wade. Am I right?”
Lauren nodded. “If he’ll have us.”
Grady frowned at his wife. “I was just going to say that Wade already owns half of that horse.”
“All the better,” Lauren said, warming to her plan. “Then if I buy your half stake in him, we’ll be joint owners.”
“Say yes, Grady,” Karen prodded.
Grady gave both of them a resigned look. “Fine. Yes. Midnight is all yours. Yours and Wade’s, that is. He’s going to be expecting a check, though. I told him I’d find a buyer for Midnight and the other horses and send him his share of the proceeds.”
Lauren reached for her checkbook. “How much?”
Karen gasped. “You don’t want him to find out that you’ve bought them, do you?”
“No, the check will be to Grady. He can pay Wade. Full value, too. I don’t want any deals.”
Grady’s eyes lit up with feigned avarice. “Now that’s what I like to hear,” he teased. “Of course, if you make that check too big, Wade might not have any incentive to come back.”
“Grady!” Karen protested.
“Except to see Lauren, of course,” he added hurriedly.
“I knew what you meant,” Lauren assured him. “How much?”
He named a figure she knew to be reasonable given the quality of the stock she was buying. She ripped the check out and handed it to him.
“Now all I have to do is buy someplace to keep them,” she said wearily.
“Not until morning,” Karen said emphatically. “We all need a good night’s sleep.”
“Especially you, little mama,” Grady said, his gaze suddenly tender.
“Oh my gosh, I forgot about the baby,” Lauren said with dismay. “Go up to bed right now. You need all the rest you can get.”
Karen scowled at her. “Don’t you start, too. One worrywart in the house is enough. I’m getting plenty of sleep. Lauren’s the one who looks as if she’s been run over by a truck.”
“Thanks so much,” Lauren mocked. “But I’m too wound up to sleep yet. Go on to bed. I’ll clean up the dishes before I come up.”
“It’s