Nathan's Child - By Anne McAllister Page 0,53

in front of me.”

“Zeno?” Douglas’s brows hiked. “You have a wolf on the island?”

“Not a wolf. A dog.”

And so they talked about Zeno. And about her show. About her painting and who was handling the business while she was here.

Douglas said he was thrilled that she and Nathan were going to be part of this show together. But he didn’t take advantage of the subject to ask her again when she was going to marry his son. He just talked about Nathan’s photography, about how well Nathan was doing, about how proud he was of him.

Dominic poured more wine in everyone’s glasses. Lacey took the twins out into the living room and built block towers with them. Rhys challenged Nathan to a game of pool.

Dominic tapped Carin on the shoulder. “The old man must be boring you by now. How about coming to talk to me while I clean up in the kitchen?”

“He wasn’t—” Carin began to protest.

But Douglas stood up. “Yes, yes. You go on with Dominic. Don’t let an old windbag waste your time.”

“You didn’t want to hear him sing Nathan’s praises anyway, did you?” Dominic asked her.

Carin stammered, unsure how to answer that.

Dominic just laughed. “Come along.”

If anyone had told her that she would ever stand in Dominic Wolfe’s kitchen, talking to him while he loaded the dishwasher, she would have said they were insane. Not even when she had been going to marry Dominic had she considered that he would unbend that far. But he acted as if he was no stranger to dirty plates and pots and pans.

And while he did it, he talked about Pelican Cay, about going back there with Sierra. “I was scared to,” he said.

“Scared?” Carin blinked, surprised at the confidence he was sharing.

Dominic shrugged. “It was sex at first, you know, between us. At least that’s all we thought it was. But it wasn’t just sex for long. It was Sierra. I cared a lot about her. I loved her. But I didn’t know how she felt.” There was still a raw aching sound in his voice when he spoke of those days.

“She loves you,” Carin said quickly, trying to reassure him. Any fool could see that.

Dominic grinned. “I know that now.”

“I’m glad,” she told him sincerely. “I’m glad you’re happy. I worried about it. About you. But I couldn’t—”

“I know you couldn’t marry me. It’s a good thing you didn’t. I just wish you could have told me why. I wish I’d let you tell me why.” His mouth twisted wryly. But then he shrugged and smiled again, though his eyes grew serious. “I hope you and Nathan can be happy, too.”

Carin wet her lips. What could she say to that? It wasn’t the same as with him and Sierra.

“I hope so, too,” she said at last.

It was close to midnight by the time they went home with Rhys and Mariah and the twins. Stephen and Lizzie were both asleep, and Lacey was yawning madly as Rhys flagged down two taxis and directed them to their brownstone across the park.

“I don’t want to inconvenience you,” Carin began.

“You won’t,” Rhys said flatly, “unless you make me take you down to midtown to some hotel.”

Carin sighed and settled back against the seat, once more giving in to the inevitable, “I won’t do that.”

Rhys and Mariah owned the whole brownstone they lived in. They had two tenants on the upper floors, but the third-floor studio apartment that looked out onto the garden was vacant.

“We keep it for friends,” Mariah said as she led Carin and Lacey up the stairs. Nathan had been deputized to help Rhys get the two sleeping children into their beds. “And brothers. And their families.”

“I’m not family,” Carin protested.

“I am,” Lacey said firmly.

“Of course you are,” Mariah said. “And Nathan is.”

“Nathan?”

“Oh, dear. I just assumed… Would you rather Nathan slept downstairs with us.”

“We stayed with him when Mom got hurt,” Lacey said. “He slept on the couch right by her room. He carried her to the bathroom every day,” she told her aunt Mariah.

After that revelation, Carin could hardly say she wanted him downstairs. “It’s all right,” Carin mumbled.

And then she discovered the sleeping arrangements.

It was a one-room apartment. The “sofa” was a trundle bed and there was a high built-in queen-size platform bed which was separated from the rest of the room by the two-foot high carpeted “wall” that enclosed two sides of it, giving only the illusion of privacy.

When Nathan finally came upstairs half an hour