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“At least agree to come for Christmas,” Brigit said. “Please?”
Deidre turned off the gas burner and reached for two cups, hardly aware of what she was doing.
“I’ve upset you. I’ll pass on the tea for now,” Brigit said quietly after a moment. Deidre paused in her senseless task of making tea and glanced at her mother over her shoulder. Brigit had stood and retrieved her coat. “Will you at least think about coming to Sycamore Avenue for Christmas?”
Deidre looked away, moved by the naked longing she’d seen on her mother’s face.
“I’ll think about it,” she said. She stilled beneath Brigit’s soft touch on her shoulder. A moment later, she heard the front door close quietly.
After her mother’s visit, she felt drained. Colleen noted her preoccupation later when they met at her house for lunch, mistaking it for exhaustion.
“You seem tired. I thought you said you were feeling much better when we spoke on the phone earlier,” Colleen said as she led Deidre to her bedroom.
“I am. It’s just...Mom stopped by the cottage earlier.”
Colleen paused in the entry to her bedroom, her expression tense. “She did? How did it go? Not very well, from the looks of things.”
Deidre waved her hand. “You can’t really expect a meeting like that to go well, can you? Maybe it’s enough that it went at all.”
Colleen gave her an understanding glance. “All right. I get it. You don’t want to talk about it right now.”
“Suffice it to say that Mom asked me to spend Christmas on Sycamore Avenue, and I didn’t say no.”
Colleen’s brows arched appraisingly. “Now that is something.” She opened her mouth to say something else, but seemed to reconsider. She swept across the room to her closet. “But so is this date tonight with Nick Malone. We better focus on that.”
“Thank you for helping me. I’m a fashion disaster. I haven’t bought any new clothes since I first moved to Germany. I hate shopping,” Deidre explained as Colleen started pulling dresses off the rack.
Colleen laughed from the interior of her walk-in closet.
“What’s so funny?”
“Sorry.” Colleen grinned. “It just struck me as funny. An heiress who hates to shop.”
“I’ll be kicked out of the billionaire’s club for sure,” Deidre mumbled, rolling her eyes.
“Here. I have the perfect dress. It always ran small on me, but it’ll be just right for you.”
She admired the sophisticated black knit Colleen showed her.
“I’ll even throw in a pair of heels and earrings if you tell me one thing,” Colleen offered.
“Yes?”
“Are you falling for Nick Malone?”
Heat flooded her cheeks. She hadn’t been prepared for the blunt question, but she should have been, given it was Colleen doing the asking.
“I suppose you’d think I was a fool if I was,” Deidre said, holding up the dress and eyeing herself in the vanity mirror, trying to avoid Colleen’s stare.
“I’d think you were a fool if you weren’t,” Colleen corrected crisply. “Not a fool, actually. More like a robot or something. There’s no way a woman wouldn’t be affected by having a man that looks like Nick stare at her the way he stares at you. While we were in Tahoe, you showed a real flair for avoiding Nick. But on the phone this morning, you sounded practically giddy at the idea of a date with him. Something’s going on between you two. Something major.”
Colleen’s knowing glance informed Deidre she might as well forget dissembling. She sighed and tossed the dress on the bed. “All right. I’m...interested in him.” Her cheeks heated even more when she noticed Colleen’s arch expression. “Okay, I’m really interested. Am I crazy? Getting involved with Nick Malone, of all people? He may end up taking me to court. I don’t know up from down anymore. When did my life become so complicated? The most difficult thing used to be doing a week of night-shift duty. I’m not sure if Nick even trusts me completely.”
“He wants you though.”
“As if that matters.”
“Do you trust him?” Colleen challenged.
