Sandra Marton - Spring Bride

“Well, so have I,” Kyra said, just as furiously. She sprang to her feet. “Just because I’m your little sister-”

“You mean, just because you’re female! Well, let me tell you something, Kyra. I’m male, yeah, but that doesn’t make me the enemy! If a man didn’t love a woman he wouldn’t—” Cade clamped his lips together. “I’m going downtown. If Zach or Grant calls, tell them they can reach me at the office.”

Kyra nodded coolly. “Yes, sir.”

Cade started to answer, thought better of it, and stormed out the door.

Cade spent the rest of the week either at the office or on the telephone. Neither he nor Kyra referred to the harsh words that had passed between them.

Kyra knew something was bothering Cade. He wasn’t just short-tempered, he was restless. She could hear him pacing his room at night—but then, she paced hers, too

What was she going to do with her life?

Late one moonlit night, after she’d pounded her pillow flat, she gave up trying to sleep and slipped down to the kitchen in her long flannel nightgown. She curled up in the bay window that looked over the new snow that had fallen on the shores of Crystal Lake.

Moments later, she heard Cade coming down the stairs. He seemed surprised to find her in the kitchen, sitting in the moonlight and staring out into the night.

“What are you doing up?” he said.

Kyra didn’t answer. What could she say? I’m depressed? I’m down? I’m trying to decide if I want to study manicuring or brain surgery?

Cade frowned. “It’s late. And it’s cold. You should be…you should be…”

Kyra looked at him, her brows raised, and he frowned.

“Hell,” he muttered. “Do I do that a lot?”

“Do what?”

“You know. Do I tell you what to do? Am I overprotective?”

Kyra sighed. “You’re not like Father, if that’s what you’re asking.”

He drew back as if she’d struck him. “Of course I’m not! I’m nothing like him. I’d never be like him!”

“No. You wouldn’t. You’re not dominating, or unkind. And you’re certainly not selfish.” She smiled. “But sometimes you do like to control people you love.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Maybe, down deep, you think you have to control them to keep them from abandoning you.” She gave him a thoughtful look. “I wonder if it has something to do with what happened the night of your twenty-first birthday.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Come on, Cade, don’t play dumb. It was when you learned Father had bought off that girl you were so crazy about. You were so hurt—”

“You’re nuts! I wasn’t hurt, I was angry.”

“Losing her that way must have been awful. But someday you’ll meet a woman…”

Suddenly, she knew. He’d met someone already; it was the reason he paced the floor, the reason he looked haunted—the reason he was questioning himself.

“Oh, Cade,” Kyra whispered, “you’ve already met her, haven’t you? And you don’t know what to do about it.”

Her brother’s eyes snapped with anger. “Thank you for that brilliant, and useless, analysis!”

He pivoted on his heel and marched from the room. Kyra watched him go, and then she sighed and turned her face to the window.

Had she deepened his wound by telling him the truth? She didn’t think so. Cade was hurting, but at least he was feeling like something more than a self-sacrificing martyr, which was what she’d been feeling like lately.

Hell. It was what she’d been feeling like ever since she was five years old and she’d become everybody’s idea of an angel, and she was sick of it!

Kyra got to her feet. She had to do something soon or she’d go crazy! She had to experience life, to feel…

To feel.

Does it disgust you, to want a man like me?

She came to a dead stop, the deep, husky voice echoing inside her head.

What would have happened if she’d said no, no, wanting him didn’t disgust her at all? If she’d said that wanting him had terrified her even as it had thrilled her, that it had made her feel alive in a way she never had before?

Her breath caught in her throat. My God, she really was losing her grip!

A change of pace, that’s what she needed. But how did you manage that when you were trapped in a house you hated, in a life you hated, with nothing more important to do than go on being the perfect little princess you’d always been?

You could take a trip, Kyra thought suddenly. You could go somewhere you’d never been before. You could see new things, do new things, meet new people…

But where? Where did she want to go?

She hurried into the library, threw on the light, and snatched a leather-bound atlas from the shelf. Then she opened it to a map of the world, shut her eyes, and stabbed it with her forefinger.

Her eyes flew open and she looked down. Her finger was resting in the middle of the Caribbean.

How could you go for a vacation on an ocean?

You could take a cruise, she thought, and smiled. A cruise in the sunny Caribbean.

Kyra’s smile became a grin. “Why not?” she said jauntily, and then she slammed the atlas shut, turned off the light, and trotted up the stairs.

EMPRESS of the Caribbean was hardly the ship of anyone’s dreams. And autumn, with its potential for storms and rough seas, was not the best time to cruise the Caribbean.

But Kyra was having the time of her life.

It wasn’t as if this was her first trip away from home. She’d skied in Switzerland, gone to horse shows in Ireland, and Charles had even let himself be convinced that she could spend her last semester at Denver’s finest private school for girls as an exchange student in England.

But always, in her travels, there’d been her father or a chaperon at her side. And now here she was, thousands of miles from home, on a trip she’d planned, start to finish, all by herself.

Actually, no one even knew about this tnp. She’d thought of calling her brothers and telling them she was going away, but what for? Did Cade or Grant or Zach phone her when they were heading off somewhere? Of course they didn’t.

Then, why should she?

Stella, the housekeeper, knew. And Ted West, who oversaw the stables, had to be told, but that was it.

Kyra zipped up her white cotton skirt, then drew a pale yellow T-shirt over her head. For the first time ever, she was responsible to absolutely no one but herself.

Maybe that was why the Empress seemed such a dream ship, despite her dated accommodations. She had chosen the ship on impulse, from an advertisement in the Sunday paper.

Adventure! the ad had shrieked. Excitement! Romance on the High Seas!

All those capitals and exclamation marks had to mean something.

And they did, she thought, smiling as she slipped on a pair of white thong sandals. For her fellow travelers, adventure meant visits to sites of pre-Columbian settlements and museums. Excitement was wondering if the wheezing old tour buses that greeted the ship at each port would be able to get to the top of the next hill, then betting that their brakes were better than their engines as they rocketed back down to the harbor through one hairpin curve after another.

As for romance…it was sweet to watch white-haired senior citizens dancing cheek to cheek. It was also about as close to “romance” as she wanted to get, Kyra thought briskly as she screwed a pair of small gold hoops into her ears.

As far as she was concerned, the cruise advertisement had put things into exactly the right perspective. Adventure and excitement came first. There’d be plenty of time for romance somewhere down the line, but not for a long, long time.