The Return Of Adams Cade

“You’re taller, more slender,” he murmured as the darkness of his gaze retraced its path to meet hers.

“Only a bit,” Eden assured him. Though at nearly thirty-two, she knew the softness of youthful curves had gradually become an inadvertent but fashionably angular leanness.

“I never thought to be in Belle Terre again. Nor did I expect to find Robbie Roberts returned as the beautiful, sophisticated Eden Claibourne, innkeeper extraordinaire.”

“Nor did I,” Eden admitted, regaining a bit of her composure. “But you’re here, and I am who I am and what I am. So welcome, Adams, to River Walk, and to my home in Belle Terre.” Her fingers still clasped tightly in his, she smiled up at him. “Because I thought you would be tired from your journey, the river cottage is ready and waiting for you.”

“Cottage?” He looked down at her in a gaze that was less guarded, if not yet at ease. “I won’t be staying in the inn?”

“Of course you may stay in the house itself, if you wish. But first, take a look.” Drawing him back to the window with its view of the grounds and the river, she gestured toward a building. Perched by the river’s edge, the single-story structure was nearly hidden by trees and plants scattered about it.

Small, in comparison to the main house, and quaint, it lay in dappled but deepening shadows as the setting sun streamed through moss-draped oaks. Within that shade, immense azaleas, camellias and oleanders blended with palms and palmettos. Clustered so thickly about its courtyard, the groomed and tended plants afforded an additional element of seclusion.

“There are porches on each side, with a lanai and a separate and private walk on the riverside,” Eden explained as he studied the cottage with a look of approval. “I thought you might prefer the privacy, at least at first.”

Adams nodded, grateful for her thoughtfulness. Returning to the low country, and the harsh days it recalled, was difficult enough without facing curious stares. A day or two of quiet to acclimatize and inure himself in the time and tide of the city would ease the way as much as it could be eased. “Thank you, Eden, for your kindness.”

“A consideration more than a kindness, Adams.” With a shrug of a shoulder, Eden dismissed the hurried but exacting care that had gone into each detailed preparation for Adams’ stay at the inn. Hopefully he would never know the mad furor the knowledge of his impending arrival had inspired.

With belying composure, she paraphrased a lecture she gave the staff almost daily. “Part of the charm of the inn is that we match our services to the unique needs of our guests.”

“Then I thank both you and your staff.”

Something in his tone made her regret her cavalier dismissal of his gratitude, and especially that she had made him seem to be just another guest. Adams had become a prominent man, a celebrity in the business world. She was sure, for that reason, he had become the object of much catering and courting. No, he wouldn’t be a stranger to special attention. But how often from the goodness of an unselfish heart? Because someone cared about Adams himself, rather than the hope of remuneration or favor?

“Adams,” she began, and discovered she didn’t know how to explain, so she settled for honesty. Touching his cheek as if she would stroke away the pain of lost years and of wounds that had never healed, she spoke from her heart. “I’m glad you’ve come, and I want you to be comfortable and happy in my home.”

Suddenly feeling presumptuous for the liberty she’d taken, Eden drew her hand away and offered her most cheerful smile. “But enough of this.” Folding her fingers in her palm, keeping the memory of the feel of his skin beneath her fingertips, she suggested, “You must be tired and hungry after your flight.”

“It has been a trying day,” Adams admitted as he strove to remember how long it had been since a lovely woman had touched him so gently and smiled only for him.

“Then as meets your pleasure, sir—” Eden inclined her head, in concern and genuine respect for an old friend “—tonight and any other time. You may make of your stay what you wish. Whatever suits your needs—privacy, seclusion, companionship, involvement. Meals in the main dining room or in the cottage. Whatever fits your schedule and your mood will be done to the best of the staff’s ability. All you need do is ask, Adams.”

At the moment a quiet meal away from prying eyes and with someone who didn’t insist on discussing business incessantly was Adams’ pleasure, and the perfect end of a disturbing day. “Dinner in the cottage sounds wonderful, but I wouldn’t want to inconvenience your staff.”

Glad for a chance to put aside the scintillating leap of tension touching him had caused in her, Eden smiled. Then she laughed, recalling how her staff engaged in friendly disputes for the privilege of dodging out of the busy dining room that served citizens of Belle Terre, as well as guests of the inn. Sometimes the break meant a quick smoke. Sometimes simply a breath of fresh air. “It would never be considered an inconvenience. In fact, there are volunteers anxious to serve you tonight.”

“Then I’d like that, Eden. As I suspect you’ve already guessed and planned for.” Turning his back on the view she’d offered, he looked down at her. His gaze touching her hair and her face once again was like a remembered caress. “I’d like it even better if you would join me.”

His voice was deep and rich, like velvet stroking her skin. Each quiet nuance stirring a longing better left in slumber. “I usually make a practice of being in the dining room most evenings,” she demurred. “Greeting guests, smoothing ruffled feathers when there are any.”

“When there are any,” he challenged. “Which is…”

The confident look he gave her made her smile again as she confessed, “Which—because I have a superb and efficient majordomo, a well-trained and wonderfully loyal staff—is, truthfully, very rarely.”

“Ahh, just as I thought when I arrived. A well-oiled, thoughtfully run operation.” Tucking her hand in the crook of his arm, he continued to stand before the windows. At his back the sinking sun turned massive oaks dressed in Spanish moss into bewitching shadows etched against the fire of the sky.

“So,” he said persuasively, the pad of his thumb stroking her fingers as they curved over the fine fabric of his jacket, “though you would be missed, no guests would cry into his or her vichyssoise or the peaches Grand Marnier, if they must suffer through one night without your lovely smile to greet them?”

At her look of surprise, he chuckled. A slightly wicked sound that triggered more memories and sent her pulse rate into orbit. “You seem to know quite a lot about the inn. Down to our guests’ favorite spring specialties.”

“Thanks to Janet and no credit to me.”

“Janet?” Try as she might, Eden couldn’t keep the curious note from her tone. His familiar mention of a woman was startling. For though she couldn’t define or explain her conviction, Adams Cade had the look of a man uninvolved and unattached.

“My secretary.” His stroking ceased, his hand folded over hers, keeping it against his arm. “My very efficient secretary, who learned quite a lot about The Inn at River Walk, but found no mention of the luxury or the privacy of a river cottage.”

“The cottage isn’t advertised. We rent it sparingly, keeping it free for guests with special needs.”

“Like Adams Cade, the black sheep returned?” Adams grimaced, the touch of wicked teasing faded from his words. “Adams Cade, whose reputation precedes him, I’m sure. At least, if small-town gossips are as I remember.”

There was the hurt again. Hurt he thought to hide with brusque conjecture. But neither time nor tragedy had irrevocably changed the timbre of the tones she had learned to read, and loved beyond measure, in days past and months and years.

With the last of laughter flown before pain she would give her soul to heal, Eden met his look solemnly. “Yes,” she said, her clasp convulsing over his arm. “For guests like Adams Cade, because he is Adams Cade, and very special.”

“A convicted felon, an ex-con, a brawler, the disowned black sheep of his family,” he said, ticking off only a few of his sins. “How could that make me special?”

“You’re none of those things to me,” Eden protested. “None. And small-minded gossips with their ugly whispers to the contrary be damned.”

Turning to her, taking both her hands in his, Adams searched her face, seeking the bravado, the bluster of a comforting lie. But he found only serene, unshakable honesty. “What was I to you? What am I now, my lovely Eden?”

Eden. The name of a woman, not a favorite tomboy. A name that made her heart sing.

“What were you?” A pensive look touched her eyes and lips as she smiled at him. “So many things.”

“Such as?”

“When I was shy and distant, without a clue how to be part of the group, you were my mentor, my champion. You made me feel like a princess, though I was painfully graceless and gawky.”

When she hesitated over the next of her memories, Adams spoke into the silence. “You were too pretty and too smart for the rest of us. Never graceless or gawky, except in your own mind.”

When he was with her, that was how he made her feel, what he made her believe. From the first, with Adams she was always more and better. Always happier. “When my grandfather brought me with him to Belle Reve…”

“Go on,” Adams encouraged. “The name doesn’t disturb me. What happened that last night might have taken my home and family from me, but that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten good times or good memories. I can hear the name and think of Belle Reve and all it stood for without being bitter. So tell me, Eden.”

Resisting the urge to clear the pain that lay like a cramp at the base of her throat, Eden was still hesitant. For no matter that he encouraged her, she had to believe that speaking of the family and the home he’d been denied would open old wounds.

“When your grandfather brought you…” he prompted, and smiled through hidden sadness when her gray gaze probed his.

“When my grandfather brought me with him to Belle Reve to treat the horses—” Eden, defeated, took up the thread of her story “— I was enchanted by the house, the land and what seemed like herds and herds of horses. But most of all I was enchanted by you.

“Even if you deny it, Adams Cade, I was graceless, I was gawky, I stuck with you like a cocklebur. Yet you were patient and kind beyond belief. You were older, but you never treated me like a nuisance.” Smiling into his steady gaze, Eden murmured, “When I look back, I count you as my first and best friend.”

“And now, Eden?” There was raw need in his look. A strong man’s need for a friend.

Eden wanted to end the hurt, silence the rejection. She wished that by caring, she could free him from the control that ruled his life. Replace this cautious, solemn stranger with the wonderfully wicked charmer of old. She wanted to hold him, comfort him. And if he should love her…

Abandoning a thought that was going where she never intended, a thought she dared not pursue, she kept his gaze. “You were my friend. I hope you will be again.”

Perhaps if he would be, this time she could repay the kindnesses that were most instrumental in molding her into the confident woman she’d become.

All of Belle Terre knew the irascible Gus Cade had fallen ill. All knew of the dissension in the Cade family. In the years since Adams was convicted of aggravated assault, Gus had made no secret of his bitter resentment of the disgrace his oldest son had brought to the family name. An opinion some of Belle Terre would share. One others, even most, would not. While Adams stayed at River Walk, she would be his champion as he had been hers. And God help any who uttered a harsh judgment within her hearing.

“I’m to be your friend and you will be mine, right?” Adams looked down at her, the edge of tension easing from his face. With her hands still nestled in his, the pads of his thumbs traced lazy caresses over her knuckles. “Then you can begin by having dinner with me at the cottage.”

“You said you were tired,” Eden protested. “And surely you will want to speak with your brothers.”

“If I’m tired, you’re the most restful thing that’s happened to me in a long while. I spoke to my brothers from the airport shortly after landing. If there’s any change in Gus’ condition, Lincoln and Jackson and Jefferson all know I’m here. None of them would hesitate to call. And I’m sure your efficient staff would see to it the call was put through to me.

“So as it stands now, all bases are covered. In the meantime, Eden, my sweet, I’m holding you to your promise.”

“My promise?” Eden had made no promises she remembered.

“‘Then as meets your pleasure, tonight and any other time, you may have whatever you wish,”’ he quoted word for word.

“Oh.” Eden blushed at the implication of the words.

“Yes, ‘oh.’ And my pleasure tonight would be a quiet dinner in the cottage, in your company.” His low laughter teased, almost as in the past. “Give it up, sweetheart. I have you cornered. You’re caught on your own hook. You promised, and something tells me you’re a woman who keeps promises.”

“This is blackmail,” Eden accused. Demurring, even as she knew that when he was like this—so much like the boy and the young man she’d known and loved—she could deny him nothing.

“Perhaps it is, but you won’t refuse.”

Eden saw then that the old confidence was there. With it, the added confidence of a survivor. The confidence of brilliance that could analyze a problem, then create a solution that would bring him to the forefront of the business world. Confidence that had faltered only in the land of Belle Terre and Belle Reve, where his father lay grievously ill.

Confidence that lived and would continue to live within the walls and grounds of River Walk. Eden was adamant.

“No,” she admitted after a thoughtful pause, “I won’t refuse. I will have dinner with you in the cottage.”

But not like this. She would not go to the man she had loved all her life grubby from a day’s work. “Why don’t we both freshen up? Merrie, the young woman you met earlier, will show you to the cottage and take your order for dinner.”

“I would prefer that you choose. My tastes haven’t changed so much.”

“All right, I’ll see to that first, then come to the cottage in forty-five minutes or so. That should give you time to settle in, have a drink and relax a bit before dinner.”

“You will come to the cottage?” he asked in a tone she couldn’t fathom. “Your word on it, Eden?”

“My most solemn word, Adams.”

“Then I’ll wait here for Merrie.” Satisfied at last, releasing her, he stepped away and, with a gallant bow, settled in a chair by the window.

He was still sitting there lost in his thoughts when Eden passed by on her return from the kitchen. Pausing, her hand on a curved stair rail, she watched through the open library door and remembered. “Adams, in my home,” she murmured, then she smiled as she climbed the stairs to her third-floor apartment.

“Have you wondered what simple soul gave such a beautiful body of water the unimaginative name of Broad River?” Eden leaned against a column as the last of day faded from river and sky. The dinner she’d shared with Adams was long finished, Cullen’s carefully supervised choice of wines nearly gone.

“It is magnificent,” Adams agreed. “Evenings like this are among the things I miss most.”

“The quiet time. Watching the play of color over the water. First the blues, which deepen to turquoise, then navy. Next comes the fire, wild and glittering. Then gradually the darkness seeps in, and reds become burgundy and maroon. Then simply black.” Eden spoke as if with her voice she might break the peaceful spell that had fallen over the evening.

“All the better to reflect the silver path of the moon.” The equally subdued, masculine voice drifted out of the darkness.

Adams sat in the recesses of the lanai, hidden within gathering dusk. But with the creak of the swing and the pad of his footsteps, Eden knew he’d come to join her at the railing. Once upon a time he’d smelled of sunlight, sea air and soap. Now, when he was near, she thought of boardrooms, shuffling papers and expensive cologne. But that could change.

“You could come back, Adams.” He was near, so near she could touch him if she dared. “You could come home again. If not to the plantation, then to Belle Terre.”

Adams only shook his head. He didn’t want to speak of the past or even the future. He didn’t want to think of anything but Eden. Trailing the tip of a finger up the back of her arm, letting the flowing georgette of her long, full sleeve add its own caress to his, he moved a step closer. “Thank you for this—the welcome, the cottage, dinner and the wine. And especially for the company.” He laughed softly. “Even the floor show.”

“We aim to please.” Eden chuckled huskily in response. Even while she fought to quell a shiver as his touch sent a fever shimmering over her skin in the blazing wake of his body heat. She knew his touch was not hot, yet it burned into her, deliciously seducing her. Mindlessly, hardly aware that she spoke, she murmured, “Mother Nature gets credit for the floor show.”

“She’s quite a beautiful lady. And so are you.”

Looking away from the river, she found Adams looming over her. A tall, dark form with the touch of heated velvet and a voice as smooth. “I’m not really beautiful, Adams. Perhaps it’s a trick of the light, the rosy glow. Or a mood or the wine. I’m only Eden, and once just Robbie, one of the guys.”

“You are beautiful. It isn’t a trick, a glow, the moon, or the wine. And, sweetheart—” his drawl was unconsciously seductive “—it’s been a long time since you were one of the guys.”

At her look of surprise, Adams’ first instinct was to fold her in his arms, to show her in ways words never could that she was beautiful. So beautiful the memory of her moonlit image had been strength and solace for a lonely man in the worst days of prison.

He’d dreamed of touching her then. He wanted to touch her now as a lover, as he had only once before. But that was a lifetime ago. Too much had happened. The Adams Cade she’d made love with on a sandy beach was not the man with her now.

He’d lived too long among the hardened and the ruthless. To survive he acquired their brutal ways and habits, the ways and habits of power. He lived his life as best he could, with honor and in truth. But deep inside he’d grown hard and bold, taking what he wanted, keeping it for only as long as he wanted.

He’d known beautiful women. But never in love. Never in tenderness. And no matter how he searched, none had been Eden.

Now she was here, only a forbidden touch away. The same sweet Eden, unsullied beneath the worldly elegance. But in the harshness that marked his life, he was wrong for her.

Perhaps they could be friends, as she asked. But never lovers, as he wished.

“It’s late,” he declared firmly, the rush of his breath warming her cheek. “This has been a long day for both of us.”

Catching the scarf draped like a shawl about her shoulders, he drew her close. Touching his lips to her forehead, he savored the feel and fragrance of her. But knowing this was all he could have of her, all that he dared, he put her from him.

Stroking her cheek with the back of his hand, he whispered, “You’re tired. I’ve asked too much of you this day.”

“No—”

A finger brushing her lips silenced her protest. “Come,” he insisted, taking her hand. “I’ll walk you home.”

She didn’t protest again. Not even when he kissed the sensitive flesh of her wrist, thanking her most gallantly for a lovely evening and for the pleasure of her company. Nor when he left her in the shadow of the sprawling back porch of River Walk.

Eden watched until the darkness washed over him and hid him from sight. She watched and waited, but he didn’t turn, he didn’t look back. And he didn’t hear as she whispered. “Good night, Adams Cade.”

Then, in a voice husky with tears, as Cullen stepped from the shadows, she whispered, “Good night, Adams, my love.”

Two

“Mrs. Claibourne.”

Eden looked up from the basket of flowers she was gathering while they were still glittering with dew. Shading her eyes against the early-morning sun, she realized that it was Merrie rushing toward her. As the girl came closer, Eden saw her face was flushed, her eyes bright, and the lovely mass of dark curls tumbled in fey disorder down her back.

Certain something was dreadfully wrong, Eden slipped off the supple leather gloves she used for gardening. Tucking gloves and shears into a pocket, she waited for the outburst.

Standing in the rising heat of the unseasonably warm spring morning, she watched Merrie weaving though the garden and wondered what problem had thrown this most vivacious member of her staff into a dither. Visions of termites swarming over the lower porches or mice in the pantry filled her thoughts, even as she knew that termites and mice would never cause this agitation in one so new to the foibles of ancient Southern homes.

“There’s more!” Merrie stopped, barely avoiding Eden.

“Whoa!” Eden exclaimed as she steadied the girl. “Calm down and tell me what in heaven’s name has you so excited. There’s more, you say? More of what?”

“More of them,” Merrie managed between heaving gasps.

“‘Them’?” Eden lifted a questioning brow as she found the oblique answer even more puzzling. “What? Who?”

“The other presidents.”

Eden was totally baffled now. “What presidents? Where?”

“The Cades.” Merrie caught a long breath, then spoke more calmly in faultless English just acquiring a touch of the Southern lilt. “In the library. The inn is full of them. The more they come, the more dangerous they are. Except for the first.”

“Adams’ brothers,” Eden interpreted rather than asked, not really certain having the three younger, brawling Cades on the premises was less disconcerting than termites on the porch or mice in the pantry. Disconcerting or not, it would be interesting, she thought as she continued her interpretation. “And, as with Adams, dangerous meaning handsome—or better.”

“Mr. Adams’ brothers,” Merrie confirmed. “But totally different and totally handsome.”

“And these presidents are in the library?” Eden chuckled in spite of knowing she really shouldn’t encourage such unbridled exuberance in her staff. Still, she doubted Merrie’s initial reaction would last. Not even a bevy of dangerously handsome men could supersede her greatest love.

“Since that was where you asked me to take Mr. Adams when he arrived, I was sure it would serve for the rest of the family.”

“Of course it does,” Eden agreed. “You did well. But next time, try to announce them with a little more composure.”

“I’m sorry.” Merrie was instantly contrite. “It’s just that no one warned me that the men of Southern North America were so…so…” Shrugging away her loss of words, she settled simply for redundancy. “Dangerous.”

Eden wondered if she should explain that the Cades were a breed apart, and certainly not men against whom others could be measured. But, deciding some things were better learned than told, she kept silent, waiting for Merrie to complete her report.

“They asked to see Mr. Adams,” the girl continued as expected. “Since you gave strict orders that he was to have no unannounced visitors unless you screened them, I thought the library was best. Mrs. Claibourne, I hope it was all right that I asked Cullen to see if they wanted coffee and muffins.”

“That’s perfect, Merrie. What you did was exactly right.”

“Should I get Mr. Adams now? Or take the gentlemen down to the river cottage?”

“No,” Eden said thoughtfully. “I think not just yet.” Given Merrie’s description, she didn’t doubt that it was Adams’ brothers who waited in the library. She couldn’t think of a soul who would be brave enough, or foolhardy enough, to misrepresent themselves as Cades. Even so, she would see for herself and judge the mood of this visit before Adams was disturbed.