One in a Billion

Who knew? Deidre wondered as she watched Nick spoon the last of the lemon chicken onto his plate. Maybe Nick had needed a truce and a nice evening as much as she had.

“Did you ever do what Lincoln requested?” she asked a few minutes later as she sank back into the couch and brought her feet up next to her. “Did you ever reflect on what it was you work so hard for, day in and day out?” she clarified when he arched his brows at her. He gave her a sidelong glance as he chewed. She enjoyed observing the movement of his strong jaw.

“I’ve reflected,” he said finally, wiping his mouth with a napkin and setting his plate on the table.

“And? Any grand discoveries?”

“No. Not really,” he admitted, leaning back after he took a swig of ice water. “I was different than Linc in that way. The work has always been reason and reward enough for me. It was Linc who was worried he’d built up his empire for nothing, that it was a hollow victory. ‘What’s it all for?’ he’d ask me every once in a while.”

“Was he unhappy?” Deidre asked in a hushed tone.

He met her gaze. “No. I would say he lived a happy, fulfilled life. But everyone has a sore point. For Linc, it was that he’d never had a family with whom he could share all that he had to give.”

Deidre studied her thighs, blinking to soothe the sudden burn in her eyes. Oh, no. She really wished these tears would be over and done with.

Her breath caught when she felt Nick touch the juncture between her neck and shoulders. His long fingers combed through her hair. He didn’t speak, but she knew he’d noticed her emotional upsurge. She felt like she needed to explain.

“It’s just … it’s hard, knowing he wanted a family so much and didn’t know he had one all along.”

Didn’t know he had me.

The thought of both Linc and her having similar longings while separated by half of the world, both ignorant of each other’s existence, made grief spike through her. They’d found each other, but for such a brief time. Now he was gone forever.

She stared at the flames and muffled a sob. A hot, vivid flash of anger at her mother mingled with her sadness. Her wretchedness was so complete in that moment, she didn’t protest when she felt Nick’s arms surround her. She managed to stifle the sound of her misery, but she couldn’t disguise the tremors that racked her body. Nick didn’t comment, just absorbed her sadness, his body seeming to cushion the impact of her grief.

She realized she’d never really wept since Lincoln died. Nick cradled her waist and encouraged her to rest the back of her head on his chest. He ran his hand along her shoulder and upper arm. For several minutes, she cried silently while she stared at the fire.

Nick closed his hand over her shoulder muscle and rubbed it. She felt his heat through the tiny holes of her sweater. She held her breath. Awareness of him, of his closeness, of his hard, male body made her misery fade. His hand stilled, as if he’d recognized the alteration in her mood at the same moment she had.

She stood abruptly from the couch and grabbed a napkin from the table. She wiped off her cheeks and walked toward the mantel. How crazy could she be, going to mush like that in front of a man who doubted she was Lincoln’s daughter, who doubted her morals and her character?

“Surely Lincoln didn’t grieve that much over not having a family,” she said flatly as she leaned down toward the flames, her back to Nick. “He had you, after all.”

“I worked for him, Deidre.”

“He loved you like a son,” she insisted. “Everyone says so. He positively glowed with pride every time he spoke of you. Why can’t you admit you thought of him like a father?”

When he didn’t speak, she twisted her chin over her shoulder, feeling regretful at her outburst. Had she sounded bitter just then? She’d accused him last night of being envious of her relationship with Lincoln, but perhaps she was the one who was jealous of Nick’s lifelong association with Lincoln. She didn’t know what to think when she saw the way he studied her, his face impassive, his eyes hooded.

“I won’t admit it, because it’s not true. I never expected Lincoln to treat me as his son. I worked my ass off for him—as a stable boy, as the foreman of his ranch, as an advertising executive, as a new global unit president and finally as his CEO.”

“I didn’t mean you’d taken advantage of your relationship with him,” she said, caught off guard.

“Other people thought so, when I was younger,” he stated bluntly. “Maybe that’s why I was so intent on making sure my work spoke for itself. I never wanted to give anyone the slightest reason to suspect that I’d used Linc. My record stands on its own.”

Deidre blushed. She hadn’t realized it was such a sensitive topic for him. Of course, what he’d said made complete sense. There would always be those who thought the worst of a person’s motives.

“When I told you last night that the officers of DuBois Enterprises had been known to think Linc was foolish for putting so much trust in another human being,” Nick continued, “I was talking about myself. There was loads of backbiting and plenty of rumors about Linc’s gullibility when I first started working for him and rising in the ranks.”

She stared at him, her lips parted in amazement.

“Maybe you’re thinking it’s pretty damn hypocritical of me to sit here and say that I was accused of taking advantage of Lincoln when I was young, and then turn around and do the same to you,” he said quietly. “But it’s different, Deidre.”

“How?”

“Because I did build a record of service to Linc, his company and it’s employees. I silenced all the naysayers, many times over.”

“How am I supposed to compete with that, Nick?” she asked, frustrated.

“I’m not asking you to. All I’m asking is that you spend time with me, allow me to get to know you … form my own opinions.”

“Haven’t I been doing that tonight?”

“Yeah, you have. And I appreciate it. More than you know.”

Deidre wondered if she’d ruined their peaceful evening with her emotional outburst when he suddenly stood.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to sound so angry—”

“Don’t apologize. I’m not leaving. I just thought of something, that’s all. It arrived yesterday.” She stared at him, bewildered, when he waved at the front door. “I’ll go and get it. It’s in the car.”

Her confusion had only amplified by the time he returned a minute later, carrying an opened cardboard shipping box. Deidre hurried to finish clearing the coffee table of the remnants of their dinner, making room for him to set it down.

“What is it?” she asked a moment later when she’d returned from the kitchen, her eyes glued to the box.

“Open it,” he encouraged.

She knelt next to the table while he sat across from her on the couch. She peeled back the box flaps and peered inside, seeing dozens and dozens of black-and-white and color photos. Excitement pulsed through her. She reached for the five-by-six photo of a woman smiling at the camera, an exquisite arrangement of white hydrangeas and roses on the table before her, sunlight flooding through the window behind her.

Recognition clicked in her, rapid and absolute.

“It’s Lily DuBois,” she whispered.

“Let me see,” Nick requested gruffly.

She turned the photo. He gave a small smile.

“Yeah. That’s Lily.”

“You knew her?” Deidre whispered.

He nodded. “I knew both Lily and George, Linc’s father. George was a rancher. He owned a huge spread between Tahoe and Carson City. When they got older, Lincoln bought a house for them in South Lake, and they spent most of their time there.”

“What were they like?” Deidre asked as she withdrew another picture, this one of Lily in the arms of a large, suntanned man with silver-gray hair and a winning smile. She studied every nuance of the couple’s faces, hungry for the tiniest details. Lily and George DuBois—her grandparents.

“The two of them couldn’t have been more different, but they were perfect for each other. George was a lot like Linc, bigger than life, personable, a natural horseman, smart and methodical when it came to business. Lily was reserved. Elegant. A sweeter lady never lived. She was English, did Linc tell you that?”

Deidre nodded, now studying Nick like she had the photographs, so eager for any tiny morsel of knowledge about people and a history she’d never known.

“Lily never lost her accent. It made her seem so refined, but never standoffish. Her warmth was her hallmark. She loved flowers and used to show her roses in competitions. The one thing both Lily and George had in common was the love of the land. Lily was always in her garden, George with his horses.”

Deidre continued to dig through the photographs, peering at the faces of people she’d never known, but who somehow seemed familiar to her. There were photos of Lincoln as a young man, tall and whipcord lean, deeply tanned from his days working on his father’s ranch. She saw Lily working in her garden, always wearing a white straw hat to protect her skin from the sun.

“Here’s a picture of one of Linc’s Christmas trees,” Nick said a few minutes after he’d begun to join her in examining the photos.

Deidre came around the table and sat next to him on the couch. There was the magnificent pine tree arranged in the picture window of the great room of The Pines. Standing before it was Lincoln, perhaps at around forty, looking fit, handsome and happy. Next to him stood his mother and father. George had his arm around a tall young man, wearing jeans and a sober expression.

“That’s you,” Deidre whispered as she studied the image of a teenage Nick. He’d been very handsome and intense, even as a boy. A strange feeling went through her, seeing Nick standing there with Lincoln’s family—her

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