My Man Pendleton(27)
Author: Elizabeth Bevarly

“Only one?” he interrupted.

She glanced up to acknowledge his interjection. “Okay, I owe you several. And I’d like to offer them in the form of an explanation.” When he opened his mouth to say something more, she rushed on, “But don’t start with all that ‘endearing’ stuff again, okay. It makes me nauseous. No offense.”

“Oh, none taken. It doesn’t bother me at all when a woman tells me I make her sick.”

“That’s not what I…” She sighed impatiently. “Never mind.”

He remained silent as she enjoyed deep swallow of her wine. Then, almost immediately, she downed a second of comparable size. Somehow, Pendleton thought she was doing it because she needed the false courage that alcohol brought on in some people. Either that, or she just really liked the wine a lot.

“Okay,” she finally said as she set her empty glass on the table. “Here’s the deal. I suspect that, unlike some of his other VPs, Daddy sent you to fetch me without filling you in on all the particulars.”

“Gee, what makes you think that?”

She smiled. “Because you’ve been way too tolerant, and not at all obsequious.”

“Ah. Then again, fetching you is in my job description.”

“Yeah, well, you’ll forgive me if I say that you don’t seem like the kind of guy who takes his job description all that seriously.”

He wasn’t sure, but he thought he should be offended by that. “Are you saying I’m not a good VP?”

“No, Pendleton, I’m saying you’re not a doormat.”

“Ah.”

“But the reason paragraph six, subheading A exists on page four of your job description is because it’s essential for Daddy’s executives to be the ones who come after me. It’s the main reason he’s hired them, after all.”

“I’m afraid I don’t follow you,” Pendleton said, studying her with interest. “Why can’t he send one of your brothers after you?”

She smiled again, but this time the expression wasn’t exactly happy. “Because I can’t marry one of my brothers. It’s against the law. Even in Kentucky.”

“Excuse me?”

“It’s true,” she said. “Not many people believe it, but it really is illegal to marry your own brother or sister inKentucky. It has been for, oh, gosh…years now, I guess.”

He made a face at her. “I meant why would your father find it necessary to hire men to marry you?”

“So he can collect my mother’s fortune.”

“Excuse me?” Pendleton was hopelessly lost. What was it about the McClellans that turned his brain into pudding?

Instead of answering his question, Kit posed one of her own. Not some idle, oh-by-the-way question, either. No, when she opened her mouth again, the oddest thing came out. “Pendleton? Have you ever been in love?”

As questions went, it wasn’t one he heard often. Nevertheless, he replied honestly, “Yes. Once.”

Her eyes widened in what was obvious surprise at his revelation. “Really?”

He nodded.

“Wow.” She gazed at him with what he could only liken to awe, then asked further, “Was she in love with you?”

That one was difficult to answer with the truth, simply because he didn’t know the truth. So he replied, “She told me she loved me. Many times, in fact.”

Kit continued to gaze at him as if he were some mythic creature that had just risen from the surf amid fanfare and fire. Then, as he knew she would, she asked the one question he really, really hated to answer.

“What happened to her?”

As always, he answered anyway. “She left me.”

That didn’t seem to surprise Kit at all, because she only nodded as if she completely understood.

He had no idea why he would want to prolong such a discussion, but somehow, he heard himself ask in return, “How about you? Have you ever been in love?”

Evidently, she didn’t have to think about her response, because, immediately, she shook her head. Then she reached for her empty wineglass and held it out to Pendleton in a silent request for a refill. So he plucked the bottle out of the ice bucket and obeyed her command.

As he was pouring, she qualified, “But I was engaged once, if that counts for anything.”

Oh, it counted, he thought as the wine poured over the rim of her glass and cascaded onto the tablecloth. He jerked the bottle back and met her gaze levelly, but had no idea what to say. All he could manage by way of a response was an echo of her earlier sentiment. “Really?”

She wiped her hand on her napkin, then sipped carefully from her over-filled glass. “Really.”

“But you didn’t get married?”

Still not looking at him, she replied, “Nope.”

He knew it was none of his business, and probably a bad idea to boot, but he asked, “Did you get cold feet at the last minute?”

She turned her head to stare out the window, and inevitably, he repeated the gesture. The black ocean beyond stretched to infinity, linking with the black sky at some point on the horizon. But since both were spattered with starlight, it was impossible for him to see exactly where that line between air and water lay. In the nighttime, both mingled and joined, becoming one. Only at daybreak would they part again.

“Nope,” she said again, her voice insubstantial, as if coming from a great distance. “I didn’t get cold feet. He did.”

Pendleton felt a twist of regret turn inside him, and he wished he hadn’t asked her to elaborate. He was about to say something about how the two of them had actually managed to find something in common, when she opened her mouth and, to his even greater regret, she elaborated some more.

“Actually, he didn’t get cold feet,” she said softly. “What he got was cold cash.”

Thinking he’d misunderstood, Pendleton asked, “Say what?”

“Actually, that’s not quite right, either,” she said, finally turning to look at him again. “What Michael got was a check. From my father. Daddy gave him one for a quarter-million dollars at the rehearsal dinner as kind of a ditch-the-wedding present. But Michael cashed it the next day, so I guess that makes it close enough to cold cash, don’t you think? It certainly made for cold feet. Michael couldn’t get out of the restaurant fast enough.”

“Your father paid your fiancé a quarter of a million dollars to leave you?” he asked. “The night before your wedding?”