"I've always been very wise." He tugged me gently back into step with him. "My mom was the same around my dad."

It took every ounce of self-control I had not to trip in surprise at him mentioning his mother. As far as I was aware, this was a completely taboo subject. I kept utterly quiet, hoping he'd continue.

"My mom was a different person around my dad," he admitted somberly. "It was like she was trying to be who she thought he wanted her to be."

Tentatively I asked, "What she did ... the choices that she made ... did they shock you?"

"Yeah." He stared out at the water as we walked and I studied his profile, looking for any signs that he was upset. But he seemed perfectly calm. "I was just a kid. I had no idea she was that selfish. It was just like you with your mom. You thought she was a superhero, right? Until you grew up. For me ... I just happened to have the truth knocked into me a bit young." He looked at me. "Do you want to know how I get through?"

I held my breath and nodded. I was transfixed. Awed. Gratified.

Caine was confiding in me.

"I concentrate on all the good things. Because people aren't just one thing. Your mom wasn't just weak and selfish and neither was mine. Your mom wasn't unhappy all the time and neither was mine. There were times when my mother was more alive than anyone I ever met.

"She was obsessed with the color yellow. Wore it nearly every day, even if it was just a ribbon in her hair. And she had a ton of yellow ribbons." He smiled softly, his gaze reflective. "She kept them in this cheap little jewelry box I won at a school fair.

"And she made everything an event. Even Sunday morning breakfast. She had this yellow dress ... like a fifties dress. Dad and I would get up in the morning and there she was, in that dress, smiling as she made baked goods for breakfast. Not eggs and bacon, none of that. It was cakes and pastries and muffins. Because me and Dad had a sweet tooth."

I fought back the tears at the thought of Caine's happy childhood with a mother who sounded vivacious and caring.

"Dad was always saying how beautiful she was. How I had the most beautiful mom in the world. And I'd feel proud walking down the street with her. I'd feel proud as she walked me into school, because I had the most beautiful mom in the world.

"And she loved me," he said, his eyes now filled with pain when he looked at me. "It took me a while after it all to remember that, but she loved me. It was always all about me as a kid. But looking back, I realized she would hold parts of herself back around my dad. It was just little things. Like, she used to sing all the time when he wasn't there, but she wouldn't sing around him. She was quieter. She deferred to him in everything, even things I'd seen her cope with on her own, understand by herself. And it was because he needed her to be that way; he needed to feel needed.

"But when she was with me she was take-charge. She knew what we were doing, where we were going. And she wanted a lot for me. That's what I remember the most. She would tell me nearly every day how much she wanted me to have everything. Everything she never had." He threw me a rueful smile that caused an ache in my chest near my heart. "She named me after some guy in a romance novel. She said his name made him sound like somebody, and she wanted me to be somebody when I grew up."

"Is that why you've worked so hard to be somebody?"

He didn't answer me. Instead he said, "Maybe you need to remember the best in your mom to forgive her, to move on."

"How do you do that?" Since we'd already walked into territory I never thought we would, I decided to continue being brave. "I mean you're obviously still furious and unforgiving over what my family-my father, my grandfather-did to your family. But you seem at peace with what your mother did."

He frowned. "I'm not at peace with it. You can't be at peace with something like that, just like I won't ever be at peace with the fact that my father took his own life knowing it would leave me with no one. But I have to consider everything that they were both going through at the time, and I have to somehow find a way to move on knowing that I wasn't enough to save either of them from their mistakes. So I remember the good stuff and most days it gets me through it. Not every day, but most days. I don't believe you can make a firm decision to just forgive. Sometimes forgiveness can be won back, but there's no one left around to earn that from me. So it's about trying every day to be okay, to let it go. It takes work. There are days when it's impossible to do that, and one of those times was the day you walked onto that set. I was pissed because you were trying to apologize for something that a simple 'sorry' can't undo. It's fucked, but it's true."

I nodded, understanding. "So you want to forgive your parents?"

"Honestly?"

"Yes."

"I really do."

"But ..." I tugged on his hand, needing to know-perhaps hoping he would have the answers to help me. "After everything they took from you. Why?"

Caine stopped and faced me. There was a hard aspect in his gaze that I didn't like. "I want to forgive them because ... I know how easy it is to fall down a path you never meant to take. I know what it's like to have done things I'm not proud of."

"I don't believe that. You could never have done the shameful things they did."

At that Caine scowled and began to walk away again, this time no longer holding my hand.

Not understanding his reaction, I hurried to catch up. "Do you think I should forgive my father and grandfather?"

"I don't know that either," he said quietly. "I just know that kind of bitterness can eat you up from the inside out." He softened. "You've got too much going for you to let that happen."

I smiled, feeling an overwhelming amount of emotion for him surge up inside me. "You amaze me. You know that, right?"

Apparently, somehow, in all the hard subjects we'd just touched on, that was the wrong thing to say.

An uncomfortable silence swelled between us.

And I pushed. "You don't think you're amazing?"

He looked at me sternly. "No. And I don't want you to either."

"Caine-"

"It's not about pushing you away," he interrupted, anger in his eyes. "It's about making sure you don't start seeing something in me that doesn't exist." He shook his head and looked away. "You wanted friendship between us? Well, the truth is you are my friend, Lexie. And I don't like disappointing my friends. So don't pretend I'm a man I'm not."

What Caine didn't realize was that he couldn't disappoint me. We'd had a more than rocky start, a more than complicated history, but I was still standing by his side, and I wanted to keep standing by his side, because I didn't think he even realized how good a man he was.

My whole life I'd been terrified of making the same mistake as my mother-of falling for a man who wasn't worthy without even realizing I was wasting my heart on him. Because of that fear I'd never truly let myself fall.

But Caine Carraway was not Alistair Holland.

Caine was ambitious and hardworking. He was strong and stubborn and ruthless, but he was also this contradiction. He could be kind and compassionate and generous.

And even if I didn't understand him sometimes, even if I didn't agree with him on occasion, I would never, ever be disappointed in him.

However, I knew him well enough to recognize that look in his eyes. That obstinate glint. So for once I let it go.

"I'm buying you ice cream." I held out my hand for him.

Caine gave me a dubious look.

I grinned and urged him to take my proffered hand. "You've never tasted ice cream like Luigi's."

Sighing, Caine laced his fingers through mine. "Did you ever really grow up, Lexie?"

I shot him a saucy look. "I did in all the places that matter."

Like always, triumph rushed through me at the sound of his answering laughter.

CHAPTER 19.

What happened between Caine and me next took me by surprise. There was definitely an intimacy between us that hadn't been there before, but instead of us relaxing into it, a new kind of tension sprang up between us. There was a desperation in our interactions-sex between us became almost an addiction, an obsession. It was wild and passionate as we tried to quell this tension that couldn't be quelled.

"Are you sure it's a good idea for me to be there tomorrow night?" I was perched on Caine's desk, my legs crossed at the ankles. There was a possibility I was sitting on important paperwork, but Caine hadn't said a word.

He was too busy staring at my legs.

"Caine?"

His gaze roamed up my body and I shivered at the heat in his eyes. "I told you this party is mostly business. We're there to rub elbows with clients and potential clients. No one will question the fact that I brought my PA." He suddenly grinned and it was wickedly sexy. "Although they might question my motives in hiring one that looks like you."

"Henry's already suspicious."

He shrugged. "Henry doesn't know a thing."

Hmm, I wasn't so sure. "And what about my name?"

"We already introduced you as Alexa Hall at the last party."

"And you don't think anyone is eventually going to find out that's not my name? Everyone in the company knows my surname, Caine."

"Fine." He sighed. "We just won't mention your surname. We'll introduce you as Alexa. Not to be a dick or anything, but no one there will really care what my PA's surname is."

Arrogant SOB. "Ouch."

He slid his hand along the inside of my thigh in a comforting gesture that mostly just turned me on. "The truth is these people, my people, they're self-important, self-involved, and all they care about is who has the most influence."

"Which doesn't include the PAs." His expression gave me my answer. "You know, I was thinking about a career move. Like ... moving into the events management business ..."

Caine smiled softly. "You'd be good at that."

Gratitude rushed through me. "You really think so?"

He nodded. "I know so. But give me plenty of warning." His fingers moved higher up my thigh and his voice thickened. "You're the best PA I've ever had. It'll take time to replace you."

As he touched me I let my head fall back and I savored the physical rush of being with him, but somewhere in the back of my mind his words twisted into something ugly.

Something real I didn't want to face.

Caine would eventually replace me.

I should have known attending the party with Caine was a bad idea. The only other person I knew there was Henry, and he'd brought a date and was much more interested in seducing his date than doing anything to promote "friendship" with other businessmen at the party.

The party was hosted by investment guru Brendan Ulster and his wife, Lacey. Caine said their circle took turns to throw these kinds of bashes throughout the year, and this year it was hosted under the pretense of an apartment warming, as the Ulsters had just purchased a top-floor apartment across the Common from Caine on Beacon Street.

The place was beautiful.

The people ... well, not so much.

Among the men, Caine was a man's man, the kind of guy that other men looked up to and admired. Among the women, Caine was that elusive catch. If the men weren't attempting to engage Caine in business conversation, they were trying to engage me in flirtation. It was exhausting fending them off, my irritation increasing as so many of them looked at me as if I were easy pickings. I was of course just the PA. And I had the distinct impression that they thought I was the kind of woman who would do anything to be near a powerful man.

They weren't the only reason I was annoyed. The night had started out well-Caine was attentive and funny as he made dry remarks about some of the snootier people we met. However, as the evening wore on, he began to treat me with a familiar aloofness that was driving me insane. I had no idea what had happened in the space of an hour, but I was biding my time until the end of the party to let him have it.

"You've been noticeably absent from society lately, Caine," some woman whose name I couldn't remember purred to him as she cut me off from his side by insinuating herself between us. She ran a perfectly manicured nail along his shoulder and pressed her breasts against his arm. "There are rumors that you're hiding some kind of forbidden dalliance."

Forbidden dalliance? I rolled my eyes. Who talks like that?

Caine extricated himself from her and looked away in boredom. "There are always rumors, Kitty."

She fluffed her hair, seeming perturbed by Caine's aloofness with her.

Yeah, I could relate.

"True." She shrugged. "People talk. Well ..." She stared at him a moment, waiting for him to pay her some attention. When he didn't she finally glanced at me questioningly. I merely raised an eyebrow at her. She gave a little huff. "Well, if you'll excuse me ..." She sashayed away from us, her elegant figure wrapped up tight in a pale gold dress.

"The women around here certainly like you," I noted dryly, wishing I didn't feel that curl of jealousy in my belly. I'd never been a jealous woman until Caine, and I didn't particularly like that he provoked that aspect of my personality. I did my best to keep it under wraps, using humor to hide behind.

Caine didn't reply.

"You know, you might have them fooled, but you don't fool me."

He slanted a look at me out of the corner of his eye and I could tell he sensed the dark undercurrent of my mood. "Is that right?" he murmured.

"Mmm. They all whisper behind your back that you're dangerous, ruthless, exciting, giggling like titillated morons. But I know something they don't."

Turning fully now to face me, Caine practically dared, "And what's that?"

Melancholy coiled around my heart like an iron fist. "You seem dangerous because you are dangerous. You walk among them like a surly tiger, and they're all just prey caught in your paws. They're so busy looking up at you, oohing and aahing over how beautiful you are, they have no idea that you're mere seconds from eating them. That you're just going to chew them up and spit them out." I looked away, taking a sip of my drink and willing my hands not to shake as I did so.

The tension we'd felt between us all week seemed to expand into this suffocating thing that wrapped around us, shutting everyone else out.

Finally I found the courage to look at him.

He was staring out at the crowd, seemingly bored. Only the tightness of his jaw gave away his irritation.

A grim-faced gentleman nodded at him from across the room and Caine lifted his drink in acknowledgment.

"Who's that?" I said curiously, trying to draw focus away from the bad mood between us.

"Leonard Kipling. Pharmaceuticals giant."

"You know everyone, don't you? I didn't think Kipling was the kind of man you wanted to get into bed with."

"He's powerful. I don't rule out anyone with his kind of influence. Who knows where the future may take me, or if there'll come a day when an acquaintance with him will benefit us both?"