Dear Lord. She let out an exasperated huff. "If you send me one more thing, I swear I won't come to work on Monday....and I definitely won't bring any cinnamon-almond cookies!"

"Oh, so you can believe I'm crazy about your cookies, but if I tell you you're the last thing I think about at night or that your smile is the first thing I want to see in the morning, I must be lying, right? What's the difference?"

The guilt was too much to bear. She had to tell him what she'd done. "The difference is, I didn't hypnotize you into believing you love my cookies!"

The line went dead silent for a second. "What're you talking about?"

"You just think you love me because of that relaxation CD I gave you. It's encoded with subliminal messages and has over a dozen affirmations about how much better your life would be if you were married to me."

"Are you saying you brainwashed me into falling in love with you?"

"Not exactly. And you're not in love with me. What you think you feel isn't real, despite how much I'd like it to be."

"Damn it, Hannah, I believed you were different." The pain and disappointment in his voice twisted in her heart like a knife. "But you're not, are you!" he shouted, making her flinch. "You're just as conniving and scheming as every other woman who's ever screwed with my head!"

What could she say? He was right. "I knew I shouldn't do it, but I love you so much."

"Making a fool of me is a helluva way to show it. You told me love is about becoming vulnerable, giving a woman the opportunity to hurt me, but trusting her not to. Well, jackass that I am, I trusted you! I told you all my darkest secrets and was completely honest with you. Can you say the same?"

She'd never heard him so mad. And God help her, Jordan had a right to be angry.

"Please believe me, I didn't deceive you to hurt you. I just wanted you to love me. I've been racked with guilt ever since I gave that CD to you. It's why I told you about it. But words can't express how sorry I am."

"Me, too. But at least you have the satisfaction of knowing your devious little plan worked. You can celebrate, sweetheart. This sucker now believes he's madly in love with a calculating manipulator who can't wait to walk out of his life!"

The line clicked in her ear and the unspoken words she knew he'd been thinking echoed in her head.

.... just like every other bitch I ever cared for.

Chapter 21.

hap*py end*ing n. 1. A favorable conclusion or termination. 2 The conclusion of most fairytales and romantic fiction. 3. Vulgar Slang. A hand-job at the conclusion of an erotic massage.

Just when it seems like a happy ending might be possible, without fail your sins come back to haunt you.

What a sucker! Jordan flopped into a cushioned rattan chair in the solarium. No wonder he'd been dreaming about stripping wedding gowns off her. The CD had brainwashed him into believing they could be happy together, when deep down, he knew damn well the only happy ending he could count on was one bought in a massage parlor.

"I should've known she was too good to be true."

"They say you don't have to worry about talking to yourself until you start answering." Bryce said from the doorway.

"Hey. What're you doing here?"

Bryce settled in the chair across from him. "I was at loose ends and thought you might like to shoot some pool."

Jordan shook his head. "I wouldn't be very good company."

"Okay, what'd Hannah do?"

"Why do you assume she's at the root of my foul mood?"

"You were muttering about some woman when I got here. I figured it had to be her."

Drawing in a shuddering breath, Jordan told Bryce about the CD and ended saying, "I can't believe I was so gullible."

"Wait. Explain this again. Exactly what'd she do that was so awful? Get you to admit you care about her?"

"She lied and manipulated me."

"Uh-huh. So what's really got your shorts in a twist? That you trusted her? That she put one over on you to make you face the truth? Or that she won't believe you're in love with her?"

"Am I?"

"You tell me. Now that you know about the subliminal messages, do you want her any less?"

If anything, Jordan wanted her even more-probably because his testosterone level had risen in direct proportion to his fury. The savage way he'd taken her in his office last week would seem downright tender compared to the way he would plow her now, given the chance. First, he'd spank her luscious bare ass, then bend her naked over the closest chair and take her from behind for however long he could keep it up. When he finished, he'd do it again.

"Come on, JC." Bryce nudged him out of his erotic fantasy. "Do you honestly think any kind of mind control could make a person fall in love with someone he doesn't really care for?"

"When you put it that way, no, I suppose not."

"How long have you been listening to the CD?"

Jordan frowned and thought back to the afternoon she'd given it to him. "Since the day before I took her to Washington."

"How'd you feel about her before that? Like, say, the night of the auction when she refused to bid on you, and you bellowed her name across the ballroom?"

He'd had to squash an impulse to put her over his knee and spank her right there with five hundred people watching. Although that urge had been accompanied by a staggering desire to make love to her, too.

He tossed his hands up in surrender. "Okay, so I was already crazy about her and couldn't admit it. I guess what bothers me is the woman I hired never would've done anything that underhanded."

"The Hannah I know wouldn't, either. If you ask me, it sounds like an act of desperation. That should tell you something."

When he didn't respond, Bryce stood and slapped Jordan on the shoulder. "It's obvious you don't want to talk. Call me if you decide you want company."

After Bryce left, his words continued to linger in Jordan's mind. It sounds like an act of desperation.

What was it supposed to tell him? That he should be flattered she wanted him so much she was willing to do something that went so totally against her better nature to win him?

He'd trusted her, damn it, and she'd let him down. He'd done exactly what she'd asked him to do. He'd trusted her not to hurt him-but she'd trampled on his heart anyway.

"Candace is right." Ruth sighed that evening after Hannah told her about her conversation and shopping trip with her mother. "Your grandpa and I made a lot of mistakes with her. That's why we were so set on not making the same ones with you."

So instead, they made different mistakes and raised her to be self-conscious, inhibited, and way too concerned about pleasing the world-all in the name of love.

Hannah slid her arms around her grandmother and kissed her cheek. "Thanks for caring so much." She turned back to the mixing bowl. "So how are things going with Edward?"

"They aren't. I'm not seeing him any longer."

"Gram-" She huffed. "Why do you have to be so stubborn? The man wants to marry you." She scraped the last of the buttery dough onto the floured board. "How could you turn him down?"

"Easy." Her grandmother spread her arms and glanced pointedly down at her faded jeans and Phillies T-shirt. "All I had to do was look in the mirror. The weekend I stayed at his house we had fresh fruit salad served in Waterford crystal bowls for breakfast, followed by Eggs Benedict on Royal Copenhagen plates with gold serrated edges. At home, I usually eat peanut butter on toast and a banana right from the peel. I'm too old to change that much."

"But he's not asking you to." Hannah rolled the dough out to a quarter-inch thickness.

"I know he's not. In fact, last night he even offered to come live here."

"You're kidding?" She stared at Ruth. "Do you know what I'd give to have a guy love me so much he'd give up his whole lifestyle for me?"

"Except I don't want Edward to do that. It wouldn't be fair to him, either." Ruth brushed the sheet of dough with the egg-white mixture Hannah had beaten to a froth.

"So can't you meet him halfway? I guarantee he's got a jar of peanut butter in his pantry."

Ruth glanced pointedly at the bracelet on Hannah's wrist. "Like you're meeting Jordan halfway? How much do you think that bit of-what's the term those hip-hoppers use?"

"Bling? When did you start listening to hip-hop?"

"I don't. I heard it on The View. I'm not completely behind the times. And don't change the subject. How much do you think that bauble cost?"

"Too much. And I'm not meeting Jordan at all-let alone halfway." She seriously doubted he even wanted her to have his baby any longer. "I'm giving this back to him as soon as I see him on Monday. I just need your help to take it off." She'd loaded everything into the Jaguar's trunk that morning.

"Exactly. You're a fine one to talk about being stubborn. Edward told me Jordan asked you to have a family with him. The man obviously loves you."

"He just wants me to sleep with him and give him an heir." Hannah sprinkled a mixture of cinnamon, sugar, and chopped almonds over the egg white layer on the cookie dough.

"Do you hear how ridiculous you sound?" Ruth snorted softly. "In one afternoon, the man spent a small fortune trying to convince you just to speak to him. Don't you think a surrogate would cost a lot less? Jordan could probably have any woman he wants in his bed and can afford a half dozen nannies to help him take care of his baby. But he wants you to be his child's mother."

Put that way, it did sound a bit preposterous.

"Gram, things are way too, uhhh....physical between Jordan and me. I'm worried we're both thinking with our hormo-"

"You're saying you can't keep your hands off each other?"

Hannah nodded.

"Sweetie, your grandpa and I were the same way with each other. That's how it is when a man and woman are in love."

The constriction in her throat made speaking difficult. "So you think I should agree to just live with him?"

"Why not?"

"Grandma!"

"Well, you insist I should meet his grandfather halfway. This is no different. Judging from what Edward has told me, it doesn't sound as if Jordan has an issue making a commitment to you."

"No?" Hannah arched one eyebrow. "Then why won't he simply marry me?"

"I think it's because he's afraid to have you make a commitment to him. According to Edward, love has never given Jordan any reason to trust it would treat him kindly."

Right. And now she'd given him even more of a reason to distrust it-and her.

"I'm guessing he wants to share his life with you, but he's terrified of letting himself count on you being there."

Listening to her grandmother's analysis, Jordan's words echoed in her memory. I don't trust love, Hannah. I won't let people make commitments to me, and I won't rely on them not to hurt me. As soon as I do, they either die or leave me.

Now that she thought about their conversations, he'd never once said he wouldn't commit himself to her. The only reservation he'd expressed was his fear of her leaving him.

"Ah-ha." Hannah pointed at her grandmother. "It takes one to know one. You're afraid."

Ruth closed her eyes. "Maybe I am."

"So, you'd have no problem with me giving you a bastard great-grandchild?"

"How can you ask me something like that? Have you ever wondered if I love you?" Ruth hugged her. "Naturally, I'd like to see you married. But I have a much bigger issue with you living without love. And to be honest, neither of us is getting any younger. I'd like to hold one of my great-grandchildren before I die."

Maybe her grandma was right. If Jordan really did love Hannah, he would never leave her. What he'd yelled at her on the phone yesterday suddenly made sense. Well, I trusted you! Can you say the same?

She wasn't demonstrating any more faith in him by holding out for marriage than he was in asking her to settle for living with him without any legally binding promises.

Her mother never would've let the conventions of society stop her from living in sin with the man she loved.

Although sin had nothing to do with Hannah's feelings for Jordan. Well-nearly nothing, she mentally amended, remembering the way he could set her body on fire. All he'd cared about was pleasing her on Friday night, and she'd been too scared to see what he'd been trying to show her.

The heck with what the world thought. She loved him, and if he still believed he loved her and could forgive her for her deceit, she would spend the rest of her life in his arms, earning his trust again.

Hannah slapped her palm over her mouth, tasting the residue of dough and cinnamon on her hand. Oh, jeez. In one breath she'd be trying to convince Jordan she'd never leave him, and in the next, she'd have to tell him about her deal with Kurt Preston and resign from her job. Talk about contradictory.

Jordan punched his pillow for the hundredth time that night. He'd been staring up at the ceiling for two hours, trying not to think about Bryce's question.

So what's really got your shorts in a twist? That you trusted her? That she put one over on you to make you face the truth? Or that she won't believe you're in love with her?

No, it didn't bother him that she didn't believe him. Given time, he could convince her of his feelings.

She'd lied to him!

Yeah, you're so perfect, the voice of his conscience hooted. Like you've never let her down or hurt her without meaning to, right?

Only several times in the last week.