“I do.”

She flushed to the roots of her hair. “Hart-”

“It was the most special night I can ever remember. You were beautiful, Bree. A beautiful, loving, giving, passionate woman. You’ve got spirit and humor, and I haven’t the least idea what you’ve been running from-but you don’t have to run from anything. You’ve got the strength to carry you-you just need someone to tease it out of you once in a while. And last night was not a one-night stand, so quit trying to make it sound like one.”

She was staring at him, a jumble of words jammed in the back of her throat all trying to get out at once, when there was a knock on the door.

It opened. A familiar face peered in first, a woman with faintly graying auburn hair tied back in a loose bun, a soft tentative smile and worried lines on her forehead. Behind her was another familiar face. The man was just short of six feet, with steel-and-charcoal hair and a slight paunch, and in addition to a wrinkled cotton shirt, he was wearing a scowl.

Bree lurched up from her chair. “Mom! Dad! What a surprise!” she said weakly.

Chapter Eight

“Darling! You’ve got your voice back!” Addie Penoyer’s words came out in a delighted rush, tears filling her eyes as she surged toward her daughter. “I can’t believe it!”

Bree hugged her mother back, suddenly laughing. “I couldn’t either. It just happened last night, or you know I would have called you, Mom.”

“I don’t care, as long as it happened. Darling, I know I should have called to tell you that we were coming, but I kept telling Burke that we just couldn’t let you stay down here alone-we had to do something…” Addie tripped just slightly over the word alone; Bree turned tomato-red, and behind her she heard Hart’s chair scrape back.

“Look. Mom…” Bree started uncomfortably, but Addie, staring over her shoulder at Hart, wasn’t wearing the maternally disapproving expression Bree expected. Maybe Hart had miraculously donned clothes in the past thirty seconds? Searching her mother’s face, Bree saw Addie bite her lip slightly, glance at Bree again with joy and relief in her eyes, then gulp in a little breath. She squeezed Bree’s shoulder, and then with a tentative smile offered a slim hand to Hart. “Mr…?”

“Manning. Hart, please, Mrs. Penoyer.”

Bree pivoted around, startled to see Hart’s normally cocky demeanor destroyed. His complexion was ashen and his movements jerky as he courteously took her mother’s hand. And for some reason, he had draped a kitchen towel around his bare shoulders. The flowery pattern didn’t do a thing for him. “Mrs. Penoyer.” Hart cleared his throat. “I know how this must look to you, and I don’t want you to think…”

Addie waved a hand in midair. “My daughter is talking again, Mr. Mann-Hart. If you think her father and I care about anything else-”

“Agreed,” cut in an ominous tenor from the door. “Just because a man’s clothes are strewn all over my daughter’s backyard, I wouldn’t want you to think we see any reason to be the least upset.”

Another time, Bree would have been fascinated, watching Hart turn from pale ashen to dove gray. At the moment, she was too mortified. Thirty seconds of silence filled the cabin. Each one lasted about a year and a half. Nervously locking her arms under her chest, Bree turned back to her father. “Look. Dad…”

“I have every intention of marrying her, Mr. Penoyer,” Hart interjected swiftly.

Bree’s eyes whipped up. “Have you gone out of your mind?” she whispered. The situation was mortifying, embarrassing and downright awful, but it certainly wasn’t a death sentence.

You’d never know it to look at Hart, though. Gone was the arrogant playboy, the cocky grin. He looked awkward; actually, he looked a little silly, holding on to the towel that didn’t even begin to cover his chest, anyway. And he positioned himself in front of Bree as if he intended to protect her from dragons. For heaven’s sake, it was just her father.

“I don’t for a minute blame you for coming to certain conclusions, Mr. Penoyer. I realize how this must look to you,” Hart started gravely.

“You can bet your sweet petunias how it looks,” Burke agreed.

“Dad-”

“I take full responsibility-”

“Hart.”

“You’re telling me something I don’t know? A month ago, my daughter was engaged to another man-did she tell you that?”

“No.” Hart’s eyes shifted sharply to Bree’s. “But it wouldn’t have made any difference. She never belonged to him. I wouldn’t care if she’d been engaged to forty-seven men, and I really wouldn’t care if it was yesterday.”

“Listen,” Bree said firmly. Hart’s stare was unnerving; you’d think there was suddenly no one else in the room. It was easier to whirl around in her father’s direction. “Dad, if you would relax for just a minute,” she began.

Burke ignored her. “My daughter,” he said heatedly to Hart, “has never once in her entire life given us cause to worry about her behavior-”

“Bree was not to blame,” Hart said swiftly. “I was. But just because we’ve only known each other a short time, sir, doesn’t mean that we haven’t developed feelings for each other. My intentions-”

“Oh, my God,” Bree muttered at the old-fashioned word. Hart had clearly flipped out. She stepped determinedly between the two men with a frantic glance at her mother. “Look, both of you. I would appreciate it if you would-”

Hart very gently lifted her to one side. “Mr. Penoyer, if I could talk with you on the porch for a moment-”

“Over my dead body,” Bree said flatly.

“I think that’s an excellent idea,” Burke told Hart, ignoring Bree, then stalked out the door. Bree tried to dart out after him but was forestalled by Hart. Actually, he came very close to shutting the door in her face…right after he’d tapped a forefinger to her nose in an affectionate gesture that he might have intended to be reassuring.

She could hear raised voices the minute both men were outside, and Hart must have had his hand on the outside door handle, because she couldn’t open it. Turning to her mother, she rolled her eyes heavenward. “I just don’t believe this.”

Addie’s eyes searched her daughter’s. “He’s the reason you’re talking again, Bree?” she asked softly.

“I…” Bree hesitated, glancing worriedly at the closed door. “Mom, if you’d just let me know you were coming-”

Turning to the cupboard, Addie brought out an empty mug and calmly poured herself a cup of coffee. “Darling, you don’t have to tell me. I knew the minute I saw the clothes in the yard. Actually, when you didn’t turn to Richard in your time of trouble, I knew that he couldn’t have been the man for you. I don’t know that this man is, Bree, but he must be something special to have you totally…change your ways.”

Bree blushed.

“I’m not saying I like it,” Addie added quietly, “but I am saying it’s your business.”

“I…” Bree was at a loss. Addie had always been the wringing-hands kind of mother, never the cool, calm lady she was projecting at the moment.

The door popped open behind Bree, and she whirled around. Burke walked in, and Bree’s jaw gently sagged. His irate mood seemed to have vanished. His smile was typical of her father, and he’d squeezed her shoulder just like that a thousand times. “Any coffee around here?” he asked his wife jovially.

Addie was already pouring him a cup. “Bree?”

“Ah…in a minute.” She offered her father a tentative smile, received one back and, carefully closing the door behind her, whisked outside.

“Hart!”

He half turned from his lazy stride toward his car. He was all bare chest in the shining sun, his smile as slow as a summer morning as she reached him at a dead pant.

“What on earth did you talk to him about?”

He reached down to place a light kiss on her nose. “Football scores.”

“Try another. You know dam well my dad was a little…out of control,” Bree said delicately. Hands on hips, she felt like tapping her bare foot impatiently, but refrained.

Hart made a sweeping motion toward the yard. She glanced back, a mistake. His suit coat was spread on the grass. One of his shoes lay nearby. The other had made it to the porch. His shirt, her blouse and skirt…she winced. “Naturally, he was a little out of control,” Hart said darkly. “If I were a father and came across a scene like that, I’d damn well kill the son of a bi-seadog.”

Unaccountably, Bree’s lips twitched. “Hart. Aren’t you forgetting that you were the son of a…uh…seadog in this particular instance?”

“Now, don’t get sassy.” Hart opened his car door.

Bree’s eyebrows shot up in alarm. “Wait a minute. You still didn’t tell me what you said to my dad. Where are you going?”

“Home. So you can have a little time with your folks. There won’t be any more fireworks, Bree, rest easy. And your father only has the weekend, which means they’ll pretty much have to turn around and drive back if he’s going to be at work on Monday morning. I’ll be over tomorrow night around nine…”

“Wait,” Bree said impatiently. He was going too fast, Hart style. The Galahad role he’d played for her father confused her; it was out of character-the character he’d so often portrayed. Regardless, he’d interfered in her life again, something he had no right to do. And as for any tomorrows and specifically tomorrow nights, Bree suddenly felt as shaky as a kitten on a too-high limb.

A faint smile slashed across Hart’s face as he reached for her. “Are you going to give me some nonsense about not being ready for a relationship right now, Bree?”

“Yes,” she said flatly.

His fingers curled around her shoulders, his body blocking out the sun. “You know what I think, honey?”

Bree was beginning to simmer. “No. And I really couldn’t care less-”