Sweet Fortune

Remember?”
    “Easy for you to say.”
    “You'll learn how. All it takes is a little practice. I won't have them using you anymore, Jessie. I mean it. I don't want you doing those kinds of favors for any of them. Not your mother or Connie or David or your Aunt Glenna. Enough is enough.”
    “But it's easier for me to deal with him, Hatch. Don't you see? I've always done it. I know how to do it.”
    “The others can damn well learn if it's important enough to them.”
    She shook her head sadly. “That's just it. It might not be important enough to them.”
    Hatch stared at her. “What the hell are you talking about?”
    Jessie looked up at him, willing him to understand. “I'm afraid they'll all give up on him if they're forced to deal with him directly. After all, Connie and Lilian both gave up on him while they were married to him. David got so resentful and frustrated trying to please him that he finally stopped talking to him. Aunt Glenna says it's a waste of time trying to forge a relationship with Dad. But it's not. Not entirely.”
    “What you mean is that you've managed to keep some kind of bond established among all of you by doing all the diplomatic work. Jessie, that's wrong.”
    “Is it?” she demanded softly. “At least this way he's got some kind of family ties and the rest of us have some kind of contact with him. Maybe it hasn't been exactly Father Knows Best around here, but at least we've all had a relationship of some sort. It could have been worse, you know. He could have done what David's father did and just disappeared from our lives altogether.”
    “Christ, what a mess.” Hatch's eyes glittered. “Jessie, I don't want you holding the whole thing together by yourself any longer. With the exception of Elizabeth, they're all adults. They can deal with their own problems.”
    “I'm supposed to just step out of the picture, is that it?”
    “Yeah. That's it.”
    “This is my family, Hatch. Give me one good reason why I should do what you want,” she hissed.
    “I thought I'd already explained this part. I want to be damn sure that when you marry me you're not doing it solely for the benefit of the Benedict-Ringstead clan.”
    “And I've already told you, I have no intention of marrying you.” But the protest sounded weak, even to her own ears.
    “We'll save that argument for another time. Right now I want to make sure you understand that you're out of the intermediary business. Let the other Benedicts and Ringsteads fend for themselves.”
    “But I've already promised David I'd ask Dad about financing grad school.”
    “I'll handle David.”
    “You'll handle him? Hatch, you barely know him. You haven't been around our family long enough to figure out how to deal with this kind of thing. David's very sensitive.”
    “So am I,” Hatch snarled softly, slapping his other hand against the wall on the other side of her head. “You just haven't bothered to take much notice, what with being too busy worrying about everybody else's sensitive nature. One last time. I want to make damn sure I'm not being married so that David and his mother and the moms and your sister are all being taken care of by you as per usual. Got that?”
    “You're about as sensitive as a rhino. And stop talking about marriage. We're having an affair and that's as far as it's going to go.” Jessie tried to duck out from under one of his arms and managed to blunder straight into the potted palm. The plant and Jessie both began to topple to the side.
    With a muttered oath Hatch caught both palm and woman before they sprawled ignominiously on the floor. He steadied the plant and held Jessie's arm as she spit out a palm leaf.
    “I want your word on this, Jessie. I mean it.”
    “Look, Hatch…”
    “I said, I want your guarantee not to play go-between for everyone in the family, at least until our relationship has been finalized,” he repeated through tightly clenched teeth.
    “Finalized?” For a split second, standing there, looking up at him, Jessie felt disoriented. A strange, familiar sense of need hovered just at the edge of her awareness, not her own need, she realized, but something Hatch was experiencing.
    “You know what I'm talking about.” Once more he put his hand on the wall behind her and leaned in close.
    “This is intimidation, Hatch.” She was breathless and confused all of a sudden. Hatch needed her ?
    “Damn right. Come on, Jessie, stop wasting my time and your own.”
    “All