Free The MacGregor Grooms by Nora Roberts

level requires a certain amount of compromise and unselfishness.”
    “You had a rough childhood?” he murmured.
    “No. No.” She let out a breath. It was boggy ground, trying to explain to someone else what you’d never fully understood yourself. “I had a very good childhood. I had a wonderful home, opportunities totravel, advantages, access to an excellent education.”
    D.C. shook his head. If anyone had asked him the same question, those items would have been bottom of the list. Even being raised in the fishbowl of world politics, he’d had love, warmth, attention and understanding from his family. “Did they love you? Your parents.”
    “Of course.” But because she’d often asked herself the same question, she picked up her wine to wet her throat. “We’re not like you, your family. We don’t have that … openness of heart, or that ease with displaying affection. It’s a different way of being, that’s all. Very different,” she added, looking at him again. “I remember seeing pictures of your family, you with your sister, your parents, on the news. You could see the devotion. That’s admirable, D.C, it’s lovely. But it’s not where I come from.”
    She would wonder later if the wine had loosened her tongue or if it had simply been the fact that he listened as well as he watched. “My parents’ marriage suits them. They lead their lives, together and separately. And they keep their affairs discreet. Drakes don’t court or tolerate scandal. I understand that, and I prefer avoiding entanglements.”
    He wondered if she knew that her family made her sad, or if she actually believed that what she was saying, what she was feeling, was inevitable. “You didn’t avoid this one.”
    “That’s exactly what I’m trying to do.” And she wasn’t doing a particularly good job of it, Layna admitted. Not when she was sitting in his ridiculously messy kitchen, wearing his ridiculously ragged robe. “It’s like the flowers,” she began.
    “What flowers?”
    “The pansies. My instinct was to plant them precisely. Just so.” She used her hands to demonstrate. “Because it was ordered, it was logical. Yours was to sweep them out, crowd them together, tangle them up. Maybe you were right—they look better your way, more creative. But I deal with things better if I have a specific plan.”
    She was, he thought, so earnest just then. It made him want to snuggle her on his lap. “But you can change plans when you see the advantage of a different direction.”
    “And I avoid changing them if I see as many disadvantages. My plan is to concentrate on my career without distractions. I like being single. I like being solo.”
    “So do I. I also like being with you. I don’t have a clue why. You’re not my type.”
    “Really?” Frost edged her voice. “And what would your type be?”
    Amused, he watched her as he enjoyed his meal. “You’re cultured, sophisticated, controlled, opinionated, with tendencies toward snobbery and aloofness.” He continued to smile as her eyes flashed. “You could say my type’s the opposite.”
    “You’re controlling, sloppy, arrogant, with tendencies toward irrational behavior and selfishness. You could say
my
type’s the opposite.”
    “See, we cleared that up.” Unoffended, he topped off her wine. “But I still want you. I even like you, for some odd reason. And I damn well know I have to paint you.”
    “If you think that flatters me—”
    “It wasn’t meant to flatter you. I could flatter you,” he said thoughtfully. “You’d have heard it all before, though, and I don’t like to waste my time. You’re a beautiful woman, and that restrained sexuality is compelling—it’s damn near brutal now that I know what’s under it. We’re both free, healthy adults with a basic attraction for each other. We’re acting on it. It doesn’t have to be any more or less than that, unless we want it to be.”
    She said nothing for a moment. What he’d outlined