“I thought you might. The moment I heard your voice, I knew you would be a sensible young woman. Businesslike too. I appreciate that in a person. I think that we can just solve the whole shebang if I give you a figure and you tell me if it’s in line with what you would be willing to sell the estate for.” He named a sum.
“That’s very generous, Mr. Morrison,” she said slowly, drawing on her years of training in business to remain calm. It was a good thing he was on the other end of a phone line, she thought, otherwise he would be on the other end of a punch in the nose. She added, “However, I’m afraid you’ve left me a little confused.”
“Confused?”
“Yes, sir. I am wondering why your vice president is diligently searching for a site to replace the estate, while you are offering a price for it. You
are
from Atlantic Developers, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I’m from Atlantic!” he snapped.
“Well, I suspect some communication lines have crossed at the company, and you probably haven’t gotten the message—”
“Now just one—”
“Excuse me, sir,” she broke in politely. “All I was going to say was that I have no intention of selling the estate. I’m sorry for your time and trouble—”
“Now you listen to me, missy. I made an agreement of sale for that place, and I don’t give a damn whose signature is on the settlement papers, but they will be signed! You think about that!”
“Shall I tell Mr. Waters to stop looking for another site?” she asked sweetly.
“Jed already knows what I want!” Morrison nearly shouted. “And what I send him after, he gets! No matter what it takes! You think about that too!”
The words stabbed deeply into her, and she nearly cried out at the sudden pain. She wanted desperately to deny them, but her voice was frozen. Everything inside her had frozen at the thought that Jed would do
anything
to get the estate from her. It just couldn’t be true. She loved him. She trusted him.…
She was aware of Morrison speaking again.
“We’re getting away from the point here, Miss Barkeley. It just seems to me that we can come to some kind of arrangement without the lawyers
using their muckraking tactics, but I do understand your hesitation.” She realized his voice was much calmer, almost soothing. “After all, selling a house isn’t like tossing an old dress in the trash, is it? You just take your time considering my offer and give me a call back. Now I suppose I better talk to Jed and find out what he’s up to.”
Rae finally found her voice. “Yes. Yes, of course.”
She put the receiver down very gently on the desktop and went in search of the man who had well and truly caught her in his trap.
“It’s hopeless, Jed,” Rae said later that afternoon, as she dropped some site reports onto the living room coffee table.
Seated across from her, he chuckled. “Just impossible, sweetheart, but never hopeless.”
Her heart lifted at the endearment, and she immediately suppressed the feeling. Picking up another set of papers, she gazed at them, but her thoughts were on the morning’s revelations.
It wasn’t the first time she’d gone over it in her mind, and she knew it wouldn’t be the last. After she’d told Jed his boss was on the telephone, she hid herself away in the library again. When the emotional shock was finally under control, she considered what she should do. She quickly realized the one thing she shouldn’t do was divulge what Morrison had blurted out. As much pleasure as it would have given her to tell Jed what a rat he was and toss him off the premises, it would be an
even greater pleasure to beat him at his own game. So she said nothing. Jed could
think
he was making a fool of her, but she had too much pride to reveal he’d nearly been successful.
With an inner smile, she acknowledged Morrison had blundered very badly with his offer. In another week’s time, Jed would have probably romanced the place out from under her. He must have been furious with his boss, but he’d never brought the subject up. At first, she was surprised, then she realized it was a very shrewd move on his part. He’d already mentioned Atlantic’s continued interest in the estate several times and could have excused the offer as Morrison’s overactive enthusiasm. Or he could have continued making himself out as the hero protecting her from the bad guys. In fact, there were any number of ways he could have smoothed it over. By not saying anything, however, Jed did seem to be the one in charge, not Morrison.
She blessed her mother for the years of training on how to maintain a cool, poised facade in the face of disaster. Since she’d joined him in the living room, she’d been giving quite a performance. She was positive he hadn’t noticed a thing wrong, but the hurt and anger inside her had built with every tender look and caress he’d given her.
Let it build, she thought. Eventually, it would wall off her heart.
“How about going out for dinner and a movie?” he asked, breaking into her thoughts.
She glanced up to find him grinning at her. “Tonight?”
“I suppose we
could
do it tomorrow morning.”
There was a devilish glint in his hazel eyes. “It all depends on how much you want to take Merriman’s place as Resident Eccentric.”
She couldn’t help the smile that curved her lips. “No, thank you, I believe Burrows is already preparing dinner.”
“Okay, then the movie.” He reached across the small table and took her hand. She controlled herself not to yank it from his warm, strong grasp. “We’ve been interrupted enough by dogs and boys and butler and work, Rae. We need a little time to ourselves.”
It was on the tip of her tongue to say she was too tired, when she realized it might sound suggestive. So far, she’d managed not to think about how she’d keep him out of her bed, without really looking the fool. Maybe a movie wasn’t such a bad idea, after all. She’d have two hours in a darkened theater to come up with an acceptable excuse—and she wouldn’t have to guard her facial expressions while doing so.
“I think you’re right. A movie sounds wonderful.”
She hoped
Bambi
was playing somewhere. The last thing she wanted to see was some damn love story.
“
A Man And A Woman!
”
“Yep,” Jed said, as he steered the car past the movie marquee and into the theater parking lot. “It’s a terrific movie.”
“I know that,” she said in an exasperated voice. “But obviously you’ve seen it before, and so have I. There’s that new horror movie at—”
“Rachel Barkeley, I’m surprised at you!” he teased, while maneuvering the car into a parking spot. He turned off the ignition. “This is one of the greatest movies of all time, a true classic, and you want to pass it up for blood and guts. For shame!”
“Well, it’s just that we’ve both seen it before,” she mumbled, not looking at him.
“But not together.”
He got out of the car and walked around to the passenger side to open the door for her. She didn’t say anything as she got out and waited for him to close the door.
“Come on,” he coaxed, taking her arm. “I’ll even treat you to some candy.”
She sighed and began walking with him to the box office. “Anybody ever tell you you’re the last of the red hot dates, Jed?”
“Of course,” he replied. “In the eighth grade, I took Marylou Polaski to the Autumn Dance, and she thought I was the best slow dancer there.”
“Oh yeah?” she asked, grinning triumphantly up at him. “Any other ‘hot’ dates, besides good old Marylou?”
“I’m not a dope. Beyond eighth grade, I plead the fifth.”
Just after they settled themselves in the back of the nearly empty theater, the movie began. Jed handed Rae the box of candy to hold and draped his arm across the back of her seat.
“Candy?” Rae asked, offering up the box.
“Thanks.”
With his free hand, he dug inside for several pieces of the gummy candy and popped them into his mouth. As he watched the bittersweet love
affair unfold on the screen, he decided he had been right about their needing some time away from the house. He sensed that something was bothering her, as she helped him sort through the various property projections. When she called it hopeless, he knew she was dejected that there was no quick solution in sight. Over the years, he’d learned to have patience with seemingly impossible problems. Still, he could easily understand her frustration with this one. The one time he really needed a quick fix, none was forthcoming, dammit! In spite of how close they’d become, the deal was still between them, and it would continue to be.
Then there was Henry nearly crowing with delight that his vice president was ensconced at the Barkeley estate. He’d been half-expecting Henry to get in touch with him, even though he’d told his assistant, Ross, to say he was in Harrisburg. Ross would never hold out against Henry, and who could blame him? Henry had had a good laugh over the kidnapping, but it had taken quite a bit to convince him that the new objective of finding an alternate site remained unchanged.
At least, his boss had said he hadn’t spoken with Rae, Jed thought in relief. He could just imagine the conversation if he had, but he knew Rae would have told him if anything had been said. Knowing Rae, she would have set the dogs on him again. Their relationship was fragile and complicated enough, without Henry trampling over it.
Clearing his mind of pressures, he relaxed and congratulated himself once again on thinking of a
movie.
A Man And A Woman
had been the perfect choice, he thought as he hummed along with the famous mandolin theme.
Between them, they finished off the candy about halfway through the movie. Rae crumbled the box, then leaned over and whispered, “Ever notice how the food never lasts through the movie?”
“They do it that way on purpose to leave time for ‘making out,’ ” Jed said, while he ran his fingers through the strands of her heavy, lustrous hair. “I forgot to tell you, but this is a great movie for necking too.”
“Jed!”
Ignoring her protest, he pulled her closer and kissed her. His mustache brushed enticingly against her mouth. For a moment, she struggled against the desire coursing through her, then relaxed. He deepened the kiss, letting his tongue swirl with hers to the rhythm of the theme music. Her arms crept around his neck, and her lips clung to his for long moments. Finally, he shifted to string kisses along her jaw.
“We’re much too old for this,” she murmured, her arms tightening as he kissed the sweet shell of her ear.
“Nothing like a little necking in a movie to revitalize the aged,” he whispered.
As his mouth covered hers again, Rae knew she had made a terrible miscalculation. She had thought her anger and hurt would keep her detached. In a way, she was. Half of her watched in shock as the other half melted from the sweet fire he was creating. Feeling the slow wave of heat flooding her veins, she wondered how she could
love a man and hate him at the same time. It was a contradiction, she thought dimly. But she was helpless to resist him. She’d walked into this trap with her eyes wide open, and now her love for him was closing off any escape route. At twenty-seven, she had had enough experience not to love until she could trust, but she’d followed her heart first with Jed. She was still following it.
Even as she stroked his shoulders, she knew that what she had now with Jed would never be enough, and what she wanted with him she would never have.
In the small hours of the night, as he held her in his sleeping embrace, she realized that she was old enough to know that love didn’t come in a perfect package.
She would take what she could before it was gone.
Jed woke with a sudden start. Instantly alert, he lay for a moment, listening for whatever had disturbed him. Rae slept unmoving in the crook of his arm, and he finally opened his eyes.
The curtains were still closed, although he could see the gray-pink light of early morning filtering through them. There was no coffee tray on the nightstand, so he knew it hadn’t been Burrows who had disrupted his sleep. Attempting to go back to sleep was useless. He thought of kissing Rae awake, then decided it would be gentlemanly to let her sleep.
He slipped out of bed and dressed quietly, before leaving the room. The dogs, hearing his footsteps
in the upper hall, met him halfway up the back stairs that led to the kitchen. Samson greeted him with his tail wagging, but Delilah was still snubbing him. Downstairs, he took his sweatshirt jacket from the pantry room peg and went out the kitchen door. The dogs rushed past him through the open doorway.
The autumn morning was chilly, almost too chilly for just the jacket. Jed walked briskly down the back lawn to the river in an attempt to warm himself. He stopped to admire the turning foliage in the park on the opposite bank. In another month the leaves would all be gone. Still, the view was stunning with the morning mists rising from the river, and the surrounding stillness gave him a sense of peace and contentment.
The dogs suddenly stopped sniffing around a tree and scrambled off in the direction of the house. Jed turned around to see Burrows making his way down the back lawn to the herb garden. He’d noticed the other day that one section of it was nothing but a lump of mud, but with everything else happening it had seemed a trivial thing.
He walked across the lawn and joined the butler on one of the garden walkways.
“I didn’t think anyone else was up but me,” he said. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“Yes, sir, it is,” Burrows said, although there was a slight tightening around his mouth. “I had hoped that this damaged section of the garden would have begun to dry out.”
Jed glanced over at the muddy area which was about six feet wide. He remembered when he’d seen Rae on the day he snuck in looking for
Merriman. Smiling at the memory of her mud-streaked face and slender form, he said, “I remember Rae saying something about a damaged water line. I take it this is where it happened.”
Burrows nodded. “I do know a little about gardening, but not enough to cope with this. Unlike most of my fellow countrymen, I have no green thumb. If you’ll beg my pardon for saying so, at the moment I cannot help wishing Miss Rachel had kidnapped your father instead of you, sir. He would know how to salvage the bed.”