Jude Deveraux (16 page)

Keeping
her head turned so she couldn't see McBride, she smiled at Brad. 'I'd love to
go. Maybe I could get something to eat while you're in your meeting,' she said.

Behind
her, Jared said, 'Me too. I'm starving. Maybe we'll see you after the meeting.'
Again, he put his arm possessively around Eden's shoulders.

Brad
frowned slightly as he looked from one to the other. 'It's the BIG EVENT, all
capitals. Home buyers are flying in from all over the U.S., and we're meeting
at the clubhouse. I shouldn't have left everything this morning for the others
to take care of, but my daughter insisted.' Pausing, he glanced at Remi, as
though to say that  if anything bad happened it would be his fault. Taking
Eden's hand, Brad gently pulled her in an attempt to get her away from Jared.

But
Jared didn't release his hold easily.

'I'd
love to go with you,' Eden said, forcibly pulling away from McBride and heading
toward Brad's car.

As Brad
got into the driver's seat, Jared took Eden's arm. 'I don't want you around a
lot of people,' he said quietly. 'Until this is sorted out, you need to be
isolated.'

'Isolated
with
you?'
she asked, giving him a cold smile. 'Mr. McBride, I'm
beginning to wonder if your interest in me is purely professional. Perhaps you
have other things in mind.'

At that
Jared stiffened and dropped his hold on her arm. 'I'll have you know, Ms.
Palmer, that I — '

He
broke off when she quickly opened the passenger door and got into Brad's car.
Jared slid into the backseat just as Remi took the seat beside him. For a
moment Brad looked askance at Eden, but all she could do was shrug. She had an
idea that if she said she didn't want McBride to go with them, he'd tell Brad
the truth. And what would happen if it were found out that she was being
investigated by the FBI? Or that men had broken into her house last night and
searched it?

She
gave Brad a weak smile as he started the engine.

Ten
minutes later, he turned onto a wide road with a discreet sign that said QUEEN
ANNE and nothing else. There were no words that shouted the number of houses
being built, or that they offered water views and docking for boats. There was
nothing but a small sign that by its very plainness declared elegance and
wealth.

They
drove through trees that had been saved from the builders' bulldozers, then had
been pruned to be neat and tidy. To the right and left of them was empty land,
with several trees, all of them of old growth. Someone had gone through the
land, marked the best trees, then had the undergrowth cleared.

'Later
in the spring, these meadows will start sprouting wildflowers. It all looks
very natural, but it took years of work.'

'Yes,'
Eden said, 'get rid of the weeds first, then plant the wildflowers and nurture
them until they take over.'

'Exactly,'
Brad said, smiling at her.

As she
looked out at both sides of the road, she saw no buildings anywhere. 'So when
do you start building?'

'What a
compliment! Actually, we've sold eighty-two percent of the houses, and nearly
sixty of them have been completed or at least started.'

Eden
twisted in her seat. 'Where are they?'

At that
moment, Brad drove over a little hill, and when they got to the top, he stopped
the car. Below them was Arundel Sound, the huge body of water that connected
the many freshwater lakes and rivers in the area to the ocean. The sound was
part saltwater and part freshwater, and was great for boating and fishing. Between
them and the sound was an enormous building, partly hidden by old-growth trees.
Behind it was a parking lot, also nearly hidden. To the right and left of this
building were houses facing the water.

'Beautiful,'
Eden said and meant it. Next to unspoiled wilderness, this was the best. It
looked as though every big old tree that had been on the site had been
preserved. Every subdivision of new houses that Eden had ever seen had started
with land being bull-dozed flat. Empty land was easier for the builders to get
their trucks and machines onto. No one had to be careful with a backhoe when
digging foundations if there were no trees in the way. No one had to think
about concrete hurting roots. No one had to worry about harming anything if it
was just barren land.

'Either
you have an environment-loving builder or he hates you,' she said.

'Both,'
Brad said, smiling at her. 'By the end, though, it was hate. I even kept some
natural shrubs, and to do that I had to have wooden barriers put around the
plants. I wasn't popular.'

'No, I
can't imagine that you were.' She raised her hand to indicate the coastline.
'But it was worth it. So how many awards have you received for this?'

'A
few,' he said modestly, but Eden could see that he was pleased.

He parked
in a space marked FOR THE DIRECTOR, and they got out of the car.

Jared
caught her arm. 'Stay near me,' he said softly. 'I don't want you out of my
sight for even an instant.'

All she
could
do
was nod as Brad  turned to her. 'I'm sorry if I won't be able
to spend much time with you today, but there is going to be a lot of people
here. Do you mind if I introduce you?'

'No, of
course not,' she said, moving away from McBride and leaving him to follow
beside Remi.

Once
they were inside the building, she paused and looked about. Had she been told
in advance about this she would have imagined one of those modern buildings
with windows that almost reached heaven. The room would have dwarfed human
beings by its size and grandeur. Rather like a cathedral that was meant to awe
the occupants.

But
this building wasn't like that. If she hadn't seen from the outside that it was
huge, she wouldn't have known it from the inside. True, they were in a
two-story lobby with huge windows that looked out to the sound with its
picturesque sailboats, but the room didn't dwarf her or the furnishings —
which, by the way, didn't look like the usual public building furniture. There
was a mixture of chairs and couches and tables that looked as though someone's
attic had been cleaned out. Standing in front of the windows, she looked at the
furniture and knew without a doubt that not one piece of it was new. True, the
couches had been reupholstered, but there was no mistaking the look of age. On
the walls were pictures and framed pieces of fabric, and here and there was a
quilt. There wasn't a single reproduction anywhere, and as a result the room
had a cozy feel that made it welcoming and personal.

'Who
did this?' she asked, and Brad knew what she meant.

'There
wasn't an auction in North Carolina or southern Virginia that we didn't attend
over the course of two years. By 'us' I mean my daughter and my assistant,
Minnie. You'll meet her. She has the fastest auction hand in three states.'
Brad leaned toward Eden. 'Want to know the truth? We started going to country
auctions as a way to save money. We always planned to buy the couches and
chairs new, then add a few old things as decoration. But Minnie found an old
couch that she loved, had her friend's husband reupholster it, and that was that.
Do you like the result?'

'Very
much.'

Smiling,
Brad took her arm in his and squeezed it.

It made
her feel good that he was pleased with her. Actually, the more she saw of him,
the more she liked him. She glanced over her shoulder at McBride to see if he
was impressed by the building, but he was looking about as though he was
searching out hiding places. Remi had disappeared through a door as soon as
they'd entered.

'Shall
we go?' Brad asked just as a door at the end of a hall opened.

'There
you are,' said a young man, his face showing his obvious worry. 'We thought
maybe you'd run away and left us.' Turning, he looked at Eden. 'You must be
Eden Palmer of Farrington Manor,' he said, extending his hand. 'I'm Drake
Haughton, and I work with Brad on his project.'

'He's
being modest,' Brad said. 'He's the architect.'

'I
merely draw whatever Brad envisions.'

Smiling,
Eden took the young man's hand. He was nice-looking in a pleasant way, rather
like a young missionary. She had an idea that this was the type of man Brad had
wanted his daughter to marry. That she'd instead married a man who was good on
a tractor must have been a disappointment. But Eden liked Remi. Maybe he didn't
have the last names that were so important in Arundel, but he seemed like a
good guy. At least his daughter didn't marry someone like Stuart, Eden thought
as she followed Brad and Drake into the next room, Jared just a step behind
her.

They
entered a room that again was of a scale that could have been intimidating, but
the use of refurbished furniture brought it down to a human size. Through a
wide doorway to the right was a large room filled with well-dressed people.
They were milling about and munching on tidbits passed by waitpersons dressed
in white and black.

'If
you'll excuse me,' Brad said, and his entire demeanor changed from laughing and
warm to . . . well, laughing and warm. But the new version was like that of a
salesman. He walked into the room full of people, smiling, his hand extended.

'Ah,
Brad the salesman,' Drake said, smiling at Brad's back, then he turned to Eden
and looked at her again. 'So you're the one.'

Eden
wasn't sure how to respond to that. Was she pleased that the gossip of Arundel
was already matching her with Brad? Or was she annoyed that she was assumed to
be a done deal?

Before
she could reply, Jared cleared his throat, and Drake looked up at him, puzzled
as to who he was. When he figured it out, he looked Jared up and down as though
to ascertain his wounds. 'The man looking for the circuit box,' he said, extending
his hand to shake.

'Jared
McBride.' He shook Drake's smaller, whiter, softer hand. 'I take it you're of
one of the 'families' of Arundel.'

'That I
am. Cursed with three last names. Shall I tell you my middle name?'

'No,'
Jared said, and for a moment Eden saw a frown cross Drake's handsome face. She
knew that in that instant Jared had been cataloged and dismissed. 'Mannerless
Yankee' she could almost hear McBride being described as.

For a
moment, the three of them seemed to have nothing to say to one another. Or at
least Eden and Drake had nothing to say. McBride was still looking about the
room and at the people through the doorway.

'Don't
let us keep you,' Eden said. She could tell that Drake was waiting for her to
explain why she was there with her rude neighbor, the man she'd put in the
hospital. But Eden couldn't imagine repeating the story about McBride being her
cousin, so she said nothing.

'Yes,
Brad is to speak in a few minutes, then we'll have lunch. You're staying for
lunch, aren't you?'

'She's
doing the landscaping for all the houses,' Jared said, looking at Drake with
his eyes narrowed.

'Landscaping?
But I thought you were . . . ' He broke off, obviously having no idea what to
say. 'Yes, of course. Landscaping. I'll talk to Brad. Will you be all right
here alone?'

'She's
always all right when she's with me,' Jared said.

Before
he could put his arm around her shoulders for the third time that morning, Eden
sidestepped him and reassured Drake that she'd be fine. When he was gone, she
turned on McBride. 'Where were you raised that you could be so vile to that
young man? You were insufferable!'

'I hate
snobs, and he was the pinnacle of snobbery. Right up there on the crest. Top of
the garbage heap.'

'You
don't know that. He seemed quite nice. He — '

'"Shall
I tell you my middle name?"' Jared mocked. 'Who says 'shall' nowadays?'

'Certainly
not any of the writers in the manuscripts that I'm given to edit. Are you
jealous of that young man because he has an education? Is that something
You
never had? Please don't tell me that you quit school in the tenth grade so
you could be an — '

She
broke off at a look from McBride. He was so paranoid that he probably thought
the entire clubhouse had been bugged and someone was dying to find out that he
was an FBI agent. She threw up her hands in exasperation. 'It's no use trying
to talk to you.' She lowered her voice. 'I'm sick of people like you thinking
that everyone who has an education and knows how to use a napkin is a snob. I
wish my daughter had married someone like Drake Haughton instead of that
useless man she did marry, and I bet that Brad wishes his daughter had married
someone like Drake too.'

'So
what's wrong with the Cajun kid? I've never seen anybody handle a tractor the
way he did. He moved that dirt around so there wasn't a crumb of it left
behind. He could scoop out the ashes in a fireplace and not hurt the living
room rug. But now you're telling me that that's not worth anything. No, a man
needs to have lots of last names and — '

'For
your information, I happen to like Remi. I have nothing whatever against him.'

'Then
it's just Granville who thinks he's above somebody who drives a tractor. He'd
rather his daughter marry a prissy little — '