“Maybe someday you’ll call me Quinn,” Mr. Jennings said, seemingly unaware of her turmoil. “That’s my first name, you know.”
She nodded, holding her arms stiff against his chest until he let her go. “Maybe. But not in the office.”
“Oh, God no!” he gasped in mock horror. “Of course not.”
She had to force the laugh, but she managed it.
“You need more time off, don’t you? You shouldn’t be here.”
“No, I can do this. Don’t worry.”
“Jane, I’m not worried about the office. I think you’ve only called in sick one time since we opened. You’ve earned whatever time you need. Take it.”
She knew he was just being kind, and she knew she needed the time, if only for her own sanity, but something inside her still held tight to denial.
You can do this
, it insisted.
You don’t need a break. You don’t need help
.
Her nails dug into her sweaty palms. She
could
do this without help, but that didn’t mean she had to. She did have friends, and they were offering help. Quinn and Lori…and even Chase if she were being honest.
Jane took a deep breath. “I’ve set up e-mail notifications that should get you through the next few days.”
Mr. Jennings smiled as if he were bursting with pride for her.
“But I will stop in!”
“Go on, Jane. I’m not a child.”
She arched a doubtful brow.
“I can do this. I swear.” He grimaced at her stare. “All right…if I can’t, I’ll call you.”
“Okay.” Her smile was real this time. “That’s more like it. Promise that you’ll call if you need me.”
Half an hour later she’d done all she could. Quinn Jennings got lost in his work, and there was nothing to be done about that, but hopefully if his cell phone beeped incessantly enough, he’d notice it.
Jane left relatively guilt-free and headed straight for the jail to see Jessie. If he looked okay, she could stop considering fronting his bond money.
But he didn’t look okay. He looked awful. “Jessie, what’s wrong?” she gasped.
“My lawyer was just here. I could get six years for this, Jane.”
“Jess—” she sighed, slumping a little “—you were stealing from people. What did you expect?”
“I don’t know!” Tears glinted in his eyes. “I wasn’t hurting anyone. I didn’t threaten any of those girls and flash a gun around. I just copped a few dollars, that’s all.”
The fear on his face left her torn between heartache and anger. “You’re not a child, Jessie. And after what Dad went through, you can’t even claim ignorance. How many times did he warn you never to put yourself in this kind of situation? Even aside from the theft charges, you’ve set yourself up for huge trouble.”
He flattened a hand against the counter. “I didn’t touch those women, Jane. I swear to God, I didn’t. Can’t you talk to your D.A. boyfriend for me? Get him to believe me?”
Crud. She shook her head. “He’s not my boyfriend. Not anymore.”
He asked about home, and Jane told him about Grandma Olive and her margarita accident.
Jane tried to hide her tears behind laughter, but Jessie noticed anyway.
“I really am sorry, sis. I know I let you down.”
She shook her head.
“If I get out of here, I swear I’ll do the right thing. Stop hanging around with those guys. Maybe go back to school.”
Jane wanted to believe that this experience would scare some ambition into him, but Jessie knew how to work a room. Regardless that he looked like a typical high-school slacker, he had eyes that puppy dogs would envy.
The one-minute warning rang in her ear and she watched Jessie flinch. The warm puppy eyes tightened at the edges, leaving him with a wary, exhausted look.
“Tell Dad I’m sorry. I should’ve listened to him. If they send me to prison, I know he’ll never come see me.” His voice broke on a sob. “So tell him I’m sorry, all right?”
Oh, God. Jane pressed her fingers to her mouth to hold back her own tears.
“Please?” Jessie begged.
She nodded because she couldn’t say anything more. His cool confidence had been stripped away in here. He’d finally gotten a glimpse of the truth: he was a criminal. Not a cute slacker. Not a laid-back pothead. He was a criminal and he was in trouble.
Jessie hung up the phone and swiped at his eyes in a gesture she recognized from his toddler years.
If he got out of this without a six-year prison sentence, maybe he really could change. She’d changed. One really bad weekend had changed her course in life.
So maybe Mac was right. Jessie had been stealing and using drugs and hanging out with dealers. Maybe a few months in jail was just the kick he needed to set him on the right path.
Tears streaming from her eyes, Jane walked out of the jail. Jessie would either become a man in this place, or he’d decide to never grow up, but she couldn’t make him choose the right path.
And for the first time in years, his father had done something wonderful for him; he’d called Chase to let him know that Jessie MacKenzie’s bail had been lowered to thirty thousand dollars. Chase had an excuse to contact Jane.
He dialed her number and held his breath. Would she be upset about the way he’d dropped her at her place the other day? He’d been torn that night. Worried over her exhaustion, distressed about her past, hurt that she was lying about her identity and pissed that she lumped him in with the “bad” guys. Sleeping with her had been the last thing on his mind.
But now her phone was about to go to voice mail, and he was scowling with regret.
“Chase?”
He was so startled by her voice that he didn’t answer for a moment.
“Hello?”
“Jane! Hi. Sorry, I was just…How are you?”
“I’m okay, actually. Just…I’m good. Worried, but good.”
“You sound good.” She did. She sounded…
familiar
. “I heard Jessie’s bail has been lowered. That’s great news.”
“It is! We’re hopeful it means they’re looking in another direction as far as that girl’s murder goes. But now my mom’s talking about fronting the bond money…. I don’t know.” Her words faded into contemplation.
“Listen,” Chase said, “I’ve got a proposition.”
“Really? What kind of proposition?”
He was almost sure he heard a note of interest in her voice, and he felt pitifully encouraged. “I’m blasting at a site today. Wanna come?”
“You’re…what?”
“Blasting today. I thought, with everything going on, it would be good for you. It’s a big stress reliever, watching things explode.”
“Are you serious?”
“Dead serious. It’ll be a blast. Get it? A blast?”
“Ouch! Yes, I think the kindergartner next door got it, too, and she didn’t even hear it.”
Laughing, Chase squeezed the handle of his coffee cup in nervousness. “So it’s scheduled for ten this morning. You probably have to work…?”
Jane cleared her throat. “I don’t, actually. Mr. Jennings gave me a few days off. But won’t you get in trouble?”
“What do you mean? Because of safety? We’ll watch from off-site to keep the insurance company happy.”
“No, I mean with your boss.”
“My boss?” He slipped his feet off the coffee table and sat up straight. “What are you talking about? I am the boss.”
“Okay.” She sighed. “What about the owner, then? Surely he wouldn’t want you bringing—?”
“You really do think I’m just a big piece of meat, don’t you?” He actually heard her teeth snap shut, and the sound made him laugh. “You little snob. It never even occurred to you, did it?”
“I don’t understand what—”
“
I
own Extreme Excavations, Jane. It’s my company. I may not play the part of respectable business owner very well, but looks can be deceiving.”
“You’re the owner?”
The breathless shock in her voice pushed a little twinge of annoyance into Chase’s nerves, but he shook it off. “Yep. I started EE from scratch about six years ago.”
“I had no idea.”
“Maybe that’s because you were too busy using me as a birthday present to ask any questions.”
“Oh…well…”
Chase decided the guilt in her voice was a nice hint at weakness and he jumped on it. “So I’ll come by and pick you up in half an hour?”
Thirty minutes later Jane was climbing into his truck.
Before he’d pulled up, Chase had felt sure he had the upper hand on this date, but her appearance shocked him speechless. Not because she looked outrageous, but because she looked
normal
. Jane Morgan was wearing
jeans
. And a T-shirt. And shades. Her pony tail bounced when she hopped in and took a seat. Chase wouldn’t have recognized her if he’d passed her on the street. Maybe that was the point.
“Look at you,” he said, stunned.
“Look at you! Did you get a haircut?”
“Just a quick trim.” He ran a palm from his neck to the crown of his head, aware that another half inch of his tattoo was exposed. Though he pretended to concentrate fully on backing out of her driveway, Chase felt her eyes on his neck. He’d thought of her when his barber had cleaned up the edges with the buzzer.
Once he hit the street, Chase snuck another glance at Jane. In her dark jeans and long-sleeved shirt, she really looked like a woman in her twenties. A cute woman in her twenties. And the tight T-shirt wasn’t hurting her figure any. He saw the sweater tucked over her arm and knew she’d slip it on when they got to the site—or he hoped she would, anyway. He wasn’t in the mood to show her body off to his men.
She cleared her throat. She seemed to do that a lot when she was nervous. “Your dad’s been really great. Jessie’s lawyer is impressed.”
“He’s drinking less, which is good. Good for your brother, anyway.”
“Good for you, too,” she said quietly.
Chase shrugged. “It happens sometimes. He’ll slow down and get a job for a week or two. Once he had a girlfriend who talked him into going cold turkey for a few months. It never takes.”
“I’m sorry.”
He felt his jaw tightening and forced it to relax. “He’s old school, doesn’t believe in rehab, so I’m not sure he’ll ever stop drinking. I’m not exactly at peace with it, but it’s easier since I stopped helping him out. No more beer runs.”
The truck bounced over a ridge of dirt as he turned into the huge building site. “I need to walk the site first, then I’ll drive us farther away before the actual blast. I don’t want you getting hit by debris, and it’s best to coddle my insurance guy. He’s paranoid.”
He slid out of the truck and jogged around to open her door.
“You want me to come with?”
“Absolutely.”
Thankfully, she pulled on the black sweater and zipped it up, disguising her curves. Chase breathed a sigh of relief and resisted the urge to take her hand. She wouldn’t want to be led through the site like a date, regardless of his desire to mark her as his to keep all the men away from her.
It took him a good fifteen minutes to check the placement and fuses and wires. He went over the plans one last time, double-checking measurements. Everything was in order.
“Chase!” one of his technicians shouted, jogging over to him. He waved a yellow paper that Chase recognized as a permit.
“Just a second, Jane. I’ll be right back.”
Why had she never even suspected?
Yes, she was a snob, if only within the strict parameters she’d set in her own mind. But Mac was a business owner, too. She knew they didn’t all wear suits and ties.
Hidden behind her dark glasses, Jane watched Chase as he worked. Maybe she hadn’t considered him anything more than a laborer because that’s what she’d wanted him to be. If Chase was successful and ambitious in addition to being tattooed and rough…
She watched as he folded his arms and cocked his head, looking down at the paper the other man held. Then Chase nodded and clapped his hand against the guy’s shoulder before turning back toward Jane. When he glanced up and saw her, his mouth curved into a smile.
Something deep inside her chest clenched. It wasn’t her heart. It couldn’t be. Just her stomach. For all his muscles, Chase had the smile of a mischievous little boy.
He was impossibly cute. And this was the reason she needed him to be nothing more than a dead-end laborer.
This was bad. Really bad.
She shouldn’t have come. She should’ve stayed home and puzzled out what Chase’s revelation meant to her.
But his offer had been irresistible. She’d been pacing her condo restlessly, trying to think of some way to occupy her time before Jessie’s discovery hearing at three. Then Chase had called and offered to take her to an
explosion?
She’d nearly wept with relief. But now she didn’t feel anything like weeping. Now there were butterflies dancing in her stomach.
“You ready?” he asked, shocking her into a little jump with his sudden appearance.
“Oh, y-yeah,” she stammered. “Absolutely.”
“Come on.” His hand rested low on her back for a moment before falling away. The faint imprints of his fingers tingled for a long time after as they walked across the wide lot toward his truck. But Jane forced her pulse to slow as she glanced back toward the jagged wall of rock. Perfect little holes peppered it, trailing red wires like tails. “Are you sure those little bits of dynamite will work?”
Chase winked at her. “I’m pretty sure.” When he handed her up into the truck, his hands lingered at her waist and dragged down her hips. Lust shot through her like tiny explosions, racing out ahead of his fingers, and her thoughts scattered.
“Where are we going?”
“Just to those trees over there. Here.” He reached into the tiny backseat and grabbed a hard hat. “You’ll need this.”
“Ooh, cute.” She plopped it onto her head.
“It’s not bad. Put it on with sexy lingerie and see how I react.”
“Hmm. Maybe the same way you’d react if I wore a jester’s hat with sexy lingerie?”
“Possibly.” Oh, God, that smile again.
Jane put her hands flat to her thighs and pressed. “So how did you get into the job of blowing things up?”
“That’s not all I do!” he protested.
“Yeah, I get it. You’re the owner. But blowing things up is what you love, right? Your eyes are sparkling like disco lights.”
“Ha! Okay, yes, I love it. I started working construction when I was sixteen. The first time I saw a blast…I was in awe. I couldn’t believe that was actually someone’s
job
. I wheedled my way onto the excavation team, and that was that.”
“Well, I’m awfully glad you found a way to use your powers for good.”
He winked. “The other side of that coin wouldn’t be pretty. Luckily, I’m one of the good guys.”
Yes, he was. He really was. And his goodness was beginning to seep into her, sneaking through her pores when she was trying to have meaningless sex with him. She’d tried so hard to feel this kind of comfort with Greg. And with Mitch. And with all the socially acceptable men she’d dated before them. But when she was with those men, she felt as if she was working. On guard. Always careful.
With Chase she felt
alive
. The way she felt alive when she boxed. But danger made some people feel alive. So did drugs. Shoplifting. Reckless sex. Those kinds of feelings didn’t mean something was good for you.
“This should do it,” Chase said as he backed the truck underneath a big maple tree. The new leaves fluttered around them, turning the sunlight into glitter.
Chase got out to open her door again. But he surprised her this time by lifting her up as soon as her feet touched the ground.
“Oh!”
He set her on the hood of the truck. “This’ll give us a better view.” His hands rested on her thighs, both easing close to a very interesting place.
“Good,” she murmured, breath coming a little faster at that harmless touch.
“Scoot over?”
She slid across the hot hood of his truck and found a comfortable spot to lean against the windshield.
“Leave your sunglasses on just in case there’s any debris,” he instructed as he slid his own shades into place and leaned back, his shoulder nestled comfortably against hers. She wasn’t truly surprised when his big hand slid under hers and he laced their fingers together. She wasn’t
surprised
, but it did shock something deep in her chest. Something warm and melty and frighteningly soft.
“So what do you love?” he asked.
Fear trembled up from that place he’d just warmed.
“What?”
“I love blasting through rock. What do you love?”
“Oh. I guess…” She shuffled nervously through her thoughts. What did she love? She liked boxing, but she didn’t think it made her eyes light up. It was just an outlet. “I…I love my job.”
She saw his head turn toward her, but Jane kept staring straight ahead.
“Being a secretary? You mean like…answering phones and stuff?”
“No, I mean…I like knowing that I’m good at something. Being shown respect. Being valued. Can I tell you a secret?”
“Yes!” he said as if he’d been sitting on the edge of his seat for days.
Jane flashed him a smile. “You won’t tell anyone?”
“You know I won’t, Jane. You can tell me.”
She nodded. “Okay. Here’s the truth. I’m not just the secretary. I own part of Jennings Architecture.”
Well, she’d shocked him. She couldn’t see past his sunglasses, but his mouth had fallen open. There. That would teach him to hide his success behind dirty jeans and ragged T-shirts.
“It’s true. Mr. Jennings couldn’t pay much when he first started out, so he offered me a share in the profits. I’m the secretary and receptionist and office manager, but I’m more than that, too. Mr. Jennings consults me about the direction of the company, or risks he might take, or partnerships he enters into. He values my opinion. I never thought I’d…” Jane paused in the face of her vulnerability. “It’s not explosions and dynamite, but…I really, really love it.”
A piercing tone cut through the stillness around them.
“What’s that?”
Chase murmured, “It’s the all-clear warning.”
She clutched his hand tighter. “Is it about to happen?”
“Yep. Are you ready?”
“I’m ready!”
The all-clear warning sounded one last time, then warped into a clear, computerlike voice. “Five, four, three, two…” Pulling his hand up to cradle it tight to her thumping heart, she held her breath and then…Whoom! A blast of sound went through her, an invisible hand. Silence held on to its coattails—complete silence—just before the rattle of falling rock began to pop through the air. Dust and smoke billowed up as she felt the adrenaline hit her blood.
“Wow!”
“Did you like it?”
It was simplicity itself: something had blown up. End of story. But her heart was jumping hard with excitement. “That was great!”
“It’s even better up close. This was a pretty small one, but I thought you might like it.”
“I loved it. Thank you so much for inviting me.” His knuckles brushed the bare skin at the base of her neck and she realized she was still clutching his hand. She forced her fingers to uncurl. When she let him go, his hand rose to cradle her face and turn her toward him.
His mouth touched hers. Lust spiced the adrenaline in her blood and set off a different kind of explosion. Jane ran her hand up the back of his neck. His newly cut hair prickled against her skin as his tongue rubbed hers.
Every time he touched her, she wanted him, but the adrenaline added something dangerous to her need. She wanted to crawl over him, crawl
inside
him. Her hand curled, trying to hold on to his hair.
Chase broke away. “Jane…we
really
can’t do this here.”
“I know that!” She laughed.
He kissed her again, tasting her, pushing into her wetness. Oh, God. This was what she wanted. Nothing more complicated than this.
“My place,” she murmured as he nibbled at her bottom lip, “is only three minutes away.”
“Let’s go.”