Annette Blair (6 page)

“While I plan to have several pricey events over the next few months,” Goddard continued, “a thousand will not be the cost for all attendees or for every event.”

His gaze lit on each woman in turn, raising the estrogen level to catfight proportions. “In addition to the Sunday-night tour, we’ll give the tour after school on Halloween the following day to about two hundred children. Some will be from St. Anthony’s and others will be selected by social services. No charge, of course, with games and Halloween treats. Do you have another question, Mizz Fitzgerald?”

Kira felt small and she wasn’t certain why. Her questions had been valid, but his answers had been better—professional and self-effacing. How did a living legend pull off “humble” with such apparent ease?

Kira sighed. “No more questions.”

“Good,” Goddard said. “I’m looking forward to working with all of you. I hope the foundation will profit from my six months here while I have the chance to heal and rejuvenate, and figure out what I want to be after my hockey career ends, which won’t be for some years yet.”

“Most people our age know what they want to be when they grow up,” Kira said, her quip hitting him like an unexpected dart. Without meaning to, she’d opened a wound and made him bleed.

“Hockey was practically my first word,” he said, tossing his own quip, which fell as flat as hers. “I knew what I really wanted to be when I was three, but it’s the nature of the game for hockey players to go on to a second, less strenuous career, eventually. Any other questions? Anybody?”

She’d really liked living at Cloud Kiss, Kira thought with a sigh. Who wouldn’t want to live in one of Newport’s finest Gilded Age mansions? But it was definitely time to go apartment hunting.

Damn. She hated the thought of moving, but fighting her inclinations, as in allowing herself to become tinder to this man’s spark 24/7, would suck.

If she stayed, she’d hate herself in the end . . . and so would he.

Cloud Kiss was incredible, and Bessie was sweet, but the old dear couldn’t use living alone as an excuse to keep her any longer, job perk or . . . rent. Crap, she’d be forced to pay rent anywhere else.

She couldn’t afford to move, damn it. How could she forget that little detail, even for a minute?

Kira closed the folder on her notes. She had to face facts; she had no choice but to stick it out at Cloud Kiss. She’d simply take steps to avoid the Big Bad Wolf after hours.

He checked his notes. “I guess that’s it for today. A light lunch is being served in the dining room, compliments of Mrs. Hazard, to celebrate my first day. You’re all invited.”

He checked his watch. “Since it’ll be late when we finish eating, why don’t we make this a real celebration, call it a day, and start fresh tomorrow morning.”

Kira saw that Bessie approved his move. With his decision and his announcement, Goddard made it clear who was in charge.

Everyone left, except Michaela, who eyed their new leader with determination, and more on her agenda than Pickering’s development program. Kira could have sworn Goddard caught her approach, but he turned away.

“Mizz Fitzgerald,” he said. “Can I speak with you for a minute before you go?”

Michaela turned on a proverbial dime, broke her heel, faltered, and kept going.

Kira stifled a grin.

Goddard gave her an assessing look, causing another hormone surge. I am woman; hear me sizzle. How weird was this? Kira could have sworn she’d iced over months ago.

Yeesh, Goddard shows up and her hormones rush out to greet him with hot popcorn dances and full-bodied sociability.

Hell, she guessed she’d been handling her jilt pretty well . . . until today.

“You didn’t do that?” Goddard asked. “Did you?”

“Do what?”

Again, that appraising look. “The broken heel,” he said.

“Ask me again when her hair falls out.”

“You couldn’t?”

Kira laughed. “You look so serious.”

“And you look so dangerous.”

“Dangerous, huh?” Kira liked that, however wrong the call.

Okay, so she’d admit it. She was a sex-starved jilted bride, who’d sworn off men, dealing with a slightly broken, vulnerable ex-jock, who just happened to be drop-dead gorgeous, with eyes sad and intense enough to turn her to Jell-O. Cherry Jell-O, with whipped cream, and . . . popcorn on top. Yum. She would share. They could wallow in it. Make love in it. Kira covered her lips with her fingers to keep from betraying a vocal and hysterical reaction to the thought.

Goddard regarded her quizzically.

“Hiccup,” she said, feeling as if the words
loose cannon
should be stamped on her forehead.

“Mizz Fitzgerald—”

Kira groaned. “I hate it when you call me that.”

“You
told
me to.”

“But you say
Ms.
as if it has
three
z’s. Mizzzzzz.”

Her nemesis rose, winced, and sat again. “Of all the—” He shook his head, rubbed his knee, and gave her a near grin. “Perhaps we should . . .”

Oh, yeah,
she thought,
we should
. “What?” she asked.

“Bury our pasts and work together?”

How could she argue, when burying her past was exactly what she’d come to Newport to do? “Listen, Mr. Goddard, I didn’t intend to—”

“Call me Jason, will you? My father is Mr. Goddard, damn it, and neither of us appreciates the comparison.”

The dysfunctional disclosure resonated in the silence of the empty boardroom. He stopped rubbing his knee and looked up, as if he’d just heard himself. “I can’t believe I said that.”

Kira felt normal in the face of his admission. “Wow.”

“You never know, though,” he said, “I might be in favor again, now that hockey’s temporarily out of the picture.”

Kira relaxed for the first time since meeting him. “That’s okay,” she said. “I like you better flawed.”

He removed his hand from his bad knee, his expression hard.

“I don’t mean physically flawed,” Kira rectified. “Yeesh. Sorry, again. I mean the kind of flawed that negates the silver-spoon, rich-pampered-brat image.”

Jason barked a laugh. “You wouldn’t think me pampered if you saw me on the ice.”

“No, I’d imagine that rather than a silver spoon, you’d need a silver stake to stop you on the ice. That’s what they use on wolves right? Or is that vampires? Which are you? I can’t keep my wolves and vampires straight.”

She was glad he’d found the grin she was going for.

“Seriously,” she said. “You might want to talk to somebody about that father issue.”

“Why would I want to dredge up all that crap?”

“You’re right,” she said. “Let’s leave our pasts at the door and be ourselves, shall we? No walking on eggshells. You’re the Ice God and I’m the Ice Maiden. Deal?”

“Already, I disagree with you.”

“I’m well aware of that.”

“I mean, if I’m a god,” he said, “then you’re a goddess.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Fine then; I
play
hockey, and you
play
ice maiden.”

Kira shrugged. “If you say so.”

He damned near smiled. “Why do I think you won’t always be this agreeable?”

“Search me.”

He gave her his cockiest grin, but Kira refused to blush. “So,” she said, “I guess we
are
free to be ourselves.”

“I’m almost afraid to agree.”

“Too late. That was definitely a yes, in which case, hello, Jason, I think a ghost tour in a house with no ghosts is a blatant misrepresentation, and smacks of questionable ethics. Oh, and please call me Kira.” She didn’t extend her hand this time, which would be about as smart as sticking it in a fire.

Goddard—no, Jason shook his head. “Hello, Kira. I expect we’ll find
something
spooky at Rainbow’s Edge, because we’re going to look
very hard,
and if we don’t, it doesn’t matter, because I’m the boss for the next six months, right?”

“Right,” she said, as ordered.

“Three hundred invitations have already gone out, so you’ll coordinate this event, and any others I hand you, with that special magic my grandmother assures me you possess, misgivings or not, until I go back to the NHL.” He waited for her to accept his authority.

She gave it with a nod.

“After my grandmother and my hockey career, the foundation is my top priority.”

“And you said
I
needed to get a life.”

He gave up the point with a gracious nod. “It appears we’re in the same situation.”

“Not quite,” she said, “but I won’t argue.”

“Already I find that suspicious.”

Kira shrugged, grabbed her briefcase, and rose. “I’m picking my battles.”

“Good game plan. I’m sorry about your wedding.”

He knew. Damn.
She sat down again. “I made my own bed, as they say, except that somebody else . . . Well,
c’est la vie.
” She popped back up. “Lunch?”

AFTER
lunch, Kira returned to her office and found she had company. Castleton Court’s jet-setter in residence, heir to the Castleton fortune, Mr. William Castleton—bronze, blond, and beautiful—sat slouched in her cordovan leather armchair, ankles raised and crossed on her desk, a martini in his hand.

Another charming toad of the lily-pad set.

Billy’s family had donated Castleton Court to the Pickering Foundation some thirty years before, with the stipulation that their descendants, in perpetuity, occupy the family apartment on the top floor. Billy was the last of the line, thus far.

Definitely a silver-spoon kind of guy, Billy also owned a silver Ferrari, a Lamborghini, an Aston Martin, a Porsche, and a Jag. Bewitching Billy collected the world’s most expensive cars the way her grandmother collected silver snuffboxes.

Frankly, Billy’s I-can-have-anything-I-want attitude got old fast. His style made Goddard seem like an everyday-Joe, a regular nine-to-fiver. Even the tennis outfit Billy was sporting right now probably cost more than her weekly paycheck.

Not that Goddard dressed off-the-rack. His dapper double-breasted suit of dark eggplant, with pale blue pin stripes, felt like silk to the touch. She’d discovered that by accident when he leaned over to suggest she use a broom for transportation, but keeping herself from touching it, or him, again had turned into a study in control.

The difference between the two men stood out, however: Billy didn’t play tennis, hence his tennis clothes were no more than a pricey male-peacock type display,
while Goddard had just put on a great show of working for a living.

“Anybody home?” Billy asked, waving a hand in front of her eyes, to reclaim the attention he craved. “Got something on that pretty little mind of yours?” he teased.

“Yeah, like my job. Hello.”

But Billy only heard what he wanted. “How about we go”—he sipped his martini, as if she had time to waste—“for a spin?”

Kira sat at her computer to look up Sister Margaret’s phone number on her database. “Which car?” she asked, typing Sister’s name into the “find” field. Billy’s cars were beautiful.

“Who said anything about a car?”

Kira turned a look his way.

Billy winked. “Four-poster, upstairs, my suite. Whadya say?”

Kira shook her head at his nonsense. “Did you hear? I have a new boss.”

“Yeah, Bessie’s puck-stoppin’ grandson, Mr. Kissy Face Goddard, himself, is hanging here these days, working, no less, or pretending to. Imagine that.”

“Billy,” Jason said, his greeting frosty.

Again, Kira didn’t know how long Jason had been standing in the doorway behind her. This time he stood like a stone statue, jacket gone, ice blue shirtsleeves rolled up, muscular arms crossed, perfect lips firm, the scar on his brow white against his tan. His cane, she noticed from her vantage point, he’d left against
his
side of the connecting door.

By the matching expressions of distrust on the faces of the hard, dark jock, and the soft, fair jet-setter, Kira thought a new-millennium pissin’ contest, rich-boy style, might be brewing.

She leaned back in her chair, tapped her pencil against her smile, and crossed her ankles to wait for the show.

“Kira,” Goddard said, using her first name for the first
time since their postmeeting chat, making her name sound like honey on his tongue, probably for Billy’s benefit. “I thought I gave you the afternoon off. What are you still doing here?”

“I wanted to call Sister Margaret and give her a heads up on the play. She’ll need to get started, and we should set a date for the sake of publicity. Then I want to call a friend on the
Journal,
see if we can get some buzz going. I think I can get a story in the Boston papers, too.”

“Go
team,
” Jason said. “Want to iron out a few details before you call?”

“Sure. I’ll be ready in a minute,” she said, going for her notes, pleased by her promotion to the team.

“Well.” Billy pouted as he rose, ignoring Goddard. “I guess that’s our spin canceled for the day.”

“Right,” Kira said, waving him off without looking up.

JASON
smiled in approval at Kira’s response to Billy. He and Billy had been rivals through high school, whether it was drinking, sports, cars, or girls, but they’d grown up now . . . for the most part.

It wasn’t his fault, Jason thought, that the people who worked here at Castleton Court called Billy the Court Jester while they called him the Boss. Sweet.

Kira stepped into his office, notes in hand. “What are you smiling about?” she asked.

“Progress,” Jason said. “By the way, I’d like to do a ghost hunt at Rainbow’s Edge tomorrow. How does first thing in the morning sound?”

“What are we gonna do,” she asked, “sit and wait for something to spook us?”

“Of course not,” he said on a frown. “I thought we’d check out the library, see what we can find on the history of the place.”

“I read only one history on each house, so who knows?” she said, choosing a sofa. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and find
a tunnel . . . with a skeleton . . . and hidden treasure, so we can improvise.”

Jason didn’t seem to appreciate her sarcasm. “We’ll find something.”

“I still can’t believe you invited people to a ghost tour without making sure the house had ghosts.”