Crazy in Love (14 page)

She felt the mattress shift as his weight settled next to her on the bed. Warm fingers circled her wrist, pulling her hand away from her face. His smile was gentle, and his eyes were kind, and even his tousled, unkempt hair was making her stomach tighten.

He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again. One of his hands rested next to her hip, his body crossing hers, blocking her from jumping up and running to the bathroom for sanctuary. His other hand still held her wrist, one thumb absently tracing the tendons under her skin. With every second of silence, her heart beat harder, and she was sure her face was practically radioactive with heat by now. He released her wrist and reached up to touch her face, his fingers grazing her cheek, making her skin tingle.

Okay. That
’s enough.
She pushed her back up against the headboard, putting only maybe an inch or two of extra space between them, but it was space she suddenly needed.

“
Tucker—”

“
We’re in bed together. I think you can call me Jake now.”

“
I can’t.” She swallowed.

A slow smile spread over his face, and he laughed.
“Stubborn, thy name is Flynn.”

She could feel heat from his body, hovering so near, not technically touching her but still effecting an intense visceral reaction. This had to stop. He either had to get in that bed for real or leave.

“Jake…” she said quietly, hoping he’d understand his
choice without her having to lay it out for him. Avoiding that humiliation was worth the concession of using his first name.

He nodded. He understood, and she could tell by the look of resignation on his face that she
’d be alone in just another minute. Still, he leaned forward, one hand cupping the back of her head in his hand, and his lips landed softly on hers, at first gentle, but then the energy between them started to crackle and he dove in deeper.

Oh, this is good. This is goooood.
Her entire body hu
mm
ed with the feel of him as he leaned over her. Sensations came at her in bits and pieces; the softness of his hair under her fingers, the strength of his arm as it pulled her up to him, the harmonizing heart-pounding rhythms that reverberated through them both like primal drumbeats. Her fun parts were just getting into the swing of things when he put his hands on her shoulders and pulled back, his eyes heavy-lidded and, she thought with satisfaction, not entirely able to focus.

“
Well,” he said. “That was…”

She let out a sharp breath.
“Yeah. It was.”

“
Okay.” He released her shoulders, then ran one hand through his hair. “Okay.” He hopped up off the bed, took a few steps toward the door, then turned back to face her, gesturing over his shoulder toward the door. “I’m gonna go.”

“
Fine.” She heard the petulant strain in her voice, but there was nothing to be done about it. She gave him a stiff wave. “See ya.”

A confused look flashed over his face, and he took a step closer. Good God. Was he
trying
to torture her? Why didn’t he just
leave
already?

He squinted at her a bit, his expression unsure.
“Are you mad?”

“
Mad? No. Why would I be mad?”

“
I don’t know. I just—”

“
I mean, just because you kiss me like that and then run off like it’s Superbowl Sunday. Who would possibly be offended by that?”

“
Oh, Christ.” He took another step toward her, looked at her like she was the crazy one here. “Flynn, I’m leaving
because
I just kissed you like that. I...” He shook his head and let out a long breath. “There are rules.”

“
Since when do men care if a girl’s been drinking a little? I thought most guys used Jim Beam for their wingman.”

“
Well,” he said, his eyes locked on hers, “I’m not most guys.”

“
So… what, then? Are you gay or something?”

His head reeled back in shock.
“Am I…? You think I’m
gay
?”

“
Look, I would have stopped you.”
Probably.
“But you didn’t even go for the sex. That means gay, married, living with Mother, or crazy. None of which bode well for you.”

Anger flashed over his face.
“Or, maybe, I was raised by a family of women who beat it into my brain that there are certain things you don’t do when a girl is—”

He stopped suddenly. Flynn threw her legs over the side of the bed and stood up, advancing on him as she spoke.
“When a girl is
what?
Weird? Undesirable? From Boston? What?”

“
Special
.” He raised both hands, his fingers raking the air in frustration. “When a girl is
special,
you take her on
a date first. You shower beforehand. With soap. You buy her flowers or candy, both if she’s really making you nuts. You follow steps, you stick to the rules. God! I’m killing myself to do the right thing here, and you assume I’m
gay
?
What, were you raised by wolves?”

Flynn softened, chose to ignore the raised by wolves comment, and smiled.

“You think I’m special?”

He let loose with a frustrated chuckle.
“There are many definitions of
special
.”

“
You think I’m special,” she said in a teasing singsong voice as she took a step closer to him.

He smiled and shook his head.
“You thought I was gay?”

“
If it helps, I hoped you were just living with Mother.” She wrinkled her nose. “You don’t live with Mother, do you?”

“
Oh, hell.” He threw his arms up and headed toward the door. “Good night, Flynn.”

“
Good night,” she said softly to his back. His hand touched the doorknob, then he froze where he was. She was just about to say something when he turned suddenly and grabbed her, pulling her to him so fast she thought she might get whiplash. She closed her eyes and fell into the kiss with him, allowing the feel and scent of him to finally silence her internal chatter. Every movement sent off sparks in different parts of her body, and if she had been able to think anything, it would have only been,
Don’t stop.

But he did, and they pulled back from each other a bit, both of them breathless and flushed.

“Okay,” she said. “I take back the gay thing.”

He laughed, put his hand on her face, and traced her lower lip with his thumb, making the muscles in her legs tremble. She let out a little moan and his eyes fluttered a bit, but then his face cleared and he released her.

“Do something for me?” he asked softly.

“
Yeah?”

He let out a rough breath.
“On another night, when the time is right, if you’re so inclined and you haven’t been drinking…” He smiled and kissed the tip of her nose. “Ask me again.”

She made some kind of guttural sound that she hoped would pass for,
“Sure.”

He let out a soft laugh.
“Good night, Flynn.”

“
Night.”

He shook his head, chuckled lightly to himself, and then let himself out, leaving her alone, dizzy, and unsure. She leaned forward slowly and let her forehead rest against the dark wood of the door. She saw his face when she closed her eyes, and it wasn
’t hard work to recall the feel of his arms around her, the earthy scent of his skin, the…

“
Hoo boy,” she said, releasing a breath as she pulled herself away from the door. She walked to the bathroom, turned the shower on, and stared at herself in the mirror.

“
This is a prime example of poor decision-making,” she told herself. “Bad news. Do not get all gooey over the bartender.”

As her reflection smiled back at her, she heard the retort clear as a bell in her head.

Too late.

Eight

Something was buzzing. Rattling against wood. Something was…

Flynn opened one eye just as her cell phone vibrated itself right off the nightstand and clanked perfectly into a glass with about a half
-inch of Irish whiskey. She’d moved it to the floor in the middle of the night because the smell was bothering her, but she’d lacked the motivation to carry it all the way to the bathroom sink.

“
Oh, shit,” she said, reaching in, glancing around, then finally wiping it on the bedspread. The A
rms
was a nice place, but it was still a hotel. Surely the bed had suffered worse indignities. She flipped the phone open.

“
Yeah?”

“
Flynn.” Her father’s voice came through the line. Taut and businesslike, the way it always was, even on birthdays and Christmas. She sat up straight in a Pavlovian response.

“
Hey. Dad. Wow. What time is it?”

There was a slight pause.
“Nine thirty. Are you in your office?”

She glanced at the half-empty bottle of Jameson
’s on the floor. “Yep.”

“
Good. I’ll need an update on the situation with the financials. I have some preliminary reports here, but they’re only current as of the end of the second quarter. I’ll need everything up to and including the end of the third quarter.”

“
Mmm-hmmm. You bet. I’ll get right on it.” First, of course, she’d have to ask someone what a quarter was. It sounded like a football thing, but somehow Flynn doubted that was the case. “Anything else?”

There was a hint of surprise in his voice when he answered, as though he
’d been expecting the football question. “Uh, yes, actually. There’s a local contact down there I’d like you to take a meeting with.” There was a slight pause. “I just want you to make initial contact, establish a relationship.”

“
Dad. You know I’m not that kind of girl.”

He didn
’t laugh. “I’m talking about a business relationship.”

“
Yeah. I know. You see, it was funny because—”

“
You’re the face of the company out there, Flynn. Take him to lunch, dinner, coffee. It really doesn’t matter. If he asks you a question you don’t know how to answer, just tell
him
you don’t know and you’ll get back to him.”

She shrugged her shoulders to release the tightness there.
“So anything other than, ‘What’s your favorite color?’ then?”

Another joke, landing like a brick.
“I’ve got my team working on things here, but apparently this guy can help
us work through the local red tape, which is always helpful in little places like Scheintown. They’re notorious for making things hard on outsiders, and I’d like to get this off my plate quickly. The guy’s name is…”

She listened as her f
ather ruffled through his notes, and then said the name in unison with him: “Gordon Chase.”

Her father paused.
“Has he contacted you already?”

She thought on this for a moment.
“His name has... come up.”

She decided to leave it at that. If she started talking about embezzlement, suspected murder, and poisoning by berry, Dad would pull Freya out of Tucson in a heartbeat. And then likely put Flynn in a treatment program. What was it Freya had said? Only tell people what they need to know?

Good advice,
she thought, then realized her father was still talking.

“
… three meetings in New York on Tuesday, then…”

She sat up straighter.
“Three meetings? In New York? Dad, shouldn’t you be… I don’t know. Slowing down a bit? Can’t that wait for Freya to come back?”

There was a long silence.
“Why should I slow down?”

Flynn sighed.
“Dad. Freya told me. About the angina.”

“
What angina?”

“
Your angina.”

“
I don’t know what Freya told you, but I don’t have angina. I’m fine, Flynn. You must have misheard her.”

Flynn snorted.
“Well, there’s only one other thing that sounds like angina, and I know you don’t have that.”

Crickets.
Good God, what did it take to break that man?

“
Dad,” she said, more seriously. “Freya said—”

“
I don’t know what Freya told you, Flynn, but I assure you, I’m fine. I had a full checkup in August and my doctor gave me a clean bill of health. I can have him fax over an official statement if you’d like.”

“
No,” Flynn said slowly. “That’s not necessary.”

I might need a good lawyer for when I kill Freya
for lying to me, though.

He cleared his throat.
“Can we get back to business?”

Flynn threw one hand up in the air, but kept the frustration out of her voice.
“You bet.”

“
Good. I should have a decision on a buyer by the end of next week, so you won’t have to be there much longer.”

A buyer.
The words struck a surprisingly uncomfortable chord in her gut.

“
Dad? Have you thought at all about maybe keeping the place? It’s really beautiful, and the people are amazing. The chef makes this incredible pumpkin—”

“
Don’t get attached, Flynn. It’s the first rule.”

She rolled her eyes. Stupid men and their stupid rules.
“But it turns a profit. Okay, not a
big
profit, but not losing money is a good thing, right? And what if some big chain buys it and replaces the rose garden with a waterslide? Or fires everyone and then no one will know which room George Washington slept in? What if they put onion blossoms on the menu? Have you thought about that?”

There was a long silence, then,
“I want the numbers by tomorrow morning, Flynn.”

She released a heavy sigh.
“Okay. You’ll have them.”

“
Thank you. I’ll be in touch.”

Click.
She made a face at her phone and tossed it down
on the bed. Her father was a good man, she knew. He was fair and moral and hygienically irreproachable. The only niggle she had about him was that he didn’t seem to possess a soul, or at least not one anyone could see.

His heart, though, was fine. Apparently. Flynn picked up the phone again and thought about dialing her sister and demanding an explanation, but rejected the idea. She didn
’t have the energy to confront Freya right now. Right now, she had bigger things on her mind.

Like waterslides and onion blossoms.

She sighed and looked around; when, exactly, had this place gotten under her skin? She should hate it, what with all the nature and nothing within walking distance and the cottage that was quite literally making her insane. But the rose garden had charmed her, and the rooms were gorgeous, and then there was the bartender…

Tucker.

She sucked in a breath and a flash of panic ran through her as she remembered the events of the previous
night.

“
Oh, God,” she said, dropping her face into her hands. Had she really thrown herself at the bartender?

Yes
. Yes, she had. It had been late. She had been drinking. And he had those warm brown eyes that made her go all gooey inside. The eyes were really at fault. If he just hadn’t
looked
at her that way…

Oh, God.

She’d called him
Jake.

She
’d
kissed
him.

She
’d told him about the Renaissance-Faire-prostitute thing.

“
Ugh,” she groaned. And now she was going to have to work with him on this Chase thing, which at first had
seemed fun and exciting and oddly necessary, but now didn’t really seem to stand up to the humiliation of facing him again.

“
You are a big bottle of stupid,” she said, leaning over and picking up the Jameson’s and glasses from the floor. “No more stupid for me.”

She had just finished rinsing out the glasses when there was a knock on the door. Her back stiffened.

Tucker.
He was the only one who knew she was here. She peeked in the mirror, touching her hair briefly before deciding not to bother. She needed a full rehaul, and there just wasn’t time.

“
Just a minute!” She squeezed a dollop of toothpaste on her finger, swished it around her mouth, and rinsed. She walked across the room and pulled the door open, ready to launch into a big speech about how she’d been so drunk the night before she couldn’t remember
a thing
when she heard a high voice say, “Oh!”

It was Annabelle. Flynn relaxed and smiled.
“Hey, Annabelle.”

“
Um.” Annabelle stepped back, glanced at the door, and then looked back at Flynn, confusion on her face. “This is 213.”

“
Yep.”

“
But that’s… that’s Jake’s room. I mean, the room I gave to Jake for any bar patrons that couldn’t drive home. But Jake wasn’t working last night. How…?” Annabelle stopped talking and her eyes widened. “Oh.”

“
No!” Flynn put one hand on Annabelle’s arm. “No, it’s not like that. He just…” She scrambled internally, wanting to say something, anything, to take that heartbroken look off sweet Annabelle’s face. “Because of the
cottage
door. Last night. He kicked it down. It’s broken. The lock, I mean. So Jake brought me here and then
”
—skipping three or four hours
—“he left.”

She sounded guilty as hell even to her own ears, but Annabelle didn
’t seem to catch it. She smiled brightly and nodded. “Oh, that’s right. I’m sorry. I’ll have Herman fix that for you today.”

Flynn released a breath, and the tension drained from her shoulders. How could Jake not see how Annabelle felt about him? Was he really that clueless?

Well. He
was
a man.

“
Anyway, I’m sorry to have bothered you,” Annabelle said. “It’s just that one of the housekeeping staff said she saw the Do Not Disturb sign on the door, and I was all, ‘No, I don’t think we have a guest there, that’s Jake’s room, and he wasn’t working last night,’ and so I came in to check just in case and when I saw you here…” Annabelle stopped and lowered her eyes. “I’ll have Herman fix that lock.”

“
Thank you,” Flynn said. She was about to shut the door when she suddenly remembered the conversation with her father. She poked her head out into the hall.

“
Annabelle?”

Annabelle turned around.
“Yes?”

“
Please don’t tell anyone I had to ask you this, but what’s a quarter?”

Annabelle blinked.
“What do you mean? Like, the money?”

Flynn smiled.
“I don’t th
in
k so. My father called. He wants all the financials for the third quarter. Whatever that means.”

Annabelle nodded.
“Yeah. The third quarter just ended last Friday.”

Oh. So it was a calendar thing.
Gotcha.
“Okay. Well, can you get some reports together for me? Profit and loss or... whatever?”

She smiled. She knew she probably sounded like an idiot, but she trusted Annabelle to pretend that wasn
’t the case.

Annabelle
’s face, however, was unusually stiff. “Um. Sure. It might take a few days.”

Flynn sighed, leaned against the doorjamb, and gave Annabelle a comrades-in-pain expression.
“He wants it tomorrow morning. Is there anything I can do to help?”

“
No.”
An
nabelle’s voice was unusually high, even for her. “No. No. I can...” She pulled on a bright smile. “Sure. I can do that.”

“
Thank you. I’ll be down in the office in a little bit.” Annabelle gave a little wave and disappeared into the stairwell. Flynn stared down the empty hallway for a long moment, her mind traipsing back to the night before with Tucker. A smile spread across her face and she shook it away, then stepped back into her room to get changed and start her day.

It promised to be a long one.

***

Jake lay sprawled across his couch, one arm resting on his forehead, and stared at the ceiling. He
’d been in that position for most of the morning. Then, all of the afternoon. Now, his shift was going to start in an hour, and still he hadn’t come to any conclusions, except that the water stain on his ceiling looked a little like Vladimir Putin.