Lake Magic (10 page)

“Jenny . . .” The look on her sister’s face left little doubt as to what Anna thought of that statement.

“This time is different,” she said emphatically.
She
was different. Or, at least on her way to being different. Stronger. More determined.

“How’s the website coming?” Anna asked.

Jenny’s rocking chair came to a sudden halt. How was it Anna knew exactly where Jenny was most vulnerable? She struggled to find her voice, wanted to remind her sister of the new advertising plan she’d launched and the weekend getaway packages she had put together. But emotion clogged her throat, made it impossible for her to speak. The website. Like so many aspects of Blue Sky, the thought of returning to a project she and Steven had started all but crippled her.

“Fine,” Jenny lied, finally able to speak. Thankfully, Anna let the subject of the website drop.

“Paul said this partner of yours was in the same squadron as Steven.”

In the space of a day, her family had said Steven’s name more times than they had in the last nine months. After the accident, as if by some tacit agreement, her family, neighbors, and friends had avoided any mention of Steven whatsoever. It was as if they believed that by acting as if he never existed, somehow her pain would go away, and she would forget. But Jenny would never forget. Each time she climbed into his car, smelled his cologne, or remembered how his arms felt wrapped around her, her heart cracked a little bit more. That was something she had learned since losing Steven—a heart didn’t break all at once. It happened over time, bit by painful bit, until it completely shattered, leaving nothing left. Jenny could only pray that hers would shatter soon, because the pain was becoming more than she could bear.

“And here I thought you were done with flyboys. Is he at all like Steven?’

The question took Jenny aback. She swallowed hard, fought to breathe. “No,” she said, her voice hollow and achy. “He’s nothing like Steven.”

For a moment the pain of losing him lifted, and she saw him in her mind. She saw his bright open smile, heard his laughter, felt the warmth of his breath as he whispered something into her ear. Whenever they went out, he was the life of the party, telling joke after joke in his loud, booming voice that captured everyone’s attention. He was as all-American as they came: handsome with his sandy blond hair and green eyes and a personality so open everyone loved him. Her most of all.

“Jenny? What’s this Jared like? Mother seemed quite impressed, and you know what it takes to impress her.”

Jenny tried to cling to the vision of Steven, but it drifted away, and another man took his place. She tried to block the image, but the effort was as futile as ignoring the man.

Against her will, her sister’s question kept coming back to her.
What’s he like
?

Honestly, she couldn’t think of a way to describe him. She knew if one of her girlfriends ever saw him, they’d sum him up in three words: raw sex appeal.

But Jenny needed only one:
unsettling
.

Everything about him unnerved her. He was tall, with hair as dark as the night sky. And his eyes . . . Eyes that blue should hold warmth, or at least a hint of softness. But there was nothing soft about Jared. There was a hard ruthlessness about him that hinted at a life she couldn’t understand, nor did she want to. Beneath that leather jacket, he wore a confidence like most men wore custom-made suits. And when he spoke, iron determination fortified his words. It was almost as if he was from another era, from a time when warriors ruled the land, and their cunning and strength determined their survival. Jenny had little doubt that if Jared had lived back then, he would have been a force to be reckoned with.

Who was she kidding? He was one now.

A shiver of apprehension ran through her. Even though she’d only met with him twice, somehow she knew: he was a man accustomed to getting his own way. And right now, Jenny was a roadblock he was determined to move.

Tomorrow, Jennifer
.

She shivered again. One way or another, she was going to have to do the impossible. She was going to have to find a way to deter Jared Worth from his path.

She looked once more to her sister and said the only thing she could. “No. He’s nothing like Steven.”

Jared was mad as hell.

Not upset. Or furious. Or even pissed off. He’d passed those markers around three this morning.

Yesterday when he’d given Jenny his ultimatum, he’d known it was his only option. The only way for him to see his investment repaid. But that didn’t mean he had to be happy about it. Plus, he’d thought Miss January would cave. When she hadn’t, she’d surprised the hell out of him. Something that didn’t happen all that often, if ever. But if she thought he was going to lie down and accept her terms, she had another think coming. For over fifteen years he’d been intimidating men who outranked, outsized, and flat-out outnumbered him. And he’d always come out on top. If she thought she could bluff her way past him, she was in for one rude awakening.

The conversation he’d had last night with his realtor came back to him, and he all but growled in frustration.

I’ll try to stall and buy you some time, but get the money to me as soon as you can
.

That’s not how it was supposed to go last night. Last night was supposed to be about wire transfers. Sealing the deal. Signing on the bottom line. And getting the hell out of this town. Instead, he spent another night in lavender hell cursing the bargain he’d been forced into making. The more he thought on it, the more pissed he got.

Partner. In a tourist-taxing, travel-at-the-speed-of-a-snail, stuck-in-Mayberry, seaplane charter business.
Christ
.

With more speed than necessary, Jared pulled into Blue Sky a few minutes before seven. The bike’s engine rumbled in the quiet, echoed off the lake. The first thing he saw was that wannabe plane at the end of the dock. The second, the Corvette.

His dark mood went to ugly black in less than a second.

What a goddamn waste of money.
His
money.

He parked in the same spot he had yesterday. The place was as deserted as a minefield. It was obvious no one was up. No one was working. No wonder there was no money to repay him. How did she think a business could survive—let alone thrive—if the owner didn’t get her delectable little ass out of bed before noon?

Disgusted with the whole situation, he made his way toward the hangar. Briefly he’d toyed with the idea of going to the house and pounding on the door until Sleeping Beauty answered, but he discarded the idea as quickly as it had come. For one reason, he doubted she’d wake up. And second, even he realized he was too pissed-off to face anyone.

From his visit yesterday, he knew the office was located in the far corner of the hangar. His footsteps rang out against the concrete floor as he made his way through the dark, cavernous space. The office was unlocked. Big surprise. Letting himself in, he turned on the lights and looked around.

He swore again. Whatever he’d been expecting, this was far worse.

Boxes, stacks of papers, magazines, and even clothing for Christ’s sake littered the room. The amount of shit was unbelievable. The top of the desk was buried under a mountain of God only knew what. The place was a disaster.

He shook his head. How in the hell did anyone get any work done in this chaos?

They didn’t. That’s how.

Ignoring the mess, he tried to see the office as it could be if it wasn’t one big garbage can. All in all, it wasn’t a bad space: large and bright. An expensive looking L-shaped desk was positioned against the far corner. Above it were two good-sized windows that faced the lake. Even in the muted morning light, the lake was a glistening, tranquil blue.

On the far wall, a brown leather sofa and two chairs formed a seating area but, like the rest of the office, their horizontal surface was covered in crap.

Tripping over a pair of high heels—
high heels!
—and an empty box, he made his way to the filing cabinets on the far wall. It took him less than a minute to discover the cabinets were almost completely empty. He would have laughed if the situation weren’t so depressing.

“Jesus, Steven. What were you thinking?” But Jared knew exactly what—
where—
his friend’s thoughts had been. They’d been on a pair of sky blue eyes and long legs. On a body with enough curves and swerves to make a man not give a shit about whether the office got cleaned or the filing got done.

It was obvious Jenny had brought other talents to the partnership. Talents he’d had no trouble envisioning last night—when he hadn’t been cursing her.

Remembering the thoughts he’d had last night, something told him he should just leave, walk away from his money and this wreck of a business. But he’d never been one to take the easy road, and he wasn’t about to lose his money. Besides, leaving would make her only too happy. And making her happy was the last thing he planned on doing.

Just the opposite, in fact. Sometime during the night, Jared realized she probably didn’t believe him. But if she thought he’d just leave, she’d seriously underestimated him. Bluffing wasn’t in his vocabulary. He’d give it two days . . . three at the most, before she went running to her parents begging them for the money to pay him off.

With that thought, his mood lifted, and he got to work. Buried under a mountain of paperwork, he found a small table with a coffeemaker and can of coffee. After a quick rinse in the bathroom sink, the coffeepot was good to go, and not long after, the smell of freshly brewed coffee filled the room.

With the help of caffeine, he made the desk his top priority. He worked nonstop, sorting through stacks of paperwork and piles of miscellaneous items. A lot of the stuff was junk. Some of it needed to be filed. And some of it just plain did not belong in an office. As he went to file some paperwork, he opened the drawer with the pitiful few folders. Intrigued, he pulled them out. As he glanced through them, he realized he was looking at a market strategy proposal for the company. And if his guess was correct, they were done in a woman’s handwriting. Jenny’s, undoubtedly. He continued to rifle through the papers, surprised to find some solid ideas.
Well, well, well
. Cotton Tail might have more to her than what met the eyes.

He put the folders back, along with the other paperwork he’d gathered and organized, and shut the file cabinet drawer. From what he could tell, none of those proposed strategies had been implemented. He wondered why the hell not.

He’d been working for nearly three hours when he heard footsteps slapping against the hangar’s concrete floor. Moments later, Jenny entered the office.

Jared looked up. God, but she looked good. Too damn good. And totally pissed.

“Just what do you think you’re doing?” she demanded.

“Good morning to you, too.”

“Believe me, there is nothing good about this morning.” She’d pulled her hair up into a ponytail, and with her every movement, it snapped back and forth like a golden flag.

Her anger was palpable, and Jared found himself responding. He’d been wading around in the pissed-off pool by himself for far too long—he more than welcomed the company. “Working. I’m not surprised you don’t recognize it.”

Her eyes shot sparks. “Leave.”

“Gladly. Just as soon as you hand over my money.”

“You know I don’t have it.”

With deliberation, he leaned back in the chair and propped his feet up on the edge of the desk—the
cleared
desk. Crossing his ankles, he steepled his hands behind his head. “Then I guess I’m staying.”

“Don’t you need to get back to your squadron?”

“I have plenty of time for this.” It was the god-awful truth. He had nowhere to go. Nowhere he had to be. His whole life had been taken away by a military inquest.

She eyed his proprietary pose, and he could tell she wanted to take him out. “I have a business to run. How do you expect me to get any work done with you in the way?”

“Believe me, no one gets any work done in this pit.”

“My office—”

“Is as organized as a landfill.” He dropped his feet to the ground. “Just what time does this
Titanic
of a business open?”

Her chin stubbornly shot up. “Our hours are flexible.”

He choked back a laugh. “More like nonexistent. Where’s the guy I ran into yesterday? The one working on the plane? Why isn’t he here?”

“Zeke has the day off.”

“Of course he does.” His tone was heavy with sarcasm.

“How I run my business is not your concern.”

“Somehow I don’t think these”—he reached for the stack of magazines he’d found—“have anything to do with running a business. Riveting as the articles are. And by the way, thanks for highlighting them.”

“Give me those.”

She made a move to grab them, but he easily evaded her.