Lost in Love (5 page)

“Well, ain’t that a mouthful?” He propped his hand next to her head and angled closer. “What do you want to see ole Jackson for, duchess?”

She frowned. “I’m an earl’s daughter, not a duchess, and why I want to see him is my business.”

“You’re going to be mightily disappointed. He ain’t into fancy faces.”

She shook her head, confused. “I don’t have a fancy face. I barely wear any makeup.”

His gaze touched every corner of her face, his fingers curling under her chin to lift it to his scrutiny. “You may not wear war paint, but you still have a fancy face, sugar.”

His voice was low and intimate, and she felt it at the core of her belly. She melted against the wall, putty in his hands. How had he done that? She looked at his mouth—so close to hers—and wondered what he’d kiss like. Certainly not like Baxter Wellesborough, the last man to kiss her. Baxter’s lips had been cold and clammy like raw shellfish.

“Keep looking at me like that and you straightening your stockings will be for nothing.”

“You promise?” she asked, not recognizing her voice for its huskiness.

His smile was slow and full of devilry. His hand slid around her hip to trail over her buttocks as he leaned in.

The elevator doors opened, startling them out of the moment.

He sighed as he put his hand in front of the door. “After you, duchess.”

“I’m not a duchess,” she said as she walked out with as much dignity as she could muster considering she’d been contemplating letting a stranger have his way with her in an elevator. Maybe she had more of Catherine Summerhill in her than she’d ever realized.

“None of us are what we seem,” he said, the thick drawl suddenly tempered. “This way.”

She frowned at him as she hurried to keep up with his long gait. She wasn’t sure what to ask first, so she went with the obvious. “You’re taking me to Jackson Waite?”

He snorted. “I don’t have to. You found him yourself.”

She gaped as his meaning became clear. “
You
?”

“I fight the disappointment every day myself, duchess.” He gestured to an office that had a pair of red knickers hanging from the door knob. “After you.”

Something had gone wrong but she wasn’t sure what. She stared at the knickers, wondering why they were there and who they belonged to.

The tiara. This was about the tiara, not the man or Portia’s wish that he’d strip
her
knickers off.

At the moment it was hard to separate it all. Because she didn’t know what to do, she lifted her head the way generations of Summerhills always had and entered the lion’s den.

Chapter Six

Jack liked sex as much as the next guy. He was a physical sort of guy. He appreciated a good-looking woman, especially one who was enthusiastic under the covers. But he’d never met a woman and wanted to rip her clothes off where she stood. Not until Lady Portia Summerhill.

He held open the door to his office. He smiled a little as he watched her stare at the red panties hanging on the doorknob. He put them there as a marker, so he could find his office. Every damn hallway in this building looked the same to him. Plus, it bent Quinn’s nose when he did stuff like this. Let it confuse the duchess, too.

“After you.” He motioned her inside, less because it was gentlemanly and more because he wanted to check out her ass.

His mother would have smacked him upside the head just thinking that. And it’d have been completely worth it, he thought as he ogled it.

He closed the door, trying to ignore the predatory rush by having her captive in his domain.

If he were being honest, he was the one captive here, because he could barely keep from grabbing her and tearing off that prissy skirt of hers to see the fancy getup she had on underneath. That annoyed him, because she was clearly after something. Worse, he could tell by the way her perfect, little nose was in the air she thought he was a hick.

Well, he had no trouble playing that up. He sauntered to the couch lining the wall and sprawled out on it, legs crossed wide, adjusting his hat so it was low on his forehead. He pointed to a chair well out of his reach. “Sit.”

She sat primly, too far from him to grab her but still a temptation. She glanced at his shoes and then back up at his face.

The pearls she worried with her fingers should have looked stuffy and straitlaced, but all he could think about was using them in foreplay—the sort of foreplay that took hours and would leave her weeping for release.

He shifted his legs, his jeans feeling tighter. To distract from what was going on below, he held his arms out. “So you’ve found me, duchess. What can I do you for?”

The creamy skin of her forehead ruffled a little. She crossed her legs and smoothed down her skirt. “My father sold Suncrest Park to you.”

He had no idea who her father was, but Suncrest Park was the bane of his existence. “And?”

“And there were some personal effects in the house that weren’t removed before the sale.” She fiddled with her pretty little beads. “I wondered if I might be able to have a couple of those returned.”

“What sort of things could be important enough to want back after all this time? Diaries? Love letters?” He didn’t like the thought of her with another man—
at all
. “Is that it, duchess? You lost letters from a lover?”

“Of course not.” She lifted her blue-blood nose in the air.

He found that little nose oddly appealing. “No letters, or no lover?”

“Both. Neither.” She frowned at him. “What I want is of ancestral significance.”

“It’s so significant that it took you this long to come ask for it back? As I recall, we bought that property almost two years ago.” He may not pay attention to some things, but his memory was a steel trap.

“Two years …” Portia blinked her eyes, looking stunned. “He never told me.”

Something in her tone made his heart twinge. “I take it you were against the sale.”

“How could I be against it when I didn’t know it happened until after he died?”

“When was that?”

“The beginning of December.”

It was the mid-January now, and obviously she still wasn’t over the news. “You had a tie to the land.”

“I loved it.” She looked up at him, her eyes blue and earnest. “I always pictured living there. You could tell?”

The door opened and Quinn walked in, stopping suddenly when he noticed Portia sitting in the office. He looked at Jack, his expression carefully blank. “Excuse me. I didn’t realize you were here, much less that you had a guest.”

He frowned, hearing Quinn’s underlying assumption that Portia was a bit of fun he’d picked up first thing on arrival. “I managed to find the office, if that’s what you’re saying,” he said lightly.

Quinn glanced at Portia. “I’ll come back when you’re less occupied. In the meantime, here’s Meredith’s quote on decorating the Suncrest property.”

Jack felt Portia come to attention, but she didn’t say anything. He glanced at the top of the proposal Quinn handed him. Then he did a double take at the number. “Holy shit. That’s insane.”

Quinn nodded. “It puts us over budget. I told Meredith that instead of buying new antiques, maybe we could recycle some of the furniture that we carted out of there. It’s all sitting in a warehouse. But she doesn’t have the bandwidth to handle it all on her own. We’d have to hire an expert to help her cull through it.”

“I’m an expert,” Portia said.

They both looked at her.

She looked startled that she’d spoken, but then her adorable little chin pointed into the air. “I’m an expert on those pieces,” she repeated.

Moxy. He admired it. But business was business, and he couldn’t afford to muck up this new line of luxury resorts. There’d be no telling how long he’d have to stay on to correct it all, and he wanted out.

But Quinn was the one who worded the doubts. “That’s nice, miss, but we need someone who can give provenances on the furniture and knows their value. We’ll use some on the property, but we’re going to auction off the rest.”

Portia nodded. “You won’t find someone who knows each historically significant piece the way I do. I know the story and provenance behind each piece, including all the personal Summerhill artifacts.”

Quinn glanced at him.

Jack held out his hand. “Andrew Quinn, meet Lady Portia Summerhill.”

Quinn’s brow arched the faintest bit, but he turned to the duchess, all manners and smooth coolness. “Forgive me, Lady Portia, I didn’t know.”

She colored prettily as she shook his hand. “It’s just Portia, please.”

Quinn nodded. “Perhaps Jackson and I can discuss this and let you know what we decide.”

For a moment, Jack thought Portia was going to accept that as her answer, even though it disappointed her. But then she shook her head and got some lead in her spine. “I don’t see as there’s anything to discuss. You need someone who knows what’s valuable and important to place in your new resort. You probably want to infuse the property with a sense of its history.”

He just wanted the property to have beds for guests. Jack glanced at Quinn, who studied Portia with shrewd interest.

“I know every significant piece in that house. I know the story behind them.” She touched her necklace as though for courage. “There’s a first edition volume of Byron in the library, given to Elizabeth Summerhill by Byron himself. It’s signed and inscribed with a special message to her.” Portia shrugged. “Byron seemed a forward sort.

“There’s a lot of jewelry that was left at the estate,” she continued. “I know the story behind each piece. Perhaps you’d care to display them, or if you choose to auction them off it’d bring a decent sum as well as press, which could be tied to the opening of the resort.”

“It’s a lot of work,” Quinn pointed out. “Why would you do it?”

She glanced at Jack.

Jack knew what her price would be: the mysterious thing she wanted.

“There’s a tiara,” she said, her gaze never leaving his. “It’s worth quite a bit, but it pales in comparison to the rest of what was in the manor. If I help you organize and curate everything, I want the tiara.”

“A tiara?” Jack repeated. Of all the things he expected, that wasn’t it. He wondered why it was so important, but he could see her wearing it, her head proud. Of course, in his imagination, she wore nothing else.

Quinn shook his head. “We’ll need to discuss—”

“You’re hired,” Jack said.

Both Quinn and Portia gaped at him.

He had good business sense. He speculated on all sorts of things and had made a killing on his own. And right now, his instincts told him to take a gamble on Lady Portia Summerhill.

Okay, he wanted her close, too. He wasn’t ready to let her walk out of his life. He wasn’t opposed to mixing business and pleasure. He remembered the lace ties that held up her stocking and felt a surge of eagerness to get on to the pleasure part.

He stood and held out his hand. “Welcome to the Waite Hotel Group, duchess.”

Chapter Seven

A man spoke just outside her office. Meredith stilled, alert, even though she recognized that it wasn’t Quinn.

A girl could hope, though.

Sighing, she dropped her head into her hands. Ever since Quinn saw her list, she’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop.

He hadn’t said a word to her.

At least not about her list. Yes, he’d talked to her, but it’d all been business related. She didn’t know how she felt about that. She was torn between leaving the situation as-is and pretending that he’d never seen it, or shaking him and demanding to know what he was thinking.

It made her uncomfortable.

Edgy.

She hated that he was obviously not very affected when she so totally was. She couldn’t focus on work. She couldn’t eat. She felt like she was constantly waiting. She heard him say
I’m going to help you
in his deep, sexy voice over and over in her head until it drove her crazy with need.

Each night since, she hurried back to her hotel room to touch herself, imagining the things he’d whisper to her in his wicked voice. Only the tension never eased—it mounted because her touch wasn’t enough.

She wanted his.

What a conundrum, because if she let him touch her, there was a good chance she wouldn’t be able to climax, and then what would
that
do to their working relationship?

“Depressing,” she murmured.

“Are you taking a nap?”

Her head popped up, her cheeks burning as she blinked at the object of her desire. “Quinn. I didn’t hear you.”

“Obviously.” He adjusted his glasses as he walked in. He unbuttoned his suit coat and sat on the corner of her desk.

Close.

She swallowed, trying not to breathe in his sexy scent. She forced her gaze up, so she wouldn’t stare at his private parts or be tempted to reach out and touch.

“What are you doing?” he asked, glancing at the paperwork in front of her.

Waiting for you to take me, she wanted to say. Her panties were damp, and she had to press her legs together. Because her cheeks began to burn, she ducked her head. “Just going over the antiques estimate to see where I can cut things for the Suncrest project.”

“You may not have to use it. Jackson hired someone to help you go through all the junk that was taken from Suncrest Park.”

All thought of her list and sex with Quinn fled, and she frowned. “What? Who?”

“The daughter of the man we bought the estate from.”

Meredith pursed her lips. “That could be a boon. Does she have a background in antiquities?”

“No. She has great legs.”

Meredith shrugged. “Jackson was always a leg man.”

Quinn frowned. “You don’t mind having to work with her?”

“Not unless she’s useless. But no matter how attractive she was to Jackson, he wouldn’t have sabotaged this project by bringing in someone incompetent.”

Quinn stared at her, obviously thinking, though his thoughts were well guarded. Finally he said, “He wants to fuck her. You don’t mind that?”

She blinked. “That was direct, wasn’t it?”

“I think it was an accurate assessment of the way he was looking at her.”