Make Your Move (6 page)

“What do you mean? Of course that’s what happened. It was a bad plan in the first place, and I never
considered that I wouldn’t be able to resist the effects of the cologne,” she said, her voice softer than she wished.

“Your pulse has spiked, your cheeks are flushed, and your pupils are dilated,” he said, raising a hand to her cheek.

“It’s that stupid cologne. Does it ever wear off?”

Dan smiled. “There’s no way the cologne is still having any major effect at this point. The ingredients break down over forty-eight hours. So what else do you think could be causing this reaction?”

“I’m furious with you, that’s what,” she said. “I want you to leave.”

“I think you want me to leave because you know your response isn’t having anything to do with the cologne,” he said softly. “Neither is mine. Whatever is happening right here, right now, it’s just us, Jodie.”

She did step back, sure that some distance would give her sanity, but he stepped forward, trapping her against the wall. Hardness pressed against the softness of her stomach, and she couldn’t stop the rush of heat between her legs.

“Dan, we can’t do this,” she said, sounding more desperate than she wished.

“Why not? It appears we have fantastic chemistry, with or without additives,” he said with a brief kiss to the edge of her lips. “Though I am always interested in experimenting, I’ve never had much use for…implements…toys. But maybe we could explore…”

Jodie’s mind entered total meltdown mode as she even considered the idea. Dan tying her to the rails of
her bed and experimenting with her vibrator…or maybe she’d tie him and experiment with warm honey….

“Stop,” she said sharply, though she was speaking to the direction of her own thoughts more than she was to him. Still, Dan nodded shortly and stepped back. She appreciated it, and also regretted losing the closeness.

He had her so confused she didn’t know what she wanted.

“Jodie, can I suggest something?”

“As long as it doesn’t have to do with sex toys, yes,” she said.

“I want to apologize for the cologne. I did use it the day in the shop, because I had an agenda, as well. I needed to stop you from seeing Jason. He’s a…he’s an ass. I’ve wanted you for so long, and I couldn’t stand the idea of you with him. So I…I gambled.”

Shocked by his confession and his honesty, Jodie relaxed slightly. “You were jealous of Jason?”

Dan looked minutely uncomfortable, but nodded. “I’m jealous of all of them, jealous of anyone who touches you, of who gets to be with you. But the rest were strangers. With Jason…I could…it was just too much.”

Now, when she thought he couldn’t rock her world any more than he already had, he went and tilted it entirely in the other direction.

It was a revelation of sorts. She’d never had any idea that Dan could be jealous. She’d always just thought of him as her friend. As a friend, she supposed she could meet him halfway, all things considered.

“I’m sorry, too. For the cookies, and for planning to
seduce you, and leave you high and dry. We’ve been friends too long. I should have just come and talked to you,” she said, truly regretful now that she had calmed down.

“Thank you.”

She blew out a sigh. “So I guess we just try to put this behind us? To pretend this never happened, to save our friendship?” she said, walking to the other side of the kitchen to get some distance.

Could she? Could she really forget last night?

“I guess I wasn’t clear,” Dan said, smiling ruefully. “You make things topsy-turvy. I look at you, and it’s hard to think straight.”

Her breath caught. Lots of men had said things to her like that, but none of them with the depth of emotion that Dan had. The way he was looking at her led her to believe he wasn’t interested in going back to being friends at all.

Uh-oh.

“What I meant to say,” he continued, “was that not only would it be impossible for us to forget what happened last night, but we
shouldn’t
forget it. How can we ever be with each other again without wanting more?”

Her heart sank. He was right.

“So I guess we have to keep our distance? Let things cool down, and over time, maybe we can make it work, if we try?” she suggested, her throat constricting at the idea of losing Dan at all, even short-term. She hated feeling so needy, but couldn’t seem to help it. It was
Dan.

He closed the space between them, taking her in his
arms and holding her close. “No, Jodie. What I mean is that we should do the exact opposite. We should be lovers. Exclusive lovers. Just you and me.”

D
AN WATCHED THE COLOR
drain from Jodie’s face and grabbed her shoulders, helping her to one of the kitchen chairs.

“Hey, are you okay?”

He hadn’t expected such a drastic reaction to his proposition. Maybe laughter or something along the lines of her telling him he was completely crazy, or another angry flare of temper, but he hadn’t expected her to look as though she would pass out.

“I’m fine,” she said, wiping a hand over her face. “I don’t…I think I misunderstood you.”

“You heard me exactly right. We should be together, Jodie. It’s…logical.”

Her eyes widened. “How is any of this logical?”

He started to pace back and forth, the way he always did when he was formulating an idea.

“Well, we’ve already been in a committed relationship for over a decade,” he posited, and when she tried to interrupt, he stopped her. “Just listen. Statistically our friendship has lasted longer than sixty-five percent of new marriages, which tend to dissolve within eight years,” he said.

“But we aren’t—”

“True, we aren’t married, but we have spent a lot of time together. We’ve seen each other at our best and worst, and we’ve always communicated extremely well. We’re there for each other, no matter what. On top of
that, we’ve been successful business partners. That’s even more impressive than beating the divorce statistics. Did you know that two out of three business partnerships fail within five years?”

She shook her head. “No I didn’t but—”

“Additionally, you can’t argue that our sexual compatibility is off the charts. Do you know the odds against the number of orgasms that you had—”

Jodie put up a hand. “No, I don’t, and I don’t think I want to. Listen, Dan, people can’t become lovers based on statistics.”

“Why not?”

She looked at him long and hard, as if trying to figure out whether he was serious.

“Well, because…they just don’t.”

“And maybe that’s why they fail. You and I have history, we have background, we have
friendship
…now we have more. It’s logical that our friendship would have developed into more over time. It’s probably why neither of us has been permanently attracted to anyone else.”

“That’s a stretch.”

“Maybe. But I hypothesize that we could be extremely happy and successful in a romantic relationship. We owe it to ourselves to try.”

“You’re forgetting a pretty big consideration, Dan.”

“What?”

“I don’t
want
a romantic relationship. I’ve lived my life without it, and no matter how many statistics you quote, I don’t want this,” she said quietly. “And you know me better than anyone. You know that’s true.”

Dan felt the words as a punch to the gut, but he
straightened, figuring that if she wouldn’t be convinced in one way, maybe he could convince her in another.

“You haven’t wanted it before, with anyone else, and I understand why. I know how you were hurt, Jodie, and I know—”

“You don’t know everything, even if you think you do.”

“I know enough. I also know you’re cutting love out of your life, and if you do that, it’s letting him win. Did you ever consider that? That living your life without love means he changed you forever? That you let him keep you from being happy in your life?”

She was so still Dan didn’t know what to think. They stood like that for several long minutes, no one saying anything. Had he gone too far?

“I guess that’s true,” she said, surprising him, but still not looking at him. “I never thought about it like that.”

“And?”

“I don’t know. I am who I am, you know? I don’t believe in love.”

“Maybe I can help you change that. People change their beliefs all the time. It’s the foundation of scientific thought, really, when you think about it.”

“Who am I to thwart the very foundations of scientific reason?” she said, and Dan had to smile. He knew he was wearing her down.

“Exactly.”

“I guess if I was ever going to risk any kind of permanent relationship, you would be the right choice? The logical choice?” She laughed, pushing a hand
through her hair. “I can’t believe I’m actually buying into this.”

“It will work, Jodie. You’ll see.”

“Listen, Dan, I know you mean well, but—”

“No buts. Let’s try this, Jodie. What do you have to lose? The sex between us is great, and we’re friends. Why not give it a shot?” he asked. “We can see if it works, and if it doesn’t, we’ll leave it behind, and just go back to being friends?”

Dan was building an escape hatch, and he was okay with that, since he had no intention of letting her use it. He knew they could never go back to being simply friends. Ever.

So this experiment had to work.

She stared at him intently, shaking her head, and he felt his heart take a dive, sure he had lost his chance to convince her.

“Okay then,” she said, dusting her hands on the side of her jeans. “You win. We can be friends with benefits for a while, but either of us can call time, and we just become friends again, right?”

“Yeah,” Dan said with a smile. He’d won. Jodie was his. He’d make sure this worked.

And he was going to start right now, he thought, crossing the kitchen and catching her up close for a deep kiss, old-movie style, dipping her down low. She laughed at first, but before long, they were on their way to the kitchen tile, breathless.

Until they were interrupted by the shrill ring of her cordless phone on the wall.

“Don’t answer, they’ll leave a message,” he said against her neck.

She was inclined to agree, as he had her both hot and bothered, but they froze as they heard Ginger’s panicked voice. Jodie jumped up and grabbed the phone, tugging her clothes back into place.

Dan watched her face clear, red patches staining her cheeks—anger. She pushed a hand through her bangs.

“Okay, I’m sorry, Ginger, I’ll be right there.” She hung up and walked past him, grabbing his hand. “C’mon, we have to go.”

“Where?”

“It’s the shop. Someone broke in and wrecked the place.”

“I
CAN’T BELIEVE THIS,
”
Jodie said in amazement, noting the destruction of the cases, the ruined baked goods on the floor, crushed.

Jason,
she thought immediately.

He’d said she hadn’t seen the last of him, but would a respected scientist really break into a business like a common thug? There had to be another explanation.

“We’ll be closed for two days, at least,” Ginger said dispiritedly. “The back is even worse. The orders were thrown and ripped, bags of flour and other ingredients dumped.”

“Insurance will cover the damage, but not the lost business,” Jodie said with a sigh, contemplating the slurs written in red spray paint across the glass display. It was clear disapproval of the sexy cookies she sold.

Dan hadn’t said a word, but had been out back while she and Ginger had surveyed the damage up front and talked with police. Jody hadn’t mentioned suspecting Jason, and tried to think through all the possibilities. There was no way the break-in was random.

“Hey, did you ever call that guy who stopped by and wanted to hook up with you?”

“No. He came in again, though, and I had to tell him no, in no uncertain terms. I can’t expose Anna to this right now. She has enough to deal with without me dating.”

Jodie nodded, patting Ginger’s shoulder. She wasn’t a mother, so she had no idea, and didn’t want to say more than she had.

“Do you think that could have ticked him off?”

Ginger’s eyes widened, but then she shook her head. “He didn’t even get upset. He just said if I ever changed my mind, to call, and that he’d still stop by if that was okay, to see me here. I didn’t want to encourage him, so I told him…oh crap. I told him customers are always welcome.”

“Ouch. That was a bit cold.”

Ginger’s back stiffened. “I didn’t want to encourage him.”

“I know, I know. I’m sorry. I guess I’m trying to think of who else would do this, and your new admirer is the only other one I thought of. He doesn’t seem the type, but you never can tell.”

“Other one? Who else are you thinking about?”

“Jason—he was pretty pissed the other day. I just find it hard to think a guy of his stature would do something this…low.”

“Then again, he might be smart enough to know that no one would suspect him, maybe.”

Jodie nodded. She hadn’t thought of it like that.

The police were done, and filed out the door. Now all
that was left was cleaning up the mess. Jodie closed the door as best she could behind them. A new lock would be installed before the end of the day, and she turned to hug Ginger tight.

“I think your idea about Jason could be right,” Dan said from the doorway, joining their conversation.

Jodie turned, a slight riff of some new emotion wafting through her as she made eye contact with him, even in the middle of this mess.

“Dan, I know you don’t like him, and I don’t, either, but would he really stoop to something like this? Why?”

“There’s only one good reason, especially since there was no money in the register and the safe is intact.”

Awareness dawned painfully. “He came after the icing recipe.”

“I’m afraid so.”

She looked around and rushed to the back refrigerators. “All of the premixed icing I had made is gone, as well. None of the canisters are here. They’re all gone.”

“He’d need that to run tests, to back up the formula,” Dan said.

“But isn’t it patented or something? What can he do?” Ginger asked.

“He could share it on the Internet or do any number of things to ruin our sales. People wouldn’t be able to get hold of the ingredients, but commercial manufacturers could, and then they just tweak something, call it something different, and there you have it,” Dan said, wiping flour from the front of the designer shirt he’d
been wearing all morning—the same one he’d come to her apartment in the night before.

“Or he could sell it, or who knows what else. But why wreck the rest of the place?” Ginger asked.

“To make it look like thugs did it. We can’t prove he stole it. We can’t prove it’s him, unless we can catch him with the icing, but Jason is too clever to allow that to happen. But I know it in my gut,” Dan said angrily. “And he’s going to pay, one way or the other.”

There it was again, Jodie thought, that little riff of excitement as she watched Dan’s jaw square and his eyes darken. Kind of like when he was having an orgasm….

I am a sick, sick woman getting turned on in the middle of this chaos,
she thought with a sigh. But now that the barn door was open, so to speak, on her and Dan having a friends-with-benefits relationship, she wanted him even more than she had before. And she was only now willing to be really honest with herself about how long she had been fantasizing about sleeping with Dan.

And she was happy a million times over that she hadn’t done the deed with Jason Kravitz. What a monumental mistake that would have been. Jason had obviously been a stand-in for Dan, anyway, and the original was always better than a facsimile, she mused, and then turned her attention to the problem at hand.

“We can’t know for sure who it was, unless the cops turn up a usable print, or some other kind of evidence,” she said. “But Jason has an ego the size of King Kong. He’s going to want us to know he did it, and he’ll enjoy
the fact that we can’t do a thing about it without any evidence. He’d get such joy out of thinking he’d outsmarted us.”

Dan met her eyes over the top of the case and nodded.

“Well, he’s in for a surprise, then. When he makes his next move, we’ll figure out how to beat him at his own game.”

“And until then, we have massive cleaning and baking to do,” Ginger said with a sigh. “I’ll call Mom and see if Anna can stay overnight.”

Jodie nodded, waving Dan off. “You don’t have to stay, Dan. I know you probably have more important stuff to do.”

He looked surprised. “Nothing is more important than being here with you right now. I want to help,” he said plainly, his eyes and tone speaking volumes. Jodie couldn’t help but be touched.

Ginger cleared her throat awkwardly. “Okay then. I think I’ll start working out back so that we can get some baking done as soon as possible. Not that things aren’t already pretty warm around here,” she added with a chuckle as she left them alone.

Jodie and Dan smiled at each other. They’d figure it out, she knew. Together, like they always had.

T
WO DAYS LATER THEY
were open for business while a contractor finished replacing some of the casing glass that had been wrecked by their intruder. Life was almost normal again. There had been no word from Jason, and Dan had said he wasn’t around the offices at all. They
could simply speculate he was holed up somewhere, trying to decipher the frosting formula.

Every time Jodie thought of it, she wanted to strangle Jason Kravitz. But as time passed, she wondered if they didn’t have it wrong? Maybe it was a random break-in? Her cookies were well advertised. Maybe it wasn’t Jason. More likely some puritanical freak who didn’t approve of her Passionate Hearts cookies or their side effects had finally decided to cause her some trouble.

They did live in a large city, and there was crime. Dan was still sure Jason was to blame, but Jodie wondered if that wasn’t just a reaction to the fact that she and Jason had almost hooked up.

That was now in the past. They were exhausted but couldn’t seem to keep their hands off each other. She’d almost been late for work again this morning, and Dan for a meeting, as well.

“So, you and Dan are an item now, huh?” Ginger inquired casually, though with a sparkle in her eye. “I always thought you two had some chemistry between you. And it’s nice that you’re friends. Friendship is a great thing to build a future on,” she added, wiping down the counter as Jodie finished boxing up an order for delivery.

“Future? Don’t go there, my friend. Dan and I have agreed we’re just friends, and that’s all we’ll ever be. Friends with benefits maybe, but that’s all. So you can keep that romantic imagination of yours in check.”

“Really, Jodie? I thought you were the expert on men. Don’t you see how he looks at you?” Ginger stopped working, obviously surprised. “The man is besotted.
And for what it’s worth, you look at him exactly the same way.”

Jodie pushed down irritation, or was it another emotion altogether? Fear? Apprehension?

“You have it wrong, Ginger. Believe me, Dan and I do care about each other. We have for years, and so we already have a relationship. We’re giving in to this fantasy, this chemistry, but it will wear off. Trust me, it always does.”

“Sure, after you’ve been married for years. And then it turns into something better.”

“There’s no need to get nasty and start using the
M
word,” Jodie said with a frown.

The conversation was abbreviated when the bell over the door rang. The laughter and goofing around stopped when Jodie saw the man walk in and Ginger’s color fading.

“Ginger, are you okay?” Jodie asked quietly as the man hovered by the door for a moment, then advanced.

“Hi, Scott. What are you doing here?” she said, both in response to Jodie’s question, and to the man who now stood uncomfortably before the counter. Jodie went to her side, straightening her spine and set her hands on her hips, eying Ginger’s ex.

So this was Scott. Tall, lanky, raven-haired with a pale complexion and poetic features that were too soft for Jodie’s liking. His little girl looked just like him. What a difficult reminder for Ginger, Jodie realized.

How did she do it? Jodie had completely repressed that she had her own father’s eyes, his coloring. She
couldn’t look in the mirror every day if she thought that.

Jodie’s impulse to protect her friend was fierce, coming from some unknown emotional well, certainly from her past with her father.

“I need to talk to you, Ginger, and since you haven’t answered my calls the last few days, I had no choice but to try to catch you here,” he said.

“I’ve been busy,” Ginger said tightly.

“If you’re not here as a customer, you should probably leave,” Jodie said. She eyed the man coolly but felt Ginger’s hand on her arm.

“I can deal with it, Jodie. Do you mind if I take ten minutes?”

“Take as long as you need,” Jodie said, nodding. “I’ll be right out back.”

“I won’t be long, but thanks,” Ginger said with a tense smile.

Jodie made herself scarce, but barely, hovering by the corner of the kitchen since there were no customers out front to give her an excuse to be at the counter, where it was easier to eavesdrop.

As it was, she couldn’t hear anything and her thoughts wandered back over their conversation about Dan. Were they getting into something too deep? Was she fooling herself?

She and Dan, for as long as they’d been friends, moved in completely different circles. If it hadn’t been for college, their paths never would have crossed.

Jodie wondered how well their lifestyles would mesh now and an idea formed in the back of her mind, but
she was distracted by the ring of the bell again as Scott left.

Ginger stood planted in place, looking shell-shocked, her hand at her lips. Jodie couldn’t stand it and walked out.

“What did he want? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m okay, I guess,” she said vaguely, walking back to where Jodie was, picking up a white towel, but just standing still and looking out the door where her ex had just left.

“Ginger, what is it?”

“He…he wants to get back together. To try again.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“That’s what I said. I figure he’s just going through another one of his stages. Maybe he has nothing better to do, so he figured he’d try the family thing again. But he said he got a job, and he wants to be back with me and Anna, permanently. He wants us to give him another chance, and it’s all up to me.”

Jodie huffed, outraged on her friend’s behalf. “Nice, putting that kind of pressure on you. Of course, you can’t consider it,” Jodie said.

Ginger shook her head, seeming uncertain. “I didn’t think so, but I don’t know. I just don’t know. I should probably give it some consideration, don’t you think?”

Jodie’s eyes went wide. “Are
you
crazy? Why set yourself up again with a guy like that? He’s already shown his stripes.”

“I know. But what if he stays?” Ginger’s eyes filled. “What if he means it? What if we could be a family?”

“Ginger, that’s not likely to happen and you have to
make your own decision, but in my experience, people don’t change that drastically,” she said, sounding harsher than she meant to. She remembered all the times her father had promised her mother he’d change. He’d gone to anger management, he’d read some books, and still he took out every bad mood and every nasty thought that ran through his head on his wife and daughter.

Jodie took a deep breath, keeping in mind that she should try to remain objective, for Ginger’s sake. “Maybe you can tell him you’ll consider it after he’s here for a year, and then you could make a decision, but I sure wouldn’t just open the door and let him walk right back in.”

Ginger sighed. “That makes sense. We could wait and see if he sticks around before making any kind of definite plans. Thanks, Jodie. You always seem to know what to do,” she said.

Jodie wished she could say it made her feel better that at least Ginger wasn’t throwing the door open to her ex, but the whole situation made her feel grumpy and irritable, and she had the sudden need to escape for a while.

“Ginger, while it’s slow, do you feel okay being alone here if I pop out for a while? I have a few errands to run.”

“No, go ahead. I don’t have to be at the hospital today, so take as long as you need.”

“I’ll be back in a few hours,” she promised, taking her apron off and dashing for the back door. She just had the most intense craving to see Dan, even though they’d
parted company only four hours earlier. That worried her, but not enough to stay away.

D
AN WAS DEEP
in reading files for a colleague’s promotion to tenure, and normally when he worked so intently, he wouldn’t notice if the building had dropped down around him. But this time, he’d been distracted, looking at the clock, at his watch, losing his train of thought. Jodie kept popping into his mind, the night they’d shared…how his keenly honed intellect wasn’t quite keeping control over his rampant emotions.