Nordic Heroes: In the Market and a Wholesale Arrangement (2 page)

Rainer lifted an eyebrow. “Are we talking deceptive packaging here—as in volcanic possibilities?”

The salesman stirred uncomfortably. “Like I said, only when pushed. Then she’s Mount St. Helens in action. I’ve seen them both go off.” He shuddered. “Don’t want to see either do it again.”

Rainer studied the woman with renewed interest. “Must have been a beautiful sight.”

“Beautiful from a nice safe distance,” Marco corrected him. “Not so beautiful when you’re standing in the path of the explosion.”

“That doesn’t sound like you.” Rainer frowned. “Where’s that famous spirit of adventure I’ve heard so much about?”

“With my fiftieth birthday, that’s where. Both of which are a good ten years past.” Marco shoved his pencil behind one ear and tucked his order pad into his pocket. “In all the years she’s come here to buy produce, she’s always kept herself to herself. So why do you have to pick on her? Why can’t you go after someone else—someplace else?”

Rainer continued to study Jordan. She stood by a carton of grapes, sampling them before giving a nod of approval. He liked the look of her, the suppleness of her movements. Trim, sleek, and graceful—what wasn’t to admire? Under normal circumstances, he’d be tempted to warm himself in the fire Marco mentioned. But business came first, pleasure . . . dead second.

“If there was any other way, believe me, I’d take it. Unfortunately that miniature volcano stands between me and something I want. Something I want very much. And once I get her figured out, I’m going to ease her to one side and take it.”

“Yeah?” Marco chuckled. “You’d have better luck easing aside a pallet full of spuds without a forklift. But it might be interesting to see you try.”

“Then stand back and get an eyeful.” Rainer rubbed his hands briskly. “Just make sure Ms. Roberts knows who has her bananas. I’ll be curious to see how she reacts.”

“I already told you how she’ll react.” Marco made the sound of a bomb exploding. “Thar she blows!”

H
e was staring at her again, Jordan could feel it. The prickles of reaction started, creating an uncomfortable itch square between her shoulder blades. All morning long he’d watched her and all morning long she’d pretended not to notice.

Until now.

Now she planned to do something about him. She slid her hand truck beneath the heavy cardboard boxes of apples on the dock. Angling the stack backward, her arms took the weight of the unwieldy load with ease. She gave the cart an experienced shove and pushed the load over the metal ramp and onto her twelve-foot flatbed, depositing the apples close to the truck’s bright green cab.

Her watcher had the advantage of knowing her identity, or at least where she worked. Both her truck doors read Cornucopia Produce Market, the words emblazoned in letters as rosy as the apples she’d just purchased. Now, if she could only figure out his identity. So far she’d been unable to catch a glimpse of him. One way or another, she’d change that.

She swiveled and tossed her long dark braid over her shoulder. Leaning her arms across the handles of the upright cart, she casually scanned the groups of men standing on the cluttered loading dock.

Squinting against the early July sunshine, her gaze instantly zeroed in on him. “Lord help me!” she muttered beneath her breath. If he’d carried a giant hammer in one hand and had lightning bolts flashing from his eyes, she couldn’t have been more surprised—or dismayed. A Viking! The man staring with such unswerving intensity was a living, breathing Viking. She froze, unable to look away.

He looked around thirty, tall and broad-shouldered, with an impressive physique. The sun glinted in the bright white-blond of his hair, which he wore short, no doubt to control the thick, stubborn wave. He stood unmoving, openly studying her, his legs spread wide and his arms folded across his large chest. His immobility didn’t fool her. At any moment she expected him to let out a thunderous war cry and come charging her way.

Jordan shivered. She didn’t like the sensations he stirred in her. She felt as if someone had hit an internal panic button, and it took every ounce of her self-control to keep the rush of apprehension from showing.

How could she have overlooked this man for most of the morning? It unnerved her to think she’d been so aware of him, while he’d proved so elusive to spot. More importantly, why had he singled her out? What did he want?

She forced herself to look away, debating how to handle the situation—if there really was anything to handle. Perhaps she should discover his identity before she took action. With a decisive shove, she pushed the cart off the truck and toward the salesman writing up her order.

“Who’s the Viking, Terry?” she asked quietly.

The salesman didn’t even bother looking up. “What Viking?”

She frowned. “The big blond guy. The one who looks like he just stepped out of some Norse legend.”

“Oh, yeah. Right. That guy.” Terry cleared his throat. “Been wondering the same thing myself. I think he’s some high roller Marco brought by to meet the boss.”

“Well, your high roller’s been staring at me.”

The salesman chuckled, relaxing. “Him and everyone else on the docks. Face it. You’re surrounded by a hoard of lusting animals—also known as men. So what’s one more? You should be used to the looks by now.”

Jordan rested a foot on a cumbersome carton of lettuce and bit her lip thoughtfully. “It’s not that kind of staring. He wants something.”

“Tell him to get in line. He’s got a long wait.” Terry paused in his scribbling and yanked a list from his back pocket, running a gloved finger down it. He stabbed his pencil toward the flats of mushrooms she’d selected. “Those kabobs have gone up another buck, Roberts. Forgot to mention it.”

Jordan pushed her unease to one side and concentrated on the job at hand. If the prickles on the back of her neck were anything to go by, the newcomer hadn’t budged an inch. She had plenty of time to sort him out once she’d taken care of business.

“Since you forgot to mention the cost went up, you’ll have to sell them to me at the old price,” Jordan insisted, bartering in the expected manner. “They’re not worth a dollar more. Look at the poor things.” She selected a mushroom, upending it so he could see where the stem joined the cap. “They’ve already started to open. And the color—you call this white?”

“Okay. Okay. Old price.” He shook his head in disgust. “Boss will fire me for sure over this one.”

Jordan smiled at his typical response. “Right. Sure he will. When pigs fly.” Nick Constantine would never fire Terry, not when he was the best salesman and haggler on the docks.

She swiftly scanned the long line of stacked boxes left to be loaded, comparing it to the receipt. Oranges vied with kiwi, cucumbers with green peppers, the staggering number of fresh sharp odors a source of unending delight.

She checked the order again, her smile fading to a frown. “Wait a minute, Terry. I don’t see the bananas. What’s happened to them?”

“What bananas?”

She shot him a sharp look. “Don’t hand me that. The super deal on the overripes. You were all over me about them when I first walked in.”

“Oh. Those bananas.”

“Yeah. Those bananas.”

He yanked the brim of his cap low over his eyes, ruddy color creeping along his jawline. “You see, they . . . ah . . . sort of got sold.”

“Sort of got sold?” she snapped. “Sort of—”

Jordan bit off the rest of her sentence, checking her anger. Ranting and raving wouldn’t help her case. It was difficult enough working in a male-dominated business without getting a reputation as a shrew. She’d worked too long and hard to risk losing ground now. Fast thinking and finding the right angle had won many a battle for her—as they would today.

Jordan spoke again, her voice low and even. “The bananas were sold? As in, sold out from under me? I arrived at five-thirty, Terry, which gave me first refusal. You’ll remember I didn’t do any refusing.”

“I remember,” Terry agreed, looking everywhere but at her. “How about if next time I—”

She shook her head, not allowing him to finish his offer. “Not next time, Terry. Distress sales are jam on bread in this business. You know that. That’s why I come so early. How am I supposed to make a decent living if I can’t get my hands on the deals? The competition’s death out there.”

“Maybe I could squeeze you out a box or two.”

“I’m sorry, Terry. A box or two won’t do, and I can’t afford to shrug this one off.” She couldn’t afford to shrug any of them off. Not if she hoped to get her fair share of the bargains.

Terry nodded miserably. “Yeah, I know.” He kicked aside the small pile of rotting orange peels and discarded lettuce leaves strewn at his feet that had yet to be swept up. “Give me a few minutes. I—I’ll get them back for you.”

In all the years she’d dealt with him, she’d never seen Terry so nervous. There shouldn’t be such difficulty in sorting out a simple misunderstanding. Jordan frowned.

She’d obviously missed something and she had a pretty good idea what—or who—that something might be.

“Who has my bananas?” she asked.

Terry gave a slight shrug. “Does it matter? I said I’d get them for you.”

“Who?”
she repeated.

The salesman glanced quickly over her shoulder, speaking in a low rushed voice. “You don’t want to start anything, Jordan. Not with that particular customer. You’d be better off just letting it go.”

“He has them?”

Terry nodded. “Every last one. Why don’t I speak to Marco? I’m sure he’ll straighten everything out.”

Jordan thought quickly, then shook her head. “No. Don’t bother. I told you our
friend
was after something. And I very much doubt it’s a pallet load of bananas. This is as good a time as any to find out what he really wants.”

“You think he did it so he could meet you?” Terry brightened, the idea clearly appealing to him. “Now why didn’t I think of that? Imagine, stealing your bananas just to get your attention. You’ve got to admit it’s a novel approach.”

“Yes, imagine resorting to theft,” Jordan mocked dryly, “when all he had to do was walk over and introduce himself.”

Despite Terry’s romantic view of the incident, Jordan suspected the lifting of her bananas had nothing whatsoever to do with romance, or even bananas. The man wanted to instigate a meeting and this was his clever way of going about it. It also forced her to approach him—giving him the advantage. Shrewd, very shrewd.

Jordan appraised the situation. As far as she could tell, she had two choices. She could stand up to him and demand the return of her bananas, or she could shrug it off and walk away. She struggled with her conscience, resisting the part of her urging a hasty retreat. Why for once couldn’t she simply turn tail and run? Dogs did it all the time. She liked dogs. They were insightful, intelligent creatures.

Of course, a dog didn’t have the responsibility of a business. If she didn’t keep Cornucopia a successful money-making operation, no one else would. She suspected if Terry’s high roller didn’t succeed in forcing a confrontation this time, he’d dream up another scheme tomorrow. Better to find out what he wanted now and end it.

If only she didn’t have this overwhelming urge to roll over and play dead.

She handed Terry his receipt book. “Write up the bananas. I’ll be back in a minute. Probably headless, but I’ll be back—and with the bananas.”

The distance to traverse never looked so long. Jordan blew out a slow breath. No matter how appealing the idea of doing nothing, she couldn’t stand around all day like a coward. She gazed at her adversary, refusing to be intimidated. It was now or never. Head high, she crossed the cement loading dock. Perhaps it was sheer imagination, but it seemed as though every last man jack at the market stopped working to watch.

Stay calm. Maybe there’s a logical explanation for what the banana snatcher has done.

Or maybe she’d found a modern-day Viking with plunder and pillage bred into his blood and bones.

She skirted a pile of ice chips, a container of green onions, and an unhappy-looking Marco. She stopped directly in front of the stranger.

He dwarfed her with his impressive size, not that his height bothered her. Working on the docks for so long, she’d learned to handle the occasional disparity her five foot five frame caused. It was the rest of him that proved so disturbing.

His chiseled face, tanned a deep golden brown, sported a squared-off jawline, a determined chin creased by a slight cleft and high, prominent cheekbones. Thick blond brows, several shades darker than his hair, set off the pale ice-blue of his deep-set eyes—eyes, she fancifully imagined, filled with the aggressive spirit of his ancestors.

A bright glitter caught her attention and she glanced at his left ear, astonished and intrigued by the tiny gold lightning bolt earring he wore. The symbol of Thor, she realized with a momentary qualm. A Viking in fact, as well as in appearance.

Her gaze skittered lower. She took in the broad well-muscled shoulders and chest, the lean waist and hips, and finally the thick powerful thighs encased in form-fitting jeans. She swallowed and her gaze flew back to his face. It took every ounce of self-possession to meet those cool mocking eyes with anything approaching equanimity. She braced herself for a similar visual examination, an examination that never came.