Next To Nothing!
Next To Nothing!
Barbara Dunlop
Jenna McBride is making a new start: a new city and a new business with a shot at the big time. She and her best friend–and interior decorating partner–jump at the chance to refurbish a venerable Seattle hotel. For a hands-on approach, Jenna is assigned a suite for a week's stay…it'll also give her an opportunity to ditch all the private investigators hired by her ex to spy on her!Tyler Reeves may be a blue blood, but he's the black sheep in his family–making a living the hard way as a P.I., instead of opting for corporate finance. Now he has no choice but to accept a case he normally wouldn't–tailing some guy's fiancée. Easy enough. Until Tyler meets Jenna and falls for the sexy siren in a flash. It looks as if his undercover work will take on a whole new meaning–who will be the first left wearing next to nothing!
Nobody said no to body language like that
Tyler also knew that nobody said no to a woman who looked and smelled, sounded and felt like Jenna.
He needed to stop this. He needed to let her down easy. She was the subject of his investigation, for goodness sakes.
“Tyler?” she breathed. She closed her eyes and leaned into him.
He clenched his hands into fists, trying to get the right words, the right phrases to form in his mind. But they didn’t. There was no way out of this without kissing her. Just a taste, he promised himself.
Aw, hell. Tyler gently pressed his lips against hers, but promised he wouldn’t pucker.
Jenna wound her arms around him, her soft body cradling his tightly.
A roar started in his ears and quickly overwhelmed his brain. Forget puckering, his lips parted. She tasted of sweet wine and summer sunshine.
Damn.
Dear Reader,
I love a hero with a secret. I particularly love a hero who has to choose between his secret and his principles. Add to that a sexy heroine who tempts him to compromise both, and you’ve got Tyler Reeves, private investigator, a man going quietly insane while he watches the one woman in the world he can’t possibly touch.
Growing up in Vancouver, Canada, I often drove with my family across the border to visit Seattle. With its towering hotels, exciting shopping and extraordinarily beautiful scenery, it remains one of my favorite cities. The last time I visited, my good friend Jane Porter drove me along the winding lakeshore roads to view the magnificent homes set between cedar forests and the rocky shore. This laid-back luxury was the inspiration for the Quayside hotel, the fictional setting for Next to Nothing!
I had a great time writing this story. I hope you enjoy the atmosphere of the West Coast.
Best wishes,
Barbara Dunlop
Books by Barbara Dunlop
HARLEQUIN TEMPTATION
848—FOREVER JAKE
HARLEQUIN DUETS
54B—THE MOUNTIE STEALS A WIFE
Next to Nothing!
Barbara Dunlop
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
For my editor, Kathryn Lye.
Thank you for your advice and encouragement,
and most of all for your unfailing patience.
Contents
Chapter 1 (#u4ff7ade4-906e-51e5-88bf-de1f97a56d87)
Chapter 2 (#u0514dbbd-1be6-526c-9846-9d23985c2a8a)
Chapter 3 (#u75d4a944-2c33-5acc-86ff-f63da251fbd5)
Chapter 4 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
1
“HE STILL OUT THERE?” Jenna McBride watched as her business partner, Candice Hammond, crossed in front of the waterfall fountain in the hospital’s new atrium lobby.
“Short guy?” asked Candice, her high heels clicking on the freshly finished sienna tile floor. “Balding. Doesn’t know polyester is dead?” She spoke loudly enough to be heard above the rushing water.
“That’s him.” Jenna snapped her pencil into the clasp at the top of her Canna Interiors clipboard. The closed-for-construction lobby was nearly empty now that most of the workers had left for the day. “Where on earth did Brandon find that guy?”
Jenna’s partner in Canna Interiors arched her perfect eyebrows, her dark lips curving up in a half smile that revealed the dimple in her left cheek. “One-nine-hundred aging gumshoe?”
Jenna shook her head and raked her auburn, shoulder-length hair back from her forehead. She was hot from working all day, and a fine sheen of sweat dampened her hairline.
“I can’t believe he’s still trying.” She’d finally broken off her engagement to Brandon four months ago. Then she’d moved from Boston to Seattle to put some distance between them.
“You always did live in denial,” said Candice as she settled on the bench facing the fountain, crossing one stocking-clad leg over the other. “Ol’ Brandon’s like the Energizer Bunny.”
“Not in bed,” scoffed Jenna, surprising herself with the moment of pithy honesty.
Candice’s eyes lit up with newfound admiration and humor. She sat slightly forward. “You’ve come a long way, baby.”
“Because I no longer think the sun rises and sets on Brandon Rice?” Jenna took a seat at the opposite end of the bench, curling one denim-covered calf beneath the opposite leg and setting her clipboard down next to her purse.
It was embarrassing to realize she’d been taken in so easily, and for such a long time. Naive and gullible. Book smart and life stupid. That was Jenna.
“Because you can finally admit he was a loser in bed,” said Candice, gazing at the water as it foamed against the natural rocks and sculpted mortar. Her short, chic hair curled against the collar of her jacket.
“It was kind of hard to tell in the thick of things,” said Jenna. She eased off her loafers, wiggling her toes.
The high ceiling fans sent a light breeze wafting down, but the mid-June sunshine had warmed the atrium.
Candice fought a smirk.
“It’s not like I’d done any comparison shopping,” Jenna added. “I was barely twenty-two when we met.”
She was twenty-six now. And, thanks to Candice, she had a second chance on life. A chance that didn’t include becoming Mrs. Brandon Rice—properly behaved trophy wife. Or was that properly behaved lap dog? Hard to know for sure.
“You don’t need vast personal experience to know three minutes is pathetic,” said Candice, giving her head a shake and rattling her silver earrings. “You just need the public library.” She cocked her head, contemplating the newly finished fountain. “You think the whale is too much?”
“The whale is perfect,” said Jenna, turning her attention to the brightly painted stone sculpture spouting beneath the waterfall, which was surrounded by tropical plants.
Forget uptight, three-minute Brandon, the kids were going to love that whale. The hospital board had asked for something with child-appeal when they’d given Canna Interiors the contract to decorate the pediatric lobby. Other than that, Candice and Jenna had been given a pretty free hand in the conceptual designs.
Jenna was proud of the results.
A collection of jumbo African animals adorned one corner. They were made of durable acrylic, and perfectly suited to climbing. Comfortable furniture groupings and lush plants dotted the high, glass-ceilinged room, and the carpet was a maze of brightly colored pathways twisting among cute, brown monkeys.
A week, maybe two at the most, and it would be ready to open. They were on time and on budget. And, on the strength of this project’s success, they’d been invited to submit designs to the public library.
A design invitation wasn’t a guarantee, but Jenna was finally beginning to feel optimistic about the future. After Candice had helped her see Brandon for the control freak he was, they’d moved clear across the country and pumped their life savings into a new interior design firm.
Though Jenna’s financial contribution was much lower than her friend’s, Candice had insisted they become equal partners. Jenna was determined to work day and night to prove her friend’s faith was justified.
“Why don’t you call him?” asked Candice, turning to peer enigmatically at Jenna.
“Call Brandon?” Jenna tucked her loose hair behind her ear, fingering the small gold stud in her lobe.
She hadn’t spoken to her ex-fiancé since she’d left him. In fact, it was Candice who’d insisted she break all ties. They’d burned all his letters, kept their apartment phone number unlisted and screened calls at the office.
“You want me to call Brandon?” Jenna repeated, having trouble with her friend’s about-face.
“Yes. I do.” Candice sat up straighter. “Maybe I was wrong.”
“You? Wrong?”
“I know.” Candice waved a hand in the air. “It’s hard to believe. But, maybe you should tell him once and for all that it’s over.”
“I told him it was over when I left,” said Jenna, reaching for the pencil in her clipboard, releasing it from the spring and tapping the eraser against the top page. She really had no desire to speak to Brandon again.
“You were upset then, hurt, confused. He probably thought you’d calm down and come to your senses.”
“I did come to my senses. That’s why I left him.”
“Apparently Brandon needs a bit more convincing.”
Jenna palmed the pencil and stood up. “You know, the minute I call him, he’s going to try to talk me into coming back.”
Candice folded her manicured fingers together on her knee, tipping her chin in Jenna’s direction. “Would you?” she asked calmly.
“No! Definitely not.” Not a chance in a million. Jenna absolutely did not want to live the rest of her life in a gilded cage, letting Brandon choose her clothes, her jewelry, her hair color. She’d had a taste of freedom, and she loved it.
“Well, as long as you keep hiding from him—”
“I am not hiding. You’re the one who—”
“He’ll convince himself you still have feelings for him,” Candice finished.
“There are no feelings. Period.” As she spoke the words, Jenna realized just how true they were. There was nothing. No hatred, no anger, no fear.
Flat line.
She hadn’t been intimidated by him, maybe overawed. Brandon had been a strong-minded, confident, charismatic guest lecturer at Boston University. While Jenna had been an impressionable undergraduate, fresh from a Minnesota farm community. It was pretty easy for him to convince her that he knew best—in all things.
But those feelings were gone now. Jenna took a deep breath, inhaling the light fountain mist and the scent of the pepper trees. She was free.
Sure she’d call Brandon. There was no reason not to anymore.
“Think about it, Jenna.” Candice interrupted her thoughts. “Call him and let him know that malleable young woman doesn’t exist anymore. Then he’ll back off and call off his troops.”
“You’re right,” said Jenna with conviction. Candice always did give the best advice.
“I am?” Candice looked surprised by Jenna’s easy agreement.
“You bet. He needs to know it’s over. He needs to leave me alone. We can’t have rent-a-Dick-Tracy hanging around the hospital halls scaring the children.”
Candice grinned as she stood up and flipped a concealed switch to turn off the waterfall. “Go get ’im, Jenna.” The whirring motor stopped, and the water dripped to a halt against the huge lava rocks, plunking to silence in the cavernous room.
Jenna nodded decisively, retrieving her tiny cell phone from the depths of her big purse. It was a serious purse, not one of those elegant little evening bags that Brandon bought her. They barely held a comb.
Using the end of the pencil, she dialed quickly.
Hopefully, someday soon, she’d forget his private number and free up the brain space for something useful. She lifted the phone to her ear, and Candice gave her an encouraging grin.
Brandon picked up on the first ring.
Little wonder. The only people who knew this number were his mother, a few captains of industry, some dubious politicians and Jenna.
“Rice here,” he said in that unnaturally low tone that he thought made him sound three inches taller.
“It’s Jenna,” she said, voice crisp and impersonal.
“Jenna!” His voice brightened and rose an octave.
“Finally. Where are you sweetheart?” He sounded so happy, so satisfied, so smug.
“You know darn well where I am. Your hired goon is standing outside my job-site.”
Candice gave her a thumbs-up.
“Goon? What goon? You’re talking nonsense.” His low voice was back. He was displeased. Good.
He was on the other side of the country. He could be as displeased as he wanted, and it wouldn’t affect her.
“Call him off, Brandon.”
“Jenna,” he sighed, and his tone turned patronizing. “Let’s not start this out by arguing.”
“I’m not arguing. I’m stating a fact.”
“You need to calm down and listen, Jenny-Penny.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“I don’t know what Candice told you—”
“This isn’t about what Candice did or did not tell me.”
“I always knew she was a bad influence.”
Jenna’s voice rose, and she paced in a little half circle on the cool floor. “Give me some credit, Brandon. I can make up my own mind. I can make my own choices—”
“Is it about the surgery?”
“Yes!” She spun back to face Candice. The plastic surgery, and so much more.
“It’s already cancelled.”
“You bet your life it’s cancelled. So are my hair appointments and my spa membership. You might want me to have a perfect nose and sculpted abs, but that doesn’t mean I—”
Candice’s eyes went wide. She made a frantic calm down motion with her hand.
Jenna paused for a breath, raking her hand once more through her hair. Her auburn hair—a little bright, a little gaudy, but her own natural color.
“Jenna, honey, you just had to say so.”
Yeah. Right. Jenna scoffed silently and shook her head. Like her opinion about her body or anything else had ever counted.
“Brandon,” she began again, calmer this time. Resolute. “I am not the right person for you. And you are not the right person for me. Can we please leave it at that?”
Candice nodded, admiration in her eyes.
“So, that’s it?” asked Brandon, voice hardening. “You finally call and it’s to break up?”
“We broke up four months ago.”
“You had a tantrum four months ago.”
Jenna clenched her jaw. She would not rise to the bait. She was calm, in control. “Call it whatever you like. We’re through.”
“So, you think that’s it? You expect me to tell my colleagues that my little fiancée up and left me? Pawn the ring? Eat the ballroom deposit?”
“You can tell your colleagues any damn thing you want.” Jenna pressed two fingers tight against her forehead. She wondered how he’d explained her absence for the past four months. But she sure wasn’t going to ask him.
Brandon snorted derisively into the phone. He hated it when she swore. It wasn’t ladylike.
“And call off the damn P.I.,” she added for good measure.
The phone cracked as Brandon hung up, and she jerked it away from her ear.
Candice flinched, and they stared at each other in silence for a moment.
“Shall we take that as a yes?” asked Candice.
“I’m assuming so.” A sheepish grin pulled up the corners of Jenna’s mouth. Gosh, that had felt good.
“SAY IT ISN’T SO.” Tyler Reeve’s older brother Derek filled the doorway of his office. Derek’s chin was tipped up, and his arms were folded across his broad chest.
Tyler swore under his breath, following Derek’s gaze to the duffel and the damning sleeping bag, which he’d carelessly dropped on the couch an hour ago. “It isn’t so,” he deadpanned, turning his attention back to his computer monitor.
“Striker said things were bad, but jeez…” Derek took a step into Tyler’s outer office and kicked the door shut behind him.
“Striker should mind his own business,” said Tyler, referring to the middle Reeves brother. He punched in the password to his personal bank account on the receptionist’s computer, hoping to see that the lawyer’s escrow deposit had added a few zeros to his balance.
“At least come out and stay in the guest house,” said Derek.
“No thanks.”
“This is stubborn even for you.”
“I got myself into this mess. I’ll get myself out.” The deposit hadn’t cleared. Tyler closed his eyes for a second.
He needed that money. Needed it today. He’d already cleaned out his savings account.
He’d taken a chance in writing Mrs. Cliff a check last night for her car, but it was either that or admit to the whole world that the IPS Detective Agency was broke—admit to the world that he’d been stupid enough to trust a partner who’d defrauded the company along with several of their clients.
Tyler would just as soon get shot.
Again.
In a place far more painful than his shoulder.
“Why does ‘getting yourself out of this mess’ have to involve eating cheap takeout food and sleeping on a short couch?” Derek crossed the room and picked up the corner of Tyler’s old Boy Scout sleeping bag.
“Because I sold the beach house.” Giving up on the bank balance for now, Tyler pushed back the chair and stood up. He preferred to look Derek in the eye for this conversation.
Derek might be six foot two, but Tyler had caught up to him on his eighteenth birthday, and even managed to beat him by half an inch. Not that it mattered. He was now and always would be the little brother.
And linebacker Derek could still take him out without even breaking a sweat.
“Because you were too stubborn to ask the family for help,” corrected Derek.
“A thirty-year-old man does not go running to his daddy for help just because his business hits a little snag.”
“A little snag?” Derek’s voice was incredulous.
“A little snag,” Tyler echoed.
“Your partner skipped with your clients’ money.”
Tyler gritted his teeth. “I’m handling it.”
“I can accept that you didn’t want to go to Dad. But why didn’t you come to me or Striker?”
Tyler folded his arms across his chest, imitating his brother’s pose. “I needed money, Derek. And I needed it fast.”
It had been forty-eight hours since he discovered Reggie’s duplicity, but saying it out loud still stung. Tyler had to squelch an urge to bash his fist into the nearest wall. It was an urge he’d been battling for two days.
“How much did you sell it for?” asked Derrick.
Tyler named a sum that made Derrick’s eyes widen.
“That’s it? You practically gave the beach house away.”
“They offered cash.”
“I would’ve bought it for that.”
“And I’d still have a place to live?”
“Exactly.”
“I’m not a charity case.”
Derek’s booming voice rose. “Jeez, Tyler, lightning won’t strike you dead if you borrow a little family money.”
“You know as well as I do that once Dad gets his hooks in me, I’ll be his for life.”
“Like me, you mean.”
“No. Not like you. You genuinely want to stare at balance sheets and stock portfolios all day long. Though how you’ve managed to stay sane this long is beyond me.”
Derek was the golden boy, the heir apparent to Reeves-DuCarter International, the pride and joy of three generations. Meanwhile, Tyler was the black sheep.
Derek shook his head. “You never did understand—”
“I understand perfectly. I’m thirty years old. This private eye thing isn’t just a phase. It’s my vocation, my dream, my calling.”
“Doin’ real well for you so far,” Derek snorted.
Tyler winced. “It’s a small setback.”
“How much did he get?”
“Reggie?”
“No.” Derek rolled his eyes. “Of course Reggie.”
Tyler slumped back down in the chair. “What did Striker tell you?”
Derek pulled up a guest chair and folded his big body into it. “That Reggie split with a client’s car and a cashier’s check.”
Tyler nodded. That about summed it up. Reggie had also made free with several hundred thousand in retainers over the past few months, much of which Tyler would have to pay back since Reggie wasn’t around to do the work.
“How much?” Derek repeated.
“Including Mrs. Cliff’s BMW?”
“Quit stalling.”
Tyler voiced the amount that still made him wince. “But I suspect most of it went up his nose before the big disappearing act.”
The books were a mess.
Tyler’s life was a mess.
Derek let out a long, slow whistle. “What’s plan B?”
Tyler gave a chopped, terse chuckle. Plan A implicitly being to hunt Reggie down and take it out of his hide. “Pay Mrs. Cliff for the car—I told her we wrecked it—back out of Reggie’s contracts and eat the penalties, sleep in the office for a while, find some quick, high-paying jobs…”
Derek glanced around the reception area with a frown.
“I’ve got coffee, a bath, a deli on the first floor,” said Tyler. “What more does a man need?”
“Bunk out at my place,” said Derek.
Tyler shook his head. “I don’t want Dad to know what’s going on.”
Derek stared hard into Tyler’s eyes, but Tyler didn’t flinch.
Derek was a fixer, just like their father. Tyler knew it was nearly killing him to sit back and watch his little brother stumble.
But Tyler was not giving in. He’d learned years ago that if he didn’t fight tooth and nail for every little scrap of independence, he’d end up in a Saville Row suit in a cushy office on the top floor of the Reeves-DuCarter building in downtown Seattle chatting nonsense with overseas investors and monitoring the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
“This isn’t high school, Derek. Let me handle it this time.”
Derek drew back in his chair. “One guy. I punched out one guy for you.”
Tyler shook his head. “Blackburn and his friends harassed me for three years thanks to you.” Finally, in Tyler’s senior year, he’d grown big enough to flatten Blackburn on his own and put a stop to the relentless tormenting.
“What?” Derek rocked forward. His fists balled. “They kept at it? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Tyler threw up his hands. “So you could punch him out again? Please, Derek. There’s nothing more pathetic than a kid who can’t fight his own battles.”
“Blackburn was twice your size.”
Tyler cracked a half smile. “Not in the end, he wasn’t.”
Derek’s eyes flashed with sudden admiration. “You were the one who broke his nose?”
“I was the one who broke his nose. I solved that problem. And I’ll solve this one, too. It just might take me a while.”
Derek glanced around the office again. “Well, there’s no need to be a martyr about it. Why not take a suite at the Quayside?”
“Because I’m trying to save money.”
“You’re a shareholder. They’ll give you a rate.”
“Rate’s zero if I stay here.”
The phone on the desktop rang.
“Where’s Shirley?” asked Derek.
“Had to cut her back to part-time.”
“What? You can’t even afford one employee?”
The phone rang again.
“Cash flow,” said Tyler. “It’s just temporary. She wanted to spend some time with her kids for the summer anyway.” He picked up the receiver. “IPS Detectives.”
Derek gazed at the ceiling and shook his head, as if invoking divine intervention.
“Reggie Sandhill,” said a man’s curt voice.
“Reggie is out of the country for a few weeks,” said Tyler.
Derek snorted at Tyler’s lie.
Tyler ignored him. “I’m his partner, Tyler Reeves.”
“Reggie came highly recommended,” said the man, in a tone that told Tyler he wasn’t used to disappointment.
“Perhaps I can help you.” said Tyler evenly, annoyed by both the man’s attitude and by Reggie’s habit of taking all the glory for cases that Tyler had solved. Everyone knew Reggie’s name. Nobody knew Tyler’s.
“It’s a surveillance job,” said the man on the phone, a challenge in his voice.
Like, maybe Tyler couldn’t handle surveillance. “No problem. Surveillance is one of our specialties.”
“I see.” The man seemed to be weighing whether or not to trust Tyler. “Her name is Jenna McBride,” he finally said.
“And your name?” asked Tyler, picking up a pencil and pulling a scratch pad closer on the desktop.
There was a slight hesitation on the line. “Brandon Rice. She’s my fiancée.”
“You think she’s cheating?” asked Tyler. Cheating was far and away the most common reason for a man to have his significant other followed.
Derek stood up, pacing across the room, a scowl on his face. Chasing cheating fiancées was obviously not his idea of a stellar career move. Too bad. It wasn’t like Tyler was in a position to be choosy. True, it wasn’t his usual area of business, but this was the kind of job he needed right now—quick, uncomplicated cash.
“Yes,” said Brandon Rice. “I think she’s cheating. I’m in Boston, and she’s in Seattle. I want a full report on her activities. Where she goes, who she sees. She has a decorating business. Canna Interiors.”
Tyler jotted down the woman’s name and the name of her business. “Is there anyone in particular you think she’s seeing?”
Derek made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat and shook his head. Well, hell, every case couldn’t be a crown jewel theft or a murder mystery. A guy still had to pay the bills.
Some days more than others.
“I want to know everything,” said Brandon. “Money is not an issue. I want to know everyone she sees. Everything she does.”
Tyler tapped the pencil eraser against the desktop. Reggie had taken on cases like this before. Rich man, pretty woman, edge of desperation. There was probably a big age difference.
“I’ll pay you ten thousand plus expenses,” said Brandon. “One week. A full report. And I mean full.”
Tyler resisted the urge to scowl at the phone, aware of Derek’s keen interest. He always submitted a full report to his clients—no matter what his opinion of them.
If this fiancée had any brains at all, she’d stay in Seattle and well away from Mr. Demanding. Of course, she was the one who’d agreed to marry the guy in the first place.
She was probably willing to put up with his crap for the money. Women generally did forgive a whole lot of ills for a whole lot of bank balance.
“When do you want me to start?” asked Tyler.
“Today,” barked Brandon. “I want you to start today.”
“You got it,” said Tyler. “Where do I send the report?”
After jotting down Brandon’s contact information, Tyler hung up the phone.
“You’re going to follow a cheating wife?” asked Derek.
“Fiancée,” Tyler corrected, feeling a twinge of self-consciousness.
“But you won’t lower yourself to join the family firm and negotiate with offshore investors?”
“You really want to help me?” asked Tyler, ignoring his big brother’s sarcasm, pretending it didn’t bite. From experience Tyler knew the best way to get Derek off his back was to give him a mission.
“Name it,” said Derek, pulling his checkbook out of his suit pocket.
“I’m not taking your money. If you really want to be useful, you can head over to Canna Interiors.”
Without Reggie as a second body, Tyler was handicapped. “I need to know how many employees are there. What kind of an outfit it is. And what Jenna McBride looks like. But I can’t let her see me yet.”
“Can I have one of those fountain pen cameras and a decoder ring?” asked Derek.
“Don’t be an ass.” Tyler stood up and shoved his big brother toward the door.
“But, Tyler, how am I going to case the joint without the proper James Bond paraphernalia?”
“Just tell me what she looks like, and what they do, so I can make a plan.” That ten thousand would go a long way towards operating expenses for the next couple of months.
2
“JENNA MCBRIDE?”
Jenna stopped short, halfway into the Canna Interiors offices as the large man rose from a white leather chair in the reception area.
“Mr. Reeves has been waiting for half an hour,” said her secretary, Rosemary, a lilt of excitement in her voice, and an appreciative glimmer in her eyes.
Rosemary was a grandmother in her early fifties, but Jenna could see why a woman of any age might find the burly Mr. Reeves attractive. She heard Candice suck in a quick, admiring breath behind her.
“Yes. I’m Jenna McBride.” She moved toward the waiting area, hand extended. “And this is my partner Candice Hammond.” For an impish moment, Jenna considered adding the fact that Candice was single.
“Derek Reeves,” said the man, grasping Jenna’s hand.
Then he turned to Candice and gave her a cursory glance and a nod.
“Candice,” said Candice, offering her hand.
He shook it with an absent nod, then he immediately turned back to Jenna. “I was wondering if we might talk for a few minutes?”
She felt Candice stiffen.
Jenna half turned her head to smile in Candice’s direction in an effort to include her. “How can we help you?”
Derek Reeves gestured to the low table in the reception area. “I’ve been reviewing your portfolio.” He still spoke directly to Jenna. He almost seemed to be studying her face.
“You’re interested in the services of a decorating firm?” she asked politely. Judging by the cut of his suit, Derek could be a great prospective customer.
“Uh…yeah.” He nodded. “That’s right. I am.”
“We’ll probably be more comfortable in the boardroom.” Jenna gestured to an open doorway behind the receptionist’s desk. While the man’s attention switched to the boardroom door, she signaled to the coffeepot.
Rosemary gave her a quick nod of understanding.
Derek Reeves glanced at Candice, then back at Jenna. He cleared his throat. “Sounds fine.”
“I have a conference call in about two minutes,” Candice quickly inserted, obviously picking up the same strange signals as Jenna. “Do you mind, Jenna?”
“Of course not.” Jenna reminded herself that Derek was the customer, and Candice was acting like a professional. Still, she couldn’t help feeling a little annoyed on Candice’s behalf. “I’ll bring you up to speed later.”
“Great. Thanks.” Candice turned a stiff smile on Derek. “Nice to meet you Mr. Reeves.”
“Likewise,” he replied formally, again with barely a glance.
Ignoring the obvious undercurrent, Jenna led Derek Reeves into the small boardroom.
“Why don’t you tell me a little bit about your project,” she suggested as they sat down at the polished, round table. The deep patina absorbed the late day sun. Candice had insisted their offices exude success, even before they had their first client. Jenna found herself glad of that right now.
“Sure.” Derek paused, glancing around at the sample pictures on the wall of the room. “Good idea…It’s a…lobby.” He stopped scanning the walls and sat back. “A lobby.”
“Oh.” Jenna waited a moment for him to elaborate. “Would that be in an office building?”
His forehead furrowed and he glanced around the room again. “Yes. I mean, no. It’s a…hotel.” He slowly smiled and nodded as if he’d just had a mental revelation. “A hotel lobby.”
Jenna experienced a twinge of disappointment. So far, they didn’t have any experience decorating hotels. They’d started with private homes and branched out to some office buildings. The hospital lobby was their big break into special purpose space, but she didn’t think whale fountains and monkey carpets would impress many hotel owners.
Her uncertainty must have shown, because Derek jumped back in.
“Did I say lobby?” he asked.
“Yes…”
“Well, actually, it’s more than just the lobby.” He nodded. “It’s the restaurant, too.”
“The restaurant?” Her heart sank. They had absolutely nothing in the way of experience that would qualify them to decorate a restaurant.
“And,” Derek continued, “well, the spa, too. In fact, you know, the whole hotel should really be upgraded.”
“The whole hotel?” Jenna’s eyes widened.
“Right.”
“Uh, Mr. Reeves—”
“Call me Derek.”
“Sure. Derek.” Jenna debated the merits of blunt honesty versus the incredible opportunity of decorating an entire hotel. She wanted the job. She wanted the job very, very much. But there was the touchy matter of experience.
“It sounds like…” she tried. “I mean, of course we’d be delighted to submit…” A little voice inside her told her to shut up and say yes. “Uh, is the hotel here in Seattle?”
“Yes. On the lake. The Quayside.”
“The Quayside?” Jenna’s heart stopped for a split second. She felt the blood drain from her face.
“You’ve heard of it?”
“Yes. Of course.” Who hadn’t heard of the Quayside? Jenna dropped her hands into her lap and pinched herself.
The Quayside was a gorgeous, venerated historic hotel on a scenic point of land right on the shore of Lake Washington. It was an architectural dream, water on three sides, and a stunning view of the Cascade Mountain range.
It had played host to business magnates, movie stars and royalty. This was a job which could catapult their firm to the stratosphere.
Jenna swallowed. Do not mess this up. “We could draft some preliminary sketches—”
“Tell you what.” Derek rose from the table, and Jenna followed suit. “I’ll give you my card.” He reached into his suit jacket pocket. Then he flipped the card over and pulled out a pen.
“I’m writing the name and phone number of the hotel manager on the back. Give me a few…Uh, I mean, give him a call. But wait until late tomorrow afternoon. He’ll give you the details.”
Jenna nodded silently. Her brain was running a million miles an hour. Candice was going to die. She was going to fall off her chair and die right there in the office.
Derek straightened up and handed Jenna the card.
“Thank you, Mr…. Derek.”
He smiled, and his eyes lit up like Santa Claus. “Thank you, Jenna.”
TYLER SNAPPED a couple of pictures from the Quayside Hotel parking lot as Jenna and her partner Candice emerged from the front entry. Derek had called last night to describe Jenna, and to tell Tyler she currently had a contract at the hospital. From there, Tyler had followed the pair to the hotel.
Jenna seemed to be having the time of her life with her fiancé out of the picture. The two women walked down the sidewalk, talking animatedly, laughing, and gesturing in the air like a couple of college students as they headed for Candice’s sedan.
Tyler raised his newspaper so that it shielded his face as they passed his SUV. Whatever had happened in the hotel, they were certainly excited about it. He wondered for a moment if they’d met their boyfriends. It was a definite possibility.
As their vehicle backed out of the space, he turned his attention to the stone building, training the camera in preparation for the emergence of their dates. He could catch up with the women at either the hospital or the Canna Interiors office later.
A family emerged from the hotel, then a lone businessman, then…nobody. Five minutes went by, then ten, then fifteen. Finally, the door opened again. But it was an elderly couple who stopped to talk to the doorman.
Okay, so Jenna and Candice weren’t meeting men for a clandestine lunchtime date. At least not men who were leaving the hotel a discreet few minutes after them.
He supposed they could have met men who were guests at the hotel, who didn’t need to come out to the parking lot after lunch. But that was stretching his initial theory a little too far.
He placed the camera on the seat beside him and reached for the ignition key. He could go inside and talk to Henry Wenchel, the hotel manager. Henry was an old friend of the family and, technically at least, Tyler was still a company shareholder. But the odds of Henry having noticed two women having lunch in one of the restaurants were ridiculously small.
Except that they were unusually attractive. Candice was tall and willowy, with a fresh, wind-blown supermodel look that would turn any head. Jenna was shorter, a bit more understated. But her thick, auburn hair was gorgeous, and there was something about her smile and the glint in her sea-foam eyes that made Tyler think it was a shame she was being wasted on Brandon Rice.
None of his business, he reminded himself. Rich men and gorgeous women had been making marriage deals since time immemorial. His job was to see if she was making side deals with anyone else.
He pulled out of the parking lot. Sea-foam eyes and his personal opinion notwithstanding, he’d stay focused. He’d get some photos, write the report and collect his fee. The sooner he was out of the adultery business the better.
NEXT MORNING, Tyler found himself pulling right back into the Quayside parking lot. This time, Jenna was alone when she strode purposefully into the main foyer.
Looked like his first instinct had been right. Who went to the Quayside two days in a row? Who went there alone at this time of the morning, unless they were meeting somebody inside?
Tyler loved it when his instincts were firing on all cylinders. He pulled his baseball cap down low, donned dark sunglasses, grabbed his camera and followed her.
He pushed through the revolving glass door, glancing around the antique lobby until he spotted her near the concierge desk.
Perhaps somebody had left her a key with the concierge. Perhaps a young, virile somebody who would make her forget her fiancé for a couple of hours.
The concierge didn’t hand her a key, but Jenna did pick up the house phone. Maybe luck was with him. Maybe young and virile would meet her right here in the lobby. Right here in camera range.
Though the light was bad, Tyler took a quick shot of Jenna talking on the phone.
Then he sidled over to a furniture grouping and eased down into a soft armchair. He wished he had another newspaper to hide behind, but he had to settle for the obscuring foliage of a large potted plant. He felt like a tacky Sam Spade, hovering, waiting, watching.
Jenna hung up the phone and moved away from the concierge desk, turning to face in his general direction. Her beauty rocked him back. For a minute, he almost wished he had a bank balance that would put him in the running to date her.
Angling his head, confident she couldn’t tell the direction of his gaze through the tinted glasses, he looked his fill. Her thick, auburn hair bounced around her shoulders, setting off a creamy smooth complexion. Her lips were full, her cheekbones high and her skirted business suit showed off a figure that nipped and tucked in all the right places. He could sit here and watch her all day long.
He sighed. Too bad she was so willing to trade in those stunning looks for Brandon’s money.
Something on the far side of the lobby caught her attention, and her amazing eyes lit up with recognition. Tyler gripped the camera as she smiled a greeting and started to walk toward an unseen person.
His gaze strayed to her silky legs. He’d always had a soft spot for shapely calves, especially those that rose so gracefully from strappy, feminine sandals. He felt a sudden burn in his chest at the thought of watching her greet a strange man with a squeeze and a kiss.
It got worse when he imagined those shapely calves doing…well, doing what shapely calves do when they don’t have their stockings on. He ruthlessly tamped down the unruly image, sitting forward to peek around the edge of the plant.
Henry?
Gorgeous Jenna was here to cheat on rich Brandon with Henry Wenchel? The scenario didn’t bear thinking about.
This was way more information than Tyler wanted concerning his father’s friend. And he couldn’t help thinking that Henry’s wife was not going to be happy.
Trying not to cringe, he quickly snapped a shot.
Henry reached out to briefly shake Jenna’s hand. They spoke for a minute, keeping a respectful two feet apart. Henry talked and Jenna nodded. She smiled, but it wasn’t an intimate smile, and neither of them made a beeline for the penthouse elevator.
Tyler tried not to feel too relieved. When he thought about it, if Henry was going to carry on an affair with a younger woman, he’d be pretty stupid to do it in his own hotel lobby in front of the security cameras.
A moment later, Jenna and Henry headed up the mezzanine stairs. Towards Henry’s office. Henry’s very public office. Tyler sighed, relieved that Jenna had legitimate business at the hotel. Even though it meant his instincts were malfunctioning again.
IN HENRY WENCHEL’S OFFICE, Jenna sat very still and concentrated on not hyperventilating. He was taking out a pen. He was flipping to the back of the contract. He was touching the pen to the signature line. The pen was moving. He was signing.
Her heart rate increased, and she could feel her extremities start to tingle.
He was done.
He’d signed.
Henry Wenchel had just signed a contract to pay Canna Interiors an exorbitant sum for the preliminary designs. Preliminary designs which could lead to the interior decorating contract of a lifetime.
“Understanding the ambiance is so important, don’t you think, Jenna?” He passed the contract across the table toward her and held out his gold pen.
“Yes.” She nodded, taking a shaky breath. Her fingers were still tingling as she reached for his pen. She half expected to wake up any second.
“I hope a week away from home won’t be too inconvenient for you.”
Jenna slid the contract until it was directly below her, only half listening to Henry Wenchel. “A week?” she asked automatically.
There it was. A swoopy H, a pointy W, then a squiggle and a swirl and a dot. She suddenly wished she had a signature that looked more artistic than her plain old name. A signature that nobody could really read, because she was important enough that they’d all learned her squiggles.
“We’ll assign you a suite,” said Henry.
She touched the pen to the paper above the line that read proponent. “Suite?” Jenna asked as she wrote her first name.
“You’ll stay here, of course, while you work.”
The pen faltered on the M. Drat! The biggest signature of her life, and she couldn’t even get the M right. She sure hoped that didn’t void the contract.
She carefully finished McBride, then looked up at Henry. “Stay here?” she asked, blinking.
“The only way to get the true ambiance,” Henry smiled. “That’s not a problem is it?”
“No,” Jenna hurriedly shook her head. She’d stay in Timbuktu if it made Henry happy.
“Perfect,” said Henry. He pressed a button on the telephone console.
Jenna tried valiantly to look like she made deals of this magnitude every day of the week. If Henry could tell she was faking, he was certainly being polite about it.
“I’ll put you in one of our executive suites,” he continued. “They have a phone, fax, personal computer, printer, Internet access. If there’s anything else you need, be sure to let Anna know.”
Jenna nodded. She couldn’t think of a single thing she could possibly need in life besides a plum contract and an executive suite at the Quayside.
Henry gestured toward the door. “Great. Let’s go see a registration clerk.”
Feeling like she was drifting through a dream, Jenna followed Henry back down the wide, curved staircase toward the reception desk. While they walked, she gazed at the marble pillars, the dome ceiling, the leaded windows. The carpets, wall coverings and furniture were aging, but the building itself was extraordinary.
“Hello, Tyler.” Henry’s hearty voice pulled her attention away from their surroundings.
A man standing at the reception desk turned abruptly, drawing back as if he was startled by the sight of them.
“What a coincidence.” Henry clapped the man on the shoulder. “Tyler, I’d like you to meet Jenna McBride, our new decorator. Jenna this is Tyler—”
“Carter,” the man inserted, holding out his hand.
Henry’s eyebrows briefly knit together.
“I’m a security guard here at the hotel.” Tyler Carter grasped Jenna’s hand.
His hand was warm, his grip strong and his skin leathery enough to indicate he enjoyed some kind of outdoor sport. His dark glasses were perched on a straight nose, above a strong, square chin. The smile he flashed was friendly enough, but Jenna sensed some kind of tension behind it.
“Yes. Well.” Henry cleared his throat. “We’re just getting Jenna set up with a suite for the next week or so.”
“Don’t let me get in the way.” Tyler gestured toward the receptionist and gallantly moved back.
HENRY WAS close on his heels as Tyler cut across the lobby. Meeting Jenna so soon wasn’t exactly what he’d planned. But Tyler had to congratulate himself on coming up with the security guard cover story. Now he had an excuse to hang around the hotel. Even better, he had an excuse to snoop.
“Odd that I don’t recall hiring another security guard,” said Henry as the distance between them and the reception desk increased.
“I’m undercover,” said Tyler. “On a case.”
“Somebody staying at the hotel?”
“As it turns out.” He glanced back to where Jenna was checking in. A decorating job at the Quayside. Small world, but a convenient one.
“There’s not a criminal in my hotel, is there?”
“Not a criminal.” Still smarting from Derek’s reaction to an adultery surveillance case, Tyler didn’t jump to share the particulars with Henry.
“Are you planning to stay?” asked Henry.
“Stay?”
“For the undercover operation. Do you need a room?”
What a good idea. It would make snooping even easier. Besides, he was on a “money is no object” expense account. And it would sure keep Derek from worrying about where he was living.
“Sure. I’ll take a room,” said Tyler.
“Shall I put it on the Reeves-DuCarter account?”
Tyler grinned. “Bill IPS. I’m getting expenses on this.”
“Good enough. You will let me know if my guests are in any danger?”
“That’s a promise,” said Tyler. Though it seemed unlikely that any of the guests could be decorated to death. He found his attention straying back to Jenna.
“What is Jenna McBride decorating?” he asked.
“She’s giving the entire hotel a facelift.” There was some kind of a twinkle in Henry’s eyes. “She came very highly recommended.”
Tyler squinted at Henry’s expression. It was sort of a wink, wink, nudge, nudge, inside joke expression.
Redecorating the hotel wasn’t a bad idea. But Henry was sure acting strange about it. Maybe the older man did have a crush on Jenna.
If that was the case, Tyler could have told him that Jenna was already taken. He could also remind Henry that Henry was already taken.
Jenna started across the foyer toward them.
“Can you give me a security key?” asked Tyler.
“Not a problem.” Henry nodded.
3
THE LIGHTHOUSE, the Quayside’s rooftop seafood restaurant, wasn’t light at all. Jenna squinted at the maitre d’ as she took her seat at a small table in a secluded alcove. She supposed the darkness might seem romantic to some, but it was a crying shame to waste the view.
Although the restaurant was located on the fortieth floor, right on the lake front, only about a quarter of the exterior wall space had windows. The rest was covered in a heavy, burgundy wall paper, layered between dark, hewn beams.
The feeble ceiling lights cast a smoky, orange hue, and the carpet was in red tones. At least she thought it was in red tones, she leaned sideways in her seat and peered down at it. She could barely see her feet down there in the dark depths.
Glancing around to make sure nobody was paying attention, she lifted the candle from the middle of the table and held it close to the floor.
She was right. Swirls of burgundy and bloodred. She shuddered.
“Lose something, ma’am?”
Jenna quickly straightened in her chair, giving her emerald cocktail dress a surreptitious tug down her thighs and smoothing her fingertips across the straight, strapless neckline to make sure everything was where it ought to be.
“Nothing.” She smiled at the waiter, placing the candle back on the table.
“Can I offer you a cocktail?” he asked, reaching out and returning the candle to its original position.
“Sure.” Jenna tapped her fingernails against the gold tablecloth. “A glass of red wine?”
“We have the Andollin Beaujolais from France, very light, very smooth. Or the Posselini Merlot from Italy, bolder, very dry.” He flipped open a leather-bound wine list. “Or I can open a bottle.”
“The Beaujolais will be fine.”
“Very good.” He flipped the wine list shut. “I’ll be back in one moment.”
Jenna sighed and settled into her chair. The waiter’s old-world mannerisms seemed to go with the room. Maybe wealthy people liked oppressive spaces and officious service. She’d certainly experienced both with Brandon.
Should she stay with dark and classic here, or be bold and suggest something more updated? She ran her fingertips along the ornate arm of the dark walnut chair, tracing the swirled carving as she gazed around the room, cataloguing the furniture and decor.
Most of the tables in her section were empty. Although, one of the window tables was occupied by a couple. She unconsciously paused on them. They were holding hands across the table top and seemed totally absorbed in each other, oblivious to anything else in the room.
After a brief twinge of envy, Jenna shifted her focus. It came to rest on the other chair at her table. The wood was dark, almost black, and the upholstery was diamond-tufted, red velvet. She imagined it had looked very rich in its time, but now it looked heavy and dated. Rather like the wallpaper.
Rather like the staff. She grinned to herself and took a quick sip from her water glass. She wondered if new uniforms would lighten them up a little.
Her gaze started to roam again, coming to rest on the couple by the window. The man reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a small, velvet box. Jenna’s eyes widened along with the woman’s, and Jenna quickly turned her head to look away.
She found herself focusing in on the wallpaper while she considered changing chairs so the couple wouldn’t be in her line of vision. They obviously didn’t need an audience tonight.
The wallpaper in front of her was starting to peel at one of the seams. For all its venerated reputation, the Quayside sure did need the services of a good decorator.
She touched the loose seam with her fingertip, and pried away an inch of the brittle paper. It flaked off in her hand.
“Your wine, ma’am,” the waiter startled her again, and she wondered if he practiced sneaking up on people.
“Thank you,” she murmured.
“Are you ready to order?”
Jenna shook her head. “Not yet.” She wasn’t in a hurry.
As she sipped her wine, her attention kept wandering back to the wall beside her. Curious, she shifted in her seat, taking a closer look at the smooth, surface revealed under the wallpaper. It was drywall, probably put up in the sixties. And, since the hotel was more than fifty years old, that meant somebody had renovated the restaurant at least once.
She traced the seam partway up the wall, drawing closer. She pulled up on her knees, lifting the candle for a better look. If this was a renovation, what was the original design?
She glanced around the restaurant. Lattice dividers and carved, stone statues broke the large room into sections. Hers was definitely an outside wall. If the original designer had more brains than the renovator, there might be window openings back there. She felt a hum of excitement at the thought of more windows.
With all that light, all that view to play with, she could cheerfully blow the entire redecorating budget on the restaurant alone. The possibilities were positively endless.
She shimmied up higher. Glancing around to make sure the other two diners were still making moon eyes at each other and ignoring her, she knocked gently on the wall. It sounded solid. Drat.
She put the candle down and knocked again, a little to the left this time. Still solid. A statue kept her from trying further to the left, so she stretched up to reach above it, glancing at the other outside walls, counting off the windows and trying to eyeball the pattern. She reached up and knocked.
Hollow.
“Yes!” she whispered. Pay dirt.
She rapped her knuckles in a horizontal line, trying to ascertain the size of the opening. Then she went vertical, stretching up, standing in her seat. The hollow sound went up and up. Excitement hummed through her veins.
If the perimeter of the restaurant was all window openings, she was going to fill this mausoleum with light.
“Is something wrong?” A deep voice behind her startled her.
Jenna turned swiftly, bashing her shin against the tabletop, recognizing the security guard from the lobby earlier and knocking over the candle all in a split second.
“Ouch,” she cried, leaning over quickly to blow out the candle. Her breath bent the flame then, to her horror, it leapt higher, catching the wax-drenched tablecloth.
“Watch your hair,” the man gasped, grabbing her around the waist and pulling her out of the chair. He held her tight with one arm, and swiftly snuffed the flame with his other palm.
But it didn’t go out, and he jerked his hand back.
Panic surged in Jenna. Any second now the whole cloth was going to go up. The woman at the other table exclaimed and pointed.
Tyler grabbed Jenna’s water glass and dumped it on the spreading flame. It hissed, and smoked, sputtering out, leaving a messy, saucer-sized black hole in the middle of the tablecloth.
“You okay?” Tyler asked in a deep voice that rumbled near her ear. His arm was still firmly around her waist.
“Fine,” she answered, only slightly shaken. The throb on the front of her shin bone told her she’d have a bruise tomorrow. But no real damage had been done to the table, thank goodness.
“Thanks,” she said.
“No problem,” he replied.
The spilled water worked its way to the edge of the table and trickled onto the floor. Jenna picked up her napkin and began dabbing at the mess.
Tyler reached for the second napkin. He dropped his arm from around her waist, but they were still shoulder to shoulder.
“Dare I ask?” He tipped his head to look at her as he blotted the water. His eyebrows quirked, and she found herself staring into the deepest, darkest, bluest eyes in the world. They were framed with thick, black lashes and shadowed by straight brows. Whoever decorated this guy had done a bang-up job.
“Ask what?” she managed as her pulse reacted to the fact that she was touching an extremely good-looking man. His biceps were rock hard, and his body heat radiated through his cotton shirt, warming her bare arm.
“Is everything all right here?” The waiter’s voice interrupted. His words conveyed concern, but his expression was more exasperated than worried.
“We could use a new tablecloth,” said Tyler evenly, dropping the wet napkin and guiding Jenna back a couple of steps. She didn’t fight the continued body contact, since she kind of liked touching him.
“Of course,” he finally said. He gathered Jenna’s wineglass and the silver setting, then scooped up the tablecloth.
Tyler glanced back down at Jenna as the man walked away. A grin formed on his face, showing off the barest hint of a dimple. “Dare I ask what you’re up to?”
“Experiencing the ambiance,” she said, her shoulder still brushing against his arm. She should have felt crowded by his proximity in the small space, but it honestly felt flirty.
“Do you always stand on your chair to experience the ambiance?” His leg shifted, brushing once against her stockings, sending her nerve endings into a tizzy.
“Oh, that,” she breathed, waving a hand toward the wall behind them. “I was just looking for windows.”
His gaze shifted to the solid wall. “I hate to be the one to tell you this…” He turned the full force of his attention back to her, and she sucked in a tight breath.
From his tousled dark hair, to his devil-may-care smile, to his deep voice and broad shoulders, this guy was drop-dead sexy.
“I think they’re behind the wall,” she explained, struggling to understand her strong reaction to a virtual stranger.
“I take it you’ve got big plans for the place?”
“It’s got loads of potential.” She should move away now, break the subtle contact between their arms and sit back down. She really should.
He glanced around the restaurant. “Not a fan of early bordello?”
She smiled. That was it. The red velvet, the orange-toned lighting, the sultry feel of the atmosphere. Jenna could easily imagine Victorian era ladies of the evening plying their trade.
“Maybe the last decorator was trying for romantic?” she suggested charitably.
Tyler’s expression turned skeptical.
“Sensual?”
“Sensual is free,” he said. “When you pay for it, it’s erotic.”
Jenna bit down on the inside of her cheek. Nope, she didn’t know this man. She wasn’t going to make a risqué joke about his bordello experience.
He caught the look in her eyes. “The answer is never.”
She shook her head, stifling a grin. “I never asked.”
“Uh-huh.” He shifted back, folding his arms. “But you were wondering.”
She shook her head. “I’m only wondering how many windows are hidden behind the wall renovations.” She kept a straight face for a moment before giving into temptation. “Of course, you were the one who recognized the bordello look right off.”
“I’ve watched westerns.”
“Westerns? Is that what they call them nowadays?”
His eyes turned to blue smoke, and he slowly took in her tight dress, stockings and high heels. “Decorators?” he drawled. “Is that what they call them nowadays?”
“Should I get out of this conversation while the getting is good?”
“Since we’ve both agreed we’re standing in a bordello. And since you’re the prettiest woman in the room. And since I’m about to make you an offer…Yeah, we should both get out of this conversation before I get my face slapped.”
“You couldn’t afford me anyway,” she boldly tossed out in a Mae West voice before stepping away from him and slipping into her chair.
He was silent for half a heartbeat as he took a seat across the table. Then his bass voice rolled. “Don’t bet on it.”
His dark eyes smoldered, and Jenna’s entire body contracted.
Wow.
Nobody had ever looked at her like that before—sliding a white-hot gaze straight past her inhibitions.
“May I offer you a cocktail, sir?” The waiter interrupted, his formal tone almost icy. He stood to one side while a busboy swiftly replaced the tablecloth then set out silverware, menus and a new candle.
“Scotch,” said Tyler, not appearing the least bit fazed by the waiter’s tone. “Glenlochlan. And another glass of wine for the lady.”
TYLER SETTLED BACK in the wide comfortable chair and watched the candlelight flicker on Jenna’s flushed cheeks. She’d surprised him. Shocked the hell out of him, actually.
He’d been expecting a cold, brittle, uptight gold digger. What he got was a warm, funny, down-to-earth woman who could give as good as she got and was obviously serious about her business. Brandon was definitely getting his money’s worth.
Her hair must have started the evening piled neatly on top of her head. But it was a little worse for wear now. Stray wisps teased her delicate ears and dangled around her square-cut emerald earrings.
The earrings matched the tight sheath of a dress she wore. It had probably started the evening a little higher and neater, too. Not that he minded. Not as long as they were hidden away in a dark corner where nobody else could get a glimpse of her cleavage.
A gentleman would tell her about her precarious hold on decency. Luckily, Tyler had never been a gentleman.
The waiter appeared and placed the scotch in front of Tyler and the wine in front of Jenna.
“Will you be placing your order now?” he asked, notepad at the ready, his dour expression aimed at Jenna.
Tyler hoped she’d hit him with a one-liner, but she bit her bottom lip guiltily and quickly reached for the menu.
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Barbara Dunlop
Jenna McBride is making a new start: a new city and a new business with a shot at the big time. She and her best friend–and interior decorating partner–jump at the chance to refurbish a venerable Seattle hotel. For a hands-on approach, Jenna is assigned a suite for a week's stay…it'll also give her an opportunity to ditch all the private investigators hired by her ex to spy on her!Tyler Reeves may be a blue blood, but he's the black sheep in his family–making a living the hard way as a P.I., instead of opting for corporate finance. Now he has no choice but to accept a case he normally wouldn't–tailing some guy's fiancée. Easy enough. Until Tyler meets Jenna and falls for the sexy siren in a flash. It looks as if his undercover work will take on a whole new meaning–who will be the first left wearing next to nothing!
Nobody said no to body language like that
Tyler also knew that nobody said no to a woman who looked and smelled, sounded and felt like Jenna.
He needed to stop this. He needed to let her down easy. She was the subject of his investigation, for goodness sakes.
“Tyler?” she breathed. She closed her eyes and leaned into him.
He clenched his hands into fists, trying to get the right words, the right phrases to form in his mind. But they didn’t. There was no way out of this without kissing her. Just a taste, he promised himself.
Aw, hell. Tyler gently pressed his lips against hers, but promised he wouldn’t pucker.
Jenna wound her arms around him, her soft body cradling his tightly.
A roar started in his ears and quickly overwhelmed his brain. Forget puckering, his lips parted. She tasted of sweet wine and summer sunshine.
Damn.
Dear Reader,
I love a hero with a secret. I particularly love a hero who has to choose between his secret and his principles. Add to that a sexy heroine who tempts him to compromise both, and you’ve got Tyler Reeves, private investigator, a man going quietly insane while he watches the one woman in the world he can’t possibly touch.
Growing up in Vancouver, Canada, I often drove with my family across the border to visit Seattle. With its towering hotels, exciting shopping and extraordinarily beautiful scenery, it remains one of my favorite cities. The last time I visited, my good friend Jane Porter drove me along the winding lakeshore roads to view the magnificent homes set between cedar forests and the rocky shore. This laid-back luxury was the inspiration for the Quayside hotel, the fictional setting for Next to Nothing!
I had a great time writing this story. I hope you enjoy the atmosphere of the West Coast.
Best wishes,
Barbara Dunlop
Books by Barbara Dunlop
HARLEQUIN TEMPTATION
848—FOREVER JAKE
HARLEQUIN DUETS
54B—THE MOUNTIE STEALS A WIFE
Next to Nothing!
Barbara Dunlop
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
For my editor, Kathryn Lye.
Thank you for your advice and encouragement,
and most of all for your unfailing patience.
Contents
Chapter 1 (#u4ff7ade4-906e-51e5-88bf-de1f97a56d87)
Chapter 2 (#u0514dbbd-1be6-526c-9846-9d23985c2a8a)
Chapter 3 (#u75d4a944-2c33-5acc-86ff-f63da251fbd5)
Chapter 4 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
1
“HE STILL OUT THERE?” Jenna McBride watched as her business partner, Candice Hammond, crossed in front of the waterfall fountain in the hospital’s new atrium lobby.
“Short guy?” asked Candice, her high heels clicking on the freshly finished sienna tile floor. “Balding. Doesn’t know polyester is dead?” She spoke loudly enough to be heard above the rushing water.
“That’s him.” Jenna snapped her pencil into the clasp at the top of her Canna Interiors clipboard. The closed-for-construction lobby was nearly empty now that most of the workers had left for the day. “Where on earth did Brandon find that guy?”
Jenna’s partner in Canna Interiors arched her perfect eyebrows, her dark lips curving up in a half smile that revealed the dimple in her left cheek. “One-nine-hundred aging gumshoe?”
Jenna shook her head and raked her auburn, shoulder-length hair back from her forehead. She was hot from working all day, and a fine sheen of sweat dampened her hairline.
“I can’t believe he’s still trying.” She’d finally broken off her engagement to Brandon four months ago. Then she’d moved from Boston to Seattle to put some distance between them.
“You always did live in denial,” said Candice as she settled on the bench facing the fountain, crossing one stocking-clad leg over the other. “Ol’ Brandon’s like the Energizer Bunny.”
“Not in bed,” scoffed Jenna, surprising herself with the moment of pithy honesty.
Candice’s eyes lit up with newfound admiration and humor. She sat slightly forward. “You’ve come a long way, baby.”
“Because I no longer think the sun rises and sets on Brandon Rice?” Jenna took a seat at the opposite end of the bench, curling one denim-covered calf beneath the opposite leg and setting her clipboard down next to her purse.
It was embarrassing to realize she’d been taken in so easily, and for such a long time. Naive and gullible. Book smart and life stupid. That was Jenna.
“Because you can finally admit he was a loser in bed,” said Candice, gazing at the water as it foamed against the natural rocks and sculpted mortar. Her short, chic hair curled against the collar of her jacket.
“It was kind of hard to tell in the thick of things,” said Jenna. She eased off her loafers, wiggling her toes.
The high ceiling fans sent a light breeze wafting down, but the mid-June sunshine had warmed the atrium.
Candice fought a smirk.
“It’s not like I’d done any comparison shopping,” Jenna added. “I was barely twenty-two when we met.”
She was twenty-six now. And, thanks to Candice, she had a second chance on life. A chance that didn’t include becoming Mrs. Brandon Rice—properly behaved trophy wife. Or was that properly behaved lap dog? Hard to know for sure.
“You don’t need vast personal experience to know three minutes is pathetic,” said Candice, giving her head a shake and rattling her silver earrings. “You just need the public library.” She cocked her head, contemplating the newly finished fountain. “You think the whale is too much?”
“The whale is perfect,” said Jenna, turning her attention to the brightly painted stone sculpture spouting beneath the waterfall, which was surrounded by tropical plants.
Forget uptight, three-minute Brandon, the kids were going to love that whale. The hospital board had asked for something with child-appeal when they’d given Canna Interiors the contract to decorate the pediatric lobby. Other than that, Candice and Jenna had been given a pretty free hand in the conceptual designs.
Jenna was proud of the results.
A collection of jumbo African animals adorned one corner. They were made of durable acrylic, and perfectly suited to climbing. Comfortable furniture groupings and lush plants dotted the high, glass-ceilinged room, and the carpet was a maze of brightly colored pathways twisting among cute, brown monkeys.
A week, maybe two at the most, and it would be ready to open. They were on time and on budget. And, on the strength of this project’s success, they’d been invited to submit designs to the public library.
A design invitation wasn’t a guarantee, but Jenna was finally beginning to feel optimistic about the future. After Candice had helped her see Brandon for the control freak he was, they’d moved clear across the country and pumped their life savings into a new interior design firm.
Though Jenna’s financial contribution was much lower than her friend’s, Candice had insisted they become equal partners. Jenna was determined to work day and night to prove her friend’s faith was justified.
“Why don’t you call him?” asked Candice, turning to peer enigmatically at Jenna.
“Call Brandon?” Jenna tucked her loose hair behind her ear, fingering the small gold stud in her lobe.
She hadn’t spoken to her ex-fiancé since she’d left him. In fact, it was Candice who’d insisted she break all ties. They’d burned all his letters, kept their apartment phone number unlisted and screened calls at the office.
“You want me to call Brandon?” Jenna repeated, having trouble with her friend’s about-face.
“Yes. I do.” Candice sat up straighter. “Maybe I was wrong.”
“You? Wrong?”
“I know.” Candice waved a hand in the air. “It’s hard to believe. But, maybe you should tell him once and for all that it’s over.”
“I told him it was over when I left,” said Jenna, reaching for the pencil in her clipboard, releasing it from the spring and tapping the eraser against the top page. She really had no desire to speak to Brandon again.
“You were upset then, hurt, confused. He probably thought you’d calm down and come to your senses.”
“I did come to my senses. That’s why I left him.”
“Apparently Brandon needs a bit more convincing.”
Jenna palmed the pencil and stood up. “You know, the minute I call him, he’s going to try to talk me into coming back.”
Candice folded her manicured fingers together on her knee, tipping her chin in Jenna’s direction. “Would you?” she asked calmly.
“No! Definitely not.” Not a chance in a million. Jenna absolutely did not want to live the rest of her life in a gilded cage, letting Brandon choose her clothes, her jewelry, her hair color. She’d had a taste of freedom, and she loved it.
“Well, as long as you keep hiding from him—”
“I am not hiding. You’re the one who—”
“He’ll convince himself you still have feelings for him,” Candice finished.
“There are no feelings. Period.” As she spoke the words, Jenna realized just how true they were. There was nothing. No hatred, no anger, no fear.
Flat line.
She hadn’t been intimidated by him, maybe overawed. Brandon had been a strong-minded, confident, charismatic guest lecturer at Boston University. While Jenna had been an impressionable undergraduate, fresh from a Minnesota farm community. It was pretty easy for him to convince her that he knew best—in all things.
But those feelings were gone now. Jenna took a deep breath, inhaling the light fountain mist and the scent of the pepper trees. She was free.
Sure she’d call Brandon. There was no reason not to anymore.
“Think about it, Jenna.” Candice interrupted her thoughts. “Call him and let him know that malleable young woman doesn’t exist anymore. Then he’ll back off and call off his troops.”
“You’re right,” said Jenna with conviction. Candice always did give the best advice.
“I am?” Candice looked surprised by Jenna’s easy agreement.
“You bet. He needs to know it’s over. He needs to leave me alone. We can’t have rent-a-Dick-Tracy hanging around the hospital halls scaring the children.”
Candice grinned as she stood up and flipped a concealed switch to turn off the waterfall. “Go get ’im, Jenna.” The whirring motor stopped, and the water dripped to a halt against the huge lava rocks, plunking to silence in the cavernous room.
Jenna nodded decisively, retrieving her tiny cell phone from the depths of her big purse. It was a serious purse, not one of those elegant little evening bags that Brandon bought her. They barely held a comb.
Using the end of the pencil, she dialed quickly.
Hopefully, someday soon, she’d forget his private number and free up the brain space for something useful. She lifted the phone to her ear, and Candice gave her an encouraging grin.
Brandon picked up on the first ring.
Little wonder. The only people who knew this number were his mother, a few captains of industry, some dubious politicians and Jenna.
“Rice here,” he said in that unnaturally low tone that he thought made him sound three inches taller.
“It’s Jenna,” she said, voice crisp and impersonal.
“Jenna!” His voice brightened and rose an octave.
“Finally. Where are you sweetheart?” He sounded so happy, so satisfied, so smug.
“You know darn well where I am. Your hired goon is standing outside my job-site.”
Candice gave her a thumbs-up.
“Goon? What goon? You’re talking nonsense.” His low voice was back. He was displeased. Good.
He was on the other side of the country. He could be as displeased as he wanted, and it wouldn’t affect her.
“Call him off, Brandon.”
“Jenna,” he sighed, and his tone turned patronizing. “Let’s not start this out by arguing.”
“I’m not arguing. I’m stating a fact.”
“You need to calm down and listen, Jenny-Penny.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“I don’t know what Candice told you—”
“This isn’t about what Candice did or did not tell me.”
“I always knew she was a bad influence.”
Jenna’s voice rose, and she paced in a little half circle on the cool floor. “Give me some credit, Brandon. I can make up my own mind. I can make my own choices—”
“Is it about the surgery?”
“Yes!” She spun back to face Candice. The plastic surgery, and so much more.
“It’s already cancelled.”
“You bet your life it’s cancelled. So are my hair appointments and my spa membership. You might want me to have a perfect nose and sculpted abs, but that doesn’t mean I—”
Candice’s eyes went wide. She made a frantic calm down motion with her hand.
Jenna paused for a breath, raking her hand once more through her hair. Her auburn hair—a little bright, a little gaudy, but her own natural color.
“Jenna, honey, you just had to say so.”
Yeah. Right. Jenna scoffed silently and shook her head. Like her opinion about her body or anything else had ever counted.
“Brandon,” she began again, calmer this time. Resolute. “I am not the right person for you. And you are not the right person for me. Can we please leave it at that?”
Candice nodded, admiration in her eyes.
“So, that’s it?” asked Brandon, voice hardening. “You finally call and it’s to break up?”
“We broke up four months ago.”
“You had a tantrum four months ago.”
Jenna clenched her jaw. She would not rise to the bait. She was calm, in control. “Call it whatever you like. We’re through.”
“So, you think that’s it? You expect me to tell my colleagues that my little fiancée up and left me? Pawn the ring? Eat the ballroom deposit?”
“You can tell your colleagues any damn thing you want.” Jenna pressed two fingers tight against her forehead. She wondered how he’d explained her absence for the past four months. But she sure wasn’t going to ask him.
Brandon snorted derisively into the phone. He hated it when she swore. It wasn’t ladylike.
“And call off the damn P.I.,” she added for good measure.
The phone cracked as Brandon hung up, and she jerked it away from her ear.
Candice flinched, and they stared at each other in silence for a moment.
“Shall we take that as a yes?” asked Candice.
“I’m assuming so.” A sheepish grin pulled up the corners of Jenna’s mouth. Gosh, that had felt good.
“SAY IT ISN’T SO.” Tyler Reeve’s older brother Derek filled the doorway of his office. Derek’s chin was tipped up, and his arms were folded across his broad chest.
Tyler swore under his breath, following Derek’s gaze to the duffel and the damning sleeping bag, which he’d carelessly dropped on the couch an hour ago. “It isn’t so,” he deadpanned, turning his attention back to his computer monitor.
“Striker said things were bad, but jeez…” Derek took a step into Tyler’s outer office and kicked the door shut behind him.
“Striker should mind his own business,” said Tyler, referring to the middle Reeves brother. He punched in the password to his personal bank account on the receptionist’s computer, hoping to see that the lawyer’s escrow deposit had added a few zeros to his balance.
“At least come out and stay in the guest house,” said Derek.
“No thanks.”
“This is stubborn even for you.”
“I got myself into this mess. I’ll get myself out.” The deposit hadn’t cleared. Tyler closed his eyes for a second.
He needed that money. Needed it today. He’d already cleaned out his savings account.
He’d taken a chance in writing Mrs. Cliff a check last night for her car, but it was either that or admit to the whole world that the IPS Detective Agency was broke—admit to the world that he’d been stupid enough to trust a partner who’d defrauded the company along with several of their clients.
Tyler would just as soon get shot.
Again.
In a place far more painful than his shoulder.
“Why does ‘getting yourself out of this mess’ have to involve eating cheap takeout food and sleeping on a short couch?” Derek crossed the room and picked up the corner of Tyler’s old Boy Scout sleeping bag.
“Because I sold the beach house.” Giving up on the bank balance for now, Tyler pushed back the chair and stood up. He preferred to look Derek in the eye for this conversation.
Derek might be six foot two, but Tyler had caught up to him on his eighteenth birthday, and even managed to beat him by half an inch. Not that it mattered. He was now and always would be the little brother.
And linebacker Derek could still take him out without even breaking a sweat.
“Because you were too stubborn to ask the family for help,” corrected Derek.
“A thirty-year-old man does not go running to his daddy for help just because his business hits a little snag.”
“A little snag?” Derek’s voice was incredulous.
“A little snag,” Tyler echoed.
“Your partner skipped with your clients’ money.”
Tyler gritted his teeth. “I’m handling it.”
“I can accept that you didn’t want to go to Dad. But why didn’t you come to me or Striker?”
Tyler folded his arms across his chest, imitating his brother’s pose. “I needed money, Derek. And I needed it fast.”
It had been forty-eight hours since he discovered Reggie’s duplicity, but saying it out loud still stung. Tyler had to squelch an urge to bash his fist into the nearest wall. It was an urge he’d been battling for two days.
“How much did you sell it for?” asked Derrick.
Tyler named a sum that made Derrick’s eyes widen.
“That’s it? You practically gave the beach house away.”
“They offered cash.”
“I would’ve bought it for that.”
“And I’d still have a place to live?”
“Exactly.”
“I’m not a charity case.”
Derek’s booming voice rose. “Jeez, Tyler, lightning won’t strike you dead if you borrow a little family money.”
“You know as well as I do that once Dad gets his hooks in me, I’ll be his for life.”
“Like me, you mean.”
“No. Not like you. You genuinely want to stare at balance sheets and stock portfolios all day long. Though how you’ve managed to stay sane this long is beyond me.”
Derek was the golden boy, the heir apparent to Reeves-DuCarter International, the pride and joy of three generations. Meanwhile, Tyler was the black sheep.
Derek shook his head. “You never did understand—”
“I understand perfectly. I’m thirty years old. This private eye thing isn’t just a phase. It’s my vocation, my dream, my calling.”
“Doin’ real well for you so far,” Derek snorted.
Tyler winced. “It’s a small setback.”
“How much did he get?”
“Reggie?”
“No.” Derek rolled his eyes. “Of course Reggie.”
Tyler slumped back down in the chair. “What did Striker tell you?”
Derek pulled up a guest chair and folded his big body into it. “That Reggie split with a client’s car and a cashier’s check.”
Tyler nodded. That about summed it up. Reggie had also made free with several hundred thousand in retainers over the past few months, much of which Tyler would have to pay back since Reggie wasn’t around to do the work.
“How much?” Derek repeated.
“Including Mrs. Cliff’s BMW?”
“Quit stalling.”
Tyler voiced the amount that still made him wince. “But I suspect most of it went up his nose before the big disappearing act.”
The books were a mess.
Tyler’s life was a mess.
Derek let out a long, slow whistle. “What’s plan B?”
Tyler gave a chopped, terse chuckle. Plan A implicitly being to hunt Reggie down and take it out of his hide. “Pay Mrs. Cliff for the car—I told her we wrecked it—back out of Reggie’s contracts and eat the penalties, sleep in the office for a while, find some quick, high-paying jobs…”
Derek glanced around the reception area with a frown.
“I’ve got coffee, a bath, a deli on the first floor,” said Tyler. “What more does a man need?”
“Bunk out at my place,” said Derek.
Tyler shook his head. “I don’t want Dad to know what’s going on.”
Derek stared hard into Tyler’s eyes, but Tyler didn’t flinch.
Derek was a fixer, just like their father. Tyler knew it was nearly killing him to sit back and watch his little brother stumble.
But Tyler was not giving in. He’d learned years ago that if he didn’t fight tooth and nail for every little scrap of independence, he’d end up in a Saville Row suit in a cushy office on the top floor of the Reeves-DuCarter building in downtown Seattle chatting nonsense with overseas investors and monitoring the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
“This isn’t high school, Derek. Let me handle it this time.”
Derek drew back in his chair. “One guy. I punched out one guy for you.”
Tyler shook his head. “Blackburn and his friends harassed me for three years thanks to you.” Finally, in Tyler’s senior year, he’d grown big enough to flatten Blackburn on his own and put a stop to the relentless tormenting.
“What?” Derek rocked forward. His fists balled. “They kept at it? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Tyler threw up his hands. “So you could punch him out again? Please, Derek. There’s nothing more pathetic than a kid who can’t fight his own battles.”
“Blackburn was twice your size.”
Tyler cracked a half smile. “Not in the end, he wasn’t.”
Derek’s eyes flashed with sudden admiration. “You were the one who broke his nose?”
“I was the one who broke his nose. I solved that problem. And I’ll solve this one, too. It just might take me a while.”
Derek glanced around the office again. “Well, there’s no need to be a martyr about it. Why not take a suite at the Quayside?”
“Because I’m trying to save money.”
“You’re a shareholder. They’ll give you a rate.”
“Rate’s zero if I stay here.”
The phone on the desktop rang.
“Where’s Shirley?” asked Derek.
“Had to cut her back to part-time.”
“What? You can’t even afford one employee?”
The phone rang again.
“Cash flow,” said Tyler. “It’s just temporary. She wanted to spend some time with her kids for the summer anyway.” He picked up the receiver. “IPS Detectives.”
Derek gazed at the ceiling and shook his head, as if invoking divine intervention.
“Reggie Sandhill,” said a man’s curt voice.
“Reggie is out of the country for a few weeks,” said Tyler.
Derek snorted at Tyler’s lie.
Tyler ignored him. “I’m his partner, Tyler Reeves.”
“Reggie came highly recommended,” said the man, in a tone that told Tyler he wasn’t used to disappointment.
“Perhaps I can help you.” said Tyler evenly, annoyed by both the man’s attitude and by Reggie’s habit of taking all the glory for cases that Tyler had solved. Everyone knew Reggie’s name. Nobody knew Tyler’s.
“It’s a surveillance job,” said the man on the phone, a challenge in his voice.
Like, maybe Tyler couldn’t handle surveillance. “No problem. Surveillance is one of our specialties.”
“I see.” The man seemed to be weighing whether or not to trust Tyler. “Her name is Jenna McBride,” he finally said.
“And your name?” asked Tyler, picking up a pencil and pulling a scratch pad closer on the desktop.
There was a slight hesitation on the line. “Brandon Rice. She’s my fiancée.”
“You think she’s cheating?” asked Tyler. Cheating was far and away the most common reason for a man to have his significant other followed.
Derek stood up, pacing across the room, a scowl on his face. Chasing cheating fiancées was obviously not his idea of a stellar career move. Too bad. It wasn’t like Tyler was in a position to be choosy. True, it wasn’t his usual area of business, but this was the kind of job he needed right now—quick, uncomplicated cash.
“Yes,” said Brandon Rice. “I think she’s cheating. I’m in Boston, and she’s in Seattle. I want a full report on her activities. Where she goes, who she sees. She has a decorating business. Canna Interiors.”
Tyler jotted down the woman’s name and the name of her business. “Is there anyone in particular you think she’s seeing?”
Derek made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat and shook his head. Well, hell, every case couldn’t be a crown jewel theft or a murder mystery. A guy still had to pay the bills.
Some days more than others.
“I want to know everything,” said Brandon. “Money is not an issue. I want to know everyone she sees. Everything she does.”
Tyler tapped the pencil eraser against the desktop. Reggie had taken on cases like this before. Rich man, pretty woman, edge of desperation. There was probably a big age difference.
“I’ll pay you ten thousand plus expenses,” said Brandon. “One week. A full report. And I mean full.”
Tyler resisted the urge to scowl at the phone, aware of Derek’s keen interest. He always submitted a full report to his clients—no matter what his opinion of them.
If this fiancée had any brains at all, she’d stay in Seattle and well away from Mr. Demanding. Of course, she was the one who’d agreed to marry the guy in the first place.
She was probably willing to put up with his crap for the money. Women generally did forgive a whole lot of ills for a whole lot of bank balance.
“When do you want me to start?” asked Tyler.
“Today,” barked Brandon. “I want you to start today.”
“You got it,” said Tyler. “Where do I send the report?”
After jotting down Brandon’s contact information, Tyler hung up the phone.
“You’re going to follow a cheating wife?” asked Derek.
“Fiancée,” Tyler corrected, feeling a twinge of self-consciousness.
“But you won’t lower yourself to join the family firm and negotiate with offshore investors?”
“You really want to help me?” asked Tyler, ignoring his big brother’s sarcasm, pretending it didn’t bite. From experience Tyler knew the best way to get Derek off his back was to give him a mission.
“Name it,” said Derek, pulling his checkbook out of his suit pocket.
“I’m not taking your money. If you really want to be useful, you can head over to Canna Interiors.”
Without Reggie as a second body, Tyler was handicapped. “I need to know how many employees are there. What kind of an outfit it is. And what Jenna McBride looks like. But I can’t let her see me yet.”
“Can I have one of those fountain pen cameras and a decoder ring?” asked Derek.
“Don’t be an ass.” Tyler stood up and shoved his big brother toward the door.
“But, Tyler, how am I going to case the joint without the proper James Bond paraphernalia?”
“Just tell me what she looks like, and what they do, so I can make a plan.” That ten thousand would go a long way towards operating expenses for the next couple of months.
2
“JENNA MCBRIDE?”
Jenna stopped short, halfway into the Canna Interiors offices as the large man rose from a white leather chair in the reception area.
“Mr. Reeves has been waiting for half an hour,” said her secretary, Rosemary, a lilt of excitement in her voice, and an appreciative glimmer in her eyes.
Rosemary was a grandmother in her early fifties, but Jenna could see why a woman of any age might find the burly Mr. Reeves attractive. She heard Candice suck in a quick, admiring breath behind her.
“Yes. I’m Jenna McBride.” She moved toward the waiting area, hand extended. “And this is my partner Candice Hammond.” For an impish moment, Jenna considered adding the fact that Candice was single.
“Derek Reeves,” said the man, grasping Jenna’s hand.
Then he turned to Candice and gave her a cursory glance and a nod.
“Candice,” said Candice, offering her hand.
He shook it with an absent nod, then he immediately turned back to Jenna. “I was wondering if we might talk for a few minutes?”
She felt Candice stiffen.
Jenna half turned her head to smile in Candice’s direction in an effort to include her. “How can we help you?”
Derek Reeves gestured to the low table in the reception area. “I’ve been reviewing your portfolio.” He still spoke directly to Jenna. He almost seemed to be studying her face.
“You’re interested in the services of a decorating firm?” she asked politely. Judging by the cut of his suit, Derek could be a great prospective customer.
“Uh…yeah.” He nodded. “That’s right. I am.”
“We’ll probably be more comfortable in the boardroom.” Jenna gestured to an open doorway behind the receptionist’s desk. While the man’s attention switched to the boardroom door, she signaled to the coffeepot.
Rosemary gave her a quick nod of understanding.
Derek Reeves glanced at Candice, then back at Jenna. He cleared his throat. “Sounds fine.”
“I have a conference call in about two minutes,” Candice quickly inserted, obviously picking up the same strange signals as Jenna. “Do you mind, Jenna?”
“Of course not.” Jenna reminded herself that Derek was the customer, and Candice was acting like a professional. Still, she couldn’t help feeling a little annoyed on Candice’s behalf. “I’ll bring you up to speed later.”
“Great. Thanks.” Candice turned a stiff smile on Derek. “Nice to meet you Mr. Reeves.”
“Likewise,” he replied formally, again with barely a glance.
Ignoring the obvious undercurrent, Jenna led Derek Reeves into the small boardroom.
“Why don’t you tell me a little bit about your project,” she suggested as they sat down at the polished, round table. The deep patina absorbed the late day sun. Candice had insisted their offices exude success, even before they had their first client. Jenna found herself glad of that right now.
“Sure.” Derek paused, glancing around at the sample pictures on the wall of the room. “Good idea…It’s a…lobby.” He stopped scanning the walls and sat back. “A lobby.”
“Oh.” Jenna waited a moment for him to elaborate. “Would that be in an office building?”
His forehead furrowed and he glanced around the room again. “Yes. I mean, no. It’s a…hotel.” He slowly smiled and nodded as if he’d just had a mental revelation. “A hotel lobby.”
Jenna experienced a twinge of disappointment. So far, they didn’t have any experience decorating hotels. They’d started with private homes and branched out to some office buildings. The hospital lobby was their big break into special purpose space, but she didn’t think whale fountains and monkey carpets would impress many hotel owners.
Her uncertainty must have shown, because Derek jumped back in.
“Did I say lobby?” he asked.
“Yes…”
“Well, actually, it’s more than just the lobby.” He nodded. “It’s the restaurant, too.”
“The restaurant?” Her heart sank. They had absolutely nothing in the way of experience that would qualify them to decorate a restaurant.
“And,” Derek continued, “well, the spa, too. In fact, you know, the whole hotel should really be upgraded.”
“The whole hotel?” Jenna’s eyes widened.
“Right.”
“Uh, Mr. Reeves—”
“Call me Derek.”
“Sure. Derek.” Jenna debated the merits of blunt honesty versus the incredible opportunity of decorating an entire hotel. She wanted the job. She wanted the job very, very much. But there was the touchy matter of experience.
“It sounds like…” she tried. “I mean, of course we’d be delighted to submit…” A little voice inside her told her to shut up and say yes. “Uh, is the hotel here in Seattle?”
“Yes. On the lake. The Quayside.”
“The Quayside?” Jenna’s heart stopped for a split second. She felt the blood drain from her face.
“You’ve heard of it?”
“Yes. Of course.” Who hadn’t heard of the Quayside? Jenna dropped her hands into her lap and pinched herself.
The Quayside was a gorgeous, venerated historic hotel on a scenic point of land right on the shore of Lake Washington. It was an architectural dream, water on three sides, and a stunning view of the Cascade Mountain range.
It had played host to business magnates, movie stars and royalty. This was a job which could catapult their firm to the stratosphere.
Jenna swallowed. Do not mess this up. “We could draft some preliminary sketches—”
“Tell you what.” Derek rose from the table, and Jenna followed suit. “I’ll give you my card.” He reached into his suit jacket pocket. Then he flipped the card over and pulled out a pen.
“I’m writing the name and phone number of the hotel manager on the back. Give me a few…Uh, I mean, give him a call. But wait until late tomorrow afternoon. He’ll give you the details.”
Jenna nodded silently. Her brain was running a million miles an hour. Candice was going to die. She was going to fall off her chair and die right there in the office.
Derek straightened up and handed Jenna the card.
“Thank you, Mr…. Derek.”
He smiled, and his eyes lit up like Santa Claus. “Thank you, Jenna.”
TYLER SNAPPED a couple of pictures from the Quayside Hotel parking lot as Jenna and her partner Candice emerged from the front entry. Derek had called last night to describe Jenna, and to tell Tyler she currently had a contract at the hospital. From there, Tyler had followed the pair to the hotel.
Jenna seemed to be having the time of her life with her fiancé out of the picture. The two women walked down the sidewalk, talking animatedly, laughing, and gesturing in the air like a couple of college students as they headed for Candice’s sedan.
Tyler raised his newspaper so that it shielded his face as they passed his SUV. Whatever had happened in the hotel, they were certainly excited about it. He wondered for a moment if they’d met their boyfriends. It was a definite possibility.
As their vehicle backed out of the space, he turned his attention to the stone building, training the camera in preparation for the emergence of their dates. He could catch up with the women at either the hospital or the Canna Interiors office later.
A family emerged from the hotel, then a lone businessman, then…nobody. Five minutes went by, then ten, then fifteen. Finally, the door opened again. But it was an elderly couple who stopped to talk to the doorman.
Okay, so Jenna and Candice weren’t meeting men for a clandestine lunchtime date. At least not men who were leaving the hotel a discreet few minutes after them.
He supposed they could have met men who were guests at the hotel, who didn’t need to come out to the parking lot after lunch. But that was stretching his initial theory a little too far.
He placed the camera on the seat beside him and reached for the ignition key. He could go inside and talk to Henry Wenchel, the hotel manager. Henry was an old friend of the family and, technically at least, Tyler was still a company shareholder. But the odds of Henry having noticed two women having lunch in one of the restaurants were ridiculously small.
Except that they were unusually attractive. Candice was tall and willowy, with a fresh, wind-blown supermodel look that would turn any head. Jenna was shorter, a bit more understated. But her thick, auburn hair was gorgeous, and there was something about her smile and the glint in her sea-foam eyes that made Tyler think it was a shame she was being wasted on Brandon Rice.
None of his business, he reminded himself. Rich men and gorgeous women had been making marriage deals since time immemorial. His job was to see if she was making side deals with anyone else.
He pulled out of the parking lot. Sea-foam eyes and his personal opinion notwithstanding, he’d stay focused. He’d get some photos, write the report and collect his fee. The sooner he was out of the adultery business the better.
NEXT MORNING, Tyler found himself pulling right back into the Quayside parking lot. This time, Jenna was alone when she strode purposefully into the main foyer.
Looked like his first instinct had been right. Who went to the Quayside two days in a row? Who went there alone at this time of the morning, unless they were meeting somebody inside?
Tyler loved it when his instincts were firing on all cylinders. He pulled his baseball cap down low, donned dark sunglasses, grabbed his camera and followed her.
He pushed through the revolving glass door, glancing around the antique lobby until he spotted her near the concierge desk.
Perhaps somebody had left her a key with the concierge. Perhaps a young, virile somebody who would make her forget her fiancé for a couple of hours.
The concierge didn’t hand her a key, but Jenna did pick up the house phone. Maybe luck was with him. Maybe young and virile would meet her right here in the lobby. Right here in camera range.
Though the light was bad, Tyler took a quick shot of Jenna talking on the phone.
Then he sidled over to a furniture grouping and eased down into a soft armchair. He wished he had another newspaper to hide behind, but he had to settle for the obscuring foliage of a large potted plant. He felt like a tacky Sam Spade, hovering, waiting, watching.
Jenna hung up the phone and moved away from the concierge desk, turning to face in his general direction. Her beauty rocked him back. For a minute, he almost wished he had a bank balance that would put him in the running to date her.
Angling his head, confident she couldn’t tell the direction of his gaze through the tinted glasses, he looked his fill. Her thick, auburn hair bounced around her shoulders, setting off a creamy smooth complexion. Her lips were full, her cheekbones high and her skirted business suit showed off a figure that nipped and tucked in all the right places. He could sit here and watch her all day long.
He sighed. Too bad she was so willing to trade in those stunning looks for Brandon’s money.
Something on the far side of the lobby caught her attention, and her amazing eyes lit up with recognition. Tyler gripped the camera as she smiled a greeting and started to walk toward an unseen person.
His gaze strayed to her silky legs. He’d always had a soft spot for shapely calves, especially those that rose so gracefully from strappy, feminine sandals. He felt a sudden burn in his chest at the thought of watching her greet a strange man with a squeeze and a kiss.
It got worse when he imagined those shapely calves doing…well, doing what shapely calves do when they don’t have their stockings on. He ruthlessly tamped down the unruly image, sitting forward to peek around the edge of the plant.
Henry?
Gorgeous Jenna was here to cheat on rich Brandon with Henry Wenchel? The scenario didn’t bear thinking about.
This was way more information than Tyler wanted concerning his father’s friend. And he couldn’t help thinking that Henry’s wife was not going to be happy.
Trying not to cringe, he quickly snapped a shot.
Henry reached out to briefly shake Jenna’s hand. They spoke for a minute, keeping a respectful two feet apart. Henry talked and Jenna nodded. She smiled, but it wasn’t an intimate smile, and neither of them made a beeline for the penthouse elevator.
Tyler tried not to feel too relieved. When he thought about it, if Henry was going to carry on an affair with a younger woman, he’d be pretty stupid to do it in his own hotel lobby in front of the security cameras.
A moment later, Jenna and Henry headed up the mezzanine stairs. Towards Henry’s office. Henry’s very public office. Tyler sighed, relieved that Jenna had legitimate business at the hotel. Even though it meant his instincts were malfunctioning again.
IN HENRY WENCHEL’S OFFICE, Jenna sat very still and concentrated on not hyperventilating. He was taking out a pen. He was flipping to the back of the contract. He was touching the pen to the signature line. The pen was moving. He was signing.
Her heart rate increased, and she could feel her extremities start to tingle.
He was done.
He’d signed.
Henry Wenchel had just signed a contract to pay Canna Interiors an exorbitant sum for the preliminary designs. Preliminary designs which could lead to the interior decorating contract of a lifetime.
“Understanding the ambiance is so important, don’t you think, Jenna?” He passed the contract across the table toward her and held out his gold pen.
“Yes.” She nodded, taking a shaky breath. Her fingers were still tingling as she reached for his pen. She half expected to wake up any second.
“I hope a week away from home won’t be too inconvenient for you.”
Jenna slid the contract until it was directly below her, only half listening to Henry Wenchel. “A week?” she asked automatically.
There it was. A swoopy H, a pointy W, then a squiggle and a swirl and a dot. She suddenly wished she had a signature that looked more artistic than her plain old name. A signature that nobody could really read, because she was important enough that they’d all learned her squiggles.
“We’ll assign you a suite,” said Henry.
She touched the pen to the paper above the line that read proponent. “Suite?” Jenna asked as she wrote her first name.
“You’ll stay here, of course, while you work.”
The pen faltered on the M. Drat! The biggest signature of her life, and she couldn’t even get the M right. She sure hoped that didn’t void the contract.
She carefully finished McBride, then looked up at Henry. “Stay here?” she asked, blinking.
“The only way to get the true ambiance,” Henry smiled. “That’s not a problem is it?”
“No,” Jenna hurriedly shook her head. She’d stay in Timbuktu if it made Henry happy.
“Perfect,” said Henry. He pressed a button on the telephone console.
Jenna tried valiantly to look like she made deals of this magnitude every day of the week. If Henry could tell she was faking, he was certainly being polite about it.
“I’ll put you in one of our executive suites,” he continued. “They have a phone, fax, personal computer, printer, Internet access. If there’s anything else you need, be sure to let Anna know.”
Jenna nodded. She couldn’t think of a single thing she could possibly need in life besides a plum contract and an executive suite at the Quayside.
Henry gestured toward the door. “Great. Let’s go see a registration clerk.”
Feeling like she was drifting through a dream, Jenna followed Henry back down the wide, curved staircase toward the reception desk. While they walked, she gazed at the marble pillars, the dome ceiling, the leaded windows. The carpets, wall coverings and furniture were aging, but the building itself was extraordinary.
“Hello, Tyler.” Henry’s hearty voice pulled her attention away from their surroundings.
A man standing at the reception desk turned abruptly, drawing back as if he was startled by the sight of them.
“What a coincidence.” Henry clapped the man on the shoulder. “Tyler, I’d like you to meet Jenna McBride, our new decorator. Jenna this is Tyler—”
“Carter,” the man inserted, holding out his hand.
Henry’s eyebrows briefly knit together.
“I’m a security guard here at the hotel.” Tyler Carter grasped Jenna’s hand.
His hand was warm, his grip strong and his skin leathery enough to indicate he enjoyed some kind of outdoor sport. His dark glasses were perched on a straight nose, above a strong, square chin. The smile he flashed was friendly enough, but Jenna sensed some kind of tension behind it.
“Yes. Well.” Henry cleared his throat. “We’re just getting Jenna set up with a suite for the next week or so.”
“Don’t let me get in the way.” Tyler gestured toward the receptionist and gallantly moved back.
HENRY WAS close on his heels as Tyler cut across the lobby. Meeting Jenna so soon wasn’t exactly what he’d planned. But Tyler had to congratulate himself on coming up with the security guard cover story. Now he had an excuse to hang around the hotel. Even better, he had an excuse to snoop.
“Odd that I don’t recall hiring another security guard,” said Henry as the distance between them and the reception desk increased.
“I’m undercover,” said Tyler. “On a case.”
“Somebody staying at the hotel?”
“As it turns out.” He glanced back to where Jenna was checking in. A decorating job at the Quayside. Small world, but a convenient one.
“There’s not a criminal in my hotel, is there?”
“Not a criminal.” Still smarting from Derek’s reaction to an adultery surveillance case, Tyler didn’t jump to share the particulars with Henry.
“Are you planning to stay?” asked Henry.
“Stay?”
“For the undercover operation. Do you need a room?”
What a good idea. It would make snooping even easier. Besides, he was on a “money is no object” expense account. And it would sure keep Derek from worrying about where he was living.
“Sure. I’ll take a room,” said Tyler.
“Shall I put it on the Reeves-DuCarter account?”
Tyler grinned. “Bill IPS. I’m getting expenses on this.”
“Good enough. You will let me know if my guests are in any danger?”
“That’s a promise,” said Tyler. Though it seemed unlikely that any of the guests could be decorated to death. He found his attention straying back to Jenna.
“What is Jenna McBride decorating?” he asked.
“She’s giving the entire hotel a facelift.” There was some kind of a twinkle in Henry’s eyes. “She came very highly recommended.”
Tyler squinted at Henry’s expression. It was sort of a wink, wink, nudge, nudge, inside joke expression.
Redecorating the hotel wasn’t a bad idea. But Henry was sure acting strange about it. Maybe the older man did have a crush on Jenna.
If that was the case, Tyler could have told him that Jenna was already taken. He could also remind Henry that Henry was already taken.
Jenna started across the foyer toward them.
“Can you give me a security key?” asked Tyler.
“Not a problem.” Henry nodded.
3
THE LIGHTHOUSE, the Quayside’s rooftop seafood restaurant, wasn’t light at all. Jenna squinted at the maitre d’ as she took her seat at a small table in a secluded alcove. She supposed the darkness might seem romantic to some, but it was a crying shame to waste the view.
Although the restaurant was located on the fortieth floor, right on the lake front, only about a quarter of the exterior wall space had windows. The rest was covered in a heavy, burgundy wall paper, layered between dark, hewn beams.
The feeble ceiling lights cast a smoky, orange hue, and the carpet was in red tones. At least she thought it was in red tones, she leaned sideways in her seat and peered down at it. She could barely see her feet down there in the dark depths.
Glancing around to make sure nobody was paying attention, she lifted the candle from the middle of the table and held it close to the floor.
She was right. Swirls of burgundy and bloodred. She shuddered.
“Lose something, ma’am?”
Jenna quickly straightened in her chair, giving her emerald cocktail dress a surreptitious tug down her thighs and smoothing her fingertips across the straight, strapless neckline to make sure everything was where it ought to be.
“Nothing.” She smiled at the waiter, placing the candle back on the table.
“Can I offer you a cocktail?” he asked, reaching out and returning the candle to its original position.
“Sure.” Jenna tapped her fingernails against the gold tablecloth. “A glass of red wine?”
“We have the Andollin Beaujolais from France, very light, very smooth. Or the Posselini Merlot from Italy, bolder, very dry.” He flipped open a leather-bound wine list. “Or I can open a bottle.”
“The Beaujolais will be fine.”
“Very good.” He flipped the wine list shut. “I’ll be back in one moment.”
Jenna sighed and settled into her chair. The waiter’s old-world mannerisms seemed to go with the room. Maybe wealthy people liked oppressive spaces and officious service. She’d certainly experienced both with Brandon.
Should she stay with dark and classic here, or be bold and suggest something more updated? She ran her fingertips along the ornate arm of the dark walnut chair, tracing the swirled carving as she gazed around the room, cataloguing the furniture and decor.
Most of the tables in her section were empty. Although, one of the window tables was occupied by a couple. She unconsciously paused on them. They were holding hands across the table top and seemed totally absorbed in each other, oblivious to anything else in the room.
After a brief twinge of envy, Jenna shifted her focus. It came to rest on the other chair at her table. The wood was dark, almost black, and the upholstery was diamond-tufted, red velvet. She imagined it had looked very rich in its time, but now it looked heavy and dated. Rather like the wallpaper.
Rather like the staff. She grinned to herself and took a quick sip from her water glass. She wondered if new uniforms would lighten them up a little.
Her gaze started to roam again, coming to rest on the couple by the window. The man reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a small, velvet box. Jenna’s eyes widened along with the woman’s, and Jenna quickly turned her head to look away.
She found herself focusing in on the wallpaper while she considered changing chairs so the couple wouldn’t be in her line of vision. They obviously didn’t need an audience tonight.
The wallpaper in front of her was starting to peel at one of the seams. For all its venerated reputation, the Quayside sure did need the services of a good decorator.
She touched the loose seam with her fingertip, and pried away an inch of the brittle paper. It flaked off in her hand.
“Your wine, ma’am,” the waiter startled her again, and she wondered if he practiced sneaking up on people.
“Thank you,” she murmured.
“Are you ready to order?”
Jenna shook her head. “Not yet.” She wasn’t in a hurry.
As she sipped her wine, her attention kept wandering back to the wall beside her. Curious, she shifted in her seat, taking a closer look at the smooth, surface revealed under the wallpaper. It was drywall, probably put up in the sixties. And, since the hotel was more than fifty years old, that meant somebody had renovated the restaurant at least once.
She traced the seam partway up the wall, drawing closer. She pulled up on her knees, lifting the candle for a better look. If this was a renovation, what was the original design?
She glanced around the restaurant. Lattice dividers and carved, stone statues broke the large room into sections. Hers was definitely an outside wall. If the original designer had more brains than the renovator, there might be window openings back there. She felt a hum of excitement at the thought of more windows.
With all that light, all that view to play with, she could cheerfully blow the entire redecorating budget on the restaurant alone. The possibilities were positively endless.
She shimmied up higher. Glancing around to make sure the other two diners were still making moon eyes at each other and ignoring her, she knocked gently on the wall. It sounded solid. Drat.
She put the candle down and knocked again, a little to the left this time. Still solid. A statue kept her from trying further to the left, so she stretched up to reach above it, glancing at the other outside walls, counting off the windows and trying to eyeball the pattern. She reached up and knocked.
Hollow.
“Yes!” she whispered. Pay dirt.
She rapped her knuckles in a horizontal line, trying to ascertain the size of the opening. Then she went vertical, stretching up, standing in her seat. The hollow sound went up and up. Excitement hummed through her veins.
If the perimeter of the restaurant was all window openings, she was going to fill this mausoleum with light.
“Is something wrong?” A deep voice behind her startled her.
Jenna turned swiftly, bashing her shin against the tabletop, recognizing the security guard from the lobby earlier and knocking over the candle all in a split second.
“Ouch,” she cried, leaning over quickly to blow out the candle. Her breath bent the flame then, to her horror, it leapt higher, catching the wax-drenched tablecloth.
“Watch your hair,” the man gasped, grabbing her around the waist and pulling her out of the chair. He held her tight with one arm, and swiftly snuffed the flame with his other palm.
But it didn’t go out, and he jerked his hand back.
Panic surged in Jenna. Any second now the whole cloth was going to go up. The woman at the other table exclaimed and pointed.
Tyler grabbed Jenna’s water glass and dumped it on the spreading flame. It hissed, and smoked, sputtering out, leaving a messy, saucer-sized black hole in the middle of the tablecloth.
“You okay?” Tyler asked in a deep voice that rumbled near her ear. His arm was still firmly around her waist.
“Fine,” she answered, only slightly shaken. The throb on the front of her shin bone told her she’d have a bruise tomorrow. But no real damage had been done to the table, thank goodness.
“Thanks,” she said.
“No problem,” he replied.
The spilled water worked its way to the edge of the table and trickled onto the floor. Jenna picked up her napkin and began dabbing at the mess.
Tyler reached for the second napkin. He dropped his arm from around her waist, but they were still shoulder to shoulder.
“Dare I ask?” He tipped his head to look at her as he blotted the water. His eyebrows quirked, and she found herself staring into the deepest, darkest, bluest eyes in the world. They were framed with thick, black lashes and shadowed by straight brows. Whoever decorated this guy had done a bang-up job.
“Ask what?” she managed as her pulse reacted to the fact that she was touching an extremely good-looking man. His biceps were rock hard, and his body heat radiated through his cotton shirt, warming her bare arm.
“Is everything all right here?” The waiter’s voice interrupted. His words conveyed concern, but his expression was more exasperated than worried.
“We could use a new tablecloth,” said Tyler evenly, dropping the wet napkin and guiding Jenna back a couple of steps. She didn’t fight the continued body contact, since she kind of liked touching him.
“Of course,” he finally said. He gathered Jenna’s wineglass and the silver setting, then scooped up the tablecloth.
Tyler glanced back down at Jenna as the man walked away. A grin formed on his face, showing off the barest hint of a dimple. “Dare I ask what you’re up to?”
“Experiencing the ambiance,” she said, her shoulder still brushing against his arm. She should have felt crowded by his proximity in the small space, but it honestly felt flirty.
“Do you always stand on your chair to experience the ambiance?” His leg shifted, brushing once against her stockings, sending her nerve endings into a tizzy.
“Oh, that,” she breathed, waving a hand toward the wall behind them. “I was just looking for windows.”
His gaze shifted to the solid wall. “I hate to be the one to tell you this…” He turned the full force of his attention back to her, and she sucked in a tight breath.
From his tousled dark hair, to his devil-may-care smile, to his deep voice and broad shoulders, this guy was drop-dead sexy.
“I think they’re behind the wall,” she explained, struggling to understand her strong reaction to a virtual stranger.
“I take it you’ve got big plans for the place?”
“It’s got loads of potential.” She should move away now, break the subtle contact between their arms and sit back down. She really should.
He glanced around the restaurant. “Not a fan of early bordello?”
She smiled. That was it. The red velvet, the orange-toned lighting, the sultry feel of the atmosphere. Jenna could easily imagine Victorian era ladies of the evening plying their trade.
“Maybe the last decorator was trying for romantic?” she suggested charitably.
Tyler’s expression turned skeptical.
“Sensual?”
“Sensual is free,” he said. “When you pay for it, it’s erotic.”
Jenna bit down on the inside of her cheek. Nope, she didn’t know this man. She wasn’t going to make a risqué joke about his bordello experience.
He caught the look in her eyes. “The answer is never.”
She shook her head, stifling a grin. “I never asked.”
“Uh-huh.” He shifted back, folding his arms. “But you were wondering.”
She shook her head. “I’m only wondering how many windows are hidden behind the wall renovations.” She kept a straight face for a moment before giving into temptation. “Of course, you were the one who recognized the bordello look right off.”
“I’ve watched westerns.”
“Westerns? Is that what they call them nowadays?”
His eyes turned to blue smoke, and he slowly took in her tight dress, stockings and high heels. “Decorators?” he drawled. “Is that what they call them nowadays?”
“Should I get out of this conversation while the getting is good?”
“Since we’ve both agreed we’re standing in a bordello. And since you’re the prettiest woman in the room. And since I’m about to make you an offer…Yeah, we should both get out of this conversation before I get my face slapped.”
“You couldn’t afford me anyway,” she boldly tossed out in a Mae West voice before stepping away from him and slipping into her chair.
He was silent for half a heartbeat as he took a seat across the table. Then his bass voice rolled. “Don’t bet on it.”
His dark eyes smoldered, and Jenna’s entire body contracted.
Wow.
Nobody had ever looked at her like that before—sliding a white-hot gaze straight past her inhibitions.
“May I offer you a cocktail, sir?” The waiter interrupted, his formal tone almost icy. He stood to one side while a busboy swiftly replaced the tablecloth then set out silverware, menus and a new candle.
“Scotch,” said Tyler, not appearing the least bit fazed by the waiter’s tone. “Glenlochlan. And another glass of wine for the lady.”
TYLER SETTLED BACK in the wide comfortable chair and watched the candlelight flicker on Jenna’s flushed cheeks. She’d surprised him. Shocked the hell out of him, actually.
He’d been expecting a cold, brittle, uptight gold digger. What he got was a warm, funny, down-to-earth woman who could give as good as she got and was obviously serious about her business. Brandon was definitely getting his money’s worth.
Her hair must have started the evening piled neatly on top of her head. But it was a little worse for wear now. Stray wisps teased her delicate ears and dangled around her square-cut emerald earrings.
The earrings matched the tight sheath of a dress she wore. It had probably started the evening a little higher and neater, too. Not that he minded. Not as long as they were hidden away in a dark corner where nobody else could get a glimpse of her cleavage.
A gentleman would tell her about her precarious hold on decency. Luckily, Tyler had never been a gentleman.
The waiter appeared and placed the scotch in front of Tyler and the wine in front of Jenna.
“Will you be placing your order now?” he asked, notepad at the ready, his dour expression aimed at Jenna.
Tyler hoped she’d hit him with a one-liner, but she bit her bottom lip guiltily and quickly reached for the menu.
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Barbara Dunlop
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Jenna McBride is making a new start: a new city and a new business with a shot at the big time. She and her best friend–and interior decorating partner–jump at the chance to refurbish a venerable Seattle hotel. For a hands-on approach, Jenna is assigned a suite for a week′s stay…it′ll also give her an opportunity to ditch all the private investigators hired by her ex to spy on her!Tyler Reeves may be a blue blood, but he′s the black sheep in his family–making a living the hard way as a P.I., instead of opting for corporate finance. Now he has no choice but to accept a case he normally wouldn′t–tailing some guy′s fiancée. Easy enough. Until Tyler meets Jenna and falls for the sexy siren in a flash. It looks as if his undercover work will take on a whole new meaning–who will be the first left wearing next to nothing!