Ex Marks the Spot (Harlequin Next)

by Merline Lovelace

  Andi stood on the sidewalk outside the shop, took another look around and sucked in a deep breath.

  “You’ve got yourself a new tenant, Mr. Jacobs.”

  “Great! Let’s go back to my office and we’ll draw up a lease agreement.”

  SHE PUT DOWN A DEPOSIT on Tuesday. The following Saturday she invited Sue Ellen to swing by for a guided tour. They met the leasing agent on the sidewalk outside the former scuba-and-dive shop.

  “The interior needs work,” Wayne Jacobs warned as he unlocked the front door. “The previous occupant moved out yesterday and left things in kind of a mess.”

  “Kind of a mess?” Sue Ellen gasped, halting just inside the threshold.

  Beside her, Andi swept a dismayed gaze from the trash littering the floor to the holes punched in the drywall to the fluorescent light fixture hanging by a thin wire.

  “I have a repair crew coming in tomorrow,” Jacobs assured her. “They’ll install new drywall, fix the floor, replace the acoustical tiles, give everything a fresh coat of paint. You won’t recognize the place.”

  “I’d better not.” She took another sweeping look around. “I expect a full refund of my deposit if you don’t bring everything up to code.”

  “Not to worry.” The agent swiped a palm over the few strands of hair covering the top of his head. “The town’s building inspector is a son of a gun to work with, but I guarantee we’ll meet or exceed requirements.”

  Once outside, Andi shrugged off her dismay and insisted on buying Sue Ellen dinner at the seafood restaurant across the street. Cap’n Sam’s decor ran to fishnet, plastic seashells and picnic-bench-style tables. But the latched-back shutters gave a glorious view of the gulf, and the grilled red snapper melted in Andi’s mouth. She’d taken only a few bites when a shout boomed out.

  “Hey, Colonel!”

  The call came from the bar, where six or seven men had gathered to wait for a table. One of them broke away from the group and vectored straight for Andi.

  Heads turned. Forks stilled. Sue Ellen just about choked on her snapper. Eyes wide, she gaped at the Adonis headed their way. With his short-cropped curly hair and superbly conditioned athlete’s body, he might have modeled for any of the statues adorning ancient Olympia.

  “Who is that?”

  “Major Bill Steadman.” Andi’s lips curved. “‘Crash’ to his friends.”

  “Any friend of yours,” S.E. murmured, her gaze riveted on the heart-stopping young major, “should most definitely become one of mine.”

  Andi pushed back her chair and was immediately swept into a fierce bear hug. Since she and Crash were both in civilian dress, military protocol didn’t stand a chance. Not after the months they’d spent working a classified project in the Nevada desert.

  He set her on her feet, his handsome face alight with pleasure. “I didn’t know you’d been transferred to Florida. When did you get here? What outfit are you with?”

  Andi glanced at the faces turned their way. The explanation came hard with so many strangers listening in. Pinning on a breezy smile, she gave him a modified version of events. “I wasn’t transferred. I put in my papers and bailed.”

  “The hell you say!”

  “It’s true. You’re looking at a woman of leisure.”

  “Damn, Colonel.” He struggled with his surprise and shock. “You would’ve been our first female four-star general. Everyone said so.”

  “Not likely,” Andi countered, laughing at the absurdity of his prediction. “You know darn well any rank beyond captain is a crapshoot. What are you doing here?”

  “I’m at Whiting Field, on a special assignment as an instructor at the Navy helicopter school.”

  “Uh-oh. Do they know how you earned your nickname?”

  “No, and I’m not about to tell them.”

  His gaze slid past Andi, prompting her to make belated introductions.

  “Crash, this is my friend Sue Ellen Carson. She’s civil service, but don’t hold that against her.”

  “Good to meet you, ma’am.”

  His respectful ma’am took some of the sparkle from S.E.’s smile, but she recovered swiftly and gestured to the empty places at their wooden picnic table. “You and your friends are welcome to join us.”

  “You might want to think about that,” Crash said with a grin. “They’re Navy.”

  “That’s okay. I’m nondenominational.”

  He gave a crack of laughter and signaled his buddies. “Gentlemen, I’d like you to meet Ms. Sue Ellen Carson and Colonel Andrea Armstrong, the meanest, toughest, most pigheaded boss I ever worked for.”

  “High praise indeed,” Andi drawled, “coming from the meanest, toughest, most pigheaded subordinate who ever worked for me.”

  Introductions made and handshakes exchanged, the group hunkered down on the benches.

  Several rounds of drinks, four heaping baskets of hush puppies and mounds of fried fish later, they were still there. They would have stayed even longer if Andi hadn’t called a halt to the improbable war stories and rowdy one-upmanship all helo pilots indulged in whenever they got within fifty yards of each other.

  “Sorry, troops. Some of us have to work tomorrow.”

  “I don’t,” Sue Ellen protested. “Tomorrow’s Sunday, remember?”

  “You civil service weenies may take weekends off. Entrepreneurs like me keep our noses to the grindstone 24-7.”

  “You’ll have to zap me an e-mail when you fix a date for your grand opening,” Crash said as he and his friends escorted the women to their car. “I’ll round up the entire squadron and march them over.”

  “Great. I promise to stock up on Tom Clancys and W.E.B. Griffins for the occasion.”

  “We might even arrange a flyover,” he volunteered. “One of our training routes takes us close to Stone Beach, at the southern tip of Santa Rosa Island.”

  “Surprise, surprise,” Sue Ellen snorted. “That’s the nude beach,” she added at Andi’s blank look.

  S.E.’s gaze stayed on Crash as Andi backed the Tahoe out of its parking spot.

  “That boy could fly over my southern tip anytime. Is he married?”

  “He was. His wife died in a boating accident a few years back.”

  “Oh, no. How did he take it?”

  “Hard.”

  Sue Ellen thought about that for a few moments before adding a casual comment. “Why don’t you invite him over for dinner some evening?”

  “I will now that I know he’s here.”

  “Good. How about Tuesday? I’ll bring dessert.”

  “Sorry, I can’t do Tuesday. I’m driving up to Tennessee to meet with a book distributor and tour his warehouse. I plan to stay overnight and probably won’t get back until late Wednesday.”

  “Thursday, then.”

  Andi slanted her friend a quick glance. “You don’t think Crash might be a little young for you?”

  “Honey chile, the older I gets, the younger I likes ’em.”

  “All right, I’ll invite him over. Just don’t come whining to me about sagging boobs and belly flab when he gets you naked.”

  “My boobs do not sag. As for belly flab…” S.E. patted her flat, tight tummy. “Why do you think I got this diamond winkie? A little distraction goes a long way, girl.”

  PHASE FIVE OF Operation Bookstore required Andi to firm up arrangements with a distributor to supply her shop. Accordingly, she set out for Tennessee at oh-dark-thirty Tuesday morning.

  She could have dealt with the distributor’s regional rep in Florida but wanted to get a feel for the company’s overall operation. Besides, except for scouting trips to Pensacola and Panama City, she hadn’t been out of the immediate area since she arrived.

  Leaving the Gulf coast behind her, she shot straight north through Alabama’s flat fields and spindly pines. Il Divo belted from the Tahoe’s four speakers. Coffee and a couple of McDonald’s breaks kept her fueled. Eager anticipation made the eight-hour trip whiz by.

  Funny, she tho
ught as she sped along I-24 toward Nashville. She’d once commanded a wing with an annual operating budget of more than three hundred million dollars. In her last job as director of operations for J-1, she’d managed joint billets scattered throughout the world.

  Yet here she was, as excited about establishing an operation that probably would employ one, maybe two people and run to no more than forty thousand a year as she’d been over any of her military responsibilities.

  “Everything’s relative,” she reminded the grinning face in the Tahoe’s rearview mirror.

  And this baby was hers. All hers. No boss to answer to. No large staff to encourage and support and harass. No lives affected by her decisions except her own.

  She couldn’t believe how good it felt. How good she felt. Breaking into song, she joined Il Divo in a loud, enthusiastic rendition of “Unchained Melody.”

  ANDI TIMED HER ARRIVAL at the distribution center outside LaVergne perfectly. After signing in at the front desk, she was escorted to the Customer Relations area and introduced to the rep who would manage her account.

  A genial good old boy with a comfortable paunch and more than thirty years in the book business, Ed Saunders had prepared an info packet with enough charts, fact sheets and trend analyses to satisfy even Andi’s analytical soul. They spent more than an hour discussing various discount schedules, payment options and regional readership trends. After demonstrating the company’s online ordering and inventory system, Saunders led her to a golf cart for a tour of the warehouse.

  “This is only one of our five regional warehouses.”

  Wheeling out of the lot, they putt-putted from the administrative building toward a massive windowless structure that seemed to stretch for miles.

  “If you request an expedited shipment of a certain title and we’re out of stock here in LaVergne, our computers will automatically ship it from the next closest center.”

  Andi soaked in every word like a sponge, scribbling notes when necessary on the fact sheets Saunders had provided. Her pen skittered to a halt once inside the warehouse, however.

  “Good Lord!”

  Grinning, the account manager looped a wrist over the golf cart’s steering wheel. “We get that reaction a lot from first timers.”

  Awestruck, Andi took in acre upon acre of industrial shelving stacked almost thirty feet high. The shelves were crammed with boxes bearing the labels of every publisher in the business. Forklifts chugged up and down the wide aisles ferrying pallets of more boxes. Metal bins rattled along an overhead set of tracks, whisking individual orders to the packing and shipping center.

  While Saunders drove the main aisle, Andi breathed in the musty scent of cardboard and ink flavored with the stink of diesel fumes from the semis backed up to the long row of bay doors at the far end of the warehouse. Craning her neck, she almost fell out of the golf cart in an effort to take in the towers of boxed books on either side.

  “This is one of the stations where we prepare individual shipments,” he said, pulling up at a long counter stacked with piles of books, CDs, tapes and magazines.

  They climbed out of the cart and shook hands with the “picker” working that station. As the woman explained her process for filling orders, Andi spotted a new hardcover by one of her favorite authors. She trained the tip of her finger over the cover. A thrill of sheer delight danced up and down her spine.

  She felt as though she’d died and gone to book heaven.

  CHAPTER 5

  “You should have seen that place!”

  Still jazzed from her trip to Tennessee, Andi wielded a set of salad tongs like a baton. Fresh spinach, walnuts, mandarin oranges and red onion rings flew from the serving bowl to colorful plastic salad plates.

  “They maintain an inventory of over a million titles. I was swimming in the printed word.”

  Sue Ellen and Crash exchanged amused glances. They’d been hearing about the Great Book Expedition since they’d arrived a half hour ago. Hooking one sandaled foot under her, S.E. rocked her high-backed patio chair to the rhythm of her friend’s bubbling enthusiasm.

  Andi had set the table on the raised deck that angled along the side and rear of her rented house. Fine mesh screening completely enclosed the deck. Miniature lights threaded through the overhead supports gave it a romantic glow. While dog flies and skeeters buzzed outside the screens, the narrow wedge of sea visible through the dunes had slowly darkened from turquoise to cobalt to midnight-blue.

  Sue Ellen loved both the deck and the view…which included Major Bill Steadman. He was sprawled in the chair next to hers, one knee hooked over the other, his red knit polo shirt tucked into khaki shorts. Sue Ellen ran her gaze over his curly hair, wide shoulders and muscular calves before forcing her attention back to her friend.

  This was the Andi she’d always known. Lively, animated, her green eyes alive with plans and schemes. Any reservations Sue Ellen had harbored about Operation Bookstore had melted away.

  “Their software is so easy to use,” Andi was saying. “I can order by individual title, by author or by house. I can also adapt it easily to the scanning software I’ve been looking into.”

  Interrupting her dialogue, she poised the tongs over a small side bowl.

  “Anyone not want Hungarian goat cheese on their salad? It’s pretty potent.”

  Crash didn’t hesitate. “I’m in.”

  Sue Ellen let her gaze roam his sculpted features again, sighed and nodded.

  “Me, too.”

  Between the raw onions, the goat cheese and the garlic bread toasting in the oven, she figured she wouldn’t be getting up close and personal with the major tonight. There was always tomorrow, however.

  Piling on the crumbly cheese, Andi picked up her narrative. “I’ve ordered the shelving for my store. As soon as it’s set up, I’ll re-verify my calculations on shelf space and send in my start-up order.”

  “What are you calling the store?” Crash wanted to know.

  Andi made a face. As Sue Ellen knew, that was the one tab in her notebook giving her friend the most grief.

  “I can’t decide. I’ve considered and rejected hundreds of names.” Sighing, she passed the salad plates. “I have to settle on one and get it to the sign maker next week, though, or my TPFD will slip.”

  Crash hooked a brow. “You laid out a time-phased force deployment?”

  “Of course. I couldn’t go into something like this without a detailed plan.”

  Chuckling, he stabbed at his spinach. “Looks like you can take the woman out of the military, but it doesn’t work the other way around.”

  He was only teasing. Andi hadn’t told him that her sudden retirement wasn’t entirely her idea. Nor, Sue Ellen knew, did she intend to. Still, her friend had to work to return a flip response.

  “Guess not.”

  Sympathy flashed in Sue Ellen’s china-blue eyes. Deftly she steered the conversation away from hidden shoals.

  “Maybe we can help you with this name business. Do you still intend to focus primarily on romance novels and thrillers?”

  “Unless my analyses are completely off, that’s what my customers will want.”

  “Hmm…let’s think about this.” Propping her elbows on the table, she dangled her fork between her fingers. “We’re talking love and intrigue. Bedrooms and bodies. Murder and mischief.”

  Crash followed her lead. “How about Danger and Desire?”

  “Good but a little too generic. How about Deception and Delight?”

  “Good but too froufrou-y.” Caught up in the game, he grinned and leaned forward. “Lust and Lies?”

  “Ugh.” Sue Ellen’s nose wrinkled. “You just described my second husband.”

  “Sex and Spies?”

  “Orgasms and Operatives?”

  “Guns and Roses?”

  Salads forgotten, they tossed possibilities back and forth. Andi followed the action, feeling more like a spectator at Wimbledon than a top-seeded player. After several more volleys, S.E. fin
ally stumbled.

  “Passion and, uh, Peril.”

  “Peril?” Crash hooted. “Who uses peril anymore?”

  “Okay, wise guy. How about Under the Covers with an Undercover Agent?”

  “Too long. Why don’t we just go Under the Covers?”

  Batting her lashes, S.E. pounced. “Your place or mine, sweetiekins?”

  Her throaty purr pulled Crash up short. He blinked, obviously trying to figure out how the air had taken on such a sudden charge.

  Andi could have enlightened him but decided she’d better direct the conversation back to safer ground. “I like the covers angle,” she said hastily. “Book covers, bedcovers, undercover operatives. They all sort of tie together.”

  A lazy drawl sounded from just outside the screens. “Sounds like an interesting combination.”

  Sue Ellen jumped half out of her chair. Crash whirled his around. Andi merely gulped as her ex-husband moved out of the shadows and into the light.

  No wonder they hadn’t spotted him crossing the short distance between the two houses! He wore his jungle BDUs and boots and had a floppy-brimmed boonie hat pulled low on his forehead. Camouflage paint streaked the lower portion of his face.

  “Sorry. Didn’t mean to startle you.”

  The whites of his eyes were all that were visible as they swept over Sue Ellen and lingered on Crash for a moment before shifting back to Andi.

  “I saw the lights and thought I’d come over to find out how you’re doing.”

  “I’m fine.” She rushed on, not wanting the curse to intrude on her evening. “Did you just get home?”

  “Yeah, a few minutes ago.”

  The rusty note of weariness in his voice tugged at something deep inside Andi, something she’d thought long dead.

  God! How many times had one of them dragged home after a deployment or temporary duty and unlocked the door to an empty house? How often had they eaten alone, feet propped on the coffee table in the den?

  Too often, she thought with a regret that sliced bone deep. Tonight at least they could share a meal, sitting down, with friends. Like friends, she amended, pushing open the screen door.