by Nora Roberts
To build a life.
He could make a difference here, Brody thought. And he wanted, badly, to get his hands on this place and make that difference. Even if it meant dealing with Kate Kimball, and his irritating reaction to her.
He hoped—if he got the job—she wouldn’t be one of those clients who hovered. At least not while she was wearing that damn perfume.
Then they were back to bathrooms. The old cast iron tub stayed. The beige wall hung sink went, and Brody was directed to find a suitable white pedestal sink to replace it.
The boss also wanted ceramic tile—navy and white—though she agreed to look at product samples before making the final decision.
She was just as decisive in the kitchen, but there he stopped her.
“Look, are you actually going to cook in here, or just heat up takeout?”
“Cook. I do know how.”
“Then you want solid work space there, instead of breaking it up.” Brody gestured. “You want efficient traffic flow, so you work from the window. You want your sink under the window instead of on that wall. You move the refrigerator there, the stove there. See, then you’ve got flow instead of zigzagging back and forth. Wasted effort, wasted space.”
“Yes, but there—”
“That’s for your pantry,” he interrupted, the room clear in his mind. “It gives you a nice line of counter. You angle it out here…” He pulled out his measuring tape. “Yeah, angle it out and you’ve got room for a couple of stools, so you get work space and seating space instead of dead space.”
“I was thinking of putting a table—”
“Then you’ll always be walking around it, and crowding yourself in.”
“Maybe.” She thought of the kitchen table where she’d sat with her father only that morning. And had sat with her family on countless mornings. Sentimental, she decided. And in this case probably impractical.
“Let me get the measurements, and I’ll draw it up for you in the next few days. You can think about it.”
“All right. Plenty of time. The main level’s my priority.”
“It’ll take me some time to work it up and get you a bid. But I can tell you now, you’re cruising toward six figures and a good four months work for the complete rehab.”
She’d come to that conclusion herself, but hearing it was still a jolt. “Work it up, draw it up, whatever it is you do. If I decide to hire you for the job, when would you be able to start?”
“I can get the permits pretty quick. And put in a materials and supply order right off. Probably start work first of the year.”
“Those are magic words. If I go with you, I want to get started right away. Get me a bid, Mr. O’Connell, and we’ll see if we can do business.”
She left him to measure and calculate, and went down to stand on her little front porch.
She could hear the light traffic from the main street, only a half block over. And smell the smoke from someone’s fireplace or woodstove. Her bumpy little front lawn was a disgrace of dead and dying weeds and a sad and ugly stump of what had once been a regal maple.
Across the narrow side street was another brick building that had been converted into apartments. It was old, tidy and utterly quiet at this midday hour.
Another hundred thousand, she thought. Well, it could be done. Fortunately she hadn’t lived extravagantly over the past few years. And she did, indeed, have her mother’s head for business. Her savings had been carefully invested—and the trust fund was there as a cushion.
If she felt too much was going out, while nothing was coming in, she could agree to do a few guest appearances with the company. That door had been left open.
The fact was, with all the weeks of construction ahead, it would make sense to do so—and not only for financial reasons.
She was used to working, used to being busy. Once the work began on the building there would be nothing for her to do but wait until each stage was complete.
It was an easy trip to New York, and the simplest thing in the world to stay with family there. Rehearse, train, perform, come home again. Yes, that might be the best solution all around.
But not yet. Not quite yet. She wanted to see her plans get off the ground first.
“Kate?” Brody stepped out, her coat in his hand. “It’s cold out here.”
“A bit. I was hoping it would snow. We got teased the other day.”
“As long as it’s not eight feet.”
“Hmm?”
“Nothing.” He laid her coat over her shoulders, automatically lifting her hair out of the collar. There was so damn much of it, he thought. Soft, curling miles of it.
His hands were still caught in it when she turned, when she looked up, met his eyes. Interested after all, she realized with a lovely liquid tug in the belly. “Why don’t we walk around the corner. You can buy me a cup of coffee.” She moved in, a deliberate test for both of them. “We can discuss…counter space.”
She clogged his brain, his lungs, and did a hell of a job on his loins. “You’re coming on to me again.”
Her smile was slow, devastatingly female. “I certainly am.”
“You’re probably the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”
“That’s the good fortune of birth, but since I look a great deal like my mother, thank you. I particularly like your mouth.” She shifted her gaze to it, lingered. “I just keep coming back to it.”
His throat was dry as the Sahara. What had happened with women since he’d been out of the game? he wondered. When had they started seducing men on the front porch in the middle of the afternoon?
He could feel the chill December wind whipping against his face. And the heat swarming into his blood. “Look.” In self-defense, he took her by the arms. Her coat slid off her shoulders, and he felt the taut sculpted muscle beneath her suit jacket.
“I’ve been looking.” Her gaze flicked up to his again. So male, she thought. So frustrated. “I just happen to like what I see.”
Her eyes were pure gray, he thought. Mysterious as smoke. He had only to lower his head, or better, yes better, to yank her to her toes. Then his mouth would be on those sultry, self-satisfied lips of hers.
He had a feeling, a bad one, it would be like bare-handing a live wire. Thrilling, and potentially deadly.
“I told you I wasn’t interested.”
“Yes, you did. But you lied.” To prove it, she rose up to her toes and took a quick, hard nip into his bottom lip. His hands tightened like vises on her arms. “See?” she whispered when he held her there, only a breath away. “You’re very interested.”
Amused at both of them, she lowered to the flats of her feet, eased back. “You just don’t want to be.”
“It comes down to the same thing.” He let her go, bent to pick up his toolbox. Damn it, his hands weren’t even close to steady.
“I don’t agree, but I won’t push it. I’d like to see you socially, if and when that suits you. Meanwhile, since we have similar views on this building, and I liked most of your ideas, I hope we’ll be able to work together.”
He hissed out a breath. Cool as January, he noted. While he was flustered, heated up and churning. “You’re a real piece of work, Kate.”
“I am, that’s true. I won’t apologize for being what I am. I’ll look forward to getting the brochures and information we discussed, and your bid on the job. If you need to get back in for more measurements or whatever, you know how to reach me.”
“Yeah, I know how to reach you.”
She stayed where she was, watched him stride down to the curb, climb into his truck. He’d have been surprised if he’d heard the long shaky breath she expelled as he drove away.
Surprised as well if he’d seen her slowly lower herself to the top step.
She was nowhere near as cool as January. She sat in the brisk breeze waiting to cool off. And for the frogs in her belly to settle down again.
Brody O’Connell, she thought. Wasn’t it strange and fascinating that
a man she’d only met twice should have such a strong effect on her? It wasn’t that she was shy around men—far from it. But she was selective. The lover she’d tossed in Brody’s face had been one of the three men—all of whom she’d cared for deeply—that she’d allowed into her life, and into her bed.
Yet, after two meetings—no, she thought, ordering herself to be brutally honest—after one meeting, she’d wanted Brody in her bed. The second meeting had only sharpened that want into a keen-edged desire she wasn’t prepared for.
So she would do the logical and practical thing. She’d settle herself down, clear her mind. Then she’d begin to plan the best way to get him there.
Chapter Three
Jack sat at the partner’s desk in what he and his dad called their office and carefully printed out the alphabet. It was his job. Just like Dad was doing his job, on his side of the desk.
The drafting paper and rulers and stuff looked like a lot more fun than the alphabet. But Dad had said, if he got it all done, he could have some paper to draw with, too.
He thought he would draw a big, giant house, just like their house, with the old barn that was Dad’s workshop. And there would be lots of snow, too. Eight whole feet of snow and millions and billions of snowmen.
And a dog.
Grandpa and Grandma had a dog, and even though Buddy was sort of old, he was fun. But he had to stay at Grandma’s. One day he’d have a dog all of his own and its name would be Mike and he’d chase balls and sleep in the bed at night.
He could have one as soon as he was old enough to be responsible. Which could even be tomorrow.
Jack peeked up to study his father’s face and see if it was maybe time to ask if he was responsible yet.
But his dad had that look where he was kind of frowning but not mad. His working look. If you interrupted the working look, the answer was almost always: Not now.
But the alphabet was boring. He wanted to draw the house or play with his trucks or with the computer. Or maybe just look outside and see if it was snowing yet.
He butted his foot against the desk. Squirmed. Butted his foot.
“Jack, don’t kick the desk.”
“Do I have to write the whole alphabet?”
“Yep.”
“How come?”
“Because.”
“But I got all the way up to the P.”
“If you don’t do the rest, you can’t say any words that have the letters in them you left out.”
“But—”
“Can’t say ‘but.’ B-U-T.”
Jack heaved the heavy sigh of a six-year-old. He wrote the next three letters, then peeked up again. “Dad.”
“Hmm.”
“Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad. D-A-D.”
Brody glanced up, saw his son grinning at him. “Smart aleck.”
“I know how to spell Dad and Jack.”
Brody narrowed his eyes, lifted a fist. “Do you know how to spell knuckle sandwich?”
“Nuh-uh. Does it have mustard?”
The kid, Brody thought, was sharp as a bucket of tacks. “How’d you get to be such a wise guy?”
“Grandma says I got it from you. Can I see what you’re drawing? You said it’s for the dancing lady. Are you drawing her, too?”
“Yes, it’s for the dancing lady, and no, you can’t see it until you’re finished your job.” However much he wanted to set his own work aside and just be with his son, the only way to teach responsibility was to be responsible.
That was one of those sneaky circles of parenthood.
“What happens when you don’t finish what you start?”
Jack rolled his eyes. “Nothing.”
“Exactly.”
Jack heaved another sigh and applied his pencil. He didn’t see his father’s lips twitch.
God, what a kid. Brody wanted to toss his own pencil down, snatch Jack up and do whatever this major miracle of his life wanted to do for the rest of the evening. The hell with work, with responsibility, with what needed to be done.
There was only one thing he wanted more than that. To finish what he started. There was no job more vital than Jack O’Connell.
Had his own father ever looked at him and wondered, and worried? Probably, Brody thought. It had never showed, but probably. Still, Bob O’Connell hadn’t been one for wrestling on the rug or foolish conversations. He’d gone to work. He’d come home from work. He’d expected dinner on the table at six.
He’d expected his son to do his chores, stay out of trouble, and to—above all—do what he was told without question. One of those expectations had been to follow, precisely, in his father’s footsteps.
Brody figured he’d disappointed his father in every possible area. And had been disappointed by him.
He wasn’t going to put those same demands and expectations on his own son.
“Zee! Zee, Zee, Zee!” Jack picked up the paper, waved it madly. “I finished.”
“Hold it still, hotshot, so I can see.” A long way from neat, Brody noted when Jack held the paper up. But it was done. “Good job. You want some graph paper?”
“Can I come over there and help work on yours?”
“Sure.” So he’d stay up an extra hour and work, Brody thought as Jack scrambled down from his stool. It would be worth it to have this time with his son. He reached down, hauled Jack up on his lap. “Okay, so what we’ve got here is the apartment above the school.”
“How come they wear those funny clothes when they dance?”
“I have no idea. How do you know they wear funny clothes?”
“I saw a cartoon, and there were elephants in funny skirts. They were dancing on their toes. Do elephants really have toes?”
“Yeah.” Didn’t they? “We’ll look it up later so you can see. Here, take the pencil. You can draw this line here, right against the straight edge.”
“Okay!”
Father and son worked, heads close together, with the big hand guiding the small.
When Jack began to yawn, Brody shifted him, laying Jack over his shoulder as he rose.
“I’m not tired,” Jack claimed even as his head drooped.
“When you wake up, it’ll only be five days till Christmas.”
“Can I have a present?”
Brody smiled. His son’s voice was thick, his body already going limp. He paused in the living room, by the tree, swaying slightly as he had when Jack had been an infant, and fretful in the night. As Christmas trees went, Brody mused, this one wasn’t pretty. But it was festive. The mix of ornaments covered every available inch. Wads of tinsel shone in the multicolored lights Jack had wanted.
Rather than an angel or a star, there was a grinning Santa at the top. Jack still believed in Santa Claus. Brody wondered if he would this time the following year.
Thinking of that, of the years passed and passing still, he turned his face into his son’s hair. And just breathed him in.
After he’d carried Jack up to bed, he came down and brewed a fresh pot of coffee. Probably a mistake, Brody thought even as he poured the first cup. It would very likely keep him awake.
Still he stood, looking out the dark window, sipping it black. The house was too quiet with Jack asleep. There were times, God knew, when the boy made so much noise, caused so much chaos, it seemed there would never be a moment of peace and quiet.
Then when he got it, Brody wanted the noise.
Parenting, he thought, had to be the damnedest business going.
But the problem now was restlessness. It was a feeling he hadn’t experienced for quite some time. With parenting, establishing a business, making a home, soliciting jobs, he hadn’t had much excess time.
Still don’t, he thought, and began to pace the kitchen while he drank his coffee.
There was enough work to be done on the house to keep him busy for…probably the rest of his life. Should have bought something smaller, he thought, and less needy. Something more practical—and he’d heard variations on those thoughts from his fa
ther since he’d dug up the down payment.
Trouble was, he’d fallen head over heels for the old place, and so had Jack. And it was working, he reminded himself, glancing around the completed kitchen with its glass-fronted cabinets and granite counters.
Still, work was the bottom line, and he really had to carve out the time to deal with the rooms he’d put off.
Hard to find time when there were only days left until Christmas.
Then, there was the job due to be completed the next afternoon. And on the heels of that came the school holiday. He should have lined up a baby-sitter—he’d meant to. But Jack disliked them so much, and the guilt was a slow burn.
He knew Beth Skully would take Jack at least part of the time. But after a while, it felt like imposing. In an emergency, he could call on his mother. But that was a tricky business. Whenever he passed Jack off in that direction, he felt like a failure.
He’d make it work. Jack could come along with him some of the time, go to his pal Rod’s some of the time. And in a pinch, he’d visit his grandmother.
And that wasn’t the problem at all, Brody admitted. That wasn’t the distraction, lodged like a splinter in his mind.
The splinter was Kate Kimball.
He didn’t have the time nor the inclination for her.
All right, damn it, he didn’t have the time. Whatever he did have for her was a hell of a ways up from inclination. He dragged a hand through his mass of sun-streaked hair and tried to ignore the sheer sexual frustration eating at his gut.
Had he ever felt this much pure physical hunger for a woman before? He must have. He just didn’t remember clearly, that was all. Didn’t remember being churned up this way.
And it really ticked him off.
It was only because it had been a long time. Because she was so openly provocative. So unbelievably beautiful.
But he wasn’t a kid anymore who could grab pretty toys without considering the consequences. He was no longer free to do whatever he liked, when he liked. And he wouldn’t want it any other way.
Not that taking her up on her obvious invitation had to have consequences. In the long run. Even in the short. They were both adults, they both knew the ropes.