“As far as I can tell, it was a case of him getting a feel for the Cove. He doesn’t know anyone.” She shrugged. “He wanted me to introduce him to a few people.”
He frowned. “Like who? Who’d he want to meet?”
The sharpness of his demand rankled, and Sasha crossed her arms. “I took him to Marian’s. Are you going to cool down a little?”
“Why Marian’s?”
“Jeez, Freddy. What’s this about? You know as much, if not more, than me right now.”
“I don’t trust the guy.”
She glanced toward John. “Nor do I. But right now, we’re stuck with him and it might pay to ease off the aggression pedal for a while.”
He sneered. “Clearly you’re prepared to do whatever it takes, eh?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You think I haven’t noticed the way your tongue hangs out every time you look at the guy?” He gave a dry laugh, his white teeth glinting in the semidarkness. “First time I’ve seen evidence you aren’t a lesbian.”
Heat assaulted her cheeks, and she raised her hands. “Okay, I’m out. If you’re going to be so bloody obnoxious about the situation, you’re on your own.” She moved to walk away when he gripped her arm.
“Hey.”
She glared. “What?”
“You can’t blame me for being like this. How the bloody hell did this happen without either of us knowing it was coming?”
“I don’t know, but turning on each other isn’t helping.” She snatched her arm from his grasp, her heart pumping. She glanced toward John. He laughed with one of the guys operating the cars, and the same sense of defending him she’d felt in the bakery rose again. “He seems an okay kind of a guy. Cold as ice occasionally, but not Kyle...if that makes sense.”
They lapsed into silence as they both studied the chatting, laughing enigma of John Jordon. Freddy cleared his throat. “So he didn’t specify who he wanted to meet? He just said people?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve spoken to Kyle.”
Sasha’s heart leaped into her throat but she concentrated on keeping an impassive expression. “When?”
“This afternoon. He reckons he’s out.”
“Out?” Sasha swallowed against the unease turning her mouth desert-dry as John threw them a final look before walking from the bumper cars and back toward the office. “Of the fair?”
Silence.
She snapped her gaze to Freddy, adrenaline pumping through her. “Freddy?”
He shook his head and glared at her. “That’s all it is with you, ain’t it? This bloody fair. Kyle’s concern has never been the fair. Don’t you get that? Now everything’s going tits up and I’ll end up with nothing.”
The venom in his voice set the hairs on the back of her neck singing their warning. She frowned. “If you’re talking about the other components of Kyle’s immoral enterprise, I don’t want to hear about it. That’s between you and him.”
“Ah, yes. Little Miss Goody Two Shoes.”
Irritation swept a hot flush onto Sasha’s face. “I am good, Freddy. Always have been, as you well know. There’s every possibility we’ll have a fight on our hands as far as John’s concerned, but I want the fair, nothing else. Everything else is up to you to sort out with him and Kyle, not me.”
She spun away, wanting to get away from Freddy and his spitting anger. His heavy footsteps came straight behind her, and she halted. “Leave me alone.”
He glared, his eyes manic. “Kyle didn’t just give me a job here. He took my money, my investment. I’m owed, Sasha.”
“Not from me.” She lifted her chin. “So take it up with his damn son.”
“You haven’t got a clue what you’re dealing with, have you?”
She frowned. “What I’m dealing with? Or who?”
“What, Sasha. You’ve no bloody clue.”
The infernal feeling of being out of the loop shivered over her skin, making goose bumps erupt. “I know plenty.”
She stormed toward the offices, her heart beating with a fear she’d never known around Freddy before. The one thing she couldn’t accuse Kyle of was intimidation or bullying—at least as far she was concerned. She wasn’t naive enough not to know Kyle’s reputation manifested the way it had because he’d inflicted a certain amount of terror and violence, but she’d never experienced this level of animosity from Freddy or Kyle before.
With tears burning like hot needles behind her eyes, Sasha pushed open the office door and made for the coatrack.
John emerged from the bathroom at the back of the room. “Sasha?”
“Not now. I’m going home.” She snatched her jacket and bag from the rack and strode toward the door.
“Sasha. Wait. Kyle gave me a file I want you to look at.”
She spun around and nearly knocked face-first into his stupidly broad chest. The man moved like a damn panther. He gripped her upper arms. The last thing she wanted to do was look at him. The last she wanted was for him to see her upset or unnerved. The last thing she wanted was to like him...want him.
She met his eyes. “I’m going home. Let go of me.”
He immediately released her and planted his hands on his hips instead. His eyes darkened with concern. “Are you okay?”
She glared. “Have you spoken to your dad this afternoon?”
He flinched. “What? Why?”
“Yes or no?”
“No.”
The tension between them grew. Only their harried breathing punctured the heavy silence. Questions stormed in his gaze as Sasha’s heart picked up speed. She couldn’t help staring at his lips. Kiss me. God damn it. Kiss it all away.
“Sasha? What’s going on?”
She blinked. “Nothing.”
“Then why ask—”
“Why do I need to know about Kyle’s file? Why isn’t Freddy involved with this, too?”
The concern vanished from his eyes, leaving only steely determination in its wake. “I don’t want him involved.”
“So why involve me? Why have you singled me out to know about Kyle’s affairs? What is it you actually want?”
A muscle worked rhythmically in his jaw, but Sasha held his cold stare. She wouldn’t bend or walk away. He owed her an explanation and she’d damn well have it. Right now. She hitched her bag onto her shoulder and crossed her arms. “Well?”
“We’ll talk about this in the morning. Go home. Get some sleep.” He turned to walk away.
“No.”
He halted with his back to her. His shoulders were rigid. A hard plane beneath white cotton. Her gaze ran of its own accord over the muscular expanse of his back, down to his narrowed waist and perfect ass. She swallowed and dragged her eyes to the back of his short, dark, conservatively cut hair.
Slowly, he turned. “Kyle only told me what he wanted me to know. He only told me your grandfather hung on to this fair until the very end. He laughed about it. Told me loyalty like that was a waste of time and his granddaughter had been cursed with it, too.”
Sasha trembled with rage—or maybe grief for her grandfather. “He laughed at us?”
“Yes. I didn’t think about that one way or the other...until I saw you for the first time. Until I saw the genuine panic and sorrow in your eyes when you realized who I was. I don’t want you to hate me. I’m not the villain here. Kyle is.”
Struggling to keep a hold on her rising temper and not throttle John in Kyle’s absence, she glared. “Then give me the fair and walk away.”
Time stood still as their breathing fell into sync. Their whispered breaths filled the room, fueling the tension and stretching it like an invisible band around them. Her heart ached. Had she lost this fight before it had even begun?
He closed his eyes. “I have to deal with the estrangement between Kyle and me.” He shook his head. “Something happened a long time ago. He’s been out of my life for two decades. I need to know who he is. If you can’t understand that, then maybe it’s better you
stop working here.”
She flinched. “What?”
He opened his eyes. “I need to do this. I need to deal with my stuff before I can think about yours.”
Her shock gave way to a rush of unwanted sympathy. His defensiveness had eased and now the pain in his eyes pleaded with her to understand his situation. Empathy lingered when Sasha thought of the wedge of resentment between her and her mother. She knew more than most the desire to understand a parent’s actions and motivations. Silence and hidden secrets were a cruel and affecting way to send children into the world. They ended up doing incredible and often stupid things as adults.
She sighed, her hands falling to her sides. “This isn’t right. Your issues with Kyle shouldn’t stop you from giving me back the fair. What can you possibly want with it? What good will keeping it do for Kyle or you?”
The softness in his gaze morphed into stubborn determination. “It’s important we work together to uncover the truth. Why didn’t Kyle, or even your grandfather, want your family to have the fair? We deserve to know exactly what Kyle was up to when he was here.”
She frowned. “Why do you even care? If you haven’t spoken for so long, why does it matter what he did or didn’t do?”
He wiped his hand over his face before tipping his head back to stare at the ceiling. “It shouldn’t matter. I know that. It’s just...” He dropped his chin. “It does.”
Everything cleared in that moment. She got him. She understood him and why he was here...which meant the journey had just got a whole lot bumpier. They were both dealing with stuff. Baggage. Trying to move forward through the mire of the pasts they’d endured at someone else’s hand. She swallowed and dropped her shoulders. “This is all so unfair.”
“I know, but I’m just doing the best I can with the information I have. I didn’t come here to leave without answers or to do Kyle’s bidding. Soon enough, I’ll know what to do.”
“In the meantime, I’m supposed to do what?”
“Work with me. Wait for me.”
Wait for him? Why did her heart just skip a beat? Why did it sound so intimate every time he said anything like that? She swallowed and pursed her lips, trapping any response for the sake of her sanity.
He cleared his throat, his gaze wandering over her face. “What if I decide to stay? What if I move to Templeton and make my life here?”
She tensed. No, no, no. He couldn’t stay. He couldn’t. Not here. Working where she was every day. She was strong, but not that strong. “What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a teacher at an elementary school.”
“A teacher?” Well, that was surprising. “You work with kids?”
He smiled. “Is that so hard to believe?”
She closed her eyes. “Why couldn’t you be a nerdy scientist or a lecturer in quantum physics? Why kids?”
He laughed. “You’d like a nerd more?”
“No, I’d like you less. At least it would mean we have nothing in common.” She opened her eyes. “You’re making it hard for me to keep fighting you, John Jordon.”
He grinned. “Good.”
A smile tugged. “I can’t believe this. I’d laugh if I had the energy.”
“I’m sorry.” His smile dissolved. “I’m sorry that what I’m dealing with isn’t your problem, but you’re stuck in the middle. So’s Freddy. And no doubt, tens of other people. I want to know exactly how many people Kyle has screwed over and then I’ll decide what to do. I promise.”
“I won’t lose another chance to get the fair back where it belongs.”
“In your family, right? All this passion, it’s all about family?”
The uncertainty in his tone was undeniable, and Sasha’s stomach knotted. Why was he looking at her in such a knowing way all of a sudden? Why did it feel as though he could see deep inside her? That he knew she had nothing but the fair. That her family was segregated and barely spoke. Did he realize she feared if she washed her hands of the fair, she’d have no clue where to go or who to be?
Dread rippled through her as she stared at him. She opened her mouth to respond but couldn’t think past the panic that he knew what had happened to her. That Matt Davidson’s abuse made her find purpose in the one place she should hate more than any other. Did he think she was crazy to want to make Funland as it was before: good and wholesome, before that despicable excuse for a man came along and ruined it?
She raised her hands in surrender, fighting the terror rising like a rumbling volcano. “I need to go.”
“Fine. We’ll talk tomorrow.” He wandered to his desk and picked up some papers.
She had to do something to make this nightmare go away. She couldn’t let the fair slip through her fingers. Not after all this time. “It’s my day off tomorrow. I won’t be here.”
He looked up and smiled wryly. “I was under the impression you worked seven days a week.”
“I do...did. Until you came into my life and started a war you’ll lose.”
His smiled disappeared. “This isn’t a war.”
“No? That’s what you think.” She spun around and strolled out of the office, leaving the door wide open behind her.
* * *
JOHN WOKE THE next day with a banging headache. The partially full bottle of Scotch sitting on his dresser was a cruel reminder of why he felt as if a hatchet had been buried in his skull. Groaning, he hauled his ass from Kyle’s bed and padded into the enormous en suite bathroom. He gripped the sink and stared into the mirror. He looked like crap. Felt like crap—and all too aware the majority of his misery wasn’t caused by the Scotch. The defensive hurt in Sasha’s eyes when she stared at him in the office had haunted him all night.
One minute anger, the next a lingering fondness shone in her gaze, making his breath catch and his arms yearn to pull her close. Time and again when they argued, he’d had the urge to hold her against his chest just to absorb some of her weakly veiled vulnerability. She tried to hide it behind the loaded glares and fiery retorts, but he’d been around enough kids—and adults—to recognize a painful past when he saw one. The vibrations coming from Sasha were more painful than most. He closed his eyes.
For the first time in a long time, he was aware of another person’s potential to understand him. To reciprocate his need for comfort and validation. The notion was scary and unwanted—and happening under the worst circumstances possible. Intellectually, it was a sign to deal with the contract clause so he could hand over the papers to Sasha and get the hell back home to Bridgewater.
Emotionally, he wondered if Kyle might have kick-started so much more than he realized. John was eager to get to know a woman who attracted him, fascinated him, inspired him and made him falter from a path he’d thought would be simple and entirely fueled by vengeance. He’d come to Templeton for one reason and one reason only—to see what the hell his father had done with his godforsaken life. What had been so important to prevent him ever contacting his only living family?
John cursed and pushed away from the sink.
Kyle had shot and killed the man who’d murdered his wife and then forced an estrangement from their child. Why? What would have driven him to make such stark and final decisions?
John strode to the shower and turned it on.
What the hell was he going to do today? Tomorrow? Next week? Did he really think he’d ever understand Kyle or his motivations?
Sasha’s pleas and fiery temper sparked something inside him that made John ponder the impossible. To stay for a while. To explore this new and exciting attraction for a woman so different than any he’d met. He longed to know more about her and the deep, dark passion that stormed in her eyes whenever the fair was mentioned. It was as if Funland was the source of her entire life’s purpose.
He stepped into the shower and his mind whirled. A day apart from Sasha would do him good. He needed to take action and deal with his anger toward Kyle before he’d have anything to offer anyone. The last thing he wanted to do was upset a woman al
ready suffering—but that’s exactly what he was doing.
The shower woke him and washed any weakness down the drain. He stepped out and snatched a towel from the rack. Everything in Kyle’s home was lavish. From the towels to the parquet flooring that swept the entire lower level of his huge five-bedroom house, to the huge kitchen, with its gleaming surfaces and gadgets. Everything screamed of money and success.
He tied the towel at his waist and grabbed a hand towel from the stack neatly folded on solid pine shelving beside him. Scrubbing his hair, he left the bathroom and walked to the floor-to-ceiling window in the master bedroom. He whipped back the drapes. It was obvious Kyle had chosen his abode carefully. Whereas John would’ve chosen to live close to Cowden Beach or maybe the town center, with its constant activity and warm sense of community, Kyle lived on the outskirts of Templeton. Close enough he could get to where he needed to be within a half hour’s drive, but far enough away he had the isolation he clearly craved.
Away from unwanted attention, no doubt.
John stared at the enormity of his father’s domain. The back of the house faced the ocean, but not the beach. Below spanned a huge back garden with a paved patio and furniture so luxurious, it belonged inside someone’s living room. In one corner stood a barbecue large enough to cook for the entire street and in the other, a hot tub that could comfortably seat six people and their champagne. The gate at the very end of the green lawn led to a planked wooden pier, where Kyle’s speedboat glinted in the hazy sunshine. A boat named after his mother. Fiona Forever.
John gritted his teeth. And they say crime doesn’t pay.
The front of the house faced a tree-lined avenue that John had learned was fondly referred to as “millionaire’s row.” The houses were all unique. Some brick and traditional, others art deco or contemporarily stylish. It was a strange mishmash of the owners’ personalities. The whitewashed magnificence of his father’s five-bedroom, balconied and minimalistic home told him nothing of who Kyle was today any more than it would have nineteen years ago.
What Belongs to Her (Harlequin Superromance) Page 10