by Zara Chase
Hell if she knew what his reason was. All she did know was that she could bury herself in the work here, be her own boss, and reward Zac’s faith in her by finding his lost mother for him. Knowing what she now did about the woman, she had a feeling that he might well not like what she found. Perhaps she’d use Cody as an intermediary to shield Zac from anything that his buddy thought he shouldn’t know about. It seemed strange, feeling the need to protect such an obvious alpha male. He looked like he could slay dragons single-handedly. He certainly seemed to have tamed the local workforce into submission—no mean feat in itself—but had all sorts of emotional hang-ups about his heritage.
“My previous employers are media consultants. It’s only a small firm of about a dozen employees, with Jason Graves as boss.”
“He and you were an item?” Zac asked, scowling.
“Yes.” Justine wrinkled her nose. “When he dumped me, he seemed to think that I’d get over it and carry on working for him like nothing had happened.”
“See, told you he was a jerk,” Cody said in a disgusted voice.
“I was his PA, and just about everything the company dealt with went through me.”
“So let me guess,” Zac said. “You screwed the bastard by making him continue to pay you a salary.”
“I wouldn’t put it quite so bluntly, but basically, yes I did.” Justine shrugged. “A woman scorned and all that. Anyway, bottom line, he knows I won’t go anywhere near him or the office again, but I had to agree to be on the end of the telephone for the next month to manage one particular project.” Justine couldn’t help flashing a satisfied grin. “Our client won’t deal with anyone except me.”
“Who’s the client?” Cody asked.
“A Cornish artist is putting on an exhibition in London, and Jason has promised to find him backers and/or sales. The artist, Mansell—”
“Mansell what?” Cody asked.
“Just Mansell. No one even knows if he has another name, I don’t think. Anyway, he’s a bit moody and won’t deal with anyone except me.”
“Sensible chap,” Cody said, grinning.
Zac frowned. “So you’ll have to be up and down to London?”
“No, I can handle it all online, and I have, or should I say had, an assistant who still works for Jason and can deal with the hands-on stuff.” Justine smiled as she thought of loyal Sasha, her only true ally against Jason. Everyone else in the place thought the sun shone from his backside. Justine grimaced when she thought how, until recently, she’d been their head cheerleader, blind to Jason’s very obvious character defects because she’d been so grateful to be noticed by him.
“So you’ll have to give them this number, is that what you’re saying?” Zac asked.
“Yes, they have my cell, but reception doesn’t seem to be much good down here.”
“It’s patchy,” Cody agreed.
“Okay,” Zac said. “I don’t see a problem with that.”
“Good, then we have a deal.”
“You ready to go back to town?” Cody asked. “There’s a garage in the village. We can drop Malcolm off there and I’ll drive you to… Where are we going?”
“Clapham.”
“Okay. It has a common, right?”
“That’s one of its few claims to fame. That and being close to the centre of London, with relatively cheap rents. Talking of which.” Justine scowled. “How long are you employing me for? Should I give up my flat?”
“Don’t see any point in keeping it,” Zac said.
“Easy for you to say. Flats with affordable rents are rarer than chocolate teapots.”
“There’s plenty to keep you busy down here for the foreseeable future.”
“What if it doesn’t work out?”
“Make it work.”
“Just like that?”
Zac shrugged. “Life’s a constant string of risks, and you look like the type who’s prepared to take a flyer, so live dangerously.”
Justine gazed first at Zac, his expression unsmiling but sincere, and then Cody. He seemed enthusiastic for her to move in right away.
“Okay,” she said. “Come on, Cody, let’s go get my life packed up.”
Chapter Four
“You really did mean to move in right away,” Justine said, laughing. “I thought maybe you’d take my stuff and I’d come down in a day or two.”
“Why? Got something you need to do?”
She shrugged. “No, not really.”
“Well, then.” Cody put his muscles to good use, helping Justine to load her belongings and lugging them down the two flights of stairs to his car parked in the closest free space, about half a mile away. “Don’t mean to be rude,” he added, glancing round her rather-cramped living space when he returned for a fourth load, “but I don’t see anything to keep you here. If we hurry, we can be back in Surrey before dark.”
“I guess you have a point.”
Justine took pleasure in writing out her notice and posting it, along with the key, to the landlord. She’d paid a month’s deposit and was only required to give a month’s notice, so that was that. Good-bye, Clapham. Hello, new life. This flat, small and squalid though it was, would be snapped up by some desperate person in no time at all, probably at a higher rent than she’d managed to negotiate.
Cody drove with swift efficiency, and they were soon back on the narrow road where this whole adventure had started just a few brief hours before. It seemed like a lifetime.
“No regrets?” Cody asked.
“None at all. It feels like it’s supposed to be, although I was surprised to get the job.” She glanced at him. “I guess I have you to thank for that.”
“I put in a good word, is all.” Cody shrugged. “Zac’s been interviewing for three weeks now. He’s fussy, in case you didn’t notice.”
“Which is why I’m surprised he employed me.”
“Don’t put yourself down, sweetheart.”
“I’m not, I just—”
“Today was the third lot of applicants.”
“I filled in the application three weeks ago.” She grimaced. “I obviously made a real good impression.”
“The agency pushed what they thought were better-qualified applicants on him. Problem is, when Zac needs help and the agencies realize who he is, they think he wants all beauty and no brains.”
“Thanks, I think.”
“Hey, that came out all wrong. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with you, babe. Trust me on that one.”
He took one hand off the wheel and rested it on her thigh for a moment, searing the skin beneath her jeans with the heat of his hand, or so it seemed. Once again, physical connection with him made her pussy leak. This was ridiculous. She couldn’t work with the guy and spend all her time trying to avoid touching him.
Get a grip, girl!
“The unique thing about you, Justine, is that you didn’t take one look at Zac and think money and/or wedding bells. What’s more, you stood up to him instead of crawling up his ass. That doesn’t happen very often. I figured, as soon as I saw you trying to do battle with Malcolm’s engine when you clearly didn’t have a clue what you were doing, that you had spirit and determination. That made me reckon you were the girl for the job.”
“Is it such a good idea, though? Zac looking for his drug-addled mother, I mean. He obviously has issues about his childhood. Who wouldn’t in his situation? I just can’t see him finding any closure, even if I can track Mary Elizabeth down. He knows the circumstances of his birth from his grandmother’s letter, and it’s his father who tried to do something for him by taking him away from the drug scene.” She lifted her shoulders. “But he’s dead and apparently doesn’t have any family who can shed light on the matter. So what’s in it for Zac, other than more angst?”
“I felt the same way you do at first and tried to talk him out of it. Then I got to thinking about what I know of his childhood, which isn’t much. All I can tell you is that he was never adopted and was pushed from one foster family to the
other. I don’t know that he was actually physically abused at any of those places, but I can take a pretty good guess.” Cody sighed. “Since he became successful, he hasn’t heard a word from the families that treated him well.”
“And let me guess, all the ones that gave him a hard time are at him for hand-outs,” Justine said, rolling her eyes.
“Right. They play the look at the sacrifices we made for you so you could become what you are today card. Fortunately Zac knows precisely what they did or didn’t do for him and basically tells them to fuck off.”
“I can understand why he finds it hard to trust.”
“You don’t know the half of it. But if his instincts hadn’t told him to trust you, he wouldn’t have employed you, no matter what I said. Nor would he have shown you that letter.”
“You’re his partner. Don’t you get an equal say?”
Cody laughed. “He’s generous enough to call me an equal partner, and I suppose I am, because I come from a well-off family and was able to put up half the cash to start our business from my trust fund. Yeah.” He laughed when she shot him an ironic look. “I know. Zac, on the other hand, earned his half by getting his hands dirty. He had drive and ambition from an early age. His grandmother got that much right.”
“What did he do?”
Cody shrugged. “This and that. He’ll tell you himself if you ask him.”
“Perhaps I will.”
“Anyway, my point is, Zac is the brains and driving force behind our partnership, and we both know it.”
“I see. But you’re great friends.”
“I’m probably his only friend and confidante. The only person he knows that doesn’t want something from him.”
“Well, I’ll start digging into his life and see if I can find his mother but—”
“But let me know what you find out first.”
“That’s what I was about to suggest.”
“Great. I don’t want him to get burned over this.”
Justine smiled at Cody, glad that Zac had someone so trustworthy watching his back. “Agreed,” she said.
“What about you, Cody? You’ve told me all you can about Zac, but you’re pretty tight-lipped about your own background.” She flashed him a look. “You don’t strike me as the preppy trust-fund type, no offence intended.”
“None taken.” He sighed. “Okay, I’ll ’fess up, I come from The Hamptons,” he said. “Rich father, socialite mother, blah, blah. I toed the line, followed my father into the family business and married a ‘suitable’ woman who would look like my own mother in twenty years’ time. I did what was expected of me, and—”
“And, let me guess, you were miserable.”
“Right.” He slanted her a probing glance. “How did you know?”
Justine chuckled. “I haven’t known you for long but I can already tell that you’re not the type to conform to others’ plans for you.”
“I hated the scene, if you want the truth. The country club, the society functions, plastic people with plastic smiles. None of them had done a serious day’s work in their lives, and the biggest risks they ever took was on the stock market where they’d barely feel the loss if it went tits up.”
“So you got out?”
Cody shrugged. “Caught my wife cheating on me, which was my wake-up call. I divorced her, hooked up with Zac, and the rest, as they say, is history.”
“I admire that. It can’t have been easy to walk away from a life you knew so well.”
“Trust me, it was a breeze. I felt as though the weight of the world had been lifted from my shoulders. I now feel like I’m doing something worthwhile, and I’ve never regretted it.”
“Working with Zac probably doesn’t leave you with much time to get bored. I can quite see that.”
“Right.” He swung into the driveway at Grantham Park. “Here we are.”
Zac greeted them at the door. All the workmen had left for the day, but Zac and Cody between them lugged her gear up to her room.
“Get unpacked, do what you need to, and meet us downstairs for supper,” Zac said. “Just follow the smell of burnt meat and you’ll find the kitchen.”
“Sounds appetising.”
“Don’t get too excited.” Zac flashed a droll grin. “I’m on chef’s duty tonight.”
“Ah, okay. I’ve just lowered my expectations.”
She actually heard him chuckle as he walked away.
She took a little time ruminating on her good fortune as her possessions that filled every square inch of her previous abode, frequently causing her to trip over them, were lost in her new space. She used her pristine new shower, pulled on a pair of worn jeans and a comfortable top and joined them in the old-fashioned kitchen.
A large scrubbed pine table, laid up for three, dominated the space, and a bottle of red wine was open and breathing in its centre.
“Ah, just in time.”
Zac gave her the once-over and appeared to approve of what he saw. She’d unwound her hair, washed it in the shower, and left it loose to dry. She hadn’t bothered with make-up. She was here to work, not try to make an impression.
“Everything okay?” Cody asked.
“Fine, thanks.”
“That’s good because the master chef is about to serve his offering to his helpless victims.”
“Hate to say this,” Justine said, taking the chair Cody held out for her, “but something smells good. That’s probably only because I’m starving, though.” She wagged a finger playfully at Zac. “So don’t get carried away. I didn’t get a chance to eat today.”
“Get used to it,” Cody advised. “It’s nothing but work, work, work ’round these parts.”
“Haven’t seen you doing too much today,” Zac said to Cody.
“I packed up our new assistant’s home for her, and I fixed her car.”
“Poor Malcolm. I hope the mechanic treats him gently.”
“God, we’ve employed a mad woman,” Zac said, dolling out platefuls of beef casserole. “She treats her car like it’s a living thing.”
“Are you telling me he isn’t?” Justine lowered her fork and adopted a stricken expression. “I’ve been misled all these years?”
Both men seemed to find her amusing.
“You’re gonna fit in around here just fine,” Cody told her.
* * * *
And so it proved to be the case. A worrying number of dusty boxes of papers, photographs, and official-looking documents were hauled down from the loft and dumped her in office. It already seemed overcrowded.
“We’ll let you start with those,” Zac said, watching her as she picked through the first box. “But be warned, there are plenty more where they came from.”
They disappeared and left her to it. Justine decided that if she wasn’t going to be overwhelmed then she needed a system. One corner for photographs, one for official papers, one for letters, and so on. Once things were sorted into categories, she’d go through them one by one, starting with the official papers.
She wasn’t sure what the guys got up to, but there were lots of comings and goings throughout the days. Sometimes they both disappeared for hours at a time. On other occasions, they received visitors in Zac’s study or remained glued to their computer screens.
Malcolm was returned to her, shiny, bright, and good as new. She couldn’t remember the last time his engine had sounded so smooth.
All the workmen had been told to come to her with problems or queries, and so far she’d managed to deal with them without involving Zac and Cody. Apart from meal time, which meant one or the other of them cooking, she didn’t see them at all. She wondered if she was expected to cook. She could do so, after a fashion, but figured she’d wait and see if they wanted to risk it. Some men apparently liked cooking, but up until now, she hadn’t met any.
On her third day, she received a call from Jason that knocked her for six.
“Where are you?” he asked. “I’ve been calling your cell all morning.”
“I’ve got a new job out in the country. Cell reception isn’t good. That’s why I left this landline number for you.”
“You still work for me.”
“Only in an advisory capacity on the Mansell thing. So I’m ready to advise. What do you need?”
“What’s this new job then?”
“None of your business.”
“Hey, there’s no need to be so snappy. I was just being friendly.”
“We’re not friends, Jason. We used to be lovers. Now I don’t love you anymore. Get over it.”
“Yeah, you do, babe.” He sounded annoyingly sure of himself. “It’s not possible to turn love on and off, just like that.”
“You don’t seem to have any trouble. Now, what do you want?”
He told her what he needed to know, proving that it was a completely unnecessary call. Gloria in the office could have put him straight, and well he knew it. She suspected he was just curious to know what she’d gotten herself involved with now. He didn’t want her but didn’t want anyone else to have her. Talk about dog in the manger.
“Okay,” she said. “If that’s all you want, I need to get back to work.”
“Yeah, you do,” he said in a voice that was probably meant to be seductive. “Back here. Come back, babe. I made a mistake. It’s over between me and Judith, and I want you back.”
Justine couldn’t believe her ears. “Are you serious?”
“You know we were meant to be together,” he said, supremely confident in his ability to talk her round.
Justine didn’t know what to say. All she knew was that she no longer cared about Jason. How had that happened? She was pretty sure that up to a week ago she would have forgiven him, eventually. Now she could see him for…well, what Cody would describe as the ultimate jerk.
“Sorry, Jason, I don’t want to know.”
“Okay, you’re upset, I get that, and you have a right to be. But I’ll make it up to you. Just chuck the job you’ve taken and come back to town. We’ll talk about it.”
“Get lost.”
Justine slung the receiver down and burst into tears. Naturally, Zac chose that moment to walk into her office. He almost never disturbed her during the day, and the last thing she wanted was to be caught weeping for a man who didn’t deserve it.