Damaged (Crystal Brook Billionaires)

by Blake, Jessica

  “You guys want anything?” I asked, unbuttoning my coat but keeping it on. “I can make you some coffee before I finish cleaning the espresso machine.”

  “No thanks,” Claire said, plopping down on the couch.

  Jason gave a single shake of his head.

  I hesitated, then decided to divulge my secret. I was ready for the drink I hadn’t gotten to finish and wasn’t willing to wait for them to leave before I scratched that itch. “How about whiskey?”

  “Please,” they both said at the same time, then laughed.

  “Thank God,” Claire added. “But since when do you serve alcohol here?”

  “I don’t.”

  Going behind the bar, I grabbed the bottle from where I’d left it and poured them each a small glass. Claire took hers eagerly, immediately shooting some down. I passed Jason his glass, and when he took it, something odd happened.

  Not like Shake-The-World-And-Tilt-It-On-Its-Axis odd, but maybe half of that.

  His fingertips brushed mine, and a thrill traveled across my hand and up my arm, then through my whole body. It was a kind I had never felt before. Men had given me chills, sure, but never one that visibly made my hand shake.

  Seeing my fingers tremble, I dropped my hand and hid it behind me. Jason stood still, looking at me over the counter top. He’d noticed the shake in my hand. I know it. But the big question was whether he’d felt the same thing I had or not.

  My cheeks burning, I took a step sideways to hide behind the espresso machine under the pretense of cleaning it. My hand fumbled around, finding the scrubby brush and then dropping it twice.

  I worked as fast as I could, waving off both their offers of help. All I wanted was to finish and get out of the place. I didn’t like my strange experience with Jason. No, scratch that. I liked it, but I couldn’t handle it. The number of months that had passed since I’d enjoyed a man’s touch on anything other than my hand had been shamefully long.

  In my defense, I’d been consumed with the shop. It had been my whole life for the past thirteen months. I didn’t have time for dating.

  And I didn’t have time for heartbreak.

  All of that I’d gotten my fair share of in New York. It was why I’d left and run back home to the good ole’ south.

  I especially didn’t have the desire to get involved with a man who not only didn’t live near me but was also my sister’s possibly dickish boss.

  Deciding to leave the mopping for the morning — I could just come in fifteen minutes early and do it first thing to give the floor time to dry, which meant I could still sleep in a bit — I buttoned my coat back up.

  Jason and Claire stood near the nonfiction section, having a quiet conversation. Jason seemed to be doing most of the talking, with Claire seriously nodding her head. I cringed. Work talk? My sister bringing her boss home was making even less sense by the minute.

  “I’m ready,” I announced.

  They turned their heads to me, and I quickly spun on my heel, not wanting to catch Jason’s eye. If I did, there was a chance I would be a goner. I already knew the power of the simple graze of his hand. Looking into his eyes ever again after that was sure to make me rethink my sanity.

  I led the way to the threshold, still making sure to keep my eyes averted while I held the door open.

  “There’s really not much more to see,” Claire was saying.

  I turned my attention from the hardware store across the street to her. “What do you mean?”

  She shrugged. “I was just telling him there’s not much more to see in Crystal Brook.”

  “Yes, there is.”

  She stared at me. “What? The yarn supply store?”

  My teeth clamped together. Talking shit about our hometown had been cool when Claire and I both lived in New York and were eager to escape the confines of the place we’d grown up, but now that I’d made the conscientious decision to return to Crystal Brook I really didn’t like hearing someone talk shit about it.

  Sure, I did it myself sometimes, but I lived in Crystal Brook. That alone kind of granted me the right to grate on it every once in a while.

  “There’s more to it than that,” I snapped, heading for the car.

  I climbed in and shut the door a little harder than I meant to. Thankfully, Jason got into the backseat, since that meant I wouldn’t be tempted by his close proximity, and Claire got in next to me. I caught her glancing at me every few seconds on the drive to Mom and Dad’s, but I didn’t make eye contact. I was exhausted and just ready to be done with the day. Our reunion hadn’t been anything like I’d expected it to be, and I was eager to wake up the next morning and start all over.

  “Are you coming in?” Claire asked when we got to the house.

  I shook my head. “No. I have to be at the shop at five.”

  She grimaced. “Geez. That’s like the middle of the night.”

  “It’s morning.”

  “Is the sun up then?”

  “No,” I grudgingly said.

  “Then I rest my case. It’s night time.”

  I shook my head, half annoyed and half amused. “See you later.”

  “Okay, see you tomorrow.”

  “Bye.”

  Two doors opened.

  “Nice meeting you, Gwen,” Jason said.

  I spared a half second glance at him while he climbed out of the car. “You too.”

  I didn’t wait for them to get inside before pulling out of the parking lot. Both Mom and Dad’s cars were there, and it wasn’t like Jason and Claire would get locked outside and have to spend the night in the tool shed.

  Heading for Main Street, I rubbed my tired eyes. Home was on the west side of town, a five-minute drive from Freddy’s.

  I didn’t go there, though. Pulling my car into the same parking spot I’d vacated just a few minutes before, I headed back into the shop. The flannel blanket was in its spot in the tiny office that had originally been built to be a walk in closet, right next to my kit containing a toothbrush and other sleeping over supplies.

  Grabbing the blanket, I turned the heat up a few degrees and settled down onto the couch. I rolled over onto my right side, trying to get more comfortable. The light from the lamp post across the street was keeping me up, shining directly in my eyes. Sighing, I got up and switched positions, putting my head where my feet had been.

  I still couldn’t relax. I’d set my cell phone down on the coffee table, and I glanced at it, checking to see if it was flashing.

  Of course it wasn’t. There wouldn’t be a text there.

  I reached over anyway and grabbed the phone, going to the text messages before I could stop myself. I’d deleted Mike’s number long ago, but that didn’t mean I hadn’t memorized it years before. Typing it in, I started composing a text message: Hi. How are you?

  I paused, taking a moment to read back over the text while I nervously gnawed on my thumbnail. What was I doing, really? Even if I sent the text, the odds were good that he wouldn’t respond.

  Because he never did anymore.

  Ice filled my veins, and I set the phone back down on the coffee table. I was riled up thanks to the presence of a new and attractive man. That’s all it was. Meeting Jason had me missing what used to be in my life.

  Laying back down, I pulled the blanket up to my chin. If Mike wanted to talk to me, then he would. I couldn’t go through the rest of my life just trying to get a bite from him. It was pathetic, that’s what it was.

  Other things. You need to think about other things.

  Like the schedule. Had I made the staff’s schedule for January? I knew I’d drawn up the first draft, but couldn’t remember if I’d adjusted it since Emily gave me her new class schedule.

  Thoughts of the shop made me tired, which did the trick. Soon my eyes were fluttering closed, and all thoughts of men and the complications they bring drifted away.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Jason

  “Sorry,” Claire said. “She’s not usually that weird.”<
br />
  “I wouldn’t call her weird. She was quiet, sure, but not weird at all.”

  “She usually opens up once you get to know her better. Also, she’s been through a lot of stress lately. You know, with her shop and other things.”

  I looked at her curiously. “What other things?”

  Suddenly, Claire looked incredibly guilty. “She just… she can be kind of closed off sometimes,” she explained. “It’s not a personal thing.”

  I couldn’t help but notice Claire evaded my question. At least I could understand the bit she did say. Then again, maybe Claire was making excuses for her sister. Maybe Gwen was just an ice queen. It hadn’t been the number of things she’d said, really, as much as it had been the way she’d done things. Several times, I’d caught her looking at me with a pained expression on her face. It was as if she couldn’t stand my very presence. Could she be a lesbian?

  Claire grimaced and opened her mouth to say something more. The house’s front door was opening, though, cutting her off. A woman in her sixties stood there, her short bobbed blonde hair in waves. She squealed when she saw Claire, wrapping the younger woman in a hug.

  “Get inside!” she admonished, like we were just hanging out having a party on the front steps. “It’s cold out there!”

  Claire did as instructed, and I followed her across the threshold. “Mom, this is Jason Adler. Jason, this is my mother, Susan Lawrence.”

  The odd way my name scampered off Claire’s tongue wasn’t lost on me. The whole last year I’d been “Mr. Adler.” It wasn’t till we were actually on the plane and headed for North Carolina that I insisted she start calling me by my first name. Hearing the “Mr. Adler, would you like the window seat?” had been too much. We were headed home to her family’s house for Christmas, for Christ’s sake. We needed to at least act like we were friends.

  Though I suppose we kind of were. After all, Claire had taken it upon herself to invite me to her hometown for the week when she’d discovered I’d be spending the holiday alone. No one else in the office had so much as asked to get drinks over the last six months.

  I didn’t blame them at all. If I had been working for Jason Adler this past year, I would have labeled the guy a total douchebag and put coal in his stocking.

  “Jason!” Susan squealed, like I was from her favorite boy band. She placed her hand on my shoulder and smiled. “Come inside! Are you two hungry? I’ll warm you up some dinner.”

  “Starving,” Claire said with a long groan. “The food at the airport sucked.” She removed her coat and I did the same. She took mine from me, hanging the two of them together on a hook near the door.

  “You didn’t wait for us to eat, did you?” Claire asked.

  “Oh no,” her mother said. “I thought about it, though.”

  “No, Mom,” Claire laughed. “Come on. You didn’t even have to think about doing that.”

  We followed Susan down the hallway and into the kitchen, where a man with salt and pepper hair sat at the round table reading on a tablet. The room was decorated in yellow, and Susan clearly had a thing for roosters. Not only were they on the wallpaper, but I clocked a rooster cookie jar, a rooster pot holder, about half a dozen rooster magnets, and a rooster painting as well. And that was just in the five seconds I got to surreptitiously check out the room.

  “Harry, they’re here,” Susan announced.

  He removed his reading glasses and stood up.

  “Dad, this is Jason,” Claire said. My name sounded slightly better the second time around.

  Harry reached over to give me a hand shake as Susan bustled around us, turning the stove on and pulling food out of the fridge. Claire took a seat across the table from her father and I settled in next to her.

  “Where’s Gwen?” Harry asked.

  “She went home.”

  Harry snorted with what looked to be an “of course she did” nod.

  “What?” Claire asked, her shoulders so slumped she was nearly laying on the table. For the first time that night, I noticed how tired she looked, with dark circles forming under her eyes.

  Susan spoke up. “Is she staying in the shop again? She’s going to hurt her back, always sleeping on that couch.”

  Claire looked confused. “No, I don’t think so. Why would she sleep in the shop? She lives, like, a minute away from it.”

  Harry shrugged. “Why does she do anything she does?” He clapped his hands together. “Forget about it. We can harass the hell out of your sister tomorrow. Jason, we’re glad you could join us this week.”

  I nodded. “Thank you, sir. It’s kind of you to invite me.”

  I wasn’t sure just how much Claire had told her family about my circumstances, if anything at all, but decided it best to skirt the issue. My business is my own, and I don’t like advertising my personal affairs. Obviously, if I’m spending Christmas at my employee’s parents’ house, my life is pretty shitty.

  “Where’s Danny?” Claire asked.

  “His room,” Harry said. “You should have seen the rehearsal tonight. He knocked it out of the ball park.”

  “Danny’s in a play,” Claire explained to me.

  “Opening night is in three days,” Susan chirped.

  “That’s the day before Christmas Eve,” I commented. “Is it a nativity play?”

  Claire laughed. “It’s Romeo and Juliet.” She waited for me to look appropriately surprised. “I don’t know why they’re doing it on Christmas Eve. It’s a theater troupe he and some other high school kids put together, and I guess they think they’re being alternative for reenacting something other than the birth of Christ. Unfortunately, no one’s going to go see it.”

  Susan clucked. “We are.”

  Claire rolled her eyes, a gesture I’d never seen her make. “They’re just making a statement about how much the world sucks.”

  I couldn’t hold back the laughter. “I’m not so sure I disagree with them on that one. Maybe I’ll sit in the front row.”

  Harry chortled. “See there, Claire? He understands.”

  Claire only rolled her eyes again.

  Susan spoke up. “Shakespeare wasn’t saying the world sucked, Claire. He made the biggest statement of all in Romeo and Juliet. Love is everything.”

  Harry beamed up at his wife, the sweet look taking me by surprise. I knew very few couples their age, and none of them ever looked at each other the way Claire’s father was looking at her mother.

  After Claire and I finished the leftovers, Susan showed me to the guest room on the bottom floor, down the hallway and in the back of the house. With creaky wooden boards and tall, thin windows, nearly everything betrayed the house’s age. The room was set up nice, though, with plenty of blankets and soft lighting. The bonus was the generosity of Claire’s parents.

  A generosity that toyed with the guilt hanging over my head. I wasn’t good enough to be in their presence, the recipient of their kindness if for no other reason than I’d been an asshole to their daughter this past year. I knew as much, and yet I still took what they offered.

  Sitting down on the end of the bed, I sighed and stared at the dark window. I still hadn’t properly thanked Claire for bringing me with her. I’d mumbled a “thanks,” sure, but that wasn’t good enough. The woman had a heart twice the size of most people. Now that I’d met her parents, it was easy to see where she got her good spirit.

  And what about her sister?

  My thoughts drifted to the younger Lawrence woman, with her wavy blonde hair, long bangs, and small, round face. She was obviously Claire’s sister. Not only did they look alike, but they had many of the same gestures and speech inflections.

  Something about her was different, though, and I couldn’t put my finger on it.

  She was semi-distant, that much was for sure. Even making eye contact seemed to be difficult. Was she shy? Or just disinterested in people? Or just me?

  Hooking my arm behind my neck, I leaned back and dropped my head against one of the half dozen pillow
s piled against the headboard. Her attitude, though it was lacking, was also undeniably compelling. What would it take to break a girl like that, to make the hardened expression on her face melt, only to be replaced by a smile?

  I could probably sleep with her if I wanted — turn the holiday break into a little Christmas fling. I twisted my lips around and stared at the ceiling, giving that idea some thought.

  No, I can’t do that to Claire.

  I’d had more flings and one night stands in the last year than I cared to count. It wasn’t that the number was that high — I’m not a total man whore. It’s just that once a tryst was done, it was done. There was no need to dwell.

  When it came to commitment, I appreciated and valued it more than most people probably do. Which was why I didn’t offer it to another person unless I knew for sure I’d be able to follow through. Well, unless I knew for sure that other person could give me what I was looking for. And the truth was there wasn’t a woman out there who could do just that. Believe me, I’d already tried to find my happily ever after and the attempt had failed miserably.

  The real thing holding me back from putting the moves on Gwen was the potential for drama. The Lawrences were a kind and generous family. I didn’t need to throw their well-meaning actions back in their faces by macking on one of them.

  Of course, if she comes to you willingly…

  I grinned. Now that was a different story entirely.

  My dick twitched. I didn’t often get to enjoy the excitement of a chase. Usually, all it took was one look and women were mine. I was a gold digger magnet.

  “All right,” I whispered to the empty room, finally decided. I would get to know Gwen, but it wouldn’t be aggressive or obtrusive. It would be quiet and deliberate.

  Enjoying the idea of a challenge, I committed to win her over slowly but surely. Granted, I had less than a week to do so, so I needed to get started right away.

  Excitement thrummed through me. I’d been wondering how I would manage to stay distracted while away from the office and the constant stream of busy work.