by Maggie Marr
“This woman has shut us down for nearly five days,” Nick said. “I convinced the mayor, the city council, and the zoning board of that little suburban outpost to approve this construction. We hired local architects. We commissioned environmental and economic reports. I even offered buyouts to the residents of Winter Pines and paid for their moves. All was on track until this woman. How are this woman and her grandmother still there? How is she keeping my demolition team from starting?”
“Chains, sir.”
“Excuse me?”
“She has chained herself to the front door of the central building, sir. As of this morning. Yesterday it was a sit-in, but the local police threatened to move them. Today she’s returned with chains and padlocks.”
Nick closed his eyes. He tilted his head back, and a giant blast of air exited his lips. What kind of woman chained herself between a glass door and a wrecking ball? A twinge tightened his right shoulder. He’d known such a woman, what seemed like a lifetime ago.
“I’ll be there within the hour.”
“Excellent, sir,” Frederick said.
Again Nick heard the smile in Frederick’s voice. What in the hell? Why was Frederick so excited to see Nick on-site when it was so obvious he was completely pissed off?
“I think your coming to Lake Grove and seeing what is taking place at Winter Pines is an excellent idea.”
“You understand I’m not happy about this, don’t you, Frederick?”
“Yes, sir. Looking forward to your arrival.” Frederick hung up.
Odd. Frederick hung up … Nick always hung up first when he finished a call with Frederick. It wasn’t that Frederick was any less responsive than he’d always been, but there was something in Frederick’s voice. Something unfamiliar, something unusual, something—
A chill slid down Nick’s spine and goose bumps prickled across his skin. This wasn’t right. He strode through his office and out the door. He’d be in Lake Grove soon, and he’d fix this damned mess himself.
*
“How you doing out here, Noel? I brought you another cup of hot chocolate.”
Another cup of hot chocolate and Noel’s bladder might explode. Mrs. Hyland’s blue eyes sparkled as she held out the cup to Noel. How could Noel say anything but thank you to Mrs. Hyland? The woman was closing in on eighty and she did make an excellent cup of cinnamon hot chocolate.
“Ted will be out here soon to relieve you for a little bit.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Hyland.”
“Please, call me Evelyn.” She smiled at Noel. “How many times do I need to tell you?”
“Thank you, Evelyn.” Noel tilted the hot chocolate to her lips. The burst of heat in her mouth caused her body to tingle. Damn, the cold. If it wasn’t for Nonna refusing to buy a retirement town house farther than thirty miles from downtown, Noel would be Christmasing someplace warm like Arizona or New Mexico… maybe even California.
She stomped her feet. Sharp pins poked her toes. She’d lost feeling around noon. She blew her warm breath on her fingertips. She was quite certain that her lips were a pale shade of frostbite blue. She lifted her right hand and adjusted the thick chains that were secure around her waist. She’d been standing in this doorway since six a.m. This was her third day of protest, but her first day shackled to the front door of Winter Pines.
Mrs. Hyland rubbed her hands over her upper arms. “Okay, dear, I’m going to check on Ted. I’d thought he’d be out here by now.” Mrs. Hyland turned the corner toward the steel fire door on the side of the building. Only residents of Winter Pines had a key. Even so, they’d barricaded it on the other side with the bingo table.
One of the residents should be coming soon. Whether it was Ted or any one of the other residents didn’t matter to Noel. She simply needed to pee. She hated the idea of any of the inhabitants of Winter Pines standing outside in this cold, no matter what the cause. They were all simply too old and, in Noel’s opinion, too frail to have to fight this battle. But all the residents had agreed, after Noel’s community meeting, that they didn’t want some rich man from downtown stealing their homes, no matter what the mayor or city council of Lake Grove had agreed to.
Unfortunately, no one was coming to their rescue. Her eyes locked onto the demolition crew. They loitered on the other side of the parking lot in their hard hats and steel-toed boots. They milled about their trucks, drinking coffee out of steaming thermoses, getting paid by some fat-cat real estate developer whether they did any work or not. A gang of destruction, just waiting for the door to the main building to become unmanned so that they might race into Winter Pines and forcibly remove the remaining tenants.
Noel leaned forward at the waist to set her now-empty cup of hot chocolate on the table beside her. Her eyeglasses dropped from her face and hit the bricks below. Without her glasses she was nearly blind, and she couldn’t bend, turn, or kneel down to get them. Great—now not only did she need to pee, but she was also blind.
Where was Ted? She stomped her feet and not simply because she was cold. She turned and pressed her nose to the glass of the front door. She squinted and cupped her hand around her eyes in an attempt to see if anyone was walking down the hall toward the side door.
“Excuse me? Noel Klaus?”
Noel whipped her head toward the voice. A tall woman with blond hair, blue eyes, and more makeup than a redneck prom queen stood in front of Noel on the brick steps of Winter Pines.
“I’m Mary Crossmore, channel 32 news. I came over to do a live feed for our five p.m. newscast.”
A cameraman stood directly behind Mary. The thick, sweet scent of too much perfume wafted toward Noel and she squeezed her eyes shut and wiggled her nose in an attempt not to sneeze.
“I’m so happy you’re here.” Noel sniffed, tilted her head and rubbed the edge of her nose against the shoulder of her coat. “I’ve been standing here all day and now I have to pee, and wow, I didn’t think anyone was going to show up and do our story!”
“Uh, right.” Mary took a step back. Noel closed her mouth. Her enthusiasm had been known to frighten the unsuspecting.
“So, we’re live in five minutes. I think I have all your background. I have a couple of questions to ask once we’re on air. Anything specific you’d like for me to cover?”
“Just that every Winter Pines residents is over seventy-five and that Winter Pines has been here for twenty-five years. The residents don’t want to move and especially not for a shopping mall. I mean, do we really need another shopping mall in Lake Grove?”
“Right,” Mary said. “Got it.” She eyed Noel from top to toe. Her cocked eyebrow made it obvious that while Mary might not be in need of another shopping mall, she definitely believed that Noel could use some apparel help, stat.
The cameraman pointed at Mary and she turned her back to Noel. Noel tossed her head and patted her wild curls. Better to look less like a crazy woman chained to the front door of an old-folks’ home and more like a rational community activist who was fighting for the poor and disenfranchised. A stretch, especially when she was, in fact, chained to the front door.
The cameraman pointed at Mary. “In five, four, three”—he went silent and mouthed two and one.
“This is Mary Crossman at White Pines Retirement Community in Lake Grove. With us today is Noel Klaus, community activist, and former member of the Peace Corps.”
“Hi, Mary.”
“Miss Klaus, it appears you’ve chained yourself to the door of White Pines. Could you tell us why you, a woman who obviously isn’t a resident of White Pines, has locked herself to the door the week before Christmas?”
“Well,” Noel said and brushed a red curl from her face. “When I arrived for the holidays to visit my grandmother, I discovered that some sociopathic billionaire had managed to purchase the mayor, the city council, and the zoning commissioner so that he could destroy a nursing home right before Christmas.” Noel looked from Mary toward the camera and lifted her shackled arms. “What else could I do?�
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“Hmm,” Mary said. “Some strong accusations from a woman chained to a glass door. But a very good question.” Mary glanced past the camera and Noel followed her gaze. “Let’s ask the sociopath, shall we?”
Noel pulled her eyebrows tight and squinted. Was that a car? A giant black blob pulled to a stop beside the wrecking ball and what was now a globby group of men in orange hats. A very large man walked toward Noel and Mary. Without her glasses, Noel could see little more than the fact that he was tall. A tingle started at the base of Noel’s spine. Heat churned in her belly.
Desire? For this man? The very man who was dumping a slew of octogenarians onto the mean streets of Lake Grove barely a week before Christmas?
Well, hadn’t every woman in the world been conditioned to be attracted to power and money? This heat that pulled through her was merely a Pavlovian response. Hopefully he had bad eyebrows and very crooked teeth. Maybe a horrible overbite and a lisp? Her breath shortened and her nipples hardened, an indication that on some level, even without the benefit of twenty-twenty vision, Noel found this man shockingly attractive.
Noel wasn’t alone in her desires.
With the billionaire’s approach, Mary’s entire demeanor changed. She continued to talk about White Pines, but her gaze flicked from the camera toward the man who walked with purpose toward them both. The transformation of Mary was nearly instantaneous. She went from semi-serious newswoman to a cat in heat. Mary twirled a strand of blond hair between her fingertips and nearly purred. She was most definitely ready to be stroked by the man who walked toward them.
A blast of cold air blew past and Mary’s hair, one giant shellacked blonde helmet, lifted high above her ears. Noel’s curls swirled and covered her face. She waved her hands, pulling and grabbing her thick mane of wild hair from her eyes and her mouth. She wanted to get a good look at this captain of industry, this titan of power, this asshole with a gargantuan checkbook.
Noel knew the type.
The marauder determined to destroy Nonna’s home stopped on just the other side of the front portico and Mary’s bodacious ta-tas blocked Noel’s sightline. Not that she could see, even if Mary’s boobs weren’t in the way. Noel’s glasses still lay on the bricks at her feet.
“Hello, Mr. North,” Mary purred.
Noel’s stomach churned. A gust of air froze in her lungs. Her heart stilled and then quickened.
North?
Noel squinted and pulled against her chains. Her heart hit a frantic pace. Cold sweat trickled down her spine.
No.
Not the same North.
It couldn’t be, it wouldn’t be, it—
“So, Noel Klaus, our community activist and former Peace Corps volunteer, has just referred to you as a sociopath willing to make homeless these octogenarians a week from the most blessed holiday of the year. How, Mr. North, would you like to respond?”
“Excuse me, Mary? Did you say Noel Klaus?”
Her sex quivered with the sound of her name on his lips. Heat tore through her belly and she closed her eyes. That voice, oh God no, it couldn’t be, but it was. She knew that voice. A tremble started in Noel’s toes and whispered up her legs. Every cell in her body aware of his presence, memories of his lips on her lips and his fingers, his hands—oh God, what that man could do with his hands. Noel forced her eyelids open and the memories from her mind. A long, deep breath of cold air entered her lungs and tamped down the heat that threatened to overwhelm her.
“Noel Klaus,” Mary Crossmore said and stepped out of the way. “Meet Nick North, sociopath and billionaire.”
Noel stared into Nick’s eyes. Slivers of gray around a sea of black. His gaze devoured her. She could do this. Hadn’t she walked away from Nick once before? She could most definitely do so again, although this time she needed a win before she departed.
“Noel.” His voice was a river of cold.
She shivered.
“Nick.” She raised both her eyebrows. Her attempt at practiced nonchalance. Cool, calm, and collected. Nick would have no power over her, not now. She’d managed to escape his grasp when she was younger and now, now, she knew even better who she was. She’d been right about him all those years before when she’d fled that Christmas Eve night.
“This isn’t much of a surprise,” Noel said. She hardened her heart. “In fact, this is exactly what I would have guessed your future to be.” She hooked the corner of her mouth up in an attempt at a self-satisfied and righteous smile. She jutted her chin. She had the power of the people on her side. “Ousting widows and old people from their homes and right before Christmas. I guess your father got what he wanted after all—a man just like him.”
Damn, the man was gorgeous, even if he didn’t have a heart. Full lips. Patrician nose. Black hair that tickled the collar of his crisp dress shirt. The only indication that her words landed a direct hit was the tiniest flinch of the muscle in the right side of his jaw. Her gaze scraped along his face. Then his eyes locked with hers. He knew that she’d witnessed his little tell. That tiny trait hadn’t changed since B-school. The only glitch in his impenetrable facade was that tiny little flinching muscle that happened when Nick was annoyed.
Oh yes, and she’d had the distinct ability to annoy him.
And love him.
And make him growl and moan and call her name.
Noel’s eyelids hovered at half-mast at the memory of Nick above her, his lips on her chin, his fingers pressed against her swollen nub, and his cock thrust into her, his touch, his masculinity, his raw power over her nearly sweeping her away. The heat from the memory made her sex wet and her breasts tingle with want.
For fuck’s sake, what was this desire? Like whiplash from unadulterated disdain to sex-throbbing want? Her eyes widened. If she weren’t chained to the door of Winter Pines, she might leap into Nick’s arms and press her lips to his.
Nick’s nostrils flared and he took a step back.
Did he feel this heat too? How could he not? How could anyone watching this interaction on channel 32 fail to see the desire she felt for Nick?
“Yes, so my profession is of no surprise, but what about you, Miss Klaus? It is miss, still, is it not?”
Noel tossed her curls and straightened her spine. She took a deep breath and attempted to banish the heat swirling about her as though it were a flurry of snow.
“Yes, yes, it is still miss.” She said with an ice-cold bravado that she definitely didn’t feel. Damn him. Nick knew, he knew that she’d wanted a marriage, a family, a career and that now, here, for her, only having the career would feel like a defeat. She’d wanted to finish graduate school, to work for a nonprofit, to get married and have a family. What her heart had believed she’d found in her love with Nick.
She had been wrong.
“Wait?” Mary said, her eyes widening with shock and surprise. “You two know each other?
“Did,” Noel said.
“Knew,” Nick said at the same time.
Their gazes locked. The heat pulsed between them.
“We were in business school together, but I left and joined the Peace Corps, while Mr. North, it would seem, continued his course of study and became the capitalist that every B-school in America would desperately hope to create.”
“Ah, Miss Klaus.” He shook his head and a sly smile curled over his lips. “Still the heart that bleeds for everyone. Saving the world one welfare check at a time.”
Noel stiffened. His words were patronizing and dismissive. She’d known a man, once upon a time, who believed in philanthropy and helping people less fortunate than those who had the luck of being born into the diamond-encrusted world in which Nick had been bred and raised.
“Mr. North, not all of us come into the world with a multimillion-dollar trust fund waiting for us. Some of us do fall on hard times and when those hard times happen, yes, yes, I do believe in helping my fellow man and woman. I do believe that charity is a truth upon which this season rests, is it not? How charitable is
it to make the residents of Winter Pines homeless?” Noel took a deep breath. A semicircle of the remaining residents had formed around her and Mary and Nick. His eyes flitted to each person and while his face remained hard and non-emotive, as though frozen by the winter cold, he shifted his weight slightly and Noel knew his discomfort grew. Around him stood the people whose home he would steal. Some form of the heart she’d loved had to still beat within Nick’s chest. He couldn’t be completely heartless, could he?
“Miss Klaus, as I am sure you’re aware, the majority of the White Pines residents have accepted North Industries buyout—”
“And surely you are aware, Mr. North, that many of these residents have lived at White Pines for twenty years. They’d prefer to stay together instead of being scattered.”
“Noel?”
Noel turned toward the soft voice. Nonna walked out from the side door. She wore a green sweater with Santa’s face embroidered on the front. She looked frail and cold.
“Mrs. Hyland, would you please help Nonna? Would you take her back inside?”
“Noel, I’m fine.” She shook off Evelyn Hyland’s hand from her shoulder. “What is Nick doing here?”
Noel’s jaw dropped. Nonna remembered Nick?
“Are you going to invite him in? It’s too cold out here. Nick, tell those workmen to go home, unchain Noel, and come into the house. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Mrs. Klaus,” Nick said, with a hint of a smile on his lips. “I do understand.”
“Nonna, I don’t think that’s a good idea. Mr. North is the man who is trying to tear down Winter Pines—”
“I know that, Noel. But he’s not going to tear it down while we’re all still inside”—Nonna turned her sharp gaze to Nick—“are you, Nicholas?”