Duke rocked back on his heels. One hand came out of its pocket to stroke his beard in a thoughtful gesture. “Maybe not.”
She squinted at him. “Are you messing with me?”
“It’s a long shot.”
“You’re no match for me, Duke. Don’t make me make you tell me.”
Both hands went up in surrender. “All right, all right. You asked for it. Gavin owns a cabin in the Ozarks and has this grand plan to turn it into a mountain retreat. The place is ancient, but the previous owner had plumbing installed about twelve years ago. He started to renovate, fell on hard times, and finally lost it to foreclosure a few years back. Gavin snatched the place off the market for next to nothing.”
Neve whistled. “Remote cabin. A tough one. Smorgasbord of issues. Again, remote, which doesn’t sound like much help in getting close to Gavin.”
“You wouldn’t work with the guy daily, obviously. Not unless you want to get a job here selling bras to outlet stores in the greater Arkansas area.”
“Not particularly, no.”
“But if you were renovating this cabin for him, you’d have to be in almost constant contact. He’d need to make several trips to the…remote…isolated…private cabin.”
She blinked at him. “You want to wriggle your eyebrows suggestively, get it out of your system?”
He pressed on with his pitch. She recognized a sales pitch. But what was he peddling, exactly? “You’ll have to take shopping trips together for light fixtures and hardware. By my estimation, you’d have six to eight weeks to convince him he’s your soul mate.”
She mirrored Duke, stroking her chin thoughtfully. He seemed mighty pleased with the proposition. It wasn’t immediately obvious what he stood to gain if she accepted the job. Probably took a shine to the idea of sucking up to Darcy the Pit in her absence.
As for renovating a cabin, she’d never done anything so challenging. Her realm of expertise didn’t extend beyond the interior. “Will there be a general contractor on site? What if I have structural issues?”
“An excellent question you’d better make sure to ask Gavin.”
Neve nodded resolutely. Despite whatever Duke imagined he was getting out of it, Neve needed two things: a shot at Gavin and a job. Here was an opportunity to get both, or one if not the other. “Fine. I’ll do it. Now, get in there. Time’s a-wasting, Tonto. Save my new boyfriend from his impending stroke.”
* * * *
Stupid yellow bra. Stupid Neve and her stupid perky tits and that goddamn stupid yellow bra. A few more minutes in the presence of her interesting fashion choices, and he’d have ruined everything.
Duke walked with his head down straight to Gavin’s office.
“You need to grow up, you hear me?” The whites of Gavin’s eyes had gone red from yelling.
His nephew, Nick, had come around a few times before to visit Gavin. He stared at the ground, a petulant set to his jaw.
“You have to make hard decisions in life. Time to be a man and live with the consequences.” Gavin paused in his diatribe to lift inquiring brows at Duke’s hesitant knock on the door.
He shuffled his feet. “I apologize, sir. A minute when you’ve got one would be appreciated.”
An instant smile broke out over Gavin’s face. The veins in his forehead receded and the mottled red of his cheeks faded as he inhaled and clasped his nephew’s shoulder. “Sure thing, Duke.” He gave the kid a good-natured jostle. “How’d I do, buddy?”
Nick brushed back a mop of unruly dark hair from his pimply forehead. “You did better than Dennis. I wish you could do the play with me instead. Thanks for helping me run lines, Uncle Gavin.”
“Aw, it’s nothing.” Gavin shooed off the compliment with the wave of his right hand and hooked his left around Nick’s thin shoulders. He addressed Duke. “This kid, I’m telling you. Broadway awaits.”
“I don’t doubt it, sir.”
“I’d better go.” Nick loosed himself from Gavin and hefted a fully loaded backpack onto his shoulders.
It surprised Duke when the gangly kid didn’t topple over from the weight of it.
“The play’s Friday. You’re coming, right?”
“You kidding me? Wouldn’t miss it, but I’d better get back to work myself. Tell your mom hello for me.”
“Sure, Uncle Gavin.” He waved good-bye, politely extending it to include Duke, and shuffled out the door and toward the elevators.
No one’s destination remained a mystery for long in a place with glass walls. Probably the point. Hard to get away with slacking when the boss could watch you from behind his desk. Hard to get away with a number of things, actually, including a strange woman getting handsy in your office while the busybodies from accounting pretended not to stare from behind their monitors.
Damn you, Neve. Damn you and your stupid hands.
Normally, withstanding Neve came easier. But “normally” involved Neve in ugly pajamas at the end of a long day, short on patience, humor, and a threshold for human contact. Today, she was in rare form. Or in normal form, and he simply didn’t know this side of her. He’d be in trouble if he ever did.
Gavin tucked his hands into his slacks pockets and watched his nephew go with an easy smile. “My sister’s kid.” He whistled appreciatively. “He’s got chops. Did you see him? He landed the lead part, you know. Of course, drama has always run strong in the Chambers family.”
From the faraway gleam in Gavin’s eyes, Duke didn’t doubt it. He let his boss’s reverie go on another ten seconds before issuing a light, throat-clearing cough.
He wagged a finger at Duke and settled in behind his exquisite cherry desk. “Right. Have a seat, Duke. What did you need?”
Duke did as instructed and sat opposite, eyeing the brilliant, glossy surface of Gavin’s clean work space. Clean desk, clean mouth, clean all over. That was Gavin. Also kind, thoughtful, helpful, and utterly unprepossessing.
Neve Harper’s exact opposite.
He rubbed his hands together. Last chance to back out of his devious plan. Were it anyone else—quite literally anyone but Neve—he’d never have the stones to go through with it. He checked his conscience a final time.
Not a single quivering qualm.
Her delusions about Gavin provided him with the perfect escape route, one he’d been searching for. By the time she realized her error, which by his calculations ought to come right around the same time Gavin discovered Neve’s brutal lack of social grace and basic human kindness, she’d have already signed the contract. She might hate Duke in the end, but she’d have to admire his cunning. She’d emasculate him, but with a sense of pride.
“I wanted to talk about the cabin, Mr. Chambers.”
Gavin bolted upright, nearly coming out of his chair. “Excellent! Great news, Duke. I’m so glad you decided to take the job. I told you, didn’t I? Wasting your talent downstairs designing booby compartments. Anyone can take your place here, but I want someone I trust working on my retreat. Only the best.”
Duke swallowed. “I agree, sir, which is why I’ve gone to great lengths to find a suitable alternative.” He held up a hand to ward off the interruption looming in Gavin’s disappointed face. “Please, hear me out. Neve Harper is the best in Little Rock, perhaps even the best in Arkansas. As it happens, she’s also my neighbor. The two of us got to talking a few days ago. I mentioned your cabin in passing, and you wouldn’t believe it, but she lit of up like a darn Christmas tree, sir. Absolutely insisted on an introduction. She’s in incredibly high demand, and I can’t even promise she’d have the kind of time necessary for something like the full renovation you want, but…” He puffed out his cheeks. “Heck, if you can sign on someone like Neve Harper, I wouldn’t sniff at the opportunity, sir.”
Gavin didn’t appear entirely convinced. He reclined in his cushy seat and smoothed his pale blue and pastel pink–checkered tie. One set of fingers drummed a neat staccato across the surface of his desk. “
I’ve never heard of her.”
Duke dug in his heels. He had to sell it. This had to work. If Neve couldn’t get him out of this, no one could. He wasn’t lying about her reputation.
He splayed a hand over his chest. “Sir, the project fascinates me. I’d love to do it, but on a personal level, a professional level even, I don’t have…” He needed a word. Something artsy and temperamental. “Inspiration,” he finished with a slight sad flourish. “So you see, I couldn’t do the project justice. However, I can introduce you to Neve, and that’s the next best thing. She has a real passion, sir. I’d love to bring her by tomorrow if your schedule allows it.”
Gavin inhaled, his mouth a foreboding straight line. His light blue gaze traveled the room, avoiding Duke’s carefully composed face. “You want me to meet this Ms.…”
“Harper, sir. Neve Harper.”
He nodded once. Another drum of his fingers over the desk. “Tomorrow?”
“Only if it’s convenient for you. Ms. Harper is flexible.”
Poor choice of words. Neve’s lacy yellow bra leaped back into his mind. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
It’d be easier to continue his charade if he didn’t have a hankering to sleep with the very woman he desperately wanted to avoid getting involved with. The guy who’d lived in the loft before Duke had regaled him with horror stories of their short affair, and Neve’s dragon-lady transformation once it ended. He warned Duke against getting ensnared by her.
Duke hadn’t taken the warning seriously until he met Neve. His first thoughts were overtly sexual. No way he wouldn’t get involved. Years avoiding women, but with a glance at Neve, and he knew she’d be the one to unravel him. So, he’d wiped the drool from his chin and promptly introduced himself as her new gay neighbor, vanquishing any possibility she’d ever set her sights on him.
But, goddamn, it was torture.
“Convenient for me.” Gavin’s contemplative voice broke through the vision of Neve’s enticing undergarment like an arrow through a cloud of smoke. “How about right now?”
“Well, sir, she—”
“Has impeccable timing if I do say so myself.” Neve’s mahogany hair whipped across Duke’s shoulder as she blazed past him with an outstretched hand toward Gavin. “I’m Neve. So nice to meet you, Gavin. May I call you Gavin?”
Flustered by her frank introduction, Gavin blinked several times before taking the proffered hand. “Of course, Ms. Har—”
“Neve will do, thanks.” She beamed at him and lowered herself into the chair beside Duke’s, legs crossed, back straight, hands carefully poised in her lap after smoothing down an invisible fly-away hair. “I hear you’ve got a cabin you’d like to turn into a mountain chateau. How romantic.”
Stunned into silence, Duke could only watch as the train wreck unfolded before his eyes.
Thankfully, Gavin hadn’t caught the edge of sarcasm in Neve’s remark.
She rambled on, taking control of the meeting as though she were on the other side of the desk. “I’ll be straight with you, Gavin. I’ve never renovated a cabin before. But”—she held up a slender finger and turned solemn—“you won’t find a more dedicated soul. My job is my life, my whole world, and I’ve never backed down from a challenge. You can check out my references if you’d like. In fact, I designed the lobby of a five-star hotel three blocks from here. Do you have plans for lunch? Their in-house restaurant is sublime, and you could see my handiwork for yourself firsthand. Within budget and beyond expectations, which happens to be my slogan. See.”
Duke had no clue where in the hell she’d been keeping a stash of business cards. It didn’t surprise him the placard was fire-engine red with fancy black script. More like something an escort would have than an interior designer, but totally Neve: bold and in-your-face.
He wanted to disappear. What part of he’s shy hadn’t she understood? Shy people didn’t stand up well under bombardment. They needed gentle coaxing, subtle nudges.
To his utter amazement, Gavin’s hesitant smile spread slowly as he took the card, eyebrows raised slightly at the intrepid design. “You do have a certain enthusiasm. The type to give a hundred percent.”
She winked at him. Actually winked. “Plus interest.”
Duke hardly believed his luck. He relaxed his tense shoulders. Neve had basically passed the job interview, and he’d be off the hook for good. He rose from his seat with a cheery wave. “I’ll leave you two to sort out the details. Glad I could help.” He’d done it. Escaped by the hair—
Gavin stopped him with a sudden raised palm. “Now hold on there, Duke. I haven’t given up on you yet. No matter what, I still want you in on this.”
Neve’s head snapped in his direction. Her eyes were such a pale brown, they seemed tan sometimes, with big flecks of dark amber. Her gaze narrowed. She might’ve been a lion scrutinizing his lean-to-fat ratio. “In what capacity might I require a data analyst? To double-check my math?”
Gavin perked up, excitement lighting up his face.
Duke dropped his head. Shit. He had it figured out before Gavin opened his mouth.
“That’s perfect! You two can work together. Duke, you turned down the job the first time because you wanted a partner. Well, now you’ve got one. I’m sure Ms. Harper won’t mind.” Expectant, he turned to her. “Would you?” Not exactly a question. Gavin wasn’t giving her a choice, and they both knew it.
Her whole face seemed to harden and shrink in on itself like drying plaster. “Someone enlighten me. I’m obviously missing some critical piece of information that’ll make this all come together.”
For two years, Duke had miraculously managed to avoid Neve’s infamous wrath. His streak ended today.
Gavin didn’t miss a beat. “Duke’s only filling in for an analyst on vacation. I thought you two were friends? He’s actually head of our design team, but before he came here, he was a general contractor in Louisiana. Or was it Alabama?”
Duke closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Georgia, but that was a long time ago.” He opened his eyes, almost pleading Gavin to drop it.
“Oh, come on, don’t be modest. Vale House is timeless, Duke. The man responsible for Vale House is the man I want. No offense, Ms. Harper. I’m sure you’re an excellent designer, but I won’t settle. I’ll hire you, but only if Duke’s willing to sign on as well.”
Duke didn’t think she was listening. She glared at him, once narrowed eyes gone wide with shock. “You did Vale House? The Vale House, famous Savannah plantation?” She blinked several times. “Your office. You designed it, didn’t you?”
Vale House, his supposed masterpiece. Yeah, he’d renovated and restored one of the oldest still-standing plantation homes in the South and earned renown in his field for perfectly replicating the spirit of pre-Civil War life in a house that had been nothing but shambles when he started. He’d given five years to the plantation and lost more than time because of it. He clamped his mouth shut against an ugly remark and batted away unpleasant memories. “I’m not interested.”
Coldly confident, Neve came to her feet so all three of them were standing.
This was the woman Duke was used to dealing with. Where had she been all morning? The peek-a-boo bra was suddenly less enticing, her eyes less entrancing. His damnation and his saving grace—the part of her that made him want her and drove him away at the same time. “The hell you aren’t,” she declared. Simple but definitive. “You’re taking the job, Duke, because without you, I lose it.”
Gavin regarded him with concern. “Tell you what. I’ll hire Neve here as head honcho. She can bring on whoever she likes for general contracting if the cabin needs it. I mean, the place has four walls and a roof, and that’s pretty much all I can tell you about its condition. All you have to do is consult.” He shook his head and grew quiet. “Your talent is wasted here, Duke. You’re meant for greater things than designing bras. Come on. What do you say?”
Damn nice people. Duke
wanted to be cold and hard like Neve, but even the bitterness coating the back of his throat couldn’t stop him from saying yes to Gavin. Because Gavin was nice, and he wanted a nice cabin out in the woods, and why couldn’t Duke sit around in the woods for a couple months and do something nice for his boss? Why the hell not? He dared a glance at Neve.
That’s why not. Dragon lady smoldered behind her unwavering glare.
Duke regretted ever mentioning the cabin. “Fine. Under the condition I’m there only as a consultant, and I don’t answer to Neve.”
From pleading to delighted, Gavin’s beaming smile took up his whole face. He came around the desk to grasp Duke’s hand with both of his. “Thank you, Duke. Thank you so much. It’s all I ever wanted.”
As Duke shuffled out of the office behind Neve several minutes and one signed contract later, a headache began to blossom from the back of his skull. What in the hell had he done? His plan had backfired bigtime. Not only had he committed to a job his soul cried out against, he’d jimmied himself into a hell of a pickle with Neve, whom he’d be stuck with for weeks out in the middle of nowhere at some remote cabin, hundreds of miles from normal, kind human beings.
As soon as they were a few yards down the hall, she whirled on him. Pursed lips made her high cheekbones prominent. Small breasts, angular features, thin lips on a wide mouth—nothing at all attractive about her, least of all the stinging wrath she was seconds away from unleashing on him in a place full of see-through walls. He’d be the talk of the break room for months after this. He braced for impact.
She closed in, but her voice was shockingly quiet when she spoke. Her glittering eyes made up for it. “You want to know why I’m so direct, Duke? Why I don’t believe in bullshit like tact? It’s because I can’t stand a goddamn liar. This is far from over, booby boy.” She stalked away from him.
Her hair flew out behind her as if trying to escape. Her hips cut like razors in her long, angry stride, her ass swaying from side to side with purpose.
To the Studs Page 4