“You certainly have to do that now.”
“Thank you.”
“I mean it.”
“I know. Believe me, I know how much I have to think every day. There are times when it’s a major pain in the butt, but I wouldn’t trade what I do for any other job.”
Chris looked puzzled at that. “But you’ve invested in Crosslyn Rise. You’re a member of the consortium. Isn’t that like stepping over the line?”
“I’m kind of straddling it right now.”
“Then it’s not a permanent move into development?”
Gideon thought about it for a minute. A month before, he’d have had a ready answer, but he didn’t have one now. “I invested in the Rise because I’ve never invested in a project before. It was a step up the ladder, something I wanted to try, something I had to try.” He frowned down at his plate, nudging it back and forth by tiny degrees. “So I’m trying it, and I’m finding that I really want it to work, I mean, really want it to work, and there’s pressure that goes with that.” His eyes sought hers. “Do you know what I mean?”
She nodded, but he wasn’t done. “The pressure isn’t all fun. And then there’s the thing about working in an office, versus working at a site. I like the meetings at the bank. I like being involved at that level. But when the meetings adjourn and we all shake hands, there isn’t the feeling of accomplishment that I get at the end of a day when I stand back and see the progress that’s been made on a house. Or the feeling,” he said, coming alive just at the thought, “of standing back and seeing the finished product, seeing people move in, seeing them live in a place I’ve built and loving it. I could never give up building. I could never give up that kind of satisfaction.”
He said back quietly in his chair, thinking about what he’d said, feeling sheepish. “Funny, I hadn’t quite put all those thoughts into words before. You’re a positive influence.”
“No,” she said softly. “You’d have said those things, or recognized that you felt them, sooner or later. I just happened to ask the question that triggered it, that’s all.”
“I’ll bet you do that a lot for people. It takes a good listener to ask a good question. You’re a good listener.”
She shrugged, then looked quickly up and removed a hand from the table when Melissa delivered their lunches. When they were alone again, she said, “Listening is important in my line of work. If I don’t hear what a client is saying, I can’t deliver.” She dunked her tea bag into the minicarafe of hot water. “Speaking of which, I have more questions about Crosslyn Rise.”
“If they involve spending money—”
“Of course they involve spending money,” she teased, her blue eyes simultaneously dead serious and mischievous.
“Then you might as well save your breath,” he warned, but gently. “We’re locked into our budget, says Ben Heavey. He’s one of the men you met at the bank that night, and a tightwad? He gives new meaning to the word.”
“But what if I can save money here—” she held out her right hand, then her left “—and use it there?”
He pointed his fork at her plate. “Eat your salad.”
“Take the flooring. Carter’s blueprints call for oak flooring throughout the place, but the fact is that in practically every home I’ve decorated, the people want carpeting in the bedrooms. If we were to do that, substituting underlayment for oak in the bedrooms, even just the upstairs bedrooms, with the money we’d save, we could pickle the oak downstairs. That would look spectacular.”
“Pickled oak is a bitch to keep clean.”
“Only if you have little kids—”
“I’d have trouble with it—”
“Or big kids who don’t know how to wipe their feet, but how many of those will we attract at Crosslyn Rise? Think about it, Gideon. Or ask Nina Stone. She’ll be the first one to tell you that we’re aiming at a mature buyer. Not a retiree, exactly, but certainly not a young couple with a whole gang of kids.”
“How many kids did you say were in your family?”
“I didn’t. But there are six.”
“Six kids.” He grinned. “That’s fun. From what to fifteen?”
She saw through the ruse at once and told him so with a look. “Thirty-three. I’m thirty-three. Is that supposed to have something to do with Crosslyn Rise?”
“Would you move there?”
“If I wanted to live on the North Shore, which I don’t, because my business is in Belmont.”
“Where do you live now?” Of the information he wanted, that was one vital piece.
She hesitated for just a minute before saying, “Belmont.”
“To be near your family?”
She nodded slowly. “You could say that.”
“Because you’re all so close,” he said quickly, so that she wouldn’t think he was interested, personally interested, in where she lived. “Do you know how lucky you are about that? I’ve never had any brothers or sisters. Thanksgiving was my dad and me. Christmas was my dad and me. Fourth of July was my dad and me.”
“Didn’t you have any friends?”
“Sure, lots of them, and we were invited places and went places all the time. But that’s different from being home for the holidays.” He grew still, picked up his sandwich and took a bite.
Chris speared a piece of lettuce. For a minute she seemed lost in her thoughts. Then, quietly she said, “My family means the world to me. I don’t know what I’d do without them.”
“Is that why you haven’t married?”
She raised her head. “I told you why. Marriage just isn’t high on my list of priorities.”
“Because you’re too busy. But you made time to have lunch with me.”
“This is business.”
“It’s also fun. At least, I think so. It’s the most fun I’ve had at lunch in a while.” It was true, he realized. He’d had more bawdy lunches, certainly wilder ones, but never one that excited him more. Even aside from the sexual attraction, he liked Chris. She was intelligent. Interesting.
Concentrating on her salad, she began to eat, first a piece of lettuce, then a slice of olive, then some chicken and a crumble of blue cheese. Gideon, too, ate in silence, but he was watching her all the while.
“Well?” he said when he couldn’t stand it any longer.
She looked up. “Well what?”
“Are you enjoying yourself?”
“Right now, no. I’m feeling very awkward.”
“Because I’m watching you eat?”
“Because you’re waiting for me to say something that I don’t want to say.” With care, she set down her fork. “Gideon, I’m not looking for a relationship. I thought I made that clear.”
“Well, you said it, but do I have to take it for gospel?”
“Yes.”
“Come on, Chris. I like you.”
“I’m glad. That’ll make it easier for us to work together.”
“What about after work? Can I see you?”
“No. I told you. I don’t have the time or desire for something like that.”
Sitting back in his chair, he gave her a long, hard look. “I think you’re bluffing,” he said, and to some extent he was himself. He wasn’t a psychologist. He wasn’t into analyzing people’s motives. But he was trying to understand Chris, to understand why she wouldn’t date him, when he had a gut feeling they’d be good together. “I think you’re protecting yourself, because maybe, just maybe you’re afraid of involvement. You’ve got your family, and that’s great, and I imagine it’s time-consuming to give a big family a hunk of yourself. But I think that if the right thing came along, you’d have all the time in the world for it—” he leaned close enough to breathe in the gentle floral scent that clung to her skin “—and more desire than a man could begin to hope for.” He stayed close for a minute, because he just couldn’t leave her so soon. Unable to resist, he planted a soft kiss on her cheek. Then he straightened and sat back.
“I’m not giving up, Chris.”
His voice was thick, vibrating in response to all he felt inside. “I’ll wait as long as it takes. I’ve got all the time in the world, too—and more desire than you could ever want.”
5
Chris never knew how she made it through the rest of lunch. She felt warm all over, her insides were humming, and even after Gideon took pity on her and changed the subject, she was shockingly aware of him—shockingly, because the things she kept noticing she hadn’t noticed in any man, any man since she’d been eighteen years old, and even then, it was different.
Brant had been eighteen, too. He’d been big and brawny, a football player, far from the best on the team but good enough to earn a college scholarship. She remembered the nights they’d spent before graduation, parked in the shadowy grove behind the reservoir in his secondhand Chevy. She’d worshiped him then, had thought him the most beautiful creature on earth. With his sable hair and eyes, his strong neck and shoulders, and hands that knew just what to do with her breasts, he excited her beyond belief. Wanting only to please him, she let him open her blouse and bra to touch her naked flesh, and when that wasn’t enough, she let him slip a hand inside her jeans, and when even that wasn’t enough, she wore a skirt, so that all he had to do was take off her panties, unzip his pants and push inside her. It had hurt the first time, and she bled, but after that it was better, then better still.
Looking back, trying to remember how she could have been so taken in, she wondered if she wasn’t half-turned-on by the illicitness of what they were doing. She hadn’t ever been a rebel, but she was a senior in high school and feeling very grown-up in a houseful of far younger siblings. And then, yes, there was Brant. Looking back, she saw that he was a shallow cad, but at the time he was every cheerleader’s dream with his thick hair, his flexing muscles, his tiny backside and his large, strong thighs.
Gideon Lowe put her memory of Brant Conway to shame. Gideon was mature, richly so, a freewheeling individual with a wealth of character, all of which was reflected in his physicality. The things she noticed about him—that stuck in her mind long after she left Joe’s Grille—were the dark shadow of a mustache over his clean-shaven upper lip, the neat, narrow lobe of his ear and the way his hair swept vibrantly behind it, the length of his fingers and their strength, their newly scrubbed look, the scar on the smallest of them. She noticed the tan—albeit fading with the season—on his neck and his face, the crinkles radiating outward from the corners of his eyes, the small indentation on his cheek that should have been a dimple but wasn’t. She remembered his size—not only his largeness, but the way he leaned close, making her feel enveloped and protected. And his scent, she remembered that with every breath she took. It was clean, very male and very enticing.
The problem, of course, was resisting the enticement, which she was determined to do above all else. She meant what she told him. She didn’t have time for a serious man in her life. Her career was moving, and when she wasn’t working, her time was happily filled with family. Thanksgiving had been larger—now that Jason was married, Evan engaged, and Mark and Steven bringing friends home from college—and more fun than ever. Christmas promised to be the same. She wanted to enjoy the holiday bustle. And then, there was work, which felt the Christmas crunch, too. Clients wanted everything delivered and looking great for the holidays. That meant extra phone calls on Chris’s part, extra appointments, extra deliveries, extra installations. She really didn’t have time for Gideon Lowe.
Of course, trying to explain that to Gideon was like beating her head against a brick wall. He called an hour after she returned to the office, on the day they met for lunch, to make sure she’d gotten back safely. He called two days later to say that, though he couldn’t promise anything, he was getting estimates on half-round windows. He called three days after that to ask her to dinner.
Just hearing his voice sparked the heat in her veins. She couldn’t possibly go to dinner with him. Couldn’t possibly. “I’m sorry, Gideon, but I can’t.”
“Can’t, or won’t?”
“Can’t. I have other plans.” Fortunately, she did.
“Break them.”
“I can’t do that.” The Christmas concert was being held at the high school that night. She wouldn’t miss it for the world.
“Then tomorrow night. We could take in a movie or something.”
She squeezed her eyes shut and said more softly, “No. I’m sorry.”
He was silent for a minute. “You won’t see me at all?”
“I don’t think it would be a good idea. We work together. Let’s leave it at that.”
“But I’m lonely.”
She cast a helpless glance at the ceiling. When he was blunt that way, there was something so endearing about the man that she wanted to strangle him. He was making things hard for her. “I thought you said you date. In fact, you said you date a whole lot.” She remembered that quite clearly.
“I did, and I do, but those women are just friends. They’re fine for fast fun, but they don’t do anything for loneliness. They don’t fill my senses the way you do.”
“For God’s sake, Gideon,” she breathed. He was being corny as hell, but she liked it. It wasn’t fair.
“Say you’ll see me this weekend. Sometime. Anytime.”
“I have a better idea,” she said, trying to regain control of herself and the situation. “I’ll talk with you on the phone again next week. There are questions that I didn’t get around to asking you when we had lunch—” questions that she hadn’t had the presence of mind to ask after he’d leaned close and kissed her “—and I’ve had other thoughts on the Rise since then. What do you say we talk a week from today?”
“A week!”
“This is an awful season for me. I’m up to my ears in promises and commitments. A week from today? Please?”
Mercifully her plea got through to him, because he did agree to call her the following Thursday. She was therefore unprepared when, on that Tuesday, between calls to a furniture factory in North Carolina, a ceramic tile importer in Delaware and an independent carpenter in Bangor, Maine, she heard an unmistakably familiar male voice coming from the outer office.
After listening to it for a minute, she knew just what was happening. She had told Margie that she needed an uninterrupted hour to make all her calls. So Margie was giving Gideon a hard time. But Gideon wasn’t giving up.
Leaving her chair, Chris opened the office door, crossed her arms over her breasts and leaned against the jamb. “What are you doing here, Gideon?” she asked in as stern a voice as she could produce, given the way her heart was thudding at first sound, then sight of him. He was wearing jeans, a sweater and a hip-length parka. His hair was combed, but he hadn’t shaved, which suggested that he’d come straight from work, with the benefit of only cursory repairs in the truck. The image of that unsettled her even more. But the worst was the way his eyes lit up when she appeared.
“Hey, Chris,” he said, as though finding her here were a total surprise, “what’s up?”
“What are you doing here?” she repeated, but she was having trouble keeping a straight face. For a big, burly, bullheaded guy, he looked adorably innocent.
Sticking his hands into the pockets of his jeans—knowingly or unknowingly pushing his parka in the process to reveal the faithful gloving of his lower limbs—he shrugged and said, “I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d drop in. How’ve you been?”
She steeled herself against his charm. “Just fine since we talked last week.”
“Have a good weekend?”
“Uh-huh. And you?”
“Lonely. Very lonely. But I told you it would be.” The look in his eye told her that if she didn’t invite him into her office, he’d elaborate on that in front of Margie.
Chris didn’t want even the slightest elaboration. She didn’t trust where he’d stop, and it wasn’t only Margie who’d hear, but Andrea, who was with a client in the second office and would no doubt be out before long. Then there would be comment
s and questions and suggestions the minute he left, and she couldn’t bear that. No, the less attention drawn to Gideon, the better.
Dropping her arms, she nodded him into her office. The minute he was inside with the door closed, she sent him a baleful stare. “I told you I couldn’t see you, and I mean it, Gideon. I have work to do. I’m swamped.” She shook a hand at her desk. “See that mess? That’s what the Christmas rush is about. I don’t have time to play.” Her eyes widened. “What are you doing?”
“Taking off my jacket. It’s warm in here.”
Didn’t she know it. Something about the two of them closed in the same room sent the temperature soaring. She felt the rise vividly, and it didn’t help that he looked to be bare under his sweater, which fell over his pectorals with taunting grace.
“Put that jacket back on,” she ordered, and would have helped him with it if she dared touch him, which she didn’t. “You’re not staying.”
“I thought we could talk about the Rise.”
“Baloney. You’re not here about the Rise, and you know it,” she scolded, but she seemed to have lost his attention. He was looking around her office, taking in the apricot, pale gray and chrome decor.
“Not bad,” he decided. Crossing to the upholstered sofa, he pushed at one of the cushions with a testing hand, then turned and lowered his long frame onto the piece. He stretched out his arms, one across the back of the sofa, the other along its arm, and looked as though he’d be pleased to stay there a week.
Chris had her share of male clients, many of whom had been in her office, but none had ever looked as comfortable on that sofa as Gideon did. He was that kind of man, comfortable and unpretentious—neither of which helped her peace of mind any more than his sweater did, or his jeans. “I have to work, Gideon,” she pleaded softly.
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