by Loree Lough
“She’s my wife,” he began. Noah ran a hand through his hair and prayed for strength, for guidance of his own. “The kids need a mother’s love,” he said at last. “They need Dara.”
She stared stubbornly straight ahead.
“You know how much I love you, Emmaline, but—”
“And I couldn’t love you more if you were my own son.”
“But Dara is my wife.” He gave her hands another squeeze. “All I ask is that you treat her with respect.” He paused and, grinning, said, “She could learn a lot from you, if only you’d teach the lessons with a little tact.”
She looked up at him, blinking in honest surprise. “All right, darling. I’ll be nice to your little wife if it’ll make you happy.”
Noah hugged her. “It’ll make me happy. Very happy.”
“Now, let’s go inside,” she said, patting his cheek affectionately, “I’m freezing!”
Her condo had been on the market only one day when the first couple to do a walk-through bought it. Her parents’ house had been in the multiple list computer only eight days when it sold. Dara had never seen more money in one place at one time. Shaking her head, she stared at her bank statement. Between her savings and the proceeds from the houses, the total beside the colon on the “this is your balance” line read $315,655.72.
More than enough to pay back the money Dad took from the Pinnacle account…and the capital gains taxes to boot, she thought, smiling with relief. Grabbing her coat and car keys, she dashed into the kitchen, where Noah and his former in-laws and the children were having a midmorning Saturday snack. “Will you be around for a while?”
“Sure.” Noah gave her a puzzled look. “Why? Where are you off to in such a hurry?”
“I, ah, I have a few errands to run.” She smiled at the kids. “How about if I pick up a pizza on my way home?”
“Pepperoni and mushroom?” Angie asked.
“Tell ‘em extra sauce!” Bobby put in.
She pressed a kiss to each of their foreheads, then ran out the door, breathless and anxious and feeling better about what her father had done than she had since Noah had dropped the bombshell on her all those weeks ago.
Halfway to the bank, as she sat at the red light at Route 40 and Centennial Lane, her spirited mood died a quick death. How are you going to put the money into the Pinnacle account, she asked herself, when you don’t even have a deposit slip?
When the light turned green, she eased away from the intersection, brow furrowed in thought. Maybe there’s something in Dad’s office…an old checkbook or a statement with the account number on it.
She nosed the car into a space in the Pinnacle lot and fished her key ring from her purse. Her father had given her the keys to the company years ago, when he’d been laid up with a broken leg and couldn’t get into the office. Pinnacle’s building was right on her way home from work and halfway between the school and her parents’ house. So she’d stopped in, going and coming, to deliver messages to and from her dad.
He had been a man who hated change, so she’d fully expected to find the checkbook still in the narrow center drawer of his desk. What she found, instead, staggered her.
The name engraved on the brass plate tacked to the door said William Prentice, CFO. Dara had never even heard of a William Prentice, so how could he have replaced her father?
She knocked on the door, shoved it open a crack when no one answered. Stepping inside, she tiptoed closer to the desk—her father’s desk—and breathed a sigh of relief. Everything looks just as it did the last time I was here, she thought, right down to the plaque on the wall.
So this William Prentice person must not have moved in yet. She couldn’t believe her good fortune! Dara walked around behind the desk, slid open the center drawer.
Empty.
She opened the deeper file drawer to its right.
Empty.
And so were the filing cabinets and the credenza.
“May I help you?”
Dara spun around so quickly she nearly toppled over. “Mr. Turner!” she heaved. “You scared me half to death!”
“Good to see you, Dara. It’s been quite a while.”
Since Dad’s funeral, to be exact.
“I suppose you’re here to pack up your father’s things.”
It was as good an excuse as any to be on Pinnacle property on a Saturday morning, so Dara nodded.
He frowned slightly. “Wait a minute. Didn’t you…” Tucking in one corner of his gray-bearded mouth, he said, “Didn’t you gather up his things months ago?”
“I—I packed a few things, yes, yes,” she stammered. “But I—I didn’t get everything.” She grabbed the plaque from the wall. “This, for example.”
Turner’s green gaze scanned the tweedy carpet. “I don’t see any packing boxes.”
“I, ah, this was all I really wanted,” she said, hugging it to her. “It’s all right if I take it, isn’t it?”
He smiled suspiciously. “Of course it’s all right”
“Well, then,” she said, sidestepping toward the door, “I guess I’ll be on my way. It was good seeing you again, Mr.—”
“I hear you married the head of our accounting firm.”
He wasn’t smiling when he said it, and Dara didn’t understand the angry gleam burning in his green eyes. “That’s right,” she said lightly. “December 18.”
“Congratulations. I hope you’ll be very happy.”
“I’m sure we will,” she said, turning to go. “Well, as I said, I have a lot to do.”
“Did you make yourself a list?”
She stopped in the doorway. “Excuse me?”
“Your father used to talk about you all the time—about how you never went anywhere without a list of ‘things to do.’” He drew quotation marks in the air.
It was true. She did make lists, for practically everything. But she hadn’t made one this morning.
“I guess your lists are longer than ever these days, eh, what with Noah and his kids to take care of. You probably have thousands of things written down.”
Why had he accented the number so harshly? she wondered.
“I imagine Noah helps you itemize things, so that not even one of those thousands of things will slip through the cracks.”
Dara believed she knew why Turner had put special emphasis on the word: her father’s ex-partner suspected her of having had something to do with the missing money, and because she’d married Noah, he was a suspect, too. Dara’s heart thundered. It was bad enough that the theft had tarnished Jake’s once-good name, but for his actions to have an effect on Noah’s stellar reputation…
Oh, Daddy, she thought dismally, what have you done!
“I hate to spring this on you now,” Dara said. She sat at her dressing table, brushing her hair. Noah was laying on the bed, still in his clothes, reading a book.
“Uh-oh, sounds like bad news.” He looked up from his book.
“I’m afraid it is.” She took a deep breath and turned to look at him. “I went to Pinnacle Construction today.”
He walked over to her and slipped his arm around her shoulders. “Aw, sweetie. Why didn’t you tell me? I’d have gone with you.” He kissed her forehead. “Couldn’t have been easy. Today was the eight-month anniversary of your father’s death, wasn’t it?”
It surprised her more than a little to discover he’d kept track of something so important to her.
“So what did you do—pack up the last of his personal stuff?”
“No. I wanted to get a deposit slip.”
Noah pulled back slightly, brow crinkled in confusion. “A deposit slip?”
She exhaled. “Well, you know that the real-estate checks came in for the sale of my condo and Mom and Dad’s house.”
One blond brow rose on his forehead. “Uh-huh.”
“When I left here this morning, it was my intention to put that two hundred thousand back.”
“But…but I thought you were going to let me d
o that.”
He was really puzzled now. She could see it in the furrow of his brow, the tautness of his lips, could hear it in his usually resonant voice. She rose to face him and gently brushed a strand of hair from his eyes. ‘That was the plan, but I changed my mind.”
He tucked a curl behind her ear. “Why?”
“Because,” she admitted, “I don’t want that money hanging over our heads for the rest of our lives.”
“Hanging over…” Noah placed his hands on her shoulders. “Wait just a minute here. You don’t really believe I’d use the money as a weapon…do you?”
“Of course not.”
“I was only waiting till after the first of the year to return the money, so I could say I’d found it while filling out the company’s quarterly tax report. I hope you didn’t think I was procrastinating because I’d changed my mind.”
“No.” She smiled softly. “No, I’ve always known you’d keep your end of the bargain. I just don’t think it’s fair for you to have to right my father’s wrongs.”
“Bargain?” Noah clapped a hand over his eyes. “Dara, sweetie, you talk as if I think of our marriage as nothing more than a business deal.” He shook his head. “That isn’t what you think.” He winced. “Is it?”
“Not exactly. I—”
He gazed down at her with a solemn expression. His deep voice trembled. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life. I don’t want to make any where you’re concerned. You have to believe me when I say this marriage means more to me than that.” He paused, his gaze darkened. “A lot more.”
But you can’t make yourself say you love me, can you? “I need your help, Noah.”
“What kind of help?”
“I don’t have access to the company checkbook, but you do. And the more I think about it, the more confused I get. I mean, the real-estate money is in my savings account. If I write a personal check and deposit it in the Pinnacle account…” Exasperated, she took a deep breath. “And if I go to my bank, ask them to print out a cashier’s check for two hundred thousand dollars, payable to Pinnacle, won’t someone eventually be able to trace it back to my account? How do I put the money back without drawing attention to us?”
“Us?”
She nodded again. “Kurt Turner caught me in Dad’s office. It was pretty clear that he thought I had something to do with those missing funds. And,” she added, sighing, “now that we’re married, he’s suspicious of you, too.”
“He said that?”
“Not in so many words.” “I see.”
“I have to put that money back, as quickly as possible.” She grasped his hand, gave it a squeeze. “You’ve just got to help me to figure out a way it can be done without putting you at risk.”
“Tell you what,” he said, drawing her close, “why don’t you just let me handle this alone?”
She snuggled against his chest, shaking her head. “No. Absolutely not That’s out of the question. This is my responsibility, not yours.” She shrugged. “It’s my fault you’re involved in this mess in the first place. I wouldn’t have bothered you with it at all if I knew more about banking and…and whatnot”
He kissed her forehead. “Okay. I’ll fill you in on the ‘whatnots,’ if it’ll make you feel better, but—”
She threw her arms around him, kissed him soundly. “Oh, Noah,” she gushed, “thank you. Thank you so much!”
Chuckling, he said, “If this is what I’ll get for digging you out of jams, I hope you’ll be in trouble a lot!” Then, on a more serious note, he added, “I’ll help you on one condition.”
Dara looked into his eyes, heart pounding with love for this kindhearted, beautiful man. “What condition?”
“That you’ll never shut me out again. Not for any reason. Promise?”
“I promise.”
“Okay. First thing Monday morning, I’ll get to work. By start of business Tuesday, the case of the missing money will be solved.”
He wrapped her in his arms and rested his chin atop her head. “How does that sound?” he asked.
She felt safe in his embrace, so protected and secure. “It sounds perfect,” she replied.
And you’re a perfect husband, she reflected. No wonder I love you.
Chapter Twelve
Frank Howard shook Noah’s hand, invited him to have a seat on one of the bloodred leather wingbacks across from his burled mahogany desk. “Good thing for Pinnacle,” he drawled, sitting in his many-tufted black chair, “that they found a way to pay off that debt at the eleventh hour.”
Noah slid the envelope bearing the check from his briefcase and faced the big Texan. “What do you mean?”
“Well, it’s suspicious, don’t you think, that the whole time we’ve been talkin’ lawsuits, they’ve been cryin’ bankruptcy. Then the day before the fifty-thousand-dollar late fee kicks in, they cough up the whole kit an’ kaboodle. Tells me they had the resources to pay up the whole time…and they were stringin’ us along!”
“Well, no harm no foul,” Noah stated. “Besides, it’s not so strange, really,” he went on. “Companies do it all the time. You probably do it yourself, to keep that interest money rolling in till the last possible minute.”
“No, I don’t, either!” His fist thumped the desktop. “My daddy raised me to pay my debts in full and on time. It’s one of the principles this country was founded on, one of the reasons Howard Equipment is the biggest company of its kind.”
Noah nodded politely as the older gent retold the story he’d told a hundred times before, about how his great-great-grandfather, a blacksmith, settled in Texas territory and built a burgeoning business from nothing but hard work and good intentions.
“I don’t cotton to folks makin’ a profit off of unethical business practices. The money they make comes outta my pocket, confound ‘em!”
“I agree,” Noah said, meaning it, “but I’m Pinnacle’s accountant, not their collective conscience.” He handed Howard the check and, standing, said, “I have a favor to ask you, Frank.”
He tore open the envelope, peered inside at the check. “This thing won’t bounce, will it?”
Chuckling, Noah shook his head. “Not a chance. That money has been sitting in a special account, earmarked for this payment.”
Scowling, he slapped the envelope onto his desktop. “So what’s this favor you want, Lucas?”
“Can you nudge your accounts receivable department a little? Get them to send off a ‘paid in full’ statement ahead of schedule?”
He stood behind the desk, leaned his knuckles on the blotter. “Why in tarnation should I do that?” he thundered.
Noah took a deep breath. “Well, I don’t suppose you heard, but I just got married, and—”
“Is that right?” The big Texan strode around to the front of his desk, pumped Noah’s arm up and down like a pump handle. “Well, congratulations, boy! You have young’uns to raise, ain’t that right?”
He nodded. “Two of them, a girl and a boy.”
“How old are they?” Howard asked, perching on the corner of his desk.
“Angie is seven, and Bobby is six.”
Crossing both arms over his chest, Howard chuckled and shook his head. “Got me grandkids older than that!”
“So as I was saying,” Noah continued, “I’ve been a little distracted these past few weeks, what with the wedding and—”
“Say no more,” Howard bellowed, laughing. “I’ll head on downstairs and have Mable type one up soon as we’re through here, get ‘em to mail that statement right off to the folks at Pinnacle. We’ll protect your purty li’l self, all right…”
Noah extended his hand. “Thanks, Frank. I don’t usually let things like this fall through the cracks.”
“Boy,” the Texan said, “if you weren’t distracted by a new bride, I’d say there was somethin’ wrong with you!”
“You’re a lifesaver. I mean that.”
Howard’s ruddy cheeks reddened even more in response. He clapped a fat
herly hand on Noah’s shoulder. “Now, git on outta here, boy, so you can clock out on time, have a cozy I’il dinner with that new wife of yours.”
Noah felt a little guilty, having misled Frank that way. But he took comfort in the fact that he’d done nothing unethical or dishonest. Rather, everything had been completely aboveboard, from the cash deposit he’d made with Dara’s money into Pinnacle’s account, to the bank check he’d had drafted in the amount of two hundred thousand, made payable to Howard Equipment.
When Frank’s accounting department forwarded the statement to Pinnacle, all parties concerned would believe Jake Mackenzie had had the foresight—before his trip to England—to earmark funds that would honor the company’s debt…just in time to save another fifty grand in penalties. Not only would he be cleared of any suspicion of embezzlement, he’d go down in company history as the man who’d given his life to save Pinnacle Construction.
Buoyed by the knowledge that her father’s good name had been preserved, Noah gunned the motor of his car and steered into traffic. He couldn’t wait to get home and tell his wife the good news.
Dara couldn’t explain Emmaline’s behavior. Ever since Christmas Eve, she’d been strangely quiet, and it seemed the woman had been deliberately avoiding her.
They were in the kitchen together—Dara standing at the sink, washing dishes; Emmaline perched on a stool at the snack bar, peeling potatoes—when Angie and Bobby skipped into the room.
“Can I have a sugar cookie?” the boy wanted to know.
She gave him a crooked smile. “Well, I suppose it won’t hurt to have just one.”
“Me, too?” Angie asked.
Dara winked. “Why not.”
Emmaline sighed heavily—a sure sign she didn’t approve of Dara’s permissiveness. But she wasn’t about to ask the woman to state her opinions on the subject. Life is too short! she thought, grinning to herself.
The children helped themselves to one cookie apiece and slid onto stools to eat them. Bobby pressed his palm to the snack bar, rested his chin on the back of his hand. “This sure would taste good with a big ole glass of milk,” he teased, mischievously wiggling his eyebrows when Dara looked his way.