“No. What makes you think I’m jealous?” Walter asked.
“Because you’re worried about Brenner, which means you have no clue,” Amanda said.
“No clue about what?” Walter demanded.
He frowned when Amanda laughed without explaining her comment. “It must be the lingering effect of the concussion. You’re making no sense,” he said.
“Understandable. I’m giddy because you just helped me win a bet. I told Daniel the woman you were crushing on was the woman at the restaurant, and that I was pretty sure she was the same one coming by work. If you’re getting that serious about Jane Fox, you need to introduce them. Daniel’s your best friend,” Amanda chastised, her attention going back to the computer screen to complete her task.
Walter shook his head as he walked out of the office to look for the woman who wasn’t in his life enough to introduce her to anyone yet. When he found Jane, she, Brenner, and the other two architects had their heads bent over a tiny computer tablet lying on top of the rock wall surrounding the resident swimming pool.
His elation to see Jane dressed in clothing that covered her from head to toe had his jaw relaxing. She was wearing a pair of her signature baggy pants today, with a white blouse straining across the front of her, and a sweater that was stretched to its limits while doing its best to help cover her breasts as well. He watched Brenner’s gaze lift from the tablet to Jane’s face as she talked, her hands illustrating whatever point she was making. The memory of holding her in the hospital while she cried in relief over him rushed in to offer reassurance. It helped him believe that Jane was interested in him very differently than she was in the accomplished architect.
“Hey—geo thermal pools dug yet?” Walter joked, his heartbeat accelerating at Jane’s instant, happy smile when she looked up and saw him. The woman could excite him with a glance.
Brenner walked around the others and held out a hand. “Good to see you, Mr. Graham. Jane told us what happened. How are you doing?”
“Much better—thanks,” Walter answered, thoughtful as his gaze moved from Brenner to Jane and back. “Call me Walter. Mr. Graham is my father. And my grandfather. They love that formal stuff, but I’m not into it. So has Jane been keeping things going?”
Brenner smiled broadly and nodded. “Yes. You have a great partner there. The only thing lacking is your approval of a plan. Jane insisted we not commit any of them to paper until you’d seen the workups. There are actually three to choose from.”
Walter nodded, not amazed at how much had gotten done without him. Or at least not amazed now that he knew Jane had been there all along. “Great. I’m excited. Can I see them now?”
“Sure,” Brenner said with a smile, his head inclining toward the group.
Walter walked over, deliberately standing behind Jane and as close as he could get to her pants covered rear. Grateful he’d worn his jeans today, he bumped her gently from behind. Her nervous grunt and surprised scoot back against him had him grinning and rubbing her arm in mock apology. Harrison would have said he was marking his territory so the other males would know how things were. That was as good an explanation as any. What he really wanted was to turn her around and kiss her until she was moaning in his arms.
“You are amazing, lady. Thanks for taking care of things while I was out,” Walter said softly, peering over Jane’s shoulder at what was on the screen.
“No problem, Walter. See what you think of this,” Jane said, cursing her suddenly shaky fingers as she swiped the screens back to the beginning of the last plan they had drawn up. She had let Brenner have free rein to keep him occupied, but also so there would be some comparison with the more moderate ones.
At each screen switch, Walter listened patiently to Brenner’s spiel about possibilities. The plan they were viewing would require more land use than he had first imagined, but it might be worth the sacrifice over time because it would reduce the total number of geo thermal pools needed. It was more short term suffering for the residents and his budget, but there was a lot of long term gain. In fact, Brenner and Jane had come up with several eco renovation ideas that hadn’t even occurred to him.
For example, relocating the resident’s swimming pool was one cost he hadn’t counted on, but the more he thought about it, the idea of putting a new resident pool in the middle of the housing units seemed like a great change for North Winds. It would also be a draw for new residents.
A greener version of the new swimming pool could incorporate a steam room and sauna, not to mention new safety features like a permanently affixed chair that would allow physically challenged residents to be lowered into and lifted out of the water. Yeah, he liked the idea of adding that feature. Harrison might even be able to use the pool again. His grandfather had always loved swimming.
He was so used to his mind taking creative side trips, that Walter hardly processed his imagination drawing over the existing lines being shown on the screen to show him an even bigger picture of what could be. It was Jane’s hand on his arm that brought him out of his musings and back to the present.
“So? What do you think?” he heard her ask.
But he found her hand rubbing his arm in mild concern to be so distracting it was hard to formulate thoughts, much less words. Did she know that she was doing it? Brenner and the other men were looking at her strangely. Walter had a sense that all three were aware of his multiple inner struggles. It took him a couple of moments, but he finally pulled his attention off Jane’s hand stroking him.
“I like this one really well. What do you think of it?” Walter asked finally, moving out of her reach before he got any more tempted to reach back.
“Well, this plan targets North Winds with the most aggressive amount of change. On the plus side, this plan would retain more land space for living areas. Monetarily, it could strain your budget to the breaking point. To constrain costs, you could push off rebuilding the resident swimming pool for a couple of years,” Jane said.
Walter’s head was shaking before Jane had finished speaking. It was rude of him, but he’d fill her in later about what his gut was telling him. He just had to figure out the money.
“No. We can’t do that. Didn’t you see the banner over the office door? I have enough publicity problems because of the stupid calendar. I don’t need a hundred and sixty-two North Wind residents picketing the loss of their swimming pool. We’ll rebuild the resident pool at the same time we do the other ground work. Doing all the digging at once will keep the noise inconvenience to a minimum.”
“Can you absorb an extra thirty thousand in costs to move the pool?” Jane asked. “That’s just my rough estimate. It could even be more.”
Walter winced and looked at the existing pool. “No, but I can handle fifteen of that amount right now. That at least lowers what I need to raise for the rest of the work. Maybe we’ll delay the rooftop solar installation on the housing units. Instead, we can add solar to the costs of the new pool when it goes in. Solar won’t sustain a steam room or sauna, but it will heat the pool regularly and maybe run the filtering pump.”
“Steam room? Who said anything about a steam room? That’s even more ambitious. Maybe too ambitious,” Jane warned, not wanting to say words like ‘crazy and expensive’ in front of Brenner and his team.
There were three plans and neither of the other two required more money than Walter had budgeted. She had spent the better part of four days refining the other two so they specifically wouldn’t lose him money. Whatever was motivating him to take this bigger risk, it must be pretty important.
“Moving and rebuilding the resident’s swimming pool is an extremely large undertaking,” Jane said, trying one more time to make sure Walter was really, really hearing about the risks.
Walter grinned at Jane’s skepticism, but admired her for trying to save him money. Harrison would say it was a good trait to have in a future wife. Walter thought his spin would be that a smart woman was a sexy woman. Jane’s thoughts were as great as h
er legs. So far he loved just about everything about her. He struggled to find some way to get her to trust his judgment and have faith in him.
“I bet you’ve done plenty of renovation projects where adjectives like ‘crazy’ and ‘creative’ were both applied to the same idea. Eventually, one proves more right than the other. Only after results are seen and tested do people ever come around to admitting that something is ‘logical’. If you need to discuss this further, we can do that, but unless you have serious reservations about feasibility, I’d really like to press forward. Financing the additional work will be a challenge, but I’m feeling lucky about the money.”
“Let me guess. . .Harrison taught you that whole bit about adjectives, didn’t he?” Jane asked, shaking her head over Walter’s accurate reading of her true thoughts. She was obviously losing her touch if he could second-guess her so easily.
“Harrison taught me to be a risk taker. The wordplay you can thank my mother for. She likes to argue,” Walter teased. “Are you with me or not, Jane?”
“I helped make all the plans, so I already know it’s feasible. It’s your money you’re spending, Walter.”
“Excuse me. The English debate threw me, and I just want to be sure I heard the decision correctly. So we’re using this version of the plan, not looking at the other two?” Brenner asked.
Grinning, Walter nodded to the man. “Yes. Despite her reticence to call me outright crazy, Jane Fox is still going to be my full partner for the aggressively creative plan. Draw it up and let’s get going. Put signature lines for both Jane and I to sign off.”
“What if I decide in the next day or so that I don’t agree with some of the details of this plan after all?” Jane asked. “Some of us need more than ten minutes to make up our minds.”
Walter grinned. “Don’t sign off in that case. I’d probably enjoy trying to persuade you to have faith in me.”
Jane’s mouth twitched, but she refused to smile. Flirt. Flirt. Flirt.
“Brenner? Put ‘Jane Waterfield’ on the contract. It’s my legal name,” she said.
“Waterfield? Is that one word or two?” Brenner asked, making a note to himself.
“One. My legal name is unfortunately still Waterfield. I don’t know why I never had it changed back,” Jane said, turning away from both Brenner’s and Walter’s perusals.
Seeing Jane’s discomfort, Walter grinned. “Waterfield may be your legal name for now, but it probably won’t be for much longer. My priorities are very straight after surviving that fire, and yes, you can take that two ways,” he said, laughing at everyone’s shock before turning on his heel and walking off.
“Walter, get back here. The marriage joke is not funny. You’re embarrassing our architects with your innuendos,” Jane yelled after him.
He heard Brenner deny being embarrassed and heard the other two men laugh.
“Everything is going to work out fine,” Walter yelled back, but was smart enough not to turn around. Not even when he heard Jane swearing. She needed as much time as the architects to adjust to him choosing the most aggressive plan—for the project and for winning her.
Meanwhile, he also needed to figure out where he was going to get another fifteen or twenty grand.
Chapter 9
“Yay. You came,” Lauren said, bouncing in her seat as the hostess brought Jane to their table.
“Hi,” Jane said, returning all the welcoming smiles with one of her own.
The waiter appeared instantly at her elbow and Regina laughed. “What’s your buzz drug of choice, Jane? Lucinda’s makes a terrific pomegranate martini.”
“Sounds good, but I’m a lightweight drinker, and I drove myself here,” she said, softening her refusal with a grin. “I’ll take a glass of Pinot Noir if you have it.”
The waiter bent closer as he listed several brands. Jane picked the first name she recognized. When he straightened and left to get her drink, she found all the women looking at her expectantly.
“Did I miss something? If you tell me the joke again, I’ll try to laugh at the punch line this time,” Jane said.
Lauren shook her head. “Sorry. Were we staring? The waiter was bending awfully close to you, but what we really want to know is how Walter is doing, besides his still being rock hard and handsome that is.”
Jane sipped the ice water already by her plate. Her wicked thoughts about how rock hard Walter often was around her obviously needed some cooling off. Working with him every day this week was torture. He kept finding excuses to touch her. She was running out of excuses not to let him.
“Walter is fine, as far as I know,” Jane said.
“Do you really think we’re buying that blasé tone? We all saw Walter do an Olympic swan dive off the side of Lauren’s pool to get your attention. Now we’d like to play polite with you, since it’s your first time dining alone with three notorious women like us, but we simply don’t have it in us to be that good,” Alexa explained, tapping her fresh manicure on the side of her glass. “We know you’re working on the project at North Winds with him and that you went to see him in the hospital when he got hurt. Morrie told Lydia who told Lauren. That cat escaped its bag long before you could drown it, honey.”
“Interesting interrogation technique, but I’m not biting. Dad didn’t know I went to the hospital,” Jane said, fighting the twitch of her mouth. The three of them were cleverly nosy. . .and obviously good guessers about her and Walter.
“Harrison told us,” all three of them blurted out at once.
The truth should have irritated her, but instead it made her laugh. Harrison. That was much easier to believe.
“And Harrison told Morrie that Walter talks about you all the time,” Lauren added, squeezing Jane’s arm in her excitement to finally share what she had known for weeks.
When her mellow red wine finally arrived, Jane took it from the handsome, smiling waiter, sipping it gratefully.
“The waiter is new. . .and obviously very attentive,” Regina said.
When Regina Logan’s gaze stayed fixed on her for several uncomfortable moments with no one speaking, Jane quickly sipped her way to the bottom of the glass. They probably thought she had a drinking problem. But in truth, their knowing gazes made her nervous.
“Wow. Either Lucinda’s pours a short glass or I must have been really thirsty,” she said, face flushing when the other women laughed at her statement. A change of subject was obviously needed. “Soooo. . .enough about me. What’s new in your lives?”
“Casey got a huge contract that’s going to take him to DC for a month soon. I haven’t decided if I’m going to miss him or just enjoy the peace and quiet while he’s gone. Meanwhile, at Regina’s insistence since she hates exercising, I’m launching a new line of shapewear. Oh and my pregnant daughter is driving us all crazy with plans to build onto her already gigantic home. I try to be a supportive mother, but I’m sorry, no one needs more than thirty-five hundred square feet to raise two children,” Alexa said firmly. “I raised Jenna in a six hundred square foot apartment. She turned out alright.”
Jane smiled at the affection in Alexa’s voice. She also wondered how in the world the fifty year old could manage to look younger than her.
“Okay, my turn. I crave seafood, but when I eat it—I get deathly sick. Pregnancy sucks. Jim is still wonderful and treats me like a queen. That’s really all I have to share,” Lauren said, turning to look at the grinning woman sitting across from Jane. “Your turn for social niceties, Regina. Make sure you tell Jane something true. No one is in the mood for your voodoo doctor mind games this evening.”
Her grin fading away over Lauren’s insults, especially the voodoo doctor one, Regina narrowed her gaze on her alleged friend. “I swear I’m going to bribe your OB-GYN to tie your tubes after this one. And just for that smart-ass remark, I’m ordering shrimp scampi for dinner. I hope you barf in your plate.”
Regina laughed at Lauren’s groan of genuine misery before turning to address Jane directly.
“Ignore Lauren, Jane. She’s been bitching at me since Jim got her preggers this time. Since it’s so obviously estrogen overload, we’re all convinced she’s having a girl.”
“Preggers?” Alexa repeated. “Is that a new medical term, Dr. Logan?”
Jane looked at the waiter in surprise when he set another glass of wine in front of her and waited for her gaze to lift to his face.
“On the house—you looked like you needed another one,” he said softly, favoring her with a wink before he walked away.
“He can’t be more than twenty. Is he actually flirting with me?” Jane asked.
“Yes. Isn’t Ryan just darling?” Regina asked in return, sighing wistfully as she watched him walk over to another table nearby. “Would you believe he’s a Princeton scholar? He sure makes me miss my college days. I think Lucinda’s must recruit from there.”
Jane’s curious gaze was on the waiter’s firm backside as he greeted the couple sitting at his next table. “It’s either dangerous, or a totally brilliant strategy, for a man who looks that good to walk around in an apron. Imagine how he would look in a real kitchen,” she said, pleased when Regina laughed at her comment. The older woman’s laugh was sexy as hell. Her laugh, on the other hand, was a cross between giggling school girl and snorting horse.
“Speaking of younger men who look sexy. . .” Lauren began, not caring how obvious her segue was.
Jane sighed loudly, realizing the torture wasn’t even close to ending when she heard Regina’s sexy laugh again. “Walter and I are not happening, Lauren. He’s barely older than the waiter.”
“So?” all three of the women said together, causing Jane to laugh out loud. Fortunately, it was the giggling version that filled the air, and not the horsey one. She grinned back at their guilt-free faces. She really hoped to become as blasé as they were about good-looking men one day.
“Why do I get the feeling that I was lured here tonight for more than just dinner?” Jane asked.
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