“Okay, I’m back,” Kate said, moving behind the counter. “You two can hit the road, while I hold down the fort.”
“We won’t be long,” Helen promised.
The employee’s attention was already focused on the borrowed equipment, while Luke’s attention was on getting Helen to himself.
Or at least out of the store and away from business.
The day was hot but not humid, so it was fairly comfortable in the shade. Luke suggested a short walk to a restaurant with outdoor seating. That gave him the opportunity to place an arm behind Helen’s back as they crossed the street. His hand landed on the back of her other arm and he swore he felt her pulse jump at the contact.
“I missed you,” he said, breathing in her scent.
“When did you have time to miss me?”
“I was awake half the night.” He’d tortured himself imagining what she would be willing to do on their next date. Even thinking about it now gave him a hard-on. “Are you saying you didn’t think about me at all?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well, then.”
“So when you were thinking…what came to mind?”
“What our second date would be like. And this is not it. This is in the nature of a rescue mission.”
“About that. How did you know? Did your wonderful Flash come back to Hot Zone gloating?”
“Flash? No. I was on my way to see you when I passed some of your customers talking about it, so I turned right around to get one of my machines. I didn’t know Flash had set foot in your place.”
“Not only today, but yesterday, too. She came for your assistant.”
“Alexis?”
“Yeah, they were arguing about something.”
“They’re not real fond of each other,” Luke said. “But usually they work in an atmosphere of tolerance. I was busy with a photographer and a reporter looking for a story. Any idea what the problem might have been?”
She shook her head. “I was at the computer. Anyway, today when Flash came in, she was…well, a little testy about not getting whatever it was she wanted.”
“A fancy coffee,” he assumed.
“Hmm, I wonder.”
But they’d arrived at the restaurant and Luke didn’t want to pursue a negative line of thought, so he didn’t question her further. He wanted personal time with Helen that she couldn’t count as a date.
Even so, Flash’s showing up at the cybercafé just when things were going wrong sat at the back of his mind, competing with his alone time with Helen.
“I THOUGHT I would quit my job and run away with the postman,” Christine Rhodes announced.
“Uh-huh,” Helen murmured, then realized what her mother had just said. Movie credits were running on the television screen, so she used the remote to turn it off, then faced the woman parked at the other end of the couch. “What? Surely you’re not serious? You’re in love with the postman?”
Her mother gave her an exasperated expression. “Just checking to see if you were listening. You’ve been in your own world all night.”
Earlier, they’d sprawled out in her mom’s living room and had shared Chinese takeout straight from the cartons while watching a pay-per-view movie, a long-standing once-a-month tradition that they both enjoyed. Normally, anyway. Tonight, Helen’s mind had been otherwise occupied. She didn’t even know how the movie had ended.
“Sorry, Mom, I don’t mean to be bad company.”
“But you’d rather be elsewhere.”
Guiltily, Helen realized her thoughts had been centered on Luke and the temptation of a second date with him. She’d been fantasizing from the moment he’d dropped her back at the café after lunch. Not that they’d made plans. He’d asked what she was doing that evening, and she’d told him about her standing date with her mother.
Not wanting hurt feelings, Helen tried evading the issue. “You know I love our evenings together.”
Her mother gave her an intense examination that sharpened her lovely features. Barely fifty and seeming a decade or so younger, Christine Rhodes was the epitome of the alluring older woman, from her sleek golden blond hair to her voluptuous figure, the same perfect ten it had always been. Most people seeing them together assumed they were sisters rather than mother and daughter.
Helen knew she was lucky to have inherited her mom’s great genes.
And unlucky, too.
“What’s his name?” Christine asked. “And don’t put on that innocent act, either. My instincts and that soft expression you wore when you didn’t know I was looking tell me it’s a man who has your attention tonight.”
“Whether I want him to or not,” Helen admitted with a sigh. She swore there was nothing she could hide from her mom, a realization that had scared her since she was a kid.
“Is this man nice?”
“Charming.”
“Good-looking?”
“Gorgeous.”
“Among the employed?”
“Business owner and potential workaholic.”
“Hmm, should be perfect for you,” Christine said. “You do know his name, don’t you?”
Helen cringed inside as she said, “Luke DeVries.”
“DeVries?” Her mother sat up straighter at her end of the couch. “As in the owner of Hot Zone?”
“The very one.”
The very one she’d told her mom about in the most unflattering of terms. But that had been before she’d actually met Luke.
“O-o-oh.”
Helen said, “Just a week ago, I wanted in the worst way to drive him out of town…at least out of the neighborhood. And now, after meeting him and spending time with him…” She sighed again. “All I want…”
“Is him in your bed?”
“Mom!”
“Or is he already there?”
“Stop! This isn’t the kind of thing you and I can talk about.”
“And why not? We talk about everything else. I’m sure you’ve told Annie all about this Luke.”
“Actually, I haven’t.” Not this time. This time she didn’t seem to know what she was doing. Didn’t feel in control of the situation…or of her own feelings. “Besides, even if I had, Annie is my best friend, while you’re my mother, for heaven’s sake!”
“Well, the last I heard, that wasn’t a crime,” Christine huffed. She slid closer to her only child and wrapped motherly arms around Helen. “You think I’ve forgotten what it’s like to be young? Or that I’ve forgotten how powerful sexual attraction can be? Don’t count me out on that score yet, my darling daughter.”
Helen made a face and sank deeper into her end of the couch. “Let’s not go there,” she pleaded, wondering why she couldn’t have kept her mind where it belonged—in this room, not in the bedroom—for a few hours.
“I think we should have gone there a long time ago. You know you can talk to me about anything.” Christine smoothed Helen’s hair from her face as she said, “I’ve always gotten the feeling you avoid getting close to a man.”
“Um, that’s not exactly true.”
“Okay, now I’m not talking about sex. I mean the kind of closeness that allows you to know what a man’s thinking…a special man.”
“I don’t need that kind of closeness,” Helen insisted, even as she thought of Luke again.
“Uh-huh.”
Helen squirmed and felt as if the room had grown too hot. “I’m fine dating lots of men. I don’t need to settle on just one.”
“I’m not talking about settling. I’m talking about being madly in love with someone who loves you the same way. Someone who will put you ahead of himself.”
“Yeah, right. Like they’re lined up out there, waiting for the right woman to come along.”
“You’re afraid. That’s only natural. But if you don’t put yourself out there sometime…”
She’d end up like her mom. Alone. Not that Helen would say that aloud. She wouldn’t hurt the one person who’d taken care of her all her life…who would
do anything for her…who would always love her.
Squirming from her mother’s arms, she rose. “Time for dessert. Any preference?”
“Butter pecan.”
Helen rolled her eyes and headed for the kitchen, muttering, “Why do I bother to ask?”
Though the freezer was stocked with several flavors, her mother always chose the same one. She, on the other hand, indulged herself with a variety of tastes.
And a variety of men.
Tonight she felt like rum raisin. Taking the two pints from the freezer, she picked up a couple of spoons and napkins and headed back into the living room, where she tossed the pint of butter pecan to her mother.
She’d known since puberty how alike mother and daughter really were. Men flocked around the Rhodes women for what they could get…and then discarded them.
Helen reclaimed her place on the couch and they sat there in silence, concentrating on their respective pints of ice cream.
Trophy women, both of them, mother and daughter, Helen thought. The Rhodes women were cursed by their looks.
They might both be alone, but while her mother had lived her life broken-hearted—her father having left her mother to marry another woman—Helen chose to keep her own heart intact.
Luke was obviously attracted to her. He wanted her for now. But in the end, he would be like the others and move on to someone more suitable, less threatening. Hell, he would move on to another town. And soon.
That’s why she chose her men just like she chose her ice creams, she thought and scooped a heaping spoonful into her mouth.
7
LUKE SPENT the better part of the morning mired in last-minute details to make certain Hot Zone would be ready for Sunday’s opening. Bringing the plumber back to fix a faucet that leaked in the men’s locker room…Approving plans for the flower arrangements that would be delivered on Saturday afternoon…
Sending Alexis out to a local warehouse store to buy a supply of toilet paper and napkins when their shipment of paper products didn’t come and she learned their order had somehow gotten lost.
And through the pandemonium, thoughts of Helen flitted in and out of his mind. Thoughts that were driving him crazy.
Get a grip, DeVries, he told himself.
He had more important things on his mind than his next encounter with a woman who seemed determined to push him right out of her life before he even got in.
Was that the attraction? he wondered as he left the café for his temporary headquarters, the suite of offices on the second floor, to check his messages. Was Helen’s playing hard to get turning him on?
But she didn’t do it with panache, he reasoned, not like a woman who was so sure of herself she could snap her fingers and a man would come running. Though he wished she would snap her fingers at him.
And he was ready to snap back, he thought, grinning as he took the stairs two at a time. His imagination ran wild at the possibilities of where he could “snap” her.
He reached the office and settled down at the reception desk where he checked over several handwritten reminders of things to do. By that time Luke was envisioning nibbling Helen’s stomach again, then her inner thighs.
What he wouldn’t have done the night before for a second date. Second date…touching. And he would be more than ready to slide all the way home….
He was ready now.
Great. Now he had an erection with the hardness, if not the size, of a baseball bat.
The office door flew open. “Okay, one crisis averted.”
“Alexis. And you’re back so soon,” he said, thankful for the desk between them.
“You told me to be quick about it.”
“So I did. And you came through, as always. What would I ever do without you?”
“Let’s hope you never have to find out,” Alexis said, picking up the clipboard with the growing list of last-minute tasks.
“Problem?”
“Flash.”
“She’s been on your case?”
“Whenever possible. You would think this was her company, that she’s the woman behind the man.”
Luke started at the possessive tone he heard in her voice, at the way Alexis had emphasized the she. But his assistant didn’t illuminate him further. Her forehead furrowed, she was looking down at the clipboard, her attention fixed.
“Okay, then,” she muttered, setting down the list and heading for the door. “I’d better get busy or we won’t be ready.”
Luke stared after her. He hadn’t been imagining it. Why hadn’t he noticed before?
Alexis complained about Flash’s proprietary attitude, yet she was every bit as invested in Hot Zone as was his public relations director.
The woman behind the man.
Did Flash really think of herself that way?
Or did Alexis?
“ALL DONE,” the repairman said as he finished testing the espresso machine he’d just fixed. “Good as new. You want I should switch it with the one you borrowed?”
“That would be great,” Helen said, taking the time to help him.
Luckily it was midafternoon and her only customers were a couple of regulars who’d already had their orders filled. Her own equipment was back in place and up and running before the next person walked through the door.
How was she ever going to thank Luke? she wondered.
She could think of plenty of ways…
“Okay, sign here,” the repairman said, cutting into thoughts that had been on the road to lascivious.
Helen signed, ignoring the cost, simply glad to be back in business on her own.
The repairman picked up his tool case. “See you.”
“Not too soon, I hope,” Helen muttered. Making herself a cappuccino, she said, “Kate, would you start cleaning Hot Zone’s machine, while I call Luke and tell him we’re back in business on our own?”
“You’re the boss.”
Wanting a little privacy in case the call turned personal, Helen decided to use the phone in the back room, basically a combination storage area and office. She flopped down at the desk, found the Hot Zone office number and picked up the phone, then, not wanting to sound too eager, waited a moment to take a deep breath before using it.
Her pulse had picked up and she was getting a buzz at the mere thought of speaking to Luke. Her mouth was dry and the sweet spot between her thighs wasn’t.
How unlike her, Helen thought. Then again, Luke wasn’t like any other man she’d dated.
Squeezing her knees together and telling her emotions to behave, she tapped in the number and took another deep breath as the phone rang on the other end.
But when it picked up, she was disappointed to hear a female voice say, “Hot Zone. Alexis Stark here.”
“Luke DeVries, please.”
“Can I ask who’s calling?”
“Helen Rhodes.”
“Sorry, Ms. Rhodes, he’s not available right now.”
Helen couldn’t miss the way the other woman’s voice grew tight, her words clipped. A little uneasy, she asked, “When will he—”
“I really couldn’t say,” Alexis said, cutting her off sharply. “We’re up to our eyebrows in last-minute details for the opening.”
As if she didn’t know that.
“It’s about the espresso machine Luke so kindly lent me,” Helen said in a tone that was friendlier than she was feeling. “The repairman just left, so your machine is freed up. Maybe you could tell Luke that, ask him to call me.”
“I’ll send a couple of guys over to pick up our equipment. No need to bother Luke about some little errand.”
“But I want to thank him—”
“I’ll personally thank him for you,” Alexis said, now sounding exasperated. “And someone will be at your place within the next hour.”
“Tell Luke—”
Again her words were cut off, but this time by Alexis hanging up. Helen could hardly believe the young woman’s rudeness.
Hanging up hers
elf, she sat there for a moment, wondering if she had reason to be upset. Was Alexis trying to come between them or were her emotions so screwed around that she was seeing problems where there were none? Of course they were busy. Probably harried. And she might have interrupted Alexis at a bad time.
Figuring that had to be it, she decided to get back to business. Kate was just finishing cleaning the Hot Zone equipment when Helen joined her behind the counter.
“So how soon will Luke be here?”
“Luke won’t be making a personal appearance today. His assistant said she would send someone over to fetch the espresso machine.”
Kate shrugged. “He’s probably too busy right now. His grand opening is only three days away.”
“Right.”
Though Helen hadn’t known Kate was counting, her assistant manager had probably bought into her own stress over the opening. After all, if Helen’s Cybercafé was driven out of business, Kate would be out of a job.
“With that kind of man, business comes before anything else,” Kate said, as she took ceramic cups out of the dishwasher and lined them up on the back counter. “His identity is all wrapped up in Hot Zone.”
“You seem to know an awful lot about the competition.”
Kate flushed. “How could I not when the competition has had such great media coverage around here in the past week?”
“That’s true.”
Some of it at her expense, Helen remembered. And undoubtedly she presented a conundrum to Kate, what with her dating the owner of the Hot Zone right after she’d organized a protest against his business.
Kate said, “I’m sure he’ll call you, though, once he gets his equipment back.”
“I’m sure,” Helen echoed, hoping against hope that Luke would actually come in person anyway.
She ought to have been working on the Muscle Beach Web site, but focusing seemed to be a problem. Horrified at herself, she realized she was watching the door in hopes that Luke DeVries would walk through at any minute. Customers came in and went out but no Luke. An hour passed, the workmen arriving as promised. Even though the equipment was on its way back to Hot Zone, a tiny hope lingered.
And then business picked up and the commuter rush smothered any thoughts other than keeping customer orders straight.
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