Corner-Office Courtship

by Victoria Pade

  Nati hoped that wasn’t merely an act.

  She unlocked her door. It opened into her kitchen and she flipped on the lights as she went in.

  “This is the kitchen,” she said needlessly. “That’s the living room on the other side of the bar. There’s a bathroom through there, too, and one bedroom—not impressive but—”

  “Cozy,” Cade finished for her. “And it all looks new even though the house isn’t. Did you say this is your grandfather’s place? But not your grandmother’s...”

  “We lost her three years ago,” Nati said sadly.

  “But is this the same house where you grew up?”

  “It is. The reason this all looks new is that until a few months ago it was just an open basement. But I needed a place and my grandfather needed some help with expenses, so I designed this, hired a contractor and voilà!” Paid for by selling her engagement and wedding rings.

  “So your grandfather lives upstairs?”

  “He does,” Nati confirmed while taking off her coat. She went the short distance into the living room to toss it across an antique upholstered bench.

  Cade took off his sport coat and followed her lead, laying it atop hers before they both went back to the kitchen.

  Nati found a corkscrew and gave Cade wine-opening duty while she retrieved two of the juice glasses she’d warned him about from the cupboard. He removed the cork and poured them each a glass of the raspberry liqueur, and Nati led the way back to the living room.

  There was only one choice of seating because Nati hadn’t been able to afford much furniture. In addition to the antique bench, there was a sofa, coffee and end table, floor lamp, table lamp and a small entertainment center. As Nati turned on the lamps, Cade sat on the couch—not quite at one end, not quite in the middle.

  When Nati joined him she told herself to hug the other arm of the sofa to keep as much distance as she could from him.

  But since they were both sitting at an angle, her knees came very near to touching his.

  Trying not to think about that, Nati made small talk about his family. “You and your brothers and sister and cousins—you grew up together, you work together—you’re really close....”

  “We’re a tight-knit group. Hurt one, make enemies of us all.”

  “That’s kind of a scary thought,” Nati said, thinking that it had been bad enough to have the Pirfoys united against her—mother, father and Doug. The prospect of having ten Camdens and their grandmother as enemies—and probably Margaret and Louie in the mix—was far, far more daunting.

  “Except that we’re not such a scary lot,” Cade demurred. “We’re just close. Family comes first and always has. If one of us hits a rough patch, the rest of us are there. And when one of us brings someone in—like Lacey—she becomes part of the family, too, and we’ll all be there for her just the same.”

  Unless the marriage doesn’t work out, and then you’ll all be out to get her....

  Still daunting.

  But even these thoughts didn’t stop Nati from noticing the way the not-bright lamplight cast shadows in the hollows of his chiseled face and how rugged and sexy that made him look.

  “Wasn’t there ever dissension in the ranks? Even when you were kids or rebellious teenagers?” she asked.

  He laughed. “Sure there were disagreements and fights and arguments growing up. That was actually when H.J. instigated the one-kid, one-vote system. Sometimes disagreements went to committee and we all had a say in who we supported and who we thought was wrong. Or, with the girls, there were silent treatments or freeze-outs, and then they’d make up. With the boys sometimes there were knock-down-drag-out fights—then we’d have to take it outside and more often than not it ended with Louie turning the hose on us. But basically it taught us all how to work together. And no matter how mad we might have ever been at one another, we were still a united front outside of the family if someone else had a problem with one of us.”

  “And with ten of you that was a big united front...” Nati observed. “You didn’t really even need outside friends, did you?”

  “Sure we did,” Cade said. “We’re all still individuals, with different interests and personalities. And no matter how much you like your family, you need other people in your life. You need outlets. And something for yourself alone,” he said in a way that seemed aimed pointedly at her and managed to give her a tiny rush.

  Stopping herself from looking into those blue eyes of his, Nati finished her framboise and set the glass on the coffee table.

  When she sat back she said, “I always wanted a brother or a sister. Holly was as close as I ever came, but she had two sisters of her own and there were—and still are—times when I just couldn’t be a part of it. No matter how close Holly and I were, Christmas morning it was still just me and the adults.”

  “That’s kind of sad,” Cade said sympathetically.

  “No, not really sad—it wasn’t as if I didn’t have great Christmases. It’s just that I was a little jealous. I always wished I wasn’t alone.”

  “So you’ll make sure you don’t have just one kid—assuming you want kids....”

  That topic was still a fresh wound and Nati had to force herself past the pain of it to answer him. “I do want kids and, yes, more than one. But not ten,” she managed to joke.

  “Yeah, I don’t want ten, either.”

  “But you do want them?” It was none of her business. And she certainly shouldn’t have any hope hanging on his answer—that was absolutely ridiculous.

  And yet she realized that she did.

  “I do want kids,” he said. Which automatically made her like him even more. “Two or three maybe.”

  As a way to counteract his appeal Nati reminded herself that having two or three kids didn’t necessarily mean that he intended to be an involved parent, though.

  Cade finished his wine and set the glass on the coffee table. He pivoted more in her direction as he settled back, stretching an arm along the top of the couch cushions.

  Nati had no idea why that slight repositioning made her even more intensely aware of his pure magnetism, but it did. And she couldn’t help wishing that he would use that big hand that was so near to her shoulder to touch her...

  “So none of you has produced the next generation of Camdens yet?” she asked to distract herself.

  “Nope, not yet. It’s something GiGi complains about.”

  Cade did reach for her then but it was only with two fingers to catch a strand of her hair. It was not what she’d been mentally urging him to do.

  “I should probably take off,” he said. “Tomorrow is still a workday.”

  “For me, too. I’ll sand and polish your wall in the morning, and then it’ll be finished,” Nati told him.

  Why did that make him frown?

  “You’ll work in the morning tomorrow? There’s no chance you’ll be there when I get home tomorrow night?” he asked, apparently for clarification.

  “Morning,” Nati confirmed. “Holly has a dentist’s appointment in the afternoon so I have to watch both shops then.”

  His frown went darker. “What if I wanted to talk to you about doing another wall?”

  “Do you?”

  He smiled. “Maybe.”

  “Which wall?” she quizzed.

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Well, I guess if and when you decide, you can let me know.”

  “But not tomorrow.”

  He sounded as disappointed as she was at the prospect of not seeing each other the next day. Which only reinforced Nati’s conviction that it was for the best if they didn’t cross paths. It was one thing to have talked herself into tonight. But as of tomorrow her work for him would be finished and that was a good time to end this tentative foray back into the dating world with him, too
.

  So she said definitively, “No, not tomorrow.”

  He sighed in resignation. “I had a good time tonight, though.” His voice was quieter, and his eyes met hers while he still toyed with that strand of her hair.

  “Me, too,” she confessed.

  He didn’t say anything else, but kept looking into her eyes in a way that made Nati sure he was going to kiss her.

  But instead he stopped fiddling with her hair and stood.

  Slightly surprised by that, Nati watched him as he went to retrieve his sport coat from the bench. She watched him shrug into it, reveling in the sight before it occurred to her to get up and walk him out.

  When they got to the door, she remembered to say, “Oh, don’t forget your framboise.”

  “No, you keep it—I bought it for you. But thanks for sharing it with me.”

  “Thanks for buying it,” she said, her own voice dwindling off.

  They were standing facing each other in the doorway. All she could really think about was how beautiful his eyes were. How blue and warm and kind-looking with just a hint of devilishness to them.

  He hadn’t kissed her on the couch when she’d thought he was going to so she wasn’t sure if she was reading the signals right this time, either.

  Until he raised his hand to the side of her face, and gave her a featherlight caress.

  Maybe she was reading the signals right.

  “I keep wondering if your skin is as soft as it looks,” he said in a throaty whisper as Nati tried not to melt into that scant massage. “It’s even softer.”

  Then he tilted her face upward and slowly, slowly began a descent that she could have eluded.

  Could have but didn’t.

  She saw Cade’s lips part even before they met hers. Hers parted, too, and she was instantly caught up in a kiss that she’d secretly been dying for.

  His other arm went around her and brought her in closer, close enough to deepen the kiss as his mouth opened wider, his tongue gently meeting hers.

  His tongue—that was new. And nice. Nati let her head fall back farther still, raising her hand to his chest.

  She pressed her palm to that wall of strong, solid muscle, absorbing the power hidden behind his sweater and sport coat before her hand rose to the side of his thick neck. The kiss rapidly grew more intense, their tongues taunting and teasing and playing a sexy game of chase.

  Lost in that kiss, Nati wasn’t sure when Cade had tightened his arm around her but she was suddenly aware of how securely she was being held against him, of her breasts nearly flattened to that expansive chest, of the fact that his hand had gone from the side of her face to her nape. She was suddenly aware of it all and of how her own body had melted into his, craving even more.

  That’s when the sound of the floor creaking above them intruded. Her grandfather was up and in his kitchen. Cade apparently heard the noise, too, because he retreated. The kiss cooled and finally came to an end.

  Cade lifted his chin and rested it atop her head, leaving her cheek nestled against his Adam’s apple.

  But they only stayed that way for a moment before Cade sighed and eased his arms from around her.

  Nati glanced up at him as they parted. He looked at her with a confused sort of mystery-man smile on those lips she hadn’t had her fill of.

  But he didn’t say anything about the kiss. He merely whispered a gravely voiced, “Good night,” before he reached for the door handle and opened the door.

  “’Night,” Nati whispered back, too shaken to be able to think of what else to say.

  Then Cade walked out and she closed the door behind him.

  The urge for more caused her to press her palm to the door as if that might somehow keep her in contact with him for just another minute.

  Then she reminded herself that this wasn’t—and couldn’t be—anything.

  Regardless of what every ounce of her might be calling out for.

  Chapter Eight

  “Finally! Pizza. I’m starving!” Nati said to herself when she heard the knock on her shop door at eight o’clock on Friday night.

  She was in her workroom in the back of the store. Her hands were covered with paint, so she called out the workroom door, “I’ll be right there,” and went to the sink in the bathroom to wash up.

  She’d had a full day. As planned, she’d finished Cade’s wall in the morning. She could have done it in the afternoon because Holly’s dental appointment had been canceled and Nati had been tempted to switch so she could be at Cade’s house when he got home from work.

  But the intensity of their kiss last night had unnerved her, and she’d resisted the inclination to rearrange her schedule. Even if he did hire her to do another wall or if she saw him in conjunction with his grandmother’s hope chest, she knew that she should at least take whatever time she could as a cooling-off period. If she could cool off, because so far, the mere thought of that kiss heated her up instantly.

  So in order not to make things worse for herself, she’d worked at his place in the morning, basking more than she should have in the sense of him there, in thoughts of the man himself, and certainly in the memory of that kiss that had rocked her world. Then she’d left his bill on the dining room table and slipped out.

  As she left, she told herself that the best thing that could happen was for her to never see Cade again.

  And she’d driven back to the shop feeling like that would also be the worst thing that could happen.

  And fighting that feeling.

  She’d been at the shop since then, trying to work off the pent-up desires that still tormented her from that kiss, from everything about the man, staying even after she’d closed up in order to get ready for the Scarecrow Festival the next day and the extra business she was hoping it would bring in.

  She was still drying her hands on a paper towel when she headed for the front of the store.

  But after taking one step out of the workroom, she could see through the glass in the door that it wasn’t the pizza delivery boy knocking. It was Cade.

  As a smile erupted on his handsome face at his first sight of her, Nati’s heart literally fluttered. She liked this man too much, she realized in that instant. Much, much too much...

  But he’d spotted her, he waved, and what was she going to do? She couldn’t turn tail, run and hide, could she?

  Of course she couldn’t.

  The problem was, she didn’t think she could turn tail, run and hide from the feelings he inspired in her either.

  Tossing the used paper towel into the trash as she passed by the counter, she unlocked the door and opened it.

  “Hi,” she greeted in a reserved tone of voice.

  “Hi,” he answered, looking at her as avidly as if he wanted to drink her in. “I probably shouldn’t admit it, but I didn’t have anything to do tonight so I thought I’d take a drive out here, see if maybe you were around. I can pay you and give you back these samples you did for the hope chest—” He held the samples up to show her he had them. “I went by your apartment and when you weren’t there I thought I’d swing by here.”

  “I’m here,” she confirmed. “I’m getting some extra pieces ready to put out for tomorrow in case the Scarecrow Festival gets me more foot traffic. I was getting everything ready.”

  Just then her pizza arrived, delivered by one of the waiters, who had walked it over from the restaurant.

  Nati said hello and asked how he was before he told her how much she owed him.

  Cade reached for his wallet. “Let me—”

  “No,” Nati said without hesitation, taking the money out of her jeans pocket to pay the waiter. “Keep the change.”

  The waiter thanked her and hurried off, leaving Nati holding the pizza box.

  She raised it sli
ghtly and said, “Can I interest you in dinner or have you already eaten?”

  “I haven’t already eaten and that smells great, but I didn’t come to mooch a meal off you.”

  “It’s all right, I’ll make you work for your supper—I could use a hand moving a couple of tables out front when we’re finished.”

  “Deal!” he said as if the prospect thrilled him.

  “It won’t be fancy, though,” she warned. “I was just going to eat out of the box—no plates, no silverware and paper towels for napkins. I do have some soda in the little fridge Holly and I keep but there’s only paper cups.”

  “I think I can survive roughing it,” he assured.

  Nati cleared some space on one of her tables in the workroom and set the pizza box down. After getting them both drinks, she sat on one of the high stools next to Cade and they each grabbed a slice.

  A few bites in, he said, “We need to talk about this bill you left me for the wall.”

  Nati responded with only raised eyebrows as she chewed and swallowed.

  “It isn’t enough,” he told her.

  “It’s what I said I was charging you—materials and my hourly rate.”

  “Still, you had to drive across town to get there and gas is expensive—not to mention wear and tear on that old clunker of yours that I assume is still with the mechanic since I only saw the truck in your lot. I want to reimburse you for gas and mileage.”

  Nati shook her head as she finished her third bite of pizza, then said, “I don’t charge for that. I’ve driven farther than your place for jobs before. Why would I expect you to pay for mileage?”

  “Nati, this isn’t enough,” he insisted. “I saw the amount of work you did—it’s worth more than this.”

  “I’m not Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel.”

  “Still, this was too many days of work, too many trips to and from my house. You did a great job, you didn’t leave even a speck of dust for me to clean up after you—you’ve undercharged.”

  Nati rolled her eyes. “It’s the going rate and what I bid, that’s all there is to it. Are you complaining because I didn’t overcharge you? Because if that’s what you’re used to because you’re a Camden or something, you should take a harder line.”