Kitabı oxu: «Mr. Right Next Door»

Chapter One

The ball ricocheted off the wall with a satisfying thwack, hurtling to her left. It would take a twisting eight-foot lunge to return it, but she had no doubt that she could manage. It was a move she’d made before. She had already begun the motion when she remembered that the politic action would be to let that ball pass. Her arm was already extended, the racquet at the perfect angle, with only a split second to act. Too late to abort the movement. Too late to correct—or rather, corrupt—the angle. In desperation, she did the only thing she could. She simply let go. The racquet hit the floor at the same instant she did, bounced off the rubber grip on the handle, and clattered to a rest, while Denise herself slid across the floor to collide with the wall, sprawling in an inelegant heap of bare limbs, coffee brown ponytail and athletic shoes. Chuck’s triumphant laughter echoed around the court. Denise felt a flare of resentment quickly followed by the stinging of friction-burned skin and the cool, studied control that kept her sane.

Gingerly, she righted herself and sat up, back braced against the wall, chest heaving. Well, she told herself, she could take satisfaction in the fact that he’d never know that she’d let him win. She’d had him worried this time, too, made him suffer. That counted for something. She flexed one knee, balanced a forearm atop it and concentrated on getting air into her beleaguered body. Chuck, meanwhile, stood bent over with his hands on his thighs, gasping and huffing, his slightly jowly face almost purple, sweat rolling off of the top of his balding head to drip on the floor. Denise was back to normal and checking over her racquet for damage long before Chuck regained enough strength and breath to rub in her loss.

“And old Dennis bites the dust again!” he said, finally. It was the office joke, calling her Dennis. Chuck shook his racquet at her and added patronizingly, “But you’re definitely getting better, though. Definite improvement.”

Denise smiled mechanically. Little did the old goat know that she could take him anytime she wanted. Did being the boss blind you to such lowering conclusions? she wondered. She made a mental note never to fall victim to such ego-enhancing vision herself. When her turn came—and it would, she was determined about that-she’d be a far superior manager than Chuck Dayton and his cronies, but then a woman had to be better just to be considered par. She sighed and for a moment allowed herself to be weary of the whole ugly, convoluted struggle that was her life. Then she put away the self-pity, squared her shoulders, wiped the perspiration from her brow and reminded herself that she was a woman with goals, and that at thirty-five she could handily whip her overbearing boss’s fifty-year-old butt at racquetball any day of the week. Heck, she worked harder at letting him win than winning herself, and one day he’d know it.

Retrieving her towel and wiping her face, she listened with half an ear as Chuck berated her-under the guise of helpful camaraderie-for her “lack of control” for dropping her racquet. She made noises of protest and regret, but apparently she wasn’t humiliated enough to properly feed Chuck’s need for superiority, for he somehow evaded her finely honed senses of warning and moved close enough to get a hand on her bottom and whisper in her ear, “Bet you never drop the ball between the sheets, though.”

Before she could sling an elbow at him, he moved away, chuckling and no doubt congratulating himself on his cleverness. Denise contented herself with muttered threats and a stern reminder that she could take anything that Chuck Dayton could dish out—and one day, somehow, someway, she’d make him pay for every sexist, sleazy remark. Two months she’d worked for him, from the very day she’d gotten to town, and the list was growing longer every day. She’d been warned, of course. Chuck liked to chew up his subordinates and spit them out. Those who buckled were sent down to dead-end jobs on the backside of nowhere. Those who didn’t often found themselves on the fast track to corporate heaven. Denise meant not only to breach the pearly gates of said heaven but to take a blatantly superior cloud for her own. Within five years—by the age of forty—she intended to be the top female officer in the company. With that happy thought lightening her mood, she slipped out the door to the prep room and dropped onto a bench, where she zipped her racquet into its leather case and took off her shoes before padding lightly on stockinged feet toward the women’s lockers.

A man pushed away from the wall and stepped smack into her path. Denise literally recoiled, some sixth sense recognizing her handsome landlord even before her gaze focused in on his face. Every alarm bell in her system was clanging a warning, as it had from the moment she’d met this irritatingly persistent, if somewhat charming, man.

“Good game,” he said heartily. “Must be hard to lose when you’re so obviously the better player.”

Satisfaction stabbed through her, but she repressed it ruthlessly by taking the opposite tack, a technique that often worked for her. “Don’t be absurd. Chuck’s the big dog around here. But I almost got him this time. Next time for sure.”

“Yeah, right. Want some real competition? I promise not to let you win.”

Morgan Holt smirked and folded his well-tanned arms, the hair on them glowing pale yellow, despite the chestnut brown waves that flowed back from a slightly peaked hairline, the temples streaked lightly with gray. She had noticed before, and couldn’t help thinking again, how those tiny streaks of gray brought out the pale blue of his eyes. There went those clanging bells again. She stepped to the side, ducking her head and saying, “I have to get home.”

“To whom?” he said cryptically. “Your cat?”

Anger surged through her. Blast him, why didn’t he take her hints and back off? Did he get some kind of charge out of dancing too close to the flame? Well, she could burn him if that’s what it would take. She mimicked his stance and his expression, folding her arms and flexing one knee, her smirk particularly acidic. “My cat’s far better company than anyone I know,” she said pointedly.

The wretch laughed. “But can it play a mean game of racquetball?”

Suddenly Denise was aching to slam that ball around the room or, preferably, right into his face. He was nothing and nobody to her. She wouldn’t have to hold back. She could give free rein to her competitiveness and just go for it. He was unlike Chuck Dayton in another way, though. Physically Chuck was maybe average in athletic conditioning and ability. Morgan was probably a decade younger in age and in far superior shape. Athletic ability seemed a given. Still, she had at least a few years on him, and, though at five foot five she was only of average height, she had a great deal more muscle mass, percentagewise, than most people. Plus, her reflexes were quick and sharp. She might not be able to beat him, but she could do to him what she’d done to Chuck. She could make him work for it far harder than he expected to.

“I just had a strenuous game,” she pointed out, hoping to create a little overconfidence in him.

He shrugged. “I just cut down that old tree behind your patio that you were so worried about, plus I corded and stacked the wood.”

Denise lifted a brow. She had to give him credit for being a good landlord. He maintained and serviced the small apartment building in which she lived with the same promptness and loving care that he lavished on his restored Victorian home, which was part of the same property. She had had reservations about living right behind her landlord, but Jasper, Arkansas, was a small town, and unless she wanted to make the daily thirty-plus-mile drive from and to Fayetteville, choices were limited. She’d figured that living within a few hundred yards of the office outweighed any negatives of having her landlord so close. As far as the apartment went, having Morgan Holt on the premises had proven far more convenient than she had anticipated. Personally, however, the arrangement was anything but comfortable. He’d made it plain almost from the beginning that he found her attractive, and she’d tried to make it equally as obvious that she wasn’t interested. So why was she standing here intending to accept his challenge? Because, she told herself, the opportunity for a little honest competition came all too rarely into her life. And because she had a good chance of waxing his butt, which just might have a dampening effect on his interest. She’d be nuts not to play him. Heavens, she might never again have such an opportunity!

“You’re on.”

He grinned, blue eyes sparkling. “Court three. Ten minutes.” Still grinning cheekily, he strolled away, worn court shoes dangling over one shoulder by the strings. He was showing an indecent amount of tanned skin with his faded black shorts and ragged gray sweatshirt with the sleeves cut out and the sides slashed all the way to the band at the bottom. She shook her head, wondering if any other man of her acquaintance could look so good in such unfashionable garb. Most of the members here liked to keep up with the latest trends and styles, believing science ultimately drove the market in sports gear. A new thought struck. Members. Morgan Holt couldn’t be a member here. This was a company club reserved for employees and their immediate family members. She supposed that he could have a relative at Wholesale International, but he’d been specific about being single, so it couldn’t be a spouse. More likely he was someone’s guest, but whose?

Curious, she left her shoes on the end of a bench and walked briskly out to the sign-in desk. Someone had to have reserved court three. Glancing at the clock above it, she took the clipboard off the wall and flipped up the top sheet, trailing her gaze down the time column until she came to 6:15 p.m., then following it across to the proper court column. There, written in pencil, was her own name. She dropped her jaw. The goat had reserved the court in her name! How presumptuous! How audacious! How infuriatingly nervy! How opportunistic. She slammed the clipboard in its place and turned back the way she’d come, eyes narrowed with determination. Oh, man, she wasn’t just going to wax him, she was going to kill him, annihilate him, embarrass him. When she was through with him, he wouldn’t want to so much as show his cheeky face around here, let alone sneak in claiming her sponsorship! Oh, and she was going to enjoy it. She was going to enjoy it very much.

He knew three minutes after she entered the room that she was unbeatable. He recognized the determination, the utter ruthlessness beneath the fluidity of her stride and the implacable glitter of her exotically tilted, dark brown eyes. She’d come for his hide, and he rather expected that she’d get it. The thought made him grin, not that he would make it easy for her. Oh, no. Instinct told him that Denise Jenkins survived on challenge. She needed it on some emotional level that he hadn’t plumbed yet. Then again, she hadn’t given him much of a chance, nor was she likely to unless he could wiggle his way beneath that prickly exterior. A smitten man wasn’t much challenge, as it happened, so he had to find other ways to engage her interest He had the feeling he’d outdone himself this time. He could imagine the sore muscles that would greet him on the morrow. He bounced the ball against the floor and prepared himself for a grueling workout.

She didn’t disappoint. Not only was the pace manic, the game was almost brutally physical. She meant to win at any cost, and the collisions and jabs and tripping feet were just part of it. She drove him to the wall more times than he could count, and her racquet whiffed his ear close enough to burn. He left a yard of skin on the floor and ripped what was left of his shirt into pieces, so that he wound up tossing it into a pile in a corner and playing bare from the waist up. When the end came, it found him facedown on the floor spread-eagled in a vain attempt to save the point, while she jogged backward and prepared herself to bury the ball in the wall—or his back. He sighed with relief when she let it go, dropping her racquet and relaxing her stance. Recognizing the sounds of her approach, he forced himself to roll over, groaning with the effort. Just then breathing was about all he could manage. He tried to sit up, but lifting his head a few inches was about the limit of his body’s cooperation.

Denise Jenkins loomed over him from a height of maybe five and a half feet. Her hair had pulled free of her ponytail in dark, silky locks and hung limply around a face red with exertion, while her sleeveless tank top was plastered to her firm body with the same sweat that slid down her slender neck in droplets. Her fingers were locked around the handle of her racquet, the knuckles white as she gasped for air through an open mouth. He envied her the energy required to sink down onto her haunches and give him a smug smile. She was gorgeous.

“Don’t you...just hate...to be bested...by a woman?” she asked between puffs of breath.

He left his racquet on his chest and managed to stack his hands beneath his head. “Naw,” he said panting for air. “Not me.” He took another puff. “I love a woman who-” and another puff can hold her own.”

“Hold her own?” She finally released her grip on her racquet and used it for support as she pushed up to her full height. “I beat you...in case you weren’t counting.”

“I was counting,” he said, managing to push himself up onto his arms, the heels of his hands braced against the floor. “Next time I’ll be sure I’m fresh.”

“No next time,” she said flatly. “You had your shot. One’s all you get.”

Morgan came up to balance one forearm on a knee. “Afraid I’ll take you if we play again?”

She shook her head, catching the rubber band as her thick, shoulder-length hair slid free. “You aren’t listening. We won’t play again. And if I find out that you’ve used my name to get into the gym again, I’ll report you.”

He chuckled. “You do that. But it kind of begs the question, doesn’t it?”

“What question?”

“Was it skill and stamina or pure luck?”

She pointed a stern finger at him. “I beat you fair and square.”

“Agreed. But can you do it again?”

She went down on her haunches once more, her weight balanced easily on the balls of her feet this time. “You just don’t get it, do you? We’re not chums, you and I, bashing a ball around the court in a friendly game. We’re landlord and tenant and nothing more.”

“That’s easily corrected,” he said smoothly. “How about dinner?”

Her face went perfectly rigid before she pushed up to stand over him again. “No, thanks.”

“Aw, come on, Denise. What’s a guy got to do to get on with you?”

She gave him a bored look and turned away, saying, “I’m not in a dating mode, if you must know. My job takes up most of my time.”

“I used to be like that,” he said cryptically, leaning back and crossing one ankle over the other. That piqued her interest enough to make her glance over one shoulder.

“Oh, really? What happened? You miss the big promotion?”

He just grinned at that. “Why don’t you come to dinner and find out?”

She rolled her eyes and moved toward the door. “I have enough to do just keeping up with my own career, thank you. Oh, and by the way—” she turned back to smile at him “—your dog has a habit of leaving large, smelly gifts on my front walk. See to it that he stops, will you?” With that she opened the door and strode through it, leaving him weak and disappointed. Worse yet, he was discouraged. He was fresh out of ideas how to get next to Denise Jenkins—ideas and, it seemed, opportunity.

Denise closed the door to Chuck’s office and took a deep breath, carefully keeping her facial expression stern. It wouldn’t do to show the staff that old Chuck had managed to get to her. Again. Man, she’d like to push a fist into that smug, jowly face.

Looking hot today, honey. The coolest ones in the boardroom are the hottest in the bedroom. Soften the blow and flash him a little something when you do it.

She closed her eyes momentarily, dreading what she had to do. Trust Chuck to make her his hatchet man and to insult her in the process. For five cents she’d file a sexual harassment suit against him. But then she could kiss goodbye any chance of advancement, and she’d worked too hard to lose out now. Squaring her shoulders, she strode smoothly through the secretarial pool and into one of several nondescript corridors that opened into cubicle after cubicle, each as cell-like and cramped as the last. When she reached the one she sought, she rapped lightly on the empty door frame and waited for the young man inside to look up and smile at her.

“Ms. Jenkins!”

“Ken, I need a word with you please.”

“Sure. What’s up?”

Denise would not allow herself to smile, though the impulse to soften the blow, even to derail it, was strong. “Not here. Meet me in my office. Five minutes all right?”

She watched the implications sink in and tried not to think that Ken Walters was a young married man with a baby. According to Chuck, that was the problem. Ken wasn’t giving it his all. He’d let family concerns get in the way of business. Never mind that the baby had been born prematurely with a heart ailment and this after Ken and his wife had already lost one stillborn child. It was true that Ken hadn’t exactly set sales records, but surely that was understandable given the circumstances. Sales were all that counted in this business, but had it been her call to make, she’d have transferred Ken to a less stressful job until he felt able to give it his all again. Unfortunately, it wasn’t her call-just her task. She strode back to her office, viciously determined to do what she could for Walters.

He barely gave her time to get off the phone. She was just hanging up the receiver when he opened the door and walked in, not bothering to have himself announced by her secretary and, thereby, letting her know that he was well aware what was coming. She didn’t beat around the bush. He obviously didn’t want that.

“I’m sorry, Ken. I know it’s unfair, but I have to let you go.”

He paled and ducked his head, balled hands going into his trouser pockets. “Damn it!”

She hit the button on the intercom. “Betty, bring in that letter the moment it’s ready.” She turned back to Ken Walters. “Sit down. I’m having my secretary prepare a letter of recommendation, and I’ve taken the liberty of making an appointment for you with a business acquaintance in Rogers.” She smiled lamely. “Didn’t think you’d mind.” She pushed at him a piece of paper on which she’d written the details, trying to ignore the look of amazement on his face as he gingerly lowered himself into the indicated chair and pulled the paper toward him. It seemed to take forever for him to read the few words written there.

Denise cleared her throat and went on briskly. “I know insurance will be a problem because of your baby’s preexisting health problems, but I’ve taken that into account. I happen to know that both companies use the same insurer, and I’ll do what I can—quietly—to see that you’re fully covered.” For the first time, she let herself smile. “Just don’t blow the interview. I’ve opened the door but getting inside is still up to you. Understood?”

Ken Walters carefully folded the paper and slipped it into his coat pocket before looking up, eyes beaming gratitude. “It’s a shame,” he said quietly, “that no one around here knows what a nice person you are. You must have to work very hard at keeping it hidden.”

She gulped, surprised by the lump that rose in her throat, and said, “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t mention this to anyone.”

Nodding, he got to his feet. “Don’t worry. I won’t blow your cover.”

She smiled indulgently at that, fingers templed against her lips. “If you hurry, you’ll just have time to clear out your office and make it to the interview.”

He nodded. “I don’t know how to thank you. God knows I’d rather go home to my wife with the news that I’ve changed jobs unexpectedly instead of, ‘I’ve been canned!”’

Denise held up a cautioning hand. “It’s not a done deal. You could blow this if you go in there with the wrong attitude.”

He chuckled. “Not a chance. I’m a salesman, and my top product’s me. It’s been a rough few months, but I’m ready to be on top of the heap again. In fact, I haven’t been this raring to go since I got out of college. Maybe this chance is just what I need.” He patted his pocket before saying, “I’ll just pick up that letter on my way out.”

Denise got up and extended her hand. Ken took it in both of his, held it, and said meaningfully. “Thank you. I won’t forget this.” And then he walked out of her office, his step decidedly more spry than when he’d come in. As the door closed behind him, Denise felt an overwhelming sense of loss.

It didn’t make much sense. Ken Walters had never been a buddy. She was his superior. He had only this moment begun to think of her as even human, and that had been completely by her own design, so then why should she feel lonely now that he was gone? Nothing had really changed. Nothing would. She had her career, and that was all she needed. Wasn’t it?

Denise watched out her window as Morgan whizzed the Frisbee through the air, laughing as his big dog Reiver launched his ninety-pound body into flight and snatched it in his powerful jaws, white teeth flashing against his brown-and-black muzzle. The dog landed lightly on all fours and loped toward him, ears flopping. Morgan opened his arms and bent forward in offer of reward. Reiver leaped at him, knocking him flat on his back and depositing the disk on his chest before lapping his face with a long, pink tongue. Morgan howled, trying to fend off the dog and hug him at the same time, too weak with laughter to do anything but endure. Then he turned his head and saw her, and the laughter died. Denise felt a twinge of guilt for having ruined his mood. He pushed the dog off and sat up, staring at her window. She tried not to let on that she had been watching, sipping from a coffee cup and petting her cat with one hand. Obviously he couldn’t stand the sight of her now. He got up and went into the house.

Denise turned away from the window with a sigh. She should be glad. She hadn’t wanted his attentions or any man’s, so what was wrong with her? It wasn’t like her to feel so...bereft. Well, not in a long time, not since she’d so painstakingly rebuilt her life, not since... She got up from the armchair, unceremoniously dumping the cat from her lap, and wandered over to the bookshelf, torn between taking down the photograph album and passing it by. She took it down, set aside her cup and opened the cover.

Jeremy smiled up at her, a little blob of baby fat in a blue one-piece shorty, that little eyebrow quirked just so. She turned the page. Jeremy pushed his walker around the room clad only in his diaper, his little face utterly gleeful. She couldn’t bear any more. She closed the book and briefly hugged it to her before sliding it back into place on the shelf. She couldn’t bear to see again how he’d grown and changed and matured, how the baby fat had gradually become thin, hard little muscles, how his face beamed with secret knowledge and avid intelligence. She couldn’t bear, especially, that the pictures would stop there, frozen in time forever. At eight. There would never be a picture of Jeremy at ten or twelve or twenty-one. There would never be another picture of Jeremy ever. She closed her eyes against the searing pain, no longer expecting it to soften or lessen. The years had shown her that losing one’s child never got easier or better.

A knock at her door provided welcome distraction. She left her cup where it was, wrapped her sweater tightly about her and walked into the tiny foyer to answer it. Morgan Holt smiled down at her, a casserole balanced on one palm.

“Got a minute?”

A minute? she thought wryly, pathetically grateful that she had misjudged him. Old habits died hard, however, and she heard herself saying, “Just. I have some paperwork to go over tonight and—” The cat made a bid for the door, slinking between her ankles and elongating its stride. “Smithson, get back here!” She caught at the regal bluegray tail. Morgan quickly stepped inside and pulled the door closed.

The cat immediately twined itself around his ankles, meowing. “Russian blue?” Morgan asked, maneuvering the casserole in order to look down at the cat.

“Somewhere along the way, I imagine,” Denise said, leaning down and plucking up the cat. He was a big, arrogant male, completely unconcerned that he’d been declawed and fixed. At a sleek fourteen pounds, he considered himself emperor of the world even though he seldom left the apartment and only then in a locked carrier. He ducked his head and turned away as Denise attempted to stroke between his ears. To further indicate his disdain, he hooked his only remaining claws, those of his back paws, into her abdomen and pushed away, leaping to the floor and wrapping his long body around Morgan’s ankles in another examination of the door.

Morgan laughed. “What’d you say his name was?”

“Smithson.”

“Smithson?”

“Yeah, as in ‘son of Smith.”’

“Ah, so his father’s name was Smith.”

Denise lifted both brows in a gesture of surprise. “Very good. Most people don’t get it.”

“That you had a cat named Smith,” Morgan clarified, “and now have raised one of his kittens.”

“Exactly.”

He smiled. “There, see, we have more in common than racquetball and residence.”

“And that would be?”

“Obviously we’re both animal lovers.”

Denise made a doubtful face. “I imagine we’re about as compatible as cats and dogs.”

He laughed. “You never know.”

But she did. She felt certain that she did, and instinctively she began turning away.

“Uh, about this,” he said, holding aloft the steaming ceramic dish. “It’s an apology. I shouldn’t have used your name to get into the gym without your permission. I’m sorry. Sort of.”

She couldn’t help smiling. Sorry, sort of? What kind of apology was that? She said, “Funny, it doesn’t seem much like an apology. Actually, it looks and smells like a casserole.”

He laughed. “An apology casserole. I thought...I hoped... Well, let’s just say I’m reconciled to being friends. Casual friends.”