by Ava Miles
“Tea’s not so bad.”
“Right,” Trev said. “But you’ll only drink the kind that doesn’t come in bags. You’re a beverage snob, but I love you. Don’t come back here right away. I’ll keep my eyes and ears out. Do you want to call Uncle Arthur and get his sources working for us?”
He thought again of what Uncle Arthur had told him the previous day. The Hales had a bead on everything that happened in Dare Valley—they were the best allies he could have. “Good idea.”
“That’s why I’m watching over you, little brother. Have fun with Caroline. And remember. Don’t let Sin City get to you. See ya when I see ya.”
“Unless I see you first,” J.T. said, making Trev laugh before they ended the call.
He set the phone down and leaned back against the counter, trying not to let himself worry. He’d done everything he could to ensure the museum was safe. But clearly Cynthia had a plan, and he had little choice but to wait for her next move. God, he was so tired of this shit.
Once, and only once, he’d asked her what it would take to make her stop. They’d just crossed into year two of the proceedings with no end in sight. Her response had devastated him. You can come back. On your knees. He’d hung up immediately and gotten drunk. It wasn’t an option, and after all her subterfuge, he couldn’t believe a word she said.
“Good morning,” he heard Caroline say in a jovial voice. “Were you talking to someone?”
He turned to her, and a new calm settled over him, almost like a cool wave in the ocean on a hot day. “God, you’re beautiful in the morning. I should have expected it.”
She ducked her head. “Thanks. My sisters tease me about it. What can I say? My hair stays in place.”
Yeah, the dark brown curls rested on her shoulders, an array that would have made Da Vinci rush to his easel, but it wasn’t only that. Her skin was luminous without makeup, and sure enough, her lips were a little red and swollen from all their kissing last night.
“Sorry if I woke you,” he said, crossing to take her in his arms.
She laid a hand on his chest and lifted her face. Last night had changed things between them, and he wanted her to know just how much. He cupped her cheek and kissed her slowly, as if the outside world didn’t exist, something he very much wanted to believe right now.
Her sigh was audible when she laid her head on his bare chest. “I’m so glad it’s not weird between us.”
Yeah, he’d had those mornings too. “No way. Caroline…I’ve never felt like I did last night.”
“Me either. J.T., I know this is early, but I need to tell you…I might be in love with you.”
Everything inside him seemed to still. His heart expanded, and he wanted to punch the air and yell yes to the heavens. Maybe the gods or whoever was up there were looking out for him, after all.
“That’s music to my ears,” he said. “I might be in love with you too.”
She beamed, and his heart grew larger yet—until the remaining walls he’d built around it tumbled. Filled with awe and gratitude, all he could do was stare at her, like she was the moon or a supernova or something even more beautiful and spectacular.
“Actually, no it’s not a might or maybe,” he said, his voice becoming stronger with each word. “I have…complete certainty about this.”
He’d never been one for half measures. She was blinking at him, and he finally smiled at her.
“I felt…something huge for you in Rome, but I didn’t want to say anything. I had…baggage. I didn’t completely trust myself. I mean, we barely knew each other, and I didn’t want to…”
He trailed off when he realized he was babbling.
She touched his cheek, as though trying to tell him it was okay.
Then he caught sight of his phone lying on the counter. He still had baggage, he realized, in care of his ex-wife, who was meeting with the president of the university where he’d planned to stake his future.
Caroline’s future was at risk too.
Then he looked into her eyes again, and the love he felt for her helped settle the seething feelings. She loved him and he loved her. Uncle Arthur was right.
They would face whatever came together.
Chapter 9
Caroline had to speed a little to ensure she got to work on time.
Thank goodness the gallery opened at eleven. J.T. had teased her about her lack of coffee and the random tea bags stuffed in the back of one of her kitchen drawers. Upon learning she usually had her coffee at work, he’d pressed his hands to his face in horror and told her he just couldn’t love her anymore, which had made her laugh. Then he’d stopped her mirth by opening her robe and taking her on the granite countertop.
She’d finally had kitchen sex! Oh, she couldn’t wait to tell her sisters, especially Moira, who was always bragging about her sexual escapades with Chase. Natalie was a little more reserved, although she’d told them about the Highlander kilt Blake used to role-play Jaime in Outlander, one of Natalie’s favorite heroes.
A wave of giddiness made her want to skip to the front door of the gallery. She and J.T. were in love, and despite his ex’s intrusion into their lives, she was happy. Happier than she’d been in a long, long while.
When she reached the gallery, the lights were already on inside. Weird. She could have sworn she’d turned them off last night. That worry was easy enough to swat away, but the door was also unlocked, and when she opened it, the alarm didn’t beep. She scanned the gallery in a panic, relieved to see that all the paintings were still on the walls.
“Caroline,” she heard and looked over to see her boss standing in the doorway of the break room decked out in leather gaucho pants and a cashmere sweater.
“Kendra! Whew! I didn’t know you were coming in today.”
While Kendra didn’t always tell her when she was going to pop in, she usually had a reason for coming by, like a meeting with an artist or a high-rolling client. The kind of thing Caroline scheduled. They didn’t have anything like that today.
“For a moment, I was afraid someone had broken in or something.”
“With the door unlocked and the alarm off, I don’t think so,” Kendra said dryly.
Who got up on the wrong side of the bed? Well, not everyone could be as sexually satisfied as she was this morning. “Have you had coffee yet? I was going to make some.”
“No,” her boss said, her frown firmly in place. “Caroline, let’s sit down.”
A frisson of worry went through her as she walked to where Kendra was standing. “Sure. Let me put my things in the break room.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Kendra said, taking her by the elbow and steering her to the sleek white desk in the corner where they conducted client business.
Okay, now she was really getting upset. “What’s wrong, Kendra?”
Her boss sat behind the desk Caroline usually occupied and pointed to the chair across from her. “Sit down.”
She complied, her coat still on, her purse still in hand.
“Caroline, I’ve had a bad report about you, and I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to let you go.”
Caroline’s stomach dropped like she’d taken an unexpected plunge on a roller coaster. She’d never considered the possibility of getting fired. Kendra had never been anything but satisfied with her work. “What? But that’s crazy. You know how hard I work to make clients happy.”
Kendra cleared her throat. “Yes, I do, but it seems you might have had personal reasons for being rude. I was surprised, of course, but—”
“Personal reasons?” Her brain clicked, and suddenly she knew the answer. “Did Cynthia Newhouse say bad things about me?”
“Yes,” Kendra said, pulling out a cigarette and lighting it.
Caroline had never seen her smoke inside the gallery—it was prohibited, after all—and she coughed when her boss blew out a few puffs of smoke.
“I was a complete professional, Kendra, and between us, she didn’t make it easy, but—”
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“She said you asked her reasons for divorcing her husband, whom you apparently spent time with in Rome,” Kendra said with a pointed look. “I thought you were on vacation, but Cynthia said you’re working with J.T. on a proposed museum to house the Merriam collection at Emmits Merriam University in your hometown. Is that true?”
Her diaphragm felt like a boa constrictor had wrapped around it. So this was how Cynthia Newhouse worked. God, she felt like she needed to take a shower. “My great-uncle asked me to help him out as a family favor.” That was true, at least.
“So you aren’t going to quit working for me when this museum gets further along?” Kendra asked, drawing on her cigarette hard.
Caroline stared at the line between the fire and ash. That was pretty much where she was standing right now. “Kendra, I’m still here, aren’t I?”
“You didn’t answer my question, Caroline,” Kendra said, stubbing out her cigarette.
Caroline looked her in the eye. She’d always believed it best to be truthful, but oh, this was going to hurt. “Yes, I’ve been strongly considering it, but the museum hasn’t even been officially announced yet and—”
“But there are rumors,” Kendra said, leaning forward. “I made a few calls last night. When you told me J.T. Merriam had bought a painting from us, I was over the moon. Now I realize he was poaching my manager. In my very own gallery.”
“That’s not how it was,” Caroline said, wanting to defend J.T. “He was in town on business and decided to swing by after my great-uncle told him I was open to helping him.”
Her boss’ brow knit. “So he didn’t try and talk you into working with him?”
Oh, this was bad. He had, she realized, but not in the way Kendra was thinking. “Well, he might have mentioned it and—”
“Bullshit!” Kendra said, standing up. “He was poaching. I’ve heard a lot of rumors about J.T. Merriam from people close to Cynthia Newhouse. I’m starting to believe some of them.”
“It wasn’t like that,” Caroline said, lurching to her feet. “He isn’t like that. She’s the one who’s a…” She cut herself off before she let the word slip.
“A bitch?” Kendra finished for her, crossing her arms. “Talk about personal. Caroline, you’ve been a good manager for me, but that ends now. You’re fired. I want you to leave. Someone will pack up and deliver any personal effects to your house along with your final check. I have to say, I’m disappointed in you. This is something I would never have expected.”
She felt tears burn her eyes. Disappointed? Kendra wasn’t the only one. “And I never expected you would listen to idle gossip and be influenced by someone like Cynthia Newhouse. Talk about personal. No one else has said a bad word about me. I did a good job for you here, Kendra.”
Kendra’s mouth twisted. “Yes, you did. That’s what makes this whole situation so hard. Goodbye, Caroline.”
She thought about attempting to reason with her, but why bother? Kendra had made her decision, and it was clear she wasn’t interested in continuing the conversation. She probably wouldn’t believe her anyway. God, this shouldn’t have happened. Not like this. She’d loved this gallery and everyone she worked with—especially the artists—and while Kendra could be challenging, she’d found a way to create a rewarding professional relationship with her. Or so she’d thought.
Score one to Cynthia Newhouse.
Chapter 10
As far as Arthur was concerned, everything was going to hell in a handbasket.
“Meredith! Tanner! Get in here.”
He knew he shouldn’t bark, but this was a newsroom dammit, and there should be some perks to being the editor. Hadn’t Ben Bradlee at The Washington Post barked at Woodward and Bernstein back in the day?
“Grandpa, we’re right next door,” Meredith said, her tone the verbal equivalent of an eye roll, as she appeared in the doorway with Tanner.
“Sometimes that’s the way it’s gotta be,” he told them. “Close the door. We have a shit storm on our hands.”
Tanner didn’t say anything—he just took Meredith’s elbow and led her inside. They both took a seat in front of his desk. If Arthur weren’t so upset, he’d have been tickled by the gesture. Meredith had sure as shooting picked a good one, and after he was gone, he knew Tanner would take care of her. Not that she needed it. But everyone deserved a good partner, and he was happy his granddaughter had found one, especially after the asshole she’d married the first time around.
“We have a new story we need to start pulling on,” he said, leaning back in his chair, the faithful squeak a comfort. Like his old bones, it was showing its age, but it came through in a pinch.
“What’s got you riled up?” Meredith asked, as sassy today as her red hair, it would seem.
“Cynthia Newhouse,” he said, pushing his glasses down on his nose to make the point. “J.T.’s ex-wife.”
Meredith’s brows shot to her forehead, but Tanner simply sat back in his seat, all cool like. Someone else might have misinterpreted his attitude as disinterest, but Arthur knew he got as still as a panther waiting to pounce when he was preparing for a new story. Oh, and he could pull together an article so beautiful it would make a grown man weep.
“I just heard from a first-hand source at the university that the new president, that Matthau fellow from California, met with J.T.’s ex-wife at The Grand Mountain Hotel, where she’s staying, it seems.”
“At The Grand?” Meredith asked. “Are you sure?”
“Woman, I just called reception and asked to be connected to her room.”
“Did you talk to her? Good God, what did you say?”
“Nothing. I hung up before she could pick up. I wasn’t trying to interview her. Only confirm her whereabouts. Good gracious, Meredith, have I taught you nothing?”
She leveled him an arch look, and he knew he needed to dial it back. It wasn’t like she was a rookie reporter.
“Then Jill did that whole text thing with me. Caroline was fired from Leggett Gallery this morning. Again, because of this Newhouse woman, it seems. I can see why Trevor calls her Sin City. She could drive a saint to sin with all her shenanigans.”
“Wait!” Meredith said, sitting up straighter. “Caroline got fired? Why didn’t I hear that?”
Arthur pushed his glasses up. “Apparently your sister calls me first in family emergencies.”
Poor Natalie had come into Jill’s office in tears. Of course, Natalie wasn’t normally this emotional, but she was pregnant, and Arthur knew pregnancy hormones sometimes affected women like that. His wife had been the same way.
“That’s dirty business,” Tanner said in his scary voice.
“Yes,” Arthur said, “which is why we need you to start looking into this woman. I know we have a personal relationship to some of our subjects here so we’ll do our best to be objective, but this is just going to be local news, I expect. My source doesn’t know what that Newhouse woman is up to quite yet, but you can bet it has something to do with undermining J.T. and the museum. This museum was approved by the board of trustees, and messing with that is serious news.”
Tanner nodded.
“I’ll call some of my old contacts in New York and see what I can find out about her,” Meredith said. “God, I feel so bad for Caroline.”
Arthur did as well. Even though his grandniece had planned to leave, no one wanted to leave a long-time job on such a sour note. “You can get the full story from Caroline when she comes home with J.T. Apparently he’s driving her back now so she can be around her family.”
Arthur had gotten a little emotional hearing that. The boy had listened and gone to Denver yesterday, it seemed. He was glad Caroline hadn’t left the gallery to go home to an empty house. Everyone needed support in a crisis, and now she was coming back to her family. He was grateful for that.
“How do you want to handle asking about Cynthia’s meeting with President Matthau?” Tanner asked. “The museum’s not yet public, so it would seem odd if we called an
d asked for an interview.”
“Let me talk to J.T. about it,” Arthur said. “I have a few close friends on the board I can talk to when the time comes. But I like the idea of asking Matthau right to his face. I’m still testing his mettle. I want to make him tell us straight out, but we need to approach him with some delicacy.”
“Which puts you out of the running for the interview,” Meredith said, a half smile on her face.
Had he said sass earlier? Yeah, she was sassy. Just the way he preferred. He didn’t want any of his family members to be milquetoasts.
“Let me do some digging,” Tanner said, “but if we decide to go straight to J.T.’s ex for an interview, maybe I should do the interview.”
“I hate to agree, Grandpa,” Meredith said. “Tanner is relatively new to the family and can project more objectivity.”
Objectivity. Arthur mulled that over. Investigating this woman wasn’t very objective, but she was bringing trouble to Dare Valley—and that made her and her plans news. He’d have investigated her even without the connection to J.T. But they would have to be careful like they’d agreed.
“We’ve dealt with exes effectively in the past,” Arthur said, catching Tanner’s eyes. “I seem to recall we gave Meredith’s ex the runaround.”
“But not before he caused us plenty of trouble,” Tanner said.
The couple shared a look, and Arthur knew they were remembering that difficult time. “But we got through it,” he said. “You two got hitched and now I have a great-grandbaby who I pray every morning and night has the black ink in his veins Jill seems to have missed.”
“Jill would have made a terrible reporter, Grandpa,” Meredith said with a laugh. “Like she says, she makes news.”
“Makes news indeed. I’ve never seen such a nut, but that’s why we love her. Let’s get cracking on what we can dig up on Cynthia Newhouse. I’m going to talk to Trevor in person. Sometimes pulling the threads in a conversation—”
