“Perfect. I’ll be there.”
Jesse hung up, sat down at his desk and shoved thoughts of Bella out of his mind. There was plenty of paperwork—the one sure way to keep his thoughts too busy to wander.
“For Pete’s sake, Bella,” Kevin Walters told her over dinner that night, “stop antagonizing the man. Do you want him to end your lease?”
Kevin, with his dark red hair, tanned skin and blue eyes was Bella’s best friend. They’d known each other for five years, ever since Bella had moved to Morgan Beach and rented her house from him. She could talk to him as she would any girlfriend and he was usually willing to give her the guy’s point of view when she needed it. Tonight, however, she’d really rather he saw things from her perspective.
“No, I don’t,” she said quickly. She still had two months left on her lease and if Jesse King tossed her out, she’d have to sell suits out of her rental house; she didn’t think Kevin would be thrilled with that solution. Which was just one more reason to be mad at Jesse King.
“You know, another couple of years in my location and I could have bought my house from you—”
He held up one hand. “I’ve offered to make you a deal.”
“I don’t need special deals, Kevin. You know I want to do this myself.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Reaching across the table to give his hand a pat, Bella said, “I really do appreciate that you want to help me buy the place, Kevin. It’s just that it wouldn’t really be mine if I didn’t do it all myself.”
“Right. Like that shirt you’re wearing?” He pointed to the heavily appliquéd, long-sleeved yellow muslin shirt that she wore with her best black skirt. “That’s yours, right? So what? You did the weaving yourself? Stitched it all together and did the little flowers around the collar?”
“No…”
“So houses and shirts are different?”
“Well, yeah.”
He shook his head and sighed. “Fine. Good. You want to buy the house and if you make King mad enough, he’ll end your lease and then no house. So why continue to piss him off?”
Bella used her fork to poke at her vegetarian lasagna, then gave it up and dropped the fork to her plate with a clatter. Folding her arms atop the table, she looked at Kevin. “Because he doesn’t even remember me. It’s infuriating. Humiliating.”
She’d confessed all one night during a monster movie marathon. And Kevin had immediately told her that she should have reminded Jesse of who she was when she’d run into him the following day. Of course he had. He was a guy.
Kevin shrugged and took a bite of his zucchini and potato casserole. “So tell him.”
“Tell him?” Bella just stared at him. “You know, maybe I’d have been better off with a girl for a best friend. I wouldn’t have to explain to another woman why telling Jesse that we’d slept together was a bad idea. She would know that instinctively.”
Grinning, Kevin said, “Yes, but a girl best friend wouldn’t come next door at ten at night to unclog your shower drain.”
“Good point,” Bella said. “But you’ve got a blind spot when it comes to Jesse.”
“God, women always make everything harder than it has to be,” Kevin muttered with a shake of his head. “This is why the battle of the sexes exists, you know. Because you guys are always on the battlefield ready for war and we’re standing around on the sidelines saying, ‘What’s she mad about?’”
Bella laughed at the irritation in his gaze, which didn’t appease him much.
“Let me guess,” Kevin said with a tired sigh. “This is one of those If-he-doesn’t-know-why-I’m-mad-I’m-sure-not-going-to-tell-him things, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. And it’s not a ‘thing’, it just is. He should know,” Bella snapped and reached for her wineglass. “For Pete’s sake, are there so many women in his wake that we’re all just blurs to him?”
“Bella, honey,” Kevin said, leaning back in the red leather booth, “you know I love you. But that is so female it has nothing to do with the world of man.”
He was right and she knew it. Men and women came at the whole sex thing from completely different mindsets. Even though she’d had too many margaritas that night, Bella had made a conscious decision to sleep with Jesse. And it hadn’t been because he was rich or famous or gorgeous.
But because they’d really talked to each other. She’d felt a connection to him that she’d never felt before to anyone. That was the only reason she’d done what she did. Jesse, though, she realized by the next day, had only had sex with her because she was there. Willing. There’d been no meaning in it for him at all.
“If you wanted more from him than one night, you should have said something the next day,” Kevin told her. “Made him remember. But no. Instead, you went all female on him and left him in the dark.”
“I didn’t put him in the dark,” Bella reminded him.
For at least the tenth time, Bella went back over her conversation with Jesse King that morning three years ago. He’d looked right at her. Given her all his most practiced moves and never once remembered that they’d had sex! The man had had so many women, she’d been lost in the crowd from the moment she gave herself to him.
“Look, I know you don’t like the guy, but he’s here now and he’s not going away,” Kevin pointed out around another bite of his dinner. “He’s moved the corporate offices here, he’s opened his flagship store in town. Jesse King is here to stay, like it or not, and no protest is going to change that.”
“I know,” she grumbled.
“So if you’re going to live in the same town with him, tell him what’s bugging you. Otherwise, you’re gonna drive yourself insane.”
“You know,” Bella told him, “I wasn’t really looking for logic, here. I just wanted to enjoy my rant.”
“Ah. Okay then, rant away. I’m listening.”
“Sure, but you’re not agreeing,” she said, smiling.
“Nope, I’m not.” Kevin shrugged. “I’m sorry you hate him and everything, but he seems like a nice enough guy to me.”
“That’s only because he bought that gold-and-emerald necklace from you.” Kevin’s store stocked work by local artists and jewelry designers, so he was always happy when he made a big sale.
He smiled and sighed. “Yeah, gotta say, a guy who spends a few thousand on a custom-made necklace without batting an eye? My kind of customer.”
“Fine, fine. You’re happy. The town’s happy. Jesse’s happy.” She shoved her lasagna around on the plate. “I wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper.”
“Uh-oh,” Kevin muttered. “What kind of letter?”
She winced, regretting now what she’d done, but it was way too late to call it back. “Something about the corporations of America ruining small-town life.”
He laughed. “Bella…”
“They probably won’t even run it.”
“Of course they will,” he said. “Then you can expect another visit from Jesse King.” Kevin paused, tipped his head to one side and looked at her. “Or is that what this is all about? You actually want him coming around, don’t you?”
“No, I don’t,” she argued, wishing Kevin were just a little less observant. Could she help it if every time Jesse King walked through her door she felt a zing of something amazing? It wasn’t her fault that her hormones reacted when he was in the room. Heck, every female in America suffered from the same symptoms when it came to Jesse King.
And the very fact that he affected her so much was exactly why she was so bent on making him miserable. She probably should stop antagonizing him, as Kevin said, but she just couldn’t bring herself to.
Bella had fought Jesse’s takeover of Morgan Beach with everything she had. And still, she’d lost. He’d moved in, bought up property and immediately started ruining the only place she’d ever called home.
An only child, Bella had lost her parents at seven, gone into a series of nice, if impersonal foster homes and when she turned eightee
n, she was out on her own. She didn’t mind it so much, though the pangs for family never quite left her.
She’d put herself through college by making clothes for the girls who didn’t have to worry about saving every cent. She’d sewn and knitted and crocheted her way to an education. Then she’d taken her first vacation ever, stumbled across Morgan Beach and never left.
She’d been here five years and she loved it. The tiny coastal town was everything she’d always dreamed of in a hometown. Small, friendly and close enough to big retail she could always indulge in a fun shopping trip when she felt the need. Even better, the close-knit feeling of the community fed that lack of family she’d always felt. People here cared about each other.
Now, with Jesse here, her beloved small town felt almost claustrophobic.
“Sell it to somebody else, Bella,” Kevin said laughing. “Every time you say the guy’s name, your eyes go all soft and shiny.”
“They do not.” Did they? Well, that was embarrassing as all get-out.
“Oh, yeah, they do, and I’ll prove it. Look out the window.”
She turned her head to glance out the window onto Main Street and was just in time to see Jesse King walking by. His dark blond, sun-streaked hair was too long. His blue jeans were faded and molded to his long legs and the white long-sleeved shirt he wore only accentuated his tan.
She sighed.
“Gotcha,” Kevin said.
“You’re so evil,” Bella told him, but couldn’t tear her gaze away from the man who was still occupying far too much of her thoughts.
Three
By the next morning, Bella had convinced herself that Kevin was right. She’d just have to suck it up and talk to Jesse. Tell him just what she thought of a man who could make love to a woman one night and forget her existence the following morning. She’d get everything off her chest and then she’d be fine.
She’d be over him.
Bella paused in front of her shop for a moment, and smiled to herself. Even Jesse King couldn’t quash the thrill she experienced every time she walked into the world she’d built with her own talent.
But even as she enjoyed the sight of her place, once Jesse’s “rehab” was finished, it would lose all its character. The creak in the front door would be “fixed.” The pockmarked walls would be smoothed. The floor would be carpeted, all the gleaming floorboards covered up. Bella’s Beachwear would survive, but it wouldn’t be the same. The man had no more vision when it came to business than he had when it came to women.
It was all about the bottom line to men like Jesse.
A crowd was gathering across the street on the beach and she turned her head to look. As a few dozen people milled around, Bella caught glimpses of what was going on. She noticed the RVs parked on the sand, a bank of cameras, huge lights and electric fans. And in the middle of it all, Jesse King.
In spite of herself, she was curious. Bella hurried across Pacific Coast Highway and stepped up onto the sidewalk. She kept to the fringes of the interested crowd of onlookers and let her gaze slide over the goings-on.
Gorgeous male models, each of them wearing King Beachwear, were positioned around several surfboards, all planted nose down in the sand. Bella had to admit that the guys looked great, but her gaze kept straying to the female models they were using in the background. “Honestly, you’d think he could take a little interest in what the women were wearing.”
“Why am I not surprised you’ve got a comment?”
She whipped her head around and looked up into Jesse’s amused blue eyes. He’d managed to sneak up on her. Darn it.
“Let’s hear it,” he said, one corner of his mouth tipping up as he folded his arms across his chest. He glanced at the photo shoot, saw the photographer bustling around, arranging everything to his satisfaction. “What don’t you like about all this?”
Bella bit down on her bottom lip. It wasn’t any of her business, of course and she really shouldn’t care at all, but then…her gaze went back to the very pretty, very thin women wearing generic swimsuits and she just couldn’t stand it. “If you’re going to all this trouble to shoot a big ad campaign, why not have all of the models look good?”
He frowned at her. “They do.”
“Why do I bother?” she muttered, shaking her head. “Look at the blond girl in the back.”
He did and smiled at the view.
Bella ignored that. “Her suit doesn’t fit right. It’s too tight across her hips—what there are of them—and too big at the bust.”
“She looks fine to me,” Jesse said with a shrug.
Bella pushed a strand of windblown hair out of her eyes, then pointed at a brunette talking to one of the male models. “What about her? That bikini is cut all wrong and the fabric is shiny, for heaven’s sake. What did you do? Go down to the department store and snatch a bunch of suits off the clearance rack?”
Jesse frowned. “The girls look okay to me. Besides, this shoot isn’t about women’s suits. It’s about King Beach. We’re selling guys’ clothes. The girls are just background.”
“Do they have to be poorly fitted background?” she asked.
He sighed a little. “We’ve got a contract. We’re giving the department store—”
“Hah!” she crowed, because she’d been so right about where they’d purchased the women’s suits.
He scowled at her. “The store gets credit in the photo tagline.”
“Fine,” she said, wondering why she even cared about any of this. “Use one or two of them. But if you want this ad to look good, then all the models should be eye-catching.”
One eyebrow lifted. “Meaning…”
She shouldn’t have walked over here, she told herself. Shouldn’t have gotten involved. What did it matter to her, after all, if his magazine ad didn’t look as good as it could? Yet…
Bella’s gaze slid back to the swimsuits the women were wearing and every one of her designer instincts stood up and growled. She simply couldn’t stand it. Besides, Jesse King was so darn sure of himself. So arrogant, she really wanted to… “Meaning, women are the real shoppers of the world, Mr. King. If you had any sense, you’d know that. Those suits your models are wearing are so generic they should be marked one size fits all as long as they’re size 0s. My suits are made to flatter a woman’s figure. All women.”
He grinned, looked her up and down, then stared into her eyes with a direct challenge. “Even you?”
Insulted, Bella lifted her chin and glared at him. She knew she was being manipulated, but at the moment, Bella didn’t even care. He was so convinced that his way was the right way, she wanted to prove him completely wrong. One sure way to do that was to show him exactly what she meant.
“I’ll be right back,” she announced, then left him to walk over to the female models. She spoke to them briefly, got their sizes, then hurried across the street to her shop. It only took a few minutes for Bella to scurry back to the photo shoot, her arms filled with some of her designer suits.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Jesse asked as she herded the women toward one of the RV trailers.
“You’re about to find out,” was all she said as she stepped into the trailer behind the models and firmly closed the door.
Minutes ticked past and Jesse frowned at the RV. He wasn’t sure why he was letting Bella get away with this. He should have just headed her off at the pass, so to speak, and told her he didn’t need her help to sell his sportswear. But damn if he’d been able to do that.
“Jesse, how much longer?”
He turned to look at Tom, the photographer, then shot a quick glance at his own wristwatch. “Give her another few minutes, Tom. As soon as she admits she was wrong to stick her nose in, we’ll get back to the shoot.”
“Fine by me,” Tom told him, shifting a fast look at the cobalt-blue sky above. “But we’ve only got this section of the beach for the morning.”
“You’re right.” Jesse’s permit would end at noon, so there was no point
in indulging Bella any further, even to get her to admit that she was wrong. He stalked over to the RV and knocked on the door. “Bella,” he called out, “time’s up. We need to finish the shoot.”
The door to the RV opened and the models came out, smiling and primping. Jesse checked out each and every one of them as they walked past him. Even the skinniest of the models looked as if she had a figure now. The fabrics clung to their bodies and enhanced what few curves they had. It cost him to think it, but Bella had been right.
Tom, the photographer, let loose a low whistle and instantly started staging the women into far more prominent poses for the ad shoot. Jesse watched and shook his head, amazed, really, at the transformation. But where the hell was Bella?
Smiling to himself, he climbed the steps into the RV, stuck his head inside and shouted, “Lose your nerve? C’mon Bella, let’s see you in one of those suits you’re so proud of.”
“Turn around.” The sound of her voice came from right behind him and Jesse couldn’t figure out how she’d gotten past him. But when he turned to look at her, he understood completely.
For months, he’d seen the woman around town, always buried under mountains of fabric. He’d naturally assumed that she had a body she was trying to hide.
He couldn’t have been more wrong.
“Bella?” His gaze moved over her in a quick, thorough glance, then he looked again, giving her a more leisurely going over. The woman had enough curves to make any man sit up and beg.
“Wow,” he said, walking a slow, tight circle around her, “you look…” Familiar was what he wanted to say, but he couldn’t figure out why that would be, so he let it go in favor of, “amazing.”
The bikini she wore was a deep red and clung to her body like a lover’s hands. Her breasts were high and full, her waist was small, her hips rounded and just above her behind, at the small of her back, a tiny tattoo of the sun peeked at him. Her skin was smooth and the color of warm honey. Her long, dark brown hair hung down her back and swayed with her every movement. And her chocolate eyes were watching him with satisfaction.
Conquering King's Heart Page 3
