The One Who Changed Everything (The Cherry Sisters)

by Darcy, Lilian

  He shrugged. “It’s fine.”

  And it seemed to be. He was strong, adept, easy about the load, and when they got back to the truck, he slid them onto the pallet with just the right gentle shove so that they stacked neatly but didn’t scrape. She wondered if his hands and body were that good...that experienced and easy...in other areas.

  Let it go, Daisy. Do you want an attraction to someone this distant and prickly?

  Someone who used to be engaged to Lee.

  “I have things to do in the office,” she said abruptly, needing to get out of his aura, away from the heat she could almost feel, and that he clearly didn’t want.

  Boring things to do, unfortunately.

  He seemed to read her reluctance. “Yeah, I know, I hate when I have to sit looking at screens for hours at a stretch.”

  “Why does every career seem to require that now? Even as a dessert chef, I was online, researching suppliers and food trends.”

  “Prison of our own making. Doing plans and designs on a computer is way easier than on paper.”

  They went in different directions, and Daisy was shocked at the level of tickle and thrill inside her just because of that tiny bit of sharing about sitting in front of screens.

  In the family kitchen, she fixed herself coffee and grape jelly on toast for breakfast and took them across to the resort office, to ease into the task of messing around with the numbers. Offer a white Christmas special deal maybe? Would the increased occupancy offset the lower room rates?

  She surprised herself by getting completely immersed in the work. The coffee and toast were long gone, and in another half hour, she would have several beautifully laid-out sets of figures to show Mary Jane next week when she arrived back from her trip—and Mom and Dad, also, if they insisted on seeing them.

  Now if she just bolded some of these numbers, the whole thing would be even clearer to see at a glance...

  She heard footsteps coming onto the porch, and saw Tucker’s outline looming through the window. Scraping her hair behind her ears, she did a quick save on the computer and then there he was. “Do you want me?” she asked brightly.

  A question that could have been phrased better, Daisy Cherry, under the circumstances.

  He gave a short nod and launched into a long and complex explanation about subsiding earth on the slope of ground heading down to the lake where they were putting in stone steps and compacted gravel paths. “It’s going to cost,” was the rather blunt and distant warning he finished with.

  “I’d better come look for myself, right?”

  “Sorry to interrupt.” As gruff as ever.

  “No, it’s good that I’m on site for this kind of thing.”

  They walked side by side across what used to be the lawn and was now a flat mass of dirt littered with equipment and piles of supplies. In two of the cabins, she could hear the contractors at work on the remodeled bathrooms—men she’d been consulting with for days, offering coffee to occasionally, sharing a joke with once or twice.

  Just men.

  But this was Tucker beside her, and he was different. Something told her this in a way she couldn’t ignore or talk herself out of. In the silence between them, she felt his pull growing, showing itself in her body’s mounting heat, her breathing’s fraying edge, just her whole awareness.

  It was a stupid word, awareness, but it fit. She was aware in a way that felt too intense. She could sense the way his body filled the space beside her, the way it moved. She wanted to strain for the sound of his breathing, look across to see the rhythm of his walk.

  With increasing need, she wanted some kind of response from him. She wanted Tucker to notice her as a woman, to find her attractive. She wanted to get through to him on that elemental male-and-female level. It was starting to kill her a little bit inside that he seemed so oblivious and distant, with a wall in place that she couldn’t interpret no matter how much she tried.

  Did he not like her as a person? Did he have rules about clients? Was it still because of Lee and the canceled wedding ten years ago? Was Mary Jane right, and he just wasn’t an especially nice person? Cold, or something?

  She felt like a teenager, or like the twenty-one-year-old she’d been back when they’d known each other before, too new at this adult stuff to get it right.

  Which was crazy, because she was thirty-one now.

  So what did a woman on the wrong side of the big three-oh do in a situation like this?

  Think about it, Daisy, you know this...or you should.

  She lets him know.

  She lets her eyes say it, lets her hip brush a little too close. Pulls back if he doesn’t give her anything in return. She could let it go then, not now, when she had no real indication of what his response might be. Her head began to spin with hope and possibilities and fear. It was scary to think of putting herself on the line like that, scary to let herself in for the whole roller-coaster ride, but she hated holding back in life. How could you be a miser about your own feelings?

  They’d reached the section of slope that Tucker wanted to show her. It was quiet out here. The noise and activity of the work on the resort was all happening elsewhere. You could still hear the faint sound of a tile cutter on a far cabin porch, and a Bobcat moving earth near the pool, but those were background sounds, less dominant than the sound of water lapping the hulls on the boats docked on the lake just below them, or the rustle of falling leaves stripped loose by a rising breeze.

  “The plan calls for a series of steps and landings down here,” Tucker said. “But when I look at the slope, it’s not stable enough. The landing will subside at this point.”

  “And look ugly?”

  “That, and eventually it’ll be unsafe.”

  “So what are our choices?”

  “We could switch to wooden steps, which can be anchored in place by wooden supports driven well into the ground. Or we can put in better structural work to stabilize the slope, and stick to what we decided before—the compacted gravel and the stone.”

  “Hmm.” He was distracting her, and the little agenda of carefully letting him know that she fancied him was distracting her more. Should she do it?

  She stepped back just so she could watch him better. He’d done that crouch thing again, the way he had by the pool, getting down low to examine the seam of sandier soil that was part of the problem he’d found. She liked the way he moved, sure and economical and strong, focused and—

  “Do you want the cost comparison before you make a decision?” he prompted, sharply putting her focus back to where it should have been.

  “Oh, um... Yes. I think so.”

  “I should have it for you tomorrow, in that case. Is that soon enough?”

  “It’s great, Tucker.” She stepped forward and touched his forearm as a way of saying thanks...and a way of testing him.

  He looked down at the unexpected contact, his skin warm even through the sleeve of his work shirt. Daisy looked down at it, too. There was plenty of time because time had stopped completely. They’d both frozen in place, locked together by the simple act of her placing a palm on the muscle of his lower arm and leaving it there.

  Her heart was beating. The moment seemed ridiculously important, as if she would live or die by the way he reacted, whether he threw her off, ignored her touch or pulled her closer. Which would it be?

  This is a question, Tucker, and I’m waiting for your answer. This is me, laying myself on the line and telling you what I want, waiting to see if you want it, too. You haven’t showed me much, but I just have this feeling...

  Would he kiss her? Reach a hard hand to the back of her neck and draw her in so that they pressed together length to length? Let out a sigh of exultant relief because he’d been feeling this, too, and at last one of them had dared to make a move?

 
Or would he pretend it wasn’t happening, and say something inane and practical about treated timber or cement-truck access?

  No.

  None of the above.

  They were both still looking down at the join between them, the shared warmth of hand and arm, the closeness, the message. Seconds had passed. Or maybe not, because time really did not seem to be functioning the way it usually did.

  But then, finally, he picked up her hand. Just picked it up the way he might have picked up a dry leaf that had settled there, or, no, a beetle—a pretty one that he didn’t want to hurt, but that couldn’t be permitted to stay where it was, because it didn’t belong there. Picked it up and gave it back to her.

  Here is your hand, Daisy. It accidentally fell onto my arm and I’m carefully lifting it off so it doesn’t get hurt, but I don’t want it there. Okay?

  She began to burn inside as she stepped clumsily back, and she knew that her cheeks were burning, too, betraying her even more than her own actions had done. Beyond that one gesture of rejection, Tucker hadn’t moved, hadn’t said a word, hadn’t changed the neutral expression on his face, and yet she was in no doubt about what had just happened.

  She’d acted and he’d reacted. She’d asked and he’d answered. There didn’t need to be anything further.

  Message received, Tucker.

  Message received loud and clear.

  Her insides lurched and sank in disappointment.

  Chapter Eight

  Tucker was running late, driving back from Vermont. He’d had a final site visit with a client this morning for a project he’d done in the Burlington area and it had gone overtime. He’d wanted to be on site at Spruce Bay for the concrete pour, but since traffic through Queensbury wasn’t cooperating, he accepted that the concrete pour was happening without him, and sent a phone message to the guys to tell them he wouldn’t be there.

  He arrived at around three to find the cement truck gone, the concrete already partially smoothed around the pool and his new employee, Kyle, mucking around while seasoned Reid Landscaping site manager Brad growled at him to take himself seriously and get on with the job.

  They were going to have problems with Kyle.

  Tucker strode closer, ready to intervene. The new guy was around twenty-two years old, skinny but strong, cheerful but vague, well-intentioned but clueless. Right now, he teetered on the edge of the fresh pour, asking nineteen-year-old Scott, “Haven’t you always wanted to do it? Step in this stuff?” He had Scott by the arm, threatening to knock him off balance and into the wet cement.

  “Quit it, Kyle,” Scott said. He could clearly tell that Brad wasn’t in the mood for this, and both he and Brad had seen Tucker’s approach.

  Kyle hadn’t, apparently. He teetered more, beginning to look as if he was losing control. Looking wrong, somehow. His hands had begun to jerk. He tilted off axis as if his brain couldn’t tell which way was up. Was the idiot still just messing around?

  Scott shook off the other guy’s grip, not wanting to spoil his own record of good work by association with this character. Kyle staggered backward into the fresh cement, leaving deep, dragging tracks, then he swiveled crookedly and pitched and staggered in the opposite direction, into the pool they’d drained a few days ago ready for the retiling, leaving just an inch or two of murky water still needing to be pumped out.

  He landed with a crack of bone on concrete, which Tucker heard clearly, even though he was still a good fifteen yards away. He quickened his approach and yelled, “Sheesh...jeez! Is he okay, Brad?”

  “Not moving.” The site manager vaulted down into the pool, while Scott swore repeatedly and seemed fiercely determined to get back to work, as if he thought he’d be in trouble if he didn’t.

  “I’m calling 911.” Tucker reached for the phone that should have been in his pocket, then remembered he’d texted Brad from the side of the road in Queensbury and flung the phone onto the passenger seat, intending—but then forgetting—to grab it again when he got out of the car. “Don’t move him. I don’t know what that cracking sound was, but if he has neck or spinal injuries...”

  “That part I do remember,” Brad said.

  Brad and Scott didn’t carry their phones when they were doing things like pouring concrete, Tucker knew. “I’ll call from the office.” He picked his way back past the half-spread piles of wet gray slop, thinking that if it wasn’t finished soon it would start to set in place, and it would be a pain in the butt to remove. Hell, he knew it was wrong to feel angry with Kyle over the work disruption when the guy was hurt, but he felt it anyhow.

  As he approached the office, Daisy came out to meet him. She’d seen that something was wrong. “What is it?”

  She folded her arms across her front in an unconsciously defensive gesture Tucker was growing accustomed to by now. He was responsible for it, he guessed. She wore jeans and a thin, figure-hugging light blue sweater with a line of intricate gold embroidery around the neckline, and when she did that thing with her arms it had the effect of pushing her neat, rounded breasts up. The sweater showed every change in contour.

  Shoot, he couldn’t look...must not look. He told her, “Kyle fell in the pool and he’s out cold.”

  “What did he hit? Just his head?”

  “Don’t know.”

  She whirled around and hurried back onto the porch and through the door, and had the phone in her hand by the time he reached her. He almost went to grab it from her, but she seemed cool and clear as she spoke to the dispatcher. “We have a man injured on a work site, and he’s unconscious. We need an ambulance.”

  A week had gone by since that moment out by the lake when she’d put her hand on his arm, and he’d thought about it countless times since. It had been so clear what she was asking, and what she wanted.

  Hell, he thought again.

  He’d turned into a block of stone in that moment, trying to control what he gave back in reply. Her aura had surrounded him like honey or light or magic. He could so, so easily have leaned into it, leaned down, brushed his forehead against hers, looked for her mouth, found the sweet fruit of her lips and closed the space between their bodies until they were locked together, thigh to thigh, chest to soft breasts, mouth to mouth, sigh to sigh.

  He’d lived all those actions, and more, in anticipation and need, and then he’d taken a grip and hadn’t done it, not any of it. He’d just taken her hand away, his teeth hurting from clenching them so hard, and had watched her step awkwardly back with pink color flaming in her cheeks, almost matching the bright cherry-pink top she’d been wearing that day.

  He had no doubt that she was clear on what he was telling her.

  Thanks, but no thanks.

  It had been so damned hard!

  Yeah, and take the double meaning in that sentence if you want.

  Since then, they’d avoided each other. Or rather, avoided being alone with each other. When they needed to consult over the project, they exchanged text messages and arranged meetings in the thick of the work, where the presence of Brad or Scott or Kyle could ease the atmosphere.

  And now Kyle was lying unconscious at the bottom of the almost-empty pool, while Daisy was giving the address and location of the resort as she leaned her pert, peachy butt on the edge of a computer desk littered with various brochures, a calculator and pages of scribbled notes.

  Her blond hair was somewhat untidy today, and she had a tiny smear of dark blue ink on her baby-soft cheek and another on her fingers, and Tucker still wanted her so badly with every cell in his body that it hurt to be in the same space.

  Hurt, so he left, seeking the air of a cold, cloudy afternoon that threatened the fresh concrete pour as much as the effect of Kyle’s staggering footsteps. There’d been no rain in the forecast, but if it showed up anyhow...

  Daisy came out again. “They’re on t
heir way.”

  “Could you grab some blankets? He’ll be losing body heat.”

  “Yes, you’re right. I’m sorry, I should have thought of that myself. But I’m—” She slapped the side of her head lightly with the heel of her hand, with her mouth turned in an upside-down smile, and didn’t finish the sentence.

  “Don’t worry about it,” he answered, voice all gruff and caught in his throat, because he knew her apology was about the moment by the lake as much as it was about the blankets. She thought it was her fault out there, that she’d got it wrong.

  No, you didn’t, Daisy. You got it totally right. More right than you could possibly know. There are other reasons, that’s all. Messy reasons getting in the way.

  She went to the storeroom that opened from the back office and returned a few moments later with a folded pile of blankets tucked into the crook of one arm.

  “I don’t think he blacked out because he fell in the pool,” Tucker told her. The realization caught up with him, finally, although it had been lurking since he’d watched the way Kyle’s body was moving, and the stagger of his feet in the wet cement. “I think he fell in the pool because he was blacking out. He was messing around, and then he went off balance... His hands were jerking. I think he was having some kind of seizure or fainting spell.”

  “Will that make a difference to how they treat him? Should we call the dispatcher back?”

  “No, I don’t think we need to do that, but we should tell the paramedics when they get here. I’m going to call Jackie in the office in a minute, and get the contact details listed for his next of kin.”

  “This is terrible.” She frowned and dragged her free hand through her hair. It was like messy straw, the fine, fluffy strands sticking out every which way so that his fingers itched to smooth it back from her forehead and behind her ear. “I wasn’t too impressed with him, Tucker. I’d thought about having a word with you on the subject. You haven’t been on site so much this past week.” The words faltered for a moment, as if, once again, she was remembering what had happened a week ago. Was this why he hadn’t been on site? she was wondering. Was it because he was too embarrassed?