Running the Numbers

by Roxanne Smith

  Her giggle was a tinkling girlish variation of her normal laugh, which he only ever heard in his office, for his benefit. Her normal guffaw was much hardier, and not so pretty. “You’re so funny. Anyway, I thought I’d better remind you of the time. Wouldn’t want you to miss lunch.” She gave him a small, secret smile that made his hackles rise.

  An invitation. Blake ought to know. Once upon a time, he’d taken a woman up on it. “Actually, I was just leaving.” He rose and grabbed his black suede coat from the coat tree in the corner of his office before brushing past Kennedy.

  She followed close at his heels. “Really? You sure? Actually, I was going to ask you—”

  Blake whirled on her. “I have plans.” His mind raced. “With Amanda.”

  Before she could question him further, he sought Amanda in the bookkeeping parlor. She had her head down, working with her usual single-minded steadiness. He started toward her and checked back quickly to make sure Kennedy had stayed put.

  She had, looking sad with the downturned lips of frustration. It probably wasn’t the best idea to piss off his secretary. But, at the same time, if she didn’t find the line, he’d have to ask Duncan to point it out to her.

  Talk about awkward.

  He slid his hands into his pockets when he approached Amanda’s desk. “Hey.”

  She didn’t startle but looked at him with a perfectly blank face he couldn’t have read if his life depended on it. Was she irritated by the interruption? Happy to see him? Indifferent?

  “Hi, Mr. Cobb.”

  “You can call me Blake.”

  “Okay. Can I help with something? If it’s a payroll concern, you’ll want to speak directly with Pearl Harris. I can point her out if you’re unsure.”

  “Oh, no. No, I don’t have a payroll concern. I, uh… See, I wondered if you had plans for lunch. I thought maybe you’d have lunch. With me?” Should he say please, or would it sound desperate?

  His neck heated. He didn’t recall this being so difficult or awkward. His recollections of his high school relationship with Quinn seemed to come back to him like a perfectly scripted movie. Words spoken with ease, kisses achieved with little effort, everything he wanted placed ever so obligingly into his waiting palms. Kira had pursued him with a sexual aggression that was reminiscent of a different type of movie. With such little life experience, having been with Quinn since the beginning, it hadn’t once crossed his mind to fight the pull, let alone take a hard look at the distinction between love and sex. And Emily had simply wanted him when no one else had.

  They’d all come to him. He had no idea how to properly pursue a woman.

  Amanda didn’t help the situation. She could at least smile pityingly. Offer a tiny hint to give him an idea of what was going on in her head, or prepare him for rejection.

  “No, thank you. I brought lunch from home.” For a second, her gaze wavered and she seemed uncertain of what to say next, as though something were owed to him. “Turkey on whole grain seed bread. No mayo, with sprouts.”

  Before he could figure out a response that didn’t make him look or feel like an idiot, a tap on his shoulder made him turn around.

  Sadie’s heather-hued eyes were alight with mischief.

  The queen of zippy one-liners had witnessed his spectacular fail. Fabulous. Like he needed any more reasons to hide in his office. “Can I help you with something?”

  Her grin widened. Her hands clasped together in front, reminding Blake of a child with a secret. “Oh, just thought I’d rescue you, that’s all. Since Amanda is busy”—she glanced past Blake’s shoulder to give Amanda a wave in the form of wiggling fingers before looking back at Blake—“how about I take you to lunch?”

  His eyebrows rose on their own accord. “You want to go on a date with me?”

  She blinked but didn’t appear surprised. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were asking Amanda out on a date.” She performed a solemn nod for her audience, which had grown to now include Amanda, Reba as she passed through on her way to the break room, and Wes, who watched from his office doorway. He rested against the jamb with crossed arms and an indiscernible look on his patrician face.

  Blake came close to pulling his collar away from his neck in a cartoony gesture of nervousness. Sadie’s entertained expression said she knew it, too. “Uh. No. Not really. Not like a date date.” He turned to glance at Amanda with a nervous smile but needn’t have bothered.

  Her attention was once again trained on the work at her desk.

  Blake sighed and gave Sadie a flat glare. “Fine. But you’re buying.”

  * * * *

  Sadie’s mouth almost hurt from the effort of wrapping it around the massive burger. She’d taken Blake to the famous Billy Burger’s only to have him order off the menu from the fancy-pants Cadillac restaurant instead.

  A genius concept, really. The famous Cadillac Grille was split down the middle, separating the upscale dining area from the retro-style bar. Billy’s, attached to the restaurant front, hit full capacity with fifteen people. It took a stroke of luck to get an empty seat. The simple solution had been to combine the menus, so that even if there was no chance in hell you could squeeze into Billy’s, you could still get one of their humongous burgers and fresh waffle fries.

  Sadie licked ketchup from her thumb and mumbled around the wad of food in her mouth. “What’s with you and Amanda? You’re crushing pretty hard on a woman you don’t even know.” If a direct hit couldn’t draw him out, Sadie was at a loss. She might have to give up on Blake, no matter how stunning his eyes were against the hunter green button-up he wore today.

  He stabbed at a pork dumpling like it deserved it. A deep sigh escaped shortly after, and he seemed to come to some kind of internal decision. Shoulders squared, he looked at Sadie dead on. “You’re really nosy. And I don’t like it. But you know who else is nosy? My ex-wife’s new husband, and I’ve learned from having that guy in my life the last five years, there’s no defense against people like you and him.”

  Interesting. Finally, they were getting somewhere. Sadie scooped ketchup onto a waffle fry and used it to motion Blake to continue before plopping it into her mouth.

  He dropped his fork as though it disgusted him.

  He must have some intense history if it made him lose his appetite to think about.

  “Amanda reminds me of my first wife. Okay? They’re practically identical. Besides physically, they share the same polished reserve and poise, which I find attractive in a woman. There. Now you know.”

  “First wife? How many times have you been married?”

  “Three.” He shook his head. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Fine.” Sadie sat back and dropped the fry she’d been about to eat. “You should know I’m picking you up Saturday morning. Don’t ask me what for or where we’re going. My only warning is that you attire yourself in the exact opposite fashion of how you’re dressed now. We’re going to get dirty.”

  A slight blush crept up from Blake’s collar.

  Aww… I think I flirted. The only problem was her own face heated. What were they, twelve? Sadie went back to her burger. “Tell me what happened with your wife. The first one. Divorce?”

  Blake inhaled deeply and directed his gaze at the tabletop. “I had an affair with a woman named Kira. For five years. Quinn found out. We divorced. She eventually moved to London, met her new husband, and gained primary custody of our son, Seth. Not long after the divorce, Kira got pregnant. We married, making Kira wife number two, and had a son together. Sometime later, I learned I wasn’t Hunter’s biological father. Next came my second divorce. Obviously, she took Hunter. If you’re counting, that’s one mistress, two wives, two sons, two divorces, and a partridge in a pear tree.”

  Ah. The mysterious Quinn he’d mentioned. Dumbly, Sadie chewed her thumbnail. That was some serious, serious baggage.

  He raised his eyes to hers. “There you have it. I’m pining after
a woman who reminds me of my first wife.”

  Sadie thought back to the last time she’d heard the name Seth. “How’s your relationship with your son? The, uh, real one.” An awkward personal question, but Sadie needed a minute to mull over the wife stuff. So far, he’d mentioned two. The third remained unaccounted for.

  “Fair enough, given our history. He starts college in the spring.”

  “I recall. Headed to Purdue.”

  Blake lifted one shoulder. “Probably. Quinn wants him to go to Oxford. She lives in London most of the time. Goes back to L.A. occasionally for work stuff.” With his elbows resting on the table, Blake regarded Sadie from behind hands locked together. “Are we done with my history yet?”

  Not by a long shot. Curiosity niggled at her, like a rabbit with a lettuce leaf. But also, something sour lurked in her stomach. Blake was a cheating douchebag. But of course, right? Because the universe had long ago dictated Sadie couldn’t be attracted to simple, kind men. At least Blake had the redeeming quality of remorse.

  She supposed her most burning question had to do with the mistress. “If Quinn’s so wonderful that you’re drawn to Amanda because of their likeness, what the heck was so great about this Kira lady?”

  Blake didn’t seem to mind the question. He even picked up his fork again. “Ambition,” he said, almost curtly. “Quinn and I were both accounting majors in Los Angeles, where money is king. But when she had Seth, her priorities changed, while mine didn’t. She was content to be a stay-at-home mom and wrote to pass the time. It turned out to be a lucrative endeavor, but by the time she had any success at it, I lived in a different world. My clients were movie stars, bankers, and politicians. I wanted to go to the top of the top. I met Kira on the way, flying up the same ladder. She was everything I imagine Quinn might’ve become if it weren’t for Seth. I came home to a wife who was bored to tears by my talk of the office, while I didn’t really have an interest in what Seth had chewed on that day. Or the words he learned to say.”

  Blake paused and stared off into the space beyond Sadie’s shoulder. Sadness and simple longing filled his expression until he blinked it away.

  An ill feeling crept through Sadie. Blake wasn’t pulling any punches—the picture he painted did him little credit. At the same time, her heart went out to him. The lines that were always on his face were deeper now.

  She guessed he spent a lot of time in this headspace, contemplating a past he was ashamed of, apparent in the way he could hardly meet her gaze.

  After a short silence, an abrupt dry laugh croaked from Blake. “I’m not innocent, by any means, but Kira… That woman is like no one I’ve ever met before or since. Ambitious to a fault. Manipulative.”

  His hazel gaze flicked over Sadie, hard and distrustful, before dropping to his plate.

  Her skin broke out in goose bumps. What the hell was that?

  Blake turned his attention to his food, without touching it. “Weirdly, Seth actually was the one who found out about Hunter. And yet, it was months before anyone clued me in.” Blake’s lips twisted sardonically. “Quinn’s sister, Emily, did the honors. Since I’m telling the story, I should go ahead and mention she was wife number three. Divorced three years ago. She’s remarried now to some surfer dude she met in Honolulu.”

  Sadie suddenly found she was the one unable to keep eye contact. For someone he claimed to love, Blake had done a real number on Quinn. First, an affair. Then he marries her sister. I sure know how to pick ’em. She brushed crumbs from her fingers. “I have good news for you, Blake.”

  His eyebrows rose. A hint of something close to exasperation or even despair glinted behind his green-gold stare.

  She looked away. “We’re definitely done with your history.”

  * * * *

  Sadie turned onto Brewster’s Lane with a quick peek at the dashboard clock. Hopefully, eight wasn’t too early on a Saturday morning for Blake. But the drive out to Cliff Creek took time, not to mention the actual cutting and chopping to get the wood to fit in her truck bed. Her back hurt just thinking of the splitting that came later. She’d leave that part to Blake, once she gave him a tutorial.

  Her cell phone buzzed, and she grabbed it with her right hand, while using the left to smoothly navigate the first switchback.

  “Hi, Kennedy. Sorry, can’t hit yard sales this weekend. I have plans.”

  “Yeah, I heard.”

  Her voice was like a frosty breath in Sadie’s ear. “You okay, Ken?”

  “Sure, I’m fine,” Kennedy began, with blatantly false lightheartedness. “Just seems weird to me. Last weekend, you weren’t interested in Blake in that way. Yet, you’ve been his new little best friend ever since.”

  Torn between irritation and a hint of guilt, Sadie exhaled through her nostrils. “I took him to lunch on Monday, and I told you last week I was going to offer to help him out. Which is why I’m taking him out to cut firewood. He mentioned spending a fortune on those little bundles at the grocery store, trying to learn to make a decent fire before winter. Anyone in the office could’ve offered to help him out. Besides, why do you care?”

  “Isn’t it obvious?” Exasperation swept Kennedy’s cry into the realm of petulance. “Monday, I’d been two seconds from asking him out after Amanda shot him down, but you zoomed in like Superwoman and snatched him up. All I have to do is show an interest in someone for you to suddenly be keen as hell on them. Wes is a perfect example. What’s your deal, Sadie?”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Okay, she might cop to Blake, but Wes was a different matter altogether. “You’re mixed up, Ken. The thing with Wes is…” Crap. Sadie clenched her teeth. “It’s complicated. And it’s long over. You want him, he’s up for grabs. As for Blake, I’ve told you, my goal is to find out if he wants Duncan’s job. That’s it.”

  Kennedy’s tone fell into tired dejection. “Yeah? Well, Wes called looking for your number again. He said you keep deleting it from his phone.”

  Sadie grinned. “Eventually, he’ll quit leaving it in the breakroom.”

  “This time it was important. But I think I’ll let you call Wes yourself. Maybe you can go back to pretending not to flirt with him under the guise of not wanting attention instead of pursuing Blake, with whom I’ve made my interest clear.”

  Crap. It’s last summer all over again.

  The same thing had happened when a cute young guy from Utah had moved in next door to Kennedy mid-summer. Her best friend had crushed hard on the guy for months, who ended up asking Sadie out. The circumstances incited pity for her friend but also incurred a fair amount of frustration and irritation—Sadie would have said yes if it hadn’t been for Kennedy’s irrational anger that he’d dared to ask, and the not-so subtle hints that Sadie had enticed him to do so.

  The kicker was that if Kennedy knew the gritty details of Sadie’s past with Wes, she wouldn’t be so blasé about her crush on him. But it was Sadie’s own fault the whole office thought of their past relationship as a mere fling.

  “Look, I don’t flirt with Wes. We have history, and it shows. That’s all there is to it. Concerning Blake, you can’t claim every man who randomly shows up in our lives, okay? What if I like Blake, too? I don’t owe you first shot, Ken. And I definitely don’t have to let you treat me like crap for hanging out with him.”

  The silence told her Kennedy had hung up. Wonderful. She ended the call and immediately dialed Wes.

  “Hello?” He answered on the first ring, deep and slow as usual.

  The one and only thing she would ever admit—and to herself alone—was the attractiveness of Wes’s disembodied voice. “If you memorized my number, you wouldn’t have to spaz and call every other person in the office to get in touch with me.”

  “Yes, but if I did that, you’d probably change it just to be difficult.”

  She almost laughed, then recalled Kennedy’s accusation. She wasn’t flirting, she simply forgot and slipped into old habits occasionally. Such as laugh
ing at his lame jokes, which she vowed to never do again. “What’s the big story?”

  “Duncan sent out a company-wide e-mail this morning. When I didn’t hear from you, I had to wonder if you’ve seen it. I’m not sure if you’re still refusing to check your office e-mail on the weekends.”

  Sadie pulled up behind Blake’s rental—when was he going to get his own car?—and set the parking brake. “Yeah, well, I have a life, unlike the rest of you.”

  “He announced his exit from Avery & Thorp. He and Zoey are going back to Salt Lake City in the spring. She’s pregnant, so there’s no way they can pull off the move before winter hits.”

  So, Nina had gotten it right. Duncan was leaving behind the coveted chief accountant position. And Sadie’s number one obstacle was on the other end of the line.

  He seemed to know it, too. “I guess this means no more games, huh? I know you’re going after the promotion. As am I.”

  At that moment, Sadie caught sight of Blake, and something in her chest squealed with delight.

  He crouched barefoot on the ground, pine cones and rocks scattered across the dirt and grass. In lieu of his usual starched slacks, or even the new-looking Levi’s he’d worn last weekend that still had their store creases, he wore a faded pair of jeans she’d bet anything he never wore in public. They rode low on his hips, which dipped into hollows she hadn’t imagined he might have. Shirtless, a fine sprinkling of blond chest hair glinted from the dappled morning sun shining through the pines. Sunbeams fell over his hair, reflecting like a halo. Sitting back on his heels, Sadie had a swift urge to climb right onto to those steady thighs.

  Oh, damn. I’m in so much trouble. It’d be easy to put a swift end to a crush, given Blake’s horrid relationships of yore. But if she dipped too low into the vat of physical attraction, there’d be no digging herself out of that hole.

  He stretched out a hand toward one of the trees. A black snout rimmed with red fur cautiously peeked out.

  “Wes, I have to go. We’ll have to talk later.”

  “Lunch on Monday to discuss this new development?”