Best Laid Plans jh-2

by Nora Roberts

  Just as she checked her watch, she heard a shout from above. She had enough time to see the metal stud falling tpward her before she was grabbed by the waist and dragged aside.

  The stud landed inches from her feet, spewing up dust and clattering. Hard hat or no, she'd have been taking a trip to the hospital now if she'd been under it.

  "You all right? Hey." Arms were still around her waist, but now she was turned and pressed against a hard male body. She didn't have to see to know who was holding her.

  "Yes." But her voice wasn't steady. Neither were her hands. "I'm okay. Let me-"

  "Who the hell's responsible for this?" Cody shouted up, still holding Abra against him. He knew now what it meant to be sick with fear. He'd moved instinctively, but the moment the stud had hit harmlessly his stomach had heaved. Looking at it, he could envision her lying there, bleeding. Two men were already scurrying down the ladder, their faces as white as his.

  "It got away from us. God, Ms. Wilson, are you okay? There was an electric box on the floor. It tripped me up, and the stud just went."

  "It didn't hit me." She tried to move away from Cody but didn't have the strength.

  "Get up there and make sure those floors and platforms are clear. If there's any more carelessness, people are going to be out of a job."

  "Yes, sir."

  The hammering, which had stopped dead, resumed hesitantly, then with more vigor.

  "Look, I'm all right." She had to be. Even if her hands were clammy, she had to be all right. "I can handle the men."

  "Just shut up." He fought back the urge to pick her up, and pulled her along instead. "You're white as a sheet." He shoved her down on a crate. "Sit."

  Because her legs felt like rubber, she didn't argue. A few deep breaths, she told herself, and she'd be fine.

  "Here." Cody pushed a cup of water into her hand.

  "Thanks." She drank, forcing herself to take it slow. "You don't have to bother."

  "No, I could just leave you in a puddle on the ground." It hadn't come out the way he'd intended, but he was angry, as sick with anger as he'd been with fear. It had been too close, way too close. If he hadn't glanced over at her… "I could've stood there and watched you get smashed, but it seemed a shame to get blood all over the fresh concrete."

  "That's not what I meant." She swallowed the last of the water and balled up the paper cup in her hand. He'd saved her from a major injury. She'd wanted to thank him, nicely. And she would have, too, Abra thought, if he hadn't been scowling at her. "I would have gotten out of the way myself, in any case."

  "Fine. Next time I'll just go about my business."

  "Do that." Biting off the words, she tossed the paper cup aside. She rose and fought back a wave of giddiness. Hammers were still pounding, but more than one man was watching out of the corner of an eye. "There's no need to cause a scene."

  "You've no idea the kind of scene I can cause, Wilson." He was tempted to show her, to release some of the fury that had boiled together with the fear and let her have a good long look at what he could throw. But her face was chalk white, and whether she knew it or not her hands were shaking. "If I were you, I'd have your foreman drill some safety rules into these men."

  "I'll take that under advisement. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to work."

  When his fingers curled around her arm, she felt the temper in them. She was grateful for it. It made her stronger. Very slowly she turned her head so that she could look at him again. Fury, she thought with a kind of edgy curiosity. The man was absolutely furious- more than a few cross words warranted. His problem, Abra told herself.

  "I'm not going to keep telling you to back off, Johnson."

  He waited a moment until he was sure he could speak calmly. In his mind he could still hear the sickening crack of metal hitting concrete. "That's something we can agree on, Red. You won't keep telling me to back off."

  He let her go. After the briefest hesitation, she strode away.

  She wouldn't keep telling him, Cody thought as he watched her disappear outside. And even if she did, it wasn't going to do her any good.

  Chapter Three

  He had other things to think about. Cody let the hot spray of the shower beat over his head and reminded himself that Abra Wilson wasn't his problem. A problem she undoubtedly was, but not his.

  Women that skittish were best avoided, particularly when they had those pretty feminine looks that contrasted with a mean temper. The Barlow project was giving him enough headaches. He didn't need to add her to the list.

  But then, she was mighty easy to look at. Cody smiled to himself as he turned off the shower. Easy to look at didn't mean easy to handle. Usually he appreciated challenges, but just now he had enough on his plate. Now that his partner was married and expecting his first baby, Cody was doing what he could to shoulder the excess. With business booming, the excess meant twelve-hour days. In addition to overseeing the construction of the resort, there were innumerable phone calls to make and take, telegrams to send and receive, decisions, approvals and rejections.

  He didn't mind the responsibility or the long hours. He was grateful for them. It didn't take much prodding for him to remember the boy who had grown up on a muddy farm on the Georgia-Florida border. The boy had wanted more, and the man had worked to get it.

  Come a long way, Cody thought as he knotted the towel at his waist. His body was lean, the torso tanned. He still worked outdoors, though that was from choice now, rather than necessity. It wasn't only drawing boards and dreams with Cody. There was a house on a lake in Florida that was half-built. He was determined to finish it himself. A matter of pride now, rather than lack of funds.

  The money was there, and he'd never deny he enjoyed its benefits. Still, he'd grown up working with his hands, and he couldn't seem to break the habit. He corrected himself. He didn't want to break the habit. There were times when he enjoyed nothing more than the feel of a hammer or a piece of wood in his hand.

  He dragged his fingers through his wet hair. They were callused, as they'd been since childhood. He could run a tractor even now, but he preferred a slide rule or a power saw.

  He strode into the bedroom of his hotel suite. The suite was nearly as big as the home he'd grown up in. He'd gotten used to the space, to the small luxuries, but he didn't take them for granted. Because he'd grown up skirting poverty he's learned to appreciate good material, good food, good wine. Perhaps he appredated them with a more discerning eye than someone who had been born to the good life. But he didn't think about that.

  Work, talent and ambition were the keys, with a bit of luck thrown in. Cody remembered that luck could change, so he never avoided work.

  He had come a long way from digging in the mud to make a living. Now he could dream, imagine and create-as long as he didn't forget that making dreams reality meant getting your hands dirty. He could lay a score of brick if it was required, mix mortar, pound in a stud or drive a rivet. He'd worked his way through college as a laborer. Those years had given him not only a practical bent toward building but a respect for the men who sweated to create them.

  Which brought him back to Abra. She understood construction workers. He knew firsthand that many of the people who worked at drawing boards forgot the men who hammered the nails and hauled the bricks. But not Abra. Thoughtfully he slipped into a white terry-cloth robe with the vague notion of calling room service and eating in. Abra Wilson, he mused. She would have gone to the wall to get an extra thirty minutes' break for the men. She was a fiend about checking the water supply and the salt tablets.

  She was also a woman who would step in between two angry construction workers to break up a fight. Or pour beer over the head of an insubordinate employee. The memory made him grin. No drinking on the job. And she'd meant what she'd said.

  He appreciated that. He was a man who preferred frankness to subtleties in both his business and his personal life. She wasn't a woman who would play flirting games or give teasing hints. She w
ould say yes or she would say no.

  As she had on the side of the road, he remembered. She'd said no, Cody mused, and she'd wanted to say yes. Discovering the reasons for the contradiction would be interesting work. It was a pity he could only fit Abra into the business slot. They might have had some fun together, he thought, dragging a hand through his still-damp hair. The trouble was, she was too uptight to settle back and have a good time. Perhaps it would be fair to say that she was too honest to take intimacy on a casual level. He couldn't fault her for that, which made one more reason to keep things on a business plane.

  And there was too much friction. Friction usually led to a spark, and a spark to a blaze. He didn't have the time to fight fires just now.

  With a glance at the clock on the bedside table he calculated the time back east. It was far too late to make any calls to the East Coast. That meant he'd have to get up at five, pull himself together and make all the necessary calls and connections between 6:00 and 7:00 a.m.

  With a shrug, he decided that what was called for was a quick room-service meal and an early night. Just as he picked up the phone, the buzzer sounded at his door.

  If there was one person he hadn't been expecting, it was Abra.

  She stood there, balancing a brown grocery bag on one hip. Her hair was loose-it was the first time he'd seen it unbraided or unpinned-and curled wildly to her shoulders. She still wore jeans and a T-shirt, but she'd changed from work boots to sneakers. The next surprise was that she was almost smiling.

  "Hi," she managed. It was ridiculous, but she'd never been so nervous in her life.

  "Hi." He leaned against the doorframe and took a long, lazy scan. "Passing by?"

  "Not exactly." Her fingers dug into the stiff brown paper bag. The telltale rattle made her relax them again. "Can I come in?"

  "Sure." He stepped back, and she stepped through. From behind her, she heard the door click closed. Her heart jerked with it. "This is nice."

  The living room of the suite was done in desert colors, mauves and umbers and creams. There were sketches on the walls and narrow louvered blinds at the windows. The room smelled of soap. He smelled of soap. Abra braced herself to turn.

  "I wanted to apologize."

  His brow lifted in an unconscious gesture as he studied her. She was doing her best, Cody realized, and hating every minute of it. Amused, he decided to draw the scene out.

  "For what?"

  She nearly ground her teeth. On the trip over she had prepared herself for the likelihood that he wouldn't make it easy. "For being rude and ungrateful this afternoon."

  Cody slipped his hands into the pockets of his robe. "Just this afternoon?"

  Venom nearly poured out, and it was hard to swallow. An apology was due, and she was damn well going to get it over with. "Yes. We're dealing with a specific instance. You helped me this afternoon, and I was ungrateful and unkind. I was wrong, and when I am I like to think I can admit it." Without asking, she moved over to the counter that separated the living space from the kitchenette. "I brought you some beer."

  "To drink or to wear?" he asked when she pulled out a six pack.

  "Up to you." She broke down enough to smile, really smile. The flecks in her eyes brightened. Her lips softened as if by magic. Cody felt his heart stop for two full beats. "I didn't know whether you'd eaten, so I tossed in a meatball sub and some fries."

  "You brought me dinner?"

  Uncomfortable, she shrugged. "It's no big deal, just a sandwich." She pulled out a twelve-inch tube wrapped in white paper.

  "Some sandwich."

  "Yeah." She took out the Styrofoam dish that held the french fries. If it killed her, she told herself, she was going to get the words out. And it might kill her, she thought, if he kept looking at her as though he'd rather nibble on her than the sub. "I wanted to thank you for acting so quickly this afternoon. I don't know whether I'd have gotten out of the way in time or not, but that's not the issue. The fact is, you made certain I wasn't hurt, and I never really thanked you at the time. I guess I was more shaken up than I realized."

  As he had been, Cody thought. He crossed over to stand beside her. She was holding the empty bag, folding and unfolding it. The gesture showed him more than words could have how much it had cost her to come. He took the bag from her and tossed it on the counter.

  "You could have written that down in a nice little note and slipped it under the door. But I don't suppose that's your style." He resisted the urge to touch her hair, knowing it would be a mistake for both of them. He would only want to touch her more, and she already looked as though she'd jump out of her shoes at the first advance. Instead, he pulled a bottle out of the pack and turned it to read the label. "Want a beer?"

  She hesitated only briefly. It looked as if he was going to make it easy for her after all. "Sure."

  "Half a meatball sub?"

  She relaxed and smiled again. "I could probably choke it down."

  A truce, undeclared but understood, had been negotiated. They shared cold beer and spicy meatballs on Cody's terrace. A small in-ground spa swirled silently at their feet. Orange and red blossoms, their scent heavy, trailed up and along the high walls that closed them in. The sun was low, and the air was cooling.

  "All the comforts of home," Abra mused as she sipped her beer.

  Cody thought about his house, where everything was familiar, where so many walls were still unfinished and so many yards of trim were still unpainted. "Not quite home. But it's the next best thing."

  Abra stretched the toes of her sneakers toward the water. Lord, she'd like to sink into that, close her eyes and let every muscle hum. With a soft sigh of regret, she dismissed the idea. "You do much traveling?"

  "Enough. You?"

  "Not really. Well, around the state. Up into Utah a couple of times. I like hotels."

  "Really?"

  She was relaxed enough to ignore his smirk. She bit into the sub and savored the blending of meat, sauce and cheese. "I like being able to take a shower and go out and come back to find fresh towels. Ordering room service and eating in bed. Stuff like that. You must like them, too." She watched him tilt back his beer. "You don't strike me as someone who'd keep doing something he didn't care for."

  "I don't mind moving around." The fries were greasy and loaded with salt. Perfect. He took two. "I like knowing I've got some place to go back to, that's all."

  She understood that very well, though it surprised her that he felt the sentiment-and the need. "Have you always lived in Florida?"

  "Yeah. Can't say I care much for the snow-shoveling, finger-numbing weather in the North. I like the sun."

  "Me too." She dug out fries. "It only rains here a handful of times a year. Rain's an event." With a grin, she finished off her half of the sub. The best meal, she had to admit, she'd had in weeks. It was hard to believe, but his company wasn't such a trial after all. She settled back to nurse her beer and wait for nightfall. "I'd like to see the ocean, though."

  "Which one?"

  "Any one."

  Her eyes were gray in this light, he noted. Gray and a little sleepy. "It's a short flight to the West Coast."

  "I know." She moved her shoulders and continued to watch the sky darken. "I always figured I needed a bigger reason to make the trip."

  "Vacation?"

  "I've been pushing pretty hard the last few years. This may be the age of women's liberation, but there are still walls to break down when you're an engineer who happens to be a woman."

  "Why are you an engineer?"

  He reached lazily for more fries, and so did she. Their fingers brushed companionably. "I always liked to figure out how things worked-or what to do to make them work better. I was good with numbers. I like the logic of them. If you put them together and figure out the formula, you're always going to come up with the right answer."

  "The right answer's not always the best answer."

  Crossing her legs at the ankles, she turned her head enough to study his face in
the lowering light. "That's artistic thinking, which is why an architect needs a good engineer to keep him on track."

  He took a lazy swallow of beer and smiled at her. "Is that what you're doing, Red? Keeping me on track?"

  "It isn't easy. Take the design of the health club."

  "I figured you'd get around to it."

  Mellowed by the casual meal, she ignored his sarcasm. "The waterfall on the east wall. We'll overlook the fact that it's an impractical piece of fancy."

  "You've got something against waterfalls?"

  "This is the desert, Johnson."

  "Ever hear of an oasis?"

  She sighed, determined to be patient. It was a nice night. The food had been good, and the company more pleasant than she'd expected. "I'll give you your little whimsy."

  "Bless you for that."

  "But if you'd put it on the west wall, as I requested-"

  "It doesn't work on the west wall," he said. "You need the windows on the west wall for the evening light, the sunsets. And the view's best in the west."

  "I'm talking about logistics. Think plumbing."

  "I leave that up to you. You think plumbing, I'll think aesthetics, and we'll get along fine."

  Typical, typical, typical, she thought with a shake of her head. "Cody, my point is that this project could have been half as difficult as it is with a few minor adjustments."

  The challenging light had come back into her eyes. He nearly smiled. The evening wouldn't have been complete without at least one argument. "If you're afraid of hard work, you should have found another profession."

  That had her head snapping up, and her eyes, already filled with anger, narrowing. "I'm not afraid to work, and I'm damn good at what I do. It's people like you, who come along with your six-story egos, refusing to make any adjustments, who make things impossible."

  He had a temper of his own, but he managed- barely-to check it. "It's not my ego that keeps me from making adjustments. If I made them, I wouldn't be doing the job I'd been hired to do."