by Jo McNally
The next day he and Brittany returned the hosting favor, having a hamburger and sausage cookout before taking Asher and Nora out on Nate’s antique boat, the Gallant Lady. The wooden Chris-Craft Continental was his pride and joy. His grandfather had bought the twenty-two-foot boat new in 1955. Nate had meticulously restored it over the years. It still had what collectors called an “original bottom,” but the inboard engine, housed beneath a large wooden box in the center of the boat, was new. It had plenty of room to move around, with a bench seat across the back and a split bench at the helm. It was one of the few older things that Brittany had never once teased him about. She fell in love with it the first time he’d lowered it from the boathouse into the water.
She’d pronounced the boat an elegant and sexy classic, with long, sleek lines and the highly polished mahogany and teak. She also liked the raw power the boat had, and the smooth ride when the lake was choppy. She’d taken to the boating life and was driving it now, with Nora at her side. Nate and Asher sat in the back, enjoying a sip of whiskey from plastic cups. Brittany was new to driving, but they were out in deeper water, and the lake was surprisingly quiet for a Sunday afternoon, so there wasn’t much to worry about. As if knowing this wasn’t a time to be a hot-rodder, she was keeping a sedate cruising speed while she and Nora talked up front.
Asher nudged Nate’s arm, gesturing to the two women. “They’re thick as thieves these days. I know I said this yesterday, but I want to be clear—if she’s it for you, don’t blow it. Ask her to stay, man. Look how happy she is. You guys have a good thing.”
Brittany laughed as her hair started pulling free from the knot she’d tied it in. The wind whipped it around her shoulders and face, and she finally gave up, pulling all of it loose. She glanced back at him, and her face was lit with joy. It radiated from her like sunshine, and he knew his expression was probably the same. Brittany was one change he didn’t want to avoid.
They were tidying up the kitchen later that night when he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her in for a kiss.
“Unhand me, sir!” She swatted his shoulder with a dish towel. “No distracting the...help!” The last word was shouted as he swung her around and pressed her against the old metal kitchen hutch. It rattled a bit but held firm when he lifted her up to sit there. At just the right height. Her eyes went dark and her smile moved from humor to heat. “What are you doing?”
Nate cupped her face with his hands.
“Loving you.”
There. He’d said it. Her eyes went round, but he kissed away whatever she had to say. Getting the words out there was hard enough. He didn’t want to analyze it right now. He just wanted to feel it. Revel in it. Make love to her with those words floating in the air above them. In that all-knowing way she had, Brittany read the need in his eyes like a book. She opened her legs so he could step inside them, pressing against her and kissing her with more raw desire than he’d ever felt before. She was his. His.
He felt that door to a future together open a little bit wider.
Asher was right. She was it for him.
She was everything.
* * *
“Conrad, I’m telling you Gallant Lake is a bad idea.” Brittany tried to keep her voice level. If she couldn’t deflect Conrad to something new and shiny, she was going to have to tell Nate, and everyone else, the truth about her role. “I sent you the information on that town in Connecticut, not far from the casino there, that got missed with the initial development that popped up. It’s the same distance from Manhattan as Gallant Lake, and it’s much more fiscally depressed, so people will be more eager to sell.” Joey was lying on the sofa, tipping his head back and forth at her in curiosity, as he always did when she was on the phone.
“Brittany, if you can’t handle this job,” Conrad replied coolly, “tell me now so I can send someone else. My nephew keeps telling me he wants to prove himself.”
There was a time not too long ago when those would have been fighting words. Brittany and Conrad’s nephew, Kent, had been in competition for years. It was a battle largely manipulated by Conrad. He’d regularly pitted them against each other and then reaped the rewards when they went into overdrive to be the fastest and the best. Those days were over for her. She no longer felt the crushing need to prove herself to Conrad. His approval had always hinged on money. It had always been empty.
Over the past month or two, her drive to make more and more money had faded. Maybe Ellie had finally gotten through to her. Or maybe it was Nate, with his appreciation for repurposing old things and putting so much value on function. The way he appreciated what he had and where he was.
Money was never going to keep her warm at night the way Nate did. Would never give her the heart-deep joy of sitting on the dock in the morning with a hot mug of coffee and the man she loved. But as much as she wanted to tell her boss to go to hell, she couldn’t afford to have Kent coming in to buy up the properties she was trying so hard to protect.
“There’s no need to send Kent. I’ve got this.” She put on her best barracuda voice, tough and confident. “I’m just looking out for the company’s bottom line. With the resort already here and growing, people know what their properties could be worth. There’s an active preservation society...” Run by Nate. “...that is not afraid to take developers to court. They did it with Blake Randall a few years back and won...”
Conrad talked right over her, suddenly angry. “I am not Blake Randall. Just because he thinks he’s the kingpin of resort development doesn’t mean it’s true. He was born with a damn silver spoon in his mouth.” He was almost yelling now, and she held the phone away and stared at it in confusion. Where was this coming from? “I can outwit that jackass with my eyes closed, Doyle, and don’t you forget it. He may have caved to them, but I’m not afraid of a few local yokels.”
“Don’t call them that!” She clapped her hand over her mouth. It was a bad idea to elevate this. Especially when she had no idea why her boss was so irrationally angry. Conrad paused.
“Excuse me?”
“I mean...” She sighed. “Look, these people are smart and passionate about their town. You pay me to get the job done, but you also pay me for my experience and my ability to assess a situation in order to protect the bottom line. Right?”
He took a little longer to respond than she would have liked. Was he losing his faith in her? She couldn’t afford to have that happen until she’d solved this mess. Instead of exploding, his voice settled a bit.
“That’s right.” Another pause. “But Gallant Lake is important to me. We need to make this work. I know you can do this for me. And there’s a partnership waiting for you if you do.”
That wasn’t the enticement it had once been, but she didn’t say so. Although she was curious.
“Why is this place so important, Conrad? Why are we doing this project differently from our usual, and very successful, approach?”
“Let’s just say this one is personal. Make it happen.”
She sat on the sofa after the call and scratched Joey’s head, wondering what she was missing. Conrad said it was personal. He was one of the most ruthless businessmen she’d ever met. He hated any hint of people getting their emotions involved in their work. And what seemed to make it personal to him was Blake Randall. She knew about Randall Resorts International, but she’d never heard Blake’s name mentioned before arriving in Gallant Lake, and never by Conrad until today.
She reached for her laptop. She was determined to get Conrad’s sights off this town. It was time to research why his sights fell on it in the first place.
Chapter Thirteen
Nate tightened the tie-down straps holding the tall, heavily carved headboard to the side of the van. Brittany’s eyes had lit up when she saw it the first time at the Kennedy place. Right before she smacked into that spider’s web. Right before he kissed her. Right before he started to fall in love with
her. At the time he’d dismissed the headboard as being too narrow. That was the problem with antique beds—they tended to be full-size or even smaller. Most clients wanted a minimum of queen-size.
Asher Peyton walked around the back of the van, carrying the footboard. He slid it into the van, and Nate wrapped a couple of blankets around it and strapped it to the opposite side. They lifted the side rails in last.
“Blanche told me her great-great-grandfather carved this bed from walnut trees he cut down on the farm over a hundred years ago.” Nate gave the rails a pat. “Even after sitting in that abandoned house with no heat, it hasn’t warped or split. That old man knew how to build.” He looked at Asher. “You still think you can build this out to be a queen-size bed?”
“I’m a furniture maker by trade, Nate. Yes, I’m sure.” Asher threw a blanket over the rails to keep them from sliding around. “Like I told you, I’ll preserve the main sections of the headboard and footboard, but I’ll have to add a lot of wood and match it the best I can. It means stripping and changing the structure of the original piece permanently, which isn’t usually your thing.” Asher looked up at him. “In fact, nothing about this is your thing. That bed’s a little ornate for your place, and the dressing table is a bit...feminine.”
He wasn’t wrong. But it was the first antique Brittany had fallen for, and that made it special. If he could get her to stay, it might be their bed to be handed down over more generations. He just had to get her to stay. She was close; he was sure of that. They’d spent nearly every waking minute together since the storm, and the way she looked at him warmed him in a way no other woman had. She made him laugh, but even more important, he made her laugh. Every time she did, he could see more stress leave her shoulders. He could see more of the real Brittany.
He and Asher took the bedroom suite back to Asher’s shop and unloaded it. This type of alteration wasn’t something Asher normally did. He liked to build his own designs from scratch, not reconfigure someone else’s work. But he and Nate had been friends for a long time, and he hadn’t hesitated when Nate asked. They pushed the pieces together and tossed a canvas drop cloth over them.
“I can’t keep them hidden all the time,” Asher said, “but I’ll do my best to keep my wife or her cousins from seeing an antique in my shop. They’d be asking questions nonstop, nosy biddies that they are.” He winked, then grew more serious. “But I’m not gonna lie to my wife. If Nora asks, I’ll have to tell her the truth. That’s how love works.” He paused. “Speaking of love, this bed wouldn’t have anything to do with a pretty visitor to town, would it?”
He was usually pretty good at keeping a poker face when actually playing poker, but he couldn’t stop the smile that formed. Talking about Brittany did that to him.
“It might.” He tugged at the covering over the set. “She saw it a while back and liked it.”
“She liked it.” Asher opened the bottle of whiskey that sat on his workbench and grabbed two plastic cups, splashing a small amount of the amber liquid into them. “She just liked it and you’re getting ready to spend a good amount of money making it work for her. A bed. That’s quite a gift. Pretty intimate, if you ask me.”
“Which I didn’t, by the way.” Nate accepted the glass of whiskey. “But if you must know, I’m trying to get her to hang around for a while. To give us a chance. And I’m not too proud to offer a bed as bribery.”
“Ballsy. Nice.” Asher drained his glass in one move. “So you think she might stay, huh? What about her job?”
Employment was the one area between them that had remained shrouded in foggy mystery. She said she was a consultant but had been perpetually vague when he’d pressed for any details. She’d change the subject and say it was boring or something like that. But he couldn’t imagine Brittany doing anything boring. She was too driven. Competitive.
Asher sighed in satisfaction after finishing his drink.
“Did that friend of hers ever decide on a property to buy? Stella was complaining that her accepted offer has been sitting out there for a few weeks now.”
Nate straightened. “Stella had an actual offer?”
“That’s what she said. Brittany negotiated a price and took it to her buyer.”
“But...Louise DiAngelo told me she’d agreed on a price.” He frowned. “Why would anyone want two storefronts that aren’t connected?”
Why hadn’t Brittany mentioned either deal to Nate?
Asher put his hands on his lower back and stretched. “I don’t know, man. Ask your girl. Damn, I must be getting old. My back is screaming. If you don’t mind, I think I’ll head home to my wife and talk her into spending some time in the whirlpool with me.”
Nate couldn’t get the question out of his mind, even after heading back to his shop. He and Brittany had bared their souls—and their bodies—to each other. But he’d always felt she was holding something back.
Hank called out as soon as Nate walked into the shop. “Come spend your money! Come spend your money!”
That was a gem that Darius had taught him. Nate had been annoyed at first, but it turned out customers loved it and always laughed.
He tossed the bird a banana chip. “I spend enough money on you, you old fleabag.”
Hank scrambled to the top corner of the cage, hanging sideways with one foot while chomping at the chip.
Darius came from the back storeroom. “Oh, hi, Nate. S’been a decent day so far. Old man Clifton cleaned us out of copper hinges for some remodeling project, and the resort sent someone in to order five dozen shelf supports for the new maintenance shed they’re building, and they bought a bunch of line for their boat dock, too.” The kid stopped for a second, screwing his face up, then snapping his fingers. “Oh, and Mrs. DiAngelo was looking for you. She has a question and apparently didn’t trust me with it.” He shrugged, unoffended. “But she was headed to Albany for something today, so she said it could wait until Monday. Oh, and listen to this... Hank, are you bringing sexy back?”
Hank let out a whistle, then started bobbing his head.
“Bringing sexy back! Bringing sexy back!”
Great.
“I know you love teaching him new stuff, but let’s keep the sex talk to a minimum, Darius.” His scolding lost its effect as Hank kept repeating the phrase, until Nate finally laughed at his bird. “Not cool, Hank.”
“Bringing sexy back!”
Nate narrowed his eyes at Darius, who just shrugged again. The kid never seemed to get ruffled.
“It’s not my fault your bird mimics everything. Say something often enough around him and he’ll figure out how to repeat it. And how bad can that song be? My grandma uses it as her ringtone!”
Nate checked the levels in Hank’s water bottles. “Maybe don’t say stuff over and over again and he’ll stop doing that.” He waved Darius toward the back corner. “And your grandma is too frisky for her age, kid. Before you head out, we need to move some of that summer seeding and stuff to make space for snow shovels and ice melter. I’ve got an order coming in at the end of the month.”
The days were getting shorter and the air was more crisp. Seasons were changing in the Catskills. As he and Darius shifted merchandise around, Nate couldn’t help but wonder if Brittany would still be here when the first snowflakes flew. He thought she was falling as hard as he was, but she was still holding something back.
After the way she grew up, it was understandable. She’d been the family protector since she was a kid, and her fallback position was caution and skepticism. He’d have to be patient and try not to take it personally. He just needed to work harder to gain her complete trust.
* * *
Brittany was surprised to see Nate sitting on the steps to her cabin when she got back from visiting Blake and Amanda Randall at Halcyon. She’d reached out to Cassie Zetticci at the resort to ask a few discreet questions, but Cassie must have mentioned the
conversation to her boss, Blake. She should have known she couldn’t do anything under the radar in a small town. But in this case, she was happy Cassie had squealed on her.
It was Amanda who’d called, inviting her up to the big stone house for coffee and a slice of fresh-baked apple pie. They’d barely sat down when Blake joined them in the sunny solarium. Charming as always, it still didn’t take him long to turn to her and pointedly ask who her mystery buyer really was and what she was doing here. She hadn’t wanted to have that conversation with anyone in town before she’d talked to Nate, but she was also dying to know what the story was between Blake and Conrad. Her career at Quest Properties was over anyway, so she told him. After he’d finished laughing, Blake told her the whole story. And suggested a secret partnership of his own to replace the one she was about to lose with Conrad.
Feeling energized now that she hopefully had a way to get herself out of this mess, she gave Nate a bright smile. He stood and headed her way, returning her smile.
God, she hated lying to this man. She’d just been sworn to secrecy...again. But Blake assured her it was only temporary, and if all went well, she’d be able to give Nate—and Gallant Lake—the best news ever. Such good news that he’d have to forgive her for not being honest from the start. She hoped. Her chin lifted. She was The Barracuda. She could sell ice to polar bears. She could definitely make Nate see how much she loved him, and then he’d have to forgive her.
