by Fiona Harper
Kelly sighed. ‘There’s no hope, is there? Raw meat? He’s a proper man already. Next thing we know, he’ll be firing up a barbecue and asking for a beer.’ Then she smiled at Jason, a soft, thankful smile, for once completely unlaced with sarcasm.
He grinned back at her. ‘You’re welcome.’ And, instead of the devilish glint she’d come to expect, the look in his eyes was warm and honest and...Jason.
For the longest moment they stayed like that, and then Kelly looked away, fussed with the cool bag and then resorted to unwrapping the sandwich she no longer had an appetite for. He had no business being all Jason with her. She’d rather he was that guy who’d been helping the bimbos to bat. That guy was much easier to resist.
‘You are going to help me eat this, aren’t you?’ he asked her. ‘I can’t believe that tiny little sandwich is going to fill you up.’ And he waved a real plate under her nose, on which sat a piece of perfectly pink salmon fillet and a dollop of creamy-looking coleslaw. Kelly was a sucker for coleslaw.
She let out a theatrical sigh. ‘If I have to...but just remember, if I do this for you, you’ll owe me.’
‘Of course,’ he replied, and she could hear the mirth in his tone, but she dared not look him in the eye. It would be too easy, too easy to feel as if this was normal, as if he should always fill the empty spot on her picnic blanket, but they both knew he wasn’t auditioning for that job.
But it didn’t help when, after lunch, he urged the boys to join in the kids’ rounders game, then volunteered to teach them how to swing a bat when they said they didn’t know how.
They should know, Kelly thought. That was something Tim should have taught them, not a stranger barely an hour after their first meeting.
She should have known something was inherently wrong with Tim right from the start. He’d never seemed quite as into spending time with his sons as her friends’ husbands had been. Oh, he’d done it. Sometimes. But there’d always been a look hidden behind his smile that suggested he couldn’t quite get the minutes to tick away fast enough so he could do something he wanted instead.
She’d thought Tim and Jason had been like peas in a pod when she’d first met her boss but, watching him disappoint the pouting girls who were hoping for a refresher course before the big game so he could patiently show a four-year-old how to hold a rounders bat, she realised she couldn’t have been more wrong. On the surface, maybe, but deep underneath, where it mattered, there was something more to Jason, something that had been missing in her ex-husband. Which led to a scary kind of logic: If having that piece missing meant there had been something inherently wrong with Tim, did that mean there was something inherently right with Jason?
When he finally tired the boys out and they begged to come and have more food, all three rejoined her on the blanket. She reached over and ruffled Ben’s hair as he dived head first into the cool bag in search of his chocolate biscuit.
‘You’re good with them,’ she told Jason, looking longingly at her smallest son, feeling her heart warm at the sight of his mouth smeared with chocolate after just one bite. ‘I suppose that comes from being a big brother.’ She raised her eyes to meet Jason’s. ‘Is there much of an age difference?’
His smile froze, just for a split second. ‘Four years.’
‘You must have felt very protective towards him.’
Jason shrugged. ‘Guess so.’ He nodded towards the boys. ‘But you know what brothers are like. We fought more than we bonded.’ And then he stared out across the park to the glinting skyscrapers on the other side of the river.
‘You don’t talk about your family much.’
Jason continued to stare at the skyline. ‘Not much to say. I’m the black sheep, so nobody minds if communication is patchy. Frankly, I think my father prefers it that way.’
‘What about your mother? You keep in contact with her, right?’
He shrugged. ‘I don’t know what my mother was like when she was younger, but now she’s more like my father’s shadow than his wife. And if he thinks I need to be left out in the cold for a while so I can see the error of my ways...well, my mother wouldn’t dare disagree.’
Kelly leaned in closer and spoke softly. ‘But she sends you the hamper every year—the best money can buy. I bet she sends you other things too, little things she knows you’d like.’
Jason turned and looked at her, surprise and dawning realisation on his features.
‘Perhaps you should give her a call once in a while,’ Kelly said, looking away and staring at the view Jason had found so riveting. ‘Mothers know they have to let their sons go one day. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt to do it...or even think about it.’
She could feel Jason looking at her and ignored it for as long as she could, but eventually she caved and turned her head.
‘I’m seeing a whole new side to you today, Kelly.’
Ditto. But she wasn’t going to tell him that.
Instead she gave him one of her patented haughty looks. ‘Don’t get used to it,’ she told him. ‘Come Monday morning, it’ll be business as usual.’
SEVEN
There was nothing Jason liked better than a competitive game, even if it was only with a stumpy version of a baseball bat and a tennis ball, and the company rounders tournament was no exception. Each year he joined a different team rather than just creating a senior management team that everyone was afraid to win against. Where would be the fun in that? For a competition to be exciting it had to have a real threat of defeat, otherwise the adrenalin zing that victory always brought would be missing.
This year he’d joined the Secretaries and Stuff team. Self-named and totally intent on putting their bosses in their places, even if their battle readiness outstripped their ability. And it hadn’t been because Kelly was on the team. Because she hadn’t been. Not until they’d realised they were one short because of a no-show and he’d convinced her to join them.
‘I’ll show you how to hold the bat, if you like,’ he’d told her.
She’d just scrunched up her face and shook her head. ‘First, I’ve seen what your version of showing entails, thank you very much. Besides, I have two burly older brothers. Do you really think I don’t know how to play rounders?’
‘And second?’
She smiled sweetly at him. ‘You, in particular, don’t want to be within hitting distance when I have one of these in my hands.’ And then she’d marched off to take her place in the line, ready to take her turn. Jason had just laughed as he’d watched her go.
Pity.
He’d have liked a seemingly innocent excuse to get closer to Kelly, more than just a handshake. While he’d totally enjoyed his tuition session with some of the female staff earlier on—even if he’d been able to sense Julie’s disapproving glare from under the large chestnut tree on the fringes of the picnic area—he hadn’t been able to help wishing it wasn’t a fresh, young twenty-something pressing herself against his front as he put his arms around her and guided her hands into the right grip on the bat. He realised he’d wished it was a certain single mom instead.
The need to smell that perfume of hers again had blindsided him. He didn’t just want to get a waft as she walked by him in the office, but up close and on her skin, the way perfume was meant to be smelt.
And he couldn’t quite get that idea out of his head as the game progressed.
It was weird, because he hadn’t thought seeing her with her boys would have been so appealing. He didn’t mind the single-mom thing, had dated plenty of them, but this was the first time it had made him want a woman more.
Kelly was different with her kids around. He’d seen a softer side to her, one that she usually hid. And she was amazing with Ben and Cal. They’d got frustrated at not being able to hit the ball at first but, instead of losing patience with them—as his own father had—and telling them
to stop whining and just suck it up, she’d encouraged them. She’d reminded them it was only their first time and just how hard they’d found it to kick a football far when they’d first started. He also liked that she hadn’t given them false praise. She’d agreed they weren’t superstars but she also hadn’t pretended their frustration didn’t matter.
She loved them the same way she did everything else, he realised, with openness and honesty, and that was a rare thing. He’d thought her guarded and prickly, but maybe she needed to be because it was obvious to anyone with eyes that when Kelly gave herself, she gave herself completely. Those boys were lucky. They were going to grow up feeling secure with their place in the world because of the gift she gave them every day. So many kids weren’t that blessed.
There were cheers when she took her turn to bat. She’d only been at Aspire a few months, but she was already a popular member of staff. He’d have to talk to Julie about her future with the company. They’d be all the poorer if they lost her to someone else after the temp contract came to an end.
The bowler narrowed his eyes and focused on the slim, long-limbed woman brandishing the bat. He swung and released the ball. A split second later it cracked against the wood and shot off to the right, sending the fielders running. Kelly threw the bat behind her and sprinted off round the pitch. Their team went wild, yelling and whooping and cheering her on. Jason joined them, and when she shot past fourth base and into the arms of a squealing bunch of women, he had to concentrate on rooting himself to the spot so he didn’t plough through them, peel them off her and do the same.
Something began to buzz in the pit of his stomach. Something warm and tingly that he hadn’t experienced before. It worried him slightly. Enough to stop him following through on his urge, anyway.
She joined the end of the line, right behind him. He held up a palm for a high five and she grimaced before smacking it.
‘You hit that ball like you meant it,’ he told her.
‘I did,’ she said, grinning just a little too widely for comfort. A nasty thought sneaked up on him.
‘It wasn’t my head you were visualising hitting, was it?’
She laughed. ‘No... That honour was reserved for my ex,’ she admitted, then frowned as she scanned the crowd.
‘Problem?’ he asked her.
She shook her head. ‘No, just looking for someone. Inspiration for hit number two.’
Jason stopped grinning. ‘He’s not here.’
She stopped searching the crowd and searched his face instead. ‘Who?’
‘Payne.’
Her mouth dropped open, just a little.
‘I fired him a couple of weeks ago,’ he said.
She pressed a palm to her chest. ‘Because of me?’
He shrugged. ‘Because of a lot of things but, yes, your complaint was part of it.’ And then, because she was looking at him all wide-eyed and soft, because he was worried he liked her looking at him as if he was some knight in shining armour, he forced himself to shrug it off. ‘Darn your civilised employment laws. If I’d had my way, I’d have creamed the guy months ago, not jumped through hoop after hoop to get rid of him.’
But the implication of violence on his part didn’t seem to put her off any. If anything, she was softening further under his gaze.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered.
He looked away. ‘No problem. I did it for Aspire. We don’t need jerks like him on our team.’
Liar, a little voice inside his head whispered. You know why you really did it. And you know why you really wanted to beat the loser into a pulp.
Jason ignored the voice. Instead he turned and focused on the rest of the game, cheering the other players on and feeling slightly relieved when he and Kelly ended up at far ends of the grassy expanse when it was time to field. This wasn’t the time to change his game plan and get serious about a woman. And this was not the woman to get serious with. She didn’t want a guy like him in her life. Strangely, he couldn’t help but think she was right.
When the game finished, Secretaries and Stuff coming in a respectable third, they made their way back to Kelly’s picnic blanket. He had to, so he could collect his mother’s idea of an informal lunch.
Kelly called the boys over, who’d been losing a wrestling bout with Sarah’s three daughters, and she started to pack her things away.
‘Are you going home?’
She nodded. ‘Not only are the boys worn out, but it’s a long trip home. I know this isn’t far from the offices, but I have quite a long commute.’
As if on cue, Cal yawned. Kelly smiled at him, then bent to kiss the top of his head. ‘If we don’t set off now we’ll be really late home for tea, and you don’t want to know just how grouchy my little dinosaurs get when they’re hungry.’
Ben looked up at her. ‘Mum? Can’t Jason come home with us for tea?’
Kelly stopped what she was doing and stood up. It was a couple of moments before she met Jason’s eyes. ‘Would you? Like to come back for something to eat? It’s the least I could do after the help you’ve been this afternoon.’
Normally Jason would have sprinted away as fast as the famous Dale McGrath at such an invitation, but he discovered he wanted to say yes. ‘I could drive,’ he found himself saying, ‘save you the Tube journey.’
She just looked at him. Not the normal, half-suspicious surveillance, but an open and unguarded look, as if she was trying to see inside his head and read what was there. And he let her. He let her see because, for once in his life, he couldn’t be bothered to find an angle to play. Whatever she saw, it surprised her, because her eyes widened just a fraction, but she still didn’t look away.
The sounds of the park faded. All Jason was aware of was a pair of big grey-green eyes staring back at him, the dark lashes framing them, the rise and fall of her ribcage in time with his own.
Suddenly he understood that what they were considering would mean crossing a line. Not just between professional and private, office and home, but something deeper, something less easily defined and much more dangerous.
It was Kelly who broke away first. She looked away across the park, then back at him. ‘Tell me one thing, Jason.’
He swallowed. The mood had gotten very serious and he had a feeling that whatever she was about to ask was very important.
His throat felt tight when he answered. ‘Sure. Fire away.’
‘Do you own a set of golf clubs?’
He blinked. That was the all-important question? He almost laughed it off, but she was looking at him intently, waiting for his answer.
‘Uh-huh.’
She considered that for a moment. ‘And where do you keep them?’
He frowned and opened up his mouth to ask where the heck this line of interrogation was going but she held up a hand.
‘Just humour me, will you?’
Jason shrugged. It wasn’t top-secret information. ‘At the moment, they’re gathering dust in my hall closet,’ he told her and paused for a moment, calculating just how long they’d been there. ‘I really should get back to golf some time soon....’
Kelly nodded, more to herself than to him, and hitched the cool bag higher on her shoulder. ‘Actually, I’m exhausted too. I’ll probably just resort to beans on toast when we get in...’ She shrugged. ‘But maybe another time?’
He nodded because he was supposed to. ‘Sure.’
She held out a hand for each boy. ‘Come on, you two.’
They paused as their gazes snagged again and silent communication zapped between them. He nodded. ‘See you Monday.’
She tried a smile that didn’t quite fit. ‘Monday,’ she repeated, and then she turned and walked away without looking back.
Jason let out a sigh then looked at the sky. He’d always said she was a smart lady, and she’d just pr
oved him right again, had saved them both from something that would only have gotten messy and complicated. He understood. Hell, he even agreed.
But that didn’t mean he didn’t stop thinking about her as he offloaded the rest of his mother’s fancy picnic on his employees. And that didn’t mean that when he set off for his car, empty hamper swinging from his hand, he didn’t think of his riverside apartment and how large and empty it would feel when he stepped inside it that evening.
* * *
Kelly walked into Jason’s office on Monday morning with her blouse and skirt pressed to perfection and her chin lifted high. Back to normal. Fantastic.
But as she got closer to the desk she realised that, even though Jason was wearing a suit, she could still see the man with the soft blue jeans and sun lighting up his dark hair. She could still see the man who’d pretended to be a dinosaur so a little boy would eat his lunch.
The word that echoed round her head was not one she’d have wanted her kids repeating.
She stretched her smile wide as he looked up. He seemed slightly taken aback, as if her unusually bright grin was blinding him a little, but he smiled back. A half sort of smile, not a full-on Jason sort of smile.
‘What’s up?’ she asked.
He pressed his lips together and shook his head. ‘Nothing. In fact, everything is going great. I have the contract for the endorsement deal in front of me. One signature and Miles Benson, supreme decathlon champion, is ours.’
He stared at the bit of paper and his pen stayed where it was on the desk, lying perfectly perpendicular to the top of the contract.
‘So why don’t you sign it?’
Jason looked up at her, a slight frown crinkling his forehead. ‘I will. I just... It feels like it should be a moment, and this doesn’t feel like a moment.’ His eyebrows shot up. ‘Don’t you think it should be...?’
She gave him a wry look. ‘A moment?’
Jason shook his head and looked away. Kelly studied him. For a man who sometimes had more bounce than an excited Labrador, he was awfully still and quiet this morning.
