Under His Spell (Holiday Hearts #4)

by Kristin Hardy

  “You still here?”

  It was Lainie, frowning at him, laptop slung over her shoulder. She wasn’t wearing the little skirt and crop top this time but a long summer dress made of some intriguingly fragile-looking fabric that shimmered over the slip beneath and flowed around her calves like water.

  It should have looked demure, with its faintly old-fashioned looking pattern of pale blossoms, but all it did was make him itch to unfasten the row of buttons that ran down the front, beginning with the hem and rising to where the fabric dipped down around the slender column of her throat. She wore a necklace with a single bead like a flat pearl, pierced from side to side with a string-thin leather thong so that it sat atop the hollow where her collarbones came together.

  “Earth to J.J.”

  He’d been staring, he realized.

  “I have to go. You shouldn’t have waited.”

  And she clearly hadn’t wanted him to, though that didn’t bother him. Not when he saw the faint pulse begin to beat in her throat. “Salem could be a tough town. I owe it to your parents not to let you walk around alone. Although—” he eyed the black bulk of her laptop case “—that thing probably counts as a lethal weapon.”

  “Try to remember that,” she advised him.

  He reached out and curved his fingers around the black webbing of the strap. Her eyes widened. “Maybe you’d better just give it to me to carry,” he said.

  She tugged it back from him. “I thought you had a bad shoulder.”

  “It’s the other one, and it’s getting better all the time,” he told her. She finally gave up, and he slung the bag over his shoulder, trying not to look smug. “So, where to?”

  She didn’t bother answering, just headed toward the iron gates that led to the street, and the trapezoidal town common beyond.

  She could needle him, she could pretend all she liked that she didn’t want him around. He knew better.

  He was used to women with quick hungers, women who knew what they wanted. And what they wanted was him. He’d had more memorable times than he could count and none of them were anything as hot as that moment in the gift shop when he’d stood just a little too close to Lainie and seen the flare of desire in her eyes.

  He wasn’t sure what to think about it, what to do about it except that he knew there was no way he was just going to walk away.

  Not until he figured it out.

  She didn’t know what he thought he was up to, but the last thing she needed before an important meeting was a distraction. Especially a distraction like J. J. Cooper. Out of habit, Lainie walked between the stone pillars that led into the common itself. Even if it was only a few dozen yards, she liked wending her way along the graceful oaks and the grass-edged paths instead of the narrow concrete sidewalk that threaded along the street. On drowsy, Indian summer mornings like this one, it was quiet and tranquil.

  Usually.

  She blew out a breath.

  “Careful,” J.J. said. “Hyperventilating isn’t good for you.”

  Lainie glanced to the heavens for patience and headed toward the side of the common by the hotel.

  The warm breeze slipped over her skin as they walked a few steps in silence. “Nice common,” J.J. said. “Do you spend a lot of time here?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “I can see why you would. It must be something in the fall. There are some beautiful places in the world, but there’s nothing quite like New England.”

  Lainie stopped to stare at him. “I thought you had an appointment.”

  “I’ve got time.” He just smiled and began ambling again with that loose, careless stride. He didn’t move with the controlled grace of an athlete, and yet something in the way he held himself suggested that he could do just about anything he wanted to with that body of his.

  Like she needed to think of that.

  Lainie made an impatient noise and caught up with him. “What’s the appointment?”

  “Dry-land training. Rehab.”

  She snorted. “I don’t think you can be rehabilitated. I think you’re stuck with yourself just as you are. And so are we, sadly.”

  It didn’t do a thing to wipe away that confident grin. “You know, you talk tough, but deep down inside, I think you’ve got a soft spot for me.” For an instant, there was something almost velvety in his voice.

  “So young to have terminal delusions,” she said.

  “In fact, I think deep down inside, you can’t resist me.”

  “It’ll be an enormous effort, but I think I can just about see my way to it. In fact, I think I’ll manage pretty well.” She threaded her way between the stone pillars on the side of the common and started across the street to the Seven Gables Inn.

  “I don’t know if I buy that.”

  There it was again, that velvet note. He flicked a glance at her and their gazes tangled for a moment. Awareness of him dragged at her like some kind of a gravitational field. His smile this time was slow, almost dangerous.

  A horn tapped and Lainie realized that she’d come to a stop in the middle of the street. “Well, you stand right here until you’re sure.” She shook her head and strode across the pavement as he followed. “Anyway, you told me why you’re going to Boston. That doesn’t explain why you’re here harassing me.”

  “Because it’s so much fun?”

  “There’s something deeply twisted about you,” she muttered.

  He laughed in genuine amusement. “So I’ve been told.”

  “Why are you here? A town like Salem can’t hold anything for a guy like you.”

  “Maybe I came here to sightsee.”

  Lainie snorted. “Next thing you’ll be telling me is that you came here to get your fortune told by the Salem witch.”

  “No. I came here because I wanted to see you,” he said simply.

  It stopped her in her tracks. In the middle of the sidewalk that ran in front of the plate glass windows of the hotel, cars whizzing past in the street, she turned to stare into those blue-gray eyes. And for the first time since she’d been twelve, found herself at a loss for words with him. She moistened her lips. “Why?”

  He reached out for her hand. Heat vaulted up her arm, making her dizzy. “I don’t know,” he said, staring at her palm as though the answer might be there. “I thought maybe I’d figure it out when I got here.”

  And suddenly she was very afraid of hearing what that answer was. “I have to go,” she said faintly, telling herself to pull her hand away. But instead she just stood there, staring stupidly at him.

  “I know.” He placed something in her fingers and closed them over it, then raised her hand to his lips.

  Heat bloomed through her, making her dizzy. She wouldn’t let him throw her off balance, wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of playing Casanova and making her look the fool.

  “Is that one of those moves you’ve learned in Europe?” Lainie asked unsteadily.

  “We haven’t even scratched the surface of what I’ve learned in Europe yet,” J.J. said. “I’ll see you around, Lainie.”

  And he turned and walked away.

  She opened her hand and found one of the serenity stones they sold in the gift shop.

  Carved into its surface was the word beginnings.

  Chapter Four

  “I can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” Lainie said, puffing as she struggled to raise her toes, already pointing at the ceiling, even higher in rhythmic bursts. “Nobody should work this hard at six in the morning.”

  “Just think of all the good it’s doing you.” Caro lay on the mat next to her, doing the exercises as though they cost no effort at all.

  “I’d rather be running any day. Tell me why I’m doing this again?”

  “To strengthen your core.”

  “I think my core’s as strong as it needs to be.”

  “If it were, you wouldn’t be puffing,” Caro said serenely.

  “I’ll tell you what my core needs,” Lainie said, rolling to her sid
e to do the plank. “Coffee and scones at George’s.”

  Caro turned to stare at her before getting into position. “Work out and then go pack the calories right back on? Isn’t that contrary to the whole point?”

  “What do you mean? Coffee and scones are the whole point. This is just what we do to earn our right to them.”

  “I feel sure there’s something really off about that statement, but I can’t quite figure out what,” Caro said.

  “Come on, guys, no talking,” the instructor reprimanded them gently from the front of the class. “Concentrate on your core.”

  “See?” Lainie whispered. “Scones.”

  “Isn’t this the guy who was kissing your hand outside the hotel yesterday?” Caro looked up from her newspaper.

  Lainie froze, a bite of scone halfway to her mouth. “Kissing my hand?” she repeated faintly.

  They sat at the window counter in Cool Beans. Caro held up the sports page. On the bottom, in living color, J.J. stared out at her with his crooked grin. Local Champ Down as Season Looms, read the headline.

  Lainie cleared her throat. “You, um, saw that?”

  “It was kind of hard to miss.”

  “You didn’t say anything.”

  Caro gave a Mona Lisa smile. “I was biding my time. It was the fourth grader from the gift shop, right? Funny, we don’t often get Olympic medalists dropping by.”

  “Oh, he’s just…” Lainie flapped her hands.

  Caro raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

  “Someone I grew up with.”

  “That didn’t look like the move of a childhood friend.”

  “I never used the word friend,” Lainie said darkly.

  Caro’s mouth curved. “Now, this is getting interesting.”

  “It’s not interesting. There’s nothing going on.”

  “It sure didn’t look like nothing.”

  “I ran into him at a family event over the weekend. Lucky me, he decided to stop by and bug me.” Lainie took a drink of her latte and set the cup squarely down on the picture of J.J.’s face.

  “Looks like he did a pretty effective job,” Caro observed.

  “Oh, that’s the one talent he’s got.”

  “Judging by the hand-kiss thing, I’d say he’s got a few more.”

  Lainie sucked in a breath of annoyance. “Yeah, well, he’s not going to use them on me.”

  “You so sure of that?”

  “Positive.”

  Caro stirred her cappuccino. “What’s the problem, is he a jerk?”

  Both less and more. “J. J. Cooper cares about three things—skiing, parties and women, and not necessarily in that order. He has the biggest ego on three continents and the attention span of a gnat.”

  “Big breeders, those gnats.”

  Lainie finished her coffee and thumped down the cup a little too loudly. “He’s just yanking my chain. He’s stuck here for a while instead of being Mr. Continental and he’s bored. Showing up here gives him something to do.”

  “So are you going out?”

  “Not in this or any other universe.” Lainie finished the last bite of scone with a decisive munch and screwed up the napkin.

  Caro took a meditative sip of her coffee. “Why not?”

  “The same reason I don’t hit myself on the head with a hammer. It’s dumb, it’s unhealthy and I know for a fact it’s going to be painful before I ever start.”

  “So you’ve got a thing for him.” Caro nodded wisely.

  “I do not have a thing for him,” Lainie retorted, stung. “And Speed Racer is dreaming if he thinks for one minute that I’m going to be the one to take him off the hook while he’s stuck here.”

  Caro nodded. “Understandable.”

  “Because I am so not.”

  “You’ve got me convinced,” she said mildly.

  “He’s not my type. He never has been.”

  “Don’t forget to invite me to the wedding.”

  Lainie gave her a narrow-eyed stare. “Does the phrase ‘when hell freezes over’ mean anything to you?”

  “Winter’s coming,” Caro said genially.

  It looked, J.J. thought, like a medieval torture rack, an open-sided, metal-framed cube built of steel bars as tall as a man. Levers and steel weight plates and leather belts dangled on the inside. “You’re weren’t part of the Spanish Inquisition in a previous life, were you?” He turned to the short, muscle-bound man in sweats who stood outside the cage.

  Manny Turturro grinned at J.J. from a face misshapen from a decade in the boxing ring. “Me? I’m the milk of human kindness.”

  “The milk of human kindness,” J.J. repeated. Actually, to his eye, Manny looked more like a human fireplug with a smile. “So how does this work?”

  “I use the lever to raise the weights, then lower them so that all the pressure is on you. Your job is to use your legs and abs to stay in place for a count of ten, then I pull the weights off. The idea is not motion but maintaining peak muscle contraction.”

  “And it’s not going to be a problem with my shoulder?”

  Turturro shook his head. “The weight’s going onto your trapezius. I checked it all out with your sports med doc and he was fine with it. How’s the shoulder feel, anyway?”

  J.J. moved his arm around a bit. “Good. A little twinge if I try to move too fast, but otherwise it’s fine.” Not fine enough to let him get on the slopes, though, which was why he was at Turturro’s. Manny Turturro’s methods may have been unorthodox, at best, but the iconoclastic trainer had brought countless elite athletes to the peaks of their professions with a few months of work at his training compound north of Boston.

  “I can pretty much guarantee it won’t be pleasant, but you want to be ready for the slopes, we’ll get you ready for the slopes.”

  J.J. grinned and stepped into the metal cage. “Okay, let’s do it.”

  Unpleasant, he quickly discovered, was a mild word for it. Agonizing, maybe, or excruciating. And Manny just kept grinning at him like a demented gnome and calling for another set.

  “Come on, Cooper, show me what you got.” He levered up the weights without breaking a sweat.

  “Anybody ever tell you you’re a sadist, Manny?” J.J. said through gritted teeth as his quads trembled with effort.

  “Hey, all you have to do is convince yourself you’re having fun. Just ignore all this. Think about something pleasant. Take your mind off it.”

  Something pleasant? And that quickly, Lainie popped to mind. Stop it. He’d been tempted, oh, so tempted, to stop in Salem again the previous day, and even that morning. Unfortunately he’d been running late—figuring out he hadn’t needed to leave at the crack of dawn to make his appointment had made sleeping in far too tempting. As it was, he’d still gotten up earlier than he’d have liked, and if he had to spend more days in the car than he was out of it anymore, he was going to start clawing his face off.

  Time to think about Plan B.

  “Come on, Cooper, another set.”

  He glowered at Manny. “I’ll give you another set.”

  “If distracting yourself doesn’t work, then visualize. Isn’t that what you fancy athletes do? Close your eyes, feel the weight and imagine it’s the g-forces from going around a gate.”

  Fine idea in the abstract, except that when he closed his eyes, the image in his head was Lainie, staring at him, stunned, as he kissed her hand. J.J. sank down into another rep, pushing aside the pain of fatigue. He liked seeing Lainie stunned, her control and assurance gone. He liked knowing that for a moment all she thought of was him.

  So maybe he should get in her way a little more, see where it all went. He had the time; she wasn’t attached the last time he’d heard. Maybe they ought to run it around the block, see how it did. Of course, she might take some convincing.

  He smiled broadly. Then again, the convincing might be the fun part. After all, he’d never set out to charm a woman yet without succeeding.

  “There you go, imagine yourself winn
ing,” Manny said. “It works—you know as well as I do. You get a goal, then concentrate on it and make it happen. It’s as simple as that. Give me one more.”

  J.J. swiped away the sweat that was starting to drip into his eyes and tried to ignore the trembling of his legs. Think about something pleasant. Like the feel of Lainie folded against his chest at the Jack and Jill party. Like the way she’d feel, warm and naked against him in bed.

  “There we go, that’s what I’m talking about,” Manny said. “Focus, concentrate on what you want.”

  And J.J., in the midst of another rep, concentrated.

  The mountains were where he felt best, he thought as he stood on the terminal slope of the Mount Jefferson ski run with Gabe. Something about being there always felt right. Not that he didn’t love the beach and the city, or that he couldn’t find a sort of quiet beauty in the desert. They weren’t the same, though.

  Up among the peaks, he somehow felt more alive, as though he could breathe more deeply, stand taller, become more than what he was. Whether it was because skiing was in his blood or whether he’d become a skier because of his love for the mountains, it was the place that was right for him.

  They stared down at the sweep of turf that spread out below them. To their left, the sculpted curve of the new half pipe was already lightly grassed over. Across the valley, the Hotel Mount Jefferson gleamed white in the morning sun.

  Gabe turned to stare thoughtfully at the point where the new downhill run tapered into the main slope. “You did a hell of a job.”

  J.J. shrugged. “All I did was draw a couple of things and wave my hands around. You and Hadley were the ones who made it happen, you guys and your construction crews.”

  “Team effort. Besides, if Hadley and I can pull off planning a wedding in three months, we can sure as hell pull together a ski resort remodel.”

  They began walking over down the slope toward the new lift.

  “So, you ready for this?” J.J. looked across the valley at the peak that was Mount Washington, rising into the clouds.

  Gabe held his ever-present walkie-talkie phone in one hand, his clipboard in the other. “The resort opening?”