Only Her Heart

by Lyn Cote

Melissa nodded. “I know. I’ve been angry with him ever since Christmas. I finally got the courage to confront him with...it.”

  “With what?” Annie sat up straighter.

  “Annie!” Claire hurried in and headed right for them. “Come quick. A client is on the phone for you.”

  Chapter 12

  Very late that afternoon, Jack stalked into their office next to the Polska, his shoulders hunched.

  Annie had been watching, waiting for him all afternoon. But she’d resisted calling him because she wanted to tell him in person. She rose from her desk, trying to control her face that insisted on smiling. I have news for you, Jack.

  “Hi, how did the Hope meeting go?” she asked instead, controlling her voice, keeping it composed.

  He lifted his shoulders and then let them drop. “Hard to tell. I told them they have to get busy and get me some leads about who might be doing this.”

  She studied his disgruntled face. She repressed the urge to hurry to him and put her arms around him. “Had they frozen the corrupted files?” she asked, already guessing the answer.

  “Of course not.” Jack shoved his hands into his pockets. “Someone who thought they knew how to track the accessing of files decided to take a look.”

  “Oh no.” She sank back into her chair.

  “Yes, a red alert via memo wasn’t enough of a deterrent to this helpful person,” Jack growled. “I still had some untouched files to look through, but they proved inconclusive.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Claire breezed in from the break room in the back. “Greetings. I’m heading out. What do you think of our big news, boss?”

  “Big news?” Jack looked at her and then Annie.

  “I didn’t have a chance to tell him yet.” Annie had been imagining just how she’d tell him and now she shook her head at Claire. She’d imagined Jack pulling her into his arms and...

  “Well, tell him.” Claire almost danced with her excitement.

  Annie’s stomach fluttered. She cleared her throat. “Jack, I negotiated my first solo contract. It’s not much—”

  “Not much,” he scoffed, taking a step closer “Who?”

  Annie’s spirits soared at his instant interest and appreciative expression. “It’s a new group of doctors in Oak Park. It’s not big like the Hope but—”

  “Isn’t that great?” Claire cut in.

  Jack beamed. “Sounds like a good time to celebrate, How about steak at Sharkey’s?”

  “Oh, Jack...” Annie tried to keep things in perspective in spite of her mounting elation. “It’s not that big.”

  “Grab your purse. I’m hungry.” He turned to Claire. “Coming with us?”

  “No, I’ve got to get home,” Claire said primly, her gaze on Annie.

  “Will you close up shop for us, then?” Jack asked over his shoulder as he led Annie toward the door.

  “Sure.” Claire winked at Annie.

  Annie felt her face warm, but she allowed Jack to lead her out to the alley where his car was parked. A new client. I did it. Thank you, Lord.

  By the candlelight at Sharkey’s, Jack gazed across the booth toward Annie. Whenever he looked at her tonight, he remembered those moments by the lake just two days ago. Just days ago. How had it all come about? Had he really kissed Annie and asked if they could start a dating relationship? Do I have feelings for Annie? Yes, I do.

  The waiter delivered their salads and ground spicy fresh pepper onto their lettuce. Jack gazed at Annie as she thanked the waiter. Her gray eyes were open wide in the low light of the restaurant and her golden skin glowed with a hint of pink on her cheeks. How long had he merely ignored how lovely Annie was? I’ve been walking around blind. I never thought about love and marriage...

  “I’m very happy with the ways things are turning out,” he said, breaking the silence after the waiter’s departure. His voice dragged along the bottom of his throat. Marriage—where had that thought come from? I’m feeling so much for Annie. But how do I get it out into words? How do I let you know, how do I say it?

  “It’s just a small account, Jack—”

  “No. I’m not talking about business.” He stopped to sort out his emotions, what he wanted to say to her. He watched her gaze back at him, her fork poised over her salad. Her slim wrist reminded him of how slight, how fragile she had felt in his arms. A contradiction. So delicate, but so strong. So necessary to him.

  “It’s this, Annie...I like the fact that we’re working together.” He folded his hands and stared at them, afraid to look at her. “I like the storefront in your neighborhood. I like it that you are more than my executive assistant.” He paused. “I don’t know how to say what I’m...feeling.”

  “I think I understand.” Her small, light hand covered his.

  He looked up, urging her silently to put his thoughts into words, one of things he most valued in Annie.

  “I think you’re trying to say that losing Tom could have ruined everything, but we’ve handled the changeover well. And now that I’ve brought us in our first new account, we know that we can go on. LIT isn’t going to suffer from losing Tom.”

  “That’s part of it.” He reached over and touched her hand. “I’m glad I went on vacation with your family. It was fun and I’m glad I got to know your dad better. You better.”

  She closed her hand over his.

  He wanted to add, I liked kissing you. I have feelings for you. But this was too public a place for that kind of declaration. “I’m glad we got to know each other away from the office. I’m glad you’re here with me tonight.” Revealing this much shook him.

  “I’m glad you came to Wisconsin with us, Jack.” Her voice had softened. “But I warn you, you’re going to take another vacation next year.” She aimed her fork at him and then pierced a cherry tomato.

  Relieved, he chuckled. “You’re scaring me. Mrs. Groshky is one tough cookie.”

  “Eat your salad.” She tapped his hand and then popped the tomato into her mouth.

  He obeyed her. But from under his lashes, he watched her eat her salad. How could she be so fascinating? He’d eaten many meals with her. The memory of eating Chicago dogs with her at their old office flickered in his mind. I was so blind.

  Later, Jack walked Annie to her back door in the neighborhood he was beginning to feel a part of. The summer evening was still warm, the usual for July in Chicago. As they had strolled up through the backyard, he’d taken her hand. All the doubts he’d had about not knowing how to talk to Annie had faded. How could I have known how easy it would be to fall for Annie?

  But he had something he had put off asking her, something that would push him to make more changes. Will this work or is it going to be one big mistake? He had no doubt what Annie’s reply would be. She would do what was right. He could trust her in that way.

  In the faint light from a small fixture beside the back door, she bent over her purse and dug inside for her key ring. When she brought it out, he reached for it.

  “Not so fast.” He pulled her into his arms and pressed his face into her fragrant hair. “Tonight is pleasure, not business, remember?”

  He heard her sigh, a pleasant sound, especially when she relaxed against him, not pulling away. This is right. It feels so right.

  He bent and claimed her mouth, losing himself in the sensations of her soft lips and then a second sweet sigh. He ended the kiss and held her closer to him.

  “I have a favor to ask.” Jack breathed in the appealing scent that clung to her hair and hearing the traffic in the distance.

  “What?” She looked up in the dim light.

  He cupped her face with his hands. The moment felt poetic. How delicate. How lovely is my Annie. If only he had the courage to say these words.

  “What, Jack?” she whispered.

  He kissed her mouth once, twice, three times. Closing his eyes, he leaned his forehead against hers. “My dad wants me to have dinner with him tomorrow evening. He wants me to meet his fiancée. Would you
come with me?”

  “Meet his fiancée?” She hesitated while he waited for her reply.

  Then she hugged him tighter. “Of course. I’d be glad to, if you’re going to give the woman a chance.” Her tone turned doubtful.

  He’d asked himself the same question. “I will or at least I’ll try.” He rolled his forehead back and forth against hers, relishing their closeness. “Mom says she’s a nice grandmotherly-type woman.”

  “Well, good.” Annie kissed his nose.

  Hearing a door slam a few houses away, Jack claimed her lips again. Annie, you make me feel like I can do anything.

  “Hey. Oh, it’s you two.” A voice interrupted the kiss.

  Jack and Annie both turned to see Troy mounting the back steps, but Jack didn’t release her.

  “Sorry to intrude.” Troy grinned at them, unrepentant. “I’m just returning from taking Melissa home.”

  “You look different,” Jack observed, “from the last time I saw you.”

  “I feel different. Hey, thanks for pitching in and being so good to my guys at the lake. They told me all about you and fishing and swimming with them. Oh, and I had to hear about the North Star and dippers.”

  “I enjoyed it myself.” Jack held out his hand.

  “Great” Troy shook hands and then passed around them. “Sorry I interrupted. Go right on with what you were doing.” He gave another grin over his shoulder. “Good night.”

  After he’d gone inside, Jack looked down at Annie. “What gives?”

  “While we were away, he and Melissa started going to counseling and working things out. She hopes to move back home by the end of summer.” Annie traced the line of his jaw.

  Her light touch filled him with longing. “Really? How did that happen?” He stole a tiny kiss.

  “Melissa said the counseling’s really helping. Both of them had made assumptions about marriage and being parents without checking to see if their assumptions matched.”

  “Do they match now?” Jack nuzzled the soft skin of her nape. A car drove down the alley behind the house.

  “I guess that’s what they are working on now. Remember when Staramama came in and gave me trouble about Melissa?”

  “Yes.” Jack buried his face into the soft hair behind her ear.

  “Well, Staramama has been causing trouble all along. She doesn’t like it that Melissa wants to have an education and she has been interfering.”

  “I’m not surprised.” Jack pressed kisses along her hairline.

  “Anyway,” Annie went on, trying to concentrate, “at Christmas Melissa overheard her tell Troy that he should just get Melissa pregnant again like he did on their honeymoon and that would keep Melissa from going back to school.” Annie sounded breathless.

  He tried to put together what she was saying. “What?”

  “Yes, I know. Anyway, that made Melissa suspicious because she always thought that her getting pregnant on their honeymoon just happened—in spite of trying not to.”

  Concentrating on her words, Jack paused, his face buried in the cleft between her neck and soft shoulder. Even here in the city, he felt as if they were totally alone.

  “So this possibility really steamed Melissa,” Annie continued. “And when Troy tried to persuade her not to go back to school, to have another baby instead, she thought what she overheard must have been true. That made her really angry, and that’s why she went ahead and applied and got a grant and started summer school.”

  Jack lifted his head, and with one finger he turned Annie’s chin toward him. “Okay, but how has that changed now?”

  Annie smiled at him as though he’d just won an award. “Good question. The answer is that at the first counseling session, Troy said something about his great-grandmother, and Melissa confronted him with what she’d overheard.”

  “Oh, that doesn’t sound good.” Jack shook his head.

  “But it was. Troy was able to convince her that just because his great-grandmother said it was true, didn’t make it true.”

  “Ah.” Losing interest in Melissa and Troy, Jack ran his fingers into the hair above Annie’s ear, feeling its silky texture.

  She punched his chest, gaining his immediate attention. “Okay, that’s enough about my sister and her family for tonight. I’ll shut up.”

  “Annie, I’m glad they’re working things out. Austin and Andy need both parents.” He bent down and kissed her.

  For a few moments, he lost himself in the rush of sensation that flowed through him, sensitizing him to everything about Annie. An air conditioner in the window next door buzzed to life.

  Finally, she pulled away. “I should go in.”

  “Now?” he asked.

  She chuckled. “Yes, now. We have work to do tomorrow, remember? Vacation’s over.”

  He exhaled. “Yeah.”

  “You’re spending the day in Oak Park?” She pushed the door open.

  “Right. I’m meeting with the new client.” He took a step backward, though everything inside him yearned to stay with her.

  “Are you sure you don’t need me?” She paused in the doorway.

  Yes, I need you. I’ll always need you. “I’ll be fine on my own.” Then he held up one hand as though taking an oath. “I promise that I’ll be on my best customer-oriented behavior. And afterward I’ll pick you up here at six to take you to dinner with my dad.”

  “Good.” She stepped all the way inside and paused again.

  “Good night,” he said, not moving.

  “Good night.” She stared at him and then slowly shut the door. The lock clicked.

  Jack walked out to his car and climbed in. The night was warm but not sultry. A cool breeze was now whiffling the leaves overhead. He didn’t feel like going home. Why not just spend a few hours at the office? He had some files left from Tom that he wanted to scan to see if he should save the data or delete it.

  An hour later, Jack was staring at the screen of his computer in the quiet storefront office. What he saw there angered him beyond belief. How could Tom have betrayed him like that?

  Chapter 13

  The following evening in a chic and cosmopolitan restaurant, Annie sat on the edge of her chair beside Jack and across from Cliff and his fiancée, hoping she was wrong. What had happened to Jack’s mood?

  “I’m glad we made reservations.” Cliff glanced around the crowded dining room, agleam with lustrous white table linen and gilded silverware. “I thought business would be thin with everyone out of town on vacation, but I was wrong.”

  Sitting very straight on her cushioned red velvet seat, Annie sensed undeniable but unseen tension radiating from Jack. She’d felt it in the car when he picked her up. But he’d merely passed off her questions and talked nonstop computerese about what he’d done all day on their new account in Oak Park.

  Jack talking a lot and only in technical language was always a bad sign.

  Dear Lord, I sense a change in him from only last night. What’s happened to make him so resentful again?

  Beside Jack’s dad, Gloria, Cliff’s slender fiancée, looked too young to be a grandmother. She had a golf-and-tennis tan. Her shoulder-length graying hair was highlighted blond and pulled back severely into a clip at her nape. Her linen pantsuit probably had all the right labels and she wore a chunky matching bracelet and earrings set that looked to be eighteen-carat gold.

  By contrast, Annie felt that the strand of pearls she had inherited from her mother and her new summer dress of pale-yellow cotton with white buttons and belt screamed “discount store!”

  Cliff wore a well-tailored sport jacket. But Jack hadn’t changed from his work clothes, a pair of chinos and a casual knit shirt. That should have been her first warning. I should have insisted he change or refused to come along. This is going to be bad. She nearly buried her head in her hands.

  “Well, it’s nice to meet you at last, Jack,” Gloria said, when the two couples were suddenly alone after the waiter seated them.

  “Nice?” Jac
k crooked an eyebrow. “Maybe ‘astonishing’ would be a better word. My dad and I hadn’t spoken in years, until a few months ago.” Jack’s tone of voice was just this side of offensive.

  Annie endured its aftermath, the awkward silence at their table that ensued while ice clinked in glasses and well-bred conversation hummed all around them.

  When no one broke the intimidating hush, Annie took a bracing sip of ice water and made herself ask, “Gloria, how did you and Cliff meet?”

  “We met at a charity fund-raiser.” Gloria glanced at Cliff at her side, her affection showing in the way she smiled at him and reached for his hand. “I’m very much involved in the search for a cure for type 1 diabetes.”

  “Yeah, my dad goes in for that charity stuff. Good public relations.” Jack tossed this verbal grenade in a too casual tone and leaned back in his chair, staring down his nose at his dad.

  Annie had the urge to drag Jack aside and tell him to knock it off. Instead, she ignored him as the others were doing and smiled.

  “Type 1? That’s the type that children get, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it is.” Cliff’s steely tone showed how he was taking Jack’s behavior—not well. “Gloria’s second daughter was diagnosed when she was only eight.”

  Jack said nothing, just sat with his arms crossed.

  “I’m sorry to hear that Type 1 is the one treated with injections, right?” Annie’s new white pumps were pinching her toes, but she didn’t dare slip them off under the table. She had to be ready for a quick exit. Don’t push your luck, Jack, please.

  “Yes,” Gloria continued, “I can’t tell you what a shock it was to me to have it happen, though my husband had a much older sister who also developed it in childhood.” Looking down, Gloria swirled the water in her glass, making the ice chink-chink. “She had diabetes, but her family didn’t recognize the symptoms and they lost her to a diabetic coma back in the late 1950s.”

  “How sad.” Annie leaned forward, drawn by sympathy to Gloria.

  “Yes, it was.” Gloria moved her focus to Annie. “And since it can be hereditary, Ted and I watched our children for the symptoms. Unfortunately, our Debbie was the one who got the wrong gene.”