“Where is your husband?” Melanie hadn’t liked to ask before Emily raised the subject herself.
“He’s a commodity broker. Money’s great, family life is rubbish. He’s supposed to spend the week in London and come home for weekends, but lately he’s forgotten we exist.” Emily looked at Melanie and bit her lip. “I’m not sure if I’m speaking out of turn, as it’s so soon after Stephanie, but if you get the chance, hang on to Jack. He’s a keeper.”
Before Melanie could answer, Emily leaped up and strode towards the heap of grass-stained arms and legs on the lawn. “Come on now, kids. All four of you,” she added, grinning at Jack as he disentangled himself.
Jack sat on the grass, his hair a mess, his clothes muddy, grinning down at Ryan in his lap. Ryan leaned back against Jack’s chest and gave Melanie a contented smile.
Her breath caught with a sudden, almost painful yearning for a happy, settled family life, for a man like Jack to love her and Ryan. But it was something she knew she could never have.
* * *
The comfortable working relationship Melanie had with Jack before he left for Barbados soon became a distant memory. Everywhere Melanie went, Jack seemed to be. Simply being in the same room with him set her nerves jangling with awareness, as if he exuded some sort of force field.
Unable to cope with the assault on her senses, Melanie hid away in the cellar on the pretext of looking for invoices the accountant had requested. The boiler hummed beside her, making the room unbearably hot as she searched through dusty boxes of old business documents.
Sweat and dust prickling her skin, she checked her watch for the millionth time. Thank goodness. Only fifteen minutes left before she could escape to collect Ryan from school. She wiped the back of her hand across her forehead. This situation was ridiculous. How could she be reduced to hiding from her boss? Why wasn’t Jack out pursuing business opportunities for the hotel so she didn’t keep tripping over him?
As if summoned by her thoughts, Jack appeared at the door and sauntered down the narrow stairs. The harsh light from the bare bulb sculpted his face into an exquisite masterpiece of light and shadow. Her heart did a crazy somersault and she concentrated on her hands.
“Is it my imagination, or are you avoiding me?” he asked.
“I’m not,” she fired back without looking at him.
“We need to talk about what’s going on between us.”
She made a show of riffling through the box of papers, although her mind had blanked the moment she became aware of him. “There is no ‘us.’ I told you before I came to lunch on Sunday that it didn’t mean anything.”
He took a step closer. “I’m not talking about lunch,” he said, a touch of exasperation in his tone. “Steph said we have chemistry. I think she might be right.”
“I don’t want to talk about what Stephanie thinks.” Melanie closed her eyes and bit her lip. Why was he interested in her? Why couldn’t he turn his charm onto someone else and leave her to do her job?
Moving a few steps closer, he blocked her view of the door. “Melanie. Look at me.”
She kept her gaze fixed on the box of documents, terrified that if he saw her face he’d see into her heart. His inquisitive blue gaze would penetrate the brisk businesslike persona she used to keep people at a distance. She couldn’t risk getting close to him. She couldn’t bear to see the look of condemnation on his face if he discovered her secrets. “I can’t discuss this.”
He laid his hand over hers to still her busy fingers. “Melanie,” he whispered, his tone low, compelling, sending a flutter of longing through her. “Talk to me, please.” He raised his other hand, and his fingertips cradled her chin, gently turning her face up to his.
Melanie closed her eyes in a hopeless attempt to fight the temptation of his seductive charm. The pad of his thumb grazed the corner of her lips. “Allow me to take you out on a date so we can get to know each other. You might even find you like me,” he added with a touch of self-deprecating humor.
“I won’t date my boss,” she whispered desperately.
“Shall I sack you then?”
Her eyes flew open. “No, I…” Trapped in the simmering blue fire of his eyes, her mind stalled. The heady scent of spicy soap and warm male skin sent heat rushing across her skin. “I…I…” Somewhere far away on the edge of her awareness the grandfather clock in the entrance hall chimed three times. “I have to collect Ryan.”
Snatching a breath, Melanie ducked under Jack’s arm and stumbled up the narrow stairs, dragging herself up the handrail as though it were a lifeline. She dashed into the manager’s office, terrified Jack would follow. Grabbing her handbag, she tripped out of her work shoes, kicked them under the chair and stepped into her flats. As she headed for the front door, Jack emerged from the hall that led to the cellar.
Breath coming in uneven snatches—more to do with what happened in the cellar than the speed of her stride—she tried to calm down and focus on meeting Ryan. This was crazy behavior. She was thirty, not sixteen.
After her dash down the street, she reached the school ten minutes early and had to wait. Leaning against the green metal railings outside the flat-roofed building of the classroom, she massaged her temples.
How could she continue to work with Jack now? When she looked at him she wanted to see the charming, politely aloof man who’d employed her, but his attitude had changed since she’d shared his family dinner. He smiled at her as if he knew what she was thinking. He touched her, a casual brush of fingers on her sleeve or a polite hand to her back as they passed through a door—maddening moments of contact that should mean nothing but made her brain turn to fluff and her blood burn.
And every time she looked at him, she remembered him flopped on the lawn after playing football with the kids, his hair mussed, his eyes sparkling, and Ryan happily cradled in his lap.
Jack was ruining all her plans.
“Mrs. Marshall?”
Melanie looked up, startled by the sound of her name.
Ryan’s form teacher stood on the pavement in front of her, smiling, while Ryan chatted happily to his friend close by. “I understand congratulations are in order,” she said.
Congratulations? Melanie racked her befuddled brain to remember if she’d entered a draw run by the parents’ association or something, and came up blank. “I’m sorry, I’m not with you?”
“Your impending nuptials.”
“My what?”
“Ryan told me that Jack Summers is going to be his new daddy. It’s not a secret, is it?”
The mild ache in Melanie’s temples pounded with her heartbeat as she glanced at her son’s happy smile. “I’m afraid Ryan’s confused. Jack’s my boss.”
The teacher frowned, then smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry. I just assumed after the story I heard about Mr. Summers’s breakup with that solicitor… Never mind. Must be a case of wishful thinking on Ryan’s part.”
“Yes.” Melanie nodded as Ryan skipped towards her, grinning. “Wishful thinking.”
Her chest tightened with doubts as Ryan looked up at her, brown eyes sparkling with excitement. Surely Ryan was only dazzled by Jack’s skill with a football. If she kept Ryan away from Jack and distracted him with other things, her son would soon forget his obsession.
“Did you have a good day at school?” she asked with forced brightness.
He jumped up and down. “Can we see Jack tonight?”
Melanie glanced away and counted to three. “Not ton
ight. We’re going to get your feet measured. Maybe you can have new shoes.”
“New shoes. New shoes,” Ryan chanted as they set off along the pavement towards the shops. At least she’d turned his attention away from Jack.
“Can I go and show Jack my new shoes?”
“No,” Melanie snapped before she could stop herself. “No, sweetheart,” she added more gently. “Jack will be having his tea.”
“Can we have tea with him?”
“He hasn’t invited us.”
“We can invite him to our house then.”
“Not tonight.”
“When?” Ryan pulled on her hand until she stopped and looked down at him. “When can he come, Mummy? I want to play football again.”
As Ryan’s demands became more insistent, Melanie’s insides wound tighter. She had to get off the pavement, away from the people pushing past them, or she was going to scream.
Melanie guided Ryan to a wooden bench beneath a willow tree in the nearby park and they sat. “Look, sweetheart. You can’t tell people Jack is going to be your daddy when he isn’t.”
“But he’s your boyfriend. That makes him nearly my daddy.”
“He’s not my boyfriend. I work with him.”
Swinging his legs, Ryan looked down and twisted the hem of his T-shirt. “My friend Martin says Jack dumped his mum’s friend because he wants to marry you.”
Melanie briefly covered her eyes. So the gossip had reached the playground. “Dumped isn’t a nice word, Ryan,” she said, evading the topic.
Ryan’s little legs stilled and he looked up at her, his face creased with concentration. “If I tell Jack I want him to be my dad, will he marry you then?”
A knot cinched tight around Melanie’s heart and she couldn’t catch her breath. She’d been so sure the way to protect Ryan from being hurt was to raise him alone. She would not let her parents back in his life just so they could reject him again, and she would never give another man the chance to get close. She’d ignored the fact he might need a man’s company. In trying to protect him, had she instead deprived him of something important?
A little boy’s voice rang out from the playground on the other side of the park, calling for his dad. Melanie stared at the children scrambling across a wooden climbing frame, at the mums and dads standing together ready to lend a helping hand.
Had she deluded herself? Who was she really protecting? Had she sacrificed Ryan’s happiness to guard her own heart? How could she have been so blind? So selfish?
If it hadn’t been for Jack, she might have cut Ryan off from adult male company until he was a teenager. She needed to do some serious thinking, reassess her priorities. Whatever it took, she had to do what was best for her son.
Chapter Four
Jack paced back and forth across his office. If he didn’t know why Melanie refused to date, how would he ever overcome her objections? Yet every time he tried to talk to her about how he felt, she changed the subject or ran away. He guessed some man had really done a number on her. Top of the list of suspects was her husband. The man might be dead, but he was certainly not forgotten.
He should ask Melanie about her past and let her decide how much she wanted to reveal. Unfortunately, she was so secretive he suspected she wouldn’t tell him a darn thing.
He fished out of his pocket the note of the doctors’ surgery telephone number. His conscience squirmed at the thought of checking on her behind her back, but what other option did he have?
Decision made, the tension in his neck eased. He strode around the desk, snatched up the phone and started punching in numbers. At the last minute, he slammed the handset down. He couldn’t call from the hotel. Knowing how efficient Melanie was, she’d be bound to spot the telephone number of where she used to work listed on the phone bill. He rubbed the back of his neck. He couldn’t use his mobile phone for the same reason. He’d have to use his home phone.
A few minutes later, he walked through his front door. He fixed himself a stiff drink—almost unheard of for him midafternoon, but he thought he’d earned it after the week he’d suffered. He sat at the writing desk in his living room and called the doctors’ surgery in Kent where Melanie had worked.
“Good afternoon, Littlechurch Surgery, can I help you,” a brightly efficient female voice answered.
“I need some information on a woman who used to work at the surgery.”
There was silence on the other end of the line for a few seconds. “I don’t think we’re allowed to give out details like that.”
“I’m an employer. The surgery was quoted as a reference.”
“Oh, I see. Let me put you through to the practice manager. Can I have your name please?”
Jack balked a bit at this request. He’d hoped to remain anonymous so there was no chance his inquiry would get back to Melanie. Only after he’d given his real name did it occur to him that he could have used a false one.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Summers. I’m the practice manager. Who were you wanting a reference for?”
“Melanie Marshall.”
A heavy silence descended on the other end of the line. When the woman spoke again, her tone was clipped. “Mrs. Marshall left our employ when her husband left the practice.”
“Her husband worked there as well?”
The silence deepened.
“Dr. Marshall was one of the partners.” She was quiet for so long, Jack thought they’d been cut off, then in a warning tone she added, “Before you employ Mrs. Marshall, I strongly advise you to do some research on the internet. That’s all I’m willing to say over the phone. If you want anything more, please put your request in writing. Goodbye.”
The dial tone hummed in his ear and he frowned. Search on the internet for what? Melanie’s name? Was she famous? Or infamous? He’d never heard of her before, although the name Dr. Marshall rang a bell somewhere in the back of his mind. A chill crept through him.
Jack opened his laptop, turned it until he got a signal from the wireless router in the hotel, and typed Dr. Marshall into a search engine.
A page of results popped up. Before Jack had a chance to scan them, a knock sounded. He gazed at the front door warily. He’d be willing to bet that was Melanie. She had a habit of catching him out. This time he’d be prepared. He closed the page and shut the lid on his laptop before he headed for the door. Through the small diamond-shaped glass panel, he saw chestnut hair. He smiled to himself in anticipation of seeing her.
When Jack opened the door, he found Ryan beside her, drumming his feet on the path. “Look at my new shoes,” the boy burst out with obvious glee.
Jack smiled and ruffled Ryan’s short dark hair. “Wow, they’re super smart.” He turned his attention to Melanie and his smile faded. Her face was tense with worry. “What…?” Instinctively, he raised his arm to hug her but then let it fall back to his side. Frustration warred with concern. She’d run from his touch earlier so he couldn’t risk touching her again, even to give her comfort. He stepped aside. “Come on in.”
Ryan belted in and started picking things up, exploring his new surroundings.
“Look with your eyes, not your hands, Ryan,” Melanie warned, although her voice lacked its usual ring of authority. She sounded weary and defeated.
“Want a cup of tea?” he asked.
“We need to talk.”
He felt like saying he’d been trying to talk to her all week, but she obviously wasn’t in the mood to ap
preciate the irony.
“Let’s talk while we have some tea. Want to go out in the garden, Ryan?”
The boy scampered towards the back door and hauled on the handle. Jack unlocked the door and watched him race outside. Melanie followed Ryan out and glanced around. “Stay on the lawn where I can see you, sweetheart.”
Jack carried their cups of tea outside. The two of them sat on a bench facing the garden. Ryan ran in circles looking down at his new shoes.
“Life’s so simple when you’re young, isn’t it?” Jack said.
“Hmm.” Melanie wrapped her hands around her cup. “I’ve been thinking.”
He stilled, sensing this was important.
“I’m sorry I’ve avoided you this week. I’ve been confused.”
“I’m a bit confused myself,” he quipped, trying to lighten her mood. She gave no response.
“I’m not ready to start dating again.”
Jack’s chest tightened and he quashed his instinct to try to persuade her otherwise. He sensed a “but” coming.
“What I would like is a friend.” She curled her lips into a smile, and it looked like an effort.
His instinct to pull her into the safety of his embrace surprised him. Her vulnerability touched him in a way that was unfamiliar. He’d never felt the need to protect Stephanie or any of his past girlfriends.
“Since the accident that killed my husband and injured Ryan, I’ve been a little overprotective.” She took a sip of tea and her hands trembled around the cup. “I think I’ve made a mistake.”
Jack suppressed his burst of relief that she’d decided to confide in him and kept his voice level. “Is that how Ryan got his scars?”
“You’ve noticed them.” She pulled out a tissue from her bag and wiped her nose.
“What happened?” he asked gently, hoping she’d open up and give him an insight into her past.
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