Pimpernel

by Sheralyn Pratt

  She wanted Jack to walk through the door, but she didn’t expect it. It was probably just one of those oversized muscle men delivering something. Margot had made it clear that things would be running non-stop for the next forty-eight hours and that she would check in and update her when she could. In the meantime, Claire just needed to hunker down and be low-maintenance.

  So when Jack walked through the door wearing the same clothes she’d seen him in earlier that night, Claire froze for a moment.

  What was he doing here?

  “Hey,” he said softly, shutting the door behind him. The security light flashed from green to red, which was an easier thing to pay attention to than the fact he was smiling at her. “Great job tonight.”

  “Thanks,” she said, a little warmth spreading in her chest. She had done well. One might even say she’d done things perfectly.

  He moved closer, which had her heart doing that jump rope thing again. She looked him over, trying to figure out why she would have the reaction. Jack wasn’t handsome like Ryan. In the looks department, he was utterly average. Not handsome…not ugly…quite forgettable, actually. Yet her hands felt a little shaky when she looked at him and she wasn’t sure what to do with them.

  He walked over to the bed and sat on the end. “You need anything?”

  The truth. That’s what she needed. And the answer to the question she’d been asking herself for the last thirty minutes.

  “My mom’s heading up the investment scam, isn’t she?” Claire blurted. When Jack’s face didn’t change expressions, she kept going. “It’s the only thing that makes sense in all this. I mean, there is no other reason for her to be here in Las Vegas, and I could never comprehend why she moved in the first place. She hates it here. Combine that with the fact that you said that learning who the invisible partner is could play with my head and…it’s her. Isn’t it? She’s the one I just screwed over, and she’s the one you’re going to hand over to authorities.”

  In the place of answering, Jack reached into his pocket and brought out the stack of cards he’d shown her before—the cards with the secrets written on them. Without saying a word, he fanned them out in front of her. “Choose one.”

  Out of habit, her mind mapped the cards, coming up with a different number than last time.

  Twenty-four? There were twenty-four cards? “There were twenty-three last time,” she said aloud.

  “You’re very observant,” Jack said, looking both nervous and impressed. “Now pick a card, any card.”

  “What if I pick the wrong one?”

  He smiled. “Give it a try.”

  People always picked cards out of the center, but she went for the card on the far left. Once she had it in her hand, she hesitated in flipping it over.

  “How’d I do?” she asked.

  “Take a look and find out,” he said, returning the remaining cards into a stack without putting them away.

  Taking a breath, she flipped the card and looked. Your mother is a founding partner in the investment scam.

  Sitting there, with her worst fears realized, Claire was still impressed at Jack’s skill. “How did you know I’d pick that card?”

  He smiled. “Magician’s secret.”

  “Of course,” she said, looking back at the card. A moment later she felt tears making their way to her eyes.

  “I’m so sorry, Claire,” Jack said, his hand reaching out to rest on hers.

  Claire didn’t pull away. Doing so would have been fake, and at the moment, she didn’t care if Jack was faking sympathy or honestly offering it so long as it was there for the taking. So what if her heart was double-timing at his touch and her blood felt like it was being heated inside a teapot? Let it. Moments like this were so few and far between for her that it would be a crime to kill it.

  Maybe Jack would betray her down the line. Maybe not. If so, would that hurt any worse than what her mom had been doing for the past year?

  No. It wouldn’t. It couldn’t. So she’d take the comforting touch from the guy she was starting to like just a little too much. She’d even take a hug from him if she could get it. Heaven knew she needed it.

  Claire wasn’t aware she was crying until Jack handed her a handkerchief. She took it and shook her head. “I don’t know why I’m crying. My mom and I were never close. She never even liked me.”

  “But she’s your mom,” Jack said.

  The words broke the dam on Claire’s tears. At first, she hid them in the handkerchief, but when a shoulder presented itself, Claire was quick to wrap her arms around Jack’s neck and latch on. He didn’t speak. He didn’t offer soothing words. He just held on lightly until she had the composure to pull away.

  “Sorry,” she muttered, more out of reflex than anything.

  “Not at all,” he said, ignoring the cry stains on the shoulder of his shirt. “It’s a lot to process.”

  She shook her head. “I knew. I think part of me knew the night those guys pulled me into the SUV to meet the shadowy guy. I think part of me at the time was thinking my mom had sent them. I just chalked it up to paranoia and kept pushing the thought down…but I knew.”

  “Well, then, I’m sorry you were right,” he said, looking like he meant it.

  She shook her head. “So if people are sent to hunt me down over the next few days, my mom is the one who sent them. That’s great. Just great.”

  “It sucks,” he agreed. “But we won’t let them get you—not until we want them to—if it’s any consolation.”

  Claire wasn’t so sure about that. “My family is rich.”

  “It won’t help them,” Jack said with such quiet confidence that she believed him. Again, her heart pounded as she looked at him. Again, she let it—happy to feel something besides fear or anxiety. That would all rain back down on her after he left. She’d take the reprieve for as long as she could get it.

  “I never know when you’re acting, but right now I’m choosing not to care,” she said before she could think better of it.

  He fiddled with the cards in his hands. “From here until the end, I’ll deal straight with you, Claire. We’re working together now. Lies serve no one.”

  It made sense, but she still had her doubts. “And if I ask you to pick another card?”

  “It’s up to you,” he said, his voice carefully neutral. Then he brought the deck up between them, one card rising up out of the rest as if an invisible string was pulling it up. “You told me earlier that you already know this one.”

  Part of her wondered how he’d done the trick while the other part reached out and grabbed the card and flipped it. Everett Ramsey is not your biological father.

  She nodded. “Yes. That family secret is an oldie but a goodie.”

  He nodded, fidgeting with the cards again, and it was then she realized she was looking at Jack’s tell. When he didn’t want you looking at him, he hid behind magic. That meant he didn’t want her looking at him just then. He was using distraction and facts to keep distance between them.

  Part of her was grateful while another part wanted to ask why he had bothered coming down if this was all he was going to do. It was confusing, and Claire wasn’t in the mood to be any more confused than she already was.

  The grateful part of her won over and pushed the conversation forward.

  “You know who my father is, don’t you?”

  He froze ever so slightly, confirming her suspicion and making her heart pound in an entirely different way as she assessed his body language.

  “But you don’t want to tell me,” she guessed. “Not tonight.”

  “Not tonight,” he agreed.

  “Why not?” She studied his hazel eyes and tight lips, trying to pretend he was an investor on the other side of a screen and not a guy she wanted to use as a pillow. “Because I know him?”

  His lips stayed pressed together, and he nodded. “You do, Claire.”

  She knew her father? He’d been in her life somewhere along the line? Or maybe he was a celebri
ty that everyone knew. Whatever the case, she would know the name on the card if he let her pick another card at “random.”

  Something about that had her feeling hopeful.

  “I want to know,” she blurted.

  He hesitated. “Can it wait forty-eight hours?”

  Of course it could, but after fifteen years she didn’t want to wait another moment. “Convince me it should.”

  Jack dragged his thumb along the edge of the cards. “Before this is over, you will have to look your mother in the eye one last time. If you know who your father is, it will change the conversation. It might even change the outcome in a way that takes you out of the safety zone. I’d rather that not happen.”

  “Then that’s all the more reason I should know now.”

  Jack shook his head. “I’ll say this much. Your father has always known he was your father. From the beginning and throughout your life. He never told you, nor did your mom or dad. And if they tell you sometime in the next few days, it will not be out of love. It will be to manipulate you into making a choice that is in their best interest. Not yours.” His hand again reached for hers. “They’ve had a quarter of a century to put your needs first, Claire, and they haven’t. Don’t think they’re going to change all that starting this week.”

  Wow. Maybe the most fully depressing thing anyone had ever said to her. Ever. And that was saying something.

  He held up the cards. “In forty-eight hours, these are all yours. I promise you that, but I also can’t force you to wait. I can only ask that you trust me.”

  She shook her head. “I have a pretty long track history of trusting the wrong people. Including you.”

  “Fair point,” he said, placing the cards on the bed. “But if you think back on the past few weeks, I think it’s fair to say that I have a decent understanding as to how you work. I know what gets under your skin.”

  All that was absolutely true. Daniel definitely knew how to push and un-push her buttons. By default, Jack would know all that too.

  “Some things written on these cards will paralyze you,” he said. “I hate to hang them out in front of you, but I told you when you came on with us that we would be straight up with you. So I am. But I’m also asking you to trust me when I say that if your subconscious is still fighting to make you not see things that have been around you throughout your life, maybe right now isn’t the best time to force your eyes open. It can wait two days. If you choose to see something before then, so be it, but don’t force it when you’re at your most vulnerable.”

  She heard the words, all of them, but she was more fascinated by the light grip of his hand and the gentle stroke of his thumb across the back of her hand. Part of her wondered if it was a manipulation to get her to agree, but it seemed unconscious on his part. Either way, she felt the cozy kind of warm that was usually reserved for sitting in front of warm fireplaces on a cool night.

  “You make good arguments,” she managed to say after about a second of awkward silence. And I trust you. You make it easy. Too easy.

  He leaned forward, his hazel eyes growing intense. “The secrets that have been used to manipulate you throughout your life shouldn’t be what you think about over the next two days. What you need to think about is what you want. What do you want your future to hold? Who do you want to be? Where do you want to be? This is a time to look forward, not back, as you make your decisions.”

  His intensity had her skin tingling, but she tried to ignore that as she considered his advice. “Think about myself and what I hope for the future? I’m not very good at that. I’m better at freaking out at all the things that might go wrong along the way.”

  Jack shook his head. “Not for the next forty-eight hours. Now is a time to forget your baggage and envision where you want to be. Only then will you be able to make the decisions that take you to that place.”

  “I hadn’t thought of it that way before.”

  He tapped a finger on the cards laying on the bed. “There are always distractions to drown in. There are always people who wish to push you beneath them so they can rise another step—especially with someone who has skills like you, Claire.”

  Was he trying to make her feel special? If so, mission accomplished. Against her will, her face flushed as she felt her heart pounding in her ear, of all places. Still, she couldn’t fully buy into the picture he was painting.

  “That’s really hard for me,” she confessed. “My mind gets really fixated on what ifs, and once those start, I don’t know how to stop them.”

  He let out a small sigh of frustration. “I don’t know how to stop them either, but I can tell you that worry is a waste of imagination. Once you start imagining all the things that can go wrong, it gets ridiculous pretty fast.” He gestured to the ceiling. “I mean, a satellite could plummet from the sky right now and take us both out in a fiery ball of flames. But what are the chances? Is that really worth thinking about?”

  The visual of a plummeting satellite hit Claire like a punch to the stomach as she imagined death via fireball. It was quite…operatic.

  He gripped her hands and kept going. “So I guess my question for you is, if something as impossible as falling satellite came your way, what would you want to be doing when it found you? Who would you want to be? How would you want to be remembered?”

  His hands squeezed her lightly, probably not having the intended reassuring effect since her heart started pounding. She heard his words—maybe too well—because suddenly all she could think that if a satellite torpedoed out of the sky that very moment she didn’t want to be remembered as the woman who died having never kissed a man…a very specific man.

  The temperature in the room seemed to rise ten degrees in an instant as the sound of her own heartbeat became audible in her ears. It was like having a panic attack…only nicer.

  Across from her, Jack suddenly looked concerned. “Whoa, you suddenly don’t look so well,” he said, pressing the back of his fingers to her forehead. “I probably shouldn’t have used that example, should I? I’m—”

  She didn’t want to hear whatever he had to say next. If a satellite was about to fall out of orbit and torch them, Claire didn’t want it to find the two of them with Jack panicking and apologizing while he checked her temperature like she was a child.

  In a moment of rare impulsiveness, Claire gripped Jack’s shirt and pulled until his lips landed on hers. He didn’t pull away, but he didn’t press in either, so for a moment, they just sat there with their lips pressing together.

  Claire’s first thought was that the bumping of their lips didn’t quite have the punch she thought it would. Their mouths were touching, and no matter what all the story books said, there wasn’t anything all that magical—

  He moved, his mouth slanting against hers as the hand that had been checking her temperature came down to trace her jaw. The change had her eyes blinking open in shock as what seemed to be flu symptoms washed over her. Hot, too-sensitive skin. Lightheadedness. Unsettled stomach. Shallow breathing. Foggy mind. Lethargy—all she wanted to was lean in and stop thinking.

  Unsettled, Claire started to pull away only to have Jack’s lips seek hers out again and pull her back into the kiss. She gave in for a few moments before pulling away and pressing her hand to her forehead.

  “I feel…” Words stopped when she saw Jack’s face. Dilated pupils…flared nostrils…shallow breathing, all paired with a fixated gaze and direct body language. He’d liked the kiss—a lot—and the realization that she’d this effect on him swam through her flu symptoms, leaving her feel a little euphoric. The fever washing over her suddenly didn’t feel sickly at all, but yummy.

  An involuntary smile curved her lips as she tried to finish her sentence. “I feel…”

  He traced the edge of his thumb down the center of her lips, somehow making her feel the simple touch everywhere.

  “I feel the same way,” he said, leaning in again.

  Jack was clearly more practiced at this kissing thin
g than she was because his kiss felt very different than the one she’d pulled him into. Their first kiss had been like a crash course where their lips had acted like airbags to keep their teeth from cracking together. Claire understood that wasn’t optimal now that she felt kiss number two, which was…was…

  She couldn’t process it in the moment, but already knew she was totally going to obsess about it later.

  For now, Claire knew that she liked the way the short crop of Jack’s hair tickled against her palms and the way his hands splayed on her back as he held her. She felt secure, not trapped by his hold, as she let Jack introduce her to the connoisseur version of kissing. Less mashing and more exploring. If your brain forgot to think, you were doing it right. At least, that was Claire’s assumption based on everything she’d experienced so far.

  Time disappeared, as did everything else until Jack’s phone chimed with a text. He flinched as if surprised by the sound, then pulled away. She opened her eyes and felt like she was looking at him through a haze. Except his lips. They were wet and shiny and a little swollen. Had she done that?

  She wanted to do it again.

  He was looking at her like he might be thinking the same thing when he pulled out his phone. “I’ve gotta—”

  “Of course,” Claire replied before he could finish. When he looked at the text, she appreciated that he didn’t hide the screen from her.

  Conference room in 5.

  He looked up at her. “I’ve got to go.”

  “Yeah,” she said. She meant to look into his eyes as she said it, but her eyes dipped down to his lips.

  “Oh, man,” he breathed. “I really need you to not look at me like that.”

  “Like what?” she asked, forcing her eyes up to his.

  For a moment Jack was stone still, then he stood, his hand sweeping up the cards from the bed and pocketing them.

  “I’ve got to go,” he repeated, then walked out the door without looking back. His abruptness confused her, but one thing Claire knew for sure was that if a satellite fell from the sky and crushed her that very moment, she would die a very happy woman.