by Linda Cajio
Her jaw dropped in astonishment at his knowledge of the terms of her agreement with Ned.
“That is private business!” she began hotly.
“Half of Wall Street knows it.” he said in a cool voice. “Ned is in the habit of bragging to his friends about how untroublesome that little clause is to him. It feeds his ego to think that you’re too flighty even to know you can invoke it.”
“Flighty?”
“Flighty. At M & L, you are considered to be a born-late hippy who has an unprofitable shop in a quaint little seaside town because she needs to do something to fill the hours.”
She opened her mouth to vent a protest, then shut it as she realized it was exactly what he wanted her to do. He wanted her angry at Ned, angry at everyone, and determined to prove them wrong. She could see how people would get the wrong impression of her. They only knew she owned a Christmas specialty store on the Jersey coast. Even Ned really didn’t know much more than that about her. But they didn’t know her. She doubted very much if Ned “bragged.” He was probably relieved that she had confidence in him.
She forced herself to shrug nonchalantly. “They’ve got a right to their opinion. But I’m curious about why you’d think that breaking my proxy agreement with Ned would cure the company’s ills.”
“I told you before. Your shares give Ned the majority voting block on the board. How a board goes, so goes the company. It’s bad enough when stockholders don’t vote the right way, but it’s worse when someone else is doing it for them.
“So you expect me to go up to M & L’s main offices, take a quick look-see, and be ready to make an intelligent decision?” She laughed dryly. “I could decide that Ned is doing a great job.”
“Not if I’m the one showing you the operation, Cass.”
Aha, she thought, while smothering a smile of satisfaction. So Dallas would guide her through M & L. It ought to be some guidance. She bet her last Mary Snead pillow he was the one who thought she was flighty—and pliable. He had to, if he expected her to fall for this.
It suddenly occurred to her exactly how to teach Dallas Carter a well-deserved lesson and at the same time keep him from causing trouble with the other stockholders. It meant being around him for hours at a stretch, but she decided she could handle it. All she had to do was maintain her poise, and she’d just done that.
“I do understand what you’re telling me,” she began slowly. “But M & L is a manufacturer. I sell—”
“It’s still a business. You obviously have a talent for knowing what will sell in what market. It doesn’t matter whether it’s ball bearings or microchips; the appeal of each is only to a particular market. I know what I’m talking about, Cass. It’s what I do for a living. I’ve worked for a computer manufacturer, a foreign-car builder, a major restaurant chain, and now a lingerie company. Strip any business down to the fundamentals, and it’s the same as the next.”
“How long is your vacation?” she asked.
He frowned at the sudden question. “I have to be back a few days before the board meeting on the fifteenth. I’d like you to go with me, Cass.”
“But …” It was her turn to frown. She could have sworn Ned had said it was on the twentieth. She made a mental note to double-check the date when she received the notices.
“I’ll make you a deal, Dallas. You say selling is the same thing, no matter what it is or how big. Work in my store for the rest of your vacation. Prove to me that you can put a fish in another pond and he won’t know the difference. If you can do that, I’ll go up to New York and look over M & L.”
He narrowed his eyes at her, clearly considering what her offer meant. She mustered an innocent smile and added, “I bet you can’t.”
He gazed at her for one moment longer, then thrust out his hand. “Done. And I’ll outsell your other employees.”
He had taken the bait. Cass grinned and shook his hand. She instantly realized that touching him was a big mistake. His hand was warm and strong and very masculine. To her relief, the door to the store opened and a young couple walked in.
“I believe, Mr. Carter,” she said, “that you have customers to wait on.”
And that, she decided, made them almost even.
Four
He must have been crazy.
As Dallas pushed his way through the aisle to ring up his third sale of the day, he wondered why he had ever agreed to Cass’s deal. At the time it had seemed like a perfect opportunity to nurture the seeds he had planted with her. They’d be working together for long periods of time. He could talk in detail about what was happening at Marks & Lindley, bring more logical argument to his case. Instead, everything seemed to be conspiring against him.
First the heavens had split apart at the seams, and heavy rains were drenching the entire shoreline. WinterLand had been mobbed since it opened that morning. If Noah’s Ark had pulled up outside, he wouldn’t have been surprised. Hell, he thought, everybody else was here. The only good thing was that he couldn’t help but sell something. It was frustrating to admit, though, that he wasn’t outselling the regular employees. Jean mothered people into buying. Mary, with her round-eyed madonna look and eager-to-please attitude, made people feel guilty if they didn’t buy. And Joe, the part-timer, called in for the heavy traffic, acted as if every customer were an unpardonable interruption. Somehow, people couldn’t resist forcing him to sell them something. But the big-shot president could barely give away the damn stuff compared to them, Dallas acknowledged grimly. So much for putting fish in different ponds. If it weren’t for the rain, he’d be in big trouble as far as the terms of the deal were concerned. And Cass, with the constant gleam of triumph in her eyes, knew it.
“How about some postcards?” he asked his two women customers when he reached the register.
“No,” said one. “Just the doll.”
“A hand-carved wooden ornament? It would look terrific on your tree.”
“I don’t bother with a tree.”
“We have some beautiful glass candle holders—”
“Just the doll,” snapped the other. “And hurry it up—it’s hot in here.”
“Right,” Dallas said flatly. “Cash or charge?”
He jabbed out the amount on the register buttons and practically slapped the change into their hands.
Jean appeared and, with her hip, nudged him away so she could ring up a sale.
“How’s it going?” she asked.
“Rotten,” he admitted, not bothering to leave the counter area.
“Why don’t you take a break?” Jean suggested. “We’ve handled bigger crowds than this.”
He smiled at her. “No. I might miss out on yet another humbling experience.”
Jean chuckled. “You’re doing okay.”
“Jean, I haven’t done just okay since I sold encyclopedias door to door.”
“Come on,” Jean said scoffingly. “Encyclopedias? You?”
“Me,” he confessed with a wry smile as he remembered the summer before college, when he’d lugged samples of the heavy books in a desperate attempt to earn tuition money. His father’s military income hadn’t stretched to funding higher education. He’d finally wised up on the encyclopedias, and gotten a full-time job after classes. He’d nearly killed himself, but he’d had the money for school. Chuckling, he added, “Believe me, Jean, doing okay with that was actually doing great.”
“Well, relax, Dallas. You’re simply helping out here, right?”
Gazing into Jean’s shrewdly questioning eyes, he only smiled. Obviously, she wasn’t buying Cass’s story that he was filling in while he was down here. Considering the way he was doing so far, he wasn’t about to admit the truth. “That’s me. Good old ‘fill-in’ Carter.”
“When donkeys fly,” Jean muttered.
After Jean went back into the fray, he leaned on the counter and surveyed the crowded shop. The customers were animated, their festive voices belying the gloomy day outside the door. One big party, and he was the wallf
lower, he thought in frustration.
His gaze turned to Cass, who was showing several wreaths to a group of people. Her profile was patrician and delectable. Her shining ash-blond hair was swept back from her shoulders and arrowed down to the middle of her back. Her stance was at once straight and relaxed, the tailored plaid shirt and blue trousers she wore showcasing her figure.
She was gorgeous, and that, he admitted, was becoming a very big problem. The time he’d spent in her company had only made him more aware of her small but perfect curves, the scent of wild flowers in her hair, and the easygoing confidence she exuded. It was obvious that she was comfortable with the woman she was, and accepting of others. He considered the ardent career women he had dated in the past. Conversations with them had consisted of debates over whether women were getting a fair shake in the marketplace; relaxation had meant doing something very up-scale, like the Club Med; and sex had been a serious competition for equal satisfaction, with each going to his or her side of the bed afterward to sleep in solitary peace. That kind of woman had made sense, in an odd way. He’d been burned badly once, after which companionship without commitment had appealed as much to him as it had to the women with whom he’d been involved. But for a long time now, he had preferred being alone rather than attempting what he had known would be another sterile relationship.
Cass was different from those women. Very different. She had a joy in her that left him wondering if he’d missed some joke. He could easily imagine her sopping wet and grinning with satisfaction as she held up a crab … or naked and laughing in bed. She was an oasis in a very dry desert, he admitted. With each moment he was becoming more and more attracted. He’d begun to fantasize about kissing her, and the idea was so tempting that he could almost taste it.
Dammit, he thought. He couldn’t afford to waste time daydreaming about her, like some kid with his first crush. He was too old for crushes. But the more time he spent with her, the more he wanted her. He’d have to do something about that. Later, he acknowledged. He should be taking advantage of this golden opportunity to push her toward his objective. And he should be doing his damnedest to figure out some way to win in this deal with her—even if he had to cheat.
“Hey, mister! You planning on daydreamin’ all day? I got things to buy, ya know.”
Dallas straightened from the counter and stared down at a wizened lady, who glared back belligerently.
“Here.” She shoved a half-dozen items across the counter. “Ya got any tablecloths with reindeer on ’em?”
“I’ll go look,” he said, smiling politely.
As he walked toward the tablecloth displays, he decided that if he had to, he’d draw the damn reindeers himself.
Anything for a sale.
With weary satisfaction Cass totaled up the day’s receipts on the register. The deluge of rain and customers was over, and WinterLand looked as if a cyclone had hit it.
A very profitable cyclone, she admitted, smiling as she stuffed the money and checks in a bank bag and zipped it locked. Dropping the bag on the counter, she glanced up to find only Dallas straightening the displays.
“Where are the others?” she asked, frowning.
“They left a few minutes ago.” He winked at her. “We’re alone at last.”
She looked around the shop as if disbelieving, then forced back a desperate urge to run. Okay, so she was alone with him. No big deal. “Well, you might as well go on home, too, Dallas. I’ll clean up.”
He came toward her. “And desert you? Never. My father, the colonel, would be put out by my lack of manners.”
“Your father wasn’t a colonel,” she retorted.
“Full-bird, Air Force,” he replied, leaning over from the other side of the counter.
She ordered her feet not to back away. The counter was between them, and Formica made a damned fine barrier. “That explains why you think you can order someone to do something, and she’ll just do it.”
“Not me, Cass,” he said, chuckling. “I haven’t ordered you to do anything. I’ve merely told you the problem and the only possible solution. Why are you so resistant to the thought of being more active with your shares?”
Forgetting herself, she leaned forward and said in a heated tone, “Because I don’t believe in butting in where I don’t need to.”
He smiled at her. “A company has to be run by what’s best for the whole. Too many people depend on it for their livelihoods to stand on good manners. You’re letting one man get in the way of what’s best for everyone else.”
Determined to puncture his argument, she rested her elbows on the fake marble veneer of the Formica top, and smiled sweetly. “That’s the problem, isn’t it, Dallas? I don’t know that what you’re saying is the best thing for Marks & Lindley.”
“Yes, you do.” He placed his forearms on the counter. Their hands nearly touched. “You know Lusty Lingerie is totally wrong for the company. And you wonder why you were never made aware of the line.”
She stared into his tawny brown eyes, fascinated by the tiny flecks of green flame she saw in their depths. “I’m not wondering about anything. I missed the announcement, that’s all. I’m a lousy reader.”
His features seemed to loom closer, yet she could have sworn he hadn’t moved. “You can’t read what isn’t there, Cass. Aren’t you wondering what else you ‘missed’?”
He had the beginnings of a dimple on his right cheek. Odd that she’d never noticed it before, she dimly thought. “What else could I have missed?”
“This.”
His mouth captured hers in a fierce kiss that sent a sudden and shocking explosion of desire rocketing through her body. She tried to resist it, to force herself to break away, but a loud buzzing was in her head, cutting off all logic and sensibilities. Mindless, she pressed closer, greedily trying to draw in the incredible sustenance she found. His hands, strong and sure, knotted around her ash-blond tresses, his lips coaxing hers to open.
Helplessly, she responded as he deepened the kiss. Her hands threaded through his hair, her fingers clenching and unclenching with her rising need. For long minutes their tongues swirled together in the first dance of mating, teasing and tormenting their desire to greater heights. As if she’d been kissing him all her life, she instinctively sensed the changes of movement and adjusted her mouth to his each time. The promise of satisfaction sang through her, as did the desperation to possess it. Breathing was impossible and unnecessary. It wasn’t fair, she thought, that he could kiss like this.…
She was never sure who ended the kiss first. Suddenly, though, his lips were gone, and at the same time she was straightening away from the counter. They gazed at each other across the solid barrier between their bodies.
Finally he spoke. “We can’t do that again, Cass.”
“No,” she agreed, refusing to turn away from him. He’d think she was hurt by his words. And she wasn’t hurt. She ignored a shot of odd pain that raced through her. Common sense never hurt anybody, she acknowledged. It was just a case of libidos exercising their freedom of speech … so to speak. One little kiss was nothing to get excited about.
Cass swallowed against the lie.
“Right.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. “You about ready to go?”
She looked around for the bank bag she knew she must have knocked over when she’d been kissing him. It was on the floor. Promising herself she’d come in early to clean the store, she picked up the bag and forced a smile to her lips. “I just have to lock up.”
Without looking at him again, she finished her tasks and strode proudly out the door.
In the small hours of the night, Cass glanced at her illuminated clock radio and groaned. Three in the morning, and she still hadn’t fallen asleep. Dammit, who could, after getting kissed like that?
He was the wrong man, she told herself for the hundredth time. The wrong man. He was underhanded and ruthless. He was funny and charming. She liked him, and she didn’t. She was attracted and repulsed.
“I’m so confused!” She moaned, crossing her arms over her eyes.
Why did it have to be Dallas Carter who sent her body soaring with delight? She was too old not to know a unique physical attraction when she found it. Still, that didn’t mean her body ruled her. After all, she was a grown woman, and totally in control when around the human male.
The problem, unfortunately, was that he was different from the wealthy spoiled men she knew. Dallas had a hardness to him that spoke of an uneasy road to maturity. He seemed like a man who had learned a few lessons over the years, just as she had.
The kiss ran through her mind, and instantly the sensations were flowing around and through her again. Her breasts ached, and her blood swirled thickly until it settled in her pelvis.
Gritting her teeth to dispel the feeling, she decided he was absolutely right. They definitely couldn’t do that again. She reluctantly acknowledged a bit of admiration for him. He must have some sort of honor code even to suggest a kiss was wrong.
So why had she had this urge to kill ever since he’d said it?
Now, that, she admitted bitterly, made no sense whatsoever. What she ought to be doing was figuring out how to keep him busy until the board meeting on the twentieth.
Cass frowned, remembering how she had looked through her papers and still hadn’t found a notice of the meeting date—or an announcement about Lusty Lingerie. It wasn’t like her to misplace them. Shrugging, she decided she’d been smart to call Ned. She should be receiving his packet by the end of the week at the latest. Then everything would be cleared up. She hoped.
In the meantime, all she had to do was never be alone with Dallas Carter again.
A faint snicking sound caught her attention, and she strained her ears at the unusual noise. Lord, she thought, please don’t let that be a gas leak. Why the house was suddenly falling down around her, she couldn’t understand. She mustn’t be as good a homeowner as she thought she was.
She froze at a sudden screech of metal across glass, followed by a muffled curse. If that was a gas leak, it was definitely getting human help.
