Mr. Valentine

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  THE FIRST WEEK IN JANUARY, Krysta came into the office earlier than usual to get a head-start on a contract that had to be finished that morning. Lately she felt like a person running a foot race on a frozen lake. The transfer to marketing didn’t look as if it would happen anytime soon, and her personal relationship with Derek was becoming sticky. He was pressuring her to go to bed with him, and she’d discovered that no matter how hard she tried to be attracted to him, he left her cold.

  On paper Derek was everything she wanted in a man. He had position, reasonably good looks, ambition and cultured tastes. And he was polite and considerate. But he was also as boring as broccoli and his kisses made her gag. She’d never have guessed that would happen, and it was extremely inconvenient. Instead of making an ally of Derek she chanced making him an enemy if she kept holding him off.

  Then last week her nineteen-year-old brother Henry had lost his part-time job, which meant he’d need a subsidy in order to continue in college until he could find another job. And her brother Joe had been offered a scholarship at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, which was where he wanted to go, but it clinched the need for live-in help for her father beginning in September.

  And to top everything off, Jack Killigan hadn’t improved one whit. He’d dawdled about enrolling in a night class and missed the cutoff date. He still hadn’t gotten a decent haircut, and his dark hair was longer and more unruly than ever. Down in shipping they’d started making him tie it back in a ponytail while he worked. He still held the earpiece of his glasses together with tape, ate an atrocious diet and seemed to get no sleep whatsoever. She’d considered giving up on him and telling her father and the Killigans that it was no use trying to save Jack from himself. But every once in a while the fatigue would fall away from Jack’s blue eyes and they’d shine with an intelligence that took her breath away. So she soldiered on, although she appeared to be wasting valuable time on him.

  With a sigh Krysta turned on her computer and called up the file with the contract that needed to be finished.

  A few minutes later, Rosie came in and hung up her trench coat. “No word on the marketing department job yet, huh?”

  “No.” Krysta looked up from the screen. “I’m surprised, considering they’re using the infomercial idea I suggested through Derek. That should have made an impression on somebody.” She reached for her coffee mug, but paused in midmotion. Jack Killigan had just walked through the door. To her knowledge he’d never set foot in her office in the eight months he’d worked for Rainier Paper.

  Rosie turned toward the door, obviously motivated by the expression on Krysta’s face. Rosie glanced at the name embroidered over the chest pocket of Jack’s coveralls and smiled. “You’re Jack.” She held out her hand. “We’ve never met because I’m one of those people who blow their money going out for lunch, but Krysta’s mentioned you.”

  Jack shook her hand and returned the smile, but he seemed very distracted. “She probably told you I’m a hopeless case.”

  “She did, as a matter of fact.”

  By this time, the agitation evident in Jack’s manner had Krysta on her feet and moving toward him. “What is it? Has something happened?”

  “I wondered if I could talk to you for a minute.”

  “Sure.”

  He glanced at Rosie. “Uh, in private?”

  Krysta frowned. She’d never seen him like this, so full of nervous energy that he couldn’t stand in one place. “There’s a little conference room down the hall. We can go there.”

  “Great.”

  She led the way out the door, and he fell into step beside her as they moved down the carpeted hallway. They met Juliet Bancroft coming toward them, hurrying as she glanced at her watch. She gave Krysta a puzzled look.

  Krysta paused. “I’ll be back in a minute. I know you want to go over the Stevenson Corporation agreement first thing. I’m already working on it.”

  “That’s good,” Juliet said. “Derek said he wanted it ready by ten.”

  “It will be.” Krysta had noticed Derek was setting tighter deadlines for the contracts department lately. She figured he was getting pressure from above to improve efficiency.

  As she and Jack continued down the hall, she expected some crack about Derek, but Jack stayed uncharacteristically silent. She became more curious than ever as to why he was so preoccupied.

  She opened the door to the windowless conference room and flipped on the overhead lights. A polished wooden table and eight chairs upholstered in blue tweed commandeered most of the space, and a large dry-erase message board covered with diagrams from a recent meeting dominated the wall at the end of the table.

  Jack closed the door behind them and glanced around.

  Krysta pulled out a chair that rolled easily on its casters and sat down. “Is this private enough?”

  “I guess so.” Jack moved around her to the next chair, but he leaned against the back instead of sitting in it. He pushed his glasses up on his nose and glanced at her. “I don’t know quite how to explain this.”

  “You’re in trouble with the law and they’ve tracked you down?” She’d always wondered what he’d been up to after he quit college and went adventuring around the countryside for several years.

  The corner of his mouth lifted. “You don’t think very highly of my character, do you?”

  “Jack, people can usually put past mistakes behind them. Maybe I can vouch for you when—”

  “Okay, I’ll just say it.” He gripped the back of the chair. “I’ve been spending all my nights writing books.”

  Whatever she’d been expecting, it wasn’t this. She stared at him.

  “So far I’ve only had rejections.” He pushed away from the chair and took a deep breath. “Then yesterday Manchester Publishing called my apartment, and they want me to call back today, collect, and…” He paused. “God, I’m so afraid to jinx this by saying it out loud.”

  “You’ve sold a book?” She couldn’t have been more shocked if he’d revealed that he was an international jewel thief.

  “I think so.” Suddenly his grin flashed full wattage. “Yeah, Krysta. Yeah, I think I finally did it.”

  “Jack, that’s marvelous!” She sent the chair thumping against its neighbor as she leaped to her feet and threw her arms around his neck. “I knew you weren’t a loser!” And then, surprising them both, she kissed him soundly on the mouth.

  2

  KRYSTA HAD A BRIEF few seconds to register a citrus-scented after-shave, a mouth that fit almost perfectly against hers, a solid chest, and a very pleasant zing of feeling before she came to her senses and pulled away. Kissing Jack! She must be out of her mind. In all the years the Killigans and the Lueckenhoffs had been friends, she’d never thought of Jack in that way. Never.

  She put a hand to her heart and steadied her breathing. Somehow she had to pretend she hadn’t just done such a ridiculous thing. Jack was like one of her brothers, for heaven’s sake.

  “So all this time,” she began, her voice quivering only a little, “when I thought you were a couch potato, you’ve been writing a book?” she said.

  He gazed at her without speaking for several seconds. Finally he cleared his throat and pushed back the glasses she’d dislodged. “Several books, actually. That’s why I’ve been working on the dock. It’s the perfect job for a writer, because I don’t have to think much and I still feel creative when I get to my computer each night.”

  She shook her head, dazed by his revelation. No wonder she’d reacted so uncharacteristically and kissed him. “We need to tell your parents, Jack. They should know that you—”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “But Jack, they think you’re a lost cause!”

  “First of all, we don’t know yet if I’ve sold this book because I haven’t called Manchester Publishing, and second of all, I’m not sure my parents will be all that impressed when they do find out.”

  She was slowly regaining her poise, although her lips still ti
ngled. “Of course they will. And why haven’t you called the publisher back? It’s—” she glanced at her watch. “—already ten minutes after eleven in New York! Another half hour and they might be at lunch! What are you waiting for?”

  “You.”

  She really shouldn’t have kissed him. No telling what sort of ideas he might get from that. The kiss meant nothing, of course, but in her experience men tended to respond quickly to such stimulation. She schooled her expression into a professional mask. “I don’t understand.”

  “I wrote a romance.”

  “A what?”

  “You know. A love story. Manchester was having a Valentine’s Day contest for unpublished writers and I—”

  “I know what a romance is, Jack. I read them all the time. I just can’t picture you writing one.”

  “Why?”

  She opened her mouth to reply.

  “Never mind.” He sounded vaguely irritated. “I’m not sure I want to hear your answer. At any rate, I was afraid the publishers would react exactly the way you’re reacting if I sent the book in under my own name, so I made up a woman’s name, figuring that would help my cause. I don’t know if it did or not, but I’m not taking any chances on messing things up now. I want you to call and pretend you wrote the book.”

  “Me?” She drew in a lungful of air. “I don’t think so.”

  “Please, Krysta. You’re the only one I can trust to do this.”

  “No, Jack! They could ask me something about the book, and I won’t know what it’s about or anything. Just tell them who you are.”

  “I promise there’ll be nothing to it. If they want to buy, they’ll probably offer me—you—a contract. All you have to do is accept it. If they start talking about the book, just say you’d rather have those comments in a letter because you’re better at visual communication.”

  Krysta’s eyes narrowed. “Did I just hear you say that all I have to do is accept the contract?”

  “That’s right. Just accept it and get off the phone.”

  “Oh, no, you don’t!”

  He looked puzzled. “Oh, no I don’t what?”

  “You never just accept a contract. You always negotiate.”

  “You don’t understand. I would pay them to publish this if I had the money. I don’t care what they offer, as long as the book will come out. It’s a reputable publisher. I don’t think they’ll try to low-ball me. But even if they did, I wouldn’t care.”

  Krysta was beginning to understand the situation and now realized she needed to make this phone call for Jack. As usual, he wasn’t prepared to watch out for his own interests. “Okay, I’ll do it.”

  His eyes sparkled. “You will? Fantastic!”

  “When did you want me to make the call?”

  “I thought we could call from your office during the lunch hour, when everybody’s gone. I don’t want anybody else to know about this yet.”

  “Why not? You’ll be a published author, for heaven’s sake. Not many people can say that.” Her mental image of Jack was undergoing a rapid transformation. And she’d thought he had no enterprise in his soul. She’d been so wrong.

  “Well, for one thing, the guys down on the shipping dock will never give me a moment’s peace if they find out I wrote a book. Then, if they find out it’s a romance, my life won’t be worth living.”

  She nodded. “I see your point. Romance writing is rather an unusual field for men.” She had a million questions about how a smart-mouthed guy like Jack had managed to write such a book, but she had to get back to the Stevenson contract before she put her own job in jeopardy. “Well, you can trust me to keep your secret.”

  “I know that.”

  She looked past the disreputable glasses into blue eyes that for a moment held hers captive. Her stomach gave a funny little lurch, and she glanced away. She couldn’t imagine what was wrong with her. She’d looked into Jack’s eyes a thousand times before, and her stomach had always behaved itself. “Why don’t you come up to the office about fifteen minutes after twelve?” she said. “Everyone else will be gone, and you can listen in on the conversation when I make the call.”

  “Perfect.” He reached for her wrist and looked at her watch. “We’re both late. I’ll probably catch hell. See you then.” He was out the door and loping down the hall before she could say anything.

  She stood in the open doorway and looked after him while she unconsciously massaged her wrist. When she realized what she was doing she stopped and glanced down at the spot where his fingers had gripped her gently. Her skin seemed to vibrate where he’d touched her. In all the years of playing tag, arm wrestling and exchanging high-fives, she never remembered a tingle like that. It was disconcerting, to say the least.

  JACK BARELY AVOIDED maiming himself while working on the shipping dock that morning. A potential book sale and a kiss from Krysta in the same day would be distracting enough on a full night’s sleep, let alone on the two hours’ rest he’d allowed himself between four and six.

  He wandered in front of moving forklifts without looking and came within a half inch of dropping a paper bale on his foot. Fortunately the guys in shipping were used to his muddled ways, and for some reason the foreman had taken a liking to him and routinely excused his blunders. If he had to hold down a regular job, he couldn’t ask for a better one than this. And there was also the fringe benefit of seeing Krysta every day.

  As kids growing up together they’d never dated, partly because they’d known each other too well and there was none of the mystery so critical for teenage romance, and partly because Krysta had been too much of a goody-two-shoes for Jack’s tastes at the time. Then they hadn’t seen each other for years, until he landed this job at Rainier. Her attitude toward him had remained exactly the same, but Jack had taken one look at Krysta and wondered how he could have been such an idiot for all those years.

  Unfortunately, Hamilton had already gained the inside track when Jack arrived on the scene. Besides, Krysta had never given Jack the slightest indication she regarded him as anything other than an old friend. Until this morning. Not that he should put much importance on that kiss. She’d reacted on impulse and caught herself right away. But for a moment…

  Finally noon arrived and he clocked out for lunch, washed up and headed for the service elevator. His stomach grumbled from nervousness and lack of food. He wondered if he could be building castles in the air. The night before he’d played the phone message over and over until he had it memorized.

  This is Stephanie Briggs, senior editor at Manchester Publishing, calling for Candace Johnson about your manuscript Uptown Girl. I’d like to discuss the book with you. Please call me collect at your earliest convenience.

  Then she’d given the number and her extension. He couldn’t believe an editor would give that out unless she was serious about a manuscript. But then again, he still had a lot to learn about this business. He had to prepare himself for anything. By the time he walked into the contracts office, he was sweating.

  “You look awful,” Krysta observed helpfully.

  “Thanks. I feel as if a whole bowling team is practicing in my gut.” But he felt calmer from the moment he saw her sitting there, perfectly groomed in her kelly green suit and white silky blouse, her hair burnished as if she’d just given it a hundred strokes with a hairbrush. A chair was positioned beside her desk. He took it and drew a deep breath. “Got a pencil? I’ll give you the number.”

  She lifted her eyebrows. “You didn’t write it down?”

  “Didn’t have to.” He was loathe to admit he’d played the message about a hundred times and wouldn’t be able to forget the phone number if someone gave him a lobotomy.

  He recited the number, and although she shook her head in disapproval, she wrote it carefully on a notepad. She put a line across her sevens, European style, and he found that kind of sexy.

  “You’re calling Stephanie Briggs, senior editor at Manchester Publishing,” he added, and Krysta wrote that down,
too, her writing full of little angles and squiggles that intrigued him. He realized he could be quite happy sitting here for hours watching her do her job. “And your name is Candace Johnson.”

  Her gaze flicked up from the notepad and met his. “Candace, like your mother?”

  “Yes. Candace and John’s son,” he finished for her. “I know it’s corny, and they might not appreciate it when it appears on a book jacket, but I needed a woman’s name, so I came up with that.”

  “I think you’re wrong about your parents. I think they’ll be very impressed.”

  He grinned at her. “That their only son is masquerading as a woman?”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake. I think it’s a wonderful choice, and so will they.”

  “Besides, J is close to the middle of the alphabet, so on a bookstore shelf the book will show up about eye level.”

  She gave him an approving glance. “It’s good to know you can think in practical terms sometimes.” She wrote the pseudonym on the notepad. “Candace Johnson. I think it’s perfect.” She looked up at him again. “What’s the name of your book?”

  Gazing into the warmth of her eyes, he couldn’t remember.

  “Jack?”

  “Uh, Uptown Girl.”

  She glanced down at the notepad and started to write. Then she paused. “I can’t remember if uptown has a hyphen.”

  “No hyphen.” Released from the magic pull of her gaze, he was able to regain his equilibrium and smile at her perfectionistic tendencies. “But I don’t think that will matter on the phone.”

  “You’re right. I’m just so used to typing faxes.” She finished writing and tore the paper from the pad with a crisp movement. “I really wish I knew more about this book, Jack.”

  “All right. Here’s a quick synopsis. Jake, a guy from the wrong side of the tracks, falls in love with a CEO’s daughter, Christine, after they accidentally spend the night together. She doesn’t want anything more than a fling and they part. Jake becomes a labor leader fighting her dad’s company. A bunch of stuff happens, but in the climactic scene, she chooses Jake and his world over life in the fast lane.” He watched her expression to see if a heroine named Christine would alert her to his use of her as inspiration but no awareness dawned.