by Tessa Radley
“The final payment is done.” It had given Nick enormous satisfaction to come here, into Desmond Perry’s lair, to tell him that. He glanced at his watch and pushed back the chair he’d taken because Desmond had clearly expected him to stand. He rose now to his full intimidating height. “I won’t have a cup of coffee—” the older man hadn’t offered “—because I have an appointment.”
Desmond carefully set the pen he’d been twirling between his blunt fingers down on the leather inset of the desk. “You should know I plan to sell my stock in Valentine’s,” he said.
Nick said very softly, “You what?”
“I will be selling my share of your business as soon as Jilly’s estate has been settled.”
His share? For a moment Nick could only stare at his father-in-law in disbelief. Then reality sank in. Desmond was talking about Jilly’s stocks. The stock that in terms of their prenuptial agreement Nick had given to his wife. Stock that Jilly had then bequeathed to her father in her will.
With Jilly’s sudden death brought on by a virus, Desmond no longer needed to pretend any loyalty toward the son-in-law he’d bought for his daughter—but never liked. Mostly his own fault, Nick knew; he’d been unable to kowtow to the man, be the obsequious puppet Desmond had expected. For seven years he’d worked night and day to maintain the astronomical payments to repurchase the garden center Desmond had tricked Nick’s mentors, Bertha and Henry Williams, into selling.
By giving Nick a job, Bertha and Henry had saved Nick from sure trouble when he’d been a teen. And though he’d gone on to establish his own business, he couldn’t stand by and watch them lose the garden center they’d loved…and the home they occupied on the premises. And wily Desmond had known that.
Desmond had set him up. The price for the center had not only been an unrealistic, extortionist amount, but also marriage to Jilly. Nick had considered refusing, but Henry’s heart attack and Bertha’s terror had caused Nick to grit his teeth and accept the terrible terms.
But once he’d signed the contract, and taken occupation of the garden center that had once belonged to his mentors, he’d given Bertha and Henry back their home. It hadn’t been the end of it.
His new father-in-law had sat back, expecting Nick to fail to meet the punishing payment schedule, which would’ve put the property back under his control—and allowed him to triumph over the son-in-law he detested.
But Nick had done it.
The final repayment had been made. And he’d done it without jeopardizing the financial well-being of his own company. Sure it had slowed his expansion plans down, tightened his finances, but he was still a wealthy man.
But now, as the first glimpse of freedom appeared like a fragment of sky between dark city high-rises, Desmond had dropped his next bombshell.
Nick wasn’t going to roll over. “The prenup stipulated that once the full amount of the sale price was repaid to you—” and Nick had worked himself almost to death to make sure of that “—then I would have right of first refusal on the shares if Jilly ever wanted to sell them.”
He’d paid dearly for Bertha and Henry’s retirement dream…
“My daughter is dead. You failed to pay the price before she died—the right of first refusal died with her. In terms of her will, the stock is now mine. And I have no intention of waiting until you can raise sufficient funds for the stock,” Desmond sneered. “The growth of Valentine’s garden centers has not been at all what I expected. I’m selling.”
Nick forced himself to keep still. Not to defend the performance of the stock. Not to reveal his shock at Desmond’s revelation. Instead, raising an eyebrow, he asked, “You already have a buyer for the stock?”
“Oh, yes.”
Nick allowed himself a slight, disbelieving smile at Desmond while his brain worked frantically. Alison had said she and Richard had had an offer for their shares, too. Was he sensing a conspiracy where none existed?
Nick shrugged. “Well, they’ll have to wait for Jilly’s estate to be finalized.”
“My buyer is not in a hurry.”
“Who is it? Another chain of garden centers?” Nick tried to think which of his competitors might have the liquidity in the present economic climate to force a takeover.
“Why must the buyer be a garden center? The land owned by the company is worth a fortune.”
That wiped the mocking smile clean off Nick’s face. “A developer?” he asked dangerously. “You’re planning to sell to someone who will hunt more stock until he has enough to close all the centers and develop the land?”
Triumph glittered in Desmond’s pale blue eyes. “The developer I have in mind is prepared to pay a premium rate for the stock.”
The Super Center, Valentine’s flagship store, was located close to Auckland city, not far from the waterfront on a sizable tract of prime real estate. It was worth a fortune, and other stores in other cities were equally well situated. A developer would love to get his hands on the company’s assets.
In the back of Nick’s mind, there had always been the knowledge that he could sell off some of the land to raise funds, but that would be a last resort. It was something he’d never seriously contemplated—no matter how hard Desmond rode him.
Because that would mean closing those centers. Not only would his staff lose jobs, the community where the center was located would lose, too. Each center had landscaped gardens, a café where customers could socialize, well-equipped playgrounds for children and bandstands offering musical events. A Valentine’s Garden Center brought pleasure to everyone who stopped by.
To hurt him, Desmond wanted to destroy the culture Nick had built.
Desmond knew him too well…
Narrowing his gaze on his adversary, Nick challenged, “You’d sell your stock, so your crony has a chance to make a fortune out of building high-density developments?”
Desmond placed his hands behind his head and smirked. “Sounds like a good plan.”
Nick rocked on his toes, tempted—not for the first time—to slam a fist in his father-in-law’s corpulent stomach.
The open green space with streams and lakes that Henry had painstakingly created and lost to Desmond seven years ago would be the first site to be bulldozed and developed—Nick had no doubt about that. With it would go the craftsmanship that Valentine’s stores had brought to the lifestyle market. The handmade pots. The carved garden statues. The water features that were so carefully created. The plants that were so lovingly tended.
And it wouldn’t stop there. The network of suppliers would lose contracts…and as for his staff, Nick didn’t want to think about the layoffs that would follow.
His anger roared into fury. Nick took a step closer to the devil behind the desk. Then he checked himself, drawing on the control that had always served him well and helped him thwart Desmond in the past.
A glance at his watch caused him to grimace inwardly. Damn. He’d lost all track of time. He’d been due to meet Candace at the doctor’s room fifteen minutes ago. He was going to miss the chance to talk to the doctor about how well Jennie had recovered. Hurriedly, Nick stuck his hand into his pocket searching for his cell phone.
It wasn’t there. Cursing silently, Nick remembered placing it in the holder between the front seats in the Ferrari before he’d left his office.
“We can discuss an alternative plan.”
Distracted by his thoughts, Nick turned his head. The triumph in Desmond’s expression glowed even brighter. Whatever the alternative plan was, it boded ill—Nick had no doubt about that. He had no interest in bargaining with the devil.
He wasn’t going to stay a minute longer. Already he’d allowed Desmond to consume too much of his time. A twinge of shame pierced him. He’d told Candace he would be at Jennie’s doctor’s appointment.
She was going to be furious—and how could he blame her?
If he left now, he’d make the tail end of the appointment and be able to speak to the doctor about Jennie himself. Snatching up hi
s suit jacket from where he’d slung it over the chair back, Nick swiveled on his heel and headed for the door.
“Nick!”
He kept walking as Desmond’s voice called out from behind him, “If you don’t stop right now, I’ll start negotiating the stock sale.”
Nick cast a glance over his shoulder. Desmond had risen to his feet, his face red with frustrated anger. It gave Nick an immense amount of satisfaction to say, “Do what you must, but you’ll have to excuse me, I have something more important to deal with right now.”
Nick watched frustration and rage darken Desmond’s face to the color of a tomato. Quite suddenly, the other man no longer resembled Santa.
Four
Candace was furious with him.
It wasn’t apparent from what she said, but rather from the overly cool, calm manner in which she had greeted his arrival. Nick decided he would’ve preferred it if she’d raged at him. Instead he was conscious of the chasm of chilly disapproval that divided them.
After leaving the doctor’s rooms, Nick had given the keys to the Ferrari to Mr. Busby to take home and loaded Candace and Jennie into the more conservative Daimler, which at least provided space for Jennie’s car seat. Rather ironically, Nick planned to buy Candace coffee from the café at the closest Valentine’s—which had been the topic of his recent argument with Desmond.
Nick hoped the parklike surroundings and pretty gardens would pacify her—and he figured he owed her some sort of explanation.
“I’m sorry,” he said finally, stopping at a crossing to allow a group of boys to wheel their bikes across.
“Sorry?” She turned her head. The eyes that clashed with his radiated silver-white heat that her cool civility couldn’t cloak.
Incongruously, the heat caused desire to leap in his gut.
“I mean it.” He’d never apologized to Jilly in the seven years they’d been married. Not for arriving home when dinner had congealed on the plates. Not when he’d left her standing on her own at one of the society events that were so important to her. Not even when he’d missed Jennie’s birth—although that had been the one time that he’d come close.
He’d figured there was no point apologizing for anything to a woman who’d charmed her father into trapping the bridegroom she’d wanted at all costs. Saying sorry would’ve been a lie.
This was different.
“I suppose you had some life-threatening crisis at work?” she said.
Nick thought of Desmond’s threat to sell Jilly’s stock in Valentine’s as he pulled away from the crossing. “Something like that.”
“That’s what I expected.”
It was the weary, defeated note in Candace’s voice that caused Nick to throw her a quick, sharp glance before focusing back on the road ahead. “I got there, didn’t I?”
“Halfway through the deferred appointment, if that’s what you mean.”
He’d cursed the city traffic all the way. Now she couldn’t even thank him for almost killing himself to get there. “The baby is fine. The doctor couldn’t find anything wrong.”
“But what if she hadn’t been?”
Her tone was full of suppressed anger and disappointment and…some other emotion he couldn’t name.
Why was this so important to her?
There was no point arguing. Yet a twinge of shame twisted deep within him. Nick nosed the car into a side lane and turned into the parking lot beyond. After bringing the Daimler to a halt he switched it off and changed the subject. “This is one of my centers. There’s a café that overlooks a lake. Let me buy you a coffee.”
She wrapped her arms around her middle and turned her head away so he couldn’t read those all-too-expressive eyes. “Nick, I don’t need you to buy me a coffee. I needed you to be there for Jennie.”
“Maybe Jennie would like to see the ducks.”
That evoked a response, though not one that he wanted to answer. “Is that the real reason we’re here? Because you want to show Jennie the ducks?”
Nick searched her frozen features for sarcasm, but couldn’t find any. “My first thought was that I owed you an apology.” He spread his hands. “But it is a good place to show Jennie some ducks. I can’t wait to see her face. She’s going to love it.”
It was the truth. To Nick’s immense surprise, he was looking forward to watching Jennie’s reaction.
The baby’s birth had unleashed a startling realization of all that was wrong in his life. Beginning with his sham marriage to Jilly. A deal to which he should never have agreed. “Nick…”
The uncertain note in Candace’s voice captured his attention. The stiffness had left her face, although her arms were still wrapped protectively around herself. “Yes?”
“You and I need to talk.”
Her expression told him that she wasn’t looking forward to whatever she wanted to talk to him about. After a second’s pause, Nick instinctively knew what it was about.
Damn, he should never have given in to that wild, insane urge to kiss her. God knew what she was making of his bringing her here for coffee.
Dismissively he said, “You’re making too much out of the fact that I want to buy you coffee to apologize. This isn’t a date…or any attempt to change the footing of our relationship to anything more personal—you don’t need to worry about that.”
Nick knew he was lying through his teeth. Despite his promise that there would be no more kisses, he hungered to kiss her again, and see if she tasted as good as he remembered.
But she was good for Jennie…and he needed her for Jennie’s sake. He couldn’t afford to screw it all up and have her leave.
He could sense her stiffening in the seat beside him, and Jennie didn’t help matters by letting out a squawk from the rear seat. “I never thought this was a date,” Candace told him with an edge in her voice.
“Then what do you want to talk about?”
“You and Jennie—but now is probably not a good time. Jennie wants out of the car.”
Candace scrambled from the Daimler as if she couldn’t wait to escape the cocoon of the car’s interior, and the passenger door slammed behind her.
Nick gritted his teeth. Okay, so he’d sure got that wrong. Badly. Sex was the last thing on her mind. Whereas he couldn’t think of much else. All he could think about was repeating the “mistake” they’d made the night before.
Except Nick couldn’t view that kiss as a mistake. Unprofessional? Hell, yes. But a mistake? No way.
Nick had always gone after what he wanted. And right now he wanted Candace. But he didn’t want to spook her and lose her. Nor could he rid himself of the wriggle of discomfort over his ruthless desire to seduce someone who worked for him. He’d never been tempted to do anything like that before.
But then again he’d never experienced anything like this.
He wanted Jennie’s nanny.
And what was more, he was certain Candace desired him, too, despite her cool annoyance. The challenge lay in getting her to admit her desire—especially after all the lengths he’d gone to in order to convince her that he wasn’t interested.
Yet Candace wanted to talk about him and Jennie, the last thing Nick wanted. He never talked about Jennie—about his suspicions that she wasn’t really his daughter.
By the time Nick had gotten himself firmly back in control, Candace had already taken Jennie out of the rear car seat. Nick pressed the key fob to open the trunk, hoisted the stroller out and unfolded it.
He took Jennie from Candace and lowered her into the stroller. She let out a howl of protest and went rigid.
“Hey,” he chided her, “stop that.”
The objection grew more vociferous.
Nick shot Candace a helpless glance. She was watching him through narrowed eyes—okay, so he was on his own. He transferred his attention back to Jennie; he wasn’t about to let a baby defeat him.
“Come on, missy, be still. Let me buckle you in.”
Jennie let out a yell of objection. It was clea
r to Nick—and to anyone who cared to listen—that she had no intention of submitting to being strapped into the stroller. Time to change tactics.
“After we show you the ducks I’ll take you up to the café. You can have a treat—an ice cream,” he said craftily.
Jennie greeted his bribe with the contempt it deserved and simply shrieked more loudly.
“You little hellion,” he told her softly, his admiration growing in leaps and bounds.
The noise stopped abruptly. Eyeing him assessingly, Jennie cooed and blew a raspberry.
Nick couldn’t help himself—he laughed, then leaned down and planted a kiss on her plump cheek. It was soft, like a peach. A wave of emotion rushed through him.
What did it matter if she wasn’t his child? No one except he would ever know that Jilly had played him for a fool.
There was no point in maintaining the distance he’d been keeping from Jennie. She didn’t deserve to suffer; after all, she was the only innocent party in the entire mess.
And if he wanted, she could be his. All his.
“You are a hellion,” he said, impressed.
She gave him a gummy smile and capitulated, allowing him to put her into the stroller.
In that moment Nick felt his heart constrict and he fell irrevocably in love.
“You’re also a wicked flirt,” he scolded Jennie as the clip for the restraining strap locked into place.
A movement out the corner of his eye had him lifting his head. Candace was watching them. The look in her eyes was full of yearning, but as she caught him studying her, shutters dropped into place.
It was possible that Candace was as ready as he to take their relationship to its inevitable conclusion. Yet Nick suspected that Candace would want more than simply sex. And while he could never tell her the true reason why he’d held Jennie at a distance, it might help to divulge the precarious position he was in with Valentine’s. It wouldn’t be easy to share that knowledge; he’d always handled his problems by himself, in his own way. He’d never been the kind of man who shared his concerns.
