Boardroom Rivals, Bedroom Fireworks!

by Kimberly Lang

  The action stabbed him in the chest, as he’d never seen her tear up before. Brenna didn’t cry. She exploded, she shouted, she slammed doors, and she even sulked occasionally, but she didn’t cry.

  He’d pushed her too far this time. Considering their past, that was an accomplishment in itself. Their marriage had fallen apart and she’d never shed a single tear. Hell, she’d sat dry-eyed and stoic through her own mother’s funeral. But her beloved damn winery brought out the waterworks. Astonishing and insulting, but he still felt like a snake.

  Neither of them had a graceful escape route, but he could try to defuse the situation. It wasn’t easy—not with his body still wired and ready to finish what he’d started—but he managed a toneless “Forget it, Bren. Chalk the offer up to temporary insanity.”

  Brenna’s eyes flew open, widening in shock as her jaw dropped. She looked as if she’d just been slapped. “What?”

  “I said forget it.”

  “Oh, I don’t think so.” Brenna’s hackles were back up, but it beat her tears. “You can’t toy with me like that and then just walk away. Things have changed, Jack. I won’t let you hurt me again.”

  Where had this come from? “Hurt you?”

  “Maybe you can keep things in little boxes, all compartmentalized in your head, but I can’t. You can’t come out here and turn me inside out and expect me to just take it. You broke my heart once, Jack. I’m finished crying over you.”

  Her? Heartbroken? Crying? She’d walked out dry-eyed and never looked back. “You left me, Bren. Don’t forget that.”

  Her mouth twisted. “Yes, and you were kind enough to order a ride for me while I packed.”

  “What, exactly, was I supposed to do? You said you were miserable and that you wanted to go home. I couldn’t force you to stay.”

  “You didn’t want me to stay. You were just as miserable as I was.”

  “Did I ever say that, Bren?”

  “You didn’t have to.” Her voice broke on the last word, and Brenna cleared her throat. “You’re right. We should just forget this.”

  Oh, no, he wasn’t going to let Bren retreat. Not after tossing down the gauntlet. “Here’s a newsflash for you. You left. You served me with divorce papers. Don’t blame me for your broken heart when you’re the one who walked out.”

  Brenna pulled back as if he’d slapped her. Then her eyes narrowed. “You’re saying it was all my fault? Don’t even try. It takes two people to make a relationship fail that spectacularly. I loved you, Jack, and it hurt too much that you didn’t love me.”

  Had he heard her correctly? “You think I didn’t love you?”

  “You wanted me.” She made it sound distasteful.

  “I’m not denying that. But if you want to talk pain and heartache, try your wife telling you she’d rather live at a damn vineyard in Sonoma than with you. We can divvy out blame however you want to for the rest of our problems, but don’t try to tell me I didn’t love you. Because you’d be wrong.”

  He was rewarded for his honesty when Brenna’s eyes grew wide. She opened her mouth to speak, then closed it again with a snap. “Maybe we were better off when we weren’t speaking to each other.”

  No one could wind him up like Brenna could. This debacle of an evening was proof of that. “I’m inclined to agree with you.”

  “Then why—?”

  “I think we’ve taken this discussion as far as it can go. No sense circling back and rehashing the past again. When you’re ready to sign the sale papers, let me know.” Picking up his towel from where he’d dropped it earlier, he draped it over his shoulders and left her standing there, glaring at him.

  It certainly wasn’t for the first time. Oddly, though, this time he felt as if he deserved it.

  Watching Jack walk away was like reliving yet another painful scene from their marriage. Except this time there wouldn’t be the fabulous make-up sex later on.

  Knees shaking, she made her way carefully to the table and sank into a chair. She heard the door to the house close, and now, safely alone, she let her head drop into her hands. So much had been thrown at her tonight, and she wasn’t sure she could process it all.

  This was a nightmare—the kind she couldn’t wake up from. She’d been so close—too close—to giving in to the sensual pull of Jack that if he hadn’t whispered his indecent proposal into her ear at that exact moment she’d probably be happily under him right now.

  But to have him offer her…God, it didn’t bear thinking about. She didn’t know which was worse: the fact Jack thought so little of her now he believed she’d be willing to sell herself for Amante Verano, or the fact she’d seriously considered it for a nanosecond.

  And how to explain the pain that had shot through her when he withdrew his offer altogether?

  No one could rip her apart with the effortless efficiency of Jack Garrett. She’d thought—make that hoped—time and maturity would have made her immune to him. Or that he’d forgotten how.

  Tears burned in her eyes. No, she told herself angrily as she took deep breaths. She would not cry over him again. She’d long ago grown weary of crying after one of them walked out, and she was finished with that. It had to be the rehashing that had her so close to blubbering again.

  She’d loved him so much back then, but over the years she’d decided it had been a one-sided affair. To have him say he’d loved her? To hear that she’d hurt him when she left? That was a one-two punch she hadn’t seen coming, and her head was still reeling.

  Once upon a time she’d believed her love for Jack could solve anything life threw at them. But the cold reality of their endless cycle of fight-truce-sex-fight had shown her how big the gap between them really was. The inability to bridge that gap had always been her secret failure, the thing she’d never admitted to anyone.

  But for a few minutes tonight she’d thought they’d almost built that bridge. She’d briefly felt that old connection—the one they’d had in the very beginning, when they could talk for hours about everything and nothing. That feeling had been buried quickly in the ensuing mess, and she felt a pang of disappointment at the loss.

  Brenna sighed and lifted her head. Everything looked exactly the same, seeming to belie the upheaval she’d just gone through. The glowing lights from the pool, the bubbling hot tub, the chirp of the crickets and the smell of the flowers created a serene setting designed to soothe—exactly what she’d come looking for tonight. But it was wasted on her now.

  Her insides tumbled over each other and her head ached from the emotional extremes and pressure. Even her wine couldn’t calm the storm within her. Grabbing her robe, which she didn’t bother putting on, she concentrated on making her shaky legs move her back to the privacy of her bedroom quickly.

  Because, damn it, Jack had made her cry. Again.

  Chapter Five

  “‘EVERY day is a beautiful day at Amante Verano.’ Isn’t that your motto?” Dianne sing-songed the greeting as she poked her head around the lab door and extended a steaming mug in Brenna’s direction.

  Brenna accepted the coffee with a grateful smile. After another restless, miserable night, the heady aroma of Di’s high-octane brew was a welcome jolt to her sluggish system. “Ever since you printed it on my coffee mug it is.”

  “Then why do you look like someone kicked that puppy you claim you’re going to get?”

  She wouldn’t be able to avoid this conversation for long. She might as well go ahead and get it over with. “One guess.”

  “Jack.” Dianne pushed a rack of vials and testing supplies to the back of the counter and pulled herself up to sit, her legs swinging gently. “Are you two still fighting? Come on, Brenna, surely there’s a better way to sort this out?”

  “I wish. Every conversation—no matter how nice I try to be—always deteriorates into a shouting match. And last night was a nightmare. I thought exes were supposed to get more civil as time progresses. Not us.” Brenna shook her head and leaned back in her chair.

  �
��Unfinished business, I think.”

  Brenna stared into her coffee. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Dianne snorted. “Try that with someone who didn’t witness the whole thing. I watched you fall goofystupid in love, elope, and then divorce in less than six months. I also know what that did to you—even if you tried to hide it from everyone else.”

  Her stomach was hollow enough at the moment. She didn’t need Dianne making it worse. “Where’s Chloe?” she asked with forced cheerfulness.

  “With her father, learning the intricacies of wine-making, testing and probably teething on your new digital refractometer. Now, don’t change the subject.” She shook her head in disappointment. “It was a weak attempt, anyway. No points for effort.”

  “I thought it might work there for a minute,” Brenna grumbled.

  “With someone else, maybe. But you can’t fool me. Now, spill. What is going on with you two?”

  She certainly wasn’t going to go into detail. She still hadn’t made sense of it yet herself. “You know the basics. Then, last night, Jack offered to give me his half of the winery.”

  Dianne lit up and she clapped her hands. “That’s fantastic! It’s not perfect, I know, but it beats…” She trailed off as Brenna shook her head slightly. “Oh, no. There’s a ‘but,’ isn’t there? I hate the ‘but.’”

  “No ‘but.’ An ‘if.’”

  Dianne’s forehead wrinkled in confusion. “I’m not following you. An ‘if’? What kind of ‘if’ ?”

  Brenna glanced over to make sure the lab door was firmly closed. “Jack offered to give me his half if—” She took a deep breath. “If I slept with him.”

  Her eyes widened. “You’re not serious?” Brenna nodded, and Dianne’s jaw dropped. “That’s—that’s—that’s…”

  “Disgusting? Amoral?” she offered. “Brilliant? Good business sense? I honestly don’t know.”

  “But you didn’t.” Di looked at her carefully. “Did you?”

  “No! Do you think I’d be in this bad shape if I was now sole owner?” Brenna leaned back in the chair and took another sip of coffee. “I have to admit, though, it was pretty tempting.” And if she’d given in to that temptation she wouldn’t have been turned inside out by the rest of their conversation.

  “And I can see why. You get everything you want just for a little nookie? That’s a helluva return on your investment.” Brenna felt her own eyebrows go up at the words, and Dianne cleared her throat. “Not that you would, though. That would be wrong.”

  “I had no idea you had such a practical Machiavellian streak. In some ways it does seem like a relatively minor thing to do—I mean, it’s not like I’ve never had sex with him before.”

  “Ah-ha!” Dianne jumped off the counter. “That’s what was tempting you. Not the vineyard. Oh, no. Sex with Jack again was the temptation.”

  That much was true. No sense in lying. “Yes. Jack was the temptation. I haven’t forgotten what it was like. I remember every single detail.” Images danced through her memory, bringing a physical response. “Vividly.”

  “So do I, and I only heard them from you,” Di said, fanning herself.

  “But I’m not stupid. Physically and financially it sounds like a pretty decent deal, but honestly—and if you repeat this I’ll kill you—I’m afraid it would hurt too much. In here.” She placed a hand over her chest.

  “Afraid you wouldn’t be able to respect yourself in the morning?”

  “That, too.” She’d come to several conclusions in the wee hours of the morning. Including that one.

  “Ahh.” Dianne bit her lip. She understood. “Jack still has a piece of you. I suspected as much.”

  “I don’t know how or why, but, yeah, it seems he does. You’d think I’d be over him by now. It’s been a long time.”

  “Avoidance doesn’t mean you’ve been dealing.”

  “I guess not. Now look at me.” Brenna balanced her elbows on her knees and let her head rest in her hands. “I’m a mess. And I’m in a hell of a mess.”

  “That explains a lot of the fighting.” Dianne returned to her perch on the counter and drummed her nails on it.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Unfinished business, remember? Maybe Jack has some, too.”

  “Oh, please.” Jack didn’t sound like someone with unfinished business—unless she counted the winery, of course. “You’re insane. And that noise is making me insane.”

  Dianne stopped the drumming and folded her hands in her lap. “Jack doesn’t need to bribe or blackmail women to get them to sleep with him. There’s got to be a reason he propositioned you.”

  Her heart skipped a beat. She’d thought about that, too, and decided not to dig too deep lest she find something to make her even worse off than she already was. “I have to admit, though, it’s the one thing we were really good at. It was everything else that didn’t work.”

  “Still…even good sex can’t be that hard for him to come by. There are lots of women in San Francisco, and he’s rich, young, and unbelievably handsome. He doesn’t need to hit you up for ex-sex for a little relief.”

  Pulling her hair out sounded like a grand plan about now. “Argh. Can we pick another subject now? Please?”

  “Just one more question.” Dianne turned serious. “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think the offer is open now anyway—not after last night’s blowout. I may sound like a broken record, but I just don’t know.”

  “You’ll figure it out. I know you will.” Dianne left her then, squeezing her shoulder in comfort and support as she passed Brenna’s chair. Dianne also left the Thermos of coffee for her, but her stomach didn’t seem stable enough to take more.

  Brenna stared at the walls—old pictures, notes written in her mother’s elegant handwriting, label prototypes, newspaper clippings and lists of local growers all competed for space. She would figure it out. She had to. But last night’s revelations wouldn’t leave her alone.

  She’d loved Jack, but he’d also offered an excitement she’d lacked living out here on the property. When that had gone to hell she’d slunk home, to the one place where she understood who and what she needed to be. She’d thrown herself into Amante Verano—partly because she loved it, but also partly to fill the gap losing Jack had created.

  Right or wrong, though, this was her life now. Everything she’d worked for in the last ten years had come to this moment. Jack’s presence had just created a wrinkle; the blast from her past shaking her world a little. She needed to come to a workable arrangement with Jack, and once she did everything would go back to normal.

  And Jack himself…Well, she needed to get past old hurts and old feelings and remember what they were now—not what they had been. All she had to do was ignore that pull he had on her and take back that little piece of her he still seemed to have. Needless to say sleeping with Jack was out of the question. For any reason, she told herself.

  In the meantime, sitting around moping in frustration wasn’t going to change anything—at least she knew that much. She also had a to-do list a mile long, and she wouldn’t accomplish any of it hiding out in her lab.

  Her first stop was the storeroom, where the banal task of inventory was waiting for her. Before she could get started, though, her cellphone rang. Fishing it out of her back pocket, she checked the number. What could Di want?

  “Where’s Jack?”

  She eyeballed the boxes containing bottles, mentally calculating. “At the main house, I assume.”

  “No, because I’m at the main house. His car’s gone.”

  Brenna’s heart jumped in her chest, then sank. Which is it? she asked herself. Am I happy or not? “Gone?”

  Di sounded exasperated. “I can’t believe he’d take off without telling anyone. That’s just plain rude. And after what you said about last night…”

  It was a bit of a slap in the face. “Jack can come and go as he pleases. He doesn’t owe anyone any kind
of explanation.”

  “Maybe he just went into town for something. Want me to check his room and see if his stuff’s gone? It would give us a clue if he’s planning on coming back or not.”

  “Di, no. If he’s not coming back he’ll call. Or have his lawyer call. It’s not like anything is settled. We should enjoy the break while we can.”

  Then why didn’t she feel any relief? She still felt the tightness around her chest that hurt when she breathed. Good thing I didn’t sleep with him.

  “But Brenna…”

  “Don’t you have something you need to do? Something useful?”

  “Fine.” Dianne grumbled. “But I wonder where he went? And why?”

  Me, too. “It’s not our business.”

  She wasn’t naïve enough to believe Jack had simply given up and gone home, and the knots in her stomach tightened. No, Jack had something cooking, and she wasn’t going to like it.

  “You’re off your game. That’s the closest I’ve come to beating you in five years.” Roger bounced the blue ball in his direction and Jack caught it easily. “Whatever it is, keep it up. I could get used to not having my ass handed to me twice a week.”

  Roger’s words echoed in the enclosed court as he wiped a towel across his sweaty face. Jack took aim, then sent the ball flying down the court to bounce off the wall and hit Roger in the leg. “I’ll never be that off my game.”

  But Roger was right. He was distracted. Two days of dealing with Brenna and he couldn’t even keep his mind on a racquetball game. He couldn’t decide which was more of a distraction, though: remembering the feel of her skin and the way she’d reacted to his touch, or the look on her face when she accused him of breaking her heart.

  “I have three ex-wives, remember?” Roger continued as he packed up his gear. “As your attorney and your friend, I can tell you it never gets any better. The path of least resistance is your best bet. Expensive, but expedient. If you want to stay sane, that is.”