by Nancy Warren
She kept clicking. “Here’s a Maxwell Varon. Could he have shortened his name?” she mused. “Oh, no. Wait. This guy’s a soccer player.” They checked out the photo of a twentysomething in soccer shorts and a jersey who was blond and much younger than her Max. “Cute, though.”
But not her Max. She began to feel better.
“It’s weird not to find him at all. Do you think he’s using an alias? Maybe he’s wanted and he’s hiding out in Alaska under an assumed name.”
“Then how did he provide the references? They were from legitimate sources.”
“Okay. Just trying to be helpful. Oh, look. Here’s a Maximilian Varo. Hah, maybe he’s your guy. Says he’s a reclusive billionaire.”
Claire snorted. “As if I’d sleep with a man named Maximilian. Please.”
“I’d sleep with him. He invented some air-conditioning system for NASA. He’s made a fortune. Too bad there aren’t any pictures.” She chuckled. “He likes to spend his money, though. Says here he was one of the first passengers to book his seat for Virgin Galactic’s first trip to space.”
“What?” Claire shrieked. “That costs two hundred grand. Let me see that.” She read the biography Laurel had unearthed. Obviously the subject hadn’t wanted to reveal much about himself to the public. The paragraph was vague and impersonal. She could imagine a communications person going, Please, Maximilian, give us something interesting, and he’d told them he was going to space.
The conversation she and Max had shared over dinner at the B and B came back to her with distressing clarity. His dream had been to go to space. She’d teased him about the cost of space tourism. And he’d dropped the subject.
“There must be pictures of him,” she exclaimed. “You have to find me a picture.”
Laurel’s mouth dropped open. “You seriously think this might be your guy? The billionaire?”
Yes, she found, she seriously did. “So many things make sense now. How he paid for that lodge without blinking.” She slapped her hands to her hot cheeks. “Oh, my God. He probably threw out the people who’d been booked in that B and B for months. Because he’s a billionaire. They can do that, right? Throw around their money to get anything they want?”
“Okay. Calm down. It can’t be him. Why would a billionaire named Maximilian want to come to Spruce Bay and fly as a bush pilot with Polar Air?” She glanced at her friend. “No offense.”
“I don’t know. But I’m going to ask him.”
“Wait. Before you make a fool of yourself, let’s see if we can find a photograph.”
Claire waited in burning impatience while her friend clicked here and there. Finally, she said, “Okay. Here’s a picture. It’s not very clear. He’s obviously not big on publicity.”
“Let me see.” She squinted at the screen. The photo had been taken at some fancy, expensive fund-raiser. The picture was from the website of the foundation. The caption read, Lady Jane Snow-Hinton and her date for the evening, venture capitalist, Maximilian Varo. The man in the tux was so busy talking to another man in the background that he clearly hadn’t known he was being photographed—any more than she’d known when she’d been snapped at the Fourth of July party.
Even though the photo wasn’t superclear, she knew it was her Max. The profile was the same, the body she knew so well was the same. Something about the way he held his head was as distinguishing to her as a fingerprint would be to a forensics expert.
“It’s him.”
“Oh, boy.”
“But—but why? What is a venture capitalist doing at Polar Air?”
Laurel ran her fingers through her hair. It was her I’m thinking gesture. “They fund new enterprises, they buy ailing businesses for pennies on the dollar and turn them around, they—” But she stopped at Claire’s cry of rage.
“He’s planning to buy Polar Air. That’s got to be it. Frank Carmondy had us mortgaged to the hilt. He must have got wind of it somehow. Planned to buy the airline for cheap.” She heard her own teeth grinding. “The property alone is worth a fortune. What if he buys the mortgages? What if he forecloses?” Her voice was rising dangerously. “We’ll lose everything. Everything my family has worked for. What about Lynette? Where would she go? He’s planning to take our business away.” She nearly choked on her own fury. “And he even slept with me to get more control.”
There was a moment of silence. Fiona Apple had disappeared and some other female soloist was now singing of heartbreak and loss. Perfect!
Laurel spoke. “First, you don’t know that any of this is true. He could be here for a bunch of reasons.”
“Name one?”
“I don’t know. But before you take a shotgun to this guy’s cojones, you should maybe talk to him first.”
“I don’t like it. Why wouldn’t he tell me he was rich?”
“Lots of people don’t boast about their assets. Maybe he’s tired of women like Lady Jane Snow-Hinton parading him around the way a big-game hunter shows off a dead lion’s head. Maybe he’s lost all his dough.”
She snorted. “Then how could he afford the B and B?” She smacked her head. “Didn’t you say that Felix Gerard had angel investors who helped him open his place?”
Laurel nodded slowly. “What do you bet?”
“That Maximilian Varo is an angel investor? Makes sense. Felix Gerard wouldn’t clear out his fancy lodge for just anyone.” Her eyes narrowed as she remembered something. “When we first got there, I said, ‘Are we the only guests?’ And Felix looked at Max and then said, ‘But of course.’”
“I agree, it does seem suspicious, but—”
“Why do we let men do this to us?” she wailed. “Why do we let them come into our perfectly happy lives and mess everything up? I was fine. We were fine.” She took a breath. “Well, we had an embezzler running the operation into the ground who might, maybe, have attempted to murder me, but other than that, we were doing okay.”
“And you didn’t need a man.”
“Exactly!” She jumped up, needing to get away from the photo of Max—no, she reminded herself—of Maximilian, and Lady Prunella Finch-Bottom or whatever her name was. “I didn’t need a man. I was perfectly happy without one.”
“And then he came along.”
“Yes. Then he came along. And now everything’s a mess.”
“I’m not siding with him, you know I’m not, but it did sound like he was a good guy to have along when your plane went down.”
She swung around. “I would have survived by myself.” She thought of the way Max had risked his life to grab the survival kit, and how nice it had been not to be alone in that ordeal. But even so, she was pretty sure she’d have made it back alive.
“I admit it was nice to have company. I wouldn’t have enjoyed going through that alone.” She wasn’t saying she’d enjoyed the ordeal with Max, either, but it had been less terrible than it could have been.
She paced a little. Then she asked Laurel, “Can he buy the business without our consent?”
Laurel ran her fingers through her hair again. She was starting to look slightly wild. “I’m not sure. It depends who holds the mortgages and if they’d sell them. It depends on how deeply Polar Air is in debt. Do you know?”
She blew out a breath. “It’s bad. I trusted Frank. We all did. Since I found out he was stealing from us, I’ve been studying the books, trying to follow the money.” She faced her friend. “I’ve hired an accounting firm to try and sort out the mess, but it’s not good.”
“Look. Maximilian Varo’s a venture capitalist. Maybe you can make a deal with him. Get him to help you.”
“If he was interested in helping us, wouldn’t he have been up front about who he was and why he was here?”
Laurel looked as though she wished she’d never suggested the Google search. It was as though they’d gone to a fortune-teller giggling and figuring they’d both find out they were going to inherit money and marry dark, handsome strangers, only to find out that their futures were going
to be bleak and tragic.
“I was so stupid. First I trusted Frank. Then Max.”
Now she wondered if she could ever trust her own judgment again.
“You can’t be blamed for Frank. Your grandparents hired him.”
“Well, I hired Max.”
“Okay. That one’s on you.”
“I should go. Thanks for dinner.”
Laurel said, “Let me ask you one more thing. Do you love him?”
She closed her eyes for a moment and then opened them. “I can’t answer that question because I do not want to hear the words that might come out of my mouth.”
“So, that’s a yes, then.”
With a strangled cry, she headed for the door.
19
CLAIRE WAS GLAD she was on a bike, she had such a mad on the ride was good for her. She pushed through her anger by jamming down hard on the pedals until she was flying along the road. She was gasping for breath when she reached the Polar Air property.
Max’s cabin was dark when she pulled up in front of it. She checked her watch but it wasn’t late, barely 9:30. She leaned her bike against the front porch. Banged on his door.
Nothing.
She called and still nothing. Was he out in town?
Finally, she rode back toward her own place and as she passed the lockup for the planes, she noticed that Max’s wasn’t there. She pedaled as though a fire-breathing monster was after her, got to Lynette’s and fishtailed when she tried to stop. She dropped her bike just like she had when she was a little kid, simply left it lying on the gravel and pounded up the stairs. She ran into her grandmother’s house.
“Grandma? Lynette?”
“I’m watching TV.”
When she burst into the room, Lynette adjusted her glasses. “Claire?” she said. “What is it?”
“Where’s Max?”
“He had to go down south. Said there was something important he had to deal with. He’ll be back in a couple of days.”
“A couple of days?” she cried. She sat down. Stood up. The characters on Glee continued to sing their harmonic hearts out on the TV. “A couple of days?”
“Claire. What is it?”
She threw back her head, a wolf in midhowl. “Men!”
The Glee cast got cut off midnote.
“All men or one in particular?” The older woman’s voice was puzzled and perhaps a touch amused.
“It’s Max. I’m really sorry to tell you this, Grandma. But I don’t think he’s who he says he is.”
“Well, who is? The longer you live the more you realize that most of us are living in a fantasy of our own creation.” She snorted. “Have you ever read personal ads? If the people were as fantastic as they say they are, they’d never be single in the first place.”
“That’s exaggeration. This is downright lying.”
“Sit down, honey. You’re giving me a crick in my neck. Then tell me all about it calmly.”
Calmly? Right now Claire didn’t have a calm molecule in her body.
Still, she drew a full breath, held on to it for a few seconds and then slowly let it out. Then she told Lynette everything Laurel and she had found out about Max.
“So, his name’s Maximilian. Well, you can’t blame a man for hiding that.”
“It’s not the name, Lynette. It’s everything else that goes with the name.”
“Like that he’s a bazillionaire.”
“A bazillionaire masquerading as a bush pilot.”
“I don’t think he is. You can’t hide that kind of thing. He’s got the skills and he’s logged the hours flying. We checked his references and his credentials.”
“But why is he here?”
“Why is anyone here?”
She let out an infuriated cry. “I don’t mean in an existential way, I mean why, specifically, is Maximilian Varo, owner of a venture-capital firm that buys struggling companies for cheap and turns them around, here?”
“I don’t know. But even if our Max is this Maximilian person, the fact that he’s here doesn’t mean he’s up to no good.” She sighed. “We used to trust people. We used to take them at their word. We still don’t lock our doors at night. Spruce Bay isn’t that kind of town. Never has been. And we’re not that kind of people.”
“But—”
“I’m as sorry as I can be that Frank Carmondy went down the path he did. But he’s paid for it with his life. And of all the people I’ve trusted in my life, and I’ve been around for a lot of years, he’s the only one who’s ever let me down.”
“But—”
“He’s let you down, too. I know that. And badly. Frank was a trusted employee, more like family, really. And he betrayed that trust. But that doesn’t mean we don’t extend trust to others.”
“But why, why would Max be here if it wasn’t to take our business away?”
“I don’t know. But it seems to me if he’s as much of a big shot as you say he is that he’d have underlings buying up no-account airlines. What’s he doing here himself?”
That was the part she still didn’t understand. “I don’t know.”
“Well, maybe we should ask him before we get ourselves too riled up.”
“I would ask him,” she said with forced patience, “but he’s not here. He’s gone south on some mysterious errand.”
“What do you think he’s going to do?”
“I don’t know. Laurel’s the one with the business degree. She talked about hostile takeovers and buying up mortgages for pennies on the dollar. I think, since Frank helped himself to the cash drawer, that we are vulnerable.”
Lynette rose. She came closer and rubbed Claire’s shoulder. “Polar Air has been around for a long time. We’ve survived terrible weather, economic downturn, competition from other airlines.” Her face creased for a second. “We lost our only child to a foolish car accident. You lost your parents. I lost my husband. And we’ve always survived. Sure, we’re weakened right now and hurting, but whatever happens, I think we’ll make it.”
“I wish I had your optimism.”
“I wish you did, too. You’d be a lot happier.”
* * *
HE WAS GOING to tell her, Max decided as his plane drew closer to Spruce Bay. He felt anticipation building inside him. He was going to see Claire again. Kiss Claire again. Make love to Claire again.
He felt as though he hadn’t seen her for weeks when it had only been a couple of days.
He wondered how she’d react when she discovered who he really was.
Once more he was reminded of The Prince and the Pauper where the poor guy turns out to be pretty flush with cash. He could finally remove the crease of worry between Claire’s pretty hazel eyes. He wanted to take some of the burden off her shoulders more than he could ever remember wanting anything.
If the fairy tale held true, he’d discovered a woman who loved him for himself. For the bone-deep qualities he believed he possessed and not for his material possessions, especially his money, which had come to him more as a fluke than anything else.
It helped that she loved to fly as much as he did, that she was adventurous and loving and that they fit together so well, whether in bed or in conversation over coffee and the paper. He imagined having children with her, flying to remote spots and camping out with her, growing old with her.
He let out a breath. Oh, yeah. He was a goner.
Looked like Dylan was going to win their foolish bet after all.
He’d never lost anything more willingly.
When he landed, he felt a smile begin to bloom. He grabbed his bag and the bouquet of roses he’d picked up in Seattle because they’d looked so fresh, the way flowers should look. The only place in Spruce Bay that had flower arrangements was the grocery store, and the couple of times he’d gone by the blooms had looked like they had died and somebody’d glued the petals back on. Saddest damn things he’d ever seen.
He liked to give a woman flowers. And Claire seemed like a woman who should receive roses
on a regular basis.
Specifically from him.
When he jumped down from the plane he strode off in the direction of the office, hoping to catch her on the ground. He’d tried to rehearse what he wanted to say to her on the flight up, but he didn’t want it to sound like a speech, nor did he want to come across as some arrogant twit so full of himself that he thought a few bucks would make a difference in their relationship. Still, as Adam’s fiancée had reminded him during his brief visit home, there came a point when a woman deserved full disclosure. He suspected he’d reached that point, especially since he wanted to help her save her family company.
He knew the second Claire saw him. In fact, it seemed almost as though she’d been waiting for him. The outer door of the office building flew open and she pretty much ran toward him.
It felt like that moment in the movies or TV commercials when the lovers run toward each other, usually barefoot and on the beach. They may not have been on a beach, but he was pretty sure the handful of roses he was holding out went a long way in the romance department.
It wasn’t until she got closer that he noticed the expression on her face.
It wasn’t the bliss of a woman about to embrace her lover.
Looked more like the grim mask of an executioner as he raised the ax.
He stopped in midstride, puzzled. “Hey, is everything okay?”
She’d sprinted so hard she was out of breath. Her eyes snapped with fury. “No. Everything’s not okay, Maximilian!” She pretty much spat out the formal version of his name. Funny how when he heard himself called that, it often meant somebody was mad at him. Usually, his mom.
It seemed, based on Claire’s use of his full name, that she had probably figured out who he was.
And she didn’t seem thrilled.
She stood there in front of him, her hands wrapped firmly around her torso. He got the impression that she was holding them tight to prevent herself from slapping his face or punching him or something.
They weren’t even alone. Lynette had emerged from the office right behind Claire, walking at a normal pace, and had nearly reached them. One other pilot was walking up toward the office, and a maintenance guy was looking over at them with interest.
