by T. L. Haddix
“You’re welcome. And here’s this,” he said, giving her a key. “I’ll get the code for you before you leave today. I really am sorry I wasn’t here on time this morning.”
She waved the apology away. “It’s not a big deal. The cupcake more than makes up for your tardiness. It’s hard to stay angry when you’re confronted with buttercream.”
He smiled. “I’ll have to remember that for future reference.”
“Are you planning on upsetting me frequently, then?” she teased.
“Me? I’d never do such a thing. I’m easy to get along with,” he said with a grin. “Just ask anyone.”
“That’s a likely story. Get out of here, Boss. I have work to do. I put your messages on your desk.”
After a quick salute, he headed into his office. Sydney made sure the door was closed fully before she opened the box containing the cupcake. As much as she’d joked about the confection’s superiority, eating one of the bakery’s cupcakes really was an experience. She took a moment to admire it visually before she lifted it out of the box and took a big bite out of the side. When the sweet saltiness of the buttercream hit her tongue, her eyes drifted closed.
“Oh, that’s good.”
A click sounded, and her gaze flew to Sawyer’s office door. She was horribly embarrassed at being caught enjoying the cupcake so much. To her relief, the door was still closed. Regardless, she carefully placed the rest of the treat back in the box. She didn’t want to chance Sawyer catching her for real.
“I’ll take care of you later,” she whispered as she closed the lid. “And I might stop by and get a dozen of your friends to take home with me tonight. Strawberry cupcakes for dinner sounds like a plan I can really get behind.” She might have to run twenty miles to work the calories off, but it would be worth it.
Inside his office, Sawyer leaned against the door, exhaling as quietly as he could. He’d intended to sneak and open the door, to tease Sydney about eating the cupcake. But the look of pure ecstasy on her face as she took that first bite had taken his breath. The moment had turned into something hot, erotic, and his reaction had been nearly instantaneous. How he’d managed to close the door without making a sound, he’d never know. But as he stood there, his mind reeling and his nerves humming, he called himself ten kinds of fool.
“She’s young enough to be your daughter. You’ve known her since she was a child,” he muttered under his breath as he paced to his desk. “You really, really need to get laid, Evans.”
As much as he’d grown out of the days when he’d indulged in casual sex, he might have to make a couple of phone calls, see if he could arrange a date. Otherwise, he’d soon be howl-at-the-moon crazy with lust, and all because he had the misfortune to be attracted to his assistant.
Chapter Nine
Late Monday afternoon, Sydney asked him a question that shoved all thoughts of how delicious she might be covered in buttercream out of his head.
“Have you filed your quarterly taxes yet?”
Sawyer was ashamed to admit all he could do at first was blink at her. “Quarterly taxes? I don’t file quarterly. I file annually.”
It was Sydney’s turn to be dumbstruck. “But you’re a small business. You have to file quarterly or you pay a penalty. How are you structured?”
He told her. “But my accountant said filing quarterly was optional. Same with payroll taxes, though I suppose now that you’re on board, I’ll have to start that up again.”
If looks could maim, he’d be short an arm or leg. “They told you what? Sawyer, if you’re set up to file payroll taxes, you can’t just quit. You can probably get away without filing quarterly in a pinch, but payroll’s a different story. Please tell me that isn’t what you’ve done.”
He shifted his feet. “Um…”
Sydney whimpered, her head falling into her hand. “Oh, my God. Who’s your accountant?”
“Tracy Ward. She’s been doing my taxes for about ten years now.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Tracy Ward. Why does that name sound familiar?” She pursed her lips and stared at him. “I know that name. I’m going to call Uncle John. You’d better cross your fingers and your toes, buddy. I’m afraid you might have a real mess on your hands.”
He folded his arms over his chest. “You really think that’s necessary?”
“Yes.” But before she could pick up her cell phone, her face went blank. “Wait a minute. Oh, my God. Tracy Ward.” Eyes huge, she stared at Sawyer for a moment, then grabbed her phone.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, stepping closer to the desk.
Sydney held a hand up, shushing him. “Mom? I have a question for you. Is Zanny around? No? Good. Remember that woman John worked with that kissed him? What was her name? Was it Tracy Ward?”
She listened to Emma’s response, nodding grimly. “I thought so. She’s Sawyer’s accountant, and she’s a fricking lunatic. I’ve got to call John and see if he can help get him straightened out.”
Sawyer didn’t like the sound of what he was hearing, not for an instant. “Now wait just a second,” he protested as Sydney ended the call with Emma. “You don’t know that I’m in a mess.”
“One of my duties with Charles was helping him get his paperwork lined out for taxes. I worked for him for three years. How long have you been self-employed?”
He stared at her, tapping the fingers of his right hand on his left arm. “Thirteen months.”
“Exactly.” She thumbed through her contacts.
“So let me get this straight. John used to work with Tracy?”
Sydney nodded slowly. “And the woman set it up so that Zanny walked in on them kissing. Not that John was interested in her in the least, you understand. Your accountant took advantage of the situation. He and Zanny were going through a rough patch at the time, and it almost caused a divorce. They were separated for a few months. It was right before I was born. I’ve heard Mom and Zanny talk about the woman, and that’s how I knew the name.”
He sighed, rubbing a hand over his face, then pulled a chair up to sit in front of her desk. “Call him, then. If you think you should, call him.”
She did. An hour later, John was in the conference room, papers spread out around him as he went over Sawyer’s tax returns. If the look on his face was any indication, he wasn’t pleased with what he was seeing.
“I can’t believe this. Sawyer, I’m sorry. This is… This is going to take some unraveling to fix. Damn.”
“How bad is it?” Sawyer asked from across the table.
John grimaced. “It’s not ‘hire a tax attorney’ bad, but it’s a tangled ball of yarn. We can fix it. I’m just… I can’t believe she’d do this. For all her faults, she’s a good CPA. It’s almost like she’s deliberately set you up to get in trouble. But that wouldn’t make any sense.”
Sawyer had the sinking feeling it did make sense. “Um, yeah. It would.”
When Sydney and John both looked at him expectantly, he felt his face heat up. He really didn’t want to have to explain to them that he’d rejected the woman’s advances several times, and while she’d finally accepted his refusals, it had strained their professional relationship.
“Well?” Sydney asked. “Are you going to tell us?”
“I wouldn’t go out with her,” he finally admitted.
John whistled. “Damn.”
“Yeah,” Sawyer agreed. “I hate to ask you to get involved with this. I know you stay pretty busy with your regular job. Can you refer me to someone?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll be happy to help. You know I’ve cut back to part time now so Zanny and I can take time off and do some things. Besides, I used to work with Tracy. I feel kind of like I owe you the help if we’re being honest. She caused a situation a long time ago that I never felt like I made proper restitution
for. This might be a good way to balance out the karma.”
Sawyer exchanged a look with Sydney. There was no reason for him to mention that Sydney had told him about the kiss. “If you’re sure, then I’d really appreciate the help. What do we do?”
“First, we sit down and go through your taxes every year she’s worked on them. And it wouldn’t hurt to pray or cross your fingers or whatever you feel comfortable doing.”
A glance at his watch told him it was nearly five o’clock. “Okay. I have the business records here. My personal records are at home. When do you want to start?”
“If you want to get started tonight, we can. If you trust me with your files, I can take them home and review them,” John offered. “Or I can make some schedule adjustments and come back tomorrow. That might be better. Bring in everything you have, personal and professional, and we’ll see what we see.”
Grimly, Sawyer nodded and stood. “I’ll have it here first thing.”
John looked over his shoulder to the reception area, where Sydney was taking a phone call, then turned back to eye Sawyer hesitantly. “If you don’t mind my being nosy, when did you turn her down?”
“Right about the time I was setting up the business. I’d probably had the doors open a month? Maybe two?”
“That fits with what I’m seeing,” John said, “so we may have gotten lucky if you’ll forgive a bad pun. All the paperwork from where the company was set up looks fine. It’s just the tax reports after that which are messed up.”
Sawyer rubbed the back of his neck, his cheeks hot. “I feel like an idiot. You’d think I’d have had the sense to know that I couldn’t just stop filing payroll taxes.”
John shook his head as he stacked papers. “Not necessarily. You’re plenty smart. But smart has nothing to do with this. You had a professional whose opinion you trusted to advise you on what to do. There’s no reason for you to think anything would have been amiss with what she said. Like I told you earlier, she’s a good CPA. She’s just a really nasty piece of work personally.”
“I appreciate the sentiment. Doesn’t make me feel like less of an idiot, though.”
John smiled. “Sawyer, you’re about as far from an idiot as anyone I’ve ever met.”
Sawyer chuckled ruefully. “Thanks. You know, I had serious reservations about hiring Sydney. But I’m very glad now that I did. I probably shouldn’t tell you that.”
“Eh, I understand what you mean. The last time you had any interaction with her, she was a somewhat wild teenager who had a penchant for finding trouble whether she wanted it or not.”
“She was,” Sawyer agreed, keeping his voice low so that it didn’t carry to the other room. “And now she’s so competent it’s scary. Do you know, as soon as I explained my filing system to her Friday, she had it in hand? The other women who worked for me, at least the one who was familiar with office management? It took her a week.”
John’s smile was a little bit wicked as he asked, “What about the other one?”
In response, Sawyer simply lifted his hand and raised his middle finger.
John laughed. “That’s what I heard. In all seriousness, Sydney’s had a rough way to go the last few years. She’s kind of forged in fire, thanks to her piece of shit ex-husband. And she really enjoyed her job with Charles, took a lot of pleasure out of helping the clients who came in. Archer was pretty sharp to put you two together. I think once you get past the idea of her being that troubled kid, you’ll be trying to figure out how you made it this long without her.”
Sawyer agreed. “I think I already am.”
Chapter Ten
When Sydney came back from lunch Thursday, John was leaving, having dropped off Sawyer’s taxes.
“Hey, Uncle John. Did you get him straightened out?” she asked as he gave her a hug.
“I did. And now I’m going to head next door and grab my girl. We have a date.”
“Try to stay out of trouble,” Sydney told him with a smile as he left.
“I make no promises,” he called over his shoulder, his grin wicked.
“He’s a good guy,” Sawyer said. He sat on the edge of her desk as she put her purse in one of the drawers. “He’s going to handle my taxes from here on out. I hated to ask him to do it, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
“He enjoys it. He has a gift for seeing patterns, doesn’t see numbers the way the rest of us do. And if he didn’t want to take you on as a client, he wouldn’t have offered.”
“I know.”
Sydney came around and perched on the edge beside him. “It’s good to see him and Zanny taking some time for themselves. After her breast cancer diagnosis and everything that’s happened between Noah and Eli, it would have been too easy for them to lose sight of each other. Instead, it’s made them stronger than ever.”
Sawyer nodded. “So things aren’t any better between Noah and Eli? I thought they’d patched things up a bit after Eli’s wife was killed.”
She shrugged, thinking about everything the family had been through in the last few years. Noah and Eli had fallen out when they were teenagers, still in high school. As soon as he’d graduated, Noah had gone to Europe, where he’d stayed for several years. It wasn’t until Zanny was diagnosed with breast cancer, when Sydney was sixteen, that he’d come home for good. Eli had just graduated from high school, married his long-time girlfriend, and had enlisted in the Army, his absence being the only reason Noah had been able to manage moving back to Kentucky.
“They called something of a truce when Zanny was sick, but the animosity didn’t start to fade until after Erica died. And it’s been better since then, but it’s still tense whenever they’re in the same room, which isn’t often. I know that’s really weighed heavily on John and Zanny. With that feud, the cancer, and getting Molly through her teenage years, they’ve had a lot of stress. Even though Molly was nothing approaching a troubled child,” she said with a soft smile. “Unlike some people I could mention.”
“You were okay. Trust me, the things you did? You could have been a lot worse. A lot worse.”
“I do know that, but I was bad enough. For heaven’s sake, I stole Daddy’s car and took it to Virginia when I was fifteen. Fifteen, Sawyer. Do you know what could have happened?”
He laughed and she nudged him with her shoulder.
“I do know. You had enough sense to take Danny with you, though. And like I said, in the grand scheme of things, what you did wasn’t that bad. You turned out okay.”
Sydney grinned. “Most days. I still get a wild hair every now and then.”
When the phone rang, she reached behind her and answered it. “Evans Investigations.”
“Yeah, I’m Bret Varney with McElty and Jones of Charleston. I’d like to speak with whomever’s in charge.”
“That would be the owner, Sawyer Evans. If you’ll hold one moment, I’ll put you through.”
She pursed her lips as she pushed the hold button. “Sounds impressive. McElty and Jones, Charleston?” she asked Sawyer.
He shook his head and stood. “No idea. I’ll take it in the office.”
With a groan, Sydney headed for the restroom. She started a pot of coffee on her way back to the reception area, all too aware now of Sawyer’s addiction to the stuff, and settled in to check e-mail.
A few minutes later, Sawyer came out, a pensive look on his face as he stared down at her.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know,” he said slowly. “Do you know anyone from Charleston, South Carolina, who would be looking into you?”
Sydney raised a hand to her throat. “Into me? What are you talking about?”
“Varney’s a PI. His client’s based in Charleston, and they’re looking for a thorough dossier on one Sydney Gibson Tate. He knew you were back in Hazard, and
he was looking for someone local to do the legwork.”
Her hand clenched involuntarily, and she cursed under her breath when Sawyer’s eyes dropped to follow the movement. She forced herself to relax.
“I don’t use that name anymore. I legally took Gibson back. But to answer your question, no. I don’t know who would be interested in investigating me.”
Sawyer lifted a pen out of the cup on the desk, twirling it end over end as he studied her. “Is there anything you’re not telling me, Sydney?” he asked softly.
“No! Honest to God, I-I don’t know… Adam and his family would know to call Mom and Daddy. Shoot, they could call me—my cell phone number’s the same. I can’t think of anyone who would have any reason to hire a PI to find out about me.”
“What about your biological father?”
She sat back in her chair, her gaze falling to the blotter calendar on the desk. “He died about eighteen months ago. And you were there the one and only time I ever met the man. Do you think he’d have any interest in finding me?” She chanced looking up at Sawyer, hating the sympathy she saw in his face. “What did you tell him?”
“That I’d ask around and call him back. He didn’t want to let go of too many details, such as what his client’s name is, until and unless I agree to take the case.”
“If you don’t do it, someone else will.”
He dropped the pen back in the cup and paced to the window beside the door. “I know. How do you want me to handle it?”
Sydney didn’t have a clue how to answer. She told him as much. “What do you advise?”
