PLAYED: A Small Town Billionaire Romance (Reckless Falls Book 5)

by Vivian Lux

  The last remnants of the fiery sunset slipped away. Over the humped bulk of the western ridge the sky was still a faint aquamarine, but to the east a full moon was rising, its white light reflected in the dark water of the lake. It was so quiet out here that I imagined I could almost hear the far-off rush of the falls.

  Then there was the sound of a motor and headlights swept across the dead-end street. I straightened up, expecting to see the patrol car.

  But when I saw who it was, I stepped back into the shadow, my cheeks flaming.

  Finn Walker. I only knew his name because, in a fit of creepy stalkerish-ness that was completely unheard of for me, I'd looked up the owner of the building going up next door to my bakery. It seemed that, in addition to looking like he'd stepped off the pages of some rugged outdoorsman magazine, with his tanned skin and thick blond waves, he was also some kind of business whiz. The articles I'd searched through didn't explain why he'd left New York City for this tourist trap upstate, but I was eternally grateful that he had. The opportunity to stare at him through my window as he strode through his building, meeting with his contractors and directing his workers was the reason I'd come in to work so early tonight in the first place.

  He pulled into the alley that separated our two buildings and cut his engine. I heard the door slam and his footfall in the alley and ducked further back into the shadows, hoping like hell the patrol car wouldn't chose this moment to roll up and expose me.

  His footfalls grew louder. In a fit of panic, I rushed around the other corner.

  I heard him pause. I held my breath and wondered if he could see the graffiti. It was almost dark... but if he turned on the lights in his building, he would see it for sure.

  My mind spiraled out from there in dizzy terror. If he saw the graffiti, he'd probably come over and see if I was okay. And if he did that, I'd have to look at him without blushing and somehow pretend I hadn't already Google-stalked him thoroughly. And if he asked me about myself, my loneliness would bubble up and I'd probably end up spilling my life story — married at eighteen, divorced and fully estranged from my family at twenty-four, new in town and clearly hopeless at running a business — rather than just being casual and pithy. I'd probably alternate between gushing wildly about the restaurant he was opening and clamming up awkwardly when I realized I'd revealed too much.

  And then I'd see my awkwardness reflected in his blue eyes — the fact that I already knew they were blue was the worst part of it all — and then they'd glaze over and he'd look past me. Just like guys my age always did. And he'd get bored and go back into his restaurant and then I'd never talk to him again.

  I ducked back against the side of my shop, pressing my body flush up against the bricks. After a moment, I heard his steps resume, and then the sound of the door to his restaurant swinging open.

  "Huh, guess he doesn't lock it," I thought to myself, filing that away into the mental Rolodex I kept about Finn Walker. Not locking up meant he was completely confident, that he believed Reckless Falls was safe.

  The angry words scrawled across my storefront told me otherwise.

  I tapped my fingers against the bricks. This development was going up on land that used to belong to a resident. It used to be a marina, that's what the real estate agent had told me when I met with her. "Granger Point is going to completely reshape this town," she'd said confidently. "A highly walkable waterfront shopping destination, full of high-end boutiques and the best restaurants in the region. It's all very exciting."

  And it had felt very exciting at the time, especially as I sat there in the office with my suitcase at my side. Starting over again in a new town while the town itself was starting over seemed too much like synchronicity for me to ignore.

  But now I wondered if maybe the townspeople themselves didn't want to start over. And were making their displeasure known in the form of four-foot high graffiti on my store.

  I leaned my head back on the bricks and stared up into the sky. One by one the stars were coming out overhead. I really needed to start my baking, but I seemed rooted to the spot, stuck between moving forward and being dragged back in time.

  It was fully dark by the time the cruiser arrived, lighting up the darkened block in reds and blues. "You again?" the cop behind the wheel called out before stepping out of his car.

  Shame washed through me right down to my toes. I closed my eyes and for a moment I could see Zach standing right there in front of me, slowly shaking his head. "This is so stupid, Bee," imaginary Zach drawled in his bored tone. "Just give it up already."

  "No," I whispered.

  "What was that, ma'am?" the cop asked.

  I snapped my eyes open again. "Nothing. Sorry."

  The cop was in his mid-forties, with closely cropped hair and a full, bushy mustache. He was solid and dependable looking, and the wedding ring on his finger meant he wasn't frightening at all. I felt myself relax just a fraction.

  He looked at my ruined storefront and let out a low whistle. "Damn, girl. Who'd you piss off?"

  I bristled. "Nobody," I said, raising my chin. "I’m a baker. I make cupcakes and sweets. How could anyone be mad at me?"

  The cop did a slow double take. I straightened up to my full five feet four inches and gave him my winningest smile. "In fact, I was thinking. We don't need to stand out here in the dark. Why don't you come in and sit down? Have you tried my honey buns yet?"

  "No ma'am, I can't say that I have. I didn't even know there was a bakery down here until you started having your trouble..."

  "See now," I interrupted. "That's a shame. I have the best buns in the world, and that's not an exaggeration," I said, dragging out the innuendo. Falling into the old patterns was so easy to do. "You can see for yourself."

  At that his eyes nearly bugged out of his head. I grinned and turned to unlock the front door. "Take that, Zachary," I whispered to myself as I felt the cop’s eyes sliding down my backside. "I'm capable and sexy. I don't need anyone to take care of me. I can take care of myself just fine."

  You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, my mother's voice sang out in my head. I stumbled for a second midstride, then caught myself and did a little skip-hop dance over to the light switch and flipped it on.

  "Here, let me get you something," I told the cop. "What did you say your name was?"

  "Abbott. Jerry Abbott." The cop looked bewildered, but sat down at one of my tables anyway.

  "Well thank you for coming out Jerry," I said, bustling around behind the counter. Gathering a plate and a napkin, it felt like I was moving on autopilot. Hospitality was a habit of mine, ingrained in my DNA, it seemed. "I'm sorry this keeps happening, me having to call you out like this."

  "Thank you," Jerry said as I set his plate in front of him and stepped back.

  "You're welcome, of course," I replied, watching him anxiously.

  He lifted the sticky sweet bun to his mouth. I tapped my foot on the floor, feeling the familiar nervousness that came over me whenever someone tried my baking.

  But I clearly didn't have to worry. Because the second that the glazed dough touched his tongue, Jerry was putty in my hands. He devoured the bun in two bites and suddenly my case seemed to be a lot more important to him.

  "Don't worry, Bee," he told me once I'd given my statement, his voice full of gruff seriousness. "We're going to get to the bottom of this."

  A flaky piece of crumb still clung to his mustache. I looked away and sighed. "I hope so," I said. "Because I've only just opened, you see. It's been a rough couple of weeks. I have to clean the graffiti off now before it drives away my customers."

  What customers? Zach's voice asked in my head. I bit my lip and silently ushered Jerry out the door, waving goodbye with a smile that didn’t meet my eyes. You've barely sold a thing. This whole idea is completely terrible. Wouldn't it be easier if you just gave up and came home?

  I closed the door firmly. "No," I whispered aloud in my empty, defaced store. "I can do this. I can do this. B
y myself."

  CHAPTER TWO

  Finn

  I'd definitely seen something, though I wasn't sure what. Something, or someone, slipping out of sight in the shadows, but when I turned my head there was nothing there. Nothing except the darkened street and the moon overhead.

  "We need fucking streetlights," I muttered to myself as I opened the door to Indigo. I made a mental note to call the town about that tomorrow.

  One more thing on the list. But tonight, we were ticking a big one off and I was excited.

  I walked in to the restaurant, nodded at Jackson and sat down in front of the test dish. The pretty line cook stood in front of us both with a pleased little grin.

  I glanced at Jackson. He raised his eyebrow noncommittally. I gave a small nod in return and bent over the plate in front of me.

  It was delicious. Every bite a delicately composed symphony of taste. The more I ate, the more I stared at her. She gave a smug grin in return. She was good and she knew it.

  Could she be the one? After all this time? My breath was coming in short gasps now, like I'd run a marathon, and in a way, I sort of had. But maybe, just maybe it was coming to an end? Was the finish line in sight?

  "What do you think?" she asked, a glimmer of hesitation in her voice that made me clench my fist. How could she wonder when it was so obvious? She was it, she was the one, she was...

  "...Not working for me, sorry," Jackson sniffed.

  I twisted in my chair to glare at him. "Are you fucking kidding me?" I hissed, throwing my napkin down and gesturing at his full plate. "You've had one bite!"

  But Jackson was already pushing his chair back from the table, the elegantly plated remains of the test dish sitting in front of him, barely touched. Frantic hope was still coursing through my veins, but it ebbed away when I looked at the stubborn set of his jaw.

  "Goddamn it," I exhaled.

  The pretty little line cook's smile dropped into a frown. "Really?" she whimpered, breaking my heart into a million fucking pieces. I opened my mouth to comfort her, maybe tell her to ignore the asshole to my left, but Jackson cleared his throat.

  "You're good at what you do, honey," my best-friend-the-asshole said patiently. "But what you do is not what I am looking for."

  I gritted my teeth to keep from protesting. We'd agreed on how this would go a long time ago. I was in charge of the business, everything that had to do with turning this restaurant into the money-making cash cow I envisioned. Jackson had agreed to defer to me in all of the hiring decisions.

  "Except my kitchen," he'd declared. "That belongs to me."

  Fucking chefs, man.

  The pretty little line cook pouted for a second, then, seemingly over it, she threw down the custom apron we'd loaned her for the demo, with the old version of our logo still emblazoned across the front. We'd gone through three design changes since that version because, just like everything else that had to do with opening this new restaurant, Jackson and I had argued viciously about it. Or rather I'd yelled — and thrown a couple things too — while he sat that with that fucking arrogant smirk on his face. "I don't care about this shit," he'd told me for the millionth time. "I just want to cook. When can I cook?"

  "You want to cook?" I hissed at him now, as the line cook gathered her knife set. "Then you need to fucking hire a staff!"

  "I am," he said with an exasperated eyeroll. "I'm trying to find the perfect fit."

  My blood felt like the sizzle of water against a red-hot pan. "Perfect doesn't fucking exist!" I exploded.

  Jackson's mouth betrayed no sign of hearing me, but I knew him well enough to see it. That tiny little glimpse of panic in his eyes. He would never admit to it, hell I think he'd rather stab his eye out with his boning knife before he admitted it, but he was scared.

  Good.

  I was too.

  We'd sunk everything into this move. A fresh start for both of us, and I believed with all of my heart that we were on to something. Moving to Reckless Falls right as it was poised to go from dusty old family vacation spot to a world-class, high end resort town, that could only be good for us. I knew Jackson was looking to earn his second four-star chef rating, and me, I was ready to use all the shit I'd learned about making money for other people to start making some money for myself.

  "Let me see you out," I said to the line cook with a sigh. She wouldn't meet my eyes as I led her through the unfinished front end. The smell of just-cut lumber and the strangely astringent scent of unhung drywall hung in the air. The front atrium was still hung with plastic to keep out the elements, and I ducked under it first to sweep it out of her way.

  It was only then that I saw the red spots blazing on her cheek. "He's a fucking asshole," she hissed furiously.

  I took a deep breath. "I know," I told her, in all seriousness. "But he's a genius. And he's never wrong."

  She stared at me, openmouthed as I opened the door. "Good luck," I told her.

  Then I let the door close and dug the heels of my hands into my eyeballs before I headed into my unfinished office to yell at a few of our suppliers.

  After what felt like only minutes, the plastic that hung in my office doorway crinkled. "Are you ever coming out of there?" Jackson asked.

  I leaned back in my chair and stretched. "Why?"

  "Because I'm heading out."

  "What time is it?"

  "Two thirty in the morning."

  I rubbed my eyes furiously. "Jesus. How?"

  Jackson shrugged.

  "Jesus," I repeated, leaning back in my chair. “This place eats time. And here I thought I'd have a new hire to celebrate..." I glared at him

  "She wasn't right," Jackson repeated from the other side of the plastic sheeting. "All flash. No foundation in the basics. If that's the kind of bullshit graduate the Culinary Institute is putting out these days, I need to give Tom a call."

  I looked up, pressing my lips together to keep the torrent of anxiety from spilling out. "Okay," I finally said, shoving the plastic aside and heading back out into our raw space. "So we're supposed to be opening in time to catch the height of the summer season." I pinched the bridge of my nose between my fingers. "But, Jacky-boy—" Jackson's eyes narrowed at this hated nickname, so of course I made sure to use it again. "Jacky-boy, can I be frank with you? You're fucking everything up."

  He regarded me with that same amused grin he always wore. Like this was all a big joke and didn't matter to him because he knew I'd fix it.

  And most of the time he was right.

  "You told me that I was in charge of hiring the kitchen staff, Finn."

  "Yeah, but when I said that, I thought you might actually fucking hire someone."

  "No one in this shit town knows how to julienne a carrot much less cook a steak sous-vide."

  I glared at him. He shook his head. "Don't fucking say it."

  You could have hired half the staff at your old place if you'd just played nice. "I'm not saying it," I said. I'd already said it a billion times before.

  Jackson's lip curled. "Yeah but you're thinking it loud and clear."

  "You know I'm right."

  "Nothing wrong with burned bridges, so long as you're on the right side," he intoned loftily.

  "Jacky-boy you didn't burn them. You fucking nuked them from orbit."

  "Yeah well," he mumbled. And without another word, he turned on his heel and headed back to the half-done kitchen.

  I took a deep breath. We'd been working sixteen hour days. I was hemorrhaging money like crazy and Jackson still hadn't worked out a menu he was happy with. The opening date I'd announced in all the press releases, the one that had seemed to comfortably far away, was closing in fast. Only a month to go.

  I sighed again, rubbing my eyes, and when I opened them again, it was like I'd seen the light.

  The light next door that was.

  She was working.

  Indigo was situated in a prime location in a new strip of waterfront development carved out of an old marina. All aro
und us were the shells of new construction, some finished, some still unfinished and looming over us like dinosaurs skeletons in a museum.

  But there was one place that was open and ready for business and it sat right next door to us, across a shared alleyway that led to the back. The huge plate glass window I'd had installed here on the corner to give the widest possible view of the water also gave a pretty nice view of Honey Bee's, a sweet little bakery run by her.

  Her. That's what I called her, because I didn't know her name. I just knew that seeing her bustle around in her shop at night — baking all those sweet things in preparation for the morning — was the brightest damn spot in my day lately.

  Maybe once the restaurant opened I'd have time to go over there and actually say hello.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Jackson

  "Staring at Beatrix again?" I asked.

  Finn nearly jumped out of his skin. "Fucker, aren't you wearing clogs?" he demanded. "How'd you sneak up on me like that?"

  I suppressed a laugh. Finn didn't like when people laughed at him. Which was fucked up because I pretty much laughed at anything. "I didn't sneak," I said instead. "You were just too wrapped up in staring at your baker."

  "The hell you talking about?" he scoffed. But he backed away from the window anyway.

  "Hey, I don't blame you," I told him, going to the window myself. I couldn't see into her shop from this angle, but I knew she was there because her beat up Taurus was parked in the alleyway, its rear end covered in bumper stickers. I liked how she wore her ideals out in the open like that. Like she wanted to waste no time in letting the world know who she was. "Beatrix is a cutie."

  Finn had been leaning up against the window pane, smudging his face against the glass, which made me wrinkle my nose and look around for the glass cleaner. But when I said that, he launched upright. "How do you know her name?" he asked.

  I licked my lips. There was no way I was answering that question. "I have my ways."