Over on the counter, her phone buzzed with a text. She ignored it.
“You need a ride anywhere today?” he asked.
“Nope. And really, you don’t have to drive me everywhere. I’ll just call a cab.”
“Cab service around here isn’t the best,” he warned. “Sometimes it takes them forever to show up.”
“I can wait. It’s not like I’m on a tight schedule or anything.”
“Maddy. You need a ride, you call me.”
She spread marionberry jam on her toast, taking great care to spread it out to the crusts. “Are you saying you want to drive me?”
“I’m saying I’m my own boss and my schedule is flexible. I’m saying just call me and I’ll take you where you want to go.”
She set down her knife. “So many things I love about Oregon, including the amazing marionberry jam.” She took a bite, chewed it slowly and swallowed. How could the sight of her eating toast be so sexy?
Was he over-the-moon for her? Definitely.
But it was okay. It was fine. As long as he kept things in perspective, why shouldn’t they both have a really good time together?
She studied her toast as though considering where to bite it next. “But do you want to drive me?”
He wanted to do a lot more than drive her. Why not just admit it? “Hell, yes.”
She slanted him a glance. “Because you want to be with me every minute you can, right?”
“That’s right.” It came out sounding like a growl.
“And I want to be with you.” She showed him those dimples. He was a goner, no doubt about it. “Fair enough, then. I’ll call you when I need a ride.”
Her phone buzzed. She just sipped her coffee and enjoyed a bite of scrambled eggs. Then the phone rang.
“Fine,” she muttered to no one in particular. She got up and answered it. “What is it, Rudy?” Her lush mouth a flat line and her turquoise eyes stormy, she listened to whatever her assistant had to say. “Just tell Myra that no, I haven’t had a chance to read it. I am on vacation, and she knows it. I’ve told her like five hundred times—and you know what? I give up. Just have her call me. I’ll tell her myself. Again... Yeah. Thanks... It’s not you. You’re the best. Mmm-hmm, bye.” She ended the call. “Sorry,” she said. “My agent is about to call and when she does I’m not going to say what she wants to hear. Myra’s a powerhouse. She’s not nice when you tell her things she doesn’t want to hear.”
“You want me to leave?”
“No. Although, I confess, you will probably wish you had.”
Maybe he would. But he stayed where he was. This was her life and it wouldn’t hurt for him to witness a reminder of that.
The phone hadn’t finished the first ring when she answered it. “Myra. Rudy said it was urgent. What can I do for you?”
The woman on the other end was a fast-talker. And a loud one. He could almost make out what she said even though Maddy hadn’t put her on speaker. He got, “...to dream.” And “...read it?”
“Myra, I told you. I’m not reading anything right now. I’m taking some much-needed family time.”
Myra took issue—vehemently. He understood enough of the words to get that the agent didn’t know Maddy had a family.
Maddy sucked in a tight breath through her nose. “Sorry. Figure of speech. Vacation, then. You have heard of those?”
Myra snapped back with something sassy.
Maddy said, “I realize I don’t take vacations—not until now, anyway. And that is why I’m due one, wouldn’t you say?”
Myra didn’t sound like she would say that at all. She fired off a string of sentences, like the rat-tat-tat of a Gatling gun.
And Maddy replied, “Well, then tell them I understand. Thank them for thinking of me for the part. I’m not going to read it until I’m back in LA and I guess that means—no, wait.” Maddy drew herself up tall. “Myra, just turn it down for me. It’s as simple as that. Tell them it’s not for me.”
Myra squawked like an outraged duck.
“It’s a movie,” said Maddy. “Not world peace.”
Myra disagreed. At length.
“Well, that is my answer, so there’s nothing else to say right now. Anything else you need, reach out to Rudy. I’ll call you as soon as I get back. We’ll do lunch, talk about, um, the future...”
Myra started squawking again.
Maddy didn’t let her get rolling. “I have to go. Take care, Myra.”
The room seemed deathly quiet when she ended the call. She let out a long sigh.
Not really sure what to say, he asked, “You okay?”
Her slim shoulders were slumped. She rubbed the space between her eyebrows like she was getting a headache. “Just thinking about the people who depend on me for their livelihood. If I do walk away from acting, I’ll need to start considering how and when to tell them that I’m not taking on any more projects.”
“So, you’re Myra’s only client?”
That made her smile. “Hardly. She represents several big names. It’s not really Myra I’m worried about. It’s more, well, Rudy’s a treasure and so is my housekeeper. And they’re not the only great people who work for me. I’ll need to start talking to them about where they might go next.”
He shouldn’t even ask. But he did. “Would you leave LA, then?”
“I’m thinking about it. I’m mostly there because that’s where the film industry is. If I’m not in the industry, well, why not try somewhere else?”
Somewhere else like, say, a small town in Oregon where her newly discovered family lived?
Why was he even letting himself think it?
She went on, “Then again, it will be a while before I have to let anyone go. I’ve got those two projects I’m already signed on for. And the house in Bel Air isn’t my only property. I’ll still be needing staff for at least the next few years—maybe longer, depending on what I decide I want to do next.”
Staff? Last night, he’d had the best sex of his life with a gorgeous virgin—who had staff.
Talk about putting the situation in perspective.
And come on. He’d known her for two weeks. It was way too soon to be worrying about the future, anyway. They were having a great time and he needed to focus on that.
She seemed to have come to a similar conclusion. She asked brightly, “So what’s up for you today?”
“The usual. I’ll stop in to check on the progress at a house I’m flipping and then spend the afternoon at the Boatworks.”
She gave him that look, the one that made him forget his own damn name. “I would love to see your flip house and I’ve been dying to look around the family business. Take me with you.”
He tried to talk her out of it, tried to get her to see that drywall and tile wasn’t all that interesting and a tour of the Boatworks would take ten minutes tops. Plus, he had a few hours of work he needed to do there.
Maddy was undeterred. “I’ll read a book or take a walk or check in with my investment banker. Sheesh, Sten. Believe it or not, I know how to amuse myself.” Her dimples were flashing and those eyes could coax a guy to jump off a cliff and smile all the way down to the canyon floor below.
Sten knew he was in big trouble. It was official: he could refuse Maddy nothing. “You sure?”
“What part of ‘Take me with you’ didn’t get through to you?”
He surrendered. “Wear something you don’t mind getting paint on.”
“I need a shower. Care to join me?”
He folded his arms across his chest. “That’s just mean and you know it. If I join you in the shower we’ll spend the whole day in your bed.” Which sounded pretty much perfect to him.
Her grin said it sounded good to her, too. “So that’s a no?”
His pants were getting tighter. “Stop it.”
&n
bsp; She waved a hand. “Fine. Go...put on your tool belt. I’ll meet you down at your garage in twenty minutes.”
He didn’t expect her to make it in twenty, no way. But seventeen minutes later, she was waiting in the driveway when he opened the garage door. He pulled out and she jumped in on the passenger side, looking ready to lay tile in a plain white T-shirt, old jeans and a pair of high-tops. She’d tucked her hair up in a short wig and finished the look with a Mariners cap and a pair of aviator sunglasses.
At the flip house, the painters were hard at work, inside and out. Sten gave her a quick tour, explained that the floors were covered in the main room because he was keeping the original hardwood. In the kitchen, he planned on refinishing the cabinets, installing quartz countertops and putting in new appliances.
“The yard’s pretty bare,” she said, dipping her head and peering at him over the tops of those flyboy shades. “What about curb appeal?”
“You’ve been watching those home improvement shows.”
“I love them. Especially Property Brothers.” She pointed her thumb at herself. “Team Jonathan, all the way, baby.”
He happily launched into way more detail than she could possibly need about driveway resurfacing, water-conserving irrigation systems and what would be planted, and where.
Marcus Dunbar, who ran the painting crew, stuck his head in the front door. “Sten. Got a minute?”
“Go ahead,” Maddy said. “I’ll be fine.”
He wasn’t outside for long. But when he came back in, she was nowhere in sight.
“I love you...” The voice—a guy’s voice—came from down the hallway that led to the bedrooms.
What the hell? Sten turned the corner to the hall and spotted them down at the other end—a muscled-up guy with long hair knotted up in a manbun, and Madison. The guy had her cornered against the far wall. “I’ve seen all of your movies. Heartbeats about finished me. And The Deepest Lie? You were amazing.”
“Hey.” Sten practically shouted it as he strode toward them. The guy didn’t turn. “Back off. Now.” Sten grabbed the guy by his brawny shoulder and yanked him around.
“Dude.” The guy had a beard—or the skimpy beginnings of one. Just a kid, one who apparently did a lot of lifting. He looked to be maybe twenty, tops. He put up both hands. “No offense. Seriously. Chill.”
Maddy lifted her chin in Sten’s direction. With the dark glasses, he couldn’t tell if she was scared or not. “It’s okay, Sten.”
“No, it’s not.” He released his grip on the kid and demanded, “Name?”
“Uh. Darby Williams.”
“I’m Sten. I own this house. You’re on Marcus’s crew?”
The kid finally had the sense to get nervous. “Uh. Yeah. New today—and man, I’m sorry. It’s just, you know, Madison Delaney.” He said her name like that explained everything: all manner of unacceptable behaviors, up to and including boxing her in at the end of a hallway to gush all over her.
Sten shot another glance at Maddy, seeking a signal as to how he was supposed to deal with this fool.
She took off the dark glasses. Her eyes were calm—resigned, even. “Darby just wanted me to know he’s enjoyed my movies.”
“Enjoyed?” Darby was outraged. “Doesn’t even come close.”
“Listen, Darby.” She turned those amazing eyes on the guy. “I’m kind of on the down-low here, so if you could maybe—”
“Madison.” He plunked his fist on his paint-spattered Imagine Dragons T-shirt, right over his heart. “No one is gonna hear anything about you from me.”
“Thank you.” She blasted him that megawatt smile.
“God. It’s an honor. Words are not enough.”
Sten was thinking that maybe he ought to just fire the guy on the spot. That, or punch his lights out.
“Darby!” It was Marcus—at the front door, it sounded like. “Where’d you get off to?”
“On my way!” Darby turned to Sten. “Sorry, man. Really.” And then to Maddy, “What you do? Never stop.” And then he spun on his heel and sprinted off, leaving Sten and Maddy staring at each other.
“You told him who you were.” He didn’t mean to sound accusing, but the sight of her boxed in by a strange guy had his adrenaline pumping.
“Remember what I said about misdirection? Didn’t work on Darby. He spotted me and he knew it was me, so I had to go with it.”
She could have been hurt. “Was that smart?”
Her eyes got frosty. “I did the best I could, Sten.”
“The guy had you backed up against the damn wall.”
“He was a fan. It’s not a big deal.”
“I shouldn’t have left you alone in here.”
“Please. You had no way of knowing someone would recognize me. He wasn’t even in the house when you went out. I heard him come in the back door right after you left looking for that Marcus guy.”
“How did he get you boxed into the hallway?”
“I was already in the hallway. He spotted me as he went by and stopped to ask if I knew where that Marcus guy was. You should have seen him when he realized it was me. He did this double take and his mouth fell open.” She chuckled. “Really, it was kind of cute.”
“Cute? He boxed you in.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I’ll say it again. He boxed you in because I left you alone.”
She let out a groan. “Now you’re beating yourself up. Don’t. It’s not your fault. It can happen. And if I want to change things up in my life, I’m going to have to start developing coping strategies that don’t involve a round-the-clock security team.”
“Coping strategies? Some people are crazy. There’s no coping strategy for dealing with a guy who’s come unhinged.”
“Darby is not unhinged.”
“Close. Did you see that look in his eye?”
“It just surprised him to see some film star, here, in a half-finished flip house in Valentine Bay, that’s all.”
“Did he put his hands on you?”
“No, he did not—and as for coping with crazy people, yes, there are strategies for that. There are coping strategies for just about any situation.”
“Yeah, and you can cope your ass off and things can still get out of hand.”
“But they didn’t. It all worked out.”
His heart still pounded way too fast. He wanted to put a fist through the freshly hung drywall.
And yeah. He did know he was overreacting.
It was just, well, he couldn’t stand it if anything happened to her. The need to take care of her, to protect her, keep her safe had become an imperative.
When had that happened? He wasn’t sure.
But somehow, at some point, he’d become completely invested in her well-being.
He kept telling himself that he saw the situation realistically. He liked her a whole hell of a lot. And he wanted her safe. Add to that, he just plain wanted her. Bad. And constantly.
And as of last night, they were lovers. A man needed to protect his woman.
Even if it wasn’t meant to last.
And it wouldn’t last, he reminded himself for the umpteenth time. In a few weeks, she would return to LA, make her next movie, work things out with that pushy agent of hers and realize that being a big star wasn’t such a bad gig, after all.
All her talk about making a different kind of life was just that—talk.
If he had any sense of self-preservation at all, he ought to get some distance from her.
Yeah. Distance. Good luck with that. All she had to do was smile at him and he forgot all the reasons he shouldn’t have let her get under his skin.
“Sten.” She hooked the sunglasses in the neck opening of her T-shirt and took a step closer.
Even with the smell of fresh paint heavy in the air, he g
ot a whiff of petunias, sweet and yet sharp. Her mouth was tipped up to him. He was aching to take it.
“Sorry,” he said. “Darby freaked me out.”
She lifted her arms and propped them on his shoulders. “You okay now?”
“Yeah.” He dared to rest his palms on the swell of her hips. Back in the day, before he’d had the bad judgment to try to find love and happiness with Ella Robson, he’d had his hands on a good number of pretty women. Not one of them—Ella included—had felt the way Maddy did, like the curve of her waist was just made for his hands.
She was smart and funny and kind and beautiful. And he wanted her. Who wouldn’t?
It’s not deathless love. Get over yourself.
He kissed her, slow and sweet and just deep enough to ease the coiling tension inside him, to reassure himself that she really had taken the encounter with that Darby kid in stride.
“So no harm done,” she said when he lifted his head. “What’s next?”
* * *
Madison was having a fabulous time.
The flip house really interested her. She’d always thought it might be kind of fun, to fix a house up to sell, to figure out cost-conscious ways to make it better, make potential buyers want to live there.
Plus, Sten had just kissed her. Kissing Sten was one of the premier experiences of her life, an experience she planned to repeat. Frequently.
They went to Larson Boatworks next.
The family business consisted of a series of hangars and a row of boat slips on the Columbia River not far from Astoria. Most of the boatbuilding was done in the larger two hangars. The smaller hangar was the office.
They stopped in at the office first. Karin was busy behind the counter. She gave them a wave and a smile.
Sten led the way to the full-size hangars and showed her the projects they were working on now, including a sixty-six-foot commercial fishing vessel called the Lady Defiant. The Lady was getting a major refit. When the work was complete, the boat would be seventy-eight feet long and six feet wider than originally, with what Sten called a bulbous bow.
Otto Larson was at work on the Lady Defiant. Madison greeted him, but she also took care to keep a low profile with the guys who worked for the Larsons. She wore her hat and glasses the whole time.
Switched At Birth Page 13
