Keeping Company Page 8

  Alaina’s teeth went on edge. The name had roughly the same effect on her as fingernails on a chalkboard. “Promise me on pain of death you won’t ask me to see Knute Grabowski again.”

  Knute was a lumberjack Jayne had met, God knew where, befriended, and then foisted off on Alaina at one of her oddball parties. He was approximately the size of a sequoia and very nearly as intelligent as one.

  Predictably, Jayne defended him. “He’s not a bad guy once you get to know him.”

  “Jayne, you would say that about anybody. You would say that about Adolf Hitler. You would say that about the Marquis de Sade.”

  Jayne made a face. “What did Knute do?”

  “He took me to a wet T-shirt contest in a biker bar. I had to threaten him with a broken beer bottle to keep him from signing me up as a contestant. You can’t imagine how disappointed he was. In spite of the fact that I didn’t get doused, he announced to one and all that I had far and away the best hooters in the place.”

  Jayne choked on her muffin. Her eyes watered. “I admit, he’s a little rough around the edges.”

  “A little?” Alaina arched a dark brow sardonically. “ ‘I’ll bet you like to be on top’ is a long way from being a smooth line in my book.”

  Jayne pressed a fist to her mouth and glanced away, her cheeks turning red with pent-up laughter. “I suppose Dylan seemed like a great match after that, huh?”

  Something in her tone of voice caught Alaina’s attention. She prided herself on being able to read people. It was essential to success in her business. A look, a muscle twitch, a slip of the tongue—each could be a giveaway of something important in a client or a witness. And Jayne’s voice carried something other than amusement. It was something subtle, something odd. Alaina gave her friend a shrewd look.

  Swallowing her laughter, Jayne glanced around, casting about frantically for a new topic. Her eyes settled on Alaina’s canvas and she pointed to it as if it had just suddenly sprouted up from the floor of the porch. “I like your painting. A dog with a horn. Very symbolic.”

  Alaina stared at the canvas. “It’s a horse.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure.”

  Her artistic rendition wasn’t exactly a dead ringer for Fury, she admitted objectively. In fact, it had to be the ugliest horse ever immortalized in art. It had four stubby legs that all appeared to be on the same side of its body, and it definitely had the head of a Doberman.

  Jayne pushed herself up from the swing and stepped closer to scrutinize the damp canvas. She narrowed her eyes and chewed her full lower lip. “Maybe subconsciously you wanted to paint a picture of a dog with a horn. Art comes from the subconscious, you know. You really shouldn’t try to make the cosmic flow of creativity conform to conscious precepts.”

  “It’s just a painting, Jayne,” Alaina muttered crossly. “Don’t make a big federal case out of it.”

  “Hello, ladies!”

  The simple salutation jolted all of Alaina’s sensual systems into high gear. Her head snapped up, and her gaze collided with Dylan’s as he jogged up her sidewalk. He wore a pair of red running shorts that made him look impossibly tan and impossibly sexy, not just because he had great legs, but because shorts were the only clothes he had on.

  His upper torso was wonderfully bare except for the thicket of dark curls that carpeted his chest and the patch of silky-looking hair on his belly. He looked damn good for a forty-year-old guy, Alaina marveled, her gaze taking in taut, flat muscles. From his chest to the tips of his running shoes, there didn’t appear to be a spare ounce on him. She unconsciously sucked in her tummy as he bounded up the steps onto her porch.

  Jayne beamed a smile at him. “Hello, handsome.”

  “Hi, Jayne.” He stopped mere inches from Alaina, leaned down, and dropped a kiss on her mouth. “Good morning, Princess.”

  “Ummm …” She really did mean to say something, but her brain was stuck in neutral. The warmth of his mouth clung to her lips, and his taste lingered as well—mint toothpaste. “Ummm …”

  “Honestly, Alaina,” Jayne chuckled. “You sound like one of my llamas.”

  Dylan grinned, more than a little pleased with Alaina’s reaction to his surprise attack. “Speechless, Counselor? I guess I’ve still got the magic touch.”

  “You do okay … for an old guy. What brings you to this neighborhood?”

  “Exercise, Princess,” he said, jogging in place for a few steps. “You ought to give it a try before desk-jockey spread sets in.”

  He had the audacity to emphasize his statement by smacking her on the fanny, then letting his fingers linger just a bare second longer than was strictly necessary. Alaina would have come back at him with a scathing remark, but she was too busy trying to gulp down a breath. The feel of his hand on her bottom had done something diabolical to her lungs.

  “I’ll have to take you running with me one of these mornings,” Dylan said. He planted both hands at his waist. “Fresh air, exercise, get those old endorphins flowing, flush some of the tar and nicotine out of your system. You’ll love it.”

  Alaina shot him a look. “Get real.”

  “The most physical thing Alaina does is run the fax machine at work,” Jayne said.

  “I object to exercise on principle,” she explained with her most regal look, tilting her nose up. “It makes me sweat.”

  Dylan waggled his brows. His voice dropped to the velvety, sexy purr that set all of Alaina’s most strategic nerve endings humming. “Some of the best activities in life make us sweat, Princess.”

  “Speak for yourself, Conan.”

  How she had managed to say anything at all was beyond her. Her brain was suddenly writhing with sweaty images, every one of them erotic and every one of them involving Dylan Harrison. It wasn’t difficult to imagine that he would be fantastic in bed. Most of his muscled body was visible to the eye right now, and the red running shorts didn’t leave a whole lot to the imagination.

  Dylan backed her up against the porch railing and bent to nip at her pearl-studded earlobe. “Oh, I just love all those barbaric little pet names you have for me, honey muffin.”

  “Laying it on a bit thick, aren’t you?” Alaina asked under her breath, ignoring the urge to wrap her arms around him and start doing some nibbling of her own. This was an act for Jayne’s benefit, she reminded herself.

  Dylan gave her his devil’s smile and stepped back. “The picnic tomorrow is potluck. I volunteered us to bring potato salad. Thought I’d better tell you so you could get busy in the kitchen.”

  Alaina arched a brow. “You expect me to cook?”

  “Well”—Dylan frowned—“it’s just potato salad.”

  The silence that accompanied her look was telling. Dylan felt his heart sink a little. She couldn’t cook. He wondered if she’d ever even heard of Donna Reed. He had really been hoping she would surprise him and tell him she was into gourmet cuisine. Even nouvelle would have been preferable to no talent at all.

  Jayne patted his arm consolingly. “Honey, if it doesn’t have microwave instructions on the box, you’re out of luck.”

  “I can do it,” Alaina said defensively.

  It was a bald-faced lie, but she didn’t care. She didn’t like the feeling of feminine inadequacy she’d felt facing Dylan’s obvious disappointment in her lack of culinary skills. It was just potato salad. How hard could it be? She had two degrees from the University of Notre Dame, for crying out loud. She could sure as hell handle a little potato salad.

  Dylan was dubious. The look of absolute shock on Jayne’s face was enough to make anyone skeptical. But Alaina had her lovely chin set at that angle he recognized as mule-quality stubbornness, and there was a strange light in her eyes. She looked very determined and very vulnerable, as if she really needed to have him believe in her ability to make a stupid potato salad. His heart ached a little at that look. He had to fight to keep from wrapping his arms around her.

  He was falling for her lik
e a ton of bricks. The realization had roused him from a fitful sleep before dawn. He had sat bolt upright amid tangled sheets, his body shining with a film of cold sweat. He wasn’t just physically attracted to Alaina Montgomery. There was that rare extra something to this feeling. Either he was coming down with a stomach virus, or he was falling for Alaina “I’m a career woman” Montgomery. A woman who couldn’t even make potato salad.

  “I’ll do it,” she said. The words sounded ominously like a threat.

  “If it’s no trouble,” Dylan said tenderly, lifting a hand to rub at a smudge of black paint on her cheek.

  “It’s no trouble at all,” Alaina murmured, her gaze still locked on his as the pad of his thumb moved in lazy circles near the corner of her mouth.

  This is weird, she thought. That wavelength of awareness was buzzing between them again even though this was hardly a romantic moment. She doubted the discussion of potato salad moved even the most domestic of women to passion.

  “Alaina turned loose in a kitchen?” Jayne mumbled, winding her hands in the tails of her shirt. “Sounds like big-time trouble to me.”

  “Don’t you have to go ride your llamas or something?” Alaina asked with a pointed look.

  “You don’t ride llamas.”

  “Then whatever it is one does with llamas—shouldn’t you be doing it, Jayne Emilia?”

  Jayne winced and bent over the porch swing to gather up her nail polish and the enormous canvas bag she called a purse. “Okay, I can take a hint. You don’t have to resort to middle-name calling.” She waved to them as she backed toward the steps. “Y’all have fun at the picnic tomorrow. Alaina, call me if you change your mind about Knute.”

  Alaina rolled her eyes.

  Dylan turned toward her with a strangely fierce expression. “Who’s Knute?”

  Alaina bent to pick up her palette and brush again, a slow smile tugging at her lips. That was certainly an interesting timbre in his voice. “Knute Grabowski? Just a friend,” she said nonchalantly. “He’s … big in the lumber business. It’s nothing, really.”

  Dylan frowned, scratching his chest absently. A lumber baron. He didn’t like the sound of that.

  Without giving his actions much forethought, he reached out, turned Alaina around, and pulled her into his arms. Whether she opened her mouth out of surprise or to protest he never found out, because he took full advantage of the situation to kiss the cotton anklets off her.

  His lips settled firmly against her lips, and his tongue swept against hers with lazy familiarity. Holy Hannah, she tasted good! Warm and sweet and more than a little willing. She twisted in his arms, not to escape but to get closer. Her arms crept up around his neck, the action lifting her full breasts up and rubbing them against his bare chest.

  Dylan groaned his pleasure. He let one hand slide down the supple curve of her back to her hip, caressing her through her khaki walking shorts. He pulled her closer, nestling her against the cradle of his maleness.

  Her brain devoid of reason or that famous control of hers, Alaina melted against him. It seemed all he had to do was touch her, and she was transformed from a rational, practical person to a featherheaded ninny.

  When he finally lifted his head, she looked up at him, dazed. Dylan Harrison had just kissed her senseless on her front porch in front of God and everybody. Two teenagers biking past had stopped by her curb to watch.

  “What was that for?” she asked weakly.

  Careful what you say, Harrison, you’re going to blow it, he warned himself. Alaina claimed she wasn’t interested in anything other than a phony relationship. If he even hinted at what kissing her meant to him, she was going to hand him his walking papers.

  He grinned wickedly and tapped a finger against the tip of her patrician nose. “Practice. We want to be convincing, don’t we?”

  Yes, but who was he trying to convince now? she wondered.

  “Nice painting,” he said as he sauntered toward the steps. “A dog with a horn. I like it.”

  He just managed to dodge the paintbrush that sailed at his head.

  “See you tomorrow, Princess,” he said with a chuckle.

  Chapter 5

  Alaina wasn’t sure what she had imagined a bar and bait shop would look like, but the reality was a pleasant surprise. Dylan’s was a tidy-looking place with weathered gray siding decorated with all manner of seagoing paraphernalia. Fishnets were draped artistically between life rings and anchors. The signboard swinging above the main door on an iron bracket read simply DYLAN’S BAR AND BAIT SHOP in jaunty blue letters. There was a wooden tub beside the entrance overflowing with fuchsia petunias. The building had been constructed right on a pier in Anastasia’s thriving marina district, an area that was buzzing with activity on this perfect fall morning.

  Slinging her purse over her shoulder, Alaina scooped her container of potato salad off the front seat of her car and headed for the bar—peeling the deli price tag off as she went. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t tried to make the damn stuff herself, she reflected as she rolled the gummed tag into a little ball and tucked it beneath a petunia in the tub beside the door. The current state of her kitchen was a testament to the fact that she had indeed made a valiant if unsuccessful effort. The taste of defeat was still bitter in her mouth.

  She took a deep breath before stepping inside, trying to still the jittering nerves in her belly. What did she have to be nervous about? She was going to meet Dylan’s employees and his children. They were going on a nice, simple picnic. As far as social occasions went, she’d handled a lot tougher gigs than this one.

  The interior of the bar was much like the exterior—weathered gray boards and a fishing motif. She had half-expected mismatched chairs and battered tables crowded with hulking, smelly fishermen. What she found were neatly kept, relatively new furnishings, a floor clean enough to eat off, and a handsome bar area with shelves of bottles behind it. A door at the far end of the room had the words BAIT SHOP stenciled on the glass, obviously leading to the second, less appetizing half of the business.

  Dylan sat behind the bar, a blue T-shirt with the place’s logo on it spanning his chest and broad shoulders. He was bent over the keyboard of a personal computer, tapping keys as he spoke with a stocky man dressed in jeans and a Windbreaker.

  “I think a tax-deferred annuity is the answer, Miguel,” he said. “Precious metals can be lucrative, but they can be risky too. I’ve got a bad feeling about the gold market right now.”

  “If you think this is best, my friend,” Miguel said in broken English, nodding his dark head.

  “I’ll take care of it first thing Monday.”

  “Tax-deferred annuities?” Alaina questioned when Miguel had gone. “I thought all a person could get in a place like this was rotgut whiskey and chopped-up fish.”

  “Caught in the act,” Dylan said with a rather sheepish grin on his wide mouth. “Um … I used to work for Drexel-Barnhart,” he said almost apologetically as he pulled his wire-rimmed reading glasses off and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

  Alaina’s brows rose at the name of the prestigious investment firm. Dylan Harrison of the hula girl tie and high-top sneakers working for a button-down-collar, gray-flannel-suit place like Drexel-Barnhart? It was difficult—no, impossible—to believe.

  “I had shorter hair then,” he said, as if that would clear everything up.

  A wry smile lifted the corner of Alaina’s mouth. “Unpretentious, unambitious, unmaterialistic Dylan Harrison at Drexel-Barnhart?”

  “That was before I saw the light,” he said in a superior tone.

  If he was so enlightened, then what was he doing discussing annuities with Miguel? she wondered. It looked to her as if Dylan wasn’t completely reformed of his yuppie ways. The look she slanted him told him as much.

  “I do a little on the side now, just for friends,” he explained defensively as he shut down his computer, uncomfortable with the topic and with Alaina’s sharp-eyed scrutiny. Rising from his chair, he spied the
container in her hands. “That the potato salad?”

  She nodded, still trying to recover from the shock of discovering Dylan was a closet investment counselor.

  “Did you have any trouble with it?”

  “No, not a bit.” That girl behind the deli counter had just scooped it right out, no problem, she thought. There had been a tense moment deciding between the kind with hard-boiled eggs and the kind with shredded carrots, but other than that the mission had gone smoothly.

  “Let’s get it in the cooler,” Dylan said, motioning for her to follow him, “then we can load up the boat. Everyone should be here soon.”

  “Boat?” Alaina questioned weakly as Dylan rounded the corner of the bar and took the plastic container from her suddenly numb fingers. “What boat?”

  He peeked inside the dish and made a face of surprised approval. “My boat. The Tardis.”

  “You never said anything about a boat.”

  “Didn’t I?” He shrugged. “Oh, well.”

  Oh, well?

  Dylan gave her a curious look. “You’ve been on a boat before, haven’t you, Princess?”

  “Sure,” she managed, scraping up a bare ounce of bravado. “Of course I’ve been on a boat.”

  She’d been on a boat. Once. On Lake Michigan with stepfather number two, Harold the ball-bearing manufacturer. She couldn’t remember which aspect had been the worst—Harold, the seasickness, or the sun poisoning.

  “The picnic is on the boat,” Dylan explained.

  He led her out a side door to a wide area of the pier that was shaded this time of day. Round white tables with collapsed blue umbrellas nestled against the side of the building, waiting for customers and a romantic sunset.

  Dylan knelt down beside an enormous brown cooler and tucked the potato salad inside. “We’ll go up the coast a ways to this little cove, drop anchor, eat, and fish. It’s a nice, relaxing way to spend the day.”

  “Who minds the bar?” Alaina asked, strongly considering volunteering for the task. “What if someone comes in and wants to order up a beer or some T-bills or something?”