Be Mine(43)

“I’ve worked at Jasper’s for years. Paulie and I were there before he bought it.” Her voice sounded surprisingly normal considering what she really wanted to do was plant her knee in his balls before making a grand exit.

“So you’re here to help me launch Jasper’s Pub.”

Really? That’s what he wanted to talk about? He’d held her hand and made love to her and kissed her goodbye with promises of a phone call and he wanted to talk about work. “I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

She was going to get back in her car and drive back to Concord. The three-hour trip would give her plenty of time to come up with an excuse to give Kevin about why she couldn’t do him this favor, after all. Maybe she could tell him she startled a Dumpster-diving bear and she was too traumatized by the encounter to stay in bear country.

Jake blew out a hard breath and tossed the towel onto the counter. “We can make this work.”

Darcy sighed. She was a nice person, really. People described her as cheerful and happy and a few of the regulars called her Sunshine. But under the sunny personality, she had a really low tolerance for bullshit. And she’d already had a shovelful from Jake Holland.

“I don’t think so.” She turned around and went back down the stairs.

* * *

JAKE SHOVED HIS BARE FEET into his boots before he went after Darcy, but he didn’t take the time to grab a shirt or coat. She was halfway across the parking lot before he caught up to her. “Darcy, wait. Please?”

He couldn’t let her go. After weeks of thinking about her and beating himself up for not putting her number in his phone right away, he couldn’t let her leave without trying to explain. Upstairs, his mind had been trying to work out the business implications of her arrival, but right now he was just a man trying to catch the woman who had slipped through his fingers once already.

“I’ll tell Kevin I’m afraid of bears,” she said in a flat voice, reaching for the door handle of her car. “He doesn’t need to know we’d met before.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t call you.”

That stopped her. “Whatever. We both knew you weren’t going to call.”

That pissed him off. He wasn’t that kind of guy, and maybe she didn’t have any way of knowing that, but a little benefit of the doubt wouldn’t hurt. “My jeans got wet and the ink ran.”

“Funny how often that happens to guys.”

“I swear, Darcy. I wanted to leave a message at the bar where we met, but I couldn’t remember the name of the place. I even called the car garage where I saw the trivia night flyer to get the name or number off it, but they’d thrown it away. I didn’t know how else to find you.”

“You haven’t been back in the city since then?”

“I’ve only managed to get down there once, since the contractors screwed up the HVAC plans and we had to scramble. I drove around a little, but a lot of those streets look the same and all the buildings look the same and I couldn’t find the bar.”

She wasn’t allowing herself to believe him. He could see it on her face. “Look, Jake, it doesn’t matter if you were going to call or not. We can’t work together.”

“Why not? If Kevin sent you, it means you’re damn good at what you do. I’m damn good at what I do. There’s no reason we can’t open Jasper’s Pub together by February.”

“I thought being roommates with a man I’d never met would be weird.” She shoved her hands in her coat pocket. “This is worse, I think.”

Jake wished he had a coat to shove his hands into. When it was cold enough to see your breath when you talked, shirtless wasn’t a great fashion choice. “I’m not going to lie to you. You being here feels like a second chance to me, but—”

She shook her head, but he pushed on, anyway. “But this restaurant and my partnership with Kevin are important to me. Important enough so I can set aside any personal stuff and keep it professional.”

“You look cold.”

“I was, but the numbness is setting in now, so it’s not so bad.”

“You should go inside.”

“Kevin wants you in his corner on this project, Darcy.”

“I know he does, and trust me, that matters.” She was wavering.

“Let’s try it for a couple of days and see how it goes. If you still want to leave, you can tell Kevin I’m an * and I’ll take the heat for it.”

“I’m not here just because Kevin’s a good boss and he asked me. It’s an interesting opportunity and I was excited about it.”

“It’s still an interesting, exciting opportunity.”

When she sighed, blowing out a frosty cloud, relief seeped through his frozen veins. She was going to stay long enough for him to make things work professionally. Personally? That could come later. Especially since it would probably be at least a week before his body thawed enough to even think about misbehaving.

“I’ll stay. But if it’s too awkward, I’m going to move to the motel and waste your money. If it’s still awkward after that, I’m leaving.”

“We’ll be working too hard for awkwardness.”

“I’ll bring up my bags.”

Because he was raised right, Jake willed the impending hypothermia away and helped her carry up her luggage, but he threw on a thermal shirt and a flannel shirt and his coat before he went back down for the boxes and bags she had crammed in her trunk.

On his third trip up, he realized both bedroom doors were closed and she was hovering over the growing pile of her belongings as if she wasn’t sure what to do with them. “I was greedy and took the room with the queen bed, but we can switch if you want.”

“Are they both as brown as the living room?”

“Yeah.”

“Then it doesn’t matter.”

“Then that room’s yours,” he said, pointing to the door on the left. “At some point down the road we’ll redo this apartment, but right now all the time and money are going into the pub’s launch.”

She shrugged, picking up a suitcase to bring into her room. “Doesn’t matter to me. I won’t be here after the launch.”

“I’m not sure what I’ll be doing. It’s open-ended right now. After it opens, we might turn it over to a manager. But if I like it here, I might stay.”

“Where did you come from?”

“Connecticut. But I’m a Red Sox fan, not Yankees. Connecticut goes both ways, but I was born in Mass.”

It wasn’t until she turned and glared at him that he realized that while they’d been talking, he’d followed her into her bedroom. He took a couple of big steps backward, until he was on the living room side of the doorway.

“This space is mine and you absolutely are not allowed in here,” she said firmly. “I’m here to work, Jake. Nothing more.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Don’t call me ma’am.”

“Mistress?” Now, there was a word he liked. He let his gaze wander down the body his hands itched to touch again, dressing her up in his mind.

“Darcy’s fine, thank you very much.” She frowned at him. “Are you picturing me naked right now?”

“No.”

“Okay, good.”

“I’m picturing you in thigh-high, black leather boots, wearing one of those corset things that pushes your boobs up.”

She snorted. “That sort of thing turn you on?”

“Never did before, but being punished by Mistress Darcy wouldn’t hurt. Much.”

“I think you’re too bossy in bed to let a woman take charge.”

“I think we should stop talking about this while I can still walk.”

She slammed her bedroom door in his face, which was probably a good thing. One of them had to set boundaries because the last thing he wanted to do was tell Kevin their plan for Jasper’s Pub was screwed because he couldn’t keep his hands off the one woman he’d sworn he wouldn’t touch.





CHAPTER THREE



DARCY DIDN’T WANT to get out of bed, even though she’d been awake long enough so she really needed to pee. But she waited out the sounds of Jake making coffee and taking a shower and the smell of slightly burnt English muffin. There was a horrible grinding sound, as if he’d thrown a bunch of rocks in the blender, and then, finally, the door closing and his heavy footsteps on the outside stairs.

She should have gotten in her car, driven back to Concord and fed Kevin the scary bear story. Even while she was telling herself the chance to be in on the opening of a new and hopefully successful restaurant was a golden opportunity, she knew deep down in some sappy part of her that she hadn’t wanted to walk away from Jake so quickly.