Hands On (17 page)

For the way she’d managed to insert such a taint, his dislike for Constance flared into something approaching true loathing.

“We have a problem,” he told her, biting off his words carefully to keep from saying more than he meant to. “Ginnie deserves a mother. You had better start acting like one.”

“Or what?” Ginnie’s mom put on a bored air. “Or you’ll
beat
me with your dirty laborer
fists
?”

Oh, she was asking for it. Harry looked at Lara to verify. Lara nodded, shrugged. The woman needed a takedown.

But Harry had more negotiation savvy than this horrible woman, who didn’t deserve a daughter as brilliant, as alive and wonderful as Ginnie. “Or I’ll seduce her. Oh yes,” he said, taking in her sudden frown. “You saw the way she was looking at me. I’ll just go comfort her now. Wipe her tears and give her a cuddle. Then I’ll rip her clothes off. She’ll love every minute. She’ll be walking bow-legged for a week.”

He felt a tiny bit ashamed at the worry in the woman’s face as he spoke. But he had to admit he mostly enjoyed her shocked gasp when he got to bow-legged. Even Lara was coughing, trying to hide her laughter.

Harry looked at Constance. “Is that what you want for Ginnie?”

Constance shook her head frantically.

“Then show some nurturing qualities. Be a mother. You might even find it fulfilling.” He stepped closer, inhaling the woman’s cloying perfume and trying not to gag. “But whatever you do, don’t make Ginnie cry again. If you do, I’ll make you a grandma. Many times over. Ginnie’ll live in my trashy single-wide. It’s a small trailer, but it’s home. You won’t be able to stay overnight.”

“I… I…”

“You’re right, where’s the hospitality in that? You can sleep on the couch. Just push the cats and dogs aside if they get too aggressive. They have to sleep somewhere too, you know, and it helps a body to stay warm in cold Portland winters. They’re mostly housebroken.”

“Oh.” Constance backed slowly away, as if from a snake.

“I kind of hope you decide to keep being mean to Ginnie.” Harry watched her back away then turn to walk quickly toward Ginnie’s car. “I really do. Ginnie’s a hot piece of—”

“Harry.” Lara’s voice, laughing. “I think that’s enough.”

Harry watched Constance enter the passenger side of Ginnie’s car, shut the door and immediately get on her cell phone. “Yeah.” Harry turned away from the sight. He went to go after Ginnie.

Lara’s hand on his arm restrained him. Stars danced in her eyes. “That was pretty wonderful. You really do like Ginnie.”

“Don’t you get her hopes up,” Harry warned. “I like her, but I’m not her knight in shining armor.”

“Uh-huh.” Lara’s expression changed. “There’s a bit of pressure to get this house finished quickly. I’d wondered about all the urgent pressure for this job. Money no object, questions not encouraged. Of course you’re funding it.”

Harry looked at her. “My trailer-boy act didn’t convince you, huh?”

“It was pretty good. For a multi-millionaire.”

“Are you going to inform Ginnie about the funding? And about my name?”

“Are you?” she shot back.

“First things first,” he snapped, still feeling angry at Ginnie’s mom. He pulled his arm free and kept walking. “Excuse me.”

Ginnie needed him.

The knocking on the bathroom door made her stiffen with alarm, until she heard Harry’s soft voice. “I’m here.”

“Just a sec. I’m, ah, fixing my mascara.” She blinked at the mirror. Pale brownish-black streaks rimmed the bottoms of her eyes and upper cheeks. The whites of her eyes were pink, and her flesh looked blotchy.

Pathetic.

Grimly, she wet a washcloth and made what repairs she could.

She smoothed her hair. Better.

She braced herself for Harry’s scorn and opened the bathroom door. “Hey.”

He knocked the breath out of her, he moved in and hugged her so fast and tight. She tried to speak, but it came out only as a squeak.

“Hush.” Harry relaxed his hold, but the brief tight squeeze had done worlds to bolster her spirit.

Which levered her up from misery to aching unhappiness. Not to mention embarrassment. She snuggled into his broad chest, inhaling Harry-scent, glad she didn’t have to meet his gaze.

He murmured against her hair. “Are you okay?”

“She’s still here.”

“So that’s a no.”

Ginnie snorted laughter, but it was sad laughter. She forced herself to look into his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

Instead of the scorn she’d feared, she saw friendly compassion. “It’s not your fault. You can’t choose your parents.”

“No, I’m sorry for leaving you with her.”

“Oh, that. Nope, unforgivable.” He tilted her mouth up to his and kissed her. “Completely inexcusable.” A gentle flicker of tongue on her earlobe. “There will be no pardon. I’m just going to take it out of your hide. If that’s acceptable to you.” He lifted her against him, letting her feel exactly how he’d take his recompense. Then he kissed her again, deep and wet and hard, until she trembled with desire.

“Ginnie, I want you. You know what I think of being in a relationship, but you bring out the romantic in me. I want to get naked right now and have you up on the bathroom counter. I can’t help wanting you, and wanting to be with you. You’re like no one I’ve ever known. You’re smart, talented, stubborn, sensitive and totally passionate.” He kissed her again.

Oh, how she loved him. The words hovered in her heart, then in her throat, then on the tip of her tongue as he nibbled on her lip gently. He moved against her, and she moaned. She wanted nothing more than to share the kind of lovemaking with him that would pound every other thought out of her head. But she pulled away.

“Yes?” The bass of his voice vibrated from his chest into hers, a pleasurable rumble.

“She’s still out there. My mother.” Ginnie regretfully extricated herself. “It’s the last thing I want to do, but I should keep her company this afternoon, until her flight back. Oh, she’s going to rip me a new one for this. She’ll say I fell apart, that I’m weak, that I’m a helpless, hopeless mess and not at all like her. I’ll be lucky if she doesn’t knock me out and pack me into her carry-on to get me back to Rick.” Ginnie tried to make her voice light and amused, but she didn’t think she succeeded.

It wasn’t fear of her mother that she felt, but a bone-deep tiredness. Her nerves always got a workout around Constance, but never quite this badly. “She’s going to savage me.”

“I don’t think she will.”

“You sound awfully confident about that.” Ginnie scrutinized him. “Do you know something I don’t?”

“I just don’t think she will. But she is right about one thing.” At Ginnie’s look, he said, “It’s true that you’re not like her. You aren’t. You’re better in every way.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“Would you leave your daughter alone when she’s upset? Last I saw your mother, she was. Just sitting in your car, using a cell phone.”

“Oh no. I need to get going. She’ll be furious at having to wait.”

Harry stopped her as she went by. “Ginnie. Don’t let her push you around or make you feel bad. You’re not like her. You’re not. Really. Okay?” Then, as if he couldn’t resist himself, he kissed the tip of her nose.

“Okay.” Ginnie smiled, feeling better. It was as if his words actually held magic to heal years’ worth of conflict with her mother.

It was an amazing testament to his power over her.

Ginnie lowered her eyes so he wouldn’t see how shaken it made her feel. He simply had no idea of his effect on her.

He would be terrified to know.

Still, she had to tell him. Soon.

“The mother’s gone?”

“The mother is.” Ginnie smiled at Lara, who looked concerned for her. It touched Ginnie. She’d gotten lucky to have a friend like Lara. It was a gift of something precious. She felt suddenly grateful for her luck, to have Lara to talk to rather than the other rental broker, the one who’d started the house mess.

Ginnie pointed her key fob at her little car and made it beep to lock up. They both walked toward her bungalow. “She moved her flight time up. But before that…it was so weird. We actually had a civil brunch over at Mascique. Coffee and eggs and conversation. She only mentioned Rick once, and she seemed in a strange mood. I’d say she seemed more motherly, if that weren’t so improbable.” Ginnie pondered, then shrugged. “It was a nice change.”

“Maybe she finally figured out she has a daughter and not a clone of herself. Maybe she realizes how much of an ass she’s been. Sorry. But, you know, she’s not exactly nice.”

“Not nice at all. She’s vindictive, she’s materialistic and she holds grudges like nobody’s business.” Ginnie strolled up the walk with Lara to view the progress of her house repairs. It reminded her of something else.

“She did say something interesting. She was making all kinds of charge-to-war noises about a lawsuit when she first got here. But after a phone call to her attorney, she’s backed off the entire idea. Says it’s inadvisable to sue. She said someone is funding this project to the tune of fifty thousand dollars. The property management company has really good disaster insurance, I guess?” Ginnie looked at Lara inquiringly.

“Not exactly.” Lara stared straight ahead. “The repairs are coming along fast. I’m sure you’ve noticed.” She seemed to be looking around for something.

Or someone.

“It’s actually completely unprecedented, how quickly it’s going,” Lara said, leading Ginnie into the house. They viewed the kitchen. The intact roof blocked off open sky. The women listened to roofers above, their feet crunching against newly laid composite sheets as the men applied shingles to the sheathing. “With multiple bureaucracies and paperwork involved, this just never happens. Ginnie, there’s something I need to tell you.”

“Um, okay.” Lara’s earnest expression seemed almost as odd as her mother’s niceness. “What is it? Is there a problem with the security deposit?”

“Harry should have told you. I asked him to.”

Ginnie stared. “What does Harry have to do with it? You’re worrying me, Lara.”

“It’s been twenty-four hours. I don’t like how he’s keeping it from you. It’s not fair. That scandal last year doesn’t give him the right to deceive people about who he really is.”

“You know about that?” Ginnie gaped at Lara. “The Christmas party disaster with the kid and the reporters?”

“Oh yeah. It was in all the headlines, and even on national TV for a couple of days.”

“Headlines? National TV?” Were they talking about the same Harry? “But it was just a misunderstanding. No wonder I don’t watch TV anymore. It’s shameful the way they scrape the bottom of the barrel for ratings, slandering a simple businessman that way. If you’re worried that he’s actually a pedophile, Lara, I can assure you he’s not.” Disappointment in her new friend filled her. She’d thought Lara was a better judge of character.

“No, no, no,” Lara said. “Oh, Ginnie.” She waved her hands helplessly. “I don’t believe he’s that. But don’t you wonder how a simple businessman got so much news coverage?”

Ginnie tapped her hip with one finger, impatient. “What are you getting at?”

“He’s not a simple businessman. Ginnie, he’s H. Barrett Sharpe.”

The name sounded familiar, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it.

Lara huffed impatiently. “H. Barrett Sharpe. Barrett ‘Hairy Bear’ Sharpe, the real estate tycoon?”

Ginnie took a quick breath of utter astonishment. “The one who pulled the funding from Helping Hands! Oh. I think I have seen him before. He had lots of hair. The hairy millionaire?”

“Your Harry. He might be a billionaire by now, actually.”

“
Billionaire?
”

Lara laughed, but it sounded a little grim. “The Santa scandal was everywhere on the news last year. Lots of people around here are convinced it was his fiancée who set him up. She was a vicious piece of work. Called the newspapers and television before allowing the police in to check out his home computer. Totally staged.”

“Of course it was staged. Harry told me about it.” Ginnie shook her head. Should she even call him Harry anymore? Harry the billionaire. He never said anything about that. “So, why’d the fiancée do it?”

Lara stretched her lips in a mirthless grin. “Why else? Money. Or revenge. Both, probably. The gossip mill says she flipped out when Mister Sharpe—I mean Harry—insisted on a pre-nup. And after she went nuts, telling people that horrible lie, that’s when Harry sort of disappeared. I didn’t recognize him at all without his brown business suit and trademark long hair and beard.” Lara paused, thoughtful. “Sometimes it was a goatee.”

“Harry had a goatee?” Ginnie felt slow. Her Harry had a goatee.

“Why d’you think his nickname was Hairy?” Lara grinned until she saw Ginnie’s face. “I know. It’s kind of a shock to find out you’re dating a famous billionaire tycoon. Or ex-tycoon, I guess.”

Ginnie felt faint. “Tycoon? Ex-tycoon?”

Lara started laughing. “Let’s go get drinks. You need one, and I need to fill you in.”

That night, Ginnie lay on her side, curled up next to Harry. Her soft hair caressed his shoulder and her warm breath tickled his bare skin.

“I hope you didn’t take it personally. How my mom treated you, I mean. She’s like that to anyone she considers poor.”

Harry stroked her hair, playing with the silky curls so they grazed his fingers before falling back into waves, enjoying the way she shivered at the sensation. “No. I didn’t take it personally.”

“I don’t know what happened, but my mom was really nice after we left the construction site. She even asked about my upcoming show at the school auditorium. She’s never asked about my career as a puppeteer before. Not politely, anyway.”

The happiness in her voice let him know he’d done the right thing where her mother was concerned. The older woman needed more of a reality check than he’d given her, but at least she’d modified her behavior toward Ginnie. He sincerely hoped it stuck. Or else he’d be forced to fly down to her McMansion in the ’burbs and make his point more strongly. He doubted either Ginnie’s mother or the sugar daddy she’d married would appreciate that.

“The house looked good,” she added and kept talking about the repairs and improvements. He felt a delightful languor suffuse him, listening to her sweet voice. A small tapping on his shoulder was all the warning he got. “Then Lara and I had an interesting conversation. She told me about a guy named H. Barrett Sharpe.”