Strictly Business (16 page)

“Sandy!”

“Sandy!” Sandy mimicked wickedly. She was grinning. “You’re happy.”

Jess smiled. “Yes.”

“I love it. But I have enough sense to know you’ll probably have one heck of an excuse for tomorrow.”

“No, honestly—”

Sandy held up a hand. “I’ll make it easy for you. You and Nick go out and look at bedroom furniture.”

“Nick!”

“Yes. Actually it’s a great idea.” Sandy reached over her shoulder and patted herself on the back. “Wonderful thought, old girl.”

“Sandy, I don’t know …”

“Think of it as an adventure, Jess.”

“It sounds more … domestic to me,” Jess pointed out.

“Couldn’t hurt.”

Jess wondered if she was surrounded by pushy matchmakers. First Sam, and now Sandy. It was enough that she was beginning to trust her heart. She wasn’t asking for more. And she didn’t know if Nick was, either. They’d both tried marriage, and it hadn’t worked. For all she knew, Nick had vowed never to marry again. As for herself … She was startled to discover it was easy to imagine being Nick’s wife.

Sandy’s voice rescued her from her disconcerting musings.

“Oh, go ahead, Jess. The two of you will have fun, and you can justify it by saying that it’s for the model, not for yourselves.”

That was true, she thought.

“Well …”

Her voice trailed away as she spotted through the open doorway a gleaming black Lincoln Town Car pulling into the site.

“Must be more prospective buyers,” she said. “We’ve had several since the ad ran.”

“I know,” Sandy said. “And the model isn’t even open yet. Isn’t it great?”

“Great,” Jess said, enthusiasm draining from her as two men emerged from the vehicle.

Even from the distance, she could discern one was young, the other older. Something in the stance of both, though, gave her a cold shiver. She somehow sensed that they weren’t house-buyers. They never looked once at the finished model or the house in progress. Instead, they were deep in conversation as Nick strode over to them.

Nick’s worried frown as he greeted the younger man only confirmed her apprehension. She watched
as he was introduced to the older man, then the three of them disappeared into the office trailer.

“I wonder if they’re a gay couple,” Sandy said.

“I would love it if they were,” Jess said, praying silently.

Twenty minutes later she was on her rosebush assembly line again when she saw the two men emerge from the trailer. Both of them looked grim. Nick didn’t come out.

Something was definitely wrong.

“Guys, I need to see Nick about something,” she said, dropping the rosebush into the trench and standing up.

“But we’re almost done, Jess!” they both yelled.

She barely heard them as she began to walk across to the office. The trailer door was suddenly flung open, and Nick bellowed for Sam. Jess hesitated. Sam trotted over, listened for about three seconds to whatever Nick was saying, then erupted into a volley of shouting and arm-waving. He was talking so fast that the words mostly blurred together—except for two.

“Close down? Close down?”

Jess was rooted to the spot. Close down? Close down what?

“Not the site!” she breathed, and began running.

Nick turned away from Sam in midargument and headed for the truck. Jess veered in his direction.

“Nick!” she shouted.

She knew he must have heard her, but he never looked around. Instead, he got into the truck. She ran up behind it, waving her arms and shouting for him to wait. He didn’t. The truck roared to life and sped away, leaving her literally eating dust.

“Jess!” Sam exclaimed as he ran over to her. “You okay?”

“He didn’t wait,” she mumbled, shocked at Nick’s rudeness. She stared after the truck. “He didn’t wait.”

“I don’t think he heard you.” Sam smiled gently at her. “I don’t think he hears anything right now.”

“What happened, Sam? Who were those men? Close down what? The site?”

Sam nodded. “That was Tommy Sayers and his banker. Tommy’s one of Nick’s backers for MeadowHill. Was, I guess, is better. Tommy just pulled out.”

Jess stared at the foreman. “But why?”

“All Nick would say is that the man has his own problems. Nick told me to close down the site and put the men on standby.”

“For one backer pulling out?” It was incredible, Jess thought.

Sam nodded again. “Nick’s either got to get the other backers to put in more, or find a new one real quick. In the meantime, we shut down. The labor costs kill the cash flow.”

Jess closed her eyes.
Poor Nick
, she thought. Everything had been going so well for him, and now this. It was a disaster. She took no consolation that it wasn’t something she had caused. Nick was in trouble.

“Did he go to talk to his other investors, do you know?” she asked, opening her eyes and looking at Sam.

“I don’t know. Probably he just needed to get away by himself and think. I’d better go tell the men we’re shut down, and then I’ve got to go home and tell my wife. We just bought new living room furniture.” He grimaced. “Looks like we’ll be eating soup for a while.”

Jess swallowed back her horror. She had been thinking only of Nick, but this would affect everyone.

She straightened her backbone. “Nick will have us back working in no time. Now I’d better get the roses in and burlapped.”

Sam whipped around. “But we’re shut down.”

“The construction is shut down. I make the decisions on the landscaping,” she reminded him. Smiling, she added, “Besides, if we don’t get the roses in now, we’ll have another disaster when Nick reopens.”

Sam chuckled.

As Jess walked away, she decided Roger and Duane would have to finish the roses without her.

She was going to Nick’s.

Nick pulled into a driveway and was briefly surprised to find it was the one attached to his house. He didn’t know where he had been or how he’d managed to find his way home. The numbness that had begun the moment he had spotted Tommy hadn’t abated. It was worse.

He became aware of someone hurrying around the front of his truck, silhouetted by its lights, then realized it was Jess. It was dark and had been for some time. He glanced at the truck clock. It was after midnight.

Jess banged on the window. “Nick, where the hell have you been? Are you okay?”

Slowly, he opened the door and climbed out of the cab.

“Where were you?” Jess asked, as she pushed past him to reach into the truck’s interior. The truck
lights snapped off. “Nick, where were you all this time?”

“Maryland, I think.” He began moving toward the house.

“Maryland! What were you doing in Maryland?”

“Running out of gas.” He rubbed his forehead, suddenly aware of a tremendous headache.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes. No.” He turned around and pulled her into his arms. He had to hold her. “Think you could love a man who’s a millionaire and broke at the same time?”

“Yes.” She burrowed against him, her arms wrapping tightly around his waist. He could feel the warmth of her seeping in and curling through his frozen veins. Not ready to talk, he held her for long minutes in the dark silence.

“I could hold you forever,” he whispered into her hair.

“Could you hold me forever in the house?” she asked, her voice muffled against his shoulder. “My feet are freezing.”

He laughed. And as he did, the strength seemed to flow back into his body. He had been helpless, as if the earth had fallen away from his feet without warning. Now just knowing that Jess loved him was like a lifeline pulling him back to safety.

After they were inside the house, Jess asked, “Have you eaten?”

He shook his head.

“Well, the world’s worst cook will whip up a midnight snack.”

“All I need is a bottle of whiskey and some aspirin.”

“The aspirin you’ll get, the whiskey you won’t.”
She headed for the kitchen before he could change his order to straight whiskey.

He shed his jacket and followed her. “Jess, I’m not hungry.”

“You need to eat. You deserve a little pampering.” She flipped on the kitchen lights and pulled open several cabinet doors before she found the canned soup. She grabbed one and turned around. “Sam told me one of the backers pulled out.”

“Tommy Sayers.”

“The jerk,” she said succinctly.

“Tommy’s a stockbroker and a heavy player in the stock market. He got creamed last week when the market took that tremendous plunge. He lost almost everything.”

Jess sucked in her breath. “The idiot.”

“He had to pull out. So much for Marty’s experts saying the effects would be marginal.” Nick was silent for a moment. “He called in the loan.”

Jess stared at him, wide-eyed. “But he can’t do that!”

“Yes, he can.” The emotions he’d kept bottled up inside him during the hours of driving finally burst through. “The bastard says, ‘Gee, Nick, I’m really sorry I blew everything.’ He’s calling in the loan for the money he’s already invested.”

He uttered a string of obscenities that left him feeling better and more angry at the same time.

Jess wisely didn’t comment on the language. She set the can down on the stove and walked over to the sink. After filling a glass with water, she took down the aspirin bottle from the window ledge and shook out two. She handed the glass and pills to him and said, “But you have a contract or something
that says you have so many days to pay him back, right?”

“Thirty days. Unless I find somebody to replace Tommy before the end of the week, I’ll have to close out the business account to pay him. He needs the money now.”

“But how can he do that to you?” Jess exclaimed.

“If he doesn’t get out immediately, his creditors could claim the entire project as part of his assets. Actually, he’s doing me a favor by getting out completely.”

He sat down heavily on a kitchen chair and swallowed the aspirin. The whiskey would have put him out of his misery much faster, he thought. When he spoke again, his voice was flat.

“I’ve seen places where there’s a ten-foot stretch of paved street with a model house, the windows busted out of it and piles of dirt all around it, overgrown with weeds. You’ve probably seen them, too.”

She nodded.

Lifting his head to look at her, he went on. “You know the builder went belly-up. It’s common enough, especially since there’s a big housing boom going on. Some guys get greedy, and they think it’s a sure thing. Every time I see an abandoned site, I vow it will never happen to me. I’ll make sure my backers are solid and my homes saleable. But now it’s my turn to go belly-up.”

“You’ll get another backer, Nick,” she assured him.

“If I’m extremely lucky, and even then I doubt it’d be in time. Everybody’s going to hang onto their money after last week’s fiasco. And if anything else happens, they’ll want to get at their money fast, not
have it tied up in a long-term investment like housing construction.

“I’ve got men to pay and no cash.” He laughed bitterly. “Hell, and I really am supposed to be a millionaire. I’ve never seen the money, but they tell me it’s right there in the property, the trucks, the backhoes, the cranes, the bricks, the siding. The truth is, I’ve got enough personal cash to pay my men for about a week, two at most. If I shut down too long, they’ll get other jobs, and I’ll be without a crew.”

“I’ll be the new backer,” Jess said, in a matter-of-fact voice.

Nick snapped his head up. She was facing the stove and stirring the soup. He didn’t even have to think about his answer.

“No.”

She turned around. “Nick, come on. You need a backer. I want to be the backer.”

“No, Jess.”

“Why?” she demanded, dropping the spoon into the pot.

“I won’t take your money, that’s why.”

“Because I’m a woman?”

“Because I love you. I don’t want your money, Jess. I want you.”

“Come on, Nick. I have a stake in MeadowHill, too! I wanted the landscaping job from the beginning because it would help my reputation as a landscaper. I need that backer as much as you do. And I know it’s a damn good investment, so why can’t it be me who’s the investor?”

“Jess, please.” He curled his hands into tight fists. It would be so easy to say yes. He needed a replacement
backer. This minute wouldn’t be soon enough. But not Jess. His pride wouldn’t allow him to do it. He’d never needed help before, and he seriously doubted if he would be able to live with himself if he took this kind of help from her. “I appreciate the offer, and it’s tempting …”

“But?” she prompted, clearly angry.

“You wouldn’t really be a backer, would you? You’d just be helping me. I need to have some pride, Jess. I wouldn’t have it if I took your money.”

“Get it through your head that you are not taking money from me! I would be making an excellent investment. Unless, of course, you think MeadowHill isn’t an excellent investment?”

“Of course it is!” He rose from the chair and began to pace the kitchen. “I don’t want to fight with you, but dammit, I would be taking your money no matter how I look at it! No help, Jess, and that’s final.”

She glared at him. He walked over to her and smiled crookedly, then took her in his arms. She was stiff and unyielding.

“I was ready to quit until you started arguing with me,” he said gently. “Thanks, Jess.”

She sighed and put her arms around him.

“I’ll find another backer, you’ll see,” he promised, stroking her hair. “There’s got to be one out there, and I’ll dig him out.”

Somehow.

Faint light had barely streaked over the horizon when Jess carefully slipped out of Nick’s bed. He was finally sleeping soundly, and she didn’t want to waken him.

She borrowed his robe from the closet and put it on, then padded out into the kitchen. She set up the coffee machine and sat at the kitchen table while waiting for it to heat.

Darn him
, she thought. He was in trouble, and she wanted so much to help him. Why couldn’t he see that she would only be an investor? Why couldn’t she get that through his thick pride? Grateful as she was that his business wasn’t on the stock exchange, she still couldn’t help wishing that it was. It would be so easy then. She’d be one of the nameless out there who put her money into his stocks. He wouldn’t even think twice about it then.