What's Yours is Mine (26 page)

She went inside, and Will handed her the phone, an odd look in his eyes. Wary but also speculative. It gave her goose bumps, that look.

As she took the phone, her thumb briefly brushed the back of his, the lightest accidental touch. It left her wanting more.
 

“Hello?”
 

“We need you.” Stan sounded uncharacteristically worried.
 

Darcy sat down on the couch. Her couch. “What’s going on?”

“Johanna called in sick today. Apparently she had a bad case of food poisoning and was taken to the hospital down in Santa Barbara. They say she’s going to need a few days there to recover.”

“From food poisoning?”

“She passed out and nearly died. Dehydration and something else I didn’t quite catch about her digestive tract.”

“Oh my God, poor Johanna.”

“Quite terrible, poor thing. The office is sending flowers and a basket of DVDs to keep her occupied during her recovery.”

“Do you want me to chip in?” Darcy frowned, because that was hardly a reason for the head of the company to call.
 

“You know how we’re gearing up for the launch of the Deep Velvet cream?”

Darcy pushed down the pang she always felt at the thought of the cream. “Yes, of course, at the Natural Cosmetics Conference in Frankfurt this weekend; I flew in for the planning meeting back in April.”

“PDF versions of all the brochures and booth handouts need to get emailed to the conference tomorrow first thing, and the glossies have to be ready for printing right after. Unfortunately, it seems Johanna allowed herself to get a wee bit behind.”
 

Stan Speak translated: Johanna had finally messed up big enough for Stan to notice. “Isn’t Mathias working with her on that?”

“Yes, but Mathias…” Stan heaved a big sigh. “He’s not been very present of late. His son, you know. My people are abandoning me one by one. Matt. Johanna. You.”

Darcy bit her lip. “I’m not abandoning you, Stan. I’m very committed to my work, I promise. I’m just not on-site, that’s all. If Mathias emails me the files, I’ll get it done.”

“Come in. I need you here.”

Darcy looked at Will, who sat at the dining table acting like he was getting work done but clearly eavesdropping.
 

Maybe she should go into the office, at that. This constant tension with Will was wearing her down. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could stand their forced intimacy, not if he was going to shut down after every time he started to act human.

On the other hand, he’d kissed her. Granted, he’d shut himself in the bedroom afterward, the coward, but he’d kissed her like he meant it.
 

She wasn’t ready to leave quite yet.
 

“You know my situation here, Stan.” She eyed Will as she said this. He gave her a sidelong glance. Hard to read his expression, but he clearly wasn’t irritated at the mention of their
situation
. Something had shifted for him too.
 

“He’s still there? Darcy, you’re off your game. Where’s the powerhouse I know and love?”
 

“It’s complicated. He’s not—it’s not—” She couldn’t say more, not with Will right there. “I’m working on it.”
 

“Your life to live. Your mistakes to make. Just come on in.”

“I’ll ask Mathias to email the preliminary material. I can dig in while I wait for Thora to bring me the mockups. It’ll save time.” She glanced out the window at the growing dusk. “And I can eat dinner here while I work, no need to order takeout.”
 

Stan sighed but gave in.
 

After she hung up the phone, Darcy flopped down on her couch, staring at the ceiling. An entire presentation, PowerPoint slides and brochure and booth description and all? In one night? On a project she didn’t know that well? What had she gotten herself into?

Will watched from across the room. “Your father called.”

She sat up abruptly. “What? When? Why didn’t you come get me?”

“Apparently he wanted to talk to me.”
 

The hair on the back of Darcy’s neck stood up. Her father? And Will? “Did he, um, what did he say?” She could hear herself stammering, but her father was going to crucify him or grill him or…
 

Or find out everything Darcy hadn’t actually mentioned: the undercurrents of her not-a-relationship with Will The-Sexy-Enigma Dougherty.
 

“Your father was refreshingly blunt.”

Uh-oh. But Will was smiling.
 

Darcy rubbed her forehead. What had they said to each other?
 

No. She couldn’t think about it. Not right now. She went to fetch her laptop.
 

Curiously, Will followed. “You seem perturbed. Something at work?” He watched her closely, his eyes shadowed.

“Why do you want to know? So you can gloat about how you escaped the corporate life? Or feel sorry for me, be nice for five seconds, and then walk away anyway?”
 

“None of the above. Can’t we acknowledge that we’re no longer enemies?”

This was entirely new territory. Snark free, no need for defensive posturing. Darcy took a deep breath. “Yes, I think we can.”
 

“So tell me. What’s going on at work?” Will sat down on the her brand new couch and leaned forward attentively.

She pulled up a dining chair, sat down, and explained. It wasn’t just that Johanna had gotten sick. The product was a direct rip-off of the one she—they—had developed four years ago. With many of the same ingredients and much the same marketing campaign, though that was still in the works. She was the only one who could really pull this off at the last minute. And after staying away from the office for four days against Stan’s explicit wishes, she’d better come up with a kick-ass presentation or he might well start regretting her promotion. Her godfather or not, he had a business to run.
 

The afternoon sun slanted low, lighting a slice of Will’s face and illuminating his long fingers as they played with the couch fabric, rubbing it first one way and then the other, much like ruffling a cat’s fur. He drew patterns in the velvety fabric. He was avoiding saying something he might regret, it looked like.
 

She paused. He looked up, his blue eyes glinting in the dimming light.
 

“Out with it.”

He shook his head. “I’d best not.”

“You’d best.” She put her hands on his. He looked startled. “I won’t bite. I promise.”

She could see the thought that flitted across his mind, the subtle curve of a smile, quickly extinguished.
Ah, but what if I want you to bite?
 

And she couldn’t help but grin back, darting her tongue out to moisten suddenly dry lips.
Then I would, of course
.
 

For a moment, she thought he might kiss her again. Her pulse sped up, her body tingled in anticipation, she felt herself lean in as if he had some gravitational pull.
 

He withdrew his hands, leaving her frustrated.
 

He crossed his arms in front of himself, obvious self-protection.
 

She scrambled to her feet. Enough. If Stan wanted her in this afternoon, she’d go in this afternoon. She was done.

“What if I helped?” His honey-dark voice rumbled behind her. When she turned, he looked dead serious. And Will Dougherty didn’t play games.
 

“You’d do that? For me?” She could hear her voice crack on the last word and cursed herself for the weakness.
 

“I’m stuck here with you. I’m bored. We never did get to finish that marketing plan for our lotion.” The
our
, said so casually, sent a quake through her. “And I owe you for this morning.”
 

She frowned, puzzled. “The roof? That was nothing. I was there anyway, and your sister needed it fixed.”

“And I’m here anyway, and you need help. Even if you stay up all night, you won’t have anything coherent, not unless you get a whole department to camp out here, and frankly, I’d prefer to avoid that. So this is for my sake as well as yours.”

“So you can keep your privacy? Avoid slumming with Golden Organics?”

“Bunch of poseurs.” He mock-shuddered.
 

An unaccustomed warmth blossomed in her chest. He’d do that? For her?

Chapter Twenty-Two

When the doorbell rang, Darcy and Will were ensconced at the dining table, printed-out emails scattered across its glass surface.
 

Will got up and went to the door. Darcy highlighted an important point in green. It could be a good slogan, if polished up a little. It should go in the brochure, to be sure. She was so deep in concentration it took her a few moments to register the irritated male voices at the doorstep.

She looked up to see Mathias standing there, clutching a portfolio, red-faced. He looked past Will toward Darcy. “You can’t be serious, Jennings. You can’t work on this with him.”

Darcy hastened over. “Why not? Will’s a good designer. I remember you telling me that four years ago. In fact, you said, ‘Request Dougherty, he’s smart.’”
 

“Smart, exactly.” He came into the room, shoving past Will, to appeal directly to Darcy. “Smart enough to offer to help, only to stick a knife in your back.” He lowered his voice to a near-whisper. “Think about it, Darcy. Why should he want to help? He hates Golden Organics. He got fired in disgrace.”

Behind him, Will winced. “I wouldn’t say
in disgrace
, exactly.”

Mathias ignored him but stopped whispering. “He left me high and dry when he split. Projects half-finished, no files to be found. I lost months to this guy. You think he won’t do that to you? Think again. This is important. Deep Velvet is our first new product in over a year. I don’t know if you know, but the company shares dropped this week while you were busy playing house with this one.” He glanced at Will with disdain. “I’ve got kids in private school. I need the stock prices to go up, not down. I can’t afford to risk our investments on someone with a grudge.”

She took a deep breath. Now or never. “Is that why you’ve started adulterating the products? So they’ll stand up better in the marketplace?”

Mathias blinked, looking shocked. “Adulterated? What in hell are you talking about?” He glared at Will. “You’ve been feeding her lies.” Clutching the portfolio tight under his arm, he walked back to the door. “I don’t think you should take over the project. Not at this late date. And not with him. I’ll do it myself.”

Will ran his hands through his hair. Darcy could tell he was trying not to get angry. Funny how easily she could read him now. “Let me get this straight. You think I’m a bad person because I didn’t finish your artwork when I was abruptly canned? And for the record, you yourself told me it was downsizing, not punitive. I did nothing dastardly, except work on the wrong campaign and find out about the chemical composition.”
 

Mathias swiveled toward Darcy. “You were serious? Someone’s been tampering with our organics?”

She nodded, grim. “So it seems.”

He gripped the doorframe. “Our stock will plummet if this gets out. Worse, it could lock us up in court for years…and the publicity…God. Our hippy-dippy, good-for-the-environment-and-your-skin reputation is our biggest selling point.” He shook his head. “It could kill Golden. I can’t lose this job, Darcy. I know you don’t care, but Peter’s medical bills, and the cost of fixing up the house for his ramps and chairs…”
 

Darcy gently slid the portfolio away from Mathias’s tight grasp. “Look, you go home, be with your kid. I can vouch for Will. I’ve gotten to know him pretty damned well over the past week. We’ll do a good job on this. And we’ll figure out a way through the other thing. Somehow.”
 

Will nodded his agreement. “What she said.”
 

Mathias took a deep, shuddering breath. “I think I need a drink.”

Will gave him a crooked grin. “Fancy some bancha tea?”

Darcy snorted.

~*~

Somewhere around nine thirty, Will looked up from his rapid sketching and realized that he’d somehow drifted closer to Darcy in the past hour or so. They’d moved from the couch to the floor some time ago and were now sitting on the soft tan-and-red Tibetan wool rug, their thighs touching, their hands occasionally brushing past each other. He’d been so caught up in the work he’d forgotten to guard himself from her.
 

He’d put a world music CD on as background, and the soft sounds of an Andean flute mingled with guitar strumming to form a soft, gentle environment. Takeout containers were piled on the floor beside the rug. They’d clean up later. Right now he wanted to read over Darcy’s shoulder, see the copy she was writing up.
 

“Add the part we talked about, how it feels to rub the lotion into your baby’s back, to lull her to relaxation.”

She glanced at him. “We didn’t talk about that tonight.”

They hadn’t? He was taken aback.
 

And taken back. Four years ago. Her voice soft on the phone, the steady glow of his LCD screen lighting his scribbled notes as he’d worked in his dark bedroom, sitting cross-legged on his bed, talking into a headset he’d bought just for these phone calls.
 

They’d talked about a campaign focusing on touch. Soothing parental hands rubbing babies’ tiny backs, gentle caregiver hands smoothing lotion into wrinkled, aged faces. Lovers massaging each other, that sweet slide of hands on soft skin.
 

And maybe because they weren’t on Skype that night, they were disembodied voices in each other’s ears, the conversation turned intimate. Brushed past college crushes, first kisses, first loves. Darcy told him she’d never gotten a massage from a lover. Will closed his eyes at the vulnerability in her voice and almost promised to rub her head to toe and everywhere in between, but stopped himself. They weren’t lovers; he shouldn’t cross that line. Instead, he’d said,
“You deserve to be pampered. It’ll happen when you find the right guy.”