Worth Waiting For (8 page)

 
Her father would be out so this was a good time to have a conversation with Freddie. As she pulled up in the driveway, his dark gray truck pulled in behind her silver Mercedes. The timing couldn’t have been better if she’d planned it.

 
Standing next to her car door, Julia let her eyes drink in his tall, brawny frame as he approached. He wore a plaid, short-sleeve button-down shirt and faded blue jeans
. Just like in my fantasy.
In his hand was the notepad he used to take notes about the progress on the job. The tool pouch on his right hip was filled with a hammer, screwdriver, and other tools. She was certain a sexier man had never walked the earth.

 
Schooling her features into a cool mask, Julia ignored how her heartbeat skipped when he came to a stop in front of her. Her gaze flicked momentarily to his sensual lips, which had wreaked so much havoc on her senses Friday night.

 
“You’re home early.” The warm timbre of his voice brushed over her and warmed her body. “We should talk about the other night.”

 
“Yes, we should,” Julia agreed with a nod. “Come on inside.”

 
When they entered the kitchen, normally a neutral part of the house, a perceptible current of tension developed between them. Julia laid her briefcase on top of the island and turned to face Freddie.

 
“Before you say anything,” he began, “let me apologize for the other night. What happened shouldn’t have taken place, and I regret it.”

 
Julia thought it odd that even though he apologized, he didn’t look a bit contrite. She smoothed her clammy palms down her straight black skirt. “Well, we were both in the wrong. There was wine, beer, music, and we just lost our heads.” She shrugged.

 
“Exactly.” Freddie nodded. He lifted his hand and rubbed the back of his neck. The compact muscles of his arm flexed enticingly. Julia held her breath, fighting back the memory of rubbing her palm across those same muscles. “I pride myself on being a professional at all times, and it was a gross lapse in judgment. Believe me, it won’t happen again.” He smiled.

 
His smile captivated her, and Julia forced a laugh to camouflage her sharp intake of breath. “Well, I think we both understand it was an unusual event. I’m so glad it’s over and we’re both clear it was a silly mistake. We can behave like two adults and not let it affect our business relationship.” She smoothed her hand across her neat French roll.

 
He trained his eye on the movement. “Do you ever let your hair down?” he asked out of the blue.

 
“What?” Her fingers froze behind her ear.

 
“Do you ever let your hair down and have fun?” His dark brown eyes ran down the length of her black suit, flesh-toned hose, and black pumps. He gave her the look of pity again, like he had Friday night, and she didn’t like it one bit.

 
“Of course I have fun,” Julia snapped. “That’s a silly question. In fact, I’m scheduled to—”

“You
schedule
your fun?” His eyebrows rose.

“I–well, I’m so busy,” Julia sputtered, “I have to make an effort to schedule certain activities into my week. It’s not as bad as you make it sound.”

“Uh-huh.”

“It’s not!” Julia clenched her fist. She hated being on the defensive.

“Tell me the last thing you did just for fun. Name one thing in the past month.”

Julia’s gaze found the table as she rummaged through her brain. Seconds ticked by.

“I’m ready whenever you are,” he prodded.

“Give me a minute!” She frowned at him.

He fell silent.

“There was . . .”

“Yes?”

She shot him an annoyed look. “You’re not very nice. Your charming smile is nothing but a disguise to a heartless soul.”

His eyes twinkled. “You think my smile is charming?”

Julia rolled her eyes. “Oh, for Pete’s sake, don’t take it as a compliment. It’s supposed to be an insult.”

Freddie shoved his hand into his pocket, grinning from ear to ear. “I’ll take it any way I like,” he said.

It was an innocent statement, but the moment it left his lips, she felt the shift, as they both became aware of each other. He clearly hadn’t meant for there to be any innuendo behind it, but her mind seized on the words and repeated them:
I’ll take it any way I like. I’ll take it any way I like
.

His voice finally filled the awkward silence stretched between them. “If you can’t think of a single thing you’ve done in the past month, then you clearly need more fun in your life.”

“I’ve done some fun things. I just can’t think of them right now.”

He raised a brow in disbelief. He held up his hand and then started ticking off his fingers. “In the last month, I went salsa dancing—which I do every Friday. If you like to dance, you should come check it out, but you’d have to take your hair down. You’d stand out like a sore thumb. I went fishing, I took my nieces and nephews to Chuck E. Cheese, I—”

“I drove down to St. Simons Island with two of my girlfriends for the weekend. It wasn’t within the last month, but it was fun.” Did she hear him correctly? Had he invited her to go dancing?

“How long ago was it?”

She felt she was on the witness stand being interrogated by a particularly surly prosecutor. “Two, three months ago,” she hedged.

He shook his head. She wouldn’t dare tell him she took her laptop, despite her friends’ insistence she leave work at home. She also couldn’t tell him she spent half her time on her laptop and phone, even foregoing one of the sight-seeing tours she’d prepaid for because she was so engrossed in the deal she was trying to close. The associates under her had been making such a mess of it she’d had to get involved.

Few people understood her life was fulfilling in other ways than theirs. Her job gave her great pleasure. Not frivolous activities like dancing and fishing. Fishing. An absolute time waster if she ever heard of one. Sit there all day and hope fish bite your bait, and then you throw them back in the water. How silly. There was nothing more fun than watching a company she recommended investing in not only turn a profit, but do so handsomely.

“Well, excuse me if I don’t have enough fun in my life—according to your standards—but I’m a busy woman doing very important things.”

“Such as?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” Julia said with a dismissive wave of her hand and turned away. Almost as quickly, she turned toward him again. All the color had drained from his face. “I didn’t mean…”

“Of course you didn’t.”

She hadn’t meant to insult him. Again. She wished she could go back in time two minutes and intercept the flippant remark.

Her cutting statement shouldn’t bother him, but it felt like a knife had been swiped across his chest. He hadn’t expected that from her. With those three words she’d destroyed the tentative truce they’d re-established.

When would he get it through his head? Women like Julia Newman didn’t date or respect common laborers. They looked for men on their same level who drove Mercedes and Range Rovers and strutted around in expensive suits and Italian leather shoes. They did not date men driving gray pickup trucks and wearing dusty boots.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said between tight lips.

Instead of inspecting his workers’ progress tonight, he would inspect it tomorrow. He scraped up his notepad and turned to exit the kitchen. Loose sheets of paper slipped out and fluttered to the floor.

Cursing, he bent to pick up the scattered pages. Before he could grab them all, Julia picked up two of them close to her.

“I’ll take those.” Freddie reached for the papers, but she took a step back out of his reach.

Frowning down at the documents in her hand, she asked, “What is this?”

“Nothing.” He had no intention of letting her know he was working on a business plan to expand Mendoza Construction. In between jobs and late at night, he handwrote the narrative and scribbled calculations.

“It looks like a P&L statement. And this looks like the beginning of an executive summary.” She lifted her heart-shaped face to look at him.

His anger diminished somewhat. He couldn’t ever remember having these kinds of intense feelings for a woman before. It was a struggle to remain calm and not appear as shaken as he felt. One minute he was upset by her insensitive comment, and the next he wanted to crush her to him and finish what they started last week.

“It’s nothing to concern yourself with. It’s just something I’m working on.” His arm remained outstretched.

“Are you putting together a business plan? I could look at it for you.”

“No, thanks.” He didn’t want or need her help, and certainly not if she was looking down her cute little nose at him. “I wouldn’t want to keep you from any of those important things that take so much of your time.”

Julia winced. She deserved that. “Freddie,” she stated earnestly, “I evaluate businesses for a living. I look at the experience of their founding members, their financials, everything, and I determine if they’re worth investing in. If you’re trying to get a loan, I can make sure your business plan is so good you’ll have banks throwing money at you.”

Freddie lowered his hand and hooked his thumb in his jeans. He had to admit her offer was tempting. “How much?”

“Nothing. Give me the rest of your plan and I’ll do an evaluation.”

He hesitated. He wanted the help, but the last thing he wanted was this woman taking a look at his plans and finding he didn’t measure up. For some reason, her opinion was important to him.

“Listen, Julia—”

“Freddie, wouldn’t you rather have an honest evaluation and make sure your plan is the best it could be?”

 
Time ticked by as he pondered her question. She continued to stand there, looking beautiful and expectant at the same time. With reluctance, he took the sheets she held and reshuffled them into the proper order with his.

He handed her the plan. “That’s everything. Are you sure there’s nothing I can do in exchange? I could offer you a discount on the work downstairs.”

“No, it’s not necessary. You and your men have been working hard. Besides, this won’t take me long. Give me a few days and I’ll give you my recommendations.”

Freddie should be paying more attention to what she was saying, but he was riveted by the natural beauty of her brown skin in profile as she scanned the sheets. She wore very little makeup, and despite the prim and proper business suit, pearls and matching earrings, he couldn’t help but recollect last week’s kiss.

Her actions hadn’t been those of a controlled woman. She’d given herself over to the passion of the kiss, and despite his anger, he longed to sample that passion again. His eyes lowered to the upward curve of her full lips, which had been the cornerstone of each fantasy he’d had since Friday night.

Freddie cleared his throat to dispel the unsettling thoughts from resurfacing so he wouldn’t embarrass himself. “Do you need anything else from me?”

She seemed to have a hard time tearing her eyes away from the business plan. She was in full throttle business mode.

“No, nothing. I’ll get back to you soon.”

“Thanks,” he said with a curt nod.

CHAPTER SEVEN