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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Part One: The Storm
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Part Two: Real Life
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Part Three: Away from the Magic
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Part Four: Happily Ever After …?
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
More from Mischief
Copyright
About the Publisher
Chapter One
One glance at the stained-glass dome told me the sky had greyed further. There was no way to judge actual sunlight or the weather itself, but I could definitely tell it had darkened.
‘Hey, pretty lady! You sending us home early? What’s the occasion?’
I was already grinning when I turned and started towards Mario. One of the few overseers of labour I trusted to take care of business. ‘The glass man –’ I twirled my fingers at the overhead dome and smiled ‘– he likes to work in private.’
I shrugged to show him I understood how silly it seemed.
‘He’s sensitive?’ Mario cocked his head and winked at me.
A laugh burst free and I nodded, hoping against hope that Marcel Voorhees had yet to arrive.
Wind whipped outside making the large automatic doors creak. All entrances to the Rotunda were sealed tight but for this one. The place was deserted for renovations. Renovations I was in charge of – a fact that made me reel from surprise daily.
It was a big job. A big deal.
‘Better for you to get home early,’ I said, getting closer to Mario and his men. Don was a short, dark man with a thin moustache and dark, dark eyes. Mitchell was a college boy, tall and broad – the term ‘corn-fed’ fit him to a T. They all grinned at me and I grinned back. ‘This weather is supposed to get nasty very fast.’
‘What about you? You’ll be OK?’ The good humour faded from Mario’s eyes and genuine concern showed.
‘I will. I’ll stay safe.’ It felt like a lie. More wind made those doors creak and my stomach filled with a twisting nervousness. I worried about my little house, my drive home … most of all my grandmother.
‘You do that,’ Mario said. ‘If you need anything –’ He patted his cellphone to finish the thought.
‘Got it.’ I smiled at him and made a shooing motion at them all. ‘Now go. Go home early. Or go to a bar and have a beer.’ I levelled a finger at them. ‘A bar close to home. That way you can walk if this thing hits us full-on.’
The weatherman had predicted a storm of the century. A monster of a storm that could ‘bring the state to its knees’. I was doing my best not to dissect the morning news or the nervous energy it had triggered in me.
‘Yes, ma’am.’ Mario gave me another worried glance. Then his face became jovial and he pointed a finger at me. ‘How come you don’t marry me, chica?’
A blush crept up my cheeks. I felt it blaze a heated trail. ‘Oh, that might have something to do with that lovely wife of yours who brings you lunch a few times a week. And the cutie-patootie kids that are in tow when she does.’
Mario smacked his head, making Don laugh and shake his head at his boss. ‘Oh, yeah. Them. Still, you need a good –’
I waved my hand again. ‘Yes, yes, a good man. I’ll let you know when that magical man appears.’
Mario’s face turned serious again. ‘You’re a good person, Clover. He’s coming for you.’
They all waved and went off into the severely overcast day. I watched the automatic doors bump and grind in a silly little dance number. More wind, more creaking, but hey, if you were going to be caught somewhere in weather like this, a place like the Rotunda was the place to be.
I glanced up at the brickwork, the high ceilings, the fancy stores darkened during remodelling. It wasn’t hopping with business the way it had been during my childhood. At the moment, in fact, it was as quiet as a tomb. But it was sturdy as hell and I’d be fine. Just me and the demanding stained-glass expert.
‘He’d better be good,’ I muttered. ‘I lost a half day’s work from everyone else to suit his loner needs.’
With that, as if on cue, my cellphone rang.
I moved around near the shuttered stores to try and pick up better reception. The cell service in the Rotunda was spotty at best on the average day. Something that was on the list to figure out but hadn’t been a priority.
‘I’m sorry … Hello?’ I practically yelled.
The voice came in a bit better by the automatic doors so I took up residence there, feeling the late October wind lick at my stocking-clad legs as it bled through the cracks. I shivered and tried again.
‘Hello? This is Clover Brite. Can you speak up, please?’
The voice cracked and cut off repeatedly and I managed to make out ‘Voorhees … wind … work in … conditions.’
‘Mr Voorhees?’ I shouted.
Jaggedly an answer made its way through the cellphone.
‘Yes … Ms … to know!’
Frustration made my muscles tight. I literally ached from it. I could not hear him. I had no idea what he was saying. I practically put my cellphone in my mouth – as if that would help – and shouted. ‘Mr Voorhees! I am going to call you on a landline. Right now! Please hang up!’
Then I took a breath to get my blood pressure down and stomped my way over to the courtesy desk. When the Rotunda was fully staffed and open during operational hours, it was manned by several hospitality experts to direct patrons and help them find the stores they were looking for. At the moment it was draped in plastic and as quiet as a ghost town.
I shoved huge swathes of plastic aside and finally found the phone I knew to be there. Scrolling through the incoming calls section of my cell, I found his number and dialled it.
It rang long enough to make me fear he hadn’t heard me and was currently trying to have a conversation with my now disconnected cell. Then my pulse kicked once, hard, as he answered.
‘Ms Brite?’
‘Mr Voorhees, I’m glad I got you. When will you be here? I’m –’
He cut me off with a ‘tsk’. He was a small, narrow, prissy man who had gotten under my skin from the get-go. But he was also the most well-known and respected stained-glass expert in several states. I ground my teeth and tried to remember to breathe. I turned my back to the desk and leaned against it, hearing the automatic doors groan from what I assumed was the wind.
‘I cannot come out in this atrocious weather to inspect,’ he said with his unidentifiable accent.
Personally, I think the accent was fake. He did it to seem exotic. I found myself grasping the phone receiver in a kung-fu grip and forced my hand to relax. ‘Why is that?’
‘I cannot work in these conditions. They’re calling this the monster storm.’
But you’re only looking at it to give an opinion …
I bit my tongue to keep from saying what was in my head. ‘Mr Voorhees, I assure you that it is safe here now. The wind is a bit high and –’ As I pleaded with him, Mother Nature made a liar out of me by dumping what appeared to be a solid sheet of rain against the skylights over my head.
Fabulous.
‘Ms Brite,’ he said, enunciating each word. He was talking to me as if I were mentally compromised. Which made me want to reach through the ancient landline phone and choke his skinny little neck. ‘I cannot come today. I am sorry. I will be happy to come on a day when my life will not be at stake simply driving down the street.’
‘But I –’ I was sputtering, my voice pleading, and it infuriated me. My body grew tenser and my heart started to pound. I had sent everyone home. I was here alone waiting … waiting!
‘Ms Brite,’ he said again. ‘This is not up for discussion. Call me when this thing passes and we’ll discuss my consultation.’
‘I –’
He’d already hung up.
‘Well!’ I huffed at the silent phone. ‘Thank you, Voorhees. Thank you for fucking up my whole day! For making me send my wonderful crew home because you are so special … and, and … so fragile that you need to work utterly alone even in a place the size of the Baltimore zoo! You … you … asshole.’ I hissed the last word. I took after my mother: you did not need to worry if I yelled. You needed to worry if my voice got softer. The angrier I became, the softer was my voice, until it was almost just a hiss.
‘You told him,’ said a voice.
I jumped and let out some kind of bizarre war whoop and promptly threw my dormant cellphone at the stranger. I turned to run, my flight response having fully kicked in while facing a man who should not be here. A man I did not know.
I had made three skittering steps across the damp, dark tiled floor when he laughed. ‘I’ve never had an employee greet me quite that way before. Good to meet you, Clover. I’m Dorian Martin.’
I turned then, forcing myself to be calm. I took him in. Tall, broad, dark-dark hair worn just a touch too long and eyes as green as pine trees in summer.
Shit.
‘Oh, God, I …’ I what? Had lost my ever-loving mind? I reached for him, both hands raised as if to smooth his rugged, manly fisherman’s sweater. Really? He had to wear that? He couldn’t have gone for a suit or a button-down shirt? Damn near anything but the one piece of clothing I found irresistible on a man?
I put my hands down. I had already thrown my phone at my boss. I was certainly not going to touch him uninvited.
Something in the way he smiled at me made me wonder if maybe, eventually, I would be invited to touch him. I shook it off. Clearly my nerves and the weather had gotten the better of me.
I stuck out my hand like a lunatic and grinned. ‘Clover Brite, and I am so very, very sorry I just threw my phone at you, Mr Martin.’ I cleared my throat as he studied me, feeling suddenly deflated.
Then he took my hand in his bigger, warmer one and shook it. That deflated feeling fled, pushed out by an entirely new feeling. One that had me uncomfortable but, oddly, enjoying the sensation.
‘I know,’ he said. He shook once more and squeezed my hand and, as he pulled away, his finger trailed briefly across my palm. My stomach tumbled in on itself as heat flooded my body. My face, my chest and lower. Much lower. ‘We’ve never met but I came looking for you.’
I remembered the sound of the automatic doors that I’d chalked up to the wind. That had been him entering. And listening to me have my little rant at Voorhees. Ugh. No one had told me Dorian Martin, my big boss man, the man who now owned the Rotunda, was coming today. Of course today. Why not? Nothing like an unheard-of freak super-storm to set the tone.
‘You did?’ I whispered it. I had no idea why. It seemed to amuse him, though, because he smiled at me and went from handsome to devastating.
I bit my tongue to keep my focus. My focus being at that moment hoping Dorian Martin could not see me biting my own tongue.
‘I was. You were hired by my assistant Bradley, but I wanted us to meet. Since you’ve been doing such a nice job.’ As he spoke his eyes tracked over me. It didn’t feel dirty to me, though part of me sort of wanted it to be. What it felt like was how a man like this judged the person he was talking to. He was studying me to see if what he’d heard matched up with what he saw.
I threw my shoulders back to try and steel myself and that made him smile again. His smile was dangerous – at least to the likes of me. I’d heard of instant attraction, but in twenty-three years I’d never encountered it. I was too busy, too sceptical, too … jaded?
‘I am?’ I cocked my head, caught myself. My job was to exude confidence. To my workers, to Voorhees, that traitorous glass man, and yes, even to the main man himself. ‘I mean, thank you. But this day has not turned out well.’
‘I overheard your conversation.’ He reached out his hand again and I blinked at him, momentarily bewildered, then I noticed he was offering me my phone. Or, in the case of our meeting, the projectile I’d hurled at him.
‘I’m really sorry. This day is very much a bust. Even though the weather would have nothing to do with that … man,’ I hissed, my anger returning, ‘coming here to look at the dome. I mean, it’s not as if we were asking him to scale outdoor scaffolding. All he had to do was look and maybe walk his way up the spiral ramp to the upper level but the weather –’
‘Is terribly nasty,’ Dorian said. His voice was soft and his eyes kind.
Now I felt like a heel.
‘I guess I sound pretty callous, then?’ Wind rocked the automatic doors, making them groan. I jumped and he put a hand on my arm. Heat flooded the skin around that hand. It coursed up into my shoulders and my face and I did my best to ignore it.
‘No. Just like a woman who likes to get stuff done. And seeing as you’re handling one of my projects, I very much appreciate that.’
Whew.
‘Thank you, Mr –’
‘Dorian,’ he said. His eyes really were the wildest colour green.
I looked at my feet as if that could distract me. ‘Dorian, right. I really think if no one’s coming we should go ahead and leave. I’d hate for you to get stuck here. It’s not even close to being done.’
A rush of sirens outside caused us both to glance up. ‘I think you’re right, Clover. Can I walk you out?’
‘I need to walk through first,’ I said. ‘Make sure everything’s off. Shut. Locked.’
‘I’ll walk with you.’
‘I can’t ask you to do that,’ I said, turning to head down the main corridor.
‘You didn’t ask me to. Let’s call it boss man’s prerogative,’ he said. Then he chuckled.
‘What’s so funny?’ I wanted to really bite my tongue then. What had caused me to be so cavalier with him? It was none of my business why he was laughing. He had a reputation of being a reformed bad boy, an all-round good guy and a down-to-earth rich kid, but my words had been entirely too familiar.
‘I hate being called the boss man and here I use it as a ruse to take a walk in the dark with a pretty girl.’
‘Oh,’ I said. It was more a puff of air than a spoken word. As we walked, I noticed I felt more than a little lightheaded and, every time he strayed near to me, I had the bizarre urge to reach out and take his hand.
Chapter Two
‘Why are you here?’ I asked, unable to squash my curiosity. Surely it wasn’t really to do with me. We passed the two longest sections of mall that branched off from the main entrance. They were dark and partly sheathed in plastic and often, when I was alone, brought to mind those horrible slasher movies. I shook the thought off, but caught him looking at me.
‘I had heard from Bradley that all was going really well. That you were running a tight ship and the workers liked you and that you were even getting around to the stained-glass dome. That you’d called in an expert.’
‘Oh, he’s an expert,’ I sighed. ‘And he acts like one. A bit of a prima donna, if you ask me. But he did the Beltway.’
‘I heard.’
Another Baltimore landmark that sported some serious stained glass. It had started to leak over the years and Voorhees had been called in to repair it. It was how I’d heard of him and seen his handiwork.
‘Anyway, he’s sort of … delicate.’ My foot slipped on a stray tail of plastic sheeting and I slid, almost losing my balance. Almost – but for a strong hand that suddenly appeared at my elbow, and another at the small of my back, to steady me.
My heart gave a crazy little fish flop in my chest. I wasn’t sure if it was from the fear of falling or from his hands on me. I nodded my thanks and just kept walking, ignoring the burn of blood in my cheeks.
‘Well, you handled him well, from what I heard.’
I smiled. ‘I yelled into the phone and then got pissed.’
Watch your mouth, Clover. Be a lady …
‘That was pissed? I get way more pissed than that.’ He smiled at me in the low light. I felt that smile in my stomach.
‘This way,’ I said. My voice was tight and high. I was nervous. Any fool could hear that. And yet Dorian Martin had done nothing at all to make me nervous. Other than be so … close to me. ‘Some of the men take their smoke breaks down here. I like to make sure it’s not just locked but chained when the day is done.’ I took a small penlight from my pocket and aimed it at the push bars on the double doors. The way the chains were tangled it was unclear. ‘Can’t tell,’ I muttered.
He followed me, silently, down to the darkest end of the hall and let me push the bars to assure myself that all was not just secure but chained. ‘Good,’ I said.
‘You’re very conscientious,’ he said.
‘Is that a bad thing?’ I asked. It was a serious question. I was often told I worried too much. A habit I seemed unable to break.
‘Not for me,’ he said, giving me a soft touch on the back of my arm as we turned in the gloom. Nothing more than a gentlemanly steer with his hand, but it did strange things to me. Made me feel something I couldn’t recall feeling before.
A brief and vivid image of him kissing me right there, pressing me to the cool, beautifully tiled wall of the corridor filled my head and, when I coughed to focus myself, it burst and flitted away like a rainbow-hued soap bubble.
And then: ‘It means you’re looking out for me.’
‘I didn’t even know you,’ I said. I felt stupid for having pointed that out.
We walked back towards the light and he said, ‘You knew of me.’
‘True. Just one more stop and then we can go. But Mr –’
‘Dorian,’ he corrected, looking slightly stern.
‘Right. Dorian, you can go. I really am fine by myself. I’m here all the time. I mean, it’s like I practically live here.’ I laughed. We passed a stretch of tiny eateries. A bistro, a bakery, a gourmet preserves store. I wished they were open – I was starved.
Wind licked at the building so fiercely we heard the huge old structure creak. ‘Let’s finish this so we don’t end up living here,’ he said.
‘Right.’
Just a few more minutes together. We checked the dome to see that all the industrial work lights were off and then looked at the last exit door to make sure it was bolted and secure.
‘Done!’ I said. His eyes were darker in this light, the green less noticeable, his expression unreadable as he studied me again. Had I done something?
‘Good. I’ll walk you back. Make sure you get on the road safely.’
Safe. How long since anyone besides my grandmother had fretted over my safety? To be honest – brutally so – with myself, I couldn’t remember the last time a man had bothered himself with my safety. Of course, in their defence, it had been years since I’d done anything but casual dating. And you cannot expect a man whom you see once every six weeks or so to fret over your safety.
‘Thanks. I appreciate it.’ My voice did a new and interesting weird thing at the end. I sounded almost like I was about to cry.
Dorian Martin caught it, gave me a quick second glance but then covered with a smile.
Great, not just handsome and kind, but intuitive too. I’d have to remember to keep my big fat mouth shut until I was in my car. Then I could freak out.
* * *
‘I think –’ Outside, the wind ripped my voice away. My skirt was lifted by a stiff blast of wind and the rain suddenly changed direction, dousing me in an instant.
White blouse.
But Dorian didn’t seem to notice because a decorative bench was slowly being blown across the brickwork of the patio. ‘We might have waited too long,’ he yelled.
Another blast of wind and rain and I screamed when more cold water smacked me. I felt like a fool but couldn’t help it.
I had to be positive. This was just a storm. No big deal. Surely the weather people were exaggerating. They had to talk about something, right? ‘Oh, I’m sure we’ll be fi –’
With that, the second biggest oak on the property gave a mighty groan. We’d had rain all week already and the ground was soaked. The wind and added rain had taxed the poor thing to its limits. With another gust and another fierce moan it seemed to surrender and down it went, as if in slow motion.
‘I think we won’t, Clover,’ he shouted, taking my hand.
I’d imagined him doing it, but the reality of his big warm hand curling around mine was extraordinary. Even given the bizarre and frightening circumstances, something in me woke up when he touched me.
And then: ‘Come on, Clover. We need to get inside. Fast.’
I hurried in after him, sliding the last foot or so on the wet tile, my carefully chosen outfit now stuck to me. I dressed to say, ‘I’m in charge,’ I dressed to say, ‘Responsible.’ Now my ensemble just said, ‘Drowned rat.’
The automatic doors slid closed and to add insult to injury the lights flickered and failed. For a few heartbeats there was nothing but total silence.
Then my teeth started to chatter.
Chapter Three
He didn’t have a coat to offer me. He seemed the kind of guy who would if he had one to give. When he gripped the hem of his fisherman’s knit sweater and pulled it up, suddenly exposing a flat, taut belly, I found myself holding my breath. Then he got the sweater up further and I saw a blue T-shirt beneath it.
‘Here, let’s get this on you. A bit damp but not nearly as damp as you are.’ He tugged the cream-coloured sweater over his head and I let myself ogle him for the instant that his head was totally covered.
His body was lean and firm. He obviously worked out or kept in shape somehow, but wasn’t obsessive about it. I had a fleeting vision of him unbuttoning his well-worn jeans and shut my eyes tight like I was wishing away a monster in the dark. Not appropriate. Not by a long shot. A rich, handsome, nice guy like this obviously would have a female following of epic proportions. He probably had a girlfriend designated for every night of the week. A few for weekends just to keep things interesting.
He handed me the sweater and I stared at it like a dolt. Outside something struck the mall doors and I jumped. My grandmother was alone. Aunt Brani lived next door. She really wasn’t my aunt, she’d just been my grandmother’s friend for over three decades. Surely if I was stuck here she would check in on grandma. She would –
‘… so wet. I can turn my back.’
I blinked at him, the panic that had gripped me letting up just a tiny bit as I saw the concern in his eyes.