Owed: One Wedding Night

NANCY HOLLAND

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First published in Great Britain by HarperImpulse 2015

Copyright © Nancy Holland 2015

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Cover design by Michelle Andrews

Nancy Holland asserts the moral right

to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is

available from the British Library

This novel is entirely a work of fiction.

The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are

the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to

actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is

entirely coincidental.

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Ebook Edition © May 2015 ISBN: 9780008127374

Version 2015-05-27

In loving memory of my mother, who introduced me to romance and always believed this day would come.

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Acknowledgements

Nancy Holland

About HarperImpulse

About the Publisher

Chapter One

Madison Ellsworth’s heart pounded in rhythm with the noisy staccato of her heels on the marble floor of Carlyle & Sons’ San Francisco headquarters. The unwelcoming glass-and-steel decor, softened only here and there by hand-woven wall-hangings in shades of rust, gold, and azure, made the long path from the elevator to the receptionist’s desk seem endless.

She could do this. She had to do this. Her mother had gone through so much in the last two months. The least Madison could do was take this one burden off of her shoulders. If she felt like a sacrificial lamb on the way to slaughter, she had no one to blame but herself. She crossed her fingers for luck.

When she finally reached the stunning metal sculpture that was the receptionist’s desk, the redhead who sat behind it looked up at her with a small frown.

Madison shifted the Italian leather briefcase her mother had given her when she got into Stanford Business School from one damp hand to the other. “I’m here to see Mr. Carlyle.”

“I’m sorry.” The receptionist didn’t sound sorry at all. “He has an appointment with,” she glanced at the computer screen, cleverly hidden in the desk. “With a Mrs. Ellsworth.”

Madison took a deep breath and resisted the need to lift a hand and check that her sleek up-do was still perfect. “Mrs. Ellsworth couldn't make it. I’m her daughter.”

The redhead gave a small shrug and pushed a hidden button on the desk.

“Your ten o’clock appointment is here, Mr. Carlyle.”

The distance from the reception area to Jake Carlyle’s office was only a fraction of the walk from the elevator, but it felt ten times longer. At every clack of Madison’s heels on polished marble, the urge to forget this whole plan and head for the safety of home threatened to overwhelm her.

She forced her mother’s worried face to the front of her mind to block out everything but her promise to save Dartmoor Department Stores. If she thought too much about how Jake might react when he saw her, she could never do this. But her mother had paid too high a price to hold on to the family business for Madison to quit now.

Besides, there was no reason she and the head of Carlyle & Sons couldn’t discuss the issue like adults.

The receptionist glided ahead of her and opened the door to the office with a flourish.

The antique mahogany desk that dominated the room on the other side of the door was impressive. The man behind it was even more impressive.

Jake Carlyle’s face was elevated above mere masculine good looks by the slash of cheekbones inherited from the fashion model who had deigned to become his mother. The hand-tailored gray pinstripe suit emphasized the power of his tall, muscular frame.

He stood with a frown as Madison stepped into his inner sanctum.

Merely looking at the man took her breath away. When he raised sapphire-blue eyes to meet hers, her heart stopped entirely, then thudded back to life in double time.

Taking him by surprise was the only point in her favor. She watched the emotions run across the face she knew so well – surprise, a hint of lust, curiosity, and, finally, the beginnings of anger.

The anger made him lift his head slightly. His expression returned to the polite boredom a man like Jake Carlyle displayed to mere mortals, yet a frisson of sexual excitement lingered in the climate-controlled air.

“What are you doing here?”

Just what her frayed nerves needed – the man was channeling her father. She took a deep breath to calm herself.

“Mother doesn’t feel well, so I came instead.”

He looked away. For a moment, she’d rattled him. She lifted her chin a little higher and waited for his next move.

“How is she? It must have been a terrible shock.”

Madison’s eyes stung with a rush of unexpected grief. Shock, yes. Terrible, yes. But not in the way he thought.

For a moment the devastating memory of that pre-dawn phone call, made stronger by being in Jake’s presence, threatened to overwhelm her. Her first impulse, almost a compulsion, had been to call him, to go to him for the strength and comfort she needed, even though she’d no longer had a right to expect anything from him. Reality, and duty, had won out. She’d gone to her mother, been the strong one, the comforter. She’d had no other choice.

She fought off the still raw pain by making the Ms.-Manners-approved response. “It was nice of you to come to my father's memorial service.”

“Old friends and all that. You and your parents came to the one for my father.”

Those two unhappy events were the only times she and Jake had seen each other in three years. She sighed.

The momentary weakness didn’t go unpunished.

“So why did you, or rather your mother, want to talk to me?”

The ice in his voice made her knees wobble. Obviously the pleasantries were over.

She gave a meaningful look at the comfortable chairs that flanked the fireplace at the far end of the office, but instead he gestured at the stiff leather chair across the desk from his. They sat down at the same moment, eyes fixed on each other’s faces, like boxers circling in the ring.

She took a deep breath and began in a professional tone she hoped she could hang on to. “How much do you know about the circumstances surrounding my father’s death?”

He had the good grace to look uncomfortable. “Only what was in the newspapers. I didn’t follow all the stuff that showed up on the web.”

And thank you for that.

“I take it there are financial issues,” he continued.

She wondered if that was how her mother had phrased it when she made this appointment. Or was he only being polite? Madison took another deep breath and carefully unknotted her hands.

“These last few years…” She forced air into her lungs. “My father's relationship with Dartmoor's Chief Financial Officer…” Anger and shame, added to the nervousness that kept her heart pounding double time, finally stole her voice.

Jake chose to be merciful. “The woman he was with when he died?”

She nodded. Able to breathe again, she gave up on spontaneity as a bad bet and launched into the speech her mother would have made.

“Dartmoor Department Stores has suffered from an unfortunate lack of financial oversight recently that has left it in a difficult situation. New leadership…” Her heart stumbled at the thought. “New leadership is now in place.”

At least she’d been able to convince her father’s mistress to resign. Firing her would only have added to the scandal. Unfortunately, nothing could be done about the all-cash golden parachute the former CFO and Madison’s father had set up for her, which had decimated Dartmoor’s cash reserves.

“However,” Madison continued, “the missteps of the previous CFO have left the company seriously short of the capital it needs to move forward in this challenging economy.”

“Missteps, incompetence, or fraud?” Jake interrupted.

Madison looked down. “We’re not sure.”

“Has the new leadership you referred to had a forensic audit done?”

Her face heated. “That would cost more money than seemed wise to spend on the chance it would turn up any criminal misconduct.”

Criminal misconduct, which might, she didn’t bother to add, implicate her father.

She raised her eyes to search Jake’s face for some clue as to what he might be thinking, but met only a stare so cold it knocked what she meant to say next out of her mind completely.

“Go on,” he said. “I didn’t mean to interrupt such a carefully canned speech.”

His disdain shook her mind free of its temporary paralysis. “Unfortunately, most of my mother’s assets and those of the other investors in Dartmoor have also been victims of the economy, and as things stand there’s little chance of attracting private capital or new investors.”

“What about the trust fund from your grandmother?”

Of course he’d remember that little detail.

“My mother and I have been living on it since my father died.” Nana’s money had also put Madison through business school, but she didn’t dare say so. “We’re spending the principal now.” She suppressed a shudder at the thought of how soon they’d use up the last of that.

Jake shook his head. She was probably the only person in the world beside his mother who would recognize the tiny tic of impatience at one corner of his mouth.

His voice was as bland as his features. “So, where do I come into the picture?”

She looked past him out the window at the sunshine glinting off the building across the street. No inspiration there.

If it was up to her, she’d have sold everything and lived in a tent in Golden Gate Park rather than answer Jake’s question. She’d exhausted every other option first. She’d sold the condo where she lived while she was in business school and now shared the Pacific Heights apartment her mother had moved into when she'd been forced to sell their home in Marin County.

Jake sat there, watching her.

Panic swept over her, choked her. She couldn’t do this. There had to be another way. She’d let Dartmoor go and take one of the jobs she’d been offered in Silicon Valley. She and her mother could get an apartment together down there…

And her mother would be miserable. The humiliation of having her husband die in another woman’s bed, then all the stress of learning that they might have to close Dartmoor had already aged Dana Ellsworth ten years in the last two months. She’d had lived a mockery of a marriage for as long as Madison could remember and even that might not have been enough to keep Dartmoor in the family.

Which is why Madison was sitting here, face hot with humiliation, damp hands once again knotted in her lap.

She let out a long, slow breath. “If you would loan my mother…” She couldn’t finish.

He raised his eyebrows in a way she’d once thought the sexiest thing in the world. Right now the gesture made her look for a waste basket, in case her stomach betrayed her completely.

“How much?”

She named a figure that made Jake’s eyes open wide.

“How much of that is for Dartmoor and how much is to support your mother’s lifestyle? Not to mention yours?”

Madison was tempted to tell him her lifestyle, as bare-bones as it had become lately, was none of his business. But that wouldn’t help her mother.

“All the money will be used to implement my plan to revitalize Dartmoor.”

Both his eyebrows went up. “Your plan?”

This was the opening she needed. She lifted the briefcase to her lap and opened it.

“Yes. If you look at the some of my ideas, you'll see…”

He held up his hand. “Spare me. I don't think I can sit through another of your amateur sales pitches.”

She started to protest that her MBA in marketing made her far from an amateur, but the look on his face, somewhere between amusement and rage, stopped her. Instead she set the case down again and tried to ignore the memories that kept flooding back and threatened to make it impossible for her to continue.

“So, the money would all go to Dartmoor.”

She nodded.

“And what will you two live on in the meantime?”

What should she tell him? The whole truth wasn’t an option.

“I've had several job offers.”

Something dark crossed his face, then evaporated.

“Jobs that will pay enough to support your mother’s current lifestyle?”

“No.” That was true enough. “But with my trust fund, we’ll manage.”

He leaned forward in his chair, arms on the desk. With an effort she managed not to draw back, away from the masculine energy of his body.

“And how to you plan to pay back this loan? Out of Dartmoor’s profits? Unlikely, any time soon. Out of your salary? I don’t think so.”

“Jake, I have a photo of you at my christening.” He flinched, probably at the image of himself as a bored, but adorable four-year-old in a stiff black suit. “If you loan us the money, you know I’ll pay you back, no matter what happens.”

“I doubt either of us will live long enough for you to pay me back that kind of money out of your paychecks.”

Somehow Jake must have missed the news that she’d finished her MBA at the top of her class. She sat up a little straighter. She might not have made much in the short term if she’d taken any of those jobs, but in a year, ten years, she’d have been earning the money to pay him back several times over. A man as smart as he was could figure that out. Maybe he wasn’t ready to accept that he’d been wrong when he tried to veto her plan to go to business school.

The impulse to run away that had lurked at the back of her mind ever since she entered the building took over. She set both feet on the floor, ready to stand up, when she remembered that this time it wasn’t about her. It was about her mother and saving the family legacy.

She sat back and crossed her legs. If she had to stay, the best defense might be a good offense.

“If you’re worried I might stiff you for the money by dying, I could take out a life- insurance policy for the full amount and make you the beneficiary. If I pay you back most of it and something happens to me, you’d make a nice profit on the deal.”

He scowled. “That’s not the point. The point is that a loan implies an ability to repay the money. Frankly, I can’t see how that’s supposed to happen. Maybe your MBA will take you right to the executive suite.” She flinched, but he didn’t notice. “Or maybe you’ll get laid off or have an employer fail on you, and then where would I be?”

“Still filthy rich.” Not exactly the right attitude when she was asking him for such a big favor, but the man knew how to push her buttons. All of them.

“So you want me to give you the money for old times’ sake?” He leaned back in his chair and looked her straight in the eye.

She shook off the shattering impact of his gaze, impatient at her inability to keep the past behind her.

Apparently he couldn’t forget what they’d shared either. But she couldn’t believe he’d refuse to help because their wedding plans had fallen through. That didn’t sound like the Jake she’d once adored. She searched for that Jake in the face of the stranger in front of her.

“Is that what you would have said if it was my mother sitting here?”

“Not in those words, no, but whatever I said to her would have led to the same outcome – no loan.”

“What about half that amount?” It was better than nothing.

He shook his head.

The clang of a cable-car bell found its way up from the street below. She took a calming breath against the anger that simmered just below the surface.

“I expected better of you, Jake. I expected you to at least look at my plan to turn Dartmoor around.”

“Because?”

“Because you’re a fair man. And you know I will repay you, no matter what.”

He shrugged and picked up a pen from his desk with a this-conversation-is-over gesture.

“I think we all learned a long time ago that I am the last person to predict what you will or will not do.”

She leaned forward, hands on the edge of his desk. “I’m not asking you to do this for me.” No power on earth could make her stoop that low. “I’m asking you to do it for my mother.”

“I won’t be doing it at all. I was always fond of your mother, but this is business.”

She sank back. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected from Jake, but certainly more than that icy dismissal. When he didn’t say anything more, she reluctantly gathered her purse and briefcase to leave, mind already searching for other ways to get the money.

She was halfway out of the chair when he said, “Madison.”

She sat back down and lifted her head.

“Tell your mother I’m sorry.”

“I'm sure she’ll find that a great comfort when they liquidate her family business because you refused to help.”

His eyes narrowed as he stood. “You never do know when to shut up, do you?”

Anger propelled her to her feet. She would not let him loom over her like a predator over its prey.

“Maybe not, but I do know refusing to marry you was the smartest thing I ever did.”

On that blatant lie, she turned to walk out.

“Madi.” The old nickname came unwanted to Jake’s lips. He couldn’t let her go. Not with those words hanging in the air between them.

She turned. Hope battled with wariness in her sea-green eyes as she waited for him to say something. But what?

He needed time to think. To adjust to having her so close he could smell her perfume – the same exotic French scent he remembered, full of unspoken promises. So close he could see the little worry line between her eyes, could touch her…

“Dinner,” he said.

She frowned.

“I don’t have time to listen to your plan now. Let’s have dinner tonight. I can look at what you’ve come up with then and decide whether it can turn Dartmoor around and make a loan viable.”

A glow lit up her face.

“I’m not making any promises.” He just wasn’t ready to let her walk out of his life again.

The light in her eyes dimmed. “Of course not.”

“The Yacht Club?” His turf – and the opposite of romantic.

“Sure. What time?”

“Seven.” That would give him time to have a drink in the bar first. He’d need it. “Do you want me to send the limo for you?”

“No.”

He thought he heard an echo of disappointment in her voice. She couldn’t have expected him to pick her up. This wasn’t a date. It was strictly business. Suuuure it was.

“I haven’t had to sell the Ferrari yet.”

Her sad smile twisted his heart.

“Oh.” He’d refused to let her return his engagement gift after the wedding fell through. What would he have done with the damned car? And she loved it so much.

Her smile faded as they stared at each other for a moment too long. Long enough for the good memories to outnumber the bad. For him, at least.

Luckily his cell buzzed noisily before he could do or say anything stupid.

“I'll see you tonight.” Her voice told him nothing.

He nodded and took his call, all too aware of the door closing behind her as she left.

He couldn’t settle down to work after he ended the call. He walked to the windows and gazed down at the busy parade of people on Montgomery Street, the heart of the San Francisco financial district, several floors below. His father had preferred the office next door overlooking San Francisco Bay, but Jake had switched his office with the boardroom when he took over Carlyle's. The Bay was his father’s escape, an escape that eventually proved fatal and made Jake President and Chair of the Board before he was thirty.

The darkness of those days lingered. The tinge of Madison’s perfume that hung in the air was an aching reminder of how he’d longed to have her comfort and strength beside him through it all. But she’d made her choice. She’d chosen business school and left him at the altar.

Which is why Jake preferred Montgomery Street. It put the past behind him, where it belonged. The energy of the busy street below recharged him, motivated him, drove him. He needed all that and more after the scene with Madison.

When she first walked in – dark circles under her eyes expensive make-up couldn’t hide, pale-blonde hair twisted up on her head, wearing the same black suit she’d worn to her father’s funeral – he’d been stunned by the double whammy of tension in his gut and a pang in his heart. But before he could decide whether to take her in his arms or start raging about what she’d done to him, he realized how nervous she was. That one moment of sympathy had earned him twenty minutes of feigning the cold indifference toward her he wished he felt.

He’d avoided her for the last three years because he knew seeing her again would turn him inside out like this. A need that was far more than physical still gnawed at his gut.

Every time she’d traded verbal jabs with him the way she used to, his libido had jumped into overdrive. It had been all he could do not to grab her and take her in every way a man could.

Madison had always had that effect on him. Erotic memories flooded his mind, hardened his body, before he could stop them.

He banished them in an instant with the memory of standing at the church door, where her father had told him in a red-faced rage, “The little bitch isn’t coming. She says she’s sorry. Sorry! After all the money I threw away on this fiasco.”

Then her father had taken Jake’s arm, dragged him to the altar, and made him stand there while the preacher announced to the hundreds of people in attendance that the wedding was off.

Now Madison expected Jake to loan her mother money because he was “a fair man”. She’d been pushing the limits to expect him not to throw her bodily out of his office the minute she appeared in the door.

So why ask her out to dinner? He had no intention of loaning her, or her mother, a penny. And he certainly had no intention of letting her flaunt her plan – a product of the MBA, which had been so much more important to her than he was – over dinner.

She’d hurt him so badly the scars hadn’t completely healed three years later. The impulse to hurt her back pounded through his brain, but he wasn’t that kind of man.

No, he hadn’t asked her to dinner to get his revenge. He’d done it simply because the idea of not seeing her again was more than he could bear.

Madison’s hands were shaking so hard she could barely get the key into the ignition of the beloved vintage Ferrari that was the last remaining sign Jake Carlyle had once loved her.

If you could call it love when he couldn’t understand why she wanted to get the education she’d need to build a career at Dartmoor, the way he had at Carlyle & Sons.

In any case, love surely was not the reason behind his dinner invitation. A sincere concern for her mother’s welfare, if not her own, maybe.

Or simple lust. As if she’d hop back into his bed after everything that had happened.

She started to hand the parking attendant a credit card before she remembered her new rules and pulled a ten out of her wallet instead. The car behind her honked at the delay.

She took her time collecting her change before she drove on, then refocused on Jake’s dinner invitation. She didn’t know what he had in mind, but she did know how angry he’d been when she didn’t show up for the wedding. And how humiliated. Her father had described it all in great detail, along with his own disgust, before he’d cut her out of his life for good.

Jake was probably out for revenge, and yet she’d said yes. The remote possibility that he might loan them the money had only been part of it. An hour or two with the only man she’d ever loved, with or without the loan, had for one weak moment seemed worth whatever revenge he planned to take. Besides, what horrible things could he say to her that she hadn’t already said to herself a hundred times?

Maybe once she survived this dinner and he’d had his revenge, she could forgive herself and get on with her life. Still, the prospect of life without Jake had never looked more bleak.

Chapter Two

“Ms. Ellsworth.” The maître d’ at the Yacht Club greeted Madison with genuine warmth. “It’s been quite a while since you graced us with your presence.”

Three years, to be precise. After the non-wedding, she’d stayed away for fear she might run into her father, until he’d given up his membership and sold the yacht. Then she hadn’t had any reason to come here at all.

“It’s nice to see you again, too, Marcel. I’m here to meet Jake Carlyle.”

Marcel was a true professional. The only sign of surprise was a momentary widening of his eyes. “Of course, Ms. Ellsworth. I’ll let him know you’re here.”

None of the people who passed through the lobby in a range of attire from swimsuits to thousand-dollar business suits gave her a second glance. Apparently she’d struck the right fashion note for dinner with her ex-fiancé – a navy-blue silk dress with pearls and dressy black sandals that matched the large purse holding her tablet computer. Business-like but feminine.

And this was just business, of course. Either the literal business of the loan Dartmoor so desperately needed or, more likely, the business of letting Jake have his moment of revenge.

The Yacht Club was the perfect place for it. Everyone they knew would either be in the building or hear about it the next day from someone who was. Strategic planning had always been Jake’s strong suit.

“Madi.”

Another clever strategy. He’d thrown her off-balance by appearing from the deck behind her rather than from the bar. She turned to face him.

Dear lord, the man was gorgeous. Shirt open at the neck, hair tousled by the wind, blue eyes crinkled against the brightly lit space – he was every woman’s dream. Her dream.

And her nightmare. Walking away from this man was the hardest thing she’d ever done. The hole it left inside her still bled at odd moments. Now, for instance. She could only stare at him while he waited for a simple greeting she couldn’t quite muster.

He smiled, but not the smug smile she half expected, one that showed he was well aware of the effect he had on her. No, he smiled at her as if seeing her made him happy, as if she brought the kind of joy into his life he used to bring into hers.

She might have stood there forever if Marcel hadn’t reappeared with a bow and led them to a secluded table in the dining room that overlooked the rippling waters of the bay.

She endured the stares and mutters of the people they passed, used to living with the scandal her father had created. Thankfully Jake didn't act as if he noticed any of it.

“Do you get out to sail often?” she asked, for lack of anything else to say once the server had taken their drink orders.

A potent mixture of grief and anger crossed his face. “I don't sail anymore at all.”

She’d forgotten. His father had died sailing alone on the bay.

“I’m sorry.”

“I won’t say it gets easier, but you do learn to live with the loss.”

“I'll take your word for it.”

She could imagine learning to live with her father’s death. It was what he’d done while he was alive that she found so hard to forget – or forgive. Probably because she was still living with the consequences, including this awkward dinner.

Jake reached across the table to take the hand she’d unconsciously extended toward him, as if to comfort him. His face took on the same look of intense interest as before, as if she were the only thing in the world that mattered. She wished.

He lifted her hand to his lips with the quirk of a smile.

“But let’s not dwell on the past. Any of it.”

She jerked free of the 110-volt charge that shot through her system, expecting to see scorch marks on her hand.

To hide the heat that colored her face, she picked up her purse from the floor by her side.

“Maybe we can discuss my plan for Dartmoor over drinks.”

His lips tightened before he smiled again. “I'd rather spend some time getting to know each other again first. How’s your mother doing?”

He kept up a steady flow of small talk masquerading as real conversation through their drinks, salad, and entrée. Every time she tried to shift the topic back to Dartmoor, he came up with some new question she couldn’t find a way to dodge.

After a while she stopped trying. Clearly the whole evening was a sham. He had no interest in her plan. He’d brought her here for revenge, pure and simple.

Which replaced nervousness about showing him her plan with a deeper anxiety about what he intended to do, and when.

The few bites of salad Niçoise she’d managed to eat were followed by even fewer bites of steamed mussels and garlic-mashed potatoes. The tension that left less and less room in her stomach for food also pushed all the air out of her lungs, so the polite chitchat became almost impossible.

“Dessert?”

She shook her head.

“Here, have some more wine.”

This was the third time he’d asked and she’d said no. Or was it the fourth? She put a hand over her glass. “I'm driving.”

His polite smile widened and something she didn’t trust twinkled in his eyes.

“I could give you a ride home.”

Anger restored the backbone that had been melting away all evening. She lifted her head to meet his vaguely mocking gaze.

“I'm not a member here anymore. If I leave my car in the lot overnight, they’ll have it towed in a nanosecond.”

He hesitated for a moment, as if he hadn’t quite decided whether to try to seduce her or not, then he set the wine bottle down and took the last bite of his steak.

She let out the breath she’d been holding, not a hundred percent certain she could resist a seduction, if he tried. Her defenses, never strong when it came to Jake, were way down after an evening spent watching his face, his sensual enjoyment of the food, the way his hands moved. An evening of remembering and storing up new memories for a future without him. Her whole body ached and burned with a desire that could only destroy her.

Maybe that was his revenge.

“So,” he asked casually as he finished his wine, “what poor fool did the Dartmoor Board convince to take over as their CEO?”

She swallowed a cry of pain as the blood drained from her face.

He couldn’t know, but this would be his true revenge. Not only had he refused to listen to her plan to save Dartmoor, now she’d have to reveal the one fact guaranteed to keep him from ever loaning them the money they needed. No reason to put off the inevitable.

“Me.”

He gave his head a little shake. “I beg your pardon?”

“They convinced me to take over as acting CEO.”

Jake understood the words one by one, but together they made no sense. He could imagine Madi as a management trainee, but CEO, even acting CEO of a multi-million-dollar corporation? No way. He decided to play along.

“You always said you wanted to be head of Dartmoor someday.”

She gave him a grim smile. “The operative word being someday. I fought them pretty hard, actually.”

Damn, it was true. A probably irrational anger burned through him.

“Why didn't you just go for it? I mean, you got your MBA a whole four months ago. What else would you need to run an operation the size of Dartmoor?”

Her posture stiffened as she lifted her head to match his gaze full on.

“I don’t run Dartmoor. I replaced my father, who hardly ever went into the office except to do the deed with his mistress. After he created the position of Chief Operating Officer, my father reduced the CEO’s role to vision, strategic planning, and hanging out at the club with the other old boys.”

He couldn’t suppress a grin at the image of her fulfilling that last role.

“So, your plan to fix Dartmoor is the official one?”

“It’s in the developmental stage. I didn’t want to get anyone’s hopes up.” Her posture went more rigid. “Which is a good thing, since I can’t get the one person I was sure we could count on for a loan to even look at the plan.”

She’d counted on him? Jake didn’t know how to feel about that. More anger was safest.

“You gave up any right to guilt-trip me when you left me at the altar, Madi.”

Her body seemed to melt in front of him like a candle set too close to a fire.

“You’re right. I only…” She sniffed. “My mother…”

He missed the warrior woman, but had no clue how to get her back. “I'm sorry.”

No, that sounded like an apology for what he said, but he’d meant it.

“I'm sorry your father was a jerk. I’m sorry he died. But I can’t loan you money I don’t think you can repay. If Dartmoor’s in as serious trouble as you say it is, no matter how much money you make as acting CEO, you won’t be making it for long.”

She gave a low laugh. “Real-life business lesson number one – never make a deal without doing your due diligence. When I took the job, I agreed to greatly reduced compensation from Dartmoor as a signal to our employees that I was serious about straightening out our financial problems. Then I learned how bad they were. My salary doesn’t even pay the rent. What I told you this afternoon is true. Mother and I are living on the principal of my trust fund.”

He resisted the need to touch her hand. “I wish I knew a way…”

A tiny spark lit in her eyes. “There is a way.” She reached down for her purse.

“No, Madi. There isn’t. But I am sorry.”

He was definitely a sorry person tonight. But what else could he say?

She carefully set her napkin on the table and started to stand.

“In that case, maybe I should go.”

He reached out and took her wrist. “Don't leave.”

For one moment her face softened before it hardened again and she glared at his hand.

“Let me walk you to your car,” he said.

Slowly she nodded and he let go.

He kept one eye on her while he signed for dinner. Twice she made a move as if to walk away, but both times their eyes met and she stayed. At least some of the old magic still worked.

He escorted her out of the dining room, ignoring the stares of people who remembered, or had heard, about their past together.

When they stepped out into the foggy night, he didn’t ask where she was parked, but took the path that ran along the water. Again she moved to pull away, but when he took hold of the sleeve of her jacket, she fell into step with him.

Out of habit he led her to the empty slip he’d held onto in case someday he could bear to sail the Bay again. He stopped and rested his elbows on the weathered wooden gate, one foot raised to the bottom rail. Beside him, Madison stared over at the next dock, at her family’s old slip and the yacht that her Grandfather Moore had had built fifty years ago and named after her mother. The “Dana Marie” was now the “Blue Sky”.

The mist had curled the hair around Madison’s face. Her eyes were wide and wistful, like a poor kid peering into a toy-store window at Christmas. Not because she wanted the yacht back. She’d always been more interested in sunbathing on the deck than sailing. No, she had to want her old life back.

Something sharp wrapped itself around his heart, but he willed it away.

He hadn't taken that life away from her. Her father had.

Jake hadn’t taken anything away from her. She was the one who’d walked out on him, hurt him, humiliated him…

She must have felt him watching her, because she turned to look at him. But the wistful, wanting expression on her face didn’t go away. Instead it grew darker, hotter.

A foghorn sounded. Somewhere a buoy bell clanged on the waves. A car drove by, leaving a trail of loud music in its wake.

“What happened, Madi?”

The question seemed to surprise her as much as it surprised him. She didn’t answer, but stared past him toward the water.

“What happened to us?” he asked again.

“I couldn’t be your trophy wife.”

What the hell did that mean?

He kept his tone calm. “That's a pretty dated term. Aren't trophy wives young second wives for old guys?”

“Not necessarily. A lot of people would say, have said, our mothers were trophy wives, even though they were first wives and our fathers were only a few years older than they were.”

He didn’t try to deny it.

“Your father used his family’s wealth to win the model of the year as his wife,” she went on. “My father won Dartmoor by marrying my mother. I’m not sure which one was the trophy there, but you get the idea.”

The bitterness in her voice stunned him, but he knew her better than to comment on it.

“Even if that kind of marriage was good enough for our mothers, it would never have been enough for me, Jake. I wanted to do more with my life than have babies, hand them over to a nanny, and wait for you to come home at the end of the day.”

He swallowed the sucker punch she didn’t realize she’d so expertly delivered. He couldn’t count how many times he’d day-dreamed about exactly that.

“We could have worked it out.”

“I tried to talk with you about it. The only conversation we had about it ended with you forbidding…” She paused to underscore the word. “Forbidding me to get my MBA.”

He remembered that argument. He’d been so angry and hurt to learn that Madison didn’t wanted their marriage, their family, to be the center of her life that he hadn't known what else to say. He’d ended up silencing her outrage with a soul-searing kiss. They hadn’t come up for air until the next morning.

“Your father agreed with me.”

She winced.

“And you didn't bring it up again.” His tone was harsher, colder than he intended.

“The wedding was a run-away train. I didn’t know how to slow it down so we could talk. Our mothers had every minute scheduled for weeks. You and I were almost never alone together, and when we were we always ended up in bed. I didn’t want to fight with you in bed. I kept trying to find another chance to talk to you, to work it out, but that chance never came.”

Anger tightened his voice. “So you decided the best solution was to call your father from the limo on the way to the church and tell him the wedding was off.”

“That's not what happened.”

Madison took a deep, shuddering breath.

He was waiting for her to say more. The harsh parking lot lights transformed his handsome face into a demon’s mask of pale skin and dark shadows.

“I called my father to tell him we were caught in traffic and would be a few minutes late.”

Still no reaction from him, as if he didn’t care about what had happened. Maybe, after all this time, it no longer mattered to him. But it mattered to her. She needed to tell him for her own sake, if nothing else.

“When my father answered, I heard you in the background talking to someone. Your cousin Mark, probably. You were bragging to him that I was the ultimate trophy wife. I–I couldn’t go through with the wedding after that. I refused to stop being who I was, to give up my dreams to be your trophy wife, no matter how much I loved you.”

His face remained frozen.

“I didn't think of you as a trophy wife.”

“I heard you, Jake.”

“You didn’t hear the whole conversation.”

He put his hands on her shoulders, but she shook herself free, wishing there was some way to stop time right there.

For three years she’d told herself, if only in her weakest moments, that maybe she’d been wrong, maybe there’d been some other explanation for what Jake said. How could she live with the guilt if she had been wrong? And if she hadn't, how could she live without that one tiny hope? That was why she’d never had this conversation with him. Not that he’d ever given her the chance before.

She held her breath, dreading the inevitable pain, no matter which way he answered.

He gave her a grim smile. “Mark and I were joking with each other about our ‘trophy wives’. He was married to a hot young starlet at the time, remember?”

“You sounded plenty serious when you said it.”

He didn’t say anything right away, but jammed his hands in his pocket and turned half away from her. The hesitation, the way he couldn’t meet her eyes told her it would be worse than she’d feared. Whatever he said next would be a lie.

“I was serious. I didn’t want him to think I really felt that way about you. I told him you were the ultimate trophy wife because you were so smart as well as beautiful.”

She closed her eyes against the hurt that seemed to cut her open from neck to belly.

“Don’t lie to me, Jake. Not about this.”

She had to stop to breathe. She slowly counted to ten, waiting for him to say something.

He stood silent, the demon’s mask back in place.

So she turned and walked away.

A gust of wind stirred the fog. Jake saw Madison shiver and automatically took the two steps to catch up with her to put his arm around her shoulder. She froze for a moment, but let him walk beside her as she crossed the parking lot to her car.

When they reach the bright-red Ferrari she shook herself free and pulled the key from her purse without the usual female rummaging around. She unlocked the door and threw her over-sized purse across to the passenger seat before she straightened and faced him.

“Good-bye, Jake. Thank you for dinner.”

He couldn’t find words. She climbed into the car and he swung the door shut, then watched while she started the engine and drove off.

He still hadn’t moved when she pulled out of the parking lot and into the busy late-night traffic on Marina Boulevard.

Why hadn’t he told her the truth about what he’d said to Mark?

He sighed and headed for his car.

Because he refused to open old wounds, refused to be that guy again. The guy who’d loved Madison so completely she’d almost destroyed him.

A trophy wife! He shook his head and got into his car.

Sure, he hadn’t wanted her to get her MBA. He knew how much time and energy business school took. He’d wanted, needed, her at his side instead while he took over more and more of the day-to-day leadership at Carlyle & Sons to conceal his father’s deepening depression.

He’d had to keep his business problems secret from Madison back then, for fear she’d let something slip to her jerk of a father, who would gleefully spread the news in the business community. But Jake had planned to explain the situation on their honeymoon.

The honeymoon that never happened.

As he turned his car onto Marina Boulevard, the cell he’d left in its hands-free station buzzed. He flicked it on, not caring who was calling. Even a telemarketer would be better company than a mind full of memories and regrets.

“Ah, hello, Mother,” he said.

As soon as rush hour was over the next day Madison drove the Ferrari out to the newest Dartmoor store in Antioch. She needed the driving time to think about some changes in her plan, and fewer people would recognize her at this store than at those closer in, so she’d have a chance to pretend to be a shopper for a while.

Her first impression when she stepped into the store was sameness. Not sameness with the older Dartmoor stores, which varied in layout according to the age of the buildings, but sameness with every other store built the same decade in every other mall she’d ever been in. This was their most profitable store, but it lacked the distinctively Dartmoor flavor that would make shoppers look for their ads or lead them to their website.

She didn’t dare take photos, but she could make a few quick sketches of the possibilities taking shape in her mind when she got back to the car.

She started circling the first floor to get a customer’s-eye view, but she couldn’t see the merchandise first of all, the way a shopper would. She saw people. A seasoned professional behind the cosmetics counter giving advice to her college-age coworker. The woman ending her shift in handbags to be home to meet her kindergartner's school bus. The older woman in candy who’d worked for years at the flagship store before she moved out here to be near her grandkids. And, when she recognized Madison and called upstairs, the manager who’d built her career working for Dartmoor.

The manager greeted Madison with a smile, panic in her eyes, and an outstretched hand.

“What a pleasant surprise. We’re honored to have you here, Ms. Ellsworth.”

The words twisted in Madison’s heart. How much was honor that came from wealth and name alone worth? Especially when the next time Madison saw the woman it would most likely be to tell her this store, like all the others, was closing.

Madison forced the thought from her mind, afraid the other woman would see it on her face, and let the manager woman give her an official, and useless, tour of the store.

Madison nodded and smiled, and silently ground her teeth, until she could make the excuse of needing to get back to the office and escape.

Once in her car, she didn't even stop to do the sketches before she drove away.

Why bother? Without Jake’s help, Dartmoor was doomed. If only she’d paid more attention to what was going on these last few years. Her grandfather had left her ten percent of the company, but made her father trustee until she was twenty-two. Since her father had stopped speaking to her after she’d left Jake at the altar, to insist on voting her shares once she technically could would have been more of an emotional minefield than she’d been willing to risk.

She’d been sure that once she had her MBA, her father would do more than let her vote her own shares – he’d train her to take over Dartmoor someday.

She blinked away tears. That would never happen now. His death had robbed her of the future she’d wanted and left her nothing but anger with him over the past.

As traffic slowed to cross the bridge, a dark new suspicion appeared to rearrange that past to form a picture she’d never considered before.

Maybe the money he’d wasted on her wedding wasn’t the real reason her father had shut her out of his life. If she’d been on speaking terms with him and asked too many questions about Dartmoor, she might have discovered the truth about the new CFO he’d hired. In fact, if she hadn’t been such a coward and had insisted on voting her shares, she might have been able to stop this whole disaster before it started.

She pulled off the freeway, wound through the traffic to the garage under the apartment building, and pushed in the code. The metal doors ground open.

She’d pay for her cowardice now by having to tell her mother they had only one choice left – close down the business their family had owned for over a hundred and fifty years.

Madison parked the car and rested her forehead on the steering wheel. The garage door ground shut behind her like a prison gate. What she needed was a miracle.

Chapter Three

Madison worked to conceal her nervousness, and her grief, as the salesman inspected her beloved Ferrari in the mildly noxious air of the “previously owned” imported car lot.

Two days after her dinner with Jake, she’d accepted that she was out of other options. At least for now.

Once the salesman had checked under the hood and gone over the pristine red paint job, he slid into the driver’s seat and turned the key. The engine roared to life, then purred contentedly, forcing Madison to step away from smell of the exhaust. He pushed in the clutch and ran the shifter through the gears before he left it in neutral, climbed out and stood a moment watching the fine gray smoke that came out its tailpipe. Then he walked back around and reached inside to turn off the key, which he handed to her with a little shake of his head.

She could see the little “no” sign in his right eye and “sale” in his left, like an old cartoon.

“It's in great shape for a vintage car.” He ran a beefy hand through his hair. “Wish I could take it off your hands, but who knows how long it would sit on the lot before someone showed up who could afford to buy it. I can’t tie up that kind of money in slow-moving inventory.”

“What if I offered five percent above the usual commission?”

The man leaned back against the fender of the dark-blue Bentley parked next to her car and stared at his shoes, obviously doing a few quick calculations in his head.

“Nope. I could take it on consignment for you.”

“I'm afraid that won’t work.”

Madison needed the money now. Her trust fund was running low. An infusion of cash from selling the Ferrari, as much as it would break her heart, would stretch her inheritance out a few months longer. Maybe long enough for her to find new financing for Dartmoor.

“Can you refer me to other imported car dealers in the area who might be interested in buying it?”

The man shook his head. “Don’t think there’s anyone who can do more than I can, but I’ll email you a list.” He took her business card. “I'm sorry. It’s a great little vehicle.”

She nodded, climbed into the car, and backed carefully out of the lot while her mind sorted through what few options she had left. She quickly discarded the idea of putting the car up for sale on the internet. She’d never get the kind of money it was really worth.

She refused to admit to a flicker of relief that she could keep the car she loved after all.

Jake stretched, then linked his fingers behind his head. Across the conference table his personal assistant typed data into a spreadsheet, her shiny black hair bouncing slightly as she nodded over the numbers.

For maybe the hundredth time in the two years she’d worked for him, he wondered why he liked Astrid so much, enjoyed her company so much, found her attractive and yet felt zero, less than zero, sexual attraction for her.

And she’d made it clear she had the same reaction to him.

The exact opposite of Madison. Even after all that had happened, he could barely think of her without wanting her. A reaction that had only gotten worse in the two days since their dinner at the Yacht Club. She was like a drug – one he needed to resist or risk ending up like his father.

His cell buzzed. “Number unknown.” He had nothing to do while Astrid ran the data, so he took the call.

Five minutes later he clicked the phone off and stared out window, absently drumming his fingers on the table.

“What?” Astrid looked up with a frown of annoyance.

“Nothing.”

“If it was nothing, you wouldn’t make that irritating noise so I’d need to ask about it."

He quieted his fingers. This wasn't something he could discuss with Astrid, but she was right. He needed to talk about it with someone. If only his father…

But relationships hadn’t been his father’s strong point, either.

He stood to pace across the room and stare at the portraits of his father and grandfather that hung on the wall by the door. But he wasn't seeing them. He was seeing Madison’s face the day he handed her the keys to the Ferrari. The tears in her eyes hadn’t been because of the car itself – it wasn’t until later that she’d come to love it so much – but because he’d known her well enough to buy her exactly what she’d wanted most. Because he’d loved her that much.

Now she was trying to sell the car. The salesman who called hadn’t realized it was the same car Jake had bought from his company four years ago, but had thought Jake might be interested in a matched set of the rare vintage cars for himself and his “wife.” A distress sale, the man said, so Jake would get a good deal on it.

Which didn’t resolve the question of whether Madison was selling the Ferrari to break the last tie between them, or was in more dire financial straits than he’d imagined.

He waited until he and Astrid had the numbers crunched, then picked up his phone, fingers shaking like an addict as he punched in Madison’s cell number.

She hadn’t changed it. The sound of her voice, the stress he heard in her “Hello,” left him momentarily speechless.

He swallowed. “Hey.”

“Who is this?”

“Me. Jake.”

She drew in a sharp breath. “What do you want?”

He almost said, “A second chance.” At what he wasn't sure.

“I was a jerk,” was safer.

“There’s a news bulletin.”

He ignored the prick of irritation. “I shouldn’t have said I’d look at your plan and then brush you off. I’d like to make it up to you.”

He wasn’t sure what response he’d expected, but not the hollow sound in her voice.

“What do you have in mind?”

Nothing, right at the moment.

“Can you come by the office this afternoon? I'll go over your plan and see if there’s some way I can arrange a small bridge loan for you.”

“Really?"

“I owe you.’

“All on the up and up?”

He probably deserved that, but it still rankled.

“I said I owe you.”

“Would three o’clock work?”

Once they’d set a time he cleared his calendar and did two or three hours of work in a little over an hour.

Which left him no time to wonder why he would even consider lending money to a failing business in an industry he knew nothing about.

Madison had dreaded a repeat of the walk down the corridor to Jake’s office, but when she found him waiting for her by the elevators it only fed her suspicions about what new game he might be playing.

He made pleasant small-talk as they went through to his office, where he sat her at the large conference table and waited with a politely expectant smile, as if she were a total stranger.

He didn't seem to notice the way her hands shook as she opened the leather briefcase and took out her tablet computer. He listened to the presentation she’d so carefully prepared, then he shuffled through the printouts she’d brought to back up her cost estimates and income projections. She fought the urge to squirm while Jake read Dartmoor’s latest audit.

That was the most recent financial data she’d been able to get without telling anyone at Dartmoor about her appointment with Jake. She still didn’t want to build anyone's hopes up. Of course, things would be much worse now the ex-CFO had cashed in her golden parachute, but the auditor’s report was bad enough.

After what felt like a very long time, Jake lifted his head and gave her a look she couldn’t quite decipher.

“Your father really messed up, didn’t he?”

She bridled, surprised at the impulse to defend the man who was responsible for this whole nasty situation.

“He didn’t exercise proper oversight, no.”

“Why’d he hire such an incompetent CFO in the first place?”

“She was supposedly brilliant at another chain.”

Jake opened a file with the woman’s beautiful, cold face. Madison turned her head away.

“It's a long step from financial analyst to CFO, but I’d guess her business skills weren’t the real reason your father hired her.”

“Let’s refocus on my plan, shall we?”

“How successful your plan will be depends on what kind of resources Dartmoor has to carry it out.”

She wondered what was going on behind the polite mask he’d worn ever since he greeted her, but the face she’d once been able to read like a book was closed to her.

“That’s why I included the audit. It’s out of date, but the numbers can give you a rough idea of our current financial situation.”

“‘Rough’ describes your situation pretty well.”

She swallowed a sharp retort. She’d expected him to be a little gentler in his comments. He’d called the meeting, after all. It was as if just being near her irritated him, the same way being near him made her nerves dance along the jagged edge between grief, anger, and desire.

He set the papers aside. “Remind me of how much money you want, exactly.”

She took the tablet and shuffled through her slideshow to the screen with the final figures, then gave it back to him.

“With that I could do the most important updates at one of our stores. Once it’s clear the updates can make it profitable again, we can obtain more financing from our usual sources to roll them out in our other locations.”

“Your mother must have other assets she can sell to raise the capital you need.”

Here it came. Madison squared her shoulders and shifted back in her chair.

“My father dug himself in deeper than you think. He’d been quietly selling mother’s other assets over the last few years to balance the books at Dartmoor. Shortly before he died, he even sold the condo here in town and moved in with his mistress-slash-CFO.”

Jake swore, quietly but colorfully. She didn’t blame him.

“Your mother had no clue?”

“Mother left my dad right after…when he stopped speaking to me. She didn’t have any say in what he did as long as she stayed married to him, in any case. Grandfather Moore left everything in a trust, with my father as trustee.”

“Which would explain why your mother didn’t divorce him.”

“That, and the fact that she never stopped loving him.”

Jake swore again. He knew enough about unhappy marriages from his own parents’ to understand why Madison’s eyes clouded over with a lifetime of little sorrows.

He scrolled through the presentation and pretended to go over the numbers again while he wondered what he’d gotten himself into and how to get himself out of it. In his eagerness to solve Madison’s problem for her, he’d made two major miscalculations.

The first was that Dartmoor’s financial situation was much worse than he’d expected. He saw no way to justify a direct loan for Dartmoor to the Board at Carlyle’s. He’d be as bad as her father if he based it on nothing more than his feelings for Madison, whatever those feelings were. And he didn’t have enough liquidity to raise the cash from his other holdings for a personal loan. He hated it that he couldn’t help her.

His other big mistake was underestimating how strong his feelings for Madison still were. Their dinner together had been about closure, moving on with his life. He’d quickly learned what a stupid illusion that had been. He doubted now there was any way in the world to get this woman out of his system.

Even now his body hummed with wanting her, despite the opposite-of-sexy conversation, but the last hour had reminded him of all there was to how he felt about her besides sex. The delicate scent of her perfume calmed him at the same time it aroused him. He wished he was able to drink in the sound of her voice so he could hear it when she wasn’t there. Her every move, the shape of her hands, her rare smiles intoxicated him.

Not to mention the psychic slap to the head he’d gotten once he realized how clever her plans for Dartmoor really were. She was damned good at what she did.

Absently he flipped through the screenshots. A stray fact he’d missed caught his eye.

“Why does my mother own ten percent of Dartmoor?”

Madison gave a rueful laugh. “My father talked your father into buying it while you and I were engaged. At one point my dad owned a small share in Carlyle & Sons, too. I guess your dad held on after we didn’t…” She gestured vaguely with her ringless left hand.

Something clicked in Jake’s brain. Madison’s mother owned sixty percent of the company. Madison held another ten percent, as did his mother and two other shareholders.

The pieces fell into place – how he’d be able to help Madison. How he’d be able to have her back in his bed, in his life, which, he saw with stunning clarity, had been his goal all along.

How he’d be able to do it all, have it all, without letting her know how much her desertion had hurt him, or how badly she could hurt him again.

It was a gamble, a big one, but one he was willing to take.

“I'm sorry,” he said, “but there isn’t enough here to justify a loan from Carlyle’s.”

Instead of slumping back in defeat as he’d expected, she sat straighter and leaned toward him. “If you can loan me half the amount, I might be able to raise the rest from friends.”

“No.”

“A personal loan?”

He shook his head. “Not possible.”

A momentary wave of grief crossed her face, but she quickly hid it. Methodically she closed her tablet and gathered her papers, then put them neatly into her briefcase. She looked at him one last time, as if to gauge whether to say more, but he kept his feelings carefully masked. She pushed her chair away from the table.

Timing, keeping her slightly off-balance, was vital. She was half out of the chair when he allowed his voice to soften and said, “Madi.”

Madison sat down and lifted her chin. She didn’t trust the expression on Jake’s face.

“There might be a way.”

Now she really didn’t trust his expression. “How?”

“What if I bought two-thirds of your mother’s shares in Dartmoor?”

He cited a number that made her tense her jaw to stop it from dropping open.

“That should give you the capital to update two or three of the stores,” he added.

“I thought you couldn’t come up with that kind of money.”

“Not as a loan. But as an investment it would be worth borrowing against some of my other holdings.”

“But what if you lost it all!”

He looked as surprised as she was at her reaction, then gave her a slow grin.

“I'd still be, as you put it before, ‘filthy rich’.”

She cringed at the reminder while her pulse raced. There might be a way to save Dartmoor after all!

But the expression on Jake’s face still worried her. She ran through the numbers in her head and found the trap.

“Two-thirds of Mother’s share is forty percent of Dartmoor. With your mother’s share, you’d own fifty percent.”

He chuckled. “That gives me a lot more control over what my mother does than I’m likely to have. Besides, you, your mother, and the other current shareholders will have fifty percent, too.”

“Which might lead to a deadlocked board.”

He leaned closer and put his hand over hers. She resisted the urge to pull away, but his touch sent a shockwave of need through her system that played havoc with her concentration.

“Let’s not assume the worse. We can always put something into the legal papers that would allow you to buy part of my share if the Board should ever be deadlocked.”

More was going on behind those bright-blue eyes. She was sure of it. If she could just think more clearly. She wiggled her hand slightly to free it from the mesmerizing effect of his touch. Slowly her head cleared enough to see the flaw in his plan, draining the glow from the possibilities in front of her.

“If we reinvest all the money you give us into Dartmoor, what will Mother live on?”

He released her hand and made a sweeping gesture. “You could invest some of it elsewhere to provide her with a decent income. But that probably wouldn’t leave enough to make the difference in Dartmoor’s bottom line. You need to attract outside financing.”

Dark suspicions swarmed into her mind. She could hear her grandfather say, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”

“Ah, so there’s a catch. What more do you want from us, besides the shares? You wouldn't do this simply to make up for dinner the other night. Or out of friendship.”

“The ‘catch,’ as you put it, is that I want you to marry me.”

“What? Are you crazy?”

He reacted more quickly than she did. The bland mask lifted for only a moment to reveal the flash of anger and hurt in his eyes before it fell back into place.

“That’s not how you reacted the last time I asked you to marry me. If I remember, you were very pleased. You even cried. It was quite touching, actually. Fooled me completely.”

Her head already in a spin, she grasped the arms of her chair to help anchor herself in some sort of reality.

“Fooled you?”

“I thought you loved me.”

Her heart twisted. She closed her eyes against the bitterness of his words.

“I d–d-did love you.”

He brushed the confession away. “And how long did that last?”

Hurt almost beyond bearing, she hid the wound behind the anger that was her only protection against this man.

“Until you tried to take over my life. Choosing between my dream of running Dartmoor someday and being your trophy wife wasn’t much of a choice. Certainly not one a man would force on a woman he loved.”

If some weak part of her hoped he’d respond to her charge as she responded to his, she was doomed to disappointment.

“We've had this conversation,” he said instead. “You misinterpreted a chance remark and used that as an excuse to walk out on me.”

Anger roared in her ears. She struggled to calm the pounding in her heart and the churning in her stomach.

“So that’s what your little joke was all about. Well, you've had your laugh. Can we let it go now?”

She half-stood again, but he stopped her.

“Joke?”

She didn’t sit down again this time. She wasn’t staying.

“About us getting married.”

“It wasn’t a joke."

She still didn’t sit. She fell into the chair, legs too wobbly to hold her. Was this a dream? A nightmare?

“Why?” she asked in a raw voice.

He leaned toward her again. This time she had no urge to pull away, the sexual tug of his nearness no longer a threat. Or was it?

“I like you, you like me. We used to be friends. And we were great together in bed. Why not get married? You’re CEO of Dartmoor, so no one can accuse you of being a trophy wife.”

“I don’t see why this would be a better deal for you than simply buying Mother’s shares.”

He gave her the wicked grin she knew so well. “Did you hear the part about great sex?”

Her emotions did a U-turn so fast she felt dizzy. She pushed herself to her feet, hoping her quivering knees would hold her.

“I’m not for sale, Jake.” She headed for the door.

“Whoa!”

She kept walking.

“Not what I meant at all. It’s the whole package, Madi.”

The nickname was what made her stop. Made her hope.

“Friends, good sex, and I can help your mother out without having to explain it to anyone as a business decision.”

And maybe you could learn to love me again. Not a good way to think right now. She needed to focus on the facts here, not go chasing rainbows.

But Jake had the facts on his side, too. Once her inheritance ran out, she and her mother would be homeless, unless Madison left Dartmoor and took a job somewhere else. Even then, it would take her a few years to earn enough to support the kind of life her mother had always led.

And they’d have to close Dartmoor. After putting up with a philandering husband her whole marriage to keep the family business alive, her mother would lose everything.

And all the employees who’d made Dartmoor what it was would lose their jobs. Her grandfather’s voice again, reminding her this was about more families than hers.

All she had to do to prevent everyone from being hurt was marry the man she loved. Except, if she did that, she’d have to put her heart on the line, risk the pain of a loveless marriage her mother had lived with for years.

Madison wasn’t sure she could do it. She wasn’t sure she had any other choice.

She turned to face Jake. His careful mask told her nothing, but his blue eyes pierced through the center of hers, into her heart.

She held her head high as she walked back to the chair and sat down. “Give me the details of what would go into the pre-nup.”

An emotion she couldn’t name flickered across his face and disappeared.

“The usual. What’s mine stays mine and what’s yours stays yours. A clause about spousal support in case of divorce.”

She clenched her jaw against a stab of pain, if not surprise, at his lack of faith in her business savvy.

“I won’t need spousal support. Not after Dartmoor starts turning a profit again.”

“What if I’m the one who needs it?”

The grin he gave her felt like sunshine after months of San Francisco fog. Her heart opened to the light like a flower.

This was not only the man she loved, he was also a man she could trust. He was nothing like her father. Even if she had no other choice, marrying Jake felt right.

As if he felt the shift in the air between them, he took her hand in his. The warmth of his touch burned from her skin down to parts of her she’d half-forgotten existed.

“Just to make it official,” he said, “will you marry me?”

She blinked hard to stop the unexpected threat of tears – half joy, half fear. He must never know how much she still loved him.

“Just to make it official, Yes.”

The simmering sexual tension between him and Madison built while they sketched out a pre-nup and the contract for Jake’s purchase of her mother’s shares. By the time all the basics were set and he’d emailed them to his attorney, his body ached with wanting Madison.

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