Cursed by Love
Authors: Jacie Floyd
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Romance, #Contemporary, #Romantic Comedy, #Romantic Suspense, #Mystery & Suspense, #Suspense
Table of Contents
For Sarah and Evan. I
gave you life.
You gave me purpose,
and love, and endless joy.
That seems like a fair
exchange.
Molly Webber dodged through the
backstage chaos of the popular antiques appraisal show,
Your Grandma’s Attic
.
With her attention darting from one fascinating mound of stuff to another, she
pulled up just short of following Ernie, her speedy studio guide, under a
towering suspension ladder.
Not
that she
truly
believed walking under a ladder caused bad luck. But was
it only coincidence that Ernie plowed into a senior citizen carrying a box of
doorknockers? She thought not.
Apologizing
profusely, Molly helped Ernie get the old man back on his feet. After returning
his treasures to their carton, they hurried on through the maze of lights,
cameras, props and cables.
“Wait
here.” Ernie indicated a small, nondescript room that reeked of stale coffee.
The temporary holding area contained a couple of vending machines, a lumpy
couch, and a folding table with two chairs. A lone male occupied one of them.
“How long?” Eager to get to the
on-camera appraisal of her palm-sized pink carving, Molly almost bounced her
way into the room.
“Maybe
an hour.” Ernie tossed the information over his shoulder, hotfooting his way
back to the studio.
“Okay,
then.” After waiting in line for three hours to meet an appraiser, what was
another sixty minutes?
Idly, she took stock of the room’s other
inhabitant—a preppy type in a crisp button-down shirt and sharply creased
khakis. Too carefully pressed and repressed for her taste, but wait. Her gaze
caught on a pair of red Goofy socks peeking out between pant cuffs and loafers.
Quirky.
Cute... Interesting.
He
held a sleek phone in the palm of one hand, scrolling the screen with the
repeated flick of his index finger. The kind of pretentious phone Batman would
use for redirecting missiles away from Gotham City or intercepting messages
from his rogues’ gallery of enemies. The kind that made people way too
dependent on technology and not nearly dependent enough on their brains,
memory, and logic.
Setting
the magical phone aside, he opened a wafer-thin laptop. His fingers flashed
across the keyboard with deft strokes and an economy of motion as he peered
into the screen intently.
He
didn’t so much as glance Molly’s way when she dropped into a chair. Clearing
her throat, she waited for him to acknowledge her. No response, unless taking a
sip of bottled water counted as one.
With
his attention obviously focused elsewhere, she studied him further.
His
body was as slender and taut as a steel blade. Agile, but toned. No spare
flesh, just lots of compacted male strength. She would describe him as lithe,
if lithe described someone so masculine. Yes, lithe fit him. With the whipcord
intensity of a swimmer or a runner rather than the over-inflated look-at-me
bulging muscles of a football player or bodybuilder. Strong, but supple.
The
strong silent type.
Which
left her with no one to talk to. She sighed, wishing her mom had accompanied
her the way they’d planned. Fascinating though the day had been, sharing it
with someone would’ve really rocked.
So far, Molly had been poked with a
weathervane, attacked by unruly bagpipes, and jabbed with a revolutionary war
sword before taking her place in the Asian antiquities queue. Still, she’d much
rather participate in the mayhem of the crowded auditorium than in this dull
space with an oblivious techie.
Intending
to retrieve the self-help manual she’d been reading, she began groping through
the apple-appliquéd canvas tote a former student had given her. Her “When You
Wish Upon a Star” ringtone interrupted the search, so she switched to groping
for her very basic, ancient cell phone. Before she located it, the guy moved
his way-smarter phone from the table to his ear.
Hmmm,
she mused, as she located her book. They shared the same Disney tune for their
cell phone rings? What kind of sign was that? Not that she was looking for a
sign from the universe. But still…
Now
that he no longer had his head bowed over his laptop, Molly took stock of his
looks. His better-than average looks. Gorgeous looks, in fact. If one liked
that sort of boyishly attractive, intelligent type.
Strong
jaw with a hint of five-o’clock shadow. Brown eyes that looked intelligent and
guarded at first, then took her breath away as they flashed briefly with
something dark and complex. He blinked and the peek into his inner depths
disappeared, leaving Molly to wonder if she’d imagined the emotion.
She
fanned her hand in front of her face to cool the first heated licks of
interest.
If
his voice lived up to the rest of him, she might be willing to forget she’d
sworn off men for good.
Her
breath hitched in anticipation and her palms perspired as she waited for him to
speak. His lips parted on the simple word “hello,” and her heart pounded.
Aaahhh
, yes!
Tantalizingly deep. The kind of seductive voice capable of
turning her into a puddle of desire if whispered across her pillow in the dark
of night. “Molly,” he’d say with his breath tickling that
squirmingly
sensitive spot beneath her ear—
“No!”
He shouted the word into the phone, almost giving her whiplash as he jerked her
from fantasyland back to cold, hard reality. “Did you hear? I said
no!
”
Molly
leaned back in her chair and grimaced.
She
heard him all right. Everyone
in the Convention Center auditorium probably heard him, too.
“Stay
where you are, don’t touch the Quigley project, and don’t let Chloe near the
computer again until I get home.” He barked out the commands in a tone more
suitable to a drill sergeant or prison guard than a friend, or employer. Or
spouse. Or father. “Yes! All right, I’ll stop at the store on my way home!”
Without
another word, he thumbed off the connection and glanced up, catching Molly’s
look of disapproval. His eyes met hers for the first time. She pulled back
further, shocked by a starkly incongruous tug of attraction.
Of
desire?
But,
no. She wasn’t gullible enough to overlook obnoxious behavior just because a
guy had a handsome face and intriguing expression. She wasn’t that shallow. But
she couldn’t explain the zippy feeling tickling her in secret little places.
Her nipples puckered, and her pulse raced.
His
lips twitched in a small frown. “Sorry about that.”
Instinctively
she crossed her arms over her chest and clamped her thighs together. “Sorry
about ...?”
“That
call.” Phone Bully gestured to his phone. “For disturbing you.”
Right,
the yelling. She cleared her throat. Of course, the phone call. They didn’t
have a secret ESP link that put them on the same intimate wavelength. He hadn’t
felt the same confusing, physical reaction to her she’d had for him.
Except
for that special...
connection
, he was clearly not her type. She
shrugged away her awareness of him along with her disappointment. She wasn’t
into S
or
M, and her self-image bristled at the idea of sitting still
for verbal abuse.
“No
problem.” Not for her anyway. Too bad for the unfortunate caller he’d berated.
Perfectly
gorgeous he might be, but so far, he’d exhibited the manners of a troglodyte.
She could think of no excuse for a reasonable human being to use that tone
anywhere outside of military boot camp.
She
sniffed and opened her book. Choosing to ignore him, she flipped through
Ten
Ways to Save a Marriage
even though she could feel his gaze examining her.
Sure,
now
Phone Bully was interested. Now that the dark underbelly of his true
nature had been exposed.
Did she know how to attract ‘
em
,
or what?
Molly
gave herself a mental slap and returned to her project. She needed to read this
book to help her parents, even though the subject held no practical application
for her life.
She
hoped ways number seven through ten would provide useful advice on salvaging
her parents’ strained-past-the-breaking-point thirty-two-year marriage. Numbers
one through six had sucked.
Some
of the suggestions involved activities intimate enough to make a daughter blush
when picturing her parents as the participants, but these were desperate times.
She’d do whatever she had to do to get her mother and father back together
again.
Happily
for her, way number seven looked promising.
List
ten qualities you and your partner found attractive about one another when you first
met. Compare your lists and reminisce about the head-over-heels days of your
courtship.
Hmm. That might work. If she could talk her mom and dad into—
“Gabe
Shaw?” a stout woman wearing horn-rimmed glasses barked as she stepped into the
room. Pulling a pencil out of her curly mass of hair, she scribbled something
on the clipboard lodged in the crook of her arm.
“Here.”
The Phone Bully closed his laptop and stood.
She
glanced Molly’s way. “Molly Webber?”
“Right.”
Tucking her book into her bag, Molly got to her feet as well.
“I’m
Janice Scott, your director.” She shook hands before passing each of them a
contract. “We’re all set up for you. Here are the usual disclaimers about the
lack of payment for your appearance, the appraisals aren’t guarantees, and you
won’t sue us if it turns out we were wrong about the value. Read ‘
em
, and sign ‘
em
. If you don’t
agree with the terms, no hard feelings, but adios.”
As
instructed, Molly and Gabe read ‘
em
and signed ‘
em
. Janice pointed them toward a mirror in the corner.
“Check yourselves out. Make any adjustments you want. We like our guests to
look natural, but that doesn’t mean you need to go on camera with spinach
between your teeth.”
Molly
tucked her chin-length hair behind her ears, bared her teeth for a spinach check,
and then dabbed on peach lip gloss.
Gabe
stood behind her, enveloping her in his heat, towering more than half a foot
above her five-feet-five-inches. He flicked a casual look at his image and
swiped his fingers through his sandy hair, stopping for a quick look at his
Eeyore
watch.
First,
the socks. Now, the watch. And the fairytale cell ring. It took a lot of
self-confidence for a man to carry off that much whimsy. Neat and tidy with a
dash of eccentricity. Maybe he was batting for the other side. She wasn’t
picking up a gay vibe, but her
gaydar
might have
evaporated with her luck.
Molly
ducked her head and smoothed the wrinkles from her colorful pleated skirt. “How
do I look?”
Janice
gave her and Gabe cursory glances. “Fabulous. The camera will love you two.
Ready?”
“How
long will this take?” He rubbed his palms together in anticipation, or
possibly, impatience. At least, his speaking voice differed from his phone
bellow. Molly slid him a look from the corner of her eye. He appeared as eager
to get the show on the road as she did.
“Follow
me. The taping usually takes about ten minutes.” Janice led them back through
the studio, avoiding a woman pushing a baby buggy stuffed with teddy bears.
“Your appraiser will ask a few questions, then give you some historical
background on your jade and its approximate value.”
Gabe
surprised Molly by taking her elbow to maneuver her around a suit of armor in a
wheelbarrow. His hand felt strong and capable. She almost wished he’d keep it
there. He acknowledged her small smile of thanks with a nod.
“Forget about
the camera, if you can, but when the appraiser talks, look interested.” Janice
sidestepped a lanky teenager toting a brassbound trunk. “When the estimated
value of your article is revealed, show some animation, surprise or
disappointment, whatever’s appropriate.” She stopped in front of a backdrop
with the show’s logo. “Which one of you will be talking about the jade?”
“I
will.” Molly and Gabe spoke in unison, then stared at one another.
Janice
consulted her clipboard. “Oh, I see. There are two separate pieces. But you’re
going to appear in the same segment.”
“Is that good
or bad?” Gabe asked.
“We’ll soon
find out.” She motioned them into chairs behind a table where Molly’s pink
carving sat beside another one.
The two pieces
were similar in size and style, but dissimilar in shape and color. Molly’s
imagination often gave her observations a fanciful twist, but just now, the
pieces seemed to take on a glow of their own, as if they were lit from inside.
She spotted appraiser
James
Lindermann
threading his way across the room
toward them. Wearing a gray pinstriped suit and red bowtie, the
height-challenged dandy was the Asian antiquities expert she’d spoken with
earlier.
As
he approached, she hoped this wasn’t going to be one of those depressing,
instructional bits, where two people had brought in comparable objects. One a
priceless original, the other a worthless copy.