Playing Dirty (10 page)

And that was fine with her. Would that she could arrange it like that all the time, because she’d thought of that damn kiss way too often as it was. She sure didn’t need his annoying presence to remind her further.

John is around as well,
she thought, determined to change the direction of her thoughts. He was probably making rounds to ensure no one had managed to slip in and secret themselves in the mansion while everyone was busy. There was a lot of very expensive equipment locked in here every evening, and both security guards took their jobs seriously.

She emptied the remaining coffee into a thermal pot that would keep it hot for John’s shift and washed out the coffeemaker. Then, needing dishwasher detergent anyway, she kicked off her heels, bent from the waist and folded into a satisfying yoga stretch that eased the tension from her hamstrings. Releasing her loose grip from one ankle, she opened the cupboard and felt around under the sink for the Cascade.

“Sweet view.”

Crap.
Wouldn’t you know it? Damn that Mr. Murphy and his stinking laws. Slowly straightening with the green box in one hand, she stifled a sigh. Well, she had known intellectually that her luck wouldn’t hold forever. Didn’t mean a girl couldn’t still wish that she’d been two lousy minutes more efficient. Or, failing that, had at least been discovered in a less embarrassing position—one that didn’t include her big butt sticking up in the air.

“Glad you like it,” she said coolly without turning, and stooped this time to fill the little dispenser in the appliance, “considering I’ve put considerable effort into
making it so.” She leaned to put the box back under the sink, then slowly rose to her feet.

And found herself brushing along six feet of warm, hard body all the way up.

She froze at the apex of her rise, awareness exploding along her nerve endings.

“Trust me,” Cade’s husky voice murmured in her ear. “It’s worth every minute you spent on it.”

Her heart pounded like a bongo drummer on speed, but she fought to keep her voice steady when she said, “You wanna do us both a favor and step back there, Gallari?”

“Yeah, let me just get—” His voice trailing away, he reached overhead to open the cabinet, his inner arms and the sides of his biceps brushing her own arms and shoulders with the motion. The shivers that zinged down her arms from the point of contact were so electric she was amazed lightning didn’t shoot from her fingertips. What the hell was he up to?

And why was she falling right into whatever dodge he was running?

Tipping her head back to see his expression in hopes of figuring out what his angle was, she felt his chin brush her hair as he grabbed one of the clean mugs she’d just put away. She was highly aware of his muscular chest against her back, the hard spread of his thighs bracketing her hips.

Damn, damn, damn.
She
so
didn’t want to be, but she couldn’t deny the get-with-the-program responsiveness spreading warmth deep in her core.

Then he slapped the cupboard door closed again, and she started.

“There.” He stepped away, leaving her scrambling to convince herself she did not feel chilled with the sudden
loss of his body heat. “Sorry about that. I thought I had time to grab a cup while you were fooling around under the sink.” He reached for the thermal pot on the counter and poured himself some coffee.

Did you, really?
Ava narrowed her eyes at him.
Or are you just messing with me?
Because she knew this man. He looked way too innocent, and she didn’t trust him as far as she could shot put the guy. “Well, enjoy your coffee.” She started the dishwasher, stepped back into her shoes and turned away. “I’m taking off.”

“Before you go, I need to give you some information so you can make some arrangements for me.”

“Sure.” In fact, she was all over the idea—why, just the prospect of doing a job she knew well drained most of the tension from her shoulders. Feeling her normal poise return, she flashed him a professional smile over her shoulder. “Hang on. I’ll grab my phone.”

He shook his head. “Yeah, God forbid you don’t have your CrackBerry in hand.”

“Please.” Turning to face him, she gave him her best the-queen-is-not-amused pursed lips and nose in the air. “I’m a Mac girl. And Mac girls do not use those inferior brand-X products.” She accessed the recorder. “Okay, tell me what you need done.”

“We’re gonna start shooting the re-creations next week. And since they’re bigger and more complicated than doing interviews and we’re gonna be shooting them in film, I’ve got more people and equipment coming to town in a few days.” He reached into his back pocket and withdrew a many times folded piece of paper. He smoothed it out before passing it to her.

“Beks wrote up a who’s who for you. If there’s any room at the house you got for the crew, maybe the extra
grips can stay there. But I need hotel rooms for the wardrobe woman and her assistant and the actors.”

“Easy peasy. I don’t think there’re any major events going on downtown next week, but let me double-check.” Waving him into a seat at one of the tables, she finessed her iPhone for the information.

“Looking good,” she reported and poured herself a cup of coffee. She joined him, prepared to hunker in until she had everything she needed to do the job. “So give me the particulars.” She rattled the paper he’d given her. “Is this everyone who’s coming?”

“No. Actually the actress I found to play Agnes is from here. I discovered her through the U-Dub’s School of Drama. I found a couple others there, as well.”

“Give me everyone. Even if they don’t need accommodations,
I
need the head count. Things could get ugly around here in a hurry if I ran out of food.”

He laughed, and for just a minute she was thrust back to the brief period in her life when they’d been friends in tune with each other.

Then she shook her head. “I need details to have a better idea of what we’re dealing with.” She looked across the table at him, pleased to be back on an all-business footing. It was
so
preferable—this she understood. Hot feelings for the last man she should be having them for—and one, moreover, she was pretty damn sure was deliberately working to generate them—made her feel like a Grade A chump.

That was so not a sensation she enjoyed.

A
VA DID NOT
sleep well that night. She couldn’t seem to stop obsessing over Cade’s actions in the mansion’s kitchen. How unfair was it that now, when it was too late to matter, everything she
should
have said kept spinning through her brain as if it were on some kind of endless loop? Where the hell had her quick wit been when it might have actually done her some good?

At two in the morning she flipped from side to goddamn side on her Tri-Pedic mattress.

At three she lay on her back, tapping her fingers on the coverlet and alternated flexing and curling her toes against the bedding she’d kicked loose, while staring up at a ceiling she couldn’t even see in the impenetrable dark.

At three forty-five she switched on the bedside lamp and tried to read for a while. She couldn’t concentrate for beans, however, and after fifteen minutes of rereading the same two paragraphs over and over, the sole result of which was a tear-producing case of burny-eyes, she turned the light back off, punched her pillow into what she dearly hoped would be a more comfortable configuration and attempted sleep once more.

“Shit!” Twelve minutes later she pushed up on her elbow, fumbled her iPod out of the nightstand drawer and slid its earbuds into her ears. She started the first song in her sleepytime playlist at a low, soothing volume and practiced deep, even breaths in counterpoint with Bizet’s
Carmen,
John Barry’s theme from
Midnight Cowboy
and Delibes’s
Lakmé.

Only to discover the usual soporific effect of combining soothing music with regulated breathing had apparently taken a vacation.

At five-fifteen she threw in the freaking towel. This was getting her nowhere, so she might as well get up. Tossing back the covers, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and sat up, reaching to snag her robe from the footboard.

Pulling its snuggly warmth around her and tying the belt, she trudged into the living room and opened the shutters. She didn’t see any raindrops in the light cast by the streetlamp across Alki Avenue, so she headed back into the bedroom to don her firmest sports bra and pull on a wicking Tee and her thermal running pants. She made her bed, dropped down onto her slipper chair to pull on a pair of socks and her Adidas Supernova Adapts, then went into the kitchen to make herself a cup of tea and eat an orange and some yogurt. When she was finished, she rinsed her cup and stretched for ten minutes to warm up her muscles.

Finally, she pulled on a jacket, slipped her key and mini canister of pepper spray into its pocket, then let herself out of her condo. Bypassing the elevator, she jogged down the stairs to the ground floor.

Pushing through the building’s security door, the first thing she noticed were the stars hanging in a clear, carbon dark sky. The air was still, which was nice, since
that meant a morning that was crisp and cold but not freeze-your-ass-off frosty. Crossing the street to the bike and pedestrian paths that ran along the water, she plugged her iPod back into her ears, selected a jazzier playlist than the one that had failed to help her sleep and pointed her shoes toward the Duwamish Head, starting out at a slow jog until she built up her wind and rhythm.

She couldn’t claim to be a big lover of running, but she did find it to be one of the more efficient methods for keeping her weight down, so a few times a week she made herself tie on her Adidas whether she wanted to or not—and, okay, mostly she didn’t. Yet there was something peaceful about being out before dawn when all was quiet and she had the entire stretch of Alki to herself except for an occasional car and the biker who whizzed past her on the path with a warning of, “On your right.”

Watching the latter disappear around the head, she increased her speed as she, too, neared the point. Then she rounded it and felt her heart lighten as she saw downtown Seattle across Elliot Bay, sprawled out in a mosaic of lights against the stygian sky. From the Space Needle to the north to the lit-up monolithic orange cranes at the never-sleeping Port of Seattle stretching along the southeastern end of the waterfront, it was a sight that never failed to raise her spirits.

With only the bay between her and the Seattle skyline, she could hear the trains coupling new cars over in the Sodo district and the mournful two-note wail of their horns as they rolled out of town in both directions. Woven beneath it were distant snatches of the clack and clatter of iron wheels rumbling along the tracks.

Then the sounds and diamond-bright cityscape disappeared as she ran past Salty’s and the high berm that
separated Harbor Avenue from the Port’s busy Customs Exam station. And without the view to distract her, she had to face what she’d been avoiding all night.

Yes, she had spent sleepless hours coming up with all the brilliant, sardonic I’m-onto-you things she should have said both before and after that full body press with Cade in the kitchen last night. But mostly she’d been busy dodging what she
shouldn’t
have said following the damn kiss that had no doubt driven Cade to initiate said FBP.

Which was telling him she didn’t mix business with pleasure and then pushing the envelope by making it crystal clear that even if she did, it would be a cold day at the equator before
he’d
ever be the one to change her mind.

What the hell were you thinking?
Yeah, yeah, big deal, she
did
have an unwritten policy of not mixing sex and the clients who employed her. She still should have just shrugged off those few moments of insanity in Cade’s arms and kept her big mouth shut. What she shouldn’t have done was issue what he of all people might construe as a challenge. Dammit, she
knew
how competitive he was. She ought to—she’d seen it as far back as the freaking fifth grade. That was the first time she’d called him Buttface Gallari, a name that had just slipped out after he’d accidentally-on-purpose splashed punch all over her pretty dress and in her hair at a yacht club cotillion. Not that he’d appeared all that disturbed by the name-calling. No, it had been when she’d sworn she would never dance with him again that he had made it his mission to prove her wrong.

Which he had done, the bastard—just the first of the
victories he’d racked up over the years whenever she’d challenged him.

Scowling, she stopped to catch her breath and maybe get a peek at the inhabitants of Kitty Harbor. Unfortunately, this early in the morning the doors to the big, clean courtyard where the rescued cats often lounged and played were still closed, so she couldn’t distract herself by watching the always charming and amusing feline antics. Shrugging as she reached the intersection where the West Seattle freeway curved to the south overhead, she started back the way she had come. And finally quit dodging the issue.

She might have come a long way the past few years, but she was always going to be the sort of woman who issued challenges. Some deliberate, some not. And Cade being Cade, he would likely always be a jerk and push, push, push at her to prove her wrong.

Well, she wasn’t wrong—not about refusing to get involved with him. They were grease and water and, chemistry be damned, getting physical with the man would be disastrous. Yes, she was drawn to him—there was just something about him that acted on her like catnip. That didn’t mean she couldn’t say, “Want it, not gonna grab it.” God knows she’d been doing that very thing for more than a decade when it came to food. So she
would
be ready for him the next time he tried to mess with her. Because she didn’t try to fool herself. Cade wasn’t going to just say, “Oh, what the hell,” and let it go at that.

There would definitely be a next time.

S
HE MADE BETTER
time back from the Spokane Street turnaround than she had getting there. The phone was ringing when she let herself back into her condo, and,
glancing at her watch, she wondered who on earth would be calling at six-thirty in the morning.

She sighed when she saw caller ID but dutifully picked up. “Hello, Mother.”

“Why have I yet to see the invitations, Ava?”

“And a good morning to you, too,” she said dryly. “You need to check your email more often than once every week or so. I sent you a JPEG of the invitation last week.”

There was a moment of silence. Then, “I hate this newfangled technology. What happened to the days when people corresponded by mail like civilized men and women?”

“They discovered a faster, often more efficient way. It’s what I, at least, seem to have the most time for these days. My job is keeping me pretty busy, Mom.”

“Mother,” Jacqueline corrected.

“Right.” Drawing a calming breath, she unclenched her teeth. “Hey, speaking of my job, I met an acquaintance of yours on the set recently. Stan Tarrof?”

“For heaven’s sake. I haven’t seen Stan for…goodness. Probably four or five months. What an odd place for him to be—what on earth would a man like him be doing on a movie set?”

“Being part of Miss Agnes’s documentary. Apparently he lived a few blocks away from her when he was growing up. He also knew her socially, but like many of your set was younger than she, so he wasn’t a close friend or anything. His main claim to fame is that his grandfather built the Wolcott mansion.”

“He did? I never knew that.”

“Neither did I before watching the interview. That’s one of the fascinating things about being even a small part of this production. I get to hear bits and pieces
of all sorts of interesting stuff. Like Mr. Tarrof telling everyone how much he treasures all his grandfather’s old blueprints.” And more amusingly, in her mind, hearing him talk about when he and his brothers were kids. They hadn’t revered the grandfather’s work then—they’d just thought the Wolcott was a spooky old mansion and had dared each other to run up, ring the doorbell and run away. She found it such an interesting juxtaposition hearing it told by the dignified man of today.

The clock on the dining room wall caught her eye, and she dragged herself back on topic. “I still need to grab a shower and get ready for work, Mother, but you’re right that we need to get going on the invitations. So pull up my email while I have you on the line. If you approve my choice I’ll push for a rush on the order and get them to my calligrapher ASAP so we can mail them out right away. I have the guest list addresses you sent me on file, ready to be taken to Jessamine along with the invitations the minute the printers let me know they’re ready for pick up.”

It was silent on the line for several seconds. Then Jacqueline said, “It’s not perfect, but it will do.”

Ava rubbed at a little ache between her brows. “All right then. I’ll send you an email as soon as I mail them out.”

Another pause, then her mother suddenly said, “Actually, Ava, this is…quite nice.”

A little spark of something lit in her stomach. “Yeah?”

“Yes. Really quite nice.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

“Mother.”

She sighed. “Of course. I’ll email you later.”

Hanging up, she bent to pick up the shoes she’d toed off while she was on the phone. When the hell was she going to quit looking for the crumbs of her mother’s affection? She was thirty-one years old, for God’s sake. How pathetic was it that she was still so needy for Mommy’s approval?

“Oh, well.” On the bright side, she was at least better about it than she used to be. There might be hope for her yet. Straightening her shoulders, she blew out a breath.

Then headed down the hall to lose herself for ten or fifteen minutes in a nice hot shower.

B
EKS STUCK
her head in the mansion kitchen later that morning. “Hey. Loved those savory turnovers—they were totally tasty.” She grinned. “Who woulda thought a turnover without sugar could be so yummy?”

Ava looked up from the fruit platter she was refilling. “I’m glad you liked them. They seemed to go over pretty well. At least no one left them untouched on their plates—that’s usually a good sign that I made an okay choice.” She flashed a smile at Beks, whose clunky boots were firmly braced against the hallway floor as the younger woman gripped the doorjambs with both hands and leaned into the room. Her perky pigtails were streaked with orange today. “You gonna just hang there or come in?”

“Dude, I would love to take a little coffee break and visit with you. But I’ve got stuff to do. And I’m here on a mission—Cade asked me to check if you’ve got a few minutes. He wants to see you in the dining room.”

Shit.
“Yes, sure. Let me just finish this platter and wash my hands and I’ll be right in.”

“I’ll tell him.” And whirling on her Frankenstein boots, the PA was gone.

Ava finished up, then gave herself a couple additional minutes by working some lotion into her hands and reapplying her lipstick as she waited for that little kick to her heart rate to settle back into an acceptable level. Finally she blew out a breath, which she seemed to be doing a lot of this morning, and crossed the hall to the dining room.

She found Cade standing with his back to her, his knuckles braced on the dining room table on either side of an open photo album. Several more were stacked nearby.

“You summoned?” she said dryly. But inside she was growling like a cat confronted with a raccoon. Because, dammit, why—even from the backside—did he always have to look so damn good to her?

He twisted to look over his shoulder. “Yeah, thanks for dropping what you were doing. I could use your help if you’ve got any free time between the jobs you’re already working on.”

Okay, sue her, she was a sucker for being needed. She simply loved being useful and adored performing the tasks that made people’s lives easier. Well, except bathrooms. She didn’t do bathrooms.

Which so wasn’t the point.
That
would be that she wasn’t a complete idiot. This was Gallari, who had slapped the moves on her just last night. She wasn’t sure why yet, but there were no two ways about it, that was exactly what he’d been doing with that whole caging her between the counter and his body routine—and the subtlety of his maneuvers be damned. “To do what?”