The Offer She Couldn't Refuse Read online

  He knew she meant that as the ultimate obstacle. Just for a brief moment, he didn’t quite see it that way. “That doesn’t seem like such a stiff price to pay.”

  He was just making conversation. A flip remark at best. There was no reason why her heart should suddenly constrict within her chest. None at all, damn it.

  She drew a breath, then slowly let it out. It didn’t help.

  “I have to go help George,” she muttered, her eyes refusing to leave his. “He always gets overwhelmed right about now.” It was almost noon. It always got busier around noon. “He can’t handle more than one course at a time.”

  She moved to leave. Jared didn’t. He remained in her way, held fast by the look in her eyes, by her scent and by a need that was so urgent, it scared the hell out of him. “And what do you get overwhelmed by?”

  Steady, Demi, he’s just trying to get to you. Surprise, he was succeeding. “Pushy men who ask too many questions.”

  The pulse in her throat was throbbing. It urged him on. “I’ve got one more for you. Why didn’t you ever get married?”

  Who was feeding him lines—her mother? “I am. To the restaurant.”

  She was far too warm and vibrant to be satisfied with just that. What about her needs as a woman? “You can’t take it home with you.”

  She laughed shortly. How many nights had she fallen asleep, her bed littered with paper pertaining to the inventory, and order forms? “You’d be surprised.”

  He was making her nervous. The thought excited him beyond words. “Not to bed.”

  The phrase whispered along her skin, making her flesh melt. Still, she struggled to resist. “My bed is none of your business.”

  She didn’t mean that, not really. He could see it in her eyes. “Maybe I’d like to make it my business.”

  He was crowding her. Without taking a step toward her, he was crowding her, cutting off her escape. Her air. Her defenses were snapping like dried matchsticks. “Just how far would you go to convince me to sell?”

  His mistake was in deluding himself that he was doing this because of work. He didn’t want her making the same one.

  This time, he did move. Placing one hand on the doorjamb just above her head, the other by her shoulder, he framed her.

  “This has nothing to do with convincing you to sell. Nothing to do with the way I earn my living, or you yours. This has everything to do with the fact that I seem to be having trouble thinking clearly ever since I walked into this place.”

  She swallowed, wishing she could tear her eyes away from his mouth. Wishing she could stop remembering what it had felt like against hers.

  “That’s not my fault.” It was meant to be a loud protest. It was just the barest whisper.

  “Oh, but it is.” He moved his head as if to kiss her, stopping just short of her mouth. Jared absorbed the anticipation jumping around within him as if it were a life-giving force. “It is very much your fault. Theresa’s crazy about this place, about you.”

  Demi felt as if the words she spoke were slipping between her lips in slow motion. “Theresa has good taste.”

  When his mouth curved, she could swear she felt it. “She gets that from me.”

  With one final attempt at escape, she braced her hands against his chest. But there was no strength with which to push. “You’re in my way.”

  As it deepened, the smile on his lips curved even farther into her body. “I know.”

  Where was this strange rushing sound in her ears coming from? Had George left the water running again? Oh, please, let George have left the water running again. “Do I have to move you?”

  He liked the way her hands fluttered along his chest, liked every damn thing about this femme fatale in shrew’s clothing. He knew it was going to be his downfall. “Why don’t you try?”

  The rest was inevitable. Just the way she’d imagined that it would be—a hundred times since it had first happened.

  Just the way she’d ached for it to happen again.

  His arms slipped around her waist and he drew her closer to him. Too close for a prayer. There was no escape.

  She didn’t even pretend to fight it. She wanted to taste his mouth on hers so badly, she couldn’t even make a show of trying to fend him off. If she did, she might succeed. And lose. Because she wanted him to kiss her more than she wanted anything else in the world.

  And much more than she knew was good for her.

  It was a matter of overwhelming needs taking precedence over common sense.

  “You’re too tall,” she muttered against his mouth, rising on her toes for better contact.

  The next thing she knew, there was no floor beneath her feet. With his arms tightly wrapped around her, Jared had picked her up.

  Her body slid slowly, seductively up along his until her face was almost level with his.

  “Better?” he asked.

  She didn’t know about better, but it was certainly a lot hotter.

  “Almost,” she whispered, her eyes touching him the way she wanted her lips to do.

  Her breath tantalized him as it skimmed along his face. He could feel his body growing rigid with needs he had completely ignored since Gloria had left Needs that he’d thought were all but gone from his life for good.

  So much about living out his life as a monk.

  Jared didn’t remember bringing his mouth to hers. Didn’t remember the mechanics of the act at all. All he was aware of was the explosion that went off in his veins. The one that detonated instantly as soon as contact was made.

  Unlike the first time, this kiss was almost ruthlessly hungry.

  No one was more surprised by its intensity than he was. He could feel her heart pounding wildly against him, equating the rhythm within his own chest. His own heart felt as if it would burst.

  It was a hell of a way to go.

  Damn it, why this woman? Why now? Nothing could come of it. The path was completely cluttered with issues and obstacles. She wouldn’t believe that this was happening of its own accord and not because of the restaurant. And he couldn’t blame her.

  But none of that mattered now.

  Nothing mattered except this wild, heady rush that overtook him when he was with her like this. He struggled to absorb it as much as he sanely could while it was happening.

  There was no denying that she was driving him crazy. His hold on reality was perilously close to slipping completely out of his hands.

  Suddenly, a booming voice broke the silence. “Hey, is this some new way I haven’t heard of of saying no to a sales pitch?”

  Jared almost dropped her. Only quick reflexes had him tightening his arms again so that she wouldn’t land on her feet with an ignoble thud.

  Embarrassment and annoyance joined forces with surprise and disorientation as they turned in unison toward the doorway.

  Guy was grinning at them, clearly amused. Demi curbed the urge to tell him what he could do with his question. Ordinarily, she would have gladly told him. But Guy wasn’t alone.

  Composing herself with admirable speed, Demi had to be satisfied with shooting her brother a dirty look. She prayed she didn’t sound as breathless as she felt.

  “Jared, you know my brother, Guy.” Amused, Guy nodded his greeting. Demi dragged her hand through her hair, silently vowing to get even with Guy first chance she got for what he was obviously thinking right now. “This is my sister-in-law, Nancy.” Her tone softened. “And my three very favorite people in the whole world, A.J., Addie and the newest addition to our family.” Demi gently moved the blanket away from the sleeping baby in Nancy’s arms. “Antoinette.”

  Taking refuge with the children, Demi slipped an arm around each of the twin’s shoulders. “So, what are you guys doing here?”

  It was Guy who answered. “We were in the neighborhood and I couldn’t talk them out of coming here. Seems our place ranks higher than Bingoland with them.”

  Demi looked at Guy over her shoulder. He was still wearing that amused, annoying-as-hell
expression. She had an urge to hit him upside the head. Only the presence of his children saved him. And he knew it, she thought.

  “Oh, so now it’s ‘our’ place, is it? When was the last time you put in any time behind an apron, brother dear?”

  “He cooks?” Jared asked, surprised.

  Guy looked far too rugged to be able to do anything but boil water. But then he thought of Theo and Demi’s claim that the man cooked rings around all of them. Men did rank among the top chefs of the world. He just didn’t see that rank being shared by a policeman better suited to posing for a Greek statue. This family was full of surprises.

  “I insist on it,” Nancy told Jared. “He’s not as good as Demi or Theo,” she went on playfully, “but he holds his own in the kitchen.”

  “She says that because she hates to cook,” Guy confided.

  Nancy saw no reason to deny it. “Guilty as charged.”

  She needed some air, Demi thought. And to get away from the questions she saw in Guy’s eyes. Hell, she needed to get away from both men.

  “C’mon, kids, there’s someone outside I’d like you to meet,” Demi told A.J. and Addie.

  Swiftly transferring the baby into Guy’s arms, Nancy hurried after her sister-in-law.

  “I like him,” she said in a voice that just barely qualified as a whisper.

  Terrific, he probably heard that. Demi refused to turn around to satisfy her curiosity.

  “Good, then you can have him,” Demi told her with a note of finality. She wasn’t up to discussing Jared with anyone, not even with someone she numbered among her best friends. Not with all her feelings churned up in such an uproar.

  “My wife’s a modern woman,” Guy explained to Jared, nodding at the bundle she’d just deposited in his arms.

  The baby, as if realizing she was under discussion, opened her eyes. They were a bright green. Like Demi’s, Jared thought.

  “How old?” Jared asked Guy.

  “Nine months. Nothing like holding your own in your arms.” Guy’s pride was hard to miss. “Just like a piece of heaven.”

  A feeling of wistfulness came over him as Jared remembered Theresa at this age. “May I?”

  Yeah, Guy thought as he gently slipped his daughter into Jared’s arms, this one would do very nicely.

  Demi gave in and looked back, telling herself it was only to see what was taking Guy so long. She saw the look on Jared’s face as he took her niece into his arms. Awed. Wistful.

  It was then that she knew she was doomed.

  8

  “So, how’s it coming along?” Jack Winfield’s booming voice preceded him as the large-boned, tall businessman strode into Jared’s office. His very presence commandeered the space. “Are you making any progress?”

  Surprised, Jared looked up from the notes he was reviewing. Notes he had made to himself regarding Aphrodite. Winfield never knocked or bothered to make appointments with the people who worked for him, other than the regular meetings he’d scheduled for Friday mornings. He believed there was merit in catching employees unaware, while they were going through the usual routine of their jobs. Those who pleased him were well rewarded. Those who didn’t were shown the door. Quickly. Stress was an integral factor in working for Winfield, and lately it was becoming more so.

  Normally above it, Jared was beginning to feel the effects himself. There was a growing pain between his shoulders that sharpened at the sound of Winfield’s greeting.

  Jared closed the folder with his notes, dropping it on his desk as he sat up. “Jack, I thought you were in Hawaii.”

  “I was.” Making no pretense at niceties, Winfield turned the folder around to face him and absently thumbed through the report. Jared wasn’t taken in by the disinterested expression. He’d been with Winfield too long. Nothing that was remotely connected to Winfield, Inc., disinterested the man.

  Winfield looked up at Jared, an empty smile twitching his mouth. “Now I’m here, ready to forge ahead.” The smile disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. “Are we forging?”

  Even if he were given to lying, Jared wouldn’t have attempted it now. Not with Winfield. The man always knew if he was being lied to. “Not yet.”

  Winfield’s mournfully long face remained impassive. His eyes continued to be unfathomable. “Why not?”

  Was it his imagination, or was he feeling uncomfortable in Winfield’s presence? If he didn’t know better, he would have speculated that somehow, mysteriously, his alliances had shifted without his consciously acknowledging the fact.

  Jared answered Winfield’s question with the truth. Though the man was impatient, Jared had never known him to be unreasonable. Winfield understood that some negotiations needed more time than others.

  “Ms. Tripopulous is still averse to the idea of selling the family business.”

  Singular streaks of color subtly crept up both sides of Winfield’s neck, making the veins stand out.

  “Well, get her unaverse to it.” It was a quiet, steely order, but the intensity took Jared by surprise. He didn’t remember ever seeing Winfield this adamant about an acquisition before. “Do whatever it takes. I want that restaurant as part of my stable.”

  As if sensing he was coming on too strong, Winfield let out a long, cleansing breath. Since he genuinely liked Jared and had told him more than once he thought of him as his protégé, he threw an arm around the younger man’s shoulders in a show of camaraderie.

  “Look, Jared, I have a dream. You believe in dreams, don’t you? Every man’s got to have a dream. Mine’s when someone says they want to eat out—whether it’s home-style cooking, Italian food, Chinese, Thai, steak and lobster or Greek—they’ll think of one of my restaurants. Reasonable food at reasonable prices.” It was the slogan he’d started out with eighteen years ago when he’d acquired his very first restaurant. “I deliver whatever I promise.” The arm slipped off Jared’s shoulders. Winfield looked at him pointedly. “I expect the people I have working for me to do the same.”

  Jared was painfully aware of what he’d said when he took on the assignment That he would have the contract, signed and sealed, on Winfield’s desk within a week. They were well into week three.

  “This is taking longer than I thought it might,” he admitted.

  “But you are making progress.” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement Winfield wanted him to verify.

  Jared looked out the window. The weather outside seemed a lot better than the weather inside his office. “Yes, I’m making progress.”

  Of course, it all depended on your definition of progress, he added silently. His involved seeing his daughter smile. And feeling as if his own heart had been taken out of deep freeze. Unfortunately, it had little to nothing to do with what Winfield called progress, but there was no point in going into that just yet. Winfield’s mood was threatening to turn foul at the least provocation. Jared didn’t particularly want to provide it.

  Winfield was studying him when Jared turned around. “Well, you’re about to make progress a little faster.”

  “Meaning?” Jared had an uneasy feeling he wasn’t going to like what he heard.

  Winfield smiled with feeling for the first time since he’d walked in.

  “Meaning the lady owes a note of some substance—as far as she’s concerned anyway—to First Federal Pacific. A note her late father foolishly took out and one that she won’t have a prayer of meeting if her suppliers suddenly decide to dry up her credit.”

  The self-satisfied smile widened, chilling Jared. “She can’t make meals for her patrons if she can’t buy the ingredients she needs.”

  It took Jared a minute to assimilate what Winfield was saying. Not because he didn’t understand, but because he didn’t want to believe that a man he’d respected and at one time strove to emulate was capable of something so underhanded and deceitful. There had to be some explanation other than the one that stared him in the face. There was no reason to stoop to this level, other than sheer stubbornness taken to a
perverse degree.

  “Did you tell her suppliers to cut her off?”

  Winfield’s frown told Jared he didn’t care for his tone. “Not yet, but I’m thinking about it. I’m thinking real hard about it.” He laughed to himself. “It would make things a damn sight simpler.” Though Jared was beginning to annoy him, he was very pleased with himself. “There’s not much to do in Hawaii if you don’t want to roast like a stuffed pig, so I started calling around, checking out a few things.”

  It meant that Winfield was becoming impatient with him, Jared thought. Obviously he didn’t think he was moving fast enough on this deal. Why? What was the sudden hurry? It seemed to him that the more Winfield got, the more he wanted. Jared remembered the story he’d read to Theresa the other night about the escalating greed of a fisherman’s wife. Apparently it didn’t happen only in fairy tales.

  “Seems we have a few suppliers in common,” Winfield was saying. “And they sure as hell don’t want to get on my bad side and lose my business. My accounts are fifteen times the size of hers.”

  That was because he had fifteen restaurants to her one. How could he be proud of what he was contemplating? “That’s not fair, Jack.”

  Winfield’s eyes narrowed until they looked as if they were no larger than tiny pinpricks shooting out twin laser beams of displeasure.

  “Fair? Who cares about fair? That’s business, Jared. If you’re so concerned about her feelings, make that woman sell to us before things get too ugly for her. Tell her she can come work for me once the ink dries on the bill of sale.”

  Had Winfield changed in the last year, or had the man always been like this and Jared just hadn’t realized it? Or were his freshly unearthed feelings coloring everything? “I already told her that, Jack.”

  “And?”

  Jared supposed that one of the reasons Winfield was as successful as he was was because he refused to take no for an answer. He just couldn’t bring himself to believe that people actually meant to turn him down. “And, no sale.”

  The bony shoulders artfully concealed beneath the expertly tailored expensive jacket lifted, then fell carelessly. “Pity. Still, it won’t affect the final outcome. The lady will sell to us, Jared. It’s only a matter of time. Now get going.”