“Why must you return to such a tedious place?” Cat protested as they rode in the Hummer from the courthouse to the resort. “Send someone to pack up the patterns and let us go home. You have what you want.”
No, he didn’t, but Jacques didn’t bother responding to Cat’s whine. Leaning his head against the front headrest, he tried to luxuriate in the usual adrenaline rush of winning.
The old ego boost wasn’t there.
Amy and the town had fought so bravely. All he’d done was flash cash and impressive credentials. It had never been a contest at all.
“Champagne buffet at the spa?” Brigitte suggested from the seat behind him.
Jacques knew she had her BlackBerry out and was already hunting up the appropriate contacts to set up a celebratory dinner. She’d done it for him on numerous occasions. Bright lights, music, champagne — that’s how he’d lived his life these last years — surrounding himself with illusions of happiness.
He had a wonderful life. He had accomplished everything he had ever set out to do. He was sitting on top of the world.
So why didn’t he feel like celebrating? He’d just bought a lost piece of history, a challenging project that would create a dream collection of design patterns he could sell to every museum and historic home in America, opening entirely new doors for his company.
Perhaps he was ill. He would have Amy take his temperature and fix him chicken soup. Just the thought of Amy leaning over to caress his brow made him feel better. Maybe she would wear a loose shirt and he could admire.…
Amy was more likely to beat him with a raw chicken carcass than take his temperature. He’d stolen her future.
Not entirely, his inner voice reminded him. He’d told the judge he didn’t want the cottage. Actually, he wanted it very much. It would make a wonderful mountain escape once he’d sent a crew in to bring it up to date. He’d love making design decisions for his own home. He could return here every summer, terrorize the turkey shoot, hang out at the café with Amy and friends, drop out of the fast lane for a few weeks a year.
He had a terrace apartment in London, a penthouse in Paris, and a villa in Nice. Who was he fooling? He’d never return here. He had no reason to.
“Arrange the buffet,” he agreed, but it wasn’t champagne that he wanted.
Perhaps he would feel better if he told Amy in person that the judge had accepted her bid on the cottage.
“I’ll join you after a while,” he said once the Hummer pulled up to the resort and everyone else had climbed out. Before Cat could complain, Jacques shut his door and signaled Luigi to drive on.
Without being told, his driver took the road to Northfork.
* * *
“What in bloody hell?” Sitting straight up, Jacques peered out the Hummer windshield as they drove around the bend and descended the hill into a lightless town of wet shadows. If he looked closely, he could see a flicker through a window here and there, but for all intents and purposes, the usually well-lit town blended into the darkness of the tree-studded hillside.
The thunderstorm had retreated to flashes on the far side of the mountain. The rain had stopped, but clouds still hid the stars.
Above the town, in the upper parking lot, flames leaped and blazed against the black sky, flickering pink and orange beneath the cloudbanks.
“Bonfire?” Luigi suggested, slowing down to traverse an empty Main Street. Even the fake Victorian streetlights were out.
“There are no lights! Are we in the right place? I know they roll up the sidewalks after dark.…”
Luigi slowed so the Hummer’s headlights cut across dark storefronts and illuminated the street that wound up the mountain to the residential area. “Electricity must be out.”
“Amy.” Jacques slammed his head back against the headrest and winced. She had even him believing their silly superstition. He could imagine her furious enough at losing the mill to blow the electric grid across half the state.
Luigi chuckled as the headlights struck a line of trucks and cars pulled off the side of the road. Across the parking lot where the vehicles should have been was a banner stretched from one telephone pole to the next, framing the bonfire behind it. “This place sure knows how to throw a party,” Luigi said in admiration.
Jacques read the banner in horror and disbelief. WELCOME, ZACK, HONORARY CITIZEN. “‘Zack’? Me? For what?”
But already the athlete’s hum of adrenaline lifted his spirits at the sight of the crowd rallying around the bonfire. Competition was pointless without the recognition of accomplishment at the end. For the first time this day, triumph surged. They didn’t hate him!
Or — did the town believe it was their victory, too? Did they think he meant to reopen the mill and put them to work?
Damn.
The tantalizing aromas of barbecuing food seeped through the Hummer’s open window, and he realized he hadn’t eaten since breakfast. He was suddenly starving.
Luigi maneuvered the massive vehicle off the road to the accompaniment of a sunburst of red and orange sparks igniting overhead. The traditional oooohs and ahhhhs followed, and then someone distinctly yelled, “Zack! He’s here!” and a chorus of cheers rang over the noise of the exploding fireworks.
“If this is Northfork losing the mill bid,” he muttered to his driver, “what would they have done if they won?”
“Rode you around town on their shoulders, given you a ticker-tape parade, and the key to the city. Jeez Louise, they’re setting those things off in the parking lot. They’ll blow us all up.”
Luigi’s Brooklyn origins occasionally penetrated his European sophistication when startled. Jacques flung open the car door before his driver could decide fireworks were too dangerous for his health.
He craned his neck to watch red and blue rockets shoot across the clouds, leaving streamers of gold and orange that whistled and swirled in sparkles and smoke, and a thrill coursed through him. He’d always watched fireworks from penthouses from a distance. He’d never stood in the camaraderie of the mob directly beneath such a joyous display.
“Zack, Zack, Zack!” The crowd began chanting as he stupidly stood there, hands in pockets, watching the sky, feeling as if he were ten years old.
Startled by the shouts, he returned his attention to the throng filling the parking lot. Lawn chairs and blankets inhabited by young and old took the place of the vehicles that usually occupied the blacktop lot. A gazebo housing a few benches for tourists had been turned into a makeshift stage. A local band plucked on acoustic guitars while teenagers gathered in the shadows behind an enormous bonfire. Younger children dashed through the crowd, their elders occasionally hauling them from their feet when they became too rambunctious.
It looked like what he’d always imagined a Fourth of July picnic would be. All they needed was ice cream and hot dog stands. He’d never been a participant in community activities. He’d never belonged to any one community. How had he lived all his life without realizing that?
The mayor and some of his cronies shoved their way through to pound Jacques on the back.
“Welcome, son!” the avuncular mayor cried.
Jacques didn’t think the mayor was any older than he was, but the politician was of no interest to him. His gaze had finally locked on Amy, who was basting delicious-smelling delicacies on an enormous black grill shaped like a barrel. She didn’t look his way, but he had no intention of letting her ignore him.
She knew what he meant to do with the mill. Why had she not informed the rest of the town of his plans? If these people had so much as an inkling of his intentions, they’d take him apart with pickaxes.
What the hell was he doing here anyway? He could scarcely enjoy being the town hero when he was really the villain.
He shook hands, smiled politely over handshakes, endured slaps on the back. He never diverted his attention from the woman in a beige halter top dousing chicken and hot dogs with barbecue sauce. She was wearing a red apron to protect her from the leaping flames, but her bare back was turned toward him. Brown, smooth, with a little mole on her right side, he noticed as he approached.
He wanted nothing more than to kiss that little mole. He would wrap his hands around her bare waist, lift her off the ground, and nuzzle until she squealed. And then they would see what happened next. He still had the keys to her house.
That she had every right to murder him there gave some pause for thought.
Someone shoved a plastic-coated paper cup into his hand. More fireworks exploded, accompanied by the shrieks of children burning marshmallows over the bonfire. He checked for but didn’t see Josh and Louisa playing by the fire, thank goodness. They were much too young.
He located Amy’s children playing near their grandmother near a line of smaller grills, where their Uncle Flint was flipping hamburgers and his sons were shoveling the meat onto buns.
An amplifier sputtered into life, and a screech split the air.
“Got it hooked up to Dave’s generator,” the mayor said proudly. “Amy thought of everything.”
Jacques recognized Jo’s clear soprano breaking into a chorus of “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow.” He thought maybe he ought to just crawl under a rock and stay there.
Amy turned and caught his eye then, and from the look of angelic innocence in her expression, Jacques knew he’d been set up. She damned well knew he meant to let the mill rot, and she was deliberately twisting a knife in his gullet.
He’d suffered a lifetime of manipulation, caught between his parents and their eternal battles. He’d learned how to walk away. Walking away might be one of his best Olympic sports. He damned well ought to turn his back on the conniving, adorable little witch.
And still he kept striding toward the rebellious flower with pink cheeks and defiant green eyes across the lot. The mayor followed, slowing him down. Jacques pounded the mayor’s shoulder, nearly knocking him over, and escaped while the other man stumbled.
He never turned down a challenge, and she damned well knew she had thrown down a bloody huge gauntlet.
Amy returned to basting shish kebabs but glanced over her shoulder the instant Jacques reached her. She was wearing those sexy hoops again, the ones that beckoned with their sway against the vulnerable curve of her throat. He would love to have Amy alone and wearing nothing but those provocative earrings.
The crowd had given up on the unfamiliar verses, and Jo’s voice rang over the clearing. More fireworks exploded, leaving the damp air heavy with sulfur. He thought he might explode with them, but it wasn’t sulfur that would ignite him.
“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded, gesturing at the cheering, celebrating throng.
“No electricity. So…we have to empty the freezers,” she called cheerfully over the myriad pops of a noisy firecracker.
“And that explains the banner? And the fireworks?” He tried to work up a good tantrum to fight his terror of the decision she was forcing on him.
“Oh, that.” She waved her spatula nonchalantly. “We’re showing our support. The best man won, and we want to show we’re not sore losers.”
He’d bet even money that this highly intelligent — extremely devious — woman had incited the population into believing he would actually hire them.
He ought to be furious at her manipulation. Instead, he felt as if she’d hit him over the head with reality and left him spinning. Amy wasn’t devious.
She was creating fantasies. She actually thought that if she showed him the importance of the mill to the town he might develop an altruistic streak to match her own. She thought more of him than he did of himself.
He ought to turn around and march straight back to the Hummer, leave for London tomorrow, and let Pascal handle the sale of the equipment. He could be in his computerized office, scanning in the cards, and developing new designs before the end of the week.
But Jacques suddenly had no interest in London, offices, or designs. Why did he feel as if those things were the past, a world in which he no longer had any interest? And the brilliant green eyes challenging him and an entire town welcoming him offered a real future?
He’d lived everywhere and never felt the need to belong anywhere. So why was he still standing here? Surely he didn’t believe he could be the hero these people thought him? That was ridiculous. He was a businessman, not a hero.
Amy seemed to think otherwise.
Did she really think that much of him? The possibility dazzled more than the fireworks.
“What happened to the electricity?” he asked, sidestepping the issue. He had to conquer his rampaging libido, drag his gaze away from her dancing hoops and her sexy mole, and seek good sense.
“Guess the town couldn’t pay the bill,” she said airily, shrugging and flipping a chicken breast. “Life goes on.”
“Hog wallow,” he said. “The transformer blew out.”
“The correct term is hogwash, and it doesn’t matter why the electricity is out. We still have to eat. Good thing it isn’t winter yet. Most everyone uses electric space heaters for heat because fuel oil is too expensive.”
“You are not making me feel guilty,” he asserted firmly. “The mill has been defunct for over a year.”
“We’ve lived in hope for a year.” Still smiling, Amy used tongs to place a charcoaled chicken breast on a grilled wheat bun, then handed it to him. “Now, we either get back to work or close up the town and move on. Tomatoes and lettuce are over on the table. That’s Jo’s punch in the red cup, so I’d be wary of drinking it if I were you.”
She turned her tanned and attractive back on him to put a hot dog on a bun for a teenager. She didn’t raise her voice, argue, or go after him with a knife, and still, she gutted him.
If his finer qualities rated higher than mediocre on his best day, he did not want to know about it. She definitely saw more in him than was there.
Dave from the hardware store grabbed Jacques’s elbow. “Speech!” he yelled over the crackle of a string of firecrackers someone had thrown into the bonfire. “It’s not often this town attracts this kind of attention.”
Dave pointed at a circle of men in rumpled white shirts gulping down free hot dogs and hamburgers while keeping an eye on the Hummer, Luigi, and Jacques. They were also holding plastic cups of Jo’s fiery cocktail. Around them, television camera crews waited, leaning on their equipment and watching the circus. The media.
Trying to disguise his inner panic, Jacques set the plastic cup aside and slathered Amy’s relish on his bun. He’d learned to appreciate the salad dressing concoction she’d served him for lunch this past week. It beat ketchup, any day.
He studied the reporters waiting expectantly. What in hell would happen if he announced his true intentions? Would the crowd shoot him like a turkey? Beat him into the blacktop? He figured he and Luigi could double up a lot of soft bellies and maybe cut a swath to escape, but fighting his way out of town didn’t appeal to his pride. He knew he’d been had. He glanced back at Amy, and she gave him a wink.
Five minutes ago he would have done handstands for that charming wink from the prim Miss Amy. Now, he saw he’d seriously underestimated the power of a woman. He glanced at the stage where Jo was finishing up her song. Flint leaned against the gazebo, arms crossed, watching his wife, but the instant Jo finished singing, they both turned expectantly in Jacques’s direction.
“Speech, Zack,” Jo called into the microphone.
The crowd picked up the cry. Speech, speech!
Hoss and Jimbo, the local rock-climbing expert, leaned against each other, sipping from red plastic cups and grinning. Even Marie Sanderson picked up little Louisa and let her wave at him.
It was a damned Mickey-Rooney-Judy-Garland presentation. Jacques’s mother had all those corny films on tape and played them while she worked. His father called her art saccharine for good reason. She called her paintings an emotional tribute to hard work and sacrifice. They were both right. Jacques had just never expected to walk into a scene from one of his mother’s sentimental paeans to the working man.
He glanced at Luigi and the Hummer. He could escape. He didn’t have to do this.
Josh tugged on his trouser leg, drawing his attention downward.
The child handed him a melting ice cream cone. “You can have a lick if you want,” he said seriously.
A tidal wave of emotion buoyed Jacques and swept him out to sea, far beyond the safe waters he knew and into dangerous undertows.
“Thanks, son,” he muttered, pretending to lick and handing it back to the boy. “That’s good stuff.”
Josh nodded seriously. “Think Luigi would like some?”
“I think he would, if you go straight to him and come right back here.”
The boy grinned. “Yeah, that’s what Mommy always says.”
The crowd continued shouting, “speech, speech,” and grew silent as Bill and Dave shoved Jacques toward the stage.
And he let himself be shoved.