Smitten (15 page)
Julia seemed like a lost child, nothing like the arrogant little schoolgirl who wanted a bigger life. It was as though New York had stripped her confidence away. He never thought he’d miss that obnoxious know-it-all, but he did. It was like a part of her had disappeared.
Julia stared into Zak’s handsome face, the murky depths of his dark eyes. He’d always been a mystery to her, and she supposed he always would be. Why now? Why did he want to help her now? Was it guilt over Greg not being here to help?
She eyed him suspiciously.
“This isn’t the right place for the spa. Now if only I can convince my one and only investor that I’m correct, I can get on with things.”
“What if he’s right?”
“He’s not.”
“Just tell Devlin you’re not going to sissify the building and slather cream on a bunch of loggers. I want to put them back to work so that maybe their wives can afford such a luxury.” His cocked eyebrow took her right back to high school when she’d watch him and his popular friends horseplay in the cafeteria, and she was invisible.
With as much time as Zak spent at their house, being Greg’s best friend, he never once spoke to her outside of the safety of their home. She wondered if he realized that.
How he became someone different, someone aloof and out of reach when anyone was looking. His deep hazel stare out from under his mop of dark brown hair still intimidated her.
It always had. She felt smaller in his presence, and the words she wanted to say, the coolness she wanted to display, never managed to show itself when he was around. Today, in fact, marked the most she’d ever said to him in public, and that was only because Devlin had stripped away her choice. She sucked in a deep breath to find her voice.
“It always was like you to make fun of what you don’t understand.” She straightened her shoulders and stared over the pond rather than meet his eyes, but she felt them upon her. “I don’t intend to ‘slather cream,’ as you put it, on loggers. I intend to, along with the rest of Smitten’s women, make this town the romantic capital of the East Coast. Any town oozing this kind of quaintness and a ski lodge needs an upscale spa.”
“No one ‘needs’ a spa. You’ve been living in New York for too long if you believe that. This town needs to work. That’s a need, but I’m willing to support you rather than bring in outsider money. That will only corrupt Smitten.”
“Devlin has a few million dollars that make that statement patently untrue. Plenty of his clients believe taking care of themselves is a necessary part of life.”
“Patently . . . what?” He shook his head at her.
“Why have you always been so mean to me?”
“Mean to you? When was I ever mean to you?”
Her breathing quickened. “Never mind. I thought maybe Devlin’s professional eye saw something I’d missed here, but my first thought was correct.” She stood and brushed the back of her dress again. She bent her leg and leaned against the top of the Adirondack while she emptied her shoe out again.
“You probably think Sawyer’s wedding won’t put us in the spotlight, but I can tell you, romance means something to women, and this wedding means a great deal to Smitten.”
“On the contrary, we’re already on the map. Sawyer did this for Smitten, you know. He loves this town.”
“All the men do, right? I know how you feel about the women’s plans for Smitten.”
“I don’t think you do,” he said in a low, lumberjack growl.
He tugged at her hand. “Sit down a minute.”
She felt the hair on her arms stand on end. She refused to sit, so he stood closer. So close that she could feel the heat from his expansive chest. “I need to go. If Devlin leaves with all his money, so do my hopes.”
“We all have plans for Smitten. You girls aren’t alone in what you want. You realize that?”
“I do, but what you’ve done in the past hasn’t worked, Zak.
It’s time we did something different.” She pulled open the door and walked into the darkened restaurant.
Zak was right on her heels. “You girls, we appreciate what you’re trying to do, but, Julia . . . that guy.” He bounced his forefinger toward the door. “He’s an interloper you don’t need.
We
don’t need. You bring in foreign money and you answer to it. That’s the last thing Smitten needs. We’re hanging on by a string as it is, and I don’t like the way he talks to you. Who the heck does he think he is? When have you ever been a quiet little mouse of a person? He ruins you, Julia.
Don’t you see that?”
“You’re wrong about Devlin. He’s just used to having his way, that’s all. You should understand that. He runs the most successful spa in Manhattan, and he wants to create the same sort of ambience here.” She gazed across the room. “Clearly, no matter of plastic surgery is capable of making that happen in this building. But don’t get me wrong—I wish you all the luck in the world with whatever you have planned. I’ll just get out of your way.” She walked toward the door, and again he grasped her wrist.
“I’ll lend you the money to do what you need to do here.”
She couldn’t pry her eyes from his hand wrapped around her wrist. Had he ever touched her before today? “Where would you get that kind of money?”
“That’s a personal question, and the answer is none of your business, but I have it, and in case you haven’t noticed, the banks aren’t too keen on lending when you don’t have any collateral. Especially to a new business in a town as dead as a doornail.”
“No offense, Zak, but I’d rather have an ‘interloper’s’ money than answer to you. If you believe my idea is so ridiculous, why would you want to lend me money to make it happen?”
That wasn’t actually the truth, and she went hot with guilt, but she didn’t correct herself. Zak scared her with his bravado, and she saw herself sweating over a spreadsheet trying to explain the cost of organic cleansers.
“Don’t be proud, Julia. Why would some guy from New York want to start a business in this Podunk town? Does it occur to you to question his motives?”
She blinked away her rising tide of emotion. “I was his best student. I learned the spa business faster than anyone he’d ever hired. He recognizes vision, what we women of Smitten are doing to change the village, and he sees the financial opportunity.”
“You believe that,” he chuckled, “then I have a very successful mill I’d like to sell you. Well, it was successful fifty-odd years ago.”
“I don’t have any reason to question his motives. I love this town. And with the passion I feel for Smitten and for taking care of oneself with clean living, how could I fail?”
Zak held open his hands. “Look around you. Are you saying I didn’t love this town? And what do you see? A shell of a functional business. Ski season isn’t enough to keep us going all year long. In the meantime, I work on ways to get that plant back open while you girls pin your hopes on a dream. Without a new hit song we can’t even count on Sawyer, if the truth be told.”
“That’s why we have to do something different. We prayed, Zak, and I believe God wants us to do this. He wants to see Smitten flourish, and what better way than to blossom in love?”
“If only wishes were dollar bills . . .”
“Zak.” She let her hand grasp his. “Are you worried?”
Because she didn’t think she could take seeing Zak falter.
She watched his Adam’s apple twitch.
“I am worried, but that doesn’t mean I’ve given over reason. Lose that guy, Julia. You got his advice, that’s all you need. He says the spa should be here. If you want help, take mine. You know I’d never do anything to hurt you. Your brother would have my neck.”
She wanted to agree, but she didn’t dare. Zak Grant would break her heart again and again. He’d never look upon her as more than a little sister, and she didn’t want that kind of help.
Charity
.
“I need to get over to the coffee shop. Sorry to have disturbed you.” She ran across the darkened restaurant, and her heel caught in the plank floor. The ground rose up to meet her, but Zak’s bulging arms came out of nowhere, caught her, and set her upright. He kept his hands around her waist, and she didn’t dare move, didn’t dare breathe. She hoped he couldn’t feel how hot she was from nerves under her dress.
“Julia, I think he’s right.”
“Who’s right?”
“Devil, or whatever his stupid city name is. This place has everything you need for a spa. I’ll rent you half the building, help you make the improvements, and if you don’t make it, you can turn it into a dog wash and bathe the hounds of Smitten. It won’t hurt me, and if you owe me money at the end, you can work it off washing dishes. Or maybe we could use the hot tub to soak the ribs in beer overnight. You’re going to have a hot tub, right?”
“It has everything, except for an ounce of femininity, a total renovation, a water fountain, a fireplace, a—” She felt his arms release from her waist.
“I told you I’d help with that, but you do what you need to do. You’ve known me since grade school, and if you don’t trust me by now, you never will.”
She tried to make sense of her thoughts. “Precisely. Who I’ve known is a guy who pulled my ponytail, tattled on me to Mrs. Swindoll, and forgot he ever knew me once he joined the football team and I the chemistry team.”
“Okay, I’ll give you that. But I pulled your ponytail because I thought you were cute, and you ignored me. I tattled on you to Mrs. Swindoll because you let her class turtle go during logging season and I didn’t want it to get hit by a truck. The least you could have done was let it go near the pond! And when you joined the chemistry team, I knew you were too smart for my blood. Your brother always told me so.
All right? Trust me now?”
“You pulled my ponytail because you liked me?” She tapped her peep-toe shoe on his work boot.
“Wipe that smile off your face. I was young, and I’d never seen a girl with dimples, or one whose bow matched her dress every day. I was, in a word, smitten.”
“Smitten?” She grinned in the way that accentuated her dimples in all their glory.
“Stop.” Zak shook his head. “Dimples are a birth defect, you know.”
She sighed.
“Besides, then your brother told me you picked your nose and wet your bed.”
“He what? You didn’t believe him!”
“Maybe I did. I was ten. It sounded reasonable.”
“I have to go.”
He paused, his mouth slightly open, but he said nothing.
She’d never seen Zak Grant display the slightest sign of vulnerability, and the sight caught her off guard and forced her to question what she knew to be true: that the men of Smitten were he-men, woman-haters of
Little Rascals
lore, who needed to rule over women to be in partnership with them.
“If Devlin won’t give you the money and you won’t take it from me, will you run back to New York and leave your mom?”
“Well, I have to find a way to support myself. If I can’t do it here, I suppose I will run back to New York. I can’t babysit Mia forever, even though I love that little girl like she’s my own. She’ll be back in school in the fall and Nat will have no need of me.”
He nodded, his jaw set.
“Tell me something—does that sound committed to this town to you?” He waved her off, grabbed up his blueprints, and disappeared through the kitchen’s double doors.
That wasn’t how she thought at all, but what good would it do to explain it to Zak Grant? He’d made up his mind about her a long time ago, and as his “little sister” all that was left for her was to watch him date the town’s next beauty queen.
Julia walked out the door. She’d have to hike the quarter mile of Main Street to the coffee shop in her stilettos, feeling utterly ridiculous. She couldn’t get her mind off of Zak and his warped opinion of her. Not that it should matter.
She squeezed the lavender wreath Mia had made. The little girl’s faith reminded Julia that the women of Smitten weren’t acting alone.
She walked back to the plank sidewalk and placed the wreath on the red double doors of the Smitten Grill. Did the wreath belong there? Had pride clouded her judgment? She left it there on the door. She could always get it later.
J
ulia walked slowly up Main Street, her heels clacking along the brick walkway. She noted how beautifully the town was coming along, with the giant clock in the center of town garnished with a giant version of Mia’s wreath. That little girl was really something special.