Sweet Home Carolina (13 page)

“The
Olympics
,”
Amy breathed with awe.

Jacques brushed aside his self-deprecation to bask in her admiration
a little. He was no longer an athlete and people seldom cared if he had been,
but he was prouder of the innocent accomplishments of his youth than of the
mercenary prizes he’d accumulated since. “Only once,” he reminded her.
“Training for events kept me from terrorizing my parents.” Or vice versa, but
his dysfunctional home life was not a subject worth dwelling on.

“That’s what I need — coaches to keep John and Adam busy
every minute of the day. Put that on our wish list, Jo,” Flint said through a
mouthful of golden biscuit.

The others laughed and jested, but Jacques watched Amy’s
wistful expression as she gazed upon her own children. He remembered that
feeling of pride in Danielle’s accomplishments, wondering if he should hire
coaches or teachers so she might be all that she promised to be. He’d thrilled
at her first steps and words, her determination to ride a pony, her willingness
to fall asleep in his arms rather than let him go anywhere without her.

The familiar knife of pain ripped through his heart as he
once again remembered that life cut too short. He clenched his back teeth to
prevent the pang of anguish and looked around brightly for a different subject.

“So, Mrs. Sanderson,” he addressed Amy’s mother. “You have
worked many years in the mill, but you are too young to remember their Early
American designs from the sixties. Are there others here I might ask?”

Sipping a soft drink, Marie studied him as if trying to
decide if his flattery was worth answering. Her cropped graying blond hair framed
a weathered face more angular than Amy’s. But her eyes were sharp and watchful.

“I was a kid then,” she answered slowly, “but I remember my
mother covering all the living room furniture in that ugly brown and orange.
The mills had bolts of that fabric left even after I started there. What do you
want with it?”

“Mama, I asked you about those designs earlier,” Amy
protested.

“So, I forgot.” Marie looked unrepentant.

Jacques took that to mean she purposefully forgot to mention
the fabric. For what reason? Him? He could understand that. How could he
persuade her to trust him?

“What goes around, comes around, madam,” he said carelessly,
hoping to hide his interest. “The
toile
de Jouy
print has been back for some years. I prefer to work with original
design rather than imitation.”

“Oh, these were original, all right. Tiny colonial figures
and clapboard farmhouses and sailing ships we never saw in these mountains. I
always thought they ought to do dogwoods and rhododendrons and outhouses. Maybe
some figures in overalls.”

“Dogwoods aren’t historical, Mama,” Amy said in amusement.

“That’s a matter of opinion,” Marie answered gruffly, but
apparently accepting Amy’s comment as approval of Jacques’s search, she
continued. “Last I saw, all those old pattern cards and platens were in the
wooden chest they used for a window seat over in Building Two, but don’t be
surprised if someone decided they’d make good kindling and scrap metal. That
old barn was cold, and we were always poor.”

Startled that she actually claimed to have seen and
recognized the cards, Jacques almost didn’t respond. “Building Two?” he finally
regained the sense to ask.

“The Music Barn,” Amy said with excitement. “The mill sold
the equipment in there a decade ago. Flint, do you remember an old wooden chest
in the barn?”

Dragged away from his conversation with Pascal, Flint had to
stop and think before responding. “There’s a window seat filled with junk. Does
that count? Jo covered it in cushions.”

“That must be it!” Jacques jumped up from the chair, winced,
then gestured excitedly at Luigi. “We must see if they’re still there. Come
along, Amy; show us where to look.”

Instead of leaping up in excitement, she lifted one lovely
arched eyebrow, glanced around at all the people talking and eating, and
remained where she was. “What’s your hurry? The cards aren’t going anywhere.”

A smirking Luigi settled deeper in his chair while Pascal
returned to his discussion of country music.

Jacques clenched fists of frustration. “We could finish the
bid tonight if I knew for fact that the cards are there. It is what we’ve been
looking for all week. Don’t you want to see if they exist?”

Watching this interaction, Amy had to admit, if she was
honest about it, she didn’t. She was enjoying this escape from reality. The
flirting and attention reminded her that she was still female and apparently
attractive. That kiss had stirred her sleeping hormones into a restless hive of
bees. She didn’t want to go back to attempting to outbid a man who had access
to more money than Midas.

She didn’t want the most excitement she’d seen in years to
depart the moment they had what they were looking for. And if she really had to
be truthful, that meant she didn’t want to see Jacques leave — at least not until
she got to know the woman Jacques saw in her.

Which meant she’d slipped into fantasy again, and she’d
better kick his ass out of here as fast as she could, find the cards, and hope
he went away. Soon. Reluctantly, she rose from her chair.

“Everyone is entitled to a day off,” she reminded him, nodding
at his entourage. If she was going to be reduced to begging to save the mill,
she didn’t want an audience. “Let your friends relax. If Jo will look after the
kids, I’ll drive you over. It won’t take long to verify the cards are what you
want, will it?”

“We came in your SUV, remember?” Jo shot down that
suggestion. “If you linger too long, we’ll be out here when the drunks take
over.”

“We will take my car,” Jacques said with his usual
arrogance. “Amy will drive, and I will rest my knee as promised. Luigi can
drive the others when they are ready to return to Asheville. I have my room
here. It will all work out, you see?”

Amy saw, all right. She saw Luigi grimace and Pascal look
amused. Jacques’s type A personality was no doubt running roughshod over all their
plans.

But she wanted this over. She wanted Jacques out of her life
before she did something stupid. She wanted to know if life as she knew it was
about to end. The mill wasn’t that far away. They could be back within the
hour.

“Where’s your car?” she asked in resignation. She thought
he’d arrived in the Hummer. That’s what Luigi had been driving him around in
all week, but he surely couldn’t mean she should drive that. Catarina and
friends would be stranded.

“Over there, on the far side of the Hummer.” Jacques caught
her arm in one hand and the walking stick in the other. Displaying more
strength than Hoss on a good day, he proceeded to haul her toward his goal and
away from the safety of family.

Amy dug in her heels, refusing to let the locomotive on his
one-track mind run over her. She kissed the kids and reassured them that Aunt
Jo would be right there until she got back. Since they worshipped their cousins
Johnnie and Adam, Josh and Louisa accepted her reassurances without protest.

Amy was the one who protested when she saw where Jacques was
leading her.

On the far side of the Hummer, a group of men surrounded a
low-slung dark vehicle that looked as if it could reach outer space. She hadn’t
seen the Porsche since Jacques had hurt his knee. Apparently he’d had Luigi
drive the sports car here rather than ride with the others today.

“I am not driving that car.” She came to an abrupt halt,
almost tripping Jacques in his hurry to cross the lot.

“Don’t you know a stick shift?”

“My Ranger spits at me if I look at it cross-eyed. I’m not
about to touch anything that runs on computers and costs more than a house.”

“Don’t be foolish. It is an engine with wheels. I will
drive, if you wish. I suppose it’s not so hard if I do not use the clutch too often.”

Amy imagined careening down the mountain road to the mill
without a clutch pedal and closed her eyes in denial. “You are going to regret
this,” she warned.

“Oh, I seriously doubt that,” he murmured huskily against
her ear, his breath dancing her earring against her neck as he opened the door
and helped her in to the tune of admiring whispers. She stifled a shiver of
pleasure. Who knew earrings could be so erotic?

She respected his tenacity in maintaining his playboy act
until he had what he really wanted. All she had to do was pretend she was
accustomed to it. Jacques seriously misunderstood the situation if he thought
they were sallying off for an intimate rendezvous. She didn’t do
intimate
or
rendezvouz
. They were heading for a showdown.

Sinking into the driver’s luxurious seat, she stared at the
cockpit of gleaming dials set in the sumptuous leather of the dash and almost
cried. Already, she was at a disadvantage.

“I garden with a hand hoe,” she told Jacques when he lowered
himself into the passenger seat with the judicious use of his cane. “I sew
quilts by hand and weave on handlooms. I do not touch computers or DVDs or
anything that goes buzz or bing.”

He laughed, wrapped his arm over the back of her seat, and
leaned over to indicate the ignition. Just his proximity caused alarms in Amy’s
head to buzz and bing.

“It practically drives itself,” he assured her. “You will
see. We will be there and back before anyone notices we are gone.”

“You have no idea how very wrong you are.” With a sigh, Amy
pushed the ignition, and the powerful engine roared to life.

Men backed out of the way as she eased down on the clutch
and the gas. The race car tires scratched gravel and flew forward without a
hitch, except for an insistent
bing,
bing, bing
from one of the instruments.

Jacques hunted for the source of the binging sound to hide
his frustration. Amy cautiously eased the car’s brutal engine down the road at
the speed of a child’s pony. He wanted his knee back so he could show her what
the car could do. “There’s no one out here. You can go faster,” he
remonstrated. “Enjoy a beautiful machine.”

“You may as well tell me to enjoy a rocket launcher,” she
replied, her knuckles white on the steering wheel. “Next time, I’ll let you
ruin your knee on the damned clutch. What possessed you to drive this monster
up here?”

“It takes curves like a dream. We’ll drive it up the
mountain someday, and you will see. It is like a magic carpet ride.” They could
put the top down and let the wind blow her hair and color her cheeks and make
her laugh like a girl. And then he would kiss her again until both their heads
spun.

His head was still spinning from that last kiss. He wanted
to see if they could do that again — if he could persuade her to throw caution
to the winds and just let life happen.

“Give me real carpets any day,” she argued. “They’re at
least useful.”

“Magic is about beauty and dreams. These things are useful
in their own way. One needs to step back from grim reality occasionally to
appreciate the wonders of the world.”

“It’s a trifle difficult for the rest of us to live on
dreams. Right now, I don’t want to imagine paying for this car for the rest of
my life if anything should happen to it.”

“It’s insured,” he said with a careless gesture. “But
nothing will happen. Maybe a few dings from the gravel. You fret too much.”

“You fret too little. As Aesop points out, there’s a reason
grasshoppers who fiddle away the summer don’t last to see spring, while ants
who work to store food survive.”

He kept his arm over her seat back, enjoying the familiarity
of brushing her shoulder while leaning over to read the dials. The sun through
the windshield formed a warm cocoon around their little nest of leather and
chrome. “Aesop was a pessimist. People bring food to my door in return for my
fiddling. A woman like you shouldn’t have to worry over such things.”

She tensed so tightly when he stroked her bare arm that he
feared she would bite his ear off. He blew teasingly on a strand of warm brown
hair curling on her forehead and watched the sunlight dance on her gold hoops.
She hit the brake, and he laughed.

“What will you do if you find the pattern cards?” she
demanded.

“Do you think to drive the thought of kisses out of my
mind?” he teased, caressing her shoulder with his fingertips.

“There will be no more kisses,” she said firmly, keeping her
eyes on the road and her hands in a death grip on the wheel. “If I’m helping
you to find those cards, I have a right to know what you mean to do with them.”

She meant to force the issue she’d brought up the other day,
one he did not want to discuss with a lady he wished to seduce.

“I will produce beautiful fabrics, of course. Or the company
will, after I write the program.” He knew this wasn’t what she wanted to know,
but he wasn’t prepared for candor. “I am not a thief. I am willing to pay well
for what I want, so do not worry so.”

“If all you want is the cards, why don’t you work with the
mill committee? With your wealth, we could buy back the whole property and put
it into production by Christmas. You could have your cards and designs, and we
could have our jobs back.”

Jacques sighed and sat back where he belonged. He truly
didn’t want to have this discussion now, but she left him little choice. “The
wealth is not my own. I have a company and stockholders who expect a good
return on their investment. I have seen your plan. It is a bad investment.”

He waited for her angry argument. Instead, the
binging
noise became a more insistent
clang. Frowning, Jacques checked the instrument panel again, then opened the
dash for the manual while she summoned her forces. He had no expectation that
even a woman smelling of jasmine would leave the subject alone.

“Investing in people, in your community, is never a bad
investment,” she argued. “The returns just aren’t necessarily monetary, not at
first. The money comes later, when the economy stabilizes. You have to plan for
the future.”