Sweet Home Carolina (15 page)

At the noise of a heavy vehicle roaring around the bend and
throwing up gravel on the road, Jacques leaned over and gently suckled at sweet
buds to ease both their needs, just a little. Then, with regret, he rehooked
her garments and rolled onto his back.

He needed to slide back into the river to douse his
throbbing erection. He hadn’t been this uncontrolled since….

Since Gabrielle.

That dashed an icy bucket of water over his raging libido.

Amy retired to the Music Barn’s restroom, ostensibly to
clean up after the accident. In reality, she needed private time to fall apart.

Staring at her reflection in the fluorescent light of the
renovated Music Barn, she gripped the porcelain sink and tried not to shatter
into a thousand bits. Her breasts were on fire. Her panties were wet. Parts of
her that even Evan had left unstirred ached with hunger. Men shouldn’t have
hard muscles like Jacques’s. They made a woman weak.

That was half the problem. She was a woman now, not the
child she’d been when she’d met Evan. She had a grown woman’s desires for a
mature adult male. A raging river of yearning scoured her insides — including
her brain, obviously — leaving her hollow of everything but need.

Outside the restroom, she could hear Jacques ordering Luigi
about as if nothing had ever happened. He could wield his charm like a sword to
challenge people, or he could use it to purr and persuade. That he used honesty
and logic — despite his obvious reluctance to admit the truth — was far more
devastating.

With a character as strong as his, he could lead men into
enemy fire. He’d said everything she hadn’t wanted to hear, and still, she’d
kissed him. The man was terrifying.

She was terrified. She wasn’t the kind of woman who rolled
in the grass half naked. But the grass stains on her Liz Claibornes said
otherwise.

She’d forgotten how it felt to be held and loved. Her
breasts had forgotten the wonderful arousal of a man’s caress. She refused to heed
the physical craving gripping her lower parts. She could not get involved with
a man who would be here today and gone tomorrow, probably killing all her
dreams while he was at it. Her mother had done that, and look how horribly that
had turned out.

She ignored the niggling voice that said a hasty hot affair
would burn out these desires quickly enough. She knew herself better than that.
She would do emotional back flips and turn herself into a pretzel for any man
she chose to go to bed with. So not going there again.

Then what had just happened out there?

Jacques had happened. He was the salt that made the water
boil over. She had no business driving exotic race cars or kissing a fancy
stranger who could charm a cardinal from a cherry tree. She was the kind of
girl who went to church on Sundays and baked cupcakes for school parties. She
was way over her head trying to deal with this charismatic James Bond.

He charmed with words she wanted to hear, and she believed
them — because he was honest with words she
didn’t
want to hear.

Amy rolled her eyes at her reflection, pulled a wet wipe
from her purse, and tried to wash the evidence of her stupidity from her face.
Maybe the Sanderson women had some kind of malfunctioning gene when it came to
smooth-talking men. Her mother had fallen for a good-looking musician who’d
walked away one day and never returned. Jo had fallen for two slick bastards
before getting smart and landing salt-of-the-earth Flint. Amy had been sensible
in choosing stable, sturdy Evan, but even that hadn’t worked.

Except Evan had consistently lied to her. And Jacques had
been brutally honest.

Excited shouts in the plant warned that she was missing the
action. She’d have to quit hiding.

Flint had brought Luigi in his pickup with a hitch for
pulling out the Porsche, but once Luigi had seen the car, he’d decided to call
a tow truck rather than risk more damage. She shuddered at the image of that
beautiful ruined car in the ravine.

From the exclamations in the other room, she gathered
Jacques had now found what he wanted. She wouldn’t be seeing him again. That
was fine. That was more than fine. That was
safe
.

She scraped the dirt off her shirt and shorts where she
could, tucked her shirttails into her waistband, ran a comb through her hair,
and threw back her shoulders like a soldier marching off to war. After what
they’d done, she just didn’t think she could look Jacques in the eye once she
went back out there.

The instant she walked into the cavernous building, Jacques
waved enthusiastically, and she was hooked all over again. In one hand he held
an ancient wooden pattern card, and in the other, the cardboard versions
mechanically punched out in the sixties.

“It is a treasure trove!” he shouted, referring to the
once-upholstered window seat the men had torn apart in their search.

He’d thrown off his muddied sports coat in the unair-conditioned
heat. His trousers were filthier than hers. He had a bruise forming on his
forehead, and twigs in the mink-brown hair brushing his nape. And he looked
happier than a child with a brand new bike.

“Museum pieces!” he called in ecstasy. “Some of these designs
have not seen the light of day in decades, maybe centuries.”

How was she supposed to resist a man who could be as
thrilled with an old-fashioned fabric design as she could?

“At least the seventies,” she said, tongue in cheek, taking
the mechanized cards from his hand. Reading the design in the cards was as
impossible as reading the data on a punch card. The wooden cards from before
the turn of the twentieth century were even more fascinating and impractical.
No wonder her mother had called them junk.

Luigi and Flint merely poked with disinterest through the
window seat. Jacques sprawled out his injured leg to lay the flat wooden plates
out on the floor in some futile attempt to determine their relationship with
one another.

The town couldn’t afford to keep museum pieces like that.
With a lump in her throat, Amy kneeled on the other side of the cards. She
didn’t want to get caught up in his excitement. The town’s future demanded that
she remain businesslike.

It was damned hard to do while sitting near a man whose
shoulders strained the seams of his expensive shirt. Just the dark hair on his
forearms had her remembering how those muscled limbs had felt around her.

She wanted to return to their earlier argument, but she
doubted if he’d even hear her, so intense was his concentration.

It was contagious. Fascinated in spite of herself, she
skimmed the wooden plates with her fingers, wondering how many hands had
touched them, what kind of mind had created this bit of brilliance so long ago.
“Can you really determine the patterns without building a loom and running the
design?” She used to do her own weaving, had created her own design cards, but
even she couldn’t see the whole without threads.

“Computers,” he muttered, looking for markings on the
plates. “We match the holes using my software program. Designs are done on CAD/CAM
these days, but we can translate these once the computer matches the order.”

“Wouldn’t it be simpler to just copy the design from the
material you already have?”

“I have a few pieces, a few patterns. I do not have them
all. And it is better to have the actual weft pattern. My business depends on
historical accuracy.”

“How much do you think they’re worth?” she asked, then
kicked herself when Jacques’s dark eyes sent her a laughing look. As if he
would tell her. So much for businesslike.

“To me, they are priceless. To anyone else, they are junk.”

Damn if her hormones didn’t have her head spinning when he
looked at her like that — with respect for her knowledge. Maybe she ought to go
to bed with him — or somebody — so she could think straight again.

“Then let us have the mill, like I said earlier, and we’ll
sell the patterns to you at a price that won’t make your board of directors
flinch.” She waved her hand grandly. “Everyone wins.” Apparently some part of
her head still worked. That was a realistic suggestion.

Jacques glanced up as if she’d startled him out of deep
thought, then shook his head. “Amy, you are an
amazingly
stubborn woman.” His voice trailed off as he returned his
concentration to the cards.

She had no idea what he meant by that. She’d always done
what Evan had told her. That didn’t sound like stubborn. Hiding hopes that they
could still make a deal, she stuck with the tangible. “Is it safe to leave them
here? Should we take them to the bankruptcy judge and ask that he lock them
up?”

Jacques sent her an admiring look that almost had her
melting between the wide cracks of the worn floor.

“They have been here a very long time. I would say they are
safe, but — ”

“The river floods, word gets out, things happen,” Flint said
gruffly, coming to stand over them. “I vote we lock up the junk.”

“The river floods?” Jacques began hurriedly stacking the
aging cardboard as if the river would steal it before he could escape.

“It doesn’t flood often, and it hasn’t rained in a month, so
I think we’re safe,” Flint said gravely, the hard planes of his face
effectively concealing his smile.

His movie star looks expressing relief, Jacques rose stiffly
and dusted off his knees. Bent over like that, he exposed the grass and mud
stains of his ruined trouser seat.

She bit back a snicker, but he seemed to hear her anyway.
Straightening, he cast her a sideways glance, then turned and checked the back
of his trousers. He made a wryly Gallic expression, brushed ineffectively at
the stains, and then shrugged his broad shoulders.

“But a storm could come up any time,” Flint continued,
ignoring their byplay. “The last hurricane through here wiped out a lot of
houses and changed the river’s path. Better to be safe than sorry.”

“These are mountains,” Jacques protested. “How can you have
hurricanes in mountains?”

“It happens, usually when one comes up from the Gulf.”
Standing, Amy looked around for containers to carry the priceless cards.
Anything but look at Jacques, who was dashing even wearing muddy pants. Evan
had carried a lot of fat around his middle. His back had never formed a V from
broad shoulders to narrow hips like Jacques’s did. And she shouldn’t be
noticing. Or aching to dust his butt. “It doesn’t take much to make the river
flood.”

Together, they scavenged the buildings for file drawers and
crates to carry the heavy old plates, rollers, and boxes of cards. When they
ran out of room, Jacques used his expertise to choose the pieces to be left
behind. Amy had the feeling that if he could stuff them in his pockets and down
his shirt like valuable jewels, he would. He shut the lid on the window seat
with obvious regret — more regret than he’d displayed for the smashed Porsche.
The man was a fascinating contrast of ideals.

Now that Jacques had found his prize, no one seemed willing
to talk of it. Had he said one word about putting the mill back in operation,
questions would have flown. Amy filled the strained silence with small talk.

“I need a pickup like this to start hauling stuff down to
the apartment,” she mused aloud, climbing into the narrow backseat of Flint’s
extended cab. “I don’t think I can get the mattresses into our SUV.”

Flint slid in beside her, letting Luigi drive and leaving
the larger front passenger seat for Jacques and his stiff knee. “You can use
this truck if you want. We ought to trade. The boys are getting too big for
backseats like this.”

“Child seats would fit back here, wouldn’t they?” She’d rather
talk of anything than wonder what was behind Jacques’s studious frown right
now.

“Yup, and still have room for groceries. There’s just no
room for legs.” Flint squeezed sideways to stretch his into her space.

Flint was a good-looking, muscular hunk, and Amy could see
why her sister adored him. But their legs were touching, she was practically
sitting in his lap, and she didn’t feel an iota of excitement. Jacques, on the
other hand, was as far from her as he could be, and his every move and gesture
raised goose bumps of awareness.

“I’ve been thinking of trading in the SUV.” She continued
the desultory conversation rather than shout sense at Jacques. He wouldn’t
listen to her anyway.

“I’ll make you a good deal,” Flint offered, continuing the
pretense that they hadn’t just terminated the town’s dream. Or maybe he was so
oblivious he didn’t understand what Jacques meant to do. “My pickup for your
gas-guzzler, plus the difference in blue book value.”

She nodded agreement. “Elise can draw up something if you
talk Jo into it. Maybe we ought to work out rent on the apartment. I might have
to move in for a while.”

“You are moving?” Jacques swung around in the seat and
pierced her with his sharpshooter gaze.

“I’ve sold my house,” she said with as much dignity and composure
as she could manage. “So if the insurance company intends to sue me over your
car, they’ll get nothing.”

“The car is nothing but metal and plastic,” he said
dismissively. “It obviously had faulty wiring. My lawyers will threaten their
lawyers. It’s no matter. Why sell your house if you have no place to go?”

“Your
car
cost as
much as my house,” she said tightly. She wasn’t relieved at his dismissiveness.
“I blew up your car! We could have been killed. Don’t tell me it’s no matter.”

Tight-lipped, Jacques turned to Flint. “She is avoiding the
subject. Why is she selling her house?”

Flint bared his teeth in the grin that had won Jo’s heart.
“Jo says Amy blows up things when she’s upset. We didn’t want her blowing up a
house.”

Amy’s first impulse was to protest, but then she realized
that in his own foolishly male mind, Flint was protecting her. She wasn’t too
proud to admit that she couldn’t afford her house, but she’d rather not show
Jacques any sign of weakness.