What The Heart Knows (3 page)

There
was an assortment of artisanal soaps on the vanity from a local
business in town. Which was charming. And smart business. People were
really into local, organic goods. The shampoo and conditioner sample
sizes in the shower were expensive brands. Which was also smart.

He
moved back into the bedroom, wondering what would possess someone to
make such good choices in the toiletries and such poor choices in
decorating. Maybe it was simply something as simple as money issues.
Which would no longer be a problem with EM Corporation footing the
bill. The sky would be the limit in upgrades.

He
walked toward the window, opening it and looking out on the town.
There was a crashing sound in the hallway, followed by Emily's voice,
“Damn it damn it damn it,” she said, and he heard her
walking closer, then rapping on his door.

Curiously,
he walked over and opened it. There she was, rubbing her knee with
one of her hands. There was some kind of bottle in the other. “You
alright?” he asked, not even trying to mask the humor in his
voice.

“Fine,”
she snapped. Of course he heard her fall. “Here,” she
said, holding out a bottle of scotch to him. “this is for you.
I was under direct orders to bring it to you myself,” she said,
angry. Freaking Eric O'reilly. She was going to make him pay for that
little prank some day.

James
took the bottle, finding a note attached and opening it. He smiled,
reading it out loud.
“If you're going to be dealing with Em
on a daily basis, you're going to need every drop of this. - Eric”

“That's
Lena's boyfriend,” Emily supplied.

“Yeah,
I know,” James said. Of course he knew. He worked with Lena for
years before she decided to fall in love with the local mechanic and
start a baking business. Of all things. “He's a wise man,”
James said, smiling at her.

“He's
a moron,” Emily rolled her eyes. “Besides,” she
said, crossing her arms. “I got two dozen brownies from Lena
for having to deal with you.”

“Trade
you a shot for a brownie,” James said, holding up the bottle.

“Not
a chance in hell, pretty boy,” she shook her head.

“Pretty,
huh? I thought you said I'm not your type.”

She
hated him. Right then and there, no matter how attractive he was, or
how charming... she hated him. She needed to go downstairs and plow
into those brownies until she wasn't thinking about pushing him into
that room and tearing his clothes off. Which, she was totally
convinced, was a normal reaction to hating someone.

She
needed to calm herself down. It was only hour one and she was already
losing her cool. If he wasn't so cocky she might have been able to
just let it slide. Cocky. Good looking. Fun sense of style. He was
exactly her type.

“You're
not,” she said, her tone not even convincing to her own ears.

James
raised a brow. “Tell you what,” he started. “you go
binge eat... six or so of those brownies to try to feel better about
your overwhelming attraction to me...” he held up a hand as she
opened her mouth to object again. He had her number and she knew it.
“and then meet me downstairs for a tour in say... thirty
minutes?”

Emily
lifted her chin. Orders. He was giving her orders. They were phrased
like a question, but they were orders. So it was starting. She
slipped a sickeningly sweet hospitality smile on her face. “I
would enjoy nothing more than showing you all the exits from the
building,” she said and turned to walk away.

“Miss.
Brennan.”

Of
course he wasn't going to let her have the last word. Or her haughty
little exit. She took a deep breath and turned, eyebrow raised.

“Game
on,” he said, the side of his lips turned up slightly.

Oh,
that bastard.

Three

Emily
stormed into the kitchen a moment later, knocking into one of the
servers carrying a handful of dirty dishes toward the dishwasher.

“He's
that bad, huh?” Meggie, the main cook asked as she stirred
something on the stove.

Meggie
was a transplant. She showed up in Stars Landing one day with her
fancy culinary degree and an ability to deal with Marion's mood
swings about the menu. She was incredibly short and just shy of
overweight. She had a tendency to put a hand to her belly and call
her weight “extra padding” with a sweet sort of fondness.
She was pretty with her round face and huge green eyes. Her blonde
hair was always pulled ruthlessly into a French braid to adhere to
health code guidelines, but the softness of her face made her able to
pull the look off.

“I
hate him,” Emily said, dramatically, reaching for one of the
brownies and stuffing half of it in her mouth.

“Devon
was back here and he said you had ga-ga eyes over him,” Meggie
said, turning away from the stove, a hand on her hip.

“Oh,
please,” Emily said, waving the brownie around. “He's
rich, arrogant...”

“Honey,
he's a fine piece of man candy. Him being aware of it doesn't make it
any less true ,” Maude said, walking into the kitchen,
completely ignoring the sign that it was for employees only. “How's
that minestrone coming along, Meggie?” she asked, reaching to
steal one of Emily's brownies.

“How
did you...” Meggie started, then laughed at herself. Never
question the town psychic. “It will be ready in twenty,”
she said, shaking her head.

“I'm
still mad at you,” Emily told Maude, putting the rest of her
first brownie in her mouth.

Maude
sat down, smiling in a detached kind of way. “Girl, you can't
blame a woman for having a little fun.”

“When
it's at my expense, I can,” Emily objected, reaching for
another brownie.

“Not
my fault you can't keep that mouth of yours under control.”

“Is
he really that good looking?” Meg asked, wiggling her eyebrows
and making Emily snort.

Maude
smiled wickedly. “Girl, if I was ten years younger...”

“And
he wasn't such an insufferable jerk...” Emily added.

“You're
just mad because he's gonna give you a run for your money,”
Maude said, patting Emily's hand. “You've always had it a bit
too easy with the menfolk around here. They all eat out of the palm
of your hand. Which is why you always get bored and kick them to the
curb. Now this man...”

“Oh
my god,” Emily said, standing up and moving toward the coffee
machine. “I am not interested in him.”

Maude
laughed to herself, standing. “We'll just see about that,
missy.”

“Take
that back,” Emily said, watching her move toward the door.
“Take that voodoo witchy curse back.”

Maude
threw her head back, laughing. “Girl, I ain't playing no hand
in this. You're gonna get into a mess with that boy all on your own.”

“You
know she's not a witch,” Meg said as Maude left.

“I
know,” Emily grumbled, sipping the too hot coffee and burning
her tongue. “but whenever she says shit like that, it ends up
happening.”

“Oh,
I don't know,” Meggie said, her eyes a little dreamy. “would
it be so bad to have a little fling with Mr. Boss Man?”

“Okay,”
Emily said, reaching for a pile of forks still hot from the
dishwasher and putting them away. “you have a fling with him
then.”

Meggie
smiled, turning back to her soup. “That's not in the cards for
me, I'm afraid.”

“Cards?”
Emily asked, turning suspiciously. “Did you go to Maude for a
love reading? Really, Meggie? I expected better of you.”

Meggie
laughed. “Tell me this: in the past five years, when has she
been wrong about a love connection in this town?”

Never.
She had never been wrong. “Well...”

“Exactly,”
Meggie said, waving a spoon at her.

“Well,”
Emily said, looking at the clock with a frown. “She's wrong
about me and James Michaels. That's for damn sure.” She was
five minutes late. On purpose. She wanted to keep him waiting. “I
gotta take him on a tour,” she said, scrunching her nose up at
the thought. “I'll bring him by so you can see he's really not
that good looking.”

She
walked out toward reception, hearing Devon and James discussing some
sort of obscure art exhibit in the city. In Brooklyn of all places.
She raised an eyebrow, trying to picture Mr. Fancypants anywhere but
Central Park West.

“So
this is reception,” she said, interrupting their discussion.
She breezed past him and stood in the doorway of the next room. “And
this is the sitting room.” Before he could even cross over to
her, she was moving past the staircase.

She
said she would give him a tour. She didn't say it had to be a
particularly in-depth one.

Just
as she was about to swing into the dining room directly behind the
stairs, she felt a hand on her arm, stopping her. She took a breath,
turning to face him with a raised brow. “What's the matter?
Can't keep up?”

His
thumb started to rub the skin above her elbow. “How about we
start over and you give me the kind of tour you'd give anyone else
staying here.”

“That
is the tour she'd give anyone else,” Devon said, walking past
them.

“Shut
up, you,” she said, stretching her leg out and kicking him in
the back of the calf. She turned back to James who was looking at her
like he had all the time (and patience) in the world. “Fine,”
she sighed, pulling her arm out of his grip. She moved back toward
the front. “This is the sitting room. Feel free to borrow any
of the books you like...”

“Where
do you get the books?” James asked, reaching for one of the
spines and pulling it out. There was a fair mix of bestsellers, old
editions of classics, and no-name authors.

“Stars
Books in town,” Emily said, fluffing a pillow on the chaise.
“Liam has great taste in literature.”

“And
what about this...” he paused, smirking. “can we even
really call this 'art'?”

Emily
found herself smiling. “Those were here before me.” She
walked over to one she had always particularly hated: five women in
Victorian dresses just standing around a ballroom.

“Maybe
if these were Waterhouse they could stay.”

“Some
Boreas or Lady of Shalott, perhaps?”

James
smiled. “I was thinking A Mermaid or Echo and Narcissus.”

Emily
found herself laughing. “Of course,” she said, rolling
her eyes good naturedly. “But maybe that would be too much
nudity for a sitting room.”

James
winked at her, running a hand over the back of a captain's chair.
“You could be right. So where to next?”

“Dining
room,” Emily said, moving back into the hall.

It
was a large room, cluttered with over a dozen tables of varying
shapes and sizes. “The inn only has six rooms, right?” he
asked, deciding that, so far, it was the least offensive room he had
come across. Some new paint, new flooring, matching tables and it
would be just fine.

“A
lot of the townspeople eat here too. We don't exactly have a lot of
choices.”

“Kitchen
is through here?” James asked, pushing into the swinging door
without waiting for an answer.

“Well,
hello there,” Meggie said, raising an eyebrow at Emily that was
full of meaning.
Liar.

“You
cant be the chef,” James said, giving her an absolutely
soul-crushing smile. “You're too gorgeous to be locked back
here all day.”

Meg
broke into a fit of giggles, slapping his arm. Falling for it hook,
line, and sinker. Emily couldn't blame her. She herself was feeling a
little weak in the knees and he wasn't even looking at her.

“Is
that soup?” he asked, walking up behind Meggie and looking over
her shoulder. “Can I have some?”

Emily
watched as Meggie poured him a bowl and rushed around to warm up some
breadsticks to go with it. Emily sighed, walking over to her brownies
and picking at them. She had a sudden urge to crawl into bed and
watch endless hours of mindless television. She couldn't remember the
last time she felt that way. Months? Years? Had she ever wanted to
take to her bed in nineteen-fifties dramatics? For the first time
in... ever... she felt completely drained. No extra energy hanging
around. No antsy need to get up and do a million small tasks.