Not Quite Mine (Not Quite series) (8 page)

She stood a little taller and wore a satisfied smile.

“How do I look?”

Good enough to eat
, he thought but didn’t say. The hard hat should have looked ridiculous on her. It didn’t. A completely unwanted sense of pride sparked his ego when he glanced down at his name atop her head. The hat claimed her as his in a completely high school way.

He shook the thoughts from his confused mind and quickly said, “Fine.”

She tilted her head to the side and considered him for a moment before turning back to whatever it was she was looking at when he had first walked in behind her.

“Is this the standard size of all the rooms?” she asked.

“All but the two and three bedroom bungalows that are outside of this building. Those have small kitchens.”

She nodded and crossed the room to her purse and removed a pen. After writing something down, she tapped the pen against her bottom lip. “Is there a penthouse?”

“Not in the traditional sense. Jack wanted individual single dwellings, the bungalows, for patrons with deeper pockets and space needs. There is one suite on the top floor, but it’s only half the size of the largest single standing suite structure. The rest of the top floor is dedicated to dining, a bar, and a teen club hangout.”

“Teen club?”

Dean smiled and crossed his arms over his chest. “Family first. That’s what Jack wants. This is a destination experience. Something for everyone in the family to enjoy.” Unlike any other project Dean had been a part of building, this hotel felt more like building a fantasy. Fancy hotels catered to the rich and adult. There wasn’t a place for the kids to go and be kids.

“How soon before I can get up there and get a feel for the space?”

“Once all the exterior walls are up.”

“How long will that be?”

“A couple of weeks, give or take.”

She jotted down a few more notes and narrowed her eyes. Katie sounded so professional and ready to take on the project, Dean had to remind himself who he was talking to.

“The hotel isn’t anywhere near needing your hand. I’m surprised you flew out as quickly as you did.”

“I’m anxious to get started,” she said before turning her back on him.

“Why?” He’d asked himself why she wanted a job ever since Jack told her that she’d been hired. It wasn’t like she needed money. In fact, she wasn’t getting paid.

She ignored his question and asked one of her own. “How many square feet are the rooms?”

He told her and asked her again, “Why?”

She continued to scribble notes as she spoke. “I know you don’t want me here.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So you do want me here?”

“I didn’t say that. I asked why you want to do this. Why put out all the effort when you could be flying to France or dodging photographers in Italy?”

Blue eyes met his and held. “If I were a man, you wouldn’t ask me why I was doing this. No one asks Jack why he wants to build his own hotels when he has Daddy’s to fall back on.”

“You’d be hard-pressed to pull the women libbers’ card wearing that skirt, darlin’. I’ve never known a female more proud to be a woman in my life.” It was one of the many things he admired about her. She wore womanhood like a thick fur and dared anyone to say a thing about it.

Her eyes softened. “Maybe I’m bored with France.”

Ah, now they were getting somewhere. “People are going to depend upon you here. This isn’t something you can get bored with and move on.”

“Have I ever walked away from my obligations?”

You walked away from me. From us.

Hurt swelled in his chest and he needed to remove himself from her side before he revealed any of his undesired thoughts. “Return those plans to my desk before you leave.”

What felt lower than dirt? Mud…definitely mud. Worm-filled mud crawling with insects might be the closest thing Katelyn could compare herself to as she watched Dean walk away.

She could convince herself all day long that Dean had run full speed into her ego, knowing damn well she had one and would defend it to the death. But the look of longing that had passed over his beautiful gray eyes before he told her to return the plans to his desk would live inside her for some time to come.

The last thing she wanted was to involve Dean with her life. He needed to be free to find a life with another woman, one who could give him the large family he wanted.

That wasn’t her.

It didn’t escape her notice when his eyes followed the length of her legs and settled on her breasts a time or two during their brief conversation. Oh, he’d been tactful, but he hadn’t been invisible. Maybe she should wear something a little less
her
while at work.

Dealing with Dean on the job site would be complicated, but she assumed he’d see her in passing. She did the finishing work and he did the major construction. Yet as she looked deeper into what it would take to pull off designing the hotel after construction, she knew she needed to have more involvement from the beginning.

A teen club would require more lighting, more soundproofing. Katelyn was certain that Jack and Dean had considered some of
these things, but not the design aspect of them. Her being involved this early on would save money in the end and make her job easier once Dean completed the job.

Putting emotional distance between her and Dean was a must from the beginning. For more reasons than he would ever know. It didn’t matter that their chemistry had always been combustible. Hell, she remembered phone conversations with him that left her breathless and wanting.

All of that was before. Before she learned just how inadequate she was to be with anyone, let alone a man as good as Dean.

After shifting the papers in her hands and gathering her purse, she left the shell of a room and took one more walk in what would be the main lobby.

A couple of construction workers craned their necks to watch her as she avoided multiple hazards in her high heels to visualize the space. With the right lighting, table lamps wouldn’t be necessary. She wrote a note to herself to ask about the electrician’s plans. She’d taken one course in architectural design and could fake her way around a set of blueprints. But she’d need a hell of a lot more knowledge if she was going to make hotel design her life’s work in the next few months.

She tucked her notebook into her oversized purse and strode from the room. She had a couple of days’ worth of homework she needed to do before involving Dean.

Maybe by then she’d forget the look in his eyes before he had left.

There was a slight hesitation in her step as she neared the stairs leading to the construction trailer. Dean was probably in there…doing whatever it was that he did. She’d see him again and need to meet his gaze without emotion. With anyone else, that was easy. Not with him. Never with him.

The cool, dry air of the trailer met her skin with welcome relief. She hadn’t realized how warm it was outside. Texas heat was so
much thicker. The dry Southern California air might be warm, but it didn’t weigh on her.

“Hi, Jo,” she addressed the surly secretary. “Dean wanted me to return these before I left.”

Jo didn’t look up from her computer. “Leave them on his desk.”

Katie looked toward his office, the one where she’d found the plans earlier that morning. The door was nearly closed and she couldn’t tell if he was in there.

“I wouldn’t want to bother him. How about I leave them with you.”

Jo released a gruff laugh. “He doesn’t hide inside all day. Leave them on his desk. He’ll find them when he gets in at lunch.”

Oh, good, he’s not here.

Instead of voicing her relief, she quickly returned the plans to his empty office and left the trailer.

It wasn’t until she’d pulled out of the parking lot, and the hard hat on her head started to slip in the wind, that she realized she still wore his stupid hat.

She tossed it into the passenger seat and turned the car toward Monica’s apartment.

Katelyn avoided the job site for two days. Which wasn’t difficult considering the life-changing event known as Savannah.

In the corner of the small room, Katie placed a bassinet adorned with pink and brown baby blankets. A plush pad had been affixed to the top of a dresser for use as a changing station.

She’d taken a crash course in all things baby in the past week. She’d purchased a stroller, a reclining swing, and more clothes than the infant could possible wear while she stayed in the zero- to three-month age range.

A trip to the bookstore resulted in half a dozen parenting books along with developmental expectations in children. And a baby milestone book.

The baby book she pondered. What would happen if the mother returned for Savannah? Writing down milestones and taking pictures somehow cemented her in Katie’s life.

It was silly to think a baby book was some kind of glue. Already Savannah had wiggled her tiny fingers around Katie’s heart and squeezed hard.

Monica returned home after seven that night. Her twelve-hour shifts had to be hard, yet Katie never heard her new friend complain.

“Look who’s still awake.” Monica motioned toward Savannah who was lying on a blanket in the middle of the floor kicking her feet.

Katelyn glanced up from the reference book she was using to understand Dean’s construction plans. Blueprints and furniture catalogs were worlds apart.

“And quite content just sucking her fist for about an hour now. I’m hoping to keep her up a little later to see if I can get her to sleep for three hours in a row.”

Monica placed her purse on the kitchen counter and poured herself a glass of water. “You look like you could use the sleep.”

“I can.” Surprisingly, the tiny smiles that greeted her at two a.m. were worth waking up for. The irony was, if Katelyn could have told the world about the baby from the beginning, she probably would have hired a full-time caretaker to help at night. Those two a.m. smiles would be awarded to a nanny and not her.

“If she doesn’t sleep tonight, you can look forward to tomorrow at the hotel.”

Monica had agreed to watch Savannah all night between her days off in order for Katelyn to keep the appearance of living at the
hotel. She had yet to actually sleep in the penthouse suite since arriving in California.

She kept up the appearance of living there. She left laundry, ate lunch, and even messed up the bed so it appeared she slept there. She would arrive before one personnel shift ended, change clothes, and then leave a short time later.

Gerald drove her from time to time back and forth to the apartment, but Katelyn never let him see her with the baby.

“Did you call the private detective today?” Monica asked.

“I did.”

“And?”

Katelyn pushed the book aside and focused on Monica.

“He’s flying here on Monday to discuss the case.”

Patrick Nelson came highly recommended. He was exclusive, discrete, and expensive. Hiring him to dig into Savannah’s parentage was as necessary as eating. If Katie took the birth certificate and didn’t question it, she would forever look over her shoulder. There were already times she felt like a criminal. She tensed when a police officer drove by and hid her eyes behind sunglasses when she bought diapers. It was crazy, and not the way she wanted to live her life.

Monica covered Katie’s hand with hers. “It will be all right. You’re doing the right thing. I spoke with social services today at the hospital.”

Panic rose in Katelyn’s throat. “You told them?”

“God, no. I’m getting our facts straight. What the laws are about abandoning infants. We have a safe baby surrender program here in California. Babies are dropped off in ERs and fire departments all the time. No questions asked. A baby isn’t considered abandoned unless it’s left to its own defenses. When we find Savannah’s birth mother, she can’t be prosecuted because she left her with you, gave you custody. There’s a whole bunch of legal shit involved that I don’t
understand, but there are several cases of babies being given to someone without an adoption agency.”

“The laws in Texas probably aren’t the same as here.”

“Probably. You might want to look into them…or have that PI look into them for you. The more knowledge you have, the better you’re going to feel about it.”