Starting Over (Nugget Romance 4) (7 page)

“I just wanted to thank you again for landing the Lowery reunion,” he said. “It’s huge for us and if not for you, we would’ve lost him. I also wanted to see if you’d be up for working a bridal expo the first weekend in June. A couple of Breyer Hotel representatives, including Tracy, will be there. It’ll be a good opportunity for networking and selling.”

Okay, not what she had expected. “It’s in San Francisco?”

“Yep. It’s actually at the Belvedere, a Breyer property. We’ll fly you down, put you up, and take care of your meals.”

“Will you be there?” She didn’t know why she’d asked that. Nerves, she supposed.

“In San Francisco, but not at the expo. Is that a problem?”

“Of course not,” she said. “I’d be happy to do it.”

“Good.” He flashed a smile that made her insides do somersaults. The man could be charming when he wanted to.

She figured the sudden turnaround was due to the Landon deal, but she didn’t plan to question it too hard. Nope, just go with it, she told herself.

“Is that it?” she asked.

“That’s it.”

She got up to leave, and he said, “I still owe you a drink.”

“Okay”—she threw up her arms—“why are you being so nice to me?”

He leaned his chair back on two legs and chuckled. “The truth: I’m trying to apologize. Tracy was about to blow the Lowery deal big-time, and that was on me for taking it away from you and giving it to her in the first place. I still think you’ll get bored and leave us high and dry. But you at least deserve credit for Lowery.”

She shook her head in exasperation. “Well, thank you for that. I’m going to my office now.”

“Why are you suing your dad?”

“Uh . . . nosy much?” Only four months in Nugget and she already talked like Harlee and Darla.

He shot her another one of his big, fat smiles. “You brought it up last night.”

She plopped back down into the chair. “He’s trying to extort me to come home.”

“Oh yeah? What does he have on you?”

Her beloved summerhouse. “Property that has been in my mother’s family for centuries. He’s threatening to sell it.”

“But if you return to Connecticut he won’t?”

And marry Royce too. Her father hadn’t made it one of the conditions, but knowing him, it was all part of his grand scheme to manipulate her into being his Stepford daughter. “Right.”

“Did your mother leave you the property?” Nate asked.

“She left me her share—a third. The other shares belonged to my two aunts.”

“Belonged?” He was still leaning back in the chair, his head resting against the wall.

“My father bought them after my mother died,” she said. “And he promised to leave them to me in his will.” Unfortunately, George Dunsbury’s promises weren’t worth penny stocks.

Nate looked doubtful. “It seems like he would be pretty well within his rights to change his mind. What did your lawyer say?”

“That I don’t have a case. He can leave the property or sell his shares to whomever he wants.”

“So what do you plan to do?”

“Sue him anyway. It could stop a sale, since I own a third of the house and don’t want to put it on the market. But more important, my father hates when our family business is aired publically and a lawsuit would be very public.”

“The old man must’ve had a coronary over the headlines generated by your . . . uh . . . failed wedding.”

The “Runaway Bride” headlines had put him over the edge. “To say he was unhappy about it would be an understatement.”

“Samantha”—he sat upright—“are you just trying to assert your independence or do you really not want to go home?”

She didn’t hesitate. “Both.”

He studied her for a few minutes, obviously trying to determine her true motives for the lawsuit. The man had it stuck in his head that her new life in Nugget was a charade; no matter how hard she tried to convince him otherwise. She didn’t get it. But it was his problem, not hers.

“Then I wish you luck,” he said. “I have a good real estate lawyer, if you want a second opinion.”

“Thank you. But I’m okay for now.” She hoped that the mere threat of a lawsuit would be enough to stop her father from meddling in her life. What she really wished is that George would come out here and see Nugget for himself. Maybe then he would understand how she’d fallen in love with the place.

She got to her feet and remembered the party. “Rhys invited me to the house on Sunday, but he got a call before he could give me the details. He said I should get them from you.”

“I’ll email it to you,” he said, already lost in something on his computer.

“G
et away from the grill, you’re destroying supper.” Rhys pulled the spatula out of Nate’s hand, shoved him away from the Weber, and flipped a row of burgers away from the flame just in the nick of time. “What? You fall asleep?”

The truth was Nate had been focusing all his attention on Samantha, who stood with a klatch of women on Rhys and Maddy’s porch, drinking wine. She had on a pair of jeans, a crisp white button-down blouse, and some kind of jaunty scarf tied around her neck. The whole outfit should’ve been overkill for a backyard barbecue, but it wasn’t.

She looked like a freaking goddess.

“Who you looking at?” Rhys smirked and let his eyes wander over to Samantha. The man never missed a thing.

Nate ignored his brother-in-law. “When are Sophie and Mariah getting here?” He wanted to see his daughter. Every day Lilly seemed to change in some subtle but miraculous way. Her eyes got browner and her hands moved more. Last time he’d seen her she’d grabbed for his necktie. Nate hated the thought of missing any of the big moments.

Rhys shrugged. “When they get here. Why don’t you make yourself useful and replenish the beer.”

Nate started for the house and got waylaid by Donna. “You hear about the Addisons putting in a swimming pool?”

“At the Beary Quaint?” The motel was the only other lodging option in Nugget and there was nothing quaint about it. The owners had gone bonkers with bears. Every kind of bear imaginable—stuffed, wooden, plastic, ceramic, even bear toilet-seat covers—littered the property like a creepy theme park. Seriously, the place could be the setting for a horror movie . . . the bears coming alive, doing freaky things to the guests.

Besides despising the Beary Quaint, Nate didn’t like the motor lodge’s owners. When he and Maddy had first bought the Lumber Baron, the Addisons had tried to put them out of business. They’d pulled all kinds of stunts to turn the city against him and Maddy. In the end, of course, the Addisons lost. But Nate was known to hold a grudge or two.

“Yep,” Donna said. “From what I hear, they’re putting the pool right in front, so motorists can see it from the highway. And are you ready for this? The main attraction is a water slide that goes through the belly of a bear.”

Nate nearly choked. “Those people are on crack.”

“Who’s on crack?” Maddy handed Emma to Sam and came off the porch.

“The Addisions are putting in a swimming pool, complete with a bear slide,” Nate told her.

“No!”

“Yes,” Donna said. “Apparently the Lumber Baron has them running scared.”

“They’re not even in our league,” Nate said.

“Maybe we should get a pool.” Maddy bit her bottom lip, like maybe the Addisons were on to something. “Of course ours would be tasteful.”

“With one of those swim-up tiki bars,” Donna added. “And cabana boys. Lots of cabana boys.”

“We’re not getting a pool.” Nate needed to ditch the crazy ladies. Like now.

He scanned the party for Soph or Mariah and when he didn’t see them, excused himself from Fantasy Island to get the beer. On his way into the house, he passed Sam. She smiled at him and an image of her wearing nothing but that smile surfaced. Not good.
Back away from the redhead.

He didn’t know when it had happened, but she’d become a distraction. Not just her looks, which, yeah, totally did it for him, but she didn’t take his shit. With the exception of his parents and Maddy, everyone took his shit. But Sam stood up to him. And he liked that. A lot.

The truth: He was starting to like everything about her. Her expressive blue eyes, her perfectly pressed outfits, even her cockamamie scheme to sue her father. And he needed his head examined, because being attracted to Samantha Dunsbury was a disaster waiting to happen. Hell, hadn’t he learned his lesson from the last rich, flighty, schizophrenic woman he’d fallen for?

So he smiled back and ducked into Maddy’s living room. A bunch of kids were in there playing video games, and Nate considered joining them. But then he remembered that Rhys was waiting on the beer.

When he came back outside, Sam had relinquished Emma to Maddy and asked Nate if he wanted help. She followed him to a big metal trough filled with ice and drinks and together they made room for the beer. He struggled to find something to say, which was weird, because he’d never had trouble making conversation with women before.

Finally, he settled on, “You got a haircut.”

“Yes.” She let out a nervous laugh. Apparently he wasn’t the only one feeling tongue-tied. “Just a trim.”

“It looks nice.”

“Thanks.” She self-consciously ran her fingers through the back of her hair. “Would it be a terrible faux pas to talk shop?”

“No. I don’t mind.” And he really didn’t, unless Sam was pulling a Kayla, who’d always become manic about her latest obsession. For a time, her obsession had been him. But like with everything else, when Kayla got bored, she’d tossed him away like an old toy. Nate suspected that Sam’s latest obsession was the inn.

“After you told me about the bridal expo, I did a little research,” she said, growing animated. “There is another one in Sacramento in mid-May. I was thinking that I should go to that one too. A lot of our guests come from Sacramento. It seems like a wonderful opportunity for the inn.”

“Sure,” he said, and grinned. The problem with manic people was that their enthusiasm was infectious—at least in the beginning, before they jumped to the next fixation . . . and the next one . . . and the next one after that.

“So you don’t mind if I go? It’ll just be one day. I could go the night before—”

“Sam, I said yes. You can go. However you want to do it. It’s fine with me.”

“Does this mean you’re starting to trust me?”

Nate shook his head. “Nope. I think this is a game to you. But you’re making us money, so I’ll play.”

“You’re a cynic, Nate Breyer.”

He certainly was that. And she was a temptress. “Okay,” he said. “No more shoptalk.”

She looked around the yard at the paper lanterns Maddy had strung through the trees. “It’s a lovely party.”

“Yep. Pretty low-key.” She smelled good, like expensive perfume. But she hadn’t doused herself in it, the way some women did. “My parents used to throw something similar in Madison every spring.”

“Is that where you’re from?”

“Can’t you hear the Wisconsin accent?” He said it like
Wuh-skaaaahn-sin
.

She laughed again. “You sound like you’re from California to me. How long have you lived here?”

“I came out right after graduate school, about ten years ago. A guy I knew was opening a hotel. He wanted me to be his general manager. But the place turned out to be a giant headache. Investors pulled out at the last minute and the place was swimming in debt. You name it, and it went wrong. So I eventually quit and started my own hotel management company.”

“Is this what you always wanted to do?”

“Actually, I wanted to play first base for the Brewers, but I got cut in the minors.”

“Really?”

“No.” He smiled. “I always wanted to run hotels, like my parents. How ’bout you?”

Her face lost that happy glow. “Nothing. It never occurred to me that I could be anything other than a Dunsbury. My whole life I thought that should be enough, and then suddenly I realized that it never was and it never could be.”

It’s not what Nate had expected to hear. He’d been prepared for her to tick off all the interests she’d pursued and then dropped to chase the next shiny dime. Unfortunately, he didn’t know which life was sadder—the one where you were satisfied with nothing, or the one where nothing satisfied you.

“So”—she lit up again—“here I am, starting over. And every day I feel more fulfilled than I did the day before. It’s wonderful.”

Then she did this happy little twirl thing and he felt something tighten in his gut—and groin. He chalked it up to the fact that like everything else about her he was turned on by her passion. Nothing wrong with feeling a little lust, he told himself. Not as long as he didn’t act on it. He could look his fill, just not touch. Because Nate knew from experience that touching would be an instant death knell.

“Oh”—she peered over his shoulder—“there’s Emily. I need to talk to her about something.”

And as he watched her walk away, those jeans hugging that sweet ass, a realization struck him like a ten-ton truck.

I’m a dead man
.

 

The next night, Nate went to Sophie and Mariah’s house for dinner. While the women worked in the kitchen, he got to feed Lilly and put her down for the night in her crib. For a while, he just stood there watching her sleep, her tiny chest moving up and down as she softly snored. His beautiful little girl.

Correction: Sophie and Mariah’s beautiful little girl. He needed to keep reminding himself of that important fact.

So to distract himself, Nate stared up at the open-beamed ceiling. The house was fairly new, built to Sophie and Mariah’s specifications. And he had to say, the one-level contemporary had exceeded all of their expectations. It was frigging magnificent, with sweeping views of the Sierra, big, open interior spaces, and a stone fireplace large enough to spit-roast a pig.

He left Lilly’s bedroom, careful to shut the door quietly, and made his way into the great room. Colin’s furniture pieces were sprinkled throughout the house, including bookcases, which lined the massive foyer wall and were filled with Sophie and Mariah’s books. A lot of personality here.

He made himself comfortable in one of their leather club chairs, reflecting on how Sophie and Mariah had made a nice life for themselves. Up until almost three years ago, the women had lived in the Bay Area. Sophie had been a high-powered marketing executive and Mariah had founded a tech start-up. Both had made a shitload of money and wanted out of the rat race. So they’d bought the Ponderosa, moved to Nugget, and completely revamped the restaurant-bowling alley. The only thing missing in their life had been a baby. They’d gone to a sperm bank, but Sophie had been conflicted about using a stranger’s DNA to father their child.

That’s when Nate had offered to be their baby’s daddy. He and Sophie had been best friends for years. They’d met while Nate had been dating her younger sister; the two of them hadn’t stuck, but Sophie had. Nate wound up hiring Sophie to do the marketing for all of his hotels and the two of them became pals. When Sophie married Mariah, Nate was the best man at their wedding. And when they wanted a baby, he knew he was the best man for that, too.

Now he was second-guessing that choice, even though he knew that no one could ask for better parents than Sophie and Mariah. They loved Lilly with all their hearts. And that baby had a piece of both of them, since it had been Mariah’s eggs and Sophie’s uterus that had made her.

But Nate was just as much a part of Lilly and was having trouble figuring out where he fit into their family. That was the thing; this was
their
family. If he wanted one, he needed to get his own. The experts had told them that this might happen, and Mariah had all but predicted it. But Nate had promised that Lilly would be Sophie and Mariah’s and he had to stick to his word.

“Hey”—Mariah leaned over the counter and called to him—“dinner is ready.”

Nate made his way into the kitchen and opened the bottle of wine he’d brought. “I guess I should’ve let it breathe.”

Sophie hitched her shoulders. “A little late now, because I’m not waiting.” She poured herself a glass and filled one for him and Mariah. “Mmm. Nice.” She looked at the label. “You didn’t get this at the Nugget Market.”

“Nope. It’s from my own private stash.”

“Meaning, you stole it from one of your hotels,” Mariah said.

“You know it.” He helped himself to salad, chicken, and rice. “Looks good.”

They sat down at Colin’s big farm table, which Sophie had set with her usual elegance. Mariah put on some music. Lyle Lovett.

“This is nice,” he said.

“I feel like with the construction of the house, and Lilly, we haven’t done this in a while.” Sophie topped off his wineglass.

“Nope,” he said.

“I’ve missed it.” She topped Mariah’s glass too.

Mariah laughed. “Are you trying to get us drunk?”

“
Moi?
Never.” And then, because Sophie pulled no punches, she said, “What’s the deal with you and Samantha Dunsbury? It seems to me that you’ve been holding out on us.”

“What are you talking about?” He got up to get a glass of water from the kitchen.

“We saw you two looking pretty cozy at the barbecue yesterday,” Mariah called to him over the counter.

“You guys are high. We were talking about work.”

“What about work?” Sophie wanted to know.

“She wants to pimp the Lumber Baron at a wedding fair in Sacramento.”

“That’s a great idea,” Sophie said as Nate took his seat again at the table.

“Not exactly original. We’re having one at the Belvedere. That’s how she got the idea. But, yeah, it can’t hurt.”

“From what Maddy says she’s signed quite a few events, including Landon Lowery’s.” Sophie leaned over to high-five him. “Fantastic news.”

“Mariah, do you know him?” He figured all the tech people knew each other. It was the same in the hospitality industry.

“Nah. He’s way after my time. What is he, twelve?”

Nate laughed. “Yeah. Something like that. Says ‘dude’ a lot. But he likes Sam, that’s for sure.”

“Well, what’s not to like?” Sophie said. “She’s lovely.”

Nate knew where this was going. She and Mariah were always on his ass to get serious with a woman and settle down.

“You like her?” Mariah, like her partner in crime, never beat around the bush.

He’d like to do her. There was a difference. “She’s my employee. She just broke up with her fiancé and she’s not my type.”