Switched, Bothered and Bewildered (21 page)

Of course it could be a man. That would explain a whole lot. A big fat nasty breakup could make a basket case out of anyone. But more likely it was work. He knew the signs too well. He felt like she was at a crossroads he had been at once himself.

He pulled out his framing hammer and started pounding nails into the floor underlayment that was now covering the old vinyl. They seemed to have connected last night in a way that was rare between people. Their ideas had meshed, their ability to visualize what the other person was saying had been nothing short of amazing. He'd hoped she'd seen that and decided to trust him. Whatever it was, she'd have to eventually tell him or go back and face it alone.

Aside from all that, she was a special woman. Sometimes special women needed a careful approach.

*
   
*
   
*

"Shit!" Jana Lee had a dial-up modem. Who even
had
those anymore? Jillian had gotten the damn fax program set up, e-mailed Oliver and was receiving her pages, but everything was moving in slow motion. She squirmed in the chair.
Gawd,
she hated waiting for things. She flipped open her cell phone and pressed the office line hard.

"Did it go through?" Oliver said right away.

"Hey, it could be someone else."

"Caller ID, welcome to the twenty-first century, Miss Tompkins."

"Jana Lee has a dial-up. The file is uploading, but it's like molasses in January. I wish I had a tele-transporter. I'd just get the papers and reassemble myself back here."

"Beam me up, Scottie. Just relax. It will get there. Is there anything else, Princess Leia?"

"Yes, I'll sign these here and overnight them to you. Let's not make
J.L.
forge my name on something this touchy. Here it comes. Gotta go,
Darth,"
she said. Oliver was just hilarious today. And he was mixing metaphors, too.

She snapped the phone shut and stuffed it in the pocket of the shorts she'd put on. The file finished, and she printed it off. She took some time to read through the papers and was surprised and pleased by what she saw.

It was also interesting to learn that Harvey the Dragon, aka Harvey Higgins, had to be contacted but wouldn't have the same sort of royalty struc-

ture because he'd appeared in a big blue dragon suit. She snickered. He was such a jerk.

She signed the papers, called FedEx and requested a pickup. Oliver would need these back fast. Jillian picked up a box on her way down just to be efficient. She saw a picture of her and Jana Lee on the top. Geez, right out there for Dean to see. Better deep-six that.

She took careful steps down the stairs and headed out to the garage. As she passed, Dean was talking with the tile guy, who had already started setting the countertop backsplash into place.

Boxes, boxes—the garage was full of boxes already. They'd removed most of the contents of the kitchen, the living room and the spare room to make way for Jillian's crazy idea of a gift for her sister. She'd put the new box in a fairly clean spot and moved a book on top of the picture.

What the hell was wrong with her? Probably Jana Lee would have liked nothing better than to come back to her same old house and relax. But no,
she
had to make a huge mess, and it probably wouldn't even be done by the time Jana Lee got back.

Jillian would just have to throw herself into this project and quit thinking about what was happening back at Pitman. And about Jackson. And about Dean.

*
   
*
   
*

Dean watched his boss-lady hustle up and down the stairs a dozen times, clearing the contents of the upstairs bedrooms. She was tackling her tasks like a woman driven by some demon, that was for sure. And Carly was being put to work too. She and her two friends had returned from a girls' day downtown and late lunch at the local Dairy Queen all rosy and relaxed, only to find the demon aunt on the warpath. He felt pity for them.

Carly had gotten help from the two friends for an hour, but they'd split when she'd tried to get them to paint the second coat on the living room walls. Carly was stuck with that one while her aunt was upstairs stripping popcorn off the ceiling. Not an easy job.

Dean felt pretty good about today's progress. It was nearing six, and the backsplash was looking very good. The French door was shimmed into place, and the floor was ready to be laid. He had retrofit new lighting into the kitchen and living room area, and all that was left was a trip into the attic crawl space by the electrician. But that was a morning thing, before the day's heat oven-baked that area.

Break time. Dean wiped off his brow with his handkerchief. The handkerchief she'd mopped away her tears with.

She seemed to have redirected all her emotion into working on the house. It had been a strange day. A FedEx guy had shown up about four. She'd

given him a pile of papers. He'd come up with an appropriate envelope, and she'd filled out and signed the shipping slip.

Dean would have liked to have gotten a look at that packing slip and found out where his shady lady was from, but she'd stuffed it in the pocket of her shorts. It was obviously all part of her other life. The life that was driving her crazy.

He walked up the stairs and turned back to look at the space below. A very fine backsplash was set and only needed grouting. The kitchen cabinets were much improved by their coat of paint, and the floor looked better already—even just with overlayment, before the tile went down.

The sea blue-green color she'd picked looked great as Carly put on another coat.

"Looks great from here, Carly. That extra coat makes a big difference. Maybe we'll put a glaze on it later."

"Thanks, Dean, but I'll pass on the glaze. Let nutso woman do it." Carly motioned with her paint roller to the upstairs.

Nutso Woman. They all needed to come clean so he'd have a name for her.

In the meantime, though, he could see where the mysterious sister's vision had taken downstairs. Beige linen slip-covered sofas, seashells, light colors. Nice. Too bad the layout of the place was so crazy. If it was him he'd knock some walls out and turn this into a really usable space.

Good God, he better not share
that
vision, or she'd have a sledgehammer in his hands in a New York minute, knocking down some load-bearing wall. He chuckled to himself, knowing how true that was.

He continued up the stairs and stuck his head in Carly's bedroom. There she was, his Nutso Woman, up on a ladder in the far corner of the room, wedged against the wall. Her face was covered with a mask, and she had on eye protection goggles. The
rest
of her—her great figure, her bare legs, her short shorts—was covered with speckles of ceiling junk. Like,
covered.

She had a spray bottle of water in one hand and a wide putty knife in the other. Dean could see it was going rather slowly, despite the fact that she was attacking it like a demented beekeeper.

"Did I mention this was a hard job?" he said as he strolled into the room.

"Yes."

"Be careful not to gouge the drywall. Gently is the only way. Also we might try the hose method. We'll drag in the garden hose through the upstairs window and use a spray nozzle to wet down a larger area. Much faster than the spray bottle method."

"Now you tell me." She picked up a large blob of ceiling texture and threw it at him. He ducked but got it in the hair anyhow.

She laughed. That was a good sign.

"I won't stoop to your level and return fire," he said.

"I'm not on your level, I'm on a ladder. You're already stooped." She swiped her hand along a rung of the ladder and fired another blob at him. This time it hit him in the forehead.

He shook it off like a dog and bent down to create a large ball of junk from the wet texture material. "I'm a better aim than you, so cease fire!"

"Better aim? That was a direct hit to your bean." She laughed a fake evil laugh.

He aimed and fired his blob ball. She cowered, which left her ass as target, which was exactly what he'd figured.

"Ow! Okay, I surrender."

"So easy." He climbed up the ladder behind her and dusted off her rear.

"I am
not."
She squirmed under him and started down, which was quite a feat. They both took a few fast steps to the floor, where she turned and faced him. "I'm not easy, I'm
difficult,"
she yelled.

"Who says so?"

"Everyone."

He carefully moved her face mask down on her neck, then put her goggles up on her head.

"Not everyone." He pushed her back against the ladder and kissed her hard. He let his tongue glide into her mouth and play He held her neck and slid his fingers up the back of her head,

cradling her against him. He put his knee on the ladder rung and pressed his body to hers.

First she was limp with surprise. Then she dropped her spray bottle and putty knife. Then slowly her hands reached around him and he felt her smooth touch on his back. What a hot, hot kiss. He groaned. He could feel his arousal jump to life between them, and so did she. Their mouths duplicated the rhythmic motion of lovemaking, and she let him explore her openly.

"He-1-l-o-o."

They both shot upright and stared at the doorway.

"How's that ceiling coming?" Carly stood with her arms crossed, grinning from ear to ear. "I'm hungry. Can you two like . . . hose down and think about food?"

Jillian reached down and grabbed her spray bottle off the floor and headed directly toward Carly, twisting the nozzle to stream so she could get off a good zap across the room. She kept coming while Carly shrieked and ran down the stairs.

"I'm telling!" she laughed and screamed.

"So am I," Jillian returned. "We'll order in something. Find a phone book."

She turned back to Dean, still holding the spray bottle. He put his hands in the air. "I give up," he said. He walked toward her. He was covered with ceiling texture from pressing up against her.

"Stay where you are, mister, hands up."

"No way." He grabbed her before she got one squirt out. They rolled against a wall, and he gave her one more kiss. "Don't think this is over," he mumbled into her mouth.

"I hope not," she whispered back. Their eyes met, and she saw a pure lustful look dancing in Dean Wakefield's light brown eyes. There was no doubt in her mind he was seeing the same look in her hungry blue eyes.

¹⁴

Double Ima^e

Jana Lee stood in front of the full-length mirror of her sister's walk-in closet. The black dress was pretty, even without the shoes. If she threw in a swing coat and a pillbox hat, she'd be very Jackie O.

When did she start looking so much like her mother? Over this week she'd thought about her mom and the passion she'd had for her career. But somehow Mom had been able to balance her children into the mix. Sure, she and her sister had run a little wild and free, but there had been an underlying sense of her parents being there, as well as a fine line between youthful adventure and misbehaving, which would have made their parents disappointed in them.

At least for her there had been. Her sister had been another matter. Jillian had always run a little wilder and a little freer. But the odd part was that Jillian had ended up being the sister who worked too hard. Jillian just did everything a little too over the top.

Jana Lee made a mental note not to let work overtake her life when she settled into some career path. Balance. That was the key.

She sat on a small bench and slipped into her new shoes. They had a shorter heel and felt so much more like
her
shoes, but the little bows on the front and the pointed toe were very hip—for a woman who had just recently and most temporarily given up being a Keds devotee.

There. She was kind of pretty. At least as pretty as her sister. Why did she always think Jillian was so much prettier? Hello, they were identical twins. When she thought of it, it was kind of surprising that Jackson hadn't gone for Jillian. Maybe they weren't a good match. Maybe it would be okay for her to get involved with Jackson.

And lie to him. And leave town. And leave a mess. Jana Lee leaned into the mirror, frowned and examined her face. Her eyebrows looked uneven. She rubbed her eyebrow with her fingertip. She'd have to draw that one over again. And at this rate she could just draw herself some really evil eyebrows to suit her terrible thoughts.

She loved her project with Pitman toys. She loved her sister's apartment. This wasn't turning out the way she thought it would.

Most of all she really liked Jackson. She wanted him. She wanted to be made love to and have that feeling of a man seducing her. Jana Lee closed her eyes and drifted into the thought of Jackson making love to her.

The doorbell rang right in the middle of Jackson unzipping the back of her dress and running his hands all over her silky new underwear. This time she knew it was her door.

There was Jackson with red roses and another box of Ghirardelli chocolates. The way to a woman's heart was truly chocolate, and Jackson obviously knew that.