Will Work For Love (6 page)

“Did you have some trouble finding the ladder?” Rick
asked evenly.

“That was her.”

“Her. Yeah, I get it. The furious woman who left the
message on your machine. The reason we’re out here when we have a
thousand other things to do today,” Rick said.

“No, I mean her. The woman from the airport, the
woman from last night.”

“Shit,” Rick started laughing and the tension broke
like a landslide in the truck. “No wonder you hid like a scared
puppy in the truck. I was looking for a hole to crawl into,
too.”

“Sorry I sold you out,” Chris said.

“You didn’t exactly
sell
me out, you just
left
me out to dry. There’s a difference.”

Chris looked ahead, both hands gripped on the
steering wheel. “What the hell are we gonna do?”

Rick took off his hat and let the breeze from the
open window ruffle his thin grey hair. “I guess we’re going to fix
up her place.”

Chris nodded.

“In the next nine days,” Rick added.

Chris’ head swung around and he dropped the tires of
the pickup off the edge of the narrow road. The truck veered
dangerously as he over-corrected and ran across the center line,
scaring the devil out of some tourists on bicycles. He and Rick
were both breathing heavily now and neither of them said anything
for a few minutes.

“Where did nine days come from?”

“She’s getting married on Christmas Eve. Wants it
perfect for her dream wedding I guess,” Rick said. “Sure pity the
groom.”

Chris pulled the truck into the empty parking lot of
a seafood restaurant.

“Married. Did she
say
she’s getting
married?”

Rick nodded. “And she wants it perfect. Said
something about us getting Santa to fly in or fixing it up
ourselves. I don’t think she’s kidding.”

Chris stared ahead, not even noticing the hot sun
slanting through the open window of his truck, the light breeze
doing nothing to cool the baking interior. He reviewed everything
she’d said since he’d met her. The Jeep under the name Taylor. Said
she was here for a wedding…said ‘not tonight’ when he’d asked her
about it. Was it just last night they’d walked along the colorful
street? Along the darkened waterfront? Half a day ago and he could
still feel her skin under his lips. Was he just the final island
fling before she married Taylor East: son of the wealthy owners of
East Pointe?

If she was marrying Taylor East, why was she here
alone? Why had she come ahead to deal with all the hurricane
damage? Some people they were, sending a young woman to tackle such
a mess. Of course, he reasoned, they didn’t expect it to be a mess.
For all he knew, she was here to work on her tan and pick out
island flowers for her dream wedding. She sure scared Rick. No
doubt she could handle just about anything she wanted to.

But so could he. Chris pounded the steering wheel.
He swore out loud and felt the sweat trickling down the back of his
neck.

“I’m guessing she didn’t mention the getting married
part to you last night,” Rick said.

“Not exactly.”

“So, what’re we goin’ to do about fixing up the
place for her wedding?” Rick asked. “The way she put it, you’ve got
her money and got no choice.”

“We’ll see about that.”

****

Whitney took a cup of coffee and sat on the lawn.
She waited. She had her cell phone on the chair next to her
expecting a call from Blue Isle and dreading a call from Taylor.
She didn’t want to tell her friend any more lies about the
condition of the place. She was also dreading a call from her
general manager at
OutWhit Outplay Sportswear
. On top of
everything else, she was supposed to be considering a major
business decision while she was on her pseudo-vacation. She had
devoted precisely five seconds to thinking about her business back
in Boston. She was busy frying bigger fish right now.

She promised herself that if no one showed up by
noon to work on the damage, she would call Blue Isle. If no one
showed up by one, she would call the police. If no one showed up by
two, she would storm the construction yard at Blue Isle, wherever
it was, with her rented Jeep. That’s what rental insurance was
for.

At eleven, Whitney went inside to change into
something lighter. It was eighty degrees and sunny, and she could
already feel her skin browning under the sun’s tropical rays.
Sunscreen, shorts, and a sandwich would make the waiting easier.
She pulled her lawn chair under the sparse shade offered by the
crooked palm hanging dangerously over the leaning gazebo. She
resolved to count slowly to one hundred before she had a
stroke.

At the count of ninety-seven, she heard a truck in
the driveway. Before she got to one-hundred-and-fifty, she saw
three young men saunter around the side of the house with rakes,
shovels, a chainsaw, and a few hand tools. The older man from
earlier, Rick Churchill, was not with them, but she decided they
probably knew what they were doing.

Whitney smiled. Her work here was done. She went
inside the house, happy to retreat into the air conditioning with a
good book and relax in the knowledge that things were starting to
happen. She usually got what she wanted by being direct and
persistent. This should be no exception. Nine days of being a
taskmaster should do the trick.

She played a little game with time, vowing not to
look outside until at least two o’clock. Wouldn’t the major
improvements be more dramatic if she just let a few hours go by?
Everyone likes pleasant surprises. She tried to concentrate on her
novel, glancing up at the clock only every five minutes or so. At
two, she approached the sliding glass doors and held her breath.
She expected to see three hours of work multiplied by three
workers. Nine hours of intense labor should make a substantial dent
in the hurricane damage.

She slid open the door. Nothing had happened.
Literally, nothing.

She searched the grounds, looking for a sign that
the three workers made any progress at all. She could see no
improvement except for a small pile of brush and boards stacked
where the patio should be. She stepped outside and shielded her
eyes from the sun. She searched the grounds, looking for the three
men so she could hunt them down and motivate them into action. Only
eleven days until the wedding, there was no time to lose. She
looked from left to right, her fury mounting with every second.
They were gone.

Whitney grabbed her phone. Someone was going to hear
about this.

****

Rick and Chris were eating chicken sandwiches from
Wilson’s sister, Mavis, when the office phone rang. Chris glanced
at the caller ID and grimaced.

“Guess who?” he said to Rick.

“Wanna let the machine get it?”

Chris leaned over the machine’s speaker. “Let’s see
what she says.”

“Hello, Blue Isle Construction? I’m calling from the
East Pointe estate. I met with Rick Churchill this morning and he
assured me that my repairs would be done right away.”

The female voice paused and Rick waved his hands in
front of him and mouthed the words, “No, I didn’t.” Chris grinned
in response.

“A few guys showed up here earlier and did next to
nothing and now they’re gone. If you don’t get a crew out here this
afternoon and start whipping this place into shape, my next phone
call will be to—”

Chris’ brows rose. He picked up the phone and used a
surprisingly convincing fake island accent to assure her that the
workers were just at lunch. He told her that they were coming right
back to get going on her hurricane damage, and then he hung up the
phone.

“Why’d you do that?” Rick asked after Chris hung up
the phone. “You sounded ridiculous.”

“Did you want her to actually call the police?”

“Think she would?” Rick asked.

Chris raked his hair with his fingers. “She’s
getting married. And I’ve pretty much fucked up all her plans.
She’s not going to give up until we fix her place.” He shoved his
half-finished lunch back into a take-out bag. “Guess I’d do the
same.”

“So, how’re we goin’ to pull this off?”

“We’ll put our best carpentry man on the job.”

“That would be you,” Rick said. “And even so, how’re
you gonna get it all done before Christmas Eve?”

“Motivation,” Chris said, glancing out the window
and focusing on something in the distance. “This company is all I
have.”

“So you’re gonna show up and do her a big favor and
not tell her you own Blue Isle?” Rick studied his boss for a
moment. “And then what? She’s sure as hell gonna figure it out
eventually.”

“Cross that bridge when we come to it,” Chris
said.

Rick swore and tossed his lunch wrappers in a metal
trash can by the door. “Good thing you can work like three men when
you gotta.”

Chris opened his mouth to reply, but his cell phone
rang in his pants pocket. He pulled it out and looked at the name
on the caller ID.

“Her,” he said, holding up the phone.

“You’re playing a dangerous game, Maxwell.”

“No choice.”

Chapter Seven

“Are you sure this is safe?” Whitney asked.

“I do this all the time.”

Whitney looked uncertainly at the boat Chris was
loading with heavy windows and unfinished boards. He continued to
pull boards out of an old brown pickup truck with “Flying Island
Cargo” painted on the side. The painted design was much newer than
the truck.

“How much do you plan to put on?” she asked.

“All of it. No sense taking an hour to get over to
St. John unless I take everything my friend Sammy needs.”

With every shrink-wrapped window and untreated
board, the weathered boat dropped a few inches lower at the dock. A
few more supplies and Whitney was going to rethink going on a
sightseeing/delivery trip with Chris. Maybe moping at East Pointe
waiting for builders who were never going to show up would be a
better deal than sitting at the bottom of the Caribbean.

When Whitney called Chris to take him up on his
offer of a personal tour, he made his boat sound a little more
glamorous over the phone. He also led her to believe last night
that he had this afternoon off. Nothing on this island seemed to be
what it appeared to be. Still, she
would
see St. Thomas from
the water and get a trip to St. John in the bargain. And maybe
she’d figure out the handsome man who was hot enough to distract
her from her problems. Good thing she wore casual shorts and shoes
instead of the cute sightseeing outfit she had considered.

The bright mid-afternoon sun sparkled on the blue
water in the harbor. A cruise ship cozied up to the dock on the
other side of the harbor, letting its passengers off to shop in
Charlotte Amalie for the day.

“How often do you make this trip?” Whitney asked as
she stood uncertainly on the dock and tried to stay out of the way.
How low could the boat go without taking on water?

“At least once a week. There’s no airport on St.
John, so my freight business makes a lot of deliveries over there.”
Chris stacked another window carefully on the back of the boat and
looked up at Whitney. “Lots of nice people there,” he said.

It was enticing watching him work in the afternoon
sun, the rays glinting off his muscles as he lifted the supplies
onto his boat. He took off his shirt. She sighed. She could use a
man like him to clean up East Pointe in time for the wedding.

“Everything okay?” Chris asked.

Whitney decided to leave her worries behind and
enjoy the scenery which included an incredibly sexy man inviting
her aboard his boat. She nodded brightly at him and stepped
aboard.

Flying over the blue waters of the Caribbean paled
in comparison to dangling her hand in the shimmering waves as they
cut a path eastward out of Charlotte Amalie toward the neighboring
island of St. John.

“It’s mostly nature preserve,” Chris said as she
stood next to him where he steered the boat. It was a wood boat
that had seen better days, but it seemed seaworthy. At least so
far. The open floor plan was perfect for stacking supplies and
cargo, and there was a small roof over the cockpit where the
steering wheel and two older vinyl seats were bolted to the
floor.

Whitney sat in one of the seats, escaping the
blistering sun and giving her eyes a break. Looking at Chris was
definitely easy on the eyes.

“Do they need windows and boards at the nature
preserve?” she asked.

“Nope, but quite a few people live there, too. They
mostly work in the restaurants and hotels.”

“And they’re doing some building?” she asked,
gesturing toward the supplies.

“Hurricane cleanup still,” he said. He didn’t look
at her as he spoke, his hands on the wheel and his eyes glued to
the channel ahead.

Whitney was glad he was distracted. Just the thought
of hurricane damage gave her a sinking feeling. She was tempted for
the tenth time to pull her cell phone out of her purse and call
Blue Isle to check up on the progress and blast a few more threats
just in case. She was going to resist making that call for now,
though. Ruining her trip to St. John, even if it was on a freight
boat loaded with construction supplies, was not a very fun idea.
Besides, she had given them nine days. They knew what they needed
to do.

Perhaps by the time she got home in the evening…she
glanced at Chris’ handsome profile…whatever time that happened to
be, she would find things much improved already at East Pointe. She
would think happy thoughts. Which was easy to do looking at the
green hills and white houses that dotted the island of St. Thomas
as they cruised by.

“How long have you worked for ‘Flying Island
Freight’?” she asked.

Chris looked at her with raised eyebrows and took a
minute before he answered. “I own it,” he said. “I’ve been doing
this since I came to St. Thomas three years ago.”