Windswept (3 page)

“I will also.” He ushered her out of his office and walked her to the reception area.

“Thank you for your time,” she said.

“Thank you for your explanation of the situation,” he answered.

She walked across the broad expanse of deep blue carpet and opened the outer door. She could feel his gaze on her, and she couldn’t help turning back to him. Their eyes locked, and she felt the impact in her bones. She froze for the barest second before she forced herself to blink and break the contact. She could not muster a smile or a word, only a nod, and she somehow made her feet take her out the door. As it closed behind her, she almost fled down the corridor.

Once in the fortunately empty elevator, Barrett let herself release some of her tension by shaking her fists in the air. She satisfied her need to scream with a closed-mouth “Mmmmmmmgh!”

She felt like she’d just run from one end of campus to the other in the middle of a Texas summer heat wave, only to be bowled over by a blue norther roaring out of the Panhandle. What an imposing, intimidating, challenging man to deal with, she thought. A shiver ran down her back, and she shook herself. What a difficult, gorgeous,
hard
man.

He was a hell of a negotiator. Look at how he had asked all the questions, let her ramble on, and given her no real clue about his own opinion.

So, where did the visit leave her?

She’d blown it; her career was over.

Her one chance to plumb unbelievably rich historical sources, to make career strides quickly, to get out from under the grasping, obnoxious fingers and vindictive nature of Horace Glover, and she’d slammed right into the impervious smooth marble of Davis Jamison. He wasn’t going to honor his grandfather’s agreement. He didn’t give a flip about his family history, much less history in general.

He
didn’t have the time to think about the papers. What was there to think about? What time did he need to give to the project? All he had to do was turn her loose on them and go away. He wasn’t his grandfather, who could supply hours of family tales, legends, and relationships. She and Edgar had already put a family tree together. She didn’t need Davis for that kind of information. All she needed was access, but he didn’t want to be bothered, either with the papers or her.

What was she, who always had planned out her life, every step of her career, going to do now? She had been relying too much on the plantation research project to even consider other possibilities. She needed to have at least one paper ready to submit to a professional journal by the end of the summer, and she didn’t have a clue what to study if she didn’t have Windswept.

She had to keep her goal in mind: an associate professorship with tenure, a permanent position at her university. Then she wouldn’t have to worry about looking for another place, another college, and could concentrate on what she loved to do: teaching, research, and writing. But first, department promotion rules required she publish at least two more articles; the informal grapevine, however, claimed a book contract would clinch the deal. And she only had a couple of years to do it. Windswept could have given her all that and more. Assuming she could conquer department politics, especially those involving Full Professor Glover.

She had two tasks now. First, convince Davis Jamison of the worth of and need for the inventory. She’d send him a persuasive, comprehensive letter delineating all the reasons why he should give her immediate access to the papers. She’d talk to some archivist friends for more reasons not to let old records deteriorate. Call on a couple of her former professors to bolster her arguments. Just knock his socks off with the need to settle it now. If he had so much to do, she could reduce his workload by handling this matter for him.

Second, come up with another research topic, another plan, just to be on the safe side.

“You can do it,” she muttered to herself. “Let it percolate in your brain for a while. Think about it all the way back to Grand Prairie and you’ll have ideas coming out of your head. And you have friends to be with tonight and a party tomorrow to get your mind off your troubles.”

The doors opened. She threw her shoulders back, pulled her jacket straight and strode off the elevator, head high.

***

Feeling a jolt of awareness to the soles of his boots from their brief locking of eyes, Davis watched the door close behind Barrett. He regretted for a moment she lived so far away. His first impression had been correct; he would have enjoyed her company on a personal basis.

And the reaction he’d seen in her eyes told him she was not immune to the attraction, either.

She would certainly be a contrast to his usual companions, fashionable trust-fund society types or driven women in corporate careers. The former had never worked a day in their lives and had read few books of any consequence--or few books, period. The latter read the
Wall Street Journal
,
Business Week
, and
Forbes
.

All of them were useful for socializing, for maintaining an appearance, even for some relaxation--all he wanted from any woman these days. Most of them were not interested in or capable of carrying on a complicated conversation about anything other than their main pursuits; the good professor, he was sure, could converse on a number of subjects--and would probably talk his ear off in the process.

He shook his head. He didn’t have the time to daydream about what wouldn’t be. He had just returned from a trip, first to Washington and then to Louisiana. He had work to do.

Intent on plowing through the pile of accumulated papers, phone messages and e-mail, Davis returned to his office, taking off his coat on the way. When he sat down, however, he picked up her file folder first and turned to the pages at the back where Barrett had included her curriculum vitae.

Her full name was Elizabeth Barrett Browning. No wonder she went by Barrett--probably had been teased all her life about having the name of the poet. He himself did not care for his own first name, but he was named after his grandfather, so what could he do except go by his middle one as she did?

She had done her undergraduate work over at Rice University and received her masters and doctorate from the University of Virginia. Now she was an assistant professor for women’s studies at the University of Texas at Grand Prairie. He noted her degrees, honors and publications. She certainly appeared to have the qualifications to work on the Windswept papers, but then Granddaddy wouldn’t have picked her if she hadn’t.

He sat back in his chair and rubbed his right forefinger along his mustache--a habit that always helped him think. Suppose he agreed to his grandfather’s deal. She’d have to work in his home. He didn’t like the idea of a stranger being there when he wasn’t, even with his household staff present. He liked even less sharing his space with said stranger. The house--to be exact, his office there--had become a welcome retreat, a place where he could think and plan without interruptions, without pressure, without . . . distractions.

If she came, she’d be a distraction, all right. A big one, both to his work efficiency and, to be honest, to his libido, if her parting look were any example.

What about the job she would be doing? Would he have the time to supervise her? Would he need to? Could he trust her to do the work alone? He didn’t know. After all, Edgar would have been right there with her all the time. Could he trust her with his family history?

Could he trust her, period?

He’d trusted a woman before, and look what it got him--a kick in the face.

He also distinctly remembered the words of his grandfather during their last visit together. “You’re the protector of the family now, Davis,” the old man had stated. “I know you’re not the oldest of the cousins, but you’re the one with the most sense. The one I could always count on in a pinch. That’s why I’m leaving our real heritage, the papers, to you. They tell our story. As for the rest of the family, some of them bear watching, and some need a helping hand from time to time.”

The task of protecting the family was his true inheritance, he realized and shook his head. It was not going to be easy. Some members of the extended group were fractious at best, bellicose at worst. Some required frequent attention, others were perfectly happy to maintain contact through annual Christmas cards. But making sure they were all safe was his job now—and not an unknown responsibility, thanks to his own father’s early death. “All right, Granddaddy,” he murmured to himself, “I’ll do my best.”

As for the Windswept papers . . . He looked at the work stacked on his desk, then at his crowded calendar. Pending deals demanded his immediate attention. He needed to go to Washington and New York soon. He really didn’t have the time to bother with the family history now. Or with the good professor. The papers would keep. They’d sat there for all those years; they could continue to sit. It wasn’t like they were going anywhere.

He’d let her know his decision tomorrow; he owed her at least a quick resolution of the question. She’d appeared to have a professional approach to the situation; surely she’d understand. With a small, vague feeling of missing some vital point, he put her card in the folder, closed it and added it to the stack to take home. Then he rolled up his sleeves, picked up the first set of files on his left and dug in.

Chapter Two

“Davis, I want to know what you did with the Windswept papers.”

The harsh, angry voice coming from the doorway spun Davis around in his chair and he half rose before he recognized his intruder. Lloyd Walker, his cousin.

“I’m sorry,” his usually unflappable executive assistant said from behind Lloyd. “I couldn’t stop him.”

“It’s all right, Peggy.” He sighed and felt his mouth flatten. He’d managed to avoid Lloyd at the funeral and afterward, but he knew he couldn’t do it forever. Something must be important to have brought him all the way here from Louisiana.

Davis looked at his watch; he’d only managed to get in two hours of work. He hoped he could get rid of Lloyd quickly. “Come on in,” he said.

He looked his cousin over as the man stopped in the doorway to glare, a tactic Lloyd had learned from his father. The stance and the expression were meant to be imposing or menacing, and Thomas Walker had the bulk to make them so, but Lloyd simply could not carry it off. He came across more as a seething teakettle than a powerful steam engine.

He didn’t look good for someone only two years older than Davis. Lloyd was beginning to put soft, pudgy weight on his medium-height frame, his hair was already thinning and showing a bit of gray in the brown, and his beady, light blue eyes stared out through metal-rimmed eyeglasses with smudges on them. His tan suit was rumpled and his tie hung loose around his neck. He certainly didn’t resemble the prosperous lawyer-and-businessman image he usually projected.

Davis had long thought Lloyd to be officious and self-righteous. Even as a child, he had always claimed to know the correct thing to do better than anyone else. He had also always tried to order Davis and the other kids around as if it were his right as the older cousin. Almost every time they had been thrown together by family events, they fought--physically as boys, verbally as men.

He knew Lloyd resented his success in these battles and in his business and especially in the favoritism Edgar showed him. Lloyd had always considered himself to be the proper executor of their grandfather’s estate and foremost guardian of the Jamison family name, and he hadn’t been happy when he discovered Edgar had named Davis to the executor’s post. In fact, Lloyd had stormed out of the house after the reading of Edgar’s will. Now here he was in Houston.

“What do you want, Lloyd?” Davis asked as he leaned back in his chair and threw his pen on top of the business plan he had been studying.

“I want to know what you’re doing about the Windswept records, of course. I told Granddaddy they should remain in Louisiana and be properly cared for. I need to go through them.” Lloyd stalked over to the desk but didn’t sit down, clearly attempting to loom over his cousin.

“Oh, sit down. You know you can’t intimidate me,” Davis ordered, disgusted by Lloyd’s usual bullying tactics. And about those damn papers again. He was wasting more time on those old records than he had to spare. “Why in hell do you want to look at the papers?”

Lloyd sat down and glared across the desk. “Because things in those papers could hurt the family if they got out.”

“Things? That’s a precise definition, isn’t it? Besides, what could there possibly be in the old collection to cause any harm now?”

“My mother told me so after she found out you were taking them away. She said Grandmama had told her the terrible tales and falsehoods in them would ruin the family’s standing in the community if they became common knowledge.”

Davis regarded his cousin sourly. He knew both Lloyd’s mother--Cecilia, his own father’s sister--and his late grandmother well. Both women were adamant about protecting the family’s reputation and place in society against any slights or slurs, real or imagined. Edgar himself hadn’t given a damn what other people said or thought, and he’d put up with his wife’s obsession by ignoring it. But Grandmama had passed on her predilections to her daughter and she to her son.

Davis could understand how Lloyd might have the wind up his ass from his mother’s doomsayer’s prognostications. Lloyd was still getting a lot of mileage out of the family connections, living as he did in St. Gregoryville, the nearest town to the old plantation. His law practice and business interests served some of the most socially and politically conservative elite in the state, the type of people who asked, “Who’s your family and what’s their status?” first and centered their impressions, their business, and their social activities on the response. If you weren’t from the “right people,” you didn’t stand a chance with them--unless, of course, you had something they wanted. And once they got it, they dropped you as quickly as possible.