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He gestured for her to walk into one of the offices. She hurried ahead, half-afraid he was going to usher her in with one of his big hands. The office was large but utilitarian. A big leather chair sat behind the desk, and two more in front of it. A New Dawn wall calendar was the only decoration. Annual report brochures from the last three years sat on the big, polished wood desk, and filing cabinets lined one wall. A round table with four chairs sat in one corner. The realization crept over her that this was his personal office. He pulled open a drawer. “Daily cash register receipts, arranged by date. I add up all the figures myself first thing every morning.”
He rested a hand on the most recent annual report, fingers pressing into the shiny cover. Such large hands weren’t quite decent. He certainly didn’t look like any CFO she’d encountered. All the more reason to be suspicious.
“Make yourself comfortable.” He looked at the chair—his chair. She had to brush right past him to get to it, which made her skin hum and prickle with an unpleasant sensation. Worse yet, he pulled up another chair and sat down right next to her. He opened the most recent brochure, which had a picture of a spreading oak tree on the cover, and pointed at the profit data at the top of the first page. “You’ll see we’re not kidding around here at New Dawn.”
Forty-one million in net profits was no joke, for sure. “I’ve seen the annual reports already. It’s really the raw data I’m interested in.”
He pulled out a laptop from the desk drawer and punched up a few pages. “The passwords change weekly, so I’ll keep you posted, but this account information will get you right into our daily operation. You should be able to look up and analyze any data you need.”
Her eyes widened as he clicked through a few screens and she saw he was letting her peek right at the daily intake and outflow.
Of course the numbers could be fudged. But she was impressed by how quickly he could click from screen to screen with those big fingers. They were large enough to hit two keys at once. Was he wearing cologne? Maybe it was just deodorant. His scent kept creeping into her nose. His dark gray suit did nothing to conceal the masculine bulk of his body, which was all the more evident now that he was sitting only inches from her.
“These documents here are monthly reports I do of all our activities. If anything unusual happened, I make a note of it.”
“How do you mean, unusual?” It was a relief to distract herself from noticing the tiny dark hairs dusted across the back of his powerful hands.
“Someone winning a suspiciously large amount. Anyone who gets banned, complaints from the public or from staff. I believe in paying close attention to the small details so the big ones don’t take you by surprise.”
“That sounds sensible.” She smiled. Why? She had no idea.
Just being professional. Or so she hoped. He’d smiled at her, flashing those dazzling white teeth, and her face had just mirrored his without her permission.
She stiffened. This man knew he was having an effect on her. “Why do you produce annual reports when you’re not a public company?”
“I don’t answer to investors like a public company, but I have a greater responsibility. I answer to the Nissequot people.”
From what she’d read on the internet, the Nissequot tribe was mostly his immediate family, and the entire reservation was a creative interpretation of local history for the sole purpose of pursuing a very profitable business venture. “How many of you are there?”
“We’ve got two hundred people living here now. A few years ago, there were only four of us. In five years’ time I’m hoping we’ll number in the thousands.” There was that smile again.
She jerked her eyes back to the screen. “It probably isn’t too hard to persuade people to come when you’re offering a cut of forty-one million dollars.”
His silence made her look up. He was staring right at her with those penetrating eyes. “We don’t give individuals any handouts. We encourage tribal members to come here to live and work. Any profits are held in trust for the entire tribe and fund community initiatives.”
“I’m sorry if I offended you.” She swallowed. “I didn’t mean to.” She felt flustered. The last thing she wanted to do was put him on the defensive.
“I’m not offended at all.” He didn’t smile, but looked at her pleasantly. “And maybe we could build the tribe faster if we just handed out checks, but I’d rather attract people more slowly and organically because they want to be here.”
“Quite understandable.” She tried to smile. She wasn’t sure it was convincing. Something about John Fairweather rattled her. He was so...handsome. She wasn’t used to being around men like him. The guys in her office were mostly introverted and out of shape from sitting hunched over their computers all day long. John Fairweather obviously spent a good amount of time at his desk, judging from all the material he’d showed her, but somehow—tan and sturdy as the oak tree on the cover of his annual report—he looked more like someone who spent all day outdoors.
“Are you okay?”
She jerked herself out of the train of irrelevant thoughts. “Maybe a cup of tea would be a good idea, after all.”
* * *
Constance lay in her bed at the Cozy Suites Motel, staring at the outline of the still ceiling fan in the dark. Her brain wouldn’t settle down enough for sleep but she knew she needed to rest so she could focus on all those numbers at the casino tomorrow. She wanted to impress her boss so she could ask for a raise and put a down payment on a house. It was time to move out from under her parents’ wing.
It was one thing to move back home to save money after college. It was another entirely to still be there six years later, when she was earning a decent salary and could afford to go out on her own. Part of it was that she needed to meet a man. If she was in a normal relationship with a nice, sensible man, a practiced charmer like John Fairweather would have no effect on her, no matter how broad his shoulders were.
Her parents thought almost everyone on earth was a sinner who should be shunned. You’d think she’d told them she was planning to gamble all her savings away at the craps tables the way they’d reacted when she announced she was going to Massachusetts to look into the books of a casino. She’d tried to explain that it was a big honor to be chosen by her firm to undertake an important assignment from a government agency. They’d simply reiterated all their old cautions about consorting with evildoers and reminded her that she could have a perfectly good job at the family hardware store.
She didn’t want to spend her life mixing paint. She tried to be a good daughter, but she was smart and wanted to make the most of what natural talents she had. If that meant traveling across state lines and consorting with a few sinners, then so be it.
Besides, she was here to root out wrongdoing at the casino. She was the good guy in this situation. She shifted onto her side, trying to block out the thin green light from the alarm clock on the bedside table. If only she could get her brain to switch off. Or at least quiet down.
A high-pitched alarm made her jump and sit up in bed. Something in the ceiling started to flash, almost blinding her. She groped for the switch on her bedside light but couldn’t find it. The shrieking sound tore at her nerves.
What’s going on? She managed to find her glasses, then climbed out of bed and groped her way to the wall light switch, only to discover that it didn’t work. The digital display on the clock radio numbers had gone out.
A jet of water strafed her, making her gasp and splutter. The overhead sprinkler. A fire? She ran for the door, then she realized that she needed her briefcase with her laptop and wallet in it. She’d just managed to find it by the closet, feeling her way through the unfamiliar space illuminated only by the intermittent blasts of light from the alarm, when she smelled smoke.
Adrenaline snapping through her, Constance grabbed her briefcase and ran for the door. The chain was on and it took her a few agonizing seconds to get it free. Out on the second-floor walkway of the motel, she could see other guests emerging from their rooms into the night. Smoke billowed out of an open door two rooms away.
She’d forgotten to bring shoes. Or any clothes. She was more or less decent in her pajamas, but she could hardly go anywhere like this. Should she go back in and get some? Someone behind her coughed as the night breeze carried thick black smoke through the air. She could hear a child crying inside a room nearby.
On instinct she yelled, “Fire!” and—clutching her briefcase to her chest—ran along the corridor away from the fire, pounding on each door and telling the people to get out. Had someone called the fire department? More people were coming out of their rooms now. She helped a family with three small children get their toddlers down the stairs to the ground floor. Was everyone safe?
She heard someone calling 911. She rushed back up the stairs to help an elderly couple who were struggling to find their footing in the smoky darkness. Then she ran along the corridor and banged on any doors that were still closed. What if people were still in there? She hoped that the sirens and lights would have flushed everyone out by now, but...
A surge of relief swept over her as she saw fire engines pull into the parking lot. It wasn’t long before the firemen had finished evacuating the building and moved everyone to the far end of the parking lot. They trained their hoses on the fire, but whenever the flames and smoke died down in one area, they sprang up in another.
“It’s a tinderbox,” muttered a man standing behind her. “All that carpet and curtains and bedspreads. Deadly toxic smoke, too.”
Soon the entire motel complex—about twenty rooms—was ablaze and they had to move farther back to escape the heat and smoke. Constance and the other guests stood there in their pajamas, watching in stunned disbelief.
At some point she realized she’d put her briefcase down while helping people out, and she had no idea where it was. It had her almost-new laptop in it, her phone and all the notes she’d made in preparation for her assignment. Most of the information was backed up somewhere, but putting it all back together would be a nightmare. And her wallet with her driver’s license and credit cards! She started to wander around in the darkness, scanning the wet ground for it.
“You can’t go there, miss. Too dangerous.”
“But my bag. It has all my important documents in it that I need for work.” Her voice sounded whiny and pathetic as she scanned the tarmac of the parking lot. The fire glowed along almost the entire roof of the motel, and acrid smoke stung her nostrils. What if she didn’t find her bag? Or if it got soaked through?
“Constance.”
She jerked her gaze up and realized John Fairweather was standing in front of her. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m a volunteer firefighter. Are you cold? We have some blankets on the truck.”
“I’m fine.” She fought the urge to glance down at her pajamas. How embarrassing for him to see her in them, though it was pretty selfish and shallow of her to be thinking about how she looked at a time like this. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
“You could try to calm down the other guests. Tell them we’ll find room for everyone at the New Dawn hotel. My uncle Don’s driving over here in a van to pick everyone up.”
“Oh. That’s great.” She’d made quite a fuss about not staying there. Now apparently she would be anyway.
“Are you sure you’re okay? You look kind of dazed. Maybe you should be treated for smoke inhalation.” His concerned gaze raked over her face. “Come sit down over here.”
“I’m fine! Really. I was one of the first ones out. I’ll go talk to people.” She realized she was flapping her hands around.
John hesitated for a moment, then nodded and hurried off to help someone unfurl a hose. She stood staring after him for a moment. His white T-shirt shone in the flashing lights from the fire trucks, accentuating his broad shoulders.
Constance Allen, there is something very, very wrong with you that you are noticing John Fairweather’s physique at a moment like this. She picked her way barefoot over the wet and gritty tarmac to where the other guests stood in a confused straggle. One little girl was crying, and an older lady was shivering even under a blanket. She explained that a local hotel had offered them all rooms and that a bus would be coming to fetch anyone who couldn’t drive there.
People realized they’d left their car keys locked in their rooms, and that started a rumbling about everything else they’d lost and only intensified Constance’s own anxiety about her briefcase and all her clothes, including a nice new suit she’d just bought. She tried to soothe them with platitudes. At least no one was hurt. That was a big thing to be grateful for.
Still, she didn’t have her car keys, either. If she’d flown here and rented the car she could have just called the rental agency. But she’d decided to be adventurous and driven her own car all the way here, so now she couldn’t even get into it. She was starting to feel teary and pathetic when she felt a hand on her arm.
“I found your bag. You left it at the bottom of the stairs.” John Fairweather stood beside her, holding her briefcase, which dripped water onto the tarmac.
She gasped and took it from his hand, then noticed with joy that it was still sealed shut. “You shouldn’t have gone back over there.” The fire was now out, but the balcony and stairs were badly damaged and collapsing.
John’s T-shirt was streaked with soot. “You shouldn’t have brought it with you. We firefighters hate it when people retrieve stuff before escaping.”
“My...my laptop.” She clutched the handle tightly. Tears really threatened now that she had her bag back. “It has everything on it.”
“Don’t worry, I’m just teasing you. I’d have a hard time leaving my laptop behind even after all the training I’ve had.” His warm smile soothed the panic and embarrassment that churned inside her. She felt his big hand on her back. “Let’s get you back to the hotel.”
Her skin heated under his unwelcome touch, but she didn’t want to be ungracious after he’d found her bag and offered her a place to stay. The flashing lights from the fire trucks hurt her eyes. “My car keys are gone.”
“We’ll get you another set tomorrow. I’ll drive you back in my car.” His broad hand still on her back, he guided her through the crowd toward his vehicle. Oh, dear. Even amid all the chaos, her skin heated beneath his palm as if she was still too close to the flames.
And now she was going to be trapped in his glitzy hotel in nothing but her pajamas.
Two (#ulink_84365048-30c0-51b3-abf1-85f90438b2b5)
“We were lucky the motel had a good fire alarm system.” John steered his big black truck down a winding back road. “It went up fast. Everyone got out, though.”
“That’s a relief. I’m glad the firefighters got there quickly and had time to check all the rooms. How long have you been a volunteer?”
“Oh, I joined the first moment they let me.” He turned and grinned. “More than fifteen years ago now. When I was a kid I wanted to be a firefighter.”
He should have become one. Much better than a gambling impresario. On the other hand, her strict upbringing had formed her distaste for gambling, but now that she was here it didn’t seem so different from any other business. She admired how John had pitched in and done anything and everything he could to help. He was thoughtful, too, talking to the other evacuees and reassuring them that the hotel staff would help them track down car keys, clothes and things like that in the morning. There was certainly no need for him to have offered everyone rooms at the hotel. He was being very generous. “What changed your mind?”
He shrugged. “I discovered I had a head for business. And at the time I was glad to leave this quiet backwater behind. I got seduced by the bright lights of the big city.”
“New York?”
“Boston. I’ve never lived outside of the great state of Massachusetts. After a while, though, I started to miss the old homestead. And that’s around the time I cooked up the whole casino idea. But when I came back I signed right on with the fire department again.” His disarming grin cracked her defenses again. “They missed me. No one can unfurl or roll up a hose as fast as me.”
“I’m sure they appreciate the help. But there don’t seem to be too many people around here.” They were driving through dark woods, not a house in sight. The area around the casino was very rural.
“Nope. That doesn’t seem to stop fires breaking out, though. Last week an abandoned barn caught fire out in the middle of nowhere. We had to pump water from an old ice pond to put it out. Could have set the whole woods on fire, especially right now when everything’s so dry.”
It was early summer. Not that she really noticed the changing seasons much from the inside of her pale gray cubicle.
As they continued driving, she could see the pearl-white moon flashing through black tree branches. The woods were beautiful at night.
“I think it’s nice that you find the time to volunteer when you’re so busy with the casino.” There. She’d said it. She’d been a little short with him this afternoon and now she felt bad about it.
“I enjoy it. I’d go crazy sitting behind a desk all the time. I like to have my hands on as many things as possible.”
One of those hands was resting on the wheel. For one breath-quickening instant she imagined it resting on her thigh.
She crossed her legs and jerked her gaze back to the moon, only to find it had disappeared behind the trees altogether. What was wrong with her? His hand was filthy from fighting the fire, for one thing. And she would rather die than let a business client touch her.
Not that he’d want to anyway. She’d seen the gossip-column pictures of him with all those glamorous women. A different one every week, from the looks of it. He’d hardly be interested in a frumpy accountant from Cleveland.
She let out a sharp exhale, then realized it was audible.
“Fires are stressful, but don’t worry too much. Everything you lost can be replaced. That’s the thing to remember.”
She turned to him, startled. She hadn’t even given a thought to all her burned-up stuff. Clearly she was losing her mind. “You’re so right. They were just things.”
They drove in silence for a minute.
“It’s a shame you missed Mariah Carey. She was awesome.” He turned and smiled.
“I’m sure she was.” She couldn’t help smiling back. Which was getting really annoying.
“What kind of music do you like?”
“I don’t really listen to music.” She shifted in her seat. Why did they have to talk about her?
“None?” She felt his curious gaze on her. “There must be some kind of music you like.”
She shrugged. “My dad didn’t allow most music in the house.”
“Now that’s a crime. Not even gospel music?”
“No. He thought singing was a waste of time.” She frowned. Gaining maturity had given her a perspective on her father’s views that made living in the house difficult. What was wrong with a little music? He thought even classical music was an enticement to sin and debauchery. Sometimes her friend Lynn drove them both to lunch and they listened to the radio on the way. She was surprised by how some tunes made her want to tap her toes.
She noticed with relief that they were pulling into the casino parking lot.
“So what did your family do for fun?”
Fun? They didn’t believe in fun. “We didn’t have too much time on our hands. They run a hardware store, so there’s always something to do.”
“I guess organizing rivets made accounting seem like an exciting escape.” He grinned at her.
She bristled with irritation, then realized he was right. “I suppose it did.” He pulled into a parking space in front of New Dawn, then jumped out of the car and managed to open her door before she even got her seat belt undone. There was no way to avoid taking his offered hand without being rude, and she didn’t want to be obnoxious since he was going out of his way to help her. But when she did, his palm pressed hotly against hers and made all kinds of weird sensations scatter through her body.
Get a grip on yourself! Mercifully he let go of her hand as they paused at a back door to the hotel block and he unlocked it with a key. She was grateful not to have to walk through the glittering lobby in her pj’s.
Then he put his arm around her shoulders.
Her skin tingled and heated through the thin fabric of her pajama top. What was he thinking? He was talking and she really couldn’t hear a word. He probably thought this was a warm and encouraging gesture for someone who’d been through a traumatic experience. He couldn’t have any idea that she hadn’t had a man’s arm around her in years and that the feeling of it was doing something very unsettling to her emotions.
His arm was big and heavy. He was so much taller than she that he simply draped it casually across her shoulders as if he was resting it. Then he squeezed her shoulders gently.
