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Abruptly, he dropped his hands and shoved them into his back pockets. “I remember all too well how hard it was to get CMF started. Sure, I had staff. I had hired the best people in the business, but I wanted to do most of it myself. I needed something to keep me busy.”
She found herself practically holding her breath. It had been three years since his wife had died. Still, she didn’t imagine that was something you ever got over.
She’d looked him up on Google when Emma first called to tell her he was the third board member. After carefully tucking all her girlish fantasies back away, she’d realized that she knew very little about what he’d been doing in life since he’d disappeared from the public eye.
The web had enough details about Cara’s death to satisfy the most morbidly curious, up to and including Ward’s last words to her.
She’d been so disgusted by the invasion of his privacy that she’d immediately closed the window, feeling a bit unsavory for reading even as much as she had. Losing a loved one was hard enough, but to have your grief splattered all over the tabloids for public consumption, that was … well, just unimaginable.
“It must have been extremely hard to lose her,” she said now.
He nodded, his expression patient, somehow accepting of her awkward, fumbling condolences. “If I could start CMF,” he continued, “then so can you. That’s why I’m here to help.”
But she shook her head. “It’s enough that you’re on the board, that you’re being the face of Hannah’s Hope. I’m certainly not going to ask you to do my job on top of that.”
“I’m not doing your job,” he argued. “I’m doing my job.”
“I don’t understand.”
He smiled at her obvious confusion. “You don’t know what CMF does, do you?”
“It provides healthcare for impoverished children.”
“That’s half of what the Cara Miller Foundation does.” His grin lit with mischief. Like he was about to share a secret. She felt herself leaning toward him. “When I started CMF, that was my intent. But along the way I realized how hard it was to start a nonprofit. I quickly realized that without the financial and personal resources I had, I never would have gotten anywhere. That’s why I started the other branch of CMF.”
She frowned. “The other branch?”
“Yes. Helping kids was Cara’s thing. But that’s not what really excites me.”
“What is?” Heat flooded her cheeks as she realized the double meaning behind her question. But she quickly forced her embarrassment aside. Yes, there seemed to be an attraction simmering between them, but he seemed determined to ignore it. And if he could, then she certainly could, too.
She forced her attention to the topic at hand. She’d thought she knew exactly what the Cara Miller Foundation did. She’d thought she knew exactly why he was here. Just to provide a glamorous face to promote Hannah’s Hope. Had she been wrong?
“I’ve lost you, haven’t I?”
“A little bit,” she admitted, chagrined because he seemed to read her as easily as if she had thought bubbles dangling over her head.
“Let me back up. Have you ever heard the term business incubator?”
“I think so.” She’d read an article in the paper not too long ago about them. “They’re companies whose sole purpose is to help new companies get started, right? “
“Exactly. The secondary branch of the Cara Miller Foundation—the branch that doesn’t get a lot of publicity and isn’t in the news all the time—is a nonprofit incubator. We find people with great intentions and dedicated personnel and we help them get their nonprofit off the ground. We don’t do the work for people, we just provide them with the training and resources they need to get the job done.”
“I had no idea such a thing even existed.” Surprise—no, to be honest it was out-and-out shock—washed over her. “How did I not know this?”
“I don’t know.” For a second he looked as baffled as she felt. Then he quickly shrugged it off. “Rafe certainly knew. It’s why he asked me to be on the board.”
“Yes, and he’s been such a font of information,” she muttered drily. “If that’s why you’re here, I should have been told that before you showed up.” Her indignation crept into her voice. She didn’t like being kept out of the loop.
“I thought you were.”
“Well, I wasn’t and—” But she broke off, frowning as she tried to summon up exactly how the conversation had gone the night Emma had called with the information about Ward coming.
What had Emma said about Ward? Had she even really listened to Emma’s explanation? There’d probably been a solid thirty seconds during which Ana had dropped the phone and silently squealed in excitement.
And then, a few minutes later, it had really hit her. Ward Miller. Working with her. But working for Rafe.
Her excitement had given way to unease. All of her reallife knowledge of celebrities had slammed head-on into her fandom. To do her job, she’d have to bury her fantasies. To protect Hannah’s Hope, she’d have to be suspicious of his every action. She’d have to set aside everything she wanted to believe about him.
Throughout that epiphany, Emma had kept on talking, possibly explaining exactly everything Ward was bringing to the table. And Ana’s cynicism had made her miss it.
Now, she cringed. “It’s possible that Emma explained everything and I just didn’t hear her.” She sighed, massaging the tension in her forehead with her fingers. “That must be what happened. Emma wouldn’t have purposefully left it out.”
Emma put her heart and soul into her charity work. Which was why making sure Hannah’s Hope flourished was so important. Ana couldn’t bear to let Emma down. And knowing what she knew now, she didn’t want to let Ward down, either. If he wasn’t going to immediately kick her sorry butt to the curb, if he was going to give her another chance, she was going to grab it with both hands and never let it go.
Full of renewed resolve, she straightened. “Okay, Mr. Nonprofit Incubator, you’re the expert. Where do we go from here? “
Four
Ana’s question hung in the air between them. Where do we go from here?
He could think of about a dozen places they could go. Dinner. Some cozy restaurant where he could ply her with food and wine. Down to the beach where he could coax her into kicking off her shoes to walk with him on the sand. Where he could free her hair from that maddening knot she’d worn it in and bury his nose in the skin at the nape of her neck. Breathe in that intoxicating cinnamon scent.
Hey, he had a lot of suggestions. None of them were the least bit appropriate. Not for a woman he worked with.
So he buried his gut-level reaction and gave her the answer she really needed. “We go to Charleston.”
She blinked in surprise. “Come again?”
Ward nearly laughed at the sheer disbelief on Ana’s face. “Charleston,” he repeated.
“The city?”
“Yes, the city. I certainly wasn’t planning on taking you dancing.” A look of confusion flickered across her face and he added, “I have horrible rhythm.”
She narrowed her gaze, clearly unsure how to take his words. “Somehow I doubt that.”
“Honest to God. I can’t dance to save my life.”
She just shook her head, obviously deciding to ignore his teasing. “What’s in Charleston?”
“The Cara Miller Foundation headquarters. Once you see the kinds of things we do there—”
She didn’t let him finish but cut him off. “Are you insane?”
Again, she didn’t give him a chance to answer, and he let her talk, her impassioned words pouring out in a stream. “I admit that the street fair is a good idea, but between that and my normal work, I can’t possibly jaunt off to Charleston on a whim. Even if we had the money in our budget for such a trip—which we don’t—I can’t take the time away from work.”
Frankly, it impressed the hell out of him that she had the confidence to rant at him. Most people didn’t. She seemed to have the unique ability to forget that he was a superstar.
“This isn’t time away from work,” he pointed out. “I’m not suggesting you come to Charleston to go sightseeing. It’ll be a working trip. You can meet our lawyers and accountants. People who can make the work you’re struggling with here go twice as fast. Two, three days max. If we leave Sunday night I’ll have you back in San Diego in plenty of time to get ready for Chase and Emma’s wedding next weekend.”
She seemed to consider it for a moment. Then firmly shook her head. “I just don’t see how I could justify—”
He took that as a yes. She kept on talking as he pulled out his iPhone and dialed his assistant. He was midway through the conversation before she even noticed he wasn’t listening. She came to stand directly in front of him, hands propped on her hips, gaze narrowed in annoyance.
“Hang on, Jess,” he said into the phone before he lowered it. He cocked an eyebrow at her in silent question.
“Did I just hear you say ‘first class’?”
“It’s a long flight. At night. You really don’t want to fly coach.”
“I don’t want?” she repeated. “I don’t want to go at all.”
“I know that. But you’re going to have to trust me. The trip will be worth it.”
Before he could explain more, Jess started talking again and Ward turned his attention to him. He was listening to Jess’s reply as he felt a tap-tap-tap on his biceps. He glanced over to see Ana frowning at him, arms crossed over her chest.
Into the phone he said, “Call me back with the details on the flight. Thanks.”
As he slipped the phone back into his front shirt pocket, her scowl deepened.
“I can’t just run off to Charleston for the weekend.”
“Of course you can.”
“No. I can’t. In addition to all the paperwork—which I’m ridiculously behind on—” she gestured to the whiteboard behind her “—now I also have to plan a street fair.”
He laughed outright. “You’ve already said all of this. Now you’re just grasping at straws. Besides, you don’t have to do anything about the street fair.”
“Of course I do.” She threw her hands up in the air in obvious frustration. “Everyone here is excited about it and—”
He gently grabbed her arms. “Exactly. They’re excited about it. Let them handle it. You don’t have to be in charge of everything. Jess could do this kind of thing in his sleep. Presumably, your people have contacts here who can smooth the way. My PR guy, Ryan, is relatively new and still eager to prove he’s useful. Frankly, I haven’t had a lot for him to do yet. He’ll be thrilled to have something to keep him busy.”
“You make it sound so easy.” Her tone was heavy with accusation.
“It is easy,” he assured her.
For an instant, doubt flickered across her face. He was struck by how warm and solid her arms felt under his hands. Unlike so many of the women he knew in show business, Ana had meat on her bones. She certainly wasn’t overweight, but she wasn’t scrawny, either. Her arms were leanly muscled, her body curvy in all the right places. This was a hell of a time for him to notice it.
Suddenly, he was all too aware of her very feminine body only a foot away from his. He sucked in a deep breath, trying to quell the urge to pull her fully into his arms. Unfortunately, that only drew in the scent of her. That warm cinnamon-vanilla smell that called to him so strongly. Again, an image of her flashed through his mind. Her hair loose about her shoulders, her neck arched back, exposing the long column of her throat to his lips.
Abruptly, he released his hold on her and stepped away.
Bringing her to CMF’s headquarters was the right thing to do. She needed the knowledge CMF could give her. And Hannah’s Hope needed her as well-educated as possible.
But bringing her to Charleston was the last thing he needed. He was too damned attracted to her already. Spending time with her would only make that worse. But what was he supposed to do? Walk away from someone who needed this help merely because he was having trouble keeping his zipper up?
Besides which, he’d told Rafe that he’d help. He kept his promises. And he would keep this one, even if it damn near killed him. He just wished he didn’t have to fight her as well as his own instincts.
He turned back to her, forcing a smile. “I’ll make you a deal. You come to Charleston with me and spend three days at CMF. When you get back, if you’re not convinced it was the right thing to do, I’ll personally donate enough money to cover whatever the street fair costs.”
She narrowed her gaze in suspicion. “I can’t let you pay for that.”
Of course she couldn’t. She’d bristled at forty bucks worth of muffins and coffee.
He quirked an eyebrow knowing it would irritate her. “You don’t think I’m good for it?”
“No.”
He couldn’t resist purposefully misunderstanding her. “I have plenty of money.”
“Obviously,” she scoffed. “That’s not what I meant. I can’t let you just give us the money.”
“It’s a donation.”
“It’s not a donation,” she countered. “It’s a bribe.”
He slung an arm around her shoulder, like a good buddy. The gesture backfired. Once again, the scent of her hit him. Beneath his hand, her shoulder felt both delicate and strong. Her posture was stiff and unyielding, like she didn’t quite trust his intentions. Smart lady.
‘Cause yeah, he was just a good buddy. A good buddy who got rock-hard every time he caught a whiff of her hair. A good buddy who wanted to strip away all her layers of professional clothing to see the naked body beneath. Hell, who wanted to strip away all her emotional defenses and see what was beneath those, too.
Yeah, that was just the kind of buddy she needed.
Nevertheless, like a good buddy, he gently guided her toward the table where one lone muffin still sat. He’d seen her eyeing the muffin earlier. “First rule of nonprofit—when an insanely rich donor wants to give you money, you accept it.”
“That’s not …” she sputtered. “I didn’t …” She threw up her hands in frustration. “You’re twisting my words.”
“I don’t think it’s your words I’m twisting.” He pressed a muffin into her hand.
She took a bite, despite the scowl on her face. She looked exactly like a recalcitrant toddler miffed at being talked into going to bed early on Christmas Eve. “Has anyone ever told you you’re a very difficult man to deal with?”
He grinned. “Second rule of nonprofits—don’t insult the insanely rich donors giving you money.”
She gave him a tight smile. “That wasn’t an insult. It was a question.” She broke off another bite of muffin and popped it into her mouth. Her voice dripped with mock enthusiasm when she asked, “Are there any other rules of nonprofits I need to know?”
“We’ll go over them on the plane.”
He still wasn’t sure how exactly he was supposed to spend a five-and-a-half-hour flight with her. He sure as hell wasn’t going to be able to sleep with her in the seat beside him.
The good news was, she didn’t look any more enthusiastic about it than he felt.
She forced a smile. “Yippee.”
After Ward’s comments Friday, Ana had fully expected him to make the trip with her. When he wasn’t in the car that came to pick her up, she assumed he’d meet her at the terminal. But he hadn’t shown up there, either. He’d sent Jess to explain that Rafe had rescheduled the board meeting for the following morning. When she’d offered to stay for the meeting herself, Jess quickly assured her that wasn’t necessary. Instead, she was hustled onto the plane, leaving her with the feeling that she was being “handled.”
Thirty-six hours later, at least one of her fears had been alleviated. She didn’t yet know if Ward doubted her abilities, but it was obvious from her treatment at CMF that he wasn’t angling to get her fired. Surely if he had been, the CMF employees wouldn’t have rolled out the carpet for her on such a grand scale.
Once the plane had landed in Charleston, she’d been whisked off to the hotel to freshen up and rest. Luckily, she’d been able to sleep on the plane and needed only a brief nap before her whirlwind tour of CMF. She’d spent a few hours shadowing the director of the charitable branch of CMF. The woman, Stacy Goebel, had been a friend of Cara’s and had been an executive at a marketing firm before Ward had offered her the job. That evening, Stacy had taken Ana to dinner at a local landmark before dropping her off at the hotel. The next day was more of the same, except at the incubator branch of the charity.
