It Happened One Week (4 page)

Being male and all too human, he allowed her into his room.

“That was your first mistake,” he muttered now, at the memory of the sweet lips that had kissed him senseless. His second mistake, and the one that had cost him dearly, had been letting Amanda Stockenberg into his heart.

They did not make love—she was, after all, too young. And even if he’d wanted to—which, Lord help him, he did—he knew that by legal standards Amanda was jailbait. And from the no-holds-barred conversation Stockenberg had with Dane when even he could no longer ignore his daughter’s outrageously flirtatious behavior, Dane knew the
attorney would not be averse to filing statutory rape charges on any boy who dared take Amanda to bed.

Dane’s mother, remembering her own youthful summer romance, had worried about his succumbing to his raging hormones and blowing his chances at finishing college.

“Don’t worry, Mom,” he’d assured her with the cocky grin that had coaxed more than one local beauty into intimacy. “I won’t risk prison for a roll in the hay with a summer girl.”

With that intent firmly stated, he’d managed to resist Amanda’s pleas to consummate their young love. But drawn to her in ways he could not understand, Dane had spent the next three weeks sneaking off to clandestine trysts.

Dane and Amanda exchanged long slow kisses in the cave on the beach, forbidden caresses in the boathouse, passionate promises in the woods at the top of the cliff overlooking the sea, and on one memorable, thrilling, and terrifying occasion, while her parents slept in the room below them, they’d made out in Amanda’s beloved tower room with its canopied bed and flower-sprigged walls.

Although he’d tried like hell to forget her, on more than one occasion over the past years, Dane had been annoyed to discover that her image had remained emblazoned on his mind, as bright and vivid—and, damn it, as seductive—as it had been a decade ago.

“It’s been ten years,” he reminded himself gruffly as he carried the rolls of paper and buckets of paste up the narrow, curving staircase to the tower room.

And, damn it, he’d dreamed about her over each of those ten years. More times than he could count, more than he’d admit. Even to himself.

“Hell, she’s probably married.”

It took no imagination at all to envision some man—a rich, suave guy with manicured fingernails and smooth palms that had never known the handle of a hammer, a man
from her own social set—snapping Amanda up right after her debut.

Did girls still have formal debuts? Dane wondered, remembering a few he’d worked as a waiter during collegeformal affairs in gilded hotel ballrooms where lovely rich girls donned long elbow-length gloves, their grandmothers’ pearls and fancy white dresses that cost nearly as much as a semester’s tuition, and waltzed with their fathers. He’d have to ask Mindy. The daughter of a local fisherman, she’d certainly met her share of society girls at various beauty pageants. On more than one occasion she’d complained to Dane that those rich girls only entered as a lark. Their futures, unlike hers, didn’t depend on their winning the scholarship money. The fact that Amanda still had the same name as she had that long-ago summer meant nothing, Dane considered, returning his thoughts to Amanda Stockenberg’s marital status. Married women often kept their maiden names for professional reasons.

His jaw clenched at the idea of Amanda married to some Yuppie who drove a BMW, preferred estate-bottled wine to beer, bought his clothes from Brooks Brothers, golfed eighteen holes on Saturday and sailed in yachting regattas on Sundays.

As he’d shopped for the damn wallpaper, Dane had hoped that he’d exaggerated the condition of the tower room when he’d measured the walls after Amanda’s telephone call. Unfortunately, as he entered it now, he realized that it was even worse.

He wasn’t fixing it up for sentimental reasons, Dane assured himself firmly. He was only going to the extra trouble because he didn’t want Amanda to think him unsuccessful.

He pulled the peeling paper from the walls, revealing wallboard stained from the formerly leaky roof. Water stains also blotched the ceiling, like brown inkblots in a
Rorschach test. The pine-plank floor was badly in need of refinishing, but a coat of paste wax and some judiciously placed rugs would cover the worst of the damage.

A sensible man would simply turn around and walk out, close the door behind him and tell the lady, when she arrived, that the clerk had made a mistake; the tower room wasn’t available.

For not the first time since he’d gotten the idea to buy Smugglers’ Inn, Dane reminded himself that a sensible man would have stayed in his executive suite at the New Orleans home office of the Whitfield Palace hotel chain and continued to collect his six-figure salary and requisite perks.

I’ll bet the husband plays polo.
The thought had him snapping the plumb line with more force than necessary, sending blue chalk flying. Dane had not forgotten Amanda’s father’s boastful remarks about the polo ponies he kept stabled at his weekend house in Santa Barbara.

What the hell was he doing? Dane asked himself as he rolled the paper out onto a board placed atop a pair of sawhorses and cut the first piece. Why torture himself with old memories?

He slapped the paste onto the back of the flowered paper and tried not to remember a time when this room had smelted like the gardenia cologne Amanda had worn that summer.

When something was over and done with, you forgot it and moved on.

Wasn’t that exactly what she had done?

After promising him “forever,” Amanda Stockenberg had walked out of his life without so much as a backward glance.

And ten years later, as he climbed the ladder and positioned the strip of paper against the too-heavy blue chalk line, Dane was still trying to convince himself that it was only his pride—not his heart—that had been wounded.

Although many things in Amanda’s life had changed over the past ten years, Smugglers’ Inn was not one of them. Perched on the edge of the cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean, the building’s lit windows glowed a warm welcome.

“Well, we’re here, folks,” the driver of the American Charter bus announced with a vast amount of cheer, considering the less-than-ideal circumstances of the trip. A halfhearted round of applause rippled down the rows.

“It’s about time,” Greg Parsons complained. He speared Amanda a sharp look. “You realize that we’ve already lost the entire first day of the challenge.”

Having been forced to put up with her supervisor’s sarcasm for the past hour, Amanda was in no mood to turn the other cheek.

“That landslide wasn’t my fault, Greg.” They’d been stuck on the bus in the pouring rain for five long, frustrating hours while highway crews cleared away the rock and mud from the road.

“If we’d only left thirty minutes earlier—”

“We could have ended up beneath all that mud.”

Deciding that discretion was the better part of valor, Amanda did not point out that the original delay had been caused by Kelli Kyle. The auburn-haired public-relations manager had arrived at the company parking lot twenty-five minutes after the time the bus had been scheduled to depart.

Watercooler rumors had Kelli doing a lot more for Greg than plotting PR strategy; but Amanda’s working relationship with Greg was bad enough without her attacking his girlfriend.

She reached into her purse, took out a half-empty roll of antacids and popped two of the tablets into her mouth. Her stomach had been churning for the past twenty miles and a headache was threatening.

Which wasn’t unusual when she was forced to spend the entire day with Greg Parsons. Amanda couldn’t think of a single person—with the possible exception of Kelli Kyle— who liked the man.

The first thing he’d done upon his arrival in Portland was to prohibit staffers from decorating their office walls and cubicles with the crazy posters and wacky decorations that were a commonplace part of the creative environment at other agencies. When a memo had been sent out two months ago, forbidding employees even to drink coffee at their desks, Amanda had feared an out-and-out rebellion.

The hand grenade he kept on his desk and daily memos from
The Art of War
also had not endeared him to his fellow workers.

“Let’s just hope we have better luck with this inn you’ve booked us into,” he muttered, scooping up his crocodile attaché case and marching down the aisle. “Because so far, the corporate challenge is turning out to be an unmitigated

disaster.”

Unwilling to agree, Amanda didn’t answer. The welcoming warmth of the fire crackling in the large stone fireplace soothed the jangled nerves of the challenge-week participants, as did the glasses of hot coffee, cider and wine served on a myrtle-wood tray by a handsome young man who vaguely reminded Amanda of Dane Cutter.

The young girl working behind the front desk was as pretty as the waiter was handsome. She was also, Amanda noticed, amazingly efficient. Within minutes, and without the Miss America smile fading for a moment, Mindy Tay lor had registered the cranky chilled guests into their rooms, handed out the keys and assigned bellmen to carry the lug gage upstairs.

Finally it was Amanda’s turn. “Good evening, Ms. Stockenberg,” Mindy greeted Amanda with the same unfailing
cheer she had the others. “Welcome to Smugglers’ Inn.”

“It’s a relief to be here.”

The smile warmed. “I heard about your troubles getting here from Portland.” She tapped briskly on the computer as she talked. “I’m sure the rest of your week will go more smoothly.”

“I hope so.” It sure couldn’t get any worse.

“You’re in the tower room as requested.” Mindy handed her the antique brass key. “If you don’t mind waiting just a moment, Kevin will be back and will take your suitcases up for you.”

“That’s not necessary,” a male voice coming from behind Amanda said. “I’ll take care of Ms. Stockenberg’s luggage.”

No,
Amanda thought.
It couldn’t be!

She slowly turned around, taking time to school her expression to one of polite surprise. “Hello, Dane.”

Although a decade had passed, he looked just the same. But better, she decided on second thought. Dark and rugged, and so very dangerous. The kind of boy—no, he was a man now, she reminded herself—that fathers of daughters stayed awake nights worrying about.

His shaggy dark hair was still in need of a haircut, and his eyes, nearly as dark as his hair, were far from calm, but the emotions swirling in their midnight depths were too complex for Amanda to decipher. A five-o’clock shadow did nothing to detract from his good looks; the dark stubble only added to his appeal.

His jeans, white T-shirt and black leather jacket were distractingly sexy. They also made her worry that standards might have slipped at the inn since the last time she’d visited.

“Hello, princess.” His full, sensual mouth curved in a smile that let her know the intimacy implied by the long-ago
nickname was intentional. “Welcome to Smugglers’ Inn.” His gaze swept over her. “You’re looking more lovely than ever.”

Actually, she looked like hell. To begin with, she was too damn thin. Her oval face was pale and drawn. Her beige linen slacks and ivory tunic top, which he suspected probably cost as much as the inn’s new water heater, looked as if she’d slept in them; her hair was wet from her dash from the bus, there were blue shadows beneath her eyes, and sometime during the long trip from Portland, she’d chewed off her lipstick.

Dane knew he was in deep, deep trouble when he still found her the most desirable woman he’d ever seen.

Amanda struggled to keep Dane from realizing that he’d shaken her. All it had taken was his calling her that ridiculous name to cause a painful fluttering in her heart.

How could she have thought that she’d gotten over him? Dane Cutter was not a man women got over. Not in this lifetime. Her hand closed tightly around the key.

“Thank you. It’s a relief to finally be here. Is the dining room closed yet? I know we’re late, but—”

“We kept it open when it was obvious you’d gotten held up. Or, if you’d prefer, there’s room service.”

The idea of a long bath and a sandwich and cup of tea sent up to her room sounded delightful. “That’s good news.” The first in a very long and very trying day.

“We try to make our guests as comfortable as possible.”

He scooped up both her cases, deftly tucked them under his arm and took her briefcase from her hand. It was biscuit-hued cowhide, as smooth as a baby’s bottom, with her initials in gold near the handle. “Nice luggage.”

She’d received the Louis Vuitton luggage from her parents as a graduation present. Her mother had been given a similar set from her parents when she’d married. And her
mother before her. It was, in a way, a family tradition. So why did she suddenly feel a need to apologize?

“It’s very functional.”

His only response to her defensive tone was a shrug. “So I’ve heard.” He did not mention that he’d bought a similar set for his mother, as a bon voyage gift for the Alaskan cruise he’d booked her on last summer. “If you’re all checked in, I’ll show you to your room.”

“I remember the way.” It had been enough of a shock to discover Dane still working at the inn. Amanda didn’t believe she could handle being alone in the cozy confines of the tower room with him. Not with the memory of their last night together still painfully vivid in her mind.

“I’ve no doubt you do.” Ignoring the clenching of his stomach, Dane flashed her a maddening grin, letting her know that they were both on the same wavelength. The devil could probably take smiling lessons from Dane Cutter. “But someone needs to carry your luggage up and Jimmy and Kevin are tied up with other guests.”

“There’s no hurry.” Her answering smile was as polite as it was feigned. Although she’d never considered herself a violent person, after the way Dane had treated her, dumping her without a single word of explanation, like he undoubtedly did the rest of his summer girls, her hands practically itched with the need to slap his face. “I’ll just go on up and they can bring my bags to the tower whenever they’re free.”

“I have a feeling that might be a while.” He nodded his head toward the doorway, declaring the subject closed.