Sweet Home Carolina (29 page)

His revelation had destroyed her shield of wariness as well
as his own. “I’m sorry,” was all she knew to say. Arms full of sleeping child,
she rubbed her cheek against his bare arm in a gesture meant to comfort.

Zack stiffened at the contact, but she didn’t step back or
offer the pity he feared. “The hurt never really goes away, does it?” she
asked. “Or the guilt.”

His eyes darkened with anguish, and he cupped Louisa’s
curls. “No, it never does. I have tried burying it, but you.…” He traced his
finger down Amy’s cheek. “I would not hide from you. I suppose, sometimes…a
burden shared becomes lighter.”

Amy couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything except meet his
gaze above Louisa’s head. Panicking, she thought she would have been better off
not knowing that she might be the first person he’d shared his sorrow with in a
long time. The warmth building between them terrified her. This wasn’t just
sex.

Still, she didn’t regret knowing that he was a man who felt
deeply. No one could doubt the humanity of a man who had done what was right
and opened the mill to operations, risking his business in the process. She’d
been drawn to him from their first conversation, with its lack of awkward or
strained silences. The connection of sharing felt too right.

Everything about him seemed right. It was their situation
that was impossible.

Saving her from sailing around the bend and out of sight,
Zack smiled impishly again, and kissed Amy’s nose. “I never had that tour of
your lovely new home. Shall we see how it looks in morning light?”

“I wager there is golden oak beneath this hideous paint.”
Zack smoothed a loving hand over the cottage’s Art Deco stair rail as if he’d
not torn open his chest earlier that morning and revealed the gaping emptiness
inside.

Having this house to examine gave his head and heart a more
practical direction while he tried to figure out who he was now. And who he
wanted to be.

Amy had asked him for his suggestions on how best to tackle
restoring the cottage, as if she’d known he needed something concrete to
accomplish. She had an unerring instinct for diverting minds from unhappy
paths.

“But stripping it would take forever or cost a fortune.” Amy
proceeded up the worn stairs to the upper story. “These small bedrooms will
suffice for now, but I’d love to see some of them turned into bathrooms.”

Keeping an eye on Louisa working her way up the long flight,
Zack lingered behind as Amy swept through the upstairs hallway, opening doors.
She’d come closer to him than any woman he’d known since Gabrielle, and they
hadn’t even had sex yet. Perhaps
because
they hadn’t had sex. Instead of indulging in physical satisfaction and moving
on, he was dangerously on the verge of old-fashioned courting.

“The house is more spacious than I assumed.” He admired the
high ceilings while surreptitiously admiring feminine curves. This was
comfortable ground — lusting after a woman who sent him smoldering looks from
beneath delightful long lashes when she thought he wasn’t looking. He was
always looking. Today, she wore simple jean shorts, but her copper-colored tank
top had little flowers adorning the neckline, drawing his eye to creamy
shoulders and lovely arms.

“The house has been added on to more than once,” Amy agreed,
checking a hall closet. “I assume the mill’s CEOs lived here well into the
fifties or sixties.”

“Still, it has much charm.” Having followed Louisa up the
stairs, he peered into a bedroom overlooking the big backyard. His career had
been made by his ability to look at old houses and see how they should be, but
this one struck him very personally. His vision of the renovations had little
to do with the historic and a lot to do with the comfort of Amy and her small
family. “The sleeping porch could be turned into a lovely glass parlor for the
master bedroom.”

“Josh, keep Louisa away from the windows.” Amy kept one eye
on the children. “I’m afraid it isn’t safe.” She came to stand beside him at
the French doors. “I don’t think we can move in until that ceiling is pulled
down, and all the lead paint has been removed.”

“How long will that take?” he asked, doing his best to keep
his mind on the task and not the woman standing so close he could clasp her
hand if he wished. She hadn’t shied away from him when he’d revealed the depth
of his shame and grief over losing his family, but she was as nervous as a
newlywed now. He found that very interesting.

“As long as it takes. The kids don’t mind the apartment, and
Jo is letting us have it for free.”

Zack opened the French doors and stepped onto the sagging
porch. Amy prevented Josh from following.

“The mill is just over those trees?” he asked.

“There used to be a path leading down to it, but it’s
overgrown and washed out.”

For the first time in a long time, genuine excitement surged
through him. Zack eagerly swung around and grinned at his practical Amy. He
hadn’t used his cane since he’d settled in with his computers, and bouncing in
excitement, he didn’t notice his knee now. “Let me stay here and start working
on this,” he said, completely catching her — and himself — off guard.

“Here?” she squeaked. “It’s filthy. I might be able to clean
out the tub, but the shower has to be rebuilt. I have a few rugs for the
floors, but I can’t afford to start on the kitchen — ”

“It has a stove and a refrigerator, does it not?” As the
idea gripped him, he strode through the bedroom to sling open doors just as Amy
had done earlier.

“The stove is an ancient electric and the refrigerator is
tiny.” Amy had spent many nights listing the house’s problems, but she’d still
been unable to talk herself out of it. She adored the high ceilings, the
built-in cabinetry, the gorgeous sun porch, the huge backyard.…

“They’re fine for me,” he said with a dismissive wave. “I
always work close to my projects. When rehabilitating old castles, I have lived
with a hot plate and a cooler. Here, there should be running water at least.”

Amy stared after him in shock, letting the kids run happily
in his path. After his tale of Italy and the Alps, she’d thought for certain
he’d wallowed in wealth all his life. But after he’d exposed his deep-seated
grief, she wasn’t in any state to deny Zack something that caused him
excitement. She thought she was seeing for the first time the melding of the
charming man with the grieving one into the whole he ought to be.

He’d been wary of personal involvement of any sort when he’d
first arrived. Now he was taking on both the mill and her house? She’d have a
hard time concealing her hungry need for a man willing to dive headfirst into
such hard work.

“It will be an adventure,” he continued when she didn’t
reply. “May I borrow one of your beds or should I buy my own?”

“I was planning on hiring a van, moving the rest of our
things into the dining room, and covering them in plastic until the work is
done.” There wasn’t any way she could store all her antiques in the apartment,
and Evan had expressed no interest in them, thank heavens.

“Excellent!” he crowed. “I will hire someone to clean up
this suite for my use and borrow your comfortable bed and move in here. In
return for the use of your property, I will offer you my expertise in
restoration. The ceiling will go first, I think.”

Without waiting for her agreement, he clattered back down
the stairs to inspect the damaged false ceiling in the front room.

Shaken, overwhelmed, Amy remained in the upper hall,
watching Josh and Louisa race from room to room of their new home, while she
tried to figure out what had just happened here. And how she felt about it.

She couldn’t get past the image of cosmopolitan Jacques Saint-Etienne
sleeping in her bed, in the lovely high-ceilinged chamber she’d pictured as
hers. Did he sleep naked? That thought hadn’t bothered her in the other house.
Why should it bother her now?

Because one house was the past and the other her future?

As long as she remembered it was the house that was her
future, and not Zack, she might survive this new encounter with Zack’s
whirlwind energy without being swept away.

* * *

On the last Friday of the month, Zack watched as Amy crept
quietly back to her desk in the office across from his at the mill. He’d known
she’d left to close the deals on both her houses. He’d expected her to return
jubilant.

She just looked exhausted and worried.

He should have gone with her. He should have sent lawyers
with her.

He should stuff his protective instincts into a drawer and
forget about them. Amy was a strong, independent American woman who didn’t
require his help. He was counting on that. After he’d exposed his insides so
painfully, he didn’t dare get closer to her until he’d had time to glue his
shattered walls together again.

He’d spent this last week drumming up orders for the first
fabrics off their looms. He’d learned about a major show in October, taking
place just a few hours down the road, where he could display their goods to
furniture manufacturers and decorators.

But watching Amy’s slumping shoulders, he decided they both
needed a weekend away from work. It was time to play.

Giving Amy time to answer her messages, Zack made a few
phone calls. He’d hired a truck to hold Amy’s furniture until she could move it
into her new cottage this weekend, but the house was by no means ready for
human habitation. He could stay at the dilapidated cottage tonight, or at the
motel again, but he had a better idea.

Plans laid to his satisfaction, Zack wandered across the
corridor to Amy’s office, propped his shoulder against the doorframe, and
crossed his arms until she noticed him.

She refused to look up from busily entering numbers into an
old-fashioned bookkeeping journal. It was a good thing they were still a small
operation. The new computer he’d bought for her sat unused.

“The computer will not blow up if you use it,” he informed
her.

“Promise?” She glanced at him skeptically, then returned to
work as if he weren’t there.

Zack almost laughed out loud. He wasn’t accustomed to being
ignored. Leave it to Amy to serve him up steady doses of humility. But he
wasn’t about to be denied on this. “As long as the work gets done, I won’t argue
with your methods. Come along. The first yardage should be rolling off the
machine now.”

Anticipation lit her eyes when she looked up, but then she
saw him standing there — with an obviously amorous gleam in his eye — and she
ducked down to her journal again. “I have to finish the payroll entries. Some
of us need checks, you know.”

With a sigh of exasperation, Zack strode into the small
office, grasped her elbow, and hauled her from the chair. “You are not an
ostrich to hide your head and pretend I do not exist. I will hire an agency to
handle payroll. The checks for this week are already cut. You will not go
bankrupt just because you are now a proud homeowner with a mortgage that keeps
you awake at night. All that will be there when you come back. The first bolt
can only be experienced once.”

He steered her down the hall. A copier beeped and spit blank
paper as they passed.

Grinning at this sign that Amy’s resistance to change caused
her nervousness, he gestured for his other office help to join them. He had a
nice parade by the time he crossed the parking lot under cloudy skies to
Building Three.

The entire workforce had gathered around the machine
producing the complex, textured design he’d chosen for their first sample. As
the fabric rolled off the loom, all chattering hushed expectantly.

The apple green brocade revolved through the spool and
passed the computerized optical scanners with flying colors. Everyone held
their breath while hands-on experts checked for defects and passed on the
yardage to Zack. He gave Amy one corner and he took the other, opening the
fabric full width so they could examine the woven design for themselves.

“It is perfect,” he said with reverence, thrilling as he
always did at the intricacy of the work produced by man and machine. Raised
feathers, scrolls, and delicate curves formed a cascade of embossed design. He
knew precisely what kind of furniture this belonged on.

“The detail is exquisite,” Amy murmured, running her fingers
over front and back. “The fabric feels like silk.” She looked up at all the
people who had helped produce this rare material. “I think we’ve done it,” she
announced with a hint of wonder.

Cheers and rebel yells filled the building. Zack waved for
catering to set out the prepared buffet and drinks, and as the loom continued
processing the cloth, the celebration began.

“Now we can leave.” Zack caught Amy’s hand again and led her
toward the exit.

“Leave?” She glanced longingly at her friends. She’d made
the hors d’oeuvres herself. She wanted to share in the food and excitement. She
wanted to inspect every inch of the fabric, watch it come out of the wash and
go into the processor. She couldn’t believe they’d done it — she and Zack.
They’d returned the mill to production! It was a time for celebrating.

But she was an
executive
.
Maybe executives didn’t celebrate. It wasn’t as if they’d sold anything yet.
Reluctantly, she followed Zack into a drizzling rain.

“Today is for celebrations,” he said with excitement, swing her
hand. “You own a new home! We must find a housewarming gift.”

Amy’s mental gears shifted slowly. “Housewarming gift? For
me? Right now, I just want some of that fabric — a pillow for my rocker,
maybe.”

Zack looked at her with fond amusement. Instead of heading
for the office entrance, he steered her toward the Bentley. “You think too
small, my Amy. Come on, we’ll start with paint.”

“Paint?” Still off-balance, she sank into the Bentley’s
buttery leather seat.