Читать книгу One Bride Too Many: One Bride Too Many / One Groom To Go - Jennifer Drew - Страница 12

WHEN SHE’D HAD the chance to play pool with Cole Bailey, why didn’t she play for stakes that were fun? She thought of male pool players’ favorite come-on, a bet to see who made coffee the next morning, not that she still had a thing for one of the bad-boy Bailey twins.

Tess continued glumly rearranging the display of Kozy Kountry bedding and accessories, not one of the best merchandising decisions she’d ever made. Baby Mart customers hadn’t snatched up the comforters quite the way she’d hoped, not surprising since the cow looked more comatose than cute. One thing she’d learned early on—it didn’t really matter that infants could see black and white better than pastels. The product had to appeal to grandparents and other gift-givers. That meant adorable designs and clever gimmicks.

She really wanted a jump on Bailey’s new line so she could stock the most promising items ahead of her competition. But she was having a hard time convincing herself it was worth finding a date—or maybe even several dates—for Cole. A little winged cupid would make a cute quilt design, but she couldn’t see herself in the role.

The big question was, who, who, who? Even her friend Mandy, who was practically paranoid about blind dates, might be tempted to go out with Cole, but Tess had even less enthusiasm for matchmaking than she did for dopey-looking cows that weren’t selling. And she hadn’t even had the presence of mind to put a limit on the number of dates she was willing to arrange. Her choice would have been zero, but as her sister, Karen, had pointed out when she talked it over with her on the phone, at least Tess would get to see Cole again herself.

Did she want to stay in contact with him at any price? Her saner self said forget it, but she’d had such a wild crush on him in high school, she didn’t want him to disappear again without giving her a chance to see how wrong she’d been to idolize him. Face it, she’d been using him as a standard ever since, and it was time to get him out of her system for good. Certainly this matchmaking scheme would do the job. She hated it already.

She slapped another red label with a reduced price over a cow’s lolling tongue and thought about the way Cole had plagued her in high school. He’d been a stinker but so cute she’d welcomed any attention from him, even his devilish teasing. She’d had a tremendous crush on him but had never deluded herself into believing they’d ever be a couple. Cole dated cheerleaders and party girls who, if not exactly brainless, were definitely dedicated to having a good time.

Imagine, Cole Bailey wanted her to find a woman for him. He had a pretty vague idea of what made a girl nice, though. Thank heavens she’d fully recovered from her girlish infatuation! Cole had walked away from the women in the bar, but she was still convinced boys like Cole grew into men who were heartbreakers. Reformed or not, he wasn’t going to make her suffer the pangs of unrequited love again.

Already he had her thinking like the heroine in a Victorian romance novel. So he was gorgeous, lean, hard-bodied and darkly handsome. She could see men like that any day for the price of a movie ticket. The person she’d like to meet had to be sweet and reliable, a good companion for the long haul. She wasn’t a love-struck adolescent easily impressed by a good-looking exterior.

Oh, he’d be easy to fix up, she thought crossly as she finished marking down the slow sellers in the baby-bedding display, but she didn’t want to set up any of her friends for a big disappointment. Cole might think he wanted a nice girl, but how may hearts would he break before he found the right one—if such a person existed? He’d gone this far without committing himself to anyone. She’d expect a cow to wander off one of the quilts before a bad boy like Cole settled down with a nice girl.

Unfortunately, she’d lost the bet. Cole had distracted her in the first game—had he ever! But she’d blown the third and decisive one on her own. It was too late to complain about his underhanded tactics. Anyway, she’d never admit to him that having his arms around her had ruined her concentration.

She owed him, but she hated to put any of her friends at risk. Should she issue a medicine-bottle warning with every offer of a date? Beware—this hunk may be dangerous if taken seriously. If she did, who would accept?

If she flashed a picture of Cole, every single friend she had would beg for the opportunity to go out with him. Maybe she could lay a high-school yearbook on the coffee table and casually point out his senior class picture. He’d only improved with maturity.

Much as she hated to admit it, her big sister had been right about one other thing. Not only did she owe Cole for losing an admittedly foolish bet on pool, but he’d gotten her out of an embarrassing situation with Freddy at the wedding. He probably would’ve moved in on her like a snake after a mouse—her least favorite scenario.

Her clerk, Heather, was busy showing car seats to a customer, so Tess stayed out front. She spotted a petite blond woman flipping through a rack of infant outfits and hurried over to offer assistance.

“Tess, how are you?” the woman asked when she turned and recognized her.

“Jillian, hello.” Tess smiled automatically as she did with any customer. “Can I help you with something?”

“I hope so. I’m so excited! My sister is having twins, two girls if the doctor is right. Naturally I need something special for her baby shower.”

Jillian Davis was in kickboxing class with Tess and was so good she could easily have been the instructor, except she already had a supergood job as a bank loan officer. She was one of those adorable women who made other women feel as if they had spinach stuck in their teeth and a run in their panty hose. In her spare time, Jillian volunteered for community causes and usually ended up as chairperson.

“We have some darling stretch jammies, almost like aerobics outfits for infants,” Tess suggested.

“No, something more feminine, I think. By the way, I’ve almost decided to drop kickboxing.” Jillian gave a cursory glance at the outfits Tess pointed out. “I’m absolutely fascinated by yoga. It enriches the total person, and the yoga academy looks like a wonderful place to meet Mr. Right.”

When Jillian started moaning about how difficult it was to meet the perfect man, it usually meant she’d had a bad date the night before.

“How about quilts? I have a really good sale on them today.”

Jillian took a quick look at the cutesy cows and shook her head.

Darn, thought Tess, all those attributes and good taste, too. Did the woman have no flaws?

She looked up to offer another suggestion and saw Cole striding through the mall entrance to the store. Someone could make a fortune by devising a calendar with no Mondays if they were all as bad as they were today.

He was wearing jeans so threadbare she was afraid to look closely for fear of learning the color of his underwear. His ensemble included dusty tan work boots and a faded blue T-shirt with a Detroit Lions football logo. Jillian perked up so much she looked two inches taller and a shade blonder.

“Hi, Tess,” Cole said offhandedly, eyeballing Jillian with slightly narrowed eyes. “Don’t let me interrupt with a customer.”

“Oh, I’m a friend of Tess’s, not a customer.” Jillian was quick with the smile.

Wrong on the first count, Tess thought, ready to write off any sale she might have made to her non friend.

“Nice to meet you.” Cole was quick with the handshake.

They both had good people-meeting skills—glad hands, big smiles, eye contact.

“I’m Jillian Davis.”

“Cole Bailey.” Still pressing her hand.

“Actually I’m a customer today, too. I need two baby gifts because my sister is expecting twins.”

“No kidding? I’m a twin myself.”

“What a good omen! I’m sure to find perfect gifts here.”

“Looks like Tess has anything you might want for babies. What’s this?” He picked up a Kozy Kountry crib sheet. “Cows. Cute.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Jillian looked at them again. “Look at all the things that match it—a quilt, a bib, even a wall hanging! I couldn’t be more excited about twins if I were having them myself. Of course, I’m not married…not even involved with anyone right now.”

“Hey, you’re in luck,” Cole said. “Tess only has a few quilts left, and they’re marked way down.”

One word from Cole, and Jillian was grabbing up cows without even checking the prices.

“I think this will do it,” she said a little breathlessly. “I can just see the little darlings cuddling up with these adorable cows.”

Jillian wiggled her shoulders under a champagne silk blouse that matched her skimpy skirt, and it occurred to Tess that banks were open by now.

“I’ll write them up fast,” she promised. “You must be expected at work.”

“Oh, my boss is so understanding,” Jillian assured her. “The shower is tonight, and this is absolutely the only time I have to shop today.”

Cole caught Tess’s eye as Jillian carried her selections to the counter.

“Her?” He mouthed the question.

“No way.” She spoke in haste, then wondered if this could be a way out for her. It would almost certainly save one or more of her friends from the pain of being dumped by a Bailey.

“Her!” he said in an emphatic whisper, nodding.

Convenient or not, Tess didn’t like it. If he could come into a baby store and find a woman he wanted to date, why bother involving her at all?

He chatted up Jillian while Tess tallied the purchases. She should have been delighted to get rid of the cows, but the inane conversation at the counter was so distracting she had to check the total twice.

“Actually, I came here today because Tess promised to do me a small favor,” Cole said.

“What’s that?” Jillian’s tone questioned whether there could possibly be anything a hunk like Cole needed from a drab shop girl like Tess. Or maybe Tess only wanted her to have nasty thoughts. Perfect people should have noble, uplifting thoughts. If Jillian’s were unpleasant, then she didn’t qualify as perfect.

“She promised to fix me up for Friday.”

Jillian’s jaw dropped. She recovered quickly, but Tess had seen what she’d seen.

“I thought you said Saturday.” She didn’t want any part of this pickup.

“Change of plans. You will vouch for me, won’t you?” he asked.

“I vouch,” she said, disgruntled by how pointless it had been to worry about finding him a date.

“I didn’t know Tess had such a beautiful friend.” Cole focused those dark smoky gray eyes on Jillian’s pert little face. She giggled.

“Do you want a date Friday?” Tess asked Jillian.

“Well, I don’t know. I never accept blind dates, but I have seen you, haven’t I? And Tess vouches for you.”

Whatever that meant, Tess groused to herself.

“I had in mind a late dinner, maybe pick you up at eight,” Cole suggested.

“That would be very nice.”

Tess had to give her credit for not showing too much eagerness. Jillian scooped up two big plastic bags and power walked to the exit, feet perfectly straight so there was no suggestion of a duckwalk. In a fair world, she would at least have had thick ankles or saddlebags on her hips

“I guess you’re not here to buy a baby gift,” she said to Cole when they were alone. “Jillian is probably planning to have a set of twins with you as the daddy after that come-on.”

“Doubt that, but thanks for…”

“I know, vouching for you.” Whatever that meant. “She’s perfect. I don’t know why she’s still single except she has a dynamite career. I hope you have a good time.”

“Thanks, I probably will, but I doubt she’s perfect.”

Oh, come on, Tess wanted to say.

“She’s a petite blonde with a perfect haircut.” There was that word again—perfect. “Plus she has porcelain skin with a flawless complexion, sky-blue eyes, a really tasteful wardrobe…”

“Whoa, I meant it when I said it’s what’s inside that counts.”

“Oh.” This was a new side of Cole Bailey. “Well, she works with a lot of volunteer groups including the Humane Society, so she must care about animals and people.”

“Well, you’ve helped me without even picking up the phone. Thanks, Tess. But I came here about the new products. I have to go to a builders’ supply place east of here, so I stopped on the way to tell you I’ll set up a sneak peek as soon as possible.”

“And to check whether I’d arranged a date for you yet?”

“That, too.” He grinned broadly. “But I knew I could trust you to keep your word. I’ll let you know how it goes with…” He hesitated.

“Jillian. Jillian Davis. You can call her at Industrial Savings and Loan.”

She watched him leave, surprised that his long, sexy stride still seemed so familiar. She didn’t know how the date would go, but at least some of the comatose cows were gone.

COLE QUIT WORK early, which for him still meant putting in a twelve-hour shift to take advantage of the long summer day, and pulled up to the brick building that housed the research department and administrative offices of Bailey Baby Products. He’d called ahead to make sure his mother would be there, not that she ever left her office at a normal quitting time. If workaholism was inherited, everyone in the family but little brother Nick, Junior, had gotten it from Marsh, although with the twins it was more a matter of survival for their fledgling company than a compulsion.

He took the elevator to his mother’s third-floor office suite, hoping Marsh wasn’t in the building. How many kids were expected to call their grandfather by his first name as soon as they started talking?

It didn’t much matter what Cole called him after the big blowup they’d had when he and Zack started their construction business. It’d been nearly a year since either twin had been at the plant, although for their mother’s sake, they were civil to their grandfather during occasional dinners at her house. Still, Cole didn’t want to bump into the old man. If he saw Cole, he’d harp on wanting him to take an interest in the family business.

The outer office was deserted. Sue Bailey worked long hours because she loved it, but didn’t expect her employees to sacrifice their home lives for the company.

“Mom?”

The door to her inner office was slightly ajar, and Cole stepped into the cool interior. Somehow his mother had managed to make an efficient working office seem warm and inviting. She loved aqua, and the deep pile of the carpeting was a vibrant, dark shade of her favorite color. The tinted windows of the corner office were flanked by lighter aqua drapes. White walls and sleekly modern white metal furnishings left no doubt that this was a place of business, but one side of the room had a low round conference table surrounded by comfortable chairs with seats upholstered in a geometric pattern of black, white and aqua.

“I’ve got a date with a nice girl Friday night,” he said without preamble.

His mother always looked happy in her work environment, but when she looked up at him she was positively glowing. He and Zack were doing the right thing—or rather, he was. His twin’s turn would come soon enough. Their mom had been rocked by the death of Nick, Senior, her husband, a good man who gave his stepsons as much attention as his own son, Nick. She put all her energy into running the business to forget her sorrow, and it helped her immensely. After two years of widowhood, she was like her old self again, Cole thought. But if she lost control of the plant because of her father’s high-handed manipulations, she’d be devastated.

“That’s wonderful, Cole!” She gave him a hug and walked to a table where a big pitcher, damp with condensation, was on a tray with two tall glasses. “Would you like some iced tea?”

It wasn’t his favorite beverage, but he was thirsty enough to drink Detroit River water.

“What’s this thing?”

Cole examined a gizmo on her desk while she poured tea for both of them. He wasn’t sure whether it was supposed to entertain babies or make them want to crawl back into the womb. He played with the weird spiral-shaped labyrinth wondering if maybe he’d accidentally hit on the truth when he told Tess his mom wanted grandchildren. Maybe part of her enthusiasm for her job came from loving babies. She had a lot to offer as a grandmother, so long as she kept the more bizarre Bailey toys away from them.

“It’s a toy. It must be a winner because you’re playing with it,” she teased.

He dropped it like a hot rivet. She’d gotten him on that one, and he grinned sheepishly.

“Tell me about your date.” She handed him the iced tea and daintily sipped hers.

“She’s a friend of an old acquaintance. Remember Tess Morgan?”

“Isn’t she the sweet girl who tutored you in British lit?”

“That’s her. She owns Baby Mart in the Rockstone Mall. She’s doing me a favor by introducing me to friends of hers. I promised her a sneak peek at the new product line.”

He walked around the office, noting without enthusiasm that she still had tons of pictures of him, Zack and Nicky on the walls. The cutesy photos used in early catalog ads embarrassed him. Poses of curly-haired twins with Bailey toys made him remember how bored he’d been as a child model—bored but successful. To her credit, his mother had refused to let them work for any of the agencies that besieged them with lucrative offers. She even stood up to Marsh in limiting how much work they did for the annual Bailey catalogs. It was one of the rare disputes his mother had actually won when it came to showdowns with Marsh. She did much better these days, but as chairman of the board, he was still a tyrant.

“I guess there’s no problem at this late date,” Sue said thoughtfully. “The new catalog will be ready next month for wholesale Christmas orders. A leak now wouldn’t be serious.”

“Tess isn’t an industrial spy,” he said dryly.

“Of course not. Actually, this is a good time to give her a preview. We have a display set up in one of the design labs for some potential investors.”

“Investors? Is Marsh going to go back on his word and agree to a buyout before he retires? Does he want to go public?”

“He’s always playing around with the possibility. It’s his way of keeping everyone on edge.”

His mother didn’t sound concerned. Cole was. It wasn’t his employees Marsh wanted to unnerve. Cole’s grandfather was holding the threat of a sellout over his head and Zack’s. He’d better find Ms. Right soon and insure that his mother wouldn’t lose control of the business.

“Why don’t you and Tess join your grandfather and the investors tomorrow? Their tour is scheduled for 9 a.m.”

He’d rather eat nails!

“I had in mind a private sneak preview. You know, give her a chance to look it over without the pressure of having Marsh there.”

“A private showing with Tess. I see.”

His mother smiled—slyly, he thought.

“She’s only a friend. I owe her. Tess and me? No, no way. Not my type at all, and she remembers me less than fondly from high school.”

“If you say so. Why did you persuade her to help you get dates?”

When his mother put it that way, it did sound ludicrous. When had he ever needed help meeting women? The only blind date he’d ever had was Zack’s fault. Some girl wouldn’t go out with him unless he found a date for her friend.

“She’s not getting me dates, Mom.” Maybe he sounded juvenile, but he wanted his mother to be perfectly clear on this. “She’s only putting me in the loop with some nice women. I don’t meet any when I spend all my time on the job.”

“She’s doing this just so she can see our new line?” She sounded skeptical.

“No, I’m showing it just to be nice.”

“Then why?”

He hadn’t been grilled like this since he drove without a license when he was fifteen.

“She lost a bet.”

He was getting The Look. His mother was a head shorter than he was, and slender to the point of being too thin, but when she raked him with her smoky gray eyes, he still squirmed.

“Two out of three games of pool.”

“This was a fair contest?” she asked, accusing him.

“Tess plays in a pool league. I nearly lost to her. Anyway, I can’t leave the site of the condos we’re building during the workday. I was thinking of bringing her around nine in the evening.”

“Okay. The after-hours codes have changed, so I’d better write them down for you.”

She took a legal pad and wrote a neat series of numbers and letters.

“Your grandfather has been tinkering with the new security system again. He’s obsessed with catching industrial spies.”

“He’s not happy unless he can meddle,” Cole said with undisguised bitterness. He wished Marsh would be content fiddling with mechanical things and leave people—especially his family—alone.

“The important part is punching in these numbers at exactly twenty-minute intervals. There’s a panel in the lab as well as in the hallway.” She pointed with one neatly polished, but not long, fingernail. “Best to set the timer on your watch. There’s only a thirty-second margin for error.”

“Got it. Thanks a lot, Mom.” He bent his head and kissed her soft, smooth cheek.

“Don’t let the security alarm go off. It would put your grandfather in a dither.”

He patted her shoulder, then bolted for the door.

“Trust me, Mom.”

He wasn’t sure he trusted himself when it came to picking a wife, but he did have a date Friday night. She was a friend of Tess’s, so she had to be a nice girl. Didn’t she?