They’d finally left the hotel around three o’clock in the afternoon. Mitch had bought Jenny some clothes at the hotel gift shop, and he’d assured her Jeffrey would clue in Cole and Emily. And after a walk through a lakeshore park, they’d come across a gorgeous botanical garden, wandering hand in hand amongst the trees, succulents and colorful flowers. They’d ended up in a downtown club, listening to a local country band and laughing over burgers and colas.
Then they’d spent another night together, stretching out the trip to the last second, before taking a compact private plane back to Royal.
It was nearly noon before Jenny arrived at the TCC offices. The outer door was closed, so she knew she’d beaten Mitch to work. She hustled her way along the short hallway.
“Finally,” came an exasperated male voice from behind her.
Jenny glanced over her shoulder to see Brad Price catching up to her.
“Where have you been?” he demanded, taking her by surprise.
She concentrated on inserting her key into the office lock. “Good morning, Brad.”
“It’s afternoon,” came his sharp retort.
Jenny pushed open the heavy door and glanced down at her watch. He was right about that.
Brad followed her inside. “I understood the office opened at nine?” It was more a rebuke than a question.
“I’ve been in Austin.” Mitch’s voice joined the conversation, and Jenny turned to see him stride through the open doorway. “Won an award at the Longhorn Banquet,” he said to Brad. “Don’t know if you heard.”
“What about Jenny?” Brad challenged.
“I gave her the day off.”
Brad folded his arms across the chest of his business suit. “I think we should be clear on the policy regarding office hours.”
Mitch widened his stance. “Win the election in December, and you can write any policy you want.”
A tense moment of silence ensued.
“I need to talk to you,” said Brad.
Mitch gestured to his office. “Come on in.”
Once Mitch’s office door closed behind the two men, Jenny breathed a sigh of relief. She tucked away her purse, turned on her computer and pressed the button to listen to her voice mail.
As she moved into her regular routine, uncertainty crowded in. They were back on their home turf again. Would Mitch end things as abruptly as he had last time? Was she ready to have her heart crushed so quickly?
Drawing a breath, she reflexively raised her hands to her chest and pressed them down. She’d gone into this thing with her eyes wide open. She needed to guard her heart, and she needed to be ready to walk away at a moment’s notice.
Mitch wasn’t long-term. And the new, impulsive, carefree Jenny had to be ready to accept that. What they had at the moment was fun and exciting. She didn’t need to quantify, classify and organize every nuance of their relationship.
She blew out her breath. She typed in the answer to a routine email request for information on the TCC. Then she opened a note of complaint about the proposed new clubhouse. She added it to the folder to bring to the attention of the board.
Then the phone rang, and she spent twenty minutes going over the rental options for a bride-to-be, the daughter of one of the long-term TCC members. It was going to be a spring wedding and, luckily, they were able to find a mutually workable date for the main hall and the grounds.
As she hung up the phone, Brad appeared. He bid her a reserved goodbye, and left.
“Jenny?” came Mitch’s formal voice from inside his office.
Her stomach clenched with nerves. Was this going to be an abrupt and final kiss-off? Would Mitch once again suggest they forget their lovemaking ever happened and go back to normal?
“Jenny?” he called again.
She swallowed. “On my way.” Then she reflexively grabbed a notepad and pen. Maybe it was nothing. Maybe he simply wanted to talk about business.
But when she paused in the doorway of the big, rectangular, dark-paneled room, he was frowning. He moved from behind the huge ebony desk, pushing the high-backed diamond leather chair out of the way.
“Close the door,” he told her, and her heart sank.
She pushed back on the door, latching it shut, leaning against it for some kind of defense as he made his way past the round meeting table and the low conversation group of a leather couch and matching armchair.
“Sorry about that,” he muttered.
She didn’t know what to say.
“Brad’s under a lot of stress right now. The election, the feud with Abigail, and now he’s really under the gun with those blackmail threats.”
“They’re getting worse?” Jenny was one of a very small circle of people who knew Brad had received blackmail threats involving the paternity of an illegitimate child.
Mitch nodded, but he kept moving forward, closer, closer still, until he drew her into his arms. “God, I missed you.”
“What about Brad?”
“Brad can find his own woman.”
She cracked a smile, hugging him back as relief flooded through her.
He cradled her head against his chest.
“You dropped me off an hour ago,” she reminded him. At Cole’s house, she’d quickly changed into business clothes, jumped into her own car and driven directly to the office.
“Seems like longer.” He cupped her face, drawing her back and leaning down to kiss her.
Relief continued to sift its way through every fiber of her body. He wasn’t going to break it off, at least not this second. As the kiss went on, longing took the place of relief, until she was molded tightly against him, deepening their kiss.
He pulled back and sucked in a tight breath. “We can’t do this.”
For a moment, her heart stood still.
“Not in the office,” he continued. Then he dropped his arms and took a step back. He raked a hand through his dark hair. “I’m thinking, at least for now, we should be circumspect while we’re here.”
Jenny gave herself a little shake, then nodded her head. He was saying the fling should continue, right? But they should keep it a secret? Could that work?
Certainly Emily and Cole had figured it out, since she was supposed to have stayed at Cole’s rented house in Austin. And Jeffrey knew they’d left the banquet together. How clandestine was Mitch thinking they could be?
She longed to ask him what he meant, but with the relationship so new and tentative, she didn’t dare go into specific detail. Besides, that was old Jenny. New Jenny could go with the flow.
Maybe.
“I’m going to try to focus on work,” Mitch told her with a sheepish grin. “Can you do the same? For a few hours? Then I’ll drop by Cole’s later?”
Jenny nodded more vigorously this time. She could do that.
“It’s a weird time,” he said, suddenly sounding tired, face pinched in worry. He shook his head, one hand going out to brace against the back of an armchair. “You helped me over the past two days. I’m grateful. But it’s starting to sink in, you know?”
She knew. She remembered. Their exhilarating weekend together was one thing. But his career had also ended. She took a step toward him. “Anything I can do?”
“I wish there was.” Unexpectedly, a small smile twitched the corners of his mouth. “There is one thing you can do. But your special brand of physical and emotional therapy will have to wait until after business hours.”
She was relieved to see the worry ease from his expression. “You know I’m just a temporary stopgap.”
“I’ll take it anyway.” His midnight blue gaze bore into hers.
“Did you think about this possibility at all?” she found herself asking.
“I tried very hard not to.”
“You had no kind of a plan?”
He shook his head. “Every single one of my coaches taught me to visualize success, not failure. When the
