From Ex to Eternity(9)

Probably he should forget about how gorgeous and tantalizing and challenging she was. He’d done nothing to reconcile his screwup, and her back-off sign couldn’t be any larger.

A reminder beeped on his phone but he didn’t need it. Today was his mom’s birthday and with the time difference between here and Miami, he should catch her before she started preparing for an evening on the town. His father escorted her to the opera and dinner every year like clockwork.

She picked up on the forth ring.

“Hi, Mom. Happy birthday.”

“Keith. How nice of you to call,” she said coolly as if he never called, which was patently false. “Are you enjoying Turks and Caicos? I prefer Bali this time of year but Grace Bay is satisfactory for a weekend getaway, I suppose.”

Cara is here, Mom. At the resort. Yes, she’s still a knockout but different, too. Unexpectedly so. I have no idea what to do about her.

“I’m working,” Keith said. “I’m not on vacation.”

Mitchells didn’t work; they made money as passively as possible. Neither of his parents understood his drive to break family tradition and actually get his hands dirty. The most immersing activity his dad had done in the past twenty years was browse through the prospectus of the multibillion-dollar portfolio he’d amassed as a hedge fund manager. Following in his father’s footsteps was about as attractive to Keith as sucking up Florida swamp water with a straw.

A strong work ethic, the satisfaction of tangible results and the pride of making his own way—these were the things that got Keith out of bed in the morning. Not money. Money was strictly a reward for following his own path. His father had never understood that and expressed his disappointment in Keith’s lack of interest in Wall Street on a routine basis.

“How’s the weather?” he asked.

“Dreadful. I was just telling your father that the humidity is suffocating me.”

“Did you get the gift I sent?” Alice had sent it but it was the same thing.

“Of course. It was lovely. I’d have preferred you bring it in person, but you’re too busy working.”

Keith stifled a sigh. If he recorded this conversation, he could play it back and skip the actual phone call next time. “I’ll visit soon. Maybe next month after the resort opens.”

Visits were to be endured. Much like the calls, but he did both with frequency because it meant something to his parents. What, he couldn’t fathom. They were essentially polite strangers who shared a last name. They never discussed personal feelings or anything of substance. Such was their relationship and always had been.

“Your father is having chest pains again.” His father always had chest pains because he refused to stop eating spicy food, but his mom had never met a guilt trip she didn’t like to bestow on her only child. “Don’t dally, or it might be too late this time.”

Cara’s running her own business, which I know doesn’t impress you since you’ve never acknowledged how hard I’ve worked to do the same. If it didn’t sound so patronizing, I’d tell her I’m proud of her.

He longed to say the words aloud, longed to talk to someone who really cared about his thoughts and dreams and disappointments.

“There’s a tropical storm developing,” he advised, well against his better judgment, but he’d sleep better for it. “Keep an eye on the Weather Channel. Tropical Storm Mark. It’s headed northwest toward the Bahamas and could hit Miami after that as a category one.”

“Oh, they couldn’t forecast where a shoe was going to drop if they held it out in front of them.”

“Have a nice time at the opera, Mom. Give my regards to Dad.”

Keith disconnected the call and put his parents out of his mind. The loneliness the call had sparked wasn’t so easily dismissed. But that was the price of his lifestyle.

Ten minutes later, Elisabeth sent him a text message about a problem with spa services, which immediately sparked an idea he would have thought of earlier if he’d been on his game. It wasn’t nearly enough to balance his mental ledger, but it was a start.

Shoving away from his desk, he went in search of Cara and Mary. They were having a heated conversation at a conference table in one of the resort meeting rooms.

“Brides don’t want someone picking out their flowers for them,” Cara said, so sweetly he’d have thought she and Mary were lifelong friends. Except you’d need a chain saw to cut the tension in the room.

“They do if they come to Grace Bay. It’s a destination wedding, not a church wedding. The couples will not be able to select everything ahead of time.” Mary drummed her long nails on the table but the lilt in her island accent had elongated, giving away her irritation before she’d finished speaking.

“Honey, that’s what the internet is for. Put up pictures.”

“We don’t have the budget for an interactive web—”

Mary glanced up when Keith cleared his throat. “I thought you were discussing the mock expo wedding. Not the resort’s wedding services.”

“You can’t separate one from the other,” Cara said with a syrupy smile at Mary. “You invited editors of bridal magazines to the expo. They’re going to do a write-up of the mock wedding. Next month, an engaged woman sees the spread, thinks ‘Yes, that’s exactly what I want,’ only to find out the mock wedding doesn’t resemble the real thing the resort offers. How would you feel about explaining this discrepancy to Regent executives?”

Keith closed his mouth before it started gathering flies. “Excellent point.”

Arms crossed, Mary shot both him and Cara a glare. “Maybe you should start working on your explanation for Regent executives about the expense of her grandiose notions.”

He had a better idea. “Mary, I’d like a report detailing the resort’s proposed wedding services. Work with Alice to pull the budget numbers and post the report to the document collaboration site in one hour. Cara, come with me.”

Wariness crept across Cara’s expression. “I’m not finished here.”

“You are for now. I’ll review Mary’s report and we’ll reconvene in the morning. Thank you both for your spirited commitment.” He bit his tongue to keep from smiling at their scowls. Women and weddings. Mix the two and stand back.

Mary left to find Alice, and a quick text message to his admin explained the emergency interruption he’d just sent her way. Cara leaned back in the conference room chair and crossed her bare legs in defiance instead of standing so they could go.

“Is your macho card worn out yet?” she asked.

He didn’t bother to stop the grin now that they were alone. “Not quite. I have a few days left before it expires. Come on. Or do you need me to carry you?”

She crossed her arms, which did not help his mind stay out of her cleavage since it was so nicely framed and jutting upward. “Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise.”

Her mulish expression didn’t change. “I’m not having dinner with you. I have a lot of work to do and apparently will be spending more of my precious time tomorrow doing your job. Unless the surprise involves wine and a bubble bath, keep it.”

“It does.” Smoothly, he bent down and extracted her from the chair, pulling her to her feet. “The manager of spa services needs a guinea pig with high-end tastes to evaluate the recently added staff. I immediately thought of you.”

“That was a backhanded compliment if I ever heard one,” she groused, but her face lit up and the sledgehammer took aim at his gut. She was inches away, close enough to get a hint of her perfume, which wound through his brain like an opiate.

One small movement forward by either of them would draw their bodies together. And his hadn’t gotten the message to forget about how much he wanted to take a slow, leisurely tour of her cleavage.

“I think she mentioned champagne.” He cleared the catch from his raw, burning throat. He should step back. Into the next room. The next building, before he started breaking her back-off sign into tiny little pieces.

“Lead the way.”

Golden flecks in her espresso irises had him pinned. He couldn’t look away. “You’re not too busy?”

“For the spa? Never.” Her husky voice whispered from parted lips and he was acutely aware that if there was any breaking going on, it was to his sanity.

He rocked on the ball of his foot and at the last instant moved back. Not forward. “It’s this way.”

His senses buzzed as they crossed the pool deck to the spa building overlooking the beach. The late-afternoon sun cast everything in shadow. It was going to be a long, long, frustrating night, he suspected.

Keith introduced Cara to the spa manager, Elisabeth, a diminutive French transplant from another Regent property in the Canaries, and turned to leave.

“Where are you going?” Cara asked.

“Back to work.” As always.

Elisabeth excused herself to prepare the technicians as Cara spread a graceful hand across his chest and shoved. He took a step back to humor her.

“Not so fast, Mitchell. We have much to discuss. Besides, your tastes are just as high-end as mine.”

“Are you suggesting I be a guinea pig, as well? A spa day is not on my to-do list.” Neither was listening to her ream him again for his crimes. His subconscious was doing a fine job of that without additional input.