Page 5 of 40 and (No Longer) Fighting It
JD gave him no time to argue, getting up to clean the kitchen and deliberately making enough racket to drown out the possibility of conversation. Lily thanked Linc for breakfast, then left to complete preparations for the barbecue. Linc spent the afternoon poring over the blueprints for the restaurant and brewery that would be part of the resort complex—and okay, brooding about an upstart baker horning in on his territory. By four thirty JD was removing the blueprints from Linc’s possessive grasp and insisting they get ready to go.
Lily’s home was just off a quaint Main Street, surrounded by a tree-lined neighborhood straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting. The cute yellow Craftsman looked right at home despite the crowd of cars parked in its vicinity. As they pulled into a spot at the curb several houses down, Linc’s phone buzzed in his back pocket. Digging it out, he glanced at the screen and couldn’t suppress a frown.
“Trouble?” JD asked as he shut the car off.
“Not really.” An annoyance, more like. “Shel Blanchard, that food journalist fromFood & Wine, is going to be in Nashville later this week and wants to meet up for a preliminary interview ahead of the ground-breaking.”
“Angling for an exclusive?”
For more than that. The woman was excellent at her job and had covered several stories regarding his stint as a celebrity guest judge on the popularCulinary CombatTV series and the charity work he did in conjunction with several food festivals around the country. She was also determined to ignore the “one night only” speech he’d given her when they’d slept together last year. They’d had a nice time, but sex with her wasn’t something he had an itch to revisit, and he’d made that plain. Shel, on the other hand…
Still, he couldn’t completely ignore someone with the kind of reach she had, not without risking the repercussions. And he wouldn’t, not when the resort was involved. It was too big of a project.
“Probably.” He tapped the keyboard on his phone. “Maybe I can wine and dine her into some positive press for the ground-breaking.”
He hit send on his response, asking to confirm details when he knew what his schedule would be later. When Shel replied with a happy acceptance and a smiley face emoji, he returned his phone to his pocket. Shel was a complication for another day. Tonight was for JD and Lily.
JD bypassed Lily’s wide front porch and headed directly for an open side gate leading to the backyard, stopping to chat at the various clumps of people gathered around, introducing Linc to too many individuals to keep track of. The backyard was generous for a neighborhood like this one, right in town, but Lily had utilized every bit of space for chairs and picnic blankets and small tables. A tent had been erected that covered the side farthest from the gate, and Linc could see a couple of long tables laden with covered dishes. The smell of barbecue permeated the air, and he began to think maybe JD had been telling more truth than his taste bud–challenged judgments knew when he’d said the meat would be good.
“Lily!” JD raised a hand along with his voice. His fiancée stood near a massive grill, a red plastic cup in her hand and a smile on her face that turned brilliant when she saw JD. She waved him over, Linc trailing along. Surrounding her was a group of women and one man at the grill who he assumed was Clayton of the barbecue fame. Linc’s glance slid across the faces, not really taking in details, until it came to rest on the woman directly next to Lily. Her warm brown skin glowed under the bright sun, her dark curls bouncing in the faint breeze. But it was the mahogany eyes fixed on his face that locked him in. He knew those eyes. He hadn’t seen them in years, but he could never forget the last moment they’d stared up at him, betrayal shining bright.
Linc’s steps slowed, dread rising. “You said Lily’s baker friend was named Claire?” he asked JD.
“Yeah.”
“Claire what?” he managed to get out.
“What?” JD stopped, turned to him.
He broke eye contact with the woman, forced his gaze to his friend. “Claire what? What’s her last name?”
JD’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”
“What is it?”
“Claire Taylor. Why? Do you know her?”
Claire Taylor. In Black Wolf’s Bluff, Tennessee. The last place he’d ever expect her to be. Yes, he’d lost track of her, but how in hell had she ended up here?
JD’s stare demanded an answer.
“Oh yeah, I know her.”
JD looked like he was about to say something, but he was forestalled when Lily appeared in front of them, two women in tow. And one of them was Claire.
“Linc, let me introduce you to my two best friends,” she said. “Erin is your general contractor, and this is—”
“Claire,” he choked out, unable to find the inimitable charm he was famous for. “Hello again.”
Three
Claire sensed Lincoln the moment he entered the backyard. It was too crowded—and she was too short—to actually see him, but a tingle of electrical awareness shot down her spine, sparking her body to life. As if it sensed that he could see her, even if she couldn’t see him.
She dared a glimpse from the corner of her eye. One glimpse, that was all she needed, and her breath choked off in her throat. She tried to resist, tried to look away, but it was impossible to do anything but full-on stare.
He’d been handsome nine years ago when he walked into her classroom at ICE. Confident, muscular, sexy as hell, and every woman in the room had swooned internally at a sweep of his blue-gray eyes. The celebrity chef who’d lost his beloved wife on the night of the opening of his downtown Manhattan restaurant. And though Lincoln’s eyes had held a wounded sadness back then, they’d still been charming. So had his killer smile. Until it had turned on her.
All these years later, she watched as he mingled with the crowd. Women still swooned, and men rushed to shake his hand and introduce themselves. JD slapped his friend on the back with enthusiasm, the bond between the two men obvious. She found herself searching for minute changes: That wounded look in his eyes had eased. He’d been muscular before, but now… The man had bulked up in a way that made her eyes widen and her heart flutter. And every muscle was shown to perfection in a tight T-shirt and chinos that cupped each defined part of his body lovingly.
