Business and Pleasure (Lavender Lace, Book One) (15 page)

Chapter Eleven

Keefe accepted the rental car keys and paperwork from the clerk behind the counter. He moved aside so the next person in line could be helped. Leaning on the end of the counter, he watched Marci talking on her cell phone. She took a few steps, looked up at the ceiling, retraced her steps. She frowned. Whoever was on the phone must be telling Marci something she didn’t want to hear.

Still frowning, she slapped her phone shut. She took two steps toward him when it rang again. Rolling her eyes, she opened the cell and turned away from him.

The life of a corporate president couldn’t be easy. Keefe was happy in his VP position. That was as high as he wanted to go up the corporate ladder.

This call didn’t upset her as much as the last one. She wasn’t smiling when she ended the call, but at least she wasn’t frowning.

“Trouble?” he asked when she walked up to him.

“A delay in filming of our current project. One of the major co-stars went to the hospital with appendicitis.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah. I’m sorry he’s ill, but we’re already running behind schedule due to some equipment failure and this doesn’t help.” She tossed her hair behind her shoulder. “And speaking of ill, the second call was from Tyler Wilson. He’s better now, but was throwing up earlier today. He asked if we could postpone our meeting until tomorrow. I told him that wouldn’t be a problem.”

“No, of course not.” So that meant they had an entire evening to themselves. “What do you want to do?”

“I think we should check in at the lodge first. Then maybe we could drive around a bit and scout out the area.”

“We only have a couple of hours of sunlight left.”

“That’s a couple of hours we can look.”

“Okay.” He jiggled the car keys in his hand. “Do you want me to drive or would you rather do it?”

“You drive. That’ll let me look and take notes.”

* * * * *

The sun had dropped behind the horizon when Keefe once again pulled into the parking lot of the lodge. As per Marci’s suggestion, they’d checked into their rooms first. With map in hand and suggestions from the lodge’s manager, they’d driven off to get a feel of the area.

Keefe had fallen in love with the beauty of the Pacific Northwest the first time he’d visited his friends in Seattle. It wouldn’t be any hardship for him to spend time in British Columbia while scouting out places to shoot Wilson’s movie, if Wilson agreed to the movie.

Marci met Keefe at the hood of the vehicle. Her eyes sparkled with excitement. “This is perfect! We’ll definitely shoot a lot of the exterior scenes in the area.”

“Interior shots locally or on the set?”

“I don’t know yet. We’ll have to check out more of the area. I thought we’d take Saturday and explore.”

“Sounds good to me.”

He fell into step beside Marci as she walked toward the lodge’s entrance. “Why aren’t we talking to Wilson’s agent instead of meeting directly with him?”

“He doesn’t have an agent. He’s an attorney, or was until a couple of years ago when he started writing full-time. He represents himself.”

Keefe pushed open the front door and let Marci enter before him. “Might not be a smart thing for him to do. Just because he’s an attorney doesn’t mean he knows the ins and outs of publishing.”

“He hasn’t done badly for himself. He negotiated a high five-figure advance for the book he’s writing now.”

She took her room key from her tote, opened the door and stepped into her room. She left the door open, as if she expected Keefe to follow her. He hesitated a few seconds, then entered her room and closed the door behind him.

A quick glance showed him her room had a small seating area and fireplace that his didn’t. Otherwise, the furnishings were the same.

“How about if we order room service?” Marci asked, laying her tote on the table close to the fireplace. “We could eat while we work. Unless you’re sick of looking at Wilson’s book already.”

“I’d better not be since I’ll be looking at it for a while. Yeah, eating in is fine.”

“Thank you,” Marci said, the relief evident in her voice. “I don’t feel like going out again, not even to the restaurant here in the lodge.”

She located the room service menu on the small desk in the corner. “There isn’t a huge selection, but what’s available looks good.” She walked back to stand next to him. “What are you hungry for?”

You
, he wanted to say, but he didn’t think she’d appreciate that. This was business, not pleasure. He had to remember that. “A steak would be good. Medium rare.”

“Baked potato with the works and a nice red wine?”

“Perfect.”

“I’ll order it while you get your printout of Wilson’s book.”

Keefe crossed the hall to his own room. Closing the door behind him, he leaned against it and blew out a deep breath. He’d known being close to Marci wouldn’t be easy.

He hadn’t suspected it would be torture.

There had been casual touches all day—a hand on the small of her back to guide her, a bump of their shoulders on the airplane, a brush of their fingers when they both reached for the same thing. Twice, he had to stop himself from entwining their fingers and bringing her hand to his mouth to kiss.

Marci was a very lovely woman and he wanted her in his bed, but his attraction was so much more than sexual. He liked talking to her, listening to her. She was bright, intelligent. She had to be strong to run a large corporation, yet he saw her vulnerable side too. She’d told him she didn’t have any family in the area. He wondered who she leaned on when times were rough for her.

He wanted to be that man.

As long as he worked for Marshall Media, he couldn’t have a relationship with Marci. She wouldn’t allow it.

Keefe located his printout of Wilson’s book and headed back to Marci’s room. He found her sitting at the table, her printout and legal pad in front of her. She looked up as he walked toward her.

“Dinner will be here in about half an hour.”

“Great.” He took the chair opposite her. “All that clomping around in the woods made me hungry.”

“Speaking of the woods, look on page 209 of your printout. The area with the creek we looked at would be perfect for the chase scene.”

“I agree.” He flipped to the page she’d indicated. “You’re doing a lot of work for a project that isn’t finalized yet.”

“Tyler Wilson is going to love our ideas. All this work will be a great head start for the script, and the director. He’ll make changes, of course, but he’ll know the vision I have for the film.”

“You believe in positive thinking.”

“Always.”

“Did your parents instill that sunny outlook?”

A tender smile crossed Marci’s lips. “My mom. She was the eternal optimist.”

Keefe laid down his pen and leaned back in his chair. “I rambled about my family on the plane. Tell me about your folks.”

He wasn’t sure if she’d open up to him since it took her several moments to speak again. “They were the best, and died much too young.”

“What happened?”

“They were flying back from a trip to Georgia with two friends in a small plane. It went down in the mountains of Colorado. Everyone on board was killed.”

Keefe winced. How horrible for her to lose both parents at once. “I’m sorry.”

“They died upon impact, but they must have had time to realize what was happening. For months and months, I thought about how scared they were before the crash.”

“Hey.” He reached across the table and squeezed her hand, wanting to chase the sadness from her eyes. “They were together. They drew strength from each other. That’s what you should remember.” He rubbed his thumb over the back of her hand. “Tell me a happy memory about them.”

“I have so many, I wouldn’t know which one to pick.”

“How about…best birthday present?”

Marci smiled. “That’s easy. I got a red bike for my sixth birthday. I rode that puppy all day and was back on it first thing the next day.”

Keefe chuckled. He could easily picture a six-year-old Marci with long braids tooling around town on her red bicycle. “Best Christmas present?”

“That one is tougher to answer. Mom and Dad always went all out at Christmas.”

“Okay, you can skip that one. How about first boy you ever kissed?”

“Rodney Duncan.” She wrinkled her nose. “He had the worst breath ever.”

Keefe cleared his throat to keep from laughing out loud. “How old were you when ol’ Rodney laid one on you?”

“Thirteen. We were in the school library, working on an essay for history class. I had no idea he was going to kiss me. I don’t think
he
had any idea he was going to kiss me. He turned every shade of red after it happened.”

“Did you like it?”

“Nope. Other girls raved about kissing. I didn’t understand the big deal.”

“Maybe those other girls didn’t kiss guys with bad breath.”

“Maybe.” She smiled tenderly as she looked across the room, obviously lost in a pleasant memory. “I liked kissing the next guy. Of course, I was older and wiser by then.”

“So you were…?”

“Fourteen.” She looked back at Keefe. “Rodney’s older brother, Gerald. He was sixteen. I learned that kissing was pretty cool after all.”

The opening couldn’t have been more perfect for Keefe to tell Marci how much he enjoyed kissing her. He knew that would be a very stupid thing to say.

“How old were you when you first kissed a girl?” Marci asked.

“Eleven.”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “
Eleven
? Did you even know what kissing was at eleven?”

“I didn’t have to know.
She
did.”

A knock on the door stopped Marci before she said anything else. “Hold that thought. I want to know more about the
she
who initiated you in kissing.”

She slipped her hand from beneath his and rose. That’s when it registered to Keefe that he’d been holding her hand the entire time they talked. It had felt so natural, he hadn’t realized that she never pulled away from him.

He moved their work to the side of the table while Marci opened the door for their dinner. She chatted with the waiter while he transferred their meal from the tray to the table. He’d noticed how friendly Marci was with everyone they were around. She wasn’t the least bit snobbish, which she could easily be in her position of power.

His admiration for her grew the more time he spent with her.

Once the waiter left, Keefe opened the bottle of Pinot Noir. Marci removed the metal covers from their plates. The food’s aroma made Keefe’s stomach growl.

“Yeah, me too,” Marci said, covering her stomach with one hand. “I didn’t realize how hungry I am.”

He splashed wine into their glasses. “A toast.” He held out his glass toward her. “To a successful venture. May
In The Mountain’s Shadow
earn millions for Marshall Media.”

“I’ll drink to that.”

She touched her glass to his and took a sip. “Very good. I’ve never had wine produced in British Columbia. I thought as long as we’re here, we should try it.”

“I’m always willing to try something new.”

“What’s the weirdest thing you’ve eaten?” Marci asked, breaking her roll in half.

Keefe swallowed his bite of steak and washed it down with a sip of wine. “I’m not sure about weird, but maybe out of the ordinary. Davin is a huge hunter. He’s always out in the woods the first day of hunting season. I’ve eaten all kinds of meat at his house—venison, elk, moose, bear.”

“I’ve had venison, but none of that other stuff.”

He could tell by her tone and the way her nose wrinkled that she had no intention of ever trying them either. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”

“I’ve tried just about every kind of chocolate available. My sense of adventure is fine.”

Keefe chuckled, then returned to his meal. They ate in silence for several moments before Marci spoke again.