Because of Audrey

“Name your price,” he demanded, an incredibly stupid move for a smart businessman, but he needed that land.

“I don’t have one.”

“Everyone does. What’s yours?”

“Gray, leave my shop.”

“No. Not until you promise to sell to me.”

A frown formed between her dark arched eyebrows, and she edged her hand toward the telephone. “Seriously, Gray, go now or I’ll call the police.”

“No.” He couldn’t, not until she agreed.

She reached under the counter for...what?...a gun? For mace?

He was frightening her. He might be mad to get the land, and she might be the strangest woman he’d ever met, but scaring her was unconscionable. Intimidation to get her to sell? Yes. Outright frightening her? Dead wrong.

He backed away.

“Think about it,” he said, the slightest thread of recklessness seeping into his voice. As a businessman, he was making mistakes left, right and center.

She shook her head, and there was such implacability, such conviction in the movement he knew she would never sell, no matter how high his price.

When he turned and left, desperation wrapped around his throat like a noose. He was going to have to do the unthinkable and have Dad declared unfit.

No. Before he did that, he would drive into Denver and see this woman for himself.

He couldn’t wait—for DNA results, for the woman’s next move, for another damn day. On the heels of that thought, he swore. He couldn’t leave today. He had an appointment with Dad’s accountant that couldn’t be put off.

Tomorrow then. He’d go to Denver first thing tomorrow.

Time for a showdown.

CHAPTER THREE

GRAY SAT IN his car for ten minutes getting his emotions under control, and then started the drive down Main toward Turner Lumber on the end of town opposite to where his parents lived. He couldn’t go home to face them.

Not yet. Not while he considered, let alone actually started, the process toward turning against his father.

He noticed a woman he’d gone to school with walking down the sidewalk. She was one of the descendants of the original founding father, Ian Accord. She carried herself with an elegance and grace, with an air of confidence Gray had often witnessed among the rich. Wealth was a language he himself spoke, and being tongue-tied by his current money problems disheartened him.

Down the street, Audrey Stone stepped out of her flower shop and locked the door behind her, then started in his direction, her pigeon-toed stride oddly endearing.

Full curves moved in different directions. She looked clumsy, but those curves, that walk, the slightly askew pillbox hat—those full red lips—were so insanely feminine, he started to smile.

When she stopped in front of a lingerie shop to look at some feminine froth of satin and lace, Gray imagined it cradling her shapely body. His latent smile spread.

When he realized what his foolish mouth was doing, he made himself stop.

Do not even think about finding this woman attractive. She’s your enemy. If she hadn’t bought that land from Dad, you wouldn’t be in your current predicament.

With a screech of tires, he drove on.

In the parking lot of the massive lumberyard and hardware store that had been in his family since long before Gray’s birth, he threw out the gum he’d been chewing and opened two fresh sticks, chewing hard until his shaking hands calmed and he could breathe easily. Why, for a man who was known as a sharp businessman, did just walking into his father’s business leave him feeling so...afraid? Why did everything these days?

His tension filled the car like dark gas.

He forced himself out of the vehicle and into the building, heading past the large shop to the offices that occupied the second floor. Turner Lumber catered to both contractors and the average man. And woman, Gray reminded himself. There were a lot of knowledgable women out there doing their own repairs these days.

The store covered half an acre of land and served all of the towns for miles around. Even in a city the size of Denver, you would be hard-pressed to find a better-stocked, more efficient supplier. They also rented equipment, a part of the business that used to be a going concern. Since the downturn in the economy, there was less construction. As well, homeowners no longer had the money for renovations.

There had been a spurt of construction when a new ski resort had been built outside of town, but Dad had taken his profits and had invested in risky ventures. When Gray had tried to change them to something safer, Dad had vetoed him. For a man who’d been a smart business owner for so many years, Dad’s actions these days seemed like a textbook case of how not to run a business.

Businesses suffered everywhere, including Turner Lumber. And yet, Dad was giving money away left, right and center. It had to stop. Cauterizing the hemorrhaging of money was Gray’s job.

Upstairs, he found the renovations he’d ordered nearly finished. Part of dragging Turner Lumber into the twenty-first century had been modernizing the office. Gone were the separate cubicles of old, replaced by a huge open space filled with desks and office modules. At the moment, they were squeezed into one half of the space while the floors on the other half were being refinished.

The office kept the idle lumberyard workers busy now that traffic had slowed down there. So far, Gray had managed to keep everyone on the payroll. He didn’t know how much longer he could hold out.

If he was smart, he’d start slashing now, but sentimentality kept getting in the way. Was this what Dad felt when he walked in here?

Gray stopped to talk to the office manager, Hilary Scott. She, like all the employees, wore a cotton mask over her nose and mouth.

“Here.” She handed him a mask. “You should wear it until these guys finish their work.” A frown wrinkled her forehead.

“You don’t look happy,” Gray observed. “What’s the problem?”

“The noise.”

“That’s temporary. It won’t last.”

“The dust. Look at our desks.”

A fine gray film settled over everything.

“I’ll have a cleaning crew come in on the weekend.”

Hilary sighed. “But what kind of chemicals, or even old mold, have you stirred up with this destruction?”

Gray loved language, loved how he could manipulate it to his advantage in business, but hated how it could be corrupted.

“This isn’t destruction, Hilary. This is change.”

She didn’t answer, just stood her ground like a wiry-haired bantam hen.

“In another week, things will settle down,” Gray said.

“Given how hard it is to get work done in this—” she gestured with her chin toward the open space, not the contractors and their work, he noticed “—I fervently hope it gets better.”