Czytaj książkę: «Big-city Bachelor»

Chapter One

Curling her fingers around the ends of the armrests, Lizzie Hamill counted backward from ten, willing herself to turn her head when she reached zero. Statistics showed that this was the safest form of travel possible. People did it all the time. The laws of aerodynamics weren’t about to be repealed. It was downright cowardly not to look out the window at least once.

“Two,” she whispered. “One.” She took a deep breath. “Zero.” Nothing happened. “Zero,” she repeated, lifting her hands to her cheeks and forcing her head to move.

Air rushed from her lungs in a high-pitched squeak. There was so much sky. Bluer than a morning in January, wider than the horizon from Hanson’s Bluff, brighter than a sunrise on the ripples at the bend of the creek. It was so vast, so…awesome. How could anything be so beautiful and so terrifying at the same time?

Heart beating in a hard lump in her throat, Lizzie stared, fascinated despite herself. She was thirty years old and this was her first time in an airplane. She had expected to be nervous, had every right to be nervous, and yet…

And yet, it was the same sky she had seen every day of her life, the same one that arched over the house on Myrtle Street. Why should she be afraid of it just because she was seeing it from a different viewpoint?

Gradually, her pulse began to steady. There was a confusing mix of emotions churning inside her. Along with the fear was something else, something unfamiliar. It was a stretching, restless kind of itch that she couldn’t identify, as if she were responding to…what? Challenge? Adventure?

Hardly. She was the least adventurous person she knew. She was Auntie Liz, good old Lizzie, always available to baby-sit the kids or whip up ten pies for the church bake sale. Until now, the most adventuresome thing she’d done had been to sneak nine items through the eight-items-or-less line.

Yet here she was on a plane. Not just any plane, but one that was taking her to New York City. Could this really be happening?

She dropped her hands, slowly leaning forward until the tip of her nose touched the glass. The land spread out beneath her like a quilt that had been washed too many times, its colors mellowed, its stitching puckered into hills and valleys. In stately slow motion, it rolled past, indifferent and unaware.

And so very, very far away.

Lizzie felt her stomach roll. She hadn’t been able to eat breakfast this morning. Bad move. Considering what she was going to be facing when the plane finally landed, she should have girded herself with a five-course meal. Lord knew she could have afforded it.

She was an honest-to-goodness heiress.

Well, as much of an heiress as Packenham Junction had ever produced. It was still difficult to believe, but the lawyers assured her there’d been no mistake. Her Uncle Roland Hamill, the black sheep of the family, the man whose name hadn’t been spoken above a whisper in all her growing years, had left his entire estate to the niece he had never met.

Poor Uncle Roland. She’d been saddened to learn of his death, but it was a distant sadness, not the heart-wrenching grief she’d felt when her parents had died. She knew almost nothing about him. There hadn’t been any photographs of him in the family album, although there had been some boyhood pictures of her father that had obviously had sections torn off. What had driven him away from his home? Why had her father hated him so much?

And what on earth was she going to do with all the money?

Well, not all that much money. His lawyers had already handled the sale of Uncle Roland’s condominium and his furniture, but most of the proceeds had gone toward paying his debts.

And that was a shame. Lizzie’s stepsister, Jolene, was pregnant again, and with the sporadic nature of Tim’s work, they could use some money. Zack, her youngest stepbrother, was due to start college next fall and Benjamin, the oldest, had confessed that business at the cheese factory had been steadily declining. Despite their circumstances, though, her adoptive siblings, true to the stubborn nature of the entire Pedley clan, had been adamant about not taking any of her inheritance.

“It’s yours, Lizzie,” Jolene had said on the drive to the airport this morning. As usual, the task of family spokesperson had fallen to her. “For once in your life, you have something that’s just for you.”

“But I couldn’t possibly—”

“Yes, you can. Your uncle wanted you to have it.”

“I feel weird about it, though. I mean, why should he pass everything on to me when we didn’t even know each other?”

“Well, who else was there? He never married, never had children of his own, right?”

“Right.”

“So why are you still so hesitant? It’s a wonderful opportunity.”

“I know, but it’s all been so sudden.”

“It’s just like a fairy tale, Auntie Liz,” Marylou said breathlessly, leaning forward to grasp the top of Lizzie’s seat. She blew a pink bubble and popped it noisily against the roof of her mouth. “The good princess, struggling to make ends meet, is suddenly transformed by the wave of a magic wand and is whisked away to an enchanted kingdom.”

“I’m going to New York, not Never-Never-Land,” Lizzie said, shaking her head at the irrepressibly whimsical seven-year-old. “And working at the day care center isn’t exactly sweeping up cinders.”

“But Mom’s your stepsister,” Marylou continued, her eyes sparkling as she expanded the fantasy.

“Mmm. That’s true. Do you think we could call her evil, though?”

“She makes everyone eat broccoli.”

“That’s true, too.” She glanced at Jolene. “You evil thing, you.”

“I knew all those bedtime stories you read my kids would warp their minds,” Jolene muttered under her breath as she fought to steer the old station wagon around a bend in the road. “But getting back to our topic, we were talking about your inheritance.”

Lizzie sighed. “I still don’t know what I’ll do with it if I don’t share it with the rest of you.”

“We’ll survive just fine. It’s you we’re concerned about,” Jolene said. “After all the years you’ve devoted to taking care of other people, it’s about time you had a chance to focus on yourself.”

“Maybe you could go shopping,” Marylou said helpfully. “There’s this really cool green dress with sparkles on it that’s in the window of McBride’s.”

Lizzie smiled wryly. “I know the one. Thanks for the suggestion, but I’m not sure how well sequins would stand up to a roomful of three-year-olds with finger paints.”

“There won’t be any three-year-olds or finger paints where you’re going,” Jolene said. “And I think it would be a great idea to do some shopping while you’re away.”

“This is a business trip, remember?”

“Sure, but it’s your business you’re going to visit.”

“I don’t think that part has quite sunk in yet, either. What on earth am I going to do with fifty percent of Whitmore and Hamill?”

“Run the company, of course.”

At Jolene’s deadpan comment, Lizzie burst into laughter. “Oh, now that’s almost as good as working at the day care in sequins,” she said when she caught her breath. “Me? A business tycoon?”

Jolene didn’t join in her laughter. “Why not? You’re smart enough to do whatever you put your mind to.”

“That’s sweet of you to say, but—”

“You know it’s true. You started up your own business already, didn’t you?”

“That’s different. The day care is just organized babysitting.”

“It’s a business,” Jolene insisted. “And who has been helping Ben with his books for the past six years?”

“I always helped him with his math homework. It’s just a hobby.”

“Hah. You managed to run Dad’s farm when you were only nineteen. Why, if you hadn’t turned down that scholarship so you could stay and take care of us—”

“That’s ancient history, Jolene. The family needed me, and I don’t have any regrets. I’m perfectly happy just as I am.”

There was a pregnant pause. “Are you?”

“Of course,” she said quickly. Automatically. Because she already knew from experience how useless regrets could be. One of the most painful phrases ever spoken was if only. So she didn’t speak it.

“Do you really own a company, Auntie Liz?”

“Well, part of it.”

“Hey, cool.”

“I’ll bring you some of their stationery for a souvenir, okay?”

As the engines droned on and the miles slipped past beneath her, Lizzie thought about her promise to her niece. She didn’t know much about the advertising business, but she was pretty sure that owning half the company involved more than lending her name to the letterhead. If all that was expected of her was her name, Mr. Whitmore wouldn’t have arranged this trip in the first place, would he?

That lawyer, Jeremy Ebbet, had been so kind over the phone, expressing his sympathy over the loss of her uncle and offering to help her sort out all those bothersome legal technicalities of inheriting the partnership, as he’d put it. He’d said that Mr. Whitmore had personally asked him to invite her to visit their office, insisting the entire staff was eager to meet Roland’s niece. It must be true, since Mr. Whitmore was paying for her plane ticket and even her hotel room.

And as if that weren’t enough, yesterday an extravagant bouquet of flowers had been delivered to the house on Myrtle Street, compliments of that nice Mr. Whitmore.

Relaxing back into her seat, Lizzie speculated about the owner of the other name on the Whitmore and Hamill letterhead. Uncle Roland would have turned fifty this fall, so his partner was probably around the same age. Not for the first time, she tried to imagine a face to go with the name, but the image that popped into her head was a cross between a white-bearded fairy godmother and Santa Claus in a three-piece suit.

He’d sent her flowers. Flowers. That was another first. She wasn’t the kind of woman to whom men sent flowers. A flower pot, maybe. Once while she’d still been seeing Bobby, he’d shown up at her doorstep with a foot-high cedar tree, its roots dripping clods of fresh earth on her welcome mat. She’d smiled and thanked him, of course. It had been a sensible gift, since she’d been looking for something to plant beside the fence in the side yard. But still, there was something so wonderfully impractical about flowers. And sequins.

She shifted, tugging down the hem of her short navy-blue skirt. What did she need with sequins? This suit was her best outfit, one she’d managed to keep in good condition for several years by saving it for special occasions. Like the weddings of her friends, and the christenings of her friends’ children, and all the other events that marked the milestones of life. Of other people’s lives.

Not that she minded, she thought hurriedly. She loved her job, her friends and her family. She loved seeing them happy, and hearing their children call her “Auntie Liz.” She had finally come to terms with the fact that no one was going to call her “Mom.”

She really was perfectly happy, no matter what Jolene said, right?

But if that was the case, why had she jumped at the chance to make this trip? Why had she spent the past week training not one but two women to take her place at the day care? Why did she get this heart-pounding, palm-sweating feeling each time she thought about her uncle’s…no, her company?

The plane banked in a wide, slow turn and the window tipped toward the ground. Lizzie braced her hand against the side of the fuselage and craned her neck to see the new view that unfolded. Her stomach didn’t roll quite as badly this time.

Just like any new experience, once you got the hang of it, flying wasn’t so bad after all.

The flight was forty minutes late by the time it landed at La Guardia. Tinged with gray, bleak as a closed barn door, the airport spread in drab determination across the patched asphalt. Inside the terminal, the air was thick with humidity and laced with the babble of strangers. Everyone appeared to know exactly where they were going and were in a heck of a hurry to get there, so Lizzie hitched the strap of her carry-on over her shoulder and let the stream carry her along to the baggage claim.

“Oh, Lord love a duck,” she whispered when she caught sight of the uniformed man standing beside the glass doors. Even though they didn’t have anything like this in Packenham Junction, she’d watched enough TV to recognize an honest-to-goodness limousine chauffeur when she saw one. And he was holding up a neatly lettered sign with her name on it.

That nice Mr. Whitmore had said that he’d arrange to have someone meet her flight, but she hadn’t expected anything quite so fancy. Dragging her suitcase behind her, she hurried to claim her ride before the limousine turned into a pumpkin.

The hotel room that had been reserved for her turned out to be a suite with a carpet that was thick enough to swallow small animals. There was a dazzling bouquet of flowers on the desk in the sitting room and another on the long, low dresser in the bedroom. And as if that weren’t enough to make her head spin, on the round coffee table in front of the couch there was a huge basket loaded with fresh fruit and a bottle of wine with a glittering gold bow, all compliments of Alexander Whitmore.

What an exceptionally generous man that Mr. Whitmore must be. He was being so kind to the partner he didn’t even know, what a wonderful relationship he must have had with her uncle.

One hour later, after a hair-raising trip in a taxi and an elevator ride that made her ears pop, Lizzie finally arrived at the thirty-sixth floor of the glass-and-steel tower that housed the offices of Whitmore and Hamill. Taking a deep, fortifying breath, pleased that she didn’t have to resort to counting backward this time, she moved across the reception area and stopped in front of a semicircular desk.

A slim, ruthlessly blond woman who looked as if she could have just stepped from the pages of Cosmopolitan smiled politely. “Good afternoon.”

Lizzie clasped the worn handle of her best purse and smiled back. “Hi.”

“May I help you?”

“I’m here to see Mr. Whitmore.”

The woman traced a lethal-looking red fingernail down the list in front of her. “And your name?”

How long had it been since she’d been someplace where people didn’t know her? She wouldn’t have needed to identify herself to Mabel at the Packenham Clinic, and her dentist’s wife always greeted her by name on the rare occasions she nerved herself up to go for a checkup. But this was a different place. A different world, according to Marylou.

“Miss?”

“I’m Lizzie Hamill.”

There was a strangled gasp. “Miss Elizabeth Hamill?”

She nodded.

The woman pressed a button on the blinking array in front of her, lifted a telephone receiver to her ear and spoke quickly before hurrying around the desk to Lizzie’s side. “Please, come with me. I’ll show you directly to the conference room. Mr. Whitmore’s been expecting you.”

Treating her with all the deference due visiting royalty, the receptionist, who said her name was Pamela, ushered Lizzie toward a pair of doors at the other end of a wide hall. Assuring her that Mr. Whitmore was on his way, Pamela waited until Lizzie stepped inside, then closed the doors discreetly, leaving her alone.

Lizzie glanced around. Conference room? The place was long enough to double as a bowling alley if they got rid of the table. There were enough chairs here to accommodate a Pedley family reunion, although she doubted whether the place would look quite as pristine once they were through with it. She leaned over the table, checking her reflection in the mirror-polished surface, then gave one of the swivel chairs a spin.

Framed posters decorated the walls, many of them scenes from familiar commercials. She recognized the neon colors of a soft-drink ad and the desert landscape that provided the background for a line of luxury cars. Dominating it all, though, was the elegant sign at the other end of the room. There, on the wall, engraved on a huge brass plaque in letters as long as her forearm, was…

“My name,” she breathed.

Well, her uncle’s name.

Pursing her lips into a soundless whistle, she walked the length of the gleaming table and touched her fingertips to the scrolling letters. Even though she wasn’t the Hamill the sign had been made for, seeing it still gave her a thrill. No, it was more complicated than a thrill. It was a restless, stretching kind of tickle, like the one she’d felt on the plane. It was as if that unacknowledged part of her was still responding to challenge and adventure.

Run the company.

Her mouth quirked as Jolene’s outrageous comment came back to her. Ridiculous. Tracing the outline of her name was as close as she was going to come to the kind of person her Uncle Roland must have been.

The doors at the other end of the room clicked open. Lizzie used her sleeve to rub her fingerprints off the sign and turned around. At her first sight of the man whose tall frame filled the doorway, she splayed her hand over the letters once more, only this time it was for balance.