All in all, he had an ideal life and, honestly, Beth wasn’t entirely sure why he’d want to take over Endicott Development, but he’d made plenty of noise about it.
“How’s Rebecca doing?” Beth asked as she slid into a chair along the side of a long, mahogany table and he headed to the coffee bar in the back of the room.
“Oh, you know Rebecca.”
Actually, she didn’t. Like Landon, Rebecca was always a little distant and cool, like a woman wrapped in cellophane who you could see but not touch. “Busy with the kids?”
“Always,” he agreed. “She said she was going to call you, actually, because she wants to completely redo our master bathroom and thought you might have some ideas.”
The suggestion surprised her, but she liked being able to help family. “Of course, but I’m swamped with my own renovation nightmare right now.”
“I heard.” He turned from the coffeepot and placed a cup in front of her. “Black, right?”
“Actually, I’m off coffee at the moment.”
He lifted a brow, but the exchange was interrupted by the slam of a door. “Jennifer!” Josie’s voice echoed in the hallway. “Someone call 911! Ray is having a heart attack!”
Landon and Beth exchanged a quick look before they both shot out of their seats and darted into the hall.
“You call 911, and you will lose your job!” Dad hollered over the commotion of several people running in the same direction. “I am not having a heart attack.”
Landon and Beth reached Dad’s office at the same time, but Landon pushed in first. “What’s going on?” he demanded.
“Your father is having a heart attack.”
“I am not…” Dad ground out a few more words Beth couldn’t understand, but the anger underneath them nearly made her stumble.
“Dad, are you okay?”
He was standing behind his desk, the same crisp, white, long-sleeve button-down he wore to work every day. This one looked a little too large on him now, and he flicked at the collar as though he expected it to be tighter.
“I’m fine,” he shot back, but his attention was on Josie. “And I’ll have you remember that.”
She bristled, smoothing her hair. “I don’t like the way you look, Ray,” she said. “You’re pale and you were clutching your chest.”
“I was not clutching my chest, and if shoving me in the hospital again is your way of controlling this situation, it won’t work.”
“I’m only trying to help,” she said softly, her voice cracking. Immediately, Landon was next to her, putting a comforting arm around his mother’s shoulders.
“Should I call 911?” Jenny asked tentatively from the door. Behind her, three more EDC employees watched with concern.
“Absolutely not,” Dad said. “Josie is overreacting, and we just need to be left alone.”
Two of them backed away, but his admin stayed and gave a questioning look to Josie, as if waiting for the real order.
“Not yet,” Josie said.
“How about a glass of water?” Beth suggested to Jenny, getting a nod from the other woman before leaving and taking the others with her. Wordlessly, Beth closed the door and turned to the scene. “What’s going on?” she asked.
“My wife is trying to stop me from sharing my retirement decision, and when I scratched my chest, coughed, and inhaled a little too deeply, she was ready to schedule open-heart surgery.”
Josie sniffed at that, crossing her arms. “I’m not trying to stop anything. You know I want you to retire. Believe it or not, I love you, Ray, so sue me if I’m overreacting. You were very pale for a moment.”
“Dad, seriously, don’t play it tough if you don’t feel well,” Beth said, coming closer to his desk. “How about you call the cardiologist to be on the safe side?”
He closed his eyes. “I have an appointment in three days. Beth, Landon, can you sit down? I’ve reached a decision.”
“One I think has true merit,” Josie added.
Beth took one of the guest chairs in front of his desk, and Landon sat next to his mother on the sofa. Finally, Dad dropped back into his plush leather chair and took a slow breath.
“I’ve decided to give you each part of the company to run.”
Beth’s jaw actually fell open. “You’ve decided?” An age-old resentment prickled, making her sit up straighter. “Without discussing the details first?”
“This is the best way to go for the future of EDC,” Dad continued, as if she hadn’t spoken.
When would he stop trying to run her life? She was forty years old. She opened her mouth to argue, but Landon interrupted her.
“How are you dividing it?” he asked, as if the whole thing were a done deal.
“Business and financial holdings to you. Real estate and development to Beth.” Dad turned back to her. “It’s not the whole company, Beth, which I know seemed daunting to you.”
Not exactly what she’d said, but she let it go and tried to process what was unfolding.
He went on, “Real estate and development is the part of the business you do so well. I think it’s a good compromise.”
She geared up to argue, then something silenced her. She didn’t have only herself to think of. What he was asking was a lot of work for a single mother. But it was also a lot of security for a child.
Beth shifted in her seat, still silent.
“How will that work, exactly?” Landon asked. “The two parts of the business are so interconnected.”
“That’s what I want you two to figure out,” Dad said. “I want you to pound out a strategic plan and explain exactly how you’d handle your end of the business and present it to me in two weeks.”
Beth inched back. “Dad, I need to think about whether or not I even want to do this.” Like it or not, she needed to talk to Ken.
He gave her a hard look. “Beth, do you want a multimillion-dollar company to run, with the income that goes along with it, or do you want to flip houses for sixty grand every six or nine months?”
Two months ago, she’d have stood up, smiled politely, and left. She wanted to control her life, not have him—and by extension, Josie—in charge of her business decisions. But now? An income like he was talking about was important for her child. A family-owned business was child-friendly, too. There were many benefits, even ones Dad didn’t know about yet.
“And,” Dad leaned forward, looking at Josie, “I’m keeping control of commercial development.”
“What?” Landon practically launched off the sofa. “That’s not retiring.”
“Precisely!” Josie said, slapping her hands on the leather. “But he won’t listen to me.”
“That way I still get to come into the office a few days a week,” Dad said. “And I don’t have to look for a room in a nursing home quite yet.”
Josie tsked noisily. “I want to travel and enjoy these years, Raymond.” Her voice rose with genuine emotion, along with her color, as she leaned forward. “I don’t know how much longer I’ll have you.”
Dad grunted and looked toward the ceiling. “I am so sick of this…this obituary writing.”
“Well, I for one hate the idea,” Landon said, getting all their attention. “Finance and the business end is part of both commercial development and residential real estate. I’d end up answering to both of you. No, thank you.”
Josie gave Dad a giant-eyed I told you so look.
“Then Beth can take it all,” Dad shot back.
“Whoa, whoa.” Beth held up her hands. “I’m not sure I want any of this, Dad, let alone all of it.”
“You’ll come around,” her father said, his cockiness rankling her.
“What about RJ?” she asked pointedly.
“RJ?” Her father shook his head. “He’s not in the picture.”
“Why not?” she demanded. “He could do commercial development.”
Landon snorted. “Beth, come on.”
“Yes, Beth, come on,” her father agreed.
“He’s done commercial work.” Her natural tendency to defend her little brother rose, their recent conversation still fresh in her mind. “That Van Nuys deal was awesome.”
Dad angled his head at her. “Honey, I flew a crop duster once when I was fifteen, but that doesn’t mean I could pilot a 747 over the Atlantic Ocean. RJ doesn’t have the skill set we need, and you know it. I’ll take care of him financially. RJ and I have a deal, so you don’t have to worry about him.”
But she did worry about him, and a “deal with Dad” was not what he needed right now. But this wasn’t the time to get into that. “Well, I need to think about this and talk to…” She almost said Ken, but her voice trailed off. “Friends,” she finished, standing up to end the conversation.
“There’s not much to think about, Beth.”
“There’s plenty for me to think about.” Landon shot up. “I have a thriving business and a growing family, so there’s much for me to consider if I’m going to let my investment firm suffer while I try to cobble together a strategic plan for EDC’s financial issues.”
Beth tried not to give him a look, but really. Did he have to be such an arrogant ass? And did they both have to be so dismissive of RJ? Her brother had every right to be in on this conversation and decision.
“If you’re done, Dad, I need to get back to work.”
“Is Ken Cavanaugh still doing your demo?” Josie asked innocently.
Beth closed her eyes. “He’s helping me, yes.”
“Beth.” Her father came around the desk, and she braced herself for another lecture about the problem of seeing Ken Cavanaugh. Which she would have scoffed at yesterday…but that resealed envelope in her file bin still loomed over her. “Give up the house-flipping business,” her father said, surprising her. “You can have so much security and a solid future at the helm of this company.”
“A third of this company,” Landon corrected.
But she just looked at her father, who didn’t even know how weighty that advice really was. “Let me think about it, Dad,” she said, leaning in to give him a hug. “And let me know what the cardiologist says, okay?”
“Pfft. Damn doctors.”
She gave him a kiss on the cheek and said good-bye to the others, wishing her decision was clear and easy. It was anything but.
Chapter Fourteen
Ken’s shift hadn’t gotten one bit better. In fact, by the time he pulled into his driveway, he was gripping the steering wheel hard enough to break it.
In the past twenty-four hours, he’d battled a car fire, a kitchen blaze, seen two heart attack victims taken off in ambulances, and barely saved a nineteen-year-old who’d OD’d on painkillers.
And then there was Rhonda Orsini, who’d been doing nothing but driving to work—she was a nurse, he’d learned later—when some moron checked his phone and ran a red light.
Rhonda survived. Her twenty-week-old unborn baby had not.
He dragged a hand over his unshaven face and over his hair, trying to pull out the stress.
He tried to shake off the images of the accident, using years of training to remember what he did and why. He couldn’t let it get personal. The shift had sucked balls, but it was over now, and ahead of him were four days—and nights—with Beth.
Law had left a message, asking to meet up for lunch over on Sanibel Island to check out another place he was thinking about buying, but Ken hadn’t called him back with an answer. Because Ken had a completely different plan for how to spend this day.
No more boat rides and small talk. No more distractions and distance. And no more freaking separate bedrooms.
A quick shudder blasted him at the sight of the morning sun spilling its first light on Beth’s Explorer parked in his driveway.
“Look at that, Sal. If that isn’t the damn finest thing we’ve seen in the last day or, hell, year, I don’t know what is.”
Fat Sally couldn’t be bothered to look, as she lay curled on the passenger seat next to him. He pulled into the garage, thinking about Beth asleep in bed.
And how he wanted to just climb in and join her.
His body stirred and tightened with every step. His jaw clenched, he entered the quiet house. He walked through the living room to the guest room. The door was open, but the bed was empty and made.
His room? Doubtful, but maybe. On the other side of the house, he stepped into the master to find it exactly as he’d left it. A fresh wave of frustration rolled through him.
Her car was here, so where was she?
He followed Sally when she barked, shifting his gaze to the dock.
Not as good as finding—and joining—her in bed, but he’d take it. He took a minute to check out the back of her head and her legs outstretched on another chair in front of her, a cup of tea or decaf, he assumed, on the armrest of the Adirondack chair.
Anticipation made his hands itch and his chest swell. And something else tugged at his gut, too. It felt a little like a pang of hunger that suddenly threatened starvation.
He needed her. Not just for sex, but for comfort. Assurance. Grounding.
Life.
And the pregnant, sexy, precious woman who sat on the dock was humming with everything he needed.
Sally made her way to the dock right before Ken did, barking in warning and making Beth startle as if she’d been lost in thought or even asleep.
She turned and slammed him with a smile that reached right down to his gut and twisted it into a knot. “Hey.”
When he got to her chair, he couldn’t help himself. He bent over and kissed her sweet hair. “Hi, honey, I’m home.”
She laughed lightly and flipped her long legs down, freeing up the chair facing her. He sat down and looked at her for a moment, fighting the urge to do more.
Holy, holy shit, Beth Endicott was a beautiful woman. She wore a thin tank top with no bra, making the shadows of her nipples visible. It hung over flannel shorts that barely covered an inch of her thighs. Caramel hair spilled over her bare shoulders, and her eyes were exactly the color of the morning sky, only prettier.
“Morning is your hour, you know that?”
One brow twitched in question.
“You wake up gorgeous,” he explained.
She gave in to another sweet smile. “Well, I’d love to return the compliment, but you look like you might collapse any second.”
He leaned back and shook his head, running his hands over his whiskers again, regretting that he hadn’t taken the time to shower or shave before he left the station. “That was the suckiest shift in ages. I don’t think I slept a solid hour. It was nonstop crap out there.”
“Did you save lives?” she asked, the slightest tease in her voice.
He closed his eyes. “Not every one.”
“Oh.” Her smile evaporated as she leaned forward. “I didn’t mean to joke.”
“S’okay.”
“You want to tell me about it?”
He started to say no, but closed his eyes. Because if he looked at her too long, he’d be on his knees, begging to touch and hold her. “Not yet,” he finally said, digging for a calm and normal conversation. “How was your twenty-four?”
“Good enough.”
He eyed her suspiciously. “What did your father want to meet about?”
She swallowed visibly. “His plans for the company.”
He leaned back, waiting, aware of a low-grade dread building.
“He wants to divide part of the company between Landon and me. And keep a bit for himself.”
Dread was building for a good reason, but he reined in his response and vowed to tread carefully. “Is that what you want?”
“I don’t know what I want. And I’m not happy about RJ being squeezed out, because…” She didn’t finish the thought, but shook her head. “Because it’s not fair to him. I don’t know if I want to run even a third of a company that size, but I don’t know if I can afford not to.”
He studied her for a minute, following the train of thought as
it slammed right into his pride. “I told you I do okay.”
“This isn’t about you,” she replied. “Except…” She sighed softly. “I guess I can’t make everything about me anymore.”
He appreciated the concession and knew how hard it was for her to make. And, God, he was too tired to argue about this now.
His gaze dropped to her cup. “No chance that’s coffee?”
“No caffeine for cupcake.” She smiled. “I found some lemon herb tea.”
Which probably expired three years ago, but he decided not to freak her out. He took a sip anyway, regarding her over the rim. “What do you think you’re going to do?” he asked.
“I honestly don’t know. If my dad were completely out of the picture, one hundred percent retired, could you handle the mother of your child being the head of a company you blame for your father’s death?”
He studied her, first taking a moment to appreciate the straightforward question, then realizing that in some ways he was being stubborn and stupid. But he couldn’t change how he felt about Ray and the company that bore his name.
“I don’t know if I could handle it…well,” he finally said.
“But you could handle it.”
“I suppose I’d have to and, to be fair, I don’t have a right to tell you where you can work or what you can do for a living. If that were the case, you could tell me to stop being a firefighter because I risk my life every day.”
She nodded, as if she’d thought of that, but hadn’t said it. His temples throbbed, and every inch of him wanted rest and peace and…her.
“Beth,” he said softly. “Trust me when I tell you I had a really shitty shift and don’t want to fight about this or even talk about it.”
She angled her head, an expression of concern. “What happened?”
He gave a negative head shake. “How’d you sleep?”
“You know, new place. I missed…” She reached down and scratched Sally’s head. “The dog.”
He nudged her knee with his, the little bit of body contact already warming his blood. “I missed you, too. A hell of a lot.”