They ate in silence for a while and Alix began to think of the reality of being alone in a place where she knew no one. “What are the wedding facilities like on the island?”
He paused with a fork on the way to his mouth. “You’re getting married?”
“No. My friend is, and …” She trailed off, her face red with embarrassment.
“What’s wrong?”
“I told her she could have the wedding in the garden here. I shouldn’t have done that. I don’t own this house, you do. It was presumptuous of me.”
Jared bit into another hush puppy. “These are good.” He found he rather enjoyed the way she was looking at him in question, waiting for his answer. “You have my permission to have the wedding here. This house could use some music and laughter.”
Alix smiled at him so warmly that he leaned his head toward her, almost as though he expected a kiss in thanks. But she turned away.
Jared pulled back. “I’ll get Jose and his guys to clean the place up for you.”
“They’re the gardeners? I was worried that I’d have to mow and rake and everything else. Not that I couldn’t do it, but I don’t think I’d be good at it. I want to spend this summer working.” She waited for him to be polite and ask what she’d be working on, but he said nothing.
Suddenly, Alix had had enough. It was clear that he didn’t think the two of them shared a love of land and buildings. To him, she wasn’t even worthy of telling the truth about his profession.
She knew he was physically attracted to her—a woman always knew that—but as sexy as he was, she wasn’t interested. She didn’t want to be just another one of the Great Jared Montgomery’s conquests. Bottom lip or not, she liked a man as a whole. Not just a piece of him.
She stood up. “I’m sorry to leave you with cleanup detail, but I’m very tired and I want to go to bed. If I don’t see you again, thank you for dinner, Mr. Kingsley.” She said his name pointedly.
He stood up, looking as though he meant to shake her hand or kiss her cheek, but Alix turned
away and left the room.
For a moment Jared stood there staring after her. He knew he couldn’t be right, but it was almost as though he’d made her angry. How? By asking her about his aunt? That didn’t make any sense.
He sat back down and picked up the pineapple and rum drink she’d made. It wasn’t to his taste, but it reminded him of his great-aunt. As he poured himself a shot of very old rum to sip, he expected his grandfather to appear in the room and bawl him out, but there was only silence. It was just like the old man not to warn him that Alix Madsen was in the house, that she’d arrived early—and that she’d been “working.” Designing some fanciful structure that a person would need a magic wand to be able to build?
As he leaned back in the chair with the drink, he ate the rest of the hush puppies. They were the best he’d ever had.
He knew it was thoroughly stupid of him to be attracted to his aunt Addy’s beloved Alix. When she’d first been here, she was four and he was fourteen. She was a cute little girl who liked to sit on the family room floor and build things. After the NHS president had nearly come unglued to see the child piling up valuable scrimshaw, antique tea caddies from China, and netsuke from Japan, Jared had gone home and rummaged through the attic until he found his old box of Legos. His mother had insisted on running them through the dishwasher. He remembered how pleased she’d been that he was doing such a kind thing for a little girl. But back then, Jared hadn’t exactly been a model son. His father, the sixth Jared, had died just two years before and he was still very angry about it. His mother had made him personally take the Legos to Alix.
The little girl had never seen the building blocks and had no idea what they were, so Jared got down on the rug and showed her how to use them. She’d been so pleased that when he was leaving, she threw her arms around his neck. Aunt Addy, sitting on the couch and watching her beloved Alix, said, “Jared, someday you’re going to make an excellent father.”
His grandfather Caleb, hovering in the background, snorted and said, “But he’ll make a bad husband.” Back then his grandfather didn’t have much faith that Jared would do anything but spend his life in jail. As Jared had learned to do, he didn’t react to his grandfather’s comments when his aunt was near.
But Alix, who’d heard it all, looked up at Jared with serious eyes and said, “I would marry you.” That had made Jared jump up, his face red, and Caleb had given his great bellow of a laugh.
Later, Jared saw the intricate Lego structure Alix had made, and he was impressed. Caleb said that Jared had never made anything that good when he was four years old. Alix gave him a bunch of flowers from Aunt Addy’s garden to thank him for his gift. That night Jared went out with his buddies, got drunk, and ended up spending the night in jail—which wasn’t unusual for him back then. He never saw little Alix again, as soon afterward her mother’s first novel was accepted for publication. Victoria had immediately taken her daughter away, and never brought her back to Nantucket.
Jared’s thoughts returned to the present. He thought it was definitely better that he leave the island. He’d tell Dilys about Alix, she’d introduce her to his cousin Lexie and her roommate, Toby, and within a week Alix would be deep in the Nantucket summer social whirl. And Jared would be back in New York creating … he didn’t know what. And right now he was between girlfriends so he’d … Damn! He kept envisioning Alix’s eyes, her mouth, her body.
This wasn’t good. Alix Madsen was a young, innocent girl and he couldn’t touch her. Yes, he’d better leave as soon as possible.
Chapter Five
Alix was in bed, trying to keep her mind on a murder mystery she’d found in a table drawer, but the words seemed to blur. All she could think about was Jared Montgomery—or was his name Kingsley? Everything about him seemed to be a lie, up to and including his name.
Why did he have to lie like that? As she went over every word of their conversation, she saw how he’d eluded her many hints. If he didn’t want to answer her questions, he could have said no. He could have—
Her cell phone rang and cut off her thoughts. It was her father. Why, oh why, had she told him that Montgomery was staying in the guesthouse?
She took a breath and tried to smile. “Dad!” she said cheerfully. “How are you?”
“What’s wrong?”