Falling for Her Read online

  She fought the urge to cut them short as he, the electrical expert, and the contractor talked trench, conduit, and coaxial cabling. Larry had answered in his first two words. If she didn’t trust his assessment, he wouldn’t be here.

  But her coach emphasized letting people expand beyond yes or no.

  As inefficient as that was, employees did seem happier when she followed the practice.

  To this point, Zeke-Tech’s primary responsibility for the lab had been writing checks. Now that the local contractor had replaced doors and windows, added sprinkler, air conditioning, and heating systems, and created a bathroom from a storage area, the next step was melding space and technology.

  She’d lined up these experts. They needed to be on-site. She didn’t.

  Except Zeke wanted her here, saying she needed a change of scenery. She’d told him she couldn’t afford any distraction with the end of their fiscal year approaching. Zeke hadn’t budged.

  She swallowed a sigh. And encountered Josh Kincannon’s gaze.

  That was why he made her uncomfortable.

  He kept looking at her.

  Not brief, polite glances. Not the bored, uninterested looks of a certain class of male. But long, searching surveys. Like she was a puzzle.

  “What about wall space for a blackboard?” the high school guidance counselor asked.

  “No. Chalk dust and computers don’t mix. A whiteboard. It will double as a screen for an overhead projector.” Vanessa added that to her list.

  Looking up she met Josh Kincannon’s gaze again. She held it, lifting one eyebrow.

  He didn’t look away, instead returning her look with a shifting of his mouth she couldn’t immediately translate.

  “Excellent,” the counselor said. “An overhead projector will be useful.”

  “That brings up how we’ll control natural light.” Josh gestured toward the original storefront window and a glass-topped door that together occupied nearly the entire front width.

  “Remove the glass and make it a solid wall. Replace the door,” she instructed the contractor.

  “And block all that great natural light?” Josh objected. “Then — what? Put in fluorescent?”

  His mouth shifted again.

  A smile, maybe.

  “Natural light causes screen glare,” she said.

  “Any light can cause glare,” Larry said.

  “Artificial light’s easier to control,” she said.

  “Natural light’s better. And—” Josh’s eyes glinted with what might have been amusement or challenge or something else entirely. People’s emotions were so … imprecise. “—it’s free.”

  Larry coughed, the other Zeke-Tech employee shuffled his feet, and the guidance counselor cleared his throat.

  Yes, she had brought them back to costs several times in this discussion. That was her job.

  “I’ve been thinking about the entry,” the contractor said. “You don’t want the door opening directly into where the computers are because of temperature regulation.”

  “Good point,” Larry said.

  “And interrupting classes,” the counselor added.

  “I could build a wall, about here.” The contractor gestured to a spot away from the door. “That would form an entryway, leave room for a desk for signups or business stuff without interrupting folks working on computers in the main area, like Malcolm said.”

  “Great idea, Todd,” Josh said. “What about making the wall solid partway up, then the top part from glass blocks to let light in, but filter it.”

  The contractor nodded. “Sure.”

  “We’d have to check angles, but it could diffuse the light enough to leave very little glare,” Larry added.

  After a few minutes of their pacing off distances, discussing angles, and predicting effects of glass block at various levels, Vanessa said, “Fine. You—” She nodded at Larry, then the contractor. “—explore this, pull together comparative cost figures, and report back to me by—”

  “And me,” Josh inserted easily.

  “—Tuesday,” she concluded.

  If the cost wasn’t more than her solution, fine. And if Josh wanted an update, fine. She had the final authority.

  Her mind zeroed in on another aspect. “There need to be privacy partitions between the stations. Cubicles, with a door to access each.”

  The five men — contractor, tech expert, electrical expert, guidance counselor, and principal — turned and looked at her. After half a dozen seconds, only Josh kept looking.

  “Cubicles? Why?” he asked.

  “For privacy when a user is at his or her computer.”

  “For classes everybody needs to see the instructor. And besides,” he added, “who wants to be cut off from everybody else in a little cubicle?”

  “Anyone who’s sane.” Vanessa couldn’t believe she’d said that aloud.

  But Josh smiled, quick and bright. “Nah. Everyone’ll want it open, so people can kibbutz.”

  She saw two things: He thought she’d been kidding and he believed what he’d said.

  Before she absorbed either observation, movement caught her attention. Three small figures stood outside the old storefront, the larger two with hands cupped to the window, the smallest pressing its entire face against it.

  Josh released a low groan. “Excuse me.” The next instant he was out the door. The three figures moved to him, the smallest hurtling itself at his legs.

  “Josh’s kids,” the contractor murmured, and exchanged a look with the counselor, who said, “Josh has full custody. Nothing comes before his kids.”

  Admirable in theory. But her responsibility was to Zeke-Tech, and the two Zeke-Techers had a flight out of Chicago to catch.

  “We have a tight schedule, and more to cover,” she said.

  More looks zipped around.

  The counselor nodded at the contractor then walked to the door, holding a low-voiced conversation with Josh.

  With the door open, she saw the smallest child as a genderless blob masked by an oversized jersey and dirt from the window smeared over its face. It had one hand wrapped around Josh’s leg and the opposite thumb in its mouth.

  The middle child, a boy, was thin and wore glasses, peering inside with curiosity.

  The tallest, a girl, stared directly at Vanessa with the intensity of her father but without any of his apparent inclination toward amusement.

  Detaching the smallest from his leg with a smile, Josh moved to the door while the counselor stepped out. Before the door closed, Josh said, “Be good, and I’ll see you at dinner.”

  He remained watching as the children and the older man headed off. At last he returned to the group.

  “Child-care emergency,” he said. “Malcolm’s pinch-hitting. Now, back to the spacing. Folks need room to put papers and books. And sometimes they’ll want to use a computer together…”

  The others picked up the discussion.

  Uneasily, Vanessa recognized a deepening of an odd impression she’d had since arriving this morning.

  If forced to define it, she’d say something was closing in on her. Which made no sense. Drago, Illinois sat in the middle of cornfields, with nothing but space around.

  She straightened her shoulders and weighed into the discussion.

  The sooner she wrapped up this project, the sooner she left Drago and returned to her office.

  *

  “This will be great,” Josh Kincannon said.

  It was after six, and they were the only two left. For the past half-hour, they had thrashed out adjustments to a schedule that allowed just three months before the lab’s scheduled opening in early December.

  “The general contractor has done an admirable job,” she said.

  “Todd’s more of an all-around guy. Did most of the work himself.”

  He slowly turned around the empty shell coated in construction dust. Then he faced her, as if expecting something.

  “It’s going to be great,” he repeated.
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  His mouth slowly widened. His lips parted, revealing that triangle of straight, white teeth. Lines echoed up his cheeks like … like ripples in a pond overjoyed to have a rock thrown into it. His eyes, shining, narrowed slightly as his cheeks rose.

  He was grinning.

  At her.

  With delight.

  She couldn’t begin to think of a response. But he didn’t seem to need one. He began another circuit of the space, this one with a wider radius.

  She’d had people smile at her, of course she had.

  From polite to placating to pleased to distracted. And, back before she knew better, lasciviously. She’d also had people laugh around her, sometimes at her, occasionally with her.

  But she counted the number of men who had grinned at her in delight on two fingers — Zeke Zeekowsky and Peter Quincy, the third original member of Zeke-Tech.

  And their delight generally stemmed from her work, especially her ability to figure out how to make dimes stretch into dollars.

  “This is what this town has sorely needed.” Josh looked over his shoulder at her, then, slowly, turned the rest of his body without taking his eyes off her. “Don’t get me wrong. Zeke moving a division of Zeke-Tech here is fantastic. It’ll bring people and business in like Drago’s never seen. But that’s from the outside. This — this will let people pick up skills to help themselves. You know the saying about feeding people is nice, but teaching them to fish means they can eat forever. This will let the people of Drago fish. It will give them skills to stay here and still earn a good living.”

  She shook her head. “No. It will give them the skills they need to leave.”

  His grin died.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Vanessa began the next day, as she began every day, at her computer.

  She frowned.

  Not at the screen, which conveyed that all was as it should be in the financial world of Zeke-Tech, but at the window beyond it. The window was distracting.

  Mrs. Richards had made such a point of what a perfect spot the desk would be for Vanessa to work that she’d felt obligated to put — and leave — the laptop there.

  Since Vanessa’s arrival yesterday, the landlady had repeated numerous times that if she needed anything to just call.

  She hadn’t called.

  Yet the woman, who appeared to have some unsteadiness walking, had climbed the stairs — twice — to check that everything was in place.

  It left Vanessa feeling as if her clothes were rubbing against her skin.

  That made no sense. She hadn’t worn clothes tight enough to produce that reaction for years.

  Then there’d been dinner last night at the café with Zeke and his fiancée, Darcie Barrett.

  “We’re so glad you’re here,” each of them had said. More than once. Vanessa didn’t share the sentiment, but, remembering Cathie’s counsel, she had kept that to herself.

  Even when Zeke and Darcie planned for future dinners.

  “To get you acquainted with Drago,” Darcie had said, as if offering a treat. Then she’d added, “We can start with Josh.”

  That was the closest Vanessa had come to voicing her objections. Not only did Josh Kincannon make her uncomfortable, but by the time they’d parted yesterday it appeared the feeling was mutual.

  She didn’t know why the light in his eyes disappeared when she’d said the computer lab would improve residents’ opportunity to leave, but it had. Without needing to consult Cathie, she doubted that contributed to a good working relationship.

  Movement outside caught Vanessa’s eye. She peered over the top of her glasses and saw a flash of water between scattered tree trunks. Must be the Drago River she’d seen on the map.

  Her focus sharpened. Some of the trees’ leaves had a reddish cast and others were bright yellow.

  Huh. Had the leaves in Virginia been changing when she left yesterday?

  Her desk at Zeke-Tech faced away from the window and she kept the blinds closed to avoid glare. If she was out of the building during daylight, she had other things on her mind than leaves.

  “Vanessa? Vanessa, dear?”

  In the first fraction of a second she was thrown back, back to the last time she’d been called dear.

  She caught herself.

  This was Mrs. Richards, tapping on the open door to the bedroom.

  “Todd left an envelope for you,” she said, entering. “I’m so sorry I can’t cook you a real breakfast with Marky painting the kitchen and everything at sixes and sevens. But I have a little something to tide you over — oatmeal and bananas. Real homemade oatmeal Anne Hooper grows out at Hooper Farm.”

  Vanessa ordinarily skipped breakfast. But the past twenty hours had taught her that going along with Mrs. Richards required less time than resisting. Under the same theory, she did not ask who Todd was.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Richards.” She spotted the business return address on the envelope. Ah, Todd was the contractor. “I’ll be down in ten minutes.”

  Her landlady didn’t leave.

  “I wasn’t at all sure about having anyone stay here with Marky painting and such, but Zeke — such a nice young man — said you wouldn’t mind. And the kitchen truly needed freshening up.”

  The older woman detailed all the kitchen improvements ahead, and how they would be followed by new paint for the rest of the first floor.

  Thinking her landlady had finished, Vanessa slid a nail under the flap of the large envelope. Likely the schedule she’d requested yesterday, though why he hadn’t emailed it—

  “That must be to do with the computer place Todd’s building.” Mrs. Richards nodded toward the envelope.

  “The computer lab.”

  “Did you know that’s where Zeke’s father had his shoe repair store?” Before Vanessa could say yes, the woman continued, “What a fine man Mischar Zeekowsky was. He died when Zeke was a senior in high school, you know. I expect that’s why Zeke didn’t come back for all these years — too painful after his father’s death. Such a shame Mischar’s not here to see how well his boy is doing.”

  Vanessa lowered the envelope. “Zeke’s accomplished a great deal with Zeke-Tech.”

  “Oh, yes, the business.” Mrs. Richards dismissed a top tech company with half a shrug. “But I meant Zeke and Darcie. Mischar would be so happy to see his boy happy. And pleased at Zeke bringing jobs here, and this computer lab. So you and Josh are working together on the computer lab.”

  Vanessa blinked at the shift, and raised the envelope again. “Mr. Kincannon is providing local input on the project.”

  “Mr. Kincannon? So formal. Josh is such a nice young man.” That seemed to be Mrs. Richards’ standard praise. “Poor soul hasn’t had the easiest time of it. Three children to raise, and all alone.”

  Vanessa said nothing, which generally kept Zeke-Tech employees’ conversations to a minimum.

  Not Mrs. Richards’.

  “His wife up and left two years ago. Melissa Kincannon never was content. Always saying she had ambitions. Like other folks don’t. One day, with Josh at work and the kids at school and day care, she packed up and took off. No warning. Didn’t tell Josh, didn’t tell those babies. All she left was a note. Hasn’t been back since.”

  She shook her head. “Melissa barely sends her children birthday and Christmas cards. Only contact with Josh has been through lawyers getting divorced and giving him custody. Well, it’s not as if he hadn’t been doing most of the raising already. But still. Some said good riddance, but no matter what, it’s hard on those babies. And Josh … he certainly has his hands full.”

  Vanessa remained silent. The older woman sighed.

  “Well, I’ll let you read whatever’s in that envelope. I need to have a word with Marky about the trim. Come have your breakfast soon.”

  Vanessa shifted her shoulders, aware she’d sat motionless for a full minute after Mrs. Richards left, her mind uncharacteristically blank.

  She moved her shoulders a second time and it turned
into a little shiver.

  Ignoring that, she opened the envelope and began reading.

  *

  “Mr. Kincannon.”

  Uh-oh.

  He didn’t know Vanessa Irish well, but that tone couldn’t be good.

  This is what he got for bringing the kids into town to patronize Drago’s shops. If he’d gone to the discount stores off the Interstate, his Saturday errands couldn’t be interrupted by being accosted on Main Street by tech CFOs who managed to look both coolly distant and irritated.

  And yet … at the sight of her, his bloodstream kicked up, like a gas pedal being tapped.

  Had to be his memory of that robe.

  It sure wasn’t the unsmiling expression he faced now.

  He shifted Livvy to one side so he had a hand free to stop Topher from crossing the street without them. As usual, his son had been so lost in his own world he was unaware the rest of them had stopped.

  Xena needed no such direction. She was assessing Vanessa from head to toe.

  “Mr. Kincannon, I would like to speak to you.”

  He’d admit that her certainty yesterday about Drago’s citizens viewing the computer lab the way prison inmates would the key to the main gate had got his goat. That didn’t mean he intended to let her keep it.

  “Hi, Vanessa. Nice morning, isn’t it?” Nothing like friendliness to throw off someone who expected a tussle. He’d learned that his first year teaching. “I’d like you to meet my kids. This is Xena, Topher, and Livvy. Kids, this is Ms. Irish. She works with Zeke, and we’re working together on the computer lab.”

  Xena and Topher said dutiful hellos.

  Vanessa froze an instant. “Hello,” she said stiffly. “Xena. Tougher. Libby.”

  “To-fer,” Xena corrected. “It’s from the end of Christopher. And it’s Livvy. Short for Olivia.”

  “My kids don’t stick with the names they’re born with,” Josh said. “Xena’s birth certificate says Alexis.”

  “Priblonny!” Livvy proclaimed, beaming at Vanessa.

  The woman’s expression didn’t change, but he saw confusion in her eyes, swirling like the colors on her robe.

  “I beg your pardon?” Vanessa said to his smiling youngest.