Buch lesen: «Short, Sweet And Sexy»

Prologue

A. J. POTTER NEEDED A BREAK. As the taxi careened around a corner into Central Park, she threw out a hand to brace herself against the door and glanced down at the address she’d recorded in her Palm Pilot. She was not running away. All she was going to do was move into an apartment, not ten blocks away from her aunt and uncle’s.

In comparison, it wasn’t considered running away when you asked a judge for a postponement in court.

And that’s all she needed—a postponement from her family, a little vacation from her Uncle Jamison and her cousin Rodney who sat at the dinner table every night, talking about the cases Rodney was being assigned at the law firm and she wasn’t. Most of all she needed a reprieve from her Aunt Margery whose mission in life was to match her up with a man who wouldn’t bring disgrace on the Potter family name. If she had to endure another date with one more Mr. Perfect handpicked by her aunt, she was going to…do just what she was doing. Move out!

Leaning back, A.J. closed her eyes as the taxi wound its way through Central Park. Somehow in the seven years she’d spent away at college and then in law school, she’d forgotten what a misfit she was in the Potter family. But living with them for the past year had certainly refreshed her memory. Worse than that, it was beginning to undermine her confidence. Ever since Uncle Jamison and Aunt Margery had taken her in at the age of seven, she’d tried—and failed—to prove to them that she could be a Potter, that she wasn’t at all like her mother.

A.J.’s eyes snapped open the minute the taxi lurched to the curb.

“The Willoughby,” the driver said.

After paying the fare and stepping out onto the sidewalk, A.J. studied the building. It was small with the same kind of understated elegance that characterized her aunt and uncle’s building. She sighed. Her aunt would definitely approve.

The real estate agent who’d given her the tip about the apartment had hinted at something different. Pushing down her disappointment, A.J. slipped her Palm Pilot into her purse and strode toward the door of the Willoughby.

The moment she stepped inside, she stopped short. The scene in front of her was definitely a tad unusual—even for New York. The fact that it was taking place in the lobby of a Central Park West apartment building had her thinking that she’d tumbled down a rabbit hole into Alice’s Wonderland.

The woman with the wavy brown hair appeared normal enough. The suitcases and slightly out-of-style clothes, as well as the confused expression on her face, pegged her as a visitor to the Big Apple.

The man was an entirely different matter. He was wearing a baggy blue polka-dot bathing suit and standing in the middle of a small wading pool decorated with cartoon fish. Sun poured down from a skylight, turning the zinc oxide he’d smeared across his nose a bright shade of lime green. “Surfin’ USA” blared out of the boom box beside his striped deck chair.

A.J. smiled slowly. If she wanted a reprieve from the stuffiness of her aunt and uncle’s condominium and from being a Potter twenty-four hours a day, she couldn’t have picked a better place. She was definitely going to take this apartment.

“Password!” the man with the green nose shouted above the pounding rhythm of the Beach Boys.

The woman with the suitcases shook her head.

A.J. moved forward.

“I’m waaaaiiiiiting.” He sang this time instead of shouting.

Nice voice, A.J. noted, and now that she was closer, she recognized the tattoo on his left forearm. The moment the Beach Boys faded, she said, “Toto.”

“Close but no cigar,” he said and then sang the opening stanza of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” “Are you here for the apartment?”

“Yes.” A.J. found herself speaking in unison with the suitcase woman.

“You and about forty others,” he said, peering at them over his sunglasses. “Tavish Mclain is the man you’ll have to convince, and this is his day of glory—the day he dreams of the other 364 days of the year. He is surrounded by women, and each one of them is willing to do whatever it takes to get his apartment.”

“We’d like to join them,” A.J. said. The real estate agent had warned her that there would be an auction, and she needed to size up her opponents.

He glanced quickly around, then leaned closer and spoke in a stage whisper. “You might try naming the actor who played the cowardly lion.”

“Bert Lahr.” A.J. and the suitcase woman spoke again at the same time.

A grin split his face. “Excellent.”

“Bert Lahr is the password, then?” A.J. asked.

“No. But I like the fact that you’re Wizard of Oz movie buffs, so you may pass.”

“Thanks,” A.J. said as she hurried toward the elevator. Oh, this was getting better and better. She definitely wasn’t in Kansas anymore.

“The name’s Franco,” the man with the green nose called after them. “Franco Rossi. You’re going to see it in lights someday.”

A.J. pressed the elevator button and when the door slid open, she helped the suitcase woman muscle the biggest one in.

“Thanks. I’m Claire Dellafield,” the woman said.

“A. J. Potter.” She looked the woman up and down. “I guess we’re competitors.”

Claire nodded. “Do you think the apartment’s going to be expensive? If so, I don’t have enough money to be much competition.”

A.J. thought the apartment might be very expensive. She’d heard about it through a broker for whom she’d done a closing that morning. Tavish Mclain, an eccentric and thrifty Scot, had money to burn and just couldn’t miss an opportunity to make more. Rather than allow his apartment to sit empty for three months while he went off on holiday, he ran what the broker had described to her as a sort of auction-lottery to rent it for the summer. The moment she’d heard that it was a rental and that she could move in immediately, A.J. had taken it as a sign. And the fact that the address was Central Park West would stifle some of her family’s concern.

When her mother had left the family home she’d moved to a coldwater flat in the Village with the man who’d become A.J.’s father.

A.J. would never do that to her family. The address of the Willoughby would definitely reassure her aunt and uncle of that. And the money wouldn’t be a problem for her because of the trust fund her mother had left her. But Claire Dellafield looked as though it might be a problem for her. She also looked beat and a little lost. Manhattan could be a tough city for the uninitiated, and A.J.’s heart went out to her. “Want to join forces and bid together?”

“I don’t know. I—”

A.J. nodded as the door slid open. “Smart girl. Someone warned you about the big bad city.” Unzipping her purse, she pulled out a card. “I have a hunch that the bidding might be brutal and I intend to win. Think about it.”

The noise was coming from the apartment at the end of the hall, and dozens of people were jammed around the door of 6C. At barely five feet tall, she couldn’t see over them, so she wiggled and elbowed her way through. Reaching the door and finding Claire right behind her, A.J. helped her heave the suitcases into the foyer.

The room was packed with women, mostly blondes in various shapes and sizes. They ranged in age from…A.J. figured the one in the latex capris and midriff-baring tank top to be about twenty, and the one just entering with the bouffant hair and the poodle had to be in her seventies. That poodle lady might have money, she decided. The huge rock on her right hand looked very real.

Eyes narrowed, A.J. rose to her toes and peered around shoulders to scan the room again. She caught glimpses of a tacky Southwestern decor. Could that have been a longhorn cow over the fireplace? It was only by leaping up that she finally spotted the broker who’d tipped her off to the auction. Roger Whitfield, who was handling the sublet for Tavish, stood on the steps leading up to the loft.

When she landed back on her feet, her eyes collided briefly with a tall woman—not a blonde—who carried a package under her arm and had a determined look on her face. Very determined. Well, A.J. was determined too.

Someone waved a check high over her head. “Here it is, folks. Good faith money. Forty-five hundred dollars—three months—up front.”

“Hey!” someone shouted.

“That’s not fair!”

“I can’t go that high!”

“Tavish promised to rent this place to me for eight hundred.”

As pandemonium broke loose around her, A.J. pulled out her checkbook and cell phone. Women surged around her in waves, some heading toward the stairs, others toward the door. The tall brunette with the package was pushed up next to Claire’s biggest suitcase.

“This is ridiculous.” Tapping her foot, A.J. punched numbers into the cell phone, and waited. After counting ten rings, she decided that Roger, now besieged by blond ambition, was not going to take her call. Finally, she turned to the two women beside her. She’d overheard enough of their conversation to understand that the brunette had just offered Claire a free room at the hotel she worked at.

“Why would you do that?” Claire asked. “You don’t even know me.”

“Because I can. Because helping the sisterhood was something my mother drilled into me. And, hey, I get off on warm fuzzy feelings in my tummy.”

A.J. smiled. She was beginning to like the tall determined woman with the box. “So do I, but they don’t always come from giving away freebie hotel rooms.”

The woman returned her smile. “Samantha Baldwin.”

A.J. shook the offered hand. “A. J. Potter. You sounded a little like a madam gathering a poor waif into her house of ill repute. I already made the same first great impression on her. I think we scared her.”

“I’m not scared,” said Claire. “Just fascinated by abnormal human behavior. Abnormal for a New Yorker, that is.”

Making a sudden decision, A.J. pulled out her Palm Pilot and checked on the information Roger, the broker, had given her. Then she turned her attention back to the two women. “According to my information, this place has three bedrooms.”

“I don’t smoke. I can do eighteen hundred a month, but I don’t want to.”

A.J. couldn’t help but admire Samantha’s quick uptake and no-nonsense style. “Nonsmoker. I’m in for two grand.”

“You’d get the big bedroom then.”

Perfectly in sync, they both looked at Claire.

“What’s your name?” A.J. asked.

“Claire Dellafield. Why?”

“Get with the program,” Samantha said. “We’re forming a rental coalition. You want in?”

Claire stood. “You mean we’d room together?”

“Mental functions seem to be intact,” said A.J. “Do you smoke?”

Claire shook her head. “But I can learn.”

Samantha laughed. “She’s in for the entertainment value alone.”

A.J. nodded her agreement. Plus, she guessed Claire needed this apartment as much as they did. “How much can you contribute to the rent?”

Claire drew in a deep breath. “Eight hundred.”

“That’s forty-six hundred. Surely the rent won’t go any higher,” A.J. said.

Just then, the door to the apartment swung open and two men entered.

“Tavish!” several blondes squealed as they ran towards him, arms outstretched.

“Let this play out,” A.J. suggested. Getting a handle on the opposition always paid off in the courtroom.

Samantha and Claire took her advice, but it wasn’t a pretty sight. The women were fawning all over the man in a sage-green faux leather vest—with fringe. A.J. knew the type well. He might dress a little less conservatively, but Tavish Mclain reminded her of all the rich, middle-aged, self-absorbed Mr. Perfects that her aunt had been setting her up with for the past year.

The dates from hell were one of her prime motivations for getting out of her aunt and uncle’s home. Aunt Margery’s mission was to marry her off before she disgraced the family the way her mother had. With that whole scenario off her plate, she figured she could concentrate all her attention on making her uncle take her more seriously at the law firm. For the past year, her assignments at Hancock, Potter and King had consisted of real estate closings and research. She was the only Potter woman to join the firm since it had been founded, and she definitely didn’t fit into the good old boy network.

But she was going to. And if she could prove herself at the law firm, maybe her aunt and uncle would stop worrying that she would follow in her mother’s footsteps and they would finally accept her.

She needed this apartment. But as she rose once more to her toes and saw the bevy of blondes waving checks in Tavish’s face, she feared the odds of getting it were slipping away. She remembered what Franco Rossi had said about this being the day Tavish Mclain lived the other 364 days for. She could see why. One woman was literally pawing his vest.

A.J. glanced at her two companions. No, they were definitely not the pawing types—which was why she liked them.

Hmmmm. Tapping her foot, she was desperately searching her mind for a different approach when Samantha said, “Stand in front of me.”

A.J. watched her tear the brown paper off the package she was holding.

“What are you doing?” Claire asked.

“I’ve got something in here that may convince Mr. Mclain to give us anything we want.”

“What?” A.J. asked. “A gun?”

“Even better,” Samantha replied, pulling out a wad of silky, black fabric. “A magic skirt.”

A.J. exchanged a skeptical glance with Claire. Then Claire cleared her throat. “Did you say a magic skirt?”

“I know it sounds crazy,” Samantha said as she shook out wrinkles, then began to pull it on over the skirt she was wearing. “But it’s a regular man-magnet. According to the legend, it’s woven out of a special fiber that will make men do anything for the woman who wears it. It’s even supposed to have the power to bring your true love to you…yada, yada, yada.”

“You’re kidding, right?” A.J. watched her shimmy out of the old skirt underneath. The “magic” garment was simple, black, basic. She could have sworn she had one just like it in her closet. She’d bought it at Bloomingdale’s right after Christmas. A quick look around told her that the only one paying any attention to Samantha’s quick change routine was the elderly lady with the poodle and the rock.

“Look, I don’t believe it either, but it can’t hurt,” Samantha said to A.J.

A.J. had to agree with her on that. Jumping up, she glimpsed a blonde with black lipstick, pulling out her pen, ready to sign on the dotted line.

“Follow me, ladies,” Samantha said. Then, leading the way, she cut a path through the sea of blondes toward the man in the fringed green vest.

A.J. looked at Claire and shrugged. “What can it hurt?”

“True,” Claire said. “And if it doesn’t work, we can always resort to Plan B.”

“What Plan B?” A.J. asked.

“We can hang Tavish out the window by his ankles until he agrees to sublet his apartment to us.”

A.J. grinned. “A regular win-win situation.” Then she turned her attention to Samantha as she advanced slowly on Tavish Mclain. With each step, she wiggled her hips. A.J. could have sworn the skirt caught the light and glimmered.

“I’m Samantha Baldwin.” One last step and wiggle brought Samantha within an arm’s length of the man in the green fringed vest.

“Tavish Mclain,” he said as he grasped her extended hand.

“You have the perfect apartment,” Samantha said, beaming a smile at him.

“I call…it…home,” Tavish stuttered as he pumped her hand.

For a moment neither of them said a thing. They just stood there, hands clasped and staring at each other.

“I’d like to call it home, too, for the summer,” Samantha finally said.

“Well, I…Well, I’m sure—” Tavish began.

Then Roger Whitfield and another broker crowded forward, introducing themselves, but Tavish didn’t relinquish Samantha’s hand.

Eyes narrowed, A.J. took a minute to size up the situation. The three men had their eyes locked on Samantha. Even the other women were beginning to notice it.

The blonde in black lipstick waved her check. “Just a minute. I’ve given you a check for forty-five hundred.”

“Roger, give Meredith back her check,” Tavish murmured, never taking his eyes off Samantha.

“So I’ll give you another for six thousand,” the blonde said.

Quickly, A.J. scribbled out a check and tucked it in Samantha’s free hand. Two thousand for the first month would match the blonde’s offer.

“Here you go…” Samantha glanced at A.J.’s check. “Two thousand dollars.”

Tavish smiled. “So you did want to pay all the rent up front after all?”

All the rent? A.J. glanced at the skirt. Had they just rented a Central Park West apartment for the summer for two thousand dollars?

Tavish stuck the check in his vest pocket. “The perfect tenant, wouldn’t you say, Roger?”

“I’d…say…so.”

A.J. tore her eyes from the skirt to check out the broker. Any minute now, Roger was going to drool. The other broker was doing that already. It was time to make her move. “Gentlemen, which one of you has the papers we should sign?” She was pretty sure it was Roger, but at the moment she’d settle for someone who wasn’t catatonic.

“Papers?” Roger asked.

A.J. snapped her fingers in front of his face. “An indemnity clause? Terms of lease? Liability release?”

To her relief, Roger blinked, then fumbled in his pocket for papers. Ruthlessly, A.J. pulled him aside, and made him focus on the lease agreement. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Claire take the other broker by the arm. “You and I are on crowd control. Thanks for coming, everybody.”

The only ones in the room who hadn’t moved were Samantha and Tavish. They were still gripping hands, still staring into each other’s eyes. But Samantha seemed to be perfectly all right as she explained to Tavish that she had two roommates. A.J. glanced once more at the skirt before she focused her entire attention on the lease agreement.

“It’s standard, although I should probably mention Cleo,” Roger said, his gaze drifting back to Samantha. “Could you introduce me?”

“To Cleo?” A.J. asked.

“No,” Roger said, gesturing vaguely toward the woman with the bouffant hair and the rock on her hand. “Cleo’s the poodle, lives in 6B. You’re expected to walk her. It’s part of Tavish’s arrangement with his neighbors.”

“No problem,” A.J. said. She’d see to it that it wasn’t. She wanted signatures on the bottom line before Tavish Mclain could come out of his skirt trance and change his mind.

And she got them! An hour later when A.J. stepped out into the bright sunlight on Central Park West, she gave a little jump of pure pleasure. Not only did she have a new place to live, but she had two new roommates—women she’d seemed to click with immediately. She hugged the knowledge to her.

Not bad for the day that she’d chosen to build a new life for herself.

And then there was the skirt. Samantha had put it in her bedroom closet before she’d taken off for work. If A.J. hadn’t seen it, she never would have believed it.

There was definitely something about that skirt—something that might come in handy if she couldn’t solve the problem of being taken seriously at Hancock, Potter and King by herself.

Pushing the thought out of her mind, A.J. strode toward the corner. She preferred solving things by herself.