thing? If I hung on to my half, I could be a silent partner.”
He looked at her mouth, his jaw tightening. After a breathless minute, he raised his gaze to hers.
Lizzie felt another one of those crazy tickles whisper through her stomach. There was yet another option here. She didn’t have to be merely a silent partner. What if they both…milked the cow? “Alex?”
A muscle twitched in his cheek. “Yes, Lizzie?”
“What kind of qualifications did my uncle have?”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“To work in advertising. Did he go to the same college you did, or take a course or something?”
He remained silent for so long, she was about to repeat the question before he finally answered. “No.”
“Really?”
“Your uncle learned through experience. He relied on instinct and inspiration rather than formal education.”
The tickle turned into a tingle as the seed Jolene had planted began to take root. “Even though I enjoy my day care business, it can get along without me, so there’s nothing stopping me from staying in New York for a while.” She cleared her throat. “This is something you might not have thought of, Alex, but if I learn all I can about the company, I could help you out.”
“Help me out?”
“Sort of give the company another perspective.”
“Another perspective?” His voice was growing quieter with each phrase he repeated. Rather than sounding soft, though, he sounded as ominous as rumbling thunder.
She smiled. “You know, just like Uncle Roland.”
Alex didn’t return her smile. Silence stretched out between them as he continued to stare at her. Something gleamed in the mesmerizing brown depths of his eyes. Challenge. More than challenge. Awareness.
Lizzie shivered at the thrill that went through her body. She felt herself respond, and she wasn’t even sure what she was responding to. All those tickles and tingles that made her palms sweat…how much was due to her interest in her company…and how much was due to her interest in her partner?
Alex fought to keep his expression impassive. How could her mouth look so appealing when she was talking about exerting control of the company, his company?
This wasn’t progressing at all according to plan.
Then again, how could he expect any woman who used barnyard analogies to explain the concepts of a market economy to behave predictably?
Just like Uncle Roland.
He hadn’t believed that there could be two people like that in the world. And there weren’t. Despite her innocent charm, Elizabeth Hamill was far more dangerous than her uncle. Because she was threatening far more than his business. She was threatening his self-control.
He wasn’t a man who acted impulsively. He relied on logic to guide his actions. And there was nothing logical about the sudden urge he had to lean across the table and taste Lizzie’s lips.
First thing tomorrow, he’d tell Jeremy to increase the offer for her shares. And if that didn’t work—
The silence between them was broken abruptly by a purring ring from Alex’s jacket. He jerked, yanking his attention away from his new partner’s lips to reach into his pocket and pull out his phone.
“Mr. Whitmore? Are you there?”
At his housekeeper’s panic-stricken tone, he reflexively stiffened. Great. Now what?
It took less than a minute for Alex to find out what had put the panic in Mrs. Gray’s voice. All thoughts of his business and his partner were swept away by a wave of anxiety. Flipping the phone shut, he crammed it back inside his jacket and surged to his feet. “I’m sorry, Lizzie,” he said, already moving away. “I’ll have to meet you at the theater later. Something’s come up at home.”
She hesitated for less than a second before she wiped her palms on her skirt, grabbed her purse and rounded the table to follow him. “Hold on, partner. I’m coming with you.”
Chapter Three
Alex saw the trail of destruction the moment he turned past the stone gateposts and started up the driveway. Twin ruts carved a crooked path across the lush lawn, leading to a tangle of crushed rosebushes. Mrs. Gray’s brown sedan sat in the center of the flower bed, its front wheels sunk to the axles in the damp loam, its right fender crumpled against a tilted marble birdbath.
The damage wasn’t anywhere near as bad as his housekeeper had made out in that frantic phone call, but still, it was enough to make Alex’s blood run cold. If the car had turned the other way, if it had rolled toward the street instead of the garden, if it had been going faster—
He screeched to a stop in front of the house and ran for the door. Distantly, he was aware of Lizzie getting out of the car to follow him. She had refused to be left behind—like her uncle, she appeared to have a stubborn streak. He should have insisted that she go back to her hotel, but he hadn’t wanted to spare the time to argue. Right now, all he cared about was seeing his sons.
“Jason! Daniel!” he called, striding into the foyer.
“They’re in here, Mr. Whitmore,” Mrs. Gray said.
Alex veered toward the front room. The twins were sitting on the sofa. Mrs. Gray had insisted that they were unhurt, but Alex couldn’t breathe until he crossed the floor and was able to see them for himself.
“Hi, Dad! Are you mad at us?”
“Yeah, are you mad at us?”
Smears of dirt the same color as the dark loam of the flower bed clung to the cuffs of the twins’ pyjamas. Faint traces of the same dirt streaked their hands and cheeks, yet there was no sign of scrapes or bruises.
Dropping to his knees in front of them, Alex ran his hands over their arms and legs, reassuring himself that they were all right, then wrapped his arms around their shoulders and pulled them against his chest. His lungs heaved. “Thank God,” he said roughly.
“He’s not mad,” Jason mumbled into Alex’s jacket.
“Told ya,” Daniel said, squirming in his father’s embrace.
“Mrs. Gray said we had to wait for you. She said you’d be mad. She said we were gonna get it.”
“She made us sit here forever.”
“What are we gonna get, Dad?”
Alex closed his eyes, allowing the nightmare images that had tormented him on the drive home to fade. Jason and Daniel really were all right.
“I wasn’t going to let them out of my sight,” Mrs. Gray said. “I wanted you to see for yourself what these two hooligans did.”
He
