I suppose?”
She tried out another encouraging smile on him, not that it did a whit of good. If anything, it seemed to infuriate him further. Moriah was pretty sure Jake held her personally accountable for the anger simmering through him. “No knives or ropes, but I do have a puppy to keep you company. Pets have a calming influence on people.”
He gave her one of those don’t-even-think-about-it glowers before she pivoted to intercept Chester Gray, the golf course manager and groundskeeper, who strode up the wooden porch with the pooch cradled in his arms.
“Thanks, Chester,” she murmured as she cuddled the pup against her chest.
“You bet, Mori. Tell Jake the movie starts in forty-five minutes and Anna has his supper tray heated.”
Scratching behind the pup’s ear, Moriah pivoted to face Jake who growled ferociously. The puppy huddled fearfully in her arms.
“You expect me to take care of that spitwad of a dog?” he muttered crossly. “Think again, my dear Mo. You don’t mind if I call you Mo, do you? It’s not nearly as stuffy and sophisticated as Moriah.”
Leave it to Jake to throw her words in her face. She angled her head and appraised the frown that caused his thick brows to form a V over his glittering obsidian eyes. “You really aren’t taking this well, are you?”
“Gee, ya think?” he said, then snorted. “How many more times do I have to express my displeasure before you get it through your dense blond head that I want no part of this stress management crapola!”
Moriah willfully overlooked the dumb-blonde wise-crack, giving it the lack of recognition it deserved, and scratched beneath the puppy’s chin. “As I was saying,” she went on determinedly, “we take in the unwanted dogs from the animal shelter in town to serve as companions for our guests. According to statistics, animals have a soothing effect on—”
He waved her off with an impatient flick of his wrist. “Don’t start with me. I don’t want a dog. I don’t want to be here. Do you hear me?”
Moriah smiled bravely in the face of his booming tirade. “Yes I do, but I’m not sure my guest in cabin number one heard you loud and clear.”
He bared his teeth and flashed her the queen mother of all glares. She smiled—with considerable effort. “The dog food and bowls are on the floor of the closet. The pup is housebroken.”
“Well, I’m not,” he smarted off.
Moriah bit back a grin, then glanced sideways to see Anna Jefferies ambling up the stone walkway. “Ah, here comes supper. Anna must’ve given up on me.”
“Supper?” he said caustically. “I figured Spitwad and I were supposed to rough it tonight and share the dog food.”
Moriah set the pup on the floor and exited to take the tray Anna held out to her.
“I could hear him yelling at two hundred yards,” Anna murmured, grinning. “He’s going to take special effort, I’d say.”
“He’ll be fine once he calms down and accepts his fate.” She hoped.
When Anna reversed direction and hiked off, Moriah carried the covered tray inside and set it on the small drop-leaf table. “Here’s your supper, Jake.”
“Ah, good. A reason to live. For a while there, I wasn’t sure there was one.”
She ignored his wiseass remarks. She predicted she’d be doing a lot of that during his two-week stay. “We’ll be expecting you to join us for the movie this evening. You can meet the other guests.”
“And you can hold your breath waiting for me to show up,” he snapped.
Moriah did her best to ignore his hostility—again. “We don’t watch highly intense adventure movies at the resort. Just lighthearted comedies and such.”
“No trashy porno?” he asked. “No, of course not. What was I thinking? We wouldn’t want to get all these maxed-out businessmen fired up, would we?”
“No, we wouldn’t,” she agreed. “It might upset the inner self.”
“You can take your psychobabble and stick it where the sun—”
Moriah promptly shut the door before he finished voicing his insult. Rightfully, she should be annoyed with her belligerent guest. Instead, she found him amusing, entertaining and very different from her older guests. She knew Jake was fighting back the only way he knew how—by lashing out at her in frustration.
And maybe there was a little fear involved here, too, she mused pensively. Fear of the unknown and the unfamiliar. Jake was also suffering from separation anxiety from his predictable life and from his close association with his sisters.
According to Kim and Lisa, Jake had devoted his life to raising them and making scads of money to provide for them. He’d taken family responsibility seriously and it led him into such a deep rut that he couldn’t see his way out. Asking Jake to change his ways made him uncomfortable and defensive. Moriah understood that, even if Jake refused to acknowledge that he was feeling anything except annoyance.
Somehow or another, she was going to get through to this man. She was going to teach him how to relax, how to take life at a more leisurely pace, how to laugh and smile. The man took himself, and life, entirely too seriously. Jake Prescott wasn’t the hopeless cause he wanted her to think he was. He simply had to be retrained to take a different approach to life.
If Jake didn’t cooperate she might have to resort to konking him over the head and knocking some sense into him. Moriah grinned mischievously. That idea held tremendous appeal at the moment.
JAKE STARED DOWN at the fuzzball of a dog that sniffed at his shoes. The multicolored, pint-size mutt appeared to be a cross between a frizzy-haired miniature poodle, a Pekingese, a Chihuahua and who knew what else. The mutt was butt-ugly.
Sighing audibly, Jake glanced around the efficiency cabin once again, finding nothing comforting or appealing to him. What the sweet loving hell was he going to do with himself out here in the boondocks? Already the index finger of his right hand felt empty without a computer mouse resting beneath it. In addition, there was no phone to call his demented sisters and rake them over live coals for this horrendous betrayal. What the hell were those two thinking? They weren’t thinking, he decided. Of all the lamebrain ideas they’d ever concocted over the years this topped the list!
Muttering several foul expletives, Jake plunked down on the wooden chair to examine his evening rations. A tantalizing aroma filled his nostrils as he uncovered the plate that was heaping with smoked ribs, a baked potato, corn on the cob and vanilla pudding. Until now, he’d been too upset to realize he was starving. Jake plucked up a sparerib and sighed in culinary anticipation. Anna Jefferies might look like the female version of an army drill sergeant but she could damn sure cook, he decided at first bite.
Jake polished off the first melt-in-your-mouth spare-rib, then glanced down to see the mutt staring hopefully at him. “Yeah, well, that’s all I figured a little beggar like you would be good for anyway.” He handed the spitwad of a dog a chunk of meat. The mutt practically grinned as he trotted across the tile to plop down on the rug beside the sink. Jake watched the mutt chew his food happily.
While Jake ate
