The Christmas Set-Up, Page 2

  She laughed. “You’re going to help me?”

  “Sure.”

  “You’ve never offered such a thing before.”

  “You’ve never given me the time of day before.”

  “I’m not giving it to you now.”

  He smiled, slightly lopsided and sexy as hell. The appetizer on his smile menu. “We could combine our efforts,” he said. “I’m not having trouble.” She narrowed her eyes. “Are you?”

  He laughed as if that was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard, and she had to smile that she’d even suggested it. Jason was a designer genius. He never had trouble. With anything. Or if he did, he kept it deep inside. “Go away, Jason.”

  He was still close, too close. In her near tumble, a strand of her long hair had caught on the day-old stubble of his jaw. She reached up to tug it free and another of those bolts of sensation went through her.

  Not annoyance.

  Not adrenaline.

  Lust.

  His eyes darkened, the only sign that he felt it, too. That, and the way his hands tightened on her hips. There was another beat, and for a minute she thought he was going to kiss her.

  “Zoe?” Susan, her assistant, called from her desk out front, making Zoe jump.

  Susan was one of a handful of office-support staff. “I’ve got the reference books you requested,” she yelled.

  Zoe shut her laptop and brushed past Jason without looking at him again. She accepted the reference material from Susan, and then was waylaid by Steele for a few minutes, exchanging pleasantries. Steele’s personality matched his name. He was respectful of women but not especially modern enough to fully believe in one. Zoe intended to change that.

  By the time she got back to her office, Jason was gone.

  Which was good. Perfect, really.

  Letting out a breath, she turned away from her laptop and stared out her office window. San Francisco had definitely dressed up for the holidays this year and was lit up like a Christmas snow globe, even in full daylight.

  It was beautiful.

  But she couldn’t enjoy it. Not when she hadn’t settled on anything close to a design worthy of the Weller project. And, as Jason had so thoughtfully pointed out, she had only two weeks left.

  Sighing, she scrubbed her hands over her face. Her mind wasn’t on the project, but the promotion, which she wanted with all her ambitious heart. It would give her a welcome leg up in the rivalry between her and her siblings. Her three older sisters had a head start. Cindy, Leanne and Valerie were a brain surgeon, a rocket scientist and a district attorney, respectively. Cindy and Leanne had married professional white-collar guys and were raising kids. Valerie had a significant other and was expected to reveal a diamond at some point over the Christmas holidays.

  All three practical, logical, smart-as-hell, right-side-of-the-brain, classic overachievers. Zoe used the other side of her brain, the “artist” side, and was an associate architect in a troubled field that traditionally had never been all that kind to women.

  Tonight she’d be smack in the center of the Anders’ family annual Christmas getaway, in their mountain cabin out in the middle of the Sierras, surrounded by nothing but snow and woods and more than one considerable ego. This time, Zoe wanted to be able to hold her head high and tell her sisters that she was finally on her way in her career. This time she was special.

  Except that without an architectural plan for the Weller Center, she wasn’t.

  She turned back to her desk and opened her laptop to eject the memory stick and pack up to leave.

  But the memory stick wasn’t there. She searched the desk, the floor, everywhere.

  It was gone. And so were all her notes and ideas.

  She whirled to the door and nearly growled.

  Jason.

  Grinding her back teeth together, she headed down the hall toward his office. The lights were off, so she hit the switch. His desk was clear of anything, including his laptop. The room was cool and quiet, and it took her a minute to realize what made it feel so stark. She hadn’t noticed before, probably because she’d always avoided his space, but unlike the rest of the entire floor, Jason’s office was utterly devoid of Christmas decorations.

  She turned back the way she’d come and stopped at Susan’s desk. “Have you seen Jason?”

  “He’s gone.”

  “Gone where?”

  “Left. In fact, you just missed him.”

  Zoe stared at her. “But he was just here.”

  “Yep. And now he’s gone. He’s heading out of town, I believe, and not expected in the office again until next week.” Susan smiled. “It’s Christmas Eve, Zoe. We’re all gone, or close to it,” she added cheerfully, grabbing her things.

  Zoe marched straight to Mike’s cubicle, which was the virtual opposite of his brother’s office. Every corner was decorated and lit for the holidays to within an inch of its life, including the naughty Mrs. Santa calendar hanging on the corkboard behind his desk.

  Mike was on his feet, pulling on a jacket. “Hey,” he said with a smile. “Just caught me.”

  “Where’s your brother?”

  “Jason?”

  “Do you have another obnoxious, sneaky, desperately competitive brother who steals files in order to gain the upper hand because they know they’re going to lose?”

  Mike laughed. “Ah… You caught him.”

  Zoe narrowed her eyes. “Are you telling me he really did it, he stole my flash drive?”

  He hesitated. “I’m telling you to never underestimate my brother when it comes to getting what he wants,” Mike said with a cryptic smile. “Not that he’d admit that.”

  “Where is he?” Zoe managed to say with what she felt was remarkable calm. “Susan mentioned something about him getting out of town?”

  “Yep. He’s probably halfway to Lake Tahoe by now.” Mike scooped up his portfolio and laptop.

  “Lake Tahoe?”

  “Yeah, I rented a cabin for my girlfriend and I, but she has to stay in town to do a family thing so we’re staying at mine and Jason’s place instead. Jason took the cabin to give us some privacy.”

  Zoe sighed. It could be worse. Lake Tahoe was four hours away but only about an hour and a half out of her way to her family’s Christmas gathering in Quincy. Not that it mattered. She wanted her files back. She also wanted to wring Jason’s neck. “I need the address.”

  Mike rubbed his jaw as he looked at her ruefully.

  “Mike.”

  “He specifically said he wanted to be alone.”

  Uh-huh. She just bet.

  “And there’s a storm coming,” Mike said. “You might get stuck there.”

  “I have all-wheel drive, I’ll be fine.” Besides, she’d checked the weather. She had until tomorrow morning before the heavy snow hit, and by then she’d be in Quincy with her family. “I’ll owe you a favor.”

  Mike’s eyes lit. “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  Balancing his laptop and portfolio, he scribbled an address down on a piece of paper for her. “I’ll deny giving you this.”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

  * * *

  MIKE WATCHED HER WALK AWAY, his smile spreading as he sent out a three-way text:

  Operation Getting Jason and Zoe Laid is in progress.

  CHAPTER THREE

  JASON STOOD STARING at the cabin’s empty woodstove. Outside it was pitch-black in the way only the Sierras could be at night. There were no city lights, nothing but a tiny sliver of the moon peeking out from the long fingers of silvery clouds spreading across the sky with increasing speed.

  The storm was moving in. He was going to get a white Christmas. Woo hoo.

  He didn’t waste his breath cursing his brother, the reason he was here. But wasn’t it just like Mike to book a nonrefundable weekend at a cabin with the bills mounting and the creditors circling.

  It was maybe twenty degrees outside. Inside wasn’t much warmer. The place was a low-fri
lls log cabin, beautiful in its simplicity.

  And damn cold.

  But it was a blissful Christmas-free zone, and a welcome change from the house he shared with Mike in San Francisco. He loved his brother, but even though they’d both suffered the same holiday shock when they lost their parents ten years ago the week before Christmas to a drunk driver, only Jason had seemed to retain his resentment of the season.

  Mike had gone the opposite route, probably out of sheer orneriness. Whatever, it didn’t matter to Jason as long as his brother was happy. And by all accounts, he seemed to be. He was dating Cara, and if anything, Cara was even more into Christmas than Mike.

  A match made in heaven.

  On his way to the cabin, he’d stopped at a small mom-and-pop grocery store down the road. The pretty clerk had offered to make up some meals from the deli and deliver them in about an hour, which worked for him. He wasn’t much of a cook. Takeout was his specialty, but he doubted there was any takeout within miles of the cabin. So he’d prepaid for the meals and gone on his way.

  When he’d entered the cabin, Jason had dropped his duffel bag on the one and only bed in the place and had immediately gone in search of heat.

  There was a sticky note on the woodstove telling him that the wood was stacked on the back deck if he wanted to start a fire.

  He craned his neck and eyed the thermostat hanging in the window… Yep, twenty degrees, so hell yes he wanted to start a fire. He’d do that then get down to business on the Weller project.

  He’d been slaving at it for days now and was having a hell of a time. He had the outline in his mind, knew what he wanted to accomplish, but couldn’t make the building itself reflect his vision, and it was driving him nuts.

  Peace and quiet was all he needed.

  He got to work, loading wood from outside. On his fifth trek from the back deck, a strong gust of wind hit and then a loud crack. He looked up just in time to see a large branch from a two-hundred-foot pine begin to fall. Instinct propelled him backward, the wood flying out of his arms.

  The branch hit just outside the deck, a good ten feet away. Jason would have laughed at himself…except his quick movement with his arms full of wood had sent a shaft of pain through his shoulder and neck, making it impossible to laugh, much less move.

  Shit. Last year he’d had a spectacular crash on a mountain bike and he’d pinched a nerve in his neck. Given the fire ripping along his nerves, he’d just re-aggravated it.

  Grating his teeth, he managed to get inside the cabin, but it cost him. Pain from the spasm was licking along his entire body now.

  From experience, he knew there were only two things that would give him relief. Good drugs and heat. Since he had neither, a hot shower would have to do. Only when he made his way to the bathroom, he saw that there was only an old-fashioned, freestanding claw-foot bathtub.

  This just got better and better. He needed a trip to the chiropractor, a heat pack and a bottle of Vicodin—none of which was within his reach at the moment. Driving the three and a half hours home just might do him in, so, moving like an old man, he filled the tub, turning the water on with his toes when he couldn’t bend over. He managed to strip down, barely, as even the slightest movement provoked pain like a stab with a hot poker. Getting into the tub was an exercise in torture itself, but he managed.

  Just as he settled into the hot water, he heard a knock at the door. He was two hundred miles from home and no one but Mike knew he was here. The nearest neighbor was a good quarter of a mile away. Jason eyed his naked bod, then his clothes lying on the floor, damp now from the water that had sloshed over the side of the tub. He looked at the open bathroom door and calculated the additional pain it would cause him to get out of the tub, get dressed and to the front door.

  Not going to happen.

  The knock came again, less patient this time. “Go away.”

  Blissfully, whoever it was did just that. When no further sound came, Jason sank back and did his best to relax, purposely not thinking about how he was going to get out of the tub when the water got cold.

  * * *

  WHEN NO ONE ANSWERED her knock, Zoe hugged herself and stomped her feet. She couldn’t feel her toes. Each breath crystallized in front of her face, reminding her that she should have changed from her work clothes to something with layers. Lots of layers.

  But she’d been in a hurry to get here. The night was dark, but she could see Jason’s truck in the driveway. Damn him. There was a light on inside the cabin. He was in there, possibly reading her files and also quite probably laughing at her.

  Furious, she glanced at her watch. She hadn’t gotten out of the office as fast as she’d hoped, and it was already seven o’clock. If she got the memory stick from him in the next few minutes, she could maybe be at her family’s cabin by ten. That wasn’t too bad.

  But Jason wasn’t answering.

  The ratfink bastard. She walked around to the back. To her surprise, the sliding glass door off the deck was open. At her feet were a bunch of logs, haphazardly scattered as if they’d been dropped. Uncertain, she stepped to the open door. “Hello? Jason?”

  There was a single beat of silence, then a low but deeply heartfelt oath uttered in a familiar baritone.

  Jason.

  Was he trying to sneak out the front door? With steam coming out her ears—which, by the way, were nearly frozen solid—Zoe let herself in. Unlike Jason, she shut the door—not that it mattered. It was as cold inside as out. She followed the string of swearwords, leading her to the open bathroom door. She stared in shock.

  Jason lay sprawled in the bathtub. Steam was rising from the water, fogging the room, but not enough. “You’re…naked!”

  “Yes, that’s how I usually bathe,” he muttered. “And if it’s such a traumatic sight, stop staring. What the hell are you even doing here?”

  “I’m—” So help her, she tried to stop staring but her eyes wouldn’t behave.

  “Either strip down and join me or get out of my bathroom,” he told her.

  She tried to tear her gaze off his body, but there wasn’t a red-blooded woman alive who could have resisted looking. So she slapped a hand over her eyes. “I’m so mad at you.”

  When he didn’t respond to this open invitation to war, Zoe scissored open her fingers and took a peek at him. His big, leanly muscled body was still quite naked. Naked and wet and gleaming and… Magnificent.

  So much so that it took her a shamefully long beat to realize that something was wrong, seriously wrong. His big hands were gripping the sides of the tub, his face a mask of agony.

  “What is it?” she asked, dropping her purse. “What’s happened?” Kneeling before the tub, she set her hand on his arm, which was hard as a rock and bunched with tension. “Jason?”

  “Go away.” He spoke through clenched teeth, sweat beading on his temples.

  “I can’t,” she said. “Because someone in this bathroom is an infantile moron and stole my files, which I’m not leaving without. Now, tell me what’s wrong.” She’d already seen everything he had, so she didn’t bother to cover her eyes now. In fact, she ran her gaze over him, this time looking for blood or an obvious injury. But all she saw were two long, powerful legs, a chest and a set of abs carved to absolute perfection, and—

  “That’s not where I’m hurt,” he said dryly.

  Right. It wasn’t his legs, either, though they were shifting restlessly. His hands were white-knuckled, his arms like rocks. That left his shoulders and neck, or possibly a migraine, but he didn’t seem light sensitive so she leaned over him and ran her hands up both impressive biceps. His right shoulder was unnaturally bunched, and when she got to the back of his neck, he let out a low sound, nearly a growl.

  “Don’t,” he said, his voice so low it was almost inaudible, but the warning was plain. He didn’t want to be touched.

  Maybe it was because she’d been the baby of a bunch of siblings. Or maybe because she herself always found herself scrapping and fighti
ng for every ounce of success she’d ever had. For anything she’d ever had. But she couldn’t stand to see anything in pain, even her arch nemesis.

  So she ignored his warnings, and the fact that his wet, silky hair brushed her fingertips as she moved behind him and began massaging the terrible knot she found between his shoulder and neck. His skin was warm to the touch and smooth, taut over hard muscle.

  “So is this the only way you could win this promotion,” she asked, trying to lighten the mood. “Steal my files and then hurt yourself so I’ll feel too sympathetic to strangle you?”

  He groaned, and the sound snaked through her and made her belly quiver. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t steal your files,” he said roughly, eyes closing as he very carefully shifted to give her more room to work on his neck.

  “I don’t believe you for one second, of course.” He’d really done a number on himself. She could feel the muscle spasming, so she worked him harder, digging her fingers into the spot. He jerked and grunted in pain, and she had to steel herself against the stab of sympathy. “Since when are you so weak that you have to steal and lie?”

  “I didn’t—” His face twisted and he gasped, the sound pure agony. “Right there—”

  “I’ve got it. Now tell me you took my memory stick and where it is so I can take it and go before the storm hits.” And hopefully before he’d had a chance to look at the material and realize that she’d gotten absolutely nowhere on her design.

  With a softer groan, he shifted again. “Look, despite the fact that you’re crazy, I’ll say whatever you want me to say. I’ll do anything you want, just don’t stop doing whatever it is you’re doing.”

  Letting out a breath, she kneaded the knots ruthlessly hard for long minutes. His eyes were closed, the muscles in his jaw bunching with every touch. “Relax,” she suggested.

  His barely audible “trying” was accompanied by “oh, Christ” when she dug in particularly deep.

  “Why would I steal anything from you, much less your files?” he said eventually through gritted teeth. “Especially when I have my own design, the one that’s going to win?”