Trusting Again Read online

  Trusting Again

  Book 4 in the Second Chances series

  Peggy Bird, author of Beginning Again, Loving Again, and Together Again

  Avon, Massachusetts

  This edition published by

  Crimson Romance

  an imprint of F+W Media, Inc.

  10151 Carver Road, Suite 200

  Blue Ash, Ohio 45242

  www.crimsonromance.com

  Copyright © 2013 by Peggy Bird

  ISBN 10: 1-4405-6419-1

  ISBN 13: 978-1-4405-6419-2

  eISBN 10: 1-4405-6420-5

  eISBN 13: 978-1-4405-6420-8

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.

  Cover art © istockphoto.com/Aleksander Nakic

  For Anita, Beryl, Ruthann, and our handsome date at the Heathman who made the opening scene of this book easy to write.

  Contents

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  About the Author

  More from This Author

  Also Available

  Chapter 1

  “I love it when she has the men in the audience sing the chorus to ‘Eight Miles Wide,’” Liz Fairchild said. “Hearing deep voices sing about the size of their vaginas never fails to amuse me.”

  Cynthia Blaine had known Liz for years and, although she wasn’t surprised by anything the other woman said, she was sometimes still astonished by where Liz chose to say it. However, shushing her was a waste of effort. So was pointing out the startled expressions of the people who’d heard the comment. Liz had never learned to care about keeping her voice down or her opinion to herself.

  “You like saying that out loud, don’t you?” Cynthia said.

  “No one objects to that word anymore, do they? And if they do, maybe it’ll clear out the place so we can get a table. Otherwise, we’re out of luck. The bar’s full,” Liz said.

  They’d just come from a matinee of the Oregon Symphony featuring Storm Large, a performer with a great voice and an amazing repertoire of songs, not all of which were appropriate for the faint of heart, a category which included Liz’s favorite, her signature song. Now, standing at the entrance to the Heathman Hotel bar, the women were hoping to find a table so they could have a glass of wine.

  This girls’ afternoon out also included Amanda St. Claire, who was doing a recon for a table in the back. Amanda hadn’t been out much since the birth of her baby and Liz, whose art gallery exhibited both Amanda’s art glass and Cynthia’s designer jewelry, had, as she described it, “arranged the excursion to rectify that.”

  Amanda rejoined them just in time to catch the last part of the conversation. “It’s full there, too,” she said waving toward the other room. “There are three empty chairs at a table for four, but there was a guy sitting there. I guess he’s waiting for people to join him.”

  “Did you ask?” Liz said.

  “No, it seemed rude.”

  “If he has the only empty chairs in the place, it’s not rude. If you can’t do it, I will.” Liz headed to the area that served as overflow bar, tearoom, and place to lunch for the hotel restaurant.

  In a few minutes, she reappeared in the door to the back room and motioned to the other two to join her.

  “Oh, my God. Did we get lucky,” she said in a low voice. “And not just by scoring a table. The man we’ll be sitting with is one of the most beautiful creatures ever to walk the planet.”

  “So, Liz, when did you say Collins will be back in Portland?” Amanda asked, trailing behind Cynthia.

  “I didn’t and you’re usually more subtle than that. I love Collins but I’m not blind. You’ll understand when you see this man,” Liz said. “And to answer your question, however rhetorical it may have been, this is his week in Portland. He should be home now. With any luck, he’ll even have dinner — ”

  “Holy hell.” Cynthia stopped so suddenly, Amanda ran into the back of her. “Is that the guy you’re talking about?” She nodded toward a man sitting alone at a table for four, a glass of red wine in his hand.

  “Yup, isn’t he gorgeous?” Liz asked.

  “I know him,” Cynthia said. “He commissioned a piece of my jewelry a month or so ago for his girlfriend.”

  “Damn. There goes my plan to set you up. I figured I might find a way for Amanda and me to leave without you so he’d ask you to dinner.”

  “Don’t you dare do anything like that,” Cynthia said, raising her voice slightly and emphasizing the “dare” part of the sentence. The last thing she needed was Liz’s heavy-handed matchmaking. It was uncomfortable enough when Liz tried to fix her up with one of her artists. Cynthia definitely didn’t want any attempts to get her together with this man.

  Not when he woke up a hatch of butterflies in her stomach every time she thought about him. Ever since he’d walked into the Erickson Gallery, she’d been full of fluttery things on a regular basis. As she was now.

  She smoothed the skirt of her plain lavender linen maxi dress, trying to get rid of the wrinkles, then tied the ends of the deep purple shrug she wore over it a little tighter around her waist. It was too late to wish she’d worn something sexier. Or had put her tawny blonde hair up in some intricate roll, rather than a simple braid down the middle of her back. Worn fuck-me shoes instead of the flat sandals she had on. Put on a little more make-up; put on any make-up at all.

  Oh, for God’s sake. Wearing something else wouldn’t have made any difference. He has a girlfriend. One he spent big bucks on for a birthday present. And what the hell was she thinking, anyway? Even if he wasn’t attached, he was way out of her league. After the whole Josh disaster last year, she’d vowed never to get herself in a similar situation again. She’d barely gotten out of that relationship with any shred of ego intact.

  As the three women approached the table, the subject of her fantasies stood to greet them. Cynthia was sure his picture was in the dictionary next to the phrase “tall, dark, and handsome.” Cliché it may be but, in his case, true. He was well over six feet tall, with skin the color of a latte, and thick, black-brown hair that curled around his ears and at the back of his neck. The first time she’d seen him in Seattle, she’d immediately wanted to thread her fingers through that hair. Lick up the side of his neck until she got to his jaw line, an earlobe, his full-lipped mouth, whatever she could reach to kiss. Put her arms over those broad shoulders. Earn one of those sensuous smiles.

  Everything about the man was burned into her brain including what was, she was pretty sure from watching it walk away from her, the best ass in the Northwest. So she knew if she wasn’t careful, before this little unexpected encounter in Portland had ended, she’d likely be drooling all over him like a St. Bernard.

  When the man recognized Cynthia, a broad grin spread over his face and lit up his brown eyes. “If I’d known you were one of the women who were table-less, I’d have carried it out to you. With a bottle of champagne.”

  “So, the birthday gift was a success,” Cynthia said.

  “Absolutely,” he said. “It was the hit of the evening. I’ve been out of town on business or I would have let you know how much my friend appreciated i
t.” He turned the smile on the other two women. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to be rude. I’m Marius Hernandez. Cynthia created an amazing piece of jewelry for me to give a friend as a birthday present.”

  “This is Liz Fairchild, Marius. She has a gallery in Portland where I have some of my work. And this is Amanda St. Claire. She shows her work at The Fairchild, too.”

  “Everyone knows Amanda St. Claire’s art glass. And I’ve read about your gallery, Liz. I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve the pleasure of three beautiful and talented women joining me but whatever it was, I hope I do it often.” He gestured toward the table. “Please. Sit. Let me flag down a server and get you something to drink.”

  Liz took the chair next to Marius and Amanda sat opposite her, leaving the place across from him for Cynthia. She moved the chair back from the table a bit, sure that if he went back to the slouch he’d been in before he stood, she’d be brushing knees with him and she didn’t think she could handle that.

  But instead of inhabiting the chair with a casual sprawl, he sat up straighter, his forearms on the table in front of him which put her hands, not her knees, in danger. Even without touching him, Cynthia was unnerved by being this close to him. She played with the strap of the shoulder bag in her lap, twisting her fingers in it, trying not to watch him. But she wasn’t able to keep herself from sneaking peeks at him out of the corner of her eye.

  “Cyn, what do you want?” Amanda’s voice broke through the heated mist that had obscured every other thought as soon as she’d seen Marius. “We’ve ordered our drinks and some food to share. The server’s waiting for you.”

  “Sorry, a glass of house red, please.”

  “Make that a bottle of the Malbec I’m drinking,” Marius said to the server before asking Cynthia, “Is that okay with you? I’m drinking red wine, too, and with you and Liz ordering red, it makes sense to have a bottle.”

  “I’ve never had a Malbec,” she said, “but sure. Sounds fine.”

  “Most Northwesterners who drink red wine stick to local pinot noirs. But this is one of my favorites. It’s from Argentina, from a high altitude vineyard in the Andes. I think you’ll like it.”

  “So, Marius, now that we have that settled,” Liz began, clearly finished with the wine discussion, “I’d love to know more about you. You commissioned a piece from Cynthia in Seattle, but are hanging out in Portland. Do you live in Washington or Oregon? Or do you slide back and forth across the Columbia at will?”

  He seemed to take Liz in stride, merely smiling at her as he answered. “I live in Seattle. I’m in Portland for a coffee convention.”

  “There are conventions for coffee?” Liz said. “Who knew?”

  “Coffee’s big business. Especially now that Starbucks has taken it out of the supermarket and made it gourmet. My family has been in the business for several generations and we’ve seen the change. Benefited from it, to be honest.”

  “You sell coffee?” Liz asked.

  “Not in the sense I think you mean. We’re brokers for coffee plantation owners in Central America. We arrange the deals between coffee roasters here and plantations there.”

  “Coffee roasters like Starbucks?”

  “Don’t I wish. No, we have several dozen clients in and around Portland, same in Seattle, and a growing number in California.”

  “Is your family in Seattle?” Amanda asked.

  “Miami. My family came from Cuba when Castro took over.” Before Liz could ask another question, he went on, “My grandfather started the business. My father and uncles run it now and my brother, a cousin, and I are next in line. I was sent to Seattle to open a West Coast office to handle all the business your coffee culture was bringing us. It’s only me, a couple computers, and an assistant but … ” His self-deprecating smile didn’t really match the rest of his confident body language.

  Which was what Cynthia was staring at — his body. Especially his shoulders. His gorgeous shoulders were clad in a jacket that never wrinkled when he moved, like it was part of his skin. She was sure he had his suits made for him. The one he wore today was brown, the perfect complement to his milky-coffee skin. The fabric looked expensive, imported from someplace like Italy. His cream-colored shirt had French cuffs held together with chunky gold cuff links. She wanted to touch the fabric of the shirt; it looked so soft, so smooth. Maybe it was silk, like his tie, which she thought was Prada.

  What the hell was wrong with her? First obsessing about her clothes, now his? What men wore had never been of any interest to her. Women’s clothes barely held her attention for more than the ten minutes it took for her to throw on jeans and a T-shirt every morning. She had to pull herself together. Liz and Amanda were having a normal conversation with this man while she sat like a lump, too busy thinking about things like his clothes — or what was under them — to say anything, much less anything intelligent.

  “I guess you must find Seattle a bit of a change from Miami,” Amanda was saying when Cynthia tuned back into the conversation.

  “You have no idea. Just about everything’s different, from the weather to people’s idea of fun to the politics. I’ve gotten to like it now. Except for the beaches. Even after two years, I still miss Florida beaches.”

  The wine arrived; he tasted and approved it. The conversation went on, mostly around Cynthia not with her. She’d made some progress toward normalcy — she’d stopped obsessing about his clothes. Now, she was intent on making sure no part of her body touched any part of his. When he handed her a glass of wine, she took it without coming in contact with his hand. She kept her knees clenched tightly together and primly set to the side of her chair so there was no chance they would brush his. She avoided eye contact.

  But the one thing she couldn’t get away from was the smell of his aftershave or cologne or, who knows, maybe pheromones, wafting across the table. He smelled like some exotic spice she couldn’t name. She had never, in her entire life, smelled anything that good. It was irresistible. Like every other part of him was, from the crown of his head to the just-got-out-of-bed dark stubble on his cheeks and jaw that would feel wonderfully scratchy on her skin. From the body under that custom-made suit she’d stopped thinking about until now, when she started thinking about it again, to his voice that was like a good piece of music, deep and resonant, layered with meaning. And his eyes, oh God, his eyes …

  “Cyn, is something wrong? You’re so quiet.” Amanda sounded concerned.

  Before she could answer, Cynthia caught the expression on Marius’s face. Damn. He knew exactly why she was quiet, why she was sitting like some well-behaved schoolgirl. It seemed those brown eyes could see into her heart and soul.

  “I was thinking about a new piece I’m working on. Sorry.”

  He raised an eyebrow and buried his half-smile in his glass of wine.

  “Is this for my gallery or are you going to waste it on that place in Seattle where you still have your work?” Liz asked.

  “It’s a commission that came from Max’s gallery, that place where the owner has been as good to me in Seattle as you’ve been to me in Portland. And didn’t I just bring you my Victorian neckpieces no one else has seen?”

  “I guess I’ll take that as some sort of atonement for giving him your Cleopatra collars first. Not that anyone in Seattle would ever appreciate anything like that.”

  A Cleopatra collar was exactly what Marius had commissioned from her, but demonstrating he was as smart as he was sexy, he only winked at her and stayed out of the discussion.

  The conversation moved on to subjects less likely to make her discomfited. In response to his questions, Amanda explained to Marius some of the fine points of kiln-formed glass art. In return, he answered hers about coffee buying. In her usual outrageously flirty manner, Liz encouraged him to come to her gallery before he returned to Seattle. Cynthia said little unless prompted by her friends and even then made only brief comments, still tongue-tied by sitting across from him.

  An hour later, Marius gla
nced at an expensive-looking watch, re-buttoned the top button of his shirt, tightened his tie and apologized for having to leave for a business dinner. Before he left, he shook the hand of each of the three women, seeming to linger with Cynthia longer than with the other two. At least it felt like he lingered, taking her smaller hand between both of his, holding it in what felt more like the clasp of a lover’s hand than a good-bye handshake. She noticed, as she had when they first met, that in spite of the beautiful clothes, he had calluses on his hands that could only come from some kind of physical work. It added an aspect to him that fascinated her even more.

  She hoped he hadn’t noticed how her hand trembled when he held it.

  • • •

  Marius couldn’t believe his luck. He’d been trying to find a way to get back to the Erickson Gallery for weeks so he could do what he should have done when he’d picked up the gift for a family friend — ask the beautiful artist who’d made the piece to have dinner with him. But he’d been traveling on business for most of the past month, ending up in Portland, where he’d been bored and counting the days until he could get back to Seattle.

  Until he decided to kill time before his dinner meeting with a glass of wine. And there she was.

  In only two brief encounters, Cynthia Blaine had managed to intrigue him. Curvy where most of the women he’d met lately had been long and lean, her face was clean of make-up, her eyes clear of calculation about what his net worth might be. He had his pick of arm candy, but going to dinner with women who were conventionally beautiful, fashionably dressed, and often more ambitious than he was — which was saying quite a lot — had worn thin. Not that he was looking for a long-term commitment. But someone real seemed like a nice change. And Cynthia Blaine was that — real and talented and beautiful.

  When he’d first met her, he’d thought she was equally attracted. But he had wondered if she’d written him off because he was obviously buying a piece of expensive jewelry for a woman even though he kept emphasizing it was for a friend, hoping she’d get the inference. Today he thought the message must have gotten through. The way she’d flushed when he smiled at her, held her body back from touching him, looked away so he wouldn’t know she’d been staring at him all seemed to say she felt the same attraction.