He’d made a proper hash of that.
How could he go home to sleep? He couldn’t. So he made his way to the little beach where he and Jenny and Henry had swum only days before.
Family.
What was she asking him to do? Take Lorna and Jack as well as Henry back to New York with him?
No. She wasn’t asking anything of him, he thought. She was simply looking at his offer in surprise and rejecting it out of hand.
It wasn’t a ridiculous offer. He’d made it to no other woman but Christa.
Christa would have been happy with what he was offering Jenny, he thought. He could have provided everything she’d needed. She would have been able to do whatever she’d wanted.
Jenny wasn’t Christa.
Christa had been easier. He’d known what Christa had wanted. She’d wanted what their parents wanted: prestige and money.
He had that. He was offering it to Jenny, and she’d knocked it back. What else did he have to offer her?
Nothing.
So move on, he told himself. You offered to marry her because you felt sorry for her.
Was that right?
No. It was much more. He wanted Jenny in his bed.
So it’s sympathy and sex. You can find sex elsewhere. She doesn’t want the sympathy. You’ve made your offer and it’s been rejected. So move on.
Back to thinking of Jenny as an employee?
She wasn’t the least like an employee.
She was just…Jenny.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE next day was frantic. Barret and Anna and entourage arrived, and had to be taken through the arrangements. Then the arrangements had to be tweaked so bride and groom were happy, and those tweaks weren’t insubstantial. Guy, who’d worked with both Barret and Anna before, did the front work while Jenny stayed in the background.
Last night might not have happened. She was briskly efficient and very, very capable.
‘There’s an extra bridesmaid? Get her here by two this afternoon and we’ll fit her out. We have half a ton of pink tulle, and our seamstresses are enjoying themselves.’
‘Anna doesn’t like the wedding cake? No, that’s okay. We’ll soak it in brandy and call it Christmas pudding for the party afterwards. I can get a couple of ladies onto sponge cakes now. Have her draw up details of decorations.’
‘Gifts for the bridesmaids? Pearls? Yes, it’s too late to get seven identical necklaces locally, but I can contact a jeweller in Sydney and have them couriered.’
She reassured him every time he called her, and after every call he felt about ten years old and as if she was his schoolteacher.
That was the tone she was taking, he thought. Cool, distant and bossy.
She was also never there. Every time he found an opportunity to visit the shop she was somewhere else.
‘She hasn’t finished her Christmas shopping,’ one of the sewing ladies told him.
The three women seemed to be having a wonderful time, sitting in the back room with a vat of coffee and half a ton of chocolate biscuits, their fingers flying. ‘I think she’s gone to find a present for Lorna.’
‘Hush!’ Guy turned to the shop’s entrance to see Jack pushing Lorna’s wheelchair inside. ‘I don’t like knowing my presents before Christmas Day,’ Lorna called. ‘So if you know, don’t tell. Guy, I’m pleased we found you.’
‘I’m busy,’ he said, and then thought maybe he shouldn’t be that blunt. Jenny obviously loved this woman. It was just…Lorna was part of the family thing that was threatening to engulf him.
‘I won’t hold you up,’ Lorna replied, her voice holding a hint of reproof. ‘And I’m not asking any favours, so you can stop looking like that. We just called to remind you that you’re doing the Santa run in your Ferrari tomorrow. You need to be at our place at nine. Henry’s really looking forward to it.’
Hell, he’d forgotten. He’d also forgotten Henry’s face when he’d thought it might happen.
But…
Why not ignore a few buts here? he told himself. He could do this. It didn’t mean getting emotionally involved-or any more emotionally involved than he already was.
Okay, he’d do it, and then he’d walk away. He’d moved his return flight to the day after Christmas. His escape route was organised.
How could you ask a woman to marry you and then look forward to getting back to your own life?
He was having an internal conversation, watched by Lorna and Jack and three seamstresses, but the conversation went on regardless.
Easy, he told himself. I didn’t ask to join her life. I asked if she’d join mine.
No wonder she refused you.
‘Fine,’ he managed, and if he sounded ungracious he couldn’t help himself. ‘I’ll be there.’
‘Great,’ Jack said warmly. ‘We’ll hang up a stocking for you.’
‘A stocking?’
‘Wait and see,’ Lorna said. ‘Our Santa does the best stockings.’
‘He’s still coming for Christmas dinner?’
‘Of course he is. He promised. And he’s coming at nine for stockings. He’s cute,’ Lorna told her daughter-in-law. ‘He drives a wonderful car. Henry thinks he’s the ant’s pants.’
‘Guy Carver is not the ant’s pants. He is an American billionaire who happens to be my boss…’
‘I’m sewing him a stocking.’
‘Lorna, he can’t have a stocking.’
‘Everyone in the whole world needs a stocking. Now, what will Santa put in it?’
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHRISTMAS morning.
Guy woke, as was his custom, at five a.m. There was nothing to do.
There had to be something. One of the biggest celebrity weddings of the year was scheduled for five this afternoon.
He lay and watched the weak rays of dawn flitter across his counterpane, mentally ticking off everything that had to be done.
He’d made huge lists, and Jenny had delegated.
Every person in the town seemed to have something to do. The normal sleeping-in-front-of-television end to Christmas Day was not going to happen in Sandpiper Bay. Jenny had hauled in every local, and a few tourists as well, and she’d given everyone a job.
And the best thing was that nearly all of them were doing it for nothing.
‘Barret and Anna can pay,’ Guy had growled, when Jenny had told him.
‘Yes, but most of the town’s folk believe in Christmas.’
‘So what’s that got to do with it?’
‘They believe it’s wrong to work on Christmas Day. But if it’s for something like aiding the tsunami effort it’ll strike a chord. One of our local kids is working in the international aid effort and…’
‘You’re asking Barret and Anna to give a donation to charity?’
‘No. I’m asking Barret and Anna to pay a fair price for labour and then we’ll give it away.’
‘It doesn’t make sense.’
‘Maybe for you it doesn’t,’ she agreed. ‘But for us…it’s our way.’ She glared at him. ‘If you want to take our profits for yourself…’
‘Whoa,’ he told her. And then he thought, What sort of employer/employee relationship was this? She’d just given away his profits.
But there had been no arguing, and now the whole town had jobs to do for the good of the tsunami relief effort. He could lie in bed and stare at the ceiling and think he should be back in New York.
Why should he be back in New York? Christmases back home were simply an excuse for ostentation.
He hated Christmas. Even before Christa had died he’d hated Christmas.
Five a.m. Nothing to do until nine.
He hated Christmas.
Nine. He walked up the veranda steps, carrying expensive truffles and vintage wine. The screen door slammed open and a pyjama-clad urchin catapulted through, crutches tumbling as Henry toppled forward to hug his legs.
A Labrador puppy came bouncing after him. The puppy reached Henry and Henry abandoned Guy. He sat down on the veranda and shoved his nose into the puppy’s soft fur.
‘This is Patsy,’ he told Guy, his voice muffled by puppy. ‘She was on my bed when I woke up, and she’s all mine, and I have to train her.’