Fortune's Heirs: Reunion. Marie Ferrarella
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he needed more information. “Jorge was supposed to come by to help but he was distracted at the last minute.”
He swore that every third sentence out of her mouth was an enigma. He needed a codebook to understand what she was saying. “Distracted?”
Her tone was resigned, forgiving. “I’m afraid that my brother’s libido is larger than his sense of responsibility when it come to promises he makes to his little sister.” Gloria moved her shoulders in a careless shrug beneath the coarse coveralls. “Maybe it’s for the best. He can be rather sloppy.” And then her eyes lit up again and she looked at him as though suddenly seeing him for the first time. He felt as if he was watching the birth of an idea. “You, on the other hand, would probably do an excellent job.”
He caught on before the sentence was out of her mouth. “If you’re trying to go all Tom Sawyer on me, I’m afraid it’s not going to work.” There were a hundred things he would do before agreeing to pick up a paintbrush or a roller.
Undaunted, she pressed on. He had a feeling that other than tight spaces, very little daunted this woman.
“As I recall, Tom Sawyer pretended he was having so much fun that the other boys begged him to let them try their hand at it and even offered to trade things for the privilege of whitewashing his aunt Polly’s fence.” She opened her eyes wide, the very picture of innocence. A picture he wasn’t buying. “I wouldn’t presume to try to suck you into doing something with a lie.”
She was a clever woman. Was she being transparent on purpose? “No, you’d use flattery.”
The innocent expression remained intact. “No way. Just observation. You’re a type A personality. You believe in being hands-on and you need to oversee everything yourself. People like that are too intense not to be good. Am I right?”
He watched in fascination as the smile on her lips blossomed and subsequently moved into her eyes. He supposed it wasn’t only Irish eyes, as the old song went, that smiled, but dark, mesmerizing Mexican ones, as well.
He found he had to force words to his lips. “I’ve never painted anything in my life.”
She nodded, as though expecting him to say as much. He felt as if he was involved in some kind of cosmic chess game.
“It’s not hard, really. You just put paint on the roller.” She picked one up to demonstrate, moving the roller up and down in the paint tray. “These rollers don’t allow you to drip and they absorb just the right amount to cover a given space.” She raised her eyes to his face. “You almost can’t fail.”
The look in her eyes dared him.
He found part of himself actually entertaining the idea and wondered if the paint fumes were getting to him. In the background he heard Blondie singing “‘I’m gonna getcha, getcha, getcha…’”
“I’ll get my suit dirty,” Jack continued.
She spread her hands to her sides. “Not a problem. I’ve an extra set of coveralls.” She nodded over to the side.
He didn’t bother looking to verify. For the moment, she had captivated his attention. He told himself he could walk away anytime he chose. So, for the time being, he chose to remain.
“You come prepared.”
“They were for Jorge.” Her eyes slid slowly from his head to his toes. Her smile widened as a tinge of triumph highlighted it. “I’d say that you were about his height, give or take an inch.”
“How convenient.” Maybe this woman could have shown old Tom Sawyer a trick or two, he thought, amused despite himself.
Her smile warmed him as it washed over him. “Yes, isn’t it? They’re in the back room if you feel like trying them on.”
He didn’t move an inch. “And why would I want to do that?”
Her answer came without hesitation. The space between them, he noted, seemed to have been whittled down to nothing without either of them taking another step.
“So that you can conquer something else,” she told him.
He wasn’t altogether sure if she was talking about painting or if “something else” referred to a whole different subject entirely. All he knew was that the chemistry that seemed to act up every time he got within ten feet of her was present as always.
She stood waiting for his answer. Her expression indicated that she was rather certain of the outcome. He knew he should just turn on his heel and walk out. That would have been the smart thing to do. After all, he didn’t like the smell of paint and he was far too busy a man to waste his time dipping a roller into a tray of periwinkle-blue liquid.
Finally, with a shrug, he turned away from her. But instead of heading for the papered doors, he walked in the opposite direction, toward the back.
So he’d try something new, he told himself.
He supposed Gloria was to be commended for trying to cut corners and save money. That made her a decent businesswoman. It was in keeping with what he’d already found out about her.
And he’d lied to her. He had painted before. He’d helped one of his roommates paint their dorm room while he was in college. They’d painted one wall stark black, the other three walls a virgin white. It had been very dramatic at the time. Now he had a feeling it would have driven him crazy.
He found the coveralls hanging on the inside of the back room door. Shedding his jacket and tie, he pulled the garment over his slacks and shirt.
“You’re right.” He snapped shut the row of snaps that ran along his chest. The coveralls felt a little tight, but not as bad as they could have. He could still move his arm. “Your brother and I are just about the same size…”
His voice trailed off as he came out of the back room and saw her balancing herself on the next-to-the-topmost rung on the ladder. Was she crazy? “What the hell are you doing up there?”
She turned around slowly to look down at him from the top of the ladder. Humor curved the corners of her mouth. “Am I going to have to explain this all over to you again? I’m painting.”
“No, you’re not,” he corrected, really angry. “You’re risking breaking your neck.”
He wasn’t just a type A personality, she thought, he was a worrier. She bristled against his implication that she was too clumsy to be careful.
“I’m standing on a ladder—A does not exactly equal B here.”
He wasn’t going to debate this with her. “Get down,” he ordered.
Humor vanished. Her eyes narrowed into slits. He should have picked up on the warning, but he could almost see her flying off the ladder. “You’re not in charge of me, Fortune.”
He had a different opinion. “I am when you don’t make an effort to use your brains and right now, they appear to be taking a break.”
“For your information, I’ve climbed ladders before, Fortune.” Open space had never been a problem for her. She had absolutely no fear of heights.
“Only means your luck is that much closer to running out.” Crossing the floor, he came up to the ladder and stood right beneath her. “Now get down.”
Anger surged through her. She stubbornly refused to budge. “Damn it, Jack, why do you insist on always seeing the glass as half empty?”
“Because it usually is. Now get down,” he ordered again.
Gloria was sorely tempted to give him a piece of her mind, but she didn’t want to alienate his father and most fathers didn’t relish hearing that their sons compared to jackasses.
She blew out a breath. “All right, I’m coming down, but only because I need to refill my roller.”
“Whatever.” He held the ladder braced as she