“Hmm.”
She ignored the speculation in his voice. “I also asked Hank to design a beach house in the nature of a gazebo, where we could hold company parties, picnics, and receptions. We could lease it to other groups when it wasn’t in use. That would defer some of the maintenance costs.”
“George’ll like that. And maybe while you’ve got those foreign executives sitting on the veranda sipping mint juleps, darkies could sing spirituals from the slave quarters.”
She lowered her foot and plowed a yard-long furrow in the ground before the swing came to a stop. She had to angle her head far back in order to look him in the eye. The crown of her head came close to touching his belly.
“You’re patronizing me.”
He didn’t move, although conversation would have been much easier if he had let go of the ropes and stepped around the swing to face her. “That’s right.”
“Thank you for admitting it, at least.”
“You’re welcome.”
“I guess I got carried away. Do you think I’m crazy?”
“I think you’re… intriguing,” he admitted after pausing to search for the right word. “In fact, Jade, you confound the hell out of me.”
His voice sounded too intense for comfort. She tried to make light of what he had said and divert the topic to him. “You’re a fairly puzzling character yourself.”
His mustache spread wider over his smile. “Me?”
“Uh-huh. For a bachelor living alone, you don’t go out much.”
“No mystery there. My demanding boss doesn’t leave much time for the pursuit of pleasure.”
“You don’t see women.”
He arched one of his eyebrows. “Are you keeping track?”
“I just had you pegged as a man who would frequently need female companionship.”
“You mean sex.”
“Yes, sex,” she repeated uneasily.
Suddenly, the still afternoon had become more torpid than before. Even the insects had ceased their droning buzz. The air was too muggy to inhale. Jade became aware of her clothing, and every place that it clung damply to her skin. Her hair felt heavy and hot against her neck. A butter-colored sun beat down on the earth, which released its heat in rising shimmers. It was like being in a perfumed sauna—only they weren’t naked.
She became very conscious of how close behind her Dillon was standing, how near her shoulders were to his hips. Mere inches separated their hands on the ropes. His scent mingled with myriad others, but she could distinguish it.
“What I was going to say,” she said breathlessly, “is that your lack of an active social life must have something to do with losing your wife and child.”
His mustache resettled into place. He lowered his hands and moved away from the swing, keeping his broad back to her. “How’d you know about that?”
“I knew days after I met you in L.A.”
“Leave it to you to check out everything,” he said tightly, spinning around to confront her.
“TexTile was vitally important to me. I couldn’t afford to make any bad choices. I checked you out as thoroughly as I could.”
Angrily he stared down at her for several moments, then his shoulders gradually relaxed. “I guess it doesn’t matter one way or another that you know.”
“What happened?” she asked gently.
“Why ask? You already know.”
“Only the basic facts.”