LITMIR.BIZ

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shook her head. “No, I can’t. I have new rules for myself. Parameters. If I took this, it would be just a job.” One she’d have turned down instantly if Wyatt hadn’t made it difficult to say no. “I love your hair, by the way.”

      Alex, Molly and Serena had pitched in to give Jayne a salon treatment, and she’d had her waist-length hair cut short. Alex knew it was because Jayne’s fickle fiancé had loved her long hair.

      “Thank you, but that won’t work,” Jayne said.

      “What won’t?” As if Alex didn’t understand.

      “She means that you can’t distract us,” Molly said, frowning. “Alex, we’re worried about you. We know running into Michael and his daughter hurt you last week. If you stay here alone…well, we don’t want you to stay here alone.”

      Alex’s throat began to close up. Molly, Serena and Jayne had been there for her when Michael had broken her heart and her spirit. They’d had her back…always.

      “Thank you, but don’t worry. I haven’t decided yet what I’m doing.”

      “Decide no,” Serena said. “This is too big a change to make so quickly.”

      “Yes, it is,” Alex agreed. “I totally agree.”

      Jayne and Molly and Serena looked at each other.

      “You’re going to do it, aren’t you?” Serena asked.

      “I probably shouldn’t, but when he was whispering to me…”

      Alex’s breath caught at the memory of Wyatt’s breath lifting her hair, tickling her ear.

      Molly snapped her fingers in front of Alex’s face. “Come back, Alex.”

      Alex blinked. “I wasn’t daydreaming. I was thinking.”

      “About…?” Jayne prompted.

      “She was thinking about Mr. McKendrick whispering in her ear. In that very sexy way,” Serena said.

      Serena didn’t miss a trick. It was best not to let anyone focus too much on how irresistibly sexy Wyatt was.

      “This has nothing to do with Mr. McKendrick’s hotness factor. The thing is…he offered me three times my current salary,” Alex said. “Then he upped it again.”

      Jayne’s eyebrows rose. “I think we better sit down while you tell us what happened. You only stepped out to get a menu.”

      “Talking about this is a great idea,” Molly agreed, sitting on the bed. “Talking you out of it would be even better.”

      “Spill it, Lowell, and make it good,” Serena said.

      Alex sighed. They had a point. Going through what had happened would clear her thoughts. As it was, the whole episode was a blur of excitement.

      “Okay.” She sat down cross-legged on the bed. “It all began with the pregnant concierge going into labor…”

      A smile lifted Serena’s lips. “You certainly know how to begin a story.”

      But Jayne wasn’t smiling when the story ended. “Careful, sweetie. I smell heartbreak if you stay. Wyatt McKendrick looks like a man who’s run through a lot of women. Rich, sophisticated women.”

      And Alex wasn’t either rich or sophisticated.

      “But he’s offering you your dream, isn’t he?” Molly asked. “The chance to open your shop sooner. That’s the appeal, isn’t it?”

      “Partly,” Alex said. “Without this chance I might never make enough money to open the shop. But it’s more than that. All my life I’ve ended up in situations where I had no power and no stable home. After my father and my stepfather left, my mother struggled to support us. Sometimes we got evicted. We never had a real home. Later, there were men. Always temporary. Robert, the athlete I tutored, who left me for the prom queen; Leo, the painfully shy guy I mentored and turned into a woman-magnet only to have him slip away with someone he’d known all his life. Then Michael…He was struggling to be a single father. I was helping him. I thought we were going to make a home together, but we’re not.”

      “Alex,” Jayne said. “That’s what worries me. I read somewhere that McKendrick’s is competing for an award and…we know you so well. You’re too darn warm-hearted. You jump in to help and end up getting hurt by men who don’t appreciate what you’ve done for them.”

      “Which is exactly why I’m safe this time,” Alex said. “Jayne, I’m aware of the mistakes I’ve made in the past. Those men I helped and fell in love with but who didn’t love me back—they were my training ground. The scars I picked up will protect me, because now I know that if I want a home—and I do, more than anything—I’ll have to make my own. From now on I’m declaring my independence from men who never offer forever or stability, anyway. I’m going after what I want, and when I get that shop I’m putting my whole heart in it. The money Wyatt is offering me could help speed up that process.”

      “What about your Web site?” Molly asked.

      “I can update that from anywhere.”

      “You’ll probably be living at the hotel. That won’t be anything like a home. You know how you cling to that little apartment you’ve lived in for four years.”

      “I know, but I won’t be here long.”

      “So you’re staying?”

      “I don’t know. It’s difficult. I’d miss all of you and…wow…this has happened so quickly that I’m not thinking straight. I do know that during those moments when I was manning the concierge desk it was exciting and…powerful. A little taste of what it’ll be like running my own place. It was totally crazy, but I liked it.”

      “And then along came gorgeous Wyatt McKendrick, offering to let you have that power every single day,” Serena suggested.

      Alex and Serena studied each other. She knew that Serena was worried about the possibility of Wyatt hurting her if she stayed here without her friends as a buffer.

      “If I stayed, it wouldn’t have anything to do with Wyatt,” she said. “I only spent a few minutes with him.”

      “So in those few minutes what did you think?” Molly asked.

      “He runs a great hotel,” Alex said. Good answer.

      “How about those eyes? I love amber eyes,” Serena said.

      “But they’re green.” Alex frowned…and then groaned.

      “Alex…” Jayne said, but Alex shook her head.

      “If it makes you feel better, if I do decide to take this job, it won’t be because Wyatt has gorgeous eyes.”

      “But I’ll bet it doesn’t hurt,” Molly said sympathetically.

      No, it didn’t. And that might be a problem. If she stayed, she would have to keep a constant watch over her traitorous body and emotions. Fortunately she’d already been exposed to the dangers of making emotional mistakes. She was getting quite good at the recovery and moving on part, and she was determined to conquer the avoidance part, too. All she had to do was remember one thing: Wyatt was the kind of man who would break her heart without even being aware of it. So there could be no fantasizing about him. At all.

      “Just…don’t make this decision in haste,” Jayne said.

      “We wish you’d come home with us,” Molly added.

      A part of Alex agreed. Home was a known quantity. Her apartment was tiny, but unlike this job it wasn’t temporary. Her real job offered no excitement but no dangers, either.

      “I’ll probably leave with you,” Alex agreed.

      Unless I don’t, she thought.

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