LITMIR.BIZ

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the compromise she’d made?

       Probably. And he’d been a world-class jerk for not calling afterwards. It wasn’t as if he’d forgotten her. He just…couldn’t. He looked down the hallway expectantly. No wonder she still hated him. Especially now that she had what he wanted.

       He muttered a curse. Wasn’t it unspoken that he’d always be back? Sure it had happened a little sooner than they all thought, but Dad always knew it. Didn’t she realize that when she bought forty-nine percent—not fifty—of the bar that she was essentially buying into his inheritance?

       He heard her footsteps in the hall and looked up to see her walking toward him, looking as calm as the waters beyond the glass doors. Game face on.

       “How much time do you think we should give them?” she asked.

       “Not too much. Evidently, they get easily distracted by each other.”

       She laughed a little and put both hands on the backrest of a bentwood chair, her casual indifference back in place. “We can go back. I got what I needed.”

       “What was that?”

       “My wits.” She deepened those dimples with a disarming grin.

       Was she offering a truce? He was game. “I’m sure we’ll work something out.” He gave her a friendly wink. “You never know. I bet we work well together.”

       Her eyes narrowed. “I bet we don’t.”

       “How can you say that?” He stood slowly, his gaze locked on her as he moved closer. “Don’t tell me you forgot—”

       “Newman!” She snapped her fingers in the air, a warning look flashing in those sky-blue eyes. The message was silent…but clear.

       There would be no discussing that night.

       The dog came tripping down the hallway with a bark, surprising Deuce by sidling up to his leg instead of that of the woman snapping for him.

       Kendra rolled her eyes as Newman rubbed Deuce’s pantleg.

       “He likes me,” Deuce noted.

       “He’s easily impressed. Let’s go back to Diana’s.”

       Laughing, he held the door for her. “I don’t know. Think the jury’s back already, Ken-doll?”

       “We’re about to find out, Seamus.”

      DIANA LOOKED HAPPIER than usual. Kendra noticed the diamond-like sparkle in her eyes, which usually meant she’d gotten what she wanted. Please God, let it be so. Diana would back Kendra and push Seamus to move on with their plans. She was always in favor of progress and change.

       As Diana puttered in the kitchen, straightening an already neat counter, Seamus sat on the sofa, elbows resting on his knees and knuckles supporting his chin. He only moved his eyes, looking up as Kendra and Deuce entered the family room. Unlike his fiancée, Seamus looked anything but pleased with the turn of events.

       All of the papers and sketches had been neatly piled on the coffee table. Would those documents be making the trip into banks and venture-capital firms this week…or going home with Kendra?

       Kendra stood to one side, but Deuce took a seat across from his father. “So, Dad. Whad’ya think?”

       For a long moment, Seamus said nothing, staring first at Deuce, then at the papers on the table. Kendra’s throat tightened and she dared another look at Diana, who had paused in her counter-wiping and turned to watch the drama unfolding in her family room.

       “I think I have quite a dilemma.”

       No one said a word in response. Kendra willed her heart to slow, certain that the thumping could be heard in the silence. Even Newman lifted his head from the floor, his classic King Charles spaniel face looking expectantly at the humans around him.

       “Deuce, you need to understand something,” Seamus began. “This Internet café and artist’s gallery is something we’ve been working on for almost two years. I really like the idea of bringing Monroe’s into the next century.”

       Deuce leaned forward and opened his mouth to speak, but Seamus silenced him with one look. Kendra wished she’d taken a seat when they walked in, because her legs felt shaky as she waited for Seamus’s next words.

       “And Kennie, you know that my father opened Monroe’s in 1933, the year I was born. He ran it until he died, more than thirty years later, in 1965. Then I took over, at—” he looked at Deuce “—thirty-three years of age.”

       Kendra bit her lip as she listened. Did Seamus see this as poetic justice? As history repeating itself? As some etched-in-stone prediction from on high? As the Monroe Man turneth thirty-three, so shall he inherit the bar.

       Sheez. Her gaze shifted to Deuce and she could have sworn his lip curled upward. Was he thinking the same thing? Or was he just so damn sure of himself that he could afford to be cocky?

       Instead of a snide remark, though, Deuce leaned forward again. “Dad,” he said, forcefully enough that he wouldn’t be stopped by his father’s glare. “Isn’t there some way we can compromise? Some way to keep Monroe’s in the family, as a bar, and find another property for this…other stuff.”

       “That’s not feasible,” Kendra argued before Seamus could respond. “These blueprints have been drawn up by an architect—an expensive one, by the way—expressly for that property and the other buildings on the block.”

       “So use one of the other buildings,” Deuce countered.

       “We are. As soon as we rip out the bar altogether and push that whole wall fifty feet in another direction for an art gallery.”

       “An art gallery? In that space?” Deuce looked as though she’d suggested turning it into a nursery school. “That’s perfect for a pool hall and twenty TV screens, each tuned to a different football game on Sunday. They have these satellite dishes—”

       “Sunday? That’s one of our biggest days. We do so much Internet business—”

       “Not from football fans.”

       “You two need to work this out,” Seamus said.

       “Precisely!” Diana slammed her hands hard on the kitchen counter. Kendra, like the men and the dog, turned to stare at her. “You need to work side by side, together.”

       “What?” Kendra and Deuce responded in unison.

       “She’s right,” Seamus acknowledged. “I can’t make a choice without hurting someone I care about. We’ll go on our trip, and you two run the place together.”

       “What do you mean—together?” Deuce asked.

       Diana came around the breakfast bar into the family room, her gaze on Seamus, a shared, secret arcing between them, but Kendra had no idea what it was. “Why doesn’t Kendra run the Internet café in the day, and Deuce run the bar at night? Let the customers decide where and when they want to spend their money.”

       “Run a bar at night?” Kendra almost sputtered in shock. “And lose all my nighttime business?”

       “That’s been a tiny percentage of the profits,” Seamus responded. “You’ve been shutting down by nine o’clock lately.”

       “But it’s April now. The warm weather is starting, more tourists are coming.” She worked to modulate her voice, refusing to whine. “Those are the people who need Internet access, who bring their laptops so they can work on vacation.”

       “People drink on vacation,” Deuce corrected her. “At least at night.” He slapped his hands on his thighs and slid them over his khaki pants, a smug smile in place. “I think it’s a great idea.”

       They all looked at her expectantly. Was she going to back down? Let Deuce appear more willing to take the challenge than she was?

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