Chapter 18

ONE MONTH LATER

HONEY, I'M home. Derek couldn't turn in any direction in the offices of Stillman & Sons without seeing the new slogan for Phillips—make that Hannah's —Honey. Billboard designs, print ads, product labels, website-page mock-ups. He'd outdone himself, easy to admit since he knew his own limitations as an advertising man. Phillips had been bowled over by the concept of using honey for better home health and had signed an eighteen-month contract. Feeling good about the direction of the business for the first time in a long time, he'd placed an ad in the paper for a graphic artist. Four applicants would be stopping by this afternoon, and it would be good to have someone else in the office for company.

The direction of the business seemed to be back on course, but the direction of his life was another matter entirely.

He sighed and turned the page on his desk calendar. One month. One month was long enough to have purged nagging, accident-prone, virginal Janine Murphy from his mind. After all, she was a married woman. Married to a jerk, but married nonetheless. He had actually considered calling Steve to extend an olive branch, but changed his mind after acknowledging the ploy was a thinly veiled excuse to call on the off-chance Janine would answer the phone. Besides, despite their pact, Janine could've broken down and confessed what had transpired between them—after all, she might've had some explaining to do on her wedding night. If so, neither one of them would welcome his call.

Derek cursed his wandering mind. Jack would get a kick out of knowing a woman had gotten under his skin.

The bell on the front door rang, breaking into his musings. The first applicant. Glad for the distraction, he stood and buttoned his suit jacket, then made his way to the front. In the hall, he froze. "Well, speak of the devil," he muttered.

"Hi, bro." Wearing a white straw Panama hat, a hideous tropical-print shirt and raggedy cut-off khaki pants, Jack Stillman walked past him, carrying only a brown paper lunch bag. He strolled to his abandoned desk, then whipped off his hat and, with a twirl of his wrist, flipped it onto the hat rack that had sat empty since his departure. After dropping into his well-worn swivel chair, Jack reared back and crossed his big sandaled feet on the corner of his desk. From a deep bottom drawer, he withdrew a can of beer and cracked it open. Then he slowly unrolled the three folds at the top of his lunch bag—their mother was famous for her three perfect folds. The bag produced a pristine white paper napkin, which he tucked into the neck of his ugly shirt, followed by a thick peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Derek allowed him three full bites of the sandwich, chased by the room-temperature beer, before he spoke. "Care to say where you've been for the past three months?"

Jack shrugged wide, lean shoulders. "Nope, don't care at all—Florida."

"Which explains the tan," Derek noted wryly.

His brother scrutinized his brown arms as if they'd just sprouted this morning. "I suppose."

"I don't guess it would bother you to know that about three weeks ago the agency was a hairbreadth away from turning out the lights."

Jack took a long swallow of beer. "Something good must've happened."

He'd forgotten how infuriating his brother could be. "I landed the Phillips Honey account."

Nodding, Jack scanned the room. "Honey. Works for me." He polished off the rest of the sandwich, drained the beer, then laced his hands together behind his head. "So what the hell else have I missed?"

"Oh, let's see," Derek said pleasantly. "There's tax season, Easter, Mother's Day—"

"Hey, I called Mom."

"—plus Memorial Day, and Steve Larsen's wedding."

Jack frowned and snapped his fingers. "Damn. And I was supposed to be Best Man, wasn't I?"

"Sure was."

"So did you cover for me?"

"Don't I always? When you dropped out of sight, Steve asked me to be Best Man."

Jack squinted. "You and Steve were never that close."

Derek smirked. "I think it's safe to say we still aren't."

"So how was the wedding?"

He averted his gaze. "I have no idea."

"But I thought you said—"

"I went to Atlanta and got caught up in a quarantine at the hotel."

"No kidding? Did anyone croak?"

Derek ground his jaw. "Didn't you watch the news while you were gone?"

Jack grinned again. "Not a single day."

Annoyed, Derek waved him off. "Never mind."

"So what's she like?"

"Who?"

"Steve's wife." His long-lost brother wadded up his napkin and banked a perfect shot into the trash can.

Derek walked over to his own desk and straightened a pile of papers that didn't need to be straightened. "She's... nice enough, I suppose."

Jack wagged his dark eyebrows. "Nice enough to do what?"

His neck suddenly felt hot. He loosened his tie a fraction, then undid the top button of his shirt. Images of Janine consumed him during the day, and at night he would take long runs to exhaust himself enough to sleep with minimum torment.

"Derek," Jack said lazily, "nice enough to do what?"

The innuendo in his brother's voice ignited a spark of anger in his stomach that he'd kept banked since his argument with Steve. "Just drop it, Jack," he said carefully.

But he'd only managed to pique Jack's interest. "Brunette? Redhead? Blonde?"

"Um, blonde." Long and silky.

"Tall, short?"

"Tall... ish." And graceful.

"Curves?"

Derek shrugged. "Not enough for Steve, but plenty for—" He stopped, mortified at what he'd been on the verge of saying.

"You?" Jack prompted. Then his jet eyebrows drew together. "You got the hots for this woman or something?"

"Of course not." He shuffled the stack of papers again, but wound up dropping several, then hitting his head on his desk when he retrieved them. Cursing under his breath, he didn't realize that Jack had moved to sit on his desk until he pushed himself to his feet.

"Did you sleep with her?"

Derek tossed the papers onto his desk. "What kind of question is that?"

"You sly dog. How many times?"

He looked into the face of the younger brother who could read him like a label, then sighed and dropped into his chair. "Twice."

"And?"

"And what?"

"And there's more to this story."

"Besides the fact that she was Steve's fiancée?"

Jack scratched his head. "Wait a minute, where was Steve when you were breaking in his bride?"

Derek lunged to his feet and pulled Jack close by the collar of his shirt. "Don't say that!"

But Jack didn't even blink. "Oh, hell, she was a virgin? "

Stunned, he released him. "Did you pick up mind reading, too?" He wouldn't be a bit surprised.

Jack laughed, clapping him on the back. "Man, you're about as transparent as a wet white bikini. So you dig this girl?"

"Woman," Derek felt compelled to say.

"Well, yeah, since you deflowered her."

He closed his eyes. "I think it's time to change the subject. She's a married woman, and I don't fool around with married women."

"Just fiancées," Jack said, picking up some of the honey samples sitting on Derek's desk.

"So glad to have you back," Derek said, not bothering to hide his sarcasm. "And don't eat that," he said, swiping the pint of honey butter from beneath Jack's sampling finger. "It hasn't been refrigerated and it might be bad."

"So throw it away," Jack said, moving on to a container of pure honey.

Derek nodded, staring into the container. Jack was right. Why on earth was he keeping it around? Because it reminded him of Janine, he admitted to himself. He swirled his finger on the surface of the honey butter, then flinched when the pad of his finger encountered something sharp, something unexpected. Dipping his finger, he hooked the object and lifted it free of the sticky-slick substance. With his heart in his throat, he held Janine's engagement ring in the palm of his hand. The memories of her treating his burned hand vividly slammed home. The ring must've come off without her realizing it.

Jack came over to take a look. "Wow, has Phillips started putting prizes in their packages?"

Derek didn't have Janine's phone number, and he wasn't about to call Steve.

Then he remembered that while they were confined, Janine had once called her sister Marie from his phone. He scrolled back through his phone log to the two unforgettable days he'd spent with her. His chest tightened painfully at the memories. When he found a Lexington number he didn't recognize, he called it.

Jack was holding the ring up to the light. "Put it down!" Derek barked. "That ring belonged to Steve's grandmother and is worth a lot of money."

Jack smirked. "Care to explain how Janine's engagement ring got into your jar of honey butter?"

Derek glared, then focused on the voice of the person who had answered the phone.

"Hello?"

"Yes, hello, may I speak with Janine Murphy's sister?"

"Speaking," the woman said, sounding wary. "This is Marie Murphy."

"Ms. Murphy, you don't know me. My name is Derek Stillman, and I—"

" I know who you are, Mr. Stillman."

He couldn't tell from her voice whether that was a good or a bad thing. "Okay. Ms. Murphy—"

"Call me Marie."

"Marie. I'd like to get a message to Janine, but it's important that you not tell her when Steve is around."

"Steve? Steve Larsen?"

"Yes."

"Why would he be around?"

He squinted. "Maybe I have the wrong number. I'm trying to get a message to the Janine Murphy who married Steve Larsen."

"Mr. Stillman, my sister was engaged to the jackass at one time, but she didn't marry him."

Derek felt as if every muscle in his body had suddenly atrophied. Impossible. Of course she'd married him. She'd said they would try to work things out. Plus Steve wasn't the kind of guy who would simply let her walk away.

"What's wrong?" Jack asked.

Derek waved for him to be quiet. His heart was thumping so hard, he could see his own chest moving. "Uh, would you repeat that, please?"

A deep chuckle sounded across the line. "I said my sister was engaged to Steve at one time, but she did not marry him. She canceled the wedding at the last minute."

His heart vaulted. "I see. How... how can I get in touch with her?"

"Well, Mr. Stillman—"

"Call me Derek."

"Derek, Janine's juggling three jobs, and she only comes home to sleep."

He looked at his watch, estimating the time he could be in Atlanta. "Where will she be in three hours?"

"She'll be at the clinic this afternoon and evening. Got a pencil?"

Derek grabbed five.