Page 5 of Doubting Hearts

Chapter Two

RAIN

“MOTHERFUCKER!” I snarled as I hit my thumb for the second time. I sucked the swollen digit, tasting blood. My business partner and best friend, Lucas Wright, chuckled. He was a broad, short man, with shoulder-length blond hair and hands the size of hams. My dog, a black Labrador called Sheba, looked at me in disdain. She was used to my bad language when I was working in my barn. The current job was making an ornate bookcase for an elderly spinster’s “library,” a small, dingy room with wall-to-wall books on the floor.

“Rain, your mind is not on your game today, mate.” His soft West Country burr echoed in my ears. “Best you give it a miss for a while. We need to get off down to town anyway, to the Duck and Drake. That bar is going to be a bitch to build. That Simon guy is an absolute stickler for detail.”

I nodded. “He definitely knows what he wants. I had to draw that damned bar half a dozen times before he decided which design he liked. I have to say he has good taste. It’s the one I would have said fits the space the best, and the hotel. Cherrywood will look great in that room.”

I winced, putting down the hammer I’d been using to maul my thumb. Lucas looked at me, and I sighed. “Lucas, I’m fine. My mind is just a little off, that’s all.”

“Rain, getting a postcard from your ex-lover in Monte Carlo saying, ‘Wish you were here, having a great fucking time’ is enough to put anyone off their stride. Especially because we know Tommy is probably definitely having a great ‘fucking’ time—”

I growled. “Enough, already. Yes, he’s an arsehole, and yes, I’m better off without him, but I’d rather not talk about it if you don’t mind.”

I stretched, feeling the muscles in my back pull straight, my legs giving a scream of protest. Rivulets of sweat ran down my naked chest. It was warm in the barn, and I worked shirtless when I could.

“Let me go wash up and make myself more presentable. Then we can get into town. I’m looking forward to working on this bar.” I had a passion for creating beautiful things out of wood, and I was good at it. What was it my fellow countryman, Gary Player, had said? “The harder I practice, the luckier I get.” I liked the man’s style.

Picking up my shirt, I walked out of the workshop. Sheba stood up and padded after me. The sun shone, the air smelling of fresh grass. I reached my cottage a few feet away and went into the bedroom. I picked up a fresh denim shirt from the pile in the corner and sniffed at my armpits then snorted in sheer disgust. I sprayed some deodorant all over me, paying special attention to under my arms, then shrugged into the shirt. It felt very tight. I’d been doing a lot of work lately outdoors, shifting wood, using my arms and shoulders, and I’d definitely picked up some muscle. Well, that was tough. My dirty laundry basket was overflowing, so this would have to do.

Most of the tools and gear we needed to work were already packed in Lucas’s Citroen relay van, and the real heavy-duty stuff would arrive by truck tomorrow. I was already looking forward to unpacking those slabs of beautifully crafted cherrywood.

I fed Sheba, scratched her between the ears, and we made our way to town. Known as the “stone town” due to its wealth of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century stone buildings, Stamford was an idyllic place to live with its green fields and waterways, and I was glad I’d made the move here. And the month of June was one of my favorite months. Warmish, without being too hot. But the farmers were already complaining about the lack of precipitation to grow their crops of rape and wheat. It was all a person heard about when you went into the pub for a pint.

We finally parked in the Duck and Drake’s parking lot, close to the service entrance at the back. I jumped down from the van and made my way into the cool, dimly lit lobby of the hotel. It was like something out of a film set. All wood and fancy old-fashioned lighting, with one of the most elegant staircases I’d ever seen spiraling up on the right to the second floor. It was classic old English at its best. The best thing about it was the smell—wood and that vague hint of spice in the air. I walked over to the reception desk and smiled at the young lady sitting behind it. Her name badge said Tammy. She was a pretty young thing, her hair all dark brown and shiny, with a great set of boobs. I grinned slightly as I noticed Lucas’s sudden interest. He was like a pointer dog, all ready and alert at the thought there might be a pheasant in the bushes.

“Hi, Tammy. My name is Rain Engel, and I’m here to start moving my gear into the Canterbury Bar Room. Is it okay if I go ahead? I know where it is.”

“Oh, Mr. Engel. Yes, we’ve been expecting you. Mr. Winslake said you’d be by.” She batted her eyes at me, a slight sexy smile on her face. I smiled inwardly.

Sorry, sweetheart, I don’t bat for your team. But you are cute. Now my friend here, on the other hand, is definitely the right man for you….

“Please go ahead and do what you have to. I assume you know where the tradesman entrance is?”

I nodded. Nothing like coming in via the tradesman entrance. Made me feel all warm and fuzzy.

“If you need anything at all, let me know.” She batted her eyelashes again at me, and I grinned.

I heard Lucas chuckle beside me but ignored him. “I’ll do that. Thanks.” We walked down the long corridor, through a set of double doors—more cherrywood from the look of them—down past a lounge that looked like it belonged in an exclusive men’s club, then a large library which was filled wall-to-wall with books. It looked incredible, like a bibliophile’s wet dream. I stopped to peer in and heard Lucas’s knowing sigh at my side.

“Rain, if you go in there, we’ll never see you again. Come on. Let’s start getting the gear out.” He scowled. “And can you just leave the ladies to me? Christ, it’s no fun going anywhere with you. You give off sex pheromones like nobody’s business, man or woman.”

I raised my eyebrows at that comment, and he blushed. “You know what I mean. I don’t mean I’m affected by them, it’s just—”

I was laughing now at his discomfort, and he scowled. “Fuck off.”

He almost pushed me into the large room at the end of the corridor which spanned the whole end of the wing. The room itself was just over a hundred square meters, measuring about twelve by nine. It was a comfortable, intimate venue for a bar. I felt the usual avaricious thrill as I surveyed the area that was at my mercy. I’d noticed the service entrance not too far away. The room was perfectly positioned to come and go without disturbing what I imagined were the privileged residents of this rather luxurious hotel too much. I thought drily that Simon Winslake had probably planned the whole thing to a tee. He struck me as a man who left nothing to chance.

The next couple of hours were spent dragging equipment from the van into the bar room. Lucas and I were sweating like the condensation on an ice-cold Coke by the time we’d finished. I’d just finished straining to put down a particularly big saw blade. As I let it drop to the floor, there was a loud ripping sound, and I felt a cool breeze where no breeze should blow. Lucas broke into peals of laughter as he pointed at my back.

“Fuck, Rain, you’re showing your skin, mate. Your bloody shirt has just ripped in two right down the middle!” His hilarity was not only off- putting, it was also really not on. I was standing in the middle of a swanky hotel with a shirt on my back that was ripped in half, flapping like wings.

“Christ, what do I do now?” This denim shirt had definitely had its day. “I don’t have anything else to bloody change into.” I looked at Lucas in dismay. He was laughing so hard now the tears fell down his ruddy cheeks. I was going to get no help from him.

I growled at him. “I suppose I’d better see if I can find the manager or someone and see if they have a lost property section. Maybe they can loan me a shirt, or it’ll mean driving home to go get one. I don’t fancy that much.”

I walked to the door and down the corridor, shrugging my shirt off as I did so. I rolled it up into a ball, about to throw it in a rubbish cart in the corridor on my way to reception, when I heard a soft cough behind me. I turned to find a man about my age staring at me. His right eyebrow was raised questioningly, and his face was very polite. He was well dressed in a suit and tie, his mid-length dark-blond hair artfully mussed and gelled. He was lean and wiry and very bloody sexy. My groin twitched in interest. I gazed at him, and he gazed back warily.