Owed: One Wedding Night. Nancy Holland

distance from the reception area to Jake Carlyle’s office was only a fraction of the walk from the elevator, but it felt ten times longer. At every clack of Madison’s heels on polished marble, the urge to forget this whole plan and head for the safety of home threatened to overwhelm her.

      She forced her mother’s worried face to the front of her mind to block out everything but her promise to save Dartmoor Department Stores. If she thought too much about how Jake might react when he saw her, she could never do this. But her mother had paid too high a price to hold on to the family business for Madison to quit now.

      Besides, there was no reason she and the head of Carlyle & Sons couldn’t discuss the issue like adults.

      The receptionist glided ahead of her and opened the door to the office with a flourish.

      The antique mahogany desk that dominated the room on the other side of the door was impressive. The man behind it was even more impressive.

      Jake Carlyle’s face was elevated above mere masculine good looks by the slash of cheekbones inherited from the fashion model who had deigned to become his mother. The hand-tailored gray pinstripe suit emphasized the power of his tall, muscular frame.

      He stood with a frown as Madison stepped into his inner sanctum.

      Merely looking at the man took her breath away. When he raised sapphire-blue eyes to meet hers, her heart stopped entirely, then thudded back to life in double time.

      Taking him by surprise was the only point in her favor. She watched the emotions run across the face she knew so well – surprise, a hint of lust, curiosity, and, finally, the beginnings of anger.

      The anger made him lift his head slightly. His expression returned to the polite boredom a man like Jake Carlyle displayed to mere mortals, yet a frisson of sexual excitement lingered in the climate-controlled air.

      “What are you doing here?”

      Just what her frayed nerves needed – the man was channeling her father. She took a deep breath to calm herself.

      “Mother doesn’t feel well, so I came instead.”

      He looked away. For a moment, she’d rattled him. She lifted her chin a little higher and waited for his next move.

      “How is she? It must have been a terrible shock.”

      Madison’s eyes stung with a rush of unexpected grief. Shock, yes. Terrible, yes. But not in the way he thought.

      For a moment the devastating memory of that pre-dawn phone call, made stronger by being in Jake’s presence, threatened to overwhelm her. Her first impulse, almost a compulsion, had been to call him, to go to him for the strength and comfort she needed, even though she’d no longer had a right to expect anything from him. Reality, and duty, had won out. She’d gone to her mother, been the strong one, the comforter. She’d had no other choice.

      She fought off the still raw pain by making the Ms.-Manners-approved response. “It was nice of you to come to my father's memorial service.”

      “Old friends and all that. You and your parents came to the one for my father.”

      Those two unhappy events were the only times she and Jake had seen each other in three years. She sighed.

      The momentary weakness didn’t go unpunished.

      “So why did you, or rather your mother, want to talk to me?”

      The ice in his voice made her knees wobble. Obviously the pleasantries were over.

      She gave a meaningful look at the comfortable chairs that flanked the fireplace at the far end of the office, but instead he gestured at the stiff leather chair across the desk from his. They sat down at the same moment, eyes fixed on each other’s faces, like boxers circling in the ring.

      She took a deep breath and began in a professional tone she hoped she could hang on to. “How much do you know about the circumstances surrounding my father’s death?”

      He had the good grace to look uncomfortable. “Only what was in the newspapers. I didn’t follow all the stuff that showed up on the web.”

      And thank you for that.

      “I take it there are financial issues,” he continued.

      She wondered if that was how her mother had phrased it when she made this appointment. Or was he only being polite? Madison took another deep breath and carefully unknotted her hands.

      “These last few years…” She forced air into her lungs. “My father's relationship with Dartmoor's Chief Financial Officer…” Anger and shame, added to the nervousness that kept her heart pounding double time, finally stole her voice.

      Jake chose to be merciful. “The woman he was with when he died?”

      She nodded. Able to breathe again, she gave up on spontaneity as a bad bet and launched into the speech her mother would have made.

      “Dartmoor Department Stores has suffered from an unfortunate lack of financial oversight recently that has left it in a difficult situation. New leadership…” Her heart stumbled at the thought. “New leadership is now in place.”

      At least she’d been able to convince her father’s mistress to resign. Firing her would only have added to the scandal. Unfortunately, nothing could be done about the all-cash golden parachute the former CFO and Madison’s father had set up for her, which had decimated Dartmoor’s cash reserves.

      “However,” Madison continued, “the missteps of the previous CFO have left the company seriously short of the capital it needs to move forward in this challenging economy.”

      “Missteps, incompetence, or fraud?” Jake interrupted.

      Madison looked down. “We’re not sure.”

      “Has the new leadership you referred to had a forensic audit done?”

      Her face heated. “That would cost more money than seemed wise to spend on the chance it would turn up any criminal misconduct.”

      Criminal misconduct, which might, she didn’t bother to add, implicate her father.

      She raised her eyes to search Jake’s face for some clue as to what he might be thinking, but met only a stare so cold it knocked what she meant to say next out of her mind completely.

      “Go on,” he said. “I didn’t mean to interrupt such a carefully canned speech.”

      His disdain shook her mind free of its temporary paralysis. “Unfortunately, most of my mother’s assets and those of the other investors in Dartmoor have also been victims of the economy, and as things stand there’s little chance of attracting private capital or new investors.”

      “What about the trust fund from your grandmother?”

      Of course he’d remember that little detail.

      “My mother and I have been living on it since my father died.” Nana’s money had also put Madison through business school, but she didn’t dare say so. “We’re spending the principal now.” She suppressed a shudder at the thought of how soon they’d use up the last of that.

      Jake shook his head. She was probably the only person in the world beside his mother who would recognize the tiny tic of impatience at one corner of his mouth.

      His voice was as bland as his features. “So, where do I come into the picture?”

      She looked past him out the window at the sunshine glinting off the building across the street. No inspiration there.

      If it was up to her, she’d have sold everything and lived in a tent in Golden Gate Park rather than answer Jake’s question. She’d exhausted every other option first. She’d sold the condo where she lived while she was in business school and now shared the Pacific Heights apartment her mother had moved into when she'd been forced to sell their home in Marin County.

      Jake