She gathered up her things and started up the walkway into the back of the hotel, passing landscapers as they planted trees and bushes nearby. Inside she found an organized-looking woman in a headset and asked for directions. She pointed her down a hallway to the business suite of the hotel. There, she found one office designated for each of the owners, one for the hotel manager, one for the reservations manager, one for the catering manager and one empty office that had yet to be assigned. She assumed that would be hers for now.
She opened the door and turned on the light, finding a nicely appointed office space. She hadn’t been contracted to decorate the interior management rooms, but it wouldn’t be necessary. There was a desk, a rolling chair and a bookshelf. That was more than she would need while she was here. She busied herself unpacking her things and getting ready to dig into her work.
Once she was up and running, she started her day by making important calls. All of her suppliers needed to know that she had won the project bid and the pending orders needed to go forward as planned. Fabric, furniture and wallpaper were just the beginning. She had orders for paintings to go up in every single room, 250 matching small lamps to go on each nightstand, along with another 250 torch lamps for the corner behind the reading chair. Thousands of feet of carpeting needed to be ordered, in addition to ceramic tiles for the bathroom floors.
And all that needed to get here as soon as possible. As in yesterday.
Cecelia was lost in the minutiae of managing her inventory and orders when her cell phone rang. She looked down and noticed it was Naomi calling from California. She picked up the phone and answered it. “Hey, girl, how’s California?”
“It’s beautiful here,” she said. “The weather is unreal. It makes me never want to come back to Texas, but of course I will, because you and Simone would kill me if I didn’t.”
“Is everything set up for the fashion show?”
Naomi just groaned. “I really don’t want to talk about it. There’s always last-minute chaos at these things. I didn’t call to talk about all that anyway. I called because I got a text about you and Chip breaking up yesterday. Is that true?”
Cecelia had been hoping it would take longer for the news to get out, but apparently it was already making Royal’s gossip rounds. “Yes, we’ve broken up, but really it’s for the best. I think we just had different ideas of what our future was going to be.”
“Hmm. So it didn’t have anything to do with a certain someone coming back to town?”
Cecelia rolled her eyes. Simone must’ve told her about her run-in with Deacon. “No, it had nothing to do with him. I honestly doubt Chip even knows he’s here yet. I didn’t mention it.”
“So what set all this off?”
She hesitated. She knew that she would eventually tell Naomi and Simone about her little blackmail problem, but now wasn’t the time. “It was bound to happen eventually. Things just boiled over at dinner last night, so we called off the engagement. I’ll tell you and Simone more about it when you get home. I wish you two were here.”
“I’m so sorry that all this happened while we were gone, Cece. You’ve broken off your engagement and your two best friends aren’t there to commiserate with you. That really sucks. I promise that when we get back, we will get together for some wine, a couple cartons of Ben & Jerry’s and some good girl time. You’ll put this whole thing behind you before you know it.”
That sounded great. Cecelia really needed her friends to talk to. Had they been in town last night, perhaps she wouldn’t have found herself in Deacon’s bed.
“Good luck with the show,” Cecelia said.
“Thank you. Hang in there. Oh, and don’t forget that Wes and Isabelle’s engagement party is coming up. You’re not getting out of it, you know.”
Oh, she knew. Cecelia said goodbye and got off the phone. She needed to remember to pick up a gift for that. Frankly, she had been surprised to receive the invitation, but Isabelle was the kind of woman who wanted to be friends with everybody, even the girl who had spilled the beans about her secret daughter and upended her whole life.
She had RSVP’d two weeks ago, but now she was regretting it. She didn’t really want to stroll into the Texas Cattleman’s Club and have to face everybody after the breakup. More than a few people there would get a sick amount of pleasure from her misfortune. But she said she w
ould go, so she would go.
Cecelia had just turned back to her computer when she heard a tap at the door. She looked up and immediately felt a surge of panic run through her. Deacon was standing in her doorway, a look of expectation and irritation on his face. She’d been hoping, in vain, apparently, that he would be too busy to come looking for her this morning. “Good morning, Mr. Chase. What can I do for you?”
Deacon arched a curious brow at her and just shook his head. “So this is how it’s going to be, huh? It never happened?”
Cecelia smiled, putting on her most businesslike face as she tried to ignore the rough stubble on his jaw that she’d brushed her lips across only hours earlier. Her fingers tingled with the memory of running through his golden-blond hair and pulling him close to her. “I always like to keep things professional in the workplace.”
“And later, when we’re not in the workplace?” he asked.
“There’s not much to say about last night, now or later, except that I apologize for the way I acted. It was inappropriate of me to burden you with my problems. After Chip broke off the engagement, I wasn’t sure where to go or what to do. I made the wrong choice, and I’m sorry.”
Deacon’s green-gold gaze flickered over her face, studying her as though he could see the truth there. His jaw tightened, and finally he looked away. “The head of your painting crew is looking for you. He’s waiting in the lobby.”
Cecelia watched as Deacon turned and disappeared from her doorway without another word. The warm, attentive Deacon from last night was gone, leaving only the cold businessman behind. She hated that it had to be that way, and she wished he could understand. Now, more than ever, she needed his warmth and his compassion. All too soon, the rest of Royal would be turning their backs on her. But there was too much history between them, too many memories and emotions to cloud the present. She knew she had to put up a wall to protect her business and her reputation.
And her heart.
Five
He was a damn fool for thinking that their night together would go down any differently than it had.