TamingTara

Chapter Twenty

The phone call Monday morning shocked Joe right out of his low spirits, but created a whole new dilemma. Bob Moir, calling on behalf of the California Olive Oil Producers, offered him a job. In Napa. Close to home. Close to his friends and family.

Joe hung up the phone with a promise to consider the offer, then slumped in his chair and stared into space. Why wasn’t he overjoyed? He’d never intended to stay in Santa Barbara, only came there because he’d been so desperate. This was an actual job offer, one that hadn’t required a favor to get.

So the olive business was never exactly what he’d intended to get into. But he had to admit a deep fascination with it.

Also a deep fascination for a certain woman involved in the business. But that had nothing to do with this.

He glanced at his watch. He and Tara were supposed to meet at ten to look over her proposal for high density planting. She’d finished it and had asked him to look at it before she presented it to Tyrone.

He went to her office. They hadn’t yet seen each other since he’d dropped her off at her home in Hope Ranch Saturday morning. She sat behind her desk, her mouth drawn into a downcast line, eyes fatigued as she gazed at her computer monitor. Yet she didn’t seem to be doing anything, just sitting there…staring.

Much like him.

He sighed, knocking on the open door before moving into the office.

She looked up at him, her face neutral. “Good morning.”

“Hi. Ready to review your proposal?”

“Yes.”

It was all stiff and formal business as he reviewed what she’d done. “I’d suggest changing this projection,” he said. “It seems a little optimistic.”

She nodded, saying nothing. Not even a glimmer of argument. Disappointment tugged at him.

He suggested a few other changes and additions she hadn’t thought of. “I’m going out to the mill for the rest of the day,” he told her. “Anything you need me to do?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Okay.” He started out. “Oh, before I go…here’s the deal on the soap producing.” He turned around and tossed a folder on her desk.

She grabbed for the folder. “So? How does it look?”

He shook his head. “Sorry, Tara. It sounds like a good idea, but economically it’s not feasible. The oil refinery would have to be practically right next door for it to be economically viable. The cost of shipping all that pomace hundreds of miles to have the oil extracted, then to the soap factory, pretty much eats up any potential profit.”

“Oh.” Her face fell. Then she tipped her head to one side. A hint of color brushed her cheeks and a flare of temper darkened her eyes. He could guess she was thinking he’d just said that because he was pissed off about what had happened at the ranch. “Are you sure? Did you…”

“I’m sure,” he said. “Check it out if you want, but when you see the numbers, you’ll agree.”

He hated having to disappoint her, but what he said was the truth—there was no way they could make it economically viable. He had to be honest, whether she liked it or not.

She pressed her lips together and gave a short nod, then turned back to her computer, blinking. Dammit, she was on the verge of tears. That was so not like her. Christ.

Joe’s chest ached and his gut churned for the entire drive out to the mill where he met with both Blair and Juan about some of the new equipment issues.

Tara tossed the file Joe had just given her onto her credenza and folded her arms across her chest. She regarded it blackly.

He was just being an asshole. She should have known what happened out at the ranch was going to affect how they worked together. She wouldn’t have thought he’d be that petty, that he’d nix an idea just to get back at her, but that’s what it seemed like.

Damn him.

The corners of her eyes stung and she blinked. God, she couldn’t cry over this. That was just wimpy-assed. She was a strong, independent businesswoman. She could find a way to make that pomace idea happen. She’d go through his research and find a way. But first she had to get back to the high density planting. Grandpa’d said they could talk about it Friday and she had more work to do based on Joe’s feedback.

She narrowed her eyes. He wouldn’t have suggested making changes that would trash the proposal, would he? He couldn’t be that vindictive?

No. She took a deep breath. Even as he’d pointed out things to her, she’d known he was right. She’d missed some things, overstated some projections. She knew exactly what she had to do to make it perfect.

“Tara?”

She looked up to see Fiona standing in the door.

“Yes?” She forced a smile at the controller.

“I need your signature on these.” Fiona walked over and laid some documents on the desk.

“What are they?” Tara frowned and picked one up.

“New signing authorities.”

Tara’s eyes skimmed over the print. “Oh. Why are we doing this?”

“Joe suggested it. He noticed a while ago we didn’t have much in the way of safeguards to prevent employee theft. We’re going to change some other things too. Didn’t he tell you?”

“No.” She rubbed her forehead. “No, he didn’t.”

“I’m sorry.” Fiona’s brow creased and she blinked rapidly. “I should have told you…I’m really sorry, Tara, but I…”

“It’s okay.” She smiled reassuringly at Fiona. God, the woman acted like she expected Tara to slap her or something. Was she really that intimidating?

She sighed.

“It’s okay,” she said again. She signed the papers and handed them back. “It’s a great idea. Something we should have done a long time ago. And by the way…” She hesitated, then plunged on. “I heard you were very helpful with the tax audit. From both the external auditors and from Joe. They were very impressed with your knowledge and attention to detail. So thanks for that.”

“Thank you.” Fiona blinked at her. Tara groaned inwardly at her surprise. Clearly, she didn’t hand out enough praise to the people who worked for her. “I…”

“Yes?” Tara waited.

“I think I could contribute a lot toward helping to grow the business,” she rushed on. “I know you’ve wanted to do a lot on your own, but since Joe’s been here, I’ve felt that maybe I could have more of a role in the management of the company.”

Tara drew in a long, slow breath. She nodded. “I think you’re right,” she said quietly. “I’ll set up some time in the next few days for us to sit down and talk more about that.”

Fiona smiled, nodded and left. Tara thunked her head down on her desk. He’d put things in place to prevent employee theft. She was so screwed.

The idea had circled around and around in Sasha’s pounding head all weekend. On Sunday, she’d used Tara’s computer to work on a résumé. Monday morning she held it in her hands. And then she drove to the Southern California Museum of Art. She paused outside on the sidewalk, took a breath, then went inside.

She didn’t need a job. But for some reason she wanted to show Nick she wasn’t just a spoiled princess who sat around the pool all day. She could make a real contribution.

They’d never hire her. It was a crazy idea.

But an hour later, when she emerged from the museum, she’d been offered a job. A real job. A job she’d gotten all on her own. A bubble of excitement swelled inside her, but she tried to keep it down. Getting too excited about something just led to disappointment.

She walked down the street to the Youth Action Center, found Nick in his office.

“Um…hi. Can I talk to you for a moment?”

Did she imagine the flash of pleasure she saw in his eyes when he first lifted his head and looked at her in the door to his office? Because if it really had been there, it had quickly been replaced by a guarded, wary look.

“Sure,” he said. “Come in.” He leaned back in his chair.

She took a seat. Twisted her fingers.

“I just came to tell you that…um…I’m resigning from the fundraising committee.”

He looked first stunned, then disappointed, then completely poker-faced.

“Oh. Well. That’s a surprise.”

“I’ve enjoyed working with you. All of you.”

He still said nothing, so she turned to leave his office, her chest tight and achy. As she paused at the entrance, Caleb sauntered in.

“Yo, Sasha,” he said.

She forced a smile. “Whassup, Caleb?”

He grinned. “Just wanted to let you know our mom loved the stuff we made her. She thought it was off da hinges.”

Sasha’s smiled widened. “That’s great! I’m so glad she liked it.”

Caleb held his knuckles out and she met his fist with her own in a gentle tap.

“Thanks, Sasha,” he said and ambled out, the crotch of his pants down around his knees under a baggy T-shirt.

She turned and Nick stood there in the door to his office. Their eyes met and held and the room around them faded to the background, her consciousness narrowed to Nick’s lean, tanned face, the blaze of his blue eyes. The moment stretched out and she had to fight with everything she had not to move closer to him, something invisible and powerful and almost irresistible drawing her toward him.

He felt it too, she knew he did, and her heart went hard and cold in her chest at the thought that he was letting something go that could have been so incredible. She’d never felt this kind of attraction to anyone, ever. Had he? But just because she was rich he wasn’t even going to give them a chance. Her eyes stung and she swallowed through the constriction in her throat.

“Good luck with…everything,” she said to him, her voice a bit thick. “This is a great place. You do good things here.”

“Thank you.”

She picked up her purse and started to the door. When she brushed past him, every sense and nerve in her body was on high alert, ready for him to reach out a hand and stop her. But he didn’t. With a tight smile, she walked out the front door.

“Bye, Nick. Thank you again.”

“Bye, Sasha.”

“Okay, Tara,” Tyrone said Friday afternoon. “What have you got?”

Tara had all the paperwork prepared, all her careful research and spreadsheets with projected costs and earnings. She handed it all over to her grandfather.

As they went through it, Tyrone was quiet, occasionally asking a brief question, but not saying very much.

“You’ll want some time to look at in more detail,” she finished. It was tough to get a read off her grandfather. “I know it’s a lot to take in.”

“Yes, it is.” Tyrone gathered up the paperwork. “I’ll look at it in more detail tomorrow. But I have to talk to Joe about it.”

Her heart gave a little bump.

“You have to talk to him about it?”

He frowned. “Of course. He’s seen this, hasn’t he?”

“Yes. I showed it to him on Monday.”

“Why isn’t he here?” Tyrone frowned. “I want to know what he thinks of it.”

The truth was, he wasn’t there because she was terrified.

Although he’d given her some suggestions of things to change and other things to add, he’d never really said what he thought about her proposal.

Her stomach cramped. This project was so important to her. This was her chance to grow the business, to put her mark on the company and really make it her own. If Joe trashed it like he had the soap idea, she’d be devastated.

“Um…I didn’t know you wanted him here.”

“Well, I’ll talk to him about it.”

She sat there, looking at her grandfather. She rejected the idea of begging him not to do that. She looked down at the papers in her hands.

“Sure,” she said. “That’s fine.” Then she lifted her head, met his eyes. “Grandpa, did you know why Joe left his last job?”

Joe looked up from his computer as Tyrone entered his office. Tyrone held up a folder. Joe lifted a brow.

“This is Tara’s proposal for high density planting,” Tyrone said.

Joe nodded. She’d given it to him already? He’d thought they were going to do it together. His mouth twisted. She’d obviously wanted to meet with Tyrone alone. Had she told Tyrone about his previous job and what had happened?

“I want your opinion on this,” Tyrone said.

Joe studied the man. Surely if he was going to fire him, he’d come right out with it.

“I think Tara’s done an excellent job,” Joe finally said. “Her research is thorough, she’s projected a few different scenarios based on solid assumptions. Some of them are more realistic than others.”

“But do you support going ahead with the plan?” Tyrone asked.

Joe paused. He had to be honest. “Yes. Yes, I do. Even Tara’s worst-case scenario predicts we’d be turning a profit in two years. I think that’s a reasonable risk to take, and in the best-case scenario, the pay-off could be huge. I think we can’t afford not to do it.”

“Okay,” Tyrone said with a nod. “If you’re on board, then I likely am too. But I would like to take a day to go through all this stuff.” He turned to leave.

“Tyrone.”

The older man turned back. “Yes?”

“Do you have a minute? There’s something else I need to talk to you about.”

“Remember when Mom and Dad died?” Sasha said pensively.

She and Tara sat on the couch in the den, and for once Tara was drinking a martini and Sasha wasn’t.

“For the longest time, I pretended it wasn’t true. I made up this whole story in my head about how Grandpa was just telling us that to punish me.”

“Punish you for what?” Tara turned on the couch to face her sister, propping one elbow on the back of the couch and leaning her head on her hand. It was so unusual for her and Sasha to be talking, talking about something real, something meaningful.

“The week before they died, I had a big fight with Mom and Daddy about getting a horse. Remember I wanted a horse so bad?”

Tara nodded.

“Well, Mom and Daddy talked about it, but they still said no. I was so mad I was yelling at them and I told Daddy I hated him and I wished I had different parents.”

“Oh no.” Tara’s heart contracted at the thought of what Sasha must have felt after their death.

Sasha nodded. “Two days later they were gone. God, I felt so guilty. Anyway, I made up the story and I kept believing one day they’d come back, once I had suffered enough.”

“Grandpa never liked to talk about stuff,” Tara said with a sigh. “So we never talked about how we felt or how much we missed them. It was like it wasn’t allowed.”

Sasha nodded.

Tara’s throat ached again. “So, while you were pretending they were coming back, I was just in deep denial about feeling anything at all.”

“Yes.” Their eyes met. “I guess that’s why I’ve been drinking so much,” Sasha said slowly. “And why you work so much. But lately it hasn’t been helping.”

“What does help?” Tara asked with a wry smile. “I want to know.”

“You know what helped? When I was working with the kids, teaching them how to make jewelry. When I helped Isaiah and Caleb make something pretty for their mom because she works so hard. When I found out Julia’s mom is only a year older than me and she has a daughter, goes to school and works two jobs—three, at one time. And I could do something—only little things, I know, but still—I could do something to help Julia and her mom. That helped.”

Tara studied Sasha as she shook her long, straight blonde hair back and her face firmed with determination.

“So,” Sasha said, swiping a finger beneath her eye and sitting up straight. “That’s why I decided to get a job.”

Tara’s mouth fell open. “A job? You?”

“Yes.” Sasha smiled and her smile held confidence and pride. “I got a job as a community outreach representative at SCMA. I start Monday.”

“You’re kidding me! Does Grandpa know about this? He’s gonna have a stroke.”

“He doesn’t know.” Sasha bit her lip. “I know he won’t like it, but he’s going to have to get used to it. I need to do something more with my life.” Her eyes turned sad and she looked away. “And then maybe someone like Nick will think I’m worth caring about. One day.”

Her small shrug made Tara’s heart squeeze. “You are worth caring about,” she said, reaching for her sister’s hand.

“Thanks, Tara. So are you.” Sasha blinked and smiled. “So, what’s going to make you feel better? Convincing Grandpa to let you run the company?”

Tara didn’t answer. She’d thought that’s what she wanted…

“You might get that sooner than you think,” Sasha said, squeezing Tara’s hand. “If Joe takes that new job offer.”

Tara froze. What the…? “Job offer? From who? And how do you know about it?”

“Grandpa told me. Joe just told him this afternoon. Ben Moir from Napa called and offered him some great job with the COOP. Apparently he had to make a decision by today.”

“And he’s taking the job?” Her insides were cold and hollow.

Sasha shrugged. “Grandpa didn’t know what he’d decided to do.”

“Oh.”

Tara leaned back against the couch, her heart thudding painfully, her mind churning. He had another job offer. Just what he wanted. Napa was close to San Francisco.

Had he told Grandpa about his last job? It didn’t sound like it or Grandpa surely would have mentioned that to Sasha.

“Where is Grandpa?” she asked.

“He went out for dinner.”

“Oh.” Tara stood on rubbery legs. “I’m going up to my room for a while.”

“Are you okay, Tara?” Sasha’s perfectly groomed brows pushed together.

“Yes.” She forced a smile. “This is great, actually. You know I didn’t want Joe here. When he’s gone, Grandpa will have to realize I can run the business just fine.”

Except she wasn’t so sure of that anymore.

As she trudged heavily up the wide curving staircase, doubts and uncertainties weighed on her shoulders. In her room, she threw herself down to lie sideways across her bed and stared at the ceiling.

Joe had made himself so invaluable, the idea of taking back all those projects he’d assumed responsibility for made her body clench with panic. The tax audit, all the finance stuff, that lawsuit…God. Her stomach churned and she pressed a hand to it.

He was going to leave. And if she was going to be brutally, painfully honest with herself, she had to admit…she didn’t want him to.

Her throat tightened and ached and she closed her burning eyes. God. Not only did she need him at work, but she just…needed him. She’d fallen in love with him.

He was the only person who’d ever stood up to her, who was as strong and determined as she was, who hadn’t let her walk all over him. Other than Grandpa, of course. But Joe also had a way of making her feel special. Desired. He’d told her she was smart and beautiful, while all Grandpa’d ever done was make her feel useless and incompetent.

Her heart ached with thoughts of what he’d gone through. A man so strong and proud and career-focused had had everything snatched out from under him. He’d been left with nearly nothing, forced to rely on his parents, his grandmother to help him find a job for God’s sake, humiliated and beaten up. He was a good man. He didn’t deserve that. Impotent fury rose in her that he’d been dealt such a fucking lousy deal, along with a desperate need to do something—anything—to make it better for him.

She rolled off the bed and walked over to her briefcase sitting on the carpet near the door. She pulled out the folder on the soap production idea. She still hadn’t looked at what Joe had given her.

She sat on the side of the bed, opened the folder and started looking at the research and the numbers. Her eyes moved over one page, then another. She nodded. She calculated. She nodded again.

She closed the folder and stared unseeingly across the room. Her mind wandered back to the first day she’d met Joe. Her mouth twisted wryly in remembrance of what a bitch she’d been to him, not just that first day, but lots of days. Not telling him about meetings she’d set up. Sending him to look at paperwork that didn’t mean anything, wasting his time. But he hadn’t let her push him around. He’d dealt with her grouchiness with patient humor, challenged her, stood up to her, pushed her even to the point where she’d stormed into Grandpa’s office, hoping for his support, and had to return humiliated to face Joe. And had he been snotty about that? No.

Everyone liked him. Everyone in the office, everyone in the store, even their goddamn competitors liked him. His air of solid competence inspired confidence in him.

And now, looking at her soap proposal, she saw he hadn’t just trashed it. He’d done more than just research it and cost it out—he’d even explored things she hadn’t thought of, in an attempt to find solutions. He’d tried to make it work. For her. It just wasn’t economically viable.

He was right.

He was always right.

Except about her. About her supposed desire to submit.

She bent her head and gazed at her bare feet.

If this was the time for brutal honesty…she sighed and closed her eyes.

She did want to submit to him.

He was everything she’d ever dreamed of alone in her bed, those wicked dark dreams of sin and submission. She was the one who wanted to be tied up, held down, spanked until pain turned into pleasure. She wanted everything he’d tried to give her.

She knew why she’d held back. That was no mystery. Except now…the reason didn’t seem so important. Faced with Joe leaving and the burden of running the company on her own, battling with Grandpa endlessly about every little thing, surrendering to Joe didn’t seem like weakness…it seemed…necessary.

She looked up at the clock beside the bed. The play party at Le Château started in half an hour. Would Joe be there?