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And she had made a lot of assumptions, at least some of which were apparently untrue. He didn’t just play with those gadgets she’d always thought a childish thing he’d never outgrown. It seemed he turned them into actually useful devices. And helpful ones.
How she was supposed to reconcile that with Cody Rafferty, lifetime enemy, she didn’t know.
Chapter Five
“Cody, can you come here, please?”
His mother’s cheery voice, calling out from the main part of the house, held a note of…something. He wasn’t sure what, but it was enough to pull his attention away from that blip that had developed in the new app he was trying to get moving.
If it had been anyone else, he probably would have answered, “In a minute,” and then gotten lost again until the request was repeated, or until the requester arrived at his door. But this was his mother, and judging by that tone of voice, something was going on. Maybe with a capital S.
At least she didn’t sound mad, he thought as he got to his feet, smothering a yawn. He stretched wearily. He’d been working on this darned blip since the early hours when a possible—but in the end futile—solution had occurred to him. He rubbed a hand over his face as he started down the long hallway to the main house. Stubble roughened his jaw, and his eyes were a bit bleary, so he rubbed at them, too. The hems of the jeans he’d yanked on hurriedly in the wee hours brushed against the floor around his bare feet.
“What’s up, Mom?” he asked when he reached the main house and spotted her pouring a cup of coffee that suddenly smelled irresistible. He’d started that way before she gestured toward the living room.
“You have company,” she said, in that same cheery tone as before.
A tone that should have been a warning. Crap. As he started to turn, he was trying to remember if he had a client meeting he’d forgotten. If so it was going to be embarrassing, given he hadn’t bothered to put on a shirt and his jeans weren’t even zipped all the way. He was—
Double crap.
It was Roth.
Instantly his guard went up. “Bring that scattergun with you?” he snapped.
“Good morning to you, too,” she retorted.
“It might have been,” he said, so pointedly she couldn’t miss the inference it was her presence that—despite the fact that most guys would probably think she looked pretty sweet in those snug jeans and soft sweater over curves that even he had to admit would be interesting on anybody else—had removed that possibility.
“If you two are going to be your usual sweet selves, I’ll just take myself off to my committee meeting,” his mother said. “Try to leave the house standing, all right? Quinta,” she added to her loyal dog, “come with me. I love you too much to leave you with these two adolescent adversaries.”
Cody watched his mother go, scowling.
“Not that she has an opinion or anything,” Roth muttered, also watching his mother go.
Cody spun back. For him to scowl was one thing, Roth something else altogether. “Show some respect or shut up,” he snapped.
To his surprise, she looked chagrinned. “You’re right. She deserves respect. I like your mother.”
“It’s me you’ve got the problem with, so keep it there.” He gave her a sour grimace. “Or you could just leave. That’d fix everything.”
She opened her mouth as if to snap back at him, as usual, but then she stopped. He saw her take a deep breath. “I am here about fixing something.”
“If you mean a certain expensive piece of equipment, there’s no fixing it. You did what you intended, destroyed it.”
She winced, somewhat to his surprise. He’d expected her to be pleased. Given the distance, it had been a good shot. “Just how expensive?”
“Ask your dad. I’ll send him the bill.” He wouldn’t—on Keller’s wise advice he’d insured everything when he’d started the service, and this was hardly her father’s fault—but she didn’t need to know that.
“No. Don’t.” She sounded actually anxious, and his brow furrowed. “Look,” she went on, “I didn’t know it was…that you were doing a job for him. I thought you were just…”
“Just what?”
“Trying to tick me off,” she said bluntly.
“Because it’s always all about you, huh?”
That got her; he saw faint color tinge her cheeks. “Just tell me how much it cost.” She pulled out her phone. “I’ll do a transfer right here and now. Or if you want, I’ll write you a check. Either way, I’ll pay for it.”
