Falling Awake(30)
Author: Jayne Ann Krentz

“I lost my parents when I was twelve.” He kept his voice completely neutral, the way he always did when he talked about the past. “They were victims of some crazy who had a bad case of workplace rage. My folks were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Ellis.” She turned abruptly in the seat to look at him. “What happened? Who raised you?”

“The State of California.”

“Foster homes?”

“Yeah.”

“My God. Talk about a nightmare.”

Out of the corner of his eye he saw her start to reach out as though to touch him. Her pity was the very last thing he wanted.

“They weren’t all bad,” he said, putting a lot of ice into the words because he wanted her to get the message. “Some were better than others. In any case, I was only in the system for three years. No worse than being sent away to boarding school.”

“Oh, sure. Just like boarding school. Give me a break.” She paused. “How come you were only in the system for three years?”

“I left the last home when I turned fifteen.”

“You ran away? How did you survive on your own at that age?”

The anxiety in her voice almost made him laugh. “How do you think I survived? I went into business for myself. I told you I’ve always had a knack for turning a profit.”

She cleared her throat. “What kind of business could you get into at that age?” She paused. “Or shouldn’t I ask?”

“Well, I gave considerable thought to entering the illegal substances market,” he said, keeping his tone mockingly serious. “But I guess I’ve always been a strategic thinker when it comes to business. I took a good, hard look at the profit-risk ratio and decided that the long-term prospects in that particular field were not very good.”

“Come to think of it, you don’t see a lot of successful drug dealers over the age of thirty, do you?” she murmured. “They’re either dead or in jail. Then, too, I suppose the competition is rather fierce.”

“The competition is only part of the problem. Maintaining a core market share is very difficult. Your best customers tend to die on you.”

“Okay, so you were too smart to sell drugs on the street.” She leaned her head back against the seat. “How did you make a living?”

“Online.”

She sucked in her breath in startled surprise and then laughed. “Of course. Should have thought of that.”

“I started out buying and selling for other people. Took a commission on each trade. Then I moved on to buying some products in bulk and reselling them at my own website.”

“You really are a born entrepreneur.”

“I continued to dabble a bit in high school and managed to graduate. Decided to try college. In my second year, I signed up as a research subject in one of Lawson’s sleep studies, and the rest is history.”

“You know,” she said after a while, “your decision to become a venture capitalist is as appropriate as the work you do for Lawson.”

“How’s that?”

“You’re a major dreamer, right? By making it possible for other people to start up their companies, you’re helping them to pursue the great American Dream.”

He laughed. “You know, you may be cut out for the motivational seminar field, after all. You sure know how to put a positive spin on things.”

She folded her arms. “Do you use your Level Five dreaming capabilities in your venture capital work?”

“Frequently. The process is very similar to the dreaming I do for Lawson. I look for patterns and clues. The difference is that when it comes to the business dreaming I’m working with the financial markets and the personalities of the entrepreneurs and investors who are involved. I generally have a fair amount of information in those situations so I don’t require so much help with interpretation. That’s why I haven’t sent you any of those dream narratives to analyze.”

He saw the turnoff for Sea Breeze Lane coming up on the left and reluctantly slowed for it. The temptation to keep going into the night was almost overwhelming. Maybe, if he drove fast enough and hard enough, they could outrun the dawn.

“Something wrong?” Isabel asked.

“No.” Yes. I don’t want to leave you tonight.

But he made the turn and drove slowly along the street of weathered beach cottages until he came to the one with the yellow porch light.

He parked in front of the rented house and pocketed the keys. Would she ask him to come inside for tea or a nightcap?

“Sorry, I don’t have an umbrella,” he said.

“It’s not raining that hard,” she said.

He unbuckled his seat belt and got out. Ignoring the light rain that dampened his hair, he tugged off his jacket and went around to the passenger side.

When Isabel popped out of the front seat, the slanted hem of her sexy little black dress rode up high on her leg, giving him a discreet glimpse of thigh.

His blood beat more heavily in his veins. He could feel the rising swell of his erection.

Don’t get excited, Cutler. It was probably just an accident. Short skirts, low-slung cars, hell, these things happened. It was one of the reasons automobile designers engineered vehicles like this one.

But what if she was deliberately flirting with him? He sure didn’t want to misread the signals here.

He draped his jacket over her shoulders. Just doing the gentlemanly thing, he assured himself, trying to protect the lady’s dress from the inclement weather.

“Run,” he advised. He didn’t know if he was telling her to flee from the rain or from him.

“I won’t melt,” she promised.

Lucky you, he thought. I just damn well might.

Together they raced up the steps. Isabel reached into her purse for her key. He sensed her hesitating.

Invite me inside. Just say the magic words.

“It was a lovely evening. Thank you, Ellis.”

“My pleasure.” He took the key from her hand and inserted it into the lock. “You know, we never did talk contracts.”

She looked at him, baffled. “Contracts?”

“I’m sure you have one for me to sign,” he said easily. He opened the door. “If you’ll give me a copy of your standard contract, I’ll go over it tonight. We can talk about any problem areas in the morning.”

“I don’t actually have a standard contract yet.” She moved into the doorway and looked at him with a worried expression. “I haven’t really had time to think about setting up the legal side of my business. What with moving and training for my new job at Kyler, things have been rather chaotic for the past few days.”