He wasn’t the awkward, angry boy she remembered. Well, maybe the angry part was still there. But there was nothing at all boyish about him. Tall and broad-shouldered, he had more of a brooding presence than he’d had as an angsty teenager. But then again, their high school days were almost twenty years ago. A weight settled on her shoulders. Twenty years. And what did she have to show for it, other than a son, a small apartment and a pile of college debt? Meanwhile, Zayne was building wooden lace for a living.

He looked up and caught her staring. He propped his hip against the bench and folded his arms on his chest. “If you think you can just annoy me into changing my mind, you can forget it. You may be used to getting your way all the time, but that won’t happen with me.”

Tani was right—the brooding presence thing was really working for Zayne. An energy radiated from him that made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. It was like being outside as an electrical storm approached, when the air crackled with electricity. His face had the same sharp angles as always, but with a few scars mixed in, and a shadow of dark stubble along his jaw. His bright blue eyes had always been a contrast with his black hair and heavy brows. As a boy, those eyes had often danced with laughter. She didn’t see laughter there now. And he had a serious limp. She had seen him rubbing his left thigh earlier, and he moved with a slight limp. That had to be from the car accident she’d heard about. The one that left another man dead.

He’d gone back to working on the fretwork in front of him. She felt a touch of wonder that the ultimate bad boy was now an artist. An artist with a stubborn set to his jaw as he tried again to ignore her. But she was Andrea Wentworth, and she wasn’t going down without a fight.

“There has to be some way we can come to an agreement on this issue. The committee paid for the maze, and we’re going to have to recoup that money from you if...”

“Are you threatening me?” He straightened, looking more amused than offended. “Of all the tactics you could have tried, trust me, that’s the worst. Your agreement was with Cliff. If you want to go after an eighty-five-year-old man in a nursing home for your money, have at it, but it won’t make you or your precious committee look very good.”

Andrea heard several things in those few sentences. He was right about going after Cliff. That was a losing proposition in every way. But more importantly, he’d made it sound like there might be a tactic that could work. She was just going to have to figure out what it was.