Date with a Cowboy Read online

  He cursed fiercely. “The police chief said the kidnappers followed Max to your bookstore. I didn’t send Max to see you!” he raged.

  Her sad eyes managed to meet his. “I guess she forged your name on the check, huh?”

  He went very still.

  That did make her feel a little better, but not much. She pulled the envelope out of the bedside drawer and tossed it to the foot of the bed where he was standing. “You’d better have it back,” she said. “I don’t take bribes.”

  His high cheekbones went a ruddy color as he picked it up and looked at it. “Damn Max!” he said under his breath.

  “And I’m not having a termination,” she added fiercely. “You have no right to try to force me to jeopardize my soul!”

  He looked at her as if he didn’t understand what she was saying. But slowly it came to him, and he seemed even more ill at ease. “I don’t want another child,” he bit off.

  “Then why didn’t you stop?” she demanded hotly.

  The flush got worse. “I didn’t mean it to go that far,” he said curtly. “I swear to God I didn’t.”

  It didn’t help much, but it helped a little.

  “I thought you were older,” he added heavily. “Nineteen years old. Dear God!”

  That helped a little more.

  He stuck his hands into his pockets. “I fired Max.”

  “I’m not surprised.”

  “Which one of those SOBs stabbed you?” he added abruptly.

  She blinked. “None of them,” she said. “I stabbed myself. It was the only thing I could think of. I was alone and there were three of them. I thought they wouldn’t want a dying hostage.”

  “You did what?” he exploded, horrified.

  “I had a pocketknife. I stabbed myself where Dr. Coltrain did the appendectomy. It bled a lot, but I didn’t hit anything vital. It was all I could think of.”

  He winced. “If Max hadn’t taken it on herself to interfere, they’d never have tracked her to you,” he said. “I could have choked her when she told me.”

  “She didn’t tell you about the check, I guess?”

  “No,” he replied curtly. “If she had, she’d never work again. I make a bad enemy.”

  She knew that already, from personal experience. She studied him quietly. “I thought you were just a comfortably well-off rancher,” she said slowly. “That magazine story said you own oil corporations.”

  He frowned. “What magazine?”

  “Max showed it to me,” she said. “You were on the cover.”

  He let out a short breath. “It just keeps getting better and better,” he gritted.

  Tony came into the room, angry. “How did you get inhere?”

  “I walked in the front door,” Jared shot back. “You should have called me!”

  Tony glared at him. “Wouldn’t you be lucky if I did?”

  Jared glanced from Tony’s hard face to Sara’s hard face. He grimaced. “It isn’t doing your reputation much good to have Tony hanging around here day and night,” he said.

  “See? He’s got a dirty mind, too,” Sara told Tony.

  “I have not!” Jared gritted. “I hate to see you being gossiped about.”

  “Then don’t listen. It’s a small town,” she pointed out. “There’s usually not much excitement going on around here. Gossip is how we get through life.”

  Jared seemed to draw inside himself as he looked at Sara. All his regrets were in his green eyes. He glanced at Tony. “Give us a minute, will you?”

  If he’d demanded, Tony would have dug in his heels. But it was hard to argue with politeness. He shrugged. “Okay. I’ll be in the kitchen, Sara.”

  “Okay,” she replied.

  Jared stuck his hands deeper in his pockets and looked down at her. “When will you know for sure?” he asked.

  She fought a scarlet flush. “Dr. Coltrain says it’s too soon to be sure. Two or three more weeks, I think.”

  “Damn the luck,” he cursed through his set teeth.

  She glared at him. “You go right ahead and curse,” she said. “But all of this is your fault.”

  His eyes were sad and full of guilt. She was so young. “I know that, Sara,” he said quietly. “It doesn’t help much.”

  She sagged back against the pillows. She didn’t know what she was going to do. Her conscience wouldn’t let her take the easy way out, although she was pretty sure that he wanted her to.

  “Don’t torment yourself,” he said after a minute. “You did nothing wrong, except trust me. That was a mistake. I haven’t had a lot to do with women in the past few months. I just lost it. I’m sorry, if it helps.”

  It did, a little, but it was too late for an apology to be of much use. “Nobody ever made such a heavy pass at me,” she murmured, not meeting his eyes. “I thought you just wanted to kiss me.”

  “I did,” he said heavily. “But kisses lead to other things. I thought you were older, more experienced.”

  “You wish,” she said curtly.

  He sighed. “Well, we’ll deal with it when we have to,” he said after a minute. He looked down at her quietly, his green eyes searching, curious. “I should never have let them talk me into coming here,” he told her. “Tony wanted the extra protection that some of his old comrades could provide. I didn’t expect to have you drawn into this.”

  “Neither did I,” she said. She stared at her fingers. “I guess it was hard on you, living in a little hick town, with no suitable women around to date.”

  He made a rough sound in his throat. “Stop that,” he said shortly. “You weren’t a substitute, Sara.”

  “Max said you love women until you seduce them, and then you just throw them away,” she returned, staring straight at him.

  His high cheekbones colored. “Damn Max!”

  “If you’re filthy rich, I expect you can buy as many women as you want,” she continued conversationally.

  “I don’t buy women,” he informed her. “I just don’t want to get married.”

  “I don’t think there’s much danger of that, with Max carrying payoff checks around to all your girlfriends.”

  “I told you, I didn’t tell Max to do that! It was her idea,” he added. “She said she’d handle everything, and I was drunk enough not to care how.”

  Her eyebrows arched. “Drunk?”

  He looked rigid. “You asked me to stop, and I couldn’t,” he growled. “How do you think I felt? I read the situation wrong and threw my conscience to the wind. Then Max told me how old you were.” He winced. “Nineteen. Dear God!”

  “Well, I’m not exactly a child,” she shot back, growing angry herself. “And I’m no stranger to violence.”

  “People hit you with books in the bookstore, do they?” he asked, in a condescending, faintly amused tone.

  She looked him in the eye. “A rebel paramilitary unit in Sierra Leone tossed a grenade into the clinic where my father was dressing wounds,” she replied, watching the shock hit him. “I was standing beside him, holding a bowl of water. I was just ten, it was the only way I was able to help. My father died. I was concussed so badly that I had brain damage. That’s why I can’t match socks and earrings,” she added. “I was right in the path of the grenade. Fragments penetrated my skull. One’s still in there,” she told him. “They were afraid to try to take it out.”

  His face was white. Absolutely white. “Why were you there?”

  “My grandfather talked my father into doing a stint at missionary work. Dad had been a medic in the army and he was a lay preacher. He and my grandfather forced my mother into going. I begged to go, too. I thought Africa had to be the most exciting place on earth,” she added in a dull, quiet tone. “Well, it was exciting, I guess.”

  “What happened to your mother?”

  “She drank herself to death, after she used every low trick she could think of to embarrass my grandfather, to make him pay for Daddy’s death. She grew famous locally. It’s why I was innocent,” she added bitte
rly. “I was afraid to go out with local boys, because she’d slept with some of them. Everybody thought I was like her. Everybody except Grandad.”

  Jared winced. “You didn’t tell me any of this,” he accused.

  “We were friends,” she replied heavily. “Just friends. I knew you’d never want somebody like me for keeps. I’m nothing like Max, or the women who chase after you. I don’t care about money, I don’t like diamonds, I’d never fit into high society and I’m brain-damaged. It would never have been my idea to get involved with you physically,” she added coldly, “because I knew from the outset that there would be no future in it.”

  His teeth were grinding together. He’d felt bad before. Now he was sick to his stomach. Somewhere along the road to get rich, he’d lost his way. He had everything he’d ever wanted, but he had no one to share it with. He was alone. He would always be alone, surrounded by women who liked expensive jewelry and travel. And by bodyguards hired to protect him from people who wanted his money enough to risk anything to get it.

  “It’s going to ruin your reputation, having Tony live here with you,” he pointed out.

  “What reputation?” she muttered. “Thanks to you, I’m a fallen woman. If I do get pregnant, it’s not something I’ll be able to hide. Everybody who sees me will know what I’ve been up to. You’ll be off in Las Vegas gambling, or sailing a yacht in the Mediterranean. At least Tony cares about me.”

  “There are things about Tony that you don’t know,” he said flatly.

  “Yes, and there are things about Tony that you don’t know, either,” she retorted. “Tony got me to the hospital in time for them to save my life in Africa. I don’t remember him, of course. A lot of my childhood was removed along with the damaged tissue in my brain.”

  His face was almost frozen in place. Nothing had gone right for him since the death of his daughter. He’d destroyed the life of the young woman in that bed. He’d disgraced and shamed himself. He didn’t know what to do. But he knew that he needed to do something. He couldn’t walk away and let Sara face this alone, not even with Tony for company. He’d have to have a nice talk with Tony, who hadn’t bothered to tell him what he knew about Sara. All this misery might have been prevented.

  “Don’t you have a board meeting or a conference or a yacht race to go to?” Sara asked when he didn’t speak. “I’d hate to delay you in any way from your business.”

  His eyes almost glowed red. He was just about to open his mouth and let her have it with both barrels when Tony walked in, carrying the phone.

  “Sorry, Sara, but it’s that guy from New York again,” he said, handing it to her.

  Jared frowned. “And just who the hell do you know in New York?” he demanded suddenly.

  Ten

  His own words shocked Jared. He was jealous. He didn’t want to be.

  Sara, oblivious to his thoughts, was torn between telling Jared to mind his own business and talking to the editor who was going to buy her book.

  “Hello?” came a voice from over the telephone.

  She put it to her ear. “This is Sara,” she said.

  Jared glared at her.

  “Miss Dobbs? It’s Daniel Harris here, at Mirabella Publishing Company.”

  “Yes, Mr. Harris?”

  “I wanted to ask if you could do us a colored drawing of just one of the puppies to use in advertising. Also, we’re going to need some ideas for a title. The contract will be on its way to you later this week. You aren’t agented, are you?”

  “No, I’m not,” she said worriedly. “Do I need to be?”

  “Of course not. You can have an attorney look over the contract for you, if you have any worries. We’re offering you a standard royalty contract, with an advance—” he gave her the figure, and she gasped “—and then thereafter you’ll get a percentage of the royalties when the book is on the shelves. We would also like for you to do some publicity, signings and so forth; but that will be when the book is published. Tentatively we’re scheduling it for next spring. Sound okay?”

  “Oh, yes,” she said, beaming. “Mr. Harris, I’m just overwhelmed. I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “It’s a good book,” he replied. “We’re proud to publish it. If the terms are okay with you, we’re sending the contracts down by courier. If you could send us the single drawing by next week or the week after, that would be fine.”

  “Yes, I can do that,” she agreed, without mentioning her condition. She gave him her street address, trying not to let Jared’s black scowl unnerve her.

  “We’ll be in touch.”

  “Thanks again,” she replied, and hung up.

  “Who’s Daniel Harris?” Jared demanded.

  Her eyebrows levered up. “What business is it of yours?”

  The scowl darkened. “You’re living with an ex-mercenary and handing out your home address to strangers in New York.”

  “Well, I am getting to be quite the vamp, aren’t I?” she asked, and blinked her long lashes at him.

  His teeth set audibly. “Who is he?”

  She just glared, but he didn’t back down an inch. “All right! He’s an editor. I sold my children’s book to him.”

  “Book?”

  “The one I was working on? Lisa Parks’s puppies?”

  “Oh.”

  “They bought it. They’re sending me a contract to sign.”

  “I’ll have an attorney look it over for you,” he offered.

  She sat up. “Max isn’t touching my book! Or my contracts!”

  His expression lightened. “You’re jealous.”

  She flushed. “So are you!”

  He looked odd for a minute. He blinked. “Yes,” he said finally.

  That floored her. She just looked at him, dumbfounded.

  “You might be carrying my child,” he said after a minute, and something odd flashed in his eyes. “I’m territorial.”

  “It’s my child, if there is one,” she shot back. “You’re not taking me over.”

  He was thinking, scheming, planning. It was in his expression. “I’m good at hostile takeovers.”

  “Remember me? The uncouth savage from Outer Cowpasture?” she prompted. “Imagine showing me off at cocktail parties! Think of the embarrassment when I open my mouth and drawl at your circle of friends.”

  “I don’t have friends,” he said coldly.

  “Why not?”

  He shrugged. “I never know if they’re seeing me or my money.”

  “Fortunately I don’t have that problem. Being poor has its advantages.” She thought for a minute. “Well, I won’t be as poor as I was, I suppose. If the book sells, I mean.”

  “If it’s publicized enough, it will sell.”

  She gave him a wry look. “Don’t even think about it. I can do my own publicity.”

  “I have a firm of publicists working for me, making up ad campaigns for the corporation and its divisions,” he said.

  “I don’t work for your corporation.”

  “I thought we were family,” he began.

  “Tony and I are family. We just voted you out,” she told him.

  He moved closer to the bed. “You’d leave me alone in the world, with nobody?”

  “You’ve got Max.”

  “I fired Max.”

  “I’m sure she won’t be hard to replace,” she said cattily. “And I’m sure you have a whole houseful of beautiful women ready to step into her shoes in other ways,” she added meaningfully.

  He avoided her eyes. “I’m a man,” he said curtly. “Men have needs.”

  “Yes. I noticed,” she said deliberately.

  He moved restlessly. “I told you, I didn’t mean for that to happen!”

  She colored. “Great! If there’s a baby, we can tell him he was an accident.”

  “Don’t you dare!” he exploded.

  She felt embarrassed at the statement, which she hadn’t meant. He just made her mad. “I like babies,” she said slowly, putting her hands flat on
her stomach. “But it’s scary, thinking about having one. They’re so little …”

  “When Ellen was born,” he recalled quietly, “they put her in my arms. I’d never seen anything so tiny, so perfect.” A sad smile touched his hard mouth. “I counted little fingers and toes, kissed her little nose, her feet. I never loved anything so much …”

  He stopped and turned away, walking to the window. He looked out over the kitchen garden. It took him a minute to get his emotions under control.

  Sara felt guilty. He’d loved his little child. He was afraid to have another one, afraid of losing it. He was closing up inside his shell for safety.

  “Lisa and Cy lost their first baby,” she said softly. “It was born with several rare birth defects. The doctors couldn’t save it, and they had specialists all the way from Dallas. Lisa said it wasn’t meant to be. They grieved for years. They were afraid to try again, too. But when she got pregnant again, everything went perfectly. She and Cy are like children themselves. They’re crazy about this child and talking about having more. You can’t hide from life,” she concluded quietly. “I know. I’ve tried to. I have nightmares, remembering how my father died. I blocked it out for years, but sometimes now I can see it. I was conscious for just a few seconds after the concussion hit me. He was blown apart …” She had to stop. The memory was nightmarish.

  He came back to the bed, standing over her. “I wish you could have told me about it,” he said softly. “You haven’t had it easy, have you?”

  “Neither have you,” she replied.

  He drew in a slow breath. “I’ve lost my nerve,” he said after a minute. “I don’t think I could cope with losing another child.”

  “Neither did Lisa and Cy, but it didn’t stop them from trying again. Life doesn’t come with guarantees. Sometimes you just have to have faith.”

  “Faith,” he scoffed. His face was hard, closed. “I hated God.”

  “He doesn’t hate you,” she said gently. “He doesn’t punish people, you know. We have free choice. He doesn’t control every second of our lives. Bad things happen. That’s just the way life is. But faith is how we cope. Especially in small towns.”

  “You’re only nineteen,” he said quietly. “How did you come to be so wise, at such an age?”