Texas Proud and Circle of Gold Read online

  “Thanks.” Judy hugged her back.

  Mr. Kemp came out of his office, stopped dead, and gaped at the arrangement that took up most of Bernie’s desk. “Did somebody die?” he asked.

  They all burst out laughing. Kemp grinned.

  “Mikey, huh?” he asked Bernie, who flushed. “I figured he’d work it out sooner or later. Okay, people, back to work.”

  “Yes, sir,” they chorused.

  Bernie and Judy moved her beautiful floral arrangement to a side table so that the desk was clear, but all day Bernie’s eyes went to it, and she felt as if she could walk on clouds.

  * * *

  Paul and Sari Fiore drove her home so that Paul could carry the arrangement inside for her. It was very heavy.

  “Right there, if you don’t mind,” Bernie said, indicating the cleared-off part of her chest of drawers. “It’s so beautiful!”

  “Good thing that Judy makes arrangements that don’t have a loud scent,” Sari teased, “or you’d smother in here from the fumes.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t even mind.” Bernie sighed. “Nobody ever sent me flowers in my whole life,” she added softly.

  Paul and Sari exchanged glances. It was obvious that Mikey’s peace offering had struck pay dirt.

  * * *

  He phoned Paul that night.

  “Well?” he asked. “Did she donate them to the hospital or her church?” he prompted, and sounded worried.

  “No. She cried,” Paul said. “Then Sari and I brought her home so I could carry them inside for her. God, Mikey, did you buy out a florist? I never knew there were that many yellow roses in the whole damned state,” he added, chuckling.

  “I wanted to make an impression,” Mikey replied. There was a smile in his voice. “So she liked them, huh?”

  “She loved them.”

  There was a sigh. “In that case, Santi and I might come down for a visit in a week or so. Just to get the lay of the land.”

  “I think that would be a very good idea,” Paul replied.

  * * *

  Bernie was walking home late in the afternoon, wrapped in a coat against the chill, using her cane because it was rainy and her footing wasn’t good.

  A big, black limousine pulled up beside her and the window rolled down while her heart almost beat her to death.

  “Now, don’t fall under the wheels this time, okay?” said a man with a New Jersey accent.

  Bernie laughed. “Hi,” she said softly.

  The door opened. Mikey got out, leaving Santi behind the wheel. He stuck his hands in his pockets and moved close to Bernie. His dark eyes searched her wan face in the late-afternoon dimness. They were intent, as if he was looking at something almost out of a fantasy.

  “You look good,” he said. “A little worn. You’ve lost weight, I think.”

  “Just a little,” she confessed. Her eyes went over his lean face. “You look worn, too.”

  “I never slept with Jessie,” he blurted out. “I like to stick to my own species.”

  She laughed in spite of herself.

  “I did a dumb thing,” he muttered. “I should have known that you wouldn’t pour your heart out to somebody in a public place.”

  She grimaced. “I should have known the same thing about you.”

  He drew in a breath and smiled. “So. Suppose we start over? Hi. My name’s Mikey. I sometimes break the law, but I’ll try to restrict myself to jaywalking for the rest of my life if you’ll take a chance on me.”

  Her heart leaped. “Hi. My name’s Bernadette, but everybody calls me Bernie. I never break the law, but I’d take a chance on you no matter what you did for a living.”

  His lips parted on a husky breath. “Oh, baby,” he said in a rough whisper. “God, I’ve missed you...!”

  She would have told him the same thing, but he had her up in his arms and was kissing her as if there was no tomorrow. Her arms were around his neck, her cane was on the sidewalk somewhere getting wet. She was kissing him back.

  Long minutes went by. The rain was coming down in buckets and they were both soaked. Finally Santi got out of the car and stopped beside them, coughing loudly.

  Mikey drew back, shivering a little with the overwhelming hunger he felt for Bernie. He looked at Santi blankly. “What? You got a cold?”

  “Boss, it’s raining. Really raining. You know?”

  Mikey blinked. Santi’s hair was plastered to his head and face. He scowled and looked down at Bernie. Her hair was plastered to her head and face, too. He laughed out loud. “Damn. So it is! I guess we should find a dry place, huh?”

  “I guess,” Santi mused. He opened the car door.

  “But I’m wet,” Bernie wailed.

  “The seats are leather, honey, they’ll dry. Santi, find her cane, would you?”

  “You bet!”

  Santi closed the door.

  “Now,” Mikey murmured, drawing her close. “Where were we...?”

  * * *

  They were married in the courthouse, in the office of the justice of the peace. Bernie wore a winter-white coatdress and carried a bouquet of white roses. She had on a little saucy white hat that had a veil, and Mikey lifted it as he kissed her for the first time as Mrs. Michael Fiore.

  Sari and Paul were their witnesses, and Tony Garza came down with his entourage for the wedding. In fact, Marcus Carrera and his Delia, and their little boys, also came to town for the event.

  “I owe you a lot,” Mikey told Marcus.

  The big man waved away the thanks. “No sweat,” he chuckled. “But if you come across a bolt of antique cloth, you know where to mail it, right?” he teased.

  Mikey clapped him on the back. “You bet I do.”

  * * *

  The honeymoon was in Jamaica, in Montego Bay, where they swam and acted like tourists. Well, at least, after the first night they were together.

  “You don’t need to worry about a thing,” Mikey whispered to her as he undressed her very slowly and eased her under the covers.

  She shivered a little at the first contact with his nude body, but he kissed her and caressed her until she didn’t care what he did as long as he didn’t stop.

  He carried her from one breathless plateau to another, from one side of the bed to the other, for what seemed hours before he finally moved over her with intent. She was so sensitized by then that she barely felt the little flash of pain that hallmarked his slow penetration of her welcoming body.

  She was aching for him, so hungry that she knew nothing, saw nothing, except his face above her as the passion grew and grew and grew and finally exploded into pleasure beyond anything she’d ever dreamed.

  “Oh, my goodness,” she moaned as they finally moved apart. She shifted her hips and the exquisite sensations went on and on.

  He chuckled, drawing her to his side. “It’s addictive.”

  “Very!”

  He pulled her onto him and looked up into her soft eyes. “I’ve never missed anyone the way I missed you. I was just ashamed to even call you, after what I did.”

  She bent and kissed him tenderly. “We both believed lies because we were insecure.”

  “But no more.”

  “Not ever,” she agreed.

  “There’s still the matter of the little unlawful things,” he said, grimacing. “But I’ve got a legitimate casino now, and two of the biggest mob bosses in history in my corner. So if I want to move out into the world, so long as I don’t betray any secrets, I can leave the old life behind. Not that I’ll give up my house in Jersey. You’ll like it,” he added softly. “It’s old, but it’s got character.”

  “I’ll love anywhere you live,” she said simply. “And I’ll cope, however I have to.” Her pale eyes met his dark ones. “I love you.”

  He hugged her close. “I love you, too, baby. And don’t you
dare think I mind about the cane and the days you have flares, or if you get sick. I can afford nurses, anything you need. But I’ll take care of you myself,” he added, lifting his head, and his eyes adored her. “Because you’re the most important thing in the whole world.”

  “So are you to me,” she whispered, and kissed him.

  “Listen, I spoke to your doctor,” he said. “Louise Coltrain said there are medicines you can inject, that will make your quality of life a hundred times better.”

  “Yes, but they’re so expensive—”

  “I could fund the treasury of a small country, honey,” he interrupted. “It will be money well spent, especially when the kids come along. You won’t need to try and keep up with me,” he chuckled. “I’ll carry you, if I need to. But you will need to keep up with our kids...”

  She laughed with pure delight. “Are we having several?”

  He grinned. “However many you want. And I’ll learn to change diapers and give bottles, just so you know.”

  “We can do it together,” she said softly.

  “We’ll do everything together,” he replied quietly. “As long as we live. Yes?”

  She bent and kissed him hungrily. “As long as we live.”

  And they did.

  * * *

  Circle of Gold

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter One

  Kasie Mayfield was excited. Her gray eyes were brimming with delight as she sat in the sprawling living room at the Double C Ranch in Medicine Ridge, Montana. There was a secretarial position available on the mammoth Double C, and she had the necessary qualifications. She was only twenty-two, but she had a certificate from secretarial school and plenty of initiative. Besides all that, the position was secretary to John Callister, the second son of the well-known family that headed not only a publishing empire in New York City, but a cattle empire out West.

  There was a very interesting story about the ranch in a magazine that Kasie was reading while she waited her turn to be interviewed. The elder Callisters lived in New York, where they published, among others, a famous sports magazine. When they weren’t in the city, they lived in Jamaica on an ancestral estate. The Callister who had founded the American branch of the family had been a British duke. He bought an obscure little magazine in New York City in 1897 and turned it into a publishing conglomerate. One of his sons had emigrated to Montana and founded the ranch. It eventually passed to Douglas Callister, who had raised the boys, Gilbert and John. Nobody talked about why the uncle had been given custody of both boys and left them the ranch when he died. Presumably it was some dark family secret. Apparently there wasn’t a lot of contact between the boys and their parents.

  Gilbert, the eldest at thirty-two, had been widowed three years ago. He had two young daughters, Bess, who was five, and Jenny, who was four. John had never married. He was a rodeo champion and did most of the traveling that accompanied showing the ranch’s prizewinning pedigree black Angus bulls. Gil was the power in the empire. He was something of a marketing genius, and he dealt with the export business and sat on the boards of two multinational corporations. But mostly he ran the ranch, all thirty thousand acres of it.

  There was a photograph of him in the magazine, but she didn’t need it to know what he looked like. Kasie had gotten a glimpse of him on her way into the house to wait for her turn to be interviewed. One glimpse had been enough. It shocked her that a man who didn’t even know her should glare at her so intently.

  A more conceited woman might have taken it for masculine interest. But Kasie had no ego. No, that tall, lanky blond man hadn’t liked her, and made no secret of it. His pale blue eyes under that heavy brow had pierced her skin. She wouldn’t get the job. He’d make sure of it.

  She glanced at the woman next to her, a glorious blonde with big brown eyes and beautiful legs crossed under a thigh-high skirt. Then she looked at her own ankle-length blue jumper with a simple gray blouse that matched her big eyes. Her chestnut hair was in a long braid down her back. She wore only a little lipstick on her full, soft mouth, and no rouge at all on her cheeks. She had a rather ordinary oval face and a small, rounded chin, and she wore contact lenses. She wasn’t at all pretty. She had a nice figure, but she was shy and didn’t make the most of it. It was just as well that she had good office skills, she supposed, because it was highly unlikely that anybody would ever want to actually marry her. She thought of her parents and her brother and had to fight down tears. It was so soon. Too soon, probably. But the job might keep her from thinking of what had happened....

  “Miss Mayfield!”

  She jumped as her name was called in a deep, authoritative tone. “Yes?”

  “Come in, please.”

  She put a smile on her face as she clutched her small purse in her hands and walked into the paneled office, where plaques and photos of bulls lined the walls and burgundy leather furniture surrounded the big mahogany desk. A man was sitting there, with his pale eyes piercing and intent. A blond man with broad shoulders and a hard, lean face that seemed to be all rocky edges. It was not John Callister.

  She stopped in front of the desk with her heart pounding and didn’t bother to sit down. Gil Callister was obviously doing the interviews, and now she was sure she wouldn’t get the job. She knew John Callister from the drugstore where she’d worked briefly as a stock clerk putting herself through secretarial courses. John had talked to her, teased her and even told her about the secretarial job. He’d have given her a chance. Gil would just shoot her out the door. It was obvious that he didn’t like anything about her.

  He tossed a pen onto the desk and nodded toward the chair facing it. “Sit down.”

  She felt vulnerable. The door was closed. Here she was with a hungry tiger, and no way out. But she sat anyway. Never let it be said that she lacked courage. They could throw her into the arena and she would die like a true Roman... She shook herself. She really had to stop reading the Plinys and Tacitus. This was the new millennium, not the first century A.D.

  “Why do you want this job?” Gil asked bluntly.

  Her thin eyebrows lifted. She hadn’t expected the question. “Because John is a dish?” she ventured dryly.

  The answer seemed to surprise him. “Is he?”

  “When I worked at the drugstore, he was always kind to me,” she said evasively. “He told me about the job, because he knew I was just finishing my secretarial certificate at the vocational-technical school. I got high grades, too.”

  Gil pursed his lips. He still didn’t smile. He looked down at the résumé she’d handed him and read it carefully, as if he was looking for a deficiency he could use to deny her the job. His mouth made a thin line. “Very high grades,” he conceded with obvious reluctance. “This is accurate? You really can type 110 words a minute?”

  She nodded. “I can type faster than I can take dictation, actually.”

  He pushed the résumé aside and leaned back. “Boyfriends?”

  She was nonplussed. Her fingers tightened on her purse. “Sir?”

  “I want to know if you have any entanglements that might cause you to give up the job in the near future,” he persisted, and seemed oddly intent on the reply.

  She shifted restlessly. “I’ve only ever had one real boyfriend, although he was more like a brother. He married my best friend two months ago. That was just before I moved to Billings,” she added, mentioning the nearby city, “to live with my aunt. So, I don’t date much.”

  She was so uncomfortable that she almost squirmed. He didn’t know about her background
, of course, or he wouldn’t need to ask such questions. Modern women were a lot more worldly than Kasie. But she’d said that John was a dish. She flushed. Good grief, did he think she went around seducing men or something? Was that why he didn’t want her in his house? Her expression was mortified.

  He averted his eyes. “You have some odd character references,” he said after a minute, frowning at them. “A Catholic priest, a nun, a Texas Ranger and a self-made millionaire with alleged mob ties.”

  She only smiled demurely. “I have unique friendships.”

  “You could put it that way,” he said, diverted. “Is the millionaire your lover?”

  She went scarlet and her jaw dropped.

  “Oh, hell, never mind,” he said, apparently disturbed that he’d asked the question and uncomfortable at the reaction it drew. “That’s none of my business. All right, Kasie...” He hesitated. “Kasie. What’s it short for?”

  “I don’t know,” she blurted out. “It’s my actual name.”

  One eye narrowed. “The millionaire’s name is K.C.,” he pointed out. “And he’s at least forty.”

  “Thirty-seven. He saved my mother’s life, while she was carrying me,” she said finally. “He wasn’t always a millionaire.”

  “Yes, I know, he was a professional soldier, a mercenary.” His eyes narrowed even more. “Want to tell me about it?”

  “Not really, no,” she confided.

  He shook his head. “Well, if nothing else, you’ll be efficient. You’re also less of a distraction than the rest of them. There’s nothing I hate more than a woman who wears a skirt up to her briefs to work and then complains when men stare at her if she bends over. We have dress codes at our businesses and they’re enforced—for both sexes.”

  “I don’t have any skirts that come up to my...well, I don’t wear short ones,” she blurted out.