by Meryl Sawyer
The ring of truth. Claire was more like her mother than she cared to admit. She was hopelessly attracted to Zach, but it was a relationship without a future. She could never take him home to her father—not that he’d want to go.
“Oh my God, Claire! You’re not!” Angela cried when Claire didn’t say anything. “You’re not involved with Zach, are you?”
“It hasn’t gone that far yet.”
“Well, I can’t say that I blame you. If he were younger, I’d go after him myself.” Angela slammed her palm against her forehead. “I’m sorry. This situation isn’t funny, is it?”
“I don’t know what makes Zach so attractive. If I became involved with him, he’d throw me over in no time.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Zach has a reputation for taking out women just once, then dropping them.”
Angela considered this for a moment. “I wouldn’t pay too much attention to gossip. The Sheriff may just not have found the right woman.”
“Possibly,” she conceded, “but if I went out with Zach, my father would be mortified. He might have another stroke.”
Angela held up her hand. “I have a suggestion. Go for a one-night stand out at Zach’s place where no one will see you. Satisfy your curiosity, then find someone you can take home to your father. That’s what I would do.”
It was a tempting idea, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to risk it. Would one night with Zach Coulter be enough?
“I’d better get back to the gallery.” Claire rose, smiling at Angela. “Thanks for listening to my troubles. Come with me. I’d like you to see Paul’s work. I want your opinion.”
Zach Coulter shouldered his way into The Rising Sun Gallery with Brad Yeager at his side. Being a head taller than everyone gave him the ability to spot Ramsey right away. “He’s the blond-haired guy standing next to Vanessa Trent.”
Yeager craned his neck. “By God, it’s the Vanessa Trent. She has a set of knockers that won’t quit.”
Zach didn’t bother to look around the gallery for Claire. He knew she was still in the plaza with Angela Whitmore. But he couldn’t help comparing Claire and the actress. Give him Claire any day. Better yet, any night.
“Who’s the old, bald runt with them?” Yeager asked.
“Max Bassinger, the billionaire from Texas. He lives here part of the year. Ramsey’s his attorney. Run a check on Bassinger, will you?” Zach moved forward as Seth headed to the bar. “Let’s take Ramsey out back and question him alone.”
Zach tapped Seth on the shoulder just as he came up to the margarita bar. “I’d like to have a word with you.”
Seth shot him a hostile glare that might have intimidated some men. “You’ve questioned me twice. I’m busy getting Vanessa Trent a drink.”
“Out back—now—unless you want Vanessa to see you arrested.”
“What for? I haven’t done anything.”
“Obstructing justice. You didn’t tell me that you had a motive to kill Duncan Morrell. You invested a bundle in his lithographs and lost your ass.”
A dull flush shot up Ramsey’s face, and Zach saw that he’d scored. With Yeager at his side, he led Ramsey through the crowd to the back of the gallery. Lobo and Lucy were sitting just outside the rear entrance. Zach gave his dog a pat and let Lobo lick his hand while he positioned himself so the light over the door shined directly in Ramsey’s face.
Pointing at Yeager, Ramsey went on the offensive, a bullshit lawyer tactic. “Who’s he?”
Yeager pulled out his wallet and flipped it open to show the official FBI seal and his photo ID as Zach said, “Special Agent Yeager is down from the Gallup office to help me with rodeo problems.”
Seeing the Feebie ID shook Ramsey. “What do you want to know?”
“You had a reason to shoot Morrell. You don’t have an alibi,” Zach said.
“I say arrest him, get a warrant, and tear his place apart,” Yeager put in, following the plan they had to squeeze the smarmy lawyer. “You’ll find the murder weapon.”
“I did not kill Duncan. Sure, I was angry because he sold me those lithographs, but I’m rich, I—”
“You’re lying,” Zach yelled. “You’re maxed out on your Visa. American Express cut you off.”
Ramsey glared at Yeager. “The FBI must be in on this case. You wouldn’t have access to those records.”
“Why would I call in the Feebies?” Zach hedged. “Brad’s up in Gallup bored silly. He’s doing this for fun, right Brad?”
“Yeah. Not much happens on the res,” Yeager responded, then he waited a minute. When Ramsey didn’t speak, Yeager told Zach. “Read him his rights.”
“Just a darn minute! You can’t arrest me.”
Darn? Zach grinned. What a wimp. “You have the right to remain silent—”
“I can prove I didn’t murder Duncan Morrell. I have an alibi.”
Zach slanted a glance sideways at Yeager. The bluff had worked. “I interviewed you twice and you said that you looked for Claire Holt, couldn’t find her, then went home. Are you changing your story?”
Ramsey’s face was even more flushed than before, having turned the color of an eggplant. Boy, this was going to be good. Zach could just feel it. “You’d better tell me the whole truth this time, and don’t you dare leave out a single detail.”
Seth raked his fingers through his hair, ruining the too-perfect line, then said, “I waited for Claire, but she didn’t come out. I had picked up the key to number five. I was going to take her down there.”
As Ramsey hesitated, Zach saw Yeager was confused. “The Hideaway doesn’t have a front desk. The keys are in boxes,” he explained. “You slip in ten bucks and take the key. If the key is missing, you know the bungalow is in use.”
“I walked out there to say I’d be there as soon as I found her … but I went in and didn’t come out.”
“Was there a party in number five?” Zach asked.
Ramsey tilted his head upward and the glare of the light revealed the sweat coating his brow. “You could say that.”
“Get more specific,” Yeager told him. “You’re in deep shit.”
“Look, I’ve been seeing Claire Holt for months. Her father is crazy about me, but I’ve never gotten to first base with her. Max Bassinger suggested slipping half a Roofie into her drink to relax her, then bring her down to number five.”
“You little prick!” Zach cocked his arm, ready to give him the same punch that had leveled Bam Stegner.
“Zach,” Yeager cautioned. “Don’t touch the suspect. Let’s do this right.”
Zach could barely control himself. “A Roofie can make a woman helpless.”
“I didn’t mean any harm,” Ramsey whined. “I just thought that if Claire made love to me, she’d like me a whole lot more. It was just half a pill. She was still talking. She seemed okay to me.”
“So what was Bassinger going to do?” Zach asked. “Watch?”
“Of course not. He was just holding the room until we could get there.”
Yeager asked, “What went wrong? You never came back for Claire.”
Ramsey looked down at the dogs, sitting by Zach’s boots. “Stacy Hopkins was in there stark naked giving Max a blow job. I couldn’t drag Claire into a scene like that. I went in and shut the door.”
“Who was laughing?” Zach asked, remembering Claire had heard laughter.
“Max hooted and said I was too uptight. He’s my best client. I didn’t want to alienate him. I stayed in the room and watched. Stacy couldn’t get enough … so I let her take care of me.” Seth’s voice was dropping with every word until it was hard to hear him over the sound of the band in the plaza. “The three of us were in that room going at it until dawn.”
Fifteen
Claire and Angela became separated at the front entrance of The Rising Sun Gallery. It had been crowded when Claire had left with her father, but now there was a throng in the gallery, and just one clerk to help. What had she been thinking? This was no t
ime to be sitting in the plaza, feeling sorry for herself.
Claire saw Suzi at the sales counter frantically writing up an order. Their gazes met, and the freckled-faced blond rolled her eyes heavenward. Claire was on the way over when she spotted Zach at the back of the gallery, coming in the rear door. He must have come by to check on Lobo, she decided. He was smart enough to know that the Art Festival was going to be a mob scene, and the dogs were better off waiting out back.
As he shouldered his way through the crowd, his eyes on her, Claire saw he was dressed entirely in black. Midnight black denim jeans emphasized the length of his legs, and the long sleeves on his black chambray had been rolled back to the elbows to expose powerful forearms. Tonight, Zach was wearing his badge. It was pinned to the pocket of his shirt, but the silver star was slightly off-center, as if he’d put it on as an afterthought.
Recalling the way she’d let him kiss her last night, a flush of heat warmed her neck and cheeks. With it came the advice Angela had given her. What harm would there be in having a fling, then finding a suitable man to take home to her father.
“You look like Darth Vader in cowboy boots,” she said.
He smiled, an adorable, sexy smile that would have convinced anyone that he had just received the ultimate compliment. “I came by earlier to tell you I’d checked out Paul.”
“Really?” she said, as if she couldn’t have cared less, but she was secretly pleased. “Suzi didn’t—”
“She was with a customer, so I didn’t stop.” He gave her a slow once-over that stripped her down to her birthday suit. “Great outfit.”
She shrugged as if the compliment didn’t matter, but it did. She’d spent a lot of time deciding what to wear. The baby-soft deer suede dress had a deep V-neck and a wrap skirt. The rich green, tinged with a hint of blue reminded her of the high-country meadows at dawn. The color offset the bright turquoise corn necklace that had been hand crafted and polished to enhance its natural color.
“Quentin Reynolds gave me this necklace,” she said a little too quickly, but the way he was studying it so closely made her stomach flutter. “Corn is the staple of the Pueblo Indians, you know. It’s sacred, and giving someone a corn necklace symbolizes lasting friendship.”
“I don’t need any history lessons. I grew up around here the same as you.” He was staring into her eyes so intensely now that it made her weak. And warm. Perhaps deer suede, even though it was lightweight and perfect for high-country evenings, was too heavy for a gallery crowded with people. And Zach Coulter was standing far too close.
“I take it Paul wasn’t the man at The Hideaway,” she said to get the conversation back onto business, and he nodded. “I told you he wasn’t the one.”
She lowered her voice and leaned closer to him, explaining what she’d decided to do about Paul’s prison record. Then she added, “Thanks for befriending him. He told me that you lent him the money to buy good clothes and new boots.”
“Glad to help. Every man needs two things in life, a good pair of boots and a good woman.”
There was something in his low, husky tone that made her believe this was an intimate comment, but she chose to tease him a bit instead of allowing him to become too personal. “Boots? That just goes to show you the gap in intelligence between the sexes. Who’s man’s best friend? A dog. Now, a woman is smarter. Diamonds are a girl’s best friend.”
He smiled again, but it was more of a smirk this time. “You’re after money, huh? Guess I’d better try a little blackmail.”
Blackmail. The word alone brought back the image of him kissing her breasts and heat pooled in secret, intimate places. The look on his face made her pulse skyrocket. She managed a comeback, but it was an effort. “Threatening me again? Why don’t you just grab me by the hair and drag me back to your cave?”
“Don’t give me any ideas.” He winked with a grin. “You’re so easy to blackmail, no telling what you’d do if I got you back to my cave.”
Obviously, Zach thought he was God’s gift to women, and she was only encouraging him by flirting with him instead of using her earlier tactic of being cold. Tonight she didn’t feel like being cold and sarcastic. She was elated at showing Paul’s art and thrilled to have so many people in her gallery.
She put her fingertip on the silver star pinned to Zach’s shirt. It was warm, having absorbed the heat from his body. Her pulse surged for a second before settling back into a faster than normal pace.
His dark brows slanted downward as he looked at her hand almost resting on his chest. Her own eyes were drawn to the open V-neck of his shirt where an intriguing tuft of hair had edged its way out. She had the absurd urge to unbutton his entire shirt and run her fingers through the crinkly hair on his chest.
“Feels good, doesn’t it?” he asked, his voice a shade shy of a whisper, carrying with it a sensual undertone.
For a second, she thought that he had read her mind and was telling her just how good his chest would feel, but then she realized he was talking about the badge where her finger was still resting lightly.
She yanked back her hand, her words coming out in a jumble that she hoped made sense. “I’ve never seen you wear it.”
A smile glimmered softly in his eyes as if he knew exactly what she’d been thinking. “I put on my badge during the rodeo. Folks around here recognize me, but it doesn’t hurt for strangers to know the law’s around.”
“I’m surprised you’re in town with so many cowboys and tourists out at the rodeo arena, getting drunk.”
His eyes narrowed and a frown marred the angular planes of his face. “I’m here on official business. I need to talk to Max Bassinger.”
She smiled with more enthusiasm than she felt, amazed she’d wanted him to say that he’d come just to see her. “He was out front a minute ago, cooling off, I think.”
He let her words hang there without responding while his gaze slid down her body a scant inch at a time. She waited for the familiar anger to come, but it seemed to have been tempered by Angela’s outrageous suggestion. A damp patch of moisture formed between her breasts as she wondered what it would be like to give in to her baser instincts and make love to this man.
A smile tugged at the corner of his lips as he moved his head and his thick, dark hair shifted across his brow. He winked at her, saying, “Later.”
Claire heard Suzi calling to her, but she watched Zach move through the crowd toward the entrance. She was very, very tempted to take Angela’s advice. One night. What could it hurt?
But then she remembered the tears in her father’s eyes and the anguish in his voice. Just seeing Zach Coulter upset him terribly. If he even suspected she’d succumbed to temptation—the way her mother had—and made love to Zach, he’d be crushed.
It would prove that she was exactly like her mother.
Vanessa Trent intercepted Zach before he reached the front door, and Claire watched them talking, although there was too much noise in the gallery to hear what they were saying. An unfamiliar sensation of anxiety replaced the happy feeling she’d had just moments ago.
Zach and Vanessa. Both tall, both dressed in ebony. A perfect match, she thought, like two sleek thoroughbreds. Vanessa smiled, then tilted her head just slightly as she laughed, an extremely provocative gesture.
Zach responded with a smile that Claire had never seen. It was a wide smile that revealed a set of perfect teeth beneath those sensual lips that usually smirked at her in a knowing, teasing manner. The grooves bracketing his mouth deepened and the lines fanning out from his eyes appeared. It was a masculine smile, the kind of smile reserved for a drop-dead gorgeous woman.
Zach walked away from the actress, and now Vanessa was smiling a self-satisfied smile. Did he tell her that he’d see her later? Undoubtedly. Claire tamped down her feeling of envy. She had what she wanted, a first-rate artist and a successful gallery.
Max Bassinger stood outside The Rising Sun Gallery, looking through the window at Claire watching Zach Coulter. He’
d just witnessed the little scene between the two of them.
Interesting. Mighty interesting.
No wonder Claire Holt wouldn’t sleep with Seth. Who could blame her? Zachary Coulter was a real stud who was built like a fullback, but moved with the athletic agility of a running back. All man.
A man’s man.
Max had only spoken to the sheriff once when Coulter had stopped him on a country road, claiming he’d been speeding. Max had denied it, of course, even though the speedometer on his Viper read 120 mph when he’d heard the siren. The sheriff had given him a ticket, hardly saying a word.
But Max was an expert at reading people. The first time he’d met Seth Ramsey, Max had known it would take a little effort, but he could have him. He’d used a ploy that often worked. Bring in a sexy woman and let her make love to you both. Separately, then together.
Hands everywhere, legs everywhere, arms everywhere … tongues everywhere. Suddenly you were doing something that you’d never dreamed you’d do.
And getting off on it.
Wanting more.
On that backwoods road, Max had sized up Zachary Coulter while the sheriff was writing the ticket. Nah, Coulter wasn’t the type to allow a group grope to become a two-man show. He wasn’t the kind to even consider sharing any woman with another man.
But there was no law to keep Max from fantasizing about it.
“It’s a damn sight cooler out there than it is in here,” Zach said as he came up to Max.
Max nodded, a little surprised that the sheriff had sought him out. He kept his eyes on Zach’s face, but that didn’t mean he’d missed the black denim outfit, especially the way the jeans clutched his sex like a lover’s hand.
“Yeah, cooler,” Max agreed as he let his eyes drift over the group inside the gallery for Seth. He’d disappeared over ten minutes ago when he’d gone to get the blonde bimbo a drink. Max had been so absorbed with trying to guess why Vanessa Trent was coming on to him that he hadn’t seen where Seth had gone.
