by Lori Wilde
Ranger did not come back that night or the next. The day after that was his birthday. Ember had gotten a special present for him, but it would have to wait until she had him in her bed again.
He called her of course, and sent texts, and had the local florist deliver a massive bouquet of stargazer lilies, with a sweet note that said, “When you gaze on these, think of me, because I’ll be thinking of you—Ranger.”
Yeah, right. He was thinking about fast radio bursts, and she knew it. Not that she was jealous. She wasn’t. Not of his career. Not even of Dawn. She just felt . . .
Left out.
While he couldn’t fully discuss the breakthrough with her, it wasn’t quite as earth-shattering as Dawn had made it sound. Apparently, she’d figured out a piece of the puzzle of the FRBs, not the whole enchilada. Still, even that small piece was a big deal in the astronomy world, and renowned scientists, the world over, were flying in to investigate the discovery.
With all the brouhaha going on, Ember didn’t know if Dawn had remembered about Ranger’s birthday, but Dawn texted her to say that the party had moved from Wes’s house as they’d originally planned to a star party at the observatory because it had a lot more room for the visiting astronomers.
Ember dressed with care. It would be her first time seeing Ranger since he’d walked out of her bedroom sixty hours earlier. She wondered if he’d gotten any sleep and if he remembered to eat. He could forget about the essentials of daily living when his mind was fully engaged.
She wore his special present—a sexy black-and-red bustier with garters—underneath a sapphire sheath dress, knowing that the color played up her hair and her eyes. She applied extra makeup and put on a pair of catch-me-do-me stilettoes. She wanted him to take one look at her and forget all about fast radio bursts and smart research partners.
At least for a little while.
When she arrived at the observatory, she saw people in formal wear going in through the front entrance. Men in tuxedoes, women in ball gowns, and she felt distinctly underdressed. Dawn had not warned her that what started off as an off-the-cuff birthday party had morphed into a formal affair.
She should have figured it out. The place was chock-full of astronomy VIPs.
There was even valet parking, and her heart sped up when she turned her car over to a wide-eyed young man and realized she was going to have to walk into the building with strangers.
Not that strangers intimidated her. Not one bit. She was an outgoing extrovert. But the people walking into that building were some of the smartest people in the world. What did she have to offer in the way of conversation to the likes of them?
She glanced around, hoping to find someone she knew. Ridge or Rhett, any of her sisters, Palmer, Fiona, Zeke, Chriss Anne, Spencer, Angi, Andre. Luke. As Cupid’s mayor, Luke should be here.
Finally, she spied Wes Montgomery and his wife, Sally, handing the keys to his Cadillac to the valet.
He smiled and waved her over.
Relief flooded her. At last, someone she knew. They exchanged pleasantries and walked up the sidewalk together.
“That friend of yours and his partner have turned this observatory on its ear with their research,” Wes said proudly. “I always knew Ranger was going to make a big splash.”
“It doesn’t hurt that he’s so handsome either.” Sally leaned in close as if revealing a secret.
“You’ll be giving him that job now,” Ember said with the force of a real estate agent fighting to get her client the best deal possible. “Right?”
“Ember.” Wes shook his head. “Don’t you get it?”
“Get what?”
“I don’t stand a chance of landing him now. The world is Ranger’s oyster. He can go anywhere in the world. The McDonald is mostly a teaching observatory. He’ll want to go someplace where they’re doing cutting edge research on FRBs. I wouldn’t be surprised if he and Dawn both end up at CHIME.”
“CHIME?”
“Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment.”
“Oh,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say. It was fully starting to sink in that Ranger was a rising star and he was not long for the Trans-Pecos.
“I’m sorry now that I made him jump through those hoops, and that Luke coerced him into doing that silly film.” Wes seemed to suddenly realize who he was talking to, made a quick forgive-my-faux-pas face and said, “No offense.”
“None taken.” She knew the film was inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. She also knew Ranger was special, had always known it. That’s why she’d wanted to be his blood sibling when she was ten. She’d been hoping to absorb some of that specialness.
Didn’t happen.
A tuxedoed waiter passed flutes of champagne to Ember and the Montgomerys. Another server passed through with savory puff pastries. A third carried figs wrapped in prosciutto and held together with a toothpick.
Someone had doled out a lot of money for this shindig, and Ember knew it couldn’t have been Dawn. She was a poor student on a fellowship.
And since she still hadn’t seen any of Ranger’s friends or family, she concluded that Ranger’s party hadn’t simply been moved from Wes’s house to the observatory. Rather, someone with big pockets and a lot of pull had hijacked it from Dawn.
The kind of pull that could magnetize Ranger right out of Cupid.
Feeling sick to her stomach, she waved off another waiter carrying skewered chicken satay on a tray. The party sprawled from the indoor air-conditioned building to the grounds around the telescopes. It felt like people were speaking a foreign language—quasars, distant dwarf galaxies, megaparsecs, dark energy, and y-ray bursts.
Some groups were engaged in heated debates about confirmation biases, and speculation that FRBs were proof of alien space travel. It made Ember’s head spin unpleasantly.
Ranger had talked to her about such things before. But he’d given it to her in small digestible doses with easily understood explanations. Here, everyone else was already up to speed. No need to dumb it down for the guests, except for her, and no one was paying her any attention anyway.
A couple came up to greet Wes and Sally, giving Ember a chance to break away from them. She needed to get off by herself. Needed time to absorb this new information, this startling knowledge that there truly was not a place for her in Ranger’s high flying world.
Chapter 22
“I always deserve the best treatment because I never put up with any other.”
—Jane Austen, Emma
Ember tried chatting up people, but they weren’t the friendliest bunch. Scientists, she’d discovered, were generally introverted deep thinkers, with no disposition for idle chitchat. She introduced herself around the room, told a few jokes, nothing off-color, but she got strange looks for even trying.
Okay, tough crowd. She was starting to feel like gum stuck to the bottom of their shoes when she spied Dawn standing on the sidewalk outside the Visitors Center surrounded by a group of tuxedoed men who were hanging on her every word.
Dawn made eye contact, smiled, and lifted a hand in greeting.
An inordinate amount of happiness flooded Ember at seeing someone she knew, even if Dawn was one of them. At least she was a friendly face.
Breaking away from her group, Dawn rushed up to her. “You came!”
“Of course I came. It’s Ranger’s birthday. Congratulations to you, by the way. Apparently, you are responsible for all this hubbub.” Ember flapped a hand at the well-heeled group surrounding them.
Dawn crinkled her nose. “Ranger is just as responsible as I am for the breakthrough. He started the research project. This posh stuff is maddening, but it’s part of it.”
“What is it exactly that you discovered?” Ember asked, a small part of her holding on to the hope that if she could just understand this stuff she still had a place in Ranger’s universe.
Dawn started spouting a whole lot of stuff Ember didn’t understand, but the gist of it was that
Ranger and Dawn’s research had accurately predicted when the next FRB would occur, and it had happened just as their calculations forecast. No one had been able to do that before. It took the astronomers one step closer to figuring out the source of the fast radio bursts.
“That’s awesome. I know you are so proud of your work.”
“And I know you are so proud of Ranger.”
“He told me,” Ember said. “About his plan to make me jealous.”
“Did it work?” Dawn winked.
“It did.” Ember couldn’t help grinning.
“Go on with you, then.” Dawn poked her in the ribs with her elbow. “That’s why he’s smiling so much.”
“I’m sure you’re the cause of that.”
“Don’t sell yourself short, Ember,” Dawn said. “You mean a lot to him.”
Dawn was such a sweetheart that Ember couldn’t believe she’d been jealous of her.
“I’ve got to entertain this bunch.” Dawn jerked a thumb over her shoulder at the group waiting for her to return. “After all this ruckus dies down, we’ll all go for a drink.”
“That sounds nice,” Ember said, and meant it. “Have you seen Ranger?”
Dawn turned her head. “He was here a bit ago. You want me to text him?”
Ember held up her phone. “I did when I first got here, but he hasn’t answered.”
“Some gasbag probably has him cornered somewhere. He’ll text you back.” Dawn gave Ember’s shoulder a friendly squeeze and went to rejoin her colleagues.
Leaving Ember alone once more.
The place was getting more and more crowded, but still, there was no one that she knew. She wished she’d asked Dawn where Ranger’s friends and family were, almost went back to find out, but a bulky man in a reflective vest that read SECURITY came over to escort Dawn off to a private wing of the building.
So much for that.
It was starting to get dark, and more people were moving from inside the building to the telescopes outside. The migration drove Ember indoors to get away from the crowd. Really, if she wasn’t going to get to see Ranger, she might as well go home. She was standing in an empty corridor trying to decide what to do when her cell phone dinged.
Her heart leaped, and she wrestled the cell phone out of her purse. Turn around, Sexy.
She stopped breathing, turned to find Ranger standing there, looking drop-dead handsome in a tuxedo, red bow tie, three-days’ worth of beard scruff, and cowboy boots that matched. Her slightly rumpled, dapper, cowboy professor.
Her heart skipped a beat, two. Not her professor. Not anymore. He belonged to the world.
He pocketed his cell phone, cocked his head. Winked.
She meant to tell him how good he looked, how happy she was to see him. She meant to ask him how he was feeling, if he was eating enough, if he’d gotten any rest. But looking into those dark eyes, she got swept up in his pulse-stopping grin, and she couldn’t say a word. Instead, she flew across the corridor to him, her heels clattering against the tile floor.
The minute she grabbed hold of his tie, Ember knew she shouldn’t do it, was yelling at herself not to do it, but there was an unstoppable part of her, that Lucy Ricardo part of her, that wild redhead DNA that simply could not be suppressed.
This was dumb. This was stupid. This was that night, with Trey in the wine cellar, all over again. Why did men in suits at fancy parties cause her to lose her mind? What was wrong with her?
With that bow tie stretched out as her leash, she opened the nearest door without a combination lock keypad on it and pulled him inside.
It was a janitorial closet.
Not the most romantic place in the observatory, but on the plus side, it did smell like soap.
In the pitch dark, her hands were all over him and his were all over her. Fingers combed through hair. Mouths fused. Legs trembled.
He picked her up and she locked her legs around his waist, and he did a little half-circle in the tight enclosure to find an empty wall and pressed her against it.
“God, I missed you.” He showered her with hot kisses, ran his arms up and down her body. “You are so hot.”
“Me? You’re the hot one.”
“We’re both hot, how’s that?”
“Very democratic.”
“Did you get the flowers I sent?”
“I did. I loved them. Thank you for thinking of me.”
“I’m always thinking of you. So stargazer lilies, were they too on the nose?”
“They were perfect, just like you,” she murmured.
“I hate that I got stuck up here. Especially right after we—”
“Screwed our brains out?”
“You’re incorrigible.”
“And you love that best about me.”
“True.” He kissed her forehead, sending a low vibration buzzing through her head.
“C’mon, this is me you’re talking to. Be honest. You’re loving every minute of this star stuff.”
“I didn’t love leaving you behind.”
“But you love what you’re doing.”
“Well, yeah, Dawn’s discovery is monumental—”
“She told me it was your research that was the key. She just noticed the pattern.”
“She’s downplaying her role. I gotta tell you, Em. I think I might be the luckiest man in the world. Having an amazing woman like you in my life, being on the cusp of uncovering one of the biggest astronomical mysteries of my time. Hell, it makes up for my mother packing up and leaving me, for my hard-ass father, for the scarlet and rheumatic fevers, the heart surgery. It was all worth it to be where I am today.”
The tone of his voice was just about the sexiest thing she’d ever heard. She captured his face between her palms and kissed him so fervently, he let out a groan.
His hands were up her dress, burning hot against her skin.
She was so happy to be here with him, to be loving him, to hear the strong, steady humming in her head when his lips touched her. In this moment, they were completely on top of the world and she forgot that they were in a closet at the McDonald Observatory, and that world-renowned dignitaries had gathered, that the man she loved was doing world-changing research.
Right here, right now, it was just Ranger and Ember, two best friends who had fallen in love making out in the closet.
And the darkness was sublime.
Until the door jerked open, and the light got in.
“Dr. Lockhart.” The burly side of beef hired as a bodyguard stood in the doorway of the closet. “The governor is waiting for you.”
Ranger eased Ember to the floor and slipped behind her so he could quickly zip up her dress, and his trousers.
“The governor?” Ember gasped. “Of Texas?”
“Yes, ma’am,” the bodyguard said, averting his eyes.
Ember touched Ranger’s arm. “Did you know about the governor?”
“I just found out a few hours ago that the governor was flying in for the party to meet Dawn and me.”
“And you let me pull you into the closet?” Her voice was an angry whisper.
He knew she was having flashbacks to that incident with Trey. He wanted to reassure her and tell her he wasn’t the least bit ashamed, and in fact had enjoyed himself immensely and they would still be enjoying themselves if the guy at the door hadn’t interrupted.
“Doctor,” the bodyguard said, “the governor is on a tight schedule, if you could just come along with me now.”
“You ready?” Ranger took Ember’s arm and they started for the door.
“I’m going to meet the governor?” Amazement tinged her voice, and he could feel goose bumps dot her skin.
“No, ma’am.” The bodyguard held up a palm. “Access to the governor is by invitation only. You are not invited.”
“Then I’m not going either,” Ranger said. “I’m not into this VIP nonsense.”
“Doctor,” the bodyguard said, propping the door open with his foot. “You’re the VIP the go
vernor has come to see.”
It fully hit Ranger that his life was about to change in a major way. He’d been so busy verifying Dawn’s discovery that he hadn’t had much time to think about it. But now, with the governor of Texas waiting on him, reality sunk in, and he wasn’t sure that he was prepared for this.
“You have to go see the governor,” Ember said. “I’ll be fine. You can tell me all about it later. I’m going on home, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Can she wait for me here?” Ranger asked the bodyguard.
“In the janitorial closet?”
Ranger glowered at the guy. “At the party.”
“There’s a lot of demands on your time,” the bodyguard said. “I’m guessing.”
“Really.” Ember beamed at him. “It’s fine.” She reached up to brush off his shoulders. “Oh, you’ve got a little lipstick on your cheek.” She rubbed it off with the pad of her thumb.
They left the closet escorted by the bodyguard. Dawn was in the corridor along with a dozen other astronomers visiting from around the globe. Men and women he’d only dreamed of meeting.
This was his time to shine, but he couldn’t do it because he was worried about Ember. How was she feeling? Was she really okay? Why the hell couldn’t she come with him to meet the governor? Seemed like bullshit to him.
The bodyguard herded everyone toward a private elevator at the back of the building. Ranger stopped. No, he was taking a stand. If Ember couldn’t come, he wasn’t going. End of story. He turned to go back for her . . .
But she was already gone.
Moving as fast as she could without calling attention to herself, Ember went back the way she’d come, past partygoers, who like her, had not been invited to meet the governor. People were lining up to peek through the telescopes. Others were lying on blankets staring up at the stars. Still others were seated in various places inside and outside the building.
“Canapé?” asked a passing waiter, extending a tray with fresh puff pastries.
Why not? She hadn’t eaten, and she didn’t get to spend time with Ranger. If she hadn’t been driving herself back to Marfa, she would have gotten a glass of champagne. There was so much to celebrate tonight.
