The Billionaire Cowboy's Speech (Necessity, Texas)

by Margo Bond Collins

  Some of the buildings had clearly been small houses at one time. The goats' house wasn't one of those. It had definitely been one of the barn-looking ones.

  After rinsing out her cup and wrapping her ankle securely, she set off toward the most likely looking home for goats.

  The closer she got, the less likely it seemed. The building itself was in good shape, but the grass around it had grown up in a way that Leta suspected goats might not be likely to allow.

  Still, I can only see the back of it. Maybe the front is all clipped down. Chomped down. Whatever.

  It wasn't. But having come this far, Leta felt foolish simply turning around. The large double door wasn't locked, even though it was latched shut.

  This is rude, Leta, she told herself, even as she flipped the metal latch back As she pulled the doors open, a shaft of light shot into the barn, reflecting off metal.

  She hadn't expected the barn floor to be cement, but the smell of oil wafted out to her as she pushed the doors all the way back to reveal a small, white, four-seater airplane.

  "Oh, how pretty," she said aloud.

  Tentatively, she touched it, running two fingers lightly along the fiberglass wingtips only long enough to see that it had been well cared for. As she made her way around the back, she caught a glimpse of lettering along the .

  "Oh," she murmured. "It has a name." Her voice echoed a little in the otherwise empty space.

  As she came up alongside the nose, she had to step back to read the gold lettering clearly—to make sure she'd read it correctly.

  Tor's Triumph.

  Leta was still staring at it, a frown creasing her forehead, when Tor pulled the barn door—I guess that would be hangar door, Leta thought distractedly—and stopped, breathing heavily, when he found her examining his plane.

  * * *

  "So. You have a plane?" Her voice seemed to come to him from a great distance.

  He opened his mouth before he had even decided what to say. What popped out was the unvarnished truth.

  "Seventeen."

  Including the jets.

  Surely he didn't have to get quite that specific, did he?

  "That's kind of a lot for a ranch-hand, isn't it?" That slow, calm tone terrified him, and he tried to find the right words to explain his deception.

  "This is why you never introduced me to your boss, isn't it? You're the boss."

  It was as if last night had never happened—instead of the words flowing smoothly from him as they had since then, they clogged in his throat, piling up so fast in their attempt to get out that they left him choking, unable to say even one thing in his defense.

  Leta glared at him for a long moment, then huffed and turned her back on him.

  She's leaving. I have to stop her!

  Tor reached out and grabbed her wrist. She spun away from him, jerking her hand away with a snarl.

  "I have money," he blurted out.

  She froze and watched him, but her expression didn't change.

  "A lot." He managed to force himself to say the words he least wanted to—but they were the ones Leta needed to hear from him if they were ever to move past this strange, idyllic interlude they'd had and take their relationship out into the real world.

  "I am … a billionaire." This time the pause wasn't from his injury, or any psychological trauma. It felt like sheer cowardice.

  But he'd done it. He'd said the phrase he knew was most likely to cause her to run screaming into the wilderness, as far away from him as she could get.

  Outside the barn, crickets began chirping, a sure sign that it wasn't his imagination making the moment draw out—they really had stood quiet for a very long time. Leta stared at him narrowly, her gaze pinning him to the floor, keeping him from pulling her close to him so he could erase

  Finally, she asked, "A billionaire? Like that orange guy who ran for office? Or … something else?"

  The snort that escaped him probably wasn't the best response, but he followed it with, "Something else, I hope. Something entirely different from that particular billionaire."

  "Because I'm pretty sure he's just a billionaire on paper," she said. "Like, if we added up all his assets, the ones that he actually owns, he wouldn't be worth all that much at all."

  She was rambling again.

  That was a good sign, he hoped—but not as much as he prayed that his next comment wouldn't destroy the fragile web of words she was building around them.

  Still, it had to be said. "No. Not a paper billionaire. I own well over a billion in cash and assets. Some more in land. There's even more in what I guess could be called 'assets on paper,' but …" His voice trailed off. "But yeah. I'm a billionaire. The real deal."

  Not until he had wound down and stood in front of the woman he loved, exposed in the lie he'd told her, without any defense to offer—only at that moment did he suddenly realize that his speech had switched back to an easy, fluid, conversational style.

  Apparently it didn't matter what kind of discussion he was having. He could make love to her, fight with her, tease her, or tell her stories. As long as he was talking to Leta, his words flowed.

  The sudden panic that clutched the center of his body had almost nothing to do with that, though. Tor wasn't afraid of losing the ability to speak easily if Leta walked away from him.

  He was terrified of losing her.

  The expression that slid across her face—horror and anger and disgust, all rolled into one—intensified that terror.

  "What else have you lied about?" she demanded.

  "N-nothing." He stumbled over the word and cursed internally, knowing it made him sound weak and dishonest.

  "That's a lie, too." Leta tugged her arm away out of his grip to take a step back from him, and this time he let her. "You told me you were a ranch hand." Her brow furrowed, her eyes flicking back and forth as she reviewed their time together.

  "Who are you, really? What's your real name?" she demanded, then took another step backward. "It isn't Tor, is it? No, of course it's not. Is it even Edwards?" Wrapping her arms around her torso and continuing her slow march, she began trying to remember what she might know of him. "Edwards, Edwards, Edwards," she muttered, hugging herself more tightly with every iteration.

  Tor knew the moment it struck her. She stopped halfway into a step, frozen with the toe of one foot barely touching the ground behind her, her eyes getting wider than he would have deemed possible. The fingers of one hand snaked up to her lips and hovered there, as if to cover up what she was about to say, to hold the words inside.

  "I am such a fucking idiot," she breathed. "Andrew Edwards. You got kicked by a bull. Saving a child who fell into one of your own arenas."

  But here in Necessity, I really am Tor, he wanted to cry out.

  This time, though, it wasn't physical inability keeping him from speaking.

  It was shame.

  Why didn't I tell her who I was from the start?

  But he knew that—he wanted to see if she would like him without all that money.

  "Jesus. You own a baseball team." She turned her outraged gaze on him. "What the hell are you doing out here playing ranch hand?" She flipped her hand out, then let it flutter up to her forehead and closed her eyes for a moment. "No. Of course. The whole ranch is yours, isn't it? You didn't have to ask your boss if I could stay in the bunkhouse because you are the boss."

  She continued talking in an almost contemplative tone. "And this plane. It's not some huge splurge. It's just one of your toys." Almost under her breath, she whispered, "Fuck."

  As if her expletive had loosened the tide of words inside him, Tor found himself able to speak again. "I could take you flying in it," he offered, his voice tentative. "Or if you hate the plane that much, it would be easy enough to sell it. People always want to buy things that used to belong to a billionaire." His voice trailed off as the joke fell flat.

  Leta stared at him, her wide green eyes devoid of any emotion at all.

  Figures the
only woman who's been interested in me is actually repelled by my money.

  Two weeks ago, he would have expected that to be a point in her favor.

  Then again, she now thinks I'm a total liar.

  "Let me show you the rest of the ranch," he offered.

  "The rest of it?" Her voice matched her blank eyes.

  "The main house, the rest of the outbuildings, the main stable."

  "Main stable?"

  Rather than respond to her echo, Tor waited to see what she would say when she came to a point of speaking on her own.

  But she didn't speak at all. Instead, she watched him with those cold, empty eyes for a long moment, then turned her back on him and headed toward the barn door.

  As she walked away, he tried to say more. "W-w-w-ait…."

  For the first time since he'd met her, Leta purposely ignored him as his short-lived ability to speak fled.

  Without looking back at him, she marched out.

  Tor waited, hoping she would return.

  When she didn't, he slumped against the door of the Cessna, wondering if his eyes were as empty as hers.

  Chapter 9

  His return walk up to the bunkhouse was filled with self-recrimination.

  I used to know how to do this—how to seduce women and keep them around.

  Then again, I used to be able to rely on my ability to speak.

  Some part of him was convinced that if only he could say the right words, he could convince her that he wasn't the horrible liar she believed him to be.

  Inside the bunkhouse, a door slammed.

  Leta's closet, he realized as he came even with the bedroom door. He leaned against the doorframe, watching her toss her belongings into her suitcase in jerky motions, her hands shaking as she piled half-folded clothes on top of toiletries, then shoved shoes in haphazardly.

  When she had forced the zipper closed, she elbowed past him, muttering, "Excuse me," without ever glancing up at him.

  He followed her down the hall and out the door, half-hating himself for not offering to carry her bags to her car for her.

  Not that he could say much of anything at the moment, given his stammering attempt at "Wait" earlier.

  The old Tor—the man he'd been before his accident—would have raced after her, stopped her, kissed her into submission and demanded she stay.

  He couldn't do that now.

  Not only could he not trust the words to make their way out of his mouth, but he knew with a certainty he could feel through to his marrow that any woman he could convince to stay wouldn't be right for him. Either she would want him for his money and despise his disability, or she wouldn't mind his speech problems but would loathe the moneyed world he had to move through sometimes.

  Maybe it wouldn't matter. Now that he knew he had the potential to get his voice back, perhaps he could start some sort of physical therapy and go back to being the man he had been before.

  There was only one problem with that: during the two years he'd been without his voice, he had discovered exactly what—and who—mattered to him.

  If I went back to my old life, I could have any woman I wanted, as long as I didn't want anything real.

  None of his so-called friends in high society had come to visit him in the hospital.

  But several people from Necessity had made the hours-long drive up to Parkland Hospital in Dallas.

  When he'd stopped attending their high-society functions, his friends in Dallas had ignored him.

  But when he stopped showing up at The Chargrill at least once a week, Ava Jordan and her grandmother had dropped by to check on him. And brought a pie, too.

  In the last two years, he had learned that the only people worth keeping around were the ones who came back for you, even when you weren't perfect.

  The tires of her silver Kia spun on the gravel, sending white caliche dust up into the air. Tor retreated into the bunkhouse, watching the car from behind the screen door for only a second or two before shutting the main door firmly and heading to his own room to pack up his own hastily assembled belongings.

  Time to get back to my real life.

  Even if merely thinking about it made him choke, as if all his words were piling up at the base of his throat.

  No. He wouldn't allow that to happen.

  Even if he never saw Leta again, at least one good thing had come out the last two weeks.

  He had his voice back.

  Despite his determination to move on, though, a single thought kept echoing through his mind: Maybe I can figure out a way to win her over again.

  * * *

  Leta parked her Kia in her usual parking spot, checked her makeup in the visor mirror, and swung her legs out the door. For a brief instant, the motion reminded her of that first day on the Stuart Ranch, when she had twisted her ankle. A jagged shard of pain stabbed through her chest, but with a grimace, she shoved the memory back down, and stepped onto the sidewalk.

  Her bright red heels clicked sharply against the concrete, the tone changing, but not the cadence, as she moved to the marble floor inside the building. Normally, she would've worn something more comfortable—but she wasn't about to show up looking less than perfect on her first day back to work.

  She was glad of her decision to dress up, too, when she caught sight of Brent leaning against the wall next to the elevator bank, scanning the door as people came through, and her steps faltered briefly

  The urge to bolt almost overwhelmed her, but leaving now wouldn't change anything. She would still have to deal with him the next day.

  And the day after that, and the day after that.

  Unless she could avoid him every day.

  A visceral image of an infinity of days spent avoiding Brent stretched in front of her.

  "Fuck that," she muttered harshly, causing an intern passing by to flinch and scuttle away.

  I can handle anything Dr. Brent Smithson can possibly dish out.

  Nodding a cold greeting at her ex, she strode up to the elevator and punched the number, perhaps with more vehemence than was really necessary.

  "Hey, Leta," Brent said tentatively.

  Leta stared. Tentative wasn't really Brent's style.

  "Can I talk to you for a minute?" he asked.

  Pinching her lips together, she shook her head. "I'm on my way to my office, Brent. I don't have time right now."

  "It'll only take a minute."

  She blew out a sigh. "Fine. What is it?"

  "In private?"

  Glancing around, she pointed at the corner of the room, several feet away from the elevator bank. "That's as private as we're getting."

  "Okay."

  Leta followed him across the room, watching the way he shoved his chest out, as if trying to make himself look bigger.

  Like that rooster on Tor's ranch.

  The thought made her grin, even as the memory lodged in her chest like misery. When she reached Brent, her tone was even more brusque than she had planned. "What do you need?"

  His ingratiating smile faltered. "I…I…"

  All the patience she'd had with Tor, no matter how long it took him to get a sentence out dissipated in the face of Brent's inarticulate sputtering.

  "Spit it out," she said impatiently. "I have to get to work."

  "I wanted to say I'm sorry." The words poured out of her ex-boyfriend in a rush.

  "Sorry?" Leta stared at him, indignant.

  "Yes?" It sounded more like a question than a statement.

  "Sorry's not good enough, Brent." She opened her mouth to continue haranguing him, then stopped and tilted her head. "In fact, nothing will ever be good enough. There's nothing you could ever say or do that would make anything you did to me any better. So don't bother."

  Brent's mouth dropped open, as if the last thing he had ever expected from her was resistance to whatever ridiculous excuse he had cooked up in her absence.

  To hell with this.

  She spun on her heel and marched back toward the elev
ators.

  I guess that counts as 'dealing with Brent.'

  By the time she stepped off the elevator on her floor, she had begun giggling. When she finally reached the administrative offices, tears of laughter were streaming down her face. Ducking into the restroom, she shut the door behind her and leaned back against it.

  To think she had run away to Necessity to get away from that man.

  Closing her eyes for a minute, she leaned back against the door.

  So what am I doing now?

  The answer came to her almost immediately.

  Running back to Dallas to get away from another man who lied to me.

  But this time, she wasn't sure that was what she really wanted to be doing.

  With a sigh, she wiped her eyes, stood up straight, and opened the door again. She had work to do after being gone for a solid week.

  She could go back to considering what to do about the billionaire she'd fallen in love with in that week later.

  Maybe over her lunch break.

  * * *

  I can't let her walk away forever.

  Tor jabbed at the screen of his phone, waiting impatiently for his business manager to answer.

  Three days. He had wasted three days stewing in his own misery, going over and over what he had done wrong and what he might have done differently.

  When he realized he'd been muttering to himself for most of those three days, it had suddenly occurred to him that he might be able to make things right again.

  "I need you get me two tickets to the fundraiser ball for Dallas General." Tor practically barked into the phone when John finally answered.

  "Who is this?"

  "It's me. Your boss. Who'd you think it was?"

  "Sorry, Mr. Edwards. I …um … didn't recognize your voice there for a minute." John stumbled, but only for a second. His adaptability was part of the reason Tor's grandfather had hired him a decade ago, and why Tor had kept him on. "Yeah, sure, I can manage that," the manager continued. "We've got invites here already. You want two more, or will these do? I was going to gift them to an employee."

  "That's good. Keep them for me. No. Wait. I have other plans for one of the tickets. How long is it until the ball?"

  "Three weeks."

  "Good. Get a pen. You'll need to take notes."