Those “bites” on her skin.
In hindsight, had they actually been little punishments inflicted on her?
It didn’t matter, though, because she’d seemed to like them. And that was the thing—Nicki accepted everything he did, accepted him, and that threw Shane for a real loop, because how could she possibly do that?
How would she react if she knew there was weakness in him, a kid who’d flinched whenever his father raised a hand to him? A bitter, wounded thing who felt weak just by coming back to the Slanted C, where so many dark memories remained?
It was time for some repairs, all right, because Shane couldn’t imagine himself living in a world where someone led him around by the emotions, where someone had the power to break him if he opened the gates and let them all the way in.
He went out to ride, and his inspection of those fences yielded far better results than he’d thought. Most of them were in good shape, in spite of his brother Tommy’s neglect of everything else.
He was actually in a decent mood when he rode back, unsaddling and then grooming his chosen horse, Dante, in the stables, then coming out into the sunshine, which was covered by a bank of clouds.
And, wouldn’t you know it, the clouds had brought something with them.
“Carter,” said Russell Alexander, who was loitering by the stable doors, obviously expecting Shane at any moment. He was dressed in casual pants and a white shirt and holding a sheaf of papers. Shane began to wonder if Alexander also had a more secretive contract in either of his pockets.
A document to be signed in blood.
He nearly laughed to himself. This was what you got when you played in different dramas every night—a runaway noggin.
“What’re you doing here?” Shane asked, although he already knew, judging by those papers Alexander was holding. Looked like they might be a formal offer.
Alexander glanced at his phone, almost offhandedly. “It’s Monday morning, the East Coast is alive and kicking, and I’ve already gotten another phone call that I thought I should warn you about. This one was more concrete than the last.”
Shane didn’t want to hear it, mostly because when the bad news fell, his dad’s voice would be the one haunting him the rest of the day.
You lost the ranch on your watch, boy?
Alexander continued. “Your loans will be called in sometime this week.”
Was this hard-case lying? Putting on some pressure so Shane would jump before he looked?
“Your friend confirmed this on the sly?” Shane asked.
“Yes. And everyone needs friends.” Alexander put his phone away. “Same goes for you, Carter. We both know that you’ll sorely need to do something, and I’m giving you a good opportunity. I’ll be discreet about the creditors for a few days, but my group is going to need an answer from you by the end of the week.”
Alexander walked over to Shane, handing him the papers.
“Just look these over, all right?” he said. “Don’t let this chance slip through your fingers.”
Shane should’ve told Alexander that Nicki’s ranch was for sale, not his, but with the loans getting called in…if they even were…
No more cards to play.
No more room for pride.
Still, there was a fighting spark that made him press his lips together, to gather all his dignity and walk right past Alexander and into the ranch house and straight to the office.
Surely there was something he could still do, some kind of last resort he hadn’t yet thought of.
He tried not to look at his father’s chair in front of the TV as he walked to the office, but he felt the bastard watching him from the past, anyway.
Sitting in his own chair, he opened his laptop computer, ready to go through the books one last time.
Surely there was something, and not just for his sake, but for Nicki’s, too.
9
THAT AFTERNOON, when Candace went to pick up her pill prescription at the pharmacy in town, she saw Russell sauntering down the boardwalk past the newspaper office and toward her.
She smiled, biting her tongue, thinking he would cut her off at the pass if she started babbling about business again. They’d had a nice time at the Jackrabbit Bar, and she didn’t want to squander any of that good will.
“Hi,” he said as they met in front of the Hacienda Hotel, giving her that smile that always sent a shot of lightning through her.
“Hi, yourself.”
Russell angled his head, wordlessly inviting her into the hotel as he continued walking.
As they passed the large, ornate mahogany registration desk, she didn’t think twice about going with him. Maybe he was ready to chat over coffee in the courtyard. Whatever the case, she’d let him take the lead.
She only prayed that she didn’t have bags under her eyes from spending most of the night trying not to remember that Nicki and Shane had been upstairs together. It’d been hard, though, because all the while, she’d been wishing she had someone with her, too.
And here he freakin’ was.
“Are you heading home today?” she asked, making conversation.
He stopped walking next to a stand of potted palms. “Not yet.”
Why wasn’t he talking more?
Just for something to do as they stood there, she smoothed down the skirt of her beige dress, her hand brushing the splashy yellow designer knock-off scarf that she’d tied around her waist, using it to pep up her wardrobe. He was dressed in yet another different look, as if today he was an affluent man on a weekend retreat in khaki Dockers and a white shirt rolled up at the forearms.
Abercrombie and Fitch. Don Draper on holiday.
“I’m here for one more day,” he finally added, a flirty gleam in his gaze, “and then I’ll be off.”
There was something else about him this morning, too…. Something that made his walk even cockier than normal, something that hinted that he had triumphed in a way that escaped her.
Then, before her mind could process what was happening, he latched on to her hand, making her gasp at the energy that nearly tore her in two from even a mere touch.
When he drew her in closer, she got near enough to smell the laundry detergent on his shirt.
Oh, my.
“What’re you doing?” she murmured, praying that he didn’t see how he affected her.
“What do you think I’m finally doing?”
His gaze seemed to go hazy-gray as he looked into her eyes, making her knees weak. She kept imagining what it’d be like to feel the slight scratch of his skin against hers as he kissed her.
She tossed her own question right back at him. “What I really mean to ask is why are you doing this now?”
When he glanced down the oil-painting-lined hallway, toward a closed door, it made her wonder if he wanted to talk in private away from the reception desk, where a young town woman was trying to avert her gaze to her computer screen. And when he tugged her down that hallway, her suspicions were confirmed.
He must’ve known exactly where he was going, because he pulled her toward that closed door, opening it, peering inside and leading her into a place of dimness, lit only by a long, high window trimmed with fringed valences.
He shut the door behind them.
Was that the click of a lock she heard, too?
As her eyesight adjusted, she saw that they were standing in a parlor that boasted Tiffany-glass table lamps, leather wing chairs around a fireplace and a poker table surrounded by simpler wood chairs. The faint scent of must and lemon polish floated in the air, telling her that this place had been closed off for a while, yet still maintained.
He reached under a lamp, switched it on. The beaded fringe of the shade quivered, just like the lining of Candace’s belly.
Alone. With him. And he still had that gleam in his eyes—a need, a flicker that told her he knew what he wanted and had always gotten it.
“Is business between us over?” she asked, stepping away from him, not enough t
o make a point but enough to allow her to get her head together. “Is that why it’s suddenly okay for you to…”
“Show you how much I’ve been dying to touch you?”
His directness left Candace flailing a little, and it was a strange situation for a girl who was so used to being in charge with her men.
The back of a high leather chair bumped up against her spine, and he came toward her, slowly, as if they had all the time in the world to sort this out.
“From the very first second I saw you,” he said, “I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”
He was so near now that she had to crane her neck, just to try to see past that dark gray gaze of his. Her heart created tiny sonic booms that went off one bang after another, echoing through her chest, limbs, tummy.
When he bent over her, she held her breath, waiting for it….
Then felt his mouth cover hers.
Another soft boom went off in her head, behind her eyelids, and she parted her lips as his kiss became more demanding, his tongue stroking hers, his hands on her waist, entangled in the scarf she’d tied around it.
Finally, she thought.
And she kept thinking about it as the reverberations faded away, as she was swallowed by the booms that traveled through her, the pressure of his lips and tongue, the rise of desire pounding up her body.
The sound of chimes—his phone ringtone?—was a distant tapping against her stretched senses. He ignored it just as much as she did. Why should business—or whoever was calling—interfere?
Why now, after she’d finally gotten a bit of what she wanted from him?
But then she thought about the ranch… How she shouldn’t be mixing business with pleasure… How a real businesswoman wouldn’t ever go here…
She pushed against his chest, pulling away from him. “All right. So we got that over with.”
“I was hoping things were just getting started.”
“I think we both know better.”
Her body was really getting fed up with her, punishing her with the sharpness between her legs.
She looked him straight in the eye. “The only way anything more could happen between us is when our business is done. You know that.”
As hard to read as always, he kept eye contact with her, and the longer it went on, the more her body keened.
Was business over for him already? Had he made an offer on one of the properties in the area and it wasn’t to the Square W+W?
Then he smiled down at her, running his fingertips over her face. Right now, he wasn’t Russell Alexander the business lion. He wasn’t the L.L. Bean nature man. He was a regular guy in khakis and a white shirt who’d confessed to wanting her just as much as she had wanted him.
“Even though I’m leaving,” he said softly, “I’ll be back after I’m able to make an official announcement. But I can’t say anything about that yet to you or anyone else. Just know that I’ve made my recommendation to the group, and…it’s all good, Candace.”
Her chest popped. Did this mean what she thought it did?
Relief flew in her, and she knew that he could see it as clear as day. He didn’t even give her the chance to ask for clarification: if he meant that the group would be putting in an offer for the W+W.
Did he see some regret along with the relief, though? The sure indication that she wished the W+W would have done better than as a dude resort?
Maybe not, because he cupped her face, crushing his mouth to hers, sending her reeling again.
From that point on, it was a hot mess of her purse hitting the floor, of shirts yanked off, of she and he stumbling toward the poker table at the side of the room, of their gasps as he lifted her to the surface.
Of the heart-thudding knowledge that they weren’t in a bedroom, just in a semi-private parlor where anyone could unlock the door at any time.
And that made Candace all the hotter.
He reached under her skirt to tug off her undies, then pushed her legs so that they were bent. She still had on her bra, and he nearly ripped that off of her, too, leaving her breasts exposed.
As he pulled her toward him for another kiss, her breasts pressed against his bare chest, Candace wallowed in the flesh-to-flesh explosion.
There’d always been something there, between them…. Something instantaneous. Maybe not love at first sight. She didn’t believe in that. But they were two people with a whole lot besides business in common.
Was it enough to build on?
She’d see about that soon….
She fumbled with the fly of his pants, reaching inside, bringing him out, hard and throbbing in her palm. He struggled to bring his wallet out of a back pocket, dug inside it, then dropped everything but the condom as he slid it over himself.
Then he spread her legs, pulled her closer, and drove inside her as she gave a cry of delight, digging her nails into his back.
As she moved with each thrust, he became everything to her: the city she missed so badly, the success she’d almost had and then lost, the chemically tempting man who’d been taboo to her until now…
He hammered into her, nudging her across the table with each pounding of his hips. Climbing onto the surface, he pushed her farther, farther, until she leaned back and grabbed onto one of the chairs for leverage.
Every aspect of him merged and separated in her scrambled mind: city man…country guy. The prize at the end of a long week…
All of him whipped into a montage of color and storm, each image a slash of breath, a punch of heightening ecstasy as she lost every ounce of oxygen in her lungs. She clawed to get it back, losing her mind, too….
She reached a peak just as she started to tumble off the table and he grabbed her, laughing with her, then surging into her a few more times until finally…
He groaned, spent himself, then fell to the table.
In the moments after, they clung to each other, sweaty, weak.
Finally open, finally honest.
“My room,” he said between breaths. “It’s not that far.”
She was off the table before he could say another word. First her undies, then her bra and blouse, and she didn’t even check to see that they were all neat and tidy. But, just as she was about to tie the scarf around her waist again, Russell clutched it.
Letting go of the material, she watched as he fingered the silk, then folded it into a square that he tucked into his closed hand.
A trophy, Candace thought. A memory, just like Nicki kept of Shane in her bedroom.
And, knowing how much Shane had always meant to Nicki, Candace let Russell have it.
Maybe it would turn into more than just a memento—this could be a fling that became the real thing.
In her heart, she felt like it truly could happen.
NICKI HAD GOTTEN a call from Candace earlier in the day. Her cousin explained how she’d run into an old friend in town and she wouldn’t be back for a good, long while. That was okay, though, because the day was full of chores for Nicki: inspecting the breeding barn, checking on some broodmares and finally making calls to get estimates on how much she would have to invest in order to get a strong Western performance training program going at the ranch. The latter was an idea she’d been tossing around, but it’d get the ranch even further in debt if it didn’t pay off.
She couldn’t just sit around while Russell Alexander made his choice. Besides, work never waited.
From the moment Candace strolled into the family room after Nicki had collapsed into a threadbare chair there, Nicki knew something big was up.
She merely stared as Candace stole Nicki’s barely tapped beer on the way to the couch, where she plopped down, took a long draught, then grinned like a well-satisfied kitty cat.
Nicki scanned Candace’s wrinkled dress. Oh, and the hair, which was so bed-headed that it wouldn’t have been a shock to hear that Candace had spent the day in an old Whitesnake music video rolling over the hoods of vintage cars.
“What’s gotten into you?”
Nicki asked.
Candace shrugged.
“Okay,” Nicki said. “Don’t tell me.”
She waited for Candace to spill in five, four, three, two, one—Nicki knew Candace would spill in five seconds.
“I think there’s something going around,” Candace said, unable to stop herself from blurting out something, even if it was only a little tease.
“Yeah, there’s something going around, all right,” Nicki said. “And it looks like it was you.”
Candace smiled and drank more beer.
“Candy…?”
She leaned forward on the couch, her eyes bright. “Yes, Nic, I did the deed with Russell. But don’t get mad at me—he told me his job searching out property here is basically done, and even though he couldn’t say what the outcome will be, he hinted pretty heavily that we’re going to come out of the entire thing very nicely.”
Nicki exhaled, realizing that she’d started holding her breath at the word “Russell.”
Was what Candace said true?
Did the W+W have the Lyon Group in the bag?
She waited for the happiness to come, then waited some more.
It didn’t.
“Wow,” Nicki said instead, still not knowing how to feel about the news or the fact that Candace had gotten together with Russell this soon. Hell, she’d never really warmed up to the man.
As Candace started to tell Nicki about the chance meeting in town with Russell, the room in the Hacienda Hotel and their time there, Nicki’s mind drifted to Shane again. It was never far from him, so it wasn’t a long trip. All day she’d been feeling the nice burn of those vamp hickies on her body. She’d even taken care to hide the one on her neck with Shane’s bandanna, until she’d changed into a high-collared shirt tonight.
She wondered if he was going to call soon.
When she heard Candace saying something about a poker table, Nicki tuned in, only to find Candace watching her, as if waiting for a big response.
“Wow.” It seemed to be the only word suitable for any occasion right now.
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