The Dangerous Jacob Wilde

by Sandra Marton

  Besides, the ranch had meant something to Charlie and he’d left it to her. That was a kind of obligation. She had to do the right thing with it, if only out of respect for his memory.

  “Ten minutes. He’ll be here by then,” Caleb said. “Okay?”

  “He’d better be,” Addison said, but she softened the words with a smile.

  She could spare another ten minutes, partly because she liked and respected Caleb, her attorney, and Travis, her financial consultant—

  And partly because she was curious.

  She was increasingly certain the Wildes weren’t telling her all there was to tell about the mysterious Jacob.

  She knew he was, or had been, in the army. That he’d been wounded. That he was some kind of hero. His brothers hadn’t said so but she’d heard the rumors from the one lonely cowboy who worked her ranch part-time. Caleb and Travis simply talked about his ability to assess the place.

  “You sell it without his advice,” they’d said, “you’ll regret it.”

  “Couldn’t someone else do it?” Addison had asked.

  The brothers had exchanged a glance so quick she might not have noticed it if she hadn’t been looking at them from across her desk—old man Chambers’s desk—in what passed for the ranch office.

  Addison’s eyebrows had risen. “What?”

  “Nothing,” Caleb had said.

  “Nothing at all,” Travis had added.

  “Bull,” Addison had said calmly. “You’re up to something and I want to know what it is.”

  Another of those quick looks. Then Travis had cleared his throat.

  “Jake truly is the man you want, Addison.”

  Addison had been tempted to point out that she didn’t want any man. She had a career she’d worked her tail off to obtain. But that wasn’t what he’d meant, and she knew it.

  “He’s the best there is.”

  “But?”

  Travis had shrugged. “But, he’s not plannin’ on stayin’.”

  “Here we go. The drawl. The smile. The famous Wilde charm—and you both know damned well how much good that will do you.”

  She’d said it just lightly enough so the brothers had chuckled.

  “Heck,” Travis had said, sitting back and crossing one boot-clad foot over the other, “it works with every other female in this part of Texas.”

  “I bet,” Addison had said sweetly. “But I’m not from this part of Texas. I’m not from any part of Texas.” She’d paused for emphasis. “And I’m not ‘every other female,’ I’m your employer.”

  “Our client,” Travis had said, his drawl as lazy as Caleb’s.

  The brothers had grinned. So had Addison. It was a familiar routine and it still surprised her that she felt comfortable enough with them for relaxed banter.

  “And because you’re our client,” Travis had said, “and we have your best interests at heart….”

  “Try telling me all of it,” Addison had said. “Or I’ll put this place on the market tomorrow.”

  The brothers had exchanged a long look. Then Caleb sighed.

  “Jake’s been in the army.”

  “So?”

  “So, he was, ah, he was wounded. And he, ah, he’s not sure if he wants to stay at El Sueño or maybe move on. And—”

  “And he needs a solid reason to stay,” Travis had said bluntly, no charm, no drawl, nothing but the cool voice of the financial advisor Addison had come to know and respect. “He knows your land almost as well as he knows ours. He’s smart, he’s pragmatic, and he was born knowing horses and ranching.”

  “We promise you,” Caleb had said in that same no-nonsense way, “you won’t regret working with him.” And then, before she could say anything, he’d added, “Have you had any regrets, dealing with us?”

  Thinking back to that conversation, Addison sighed, brought her glass to her lips and drank some more wine.

  No. She most definitely had no regrets. She’d learned not just to like the Wildes, but to trust them.

  Travis had been her financial advisor pretty much since she’d arrived in Wilde’s Crossing. Caleb had been her attorney close to the same length of time. Using a New York lawyer and a New York financial guru just hadn’t made much sense.

  The point was, she took legal advice from one Wilde and financial advice from the other.

  It might make sense to take ranching advice from the other.

  Which was why she was here, tonight.

  Travis had greeted her; he’d taken her on the obligatory rounds, introduced her to his three sisters.

  Apparently, no one had told them that her relationship with their brothers was strictly professional.

  Not that they hadn’t been pleasant, even gracious, but a woman could always tell when other women were sizing her up.

  Listen, she’d almost said, you can stop worrying. I do not, repeat, do not intend to sleep with either of your brothers. They’re hunks, all right, and I like them, but I have no interest in getting involved with any man, no matter how handsome or sexy or rich or charming, not even if hell should freeze over.

  She wasn’t interested in waiting another minute for the Hero to show up, either. The Wounded Hero, she reminded herself, but the wound could not have been much.

  Jacob Wilde was a famous man’s son. He would have grown up rich and spoiled—girls from trailer parks knew the type. So, why on earth was she still standing around, waiting for a man she would undoubtedly dislike on—

  “Jake?”

  “Oh, my God, Jake!”

  Someone had opened the front door ten or fifteen minutes ago. Now the entire Wilde crew was trying to fit through it at once.

  The sisters were shrieking and bouncing like yo-yo’s. Caleb and Travis were laughing. The bunch of them exploded onto the porch, and the crowd moved in behind them for the show.

  Addison sighed with resignation. Too late. She was stuck here, at least until she shook the hero’s hand, or maybe he’d be so engulfed by the crowd that she’d be able to slip out without anybody noticing….

  And then Jacob Wilde stepped into the room.

  The breath caught in her throat.

  She had expected him to be good-looking.

  He wasn’t.

  He was—there was no other word for it—beautiful.

  Tall. Broad-shouldered. A long, tautly muscled body, strong and straight in a uniform that bristled with ribbons. His hair was the color of midnight.

  Corny, all of it, but true.

  He had a face a sculptor might have chiseled.

  A sculptor with a cruel sense of irony.

  Because Jacob Wilde’s face was perfect….

  Except for the black patch over one eye, and the angry, ridged flesh that stretched across the arch of his cheek beneath it.

  CHAPTER THREE

  JAKE STOOD frozen in the open doorway.

  The momentary rush of euphoria at seeing his sisters and brothers drained away as fast as the water from Coyote Creek in a dry Texas summer.

  No party, he’d said. No crowd. And, yes, he’d figured there’d be people there anyway….

  His belly knotted.

  From where he stood, it looked as if the entire county had showed up.

  He took a quick step back, or tried to, but his sisters threw themselves at him.

  “You’re here,” Em said happily.

  “Really here,” Jaimie said.

  “You’re home,” Lissa added, and what could he finally do but close his arms around them all?

  Caleb pounded him on the back.

  Travis squeezed his shoulder.

  Despite everything, Jake began to grin.

  “Is this a welcoming committee?” he said, “or a plot to do me in?”

  They laughed with him, his sisters weeping, his brothers grinning from ear to ear.

  For a few seconds, it was as if nothing had changed, as if they were all still kids and the world was a wonderland of endless possibilities….

  Then Caleb cleared hi
s throat.

  “The General sends his best.”

  Jake checked the room. “He’s not here?”

  “No,” Travis said uncomfortably. “He said to tell you he’s sorry but he got hung up at a NATO meeting in London.”

  Reality returned in a cold, hard rush.

  “Of course,” Jake said politely. “I understand.”

  There was a moment of silence. Then Jaimie touched his arm.

  “Everyone’s waiting to say hello,” she said softly.

  Jake forced a smile. “So I see.”

  Caleb leaned in closer. “Sorry about the crowd,” he murmured.

  “Yeah,” Travis said. “Trust me, bro. We didn’t plan any of this.”

  “It’s just that word got around,” Lissa said. “And people were so eager to welcome you home….”

  “You don’t mind, Jake,” Em said, “do you?”

  “No,” he said, “of course not.”

  His brothers saw right through the polite response. They exchanged a look.

  “You ladies can have him later,” Caleb said. “What he needs right now is a cold brew. Right, my man?”

  What he needed was to get the hell out of here, especially because he knew what would happen once he stepped fully inside the room, where the lights were brighter and the crowd could get its first good look at him, but why add cowardice to his other sins?

  “Unless,” Travis said quickly, “baby brother wants champagne. Or wine.”

  Jake looked at his brothers. They were throwing him a lifeline, a way to grab hold of the past by segueing into an old routine.

  “Champagne’s for chicks,” he said, the line coming to him as readily as his next breath. “Wine’s for wusses.”

  “But beer—” Travis said solemnly.

  Caleb finished the silly poem. “—is for real men.”

  Jake could almost feel his tension easing.

  They’d come up with the doggerel years ago. It had been valid when they were in their teens. Not anymore. They’d all grown up; they’d traveled the world and, in the process, their tastes had become more sophisticated.

  Travis even had a wine cellar, something they teased him about unmercifully.

  Still, a cold beer sounded good, almost as good as the memories dredged up by the silly bit of shtick.

  “A cold beer,” Jake said wistfully. “A longneck?”

  “Does real beer come in any other kind of bottle?”

  The three Wildes smiled. And moved from the porch into the room.

  “Hell,” Jake muttered.

  He’d forgotten the crowd. The lights.

  The reaction.

  People gasped. Slapped their hands to their mouths. Whispered to the person beside them.

  Jake could have sworn that all the air in the big room had been siphoned away on one deep, communal inhalation.

  “Crap,” Caleb muttered. Travis echoed the sentiment, though with a far more basic Anglo-Saxonism.

  “It’s okay,” Jake said, because if ever there’d been a time when a lie was a good thing, it was now.

  A surge of partygoers surrounded him.

  He recognized the faces. Ranchers. Their wives. The couple who owned the hardware store, the town’s pharmacist. The owner of the local supermarket. The dentist. Teachers who’d known him in high school, coaches, guys he’d played football with.

  Most of them had recovered their equilibrium. The men stuck out their hands. The women offered their cheeks for kisses.

  All offered variations on the same theme.

  Jake, it’s wonderful to have you home.

  “It’s wonderful to be home,” he answered.

  Another lie, but what was he going to say? No, it’s not wonderful? I can’t wait to get the hell out of here? I don’t belong here anymore, I don’t belong anywhere?

  “Just keep moving,” Travis muttered.

  Jake nodded. One foot in front of the other …

  Who was that?

  A woman. Standing all the way in the rear of the big room, near Em’s piano.

  He’d never seen her before.

  If he had, he surely would have remembered her.

  Tall. Slender. Dark hair pulled away from her face. An oval face that held a faint look of amusement.

  In a sea of blue denim and pastel cotton, she wore black silk. Sexy black silk …

  The crowd swelled, shifted, and he lost sight of her.

  “You ready for this?”

  “Ready for…?”

  “The next bunch,” Travis said, jerking his chin toward the larger crowd ahead.

  “The cheers of your million fans,” Caleb added, working hard for a light tone.

  Jake forced a laugh, as he knew he was meant to do.

  “Sure.”

  Two lies in two minutes. Had to be a record, even for him.

  “Then, let’s do it,” Caleb said. “’Cause the sooner we make it to the end zone, the sooner we can get those beers.”

  A second laugh was more than he could manage. He smiled instead, took a deep breath and let his brothers lead him forward.

  The crowd swallowed him up.

  He shook more hands, returned more smiles, did his best to ignore the glitter of tears in the eyes of some of the women, said, Yeah, it was good to be back and Absolutely, it had been a long time and finally, mercifully, he, Travis and Caleb reached the long trestle table that held platters of barbecued ribs and chicken wings alongside tiny sandwiches and bowls of tiny grilled vegetables.

  “Real food and girl food,” Caleb said, and this time, Jake’s laughter was genuine.

  “And the holy grail,” Travis said, pulling three long-necked bottles from an ice-filled copper tub.

  Jake took one, nodded his thanks and raised the bottle to his lips.

  “Wait!” Caleb touched his bottle first to Travis’s, then to Jake’s. “Here’s to having you home, brother,” he said softly.

  Was it time to point out that the toast was a little premature? No, Jake thought, and they clinked bottles, then drank.

  The beer was cold and bitter, maybe what he needed to head off the still-throbbing ache behind his eye. Tension, the docs had said, and told him, earnestly, he had to learn to avoid stress.

  Right, Jake thought, and took another long swallow.

  “We’ve missed you.”

  He looked at Travis. “Yeah. Me, too.”

  “Hell,” Caleb said, his voice gruff, “it just wasn’t the same with you gone. This is where you belong, Jacob.”

  Okay. Jake could see where this was going.

  “About that,” he began, but Travis shook his head.

  “We know. You’re not staying. But you’re here tonight. Let’s just celebrate that, okay?”

  The suggestion was harmless; it changed nothing. And the truth was, right now, it felt good to be with his family.

  “Okay,” he said, and then he smiled and touched his bottle to theirs again. “A toast to The Wilde Ones.”

  The old nickname made the brothers grin. And when Bill Sullivan from the feed store came up, clapped him on the shoulder and said, “Hey, Jake, great to see you,” Jake shook hands, said whatever he was supposed to say….

  Until, in a sudden break in the crowd, he saw the woman again.

  He had a clearer look at her now, and more time to savor it.

  Her hair was the color of rich coffee, thick and shiny; she’d pulled it back with something he couldn’t quite make out, pins or maybe combs.

  The style, if you could call it that, was simple …

  So was the image that came into his head.

  He could see her brushing those lush locks into submission. Her arms were raised, her breasts were thrust up so the nipples were elevated—

  Elevated and ready for the whisper of a man’s tongue, for the heat of his mouth …

  “Jake?”

  His groin tightened.

  And that face.

  Sculpted bones beneath creamy skin. Gray eyes. No. They were more
silver than gray. A straight, no-nonsense nose above a mouth made for things best dreamed of in the deepest dark of the night….

  “Jake?”

  A hot rush of lust drove through his belly, so quick and fierce that it stunned him. He hadn’t felt anything like it for a long time.

  A very long time.

  “Hey, man, where’d you go?”

  He blinked himself back to reality, swung toward Travis, saw the plate of food he was holding out. Food was the last thing he wanted right now, but he took the plate and forced a smile to his lips.

  “Just what I needed,” he said briskly. “Thanks.”

  Travis and Caleb began eating. He did, too, though nothing he put in his mouth had any taste.

  He wanted to turn around and look at the woman with the silver eyes.

  Ridiculous, really.

  What would be the point? Forget that moment of lust or hunger or whatever in hell it had been.

  At most, it had been an aberration.

  The unbelievable truth was that he wasn’t into sex anymore, wasn’t into wanting it or even thinking about it. His sex drive had gone south.

  Like the eye, it simply wasn’t there anymore.

  Besides, he knew what he looked like. A guy with a Halloween mask for a face …

  “… and damned if Lissa didn’t say, ‘Barbecue? Barbecue?’ In that way she has, you know, of making you feel as if it’s you who’s crazy, not her?”

  Travis laughed, so Jake laughed, too, but his thoughts returned to the woman.

  And to the sudden certainty that she was watching him.

  Slowly, with what he hoped was an elaborate show of disinterest, he glanced over his shoulder.

  His pulse jumped.

  She was. Watching him. Not with curiosity. Not with disgust.

  With interest.

  And she was alone.

  Not in the sense that she was here by herself, though he was sure she was. What man would bring a woman who looked like this to a party and walk away from her?

  What he meant was that she was alone in the full sense of the word, separate and apart from everyone and everything….

  Except him.

  He felt the sudden leap of his blood. And, once again, that urgent pull of desire.

  Which was crazy.

  Now? he thought. In a room full of people? His long-dormant libido was going to kick in and—holy hell—kick in and add a boner to the fright mask that already made him a standout in the crowd?