by Robyn Grady
“Just business.”
“Then I’d best not keep you.”
She made to stand but instead of doing the smart thing and letting her go, he lightly caught her hand. That same jet of sensation swam up his arm and, while he wanted to hang on, he let go fast. Physical contact was out, but now that coffee was ordered, he might as well sit back and listen.
“I really wouldn’t mind hearing that story,” he admitted.
She considered him for a moment before her expression eased and she lowered back down. “Well, if you have time. It goes way back to the War with Mexico. Did you notice the park next to the club headquarters?”
He got comfortable. “Sure.”
“Back in the early eighteen hundreds, just beyond that park, a parcel of missionaries set themselves up. The adobe church is still there. You’d know all about those.”
“Vaulted ceiling,” he said. “Naves that were slightly taller than they were wide. Few windows although the light was organized to illuminate the altar to dramatic effect. The walls needed constant remudding to stand a chance against the New World elements.”
She sent an impressed smile. “Ten out of ten.”
Sitting back, they let Barb fill their cups before going on.
“Back in the War with Mexico,” she said, when the waitress had left, “around 1846, a Texas solider found a fallen comrade. The soldier tried to save his life, but it was too late. It wasn’t until he was burying the body that he came upon the jewels. A black opal, an emerald and a red diamond. The dead man had no identification so the solider decided he’d take the jewels back with him to Royal. They’re so rare, each on its own is priceless, back then as well as now.”
“Did anyone ever find out why the fallen soldier had them?”
“Never, which makes the legend all the more mysterious, don’t you think?”
He grinned, spooning sugar into his cup. “So how do these gems relate to the plaque?”
“Apparently red diamonds are the gems of kings. That’s how the first quality of the plaque came to be—leadership. The black harlequin opal is perhaps the rarest. It’s said that this particular type of opal possesses healing powers and also an inner light that illuminates honesty, integrity or, more simply, justice.”
“The plaque’s second quality. And the emerald?” he asked, thinking of how her eyes were sparkling like priceless jewels as she spoke.
“For many centuries around the world emeralds have been thought to be the stone of peacemakers.”
“Leadership, Justice and Peace.” He nodded and smiled. “Nice. So where are these mysterious jewels now?”
“No one knows for sure. The story goes that the soldier had wanted sell them, buy an even bigger spread, build himself a whopping great mansion. But when he got home he struck oil.”
“Black gold.”
“Ended up he didn’t need to sell the jewels to make it rich.”
“Has anyone ever tried to find them?”
“Way back, even before Tex Langley’s time—”
“The founder of the Cattleman’s Club.”
“That’s right. A group of men got together, the legend goes, to guard the stones. Others say they were simply some of Royal’s leading citizens who’d made a pact to protect the town and its citizens. There are even some disbelievers who say those men just made up the story to build their motto around.”
“You don’t believe that?”
Her eyes flashed. “The legend’s far more exciting.”
“So, if the jewels exist, where do you think they are now?”
“Somewhere safe. Not that Royal’s big on crime. We’re big on oil and cattle.”
“There are always visitors,” he said, looking at her over the rim of his cup as he sipped.
She sent him a teasing look. “Are you aiming to go treasure hunting?”
He laughed and set his cup down. “Not this visit. You look as if the thought of a treasure hunt excites you.”
“I like finding new and beautiful things. A painting I can look at all day long. A song that gives me goose bumps because the words and tune are so full of meaning. Know what I mean?”
He smiled, nodded. Yeah, he knew.
“What’s your favorite piece?” he asked.
“Of music?”
“Of treasure.”
She stared into her cup for a long moment, considering. “I don’t know that I have one.” Her glittering eyes met his. “At least not yet.” She tipped forward. “Do you have any hidden treasures?”
The question took him aback. He did have one. Something he rarely took out because it was that precious. It mightn’t make sense to some, but the feelings it evoked…he could barely bring himself to look at it. But Elizabeth didn’t need to know any of that.
“No,” he lied. “I have nothing like that.” Straightening, he finger combed hair fallen over his forehead. “Any more Royal stories I should hear?”
“It’d take all day to go over this town’s history.” She glanced at the clock above the jukebox. “And you have a flight to catch. Have you told Abigail you’re leaving?”
“Not yet.”
“She’ll be disappointed.”
Or relieved.
He set aside the pang of guilt and disappointment in himself and laid another bill on the table. Glancing at his empty cup, he angled his legs out from beneath the table.
“Better get back to the hotel to pack.”
“I’m headed that way. Mind if I tag along?”
He should have at least hesitated. He was leaving. No need to prolong this impromptu meeting. Get any more involved. But as he found his feet, he heard himself say, “Not at all.”
That waitress stopped taking an order to watch them walk by and, it seemed, every other person they passed as they strolled down the street gave a curious smile and tip of their head. But Daniel didn’t care how many tongues would wag. Soon he’d be back home where a person could truly lose himself in the rush, although he wasn’t looking forward to the cooler weather, particularly after today’s pleasant change. Rather than shrugging into his coat, he folded it over an arm and, with a valid reason, inspected Elizabeth’s attire.
“No need for your fur today.”
She flashed a cheeky smile. “It’s not a real fur.”
He tucked in his chin. “Not real? It looks so…”
“Expensive? It is. For a fake.”
“That foxtail belt?”
“Imitation, too. One thing I did change at home was the so-called trophy room.” Despite the sun, she visibly shivered. “From as far back as I can recall, I’ve hated the thought of those walls.” She shot him a look. “Was your father into hunting?”
“He used to be.” When his stomach swooped a sick loop, Daniel cleared his throat and changed tack slightly. “He’s into the law now more than ever. He’s a judge.”
“Did he want you to study the law, too?”
“He demanded that I did.” Glaring dead ahead, he set his jaw. “Only made me more determined not to.”
She pretended to gape at him. “Why, Daniel Warren, you’re a rebel.”
“It’s not rebellious to want to live your own life.”
Decide when to come and when to go. He caught her downcast look. That last comment had obviously got her thinking about her own predicament, and so he swerved the conversation back onto a higher note.
“I wanted to do something different.”
She nodded a greeting to a middle-aged couple walking their dachshund then asked, “What got you interested in architecture?”
“My typical male brain. I like to build things. I thought about studying to be an engineer but a friend’s father was an architect. He showed me a few of his drawings one summer and I was hooked.”
“So, you’re a bit of an artist?”
“Couldn’t paint a landscape to save my life.”
“Ever tried?”
“I don’t set myself up for failure.” Seemed that monster steer-horn club
design was an exception.
“You must have painted when you were a child,” she said.
“I’m not a child anymore.”
But a memory of someone else who’d loved his paint and easel at a young age pushed its way into Daniel’s mind. Clenching his stomach muscles, he embraced the image for just a heartbeat then forced himself to shunt it aside. He kept walking.
“I don’t paint,” he said. “Never will.”
“Not even to make someone you love happy?” she teased.
He answered with the utmost confidence. “Not even then.”
“I’ve tried. Unfortunately I sucked.” Something warm in his chest tugged at her soft laugh. “My dream is to one day own a Monet Water Lilies.” A diamond bracelet glittered in the sun as she wound a long wave behind an ear. “How long have you been working for yourself?”
Daniel shook off the image of Elizabeth looking stunning, standing before a panorama of those famous flowers to reply.
“I started the company five years ago.”
“From what I hear, you’ve certainly come a long way.”
“I put in a lot of hours,” he said, matching his pace to her languid stroll. “I made the right contacts and things came together.”
“You work hard,” she affirmed.
“Always.”
“Ever give yourself time off for good behavior?”
“I treat myself when I’m on location.”
“You mean when you’re away from home. Like now?”
He looked at her twice. Was that a leading note to her voice, or simply wishful thinking on his part? Concentrating on the path ahead, he thought again and laughed at himself. Get it together, Warren. The lady isn’t propositioning you. She’s staying true to her hospitable heritage and being polite.
“Most of my work comes from up north or overseas,” he pointed out.
“You don’t get down this way often?”
“This is the first time I’ve been in the South in over a decade.”
“Then maybe we’ll bump into each other again—” she gifted him a wry smile “—in ten years or so.”
The numbers tallied up in his head. In ten years he’d be forty-five. God willing, his business would still be going strong. But other than that…
Would he still have the same circle of friends? He’d probably still be a bachelor. Fact was he’d never contemplated marriage. After his abomination of an upbringing, he’d go so far as to admit he shuddered at the idea. If a woman he was seeing began to slow down whenever they passed the diamond rings laid out in a jewelry store window, he quit calling. Harsh, perhaps, but necessary. He wasn’t looking for a wife. Didn’t want a family or a son “to follow in my footsteps.” He’d sooner put a gun to his own head.
They arrived at the hotel, the oldest and best respected in Royal, so the maître d’ had told Daniel this morning on his way out. Elizabeth had stopped before a monster of a potted palm, looking like an earthbound angel as a dry breeze combed her long fair hair.
She peered up at the hotel’s stone facade. “Well, this is it.”
He braced his legs, shoulder-width apart. “Yes, it is.”
“Good luck again.” Her tone was sincere.
So was his. “You, too.”
“Don’t work too hard,” she said over a slender shoulder as she turned and walked away.
Daniel watched as those sexy pink heels clicked a provocative tune all the way down Main’s wide pavement. When she’d disappeared around the next block, he sucked down a breath and moved inside the quiet, high-ceilinged lobby then crossed the plush Oriental carpet to the lifts. In his suite two minutes later, he stopped to study his Cattleman Club’s mock-up and grunted. Giant steer horns. Not one of his better ideas.
Decided, he snapped his cell phone from his belt. No use delaying.
Abigail’s number was ringing when the doorbell sounded.
He tossed an impatient glance over. Damn. He’d meant to put out the Do Not Disturb sign. Housekeeping could make the bed after he’d vacated.
He strode over and fanned open the door. Rand stood in the corridor, surprise on his face.
“You’re back already?”
Daniel huffed. “No thanks to you.”
“Boss, you pay me the big bucks to read your mind. You might not have wanted me to leave but you most definitely wanted to be alone with Elizabeth Milton.” Crossing his arms, he leaned up against the doorjamb. “How’d it go?”
“Actually, very well,” Daniel conceded. “We had coffee. Chatted about the town’s history, how that might play into a new design.”
Rand straightened. “Are we back on?”
“No. We’re out of here,” Daniel confirmed. “Let me make a call and I’ll get back to you in ten with an exit plan.”
“Want me to let the pilot know?”
“Midday takeoff, if he can do it.”
Rand pivoted away and had disappeared inside his own suite next door when the elevator pinged. Daniel’s door was halfway shut when the earth stopped revolving and, off balance, he nearly toppled sideways.
What the devil was Elizabeth doing here?
She emerged from the elevator like a star stepping onto a red carpet. Spotting him, she bowled him over with an innocent, dimpled smile.
“Why, Daniel, you look stunned.”
He remembered to breathe. To think.
“Stunned would be the word. Elizabeth, what are you doing here?”
Had Abigail sent her for some reason? No, that made no sense. Her being here didn’t make sense at all.
A mysterious glint in her eye, she moved closer. “Invite me in and I’ll tell you.”
He got his whirling thoughts together enough to step aside and motion her in. She brushed past, that irresistible scent drifting over him, and, breathing deep, he closed the door.
“Is something wrong?”
“Depends on how you look at it.”
She continued on toward the center of the room, her behind hypnotizing him as it swayed in the pale pink fitted skirt. He swallowed against a suddenly dry throat.
“I’d offer you a drink but nine a.m. seems a little early.”
Pivoting around, she shrugged. “If I wanted a drink I’d have stopped at a bar.”
“What do you want?”
“Guess there’s no way around it,” she said, “except to come straight out and let you know.”
As she closed the distance separating them and stepped into his personal space, Daniel’s respiration cranked up and sparks began to fly. When she pushed up on tiptoe, looped her arms around his neck then brought her lips to within a whisper of his, those sparks transformed into a more dangerous form of heat. Then, to really confuse him, she gifted him with a kiss that turned that heat into a world of fireworks. Compared to this, last night’s experience was child’s play.
As her breasts pressed in and her tongue wound out to loop sensually around his, a steamy rush of carnal pleasure swept through him, something similar to the back draft from a twenty-story fire. Hypnotized, he shaped a palm over the back of that silken hair and followed his instincts. He held her tighter, kissed her deeper and told himself to hell with consequences.
As she continued to curl around him and his every inch grew hard, Daniel couldn’t stop imagining the next step. The bedroom. Clothes falling off. Urgent cathartic sex first. Long and slow and gloriously deep sex after that.
When she reluctantly pried her mouth from his, Elizabeth’s breathing was ragged, too.
“I couldn’t have you leave without letting you know how much I enjoyed last night.”
His heartbeat booming, he stole another smoldering kiss. “Up until our discussion on family.”
“That had nothing to do with us.”
“I’m obviously slow, but I didn’t realize there was an us.”
“There can be—” she lavished a lingering kiss on the beating hollow of his throat “—in a here and now kind of way.”
Surging testosterone
levels through the roof, he cupped her behind as she pressed against him.
“I know a man in this situation shouldn’t worry about questions,” he admitted as her soft, sweet lips brushed his again, “but where did this come from?”
His gut said she wasn’t the type to make a habit of offering herself up on a plate like this.
“I wanted to get to know you a little better. And with you planning on leaving today, that doesn’t give me much time.” Her lidded eyes searched his. “If you’re available, that is.”
Before his mouth slanted over hers again, he growled, “Oh, I’m available.”
Five
As his lips covered hers, Elizabeth gave herself over to the heat-infused magic and let her every inhibition go. She hadn’t been able to sleep last night for rehashing in her mind the roller coaster of emotions she rode whenever they’d touched. Especially when they’d kissed. Now Daniel knew.
She’d come here for precisely this reason.
To believe she would never feel this kind of intensity again was foolish. The world was full of attractive, interesting men. However, whether she confessed it to anyone else, she could at least admit it to herself: ten months of the year her world was limited. She could have quietly lamented Daniel Warren as a missed opportunity. But she’d decided to seize the reins and take what she wanted while she could.
Right now she wanted Daniel.
Her jacket had fallen to the floor. Zip undone, her dress was slipping past her hips, her knees. Her every nerve ending was burning, glowing white-hot. Wherever he touched, a brushfire followed.
With his mouth still covering hers, she was about to give up on unbuttoning and tear what remained of his fastened shirt wide open. Before she could, Daniel gripped her shoulders and gently eased her away. Vaguely she was aware of standing before a man she’d known mere hours wearing nothing but French white lace underwear and five-inch pink pumps. She was more concerned about why he’d broken their embrace.
She swept a fall of hair from her eyes. “Is there a problem?”
“Just thinking ahead.”
When he started walking away, an alarm bell rang in her head and all the pent-up breath left her body in a whoosh. She was about to ask where he was going, why he was leaving her, when she realized and relaxed. At the door now, he was slipping the Do Not Disturb sign over the outside knob.
