Crave the Moon

by Lori Handeland

  Nahua Springs had once been a well-respected quarter-horse ranch. Betsy O’Neil was one of the top breeders and Pete one of the best trainers. It wasn’t until after they’d died that Nahua Springs had morphed from real ranch to dude.

  Though it was considered one of the finest in the area, nevertheless, the place had been in trouble for a while. You had to sell a lot of “I wanna be a cowboy” packages just to make the mortgage every month, and that was before you figured in taxes that in recent years had bloomed well past excruciating.

  In truth, without the intervention of Benjamin Morris, Nahua Springs would have been lost years ago.

  Matt rubbed his tired eyes. Gina had been responsible for the place since she was fifteen. She could use a little help, and he was just the man to give it to her. She’d be so grateful.

  He returned to the computer, figuring he should print another copy of the photograph Gina had snatched from his hand—he was certain they had an office center downstairs where he could do just that—but he Googled his brains out and couldn’t find it. The picture was just … gone.

  “Dammit,” he muttered. Someone had removed it.

  Gina? Or Jase? Did it matter?

  He’d probably come across the image eventually—the Internet was like that—but why waste any more time? Matt didn’t need the photo to remember what the area looked like.

  From the expression on Gina’s face when he’d shown it to her, she wasn’t going to forget it anytime soon, either.

  * * *

  Gina would have liked to head directly into town and confront Benjamin Morris. Unfortunately, his office was closed for the weekend. Probably for the best, since she had to spend the next few days scheduling spa treatments and entertaining their guests.

  SOP for the final night of the spa portion of the package was a bonfire, complete with a local crooner who sang amusing cowboy ditties with help from the guests.

  Mel loved it. He and the entertainment began a dueling song contest that had begun as amusing, with Mel continuing to pull old favorites from his boys’ school days like:

  “A bum sat by the sewer

  And by the sewer he died

  And at the coroner’s inquest

  They called it ‘sewer side’

  Oh, it ain’t gonna rain no more, no more

  It ain’t gonna rain no more

  How in the heck can I wash around my neck

  If it ain’t gonna rain no more?”

  But later the contest segued into poetry and became disturbing when a few too many Moonshine Mollys, Isaac’s concoction that tasted like a weak whiskey sour but packed the punch of a double Long Island Iced Tea, led to the following:

  “There once was a fellow McSweeny

  Who spilled some gin on his weenie

  Just to be couth

  He added vermouth

  Then slipped his girlfriend a martini”

  “Whoa!” Gina jumped up from her perch on one of the flat stumps scattered around the bonfire for just that purpose. “And that concludes the entertainment for this evening.”

  “Aw, how come?” Mel muttered. “I know ’bout a hundred more.”

  “He does,” Melda agreed, snatching the nearly empty glass that had held a third Molly from his hand. “Once he gets started, it’s pretty hard to shut him the hell up.”

  “How do you slip someone a martini?” Derek asked. “I don’t get it.”

  “Let’s go.” Tim shot both Gina and Mel a look nearly as dirty as the limerick and dragged his son into the house.

  “A martini sounds good,” Amberleigh announced.

  The cowboy crooner smoothed back what was left of his hair, then wiped the grease he’d spread into it onto his jeans. “I could help you with that, little lady.”

  “Really?” Ashleigh asked. The As were sharing a sheared double log on the far side of the fire. “You have vermouth and gin?”

  “No.” The crooner shifted his hand from his hip to his crotch. “But I’ve got a—”

  “Out!” Gina announced.

  “But I want a martini!” Amberleigh wailed.

  “Not that kind,” Gina muttered. “Believe me.”

  She motioned for Jase to get rid of the guy, and while he hadn’t spoken to her since he’d stalked out of the kitchen, he did as she asked. If it got around that they’d held a lewd-limerick contest on bonfire night they could lose what customers they had. Or maybe they’d have more customers than they could handle. Either way, the cowboy crooner needed to go now.

  What was his real name?

  “I’m gonna write a new sh-ongbook,” Mel slurred. “I jush-t need music for my poems.”

  He was determined to create that music before morning. Gina would have gladly left him to it—she doubted he’d be able to keep from passing out within the next few minutes—except Mel wanted to compose music on a piano they didn’t have, wearing underwear that existed only in his imagination.

  “Isaac!” Gina shouted, and when the old man appeared she shoved a naked Mel in his direction. “Your problem.”

  She’d told him not to serve people more than one of his Moonshine Mollys.

  Gina hurried to her room, retrieved a key, and unlocked the hall closet where she kept clothes she never wore.

  Hanging in a plastic bag right in the center was her best dress. Sure, it had been her best dress since she’d gotten it for high school graduation. But that didn’t make it any less nice. Just a little out-of-date.

  Gina removed the garment from the bag, letting the full white skirt dotted with tiny purple flowers flow through her fingers.

  “You aren’t gonna wear that, are you?”

  Both As stood silhouetted in the door of their room.

  “You aren’t supposed to wear white before…” Ashleigh frowned. “Labor Day?”

  “After Labor Day,” Amberleigh corrected. “Not before Memorial Day.”

  “Why?” Gina asked.

  The girls glanced at each other, then back at Gina.

  “Because you can’t,” Ashleigh said.

  “I assure you I can.” Gina leaned down and grabbed her white pumps from the bottom of the closet. Especially since she didn’t have much choice.

  “Ew!” Ashleigh exclaimed.

  “Not those shoes,” Amberleigh agreed.

  Gina turned them over. They were a little scuffed on the heels, but otherwise they seemed fine to her.

  “White pumps are for weddings,” Ashleigh whispered as if it were a secret.

  “Only?” Gina asked.

  “Maybe christenings.” She glanced at Amberleigh.

  The other girl shrugged and murmured, “Confirmations?”

  “Bar Mitzvahs!” Ashleigh announced.

  “I think that’s Bat Mitzvahs,” Gina corrected.

  “Bats don’t have mitzvahs.” Ashleigh laughed. “You’re silly.”

  “That’s me,” Gina agreed, heading for her room with her white dress and white shoes. “Silly, silly, silly.”

  “Hold on.” Amberleigh stepped in front of her and peered into Gina’s eyes. “You really gonna wear that?”

  Gina nearly walked past without answering. But there seemed to be someone home behind Amberleigh’s usually vacant blue gaze for a change. “I have a business meeting tomorrow.”

  She didn’t, not really. She hadn’t bothered to call Mr. Morris and set up a meeting. That would only give him a chance to refuse.

  “With a man?”

  “What difference does that make?”

  Amberleigh lifted a brow and waited. Gina sighed, thinking of the short, squat, strange little man who had bought her ranch from the bank. She hated the guy. But he was a guy. And the last time she’d visited him, asking for an extension on their loan, he’d taken one look at her dusty boots, faded jeans, and flannel shirt, lifted his lip, and said, Next time, wear a dress.

  “Yeah,” she said. “It’s a man. So?”

  “Important?”

  “Very,” Gina agreed.

 
; “In that case, sugar.” Amberleigh took the white garment from Gina’s hands; Ashleigh took the white shoes, then together they tossed them into the closet and slammed the door. “You’re gonna need a better dress.”

  CHAPTER 9

  “Why are there dresses?” Gina asked, voice muffled as she pulled on a third, or maybe a fourth. Her head popped out the top. “For that matter why would there even be dress?”

  “You never know when you might need a hot outfit.” Amberleigh’s forehead creased as she studied Gina.

  “I know,” Gina muttered. “Three days past never.”

  “This one works.” Amberleigh smiled. “Don’t you think so, Ash?”

  Gina was shocked that she fit into Amberleigh’s clothes. The blonde appeared smaller in some ways and larger in two others. But with a little tugging and pinning—why Amberleigh had pins in her suitcase was as much of a mystery as why she had dresses—Gina had to admit the dress worked.

  “That’s the one.” Ashleigh agreed, then motioned for Gina to turn.

  When she did, she found herself captured by the stranger in the mirror. The garment nipped in places and tucked in others, and the shade—a combination of red and brown that the As had insisted on calling auburn—had made Gina’s plain old brown hair shine with streaks of gold.

  “You wear that tomorrow,” Amberleigh said, “and no man is gonna be able to take his eyes offa you.”

  Gina wasn’t sure how that would help; then again it probably couldn’t hurt.

  “You can’t wear a dress like that without heels like this.” Ashleigh handed her a pair of ankle breakers the shade of a copper penny.

  “Oh, I don’t think so.” Gina tried to return them, but Ashleigh put her hands behind her back and shook her head firmly.

  “The whole effect’s gonna be ruined if you don’t wear the shoes.”

  “The whole effect’s gonna be ruined when I fall on my face and break my nose,” Gina muttered.

  “Even itty-bitty girls wear heels,” Ashleigh said.

  “Especially itty-bitty girls,” Amberleigh agreed. “Makes their legs look lo-o-ong. Makes men wonder how those legs would feel naked and wrapped around—”

  “I’ll wear the heels!” Gina interrupted, not only because if she heard the rest of that sentence her eardrums might go pop but also because she’d needed to put a stop to the image that had leaped into her own head.

  Of her long legs, naked and wrapped around Teo Mecate’s—

  “Thanks,” she told the As, feeling kind of fond of them for a minute.

  Gina had never done anything like this before. No sharing of clothes and shoes, no discussions of men, no slumber parties. The few friends she’d had in school had never really felt like friends because they were always talking about all the fun things they did while Gina worked at the ranch.

  Sure, she’d had Jase. She’d always have Jase. But there was something to be said for a girlfriend.

  “Why are you helping me?” she asked.

  Had she expected apologies for rudeness, perhaps an explanation of girl power, or a sudden profession of friendship, which in her current state she might have accepted, Gina would have been disappointed.

  Because what she got was a yawn from Ashleigh. “We were bored.”

  And a shrug from Amberleigh. “It’s not like you’re gonna come out ahead in any competition for a man. Not even in that dress.”

  “Like there are any men left to compete for,” Ashleigh muttered, disgusted. “Two old guys, a dad, and a little kid.”

  “What about Jase?” Gina asked, then bit her lip. Why on earth was she trying to sic these two on her best friend?

  “He’d never leave here, and I’m certainly not stayin’,” Ashleigh answered as Amberleigh nodded in agreement.

  Every once in a while the As said something that made Gina think they were smarter than they pretended. Because they were right. Jase would never leave Nahua Springs, and neither would she.

  Gina was a bit disgusted with herself. For an instant after the As had declared she couldn’t beat them in a competition, she’d actually experienced a burst of competitiveness accompanied by the thought: I’ll show you!

  Gina rubbed her forehead. The dress and the shoes and the brainless twits were getting to her. She wasn’t in a competition, for men or anything else. The outfit was supposed to make her feel good about herself, give her the confidence to slay the dragon ex-banker in his den.

  And if Mr. Morris got distracted by her cleavage or her legs and gave her another sixty days before he sold the ranch … Gina gave a mental shrug. It was no more than he deserved for looking in the first place.

  There was a wrench in her logic somewhere, but Gina decided not to look for it.

  The As kept her up long past midnight—she’d had to wait for her nail polish to dry—and Gina overslept the next morning. Then the unfamiliar clothes, the needle-heeled shoes, which fit fine with the addition of some newspaper in the toes—Ashleigh had freakishly big feet—the styling of Gina’s hair, and the application of makeup so old she had to add water in order to smooth some of the dry cracked stuff onto her face meant she was parking the truck in front of Benjamin Morris’s office at 9:30 instead of the 8:45 she’d planned.

  “Tough.” Gina slammed the door of the truck. It wasn’t as if Mr. Morris wasn’t going to be in his office on this fine May morning. He always had been in the past.

  As before, Mr. Morris sat behind a desk that was much too large for him. Gina had to wonder if he’d inherited the furniture from an extremely tall previous owner of the building or the desk itself was the usual male compensation mechanism. She’d been around enough men to know what big cars, big hats, big boots, and big horses meant.

  She also knew better than to say so.

  As her mother would have told her, now was the time for honey, not vinegar. Since Gina was more of a vinegar type she had her work cut out for her.

  Maybe the dress would help.

  “Gina,” Morris murmured, his voice so low it still startled her to hear it coming from a man so small in stature his feet couldn’t possibly be touching the floor from the height of his gigantic office chair. “What can I do for you?”

  “I … well…”

  Get it together, Gina. Smile. Dance. Show him what you’ve got!

  Gina smiled, straightened her back, and walked to the guest chair, swishing the skirt for all she was worth. And Mr. Morris did notice. His gaze went from her face to her breasts, then did a quick leap to her feet and stayed there.

  “Nice shoes.” He licked his lips.

  “Thanks. I’ve come about this.” Leaning over, she set the letter in front of him. Instead of peering down her dress, as any red-blooded American male should, or so she’d heard, he leaned to the side so he could keep his gaze on her feet.

  Gina tapped the paper, then snapped her fingers beneath his nose. She was starting to think that the dress had been a mistake. The shoes certainly were.

  She snapped again when Mr. Morris continued to salivate over parts of her much lower than he should be and was at last rewarded with his attention.

  His tiny dark eyes flickered over the letter before he pushed it back toward her. “There’s nothing I can do.”

  “I’ll have the money next month.”

  She wouldn’t, but she had to say something.

  He stared down his also-short nose at her. “It wouldn’t matter if you did.”

  “Because you don’t like money?”

  “I adore money. Which is why I accepted the offer of the gentleman who was in my office this morning a single moment after I arrived.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  He leaned back and spoke to the ceiling: “They never understand.”

  “Who’s they?”

  He lowered his head. “People who can’t pay their bills. I warn them and I warn them; then when I sell off the merchandise they’re so confused.”

  “Sell?” Gina stood, towering over the man. He
didn’t appear intimidated. He was no doubt used to it. “You sold my ranch?”

  “Not yours. Not mine, either, anymore.” He wagged a finger at her. “I did warn you.”

  Gina sat again. Her legs weren’t going to hold her much longer. “What happens now?”

  “That’s up to the new owner.” Morris’s attention had returned to Gina’s shoes. “A doctor…”

  “Crap!” Gina sprang to her feet just as Mr. Morris murmured, “Mecate.”

  * * *

  Matt returned to the Strater and began to make phone calls. He put a decent-sized crew on alert. They’d come just as soon as he found the area of the ranch that matched the photograph. A few more calls and he’d rented all the equipment he’d need for the dig.

  He’d thought the meeting with Benjamin Morris would take longer, that the man would require convincing, that Matt might even have to bid against other interested parties or wait for a public auction. Instead, he’d walked out of the office a half hour later with the paperwork.

  Cash worked wonders. Or at least the ability to complete a wire transfer.

  Matt tossed the few things he’d removed from his suitcase back in. He couldn’t wait to tell Gina.

  He’d just set his glasses on the bedside table, then yanked off the tie and scratchy dress shirt he’d bought the day before when someone tapped on the door. Figuring it was a bellman—even though he hadn’t requested one, he had called to inform the desk he was checking out—Matt glanced up, saw he’d left the door ajar in his hurry to return to the ranch, and called, “Come in.”

  It wasn’t the bellman.

  At first he wasn’t sure who the woman was. She flew across the room so fast Matt, without his glasses, only got the impression of tall, curvy, lots of legs, and miles of flowing hair. Then he caught the scent of the forest an instant before he caught her.

  His mind, full of those legs and that hair and the smell of her, stuttered once before it came to the conclusion that she’d found out about him saving her ranch and come to thank him. Personally, so to speak. So he wrapped his arms more tightly around her.