One Night with the Texan(11)
She stood from her chair and smiled. That perfect little grin that made him crazy. He would remember this. He hadn’t been played this well in...maybe forever. Still, paybacks for Dr. Finley would be priceless. She wouldn’t get away with this.
But why did that little voice of reason in the back of his mind keep repeating, Yeah, she will...
Tallie swung her feet to the floor and got out of bed. She had a long day ahead of her. She quickly got dressed, grabbed the bottled water and headed to the wagon to get her tea. But the can was empty. She dug down inside the boxes of rations. No tea. In fact, she realized she was out of almost everything.
In the past few days, she’d made real progress on the site. She had just begun to find tiny pieces of pottery she was almost certain came from the 1500s or earlier. She hated to interrupt her work now. But she’d learned long ago, no tea, no clear head. No clear head, no work. So, to the store she would go.
The small town of Calico Springs was only about ten miles from the dig site. Returning to civilization always felt good but odd. It didn’t take her long to find what she needed, including her tea. To be safe, she grabbed two more cans. She added a can of insect repellent that hopefully was better than the first she’d bought and a box of mothballs to the items in her cart. Somebody had long ago told her skunks wouldn’t tread over mothballs. She didn’t have anything to lose.
Once she’d purchased the supplies, it was back to the dig site. On the way she called in to Dr. Sterling at the museum. He was excited about the slivers of pottery she’d found in the past few days. He encouraged her to keep at it as long as her condition would allow, apologizing again for not having enough staff to send someone to help her.
The remaining seven weeks would go fast and, before she knew it, she would be out of time. That was one thing her boss didn’t need to remind her of. She had Cole Masters for that.
Only a mile from the cabin the car began to pull hard to the left. Crud. Not a flat. Please. But when she got out and checked, that was exactly what she had. She looked around at the same rolling hills she’d been gazing at since the day she’d arrived. No human in sight.
Tallie walked to the back of the vehicle and began taking boxes of groceries out to get to the spare tire. The spare tire rack had long since stopped functioning so the tire had to be stored in the back along with everything else. She crossed her fingers the jack was with it and the spare had some air.
She was in luck. She found the jack and when she bounced the spare out of the vehicle she was pleased to see that it had plenty of air. But then she popped off the hubcap only to find the lug nuts were rusted onto the bolts. She stood, arched her back and considered her alternatives. It would take a dozen trips to carry her supplies to the camp. She might have phone service but no clue whom to call. It looked like this would cost her a full day of digging.
She heard a pickup coming down the private road, turned and saw Cole Masters behind the wheel. Of all the possible white knights, why did it have to be him? She didn’t want to be indebted to this surly man for anything.
He pulled up next to her and got out of his truck.
“Give me the lug wrench.”
“I can do this myself. Thanks anyway.”
“There might be a spider lurking behind the tire.”
She glared. “It must be nice not to fear anything.”
He snatched the tool out of her hand, lowered the car until the wheel was firmly back on the ground and loosened the rusty bolts in less time than it would have taken her to remove one brand-new one. As she watched him work, she was again struck with the feeling that she’d met him before. Something about him seemed familiar. It was then that she saw it: a small tattoo, partially revealed in the vee of his shirt collar where it was unbuttoned.
“You have a tattoo,” she ventured. “What is it, if you don’t mind me asking?”
He froze. Then he turned the last lug nut, pulled off the tire and stood. “You’ve probably seen one like it at some point.” He pulled aside the collar on the shirt.
“That’s cool. You know I do remember seeing one like it.” She frowned with a shrug. “I just can’t remember where.”
He merely smiled. It was a humorless smile that only amplified the little warning bells going off in her head. What was he up to now?
Today he was wearing black jeans and a black shirt. His hair had grown out since she’d first arrived at the ranch and it looked shaggy and wind-blown. If you took away his beard, he’d look exactly the way the stranger had looked that night in New Orleans.
She stepped back from him, her heart thundering in her chest and her eyes growing wide. It couldn’t be. It. Could. Not. Be. Was Cole Masters the man she’d...met...in New Orleans? She shook her head in denial. It was impossible. The man who had taken her to bed was nice. He wasn’t arrogant. There might be an uncanny resemblance, but the two men were completely different.
But everything fit; all the pieces suddenly slammed together. Cole would be the kind of guy to have treated her the way he had. He probably either borrowed the clothes he’d worn or visited a thrift store. So no one would recognize him. He didn’t live under a bridge or in a run-down apartment in New Orleans. He lived in multiple mansions around the world. She recalled a couple of news articles she’d read after Dr. Sterling had warned her to be wary of Cole Masters.
Dr. Sterling had no idea just how right that warning had been.
Six
She took a step back as the truth washed over her. “You knew. All this time. You knew and you didn’t bother to tell me?”
“I was curious how long it would take you.”
Her emotions were all over the place. She pressed her hands against her forehead. She could feel the blood surging to her head while her heart pounded in her chest.
“You are an arrogant, sneaky, sabotaging, lying, two-faced billionaire.” She turned to march back to her truck. “Is this how you get your kicks? You...you play with people’s emotions?”
In her mind a war raged. Was this the same guy she had met and shared a bed with or was he trying to mess with her? The man she’d met in New Orleans might have been a derelict but he was a nice derelict. She could feel the blush run up her neck and across her face. Even the tips of her ears felt hot.
Her mind was whirling. She couldn’t stop staring at Cole as she desperately tried to dispel the notion that he was the sexy stranger who had so easily and proficiently taken her to bed. A stranger. One who did magic things with his hands, his mouth, his body. The memory of that night would stay with her forever.
“You lied to me.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did. If you’d been honest, you would have told me as soon as you knew I didn’t recognize you. And I wouldn’t have recognized you without the tattoo. And the dark shirt. And the jeans.”
What was he grinning about?
“I’ve never done that before, just so you know,” she added.
“Done what?”
“Gone to bed with a complete stranger.”
“It was a great night. Why are you apologizing?”
“I’m not apologizing,” she retorted. “I just wanted to set the record straight.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me.”
He stood and rubbed his hands together. “I didn’t do anything you didn’t want me to do. You worry too much. We both had a great time. That’s all that counts. It just isn’t a big deal.”
The more he shrugged it off, the angrier she got.
“So picking up a stranger in a bar is the norm for you? How very sad.”
“No.” He rested his hands on his waist and held her gaze. “As a matter of fact, that was a first for me, as well. But I can’t say I’m sorry.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”
He frowned, obviously not understanding.
“You left me there,” she continued. “You left me to wake up alone without even knowing your name. Who does that?”
“Look, Tallie—”
“No. Don’t ‘look, Tallie’ me. What if you had a disease? For that matter, what if I had a disease?”
“I took precautions. Anyway, we both know it’s all right now.”
Oh, how she wanted to tell him how it wasn’t all right. Before she could gather the words Cole spoke.
“Tallie, I admit I could have handled it better. But everywhere I go, at least several times a month, I come in contact with a woman or a tight little group who sends in a woman to try and entrap me. If we have sex, a false pregnancy claim will shortly follow. If we arrive at a restaurant, you can set your watch by how soon she will accidently fall. Or step in a hole walking up to my front door and sprain her ankle so that she can sue. In New Orleans, when I told you I wasn’t into a long or permanent relationship, I meant it. If I recall, you said the same thing. I’m not a family man. I never will be. I don’t want a wife and I don’t want kids. For all I knew, you could have been like any of those other women. I never thought I would see you again, so why bother with formalities?”
He tossed the tire iron in the back of her vehicle and walked toward her.
“You could have asked me my name. I know my own name and I wouldn’t mind sharing it. Especially...especially under the circumstances.”