Probably Me [Davis Hollow, Davis Ranch 3] (Siren Publishing Allure)

by JQ Jones

  “You’ve got Carlevaros in Pennsylvania with issues because he likes to be able to offer his friends from the big city something that they can’t get. Maxwell in Virginia isn’t happy because he won’t have any more marijuana for his guys for their communion services. God knows what the guy in Houston wants. I don’t see how you planned on getting out of this without losing at least a little bit of skin,” Clint said.

  “Believe it or not, Clint, I planned on all the things that have come up, coming up. These are all expected issues. I mean we’re talking about Mr. Carlevaros and Mr. Maxwell. I know them very well. Of course Mr. Vargas might be my hardest sale. He’s got a bad temper, he’s unpredictable and his men are the most ruthless. He’s also the person I’ll have to talk to in the nicest, calmest way,” Nora said.

  “Why would you worry about him? You just stood up to the Mafia and a Jamaican drug lord.”

  “I know each one of my distributors very well. I know that Mr. Vargas was respectfully asked to leave the biggest Mexican gang in the Americas.”

  “Really?”

  “He was too violent.” Nora laughed at Clint’s expression.

  “You are so totally oblivious to how much danger you are in right now. I can’t even talk to you,” Clint said.

  Clint stopped fussing around long enough to look at her with narrowed eyes. “I told Miguel to be ready to go around 4:30 if that’s okay with you.”

  “That’s fine with me,” Nora said. She kicked off her sandals, pulled off her nice blue dress and laid it on the back of the chair so it wouldn’t get wrinkled. She lay in her tangerine bra and matching lace panties in the bright sunshine falling over her dark chocolate body. She just watched as he paced, he had long since given up the pretense of packing.

  She wanted him through narrowed eyes. Truthfully, she had wanted him since he woke up in her shed. He was going to get to be a habit. Like eating too much chocolate or pigging out on Ben & Jerry’s. But some habits you keep for life and others you get rid of after they give you cavities, make you fat and contribute to high blood pressure and diabetes. She narrowed her eyes trying to decide which one Clint was.

  Clint began another line of argument in order to convince her that the men she dealt with were too dangerous for her to meet face-to-face.

  “Just shush and let me think for a minute,” Nora said.

  Clint fell back onto the bed allowing his head to be cushioned by her thighs. He hadn’t been shushed in a while. Her scent enticed him as he snuggled deeper, enjoying the caress of her skin against his head. Nora took the opportunity to soothe him. Petting him as if he were a recalcitrant child who needed calming down so that he could rest and think about what he needed to do tomorrow.

  “I have more hair than you do,” Clint said. He had pulled her head down to his, foreheads touching, caressing her scalp. He loved the feel of her soft hair that had been so closely cropped to her scalp just a few days ago but now it had lengthened enough to almost curl all the way around his callused fingers.

  “Got a thing for guys, maybe,” Nora said as she stroked his hair.

  “Not hardly, Miss Nora, I never ever forget that you are all woman.”

  They napped holding each other to get up around 2:30 to finish packing, brush their teeth to be out the door to the private airport right outside of town by 4:30. As they drove onto the tarmac to the low-slung jet plane, Nora was able to watch Miguel Menendez without being too obvious about it as he stood at the bottom of the steps leading up to the cabin. He was more buff than muscle bound, with the kind of definition that made you want to touch the skin to see how deep it went.

  “He’s a fine-looking man,” Nora said.

  “You really have to say that right in my face?”

  “Of course I said in front of you that I think he’s a nice-looking man. I didn’t say I wanted to fuck him, I said he looks nice.”

  By then they had reached the bottom of the steps where Miguel enfolded Nora into a huge bear hug. The younger man grinned over her shoulder at Clint, who stood looking as if he were looking for a baseball bat.

  “Hey, Cuz,” Miguel said. He smiled even brighter as Clint looked at him with death in his eyes. “Miss Nora, you surely do look good in that blue dress.”

  For some reason Nora felt like giggling, but she didn’t because she knew that would she would have hell to pay from Clint if she did. Instead she just smiled broadly and hid her laugh as it escaped in a strangled cough. Miguel made you respond to him either in a grin or a kiss, she opted for the smile. Any women from eight to eighty had to giggle when Miguel turned that smile on them.

  Clint hustled Nora onto the plane, strapped her into one of the cabin seats, and pulled the shades down so that he could nap. Miguel went into the cockpit after talking to Nora for a little while, and after clearing through the tower they were on their way.

  It was a short trip to Houston because they gained an hour. they basically got there at same time that they had left the East Coast. The ride to the hotel owned and operated by Okie Energy took longer with the traffic. The Double D Hotel was an eclectic five-star hotel that screamed “we have a lot of money and don’t care what you think about our style.” Their room, the Safari Suite, was stuffed full of African memorabilia including elephant leg umbrella stands, zebra skins on the floor, and a stuffed lion that looked like it had been stuffed around the 1800s. The bed itself was a huge Jodi monstrosity covered with silk pillows and brightly colored African prints. It was draped with mosquito netting.

  “Can we get a room that has not so many dead animals?” Nora said. She wore a pained expression as she tried hard not to be prissy, but still.

  “You one of those queasy non-hunter kinds?”

  “I grew up in West by God Virginia and we hunt anything we think might be good in the pot. But this room screams death for no good damn reason,” she said.

  “I can understand you being uncomfortable in this room, but I called them under short notice and this is the only room we have left,” he said.

  “You tell me you won’t have a problem sleeping in a room full of dead animals? No, they’re not quite dead animals, they’re decorations. This is creepy and I think I’ll go to a no-tell motel and just hang out for the night with the hookers and the crack heads,” she said.

  She was slowly stepping her way backward toward the door, when she fell over what she figured was a large turtle shell that was being used as a vase. As she fell back, her head made a loud bang as she connected to what looked like a taxidermy wolverine. She lay staring up at the ceiling, actually counting stars, when Clint swooped down on her and picked her up into his arms. He cursed his way all the way to the lobby, cursing her, cursing her clumsiness, cursing the room and its clutter, cursing just about everybody.

  “Sarah, we need to move out of the African suite. Make sure that we clear out some of those things out of that room, it’s a health hazard. Put the items somewhere else, but for right now tell me what’s available for me and my woman?” He said.

  The young blonde woman with improbably white-blonde hair and large breasts looked from Clint to Nora and then back to Clint as she punched in possible rooms for them to stay.

  “The Roaring 20s is available. Will that suit you, Clint?” She had a wispy Marilyn Monroe type voice that made Nora crack open one eye to see if she had the accompanying mole on her cheek.

  “That’s fine. Bring the bags from African to the Roaring 20s. And when you get a chance, tell Mr. Ramirez to clean that damn thing out and do something with it. It’s just got too much clutter in it for safety. Especially when there’s someone really, really, clumsy that could possibly stay there. It’s a liability waiting to happen,” he said.

  He still had not spoken to her and carried her around as if she were his own personal favorite toy. He crossed the lobby, carrying her into the elevator and to the fifth floor, to a suite that was covered in early twentieth-century Art Deco. There were cleaner lines, metals everywhere, a ridiculous shag carpet and l
ots of tiny knickknacks, but not a dead animal in sight.

  He gently laid her across the bed. Wiggling her out of her dress and under the covers, he rang for room service and requested and received in less than five minutes a bottle of aspirin, a cold compress and a bottle of top-shelf scotch for himself.

  “You cracked your head pretty good but I think you can still go to sleep. I’ll wake you up when it’s time for us to go meet this guy,” he said. He gently sponged her head down with a cool cloth and slipped out two tablets, watching intently she swallowed them both down with water.

  “Mr. Vargas is expecting us a restaurant called Beauregard’s at 8:30,” Nora said. “Since we got here so early, I have time to pick up something to wear to dinner. I looked up the restaurant on the Internet. This is top-of-the-line, snooty class place. I’ve never been to a place like this so I don’t want to look like a hick from West Virginia, even if I am a hick from West Virginia.” She laughed, stopping as the action jarred her head and reminded her that she had cracked it pretty well on the wolverine.

  “I’ll wake you up in about forty-five minutes. We’ll do whatever you need to at the Galleria.”

  Almost against her will, Nora felt herself drift off to sleep. Right before she went totally asleep she reminded herself that Clint was a habit that could lead to high blood pressure and diabetes but most definitely some type of heart trouble.

  * * * *

  They took a chauffeured limo car to a high-end mall, and once again she was able to pick out exactly what she wanted without worrying about whether or not it would be there.

  “How do you shop so quickly?” Cliff said.

  “I pre-shop shop. I spend a lot of time on the Internet and look at catalogs. Most times, I’ve already decided what it is I want to wear so I can go in a store, get it and get out fairly quickly,” Nora said.

  She picked up a sheath dress that hung two inches above her knees. It had a black and white fleur-de-lis design on the front and was solid orange in the back. The racer back neckline was black trim with a thick, black zipper running down the front. In the accessories department she was able to find an orange clutch with a cross-stitch web pattern that went perfectly with the dress. An elevator ride took them to the shoe department, where she found four-inch-heel, cutout booties with orange lace overlays. This time she was able to pay for everything with cash before Clint could whip out his card. The trip, including the ridiculous Houston traffic, took just under ninety minutes.

  “Why is it that you have to dress up for the killer elite?”

  “I never said he was a killer, I said he was too dangerous for the cartels. Actually he’s a super smart and charming.”

  “And you slept with him,” Clint said. He felt the rise of angry jealousy but quickly damped it down.

  “Wasn’t a lot of sleeping involved, but it was a pleasant four days. I was young, my Dad had just died, I was worried about raising Spot and how to live. Like I said, he’s very charming and smart.”

  Heat radiated from Clint’s side of the limo. He had no idea why he was so angry at someone he had never met who’d had a brief affair with Nora when he didn’t even know she existed. But it pissed him off more than he could actually say.

  “You’re mad because of something that happened, I don’t know, almost five years ago. Myself, I’m going to get something to drink from room service, watch a movie, and take a little nap. Is there anything that you want?”

  “Pork and beans. So I can fart in his general direction.”

  Nora was on her way to the bathroom but she stopped, turned around, and looked at him as if he had grown wings “That’s the first joke you’ve ever told. It was crude and not funny but at least you’re loosening up.”

  “What’s my role tonight?”

  “Mostly arm candy. I don’t usually wear heels so make sure you’re close so that I won’t fall on my face.”

  Room service brought up fruit while Nora drank a very nice pinot grigio from the room fridge. They watched an old Western on TCM and enjoyed each other’s company.

  Chapter Eleven:

  World Full of Love

  It was typical Houston weather, and it felt as if you walked into a major sauna as soon as you came out of the super-cool air of the hotel. The limousine, tonight driven by an older man of indeterminate race, was parked at the entrance, waiting for Nora and Clint to enter.

  Nora studied her business plan on the way to the restaurant, concentrating on calming her nerves and perfecting her sales pitch. Clint sat in his corner watching the scenery. He worried a loose hang nail as he tried to figure out exactly how he was going to convince Nora that the safest place for her and Sebastian would be at his ranch.

  Nora wasn’t familiar with the neighborhoods and wards of Houston so she had no idea where they were, but she knew it was upscale because the houses that lined the streets were gigantic mansions. Each one was surrounded by either a high gate made of stone or rod iron, or in some cases old, old, old hedges. What little she could see of the houses themselves spoke of people who had old money and lots of it.

  As they finally pulled up to a very nondescript, painted-brick, square building that looked like an office warehouse but had a waiting line of Ferraris, Bentleys, Rolls-Royces, and limousines. Very young valets quickly made their way to each car, helped each occupant out, and passed them along to a waiting attendant.

  Clint let the valets open his door but refused to have anyone but himself reach in and help Nora exit the car. She stood blinking in the still-bright sunlight, trying to get over the fact that so many people were coming at the same time, each one of them dressed as if they were going to a Hollywood premiere, or better yet a casino at Monte Carlo.

  The interior of the building was nothing less than opulent with deep, dark, wooden, floors, beautifully done walls with art that looked original, and extremely dark, discreet lighting. The deep-seated booths were high enough so that no one behind or beside you could hear your conversation and tooled with deep, elegant, rich, red leather.

  Clint leaned over to speak with the maître d’ who obviously knew him as soon as he walked into the door.

  “Howard, how is your family? It’s been a while,” Clint said.

  “Wonderful to see you, Mr. Davis. I don’t have a reservation for you but I’m sure I could squeeze you in somewhere,” Howard said.

  “That’s okay, Howard. Mr. Vargas is expecting us. Is he here already?” Clint said.

  “Oh yes, he and his men arrived some time ago. He mentioned he was awaiting guest. I had no idea it was you Mr. Davis or I would have given him a much better table.”

  Clint laughed. He took the time to intertwine his fingers with Nora’s to help lead her through the darkened restaurant. He shuddered just slightly at the touch. They had been intimate in so many ways but this one slight touch shook him more than he could say.

  Before they reached the table Clint felt a tug at his hands as Nora stopped to speak with four men sitting at a table positioned so that it was close to a booth. The men obviously knew her as each got up and either shook her hand with enthusiasm or kissed her on the cheek.

  Directly across from their table, a Hispanic man who looked about sixty with neat, shoulder-length hair with strands of white at the temples, sat smiling with an indulgence that told that he knew who Nora was and it amused him.

  He had a full beard of the same black-and-white hair and deep-set, dark eyes that sparkled even in the dim, blue light of the restaurant. He looked like the most interesting man in the world.

  Nora finished speaking to the men at the table and grabbed Clint’s hand. She approached the older man with a broad, friendly grin. Mr. Vargas matched her grin and kissed Nora on both cheeks and lips before he turned to shake Clint’s hand.

  “I didn’t know you were traveling with a bodyguard, mi amour. I can have another place set for him at the other table.”

  “Thank you for the offer but I’m always at Miss Nora’s side,” Clint said.


  “This is Clint Davis, he’s helping me tie up some loose ends,” Nora said. “This is Mr. Oscar Vargas. He is my close personal friend.”

  Mr. Vargas cocked an eyebrow at Nora and smiled and nodded as he snapped his finger and a round of cocktails arrived at the bodyguard table and a bottle of very nice bordeaux was opened at their booth. He and Nora talked about the latest telenovela currently on Univision as Clint sat and stared at the older man.

  Just when he thought he would strangle her if she smiled one more time at Mr. Vargas as if he were a ditch of chocolate ice cream, Clint felt a hand tapped him on the shoulder. He turned around, almost ready to swing, and was surprised to see his cousin David Smythe Davis from London standing beside him. With him was a brunette with a cold, immovable face that spoke of more Botox than any woman her age needed and equally cold, red lips curled in an almost-but-not-quite smile.

  “David, I didn’t know you were in the States,” Clint said.

  “It’s so nice to see someone that I know here. I was here on business, then Barbara flew in so that she could do some shopping and visit a fashion show,” David said.

  David Smythe Davis was a man of middle height, with light brown hair and huge, round glasses that covered soft eyes that sparkled. He had an impish grin and a way of putting people at ease. Standing closely beside him was his beautiful, well-made-up fiancée, Barbara. She looked less than pleased to be introduced to people in a restaurant.

  “How long will you be here, David?” Clint said. He had quickly introduced everyone at the table to his cousin and his fiancée. Mr. Vargas graciously offered to include them at the table and have at least a drink with them, but the frown on Barbara’s face told Clint that that was not going to happen.

  “We’re going to be here for a few more days I expect,” David said. “Barbara is keen on the fashion here.”