by Tina Leonard
Zach put his hand on the desk to peer more closely at the dots, knocking off something as he did. He stooped down and grasped the rolled-up map, automatically opening it as he stood. It was a chart with seismic data from a certain region. He glanced to the top of the map, somewhat surprised to see Desperado written there.
A chill hit the middle of his stomach, making it clench painfully. Disbelieving, he looked from one map to the other, his mind denying what he was seeing.
And yet, Zach knew, without a doubt, that at last he was holding the key to Carter’s game.
If this data was correct—and this chart appeared to be recent—dirt-poor Annie Aguillar was sitting on top of something she never dreamed she owned.
Oil.
Chapter Fifteen
Rage turned inside of Zach as he stared at the map showing seismic data. Carter was buying up the land around Annie, on the pretext that it was for Ritter International. But Carter’s fingerprints weren’t on the deal, just Zach’s. He’d even gotten Pop involved so there’d be no ties to himself, and it was an excellent cover. Carter hadn’t bothered to inform Pop about the oil, obviously. Zach knew that his father would have spouted that charming factoid instantly, just to be able to brag about how he was finally going to be a rich man.
It niggled at Zach why Carter had used Pop as an accessory, besides the fact that his father wasn’t the brightest man in Austin, and his greedy nature made him an easy mark for Carter’s scheme. There was more, much, much more that Zach wasn’t seeing. He frowned at the data, wondering how he’d allowed himself to get snared in this scurrilous web. It was as if a dark cloud obscured his brain’s capacity to see what he was afraid should be clear to him.
A low giggle punctuated the austere silence of Carter’s office. Zach jerked his head up, surprise pulling his brows together. Where had that sound come from? Eerie silence settled once more in the room; it was so quiet Zach could feel his heartbeat thundering in his rib cage. After a moment, he shook his head, thinking that the receptionist, Judy, must have been laughing in the greeting area.
Except that he hadn’t noticed her speaking to anyone. Zach shrugged and went back to perusing the data, memorizing it, hoping to see more than what the squiggles and lines could reveal. If there really was oil under the Aguillar farm, how in the hell did Carter think he could get away with buying Annie out at a fire-sale price?
Fire. Zach’s intuition became razor sharp. It would be simple for Carter to have a mineral rights clause slipped into the contract. As unsophisticated as the Aguillars appeared to be—and since they apparently had no idea of their possible wealth—they would likely sign the contract without blinking an eye at the innocent-looking clause. After all, what was their land good for, besides growing corn and harboring rattlesnakes?
Zach let out a deep, ragged sigh, remembering the blackened, destroyed fields where Annie’s hopes for the future lay devastated. He could almost envision cruel, black vultures encircling her, waiting mercilessly. And when the Aguillars wouldn’t sell, Carter had decided to kick their legs out from underneath them by setting the fire.
A low, sensual moan snagged Zach’s attention. That was a female sound, one he’d heard plenty of times before. It sounded suspiciously familiar. Where the devil had it come from?
He stared at the closed door to Carter’s sanctuary As long as he’d known his soon-to-be-ex-colleague, the man had never been one for entertaining females at the office. Some men mixed business and sex freely, but Carter had never allowed a woman past the leather chair in front of his desk.
Zach quietly put the maps back where he’d found them. If Carter was in there—entertaining or otherwise—Zach didn’t want to be caught with smoking guns in his hands. He had turned to leave when something glittering and green beside the desk phone caught his eye.
He froze. In the harsh fluorescent light, the object winked brightly, beckoning him. Transfixed, Zach put a hand out to touch it, to pick it up. The contact sent ice-cold shivers through him.
LouAnn’s earring. One of the pair he’d given her as an early wedding present. Disbelieving, he reached around the phone, snagging its mate. The two unbelievably beautiful gems lay pristine in his palm, daring him to face the truth.
And another low, eager moan from behind the closed door forced him to face it.
Without really thinking, Zach deposited the earrings into his pocket and left the office, completely disregarding that he had come to clean out his desk.
But the sounds of lovemaking had shocked him to his core, rendering him unable to think. Already overwhelmed by the research on Desperado piled up on Carter’s desk, Zach’s brain had gone into overload at seeing LouAnn’s earrings casually dropped by the phone.
In less than five minutes, Zach was in his sports car, pushing the machine to illegal speed, as if he could outrun the trap he now realized had been woven around him. Another man might have thrown open the door to Carter’s office and enjoyed the hellacious scare he could give LouAnn and her lover by ambushing them in the act. Zach preferred to wait for the cool rationale that would overtake his anger soon.
It was so much more dangerous.
At his house, Zach strode into the living room, fully aware that he needed a serious game plan. Reaching into his jeans, Zach tossed the earrings onto a nearby coffee table, where they sparkled at him insidiously.
He could no longer overlook the fact that Carter had it in for him. From being one of the fast-track guys in the business, Zach had let himself be outwitted in every way. It was strange that he’d not seen through Carter’s manipulations, but having known him since law school, a reminiscent zone in Zach must have assumed Carter wouldn’t dare set up an old acquaintance. Major tactical error.
Zach knew Carter assumed he would take over Zach’s chair as president of Ritter International. Carter wanted it badly, despite his claims that he hoped Zach would return to the corporation one day; once he got over the burnout he presumed Zach was suffering from. He was burned out, but it was from dealing with chumps like Carter.
Obviously, Carter wanted the presidency of Ritter. He couldn’t possibly know what Zach did, that the board had already chosen a replacement, considering Carter much too green, too much of a twisted pistol to entrust with their business investments. With land prices being so volatile, they needed a cool head at Ritter’s stern.
But maybe Carter did know he wasn’t the chosen one. Could that be why Carter had gone after him with such a vengeance? Had he uncovered that piece of information and decided it was Zach who must appear unfit, that it was Carter who’d been running the show all along? He’d once mentioned a board member whose ear he had, but Zach had no idea who that could be. No one had raised a finger to nominate Carter for even a bonus.
Of course. He was such an idiot not to have seen the crystal-clear answer to a situation that was no Rubik’s Cube. LouAnn must have been dropping information along with her hisses of delight during their trysts.
Zach sat down in a leather recliner, waiting for the black rage he knew he should feel. Stunningly, he was more angered about Carter’s double-dealing than LouAnn’s defection. For some reason, if he felt anything at all, it was cold anger that she possessed so little moral fiber that she would stoop to humiliating Zach. But the blazing fire of fury he would expect to feel at finding his fiancée enjoying the services of another man wasn’t there. Didn’t get past an occasional bubble of disbelief. Something had changed for him, even before today.
Annie was the change. Meeting Annie had taught him the value of the not-so-fine things in his life—all worthless. But she’d given him a chance to witness real love, real grief, honest caring. Annie. Mary. Cody, and hell, yes, even old Mr. Cade had burrowed deeper into his heart than shallow LouAnn had ever managed.
Cosmetics, perfume, silky crotchless panties—all these were manufactured to make Zach feel something for LouAnn.
He felt nothing.
Where there should be rage, though, there was relief, despi
te the many issues facing him. In order to fight his way out from behind the cross-hairs he knew were trained on him, Zach knew he had to be practical now. And the cold, logical response that Zach knew would come settled over him.
First, he owed a phone call to the corporation which had been his brainchild. Zach picked up the portable phone beside him, dialing from memory.
It was answered immediately by an efficient secretary. “Sam Lindale, please,” Zach said briskly.
“One moment, Mr. Rayez,” the secretary said.
“Zach, buddy, how are you?”
He smiled at the booming voice. “Fine. Need to talk to you, though. Got a second?”
“I have if you’ve decided not to resign from Ritter”
Zach laughed. “I’m afraid not.”
Lindale sighed. “Guess I’ll have to give you a second anyway, then.”
“I need to ask you a question. Almost three weeks ago, Carter told me about a property he wasn’t having any luck purchasing down in Desperado. Relying on my instinct to do the best thing for Ritter, Carter mentioned that there were high-level commercial real-estate deals hinging on how many properties were available for sale in that area. Because of my wedding and the fact I was leaving the company, I pretty much relied on Carter’s word about this. Now, I’m wondering. Do you know anything about this, Lindale?”
“No, Zach.” The man sounded honestly confused. “I haven’t heard anything about a difficult deal, although it wouldn’t necessarily have been mentioned to me. For one thing, it’s not out of the ordinary. We’ve received a great deal of resistance over the years from folks in that area about selling, as you know. They’re stubborn farm stock.”
Zach grinned. Instantly, he thought of Annie, and he liked that description. It fit, and he was proud of her.
Lindale chuckled before saying, “And another reason I might not be in the know is because we’re pretty much staying out of Carter’s way these days. I hate to say this, Zach, ’cause I know he’s a college friend of yours, but he’s simply not Ritter material. We’re not going to give him any future international accounts.”
“That’s probably a good idea. Between you and me, those college ties have frayed very quickly.”
“Oh?”
Zach crossed his legs on the recliner, glancing at those precious green and gold baubles sparkling on the inlaid teak coffee table. “You could say that Carter has ingratiated himself with my soon-to-be-ex-fiancée.”
There was a sharp intake of breath at the other end. “Oh, hell, Zach, are you sure?”
“Very.”
“Well, that’s the proverbial old hit below the belt, isn’t it? Are you going to kill them?”
Zach laughed heartily. “I have other things to do besides go to jail because of this, Sam.”
“That’s the spirit. So, do you want me to fire Carter?”
“Actually, that was the second reason I called. I was planning on telling Carter today that he was no longer employed by Ritter. But not because of LouAnn. I believe he’s involved in a land scam, which is where this extra money would be coming from.”
“That son of a bitch.”
“Yeah. I feel bad about not checking out his story better, Sam. I hope this doesn’t hurt Ritter.”
“It won’t. I won’t let that happen. And don’t feel too bad about it, Zach. You hired Carter to be your back leg, didn’t you?”
“Yeah,” Zach said laconically.
“Well, occasionally a dog has to piss on its hind foot. It ain’t gonna kill Carter, though.”
Zach rubbed his forehead, trying not to laugh. “You’re probably right. But another thought that’s occurred to me is that we’d better do some additional checking into his expense accounts, et cetera, since he could be embezzling. I don’t know that for certain, so don’t breathe a word of it to anyone you don’t have to. But Carter got all that money from somewhere.”
“Damn right,” Lindale replied. “I’ll begin a very quiet investigation into this myself. Hey, I just thought of something,” he said, sounding rejuvenated. “If you’re not marrying LouAnn and taking over the family business, you still need a job, don’t you?”
Zach grinned. “Actually, my friend, no. I’m picking up a new enterprise.”
“I have never known a man with a bent for finding money like you can, so I’m not a bit surprised. What’s the business this time?”
“Salsa.”
“Salsa! That’s…why, I love that stuff.”
The laughter that spilled out of Zach was joyous and alive. “Well, Sam, with any luck, you’ll get to taste Rattlesnake Annie’s Snakebite Sauce one day. It’ll blow your socks off.”
“Hmm. Sounds like it. And Annie herself?”
“Pretty much the same,” Zach said with a grin.
After saying good-bye, Zach hung up, staring at the phone in his hand pensively. He had two final calls to make before he could talk to the one person he really wanted to speak with. Punching the numbers in, he waited for the familiar voice of his receptionist to answer the phone. “Ring Carter’s office for me, please.”
“But Mr. Haskins is in a meeting right now. He left word he doesn’t want to be disturbed.”
He held back a snort. “Judy, listen. I know Carter’s in a meeting, with my fiancée.”
The receptionist let out a little gasp.
Zach continued, “Now, you buzz that office and then take yourself down to the break room for a smoke, all right? And don’t you worry about Mr. Haskins either. He’s not going to fire you over this.”
“Y-yes, Mr. Rayez.”
A second later, the phone rang. Carter picked up on the first ring. “Damn it, Judy, this better be important.”
Zach leaned back against the headrest. “It is important.”
“Zach!” Carter sounded thunderstruck. “I’m sorry, I thought—damn it, I’m going to—”
“No, you’re not. I told Judy to put me through. But I’ll only disturb your important meeting for a minute.”
“What’s on your mind?”
He could hear the sweat in Carter’s voice. Zach relished that. He was glad to do this last thing for the company he’d started.
“Carter, you’re fired. Be out of there in one hour, or security will be in to assist you. Leave all items that are Ritter’s in a visible place to make the inventory easier.”
“Zach—”
“Oh, and while I’ve got you on the phone, let me speak to LouAnn, please.”
“LouAnn? Ah, she’s not—”
“Dressed? That’s fine. Her mouth works very well when she’s naked. Hand her the phone.”
There was strident whispering in the background before LouAnn got on the phone. “Yes, Zach, darling?”
Zach grimaced. “I’ll make this brief. I’ve got the emerald earrings, which I intend to take back. You can have the engagement ring, which is very generous under the circumstances, I believe. Needless to say, you can erase our wedding day from your social calendar. Good-bye.”
That felt good. Zach called security with his instructions concerning Carter, feeling better still. Hanging up, Zach relaxed against the leather headrest and closed his eyes, willing himself to relax. He told himself that he wasn’t acting out of revenge. Yet that same voice happily reminded him that this was a very small payback to Carter for burning Annie out.
Freedom. Ah, sweet, sweet freedom from the coils that had bound him. Zach breathed deeply. It was almost as if he could smell reprieve in the air. Settling more comfortably into the easy chair, he dialed one last number.
Annie answered, her voice like a balm to his soul. “Hello?”
“Annie. It’s Zach.”
There was silence for a moment. “I wasn’t expecting you to call so soon.”
“But you’re glad I did?”
There was hesitation again. “Yes.”
“How’s everybody doing?” He wanted to know everything.
“We’re all doing better than might be expected. The nu
rse who took care of Papa in the hospital—Gert—came by today. She’s going to let me pay her to help with Papa’s exercises, and even keep an eye on Cody, though we don’t dare mention that to him.”
“Very wise of you.”
Annie laughed softly and Zach’s heart pumped faster. “Gert’s been wonderful. I’ve been able to do a lot of stuff today, errands and what-have-you, and even play with Mary some.”
Zach felt complete relief at her words. “I’m so glad you have help. Maybe you can hire her away from the hospital for a while.”
“I’m trying. My ace in the hole is that Gert has a thing for Papa.”
Zach chuckled. “Travis needs someone to keep him in line.”
“I know. He doesn’t think so, of course.”
They were silent for a moment. Zach wondered if he could express to Annie the thoughts swirling around in his mind. Did he have the right to burden her right now?
“Zach?”
“Yes?”
“I know you didn’t start the fire.”
He listened to her voice, trying to intuit what she wanted to tell him but couldn’t seem to make herself say.
“I wish…I wish I hadn’t said what I did this morning. About you seeing the fire first. I acted terribly, Zach. You’ve been so kind—my God, you even saved Cody’s life—and I’ve been cool toward you. I hope you can forgive me.”
“I wasn’t being kind, Annie. I couldn’t bear to watch that crazy man on a tractor kill himself.”
He sucked in his breath, realizing his words might bring back visions of the way her husband had died. He couldn’t bear to cause her any more pain than she’d already suffered.
“Excuse me? What crazy man? Who was the man running behind the tractor in his bare feet, with no shirt on, like he was invincible?” She giggled a little, the sound sweet. “You’re as bad as Cody.”
That was a compliment. “Maybe,” he said with a smile she couldn’t see.
“Can you forgive me, Zach?”