by Diana Palmer
“What would you know about honest work, lady, unless you call lying on your back, work…!”
“Tellie!” J.B. bit off.
The blonde gasped. “Well, I never!”
“I’ll bet there’s not much you’ve never,” Tellie said coldly. “For your information, I don’t work here. Marge gave me a home when my mother died, and I earn my keep. When I’m not scrubbing floors, I go to college to earn a degree, so that I can make a living for myself,” she added pointedly. “I’m sure you won’t ever have a similar problem, as long as your looks last.”
“Tellie!” J.B. repeated.
“I’d rather be pretty than smart,” the blonde said carelessly. “Who’d want to give you diamonds?” she scoffed.
Tellie balled a fist.
“Go tell Marge we’re here,” he demanded, his eyes making cold threats.
“Tell her yourself, J.B.,” Tellie replied, eyes flashing. “I’m not anybody’s servant.”
She turned and left the room, so furious that she was shaking all over.
J.B. followed her right into her bedroom and closed the door behind them.
“What the hell was that all about?” he asked furiously.
“I am not going to be looked down on by any smarmy blond tart!” she exclaimed.
“You behaved like a child!” he returned.
“She started it,” she reminded him.
“She thought you were the housekeeper,” he replied. “She didn’t know you from a button.”
“She’ll know me next time, won’t she?”
He moved closer, glaring at her. “You’re so jealous you’re vibrating with it,” he accused, his green eyes narrowing. “You want me.”
She drew in a sharp breath and her hands tightened into fists. “I do not,” she retorted.
He moved a step closer, so that he was right up against her. His big hand went to her cheek, smoothing over it. His thumb rubbed maddeningly at her lower lip. “You want me,” he whispered deeply, bending. “I can feel your heart beating. You ache for me to touch you.”
“J.B., if…if you don’t…stop,” she faltered, fighting his arrogance and her own weakness.
“You don’t want me to stop, baby,” he murmured, his chiseled mouth poised just over her parted lips. “That’s the last thing you want.” His thumb tugged her lower lip down and he nibbled softly at the upper one. He heard her breath catch, felt her body shiver. His eyes began to glitter with something like triumph. “I can feel your heart beating. You’re waking up. I could do anything I liked to you, whenever I pleased, and we both know it, Tellie.”
A husky little moan escaped her tight throat and she moved involuntarily, her body brushing against his, her mouth lifting, pleading, her hands going to his hard upper arms to hold him there. She hated him for doing this to her, but she couldn’t resist him.
He knew it. He laughed. He pulled away from her, arrogance in his whole bearing. He smiled, and it wasn’t a nice smile at all. “She likes to kiss me, too, Tellie,” he said deliberately. “But she’s no prude. She likes to take her clothes off, and I don’t even have to coax her…”
She slapped him. She was humiliated, hurt, furious. She put the whole weight of her arm behind it, sobbing.
He didn’t even react, except to lift an eyebrow and smile even more arrogantly. “Next time I bring her over to see Marge, you’d better be more polite, Tellie,” he warned softly, and the deep edge of anger glittered in his green eyes. “Or I’ll do this in front of her.”
Tellie was horrified at even the thought. Her face went pale. Tears brightened her eyes, but she would have died rather than shed them. “There aren’t enough bad words in the English language to describe what you are, J.B.,” she said brokenly.
“Oh, you’ll think of some eventually, I’m sure. And if you can’t, you can always give me another one of those god-awful dragon ties, can’t you?”
“I bought boxes of them!” she slung at him.
He only laughed. He gave her a last probing look and went out of the room, leaving the door open behind him.
“Where have you been?” the blonde demanded in a honeyed tone.
“Just having a little overdue discussion. We’d better go. See you, Marge.”
There were muffled voices. A door closed. Two car doors slammed. An engine roared.
Marge knocked gently and came into Tellie’s room, her whole look apprehensive. She grimaced.
Tellie was as white as a sheet, shaking with rage and humiliation.
“I’ll tell him not to bring her here again,” Marge said firmly. She put her arms around Tellie and gathered her close. “It’s all right.”
“He’s the devil in a suit,” Tellie whispered huskily. “The very devil, Marge. I never, never want to see him again.”
The thin arms closed around her and rocked her while she cried. Marge wondered why J.B. had to be so cruel to a woman who loved him this much. She had a good idea of what he’d done. It was unfair of him. He didn’t want Tellie. Why couldn’t he leave her alone? He’d brought his latest lover here deliberately. Tellie had refused to go to the barbecue, avoiding being around the woman, so J.B. had brought her over to Marge’s to rub it in. He wanted Tellie to see how beautiful the woman was, how devoted she was to J.B. He was angry that he couldn’t stop her from seeing Grange, not even by snubbing her. This was low, even for J.B.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into my brother,” Marge said aloud. “But I’m very sorry, Tellie.”
“It’s not your fault. We don’t get to choose our relatives, more’s the pity.”
“I wouldn’t choose J.B. for a brother, after today.” She drew away, her dark eyes twinkling, mischievous. “Tellie, the girls wouldn’t let J.B. introduce them to his girlfriend. They gave her vicious looks, glared at J.B. and went to Dawn’s room and locked themselves in. He’s mad at them now, too.”
“Good. Maybe he’ll stay at his own house.”
“I wouldn’t bet on that,” Marge thought, but she didn’t say it aloud. Tellie had stood enough for one day.
Grange took Tellie with him around the feedlot the next week, explaining how they monitored statistics and mixed the feed for the various lots of cattle. He’d asked Justin for permission. The older man was glad to give it. He liked the strange young man who’d come to work for him. It was a compliment, because Justin didn’t like many people at all.
Grange propped one big, booted foot on the bottom rail of one of the enclosures, with his arms folded on the top one. His dark eyes had a faraway look. “This is good country,” he said. “I grew up in West Texas. Mostly we’ve got desert and cactus and mountains over around El Paso. This is green heaven.”
“Yes, it is. I love it here,” she confessed. “I go to school in Houston. It’s green there, too, but the trees are nestled in concrete.”
He chuckled. “Do you like college?”
“I do.”
“I went myself, in the army.”
“What did you study?”
He grinned at her. “Besides weapons and tactics, you mean?” He chuckled. “I studied political science.”
She was surprised, and showed it. “That was your major?”
“Part of it. I did a double major, in political science and Arab dialects.”
“You mean, you can speak Arabic?”
He nodded. “Farsi, Bedouin, several regional dialects. Well, and the Romance languages.”
“All three of them?” she asked, surprised.
“All three.” He glanced at her and smiled at her expression. “Languages will get you far in government service and the military. I mustered out as a major.”
She tried not to let on that she’d heard about his release from the service. “Did you like the military?” she asked with deliberate carelessness.
He gave her a slow appraisal from dark, narrowed eyes. “Gossip travels fast in small towns, doesn’t it?” he wondered aloud. “I expect Hammock had something to do with it.”
&n
bsp; She sighed. “Probably did,” she had to admit. “He did everything he could to keep me from going out with you.”
“So he holds grudges,” he remarked. “Lucky for him that I don’t, or he’d be sleeping with guards at every door and a gun under his pillow. If it hadn’t been for him, I’d still have my sister.”
“Maybe he thinks that, except for you, and his father, he’d be happily married with kids now.”
He shrugged. “Nobody came out of it laughing,” he said. He looked down at her, puzzled. “If he wanted you to stop going out with me, why haven’t you?”
She smiled sadly. “I got tired of being a carpet,” she said.
He cocked his head. “Walked all over you, did he?”
She nodded. “Since I was fourteen. And I let him. I never disagreed with anything he said, even when I didn’t think he was right.” She traced a pattern on the metal fence. “I saw what I could have become last Saturday. He brought his newest girlfriend over to show me. She thought I was the hired help and treated me accordingly. We had words. Lots of words. Now I’m not speaking to J.B.”
He leaned back against the gate. “You may not believe it, but standing up to people is the only way to get through life with your mind intact. Nothing was ever gained by giving in.”
“So that’s how you left the army, is it?” she mused.
He laughed curtly. “Our commanding officer sent us against an enemy company, understrength, without proper body armor, with weapons that were misfiring. I took exception and he called me a name I didn’t like. I decked him, wrapped him up in his blanket and gagged him, and led the attack myself. Tactics brought us all back alive. His way would have wiped us out to the last man. The brass didn’t approve of my methods, so I had the choice of being honorably discharged or court-martialed. It was a close decision,” he added with cold humor.
She just stared at him. “How could they do that? Send you into battle without proper equipment…That’s outrageous!”
“Talk to Congress,” he said coolly. “But don’t expect them to do anything, unless it’s an election year. Improvements cost money. We don’t have enough.”
She stared out over the distant pasture. “What happened to your commanding officer?”
“Oh, they promoted him,” he said. “Called his tactics brilliant, in fact.”
“But he didn’t go, and they were your tactics!” she exclaimed.
He raised an eyebrow. “That’s not what he told the brass.”
She glowered. “Somebody should have told them!”
“In fact, just last week one of his execs got drunk enough to spill the beans to a reporter for one of the larger newspaper chains. A court-martial board is convening in the near future, or so I hear.”
“Will they call you to testify?” she wondered.
He smiled. “God, I hope so,” he replied.
She laughed at his expression. “Revenge is sweet?”
“So they tell me. Being of a naturally sweet and retiring disposition, I rarely ever cause problems…why are you laughing?”
She was almost doubled over. He was the last man she could picture that way.
“Maybe I caused a little trouble, once in a while,” he had to admit. He glanced at his watch. “Lunch break’s over. Better get back to work, so that Justin doesn’t start looking for replacements.”
“It was a nice lunch break, even if we didn’t eat anything.”
“I wasn’t hungry. Sorry, I didn’t think about food.”
She smiled up at him. “Neither did I. We had a big breakfast this morning, and I was stuffed. Wouldn’t you like to come over for pizza tonight?”
He hesitated. “I would, but I’m not going to.”
“Why?”
“I’m not going to provide any more reasons for Hammock to take out old injuries on you.”
“I’m not afraid of J.B.”
“Neither am I,” he agreed. “But let’s give him time to calm down before we start any more trouble.”
“I suppose we could,” she agreed, but reluctantly. She didn’t want J.B. to think she was bowing down to him.
The weekend went smoothly. J.B. and his blond appendage were nowhere in sight, and neither was Grange. Tellie played Monopoly with Marge and the girls on Saturday night, and went to church with them on Sunday morning.
Monday morning, Marge didn’t get up for breakfast. Tellie took her a tray, worried because she seemed unusually pale and languorous.
“Just a little dizziness and nausea, Tellie,” Marge protested with a wan smile. “I’ll stay in bed and feel better. Really. The girls are here if I need help.”
“You’d better call me if you do,” she said firmly.
Marge smiled and nodded. Tellie noticed an odd rhythm in her heartbeat—it was so strong that it was shaking her nightgown. Nausea and an erratic heartbeat were worrisome symptoms. Tellie’s grandfather had died of heart trouble, and she remembered the same symptoms in him.
She didn’t make a big deal out of it, but she did put aside her hurt pride long enough to drive by J.B.’s office on the way to the feedlot.
He was talking to a visiting cattleman, but when he saw Tellie, he broke off the conversation politely and joined her in the outer office. He looked good in jeans and a chambray shirt and chaps, she thought, even if they were designer clothing. He was working today, not squiring around women.
“Couldn’t stand it anymore, I gather?” he asked curtly. “You just had to come and see me and apologize?”
She frowned. “Excuse me?”
“It’s about time,” he told her. “But I’m busy today. You should have picked a better time.”
“J.B., I need to talk to you,” she began.
He gave her slender figure in the green pantsuit a curiously intent scrutiny, winding his way back up the modest neckline to her face, with only the lightest touch of makeup, and her wavy hair like a dark cap around her head. “On your way to work?”
“Yes,” she said. “J.B., I have to tell you something…”
He took her arm and led her back outside to her car. “Later. I’ve got a full day. Besides,” he added as he opened her car door, “you know I don’t like to be chased. I like to do the chasing.”
She let out an exasperated breath. “J.B., I’m not chasing you! If you’d just give me a chance to speak…!”
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t like treating you like the enemy, but I also don’t like the way you spoke to Bella. When you apologize, to her, we’ll go from there.”
“Apologize?”
His face hardened. “You took too much for granted. You aren’t part of my family, and you aren’t a lover. You can’t treat my women like trespassers in my own sister’s house. Maybe we were close, when you were younger, but that’s over.”
“She started it,” she began, riled.
“She belongs with me. You don’t.” His eyes were hard. “I need more from a woman than a handshake at the end of the evening. That’s as much as you’re able to give, Tellie. You’re completely unawakened.”
She wondered what he was talking about. But she didn’t have time to ponder enigmas. “Listen, Bella’s not what I came here to talk about!”
“I’m not giving up Bella,” he continued, as if she hadn’t spoken. “And chasing after me like this isn’t going to get you anything except the wrong side of my temper. Don’t do it again.”
“J.B.!”
He closed the door. “Go to work,” he said shortly, and turned away.
Of all the arrogant, assuming, overbearing conceited jackasses, she thought as she reversed out of the parking space and took off toward town, he took the cake. She wasn’t chasing him, she was trying to tell him about Marge! Well, she could try again later. Next time, she promised herself, she’d make him listen.
She walked in the front door after work, tired and dispirited. Maybe Marge was better, she hoped.
“Tellie, is that you?” Dawn exclaimed from the top of the staircase. “Come on
up. Hurry, please!”
Tellie took the steps two at a time. Marge was lying on her back, gasping for breath, wincing with pain. Her face was a grayish tone, her skin cold and clammy.
“Heart attack,” Tellie said at once. She’d seen this all before, with her grandfather. She grabbed the phone and dialed 911.
She tried to call J.B., but she couldn’t get an answer on his cell phone, or on the phone at the office or his house. She waited until the ambulance loaded up Marge, and the girls went with her, to get into her car and drive to J.B.’s house. If she couldn’t find him, she could at least get Nell to relay a message.
She leaped out of the car and ran to the front door. She tried the knob and found it unlocked. This was no time for formality. She opened it and ran down the hall to J.B.’s study. She threw open the door and stopped dead in the doorway.
J.B. looked up, over Bella’s bare white shoulders, his face flushed, his mouth swollen, his shirt off.
“What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded furiously.
Six
Tellie could barely get her breath. Worried about Marge, half-sick with fear, she couldn’t even manage words. No wonder J.B. couldn’t be bothered to answer the phone. He and his beautiful girlfriend were half-naked. Apparently J.B. wasn’t much on beds for his sensual adventures. She remembered with heartache that he’d wrestled her down on that very sofa when she was eighteen and kissed her until her mouth hurt. It had been the most heavenly few minutes of her entire life, despite the fact that he’d been furious when he started kissing her. It hadn’t ended that way, though…
“Get out!” J.B. threw at her.
She managed to get her wits back. Marge. She had to think about Marge, not about how much her pride was hurting. “J.B., you have to listen…”
“Get out, damn you!” he raged. “I’ve had it up to here with you chasing after me, pawing me, trying to get close to me! I don’t want you, Tellie, how many times do I have to tell you before you realize that I mean it? You’re a stray that Marge and I took in, nothing more! I don’t want you, and I never will!”