Lady with a Past

by Ryanne Corey

  She was a professional in front of the cameras. While those who knew her well might detect the shadows in her eyes, the public at large would see a young woman with strong new convictions. Maxie held it together beautifully, bidding Jacob and the camera crew farewell later that evening. She continued to hold it together throughout dinner, talking with her mother about everything in the world but Connor Garrett. She slept on the sofa, giving Natalie the bedroom. That worked well, as there was no audience to witness the full eight hours of misery and sniffles, and not a minute of sleep she finally indulged in.

  The following morning Natalie took one look at her daughter’s swollen eyes and offered to miss her hair appointment that morning.

  “Don’t be silly. Go on ahead, I have tons of work to do.” Maxie walked her mother outside, waving to the guards at the gate. “Bring back some donuts or something. We’ll treat the men in blue when you come back.”

  Natalie stared at Maxie’s pallid face. “Your smile,” she said softly, “doesn’t begin to reach your eyes.”

  After Natalie drove away, Maxie retreated into the house. It was quite true she had tons of work to do, she just didn’t have the heart to do it. She curled up on the sofa and tried to lose a few of the empty hours in a much-needed nap. Exhaustion finally kicked in and she drifted off, tossing and turning fitfully. Even in sleep she couldn’t escape dreams of Connor and the single night they had spent together. Her mind told her she was a fool; her body ached for his touch.

  Her restless sleep was interrupted by a tentative knock at the door. The guards wouldn’t have let anyone unauthorized approach the house, Maxie knew. Which meant it had to be someone from the television crew.

  Irrationally, Maxie felt her spirits lift. Maybe, just maybe, the end to her love story hadn’t been written yet.

  It was a short trip for her spirits. They plummeted the instant they recognized the sheepish-looking fellow on the front porch.

  “Morrie,” she said flatly.

  “Actually, it’s Morris. But under the circumstances, you can call me any damn thing you want.” He paused, nervously pushing his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. “Can I come in, please? We need to talk.”

  “Is it something about the interview?”

  “No. Although that’s what I told the guards.” Morris shuffled from one foot to the other. “It’s about…well, it’s about Connor. There’s been a little misunderstanding. Actually, a big misunderstanding. If you’ll just let me explain, I promise I’ll go away as far and as fast as I can and never inflict myself upon you again.”

  Maxie told herself to send him packing even as she swung the door wide. She opened the door, waving him in. “Fine. You have two minutes.”

  Morris walked into the living room, giving Maxie a wide berth. She looked very beautiful, but very hostile. “I’ll make this quick,” he said rapidly, conscious of his two-minute deadline. “I am a bad person. I didn’t think so, but now I know what I did was bad, especially for you and Connor.”

  Maxie shook her head, completely confused. “I don’t know what you mean. Do you know what you mean?”

  “Of course I know what I mean,” Morris muttered. “Look, when Connor told me initially that you’d turned him down for an interview, I did what every good assistant does. I fixed things.”

  “And you did that by…?”

  “I’m the one responsible for derailing your mortgage loan at the bank. It was my brainchild, not Connor’s. I thought he would be happy when your old agency slapped a lien on your place. They weren’t going through with it anyway. They knew they were on shaky legal ground. And I figured the end always justifies the means, you know? Only this time it didn’t.”

  Maxie’s legs turned rubbery. She sank down on the sofa, looking up at Morris with unblinking eyes. “It didn’t?”

  “Connor has been a great boss, the best. Man, he taught me everything. Then, when he finds someone who really matters to him, I mess things up for him. He was furious when he found out what I did. No, it was worse than furious—he was devastated.” Morris groaned, slapping his forehead with the palm of his hand. “I’m an idiot. When I saw him here with you that morning I knew what a terrible mistake I’d made. He didn’t give a damn about the interview. The only thing he could think of was you and how all of it would affect you. You knew he quit, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, but I thought it was because he lost the interview. I thought it was just sour grapes.”

  “Hell, Connor isn’t capable of that. He quit because he didn’t want any part of a business that had hurt you so badly. He took off for Jackson Hole last night looking like the living dead.”

  Maxie flinched. “He’s gone?”

  Morris was glad she was sitting down. She had just lost all color in her face, and he didn’t know CPR. Gingerly he sat beside her, patting her hand awkwardly. “No, not really. I mean, he would have been back in L.A. today if they hadn’t put him in jail.”

  Suddenly Maxie’s numb fingers came alive, closing over Morris’s hand in a death grip. “Jail? Jail? What are you talking about?”

  Her fingernails, Morris realized painfully, were digging into his skin. “He’s in the Jackson Hole jail,” Morris explained, carefully removing her fingers from his hand. “He’s all right, just incarcerated. He called me before I came here. Apparently a couple of guys in the airport saw a newspaper and made a comment about you Connor didn’t like. He knocked them both cold before a security guard knocked him out. I told him he shouldn’t act like that in airports. He told me to go to hell, but first drive down and bail him out.” He paused, allowing this to sink in. “I’m on my way there now,” he added. “I just wanted you to know everything before I left.”

  Maxie let out her breath in a long, shaky sigh. “Ohh, what a bloody idiot,” she whispered.

  “I know,” Morris said humbly. “I am an idiot, but I wanted—”

  “Not you,” Maxie replied. “Me.”

  Morris brightened. “Yes, indeed! You were very wrong. You might think about having a nice talk with him once I get him sprung. Now that he finally found you it would be a terrible shame if he lost you. And vice versa.”

  Maxie wasn’t listening to Morris any longer. She was finally listening to her own somewhat inexperienced heart. She’d spent so many years living on the edge, building walls between herself and the rest of the world, all to keep from being hurt. But now she was healed, and she needn’t hide from the real world. She was finally strong enough and wise enough to know that love was well worth the risk.

  Connor was worth the risk.

  Maxie still didn’t know the end of her love story—there was just no predicting that. But if ever there was a man worth putting one’s trust in, worth sharing hopes and dreams for the future with, it was the beautiful, decent, selfless, golden-eyed Adonis languishing in the Jackson Hole jail.

  “He fought for my honor,” she said, violet eyes growing misty.

  “That he did,” Morris acknowledged, a little smile teasing his mouth. “And landed in jail for his efforts. What a shame. Still, if you’d like me to bring him back here after I rescue him—”

  “That won’t be necessary.” The smile of sweet anticipation that spread from her lips to her amazing eyes caused poor Morris’s heart to falter. “I’ll rescue him.”

  Morris looked doubtful. “I’m not sure the Jackson Hole jail is the best place for a reunion.”

  “He rescued me,” Maxie whispered, a forever kind of love softening her eyes. “It’s only fair that I rescue him back.”

  Things couldn’t possibly get worse.

  Connor was lying on a bunk in a jail cell in the Jackson Hole police station. For the first time in his life, he’d been arrested. Rocky Mountain Airlines had taken off into the wild blue yonder without him. Chagrined, he’d been forced to call Morris and beg him to drive to Jackson Hole and bail him out. That had been nearly six hours ago and there was still no sign of rescue.

  On a more positive note, no one had stri
p-searched him.

  He turned away a little metal tray bearing a wrinkled tuna sandwich and a bag of chips. His hangover was lingering stubbornly. The knuckles on his right hand were swollen to twice their normal size and throbbed like the devil. In addition, he had all the makings of a splendid black eye. He wondered disinterestedly if a black eye could be inflicted by falling on a roll of breath mints. Who knew? Who cared?

  A commotion in the hallway raised a tiny flicker of hope. Perhaps this was Morris, at long last. Groaning, Connor rolled to his side and gingerly got to his feet, fighting a nauseating dizziness. He closed his eyes and counted to ten, willing his stomach to behave.

  When he opened them, he forgot entirely about his wretched condition. Maxie Calhoon, live and in person, was walking down the hallway toward his cell, trailed by not one, not two, but no less than four deputies, each and every one wearing identical expressions of glassy-eyed bliss.

  “You’ve all been so helpful,” Maxie was saying, placing her hand over her heart. “What would I have done without you?”

  “Our pleasure,” chorused four voices.

  Maxie stopped before Connor’s cell, giving him a slow once-over from head to foot. “You look terrible,” she pronounced. “And I hear you’ve been a bad boy.”

  “You look wonderful,” Connor replied. She was wearing her jeans, boots and a blue denim shirt. No cowboy hat, no sunglasses to disguise her face. She seemed perfectly comfortable with several pairs of masculine eyes glued to her every movement.

  “Morris and I had a little visit this morning,” she said. “He told me you’d been arrested for disturbing the peace.”

  “I was disturbing the peace,” Connor replied. He wanted to touch her in the worst way but there were several iron bars between them. “Maxie, seeing you is the best thing that’s happened to me since the last time I saw you. But under the circumstances, visiting me in jail could result in even more publicity for you.”

  “I’m not visiting you,” she said. “I’m your white knight who has come to rescue you. And I really don’t give a damn about the publicity. Not anymore.”

  Connor opened his mouth and closed it again.

  “Cat got your tongue?” Maxie asked, a sparkle in her eyes. “How unusual. I’ll do the talking, then. I hear you quit your job.”

  “You heard right,” Connor said, growing more confused by the minute.

  “You enjoyed your job.”

  “I stopped enjoying it about four days ago.”

  She tilted her head thoughtfully, studying this man who had found his way into her heart in a few short days. His thick, caramel-colored hair was terribly mussed, sticking up this way and that. His poor, injured eye was a rainbow of blue, violet and yellow. His shirt was hanging out over his jeans and missing two buttons.

  He was quite the most beautiful man she had ever met in her life, and definitely worth taking a chance for.

  “What are you going to do now?” she asked.

  “I haven’t got a clue.” Bewildered, Connor groped for words. “Maxie…why did you come?”

  Violet eyes alight, she laughed softly. “Because you took me to a prom. Because you’ve never seen a lop-eared rabbit. Because you’re my first love and I want you to be my last love.”

  The deputies froze, eyes riveted on the glorious woman declaring her love. This was Glitter Baby talking. They were witnessing history here.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t trust you before,” she went on softly, her fingers curling around two of the metal bars. “I’ve learned to be so careful, but some things are worth taking a risk for. Yesterday, when you kept interrupting the interview, it seemed as if you weren’t thinking about Glitter Baby at all, you were worried about Maxie Calhoon. Then when Morris told me who was responsible for the lien on the ranch, I realized how wrong I had been.” She uncoiled a dazzling smile that cut to the very depths of him. “You aren’t going to hurt me. I finally figured that out.”

  Connor touched his hand to hers, feeling the connection that went far beyond physical intimacy. His voice came softly, like a prayer. “Give me a lifetime to prove it to you. I love you, Maxie. I’ve loved you from the beginning. If you don’t let me in your life…I don’t know what will become of me.” His eyes were hungry, touching on her hair, her skin, her lips. “We’ve only been apart for two days and I’ve already landed myself in jail. I’m lost without you, love.”

  Maxie’s expression carried a heart-lifting sensuality. She sank against the bars, straining to get as close to him as possible. “I can face everything with you by my side. You give me a security I’ve never known. Forgive me for doubting you, Connor. I haven’t had much experience with unconditional love.”

  There was so much expression on his face: tenderness, surprise, humility. “I never meant to hurt you, Maxie. I would move heaven and hell to keep you safe and happy.”

  A wicked smile curled her lips. “What else would you do, Connor? Hmmm?”

  One of the deputies sat down abruptly on a nearby bench. He seemed to be hyperventilating.

  “I’ll tell you what, little girl. Get me out of here and I’ll show you personally.” He gave her a knowing smile, looking more and more like the cocky, confident man she had fallen in love with. “We’ll retire to the closest hotel we can find. And we’ll stay there until we’ve both gone blind from making mad, passionate, forever love.”

  Another deputy whimpered and went down. You could hear a pin drop in the concrete hallway.

  “All my life,” Maxie whispered, “there will be you, and only you. I want to have your babies. I want to watch sunsets with you. I want to wake up every morning and see you beside me. If you need to work in Los Angeles, I’ll be right there with you. You’re never going to shake me, Garrett. I have a habit of getting what I want.”

  Connor himself was breathing a little irregularly. He wanted her lips, wanted that taste on his tongue. He wanted out of this damned jail cell.

  “I don’t like Los Angeles any more,” he said. “I’m in love with Oakley, Wyoming. I’d like to try my hand at writing and milking cows and working constantly on having babies…lots of babies.”

  Maxie’s hands were white-knuckled on the bars. Desire came to her like a flood, swirling around her heart and pooling in her secret places. Never once taking her eyes from Connor’s, she said hoarsely, “Officers? You need to let him out. Or let me in. I really don’t care as long as I’m with him.”

  Keys jangling, one of the deputies unlocked the cell. “You’re a lucky man,” he muttered to Connor. “Real lucky.”

  The door swung open, and Connor and Maxie fell into each other’s arms. They kissed, long, slow and deep. Neither of them cared who was watching or what they might think. When he reached the edges of his self-control, Connor pulled back, framing her face in his shaking hands. Oh, so beautiful, so sweet. Her violet eyes held nothing but him.

  “Together,” he whispered softly. “Always, from this day on.”

  The light in her eyes said yes.

  Clearing their throats, the deputies shuffled down the corridor. To a man, they felt privileged. Even the circus of reporters and photographers gathered in the connecting office didn’t mar their euphoria. They had seen Glitter Baby in love. Their fantasies would be particularly rich for some time to come.

  Back in the hallway, still holding Maxie for all he was worth, Connor grinned. “You’ve just made four men very happy. No, make it five. You’ve made me ecstatic.”

  “I should warn you,” Maxie ventured cautiously, “that you’re bound to hear people talking about me, saying things you might not particularly like. You can’t go around knocking them down all the time. One day the buzz will be over and the world will forget Glitter Baby ever existed. Until then, we’ll just have to be patient. Yes?”

  Connor nodded, looking at her as if he could taste her with his eyes. “Yes, dear. Whatever you say, dear.”

  Maxie’s generous mouth tugged upwards in a sensual smile. “And you’ll let me love you
? Always and forever, with all my heart and body and soul?”

  Every dream Connor had ever had in his life had come true in that moment. Tenderness filled him, warm, honeyed and incredibly powerful.

  “Yes, dear,” he whispered. “Oh, yes.”

  Some two hundred miles to the south, Jacob Stephens and Natalie Calhoon sat in a booth at Corner Drug, enjoying a banana split.

  “So, do you think we should tell them?” Natalie asked.

  Jacob feigned innocence. “Tell who what?”

  Natalie’s look said he wasn’t fooling her for a minute. “Tell Connor and Maxie the truth.”

  “Oh, that.” Jacob waved his spoon dismissively. “Why bother?”

  Natalie chewed thoughtfully on her lower lip. “They might find out one day. They might feel…manipulated.”

  “We didn’t do anything wrong,” Jacob said firmly. “We met by accident when I wandered into your antique store two months ago. If we happened to talk about Connor and Maxie, if we decided they should meet, that’s our business. They fell in love completely on their own.”

  “And the other?” Natalie persisted. “When they find out we’ve been seeing one another? Shouldn’t we tell them?”

  Jacob smiled tenderly. “They wouldn’t believe us, anyway. We did too good a job of acting. Besides, I’m too short for you.”

  “And I’m too tall for you.” She uttered a long, put-upon sigh. “What a shame. Oh, well. Would you like to see a movie tonight? Afterwards,” she fluttered her lashes flirtatiously, “we could go back to my place and I’ll show you my antiques.”

  I’m a lucky man, Jacob thought. This amazing woman had been well worth waiting for.

  “Yes, dear,” he said.

  Epilogue

  There was only one photograph in the bedroom. It was small, but it occupied a place of honor on the wall opposite the bed. There were two people in the picture, both sun-bronzed, both smiling straight into the camera without a trace of pretense. They stood barefoot on a sandy beach, with a glorious backdrop of curling blue-and-white waves. There had been a wedding, obviously. The bride wore a simple white dress and carried a bouquet of tropical flowers. The breeze tousled her long hair like a lustrous garland. The groom had shunned a tuxedo for slacks and a loose white shirt, and someone had lovingly placed a lei around his neck. A rainbow-colored sunset poured over their happiness, gilding a precious moment in time.