A Cowboy in Disguise

by Victoria Ashe

  “Must have been painful.”

  “No, it was a good evening for me,” he said. “I look at this scar and it reminds me of a time when I got rid of a lot of excess baggage and achieved exactly what I’d planned.”

  Alexandra’s hand clenched her fork until her knuckles turned white. The man was admitting he’d conned her and she couldn’t do a thing about it. The others at the table looked back and forth between her and Duncan, not understanding what was happening.

  •

  An uneasy feeling crept over Scott. This conversation was too personal, too vindictive to just be about stolen company secrets. After what they’d shared in the cabin and the conversation they’d had, she would have told him otherwise, wouldn’t she?

  Duncan pressed on, “I’ve been noticing something all night, too. When we last met, I could have sworn you had a lovely diamond ring on your finger. No personal tragedy has befallen you, I trust?”

  Alexandra’s composure held firm. “You’re so kind to inquire. But no, I’m afraid the ring you refer to was nothing, just a cheap imitation of the real thing, much like the man who gave it to me, I’m afraid.” She addressed the other men at the table with a winsome smile. “I really dodged a bullet with that one.” She laughed and winked at them, causing them to laugh in return. Her energy was contagious when she wielded it that way.

  After half a dozen drinks and the laughter of his companions assailing his ego, Duncan’s poise wasn’t so intact. “You weren’t woman enough to wear that ring, Alexandra,” he spat. “If it hadn’t been for your corporate connections, you wouldn’t have been able to amuse me in any way while we were together. Oops, I guess you didn’t, even at that.” Duncan tossed his napkin onto the table. “I’m through with this dinner and I’m through with you.”

  Duncan staggered to his feet and Scott jumped to his. He had a good idea of what had passed between them, but where he came from, a man didn’t treat a woman that way, especially not in public.

  “You’re not even close to finished,” he said. “You owe the lady an apology and I want to hear it now.”

  Duncan looked Scott up and down, judging his strength and knowing when he was beaten. “My obviously oh-so-sincere apologies,” he snarled and tottered out of the room. He knocked against his empty cup as he moved away, and it crashed to the floor without him bothering to pick it up.

  Mike and Roger both stood, stammering and red-faced. “We’re so sorry. We apologize,” they said together several times. “We don’t know what could have come over him. Again, let us apologize.”

  They each spoke a stream of embarrassed sentences in unison, stopping and stumbling over each other’s words before running down the hall to catch Duncan.

  Scott and Alexandra sat alone at the table. He turned to her, “Duncan was also the man you were involved with, wasn’t he?”

  Alexandra nodded miserably.

  “Why didn’t you tell me? We’re supposed to be on the same side here. Why didn’t you trust me?”

  “I don’t know, Scott. I didn’t really even think to say anything. I just felt so stupid. I mean, take a good look at the guy. Stupid, ugly, stupid beard.”

  “Tell me what you really think.” Scott shook his head. “After all that time in the cabin, you didn’t think to tie the pieces together for me? You told me about the stolen documents and then about the man who had hurt you—your former fiancé nonetheless. But, you never had any intention of really letting me know you, did you?”

  “Not then. It seemed too personal at the time.”

  The thought of Duncan, that puffed-up philanderer so much as laying a finger on her beautiful skin, touching and kissing her—the image cut straight through him. How could she have settled for, given herself to a man so undeserving? How could a man like that have betrayed someone so wonderful as Alexandra Hunter? The world was an upside-down place.

  “I’m not sure if you’re angry with me or jealous,” she said in disbelief. “One thing is for sure, though. We let things go too far in the cabin. We’ve let personal feelings leak over into business.”

  “I hope you don’t consider that a problem. I don’t. I just realized I jumped to a few too many conclusions, Alex. What I know for sure is that you and I have feelings of some sort for each other. Don’t you think we should find out where they lead? Come on, forget about Duncan and get to know me better. Heck, for all you know, I really could have been fooling around with celebrities in Europe all my life.”

  “You don’t really think I still believe that, do you?” She ran her hand across her forehead. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter. I think Duncan’s little display at dinner tonight is an excellent example of exactly why I’m better cut out for a career than a relationship.”

  “I’m just saying I obviously don’t know you well enough yet to have earned your trust, but I can’t figure out why you didn’t just tell me about Duncan right from the moment we met him here at the hotel. I’m not some dumb cowboy who deserves to be treated with deception.”

  Even before he finished his last sentence, he wondered if his words were meant for Alexandra, or if they were something he should have said to Mackenzie a long time ago. Scott cringed inside. This was not the untrustworthy Mackenzie he was talking to.

  “I’m private that way,” she said. “That much you should know by now. And I imagine you understand it.”

  He saw her recognition of the look his eyes as he recalled a memory of hurt and betrayal. She’d probably seen that same look staring back at her from her mirror.

  “I’m sorry, Alex.”

  “We’re both really tired, Scott. I didn’t mean to keep anything from you. I just think we’ve been through a lot the past few days. If I’d been more professional around you in the cabin, you wouldn’t feel so strongly about what happened at dinner tonight. See, this is exactly one of the reasons office romances never work. Hey, what happened to ‘I’ve got your back, Alex,’ huh? Let’s just stick to that.”

  She smiled soothingly at him, but he paid her little attention.

  Scott turned and started to leave the room. “I’ve still got your back, Alex. I could have pounded Phelps into the ground for a second there. We may not know each other well enough yet, but I already can’t stand the thought of him hurting you.”

  His voice was softer than he would have liked, and yet he didn’t turn back to look at her again before he walked away. He didn’t know which was worse, the thought of her relationship with Duncan, or the fear that she might not give him the chance to build a relationship of his own with her.

  Scott left early the next morning on a flight bound for his home office in Chicago. He needed a couple days to sort things out in his head, and handling some tasks at work seemed a good excuse.

  Two years in a relationship with Mackenzie had eroded his trust in love more than he’d imagined. There were no similarities at all between the two women, though. His judgment was clear enough to see that, his pain long enough gone. Mackenzie had stopped at nothing to promote her own financial interests, even playing with his heart and threatening his family in Montana. How would he ever get closer to Alexandra? He was afraid his reaction to Duncan had simply pointed out all of the complications of an office romance to her, and she was finished with him before they’d even started.

  •

  Alexandra was relieved she’d be taking her return flight to Seattle alone. Just when she started to feel something for him, he’d stepped all over that budding emotion by showing her exactly why personal attachments had no place in the office. Things could get too intense, too fast.

  She cursed herself for her unprofessional behavior in the mountain cabin. The heated towels—whatever had possessed her to go along with something so stupid? She’d told herself all along to listen to her head and never her heart, and here was proof of why. No, there was no way she was going to look at Scott Falconer with anything other than professional interest again. The risk was far too great.

  “Who am I kidding?” s
he whispered aloud to herself. “I’m still absolutely crazy about the big jerk.” She closed her eyes tightly and shook her head. “I might be in trouble here.”

  When Alexandra walked into the building, Sarah followed her down the hall to her office like a lost puppy. “Well, well?” She almost jumped up and down with excitement. “You have to tell me the details. What happened in Colorado? Are they from Scott Falconer?”

  “Nothing productive happened. And are what from him?” Alexandra was still somewhat irritated with her assistant for all the false rumors she’d planted in her head. She hadn’t given Scott a fair initial reaction because of them.

  “Those!” Sarah gave a sweeping game show hostess gesture toward Alexandra’s office. A dozen long-stem Lady Diana roses sat in a crystal vase in the middle of her desk. She felt the color rise in her face and remembered the emotion in Scott’s eyes … She knew without looking that the roses were from him.

  “What’s the card say?” Sarah squealed, shaking Alexandra back to the present.

  Alexandra pulled the card from the bouquet and read it silently to herself. I’ve still got your back. I’m sorry. Thank goodness the card wasn’t signed, because she wasn’t entirely sure Sarah hadn’t done a little snooping.

  “Well?”

  “They’re just from a friendly business associate, that’s all,” Alexandra told her. “Nothing to get worked up about.” She had no intention of reading the card out loud to her assistant no matter how anxious the woman was to hear what was written on it.

  Sarah gave her a suspicious and disappointed look and went back to her desk.

  Scott called Alexandra just as she sat down at her desk. “Hi, it’s me,” he said.

  “I got the roses. How very original.” She hated to shoot him down, but there was no other way.

  “Look, Alex. I think I scared you. But I feel wonderful and can’t wait to see you. I’ve asked about Duncan and about your family, but I haven’t told you anything you need to know about me. Talk when I get back?”

  “No need. We’ve got to get the presentation going, you know. I don’t need to know your past, Scott. What happened in that cabin will never be repeated. It doesn’t matter now. I apologize for being to unprofessional with you in Colorado. I wa—”

  “You’re wrong, Alex,” he interrupted. “It matters very much and you know it. We have feelings for each other that are hard to come by in this world. We need to see where they lead.”

  Alexandra hung up the phone not wanting to hear the end of his romantic sales pitch. He was right. She didn’t really know much about him considering all she’d heard. Maybe he was the playboy Sarah had warned her about and happened to be a very good actor when it came to hiding his true self.

  That ice wall was firmly in place and she wasn’t going to let him chip away at it again. But the man called incessantly, nearly every hour, every day until she wanted to scream. She finally explained to the receptionist that they were working on a presentation together and to expect several calls, but knew that the fodder for office gossip was already in place.

  “You have to quit calling,” she whispered frantically to him after the fifth call. “Between that and the roses, we may as well have actually done things together for all the damage this is doing to my reputation.”

  “Things?”

  “Things.”

  “Oh, okay. So I won’t call you,” he agreed amicably.

  Five minutes later, Scott appeared in front of her desk. “Surprise! I flew in and came straight here. Go to dinner with me?”

  Alexandra’s mouth dropped open. “Were you calling from the parking lot? The plane?” Scott Falconer had nerve if nothing else.

  Though she hated to admit it, she hadn’t seen him for a couple days, and hadn’t realized how much she’d missed looking at his face. He wore a beautifully tailored suit that screamed authority and sophistication. She loved how he could look one way at the office and quite another while tossing wood on a fire. It was as if he stepped with ease back and forth between two very separate, very masculine worlds.

  •

  Scott grinned. “You’re a sight for sore eyes.”

  Her classic navy blue suit had small yellow buttons and yellow piping at the bottoms of the sleeves—and it fit her amazingly. But no suit could erase the memory of her skin, warmed to golden hues by firelight.

  “I missed you,” he whispered.

  “Shut the door before Sarah hears you,” Alexandra hissed. “I’m not having dinner with you. I’ve put the brakes on where you’re concerned, Scott Falconer. Not that they were ever off. Okay, maybe they were off a little.” She took a breath to collect herself. “If you’d like to stay here and work on the presentation with me, we can order in pizza or something.”

  “Alex, I said I’m sorry and I meant it. I’m not typically that intense and I don’t want to talk about Colorado any more. But I also don’t want to think I damaged what had started between us. You felt it back on the side of the road that first day. I know you did—even then.”

  “I know you’re sincere. And it’s fine, really. But business is business and we agreed to keep it that way. From here on out, that is.”

  Scott sighed. “Dinner? A long conversation? How about a drive down the freeway until we get another flat?”

  Alexandra put up her hand and fought to hide a smile. “I don’t want to hear any more propositions. Not now. Maybe after the presentation.”

  “Really? I’ll have to add a couple things to my list then.” He crossed his arms over his broad chest and smiled.

  “I just mean we can talk after the presentation, if you still have the burning need to.”

  “Oh, I imagine I still will.”

  •

  They worked on the presentation endlessly, sitting side-by-side in front of Alexandra’s enormous computer monitor. Scott rolled his chair away when Alexandra signaled he was getting too close, and time after time they jumped when their hands accidentally touched. Reaching across the desk for the stapler or a paperclip took on a level of tension that wouldn’t have existed between two other people in the same situation.

  “Alex …” he would start to say in that softened tone she now recognized so well.

  “Back to the numbers,” Alexandra would instruct without looking up from her desk.

  Once while she was typing, Scott looked at her with such an expression of amazement and desire that she almost lost her resolve. His entire being seemed to jump into his blue eyes when he looked at her like that. Pretending not to notice, Alexandra excused herself and walked to the restroom where she locked herself in one of the stalls and stayed there until her hands stopped shaking.

  She found tiny gifts hidden in random places throughout her office. A truffle wrapped in red foil was tucked into her tape dispenser. She found a tiny African violet in a new pot beside the other plants on her window. A set of four floating candles shaped like tires miraculously appeared in her filing cabinet. Where in the world he’d found those, she could only guess. Of course, Scott denied any knowledge of the continuously appearing surprises.

  He was courting her, she realized. Did men even do that anymore?

  On a Friday when everyone else had left the office, Scott turned to Alexandra and said, “Come to dinner with me, Alex. I’m hungry. I mean no harm. And I’m sick to death of pizza.”

  Alexandra studied him for a moment. “Let me get this straight. We’re alone in a dark office building, locked away in my office, and you want to leave? Go to a crowded, public restaurant and talk business? I guess that’s an indication of your good intentions.” She reached for her purse.

  “You’re flirting with me, Alex.” Scott reached out and covered her hand with hers. “Does this mean you’re going to let me in again?”

  “Do I have a choice?” Her fingers burned where his hand rested on them. “We have to work together.” She had nearly forgotten her intent to remain detached from him—so easily forgotten that it scared her.

 
“Let’s date, Alexandra. Let’s become involved.” He grabbed her roughly by the waist and pulled her against him.

  “Are you crazy?” She felt her cheeks sting as her face threatened to redden. She was infuriated that this man had made her blush more times in the past week than she had in her entire life. “You can’t keep bringing up this subject while we’re working.” She struggled to pull away from his hold. “No. No. No.”

  He nodded and turned her loose. “I’ve given this more thought than you can imagine. The worst that can happen is I’ll go back to Chicago, you’ll stay here and it will just end. We’ll be discrete and if it doesn’t work out, we’ll survive. Reputations intact,” he assured.

  “It’s not just avoiding an office romance, Scott. After all that happened, I don’t trust myself with you.” She wasn’t used to such emotional honesty. She looked down at her desk.

  “Then trust me. I’m looking for the commitment, Alex. I won’t let things go so far that you’d regret it the next morning.”

  “But what about you?” she countered. “If we become involved, won’t you always wonder if I did it to keep you pliable so that I get my way on the presentation?”

  “It’s a chance I’ll take.”

  “I can’t, Scott.”

  He shrugged in temporary resignation. “Well, then it’s back to friendly colleagues for now.”

  “Well, yes and no. I think we could safely go out together just once.” Alexandra put her purse down and opened up her desk drawer. She pulled out an envelope with the words You’re Invited printed in swirling gold foil.

  “I got this in the mail today,” she said. “It’s from Mac Stevens. Four tickets to Rio’s annual holiday gala with the request of our illustrious presence.”

  “Pick you up at seven?” he asked.

  Chapter Six

  Mary was ecstatic. “You’re giving it a shot? I can’t believe it! Ms. Social Recluse on a date.” She handed Alexandra a cup of coffee and sat down next to her at the kitchen table.

  “He’s picking me up any minute now. It’s not a date, not a real one anyway. It’s for work, and David and his wife are going with us.”