The Last Cowboy Standing

by Barbara Dunlop

  He sipped his drink and surveyed her over the rim. The dark circles beneath her eyes told him she was working harder than ever since Tiberius had been murdered several weeks ago.

  “You should take some time off,” he said, aware that what she did was none of his business.

  “And do what? Sit around and grieve?” She must have heard the edge in her tone because after a long sigh, she continued on a milder note. “I know it’s what most people do when they lose a parent, but I can’t think of a better way to honor Tiberius’s memory than to work.”

  JT nodded in understanding. “I’m sure he’d approve.”

  Although he’d been given the middle name, Tiberius, after his mother’s younger brother, until the last few months JT had never had the chance to know his uncle by anything other than reputation. JT had been raised in Miami where Stone Properties had their headquarters. Tiberius rarely left Vegas. And the bad blood between Tiberius and his brother-in-law and JT’s father, Preston Rhodes, made any chance of a relationship between JT and his uncle impossible.

  The hard feelings between Tiberius and Preston went back twenty-five years. According to what JT had gleaned from family friends, Preston had accused Tiberius of embezzling from Stone Properties and had convinced James Stone to fire his son. Then, five years later, James had died and JT’s father had used his influence over his wife, Fiona Stone—bowing to pressure from her father, she’d never taken her husband’s last name—to get the board of directors to vote in favor of making him chairman and CEO.

  “Thanks for coming to the memorial service this morning,” Violet said. “I know you and Tiberius weren’t close, but lately he’d talked a lot about how he regretted all the years he kept you out of his life and how he wished he’d gotten to know you.”

  Regret tightened in his chest. “I had no idea Tiberius felt that way.” JT sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly.

  When he’d arrived in Las Vegas to run the local family operations, his opinion of his uncle had been formed by what he knew about Tiberius from his father and grandfather. Although relations between him and his uncle stayed tense for many years, after seeing how much Violet admired Tiberius, plus all the positive things said about his uncle by other Las Vegas businessmen, JT had begun to suspect that if Tiberius had done what his father had accused him of, there’d been a good reason.

  “When it came to your family, he could be hard-headed,” Violet said with a faint smile. “And he really hated your dad.”

  “The feeling was definitely mutual.”

  Violet remained lost in thought for a moment. “Lately he’d mentioned quite a few times that he thought you’d do a terrific job running Stone Properties.”

  The compliment landed a direct hit in his gut. He wished he’d had a chance to get to know his uncle the way Violet did. Now it was too late. “I’m leaving the company.”

  JT heard himself say the words and wondered at his impromptu disclosure. He hadn’t divulged his inner thoughts to anyone. Not even his cousin, Brent, and they were as close as brothers. JT peered into his drink. Had Rick infused some sort of truth serum into the cocktail? JT set the glass down. When he looked up, he caught Violet staring at him in surprise.

  “Why would you do that?”

  “When I turned thirty two months ago, I gained control of my trust fund and the thirty percent of Stone Properties shares my mother left to me when she died. This enabled me to dig into the finances and see what my father has been doing lately.”

  “And?”

  “The properties are overleveraged. My father’s been borrowing too much trying to expand and with each property that gets built, our resources are stretched closer to their breaking point.” In his gut was a ball of frustration that had been growing steadily these last sixty days.

  “I had no idea.” Sympathy made her voice soft. She felt sorry for him and he hated it. “Have you shared your concerns with your father?”

  It wasn’t like him to disclose his difficulties to anyone, least of all someone as tightly connected to the competition as Violet. But then, she wasn’t just anyone. She was special. Through her he was linked to a part of his family he’d never known and just being around her made him feel less alone.

  JT picked up his drink once more. “He won’t listen and since he controls the majority of the shares, I don’t have leverage to affect current policy.”

  “If you leave Stone Properties, what are you planning to do?”

  He’d never been one to show his cards, but Violet’s attentiveness made her easy to confide in. She acted as if she had all the time in the world to listen to what ailed him and offer sensible feedback. He’d be a fool not to listen to her opinion as a businesswoman. But it was her friendship he craved. And if he was honest with himself, her body he longed to devour.

  “I’ve been cultivating some investors,” he said. “I’m going out on my own. My uncle didn’t need the family business to be successful and neither do I.”

  “Are you sure that’s the best idea? Tiberius let your father drive him out of the business and never stopped regretting it.”

  “No one drove him out,” JT corrected her. “Tiberius was caught stealing from the company and was fired.”

  Her disappointment in him was like clouds passing in front of the sun. “He was framed.” She truly believed that. “By your father.”

  JT sat perfectly still beneath the weight of her accusation while his thought raced. A normal person would rush to defend their father against such slander, but JT had seen the company’s financials for himself and knew his father was not telling the stockholders everything. That made him a liar in JT’s books. Nor would he ever champion his father after the way Preston had treated JT’s mother.

  But he wasn’t ready to jump on the bash-Preston bandwagon either. As conflicted as JT was about his father, he put a high value on loyalty.

  “If that’s true,” he said, his tone neutral, “all the more reason to break with the company and my father.”

  Determination flared in her eyes. “Or you could stay and fight for what’s yours.”

  While JT appreciated her spirited defense of his inheritance, he’d been contemplating the wisdom of staying with Stone Properties for a couple years. It was worse now that he had seen the company’s financials.

  “I hate being powerless to stop him from taking apart all that my grandfather built.”

  “I can understand that.” Without warning her gaze sharpened. “These plans of yours, do they mean you’re leaving Las Vegas?”

  Was she hoping he wouldn’t? The thought of not seeing her every day made him grim. Did it bother her as well?

  JT searched her eyes for answers, but saw only curiosity. With Violet, what you saw was what you got. Her openness fascinated him. She never seemed to worry about guarding herself against hurt or disappointment.

  It was a major factor in why he’d never pursued her.

  Not long after he’d arrived in Las Vegas, he’d run into his uncle and Violet at a charity event. Despite his instant attraction to the twenty-three-year-old, he knew better than to act on his interest. The bad blood between her adopted father and his biological one was a significant barrier. So was JT’s playboy lifestyle.

  Before he’d moved to Las Vegas, JT had made quite a name for himself in Miami’s social scene. Going at life at a reckless pace whether it was fast boats, expensive cars or unavailable women, he hadn’t cared whom he hurt as long as he displeased his father.

  He liked Violet too much to subject her to his unhealthy family dynamic. Besides, she wasn’t a good choice for him. Unlike the women he usually pursued, she would expect things from him. Things he couldn’t give her. Openness. Joy. Trust. In order to be with her he’d have to surrender the defenses that muffled his emotions and protected him from pain and disillusionment. She’d lure
him out of his comfortable dark cave and require him to find happiness. How was he supposed to do that when his childhood hadn’t given him the tools?

  His father believed anything that got in the way of business was bad. As a kid, JT had had that philosophy hammered into his head. His mother had been weakened by her hunger for love. Being ignored by the domineering husband she adored had made her life hell, and she’d started retreating into drugs and alcohol around the time that Tiberius left town. By the time he turned twelve, JT was used to being ignored by his parents, forgotten by his grandfather and alienated from his uncle. Nor was there any family on his father’s side. The only person who’d showed any interest in him was his grandmother and she split her time between Miami, Virginia and Kentucky.

  Traditional family. Love. JT had never grown up with these things.

  Being around Violet gave him a glimpse of what a normal personal life could be. The love she had for her sisters, her mother and Tiberius made him long to be included in her circle. But he couldn’t take the steps needed to put himself there. Nor could he leave well enough alone either. The need to connect remained. A tantalizing temptation. One of his deep, dark secrets.

  So he visited Fontaine Chic night after night and sat in the bar. He craved a relationship with Violet, but had no idea how to go about having one. In casino terms, he was betting the minimum. He’d never win big, but he wasn’t going to lose everything either. Playing without risk was not how he lived. He got a rush from flinging his body into danger, but gambling with his heart was something else entirely.

  “I don’t know what the future holds,” he responded at last. “Will you miss me if I go?”

  The question caught her off guard. Her eyes widened and her lips parted, but no words came out. Usually their exchanges hovered on the verge of personal without either of them crossing that line. Tonight, he’d changed the game by giving her a glimpse into what was bothering him, by trusting her with his plans for the future.

  “I’ll miss your business,” she retorted with a wry smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. She uncrossed her legs, signaling their conversation was at an end.

  “Violet.” He caught her hand before she could rise. The casual contact created a complex chain reaction in JT’s gut. He wanted her. That had never been in doubt. But what lay below the lust was dangerous beyond belief. “I’m really sorry about Tiberius.”

  He gave her hand a gentle squeeze and released her. It rattled him how hard it was to relax his fingers and set her free. What he wanted to do was draw her into his arms and let her soak the shoulder of his suit coat with her tears. He knew it was impossible. They didn’t share that level of intimacy. The fact both relieved and frustrated him.

  “Thank you.” Two polite words, but her tone carried a wealth of emotion. She dabbed at the corner of her eye, catching teardrops on her knuckles. “I’m such a mess.”

  “I think you’re beautiful.”

  * * *

  Such a simple statement from such a complicated man. Unvarnished and without subtext, the words shook her. Needing a second to compose herself, Violet made quick apologies and headed for the bar to snag a couple of drink napkins to soak up her tears. Feeling steady once more, she returned to where JT now stood.

  “Are you okay?”

  The hard, unyielding businessman was back. As Violet nodded in response to his question, she breathed a sigh of relief. Whatever glimpse she’d had behind the curtain, however brief, made JT that much more interesting. And that was problematic.

  Long ago she’d accepted that one look from him set her hormones off like Roman candles. Lust she could handle. She was a modern girl with a healthy appetite for sex. Maybe she didn’t indulge often, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t interested. Just cautious.

  It was the way her heart sped up whenever she spotted JT that concerned her. Getting romantic notions about a man as emotionally unavailable as JT would only lead to heartbreak. And she’d seen the effects of that sort of misery up close. Violet’s mother had been abandoned by her married lover and left with a baby to support. Ross Fontaine had taken everything Lucille Allen had to give and moved on without a backward glance. Yet despite her heart being a shattered mess, Violet’s mother still loved Ross and would to her dying day.

  No. Violet was way too smart to end up like her mother. The instant the uncharitable thought surfaced, Violet regretted it. She loved her mom like crazy. It was just that being Lucille’s daughter had forced Violet to grow up too fast. If not for Tiberius, she’d have had no childhood at all.

  He’d adored Lucille. Taken on the responsibility for her and her daughter. They’d been his family. Not legally, of course, because even though he loved Lucille and wanted to marry her, she refused to give up on the hope that one day Ross Fontaine would return to her.

  When Violet gave her heart, it would be to someone available, emotionally as well as legally. His reputation as a smart, fair businessman impressed the hell out of her, but when it came to personal relationships, he never went all in.

  Not that he’d given her any reason to believe he thought of her as anything other than a competitor who’d stolen his favorite bartender. Tonight that had changed. Tonight he’d asked if she’d miss him if he left Las Vegas and made her believe his next heartbeat hinged on her saying that she would.

  Violet brushed away her fanciful thoughts, but she couldn’t ignore how her pulse had hitched at the gentle strength of his hand on hers. This was just simple desire. Nothing more. The man was six-feet, one-inch of rock solid male. Handsome with his black hair and bold eyebrows. The slight downturn of his chiseled lips. The fathomless ocean blue of his eyes.

  Her instincts said he was a man who could use some help and she was a girl who loved cheering on her teammates. Only he wasn’t on her team or even part of her circle. She would be wise to mind her own business where he was concerned. If she became too invested in offering him help that he did not want, she’d end up getting burned.

  “I’d better get going or I’ll be completely off schedule,” she said, but couldn’t bring her feet to move. Something had changed between them tonight and walking away from JT was proving difficult.

  “I’d better get going as well,” he told her, glancing at his watch. “If you need anything I hope you’ll call.”

  More surprises. “Sure.” She couldn’t imagine what sort of help she’d turn to him for. Most of the time she was pretty self-sufficient. She’d had to be. Her mother was too easily overwhelmed by the least difficulty. Violet had learned to take care of herself from an early age, even when life had grown less challenging after they’d moved in with Tiberius when Violet was six. “That’s nice of you.”

  For a brief moment his eyes softened. Before she could draw an unsteady breath he’d retreated behind his reserve once more.

  “It’s not being nice,” he said, neutral and polite. “We’re family.”

  His declaration was the cherry on top of a triple scoop sundae of surprises. “How do you figure?”

  “It might not be the most traditional connection, but you were my uncle’s daughter.”

  “Not legally.” Violet wasn’t sure how to cope with a connection of this sort with JT. If things became affectionate between them she might just step out of the neutral zone and into treacherous territory.

  “Do you really think that mattered to Tiberius?”

  “No.” Violet cocked her head and regarded him. “But I would have thought it mattered to you.”

  “Why?”

  Violet floundered. Confronting people didn’t come naturally to her. It was a skill she’d worked hard to develop during her years in management positions and when she did speak her mind, it was after careful preparation.

  But JT had flustered her tonight and she’d spoken without thought.

  “The truth is I really don’t know.�
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  “But you had a reason to say it,” he persisted, his interest laser-sharp.

  Admitting her flaws wasn’t something she did often, but Violet felt she owed JT an explanation after he’d been so kind to her tonight. “I didn’t like growing up the bastard daughter of Ross Fontaine,” she explained. “Being treated as if I didn’t exist by the entire Fontaine family gave me a huge chip on my shoulder.”

  “That’s changed now. Henry Fontaine not only welcomed you as his granddaughter, he gave you a hotel to run and a shot at becoming CEO of the family business.”

  Violet nodded. “And most days that amazes me. But sometimes I regress to that eleven-year-old girl who was ridiculed by her classmates for bragging that I was Ross Fontaine’s daughter when everyone could tell he wanted nothing to do with me.”

  “I can see where that would be hard.”

  She had a difficult time believing JT could sympathize with her situation. The sole heir to Stone Properties, he’d grown up knowing who he was and where he belonged. Maybe things hadn’t been perfect with his parents and maybe the company was struggling with his father at the helm, but that could be turned around with the right moves.

  “So, you think we’re family,” she said, aiming for a warm smile. She could tell by JT’s expression that she missed the mark.

  “I didn’t have a chance to know my uncle,” he explained. “I think I missed a lot. You knew him better than anyone. I feel connected to him through you.”

  It took a second for Violet to register that JT was reaching out to her. All of a sudden she felt a little giddy. “Your uncle was my father in all ways but legally.” She sounded a tad breathless as she finished, “I suppose that makes us cousins.”

  JT cocked his head and regarded her. “I suppose it does. Good night, Violet.”

  He departed Baccarat without touching her again and Violet was dismayed by her disappointment. She could get used to having his hands on her. Was that creepy now that they’d agreed to consider each other cousins?