“They … uh…” She paused, took a breath, pleased when it didn’t quiver, then continued. “They howl to find one another, announce a kill, freak people out. The time has little to do with it.”
“What about howling at the moon?”
“Myth. Since they’re nocturnal hunters, most of their howling’s done at night, under that moon, which is probably where the idea came from. Sure, you hear them less in the daylight, but you see them less, too. They gotta sleep sometime.”
“You got a big wolf problem here?”
Gina glanced at him. There was no reason not to tell the truth.
“There aren’t any wolves here at all,” she said.
He laughed. “Sure there aren’t. Wink.” He winked. “Wink. Don’t worry, Gina; I won’t go running back to Arizona if I see a wolf, or even a bear.”
“You won’t see a wolf.” She glanced over her shoulder at the camp. “No one ever has.”
“But—” His eyes clouded with confusion, darkening them to the shade of last year’s moss. “I just heard them.”
“Those howls are some weird phenomenon. The wind through the rocks, the mountains, the trees. No one knows. We’ve looked for wolves; we’ve never found them.”
“Maybe you just … haven’t found them?”
He obviously knew very little about wolves. “If there were wolves, we’d see spoor. Traces of kills. We’d lose a horse once in a while. They’re predators. There’s a reason the ranchers hate them.”
“Why haven’t I heard about this?”
Gina tilted her head. “Why would you?”
“No reason,” he said quickly. “It’s just odd. Isn’t it?”
Very. But she wasn’t going to admit that, for the same reason she hadn’t advertised the fact. The whole thing was a little creepy. Not the best PR. If you wanted to pay top dollar for a relaxing trip to a ranch, you didn’t want to go to one with spooky un–wolf howls that couldn’t be explained.
Isaac had even had some friend of his from the war—the Big One, WW 2—who supposedly knew everything there was to know about wolves of all kinds come and study the place. And then that guy had called in his granddaughter, some hotshot “ologist.” Zoologist? Biologist? Gina couldn’t remember. Neither one of them had any explanation for why the wolves gave Nahua Springs such a wide berth.
“The ranchers around here are thrilled,” Gina continued. “Haven’t lost a foal to a wolf in forever.”
Literally.
“Hmm,” Teo murmured, his gaze on the trees.
“You like wolves or something?” she asked.
People did. Usually city people. Those who lived in the West and dealt with wolves loathed them. Try to discuss the success of wolf reintroduction to Yellowstone with a rancher from the area and you’d be lucky to come away with only one black eye.
“Sure,” Teo said. “They’re pretty.”
Gina wouldn’t know. She’d only seen them in movies. Where they tended to be toothy, shape-shifting, monster-type wolves and not the noble beasts of a Robert Bateman painting.
“I’ll find you a bear.” She patted his hand. “You’ll love it.”
He tangled their fingers together before she could pull away, then rubbed his thumb over the base of hers, causing a now-familiar shimmy in her stomach. “I’m sure I will.”
She lifted her gaze from their joined hands to his face. His eyes, now the shade of corroded copper, captured hers. She could look into them for years and never have them appear the same shade twice. It was fascinating. He was fascinating.
“Love it,” he said.
She blinked, trying to remember what they were discussing.
Oh yeah. Bears.
Whoopee.
No wonder no man had ever asked her on a second date if bears were the extent of her conversation. Her mind groped for something clever to say, but she came up empty. She knew horses, the ranch. That was it. She couldn’t help it.
“Maybe—” Gina began, but she never finished the sentence, and later, after all that happened next, she wouldn’t want to.
“You smell like…” He lifted his free hand to her hair, not yet braided and still trailing down her back to her waist. “Trees.”
“That’s probably just the trees,” she murmured, captured forever by those eyes.
“Nah,” he said, and kissed her.
She’d been kissed before; she was certain she had. But the instant Teo’s mouth touched hers she couldn’t recall a single one because she knew in that instant that this was the one.
The kiss. The moment. The man. How could that be?
She only knew that it was.
He tasted of mint—toothpaste no doubt, yet exotic nevertheless. He was warmth amid the chill. Solid in a world that just wasn’t.
His tongue traced her lips. What should have tickled instead electrified. Her heart thundered—a rapid, steady rhythm with the cadence of hoofbeats—and her ears buzzed, almost like the ground was shaking or the air had filled with bees.
The world tilted; everything changed. She had to reach for something that might steady it, steady her.
Her fingers curled around his biceps. They flexed at the touch, bulging against her palms.
She wanted to lick his skin, see if it tasted of the oranges she smelled. Instead, she licked his teeth, his lip, his tongue, and his biceps flexed again as he grasped her hips and held on.
Her heart beat louder but slower, which made no sense; she felt it fluttering so fast and so hard it threatened to burst from her chest, yet that sound in her ears—buzzzzzz—had not only slowed but seemed to come closer. And how could it be any closer than this?
She became distracted by something else that pulsed. Lower, against her stomach, hard and full, with a beat that called to her own—bump-bump—definitely a heart and not hooves.
Gina’s ears sharpened. The buzzing had stopped.
Was she dead?
She lifted her lips. His eyes behind the slightly askew glasses—had she done that? She couldn’t recall—had gone the shade of those trees he insisted she smelled like. He smiled—a goofy, happy smile that made her smile, too. She was lifting her mouth for another kiss—it seemed a shame to waste one more second of her life not kissing him—and someone cleared his throat.
Gina closed her eyes. Hell. Were the others awake? Were they even now watching her and Teo, waiting to ruin magic more dazzling than the sun?
Except Gina still felt as if she were floating. Even the As weren’t going to be able to bring her down. She didn’t think anyone could.
She was wrong.
“Dr. Mecate.” Jase’s voice ruptured the once-perfect morning. “You sure do work fast.”
CHAPTER 7
“Mecate?” Gina murmured, the rest of the world returning to her eyes.
Matt almost kissed her again in an attempt to drive it back out. But with McCord sitting there on a big, black dirt bike, scowling at them as if he’d caught them doing the nasty in front of the local preschool class, he doubted he’d have any luck.
Why had he kissed her?
Because, simply, he hadn’t been able to stop.
“You’re Teo,” Gina said. “Right?”
Her voice quavered, and Matt’s hands, still cupped around her hips, clenched. He wanted to put them around Jase McCord’s throat and squeeze. He’d have told her the truth himself.
Eventually.
“I am Teo,” he said; then, because he needed to tell her every truth he could to try to erase every lie, he corrected, “Or I was. Teo is what my mother called me.”
“Mateo.” Gina stepped away, and Matt’s hands fell back to his sides. He continued to clench them; maybe then they wouldn’t feel so empty. “Mateo Mecate?”
“That’s him.” McCord strode over, inserting his wide shoulders between Matt and Gina as if he were afraid Matt might hurt her.
Again.
“Moldy, old Dr. Mecate,” Gina murmured.
“I’m sorry?” Matt asked.
Matt ignored him. The only thing that mattered now was her.
“Gina.” Matt stepped to the side so he could see around the other man’s bulk. “I can exp—”
“We called you moldy Mecate,” she said. “We thought you were…” She looked Matt up and down, and her lip curled. “Old.”
“I’m not. I’m…” He spread his hands. “Me.”
Now those lips flattened, and suddenly he wanted the curl back. “You’re not you. Or at least not the you you said you were. You’re not Teo Jones.”
Matt winced. The Jones part had been a mistake. But everything else was true.
Mostly.
“Who do you think you are, man?” McCord’s grin was so wide, he appeared ready to laugh out loud or maybe break into song. He had to have been dancing since he discovered the truth. “Indiana Jones?”
“What?”
“Dr. Jones. Archaeology professor. You wanna dig deep down and discover buried treasure.” McCord snorted. “Where’s your whip and your hat? You got a hard-on for Harrison Ford or something?
Right now any hard-on Matt might have had was fading fast. Thank God. Because the others had begun to duck out of their tents and gather around to watch.
“You practically told me who you were,” Gina murmured. “As if Teo is that far off of Mateo, and then Dr. Jones—” She rolled her eyes as if she, or maybe he, was the biggest idiot ever born.
“I don’t…” Matt paused, because suddenly he did understand. He’d chosen Jones because Smith seemed too obviously a false name, but he wanted something simple, something he could remember. It had never occurred to him that the name of the Harrison Ford character all his flighty students adored was Dr. Jones.
How could he be both so smart and so dumb at the same time? It was a gift.
“I didn’t—” he began.
“Oh, I’d say you did,” McCord said. “Or at least you were going to.”
“Will you shut up,” Matt said between gritted teeth.
“Nope.” McCord stuck his thumbs in his belt and rocked back on his boot heels, clearly enjoying this so much he could hardly stand it.
Matt wanted to punch him, something he could never before remember wanting. Violence didn’t solve anything. He’d studied enough wars to understand that.
However, he thought it might make him feel better to smash his fist into that smirking face. And right now Matt felt so bad it might be worth getting his own face smashed in just for the tiny bit of joy he’d receive from popping Jase McCord in his noble Native nose.
“What happened?” Amberleigh asked, her volume causing several birds to start up from nearby trees.
“Shh, dear.” Melda’s bright blue gaze switched among Matt, Gina, and McCord as she chewed on her lip. “Not our business.”
“Then why are we out here watchin’,” Mel wondered, “when we could be in the tent f—?”
“Anyone want coffee?” Tim announced, and any birds that had remained in the vicinity followed their friends to Canada. “I’m buying.”
No one took Tim up on the offer. Because they all knew there wasn’t a Starbucks for miles or because they didn’t care that it wasn’t their business since the scene unfolding in front of them was the most excitement they’d had in years?
You could take the kid off the playground, but you never, ever took the playground out of the kid. Even Matt, who’d never been on a playground, knew this as well as he knew his own name.
All of them.
If there was going to be a fight, no one wanted to miss it.
“What were you hoping to do?” Gina asked. “What possible reason could you have for not telling me the truth?”
“I … uh … well…” Matt took a deep breath. Why had pretending to be someone else seemed like a great idea? Now that he’d been outted, it merely seemed like the foolish stunt it was. Wasn’t that always the way? Matt released his breath on a rush. “I got nothin’.”
“Nothing?” Gina’s voice was deceptively calm, excruciatingly soft. “You almost had me.”
“No, Gina, it isn’t what you think.”
“You weren’t trying to ingratiate yourself with the owner? Get me into bed, make me think that I was special, then beg just one little favor?”
“No.” At her frown, he hurried onward, shoving that foot in his mouth so far down his throat it was a wonder he could talk at all. “I wanted to check the place out. See if it— See if you—” The expression on her face made him stop.
“You were spying on us?”
“No. Well, yes. But not you. The area.”
“And this.” She waved her hand to indicate what had passed between them.
“That was between you and me. It had nothing, whatsoever, to do with my work.”
One of the horses snorted; then several others answered, making it seem as if none of them believed Matt, either.
“You wouldn’t answer my calls, my e-mails, my letters,” he pressed on. “When I got here you tore up the most recent message right in front of me. What was I supposed to do?”
“Find some other ranch to trash?” McCord asked amiably.
Matt ignored him, focusing on Gina. “Just listen to me, Gina. Let me explain why this is so important.”
“Important enough to pretend you liked me,” she murmured. “Must be life-or-death stuff.”
Matt frowned, confused. “Pretend?”
“Yes,” she snapped. “Lie, cheat, act like you care. Remember?”
“I told you that wasn’t how it was. How it is.”
“Right. Because a guy like you—” She waved her hand to indicate … His head? His face? He wasn’t sure. “Is gonna be interested in a girl like me.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
She laughed, though the sound was watery. There were tears there somewhere waiting to spill out, and Matt hated himself. “Never mind,” she said. “Go on. Tell me why you had to do this. What’s so damn important about my land that you just can’t let it go?”
There was something going on he didn’t understand. But if Matt couldn’t convince her now, he was not only never going to be able to vindicate both his mother’s work and his own, but he’d also never find out what in hell she was talking about.
“You aren’t actually thinking of listening to this guy, are you?” McCord seemed a little worried, and Matt’s panic lessened.
This was the path to what he wanted. Tell Gina everything. Or almost everything. He should probably leave out the sorcerer. That usually made people stop listening, if not right away, then shortly thereafter. But he could convince her with the parts of the theory that didn’t sound crazy. He had to. He just wished he didn’t have to do it in front of all these people.
Once he made his case, Gina would agree to let him dig. Hell, maybe she’d even help.
Matt pulled the copy of the photograph out of his pocket, smoothed the paper, then held it up so she could see.
Gina took one look at it, paled, and said, “Get him out of here.”
* * *
“Wait. What? No!” Teo, or whatever he called himself now, insisted. “Gina, you have to listen—”
She snatched the photo out of his hands and walked away.
When she reached the banked fire she crouched, poking up the flames, then feeding them twigs. As soon as they licked upward again, Gina tossed the thing on top.
She’d destroyed every hard copy she had and deleted the file. She never wanted to see that place again, not even on film. Where had he gotten it?
“Internet,” she muttered. Where nothing ever died.
Gina rubbed her eyes. She felt numb, and she needed not to be. She had a tour to lead. There was no one else.
“Gina?” Melda stood on the other side of the fire. “You all right?”
“Fine.” She straightened, brushing her hands on her jeans. “Everyone be ready to leave in an hour.”
“What happened?�
� Amberleigh appeared stuck on that question.
“Why’d you send Teo away?” Ashleigh asked. “He was the only man worth talkin’ to round here.”
“Hey,” Tim said.
Ashleigh flipped her hand dismissively. “Oh, don’t get your panties in a bunch. You’re okay, but I’m not stepmama material. Especially for a boy that close to my age.”
“Stepmama?” Derek repeated, more intrigued than horrified.
“I thought you were graduating from college,” Tim said.
“So?”
“Aren’t you going to get a job before you get married?”
“Why on earth would I do somethin’ like that?”
“What happened?” This time Amberleigh stomped her foot and put her hands on her hips. Maybe that worked with other people, but it just made Gina want to turn a hose on her.
“Pack up. Deal with your mount. Or so help me—” Gina took one step toward Amberleigh, and the girl ran.
She should feel bad about that, but she didn’t.
Everyone got busy and left her alone. She’d done the job for so long it was second nature and she could go about preparing breakfast, packing her tent, and saddling her horse without having to think too much.
Because all she could think about was what an idiot she’d been.
She’d wondered why Teo was so interested in her so fast—or at all—but she’d been captivated by him just as quickly. She’d thought because there was something special between them, something she’d never felt before. But he’d manufactured those feelings the same way he’d manufactured his name and his background.
Her head went up as another thought crowded in. His interest in her photography had all been bullshit, too. Gina took a shaky breath, embarrassed at how much his words of praise had meant to her. He’d only wanted to find out the location of that cursed photograph.
She was tempted to remove her camera from her pack and leave it behind a rock somewhere, then never take another picture again. But photography was the one thing she had that was hers, something she did just for herself. She couldn’t give it up, even though she had a feeling that every time she lifted her camera from now on she’d remember him.
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