"Uh, no, my friend just cancelled and I was going to go home to eat."
"Well, I find myself free for lunch. May I join you instead, Miranda?"
Unable to find a reason that he shouldn't, that sounded the least bit valid inside her own head, she found herself saying, "Certainly."
A waitress appeared at his elbow as if by magic. "I'll have my usual, Sandy," he said, smiling up at the young girl.
"Sure thing, Mr. Kennedy. And you, ma'am?"
She was too nervous to even mentally upbraid the girl for calling her ma'am. "Uh, I'd just like a salad and a warm up of my coffee," she said.
He tsked. "Too much coffee will stunt your growth," he teased with a grin.
It was on the tip of Miranda's tongue to tell him she would damned well drink whatever she damned well pleased, but she reined herself in – barely. He might seem like Zach, but he wasn't actually Zach, and she did her best to try to convince herself that she was in no danger from him. It was in the middle of the day and they were in a busy diner where everyone probably knew him.
The food arrived in record time. In her relatively short time here, she had observed that, although the food was good, it took a while to get, although apparently that wasn't so when one was a Kennedy of Bar K Ranch. Only peons had to wait.
The waitress brought him an enormous amount of food – a huge hamburger, the size of which she'd never seen before, that shared the big platter with piles of fresh fries, a bowl of chili and a plate of onion strings.
Then she put Miranda's lowly salad and Italian dressing down in front of her and left.
"Is that all you're going to eat?" he asked, not meaning to sound quite so disparaging, watching her back go up immediately.
"Yes, it is. Not all of us are mountains."
He laughed at her characterization of him and it was almost a too pleasant sound, making her want to hear him do it again. "Well, I guess that's not a bad description of me, especially from where you're sitting, and I do work off what I eat."
"From behind a desk?" she asked doubtfully, digging into her salad.
He could have taken that as an insult, but didn't, smiling again and saying, "Well, you're right, I do work in an office most of the time, but I also run the family ranch, and that is a very physical job."
"You don't have a foreman or someone who does all the dirty work for you?"
Mace nodded, noticing that she had stopped eating after only a few bites and pushing the plate of onion strings towards her. "Here, help me with all of this. You're right; I don't need all this food. I do have a foreman, and he technically works for me, but I'd like to think that he'd say that he works with me. I do as much as I can fit in on the ranch, and he picks up the slack. As much as you might think that I'm a fat cat who sits behind a desk all day, I'm not afraid to get my hands dirty." In more ways than one, his dirty mind thought, but he carefully didn't say.
He kept pushing the onion strings towards her, along with the bowl of chili and the rest of the order of fries he was busy demolishing. "Have a fry. Or some chili. Or an onion string. You're much too thin." Especially for the things I'm thinking of doing to you; you're going to need your strength – but he refrained from saying that out loud, too.
She had to give him points for effort, and because that was the exact opposite of what Zach would have said. He would've told her that she was a fat pig for getting regular dressing rather than whatever they had that was low calorie. Sometimes it was damned hard not to hear his voice whispering into her ear some of the horrible things he used to say to her.
Mace was surprisingly easy to talk to. He was unassuming and curious about her, carefully steering them away from anything that might get her talking about whatever – or more likely whoever – had put that sad wariness in the back of her eyes.
She did, eventually, eat a spoonful of the chili because he raved so much over it and she wanted to compare it to her own recipe, and even had a couple of nibbles of his fries, too, all of which he counted as victories, no matter how small.
Sandy came by to ask whether or not he wanted dessert, but he patted his non-existent belly and said with a teasing grin, "No, thanks, hon. I'm watching my girlish figure."
Sandy laughed too loudly at that, but it was Randa he was watching as she smiled softly, taking a sip from her coffee and leaning down to retrieve her purse.
Mace reached out and put his hand on it, though, saying calmly but firmly, "You put that away. I invited myself to have lunch with you; it's only right that I should pay."
She tugged her purse neatly out from under his hand and brought out her wallet. "Thank you, but no. I like to pay my own way."
He understood her reaction completely. Someone had held her down in some way that had made her feel the need to provide her independence. It was a damned good thing he didn't know who the bastard was or his life wouldn't have been worth a plug nickel. But that didn't mean he was going to let her get away with doing what she wanted. "I understand, Miranda, but you were just going to go home. I've made you incur an expense you weren't going to have until I came by." He kept his face carefully neutral and his tone pleasant, just shy of cajoling. "Let me play the gentleman," he said, "It's not a part that comes easily to me." He gave her an outrageous wink and smile that got her laughing.
"Oh, all right, but the next one is on me."
Two more victories – she'd given in to him – although he'd pretty much had to pull out all the stops – and she'd said there'd be a next time. He was damned sure going to see that there was.
He left an enormous amount of money on the table and Miranda did a quick calculation in her head. Their meal probably came to twenty-five dollars or so, and he had easily laid out more than fifty bucks. The man was generous, she had to give him that.
When she made to get up, he scooted around behind her and held her chair, his hand light on the small of her back – which she did not like – as they made their way to the door.
"Bye, Mace!" the waitresses all screamed at him.
"Bye, all!" he rumbled back with a grin. "Where's your car? I'll walk you to it," he offered once they were outside.
But Miranda just laughed. "I can't afford a car. I just live around the block."
"Well, I'd be glad to give you a ride or walk you there."
She was already shaking her head and he was feeling as if he was rapidly losing the ground he'd gained in there. "Hey, I'm going to a small barbeque out at a neighbor's ranch this weekend. I'd love it if you'd join me? It's a very family friendly atmosphere – great food, dancing..."
She was looking wary again for some reason. "No, thank you," she answered primly, and he could sense that she was ready for a fight again over it.
He forced himself to shrug. "Well, it's Sunday afternoon, and the invitation's open if you should change your mind." She was already several steps away from him, he noticed unhappily, as if she wanted to sidle away from him before he got mad or something. "I enjoyed lunch. We have to do that again."
"I enjoyed it, too," she agreed, and it was the truth. He wasn't Zach. She could see that now. He was too nice, overall – to people he had no obligation to be nice to, like the wait staff at the restaurant.
"We should have dinner. I'll call you."
She nodded, but he knew she just wanted to get away from him. "Thank you for lunch."
"You're welcome." His protective instincts rose to the fore. "Are you sure you don't want me to come with you? It's no bother – or I could drive you..."
"No, thank you."
He knew he was quickly going to hate prim Miranda. He wanted to get to know the real Miranda – the one with the rough edges, the one with the restless heart, the one that painted from her very soul.
But it wasn't going to happen today, he guessed, and he had a pretty good idea that tomorrow wasn't looking very good, either. He was going to have to be patient, which wasn't something that he was very used to.
It was going to be a learning experience.
> He hated learning experiences.
Chapter Eight
She didn't end up going to that barbeque with him, nor did she see him for lunch. She didn't see him again for about the next two weeks and had fallen into a false sense of security because of it.
And then he had appeared in front of her in her teller line very early on a Monday morning. "You're looking very beautiful this morning, Miranda," he complimented, making her blush brightly.
"Mr. Kennedy—" she began in what she hoped was a friendly tone, although she wasn't at all sure that was how it came out considering just the sight of him had her both completely unnerved and totally wet at the same time.
"I think I asked you to call me Mace, didn't I?"
Her mouth was suddenly completely dry, her heart pounding in her throat, all at just that slightly scolding tone. She knew her face was a bright, glaring red as she said in a submissive tone that was entirely unlike her, "Mace, what can I do for you?"
"You can allow me to take you out this coming Saturday night. You choose the restaurant and what we do."
Stunned, feeling blindsided because she really hadn't seen this coming, she stuttered, "Uh, well, thank you but—"
"No?" he finished for her helpfully, opening his wallet to count out five hundred dollars in twenties.
Her smile was wan and she looked as if she thought he was going to jump over the counter and have his way with her right there on the floor behind the teller line. And she realized that her boss – who always seemed to be hovering somewhere nearby whenever he came in to see her – would probably let him do exactly that. "I—"
He touched her hand very briefly, a soft, non-threatening caress that could have been by accident, although she knew it wasn't. "I understand. I do." Suddenly he was all business. "I'd like to deposit this into my savings account, please. Here's the number."
She posted his transaction and gave him his receipt. "Is there anything else I can help you with, Mr.— Mace," she corrected herself, earning a smile from him.
"Good girl. I don’t think so, but I just want to give you a friendly warning, Miranda, that I don't take no for an answer. I'll be back tomorrow."
And he was. In fact, he was back Tuesday and Wednesday mornings, too, with the same exact deposit. On Wednesday, after she'd turned him down just as politely as always, he'd placed his hand over hers – the one that was in the act of giving him his receipt – and said, in a calm, quiet way, "I just want to tell you that, if you agree to go out with me now, that you can still choose what we do and where we go. But if you suddenly say yes on Friday, you're going to have to put yourself into my hands as to what we do and where we go. If you make me wait, you'll have to give up that control to me."
He felt the telling shudder that had run through her at that last phrase, and knew he was on the right track with her. He let go of her hand, tipped his hat at her, giving her a bold wink at the same time and was gone.
"Damn, girl, was that Mace Kennedy asking you out?" Melissa, an inveterate busybody who sat next to her, was agog.
"I guess so. He's asked me every day this week. He wants to take me out on Saturday."
It was a mistake to have muttered under her breath about that to this girl, because within about five minutes, everyone in the bank – including the customers in line – seemed to know that Mace Kennedy was after her.
Her reaction may have been, "So what?" but every other woman in the place – even the older, staid, married ones, was amazed that she was routinely turning him down. Her dating life – or rather the lack thereof – was the subject in the lunchroom that afternoon, while she was sitting right there! The least they could have done was wait to talk about her behind her back, like a normal group of coworkers.
She had to field questions about how she met him, and she let it slip that he'd asked her out then, too, and she'd turned him down. You would have thought she'd turned down George Clooney or Matthew McConaughey, for crying out loud. At least she was smart enough to shut up about the fact that he'd offered her almost twice as much as her asking price for one of her paintings, and that she'd turned him down. She figured Mr. Taylor would pretty much faint upon hearing that.
The next morning, after he'd complimented her on her pretty green dress and transacted his business with her, he'd leaned forward and said, "Today is the last day to say yes and be able to dictate the specifics of our date, honey."
For some reason, the combination of her coworkers, whose stares were burning holes in her back, and his autocratic manner hit her just wrong and she gave him a patently false smile, saying with equally artificial sweetness, "Why Mace, darling, we don't have a date about which I could dictate specifics."
She wasn't sure exactly how she had thought he was going to react but it wasn't that he simply smiled broadly at her, saying, "Have a great day, sweetheart."
Against all propriety, she called after him, in front of her coworkers and a room full of customers waiting for tellers, "You, too, pumpkin!"
And she got herself hauled into the office for her efforts, too, even though he had turned around on his way out the door to laugh at her – obviously not offended by her familiarity or the endearment she'd used.
But her boss, Mr. Taylor, had lofty goals for this relationship – between the bank and Mace; he didn't care one whit about Miranda's... well, whatever it was she had with him. But she did get a good talking to about propriety, during which she simply sat there quietly, nodding in all of the appropriate spots and occasionally saying, "Yes, Mr. Taylor."
She needed this job, or she would have told the old fart to go fuck himself. It had great benefits and – if you didn't count the annoying customers – it was relatively easy to do. At least he'd stopped short of demanding she date the man, although she could feel that he definitely wanted to go down that road, he didn't.
Mr. Taylor didn't look like a pimp, but he was certainly beginning to act like one on the bank's behalf. The mental image of that professionally staid man as a pimp had her laughing to herself all the way back to work.
What he did have the balls to mention was that, considering how... fond Mr. Kennedy was of her – and he chose his words very carefully – she might well have a future as a private banker, which would mean a considerable jump in salary. And, if she got him to transfer his accounts, business or personal, into their bank, he'd said that he would do his best to see that she got an interview with the boss of the Private Banking division.
Now that was the first thing she'd heard all week that was in the least bit tempting, and she spent the night considering whether or not she wanted to prostitute herself like that, and, in a moment of weakness that she regretted almost immediately, she caved, thinking about how many more painting supplies she'd be able to buy if she was making the figure that Mr. Taylor had quoted her for someone working in Private Banking.
She mulled that idea over until the next day when Mace was right in front of her, right then, but he hadn't brought up their potential date. Her heart thudded in her chest. Maybe the offer was no longer good? It was the night before, after all. "Mace?" she asked and his head came up from his phone.
He liked the sound of his name on her lips; and her voice did impure things to him without her ever having to touch him. And he realized that it was probably the first time she'd initiated any kind of conversation with him. "Yes, Randa?"
His use of her nickname had her thinking about the painting he'd tried to buy that night, and she knew she was coloring furiously, as always, it seemed, around him. "Is, um, is the offer to get together tomorrow night still on the table?"
A broad smile slid across his lips, but then dissolved as if it had never been there. He answered her in as calm and businesslike tone as she had asked him. "Why, yes it is." Nothing more. Nothing encouraging. Just a flat answer. He was already back to looking at his phone again, the bastard.
Miranda bit her lip and just said it, looking anywhere but at him as she did. "I'd like to go out with you tomorrow night,
then."
Mace managed to keep a triumphant smile off his face – just barely – responding to her just as neutrally as before. "I would like that. How about if I pick you up at five?"
Five? She was surprised. That was way early for a date, unless he was trying to hit the early bird specials at restaurants, and she couldn't imagine that he was like that, but then, she couldn't have imagined that Zach was like... well, what he was like, either, so she guessed there was no telling. She swallowed hard. "Fine."
There was no joy or anticipation in her voice at all, but he didn't let that deter him. "Good. Write your address down and I'll be by to pick you up. Wear something comfortable and casual – jeans and a tee shirt. Something you won't mind getting dirty."
She did as he asked, wondering the entire time what they were going to do that was going to get her dirty.
It ended up that he knocked on her door promptly at five, and, carefully, without showing him any of her dingy little place, she squeezed herself out the front door to stand on the tiny stoop with him, but he didn't seem interested in going anywhere. He just stood there, looking down at her hungrily and crowding her badly. She had nowhere to go to get away from him, until suddenly, she was unceremoniously hauled up against him.
One hand splayed itself between her shoulder blades, holding her still, while the other came up to cup her jaw in one of the most infinitely tender touches she'd ever experienced. "I have to taste you, Miranda," he said. If he were truly a polite man, he might have wanted to say that he was sorry about it, but it would have been an artifice.
He should have approached her slowly, should have given her time to deny him if she wanted to, but he couldn't; he just couldn't. He anticipated having to hold her, having her slap him for his impudence, or even her storming back into her house, but he hadn't expected that she would melt in his arms the way she did, making him want her just that much more as he felt her tentative response to the way his lips had captured hers.
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