by Diana Palmer
Her eyes widened. ‘‘Well, gee whiz, that’s a major disappointment! And to think, I was only willing to take the job because of the marriage prospects!’’
His face shuttered. ‘‘Sarcasm doesn’t get you any points with me. I’m just making the position clear. We need a cook, not a prospective soul mate.’’
‘‘Speak for yourself,’’ she told him, turning back to her door. ‘‘I think Leo likes me already.’’
‘‘I just told you…!’’
She opened the door and looked back at him with pure irreverence. ‘‘Your brother can speak for himself. You don’t own him, and you don’t own me. I’ll do what I please.’’
‘‘Damn it…!’’
‘‘With charm like that, it’s no surprise to me that you’re still single,’’ she said as she walked into the house.
‘‘I can be charming when I’ve got a reason to be,’’ he said icily. ‘‘But that’s something you’ll never know!’’
‘‘Lucky me!’’
He started to speak, closed his lips tight, and walked back to his car.
She closed the door quickly and leaned back against it, almost shivering with anger. Of all the conceited, infuriating men she’d ever met, that one took the cake!
The next day, Rey phoned her midmorning to tell her that he and Leo would pick her up at one for the drive down to Jacobsville.
She had her suitcase packed and the house closed up when the big luxury car pulled into the driveway. It was a late-model car, and it looked odd, sitting in front of the shabby little house.
As she walked to the car, Meredith saw curtains fluttering and knew that the neighbors were getting an eyeful. They probably thought she was being carried off by the mob. That amused her and she smiled, glad that something diverted her mind from her father and her pain, and the misery of the past few months.
‘‘We hadn’t planned to ask you to help us move cattle,’ Rey drawled when he saw how she was dressed, in jeans and a striped shirt and boots.
‘‘I haven’t volunteered, either,’’ she assured him. ‘‘But I didn’t think you’d want me to do housework in a dress.’’ She gave him a wry glance. ‘‘Those old black-and-white sitcoms weren’t historically accurate, you know. I never saw a woman vacuum the carpet wearing a dress and high heels and pearls!’’
‘‘You can do housework in a suit for all I care, as long as you can bake me a pan of biscuits every morning,’’ Rey said, taking the suitcase and putting it in the trunk.
‘‘Good morning,’’ Leo called from the open window of the front seat, grinning as Rey opened the back door and helped her inside.
‘‘Good morning,’’ she said brightly. ‘‘You look much better.’’
‘‘I feel better, except for the headache.’’ He gave her a long look. ‘‘You aren’t in very good shape yourself. Face hurt?’’
‘‘Yes. I guess we’re both like walking wounded, huh?’’ she asked with a grin as she leaned back into the warm leather seat.
‘‘Maybe we should take a nurse with us,’’ Rey muttered as he got in and started the car.
Meredith cleared her throat, but before she could speak, Leo turned to his brother. ‘‘I don’t need nursing, thank you very much!’’ Leo said curtly.
‘‘Neither do I!’’ Meredith agreed.
Rey glanced at them as he pulled out into the street. ‘‘I’ve seen accident victims who looked better than the two of you.’’
‘‘Don’t let him insult you, Meredith,’’ Leo told her. ‘‘I’ll tell you all about his weak spots so that you can deal with him.’’
She wouldn’t have expected Rey to have any of those, but she was keeping her mouth shut and her options open for the time being. Her new boss looked formidable, and even Leo seemed curious about his lack of warmth.
‘‘Are you all from Jacobsville originally?’’ Meredith changed the subject.
‘‘No, we’re from San Antonio,’’ Leo said. ‘‘We inherited the Jacobsville property and it needed a lot of work, so we made it our headquarters. It’s convenient to Houston and San Antonio, and frankly, it’s isolated and gives us some privacy. We don’t like cities as a rule.’’
‘‘Neither do I,’’ she said, recalling her grandmother’s beautiful flower garden at the old place near Fort Worth. She smiled. ‘‘I wish Dad hadn’t taken the job in Houston in the first place.’’
‘‘What does he do?’’ Leo asked.
‘‘He’s retired,’’ she said, not wanting to go into specifics. It hurt to talk about her family. Her father was a sore spot just now, anyway.
‘‘Simon talked to the authorities,’’ Rey interrupted. ‘‘They’re going to make sure he gets counseling and he won’t be released until he’s kicked the alcohol habit.’’ He glanced over the seat at her, his dark eyes intent. ‘‘They think it will be better if you don’t have any contact with him for a few weeks, until he’s through the worst of the withdrawal symptoms.’’
‘‘I know about withdrawal,’’ she replied, absently smoothing her hand over her jeans. ‘‘Bad habits are hard to break, even new ones.’’
‘‘You two must read a lot,’’ Rey replied. ‘‘I never saw so many books in one place as I did at your house. Even our library isn’t that stuffed, and we all read.’’
‘‘I love reading,’’ she agreed. ‘‘We have a television, but neither of us had much time to watch it. Until recently,’’ she added reluctantly, and winced at the thoughts that went through her mind. ‘‘I hope they get those men who mugged you, Mr. Hart,’’ she told Leo fervently.
‘‘Leo,’’ he corrected. ‘‘It’s really Leopold, but nobody calls me that,’’ he added with a grin. ‘‘We’re pretty informal with our employees.’’
‘‘Do you have a lot?’’ she asked curiously.
‘‘A good many in Jacobsville,’’ he replied. ‘‘Although we don’t have a full-time vet, we do have several accountants, livestock managers, computer programmers, salesmen…you name it, we’ve got one. It’s big business these days to run cattle. We even have a man who does nothing but keep up with legislation that may impact us.’’
‘‘Do you have dogs and cats?’’ she asked.
‘‘Always,’’ Rey replied. ‘‘We have border collies that help us herd cattle, and we keep cats in the barn to help handle the rats.’’
‘‘We had a cat in the house,’’ Leo added, ‘‘but it was Cag and Tess’s, and they took it with them when they moved into their new house. At least she won’t have to cope with Herman,’’ he told his brother, and laughed.
Rey smiled involuntarily. ‘‘You might not have wanted to work for us if we still had Herman.’’
‘‘Who’s Herman?’’ she wanted to know.
‘‘He was Cag’s albino python,’’ he told her. ‘‘He weighed a hundred and ten pounds and lived in a cage in Cag’s bedroom. He gave Herman up when he married Tess. He said it would be crazy to keep an animal that big and dangerous around their son. They’re still over the moon about that little boy.’’
‘‘Yes, but there are people who don’t even consider things like that,’’ Meredith murmured absently. ‘‘I remember a little girl who had to have plastic surgery because she was bitten in the face by her father’s pet boa constrictor.’’
‘‘Herman didn’t bite, but Tess almost had a heart attack when she first came to work for us and found him in the washing machine.’’
‘‘I can sympathize with her,’’ Meredith said. ‘‘I haven’t come across many snakes. I’m not sure I want to.’’
‘‘We have rattlers and water moccasins around the place,’’ Rey told her. ‘‘You have to watch where you walk, but we’ve only had one person bitten in recent years. Snakes are always going to be a hazard in open country. You can’t be careless.’’
‘‘I’ll remember.’’
‘‘We’ve got a big garage apartment,’’ Leo told her. ‘‘It’s got picture windows and a whirlpool bath. Tess lived there u
ntil she and Cag married. I think you’ll like it.’’
‘‘I don’t mind where I stay,’’ she said easily. ‘‘I’m grateful to have a job at all. I really couldn’t go to work in Houston looking like this. It would have been embarrassing for my boss.’’
‘‘You won’t have people staring at you on the ranch,’’ Leo assured her. ‘‘And it won’t take too long for those bruises to heal.’’
‘‘I’ll be fine, but you’ll have to take it easy for a few days still, I’m sure they told you that,’’ she returned at once. ‘‘No violent exertion. Concussion is tricky.’’
‘‘I know that,’’ Leo told her. ‘‘We had a man who was kicked in the head by a horse. He dropped dead three days later while he was walking into the corral. It was a hard lesson about head injuries. None of us ever forgot it.’’
She averted her eyes. She didn’t like thinking about head injuries just now.
‘‘I’ve got to stop for gas,’’ Rey said as they reached the outskirts of the city and he pulled into a self-service gas station. ‘‘Anybody want something to drink?’’
‘‘Coffee for me,’’ Leo said. ‘‘Meredith?’’
‘‘I’d like a small coffee, black, please.’’
‘‘I’ll go get it after I fill the tank,’’ Rey said. He got out and started pumping gas.
Leo leaned his arm over the back seat and looked at Meredith openly, his dark eyes quiet and gently affectionate.
‘‘You’re still having a hard time with Rey, aren’t you?’’ he asked her.
‘‘He doesn’t really like me,’’ she confessed with a wry smile. ‘‘And I have to admit, he puts my back up, too. He seems to want to think the worst of me. He was convinced that I mugged you.’’
He chuckled. ‘‘You aren’t tall enough to have knocked me out,’’ he said. ‘‘But Rey doesn’t like women much. He had a bad time of it with a young woman who turned out to be a call girl,’’ he added, noticing absently how stunned Meredith seemed to be at that remark. ‘‘He had the ring bought, the honeymoon spot picked out, and then he found out the truth about her. It took him years to get over it. He was crushed.’’
“I guess so,” she said heavily. “Good Lord, no wonder he thought the worst when he saw how I was dressed.”
Leo frowned. ‘‘I just barely remember the rig you had on. What was it, some sort of costume?’’
‘‘I’d been to a wild Halloween party and had just escaped when I saw those men bending over you,’’ she told him. ‘‘I ran at them waving my arms and yelling, and frightened them off.’’
‘‘That was taking a hell of a chance!’’ he exploded.
She shrugged. ‘‘I’ve done it before,’’ she said. ‘‘I learned it from my…from my brother’s best friend,’’ she amended, forcing the words out. It was much too soon to try to talk about her tragedy. ‘‘He taught karate in the military. He said that sometimes all it needed was a yell and the element of surprise to spook an attacker and make him run. It works.’’
‘‘Not all the time,’’ Leo said darkly, ‘‘and not for women. I’m all for equality, but most men are bigger and stronger than most women, and in hand-to-hand, you’d lose. You can’t count on a man running, loud noise or not.’’
‘‘Well, it worked for you,’’ she amended, and smiled at him. ‘‘I’m glad, because I couldn’t have wrestled those guys down.’’
He nodded. ‘‘See that you remember it,’’ he told her. ‘‘Don’t take chances. Get help.’’
‘‘Some help those partygoers would have been,’’ she scoffed. ‘‘Half of them were drunk, and the other half probably wouldn’t have walked across the street to save a grandmother from a mugging!’’
‘‘Then why were you at a party with them?’’ he asked reasonably.
She picked at a fingernail. ‘‘A girl I know from work said I needed a night off and insisted that I come. I wore an old costume, the only one I had, and thought I’d enjoy myself. I don’t do drugs or drink, and one of the men made a blatant pass at me.’’ She wrapped her arms around her body in a defensive posture that betrayed her fear. ‘‘I was anxious to get away from the whole mess, luckily for you,’’ she added with a grin.
‘‘I don’t like parties much, either,’’ he said. ‘‘Getting drunk isn’t my idea of a good time.’’
She glanced out the window. Rey had finished pumping gas and was inside the convenience store now. ‘‘Does he drink?’’ she asked.
‘‘Very rarely. I’ve been known to, under provocation, but Rey’s levelheaded and sober. He can be mean, and he’s got the blackest temper of all of us, but he’s a good man to have on your side when the chips are down.’’
‘‘He doesn’t like me,’’ she repeated.
‘‘He’ll come around, give him time,’’ Leo told her. ‘‘Meanwhile, you’ve got a job and a place to stay while your face heals. We all have hard times,’’ he added gently. ‘‘But we get through them, even when we don’t expect to. Give yourself time.’’
She smiled. ‘‘Thanks,’’ she said huskily. ‘‘You really are a nice man.’’
‘‘Nice, clean, sober, modest and incredibly handsome,’’ he added with a wicked grin. ‘‘And I haven’t even gotten to my best points yet!’’
‘‘Compared to your brothers,’’ she began, ‘‘you—’’
The door opened before she could hang herself, and Rey shoved a cup of coffee at her before he handed the second one to Leo.
‘‘It’s hot,’’ he told them as he slid in and took the soft drink out of his jacket pocket and put it in the cup holder.
‘‘Cold caffeine,’’ Leo said, shuddering. ‘‘Why can’t you drink coffee like a normal man?’’
‘‘I drink coffee at breakfast,’’ Rey told him haughtily.
‘‘So do I, but you don’t have to have rules on when to drink it!’’
Rey started the engine with a speaking glance.
‘‘See that look?’’ Leo indicated it to Meredith. ‘‘When he looks like that, you’ve already lost whatever argument you’re in the middle of. We call it ‘the look.’ I once saw him break up a fistfight with it.’’
‘‘I don’t plan to argue,’’ Meredith promised.
Rey gave her ‘‘the look,’’ and it lingered before his attention turned back to the windshield.
Meredith sat back against the leather seat and wondered suddenly if she wasn’t making the biggest mistake of her life.
Four
The Hart Ranch was almost as Meredith had pictured it, with neat wooden fences concealing electrified fencing, improved pasture land and cattle everywhere. There were also pastures with horses, and there was a barn big enough to store a commercial jet. But she loved the house itself, with its graceful arches reminiscent of Spanish architecture, and the incredible number of small trees and shrubs around it. In the spring, it must be glorious. There were two ponds, a decorative one in the front of the house and a larger one behind the house in which a handful of ducks shivered in the November sun.
‘‘Do you have goldfish in the pond?’’ she asked excitedly as Rey stopped the car in front of the house on an inlaid stone driveway.
‘‘Goldfish and Koi,’’ he answered, smiling reluctantly at her excitement. ‘‘We have a heater in the pond to keep them comfortable during the winter. There are water lilies in there, too, and a lotus plant.’’
‘‘Does the other pond have goldfish, too, where the ducks are?’’ she wondered.
Leo chuckled. ‘‘The other one is because of the ducks. We had to net this pond to keep them out of it so we’d have some goldfish. The ducks were eating them.’’
‘‘Oh, I see.’’ She sighed. ‘‘It must be beautiful here in the spring,’’ she said dreamily, noting the gazebo and the rose garden and stone seats and shrubs around the goldfish pond.
‘‘It’s beautiful to us year-round,’’ Leo told her with lazy affection. ‘‘We all love flowers. We’ve got some more roses in a big fl
ower garden around the back of the house, near a stand of pecan trees. Tess is taking courses in horticulture and she works with hybrids.’’
‘‘I love roses,’’ Meredith said softly. ‘‘If I had time, I’d live in a flower garden.’’
‘‘I suppose cleaning rooms is time-consuming,’’ Rey murmured sarcastically as he got out of the car and went in the front door of the house.
Leo glanced at her curiously while Rey was out of earshot. ‘‘You clean rooms?’’
‘‘I don’t,’’ she told him with a sharp grin. ‘‘But I’m living down to your brother’s image of my assets.’’
Leo pursed his lips. ‘‘Now, that’s interesting. You sound like a woman with secrets.’’
‘‘More than you’d guess,’’ she told him heavily. ‘‘But none that I’m ashamed of,’’ she added quickly, just in case he got the wrong idea.
‘‘Rey doesn’t like you, does he?’’ he murmured, almost to himself. ‘‘ wonder why? It’s not like him to pick on sick people.’’
‘‘I’m not sick,’’ she assured him. ‘‘I’m just battered, but I’ll heal.’’
‘‘Sure you will,’’ Leo promised, smiling. ‘‘You’ll be safe here. The only real chore you’ll have is baking. By the time you’re completely back on your feet, your father will be sober and in counseling, and your home life will have changed drastically.’’
‘‘I hope so,’’ she said huskily.
He watched her eyes grow tragic and haunted. He frowned. ‘‘Meredith,’’ he said slowly. ‘‘If you need to talk, ever, I can listen without making judgments.’’
She met his clear dark eyes. ‘‘Thanks, Leo,’’ she said with genuine gratitude. ‘‘But talking won’t change a thing. It’s a matter of learning to live with…things.’’
‘‘Now I’m intrigued.’’
‘‘Don’t push,’’ she said gently. ‘‘I’m not able to talk about my problems yet. They’re too fresh. Too painful.’’
‘‘And more than just your father, or I’m a dirt farmer,’’ he drawled.
She shrugged. ‘‘Perhaps.’’