The Mercenary and the New Mom

by Merline Lovelace

  “No dessert?”

  “I couldn’t stuff down another bite.”

  “No more coffee?”

  “Uh-uh, but thanks.”

  “No going back to my place for a couple of hours of hot, mindless sex?”

  “Maybe next time,” she replied, not missing a beat as she reached for her purse.

  The quick comeback had him sucking in a sharp breath. He’d thrown out that line as a joke. Well, partly as a joke. He hadn’t exactly sat through dinner planning ways to jump Sabrina’s bones, although the thought had occurred to him once or twice... especially when she’d leaned forward to make a point. Between that killer dress and the insidious doubts planted by Trey’s call, Jack couldn’t remember when he’d enjoyed a steak less.

  Now that dinner was over and his doubts were laid to rest, he discovered that he wanted dessert. Badly. And when Sabrina freshened her lipstick, leaving her mouth red and glossy and so damned inviting, his want shot into hot, driving need.

  He rose, his body tight, and pulled out her chair. His pulse hammered at every pressure point as he escorted her to the elevator. Before the door glided shut, he had his hands braced on either side of her head.

  “Any chance I can change your mind?”

  “About the coffee or the sex?”

  “Either one.”

  She flicked a glance over his shoulder at the elevator’s indicator panel. “You’ve got sixteen floors to give it your best shot.”

  He gave it his best shot.

  His mouth came down, hard and hungry. Hers came up, hot and eager. He didn’t surge forward, didn’t crush her against the wood paneling with his body, but the fierce urge to do just that generated a heat that scorched the air in the small, paneled cage.

  By the tenth floor, the fire in his blood ignited.

  By the fifth, he was hard as a rock.

  By the time the elevator stopped at the underground parking level, he knew he didn’t want a couple of hours of hot, mindless sex with this woman. He wanted it sweet and so slow that she would weep before they were done. Hell, he was close to weeping himself.

  The doors whirred open. The valet started their way, gaped for a moment, then grinned and retreated to his counter with its pegboard full of keys.

  “Change your mind?” Jack murmured, following the curve of her flushed cheek with his mouth.

  She tried to answer. Swallowed. Tried again.

  “Almost.”

  He trapped a groan in his chest, pulled back to look down at her.

  “I want to,” she whispered. “So badly it hurts. But we said no strings, remember? No wading in too fast or too deep. If I go home with you now, I have a feeling I’ll be in way, way over my head.”

  She left him with another brief kiss and the bitter taste of his own words in his mouth. About the only satisfaction Jack got from the moment was that her green eyes shimmered with regret.

  Chapter 8

  Sabrina was right.

  Another hour—hell, another few minutes—and they both would have plunged right off the deep end. Jack acknowledged that stark fact, accepted it, fought it all during the drive to the sprawling Wentworth estate in Freemont Springs, some miles west of Tulsa.

  Alone in the heavy darkness of the summer night, with the concrete whirring under the Jag’s tires and every muscle in his body aching with unrelenting need, he could admit that Sabrina Jensen had become a hunger, a thirst. He wanted her. He craved her. No woman had ever tied him in so many knots. Unless he wanted to stay that way, Jack decided grimly, he’d better put the tantalizing, green-eyed waitress from his mind.

  Yeah, right. As if he could.

  Gritting his teeth, he tried to concentrate on the two-lane country road, on the call from Trey, on the situation in Qatar. On anything but the regret in Sabrina’s eyes when she walked away from him tonight.

  Trey’s call certainly gave him plenty to think about. The news that dissident factions in Qatar had already heard rumors of the secret accord Ali carried back with him worried Jack. Big time. He’d been in the business long enough to know that once rumors began circulating, trouble soon followed.

  Reaching for his cell phone, he made a quick call to the Wentworth twenty-four-hour operations center. The senior controller on duty was an engineer and an old field hand. Like Jack, he’d learned the business the hard way. He didn’t question the instructions to heighten security at the Wentworth operational sites in Qatar.

  “Consider it done, Jack.”

  “Call me if anything breaks over there.”

  “You got it.”

  By the time the high stone wall encircling the thousand-acre estate Joseph Wentworth had carved out of the Oklahoma hills appeared in the headlights, the hard stroke of Jack’s pulse had slowed. He couldn’t seem to shake his biting regret at having let Sabrina walk away, though. It stayed in his thoughts as he pulled up to the massive wrought-iron front gates. Infrared sensors picked up the signal from the transmitter installed under the Jag’s hood. Like silent, well-trained sentinels, the huge gates slid open, then shut once more.

  A sense of coming home settled over Jack as he swept up the long drive. He knew every curve and turnout along the quarter-mile approach to the main house. He and his younger brother and sister had even named each of the graceful statues tucked into picturesque alcoves at strategic viewpoints.

  The stables appeared first, a long low building of native stone covered with ivy. Then the garages with attached chauffeur’s quarters and the artist’s studio. Tucked into a grove of towering elms was the two-story stone butler’s cottage that had been converted into a guest house some years ago.

  Gravel spit under the Jag’s tires as it passed the cottage and headed for the sprawling, three-story main house. Constructed of native stone quarried on the estate and cut with a diamond-bladed saw, the mansion sat atop a rolling rise. In daylight, it commanded a panoramic view of the five interlocking man-made lakes that surrounded it like the moat of a medieval castle. On a moonlit night such as this, the pale gray walls rose like ghostly battlements out of the velvety darkness.

  Joseph had spared no expense in the construction of his palace. New York architects, Italian stonecutters, English wood-carvers and Japanese gardeners had all contributed to the unique style Jack privately dubbed Oklahoma baroque. In addition to housing a priceless collection of Western art, the thirty-two room, three-story mansion had his grandfather’s personality stamped all through it A bas relief over the front entrance immortalized his first gusher. Two of his favorite hunting dogs curled in eternal marble slumber on either side of the huge fireplace in his bedroom. The swimming pool in the basement replicated the shape of the state of Oklahoma.

  Most people would have called the mansion an outrageous, egocentric monument to a self-made man. After their parents were lost in a boating accident, Jack and his younger sister and brother called it home. They still did, although he and Josie maintained separate residences for those times when their grandfather grew too overbearing and irascible...a not unfrequent occurrence.

  After pulling up under a massive porte cocherie at the side entrance, Jack climbed out of the Jag. Immediately, the summer night surrounded him, as hot and humid as a saddle blanket. He left the keys in the car and took the shallow stone steps in two long strides.

  He didn’t worry about anyone driving off in the Jag. After a would-be kidnapper broke into the mansion in the early ‘60s, Joseph had insisted on the latest state-of-the-art security systems. Jack saw that they were upgraded every year to accommodate new advances in technology. No one entered...or left...the Wentworth estate undetected.

  His footsteps echoing on the black-and-white terrazzo tiles, Jack strode down the vaulted hallway to the staircase that branched in graceful curves to the upper story. He’d almost reached the sanctuary of his second-floor bedroom-office when his grandfather’s voice boomed from the master suite at the east end of the hall.

  “Is that you, Jack?”

  The cru
sty old oilman’s heart might stutter and skip a few beats on occasion, but he had the hearing of a hungry coyote.

  “It is.”

  “‘Bout time you showed your face around here,” Joseph grumbled as Jack strolled into his sitting room.

  His grandfather was ensconced in his favorite chair, a half-empty glass of bourbon on the table beside him. His face retained its ruddy hue under a full mane of salt-and-pepper hair. His brown eyes were keen as he raked his grandson with a searching glance.

  “Where’ve you been, boy?”

  “I went out to look at those leases we talked about, then had dinner at the Petroleum Club.”

  “That so? Are they serving up raw steak at the Club these days?”

  “Not that I noticed. Why?”

  “Either you dribbled steer juice down your chin or you’ve been kissing someone partial to red lipstick.”

  Unruffled, Jack pulled a folded handkerchief from his pocket. When he offered no explanation of the smear, his grandfather’s bushy eyebrows lifted.

  “Does that brand on your chin come from the same woman you took to the Blowout last Friday night?”

  “How did you know I went to the Blowout?” Neither time nor hard living had diminished his grandfather’s barreling laugh. It rolled up from his belly, as it always had, and won an answering grin from Jack, as it always did.

  “I have my ways, boy, I have my ways.”

  “You’ve been pumping Hannah for information again, haven’t you?”

  “Ha! Since when do I have to rely on that she-mule who calls herself your housekeeper for my information? And don’t try to side-rail me. Just answer the question.”

  “Yes, it was the same woman.”

  “Who is she?”

  “No one you know.”

  “GoodLordawmighty, I hope not! Every female of my acquaintance is pushing seventy. Except those twits your brother brings home on occasion,” Joseph muttered. “More hair than brains, every one of ‘em, and a whole lot more chest than hair.”

  Snaking out a fist that showed the marks of age and a good number of barroom brawls, Joseph snagged his glass and tossed back the rest of his drink. The bourbon didn’t mellow him. If anything, it had the opposite effect. His shaggy brows lowering, he launched into his favorite theme of late.

  “I wish to heaven one of you three would settle down.”

  “One of us will, when the time’s right.”

  “The time better turn right soon. I’m damned if I’m going to die before I see the next generation of Wentworths get a toehold in this world.”

  “You’re too ornery to die even then. You’ll stick around to make sure the kid learns how to suck oil from solid rock, like you did me.”

  “I’d surely like to try,” his grandfather replied, “if only one of you would get on with the business of marriage and baby making.”

  It was a familiar refrain, one that Jack and his sister and brother had grown used to hearing. Josie merely laughed and kept her string of admirers dangling. Michael headed for Europe or the Caribbean with his latest amour whenever the old man started in on him again. And Jack...

  Jack’s standard reply was that he hadn’t yet found a woman willing to take him, warts and all. Only he knew that he refused to allow any woman to get close to him. He couldn’t. Hadn’t wanted to.

  Until Sabrina.

  The thought was like a right cross to the chin. Instinctively, Jack wanted to duck, to spin away from the impact. Under Joseph’s watchful eye, he maintained his comfortable sprawl, but his blood hammered another, more urgent message to his brain. The same message it had been pounding since he’d watched Sabrina drive away from him tonight.

  He wanted to get more than close to her. He wanted her in his arms, her mouth fused with his. He wanted to feel her flush with heat, see her face come alive with laughter. He wanted her—

  Hell, he wanted her.

  It was as simple as that.

  And as complicated.

  He pushed himself to his feet, his hard-won calm shredded by the fiery need that licked at his veins once again.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  He gave his grandfather’s shoulder an affectionate squeeze. The hand that came up to cover his was gnarled and liver-spotted, but returned the squeeze with barbed-wire strength.

  “I’d rather you go see that woman you’re so shut-mouthed about,” Joseph said gruffly.

  “I’m thinking about it.”

  The admission came hard. Slow. But when he said the words, damned if they didn’t feel right.

  The old man’s shrewd brown eyes flared with interest, but he knew better than to dig too deep where Jack didn’t want dug. Still, he couldn’t let it go.

  “You’ve always been restless, boy. Too loose-footed to stay put. Too ready to take off for the next sink or exploratory drill. This woman might be the one who’ll anchor you as fast and as hard as a deep-sea rig.”

  She might at that.

  The thought crawled up Jack’s chest and into his heart as he strode down the black-and-white tiled corridor to his room. High, vaulted ceilings caught his footsteps and sent the echoes back down at him. Tugging at his tie, he tossed it aside as soon as he entered the two-room suite that had been his sanctuary as a boy. Now more of an office than a bedroom, its dark paneling, marble fireplace and tall, diamond-paned windows still held memories of youthful tussles with Mike and late-night visits by a wide-eyed, thumb-sucking Josie. Jack’s suit coat followed the tie onto the back of a chair.

  His body taut, he stripped and headed straight for the shower. The stinging needles that pelted down on his head and shoulders cleared his mind but did little for the smoldering fire deep in his gut. He went to bed recognizing that he had two choices.

  He could travel down the road his gnawing need for Sabrina pointed him toward.

  Or he could shut the tantalizing woman out of his mind once and for all.

  It turned out to be no choice at all. Jack spent most of the night in a sweat, seeing images of shimmering green eyes and a full mouth swollen from his kiss. He dropped into sleep near dawn, and woke to the realization that he’d passed the point of having any choice at all the first time he’d taken Sabrina in his arms.

  He strode into his Tulsa office atop the Wentworth Building just before seven. Sabrina had said she had an early class this morning. Fine. Jack intended to claim her afternoon...and whatever else she’d give him.

  His executive assistant, of course, was already at his desk.

  “I need you to clear my schedule from noon on,” Jack instructed.

  Pete Hastings didn’t blink an eye. Tall, thin and impeccably dressed in a navy blazer and tan slacks, the former street bum understood that flexibility ranked at the top of the list of requirements for his job.

  “No problem.” Notepad and pen in hand, he followed his boss into the inner office. “Anything else?”

  “Yes. I need the telephone number of the owner of the leases I looked at yesterday.”

  “It’s in the file on your desk.”

  While Jack poured a cup of dark, rich coffee from the carafe already waiting for him, Pete pulled a neatly labeled folder from a brass tray.

  “This is it.”

  “Thanks. Just leave it on the desk.”

  Setting the folder aside, the efficient assistant shuffled through the rest of the stack. He extracted two additional files, which joined the lease file on the desk.

  “That’s the final accident report from Fleet Operations on the Alaskan oil spill. You need to sign off on it so we can fax a copy to EPA. And I know you wanted to review this financial analysis before the meeting with Anderson Steel this morning. Everything else can wait.”

  “Good.”

  “Oh, what about this one?” Pete pulled a thin manila folder from the bottom of the stack. “It’s the file on Sabrina Jensen, with the detailed financial data I requested. The information came in while you were in Alaska.”

  “I’ll take it.”r />
  “The report doesn’t contain anything significant,” Pete advised.

  “If it had,” Jack replied with a smile as he skimmed the two pages, “you would have faxed it to me.”

  “You’re right, of course.” His assistant took the implied compliment in stride. “Financially, Ms. Jensen is stretched as thin as a wire, but she’s kept herself out of debt and has an excellent credit rating. The small business loan she’s applied for should sail through.”

  Unlocking his desk drawer, Jack dropped the file inside. “Take care of it, Pete.”

  “Considering that our bank is handling the transaction, that shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  As soon as Pete cleared the office, Jack reached for the phone. He’d told Sabrina last night that he’d get her the name and the phone number of the man who owned the leases. He knew she wanted to arrange a salvage expedition to the old, tumble-down motel on the property. Jack now intended to do one better. He’d take her out to poke around the ruins himself. And in the process, he’d take the next step down the path that beckoned brighter and surer with each passing hour. An absolute sense of rightness settled over him as he reached for the phone.

  “Sure,” the lease owner replied when Jack explained the reason for his call. “Your friend is welcome to anything she can salvage. She’d better get out there today, though,” he warned. “After we shook on the deal yesterday afternoon, I lined up a crew to bulldoze the place. They’re going in tomorrow.”

  “Can you hold them off if you have to?”

  “It’ll cost you.”

  “I figured it would,” Jack replied dryly. “I’m hoping to get out there this afternoon, though.”

  His warning that Sabrina would insist on paying whatever she thought her finds were worth brought a chuckle.

  “Fine by me. I’ll sharpen my negotiating skills.”

  “You’d better. She knows what she’s talking about when it comes to that era.”

  “She can’t drive a harder bargain than you did,” the owner drawled. “Hell, I’m still trying to figure out how I practically promised to pay you to take my leases.”