A Fortune's Texas Reunion, page 11
He leaned his hip against the edge of the metal desk and folded his arms across his wide, wide chest. “Don’t do anything alone, for one thing. Avoid following any sort of routine. Watch out for strangers.”
“Half the people around the campground are still strangers!”
“They’re Fortunes, aren’t they?”
“That’s what I’ve been told. They just keep arriving so it’s hard to keep up.” She paced the room, then turned around again. “Now you’re making me suspicious of every unfamiliar face. How on earth are we going to keep this from reaching my father? He doesn’t know anything about my accident.”
“Damnation, Georgia! It needs to reach your father. The man needs to know that his faith in his car-dealer buddy may be misplaced. Doesn’t matter how you ordered it, sweetheart. Someone, somewhere along the line, had direct access to your vehicle. I can make some calls. Do some inquiries. But now the data that could have conceivably been used to trace down anything useful is in the hands of your insurance company.”
“Wouldn’t they rather be able to blame a single person than an entire automobile manufacturer?”
“Whatever brings the biggest payoff is what they’ll want.” He grimaced. “That’s always been my experience, anyway.”
She couldn’t help wondering if the tight expression on his face was from one specific experience, or a sum total of them.
“Is this Fortunado guy here for the wedding?”
She shook her head. “Not yet.”
“Do you have his contact information?”
“Not with me.” She spread her hands. “All I brought with me was my brush.”
He waited a beat. “And spare panties.”
She smiled weakly. “Sure.”
He raised an eyebrow. “They’re not spare?”
Earth, just swallow me up now.
Speculation and amusement filled his eyes at her lack of response. “Interesting.”
She huffed. “You were rushing me!” She twisted around, intent on entering the bathroom to rectify the mortifying situation, but the sharp catch shooting down her spine froze her for a moment.
“What’s wrong?”
“My QL.” She exhaled as the pain subsided, then finished shoving open the bathroom door. Inside the room, she donned her underwear and glared at her reflection in the wall mirror. “Should’ve left them in the suitcase, Georgia,” she muttered to herself. “He’d have never known you were going commando.”
Pulling her dress back into place, she straightened her shoulders and went out to face him.
Amusement was still rife on his face.
“Not one word,” she warned.
He spread his palms. “I wouldn’t know what one word to choose.”
She rolled her eyes and walked out of the office. Even though she hadn’t planned to, she stopped when she reached her car. The doors had been cut off, and the wheels and hood had been removed, as well as the seats from inside.
Charlie had called it an autopsy and she could see why.
Pax stopped next to her.
“Can I borrow your phone?”
He handed her his cell phone. “What’s a QL?”
“Quadratus lumborum.”
“Sounds like a curse out of Harry Potter.”
Despite everything, she smiled. “It’s a muscle in the lower back on either side of the spine.” She ran her thumb across the small device he’d given her. “I haven’t seen one of these kinds of phones in years.”
“It does what I need it to do. Make and take phone calls. Anything more than that is overkill around these parts. We didn’t even have cell service until the last few years, and then it was spotty at best. And don’t even mention internet.” He slid the phone from her hand and flipped it open, then handed it back to her. “You can thank your uncle Gerald for beefing up those particular situations.”
“Why do I get the feeling you’re not very thankful for it?”
“Paseo used to be pretty much off the grid. It was one of the last places in Texas—hell, probably half the US—where you could disconnect, for the simple reason there were no ways to connect in the first place. Damn straight I’m not very thankful.”
“Inconceivable,” she muttered as she punched in Austin’s number. “I manage everything on my smartphone, from my calendar at work to brainstorming presentations with my department.”
When her brother didn’t answer after three rings, she disconnected. If he hadn’t answered by then, he wasn’t likely to. “I suppose it doesn’t send a text message.”
“It’s not quite that antiquated.” He took the phone from her and pushed a few buttons, then gave it back once again.
She quickly sent a brief message to her brother asking him to forward Connor’s information to Pax’s phone, then handed it back again.
He folded the phone in the palm of his hand. “You use your smartphone for anything not work-related?”
She peered inside the doorless car. “Everything in my life for the past few years has been work-related. Right up until last week, anyway.” Without the seats inside the car, the seat belts that he’d cut to free her were hanging loose and limp.
Her chest felt tight and it had nothing whatsoever to do with any muscular trauma.
She stepped back. “Did I ever properly thank you for saving me from the car?”
“Depends on what you consider proper.”
She looked at him for a moment, then stretched up on the toes of her platform sandals to wrap her arms around his neck. “Thank you,” she whispered thickly. “And if you say you were just doing your job, I may hit you.”
After a brief hesitation, his hands lightly circled her waist. She could feel the warm imprint of every single fingertip. “I was doing my job.”
She blinked hard until the heat surging behind her eyes was under control again. Then she balled her fist and lightly punched his shoulder with it. “Warned you.” She lifted her head to smile at him.
Those green eyes were soft. Mossy.
And focused on her lips.
She couldn’t help it. What else could a woman do when her mouth ran dry like hers had? Not moistening them was impossible.
She felt his fingers flex against her hips. “Georgia.”
Just that. One word. Her name. Said in his low, husky voice.
Flutters erupted in her veins. Nerve endings sparked. She took a deep breath, feeling the solid wall of his chest against her breasts.
She had never felt so thoroughly flung as she did in that moment.
And all it took was him saying her name.
Her breath eked out of her as she leaned closer, watching his eyes come nearer to her, lips hovering mere inches above hers.
“Yo, Charlie!”
They froze at the shouted greeting.
“You in here somewh—Oh, hey there, Sheriff.”
Pax had straightened, his hands falling away from her, and it was such a loss, she wanted to wail in protest. Instead, she crossed her arms over her chest and stared at her toes while she struggled for composure.
“Deeter,” Pax replied. “Didn’t know you were back in town.”
“Ma dropped me off so’s I could get my truck.” The intruder shuffled through the wedge of sunlight angling through the tall, open bay. He had an affable grin on his face, a paunch on his waist and flimsy pink thongs on his feet. “S’prised your brother didn’t give you warning. He’s the one drove me back to Ma’s from my fine accommodations in Amber Falls. Who’s your friend here?”
Pax looked resigned. “Deeter Hayes. Georgia Fortune.”
“Pleased to meet you, Miz Fortune.”
She managed a polite smile. There was nothing wrong with the other man, except his timing. “Mr. Hayes.”
Deeter elbowed Pax, his grin widening. “Went to school with this ol’ boy,” Deeter told her. “You in town with all those other folks camped outside a’ town?”
She nodded.
“Charlie’s out back at the boneyard,” Pax said a little abruptly.
As if he’d needed a reminder for the reason he came, Deeter snapped his fingers. “Oh, yeah. Right.” He tipped the nonexistent hat on his dirty-blond head. “Maybe I’ll see you around, Miz Fortune.”
“Maybe.”
Then he turned with a tuneless whistle between his teeth and walked back out into the sunlight.
“You don’t want to see Deeter Hayes around anywhere,” Pax said once they were alone. “He’s friendly enough until he gets drunk and then he’s an ornery son of a...gun.”
“Is he ornery a lot?”
“Often enough. That’s why I tossed him in the Amber Falls jailhouse.” He stepped away from the car. And her.
Talk about the moment being broken.
And he obviously had no desire to recapture it, considering the way he aimed toward the wedge of sunlight.
She followed him. “What does your brother do?”
“Jasper is a police officer in Amber Falls.”
“And your other brothers?” She distinctly remembered him telling her he had three.
“Redford’s a cop with Austin PD. Marshall is a paramedic for Amber Falls.” He gestured. “Watch out for the wheel chocks.”
She dutifully stepped over the two chunks of rough wood tossed haphazardly on the ground. “And your mom farms corn. Deborah mentioned it at the party,” she said at the surprised look he gave her.
“She farms corn.” He skirted the tour bus. “Not as much corn as she could.”
“Is that some reference to the field where we’re camping?”
His shoulders moved restively.
“Why didn’t you just tell me from the start the field was hers?”
“Why didn’t you just tell me from the start that Gerald Robinson was your uncle?” He looked back at her.
She shrugged. “I don’t know. It just didn’t really seem relevant.”
He lifted a hand. “There you go.”
They rounded the run-down house again and Betsy immediately hurled herself toward her chain-link enclosure. Even though Georgia had seen for herself the dog’s friendly nature behind all that barking, she still gave the fence a wider-than-normal berth. “Does she ever succeed in getting over the fence?”
“Oh, yeah. Usually because she’s on a tear playing with another dog. She’s a lot of noise so she makes a good alarm system for Charlie. But she’d lick an intruder to death before she’d ever hurt one.” They’d arrived at his truck and he reached over the fence to the panting dog. “Isn’t that right, girl?”
Betsy slathered his hand with sloppy kisses.
“See?” He wiped his hand on his jeans and opened the passenger door for Georgia. “Let’s get you back to the campground.”
She slipped between him and the door. “Do we have to?”
His gaze settled on hers. “Sooner or later, yes.”
There was that grade-school feeling again.
But she wasn’t in grade school. She was a grown woman who, if the suspicions were to be believed, had been the target of a crazy, spurned woman. And time—particularly Georgia’s remaining time in Texas—was precious.
So she let her gaze linger on his lips. “I vote for later.”
Chapter Eight
Later.
Pax pulled himself out of the depths of Georgia’s blue eyes. He brushed the tousled bangs away from her forehead. They’d dried, but the rest of her hair was still damp and it swirled and curled around her long neck. Her bare shoulders.
He looked at the bruise on her forehead. “You can’t avoid it forever.” It was as much a reminder to himself as for her. “We need to tell everyone the truth about your accident.”
“I won’t avoid it forever. Just...for a while.” Her fingers fluttered against his chest, her touch there, then gone just as quickly. “I’ll even tell my father about it. Please?”
He was weakening, and she knew it.
“I haven’t been fishing in a long time,” she said, “but—”
“You fish?”
The corners of her lips curved. Her dimple appeared. “Don’t sound so aghast. Yes, I’ve fished a time or two.”
“For fish?”
She let out a breathless chuckle. “What do you expect me to say? For men?”
“Frankly? Yes.”
“I don’t usually have to cast a line for men, darling.”
“I’ll bet you don’t.”
Her smile widened. “I’m going to choose to take that as a compliment, whether you meant it as one or not. But as it happens, I’m more than a little choosy. Most get tossed back before getting close to the net.”
“Heartening,” he said dryly. It was either take the humor route or kiss her.
For the moment, humor was safer.
“All right, then.” He lifted her right off her feet and set her up on the truck seat. “Fasten your seat belt. It’s a bumpy ride out to the lake. And if you expect me to bait your hook, you’re in for disappointment.”
Her smile was so brilliant it was almost enough to eclipse his misgivings that he was heading down a road he shouldn’t be traveling.
“Do I need a fishing license? Or does the sheriff get special privileges?”
“He does not.” He shook his head. “But as it happens, we don’t need a license where we’re going.”
“And where’s that?”
“Martell Lake. It’s on property my grandparents owned. My mom’s folks.”
“Your family has its own lake?”
“They did. When they died, the land was sold to pay debts, but it still carried the stipulation that their descendants would always be able to fish the lake.” He chose not to mention that the section on which she and her relatives were staying had also been part of that land. Land that he’d promised his dad he’d finish paying off so the deed would finally be Cara’s, free and clear. It had been his dad’s final admission to Pax before he’d died. That he felt he’d failed his wife on that one thing.
And Pax, in turn, had failed to finish his father’s work.
The bank still owned more of the land than the Prices’ did.
“What did your grandparents do?” Georgia’s light voice nudged into the dark mood descending on him.
“Farmed.”
“And your dad? Did he grow up on a farm like your mom?”
“He was a cop from Dallas. From a long line of them. But he gave up the city when he met and married my mom and worked for the Amber Falls PD after that, until he died of a heart attack.”
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
“Was it expected that you follow in your father’s footsteps? Or did you grow up knowing it was what you wanted to do?”
Joseph Price had been Pax’s hero. His best friend. “I didn’t intend to be a cop at all.” The admission surprised him more than it ever would her. “When I went to college, it was on a baseball scholarship.”
“Really!” She shifted sideways in her seat to face him and the vibrantly patterned dress parted like the sea, giving way to a lithe leg.
His fingers tightened on the steering wheel. They already knew how supple that smooth, tanned skin felt and wanted a repeat.
“Yeah, really.”
“What position?”
“Shortstop.”
“Like Jeter.”
He gave a short laugh. “The same position. Beyond that, all comparisons to Derek Jeter leave me way back in the weeds.”
She chuckled. “What were you studying?” She lifted her hand the second she finished the question. “No, wait. Let me guess. Astronomy or astrophysics or something like that.”
“Honey, you’re crediting me with way more brains than I really have.”
“Okay, then what?”
“Poli-sci and law.”
He expected the surprised silence.
“Wow,” she said after a moment. “That’s, um, unexpected. And not without a need for brainpower. Thinking about a political run sometime in the future?”
“Some would consider becoming sheriff to be a political run. I did have to be elected.”
“Was anyone running against you?”
He smiled wryly. “No. But after eight years on the force in Dallas, I figured I was more qualified for the job than Harvey Kavanagh. He owns the hardware store in Paseo and was reluctantly going to put his name on the ballot if nobody else stepped up.” He turned off the highway again, heading up the dirt road leading to the lake.
“So how does a political-science-and-law student end up becoming a police officer?”
“Idealism is fine until you see how the world really works.”
“And how is that?”
“Money rules all.”
Her eyes narrowed, more in study than displeasure. “That’s not realism. That’s cynicism.”
“So says the woman from money. People who have it control the Monopoly board. End of story.”
She made a soft “hmm.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Her shoulders moved. She shifted again and a couple more inches of leg were exposed. “Whoever she was must have really made an impression.”
He gave her a quick frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” she assured him blithely.
He glared at her for a moment longer with no apparent effect before the bumpy road took his attention again. “I didn’t quit school because of a woman,” he said after a while. “I quit because my dad had a massive heart attack when he was way too young to die.”
“How old were you?”
“Twenty-one. I learned real quick then that life is precious. And short.” It propelled him to follow in his dad’s footsteps. It made him acknowledge what he wanted out of life. A home. A family.
“When I was twenty-one,” she said as she flicked her fingers against the folds of her dress and her knee once again went undercover, “I was just starting my MBA.”
