One Stubborn Texan

Chapter Four

Russ hurried to get the college kids on their way. So far he’d lucked out. The Milhaus sisters hadn’t revealed anything pertinent. But he had trouble on another front. His mother had heard about his date with Sydney last night, not to mention that several people had seen them yesterday around the square.

“If she’s your new girlfriend, I want to meet her!” Winnie had insisted when she’d called that morning. He probably should have seen this one coming.

“She’s not a girlfriend,” Russ had assured his mom. “She stopped by the store and we struck up a conversation. It’s just a casual thing and she’s leaving in a day or two. I’ll probably never see her again. You wouldn’t like her, anyway.” Which was blatantly untrue. His mother liked everybody. She’d always gotten on well with Russ’s girlfriends.

But in this case, the ends justified the means. Winnie had wasted too much of her life focused on money, had practically ruined her life in the pursuit of it. The one time she’d had money of her own, after Sammy paid her off to disappear, she’d blown it all on every unhealthy pursuit imaginable.

She was happy now, doing a job she loved and living close to people who cared about her. But that would change, he knew, if she saw a chance to get her hands on more of Sammy’s cash. The mere whisper of millions of dollars would send her into a tailspin he didn’t care to witness or deal with.

He glanced at Sydney; she was sitting on the edge of a planter with her face to the sun, enjoying the gorgeous afternoon. What had started out as a simple decision on his part to refuse an inheritance had turned into a big pile of deceit, and he didn’t like that, or himself for that matter, one bit.

Still, he only had to keep the two women apart for another day or so and his problems would be over.

He approached Sydney, who had her eyes closed. “Hello?”

She jumped. “Oh. Sorry. I was about to doze off. I’m afraid I didn’t sleep too well last night.”

He hadn’t, either. He kept thinking about Sydney in his arms, how she’d felt, how she’d smelled, and he’d lain awake for hours. He wondered if her sleeplessness had a similar source and couldn’t help hoping so. “Was there a problem?”

“It was too quiet,” she admitted. “I’m used to traffic noises at night and all I could hear were my own ears ringing from the loud music at the club.”

So much for his fantasy that she’d been desperate for his touch.

“You actually like the city noise? I guess you can get used to anything.” He remembered what it was like to sleep in their Vegas apartment. Though he and his mother had lived in a pricey complex, the walls were paper thin. All night long, he’d hear people coming and going, cars and sirens, drunk pedestrians outside and his mother’s partying friends inside. He couldn’t imagine how anyone found that preferable to peace and quiet.

He looked down at Sydney’s feet. “We’ll have to do something about your shoes.”

“Why?” She looked down at her black, pointy-toed heels. “I won’t actually have to hike into the woods, will I? I have a policy never to walk on dirt.” She laughed, but Russ didn’t join her. They would, in fact, have to hike to get to the cabin, but he didn’t want to scare her off.

“What size do you wear?” he asked.

“Six-and-a-half,” she answered. “But-”

He went inside and Sydney followed, looking troubled. He scanned the shelves of shoeboxes until he found what he wanted, then grabbed a pair of socks. “Try these on.”

With a shrug, she slipped out of her heels and put the socks and hiking boots over her stockings.

Russ watched, appreciating the curve of her calf and her dainty ankles. She must really want to get at those papers, because she wasn’t built for outdoor adventures.

Nor did she dress for them. Today’s hat was some high-fashion take on a pith helmet. But as he watched her stretching to lace the hiking boots, he had to revise his initial impression. Beneath the olive skirt and zebra jacket she was no city-girl softie. He saw muscles in those legs.

Forcing himself to look elsewhere, he grabbed a couple of backpacks from the storeroom and quickly filled them with a couple of days’ food-easy stuff that wouldn’t require a lot of preparation. The cabin had a pantry full of canned and dry goods, so she wouldn’t starve. He included some bottled water.

While he worked, Sydney tried out the shoes in the main area of the store, pacing along one aisle and down another, her hips swaying gently with each step. Not that he was watching.

“These are really comfortable,” she said when she returned to the storeroom. “I’ll take them.”

“Consider them a gift,” he said. A guilty gift. Not that an expensive pair of hiking boots would make up for the hoax he was about to perpetrate. “Are you ready?”

She grabbed her purse and briefcase. “Sure.” He didn’t deserve the warm smile she gave him.

Bert agreed to watch the store the rest of the day, though grudgingly. He probably thought Russ had fallen for the bird of paradise, and it wouldn’t be the first time.

His last three girlfriends had all been city girls, two from Austin and one from San Antonio. None of them had been compatible in the long run, though for a while he’d thought Deirdre was the one. They’d been unofficially engaged and he’d designed his house with her in mind-someplace spacious and comfortable where she could feel at home. But before he’d laid the foundation, she confessed that she couldn’t survive in a small town, that she would go crazy with boredom. She’d been certain she could persuade him to move to the city.

That’s what happened with all of them. As soon as the novelty of tiny Linhart wore off, they couldn’t return to the bright lights fast enough. They couldn’t believe that he stayed in Linhart out of preference. It was as if deep down they believed he was just sitting there, waiting for the right woman to come along and save him from this small town.

He kept telling himself that a plain, uncomplicated, salt-of-the-earth farm girl would be his ideal mate-someone with old-fashioned values who appreciated the things he did. Problem was, he had yet to meet one around here who stirred up even a single hormone.

By contrast, Sydney stirred up a whole flock of hormones. Could he help it if he was a man who appreciated beauty in its more exotic forms?

Out behind the store, Russ opened the passenger door of his Bronco. He honestly tried not to watch as Sydney vaulted gracefully aboard, but he couldn’t miss the glimpse he got of the top of one stocking.

The woman wore real stockings, with a garter belt. That brief glimpse was going to haunt his dreams for a long time.

By the time he slid behind the wheel, Sydney was already sifting through his CDs, which was just as well. He wouldn’t have wanted her to notice that he moved a bit, well, stiffly. He set two bottles of water in the cup holders and revved up the Bronco’s engine.

“You’ve got some great stuff here,” Sydney said, selecting an early Lyle Lovett album. “You and my dad should compare notes some time.”

He doubted he would ever meet Sydney’s father. But he was probably an interesting man, given how his daughter had turned out.

Russ pulled out of the parking lot and down the alley, checking the clock. They had plenty of time. They would arrive at the cabin well before dark, provided Sydney took to hiking.

They cruised down Main Street. Russ took the scenic route, making a few extra turns. He felt a weird compulsion to show off his adopted hometown. He pointed out a few of the sites she’d missed yesterday, like the Linhart Winery.

“Do they import wine?” she wanted to know.

“Of course not. We grow the grapes not far from here. Every bottle of wine they sell is one-hundred-percent Texas.”

“Texas wine, huh?”

She sounded dubious, but it was no use arguing. “You’ll have to taste it some time. It’s good.” Finally he headed for the highway out of town. “If your father is a Texan, how’d you end up in New York?” He was genuinely curious why anyone would leave the Lone Star State for noisy, smelly New York. This place, with its ever-changing landscape of hills and forest, canyons and rivers, vast fields of wildflowers and winding, scenic drives, was paradise on earth as far as he was concerned. It had always felt more like home to him than Vegas.

“My father’s the one who left, not me,” Sydney explained. “He fell in love with New York and moved there before I was born, thank God.”

“Why, thank God?”

She laughed. “Can you imagine me with a Texas accent?”

“So you must really love New York.” He had no reason to feel disappointed, but he did.

“Oh, I do. Theater, museums, subways and taxis, Central Park, the Statue of Liberty. In New York, every day’s an adventure.”

“You can find adventure here,” he said, not sure why he was trying to convince her. It was her business if she wanted to breathe pollution every day and fall asleep to the sound of sirens and horns at night. But it was best to keep her talking about her family and off the subject of his. “So where’s your mother from?”

Sydney blinked rapidly and for about half a second her face reflected a brand of deep grief Russ was pretty sure he’d never felt. He’d obviously stuck his foot in it and was searching for something to say when she spoke.

“My mother was pure Manhattan,” she said, her voice cracking. “She died a few months ago-almost a year, now. She was my father’s business partner. They formed Baines & Baines together when they were hardly more than kids.”

“Baines & Baines,” Russ murmured. “I thought you were one of the Baineses.”

“Not officially. I started out working for the family business, but then I branched out on my own. Heir-finding is fun, but it’s mostly research and phone calls. I wanted to get out in the field a bit more, so I started handling other kinds of cases and eventually set up my own office in the spare bedroom of my apartment.”

“But now you’re heir-finding again?”

“Temporarily. I’m helping out my father. Mom had the business head in the family and I’m afraid Dad has made rather a mess of things. I’m trying to get everything sorted out and keep the business on an even keel until he’s ready to take the helm again.” The note of cheerfulness she’d injected into her voice rang false.

“I’m sorry about your mom.” That wasn’t anywhere near adequate, he knew, but he wasn’t good with words or warm fuzzies. He spent too much time alone with his hound dog and with gruff Bert for company.

“No, I’m sorry,” Sydney said with a self-conscious hand to her forehead. “I didn’t mean to get sidetracked into my problems.”

“What type of cases do you handle when you’re not helping your dad?”

“A lot of security-consulting work. I have all kinds of clients-everything from mom-and-pop grocery stores to casinos. I do some insurance fraud, your garden-variety background checks on prospective employees, the occasional cheating spouse.”

“Sounds like your dad is lucky he has you to step in when he needs help.”

Sydney huffed. “You’d think that, wouldn’t you? But for Dad, I’ll always be a little girl. He checks up on me every five minutes.”

And solving this case-finding the long-lost Sammy Oberlin heir-would impress the hell out of her old man. Russ could read between the lines. That was why she was pursuing the case. Well, that and the million-dollar commission.

“Why does the conversation keep turning back to me?” she asked, sounding put out. “I’m the one who’s supposed to be asking the questions. What can you tell me about this cousin of yours?”

If he kept changing the subject, she would get suspicious. So he gave her some of the truth. “He’s an older man. A widower. Has some kids and grandkids. His family goes back at least four generations in the Linhart area.”

“Have you ever heard of him talk about relatives in the Las Vegas area?”

“Not that I recall.” Russ needed another distraction to delay Sydney from interrogating him. Otherwise, he was going to have to lie outright to her and he didn’t want to do that. “Are you hungry?”

“After the breakfast I had at the Periwinkle? Not likely. By the way, you were right about the sweet rolls.”

“Then would you mind reaching around to the cooler behind my seat and getting a snack for me? I haven’t had lunch.”

“Okay, sure.” She unfastened her seat belt and twisted her body around so she could lean between the bucket seats. Her skirt rode up on her thigh and Russ drank in an extended, appreciative and unapologetic look. Her legs were long for such a petite woman and she definitely had good muscle tone.

“Do you want pretzels, an apple or a granola-Oh, yuck!” She pulled back and rubbed furiously at her face. “That dog is in the car. He stuck his tongue in my ear.” She sounded utterly disgusted.

With a sinking stomach Russ glanced over his shoulder. He hadn’t planned on this outing being a threesome. Sure enough, though, Nero crawled out from under a tarp in the backseat. At some point when Russ had turned his back-probably when Sydney was distracting him-the sneaky old hound had climbed into the back of the Bronco so he could come along for the ride.

Nero shoved his head between the bucket seats and madly sniffed at Sydney, who had her hands protecting her face from his inquisitive tongue.

“Nero, go lie down,” Russ said in a loud, stern voice.

The dog gave him a surprised, injured look before reluctantly retreating to the cargo area behind the backseat.

“He’s gone now,” Russ said to Sydney.

She started digging in her purse for something. “Does he go everywhere with you?”

“Most places,” Russ answered. “But today he’s a stow-away. I think he likes you.”

“Likes me? He tried to take a bite out of my ear.”

Russ looked over at Sydney’s pink shell of an ear, which certainly didn’t bear any teeth marks. “In twelve years, Nero has never bitten anyone. He’s not about to start with you. He licked your ear.” Maybe the dog liked the body lotion she used. Russ himself wasn’t immune to her delicate scent and thought that licking her ear wouldn’t be a bad place to start.

“He was tasting me,” she insisted. She’d found a moist towelette in her purse and was energetically washing the side of her face, her neck and any other place with which Nero might have come into contact.

Russ sighed and tried to drag his gaze back to the road, which wasn’t easy since she was wiping her cleavage. He was pretty sure Nero hadn’t licked there.

Still, the Nero incident was a perfect reminder. Just when he was starting to like Sydney, she gave him another reason why he shouldn’t.

“What sane person doesn’t like dogs?” he couldn’t help asking. “What’s not to like? Dogs are the ultimate embodiment of unconditional love. Even if I’ve only been gone ten minutes, Nero greets me like a long-lost friend. He lives for someone to scratch him behind the ears or give him a doggy treat. Dogs have simple needs.” Not like women, he almost added.

“You can save your breath. No private detective likes dogs.”

From the corner of his eye, Russ noted the rise and fall of her chest. His initial guess had been correct. She was afraid of dogs.

He shrugged. At least Nero’s timely show of affection had taken Sydney’s mind off Russ’s family.

“Do you still want a snack?” Sydney asked, regaining her composure.

“That’s okay. We’ll be at our destination before too long, and I’ll grab something then.”

She tugged down the hem of her short skirt and put her seat belt back on, peering over her shoulder every so often to ensure the dog remained in the cargo area.

“How come you’re so afraid?” he asked.

“I told you, I’m not afraid of dogs. I’m just not fond of them.”

“So you’ve never been bitten?”

She hesitated. “Well, yeah, I was. Just one more reason not to like dogs. You can’t trust them. They may fool you into thinking they’re domesticated, but one false move and they’ll turn on you.”

“How old were you when you got bitten? Or was it more than once?”

“Once was enough,” she said with a shiver. “I was five. A neighbor’s chow jumped me when I was riding my bike down the sidewalk. He’d always been friendly before that.”

Russ knew about dogs and bikes. He’d been chased down a time or two by territorial farm dogs. “A moving bicycle awakens some dogs’ prey instinct. The chow probably thought you were a very large rabbit.”

“Exactly my point. At any moment, they can revert to the wild.”

“So can people,” Russ couldn’t resist pointing out. He’d seen enough dog-eat-dog behavior in Vegas to convince him of that. “But that doesn’t mean you should dislike and avoid all people.”

“I’m sure your dog is a sterling example for the whole species, but I still don’t trust him. I’m sorry if that hurts your feelings.”

Russ laughed. “It’s your loss, missing out on the love of a good dog. That’s okay. Both Nero and I still like you.”

She eyed him curiously, apparently not sure how to take his flirting. When he grinned back at her, she looked away.

Another spear of guilt needled him. What kind of a degenerate flirts with a woman he’s lying to?

“Did the chow hurt you badly?” he asked, feeling sympathy for the small child she once was.

“I spent a week in the hospital and another three years in and out of surgery.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make light of it.” No wonder she didn’t trust dogs. No wonder she was afraid-even if she refused to admit it. He glanced over at her, giving her a frank examination. “I don’t see any scars.” At least, none that weren’t covered up by clothing.

She reached over, took his right hand off the steering wheel, and placed it under her hair at the back of her neck. “Feel the bumps?”

He nodded, running his fingers along her skin as if he were reading braille. Bumps or no, her neck felt nice.

“I wear scarves for a reason. But I did have an exceptional doctor. He got rid of most of the scars.”

“But not the ones in here.” He lightly touched her temple, then quickly returned both hands to the steering wheel where they belonged.

“Dogs sense something in me-hostility, maybe. I give off some scent only they can smell. If I walk into a pet shop, all the dogs start barking like they have rabies.”

“Nero likes you. Why else would he kiss you on the ear?”

At the sound of his name, the dog’s head popped up from behind the backseat. Sydney stiffened, though she said nothing.

“Nero, lie down.”

Nero’s hopeful eyebrows fell as he disappeared once again behind the seat. Sydney relaxed.

Figuring they’d talked enough about dogs, Russ kept Sydney distracted by pointing out a landmark here and a rock formation there. She responded with seeming interest, sometimes asking a question or simply nodding thoughtfully.

“It’s beautiful out here, even in the winter,” she conceded. “Even a confirmed urbanite like me can appreciate that.”

After they’d been driving for about twenty minutes, Russ pulled off the main road and onto a rutted dirt road that challenged the Bronco’s suspension. Five minutes later, he stopped at a washed-out bridge that had once spanned Deer Creek, a ribbon of water with a steep, rocky bank.

Stately oaks, scrubby mesquite and maples crowded the road from both sides and climbed the distant hills, their brown, bare trunks interspersed with evergreen junipers. One thing Russ loved about the Hill Country was the way the landscape varied from bare, brown rocks to gentle hills and valleys coated with buffalo grass to lush woods.

“Wow.” Sydney gazed through the windshield at a landscape that was picture-postcard perfect, even when the trees were bare of leaves. “Is this a state park or something?”

“Actually, it’s private land owned by some hospitable friends of mine,” he said as he cut the engine. “But it butts up against a park creating an uninterrupted chunk of wilderness.” Big enough to support some of the threatened animals that needed large areas to range, like bobcats and cougars. But he wisely chose not to mention critters of any kind to Sydney. If she was afraid of old Nero, he couldn’t imagine how she would react to a cougar.

“Have we stopped here for a reason?” Sydney asked.

“No bridge.”

“Can’t we…go around?”

“Sorry, but from here we have to hoof it.”

“What? How far?”

“Only about four miles.” Not giving her a fair chance to object, he opened his door and jumped down, leaving her gaping.