Excerpt Letter to Reader About the Author Title Page Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Copyright

The Booming Of The Baby’s Strong And Regular Heartbeat Echoed Throughout The Examination Room.

Zach couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. He met Mallory’s gaze, and they exchanged a long, intimate look. Her eyes were suspiciously bright, and he knew she was close to tears. He felt a fierce protective urge swell in his chest. He had to take care of her and the baby. He had to. When he finally found his voice again, it was thick with emotion.

“Is the heartbeat supposed to be that fast?” he asked the doctor.

“Oh, yes. Your baby is perfectly normal,” the doctor replied.

Zach exchanged a brief glance with Mallory that dared her to say that it wasn’t his baby. She didn’t say anything. She couldn’t have spoken if her life depended on it. She was listening to the thrilling sound of her baby’s heartbeat.

And she had shared it with Zach.

Dear Reader,

Spring is in the air—and all thoughts turn toward love. With six provocative romances from Silhouette Desire, you too can enjoy a season of new beginnings...and happy endings!

Our March MAN OF THE MONTH is Lass Small’s The Best Husband in Texas. This sexy rancher is determined to win over the beautiful widow he’s loved for years! Next, Joan Elliott Pickart returns with a wonderful love story—Just My Joe. Watch sparks fly between handsome, wealthy Joe Dillon and the woman he loves.

Don’t miss Beverly Barton’s new miniseries, 3 BABIES FOR 3 BROTHERS, which begins with His Secret Child. The town golden boy is reunited with a former flame—and their child. Popular Anne Marie Winston offers the third title in her BUTLER COUNTY BRIDES series, as a sexy heroine forms a partnership with her lost love in The Bride Means Business. Then an expectant mom matches wits with a brooding rancher in Carol Grace’s Expecting.... And Virginia Dove debuts explosively with The Bridal Promise, when star-crossed lovers marry for convenience.

This spring, please write and tell us why you read Silhouette Desire books. As part of our 20th anniversary celebration in the year 2000, we’d like to publish some of this fan mail in the books—so drop us a line, tell us how long you’ve been reading Desire books and what you love about the series. And enjoy our March titles!

Regards,

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

Please address questions and book requests to:

Silhouette Reader Service

U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

About the Author

CAROL GRACE has always been interested in travel and living abroad. She spent her junior year in college in France and toured the world working on the hospital ship Hope. She and her husband spent the first year and a half of their marriage in Iran, where they both taught English. Then, with their toddler daughter, they lived in Algeria for two years.

Carol says that writing is another way of making her life exciting. Her office is her mountaintop home, which overlooks the Pacific Ocean and which she shares with her inventor husband, their daughter and their son.

Expecting...

Carol Grace

www.millsandboon.co.uk

One

Mallory pressed the throttle all the way to the floor and willed her small, overloaded car to climb up into the San Rafael Mountains above the university town of San Luis Obispo. Her tires shook and the engine knocked, but that was nothing like the way her hands shook and her knees knocked together. Just a small attack of nerves, she told herself. Understandable, considering this past week she’d quit her teaching job, given up her apartment, packed her meager belongings into her car and was on her way to start a new life. A new life. Oh, Lord, was she ready for this?

She forced herself to look at the scenery, to observe the cattle grazing peacefully beneath majestic oak and stately sycamore trees that dotted the hills on either side. As she passed the sign for the Santa Ynez Valley Ranch she was hit with another panic attack. If the road hadn’t been so narrow she might have turned back. Instead she pointed her car toward the imposing California ranch house with the tile roof and the massive overhanging eaves. At the end of the tree-lined entrance, she took a deep breath and got out of her car.

Before she could force herself to walk to the front door and lift the brass knocker, a white-faced calf came charging around the side of the house with a man on horseback in hot pursuit.

“Hey you, get out of the way,” he shouted.

Mallory froze with fear. He told her to get out of the way. She told herself to get out of the way. But her body didn’t get the message. She stood there, rooted to the spot, her arms out in front of her as if she could stop the runaway calf. She couldn’t. She frightened him though. Almost as badly as he frightened her. The animal took one look at her and bolted off in another direction. Reining up, the man glared down at her.

“I thought I told you to get out of the way. You’re lucky you weren’t run over.”

Mallory shaded her eyes, looked up into a sun-bronzed, granite-hard face with flashing blue eyes, and shrugged helplessly. “I’m sorry, but...”

“You’re sorry? You would have been even sorrier if a one-hundred-fifty-pound calf had plowed into you. Sorry and unconscious, to boot.” He looked over his shoulder and shook his head. “She’s gone. Just like the other ones. Do you know how many of these mavericks I’ve lost in one morning?”

“I have no idea,” she said. “I know absolutely nothing about cows. I’m just a...I mean I’m here to—”

“I know why you’re here,” he said, dismounting and removing his hat. “I just didn’t expect you so soon. The hell with the cattle. This is more important. Come on in,” he said turning on his heel and walking toward the massive oak front door.

Mallory blinked. So he knew who she was. Then they were even, because she knew who he was too. Everybody knew who Zachary Calhoun was, the biggest cattle rancher in the county, maybe the whole state. Famous for being almost as tough and successful a businessman as his uncle who’d left him the ranch.

It was cool inside the classic Western house, thanks to the thick adobe walls covered with native American weavings. Huge brown leather chairs flanked a massive stone fireplace, the kind you see in ski lodges. Mallory could imagine curling up in one of those chairs with a good book. Or a good man. Which brought her to the reason she was there. It was time to forget the furnishings and ask—

“Now,” he said, waving her to a straight-backed chair next to an end table while he leaned against the wall and observed her with his penetrating blue eyes. “We don’t have much time, but I need to get a little more information about you.”

She bit her lip. She’d heard he was brutally frank. That he didn’t mince words. “I’m not sure...I don’t know what you already know,” she stammered. Not everything. Please don’t let him know everything. Not yet. Not today.

“I know you’ve had some experience. You’ve done it before, but on a smaller scale.”

“That’s not true,” she said hotly, getting to her feet. “I’ve never...this is the first time I’ve ever—”

He raised his hands to stop her from continuing. “Never mind. At this point it doesn’t matter. I’m desperate. You’re hired.”

“What? Wait a minute. This is a mistake. I’m not here about a job. I’m here to see your foreman, Joe Carter. He and I...we’re...”

He gave her a cynical smile laced with pity and cut her off. “Sorry, lady, you’re a day late. The son-of-a-gun left yesterday. Ran off with the best housekeeper I’ve ever had, that’s why...”

Mallory stared at him. He was still talking, at least his mouth was still moving, but the words were a jumble of sounds. “No notice...irresponsible...unexpected,” she heard him say. The blood drained from her head, and the room spun around, as the herbal tea she’d swallowed for breakfast came up and threatened to choke her. Her legs refused to support her any longer, her knees buckled, and the varnished wide-planked floor rose to meet her with a resounding thud. And everything went black.

Zach moved fast, but not fast enough to catch her before she fell. Instead he had to scrape her up off the floor, sweep her into his arms and lay her out on the cool leather couch. He clamped his lips together to keep from blurting out a string of expletives and sat next to her, vigorously rubbing her wrists.

“Wake up,” he ordered. “Come on, sweetheart, tell me you’re okay. Say you’ve been sent by the agency to take Diane’s place.”

Her face was cold and still as a statue. A lump was forming on her head. Cattle he could handle. Sick, well, nervous, skittish, he knew what to do with them. They rarely fainted. And never cried. Women on the other hand were a mystery to him. He’d had little experience dealing with them. His mother had left him to be raised by his uncle. His wife had lasted about six months before she took off. Since then he’d avoided getting involved with the fairer sex.

But his woman problems weren’t over yet. Yesterday his superefficient housekeeper ran off with his foreman, and today a strange woman passed out in his living room. One minute she was standing there, glowing with apparent good health, her long smooth legs in khaki shorts and her white camp shirt buttoned snugly over lush full breasts. If he hadn’t noticed these details then, he couldn’t have missed them in his brief walk to the couch with her body pressed intimately against his, causing an unmistakable reaction on his part. Now she was out cold. Legs and all. And his body was still throbbing. That was the price of being celibate too long. Damn, damn, damn.

Just when he was about to hire her. Hell, he would have hired Lizzie Borden the ax murderess at this point, he was so desperate. Alarmed at her lack of response, he bent over and put his ear against her left breast to listen to her heart.

What if she never came to? If she went into a coma here on his couch? Thank God her heart was still beating. Just a little too fast. But then so was his. Too fast for comfort. He was about to raise his head from where it was pillowed on her breast, he really was, but before he did she sat up abruptly, as if she’d had electric shock treatment. He got to his feet. Calmly. Deliberately.

“What were you doing?” she asked, her eyes wide and alarmed.

He looked down at her with a frown creasing his forehead. “Checking to see if you were still alive,” he said brusquely. “You may not remember but you passed out on my floor here. I was concerned about you. Afraid I might have to call an ambulance. Thought you might have some problem...”

“I have a problem all right,” she said, her shoulders suddenly sagging under the weight of some invisible burden. “Did you really say Joe had gone somewhere with someone?”

“You got it. He’s gone somewhere with someone who was my housekeeper. Who kept order around this place in a hundred different ways. Calmly, efficiently. Did you or did you not come here today to take Diane’s place?”

“I didn’t. I came to meet Joe. I’ve got everything I own in my car out there. I thought...”

“Yes?” he said impatiently, noting the color had come back to tinge the woman’s cheeks with scarlet. “Spit it out.”

“I...I don’t know where to start,” she said, moving to the edge of the couch and swinging those long lovely legs to the floor.

“Okay,” he said crossing his arms over his chest. “I’ll start it for you. You were involved with Joe. Stop me if I have it wrong, but I’d say you met him in town, at the Old Town Tavern, listening to one of the R&B bands that rolls through. And he swept you off your feet.”

The look on her face told him he’d got it exactly right. It didn’t surprise him. What surprised him was that she’d gotten all the way up here. Joe’s usual MO was to have a hot and heavy affair with some babe he met in town then break it off just as fast as he’d started it. “Always leave them wanting more,” he’d once told Zach with a wicked gleam in his eye one early morning when he’d run into him on his way back to his cabin.

Zach had to hand it to the guy, he never missed a day’s work. No matter what he’d been doing the night before. So what happened here? What made Joe take off with Diane, seemingly a sane, sensible, incredibly efficient woman of ordinary looks, leaving this extremely attractive woman high and dry on his couch?

Zach studied the woman before him before continuing. “He told you he loved you. He told you you were beautiful, special... What else?” he prompted.

“He told me he was going to marry me,” Mallory said softly. The look on Zachary Calhoun’s rugged face told her he thought she was a fool. Not just a fool, a naive fool. He had no idea just how naïve. And how clueless she was about men. No idea how many years she’d spent with her nose in a book, in classrooms and in libraries. Pursuing knowledge while other girls pursued boys.

He had no idea that a good-looking cowboy with a few sweet words could sweep her off her feet in one night. Make love to her and make her believe he’d marry her. Or maybe he did know. There was something all-seeing in those shrewd blue eyes of Zach’s. Something that made her tear her gaze away before he saw the insecurities locked deep inside her.

She couldn’t let anyone see the fear that she’d never be desired, never be sought after or fought over the way her sister, Mimi, was. Flirtatious Mimi, the pretty one, who had boys fighting over her from day one and who was now happily married to Mallory’s one and only boyfriend. Once he’d seen Mimi that was it, he was gone. It was a long time ago, but still the memory lingered, the old feelings...

Zach stared at her with disbelief. This woman was even more gullible than he thought. He figured she could be as young as twenty with that innocent, classic face and deepset brown eyes, but with those bones she’d look just as pure and pretty at forty. Not that he was looking at her bones. It was the subtle curves he couldn’t take his eyes off.

“Well, don’t take it personally,” he said making an unaccustomed effort to be kind. “If it’s any consolation, the guy isn’t the marrying type.”

Mallory looked at him, her eyes suddenly glazed with unshed tears. His words hadn’t helped. She was not consoled.

“You’re young. You’ll find somebody else,” he said heartily. Why on earth would he care if she got married or not? He didn’t know her. She would leave in a few minutes and he’d never see her again. Still, he had this irrational urge to try to make her feel better. It must have been those eyes, those sad, dark eyes that threatened to spill over.

“I’m not young,” she said. “I’m twenty-eight.” She squared her shoulders and blinked back her tears. “I can’t believe he didn’t even... Maybe he left a note for me.”

“Maybe he did,” Zach said, tearing his eyes from her soft brown gaze, ignoring the plaintive note in her voice. Anyone dumb enough to fall for Joe didn’t deserve pity. They needed professional help. He glanced out the window to see if any of his stray heifers had shown up. No. Today just wasn’t his day. It wasn’t as disastrous as yesterday; today it was just plain terrible.

“Don’t get your hopes up,” he said. “But if you feel like it, you could walk down to his place and have a look around.”

She stood up quickly, then rocked back on her heels.

He grabbed her by the elbow, forcibly steadying her with his hand. “I’ll walk with you,” he said. “All I need is for you to get lost between here and there, to pass out again and not be found for days, which would cause me even more headaches than I have already.” He was sick of Joe’s profligate ways, sick of dealing with an ineffective employment agency, of losing employees and replacing them with others.

“I’m sorry,” she said trying to pull her arm free from his grasp, but he was not about to let her go. He was afraid she’d faint again. She was, too. Though she’d never fainted before in her life, lately she was doing all kinds of things she’d never done before. Drinking too much. Flirting with a stranger, the first randy cowboy to cross her path. Then going to bed with him. And next quitting her job, making wedding plans and changing her life. It all started on her birthday when her colleagues at the university had taken her out to the tavern to celebrate. That’s when she’d met Joe. It was a brief fling. Her first. And her last.

“Not as sorry as I am,” he muttered as they walked down the path together. When they reached the cabin, Zach threw the door open and held it while she looked around.

“Nice place,” he commented. “No wonder everyone on the ranch is bugging me about it. Before the sheets are cold they all want to move in. Diane had some system for deciding who had first claim, but I’ll be damned if I know what it was.”

Mallory wasn’t listening to him. She wandered from the small cozy living room with a potbellied woodstove and a braid rug to the kitchen with rustic tiles and a view of the surrounding hills. Then to the wood-paneled bedroom with a king-size bed, the striped sheets left in a tangle. This was the cabin she’d been going to live in. The bed she’d been going to sleep in. With him. Her face flamed. From shame. From humiliation. Before she left the room she took a deep breath and held her head high. She would not let that man with the all-knowing look in his cool blue eyes and the foul temper see her weak side again. Or try to make her feel better with empty words and clichés.

When she returned to the living room he was holding a white envelope in his hand. “You were right,” he admitted. “He left you a note. That is, if you’re Mallory Phillips.”

She snatched it out of his hand and read it standing up. Joe said he was sorry, but marriage, even to someone as wonderful as her, was not in the cards for him now or ever. He wished her good luck in her career. Her heart plummeted. He was talking about the career she’d just put on hold to join him here, to marry him and have a—

“Good news? Bad news?” Zach asked with a curious look in his eyes.

She stared at the letter for a long moment, while the tears welled up and threatened to spill down her cheeks. She would not cry in front of Zachary Calhoun. She could feel his eyes on her, watching, waiting, expecting the worst from her. Well this time he wasn’t going to get it. When she looked up she’d arranged her mouth into a stiff smile and held her tears firmly in check.

“Neither,” she said briskly, tucking the letter in her breast pocket. “Just an explanation.” She brushed past him on her way out the door, aware of his rock-hard chest muscles, of his washboard-flat stomach and the earthy scent of leather and tobacco.

Her hands trembled. Heat shimmied up her spine. It had nothing to do with Zach and his blatant masculinity. It had everything to do with her and her heightened awareness of all things sensual—sights and sounds and tastes and smells and feelings, too. Like the way his head had felt pressed against her breast. Hormones, that’s all it was. Hormonal overload.

Out in the sunshine she took a deep breath. “I’m fine now,” she assured him when he joined her. “I won’t trouble you anymore.” She turned and started up the path.

He grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her around to face him. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“Home,” she said, forgetting she had no home to go to.

“Where’s that? I thought you had everything you own in your car.”

She sighed. “I do.”

“Ever been a housekeeper?”

“No.”

“Ever wanted to be?”

“Absolutely not.”

“What are you?”

“I’m an astronomer.”

He dropped his hands from her shoulders. He raised his eyebrows, radiating skepticism from every pore. Either he didn’t believe her or she’d surprised him. She guessed he was a man who wasn’t that easily surprised. But she’d done it. That gave her some satisfaction on a day that hadn’t offered much else.

“You think you know a lot about women, don’t you?” she asked.

He shook his head. His eyes shuttered. “I don’t know anything about them.” Then abruptly he changed the subject. “Were you going to watch the stars from up here?” he asked.

“The nebulae. That’s my field. I thought it would be a good place with the altitude, and no ambient light or pollutants in the air to interfere.” She glanced with longing at the green hills that undulated to the horizon and drew in a breath of pure, clean air.

“What do you think now?” he asked, absently chewing on a piece of grass.

“It would have been a good place,” she admitted.

“Got your own telescope?”

“A hundred-pound reflector telescope. With a tripod. It’s small but has good light-gathering power for its size.”

“Then stay here. Be my housekeeper during the day and watch your damned nebulae at night. Which is what you should have been doing instead of fooling around with my foreman.”

Her face flamed. The man just didn’t know when to quit. “I wouldn’t be your housekeeper if you paid me.”

“But I will pay you. More than you make as an astronomer. Enough to buy yourself a really big telescope.”

She felt herself waver. Picturing a new telescope, one that could peer all the way to intergalactic nebulae. How hard could it be to keep somebody’s house anyway? “What does it entail?” she asked. “Making beds, cooking meals?”

He shook his head. “This is a big ranch. We have a cook, and we have maids. That cabin you saw was one of many. The housekeeper knows who lives where, which ones need repairs, she orders supplies, does the household budget, and God knows what else. I’m gone a fair amount so I need someone to keep everything in order inside the house. That’s what Diane did. She was remarkable.”

He knew she was vacillating. He pressed on. “No physical work, all administrative. If you can keep track of a few million stars, you can handle a few dozen employees, their housing, their meals, the main house, some entertaining and a thousand acres of ranchland, can’t you?”

“A thousand?”

“Forget the thousand acres. Forget the ranchland. The foreman handles that. Or at least my new one will. I’ll have someone unload your car. Your suite is in the main house.”

Mallory could have said no then. She could have gone to her car and instead of unloading it she could have driven back to town. And then what? She’d declined to teach summer session, preferring to do research. Hoping to publish her results and get her appointment changed from assistant professor to associate. She’d given up her apartment. Didn’t have much money. And then there was the real reason she’d come up here. The reason she’d decided to get married. The one she hadn’t mentioned and wouldn’t, not until she had to.

By mid-afternoon she’d stashed all her gear in a suite that was larger than her whole apartment in town. Her clothes were divided between a pine chest and a spacious walk-in closet, her computer and her boxes of journals on the oak desk. Her telescope and tripod stood in the corner of the sitting room formerly occupied by Diane, her predecessor. She’d met Juana, a maid, George, a handyman and Tex the cook, in his restaurant-size kitchen.

“You like barbecued beef?” Tex had asked giving his spicy sauce a stir.

“Love it,” she’d told him, as her stomach churned. She used to love it, but recently the only thing she could get down was saltine crackers.

“Miss Diane said my sauce was the best she’d ever eaten. You a friend of hers?”

“No, no, I didn’t know her.”

“Fine woman. Hard worker. Can’t believe she’d run off like that. Shocked us all. Now Joe, nothin’ he could do would shock us.”

Mallory gulped. She wondered when the talk would die down, if ever. Would she always be only a poor replacement for Diane? Always? There was no always. Not for her. She’d be lucky if she lasted the summer, considering the personality of her boss. A summer should give her time to figure out what to do next. Depending on what shape her research was in, and of course what shape she was in. In the mean time she had Diane’s job while Diane had her man.

“Dinner’s at seven,” Tex said. “Hope you’re not on a diet like Diane was.”

So Diane was fat. Or was she thin? Whatever she was, she had something Joe wanted and Mallory didn’t. Strange how fast she had accepted the fact. Much faster than she’d accepted her sister’s taking her boyfriend away. As if she’d had a choice either time. Funny how the shock was wearing off already. And how fast Joe’s classic cowboy face was fading from her memory.

She had not seen any more of her boss, not since he’d told her what the obscenely large salary was, shaken her hand and pointed to a large, richly appointed room he called “the office” in one wing of the sprawling house.

“That’s where we meet every morning. In the meantime...”

Just as she was about to tell him she couldn’t do anything in the meantime except collapse and that she was having second thoughts about being anybody’s housekeeper and especially his, someone yelled to him from outside the house that the vet had arrived, and he disappeared. She staggered to her room and lay on the bed, wondering how she’d ever sleep a wink in the same bed as the woman who’d taken Joe away from her and spoiled her plans.

Yet she did sleep, until dinner. Another weird thing, along with her heightened sensory awareness was her need for an afternoon nap. Of course, staying up late tracking the cosmos could do that to a person. But it never had done that to her before. She felt better after she’d had a shower and changed into khaki pants and a soft cotton shirt.

The pungent smell of Tex’s barbecue wafted through the covered walkway that led to the large, cheerful dining room. When she opened the door, the dozen or more people at the table stopped talking. Heads swerved in her direction. A hush fell over the room. Everyone was staring at her, everyone but her boss. He was busy piling potato salad on his plate. He already knew what she looked like, both conscious and unconscious.

A tall, tanned older man with a sweeping mustache stood and doffed his hat. “I know you must be, but you can’t be our new housekeeper.”

“Why can’t I be?” she asked, sitting in the only vacant chair, next to the dashing older man.

“Much too young and much too pretty. Thought you’d learned your lesson, Zach.”

Zach looked up briefly, just long enough to meet her gaze. If she expected warmth and support, she didn’t get it. There was only a brief flicker of recognition, as if he’d almost forgotten he’d even hired her.

“This is our new housekeeper,” he said briskly. “Mallory, meet the staff.” He proceeded to go around the table, introducing his vet, his mechanic, the buyer, his business manager and so forth until the names and faces all blurred together. Except for Perry, the man who thought she was too young and pretty to be a housekeeper.

“Tell me,” Perry said slanting his head in her direction. “What’s a nice girl like you doing on a ranch like this?”

“Just what Mr. Calhoun said,” she replied, taking a small piece of barbecued brisket from a platter served by a young woman in blue jeans and a braid over one shoulder. “I’m the new housekeeper.” Maybe if she said it often enough she’d start to believe it. I’m the new housekeeper, I’m the new housekeeper, I am the new—

“And what do you think of Mr. Calhoun?” Perry asked over the din of renewed conversation and the clatter of silverware.

“He’s...very decisive,” she said with a brief glance toward the end of the table. “Seems to know what he wants.”

“That he does,” Perry agreed, shaking hot pepper onto his baked potato. “But what he wants is not always what he needs.”

“I see,” she said. But she didn’t see at all. Anyone as rich and successful as Zach Calhoun could surely get anything he wanted or needed. Case in point. He needed a housekeeper, so he’d gotten her, using his forceful personality and an outlandish salary. If it hadn’t been her, it would have been the next hapless female who’d happened to pull up in his driveway for whatever reason. To marry his foreman or deliver a truckload of gravel. It didn’t seem to matter. He was just looking for a warm body.

“I guess you heard what happened to your predecessor?” he asked.

“Do you mean...”

“I mean she ran off with our foreman, and no one even knew they were involved. Talk about the odd couple. It’s the biggest scandal to happen around here in a long time. No one understands why they left, why they had to run off. Why didn’t she just move in with him and stay here and keep her job?”

“I don’t know,” Mallory said. But she did know. It was because Mallory was coming to marry Joe. And he didn’t want to marry her. Not at all. He didn’t want to marry her so much that he took the housekeeper and left a good steady job just to avoid her. And that hurt.

“They’ll never find anyone like Zach to work for,” he observed, filling her water glass for her. “He’s tough but he’s fair. By the way,” he said bending his head so close his mustache tickled her ear. “Has anyone been given Joe’s cabin, do you know? Maybe you could put me on top of the list. Perry’s the name. Perry.”

“I’ll remember,” she said, leaning forward to avoid his hand on the back of her chair. Was it the housekeeper’s job to assign housing? To fend off lecherous old wranglers?

“You’re not worried about filling Diane’s rather large shoes, are you?”

Large shoes. Was that just a saying or did Diane really have big feet? “Well, yes,” she said, “now that you mention it, I am worried. I hear she was quite good at...what she did.”

“Good? She was the best. You had much experience?”

She took a sip from her water glass. “Yes and no,” she hedged.

He smiled as if he saw right through her. As if he knew she’d been hired off the street, or off the floor as it were.

“Yes, our boss appears to have everything,” Perry said, returning to the subject he’d begun. “And he does. Except in his personal life. I’m talking about a wife and a family, of course. You married?”

“No.” She glanced at the man at the end of the table. Up to now she’d avoided looking at him. Afraid of what? That he might have the power to see into her soul? Find out her secret? The man who oozed wealth and self-confidence was at that moment glaring at her. Even down the length of the table she could feel his disapproval. Of what? What had she done but nibble on some barbecued beef and listen to Perry gossip?

The conversation at Zach’s end of the table revolved around topics like shorthorns and Brahmans. So even at dinner he was all business. But he was all macho man, too. In control of his house, his land and his personnel. Except for one renegade ex-foreman and one ex-housekeeper. Was that the reason for the frown on his face? Or was it directed at her personally?

“Does he have a wife and family?” she asked.

“No,” Perry said, stuffing a large piece of beef into his mouth. “That’s my point. What good is all this land and money if you’ve got no one to share it with?”

Leaving Perry’s question hanging in the air, she stared at Zach, wondering if he felt the same way. If he did, there must be a ton of women who would jump at the chance to share this beautiful place. If they could ignore his acerbic personality, his male chauvinist ideas and his domineering manner.

Mrs. Calhoun would have her meals cooked for her, her bed made and acres of wildflowers and stables of horses to call her own. Or half her own. If he could talk an astronomer into being a housekeeper in one half hour, he could certainly talk any other woman into being his wife. If he wanted one. She wondered if he wanted children. She never had. Not until now.

At that precise moment he looked up and caught her staring at him. Their glances met and held for a long minute while the conversation dimmed in the background and the faces around the table faded. She tried to break the contact but she couldn’t. His intense gaze held her captive over bowls of creamed corn and platters of tomatoes. She’d already consented to be his housekeeper. What more did he want with her? Her stomach knotted with nerves and apprehension. She shredded her napkin in her lap without realizing it.

Just as she thought she might have to make an abrupt departure from the table to escape his brilliant blue gaze, his interest in her faded as the maid brought in coffee and plates of freshly baked spice cookies and someone asked Zach if he’d ever found his missing calves.

Before she’d left the dining room, two more people asked if they could have Joe’s cabin. She said she’d see. She’d say anything to get out of there and away from the aura of the presence at the end of the table. But just as she was the last to arrive in the dining room, she was the last to leave. Or next to last. Zach was still at the table, making notes on a paper napkin. Without realizing she was doing it, she held her breath and tiptoed past him.

His arm snaked out and grabbed her hand. “Not so fast.”

“What, what is it?” she gasped.

“Sit down.”

She sat.

“I want to talk to you.”

“Go ahead.” Her heart was pounding. Not from fear. From apprehension. Anxiety. Misgivings.

He pressed her hands between his rough callused palms. “Your hands are like ice.”

“Cold hands, warm heart,” she said lightly.

“That’s right I remember,” he said deliberately, letting his heated gaze follow the curve of her breasts and linger there. Her face flamed. She tugged at her hands. He held on.

“Just a warning. Stay away from Perry. He’s a lech. Unless you want to end up like your predecessor.”

“I don’t intend to run away with one of your staff,” she said coolly. Little did he know she was not the type to inspire such passion in anyone. The brief affair with Joe was her one-and-only fling. His interest in her had so surprised and flattered her she’d lost her normal good sense. Of course she could blame the three beers or the music or the fact that it was the night of her twenty-eighth birthday and she was still a virgin. A reluctant virgin. There was all that. And there was more. The need to prove she could attract a man like Joe.

“That’s reassuring. Who do you intend to run away with?”

“No one. By the way,” she said, looking down at his broad, work-hardened hands that still clasped her pale slender fingers. “Am I on duty twenty-four hours a day?”

“Of course not. I wouldn’t dream of interfering with your stargazing.”

“They’re not stars, they’re nebulae. Clouds made of gas and smoke and...”

“Whatever.”

She pushed her chair out from the table. Enough of this patronizing boor.

With a loud scraping sound he pulled the chair with her in it back to the table and said, “I’m not through with you yet.”

Two

He poured her a cup of coffee from the urn on the table, leaned back in his chair and observed her through narrowed eyes.

She shook her head and set the cup aside.

“How are you going to stay awake for the Milky Way if you don’t get some caffeine in your system?” he asked.

“I’m not staying awake for the Milky Way. The Milky Way is a galaxy, made up of stars, of which we are all a part, the nebulae, however—”

“Are clouds made of gas and smoke.”

“And dust Very good,” she said with grudging admiration.

“I took notes. Thought there might be a quiz,” he said. “Here’s an idea. Instead of studying those nebulae of yours, why don’t you find a new comet and name it after yourself? Mallory Phillips. It has a nice ring to it.”

“I’ll think about it,” she said. The way he rolled her name around on his tongue made a shiver go up her spine.

“Tea?” he asked.

She capitulated. “All right.” If she wasn’t going to get away from him anytime soon she might as well have a cup of tea.

She thought he’d have someone bring it. Instead he went to the kitchen himself and came back five minutes later with a cup of fragrant, passion peach.

She eyed him over her steaming cup. “Don’t you have...things to do?”

“I have to talk to you. About avoiding the men here.”

“I don’t see how I can do that and still do my job,” she said. “What is my job, by the way? I know, housekeeper. But what does that mean, actually, besides supervising? Supervising who, what, how? How am I supposed to supervise people who know more than I do? Maybe this isn’t such a good idea.”

“You’re just nervous,” he said. “It’s a great idea.”

He would say that since it was his idea.

“Not just supervising...coordinating,” he corrected.

“All right, coordinating. What do I coordinate?”

“Everything. Everybody. You’ll learn on the job. You’ll ask people who’ve been here awhile. You’ll find Diane’s household records. Learn where she ordered supplies and groceries and how she assigned housing and who does what around here. Not all at once. As you go along. The important thing is that you not...”

“I know. Run away with your foreman. Don’t worry, it’s not likely to happen again. Not to me, anyway. I’ve never been... As you said, I’m a day late.”

Zach rubbed his hand over his forehead. “You’re not the only one. Day two and the agency still can’t find anybody for me to even interview. How do they expect me to run a thousand-acre ranch without a foreman?” he asked.

“Isn’t two days a little short notice?” she asked. “If you’re so impatient why don’t you just wait for the next man to pull up to your house and hire him?”

“Like I did you? I’ll remind you that I thought they’d sent you. And you did nothing to convince me otherwise.”

“I fainted,” she said taking a sip of the soothing, hot beverage. “That should have tipped you off.”

“Good point. Housekeepers don’t faint. At least Diane never did.”

“Diane this and Diane that. I’m not Diane. I’m not even a housekeeper.”

“You are now,” he said flatly. “It can’t be that hard. But a foreman is another matter. I want someone who’s had experience running a large ranch. They’re out there, I know they are. I just can’t seem to get my hands on one. I don’t expect to get someone like Joe. Whatever his character flaws, he was damned good at what he did.”

Mallory thought of the night she’d met him. His handsome face, his smooth talk, his expertise on the tiny dance floor, plying her with drinks, seducing her with words as well as action in that small hotel room across the road from the bar. Yes, he was damned good at what he did. And she was an admirer, and a willing participant. She couldn’t blame Joe. She’d gone willingly, like a moth to the flame.

“What’s the matter?” Zach said, studying her flushed face.

She picked up her cup and took a large gulp of tea. “Nothing.”

“Were you in love with him?”

“No, of course not.”

“Then why were you going to marry him?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” she said.

“Try me.”

She brushed her hand across her cheek. “I don’t know. I mean...maybe I was in love. I know, people don’t usually get married unless...unless they have a good reason. But what is love, anyway? What does it feel like?” She wished she had been in love. She wished that had been the reason for those wedding plans. And love would have excused her behavior in that hotel room. She really did want to know about love. Just because Zach wasn’t married didn’t mean he didn’t have the answer. Anyone who looked as worldly-wise as he did and was as rich and good-looking as he was had probably been in love dozens of times.

“Damned if I know,” he said, rocking his chair back against the wall and folding his arms behind his head. “You’re asking the wrong person. I don’t think you’ve answered my question yet. If you didn’t know if you were in love, why did you want to get married?”

She set her cup down with a thud. “That’s none of your business.” She’d had all the questions she could handle for one day. If she could summon the energy to walk out, she would. But right now she was drained.

Zach sat at the table, crumpling the napkin with the formula for feed he’d scribbled on it. He looked at her cup and noted the imprint of her lips on the rim. If she wasn’t sitting there staring off into space he would have picked it up and held it to his mouth. To taste passion peach blended with her own elusive scent.

He still didn’t get it. Why in the hell would she want to many a promiscuous stud like Joe if she didn’t love him? Then suddenly he did get it. Because he was a stud, of course. Even Diane couldn’t resist him. So why should a beautiful woman like Mallory?

Tex came in and set a fresh pot of coffee in front of them.

“More tea, Ms. Mallory?” he asked.

She shook her head. She looked like she wanted to leave but was too tired to move. To break the silence Zach turned to Tex. “You’ve been married, Tex, you know anything about love?” Zach asked.

Tex wiped his hands on his apron. “I know this much. It makes the world go round.”

“Thanks,” Zach said drily.

“What’re you asking me for? You been married yourself, boss.”

“That was a long time ago.”

“Once you’ve been in love, you never forget how it was,” Tex said.

“Then I couldn’t have been in love, because I have forgotten,” Zach said, drumming his knuckles on the table. “All I remember is the shock when she told me she was leaving.”

Mallory looked up and met his gaze. There was sympathy in her dark eyes. And he knew he’d said too much. He didn’t want sympathy from anybody, especially from a woman he didn’t even know.

“Well,” he said, “it’s been a long day. You’re probably tired.” If she didn’t take the hint that it was time for her to leave, he’d be surprised.

But she didn’t, and he was surprised to hear her say to Tex, “I think I will have another cup of tea.”

The cook smiled and took her cup to refill it.

“How long have you had the ranch?” Mallory asked.

He paused. He didn’t really want to talk about himself. But he could hardly ignore a direct question, either. “My uncle died seven or eight years ago. But I’ve lived here since I can remember. I was about ten when my mother dumped me here and took off.”

“Dumped you?” she asked.

“Call it what you want. I don’t blame her for taking off. As a single mother she was at the end of her rope. It hurt at the time, but leaving me here with my uncle was the best thing she could have done. For her and for me. I know everybody doesn’t feel this way, or they wouldn’t keep quitting, but I love this place. Better than anything.”

“Better than anybody?” she asked.

“Yeah, why? There’s nothing wrong with that. The only thing that’s wrong is that I can’t run it alone. I depend on others. I need good help. Yesterday I lost two of the best.”

“Today you replaced one of ’em,” Tex said from the doorway, nodding at Mallory. How long had he been standing there? Not that it mattered, he knew more about Zach than anybody.

“Did I do the right thing?” Zach asked with a wry glance at Mallory.

“She looks good to me,” the cook said.

“She looks tired to me,” Zach said, noting her drooping eyelids.

“You’re right,” Mallory said with a yawn. “She’s going to bed. Good night.” She rose from the table, leaving her tea untouched, and walked out the dining room door.

“Pretty little thing,” Tex noted, crossing his arms across his ample waist.

Little? He hadn’t picked her up off the floor and carried her across the room. “Doesn’t have any experience,” Zach said, pouring Tex a cup of coffee.

“Then why...”

“I don’t know,” Zach said. But he knew why he’d hired her. It was because he couldn’t send her away. Because there was something in those limpid brown eyes that told him she needed help, a place to go. It was the tears that she fought to hold in check that called forth his grudging admiration, and the way she handled the shock of hearing Joe was gone. By fainting, yes. But when she recovered, with fortitude and grim determination. Those things showed her mettle.

“I’m running a business, you know,” Zach reminded himself as well as Tex. “Not a home for the lovelorn or an observatory for astronomers.”

“Who?” Tex asked, sitting in a chair halfway down the table.

Zach took a swallow of hot coffee. “She’s an astronomer,” he said.

“She gonna read our horoscope?” Tex asked.

“Afraid not,” Zach said, not wanting to go into the difference between astronomy and astrology. “I wasn’t going to tell anybody she’s not a housekeeper, but you’re not just anybody. You’ve been with me for the last nine years. Making food that keeps a lot of guys around when they might have had reason to leave.”

“Thank you, boss,” Tex said.

“You’re welcome.”

“They can look into the future, you know,” Tex said.

“Who can?”

“Astrologers. They can tell if money or romance is in your future,” Tex said.

“I don’t need an astrologer to tell me that romance is not in my future. I tried it once. It didn’t work.”

“Maybe it’s time you tried again,” Tex suggested.

Zach did a double take. He looked into the cook’s friendly dark eyes. “Me, try again? Have you been into the cooking sherry?” Zach asked. “As if I didn’t have enough problems. As if I didn’t have goals which don’t include anything but raising the best beef cattle in the state. Now you want me to go out looking for romance?”

“Not go out looking. Just, you know, don’t fight it.”

Zach stared at the man. In all-these years he’d never had a personal talk like this with him. Now all of a sudden Tex was talking to him like a Dutch uncle. Though Zach’s real uncle had never talked like this, either. He was a cool, tough rancher who hadn’t known what to say to the boy he’d raised.

“If she’s not a housekeeper, why’d you hire her?” Tex asked.

“I don’t know.” Zach raked his hand through his hair. “I was desperate. I thought she’d been sent.”

“Maybe she was,” Tex suggested. “By the angels.”

“I meant by the agency.” He didn’t say that he’d had a strange, irrational urge to protect her. Because when he heard she’d fallen for the likes of Joe, he somehow knew he had to keep her from falling for the next randy cowboy who came along.

“Maybe it was a mistake hiring her,” Zach said. “I’m probably gonna have to let her go.”

Tex frowned and stood up. “Don’t do anything till you read your horoscope tomorrow,” he warned. “Or you’ll be sorry.”

The next morning Mallory stood at the entrance of the walk-in closet and realized she had nothing in her wardrobe that vaguely resembled what a housekeeper would wear. Couldn’t the super-wonderful Diane have left behind one housekeeper outfit? One powder-blue polyester shirt and pants would have done it, preferably with an elastic waist. Along with a set of instructions as to how to be a housekeeper. But the closet had been cleaned out. And Mallory’s clothes were either trim skirts she’d worn while teaching that didn’t seem to fit anymore or warm pants for stargazing. So she dug out a pair of baggy cotton shorts from the bottom of her duffel bag and a T-shirt to wear to the ten o’clock meeting.

Not that it mattered. He wasn’t there.

“He’s going to town to raise a little hell with the job agency,” Mike the mechanic told her. “Feels he’s not getting enough attention from them. Said he’s not coming back till they find him a foreman. Can’t run a ranch without a foreman. Boss’s getting impatient. He’s got no foreman. So, no meeting today.”

“But...” She looked around in desperation. What was she supposed to do? How was she supposed to do it? She thought he’d brief her today.

“Boss said he wants to see you this afternoon.”

“This afternoon? I’m not waiting around until afternoon to talk to him. I want to see him now.”

Mike pointed out the window where Zach was cleaning the windshield of his racy black sports car. “There he is. Don’t blink or you’ll miss him.”

Mallory dashed past the mechanic and out the front door. Zach was just easing his tall frame into the front seat. “Wait a minute,” she yelled. She didn’t wait for him to answer, she went back in the house, grabbed her purse and jacket from her room and went back outside.

He turned to look in her direction, his face expressionless, as if he’d never seen her before, never heard her yell at him to wait, and started the motor. She yanked the passenger door open.

“Wait a minute. I was expecting a meeting. I need to talk to you.”

“Later,” he said brusquely.

“No, now. I’m the housekeeper, right? I’m supposed to housekeep, but I don’t know what to do or how to do it.”

He exhaled loudly and impatiently. “Don’t do anything. Relax. We’ll talk about it when I get back.”

“I can’t relax. I’m a believer in the Puritan work ethic. If I’m working for you I’m going to work. But I can’t work if I don’t know what to do. I want to talk about it now.”

“I’m going to town now.”

“Then I’ll go with you,” she said, climbing into the seat next to him. “I have some shopping to do. We can talk along the way.”

He shook his head. She fastened her seat belt with a loud click.

“Okay,” he said, racing the motor. “But when we get there, you’re on your own. I’ve got business to attend to.”

“I know. At the job agency.”

He headed down the driveway without speaking. She looked out the window. She’d said she wanted to talk, but now that she was sitting next to him, the smell of leather upholstery mingling with his citrus aftershave, she couldn’t think of anything to say. Her mind was blank. The questions that were burning to be asked were all forgotten.

Her body was buzzing with awareness. Awareness of his oxford cloth shirt with the sleeves rolled up revealing muscular sun-bronzed arms. His strong, capable hands on the steering wheel. This idea of riding into town with him was not a good one. Sitting so close she had goose bumps on her bare arms. She was acting too much on impulse these days, unable to think logically. She had half a mind to tell him to stop and let her out, that she’d walk back.

But he distracted her with a question. “So who’s responsible for laying this work ethic on you?”

“My grandparents.”

“They lived with you?”

“No, we lived with them. They were wonderful. Hardworking, old-fashioned in some ways, but understanding, too.”

“What about your parents?”

“My father was in the foreign service. Two years here, two years there. At first they sent us back in the summers to Grandma Annie and Grandpa Ted’s, my sister and I, but the schools were iffy and Mimi and I were tired of moving all the time, making new friends, changing schools. So finally we came back to live with them yearround in Arizona. Grandpa had a small telescope set up in the backyard. I guess that’s where I got the idea I wanted to be an astronomer.”

He nodded.

“But that’s not what I wanted to talk about,” she said. “It’s about the job.”

“Must have taken a lot of hard work and study to get the job, and years of graduate school.”

“That’s where the work ethic came in handy,” she explained. “But that’s not the job I mean.”

“What classes do you teach?”

“Three sections of Astronomy 101 and an advanced seminar. I really like the freshmen best,” she said, turning to face him, enthusiasm spilling from her voice. “Taking them out the first night with a map of the sky. We plot the stars and the planets. The best part is to see the students get excited.”

“The way you did when you looked into your grandfather’s telescope.”

She studied his profile, the high cheekbones and the broad forehead. She didn’t expect someone who’d seemed so self-centered to also be intuitive. “Yes. How did you know?” she asked.

He shrugged and asked some more questions, which she answered. But she never got a chance to discuss her duties at all. When they arrived, he pulled into a parking space on the main street.

“Meet you back at the car, in what...two hours?” he suggested.

“Fine,” she said.

Zach burst into the placement office on the third floor of the only high-rise in town. The name on the door said “Frank Lovejoy and Associates. Personnel and Consulting. Specializing in Ranch and Country.” The receptionist looked up and murmured, “Uh-oh,” as he brushed by her on his way to see Frank, the president, founder and CEO.

“Gotta have a foreman, Frank, and I’ve got to have one today,” he said, pounding on the man’s desk. A greeting in this case was superfluous.

“What about the housekeeper? I might have a housekeeper for you.” Frank ignored Zach’s display of temper and shoved a manila folder across his desk.

Zach hesitated. He’d had a restless night. Thinking about her. The way her face paled when he told her Joe had gone. The way her hands felt captured between his. Her face pressed against his chest as he carried her to the couch. The glow in her eyes when she talked about her nebulae. He scoffed at horoscopes, but Tex’s warning lingered in his ears. “Don’t do anything...or you’ll be sorry.”

Zach leafed through the folder. The housekeeper was fifty-five years old. Hobbies were knitting and bridge. Came highly recommended. She sounded ideal. He didn’t need to read his horoscope to know she was right for the job.

“I’ll take her,” Zach said. Mallory would understand. She was already having second thoughts. In fact, she was so concerned about the job, she’d ridden into town with him just to talk about it. Of course she’d understand she couldn’t do the job.

“Don’t you want to interview her?”

“Not necessary,” he said shrugging off a twinge of guilt. “Now about a foreman.”

“I heard what happened,” Frank said, shaking his head.

“Hasn’t everyone?” Zach asked, irritably. He was trying to be patient. While the whole town was gossiping about his foreman and his housekeeper, all he could think of was how he was going to tell Mallory she was fired.

You can keep the advance, he’d say. Keep the first month’s salary. But you can’t stay. I don’t know what I was thinking. You were right. You can’t supervise people who know more than you do. Not that you don’t know a lost. It’s just in the wrong field. If you’d majored in housekeeping instead of astronomy...

No, that wouldn’t do.

It’s nothing personal, he’d say. Like hell it wasn’t. It was nothing but personal. Personal because of the way she appealed to his protective instincts. Instincts he didn’t know he had. Instincts he didn’t want to have.

“There must be a foreman in there somewhere,” Zach said, gesturing toward the file drawer. “Or better yet, out there.” He gestured toward the window, toward the hills beyond the town.

“No doubt, but... Hey, I got an idea for you. Only thing is he’s in semiretirement. You’ll have to talk him into coming back to work.”

“How old is he?”

“Ageless.”

“Don’t tell me it’s Slim Perkins.”

“It is.”

“The guy is almost ninety if he’s a day.”

“So? You some kind of ageist?”

“No, but this is hard work.”

“Give him a try.”

Zach exhaled loudly. “Okay. Send him out. Send them both out. As soon as possible.”

“Nice doing business with you, Zach. As usual.” Frank stood and shook Zach’s hand.

“Yeah, right.”

Zach felt a profound sense of relief as he walked down the main street in the charming town of San Luis Obispo, past the historic white-walled mission built by the missionary Father Serra in 1772, while the bell from the tourist trolley clanged as it clattered past.

To celebrate he walked into his favorite restaurant to have lunch. The ranch would get along without him for another hour or two, he thought, buying the local newspaper to read while he ate. But he never got a chance to read it. Mallory was seated all by herself in a big booth. If he’d thought fast enough he could have turned around and walked out the minute he saw her dark head bent over the menu. Or pretended not to see her and taken a seat at the counter.

But he didn’t. His feet took him to her booth as if he was a robot programmed to go wherever she was.

“Mallory,” he said briskly, taking the bench opposite her.

Her eyes widened. “Found your foreman already?” she asked.

“Yes.” Now was the time to tell her he’d found a housekeeper also, but he didn’t. The waitress came, and he ordered clam chowder. She ordered a tuna melt and iced tea. Then he leaned back against the vinyl seat and studied her, trying to figure out why she looked different. Was it the crisp striped tunic she wore? Or her short hair, feathered around her face? Whatever it was, she looked younger in this hairstyle, and totally defenseless. And totally impossible to fire. Damn, damn, damn.

He frowned. “You look different.”

“I had my hair cut and I went shopping,” she said. “Do I look more like a housekeeper?”

He shook his head. “Hardly,” he said. Her face fell.

He reached across the table, tilted her chin with his thumb so he could look in her eyes. The hurt she tried to hide caused his stomach muscles to tense. “That was a compliment,” he said. “Don’t worry, okay?”

She nodded, but he hadn’t convinced her. He could tell by the way she was studying the wine list upside down. If anyone was worried, it should be him. He’d just hired two housekeepers. Yesterday he had none, today he had two. Maybe that was best. Then if one ran off with the foreman, he’d have a spare. No, that was ridiculous. His fifty-fiveyear-old housekeeper running off with his octogenarian foreman? Not likely. Considering her background and his age, probably neither did a whole lot of running. He had to fire Mallory.

He told himself she wouldn’t mind. That she’d never wanted the job to begin with. And she was worried about what it entailed. She’d probably found out for herself by now that she didn’t belong at the ranch—look how fast she wangled a ride back to town today—and she would welcome the chance to get out of it. Where would she go? Back where she came. What would she do? Keep watching those dust clouds. Better than sweeping them out of corners.

“Have a nice morning?” he asked, trying to bring the conversation to a strictly impersonal level.

“Yes. I bought a few things,” she said.

“Like your new shirt there.” His eyes followed the modest neckline and the buttons that ran down the front.

“Yes.” She flushed and she ran her finger around the collar. “I wanted to get something... What do housekeepers wear, anyway? What did Diane wear?”

“I have no idea,” he said. She’d worked for him for six years and he couldn’t picture anything she wore. At all. Ever.

“Was she pretty?” Mallory asked.

“You got me.” He opened a packet of crackers and crumbled them into his soup.

She sipped her iced tea. “You don’t have to spare my feelings,” she said. “If she was pretty, say so.”

“I tell you I didn’t notice. What does it matter if she was Miss California? The important thing was that she was good at her job.”

“I thought if I looked like a housekeeper, I’d be able to act like one. Then someday I might be as good as Diane.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” he said, avoiding her gaze. If ever there was a time to tell her, it was now. You don’t need to look like a housekeeper, because you’re not going to be one. You wouldn’t have liked the job, anyway. It’s a lot of work. The kind of work you’re not used to. But he didn’t say that. He didn’t have a chance.

“Don’t tell me what to worry about,” she said under her breath as the waitress refilled her iced tea glass. “You have no idea what I’m really worried about.”

“No, I don’t,” he said, struck by the way her voice shook just slightly. He leaned forward, his soup forgotten. “Do you want to tell me?”

“Zach Calhoun, I thought that was you. Mind if I join you?” Before he could say yes he did mind, a tall woman lavishly decorated in silver and turquoise jewelry squeezed into the booth next to him and looked up expectantly at Mallory. Just when Mallory was going to tell him what was bothering her. He glared at the woman and stifled his irritation.

“How are you, Stella?” he asked. “Do you know Mallory... Mallory...”

“Phillips,” Mallory said.

Stella stuck her hand across the table to shake Mallory’s. “Nice to meet you.” Then she turned to Zach. “I heard about your foreman,” she blurted, unable to contain a knowing smile.

Oh, Lord, he should have known. Ranchers who hadn’t had much to say to him for years would now take the opportunity to gloat over his misfortune in losing Joe.

“Did you really?” he asked. He wished she wouldn’t bring this up in front of Mallory. But how was Stella to know she’d been jilted by Joe?

“The word is he got his girlfriend pregnant.”

“What?” he said, dropping his spoon onto the table with a loud clank. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Mallory turn pale. Oh, no, she was going to faint again. Damn Stella for gossiping. Why hadn’t he told her to butt out when she’d appeared at the booth? Didn’t it occur to her that the news might hurt Mallory’s feelings?

On the other hand, it could be pure hearsay. Diane pregnant? He would have known. She would have been sick a lot in the mornings and thrown up, those things pregnant women did. No, it wasn’t possible. So Stella was there to gloat about his misfortune and to show him she knew more than he did about his own ranch and his own foreman. And maybe to make up for the fact she’d lost out on the bidding for a bull he’d bought last year.

She nodded solemnly and ordered a salad and a diet Coke. “That’s what I heard. From Randy who heard from Chuck who got it from Joe.”

“I wouldn’t take anything I heard third-hand very seriously. I would have known if Diane...no, it can’t be true. I don’t believe it,” he said firmly with a glance at Mallory who had little worry lines etched between her eyebrows.

“Believe it,” she said. “It pays to keep your ear to the grindstone.”

“I thought it was your nose.”

“Whatever it is, you apparently weren’t doing it and now you’ve lost two of your best workers. If I’d known Joe was leaving, I would have offered him twice what you were paying him. But they say he wanted to get away, put some distance between him and the gossip. How’re you ever going to replace him?”

“I already have. Nobody’s indispensable, you know.”

“We’ll see about that. Wait a few weeks and I’ll ask you again.” She took a sip of her drink and looked across at Mallory. “I don’t think I’ve seen you around. Are you and Zach...”

“Friends,” Zach said, before she could open her mouth. “Mallory is an astronomer.”

“Really. How fascinating. Could I get some advice from you? I’m a Libra.”

Mallory might have smiled at the question if it weren’t for the pain in her chest. How many people were gossiping about Joe and the housekeeper? How long would it be before she was part of the gossip? On the other hand, she was grateful to the woman for changing the subject. The best thing she could do now was to play along.

“Libra,” Mallory said thoughtfully, gazing off across the crowded restaurant “Let me see. Yes, now I’m getting it.” She shifted her gaze back to Stella. “What you need to do is to stay in your cocoon. Don’t stray from home until your moon is in another house. Does this make any sense to you?” she asked.

“Yes, it does. You know I had a feeling I should have stayed home today. First I had a flat tire and then I broke my fingernail changing it. Instead of going to the bank, I’m going right home after lunch. You’re amazing, you know,” she said beaming at Mallory. “What’s your sign?” she asked Zach.

“How should I know?” he said.

“When’s your birthday?”

“October twenty-eighth.”

“You’re a Scorpio.” Stella turned to Mallory. “What’s in store for him?” she asked.

Mallory surveyed her boss’s rugged face as if she knew what she was doing. “Scorpio,” she repeated, her mind floundering. It didn’t help that Zach was looking at her with an expression brimming with cynicism. “Let’s see. While Mars joins Venus in Capricorn, you should weigh your options and change direction.”

“She’s unbelievable, isn’t she, Zach?” Stella said, wide-eyed with wonder.

“Unbelievable is the word for it,” he said drily.

“Let’s see what the newspaper says,” Stella enthused while Mallory nibbled on her sandwich. “Not that a newspaper would know more than a live astronomer, but still...” She reached into her bag, pulled out a section of her newspaper while Mallory nibbled at her sandwich. “Here we are. Listen to this, Zach. ‘Worrisome situations around home base can be a drag.’ Oh, ho, that’s definitely you.”

“Pure coincidence,” Zach said flatly. “Everyone has worrisome situations at home base.”

“‘Your best bet is to act swiftly,’” Stella continued unabated. “Sounds like you’ve done that. ‘There’s a strong temptation to do something rash. Despite the current chaos, stay calm. Unexpected good will come of this.’” She tilted her head to observe his reaction. When there was none, she continued. “Your thoughts and feelings are at odds,” she read loudly. “Since your thoughts are well-known, try siding with your feelings for a change.”

He smiled blandly and nudged her arm. “Thank you, Stella, for those words of wisdom. It was good seeing you again.” He stood up. Stella had to move so he could get out of the booth. He grabbed Mallory’s arm with one hand, the check with the other and almost dragged her along with her shopping bag to the cashier while Stella went back to reading horoscopes.

“The woman doesn’t know when to quit. ‘Thoughts and feelings at odds.’ What garbage,” he muttered when they were out on the sidewalk. “What possessed you to play along with her? You didn’t have to do that. You could have explained the difference between astrology and astronomy.”

“I know, but she didn’t want to hear that. She wanted someone to tell her what to do. So I did.”

“Am I the only one who doesn’t want to hear my horoscope? Tex believes in the stars, too.” He was irritated by this run-in with Stella, but he was grateful for one thing. His horoscope mentioned nothing about romance. Not that he believed in that kind of thing.

He led Mallory down the Creek Walk that wound through the downtown to get back to his truck, his hand clamped on her elbow. As if he was afraid she was going to run away. He had another housekeeper, so why should he care if she ran? He didn’t know why, but he did care.

“Sorry you had to hear all that garbage about Joe. I don’t know how these rumors get started.”

Mallory paused at the edge of the creek to set her shopping bag down and catch her breath. She was still shaking after hearing what the woman said about Joe. She wished she’d never come to town. It certainly made hiding out at the ranch more desirable, at least until the gossip died down.

“Then you don’t believe...what she said?” she asked, glancing up at him.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.