*Not many women worried about retribution from their long-dead great-grandfather, but Lauren Mackillop was no ordinary woman.
“Heading to Texas, are you?” the man standing next to her said as they queued for the check-in counter. “You won’t know what’s hit you.”
Oh, but she would.
Born under the stars, with a curse on her head to boot, she was well versed in rugged living and hadn’t wanted to go back to any of it. But here she was at LAX, flight booked.
“It’s hotter than a stolen tamale in Texas,” the man said.
Lauren ran her eyes over the top of his shiny, bald head and smiled her appreciation of his Texan-resident joke. “I know.” She flicked the tip of her tongue over her lips, enough to moisten them without disturbing her neutral-blush lipstick. It had cost a fortune and she’d have to make it last now.
“You are not defined by one thing.”
Lauren closed her eyes. “Grandmother, get out of my head.”
“Get your skinny butt back home now.”
Skinny butt? It was true, she was slim. Mostly genetics, but she didn’t eat much anyway, and in the future she might not be able to afford to eat at all—a fact her grandmother obviously wasn’t concerned about. Given what had just happened to her, she was already having nightmare visions of her future. Sad and lonely, eating packet after packet of pretzels. She didn’t like to depend on junk food to cure her miseries though, so she hardly ever ate them. Even though they were her absolute favorite.
“Don’t dally around the airport,” Ava said. “Or you’ll get yourself into more trouble than you can deal with.”
Lauren attempted to shut out the telepathic mental communication she had with her grandmother, but she’d been born with it and it wasn’t easy to silence. Especially when Ava wanted to voice her opinions. She’d probably been polishing her runes and knew something Lauren didn’t. Not that Ava needed accoutrements to portend someone’s fate.
As for trouble! She had a Louis Vuitton suitcase full. Secondhand Louis Vuitton, but still…
“Do you know what the delay is for?” she asked the little man with the bald head.
The line was at least fifty people long. A check-in person at the counter was moving his hands in explanation of something, but she was so far back she couldn’t hear what was being said.
“Something to do with a bird flying into the engine of a plane as it was taxiing. Threw a wrench into the takeoffs and landings. Everyone’s circling.”
Lauren tapped the heel of her ankle boot on the tiled floor.
“Been in California long?” the man asked.
“Six years.” Couldn’t he tell by the perfect barely there tan? The hazel highlights woven through the chestnut-brown layered bob, lengths of which framed her face and swung down her back? Couldn’t he see the Vogue look, played down with a dash of Hollywood urban chic?
Or did he just see a woman wearing another woman’s castoffs?
If only she were going home as the successful woman she’d hoped to be when she’d left. Someone who hadn’t had her business taken from her. Someone who appeared poised and a little mysterious—although not in an eerie way.
She cast a quick glance at her clothes. She’d needed a classy veneer for her clients and customers but not anymore. So, she’d chosen low-key with her outfit today. She was heading for her hometown of Surrender in Calamity Valley in the Texas Panhandle. There’d be little need of couture.
She sported dark-wash denim jeans, a large leather, stitched-and-tasseled tote bag that had cost its original owner two-thousand dollars and Lauren a hundred bucks, and matching pale lilac suede ankle boots.
“I was doing so well with my business,” she told the man, needing to voice it out loud because she still couldn’t understand how she’d let disaster through the door and shatter everything she’d worked so hard for.
She’d owned and run the In Need of Loving boutique in Santa Ynez, Santa Barbara County. A mere one hundred twenty-five miles from Los Angeles—she couldn’t afford anything in LA, although Santa Ynez was pricey enough. Still, her shop slotted beautifully between the historic facades of the businesses on the main street. She’d even acquired a few select customers in LA. Obscenely wealthy women who bought on a whim and discarded on a sigh of discontent. She picked up their preloved, sometimes never-worn, clothing and accessories for a song and sold them in her boutique.
“What happened to your business?” the bald man asked.
“I lost it.”
Her shop was boarded up now. Traded on and about to be turned into a steakhouse. They’d probably make a fortune, since it was two doors down from the saloon where her trashy business partner had lost In Need of Loving in a card game.
She never wanted to see another saloon as long as she lived. She never wanted to be reminded of backroom poker games, where sharks with laid-back demeanors bet for fun on people’s livelihoods.
She rotated her shoulder, the soft jersey of her pearl-gray scoop-neck top sliding off a little. She pulled her aviators off the top of her head and onto her nose, covering her eyes and resisting the urge to look behind her. She felt as though someone was watching her, and she didn’t want to be seen. It was probably just the disturbance of her grandmother being in her head, and everything she now faced—the unknown.
“The name’s Frankie,” the bald-headed man said, sticking out his stubby hand. “Frankie Caruso.”
He didn’t look like a Frankie Caruso. He looked like a plain old Bob Smith.
Lauren accepted his handshake. It wasn’t his fault he was irritating, it was Lauren’s mood. But it might be best to remain anonymous. “Scarlet Juliette Barrett-Bernard,” she said, making up the name on the spur of the moment.
His eyebrows shot up. “Is that so? What a fancy name.”
It was as far from Lauren Mackillop as she could get.
“Child,” her grandmother said. “Don’t put yourself in a situation you can’t easily get out of.”
What did that mean? The problem was Ava wasn’t a typical granny. She and her sisters were mystics, oracles, and soothsayers and a force to be reckoned with. What Ava had was the gift of insight at its finest. Precognition of the future. Prophetic predictions.
Unnerving, since she’d warned Lauren about the trashy business partner, but had Lauren listened?
She was supposed to have this ability, too, and obviously didn’t! Although she’d never wanted the Mackillop gift and was content with the telepathic conversations with her grandmother—which she never spoke about. She didn’t want to believe she had greater powers loitering inside her, ready to burst out. She wouldn’t know what to do with them, for a start.
“So what’s sending you to Texas, Miss Barrett-Bernard?” Frankie Caruso asked.
She offered a wan smile. “I just buried my thieving business partner.” The funeral costs had taken a fair whack of her remaining money. “He lost my business in a poker game.” He didn’t deserve to be buried; he deserved to be left to rot in the street. But Lauren had a conscience. “He was shot in the back by underworld crime lords.” That was a lie, but what did a little fib matter now? He’d died choking on a chunk of pineapple—just desserts, if anyone wanted Lauren’s opinion. He’d forged her signature on a new contract that gave him 78 percent ownership of In Need of Loving and the means to dispose of it in any way he saw fit.
A poker game!
Frankie Caruso’s jaw went slack. “Right. Well—best of luck, and all that.”
“I won’t need luck. I have my grandmother.”
“Looking out for you, is she?”
Lauren wasn’t sure if Ava was so much looking out for her as forcing her hand. “Something like that.” Her bottom lip trembled and she bit it. She blinked through unexpected tears and turned her head away.
Going back to Surrender under such demoralizing circumstances hurt. But Donaldson’s Property Development had been hounding the ninety-seven Calamity Valley residents to sell their land, so her family was working on a last-ditch effort at increasing tourist interest, to prove to people there was no need to sell. Lauren was supposed to come up with an idea for Surrender, since she had a small amount of cash and no pressing engagements in life.
It wasn’t that she didn’t love the valley and her hometown—she did, with every beat of her heart. It was just that she’d left on a high, business plans pouring out of her. Now, she’d lost that business. Who in Surrender would want to listen to her suggestions for commercial growth? She was nothing but a fake, with a suitcase full of other women’s designer clothing and exclusive one-offs.
She glanced down at the Manolo Blahnik boots she’d bought from a producer’s wife for fifty bucks. Maybe shoes didn’t count…
At least she wouldn’t be alone in the valley. Her cousin Molly was back in her hometown of Hopeless. Their cousin, Pepper, refused to budge from Arizona though, let alone return to her hometown of Reckless. And here was Lauren, on her way to Surrender, to do—what? She didn’t have a clue, but she had a niggling feeling her grandmother was up to something.
A movement in the queue brought her out of her thoughts. A guy in an airline uniform was walking along the line of people, explaining something.
Thank goodness! It looked like they’d be underway soon. All this waiting around wasn’t doing anything for her nerves.
She squared her shoulders and inhaled deeply. That wasn’t the way to think. She was going home and she had a job to do. Just because she’d made a huge error of judgment in the recent past didn’t mean she’d make another.
“I’m sorry, people,” the airline employee said, apologetic and defensive all at once. “Traffic is experiencing gate hold and taxi delays are long. There’s nothing we can do about it. You’ve got a five-hour holdup.”
Lauren sighed. Great start to the rest of my life.
*
Mark Sterrett was used to dealing with whatever came his way. He took life in his stride. But the job he was about to embark on had been forced on him, and he wasn’t in the best of moods. Not that his grim expression had made any difference to the guy with the bald head now sitting opposite him.
“It’s hot in Texas,” the guy said, continuing a conversation that had been mostly one-sided and going on for a few minutes.
Mark picked a pretzel from the bag he’d bought and munched on it. The little guy had taken a seat at the café table in Terminal One, LAX without asking but Mark pushed the packet of pretzels toward him, not wanting to be selfish just because his life had hit the pits.
“We get all kinds of weather, mind you. Not just heat, you know?”
“I know.” Mark wasn’t a true Texan, but he’d been living in Laredo for six years after moving from California and had recently discovered what heat could do to a man. Although he wasn’t referring to the weather.
He glanced at the departure board. There was still over a three-hour delay to get through before he boarded for Amarillo, picked up a rental car and got himself to Surrender in Calamity Valley, nestled against the Palo Duro Canyon. Lost and forgotten. But apparently with valuable real estate potential.
“If you’re heading to west Texas,” the jokester said, digging into the packet of pretzels, “it can be drier than the heart of a haystack and windier than a fifty-pound bag of whistling lips.”
“I’ll try to remember that.”
“Or you might find yourself in the middle of panhandle rain. That’s what we call a dust storm. We get four seasons in Texas—all of ’em big ones.”
“Thanks for the advice,” Mark said and spun the packet of pretzels his way again.
“Wherever you’re going, you’ll want to watch your back ’cause of the heat.”
Mark had cause to take very good care of his back and was only heading to the panhandle in order to protect everyone else’s.
“So what were you doing in LA?” the bald guy asked.
“Family issues.”
“What business are you in?”
Up until a month ago he’d been a ghostwriter—making up stories for others. More recently—“Property development.”
“Looks like business is good,” the guy said, raising his eyebrows at Mark’s attire.
He resisted the urge to straighten his shoulders beneath the soft leather bomber jacket. Some author had given it to him as added repayment for ghostwriting a biography about a relative who’d flown in World War II. He also owned a cowboy hat purportedly belonging to some cowpoke who’d run a cattle drive from Texas to the railroads in Kansas, and other gear handed over to him in appreciation of his services. He kept these gifts packed away like souvenirs on a high shelf that no one ever dusted, but the jacket he was fond of. He’d worn it so often, it was at that perfect lived-in stage, although it was designer and pricey, and that obviously still showed. It wasn’t the sort of thing he’d normally buy for himself.
He didn’t see money as the be-all and end-all—although he liked that he had some. He worked hard for what was in his bank account, on his own terms and under his own steam. Some might say it was a wasted talent, giving all those plots and storylines to someone else who’d reap the reward, but that was his preference. Grab a good deal, dollarwise, prove his worth with the written word, then move on. Life was meant for living, not sweating. And after a hard day’s writing, there was nothing like a visit to the local bar, or a friendly little poker game with the boys in the back room, to clear a man’s head and make him forget about the trials of the day.
But his father had put a halt to all that, so here he was, heading to Surrender. No longer working under his own conditions. The quick trip to LA had been necessary to ensure his mom and three sisters were okay and that they had no idea what was going on, or what might happen to them if Mark messed up in the next couple of weeks.
“Think I’ll take a walk,” he said to the bald-headed guy. “Keep them,” he added as he pushed his chair back to stand and nudged the packet of pretzels the man’s way.
“Thanks. See you around, maybe.”
Mark smiled but didn’t answer. It was unlikely. He’d get this job in Surrender done, ensuring his mom and sisters were safe, then attempt to not go find his father and kill him.
Twenty minutes later, he was leaning against a pillar, feet crossed at the ankle, arms folded over his chest, trying not to look at the departure board for the fiftieth time hoping for a positive update.
All around him, people were dozing on hard chairs, mouths open in sleep. Kids were getting scratchy and tired. Parents were making further demands of the now frazzled airline staff as to when they’d get to board a plane.
He ran his gaze over the heads of the many weary travelers until his sight settled on a distant corner and a woman sitting on a row of plastic chairs someone had just put out.
For a second he thought he was seeing things. Was it her?
Lauren Mackillop—the woman he was going to be snooping on.
His heart rate picked up, and any frustration he’d been experiencing got washed away in a rush of adrenaline. Donaldson’s Property Developers had given him photos of her, taken from press releases when she’d opened her boutique. They’d given him a brief dossier on all the Mackillop women after he’d agreed to do business with them—like he’d had a choice.
There were three grandmothers, each with a granddaughter, and someone called Momma Marie who ran a hair salon and a takeout in one of the towns. There was a lot of superstition surrounding these grandmothers. Three sisters, known as Wild Ava, Crazy Alice, and Mad Aurora, all with some ability to tell fortunes or weave spells.
What did that tell a guy? Stay clear, that was what. Although in other circumstances, he’d probably make a beeline just for the story.
He studied Lauren carefully. If he introduced himself, would he blow his cover and did it matter? They were going to meet anyway, and he was no longer keeping out of the limelight the way he had for the last month, trying to lay low and figure a way out of the deal he didn’t want to accept from Donaldson. Thanks to his father, he’d had no option.
Johnson Sterrett hadn’t been in his family’s life for two decades, but his latest scumbag act threatened to stab out all the decency his mother had fought for while bringing up Mark and his three sisters on her own. The man deserved to be in jail, but making that dream come true would mean dragging his mom and sisters down, too, so Mark’s only shot at ending this nightmare was to accept Donaldson’s job.
Mark preferred the word job to blackmail. It made him feel more in charge of his fate.
He sauntered toward Lauren, pausing when he got close.
“Heck of a delay, eh?” he said, with a smile. “Just because of some bird.”
She glanced up. “I feel sorry for the bird. It died under tragic and heartbreaking circumstances.”
Maybe not as coolly aloof as she first appeared.
“Did you get the food vouchers too?” he asked, indicating the ones she held in her hand.
She gave a resigned nod, and held up her vouchers, offering them. “I’m not hungry.”
“Really? I’m starving. I was hoping you might tell me the best place to eat. So far, I haven’t gotten further than a soda and a bag of pretzels.”
She was as slim as a wand, like some model on a runway, showing the world a fake boredom. But there was a skittishness beneath the poise and Mark also sensed worry.
She looked a bit lost.
“Where are you heading?” he asked, taking the seat two down from her.
“Texas.”
“Same. Where?”
“Home.”
“Nice.”
“Not really.”
So she didn’t want to go back to Calamity Valley and Mark didn’t want to go at all. He slumped a little in his chair and stared ahead. “Same,” he said, on a long-suffering sigh.
“Why are you going to Texas?” she asked.
“I’ve got an opportunity there,” he said, still not looking at her.
“What business are you in?”
“Property.”
“That’s good.”
He shrugged. “It’s some crummy backwater town. But I need a change and figured I’d get it in this place.”
“Which crummy town?” she asked, with more interest in her tone.
Mark threw her a half-smile, half-grimace. “Let’s not talk about it.”
She huffed out a laugh. “Okay, let’s not talk about why we’re going to Texas.”
He turned on his seat. “Since we’ve got so much time on our hands, why don’t we pretend we’re heading somewhere else? Where would you like to go, Miss—” He let the question hang in the air.
“Scarlet Juliette Barrett-Bernard.”
He managed to hold on to his laugh. “How do you do, Miss Barrett-Bernard? Pleasure to meet you. Danton Alexandre Dubois.”
“French?” she asked, eyes wide.
“On my grandmother’s side.” Not strictly true, but close enough for his use. Granny Dubois had been an Idaho backcountry logger. Came from Quebec pioneer stock and followed in her granddaddy Dubois’s footsteps, running the family firm until she was forced to retire at the age of eighty-three due to arthritis and an inability to swing the axe or type out an invoice. And he wasn’t making that up. He had fond memories of visiting her as a kid. She’d been a storyteller too, which was probably why he found himself ghostwriting, moving from one yarn to the next.
“You’re not nobility in disguise, are you?” Lauren asked, with a wry lift of her eyebrow.
Her eyes were mesmerizing. Moss green—dark and inviting. She made him feel like he was sitting in the lobby of some grand old hotel, surrounded by the peace and coolness of potted palms and the water music of a courtyard fountain.
She wasn’t his type at all. He loathed potted palms and teacups with dainty handles a guy couldn’t get his thumb around.
“Shall we pretend we are chic aristocrats from Europe?” he suggested. She’d find out soon enough that he wasn’t Danton Alexandre Dubois.
She gave a little shrug. “Why not.”
He could use this opportunity and gain more intel on what the Mackillop women had in mind to deter Donaldson’s salesmen who wanted to buy the valley land. As soon as he had that information, this whole business would be finished and he could get back to doing what he did best—living life his way. The casual, take-it-as-it-happens way instead of the constant looking-over-his-shoulder-due-to-being-blackmailed-by-Donaldson way.
“Nice to meet you.” He swiveled on the chair and held out his hand.
As she slid hers into his, her skin soft and cool, something fizzed, deep in his gut.
She jolted and pulled her hand away.
“Ouch,” he said lightly. “Think we got an electric shock.”
She took her focus to the floor.
“Let’s pretend we’re off to Paris,” he said, needing to keep the camaraderie going. “What’s the first thing you want to do when you get there?”
She looked up and into the distance. “Stroll down the Avenue des Champs-Élysées.” There was a wave of warmth in her voice and she’d answered without hesitation.
“Sounds good.” He settled further into the hard seat. “Can I join you? I’ll buy the coffee when we get to the Arc de Triomphe.” It earned him a glance, and a smile, and small though it was, he was rewarded by its value. He had a feeling she hadn’t cracked a grin in a long time, and her response pierced him in his most vulnerable part—the heart.
*
Lauren was caught in Danton’s gaze, a pleasant sensation of contentment coursing through her.
Handsome as all get-out and looking like a rich guy taking a day off from the frustrations of business, he wore smart yet casual jeans and a white button-down shirt, and while certainly not cheap, the tan-colored leather bomber jacket must have laid him back a cool three thousand. And what a fantastic name. Danton Alexandre Dubois. France—the place she’d always longed to go.
“What do you do for a living?” she asked, imagining the answer. I sail yachts, mostly.
“Right now, I’m into that property thing we said we weren’t going to talk about.”
“Oh, yes.” She’d forgotten, too busy trying to figure him out.
His hair was the perfect length of slightly too long, a little mussed, giving the impression he simply had to run a hand through the thick, dark brown strands and he was done.
There was a lazy charm about his handsomeness. Not because he didn’t take care of himself, the guy obviously worked out—look at the muscles in his forearms beneath the pushed-up sleeves of his bomber jacket—but he looked like he didn’t have to try.
She checked her watch, glanced up at the departure notification board again.
“Want to go someplace more comfortable?” he said. “One of the lounges?”
“They’re VIP.”
“I prepurchased a priority pass. I’m pretty sure I can take a guest, or persuade them…”
It was tempting. The VIP lounges were quiet, peaceful areas with leather sofas and the aroma of coffee beans and dainty iced cupcakes.
Should she go?
She bit the inside of her cheek and waited for her grandmother to make some pronouncement, but there was nothing in her head but silence.
“Thank you, Mr. Dubois. A decent place to sit and relax would be welcome.”
He smiled, and stood. “It’s Danton. Let’s go, Scarlet. We’ve got memories to share from our trip to Paris and only three hours in which to make them.”
Scarlet. She had to hide a smile. She was suddenly somebody else; she could make up anything about her life and get away with it.
Two hours later, Lauren didn’t think she’d ever been more enchanted by any man.
“Stuff like that got a fourteen-year-old beat up where I come from,” Danton said as he poured them another glass of chardonnay.
She picked up a white-fudge covered pretzel and popped it into her mouth. They’d eaten their way through a selection of mini gourmet sandwiches, and she had requested a packet of her favorite flavored pretzels for dessert. He hadn’t even laughed; just said white fudge was his favorite too.
“So how did you get out of it?” They’d been swapping stories about their youth, although she hadn’t told a single truth about hers, but he wouldn’t know that.
“I grew. Suddenly. In a couple of weeks, I was head and shoulders above him. That growth spurt saved my life.”
“But why did the boy want to beat you up?”
“He was Suzy Fletcher’s older brother. I fancied Suzy—actually, I’d been in love with her since I turned seven.”
How gorgeous that he fell in love at such a tender age.
“But Suzy was a year older and didn’t want anything to do with a little monster like me.”
Stupid Suzy.
“You were still in love with her when you were fourteen?”
He nodded and picked up another white-fudge pretzel. “Crazy of me, I know, but I couldn’t shake my love for her until I turned fifteen.” He blushed a little and shrugged it off.
What a fascinating man and so gentlemanly. As they’d strolled across the departure floor toward the lounge earlier, he’d slowed his pace so she could keep up with him. She was tall, but he was taller, with long legs, and her ankle boots had begun to crush her toes, being a half size too small—but Manolo Blahnik and only fifty bucks.
Right now, she wanted to kick off her boots and curl her legs beneath her. Not that she’d do that in the VIP lounge, but that was how he made her feel. Welcome and beautiful—and just a little mysterious.
“Uh-oh,” he said, turning to look behind him.
Chatter and excitement all around them broke the moment.
He turned back to her, a soft smile in his eyes that also played on his superbly firm mouth. There was a hint of stubble on his jaw now, and she longed to run the palm of her hand along it.
“Looks like this is it,” he said, standing and collecting his jacket from the back of the leather sofa.
“Looks like it,” she said, rising and picking up her tote bag from the carpeted floor.
People were now hurrying around them, scurrying to collect discarded coats and bags, or searching through pockets and briefcases for boarding passes that were nearly five hours old.
The time had gone so quickly, and so pleasantly.
She walked at Danton’s side, reluctant to quicken her pace for more reasons than too-small boots.
At the door to the lounge, he put a hand on her arm to halt her from exiting.
She went with him when he moved them aside, allowing others to tumble out the door and head for their boarding gates.
All the sounds around her faded as she concentrated on his face.
“Thank you for the memories, Scarlet Juliette Barrett-Bernard.”
Lauren shivered when he took her fingers and bent to kiss her hand. If this was how they did things in France, she’d be visiting as soon as she got the chance. She could already see herself, strolling down the Champs-Élysées on the arm of Danton Alexandre Dubois.
“Till we meet again.”
They’d never meet again; luck wasn’t on her side. “Goodbye,” she said, sorrow welling. They’d kept their promise and hadn’t talked about their lives as they were today, but it was obvious from general conversation that they’d made a connection. She was a little remorseful about having lied to him, but what did it really matter? “Thank you for everything.”
He still had her fingers in his hand; he still had his gaze on hers.
Then he bent his head and kissed her on the mouth.
For a second, the air around her was a freshened Parisian breeze, with spring rain tumbling unexpectedly from a teal-gray sky. Umbrellas were blowing inside out all around them, but his lips were warm and she was on the Champs-Élysées, she was on his arm.
He released her from the kiss tenderly, almost reluctantly.
Something momentarily passed through his gaze. Regret. Because they were parting? Because they weren’t swapping cell phone numbers? She didn’t know. He removed the expression almost as soon as it arrived.
“Bon voyage, Scarlet.”
“Passengers for…”
Her breath rose in her chest, her heart still tumbling on that avenue in Paris.
“Flight number…”
“Please proceed to gate…”
“Boarding will commence…”
There was an awful possibility she might cry. She made a move for her aviators on top of her head, but they weren’t there.
“My sunglasses,” she said, turning. She’d left them on the coffee table by the sofas. “Just a moment, I need to get them.” She also needed to get herself under control so she could say a proper goodbye to him once she knew there was no chance he’d see her tears.
She made her way quickly to the coffee table, picked up her aviators, and placed a smile on her face before turning back to Danton.
But he was gone.