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“You saw me ride?” he asked instead.
“The girls dragged me along.” She paused. “Bull riding is not exactly my sport of choice.”
He wasn’t about to take offense. He’d have been shocked speechless if she’d confessed to a secret love of bull riding. “Where were you sitting?”
She pulled back to look at him, her gaze quizzical. “Why?”
He wanted to know if he could have possibly seen her after his fall, but he wasn’t about to explain that to her. “I wondered if you had a good view.”
“Fourth row, across from the chutes.”
“Good seats.” He could have glimpsed her on the way down, maybe filed her image away in his subconscious and brought it up when he hit the dirt. It was possible.
She frowned. “I’m not sure being closer makes it any better.”
“Are you trying to pick a fight?”
She hesitated almost imperceptibly. “We never seem to have to try.”
Travis’s skin prickled in warning, and he glanced around the room, catching the glare of the man who’d approached Danielle at the table. “Who is that guy?”
“I thought we’d moved on.”
They might have moved on, but the other man obviously hadn’t.
“Are you dating him or something?” Travis asked.
“No.”
“No to dating him, or no to or something.”
She drew her arms from him. “This was a bad idea. I’m going back to the table now.”
“He’s waiting for you.”
She reflexively turned her head, but Travis stopped her with a gentle palm on her cheek. “Don’t look.”
She stilled.
“He’s staring daggers into me. If I’m gonna have to fight, you’d better warn me now.”
She gave a weary smile and a small shake of her head. “Nobody’s fighting.”
Travis gathered her back into his arms, and she picked up the rhythm again. His body gave a subconscious sigh, and he drew her closer this time, her chest brushing his, thighs meeting as they moved. She was exactly the right size, exactly the right shape. She fit perfectly into his arms.
“I’m pretty sure I can take him,” he mused, breathing in the fresh fragrance of her hair.
“His name is Randal Kleinfeld. I knew him in law school.”
“In the biblical sense?”
She tipped her head back, dark eyes chastising him. “You are insufferably rude, you know that?”
Travis might be rude, but Randal was intensely possessive. Not that Travis blamed him. Even he could see that Danielle was a gem, a beautiful, sensuous, fiery gem of a woman. And for the right man, there’d be no looking back.
“Did you date him, Danielle?”
“It’s business, Travis. He wants to talk to me about a job. With his firm. They’ve made me an offer to move to D.C.”
Travis didn’t like the sound of that. If she switched firms, she would also switch clients. She might never come back to Lyndon Valley on business with Caleb.
He tried to tell himself it didn’t matter. They’d seen each other maybe a dozen times in the past two years. They were barely acquaintances. Mostly they fought. There was certainly nothing personal between them
Still, he found himself bracing for her answer as he posed the question. “Are you going to take it?”
“I don’t know. That’s why I don’t want to talk to him. I don’t need any pressure while I make up my mind.”
Travis glanced at Randal again, taking in his clenched fists and the dark scowl that furrowed his aristocratic brow. It was patently obvious that he was after more than just a business relationship with Danielle. And Travis realized he had no way to stop him.
Not that he wanted to stop him. Danielle’s personal life, in D.C. or anywhere else, was none of his business. He hoped it wasn’t Randal’s business. He hadn’t seen much of the guy, but what he’d seen, he didn’t like.
Thankfully Randal didn’t have the upper hand, at least not at the moment anyway. Right now, Travis was the guy who had her in his arms, while Randal was the guy on the sidelines. He deliberately eased their bodies farther away from the crowd and splayed his hand across the small of her back, thinking he liked it this way.
Two
The next morning, Danielle told herself that Travis’s dancing her to the exit and spiriting her to the hotel elevator to get her away from Randal was no big deal. She didn’t owe him any grand thank-you. She’d expressed her appreciation last night, and he’d been polite about it. It was done, over. It had accomplished its objective.
She didn’t need to contact him again. In fact, it was better if she didn’t contact him again. Their dancing last night had confirmed her secret fear. His body was as fit, as rock-hard and as sinewy as she’d fantasized.
He was tall and broad. His chin was square, nose just imperfect enough to be masculine. His blue eyes sparkled with what she swore had to be hidden secrets. And even fresh out of the bull riding arena, he smelled fantastic. She supposed he’d probably showered. But it wasn’t any shampoo or cologne she’d reacted to last night. It was pure, male pheromones that had pushed up her pulse and made her skin tingle in anticipation of his touch.
When he’d pressed their bodies together, a rush of pure arousal had flooded her system. Through the back of her thin, satin tank top, she’d felt the individual calluses on his fingertips. Her breasts had brushed his denim shirt, teasing her nipples, making them embarrassingly hard. Under her own hands, she’d felt the solid strength of his shoulders, the shift of his muscles, and she’d longed to touch every inch of him.
Dancing with Travis was like secretly watching an erotic movie, or spending a week’s pay at the spa or eating chocolate cupcakes with gobs of buttercream icing. You knew you shouldn’t, but sometimes a woman couldn’t help herself.
Now, she made her way to the Sinatra Room to attend a panel on emerging market tariff relief. There was a refreshment stand in the south lobby, and she’d left herself time to pick up a cup of coffee and a muffin. She was thankful that she’d stopped after one martini last night. For a few minutes there, she’d been tempted to order another.
“There you are, Dani,” came Randal’s friendly voice. “I don’t know how I missed you last night.”
“Good morning, Randal.” She quickened her pace.
“Are you going to the tariff panel?”
She was tempted to say no so he wouldn’t join her. But it was an important panel. And if he saw her there later, it would just be embarrassing.
“I am,” she answered. “Just got to grab a coffee first.” She veered off to the right.
“Coffee sounds great.” He kept pace. “I’ll buy. So, how’ve you been? How are things in Chicago?”
“Good,” Danielle replied. “Business is brisk.”
“You got the letter from Nester and Hedley?”
“I did.”
They joined the long line snaking out of the small coffee shop.
“Nice offer?” he pressed.
“Did you have something to do with that?”
Randal held up his palms in a gesture of innocence. “I wish I had that kind of clout.”
She checked his expression, not sure whether she was buying it or not. “You didn’t bring me to the partners’ attention?”
“I did not. I think they were impressed by the Schneider Pistole merger.”
Danielle still wasn’t convinced. “And how did they know about Schneider and Pistole?”
“Everybody knows about Schneider and Pistole. You successfully navigated some very protectionist waters. Bookmakers were giving it seven to one against.”
“Very funny.”
The line moved ahead, and they squeezed to one side to let departing patrons get past. The aromas of icing and cinnamon teased Danielle’s senses. She’d told herself to go with a whole grain, fruit muffin. But the sweet confection was tempting.
Randal’s attention went to the menu board near the ceiling. “I was saying to Laura just last week—”
“Is Laura one of the partners?” Danielle found it hard to believe he’d had nothing to do with the offer.
“Laura’s my girlfriend.”
“You have a girlfriend?”
“Don’t sound so surprised.”
“I thought...I mean...” Danielle didn’t quite know where to go with this. She’d assumed he wanted to rekindle things with her. Had her ego led her that far astray?
“I’m a young, decently intelligent, decently looking man with a bright professional future.”
“Of course you are.” But the declaration sounded artificial even to her own ears.
Randal chuckled. “You should come to D.C., Danielle. It’s where all the action is.”
“There’s a lot going on in Chicago, too.”
They came to the counter.
“Why do I get the feeling you’ve maxed out there?” He looked to the clerk. “Two large coffees, one with cream and sugar, one black.” Then he raised his brow to Danielle. “That still right?”
She nodded. She still sweetened and softened her coffee.
“I’ll take a blueberry bran muffin,” she told the young woman.
“Same for me,” said Randal, reaching for his wallet.
“You don’t have to buy.”
“You wouldn’t say that if you saw the number of zeros on my bonus check.”
The clerk grinned brightly at his joke as she rang in their order, obviously aware that she was serving a good-looking, successful guy.
“That explains the Fendi suit,” said Danielle.
“Come and work with me. The salary they quoted is only the beginning.”
“I’m thinking about it,” she admitted, accepting one of the cardboard cups, and balancing the muffin in her other hand.
“Good.” His smile went wide.
There was a momentary, overly friendly glint in his eye that gave her pause. But she quickly squelched her suspicion. The man had a girlfriend. The idea that he was still pining over her after all these years was ridiculous.
Still, as they started to walk away, he touched her elbow, and something familiar moved up her spine. She shook off the ridiculous reaction, stepping to one side. It was over between them. He had another girlfriend. And she was absolutely not one of those women who took another look at her ex as soon as he was taken by somebody else.
She took a nibble of the dense, molasses-based muffin as she navigated her way through the milling crowd. As she moved into the big lobby, a movement flashed at the corner of her eye. She turned her head and scanned the cavernous space. Suddenly, her gaze caught and held, a sensual awareness washing through her in earnest.
She swallowed.
Travis was leaning indolently against a marble pillar. He should have looked out of place in a plaid Western shirt and faded blue jeans amidst a sea of dark, designer suits, but he didn’t. Somehow, the lawyers looked out of place around him.
“How’s the muffin?” asked Randal, his voice startling her.
“Mmm. Good.” She gave an appreciative nod.
Randal glanced at his watch, making a right turn toward the meeting room. “We’d better hurry.”
“I guess.” She wondered why Travis was here so early in the morning. In fact, why was he here at all? Last night, he’d told her he was staying at the Blonde Desert just off the Strip.
She half expected him to approach them. But he didn’t. Just stood here, watching, a half smile on his face.
“Dani?” Randal prompted, stopping a half step ahead.
For some reason his voice was starting to grate.
“I’m coming,” she answered, peering at Travis a moment longer.
Then she determinedly went ahead, setting a course for the panel discussion, determined to ignore Travis’s presence, but fully aware of his form in her peripheral vision.
She wondered if he had a cell phone. If she knew the number, she could send him a text and ask him what he was doing in the hotel. It occurred to her that Caleb likely knew. She could text Caleb and ask him for Travis’s cell. Would that be weird?
