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“Is that so?”
“Why, sure. What good is money, if money doesn’t do good?”
Was this guy for real? He was either the biggest fraud or the most chillingly earnest man she had ever encountered. “Who said that?” She didn’t recognize the quotation.
“I did. I made a promise, if I ever hit the jackpot, I’d use the money to make a difference in the world. See what I’m saying?”
“Who did you promise?” Her words were necessarily breathy, since the unprecedented drop in oxygen level. What was sucking all the air out of the room?
He grinned, and another wave of unidentified emotion washed over her. He had the sweetest, purest smile Dorian had ever seen on anyone not officially a member of the seraphim or cherubim.
“Why, I promised me.” Tucker’s eyes turned heavenward. “And Him.”
“And you believe a promise is a promise.” Dorian wasn’t sure she’d ever met anyone who shared that ideal. In her experience promises were easily made and easily broken, when keeping them became difficult or inconvenient. How long had she clung to her mother’s many promises before realizing they were nothing but empty words?
“Well, sure.” He exhaled, as though deeply relieved. “Boy howdy, I’m glad you understand where I’m coming from, Miss Burrell.”
But did she? Tucker clearly kept his promises. She had the unwelcome thought that any woman on the receiving end of so much sincerity would be lucky indeed. That confused her more than ever. Could the man she’d written off as a simpleton actually have layers? “I’m not sure I do understand.” He squeezed her hand. Longing to feel that rare tingling warmth more intensely, she fought the shocking urge to fall into his arms.
“I don’t want to be just another blustering redneck in hand-tooled boots, with a big truck and a double-wide.” His voice was slow, deep, hypnotic. “Why, a man like that is no more than a clown. Smart, powerful people would take advantage of him. He doesn’t deserve a gift.”
“What do you want, Mr. Tucker?” she whispered. Better question, what was he doing to her?
He looked at her intently, his gentle expression melting some of the ice inside her until she questioned her sanity again. “I want smart, powerful people to respect me. It’s the only way I can accomplish what I’m setting out to do. I know I have to earn their regard, and that’s where you come in.”
“Me?” The sound was more gulp than word.
“Yep. I’m not worried about what’s in here.” He patted his chest with one hand while clutching hers with the other. “Or here.” He tapped his head.
“I know what I have to do. But I need you to teach me how to act the part so people will believe in me.”
“That’s an admirable ambition.” And one heck of an assignment. Dorian slipped her hand free and gradually regained the power of thought she had lost when Tucker touched her. What was the matter with her? She didn’t do warm and tingly. Something was very wrong here. She would have to keep a tighter rein on all her body parts when this guy was around.
She crossed the room and opened the door, hoping he would take the hint and leave so she could pull herself together. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”
“Oh, I’ll be there, Miss Burrell, ma’am.” He gave her a quick wink. “With bells on.”
Then he smiled again, and the heat slipped past her reserve to warm the cold corners of her heart. What had Malcolm called the man? Intriguing and ingenuous. Yes, he was those things. He was something else, too, something she was unfamiliar with and couldn’t quite name.
Not until his lanky form disappeared through the door and down the hall did she realize what set him apart from every other man she’d ever met.
The man was sincerity personified. There was nothing fake or phony or devious about him. She closed Malcolm’s office door and leaned against it. Lord help her. Briny Tucker, the only millionaire in Slapdown, Texas, was the genuine article.
And she was charged with changing him.
The doorbell rang as Dorian stepped out of the shower. Great. Leave it to Slapdown to be on time. She wrapped a thick towel around her wet hair and pulled on a short satin robe, which she cinched at the waist.
“First lesson of the day,” she admonished as she yanked open the door. “Never show up at the agreed-upon time. It’s extremely bad form.”
“Oh, yeah?”
Her gaze took in his grinning face, then dropped lower to settle on a most disturbing sight. “Omigod!”
“What’s wrong?” Tucker was startled by her one-word assessment of the companion panting at his side.
“You said you had a dog.” She looked accusingly at the quivering mass of flopping ears, drooping jowls and bloodshot eyes. “Is that supposed to be a dog?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He swept off his cowboy hat and tried valiantly not to acknowledge her state of undress. His awkward gaze swept down to her bare feet, up her legs, over her chest and back up to the towel on her head.
His efforts at not noticing made Dorian more aware of her nakedness beneath the thin layer of sapphire satin. She clutched the lapels of her robe together. “Are you sure?”
Gentleman that he was, he did not allow his eyes to wander. “Miss Burrell, meet Reba. She’s just about the sweetest old bloodhound in Texas. She was the best tracker in the county until she lost her nose.”
Dorian eyed the so-called dog and the damp slime trail of saliva on the foyer’s one-hundred-dollar-a-yard carpet. “That beast cannot live here.” She blocked the doorway, in case the motley pair decided to rush her, though the redoubtable Reba didn’t look up to rushing anything. “There are kennels, you know.”
Briny reached down and scratched the hound’s head. She looked up at him, her rheumy eyes filled with adoration. “Oh, no, ma’am. I couldn’t leave Reba with strangers. I understand if you’re not an animal lover, Miss Burrell, but my dog and I are a team. C’mon, girl, let’s go back to the hotel.” He picked up his ancient suitcase and turned to go.
“Wait!” She would live to regret offering these two a temporary home. But she didn’t want Tucker to think she was one of those promise breakers he held in such contempt. “Is she housebroken?”
“Sure thing. Reba’s trained. And quiet as a mouse, too. She’s so old, she mostly just sleeps. You’ll never know she’s around.”
“I don’t know about that.” Dorian sniffed. “She reeks to high heaven.”
“I guess the old girl could use a bath.” Tucker placed one hand on the doorjamb and swayed toward Dorian with a wide grin. “There’s nothing like a warm tub of bubbles to make a female smell good.”
She flung open the door and stepped back, to escape his thought-numbing nearness, and put an end to the unwelcome vision of him in a bubble bath. “Oh, stay, Mr. Tucker,” she said with resignation. “I wouldn’t want to come between a boy and his dog.”
He shook his head. “I can’t seem to get used to answering to Mr. Tucker. Since we’ll be living in each other’s hip pocket, I’d sure appreciate you calling me Briny.”
She wrinkled her nose in distaste. “I’m sorry. I can’t, in good conscience, do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because Briny is not an acceptable name.”
“What do you mean?” He stepped closer, his smiling face darkened by a frown, like a cloud passing over on a sunny day.
Dorian backed up. He had an exasperating way of invading her personal space. “For one thing, Briny simply is not suitable for a man in your position. It’s a good name for a child. Or for the buffoon in the double-wide you mentioned yesterday. But not for a man of substance.”
His frown melted, replaced by a wounded-puppy look. Dorian’s throat tightened with an unfamiliar urge to reassure him, but she didn’t know how. She had little experience with compassion. Life had taught her to inflict hurt, but she didn’t know how to soothe the pain she caused. So why did she feel like she’d just kicked old Reba in the ribs?
She was being ridiculous. She had accepted a job which came with responsibilities. One of which was speaking plainly even if doing so seemed harsh. “Briny is a cartoon character’s name,” she told him. “Do you understand why it simply won’t do?”
“Not really.”
“Is there another name you can adopt? We can invent one if we have to.”
“Funny,” he said softly. “I always figured the good a man did in the world was more important than what he called himself.”
“Your name is the first impression people have of you,” she explained. “You do want to make a favorable impression, don’t you?”
He nodded, but was clearly unconvinced. “Well, my mama named me Brindon Zachary Tucker. That’s Brindon with an i not an e.”
“Hmm.”
“I gotta tell you though, no one has called me that since she died quite a few years ago.”
“Brindon?” Dorian tried out the sound, repeating the name several times until she could visualize it splashed across the society pages of the Dallas Morning News. “Brindon Z. Tucker. Yes. That will do. Briny is gone forever. From now on, you’re to answer to Brindon and nothing else.”
He shrugged. “I don’t see what difference a name makes, but you’re the one with all the experience living on the upper crust. Since I’m paying you good money to whip me into shape, I won’t argue the matter.”
“Good. We’ll get along much better if you don’t.”
“Since we’re getting so friendly, do I get to call you Dori?”
She chuckled dryly. “No one has ever called me Dori.”
“Not even your mama?”
“Especially not my mama.” He had an exasperating way of cutting through conventions. Why would he want to give her a cutesy nickname when no one had ever done so before? “Sit down, make yourself comfortable. It’ll take me a while to get ready.” She eyed the melancholy Reba who promptly made herself comfortable by collapsing on the floor at her master’s feet. “I’ll set up an appointment with a dog groomer, and we can drop her off on our way.”
“Nice place you got here.” He turned in a slow circle, taking in the airy apartment decorated in the bright French-country style she loved.
“Thank you.” Brindon looked even more masculine among the dried hydrangeas, the blue-and-white porcelain plates, the antique furniture and the chintz fabrics than he had in Malcolm’s office.
“On our way to where?” His curiosity was mild for a man about to embark on a life-altering adventure.
“Our first stop is Neiman’s to pick you up a few casual things from the racks.” She eyed the toned, hard-muscled length of his legs encased in tight denim. His turn around the apartment had provided her a nerve-jangling view of his body. He might have a little too much hair, but he possessed a physique male underwear models would envy.
“What are you? A forty-two long?” she asked. He nodded. “I made an appointment with a tailor for later in the week. Having your measurements taken will save time when we visit the designers for suits and tuxedos.”
“Tuxedos? As in more than one?”
“You’ll need a variety of evening wear for different occasions. I assume you don’t own formal clothes.”
“A corduroy sports coat is about as formal as I ever got. And that was just for weddings and funerals.”
“You’ll need black tie, white tie.” She surveyed him with a critical eye that quickly turned appreciative. With his wide chest, broad shoulders and trim hips and waist, he was the kind of man designers had in mind when they sat down to create. He’d look so good when she got through with him, rich bored women would close in on him like sharks on chum.
An image she found particularly disturbing. “Yes, you’ll definitely do justice to designer clothes.”
“I don’t really need specially made stuff. Do I? Can’t we just go to the mall and pick up some duds?”
Her gaze swept over his snug, faded-to-white-in-all-the-right-places jeans and plain cotton shirt, stiffly starched by the hotel laundry. Tucker looked comfortable in those clothes, so who was she to try and change him? Oh, right. She was his highly paid image consultant.
“Lesson number two. Clothes make the man. Buying from chain stores may be what you’re accustomed to, but millionaires do not shop in malls. Walking the walk and talking the talk are not enough. You have to look the part.” He had to sound the part, too, but they’d work on the drawl later.
His piercing blue gaze met and held hers. “So what you’re saying is, wearing fancy clothes will make people take me more seriously?”
Put that way, the idea sounded absurd. But Brindon’s raw, what-you-see-is-what-you-get honesty went against everything Dorian believed in. “Of course.”
“Whatever you say.” He cocked his head to one side like a curious cocker spaniel, and his bright eyes widened as if he’d just noticed she was naked under the thin robe. A chivalrous blush tinged his tan cheeks, which only made Dorian more conscious of her careless state of dishabille. She shivered and her nipples hardened as she turned away. She should have grabbed her thick, chenille robe. Unless he had superpowers, he couldn’t see through that.
“What else you got planned for me today?” His words rolled over her like warm honey. An easy grin spread from his lips to his eyes. How could a grown man look both innocent and provocative at the same time?
Or maybe she had imagined the provocative part. Dorian swallowed hard, unnerved by a fleeting fantasy of luring the newly christened Brindon’s blushing, work-hardened, testosterone-riddled body into her four-poster canopy bed and having her way with him on cool Egyptian cotton sheets.
Repeatedly.
Lord! Where had that come from? She shook her head, hoping to banish the lascivious thoughts from her mind. This was ridiculous and not like her at all. Nothing, no one, had excited her for a very long time.
“You do have plans for me, don’t you?”
His question snapped her back to the moment, but she couldn’t look him in the eye after that steamy little scenario. “After a quick stop at the mall, we’re off to Emilio’s.”
She’d called the exclusive suburban day spa and salon the day before, alerting the talented staff to clear their schedules and man the battle stations. She was bringing them a challenge, a client to sorely test their professional makeover skills.
“Emilio’s, huh? What’s that? A Mexican restaurant?” Brindon settled among the cushions on one of the overstuffed sunshine-colored sofas. He stretched both arms along the back and braced a booted foot across his knee. “’Cause I could sure go for some chili relleños.”
Right. Dorian expelled a deep breath. What in heaven’s name had she gotten herself into? How was she going to survive ninety days with this man? “Sorry, but Emilio’s is not a restaurant.”
“What is it, then?” He looked up, his blue eyes so trusting she wanted to urge him to flee before she succeeded at her job and changed him, and his life, forever.
“A surprise.” Dorian dashed for the relative safety of her dressing room and ducked inside before she could blurt out the warning screaming in her mind.
How could she explain a day spa to an innocent like Tucker? She’d thought the hard part would be getting him to sit still for his first manicure. But justifying the transformation of a rare, sweetly honorable man into another rich, jaded playboy was worse.
Obviously, when she’d signed the devil’s contract, she’d underestimated the consequences.
For both of them.
Chapter Three
Emilio’s was definitely not a restaurant. The fancy sign out front proclaimed Luxury Day Spa and Urban Retreat. Briny wasn’t sure what that meant, but instinct warned this was not a place he cared to visit.
Even for a day.
He bit back his protests. What did he know? Dorian was the expert in these matters. He should shut up and let her do her job, just as he had at the ritzy department store, where she’d turned out to be a regular force of nature. Without ever looking at a price tag, she’d ripped through racks of menswear like a Texas tornado through a trailer park, tossing one of these and two of those into the arms of a shell-shocked sales clerk who’d had to run to keep up with her. Having never seen shopping turned into an Olympic event, Briny had watched in dazed admiration. Of course, Dorian had assumed he was practicing his knot-on-a-fence-post routine.
He followed her inside the spa, lugging shopping bags filled with clothes he never would have bought on his own. He tried not to gawk, but the place was a marvel of sunshine and glass. There were enough plants under the domed skylight to put a rain forest out of business. It even sounded like a jungle. A gurgling brook, spanned by a wooden bridge and stocked with spotted koi, wound through the lobby.
Exotic birdcalls cackled and cawed from speakers hidden among the vegetation. Real parrots and cockatoos would have been too authentic, too messy for this perfect, fake environment.
“What is this place?” he asked.
Dorian didn’t bother checking in with the girl at the desk. She set her purse strap firmly on her shoulder and took off down a long corridor, seeming to know exactly where she was going. Briny had no choice but to follow, which allowed him to admire the feminine sway of her determined, stay-out-of-my-way walk. “This is the first stop on your journey toward self-actualization,” she said over her shoulder.
“Humph.” He didn’t believe in that self-actualization mumbo jumbo. He might not be Mr. Suave, but he wasn’t Mr. Stupid. He knew exactly who he was and what he wanted. Not only that, he usually knew what other people wanted, too. Growing up in a rough-and-tumble home for “troubled youths” had put a fine point on his character-judgment skills.
