Читать книгу The Gentleman Rancher - Cathy Gillen Thacker - Страница 7
ОглавлениеChapter Two
“And Last But Not Least,” Anchor Mandy Stone read the teleprompter with a salacious smile, “up and coming novelist-turned-screenwriter Taylor O’Quinn set tongues to wagging when she skipped the wrap party for Sail Away. Insiders were not surprised. Dozens of rewrites for the troubled pic have left everyone feeling frustrated and unhappy—including the film’s two leads, Zak and Zoe Townsend.”
(Cut to film of wrap party.)
“The story had some problems, as it was originally written,” Zak admitted, presenting his best side to the camera and taking his wife’s hand.
“But we’ve done our best to fix them,” Zoe added, pausing earnestly.
“We just hope Taylor’s all right.” Zak wrapped an arm around Zoe’s shoulders and pulled Zoe in close to his side.
Zoe nodded, looking even more doe-eyed and distressed. “When Taylor left the set, and drove off in her SUV, she was in tears…”
June 2 edition of Short-takes! Celebrity Entertainment Network
Taylor couldn’t help feeling relieved when their heated confrontation was interrupted by Jeremy’s pager. As he put in a call to his answering service, she scrambled to come up with a reasonable response to his accusation. Unfortunately, her reprieve was short-lived.
Medical crisis averted, Jeremy snapped his cell phone shut and gazed at her expectantly. “Well? What do you have to say for yourself?”
Taylor set the damp dishcloth down with more than necessary care. She turned back to Jeremy, her expression stoic. “I’m not running away.” She enunciated each word distinctly, then moved past him.
Arms folded, Jeremy watched her head for the exit. Her actions evoked bittersweet memories of a time when they could have had everything. If only she had stayed in Texas, instead of heading off for parts unknown… “Then why are you bolting the kitchen?”
As she whirled back around to face him, her long black hair rippled across her shoulders. “Perhaps because I’m done talking to you?” She smiled sweetly.
Jeremy shook his head. “You’re running from me the way you ran from whatever’s going on in Los Angeles.”
Defiance gleamed in her blue eyes. “You’re wrong.”
“I don’t think so.” He closed the distance between them. “I’ve always been able to read you like a book.”
Temper flared in her cheeks, turning them a rosy pink. “Then you know how ticked off you’re making me right now.”
“It doesn’t change the truth,” he drawled.
“I’m going to bed.” She glared at him.
He glared right back. “I’ll still be here tomorrow.”
She breathed in deeply and appeared to be counting backwards from…one thousand. “Hopefully you’ll be at the hospital by the time I wake up,” she predicted.
Aware he had gotten under her skin as quickly as always, he straightened. “Then I’ll be here tomorrow night.”
“Like Paige said, it’s a big ranch house.” She propped her hands on her slender hips. “We can coexist without actually coming in contact with each other.”
Her heart was beating much too quickly—he could tell by the pulse in her throat. He twisted his lips into a crooked line then murmured, “That’s not what Paige said.”
“It’s what I inferred,” Taylor huffed.
Jeremy strolled closer, trying not to notice how quickly his body was responding to her. “You didn’t let me help you the last time you were in trouble,” he reminded her, making no effort to mask his frustration.
She stomped out the back door, through the screened porch. The door banged behind her. “That’s because you weren’t interested in helping me—you were trying to tell me what to do, think and feel, and I had enough of that from my family!”
Jeremy followed her across the decorative stones of the patio, toward the driveway. “You’re right. My behavior was bad.” He caught up with her next to her red Jeep. “It doesn’t mean I can’t make up for it now.”
Taylor lifted the cargo door in stormy silence. The back was crammed with belongings, everything from dishes to lamps to computer, to clothes. Lots and lots of clothes, Jeremy noted.
“Why would you want to do that?” she demanded.
Because of the way you looked when you came up out of the water. Because I missed you. Because no one has ever made me feel the way you do when we go toe-to-toe like this.
Jeremy watched her sift through to the large suitcase on the very bottom. She grabbed hold of it and tried to ease it out. The weight on top of it kept it from budging. She yanked all the harder.
He brushed her aside with his body, and accomplished with ease what she had failed to do. Ignoring the scowl on her pretty face, he set the suitcase on the pavement. “I like challenges.”
Muttering under her breath, she rummaged around until she was able to extract her laptop computer case, which had been wedged between two stacks of linens. The action caused the towels to slide toward her. Once again, Jeremy reached in quickly, catching the towels with one hand and steadying her by placing his other hand beneath her elbow.
She stumbled, regained her footing, and jerked free of him without so much as a thank you. “I’m not one of your family practice patients.”
Thank heavens for small favors, because if she was, he’d have to keep his distance from her emotionally for ethical reasons. He paused, furrowing his brow. “How did you know what my specialty was?”
She turned her gaze to the sky. “I think Paige might have mentioned it one hundred thousand times.”
He watched as she stood on tiptoe to catch and close the cargo door. “You remembered.”
She pushed a button near the suitcase handle and yanked on the retractable grip. “Hard not to, when something is repeated that often.” She waited until she heard the handle lock into place, then shifted the weight so the wheels were at an angle and hence able to easily roll. “And as long as we’re being honest…”
“Yeah?”
Ducking his attempts to help her, she struggled to manage the laptop sliding down one shoulder, without stopping her forward progress. “Why are you suddenly hitting on me?”
He reached forward to wrest the bulky suitcase from her, despite her obvious wish he wouldn’t. “You think that’s what I’m doing?”
Reluctantly, she let him help her. With a toss of her head, she marched forward. “I don’t know what you’re doing,” she called over her shoulders. “Except I am not one of those damsels in distress you are always dating, and then sending on their merry way when their crisis is over.”
Jeremy winced as she held the door. “How do you know about that?”
“Paige,” they said in unison.
He eased past, careful not to get her suitcase tangled up with the laptop case swinging off her shoulder. “I was just friends with all those women,” he said, striding back toward the bedroom wing.
“Unlike Imogen Tate?”
Jeremy tensed. “You know about that?”
“I know you dated her for two years, starting right after I left Texas, and asked her to marry you. Instead of saying yes, she dumped you for a professional hockey player…and you’ve been on the rebound ever since.”
Just because he couldn’t seem to find a woman who came close to the one standing in front of him did not mean he was on the rebound. The truth was, he realized now, he and Imogen had embarked on a relationship that met their physical needs yet never placed any emotional demands on either of them. They were solo operators, each going their own way, never connecting for anything more than sex and social convenience. The few times he’d tried to help Imogen with her problems or have her listen to his had been a complete bust. But figuring Taylor did not need to know any of that, he shifted the attention back to her. “What do you know about rebound?”
He stood in the wing that housed the guest bedrooms, waiting for her to pick one. She noticed his belongings in the first bedroom and headed all the way down to the opposite end of the hall.
Her know-it-all smirk harkened back to their med school days. “If you have to ask me that, it shows how little you understand about me.”
Suitcase in tow, he trailed behind her. “Uh-huh. Well, I know this. I know you didn’t waste any time in the romance department after leaving Texas.” He paused in the doorway of the suite she’d chosen. “How long did it take you to hook up with Baywatch Bart?”
“His name was Bartholomew Wyndham.”
Aware he was sounding a little jealous, Jeremy continued in a more nonchalant tone, “I saw his picture. Who poses on the deck of a yacht?”
Taylor snatched her suitcase from him and rolled it toward the walk-in closet. “A guy who runs Bart’s Charter Fishing Tours, perhaps?”
“Why’d you break up?” Was Taylor still carrying a torch for the guy?
Taylor set her laptop case next to the reading chair. “None of your business.”
Had he hurt her? Was that why she was so…defensive?
Figuring it wouldn’t hurt if they spent a little more time together, Jeremy came closer. “Why’d you get together?”
“Also. None. Of. Your. Business!” Taylor went back to her suitcase.
Jeremy watched her bend over to unzip it. “Find any more beach bums in Hollywood land?”
She extracted a toiletries bag and carried it into the adjoining bathroom. With the same ease she’d exhibited when they’d been med students, sharing a house with half a dozen other students of both sexes, she took out the facial cleanser and began to lather up her face. “I haven’t been dating anyone for the last two years.” Finished, she reached for a towel.
“How come?”
Briefly, she buried her face in the soft yellow terry cloth. “If you know so much about me, why don’t you know that too?” Taylor left the bathroom and began to rifle through the suitcase.
She gave him a look that said, “If you don’t mind…”
Taking the hint, he lifted a hand and eased out of the room. She shut the door behind him with a definite thud. Jeremy exhaled in frustration, then walked out the rear of the house, across the pool area to the guesthouse.
Paige’s light was still on. She answered his knock with a look of aggravation. Open book to her chest, she waved him in. “That didn’t take long.”
He sank into a club chair in front of the fireplace and stretched his legs out in front of him. “What didn’t take long?”
Paige settled on the far end of the sofa. “For the two of you to have a fight.”
Jeremy shoved his hands in the pockets of his cargo shorts and studied the Remington painting above the mantle. “What makes you think we quarreled?”
“That look on your face,” Paige said. “The one that says you still can’t figure out what’s really going on between the two of you.”
Not true. They all knew that Taylor brought out the worst in him—the overbearing, intensely protective, got-to-have-the-last-word side his three sisters detested.
“We actively dislike one another,” Jeremy observed dryly.
“There’s that,” Paige conceded with a dip of her head.
Jeremy had an idea where this was going. He stood and restlessly, began to pace. Eventually, he slanted his old friend a reproving look. “That’s all there is.”
Paige tried not to grin but failed miserably. “If you say so.” She stuck her nose back in her book.
Jeremy scowled and continued to roam the living area. Given the amount of swimming he’d done earlier this evening, before Taylor had showed up, he should be relaxed. Instead, he was more tied up in knots than ever. In need of… hell, he didn’t know what he needed…that was the problem. Aware Paige was still watching him with a twinkle in her eyes, he chided gruffly, “I didn’t come over here so you could play shrink.”
Paige sobered, for reasons all her own. “Then why did you come over here?”
As long as he was here, he might as well ask. He’d wasted enough of Paige’s time already. Jeremy massaged the rigid muscles along the back of his neck. “Do you have a copy of Taylor’s book?”
“Yes, I do, and it’s back at my house—in town—nicely packed away so it won’t be damaged by all the renovation currently going on there.”
Jeremy swore beneath his breath.
Paige lifted her brow. “You really want to read it that badly, hmm?”
“I thought I might browse through a chapter or two,” Jeremy allowed, casually.
Paige considered that, coming to some private conclusion he would just as soon not know about, then eventually said, “There’s a signed copy in my mother’s office. It’s on the shelf next to her desk. You can read that if you promise to put it back. Anything happens to it,” she paused, accompanying her warning with a stern look, “my mother will have your head. She says it’s one of the best chick lit novels she’s ever read.”
Jeremy’d heard that a lot in passing. He’d never ventured even a glimpse of anything Taylor had written. “What do you think?”
Paige turned sincere. “I share my mom’s opinion. Taylor’s really talented.” She lifted a hand. “I don’t know what the problem in her life is now—”
“You think there’s something wrong now, too?” Jeremy interrupted.
“Duh. She only drove eighteen hours to get here today. She wouldn’t have done that if she weren’t running from something.”
Jeremy’s mouth tightened. “My thoughts exactly.”
“I offered her safe harbor here—as long as she needs. You mess with that, you wreck her peace of mind any more than it’s been wrecked, and you’re out of here.”
Already heading for the door, and the answers to at least some of his questions, Jeremy jeered, “Nice to know where I stand.”
“Isn’t it?” Paige echoed cheerfully.
Jeremy said good-night and walked back across the pool area. Unbidden, the memory of Taylor stripping down to her skivvies popped into his consciousness. Resolutely, he pushed it back down. He continued on into the house, and entered Dani’s office. The copy of Taylor’s first novel was right where Paige had said.
He sat down in a comfortable armchair and studied the cover of the oversized trade paperback novel. There were two cartoon figures on the book—a studly guy on a sailboat, and a pretty girl with track shoes on, beneath the big block letter title. The Guy Who Sailed Away and the Girl Who Found Herself by Taylor O’Quinn.
One Texas newspaper had given it a four-star review and deemed it “Unforgettable.” “Funny and real” said another. “Couldn’t put it down!” declared a third reviewer.
Impressed, despite himself, Jeremy opened the book, and began to read.
TAYLOR AWAKENED to the blinding glare of sunlight and the sound of “Chasing Cars” by Snow Patrol. Groaning, she groped for the cell phone on the table beside the bed and flipped it open. The music ceased.
“Where are you?” the voice on the other end of the connection demanded.
Good question. Taylor blinked and keeping her cell phone pressed to her ear, pushed her way to a sitting position in the comfy queen-sized bed. She felt like a truck had run over her. Her entire body ached. And she was so stiff, it was hard to move.
Which was what she got, she concluded as she recognized the guest room in the Chamberlain ranch house, for driving halfway across the country in one day.
“Why weren’t you at the wrap party for Sail Away?” Geraldine Meyerson demanded.
“How did you know about that?”
“It was on Mandy Stone’s show on CEN last night,” her editor at Sassy Woman Press replied with customary frankness. “Zoe and Zak said they were worried about you. Something about you crying as you were leaving the set?”
She’d been crying, all right. Taylor rubbed the sleep from her eyes. “Those were angry tears.”
“I know Zak and Zoe have a rep for being difficult…”
“Difficult?” Taylor echoed. “Try insane!”
“It’s all going to work out,” Geraldine soothed.
“I don’t see how,” Taylor said miserably.
“It can’t be as bad as you think,” her editor insisted.
Taylor moaned. “You didn’t see the dailies. You didn’t have to participate in the rewrites.”
“Just calm down and think about the hundred-thousand-copy reissue we’re going to do. Those copies are going to fly off the shelf. And so are the copies of your second novel. How is your proposal for a third book coming?”
Taylor made a face. “I haven’t had much time to work on it.”
“The quicker you can get it in, the faster we’ll be able to go to contract, get it written and get it to press, too. Meanwhile, it’s imperative we have your first two books available to readers when the movie does come out.”
“So you’ve said.”
“Taylor, don’t bail on me. I’ve stuck my neck out for you.”
Taylor pulled herself together. “I’ll get the new book proposal done as fast as I can.”
“And don’t skip any more movie or Zak and Zoe-related events that generate publicity,” Geraldine ordered in her usual take-charge manner. “Sassy Woman Press, and your novels, need the attention.”
JEREMY’S LAST PATIENT of the day was Krista Sue Wright. On the surface, the pretty twenty-two-year-old woman had everything going for her. A teaching job at the middle school in Laramie, an engagement to the new owner of the Laramie newspaper, a great family, lots of friends. However, the number of times she had been in his office since she had graduated from college the previous month indicated something was awry.
“I don’t think it’s broken.” Krista Sue held up her swollen pinkie finger on her left hand. “But it hurts like the devil.”
“It sure looks like it does,” Jeremy sympathized, noting she’d had to take off the three-carat diamond engagement ring she had been sporting, and move it to her right ring finger instead. “How’d you do it?”
“It was silly, really. I caught it in the bathroom cabinet, between the hinge and the frame.”
Jeremy examined her hand. “You’re right—it’s not broken. But it is sprained.”
Krista Sue’s face turned a blotchy pink and white. Her lower lip trembled. “I don’t know how I’m going to explain this to Brian. We were supposed to check out sites for the wedding reception this afternoon.”
Jeremy put a splint on her finger. “When’s the wedding?”
“July 24th.”
“That doesn’t give you much time.”
“I know. But we really want to get married before I start teaching school in August and we’re not fussy about the details. We just want our friends and family to be there.”
Then why the big deal about missing the excursion this afternoon? Jeremy wondered. He got a couple of sample packs of ibuprofen and an instant ice pack out of the cupboard. “I think you can still keep that appointment. Just keep the cold on your sprain, twenty minutes on, twenty minutes off. And take the ibuprofen three times a day until the swelling and pain subsides. You’ll be good as new in no time.”
“Thanks, Dr. Carrigan.”
“You’re welcome.” Jeremy paused. “Is everything else okay?”
Krista Sue looked at him, perplexed. “Why wouldn’t it be?”
That was just it. He didn’t know.
“How are the stomachaches you were having?” Jeremy asked casually.
“They subsided as soon as I stopped drinking so much caffeine. I don’t even need the calcium carbonate tablets anymore.”
Jeremy consulted the chart. “And the dermatitis on your elbows?”
“Gone, too, thanks to the skin lotion I’ve started using every day.”
“And the migraines?”
“I only had the one. And it went away almost the moment I lay down in a dark room and closed my eyes. I think it was just…well, it’s not easy living at home again with my folks, while I wait for the wedding to take place, after being on my own at college for four years.”
“They pulling rank on you?” Jeremy teased.
Krista Sue rolled her eyes, her exasperation with her family evident. “Let’s just say I haven’t had to account for my whereabouts so much since I was sixteen! Anyway, thanks, doc, I won’t keep you. I imagine Brian is waiting for me, over at the paper. I don’t want to be late. He gets so grumpy when I keep him waiting.”
Jeremy gave her a hand down from the examining table. “You’d tell me if there were anything else going on, wouldn’t you?”
“Of course, but, there’s not.” Krista Sue rushed past him, gaze averted She used her uninjured hand to open the door, rushed out into the hallway, then stopped suddenly. She clapped a hand to her chest and announced excitedly, “Oh my gosh, I think I’m going to faint!”
TAYLOR HAD SEEN this kind of reaction plenty of times in the last two months—to Zoe and Zak, and various other celebrities in L.A. Never herself.
“You’re Taylor O’Quinn!” The young woman dropped the ice pack she was holding and enthusiastically pumped Taylor’s hand. “I’m Krista Sue Wright. You wrote that book! I loved it! Although I have to tell you, I had to go to so much trouble to find a copy. The only place I could find it was online.”
Not surprising, Taylor thought, as Krista Sue finally let go of her hand. Meanwhile Jeremy bent to chivalrously retrieve her ice pack.
“I’m a new writer, so I got a very small print-run from Sassy Woman Press with my debut novel,” Taylor explained, aware Jeremy was still standing there, watching her, a peculiar expres¬ sion on his face. It was almost as if he were seeing her in a new light. She couldn’t help but feel good about that. For reasons that weren’t exactly clear, she had always wanted his respect.
Telling herself that it did not matter what Jeremy Carrigan—or anyone else—thought about her, Taylor turned her attention back to her enthusiastic fan.
Krista Sue looked starstruck. “The moment I read the review in Dallas Women magazine, I knew I had to get my hands on a copy. And I have to tell you—I was not disappointed. Your heroine was so funny and feisty and brave!”
“Thank you.”
“And Rafael! Tell me you modeled him after a real guy!”
Taylor avoided the heat of Jeremy’s gaze. “It’s a work of fiction.”
“But you must have known someone like him to be able to write such steamy…er…ahh.” Krista Sue blushed fiercely, turning back to Jeremy as if suddenly realizing her family doctor was standing there, too, taking this all in.
The door to the reception area opened. A handsome young man, who looked to be in his mid to late twenties, walked in. He made a beeline for Krista Sue. “Are you okay?” He started to hug her, then noticed the ice pack she had pressed to her wrapped left hand. “Your mom said you hurt yourself reorganizing the bathroom shelves?”
“It’s a long story.” Krista Sue waved off the concern. “It was just a stupid household accident. And it’s not important. What is important is…look who is here! It’s the author of that book I love—the one that’s being turned into a movie starring Zoe and Zak Townsend!”
He straightened. “You’re right—it is.” Pleasure lit his face. “I’m Brian Hilliard. I just purchased the Laramie newspaper. We’d love to do an in-depth interview with you.”
“Well, I—” Taylor knew she had a duty to promote her book, whenever possible. She owed her publisher that much. But she had come here to disappear, not step back into the limelight.
Brian Hilliard handed Taylor his business card with all his numbers.
“I’ll need to check my calendar.”
“Whatever works for you.” Brian smiled. “Just let me know.” He took Krista Sue by the elbow, intending to guide her to the checkout desk, where the receptionist was waiting to complete the necessary insurance paperwork.
Krista Sue turned back to Taylor. “I’m dying to know. The hero in your story was so sexy. Is he based on anyone you know? Or is he strictly a fantasy man?”
FROM THE WAY Taylor flushed, Jeremy noted, you’d think it was some big mystery. When it wasn’t. Everyone who knew Taylor personally, had long ago concluded the hero was a thinly disguised portrait of her ex-lover, Baywatch Bart.
Taylor ignored the taunting look Jeremy was giving her and met Krista Sue’s curious gaze. “I get asked that a lot,” Taylor admitted frankly.
“I’ll bet,” Krista Sue said. “It seemed so…real.”
“But that romance began and ended in my imagination,” Taylor concluded with a straightforward smile.
Which didn’t quite answer the question, Jeremy thought. Although the retort seemed to satisfy Krista Sue.
“Did you need an appointment?” Ginny, the receptionist, asked Taylor, after Krista Sue Wright and her fiancé left.
“No. I’m just here to talk to Jeremy a minute,” Taylor replied.
Would wonders never cease, Jeremy thought. Given the way Taylor had stomped off to bed the evening before, he’d figured it would be a long time before she ever gave him the time of day again. On the other hand, they were sharing space, albeit temporarily, at the Chamberlain ranch. Maybe she’d come to apologize to him for being so prickly. If so, that was something he wanted to hear.
“This way.” He led Taylor into his private office and gestured for her to take a seat.
“I won’t take but a minute of your time,” she started, looking less than thrilled to be there.
“Take all the time you want.” Jeremy took off his white lab coat, unbuttoned the first button on his dress shirt, and loosened his tie. Hoping to delay her at least long enough for them to call a truce, he sat, facing her. “I’m done for the day. The only thing I have ahead of me is a couple of hours’ work on my ranch house.”
She avoided his eyes, looking at everything in the office except him. “Paige asked me to be part of the celebrity auction the hospital is having to raise funds for the new wing. I know it won’t be held until next September, but she said you are in charge of gathering the items to be sold, and I should talk to you about what I might donate.”
Jeremy gripped the desk on either side of him and rocked forward slightly. He let his gaze drift over the elegant contours of her face. Aware all over again how much he had missed having her in his life, he said softly, “You could have talked to me about this back at the ranch.”
She directed her attention to him once again. Her defenses were up. Oddly enough, that gave them something in common. He didn’t know how he felt about her, either. Except that he wanted this tension between them to end…
“I was in town, doing errands,” Taylor explained, looking flustered.
“Is that the only reason you came by my office?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” She straightened. “I wanted to stare at your diplomas with envy.”
Annoying her this way was starting to be fun. “No need to be sarcastic.”
The lift of her brows said it all. “Sorry. The nosiness of others brings it out in me.”
Jeremy chuckled. “Is this the way it’s going to be?”
“What?” With an indignant sniff, she shot up out of her chair.
He caught her hand, tugged her toward him. “Us sparring back and forth continuously until you leave?”
She pushed him away, one hand flat against his chest. “I don’t mind.”
He let her go, reluctantly. “I do.”
“Jeremy—”
It was all he could do not to take her in his arms. Aware how well that would go over, he contented himself with speaking what was on his mind. “I’d like us to be friends again.”
Surveying him with exaggerated politeness, she crossed her arms in front of her. “Really?”
“Really.”
“I don’t see how that’s possible, given the fact that you still—even after all this time—think I should have ignored my writing aspirations and gone into medicine.”
Was that still true? Twelve hours ago, it had been. But now…
Jeremy thought about the chapter he had read the night before, Krista Sue Wright’s reaction to Taylor’s work, and the fact Taylor’s very first novel was being turned into a movie. He stood slowly. “I was wrong, okay?” he said, surprised to find how good it felt to let go of the opinion that had torn them apart and kept them estranged for years. He had missed her. So much.
Figuring since he was responsible—at least in part—for driving her away, he should be part of the effort to bring her back, he continued, “It doesn’t matter how good a doctor you would have been. You are obviously doing what you are meant to do.”
