It's Only Temporary - The Complete Collection Page 20

  She sacrificed for what was hers.

  Maggie took a long, long look at her drink and wished looking could give the same kind of relief.

  Ginny said, “Asking won’t hurt.”

  Yes, it would. It would quite possibly be the most painful thing Maggie had ever had to endure because of Cole Montgomery. And there was already a long list to choose from.

  Maggie looked at the sister she loved and hated. She listened to the endless beeping from her father’s machine, faint but steady. No matter where she was in the ranch house she could hear it. She could hear it in quiet moments even in Dallas, as if when her father had patted her hand and wheezed at her to look after things, he’d passed unbreakable strings connecting her to every member of the family.

  Unbreakable and loud. All their problems throbbing in her head. In her stomach.

  All of this was her responsibility.

  And sometimes she felt her father was sticking around just to see how she would do with it.

  So far she’d made a giant fuck-up of it.

  Maggie said the word no lady should ever say out loud and Ginny smiled at her. “Just think of it as Cole Montgomery bailing us out of bankruptcy. Not you. Us.”

  “He wouldn’t help any of us for any reason. I’ll just think of it as something to say ‘I told you so’ over.”

  “Maybe he’ll surprise you.”

  Maggie snorted, dumping amber liquid down the drain. “Cole Montgomery will never surprise me again.”

  Tanner wandered in just as the last bit of liquid left her glass. “Waste the last of the fine scotch, would you?”

  He pecked Ginny on the lips, wrapping his arm around her waist and sipping from her Baileys.

  Ginny smiled into his eyes and Maggie turned away from one more problem beating a swift tempo in her stomach.

  She gripped the edge of the sink, looking down into the black drain and wishing she could pour herself down it.

  Maggie drove the four hours west to Cole’s new headquarters knowing it was useless. He wasn’t going to help her, not after he’d begged.

  Six years later and she could still see him sitting in that chair. His hard blue eyes closed, his black hair just a little too long, a little too wild, as if he’d run his hands through it more times than it could take. His wide shoulders hunched, his body slumped, hiding his height, hiding his long, lean muscles that said he knew how to fight. Everything about him lost and defeated.

  She’d nearly changed her mind. And then had remembered that she’d begged him, with the same result.

  The sting should have faded. But she didn’t want it to. She didn’t want to forget what happened when you mixed up your enemy with your friend.

  She wouldn’t beg again. Not today. Not ever.

  She would ask Cole for his help, knowing he wouldn’t, so her sister would move on. They couldn’t get mired in wishful thinking; they couldn’t afford to waste any time hanging hope on a man like Cole.

  Maggie turned onto a thin dirt track far enough outside of Midland that she couldn’t see the improbable skyline of “The Tall City” rising out of the desert, and bounced gingerly along in her little, yet surprisingly big, Elantra.

  She could see a grouping of construction trailers and a dozen trucks about a mile ahead, and knew she was looking at Cole Montgomery’s empire. It didn’t look like it but since Cole’s near-bankruptcy, he’d prospered.

  It wasn’t lost on Maggie that he’d flourished while she’d struggled.

  He’d gotten lucky, there was no doubt. And she’d been supremely unlucky.

  But that didn’t change the fact that he’d ridden his luck as hard and as far as he could.

  Shale oil had saved him. Mere months after he’d come to her, oil prices had soared and his formerly unprofitable wells in West Texas had literally become gushers. Technology too expensive to use at lower oil prices had become more than profitable. He’d run to West Texas, the forerunner of a new boom in oil, and had prospered.

  With early profits he’d snatched up land and property in and around Midland, watching values double, all the while basing his business on cheaper land on the outskirts of town. Cole had learned not to overextend himself, and to not waste space that could pay.

  Shale oil had saved him from bankruptcy in more ways than one, though not before everyone knew he was headed that direction thanks to her refusal to help him.

  She’d seen him on occasion in the last six years, they were neighbors after all, and knew he wore his oil money like a badge.

  He drove a beat-up Ford truck that was usually covered in mud. He wore work boots instead of Italian loafers. And his offices were as far from the central business district of Dallas, as far from the gleaming glass skyscrapers and brand-name suits, as he could get.

  Cole’s father had been focused on making Dallas society welcome him with open arms. And Cole had spent the good part of his formative years following his father.

  Neither had ever been welcomed.

  But Cole had seemed to wave that dream away when shale had become feasible. He’d been one of the first to see just what it meant and had dropped everything for his one last chance.

  Six years ago, Maggie had been his one last chance, and she’d relished it. Relished denying him his saving grace. Relished that he knew full well he deserved it.

  And then he’d found another one last chance.

  Lucky bastard.

  Maggie thought as she parked that the busyness, the rough language and bellowed curses, the frenetic energy in the air, suited him better. This life on the edge, this aggression without the smiling back-stabbing, was just like Cole.

  The busyness and cursing stopped as she got out. She asked the nearest roughneck which trailer was Cole’s and received a wordless point as he looked down at her shoes.

  Maggie held out a business card to Cole’s harried admin when she entered. “Margaret Caldwell. He’ll see me.”

  Eventually.

  She took a seat in a metal folding chair, crossing her ankles. The admin stopped what he was doing, ran his eyes down her pale peach blouse and taupe pencil skirt, down her legs to her three-inch heels with their thin ankle straps, and said, “Uhhh…”

  Maggie had arrived knowing Cole would keep her waiting as long as he could. And she thought that in this male-dominated business, a womanly woman might just throw a kink in the works. A kink that would need to be dealt with as quickly as possible.

  Not to mention, her three-inch heels put her eye to eye with Cole’s six foot three.

  She’d thought about finding some four-inch heels but decided in the end that she needed to be able to walk after all.

  Maggie nodded at her card, still in the admin’s hand. “Margaret Caldwell. To see Cole.”

  The admin looked at the card, looked at her legs, then picked up the phone.

  Fifty-three minutes later, Cole opened the door to his office. He held a bottle of water in one hand and gripped the door with the other. The sight of Maggie sitting there, snotty and holy-hotter-than-hell left him breathless. Her mile-long legs ended in ankle breakers with straps wrapping around each ankle, and Cole knew the devil had invented those shoes. They made a man want to reach down and circle those ankles with his fingers. Didn’t matter that he’d wind up on his knees before her.

  She uncrossed her ankles, rising, and Cole knew that every man, and there were quite a few more than usual stuffed into his trailer, was watching. Watching her slim skirt ride up just a touch, watching her shimmy it back down.

  She sniffed as she passed him and murmured, “So predictable.”

  He resisted the urge to throw his water in her face just to prove how predictable he was.

  He closed the door behind her, trying not to inhale the light, crisp scent she wore. Tried not to notice that it was different from the musky scent she wore six years ago. Different from the flowery scent she’d worn in high school.

  Cole set his water bottle down gently, out of reach, and sat down behind hi
s desk. He stared at her, waiting for her to tell him why she’d come down and disrupted his operation.

  It would be good, he had no doubt. Maggie wouldn’t seek him out for anything less.

  She said, “Remember that deal you asked me for six years ago?”

  He cocked his head. “The one where you turned me down?”

  She nodded her head.

  He looked up at the ceiling and remembered a man so desperate he’d begged a Caldwell for help. He said, “What about it?”

  Her face remained cool and calm but he heard her take in a deep breath. She said, “I’m interested in that deal now.”

  He smiled, a slow grin that worked its way from slightly amused to full-out entertained. He raised his eyebrows and said, “You want to marry me.”

  “Not particularly. But I need…some time.”

  He tapped the desk, his smile fading. “How bad is it?”

  “Bad.” She moved her hands palm out, indicating him and his office. “I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

  He knew how that went. A woman had to be pretty damn desperate to come to a Montgomery for help.

  He swiveled his chair to look out his window, out into the parking lot full of muddy trucks and busy men.

  She said, “I don’t want your money. But I need your name.”

  She laughed bitterly and he couldn’t stop the breath that rushed out. Margaret Caldwell, one of the scions of Dallas, needed him. A no-good Montgomery from the wrong side of the tracks.

  He felt a cold sneer take over his face and knew what he would look like. His bastard of a father had sneered whenever he got the upper hand over someone. Anyone.

  Cole wiped his face clean, and breathed, and continued to watch muddy trucks and muddy men. Too busy to care what image they were presenting.

  Maggie said, “I need the time your name will give me.”

  He swiveled his chair back around to find her eyes closed, her hands folded tight in her lap. He watched until her eyes opened. The color of her eyes changed from cool green to brilliant turquoise, depending on her mood.

  Right now green was winning, and it pissed him off. She’d come in here in that skirt and those shoes with clear green eyes.

  He said, “You know what I want in exchange.”

  She looked taken aback, as if surprised that she was still what he wanted. Or maybe she was surprised that a grown man would still be making deals with his Johnson in mind.

  She shook her head, her expression torn between amused and insulted. “No.”

  “Then no deal.”

  She rose. “Good.”

  “You have an interesting way of negotiating.”

  “I’m not negotiating. I’m appeasing my sister.”

  “I thought I was your last option. I can’t imagine you would come beg if you had any other way out.”

  “You aren’t my last option. Just the quickest one. And I don’t remember begging.”

  Cole raised an eyebrow. “And just what are your other options? Street-walking is harder than it looks.”

  One corner of her mouth quirked up. “Not if you get the right clients.”

  He plopped one booted foot onto his knee, hopefully hiding a certain portion of his body and its growing interest in their conversation. He could all too clearly see her cool, calm and in charge.

  He said, “Let me get this straight. You’d rather sleep with anybody who’s got two nickels to rub together than sleep with me?”

  “I’d rather sleep with anything than sleep with you. I don’t really care if it has thumbs to rub those nickels together.”

  He muttered, “Tell me how you really feel, Empress.”

  Her eyes flashed, blue edging into the green, and he nearly crowed with delight. That old spitfire was still in there, ready to take his head off.

  He waited with baited breath to hear her say it. Just one little “don’t call me that” and he would agree to any of her terms. Keep her creditors at bay, play the game with her one more time. He’d even let her keep her dignity, although he might not tell her that just yet. He wouldn’t mind watching her sweat just a little.

  He waited. And he waited.

  They stared at each other, the years too thick between them.

  Maggie clutched her bag in one hand and turned toward the door.

  He said, “That was it? You drive four hours to get here, wait an hour to see me, then spend five minutes trying to talk me into it?”

  She looked back at him. “There’s nothing I’m willing to give you that would make it worth your while. But now I can tell Ginny that you won’t help and we can move on to the next possibility.”

  “If your body’s not for sale, I might be tempted by land.”

  She shook her head. “No. Again.”

  He spread his hands wide. “If you’re going to lose it anyway…”

  “Even if I would give it to you, it wouldn’t help. It’s all mortgaged.”

  “All of it?” Her eyes shuttered and he took a deep breath. “Even the ranch house?”

  “All of it.” She said it coldly, as if losing the ranch house wouldn’t rip out her soul, but he knew better. Knew what home and family meant to her.

  “Maggie.”

  She stood there silently, her back straight, her legs braced as if waiting for an attack from him.

  He said, “For Christ’s sake, sit back down.”

  “Are you going to help us? For nothing in return?”

  “Well…”

  She opened the door, stopping when she saw a group of roughnecks pretending to wait for a paycheck so they could check her out.

  She turned around with a genuine smile on her face. “Thanks, Cole. Predictable was just what I needed. I don’t think I could have taken one more surprise from you.”

  He frowned at her and she said, “I hope the vultures make you pay twice what the ranch house is worth.”

  He opened his mouth and she walked out, shutting the door before he could say anything. What would he have said? That he didn’t want the house?

  He’d wanted that house since he was fourteen years old. Since he was old enough to know that he might live in a house bigger than his old apartment building, might have more land, more money than he’d ever dreamed existed, but he didn’t have a family that laughed and played and loved each other.

  He didn’t have friends to make the huge house less empty or to stand next to him in a fight.

  He would roam his father’s acres, none too careful about making sure it actually was his father’s acres, with binoculars glued to his face, watching his new neighbors. Watching what life was like for them.

  And especially watching the Caldwells. Watching Maggie and her sister live in their big, warm house. Watching their father play and laugh and tease with them.

  A man all of Texas feared who let his daughters put a rope around him and lead him around the yard like a pony.

  Watching their mother fussing and grooming and preparing them for life. They’d hated her fussing and he couldn’t help but hate them for having what he so wanted and not realizing their great fortune.

  They’d had everything in life. While he’d had nothing, no one.

  Cole swiveled his chair back around to the window, watching Maggie leave a wake of slack-jawed men behind her. Watched her get into her little coupe, her skirt riding up again, his eyes zeroing in on those straps around her ankles, and thought he’d been just as stupid as those girls.

  He’d had someone once. He’d had someone who stood unflinching next to him when his fists were bloody and bruised. He’d had someone who fussed over him, who tried to knock some sense into him and prepare him for life in shark-infested waters.

  And he’d never realized what he’d had until he’d thrown it away.

  Twenty years ago

  Cole had been too busy looking through his binoculars to hear her footsteps. When she nudged him with her shoe, he jumped and shrieked, spinning on his toes and raising his fists.

  Maggie loo
ked at his raised fists as if she’d never seen one pointed her direction before and said, “My daddy shoots trespassers.”

  Cole puffed out his chest. “This is my land. This is Montgomery land.”

  “It’s Caldwell land.”

  He sneered. “Better check your map, baby.”

  Even at ten-years-old, Maggie knew how to raise an eyebrow just so. It was nearly as fearsome as a pair of fists.

  “My daddy says any man calls me baby, I should kick him in the balls.”

  Cole protected himself reflexively. “My daddy says your daddy is a bad loser. Empress.”

  He would just file that “no baby” rule away for future thought. He wasn’t willing to test it again on Maggie.

  Maggie took a step forward and shoved him. “I told you, don’t call me that.”

  Cole raised his hands to shove Maggie back, then remembered. You didn’t shove a girl. You didn’t hit a girl. You didn’t call a girl “baby”.

  There wasn’t all these rules in his before-life, and it took effort to take a step back. He said, “My daddy says someone shoves you, they better expect a shove back.”

  His father had never said anything like it. If Cole had to guess, his father would say if someone looked like they were going to shove you, you’d better shove first. And Cole had never in his life called Rich Montgomery “Daddy”. But Maggie had a daddy. It only seemed fair that she think he had one, too.

  Maggie sniffed. “I guess we’re even then.”

  “How you figure?”

  “I should have kicked you and you should have shoved me.”

  Cole thought about that for a few minutes, then decided Maggie probably knew what she was talking about. Maggie was pretty big on fair.

  He finally nodded. “Even.”

  “Daddy saw the reflection off your binoculars. You’ve got to remember to keep the sun behind you.”

  Cole’s stomach dropped. He didn’t mind running into Maggie when he might or might not be on Montgomery land; he sure as hell did not want to run into her father.

  He nodded again, and before he could even think of anything to say, she said, “Ginny says Martha says Gayle says she heard her brother talking about a fight Friday after school.”