The Gentleman Rancher

Chapter 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.”