Chapter Four
He looked exactly like the photograph that had been sent to her, months ago, at the beginning of their correspondence—a photo which, Caroline would secretly admit, didn’t do the man justice. No one should have the right to be that devastatingly attractive. She knew her own rather ordinary looks must pale by comparison, and wondered, once again, just what she had gotten herself into.
The basis for their future relationship started out pleasantly enough. For five minutes, anyway. When she entered his vast study, escorted by the energetic Marilou, he rose from behind a massive desk to greet her.
“Miss Finch.” Reaching out one hand, he took hers in a firm grip and then motioned for her to have a seat in the armchair upholstered in navy and forest green chintz.
Here the main motif meant wood. Dark wood on the floor and the walls, in the furniture and the many bookshelves, as a fireplace surround and as crown molding. What saved the spacious room from looking like a hermit’s cave was the set of enormous windows, all the way around, sliding open (when cooler weather permitted) to a tree-lined terrace beyond.
Impeccable. And intimidating. Everything about the master of these acres, his staff, his home, even his office, underscored the words. Was there any chink in his fortification?
“Mr. Taggart,” she acknowledged, slipping onto the indicated cushion.
“Anything else, sir?” chirped his admin from the doorway.
“No, thanks, ML. Go on, now; get out of here and go home to your boyfriend.”
She giggled. “Oh, nothin’ really goin’ on tonight. But Jimmy, he gets worried if I ain’t pullin’ into the driveway when I’m s’posed t’ be. G’night, Mr. Taggart; g’night, Miss Finch.”
“Good night, Marilou. Thanks for all your help today.”
Waving a negligible hand, she slipped away. The house suddenly sounded very quiet and felt very empty.
“Where is your daughter, Mr. Taggart?” Caroline asked curiously.
“Oh, she’s been taken on some afternoon field trip from school. One of the mothers will be dropping her off soon.”
“Is there a governess here for her? A nanny? A child-care worker?”
“Marilou pitches in when necessary; she’s my jill-of-all-trades. We’ve got it covered.”
Uneasiness began to curl a warning inside Caroline’s middle. “But—surely the child can’t be left alone in between times. I don’t believe that, in all our correspondence, you’ve ever mentioned her mother. Where is she?”
“Her mother,” said Ben, with an unexpected flatness to his tone, “is gone. Now, then.”
He leaned back in his chair, whose leather seemed to have settled in to fit his shape, to look Caroline over with speculation and calculation. It seemed only fair. After all, he had practically bought and paid for her.
His most arresting feature must surely be those heavy questioning brows set over intense blue eyes—as brilliant as a gas flame. What did they see, those keen and vivid blue eyes, as his gaze slowly roamed down her figure, then up again? There was that intimidation factor, that he had learned to use with such effectiveness. A shock of light brown hair, carelessly disarrayed, tumbled anyhow over his forehead, part of a square face, a hard strong jaw slightly stubbled at the end of the day, and a wide mobile mouth.
A face to swoon for, were she so inclined. And wondered vaguely whether his body was made to match. Nice wide cowboy shoulders, anyway, under a rather worn corduroy jacket and muted plaid shirt. Perhaps the dark blue Levi’s, glimpsed upon her entrance, might be considered part of his workday uniform.
She, at least, after freshening up and unpacking most of her essentials in the beautiful bedroom, had taken time to change for this first, all-important meeting in the flesh. Guessing rightly that casual mode would be more appropriate for now (and stealing a leaf from the secretary’s book), Caroline had put on schoolmarm’s clothing. And wasn’t that a laughable cliché!
So it was that, armored in a familiar cotton sweater of soft turquoise, a loose flowing skirt in a wash of aqua and coral, and boring beige ballet flats, she had entered what was probably the inner sanctum of Ten Buck’s owner.
“I think we can dispense with formality now, Caroline, don’t you?” His voice was a smooth drawl returning her to the present, and her responsibilities.
“Certainly, Mr. Taggart, if that is your wish.”
He smiled. Oh, God. As if the whole package weren’t enough, now a pair of fabulous dimples flashed into view. “Ben. Just Ben.” Then he frowned slightly, in consideration. “You’ve let your hair grow a lot longer. Not sure I like the length; it doesn’t really become you. I’ll have ML make an appointment for a cut and style tomorrow.”
Outwardly calm, inwardly quaking like an aspen leaf, she slid forward and rose to her feet. “Thank you so much, Mr. Taggart, for everything you’ve done. But I believe our association has just ended. I’ll go get my things, and call for—”
“Hold it, right there.” He had shot upright, his expression reading somewhere between irritation and amusement. Did no one ever cross his wishes? “What’s the problem? I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, if that’s what happened, but—”
“I don’t think our association will work, after all, Mr. Taggart. Please let me know how much you have spent on our—arrangements, so that I can—”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” The irritation won out, as evidenced by the muscle moving along his jawline as he clenched and unclenched his teeth. “What exactly has put a burr under your saddle?”
Caroline was already halfway to the door. “The fact that you don’t know tells me all I need. Good day, Mr. Taggart. Be sure to send me—”
“Stop.” Just that quickly he was beside her, one hand clamped around her wrist to prevent further movement. “Look, obviously you’re upset. And, I agree, this isn’t a good sign when we’ve only started to talk. But you have to tell me what’s wrong.”
Tipping her head back to meet his glare straight on, she dug deep for the bravado she needed to face him down. It had to be done, immediately, cleanly, or he would ride rough-shod over every aspect of her personality from here on.
“You made an assumption that may or may not be correct, Mr. Taggart. And then you usurped my own wishes. Whether you like my hair style, I will be the one deciding when and how much to get it cut. Do we understand each other?”
For a full minute, while a noisy flock of birds frolicked in the oak branches outside the window, Ben Taggart simply stared at her in astonishment. Then he began to laugh: first a slow gurgle of good humor, then a ripple that emanated upward and outward from his belly.
“May I be released now?” she asked primly, reminding him of his clasp.
“Okay. Okay.” Still chuckling, he obeyed. “Will you rejoin me, so we can make a fresh start at this whole thing?”
“Of course, Ben.” Having won what she considered a major point, Caroline returned to her seat. “Please tell me about your ranch, and about Sophie.”
“Be glad to, Carrie.” At her uplifted brow, he paused, questioning, with a hesitation that she guessed he rarely employed. The sense of command, of power, hung around him like an actual tangible scent. “What, no nickname, either?”
“I’m just not used to it, I admit. However, you may feel free to follow your preference.”
“Good God. You really were a teacher, weren’t you?”
Ben Taggart took a minute or two, leaning back once again in the luxurious office chair, to gather his thoughts, then went on to relate family history. The Ten Buck had acquired its title, he explained, shortly after the claim for 10,000 acres was staked out by grandfather William Travis Taggart, back in 1925, at the peak of the Roaring Twenties. While exploring his newfound kingdom, he had come across a herd of whitetail deer and various antlered stags, meandering their way across one of the grassy draws.
Ten Buck the ranch became, forever and ever, amen.
By 1975, the year of Ben’s birth, his father, Jefferson Davis Taggart, had augmented the holdings to double its original size and added more cattle and quarter horses and a number of buildings. He had also incorporated as a business.
Ben’s contribution had increased all of the above, plus adding a few dozen or so oil wells. Neither as much nor as fancy as his forbears, he admitted now, modestly, but then he was a late bloomer. Had some years to go yet, to catch up.
Listening to all this, Caroline involuntarily sighed. She’d known most of these facts already, of course; ancestry had been included in the extensive dossier which he had provided for her. And it was wrong. All so wrong.
Everything that this man represented, everything that he had accomplished, stood as such total antithesis to her own system of values and beliefs.
How to reconcile the two?
We all of us are forced to make choices in life. This career path or that? This partner or that one? This set of standards or that?
Without putting a pretty face on it, Caroline’s choice had come down to survival or extinction.
“Your turn,” he said suddenly.
Once again the sound of his voice had startled her out of what she called “the blue crazies.” She wasn’t used to having another person in the room, especially one so commanding. And probably demanding, as well.
“My turn? You already know all there is to know.” Because she, too, had been required to provide a dossier. Complete. Intrusive. And, she had felt, somewhat demeaning.
Leaning back far enough to prop both boots on the immaculate surface of his desk, absolutely at his ease, Ben laced his fingers together across his flat midriff and waited. “Have you completely recovered?”
“Your secretary asked me the same thing,” Caroline retorted, a tad crossly.
“Ah. You see how concerned everybody is about you. Well?”
“Yes. I have.”
Three months of hospital care and rehab work and physical therapy had returned her broken body almost to its normal condition. A few aches and pains now and then, an occasional stumble, the rare blinding headache—those, her physician had kindly told her, were to be expected. With more time, the healing would be complete, and the few remaining scars would gradually fade.
As to the psychological damage caused by killing her own father…that was another thing entirely. And nothing that she intended to discuss with Benjamin Taggart.
“The Taggarts go for historical names in a big way, don’t they?” she asked, to effect a change in subject.
“I reckon we do. Gramps was called after a hero from the Alamo—fitting, don’t you think? And Pop, of course, was honored with the President of the Confederate States. Benjamin Milam, now, he was a leader in the Texas Revolution.” Smiling, he re-crossed one ankle over the other, as if prepared to stay chatting for hours. “We like larger-than-life champions in our family. How about you?”
“I’m sure I would, as well. Can you tell me more about your daughter?”
“Sophie? Sure.” Again, he paused, considering, and the look in those intense blue eyes became tender. “Seem to remember what Shakespeare wrote in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’—Though she be but little, she is fierce. Well, that about describes my gal right down to the soles of her expensive little size two sandals. She’s cute as the devil and twice as smart, and I love her to pieces. Trouble is, I don’t have time for her.”
“Oh, I hardly think—”
“I’m a busy man, Carrie, as I’ve mentioned a few dozen times. Got too much to do and not enough hours in the day to do it in.” Without warning, he slid both feet to the floor and rose in one lithe but elegant movement—a man used to taking command, whether from the saddle of his horse or from the office chair of his desk. “That’s where you come in.”
“Well, yes, so I understood. But we really must—”
“Yep. We really must.” Even as he rounded the desk, he was settling the collar of his jacket and gathering up various folders. “But not now. I’ve already taken too much time with this meeting, and I’m running late for another one. Gotta get going now.”
Feeling suddenly overwhelmed, Caroline surged upright in a vain attempt to halt him in his path toward the door. “But—wait a minute. Didn’t you say Sophie would be home soon? Didn’t you say she’d be here for supper? You can’t mean to just—to throw us together, without any sort of introduction, or chance to get used to one another, or—or—”
“Sure I can. Told you, Carrie, that’s where you come in.” He did stop, then, only a few inches away, with his height and breadth providing once more the sense of intimidation that shook her to the marrow. “You’re here. You’ve agreed to this arrangement, and so have I.”
“To a point,” she reminded him icily. “I haven’t quite—”
“From here on, you live at the Ten Buck on my sufferance, for two purposes only: one is to look after my daughter, and give her the care I can’t.”
“And the other?” Her chin was up, her back stiff and straight, her eyes shooting sea-green fire.
“The other?”
Grinning, he took hold of her chin with one hand, leaned down, and, before she could protest or pull away, planted a hard, rough kiss squarely upon her astonished mouth.
“The other,” he finished up, long legs and booted heels having already taken him to the threshold, “is that I want sex convenient and available. So I expect you to welcome me into your bed, whenever I feel the need, just as soon as I plunk that wedding ring onto your finger.”