Chapter 17

Screw the tie. Delon flung it on the passenger seat of his car, where it landed on a large bag of chocolate stars. Share size, the bag declared. Well, screw that, too. He fished out half a dozen and popped them in his mouth. He didn’t have anyone to share with except Beni, and too much sugar was bad for a kid’s teeth.

He inhaled another half dozen chocolates as he rewound the argument with Violet. He should’ve called to smooth things over. He hadn’t. Couldn’t. It was like a gnarly, foul-mouthed troll had taken up residence in his head. Delon knew he was behaving badly, but there didn’t seem to be a damn thing he could do about it. Every time he saw Joe, he vowed to be civil—friendly was asking too damn much—and every time that stinking troll crawled out of his hidey-hole and drop-kicked Delon’s good intentions into the next county.

At least Violet and Joe wouldn’t be at the Buckaroo Ball. Not that the organizers hadn’t tried to rope the great Joe Cassidy into making an appearance, but Violet knew better than to risk a public display of the lack of affection between him and Delon. Plus she would’ve had to trust Joe not to drop an F-bomb in the middle of dinner. She’d manufactured some excuse about Joe not being able to make a commitment due to his schedule.

There was no escape for Delon. Everybody knew he was sitting on his ass in Earnest, recuperating. They would prop him up in front of the crowd as the local rodeo hero who’d almost won it all, and he’d try not to snarl as he dodged the same questions over and over. How’s the rehab going? When will you be back on the road? Plenty of time for a late run at qualifying for the National Finals, right?

All for a good cause, he reminded himself, and shook the last crumbs out of the candy bag. Then he plastered on his meet-the-fans smile and prepared to take one for the Cowboy Crisis Fund team. He’d barely set foot inside the lobby when a short, round woman in orange swooped down on him.

“Delon! So good to see you.” She looked him up and down with a gleam in her eye that went slightly beyond hospitality. “Mmm-mmm. I can’t imagine what the single girls in this town are thinking, letting you wander around loose.”

She latched onto his arm to drag him toward the ballroom, a huge necklace shaped like a sterling silver pistol bouncing in the deep cleft between her breasts and smaller versions bobbing at her ears—her concession to the western theme. As they walked, she leaned in to pat his arm and coo, “You’re not even limping. Why, I bet you’ll be spurring those broncos again in no time.”

And so it begins. He made a noise that she took as agreement and let her haul him through the crowd, pausing every dozen steps to greet partygoers and make introductions. He arrived at the head table, his mind buzzing with unfamiliar faces and high-dollar perfume. His escort stopped short, frowning. All of the seats were occupied except three near the center.

“Well, now, that’s odd. I arranged the place cards myself, and I had you down there.” She waved a hand toward one end, where a heavyset man with aggressive eyebrows was ranting in the ear of the woman next to him, while she stroked her butter knife as if debating whether to use it on him or herself. She spotted Delon’s escort and fired a glare hot enough to melt the barrels on the sterling silver pistols.

“Oh my.” The woman’s grip on Delon’s arm loosened. “If you’ll just excuse me for a minute, there seems to be some confusion—”

“My fault,” a voice said behind them, smooth and baritone.

“Senator Patterson!” She spun around. “We are so thrilled you could join us tonight! And your lovely daughter, too!”

Delon’s gaze snapped to the woman who stood slightly behind the Senator. He had to blink twice to bring her into focus. Tori?

No. He was looking at Victoria Patterson, not the woman who was his therapist. She’d gone heavy with the makeup, darkened her eyes and reddened her mouth, and her hair was pulled up into a smooth twist on the back of her head, held in place by something that left a shimmering row of diamonds visible. More diamonds dangled from her ears and in glittering trios from a silver choker around her neck. Even the contacts were back, making her eyes glow an unearthly blue. She offered him a cool smile, her posture erect, her chin angled just so, as if balancing an invisible crown on her head. Suddenly, she was kick-in-the-guts beautiful again, in the high-class way that screamed So far out of your league, cowboy.

The senator captured one of the woman’s fluttering hands and held it in both of his, paralyzing her with a smile. “I apologize. I had one of the servers switch the place cards. Victoria and Delon are old friends and I knew they’d appreciate the chance to catch up while she’s in town.”

Tori’s head jerked, her eyes widening for an instant before she pulled her ice princess mask back into place. Delon tried to do the same but the air had solidified into chunks that stuck sideways in his windpipe. They exchanged a quick, questioning look.

Did you tell him?

Tori gave a slight shake of her head.

Delon had a horrifying vision of a secret surveillance camera planted in Tori’s apartment. Dear sweet God. That one afternoon alone, with the fudge cake and whipped cream…

A sliver of sanity worked its way through his buzzing panic. No politician with a lick of sense—which, granted, left out a sizable number—would want video of his daughter’s private affairs floating around. Richard Patterson was not stupid. Besides, if he’d had any idea what had gone on in that apartment, Delon would’ve disappeared years ago, his mangled body dumped in a canyon on the Patterson ranch for the coyotes to snack on. He definitely wouldn’t be invited to join them for dinner.

The poor woman had no choice. She dodged the flaming skewers tossed at her by the woman at the end of the table and escorted the three of them to their seats. Tori avoided meeting Delon’s eyes as he held her chair, her dress and silvery lace shawl requiring her full attention as she sat.

When they were arranged to her satisfaction, she leaned sideways and muttered, “What are you up to, Daddy?”

He disengaged from conversation with the man on his left and smiled first at Tori, then Delon, his blue eyes clear as a summer sky. “I’m saving you from that battle-ax in the purple dress, and Delon from the windbag next to her. With any luck, they’ll murder each other before the end of dinner and neither of them will ever darken the door of my office again.”

Another wealthy constituent approached the front of the table, hijacking Richard’s attention. He greeted her with that same guileless smile. “Joan! Good to see you. You know my daughter, of course, and her friend Delon Sanchez. What have you done with that husband of yours?”

And so it went, the senator holding court as his minions lined up to pay their respects, so smoothly polite it took Delon a good ten minutes to realize that Richard Patterson had created a force field of cordiality around his daughter. No one was given an opportunity to engage her in conversation. Questions about her whereabouts over the past years were deftly redirected. Neither her husband nor her married name were mentioned. And the senator accomplished it all with such warmth and charm the curious walked away unaware that they’d been ruthlessly thwarted.

Delon tilted his head close to Tori’s ear to avoid being overheard. Her perfume tickled his nose—something tart with a hint of lemon, nothing like the sultry stuff she’d worn before. But still his body tightened, recognizing the warm scent of her skin beneath it.

“How is he not president by now?” he asked.

Tori’s mouth flattened. “I’m sure they’ll corner him eventually.”

“But you’re not in favor.”

She wrapped the fringe of her shawl around one slender forefinger. “I have no desire to watch my father age twenty years in his first term. And being a first daughter is not appealing.”

Of course it wouldn’t be. Not if she wanted to continue her current career, which she seemed to love. But the president’s daughter treating patients in a public facility? The security issues alone would make it impossible.

“How does your sister feel about it?” he asked.

“Elizabeth is ambivalent. She doesn’t deal with the public, and it would mean an inside track to funding for her research.”

“Which is?”

“Currently? Inserting pieces of DNA into immune cells to teach them to attack and kill cancer.”

Delon blinked. “Wow.”

“Yep.”

“Is she married?”

“No. But she has a partner, a computer programmer who is possibly even more brilliant. I suppose they might get married someday, if Pratimi can haul her out of the lab long enough, and my father’s handlers decide a gay marriage in the family would help him gain ground with the independent voters.”

Delon studied her expression, looking for any sign that she was joking. There was none. “Isn’t that sort of…cold?”

Tori shrugged one lace-covered shoulder. “We Pattersons prefer to call it practical. Somebody has to save the world. Without people like my father to woo donors and my mother and sister to devote every waking hour to their chosen fields, children in this country would still be dying of the measles. My father would make a very good president.”

“But it would suck for you.”

“Yes.”

“You could do something to scandalize the voters and ruin his chances.”

She lifted an eyebrow. Her eyes glowed like arctic ice against the pale gold of her skin. “Are you offering to help?”

Their gazes caught and held. Heat flared between them like a flash of summer lightning, the resulting thunder rumbling through every fiber of Delon’s body. A flush rose in Tori’s cheeks.

“Well, that was stupid.” She pasted a smile on her face and turned to greet the latest of her father’s worshipers, leaving Delon to stew in his own simmering juices. When she eventually looked back at him, her face was once again calm and composed. Her gaze drifted down to the open collar of his shirt and he wondered if she could see his pulse pounding.

“No tie,” she said. “Wardrobe malfunction or fashion statement?”

“Both. I hate them, and I don’t know how to make them work. Is it still black tie without the tie, or is that a violation of the rules?”

“Beats me. If the fashion police are on patrol, I’m in big trouble.”

He gave himself the luxury of examining her. The swept-up hair exposed the back of her neck, where he knew she was especially sensitive. Bare shoulders played a game of peekaboo beneath the lace shawl, making him want to pull it aside, preferably with his teeth.

“You look fine to me.” The understatement of the decade.

“I had a small problem with my shoes.” With one of those wicked dare-you smiles that had always ended with him wondering if they might actually kill themselves this time, she lifted her skirt. “I forgot I needed some.”

Delon burst out laughing. Underneath all her glitz and glamour, Tori was wearing scuffed cowboy boots.