Tall, Tanned & Texan. Kimberly Raye
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A little digging and she withdrew a candy bar. “Thank God I think ahead.” She tore the wrapper, broke a piece of candy off and popped it into her mouth. Her expression eased as she savored the mouthful before holding the bar out to Deanie. “Want some?”
Deanie shook her head.
Savannah gave her a knowing look. “It figures.”
“What?”
“If you hate Valentine’s Day, you’re bound to hate candy, too. And flowers. And jewelry.”
“I don’t hate Valentine’s Day. I just think it’s a little overdone.” And depressing. “People shouldn’t have to buy candy or flowers or jewelry to prove their love.”
“Says you.” She ate another piece of candy and eyed Deanie. “You don’t have a boyfriend, do you?”
“Not exactly.”
“Not exactly no, or not exactly yes?”
Deanie swallowed. “We broke up.”
Savannah studied her a few more seconds before winking. “Don’t sweat it. There are plenty more where he came from. Real ones,” she added, nodding toward Mavoreen’s beehive that bobbed above the seat in front of her. “And trust me, the more the merrier. That way when one’s busy in Atlanta with a buyout for his precious company, you don’t have to sit around feeling sorry for yourself. You just hop a plane to a tropical paradise and party the night away with boyfriend number two. And number three. And number four. It’s all about having a back-up plan.”
For the lucky few like Savannah Sierra Ellington with her feminine clothes and her breathy voice. She practically oozed sex appeal. It made sense that she would snag more than one man’s attention.
Deanie, on the other hand, wasn’t as concerned with snagging every man’s attention as she was with keeping one man’s attention.
The man.
And so she intended to be ready when he happened along.
If he happened along.
“I shouldn’t have had that extra glass of wine in the airport lounge. I think I’ll head to the ladies’ room before we takeoff.” Savannah tucked the remainder of her candy bar into her purse, popped open her seat belt, pushed to her feet and sashayed the few feet to the lavatory at the front of the plane.
Deanie glanced at her watch again. Anxiety rushed through her, chasing away the excitement. They really needed to get going. The last thing she wanted was to be late.
Camp E.D.E.N. ran a tight ship. There would be no lounging around the pool or writing post cards. Her training would start immediately after check-in with the first workshop—Shedding Your Inhibitions. There would be a thirty minute dinner break and then it was back to work with three more workshops before curfew and lights out. The strict regimen went hand-in-hand with the camp’s no-nonsense image. Camp E.D.E.N. was for the serious, self-improvement-minded individual, not the fun-seeking sort. At least that’s what the Web site and its page of testimonials claimed.
Her toes whimpered and she eased her feet out of her shoes just enough to allow some breathing room. She shifted and tried for a more comfortable position. The seat was more narrow than she’d initially thought, her legs a lot more cramped. Jet-setting to a tropical getaway wasn’t at all as glamorous as she’d imagined.
It felt more like being cooped up in the last row of a school bus with the other equipment assistants—all three of them, Deanie included—while the football players rode up front.
Then again, this wasn’t high school.
This was her life.
The new and improved version.
“This is a good day.” She murmured the words her grandmother had recited to her every morning during her summer visits before the old woman had passed away.
A great day.
A scary day.
She forced aside the last thought.
Exciting, not scary.
Of course, both caused massive bursts of adrenaline and a faint, light-headed feeling so it was understandable how she could confuse the two.
She pulled out the latest fashion magazine she’d bought at the newsstand—after reaching for Sports Illustrated and giving herself a mental hand slap—and flipped to an article that debated the benefits of lip gloss versus lipstick. Then she heard something…
It took her all of two seconds to realize it wasn’t just the cramped space that reminded her of her high school days.
It was the deep, husky voice that slid into her ears.
“…wouldn’t say I was the greatest tackle to ever play pro football. Maybe one of the top five…”
It couldn’t be.
Deanie closed her eyes for a long moment, her heart beating frantically, as the past pushed and pulled at her.
“Hey there, Teeny.”
The familiar voice echoed in her memory and she practically smelled the sharp aroma of cattle and hay that had filled the corral where she’d watched her brother and his best friend practice steer wrestling techniques every afternoon after school.
“…I managed to hold my own, but there were a lot of players just as good…”
She forced her eyes open, drew a deep breath and twisted to peer over the top of her seat.
Rance McGraw had been the hottest, hunkiest boy to ever wear a Romeo High School football jersey. He’d been the youngest and the wildest of the notorious McGraw triplets, the star of Deanie’s adolescent fantasies and a few adult ones, as well. He’d been sweet and charming and charismatic, and one of the best steer wrestlers to ever win first place at Romeo Junior Livestock Show and Rodeo. He’d also been the boy Deanie had wanted desperately to marry and live happily ever after with.
Wanted, as in past tense. She’d given up her infatuation with him a long time ago.
Sixteen years was a long time, however, and the boy had turned into a hotter, hunkier man.
The man now sitting two rows behind her.
She swallowed and tried for a deep breath. But while her brain issued the command, her lungs wouldn’t cooperate. Neither would her eyes. She willed them to look away, but they kept staring, drinking in the picture he made, his tall, muscular form barely contained in the narrow seat.
With his dark hair and good ole boy smile, Rance was the spitting image of his two handsome brothers. He had the same strong jaw, sensuous lips and sculpted nose. At the same time, there would be no mistaking him for the other two. Being a fraternal triplet, he didn’t have blue eyes like Mason or green ones like Josh. Rather, his gaze gleamed as bright, as bold, as intoxicating as a shot of Jack Daniels whiskey.
Even more, Rance had his own style that set him apart. He wasn’t the classic clean-cut cowboy type like the other McGraw men. Rather, his dark hair hung down to his shoulders. He wore a bright Hawaiian print shirt unbuttoned, a white NASCAR T-shirt beneath. She couldn’t see without giving herself whiplash, but she’d be willing to bet that he wore his signature board shorts, long and frayed around the edges, and a pair of flip-flops.
The only indication of his cowboy roots was the beat-up straw Resistol that he’d been wearing since the age of sixteen. It had belonged to his father who’d died that year. The hat looked worn and faded now, a Coors Lite patch stitched to the brim in between a patch for last year’s ESPN Extreme Sports Games in Colorado and another advertising the bungee jumping finals in South America.
The media still referred to him as a cowboy, however, because of his do-anything attitude and I-don’t-give-a-damn appearance. Rance was an ex-pro football player who now owned a chain of extreme sporting good stores and still made the news with his passion for the