Her Montana Millionaire

“Ding ding ding,” said Jinni. “Tell me where it is. I mean, no. Val, I really should stay with you.” She straightened, expressing her genuine desire to take care of Val.

“For heaven’s sake, Jinni, watching you prowl the house is not relaxing. Besides, Estelle’s very entertaining, full of good stories. She’s going to stay over in the third room.” Val gave her a surprisingly healthy shove down the hallway. “Go. Have a crackerjack time. Meet some people around here. You might even like them.” She was thirsting for a nice swig of Dom Perignon or…something. Maybe even beer and the sight of a muscled ranch hand would do for now.

“Are you sure?” said Jinni. “I don’t want to desert you.”

“Get.”

Jinni sighed, then smiled at her sister as she walked down the hallway to her room.

It was hard being a martyr.

After she’d showered and slipped into a black Dior sheath, which—tragically—she had to cover with a matching cape to guard against the chill of the night, Jinni headed to Joe’s Bar.

Right when she stepped inside, she knew that this was the best party she’d find for the time being.

Loud jukebox music, though it was country, but who could complain at this point? A dance floor, complete with cowboys and scantily clad women doing some sort of ritualistic boot-stomping shuffle. Chintzy beer and food signs, advertising cheap beverages, pizza and Rocky Mountain Oysters.

Hmm. Oysters. Maybe this place wasn’t so bad after all.

Jinni slipped out of her cape and hung it on a hook next to a row of cowboy hats. Then she dove out of the way of a homely rottweiler chained near the door. How charming. A guard creature.

As she glided through the tobacco-laced air and the peanut shells littering the wood-planked floor, she noted a back room where pool and dart games were in progress. Then she took stock of the nurses who gathered around the tables and the booths in the rear, the ranch hands drinking their longnecks and staring at her from under the semicover of dim lighting.

This was slumming, all right. But she smiled at the men anyway, loving the attention.

At the bar, she slid onto a stool, crossing her legs for pure show, then ordered whiskey. When the bartender brought the beverage, she took a demure sip.

Yooowwww. Not exactly Johnnie Walker Black Label, but it was better than drinking out of a paper sack while sitting on the curb.

Okay. This was fun. Sitting alone. Drinking.

Was she too old for this crowd? Were they wondering why a forty-year-old—who, by the way, didn’t look a day over thirty-four—was barflying in Rumor, Montana?

Jinni reached for her handbag, took out a cigarette. She hadn’t smoked in months—applause, please—but sometimes the feel of that smooth rolled paper tucked between her fingers lent a sense of control. A little stick of death couldn’t hurt her. No, siree. She’d whipped the habit, and it felt good to know that.

As she ordered another whiskey, she tried to think of additional ways to cheer herself up. It’d been one heck of a downer day—except for the hunk in the parking lot. Yet even that hadn’t ended in fireworks.

Was she losing her touch?

No. No possible way. She was just off her game in a new environment.

Anyway, back to cheering up. She could get her publisher off her back by hunting for a new biography bestseller. Pity that Prince Charles and Princess Monique were out of the question.

God, what she’d give for a good subject right now, someone to take her away from sorrow.

How about Rumor itself? There were the murders. Or maybe someone interesting would show up to entertain her.

Jinni twirled the cigarette through her fingers. Right. The people in this town were about as exciting as the ash and dirt blowing off Main Street.

She stared at the cigarette. It called to her, beckoning her back to a life of smoky parties in the glittering cities of Europe, times when she didn’t have a darned thing to worry about.

A man flopped down in the seat next to her, and Jinni’s male radar burst to life. She peered at him from the corner of her eye.

Egads. MonMart Man.

Her pulse skittered like champagne bubbling from a fountain. The night had just gotten more intriguing.

“Hey,” she said, posing with her cigarette.

He sort of grunted in response. Well, at least he was speaking the same language as this afternoon. He could play Neanderthal all he wanted as long as it kept turning her on.

She swiveled the front of her body toward him, legs brushing his pants. Uh-huh, still looking like he’d just come from a high-class wheeler-dealer meeting, except for his hair. Now the salt-and-pepper locks had tumbled all over themselves, slouching over his forehead.

What a cutie pie.

He ordered a shot of tequila from the bartender while talking loudly over the music. “No peace for the wicked.”

Didn’t she know it. “Rest isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

He glanced at her, ran his gaze over her body, leaving a shimmer of heat over Jinni’s limbs. God bless Val and Estelle for letting her loose tonight.

Definitely a wonderful way to pass the time in Rumor. She liked fire in a man. In fact, she couldn’t get over the way he’d hunkered into his fancy car today, shooting a burning glare at her….

Wait. Mercedes-Benz. Snazzy threads.

Did this guy have a life worth writing about?

As his brilliant-blue gaze traveled back up from her breasts to her face, Jinni batted her eyelashes at him, smiling.

He merely looked away, then threw down his shot of tequila.

Hello? The eyelash trick always worked. And, actually, it had been the prelude to more than a few marriage proposals. What was this guy…immune?

And was it possible that he didn’t recognize her? No. Unthinkable. Jinni Fairchild did not go unnoticed.

Not before, anyway.

She “hmphed” and absently stuck the end of the cigarette in her mouth, reaching for her purse.

Suddenly, the item was snatched from her lips. The next thing she knew, she was watching the man snap her death stick in two with one hand.

“Hey,” she said, about to give him a piece of her mind. What nerve. What cheek. What…hands.

Oooo. Long, tapered fingers. Large and able. Hands—one of a man’s many admirable features.

He tossed the remnants of the cigarette onto the bar, ordered another tequila, then offered one of those hands to Jinni. “Max Cantrell,” he said.

The name sounded familiar. Cantrell.