Courted by the Texas Millionaire

“Jennifer was the only one offering up the sarcasm.”

“We both know she won’t be the last.”

As she took that in, he waited. Say yes, Vi …

“Do you really think this look-alike will amount to anything?” she asked.

“Yeah. Just call it a gut feeling.”

Another hesitation. She was going to tell him to stick this story where the sun didn’t shine, wasn’t she? The worst thing about it was that he knew another no from her would chew at him for the rest of the night, the rest of …

He wasn’t sure just how long it’d be.

“Davis,” she said softly, “I can guess how much it would mean for you if you could do something wonderful for this place.”

“Earlier, I swear I saw the girl who never turned her back on a story. Where did she go?”

“You know where she went.”

A short burst from her parents’ pickup horn made her walk away. But he still felt her on his flesh, singeing away at him.

“Violet?” he asked.

She stopped in her tracks.

His pulse was flying. “The newspaper office will be open tomorrow before you get to the saloon.”

She bit her bottom lip, glancing at the bar and grill.

He pushed the subject, his heartbeat racing. “I’ll be passing your ranch on the way in.” Damned if he wasn’t going to give up. Damned if he was going out on a limb here, against all his common sense.

Her parents’ truck purred as she gave him that wide-eyed look that told him the promise of making a gesture of goodwill to the town mattered to her just as much as it did to him.

“Okay,” she said. “I can look at the archives for about an hour, just to see if there’s anything to this.”

“And to do a freelance write-up for the Recorder?”

“If the research pans out. Maybe.”

Was she about to say something more?

He never found out, because she’d already jumped into her parents’ truck, leaving Davis with a tight grin.

He’d lost her once, but he had her for a morning now.

Chapter Three

After a night of searching the internet on her laptop without much success, Violet was up just after dawn, the birds chirping outside the window of the little cabin she was staying in on her parents’ ranch.

Back in the days before her mother and father had purchased the saloon, when Dad was a full-timer at the mine, Mom and the Osbornes’ employees had run this spread that had been in the family for generations. They’d bred American Quarter horses until, after several bad years of business, they’d had to sell off most of the land and stop the operation altogether. That was when her parents had decided to invest everything they had left in the bar and grill, and this decision had left the employee cabins empty, except for this one. Mom had fixed it up just before Violet had arrived, trimming it with gingham curtains and polishing the pine furniture. It was a stark contrast to her old apartment, with its view of Wilshire Boulevard’s skyscrapers in the near distance and the elevator just down the hall, where every doorway seemed to hide an actor or a budding director behind it.

She left the cabin, knowing Mom would’ve cooked an amazing breakfast—chocolate chip pancakes. It’d been a while since Violet had eaten such a thing; not since her last short trip here months ago. Her job had kept her too busy to be in the kitchen very much, and she’d become accustomed to grabbing hot coffee and limp sandwiches on the fly.

She opened the main house’s front door, the aroma of those pancakes making her mouth water. From the entryway, she could see the hall leading to the bedrooms—the one she’d grown up in would still be untouched, with its posters of all the places Great-Aunt Jeanne had experienced while writing her upscale magazine travel articles—Monaco, Madrid, Berlin. Whenever Great-Aunt Jeanne had visited, she’d always told Violet about salon talks with poets, riding in speedboats with princes.

She would’ve been proud that Violet had spread her wings and explored everything outside this “hick town” that she had escaped, too.

Violet just tried not to dwell on what her aunt would’ve done if she knew her great-niece had landed back in St. Valentine.

She made her way into the kitchen, the whoosh from an overhead fan chasing away some of the heat already settling in for the day.

Mom was wielding a spatula at the stove, her curly gray hair in a ponytail. “Just a few more minutes and I’ll be done.”

“Can’t wait.”

“We can have a family breakfast, just like we used to. Your dad’s going to be out of the shower anytime now.”

Oops. On the way home last night, Violet had neglected to tell her parents that Davis would be picking her up this morning. Mom would be okay with it, but Dad?

He emerged earlier than expected from the hallway, his graying head wet from the shower. “It’ll be a scorching one today.” He bent down to kiss the top of Violet’s head and sat for their family meal.

Might as well get this over with. “I wish I could stick around for a long breakfast this morning,” she said, “but I’m off to town soon.”

Mom looked over her shoulder, balancing a pancake on the spatula. “How are you going to get there?”

“It’s covered.” Violet nonchalantly poured herself a glass of orange juice from the pitcher on the table. “Davis is picking me up.”

Dad sat up straighter in his chair, so Violet spoke before he could.

“I’m working on a small story that could bring some positive attention to St. Valentine in time for Founder’s Weekend.”

“Hmph,” Dad said.

“Gary,” Mom said. “Don’t start.”

Violet said, “There’s really nothing to start about. It’s work, and I can add it to my résumé so future bosses can see that I’m still sharpening my craft.”

She neglected to add that she’d been happy when Davis hadn’t brought up anything personal again last night, after he’d caught her post-closing time at the bar and grill. When he’d started talking about the stranger instead, she’d just about wilted with relief. Yeah, that’s what it had to be—relief. Because surely it hadn’t been some kind of disappointment that they were veering around everything else in favor of talking about the Tony Amati look-alike.

Mom brought the platter of pancakes to the table, but Dad didn’t dig in just yet.

“That’s all it is?” Dad asked. “A story?”

“Yes. I figure it might … I don’t know, it might go a long way in showing everyone that I want to contribute while I’m around. Coming back here made me realize that I have some things to clean up in this town.”

Mom sat down, too. “And a news story’s going to do that?”

“It could. It’s a gesture, a way of saying that I’m not any better than anyone here. That I do care about this place.” Violet picked up her orange juice glass.