Mendoza's Secret Fortune

He was just yanking his older brother’s chain. Christopher had no intentions of relying exclusively on his brother to shift around and arrange the furniture. It would be arriving with a crew of moving men in attendance. He just enjoyed giving Galen a hard time while he still could.

But when the doors into the office opened, it wasn’t to admit a team of movers bringing the rest of the furniture for this office—or any of the other Foundation offices in the newly constructed two-story building.

Instead of moving men, Orlando and Matteo Mendoza came walking in.

Rachel felt her heart reacting the second she looked up and saw Matteo. It took her almost a full minute for her to regain her composure.

What was he doing here?

By the look on Delaney’s face, she’d noted the sudden change in Rachel. But mercifully, she made no comment, which only further cemented the budding friendship in Rachel’s mind. To her, friends knew things about friends without asking outright.

Almost automatically, Rachel rose to her feet and found herself slowly moving closer to the front door and the two men who had entered.

If she was surprised to see Matteo, he looked twice as surprised to see her.

Perhaps, Rachel thought, he looked a little too surprised.

Had he somehow known she’d be here today?

She tried to remember if she had said anything to Cisco last night about having to work here at the Foundation’s office today.

But even if she had, the little voice in her head that came equipped with a large dose of common sense maintained, why would Cisco have shared that information with his younger brother? From the interaction she had witnessed yesterday, the two had an ongoing rivalry, competing with one another over just about everything.

But if that was the case, then what was Matteo doing here?

It didn’t make any sense to her.

“What can I do for you?” Christopher was asking the two men as he crossed the office to get to them.

“It’s what we’re here to do for you,” Orlando corrected him. The older man nodded his head toward Matteo. “My stubborn mule of a son and I are here to deliver a shipment of supplies for your office from your Red Rock headquarters.”

Not willing to be mischaracterized, Matteo chimed in, “My more stubborn father suffered a bad injury last year and really should still be taking it easy instead of making these cargo flights,” Matteo explained. “I came along in order to ensure that he wasn’t taking on too much too soon. I’m also a pilot,” he added, wanting Rachel to know that he wasn’t just ineptly tagging along after his father but had a true purpose as well as a true vocation.

Orlando snorted like a parent who was trying patiently to endure the know-it-all attitude of his well-meaning children. “This one thinks I’ll have a heart attack and he’ll have to grab the controls and heroically land the plane.” Orlando puffed up his chest ever so slightly and added, “Apparently he doesn’t realize his father is as strong as an ox.”

“Yeah and just as stubborn as one,” Matteo interjected. He turned toward Christopher. “If you just tell me where you keep your dolly, I’ll load it up and bring the supplies up for you.”

“I’d appreciate that,” he said to Matteo. Turning toward Rachel, he recruited her help. “Rachel, would you show Orlando where we keep the dolly? Then bring him back to the storeroom when he’s ready so he can stack the supplies there.” He glanced at Orlando. He had forgotten just how much he had ordered. “Is it a large shipment?”

Orlando nodded. “I would say so, yes.”

The smile on Christopher’s lips was spontaneous as well as wide.

“It’s all coming together,” he announced, partly to the people in the office, partly to himself.

While ranching had initially been a way of life for him, running a branch of his newly discovered family’s charitable foundation seemed like a very noble endeavor to him. And the more involved he became, the more committed to the cause he felt.

“We keep the dolly in the storeroom,” Rachel told Matteo. “Come on, follow me. I’ll show you where it is.”

Matteo fell into step with her as she walked quickly to the end of the floor and the storeroom.

“So, you work here, too?” he asked her, sounding somewhat puzzled.

That Matteo asked the question disappointed her a little. It meant that this meeting really was just an accident rather than something he had deliberately orchestrated.

What was she thinking, assuming that Matteo had gone through complex machinations just to get a glimpse of her again? Sometimes a chance meeting was a chance meeting and nothing more, she told herself.

But the fact that it was obviously true in this case stung her a little. The scenario she had put together in her head had been far more romantic.

Grow up, she chided herself.

Looking at Matteo, she realized that he was waiting for some sort of an answer.

“I just started working here,” she replied. “The Foundation doesn’t officially open to the public until next month.”

Matteo was still trying to piece things together. He knew so little about the woman who had captivated him with no effort whatsoever. He had deliberately been avoiding Cisco this morning because he didn’t want to take a chance on hearing his brother brag about what had gone on last night.

“So, yesterday was your last day at the Cantina?” he asked.

That was a shame, he thought. He’d given serious consideration to dropping in there tomorrow, supposedly for lunch but actually just to see her again. Now it looked as if that plan wasn’t destined to make it off the ground.

Opening the door to the storeroom, Rachel gestured toward the dolly—located right in front—and stepped out of Matteo’s way.

“No, actually, it wasn’t. My job at the Cantina is really part-time, and I’m keeping both jobs, at least for a while,” she told him. Just saying it made her feel tired. But this wasn’t about getting her beauty rest. It was about her future and getting ahead. “I want to see where this is going before I make any major decisions about my life.”

Pushing the dolly out of the room, he followed Rachel toward the elevator. “Have you always been this ambitious?” he asked her.

She had to admit that this was an entirely new direction for her. When she’d moved out here, she hadn’t a clue on how to start rebuilding herself—or even how to earn a living. All she knew was that she wasn’t running toward something—at least, not at first—but from something.

“No, I wasn’t,” she told him, pressing the down arrow beside the elevator. “You should have seen me five years ago.” She recalled all the empty partying, the meaningless kisses and even more meaningless words that had been exchanged. “I was a slug,” she confessed with a self-deprecating laugh.

Matteo didn’t believe it for a moment. He considered himself a fair to middling judge of character, and Rachel Robinson was a woman with a purpose. He would lay odds that she always had been.

“I sincerely doubt that,” he told her, dismissing her words. “But I would have liked to have seen you five years ago,” he admitted.

Rachel couldn’t think of a reason why he would have wanted to do that. “To compare then and now?” she guessed.

“No. If I had seen you five years ago, that means I would have known you for five years.” And he would have been able to get her attention before Cisco had a chance to move in on her. “But I guess since you live here and I grew up in Miami, that wouldn’t have exactly been possible,” he concluded.

“No,” she agreed, “it wouldn’t have.” But that didn’t mean that she wouldn’t have wanted it to be possible, she added silently.

As Matteo stepped into the elevator, pushing the dolly before him, he was surprised to see Rachel get on with him. He’d just assumed that she would wait for him to return to the storeroom with the supplies. “You’re coming with me?”