made me park in the employee lot.”
“I’m surprised they didn’t make you park it in the ocean.”
“Watch it, Jack,” she said with a smile and his chest swelled with fondness. “She’ll hear you and she doesn’t like water any more than I do.”
“It’s good to see you,” he said, awkwardly patting her shoulder. “Thank you for coming.”
“Well,” she muttered, “like I said, I figure I owe you.” She stepped inside their room. Suite, actually—he made sure she had her own room off the living room. He didn’t want there to be any more awkwardness than necessary.
“Nice place,” she said, looking around. “Better than the last dump. Being Indiana Jones must pay better than it did a year ago.”
Christmas, a year ago, he’d asked her to come to Los Angeles, to sign some legal paperwork before he took his sabbatical. He’d paid little attention to the motel where they’d stayed, not realizing how crappy it was until she pointed it out.
“The university is paying for this. It’s part of the…thing.”
“The thing?” Her smile was brief but breathtaking, a lightning strike over the Sahara Desert. “You live some kind of life, Jack McKibbon, if people throwing millions of dollars at you is considered just a thing.” Her eyes were warm. Fond. He wondered for a minute if she was…proud of him?
How novel.
“It’s not at me, per se, it’s the university. I mean, it’s our research. Our pump. But the money is going to the university. For more research.” He was babbling, awkwardly talking about his work, which did not bode well for the night ahead. Another reason he hated these events.
If people wanted to talk science, he could do that all day. But explaining the complex nature of water tables and the ever-changing political nature of Sudan in lay men’s terms was impossible for him.
Oliver was better at that stuff.
“Either way. It’s a good thing you do.” Her smile reached her eyes, crinkling the corners. “Water for the thirsty. Like you always dreamed.”
He felt her measuring him, testing him through the years and choices that separated them. Seeing perhaps if she still knew the practical stranger that stood here, found in him the boy she’d known better than anyone else.
He saw that girl he’d known. She was right there in that stubborn line to her chin. The nose that led her into more trouble than one half-size female should ever see.
“I missed you. It’s been a long time, Mia,” he breathed, the words squeezed through a tight throat.
She blinked, as if jerking herself out of a daze.
“Where do you want me to put my stuff?” she asked, and the moment was shattered. She dropped her duffel on the floor, plumes of dust erupting into the air at the impact.
“There works,” he muttered. Whatever was in that bag couldn’t be in good shape. “You know, maybe I should have made it clear, but this is a formal thing…”
Her eyes sliced through him. “You worried I’ll show up to your fancy shindig with dirt under my nails?”
“No, well, maybe. And I don’t care.” He reached out his hands, showing her the red dirt that stained the skin around his fingernails. “I just don’t want you to be uncomfortable. There’s going to be a lot of scrutiny—”
“Because you’re Indiana Jones and making Cal Poly a whole bunch of money?” She said it as a joke and guilt clobbered him.
You’re an ass, he told himself, bringing her here to be scrutinized and gossiped about.
“No,” he said and took a deep breath. No other woman in his life owed him enough to stand beside him and face down the firestorm of academia gone wild. “I should have told you this in my email,” he said.
“Uh-oh, this doesn’t sound good.” She crossed her arms over her flannelled chest and those curves she’d always worked so hard to hide were unmistakable.
“Mia, I’m sorry—”
“Out with it, Jack. You always were a wuss when it came to dealing the bad stuff.”
That was a low blow and his temper flared. It was easy for her to judge him. She’d stayed. He’d left. Big freaking deal.
“Fine, because the dean has accused me of having an affair with his wife.”
She didn’t look at him. Not for a long time. The air conditioner kicked on, loud in the silence. He counted her breaths, the rise and fall of her chest, wondering why it mattered.
“Have you?” she asked.
“No, Mia. Of course not. But Beth…the dean’s wife, has been…” How did he put this? “Indiscreet.”
“She wants to have an affair with you?”
“So it would seem.”
“And you can’t just say no?” she asked, her eyes snapping.
“It’s delicate,” he said.
“You want me to tell her?” she asked. “You made me drive two hundred miles over the mountains two months before calving season, when I’m so busy I can’t see straight, to tell some woman to keep her hands off you?”
In a way. In his head it made so much sense. But that was his problem—what worked in his head didn’t always translate to other people. To real life.
Mia picked up the duffel bag, leaving dust on the floor. This trip out to Santa Barbara was a big deal for her, he knew that. Things were busy at the Rocky M and as far as he knew, she was still doing most of the work.
And now she was here and angry with him, which wasn’t what he wanted at all.
Give him a hundred feet of sand and seventy-mile-an-hour winds, and he could make things work.
Add another person to the equation, someone he had to deal with face-to-face, and he’d find a way to blow it.
“No, Mia, it’s not quite that dramatic. With you here, she won’t try anything. And people won’t…speculate about an affair. They won’t be watching me like a hawk. It will be forgotten.”
Her eyes got wide and her lips got tight.
“Because they’ll be talking about me,” she said. “I’m a distraction?”
He nodded and shrugged. Attempted a smile. “You’re my wife.”
She nodded once, anger rolling off her like the smell of burned tires. “Sure,” she said. “Makes perfect sense. I need to shower.”
“Through there,” he said, pointing to the far door. “We need to go in a half hour.”
MIA SHUT THE DOOR behind her and collapsed
