other man in America.
Not that he was a fan. He didn’t give a rat’s ass that she was Hollywood’s latest sweetheart. But like it or not, she wasn’t the kind of woman any man with blood in his veins could easily ignore. And for the life of him, Joe didn’t know why. She wasn’t drop-dead gorgeous. She was too cute, too wholesome with her wavy, sun-streaked blond hair, freckles and sparkling blue eyes. To add insult to injury, her smile was crooked, and she had dimples, for God’s sake. Granted, she was tall and willowy and had legs that went on forever, but she couldn’t, under any circumstances, ever hope to be called voluptuous. Still, there was something about her, an air of innocent sexuality, that was incredibly appealing.
Furious with himself for even noticing, he wondered what the hell she was doing there. Then his gaze shifted from her to the suitcase in her hand, then to his open front door. And it hit him. She was moving in!
Muttering a curse, he slammed out of his pickup and strode toward her, his long legs quickly eating up the distance between them. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Her heart thumping crazily, Angel didn’t so much as flinch. Myrtle had warned her he wouldn’t be happy about the change in plans, but that wasn’t something she could be concerned with at the moment. She needed a safe haven, and like it or not, his house was it. Nothing else mattered.
Still, she wasn’t nearly as cool as she pretended when she looked down her slender nose at him and met his hostile gaze with a delicately arched brow. “I would have thought it was obvious. I’m moving in, of course.”
“The hell you are!” he growled. “Put that damn suitcase back in your car and get out of here. You’re trespassing on private property.”
There’d been a time when that would have been enough to send her packing. Unlike Joe McBride, she didn’t have an ounce of anger in her. She didn’t like confrontations, didn’t like fights. Given the chance, she avoided them at every turn. But this was one she couldn’t back down from. Not when not only her safety, but her daughter’s, was at stake.
Standing her ground, she faced him squarely. “I hate to be the one to disillusion you, Mr. McBride, but I have every right to be here. You signed a contract with the studio—”
“My contract is with an actor,” he cut in coldly. “An actor,” he stressed. “Sharing my house with a woman was never part of the agreement. Especially a spoiled prima donna who thinks she’s God’s gift to the rest of the world.”
Angel felt her cheeks burn and knew she looked guilty as sin. Damn Garrett! Was there anyone who hadn’t heard and believed the lies he’d told about her? “Your contract is for a cast member,” she said stiffly. “If you don’t believe me, you can talk to Will. I’m sure he’ll be happy to answer any questions you may have.”
She didn’t give him time to object, but simply punched in a number on her cell phone and handed the phone to Joe. Stony-faced, he was left with no choice but to speak to the producer. “Douglas, we’ve got a problem,” he snarled. “I don’t care what the damn contract says. I’m not sharing my house with a woman!”
Chapter 2
It was a fight he couldn’t win, and he was smart enough to know it. But he didn’t have to like it. Seething, he told Will Douglas what he thought of a contract that gave a man no say in who was or wasn’t allowed in his own home. When he finally turned back to Angel and tossed her the phone, his brown eyes were nearly black with angry promise.
“You win this one, Cinderella. You get to stay, and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. But I wouldn’t start celebrating too soon if I were you. You’re not going to like it here. I’ll make sure of it.” And without another word, he brushed past her and stormed into the house, leaving her standing in the driveway.
His mother—and Myrtle—would have chewed his butt out for not at least carrying in her luggage for her, but she wasn’t a guest, dammit! Guests didn’t go behind your back to force their way into your home, then thumb their nose at you when you objected. She’d stepped over the line, and as far as he was concerned, the last thing she was entitled to was hospitality. Let her carry in her own damn bags!
But as much as he wanted to ignore her, he found to his disgust that he couldn’t when she followed him inside dragging a suitcase that had to be as big as a packing crate. It was on rollers, but difficult to maneuver, and must have easily weighed half as much as she did. Still, she didn’t ask for any help. Her chin set at a proud angle—as if she were the injured party! he thought incredulously—she tugged and pulled, straining with every step, and finally got the suitcase over to the bottom of the stairs.
Delicate color singed her cheeks, and try though he might, Joe couldn’t take his eyes off her. Damn her, who the hell did she think she was fooling? There was no way she was going to be able to carry that damn suitcase upstairs and they both knew it. It was too heavy, and she was too slight. The sheer weight of it would drag her back down again. It’d be just his luck that she’d hurt herself, and she was just the type of woman who would revel in that. He could see it now. Laid up in bed like a princess with a sprained toe, she’d expect him to come running every time she crooked her little finger.
The hell he would!
Muttering a curse, he strode over to her, ignored her gasp, and took the suitcase from her as easily as if it weighed no more than a feather pillow. “I’ll take it up for you…this time,” he said coldly. “But don’t make the mistake of thinking you’re going to be waited on around here, sister. This is a working ranch and everyone carries their own weight.” His jaw like granite, he effortlessly carried her bag up the stairs, leaving her to follow or not.
Don’t make the mistake of thinking you’re going to be waited on around here, sister, she mimicked silently, glaring at his ramrod straight back. Irritating man! Myrtle had warned her he wouldn’t make this easy for her—she should have listened. But after everything she’d said about his family, Angel had hoped that he’d at least give her a chance. She should have known better. The ink on his divorce might have dried four years ago, but according to Myrtle, he still avoided women like the plague. The last thing he would want was one living with him.
She could have told him he had nothing to fear from her. She wasn’t staying there because she was interested in him in any way, shape or form. He was too hard, too intense, too full of anger, and any woman who got in his way was going to get blasted. She just needed some place safe and off the beaten track for her and her daughter to stay, and his place qualified on both counts.
Still, his criticism stung. Did he think just because she had a glamorous career that seemed to require nothing more of her than she smile and play make-believe in front of a camera that her life had always been so easy? Her father owned a small café in New Mexico and had never cleared in a year what she made in a week. Her mother had died when she was eight, she’d been busing tables when she was ten, waiting them when she was fourteen. Joe McBride didn’t have to tell her what it was like to work hard—she’d been doing it all her life.
Resentment glittering in her eyes, she followed him upstairs. Besides the bathroom, there were three rooms—the master bedroom and two smaller bedrooms, one of which contained a single bed and a small desk that Garrett would have no doubt had to make do with as an office. The second was obviously the guest room. Simply furnished with a vanity-style dresser and an old-fashioned spool bed that was covered with a white chenille bedspread, it was modest and unadorned but for the lace half panels at the room’s two windows. It was here that Joe set her suitcase.
Stepping
