Sara Orwig - Standing Outside The Fire

As soon as the waiter left, Boone leaned forward. “Where was I? Big, green eyes, luscious red lips, fiery red hair,” he said, catching a lock of her hair in his fingers. It was silky soft.

“Who were you telling all this to last night?” she asked, tugging her hair away from him. Though she was being flippant, there was no mistaking a chemistry sparking between them.

“I could deny telling anyone, but I don’t think you’d believe me. The way you decked that guy in the parking lot says a lot about your personality.”

“Am I supposed to ask you what you think my personality is like?” she asked with amusement in her eyes.

“I think you’re practical. No frills. Intelligent and cool and confident. You’re laughing at my compliments, which means you are self-assured and don’t need to hear compliments. You can laugh at yourself and don’t believe you are one of the most gorgeous women in Texas, though you should.”

“Hardly! That’s a real stretch.” She laughed, and he wondered how many men had succumbed to that irresistible smile. “I’ve never won a beauty contest in my life.”

“How many have you entered?” he countered.

“None,” she admitted.

“And I’m right in my assessment otherwise—will you agree with that?”

Her lips firmed as she seemed to give his question thought before she nodded. “I’d say that I am practical and no frills. Intelligent—I hope reasonably so, but maybe I’m not showing a whole lot of sense eating dinner with a stranger. To my credit, when we finish dinner, I will go to my room and you will go to yours. And you won’t accompany me to mine. You won’t know which room it is. You won’t even know who I am. Let’s keep the evening impersonal. I’ll feel safer that way. I carry a cell phone and can call for help at any time. As for cool and confident—most of the time. Not always. It’s a fairly accurate assessment.”

“So is the part about you being gorgeous.” He leaned back as the waiter brought a bottle of wine, opened it and let Boone approve before pouring. The pale liquid half filled the glasses and then the white-coated waiter set the bottle in a bucket of ice and placed ornate red menus in front of each of them before he left.

As soon as they were alone, Boone lifted his glass. “Here’s to you for handling a bad situation with great aplomb.” He touched his glass to hers with a faint clink, and then gazing into her eyes, took a sip of his wine. The pale, dry wine went down smoothly while excitement hummed in him like an idling engine.

As she sipped and lowered her glass, thunder boomed.

“We may have just beaten the rain here,” he observed.

“They’ve had two inches today already,” she replied, looking outside and sounding as if she had forgotten him.

“How do you know that?” He was curious about her, wanting to know everything possible and wanting a date.

“The desk clerk told me.”

While she talked, Boone caught her hand in his and felt a current zing over his nerves when he touched her. Her skin was soft and smooth. “I don’t see an engagement or wedding ring.”

“No, you don’t,” she replied with a faint smile. She looked outside again as if the matter held her attention more than Boone.

“And the way you said that, I suspect there is no steady boyfriend.”

“You’re right again. Maybe you should earn a living as a clairvoyant.”

“I’m a good—guesser,” he said, giving another innuendo to the last word, and she arched her eyebrows. “And another toast to a gorgeous redhead I’ll always remember.”

She moved her hand away as he touched her glass again. “Always being until the next pretty woman crosses your path.”

“Not so. I’m not going to forget you and—” he leaned forward again and lowered his voice “—I hope before the night is over, I can see to it that you will always remember me.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think so, but you can tell yourself that I will. When we go our separate ways, dinner tonight will be a brief and soon forgotten interlude.”

“I intend to see that it isn’t,” he said, intrigued more by her each minute. “So, I’ve given you a personality appraisal. Now, you give me one. I’m curious what you think about me and what you think I’m like.”

“Self-centered,” she answered lightly.

“Ouch! All I’ve talked about is you—where do you get this self-centered stuff?”

Her eyes twinkled. “You’re aware of yourself. You’re totally confident, determined, not a little arrogant, and in some ways, charming.”

“I’m glad you threw in the last or I’d think I’d better get up and move to another table and stop imposing on you. ‘In some ways, charming?’ How so?”

“You know you’re charming to females,” she replied firmly. “You do not need compliments. You didn’t get so self-confident by being turned down.”

While she looked at the menu, Boone studied his. “How about the steaks?” he asked her, and she nodded.

“A steak sounds delicious. Actually, I missed lunch and had only a tiny breakfast this morning, so a steak would be wonderful.”

In minutes the waiter returned and took their orders, leaving and coming back with a thick loaf of fresh bread on a wooden plank.

“You slice the bread,” Boone suggested. “I’d mangle it.”

He watched her slender fingers deftly cut two slices and offer him one.

He put a slice on his bread plate, but he was far more interested in talking to her than he was in eating. She had taken only a few sips of wine when he started to refill her glass.

“Thanks, I don’t need more. Actually, I think this is the first wine—or any alcoholic drink I’ve had—since Christmas.”

“Christmas! Do you ever get out of the house?”

She laughed. “Yes, I get out of the house.”

“Since Christmas, I think you can have a tiny refill,” he said, looking at her questioningly.

She took a deep breath as she appeared to reconsider, and then she nodded. “I suppose. This has been a horrendous day.”

“Uh-oh. I hope it took a definite turn for the better about half an hour ago.” He refilled her glass and put the bottle in the ice bucket. “What happened that was so terrible?”

“I was at a business meeting,” she said, and her voice became brisk as she stared past him. “Someone on the way to the meeting was in a terrible car crash and is in intensive care now and that put a damper on the day.”

“That’s tough. Sorry. Was it someone you knew?”

“Yes, but not well. And then my flight home today was delayed by storms, and we sat on the runway for three hours.”

“You have had a bad day. Plus the guy in the parking lot. Well, the bad part is over, and I’ll do my damnedest to cheer you up.”

“You’re doing a pretty super job of cheering me so far.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“Now I’m staying at this hotel since I couldn’t go home tonight because of the storms,” she said, sipping her wine.

“You don’t have a northern accent. Hmm—where does the pretty lady live?”

“You’re on a need-to-know basis tonight and that’s another one of those things you don’t need to know,” she said, her dimple showing.

“Maybe,” he said. She wore a delicate golden bracelet that was a chain on her right wrist. He touched it. “A gift from a boyfriend?”

“No. A gift from a friend.”

He arched his eyebrow and looked at the necklace around her slender neck. An intricate emerald cross hung on a thick golden chain. “And the necklace?” he asked, leaning forward to pick it up, his knuckles lightly brushing her throat, but he felt the contact to his toes, and from the flicker in the depths of her green eyes, he suspected that she felt something, too.

“Is your necklace from the same friend?”

“No, it isn’t. The cross is a family heirloom. Have you ever heard of Stallion Pass, Texas?”

“Yes, I have,” Boone said in a noncommittal voice, keeping his expression bland, but inwardly he was startled because she was linked to Stallion Pass, Texas, so she must live somewhere in the area. The ranch he had inherited was near Stallion Pass. Maybe he could get this mystery woman to reveal her address.

“It’s a small Texas town near here.” He continued to turn the necklace in his hand, lightly brushing her throat with his knuckles. Each contact was electric, and he noticed that her voice had grown more breathless. He looked into her eyes and could feel the tension between them increase as the air sparked around them.

In a primitive, sexual way, she was responding to his light touches and his outrageous flirting.

“Do you know the legend of Stallion Pass?” she persisted.

“Something about a horse—I don’t know the specifics,” Boone said, remembering that his friend Jonah Whitewolf had received a white stallion when he got married. There was talk about the legend, but Boone hadn’t paid close attention at the time because he had little interest in horses or legends.

“The name comes from an old legend,” she explained, “where it was said that an Apache warrior fell in love with a U.S. cavalryman’s daughter and persuaded her to run off and marry him. On the night the warrior was to come get her, he was killed by cavalrymen. His ghost was said to be a white stallion that forever roams these parts searching for his lost love. And according to legend, if anyone catches the stallion and tames him, that person will find true love.”

“So that’s where the town gets its name?” Boone asked, gazing steadily into her eyes while she talked. Once again, they were mere inches apart across the narrow table. He was only partially listening to her because the rest of his attention was heating in a fiery attraction that all but made the air crackle between them. As she talked, her words became more breathless and her voice lower. Her gaze never wavered from his. His only contact with her was his fist holding her necklace, yet the longing to kiss her was multiplying exponentially.

“Right,” she replied, her words slowing. “There have been wild white stallions in these parts off and on through the years, so their presence has always fueled the legend.”

He ran his fingers over the cross. “So where does this cross come in?”

“The maiden was brokenhearted to learn of her warrior’s death. Instead of marrying a man selected by her father, she entered a convent. According to our family history, this was her necklace and it has been passed down through the years. We are supposed to be descended from her family. She had a brother who married and had children and the necklace was passed down in that manner.”

“Giving credence—somewhat—to the old legend.”

As she talked, he ran his fingers over the cross and felt an inscription on the back. He turned it over in his hand. And read, “Bryony.” He looked up in question, rubbing her jaw lightly with his knuckles while he continued to hold the cross in his hand.

“So your name isn’t Bryony?” he asked.

“No, it’s not. Bryony was her name.”

The waiter approached bearing their salads, and Boone leaned back, dropping her necklace and brushing his knuckles across her collarbone when he did so.

Over tossed green salads, Boone said, “You’re a Texan and maybe you live in Austin.”

When she gave him a mysterious smile, he knew he wasn’t going to get affirmation or denial. “You know this area if you’re familiar with Stallion Pass and you couldn’t get home because of storms. It’s clear to the north because I flew in from there, but they’ve had storms moving through from west to east, so I’m guessing you must live in Austin and have to spend tonight here.”