Be My Guest (7 page)

Will set two plates on the counter top and
reached into a drawer to produce cutlery. Now, how could he be
expected to control himself with her looking like that? He poured
two glasses of apple juice and placed them beside the plates. Into
a mug he poured tea from a teapot.

"I made more of the sweetened tea you had
last night. I've always heard tea's better for nausea than
anything."

Palms of both his hands sweated. Maybe it
had something to do with them being alone and Aurora seductive even
in her injured state. Awareness of her every move zinged through
him, every flash of ivory skin beckoned to him, every breath caused
her breasts to rise and fall. He ran a hand through his hair and
cursed to himself. Breakfast just starting and already his
reactions to this woman left him in a sad state.

"This is perfect." Aurora smiled at him.
"Let's eat."

"Hmm, did you have any dinner yesterday?"
Will used his crutches to hobble to the stool beside Aurora.

"The last time I ate was with you in
Snyder...except for the tea and crackers last night." She peered
around as if getting her bearings. "That seems days ago."

"Seems a hell of a long time ago, doesn't
it? You had the A-1 prime example of a bad day yesterday, didn't
you?"

Will watched in fascination as she ate. She
sliced each bite of ham into precisely the same sized bite. The
neck of the over-sized pajama top she wore fell forward to reveal
perfect breasts as she leaned toward the bar. She sat with each of
her legs hooked around a leg of the bar stool, her thighs parted
slightly. If he reached out...Damn, what on earth was he
thinking?

He cursed to himself. This woman was a guest
in his home, a guest with severe injuries, someone who needed his
care and protection. He had to reign in his hormones. What made
this one woman cause those hormones to boil when other women did
not even induce a simmer?

Will hoped Aurora remained unaware of his
lecherous feelings. Get yourself under control, Harrison. Three
years of celibacy is messing with your mind and body.Already this
shaped up to be a long day. Better get Lily over here as soon as
possible.

Aurora's voice brought him back to
consciousness, "If the phone lines are down may I use your cell
phone? Mine was one of yesterday's casualties. I dropped it as I
crossed this appalling bridge with the water roaring beneath
me."

"That must have been frightening. If it's
the bridge I'm thinking of there's no railing on the bridge."

"Yes, that's the one." Aurora shuddered at
the memory. "I crawled across it on my hands and knees, trying to
hold on to my phone and the flashlight while pushing my cases ahead
of me. When something large hit the bridge’s center support, I
almost fell over the side. Unfortunately, I dropped my phone as I
tried to retain my balance."

Will lifted the receiver of the wall phone
nearby and held it to his ear. Shaking his head, he returned the
receiver to its cradle. "We also need to alert the sheriff that you
left the car in case someone sees it and starts a search for you. I
talked with my family in Lubbock last night, so apparently it's
only the local rural phone lines that are out." Will wanted
something to think and talk about to take his mind off Aurora's
appearance and her scanty costume.

Aurora sighed heavily. "I suppose my little
car is ruined, isn't it?"

Will offered sympathy. "I'm afraid it'll be
a total loss, but that's just a guess. By now, it's probably mired
in several feet of sandy mud. With any luck it beached somewhere
before it reached the Brazos River." A frown furrowed his brow. "I
hope you have full insurance coverage."

"Yes, but I guess it'll take several days to
straighten out the paperwork and get my car replaced." Aurora
became pensive as she organized the reporting process in her
mind.

He grimaced. "I hate to be the bearer of
more bad tidings after the day you had yesterday. It could only
take a few days, but if we can't locate the car to substantiate the
claim or produce the car for salvage, it could take as long as a
month."

Her eyes widened as she registered the
impact of his statement. "A month? Oh, no! Hmm, well, I suppose I
could find a temporary job nearby," she said as if to herself.

She caught Will's surprised expression and
explained, "I've been traveling for four months now. When I want to
stay for more than a couple of days in an area, I get a job through
a temporary agency or a newspaper ad. Then I can enjoy sightseeing
without depleting my funds. Of course, it's easier to find that
sort of temporary work in a more urban setting."

She paused, then resolutely squared her
shoulders. "If I'm going to be in this area as long as a month
while waiting for my insurance company to replace my car, I might
as well get a temporary job."

Will tried to imagine her as teacher, or
maybe a nurse. "What sort of work do you do?"

"Well, my degrees are in marketing, but I've
been an accountant, a secretary or receptionist several times, a
file clerk, a substitute teacher, and even stuffed envelopes. The
longest I worked since I left home was four weeks for an accounting
firm in Dallas--income tax time, you know."

Will shook his head, "I guess I don't
understand. If you're working, you wouldn't be sightseeing. Why not
just stay a shorter time in a city and spend it sightseeing all
day?"

Aurora pushed a strand of hair from her
face, "I know it doesn't make sense to anyone but me. I have a
timetable worked out that allows me to travel until the end of
summer. Sometimes I extend my stay in an area to see if that's a
place I'd want to live and what sort of job opportunities there
might be in the field of marketing."

Aurora's playful smile sent Will's raging
hormones into orbit as she continued, "After all, I might not like
living in Durango, so I need a back-up location."

Incredulous, the words slipped out before he
realized it. "What on earth could your boyfriend have been thinking
to go along with this kind of scheme--letting you wander all over
the country alone?" He leaned with his elbows resting on the bar
and shook his head slowly.

She peered down at her hands to hide the
pain that question revived, then with a toss of her head she faced
Will, "Well, right now he's busy getting married to my cousin, so
he didn't seem to mind in the least the last time I saw him. That
was just before Christmas."

A surprised expression appeared on her face.
"Oh, wow. I haven't spoken of Russell to anyone in four months. I
must say I didn't intend to mention that part of my life ever
again."

Will grabbed her plate and stacked it on top
of his before he worked his way to the kitchen sink by edging along
the kitchen counter. "Your confidence is safe with me. I'm not
likely to tell anyone."

Muttering his thoughts aloud but under his
breath, Will said, "What kind of jerk is this guy? He must be deaf,
dumb, and blind, as well as just plain stupid."

Following him with her eyes, Aurora couldn't
understand the mumbling. Her eyes inventoried the things spread out
across the kitchen table. "Do you remember seeing any aspirin in
all this stuff?"

"No, but there's a bottle on the bedside
table from last night. Nick said you should spend the day in bed,
Aurora, to give your body time to recover from the traumas of last
night. That must have been quite a whack on the head you got from
the tree. If you'll get back in bed after you take the aspirin,
you'll find the phone on the table near my side of the bed."

Aurora flushed slightly at his phrasing. My
side of the bed. It sounded as if they always shared a bed. She
found it a pleasant thought, and the flush deepened. Remember your
resolve, girl, she thought as she watched Will leaning against the
kitchen counter. She had to admit he really made her pulse race
when he was near.

It's only that he's been kind, she thought.
She mustn't let her imagination get carried away. Anyway, the last
thing she needed was to complicate her life with a romance. She had
learned her lessons about men the hard way. Aloud, she said, "I
suppose we're trapped in here by the water?”

He added detergent to the water gathering in
the sink and dumped dishes into the water. "'Fraid so. According to
the radio, we had over ten inches of rain last night and will
probably get more today. It's a record amount of rain in that time
span, or so the announcer said. Can't remember the water being this
high before, so I guess he's right about this storm setting a
record."

"I can definitely believe that. I started
searching for a big ark." When he turned to wipe down the counter
and range top, Aurora saw his solemn face. "Oh, Will, I'm sorry.
Here I've been worried about my car and a few clothes and things. I
guess you must be frantic about your stock."

"Yes, and this cast doesn't help me get
around to see about them." He admitted his concern, but how could
he explain the frustration of being trapped by his cast? "My
foreman Bob Hankins has already been by here this morning. Bob, his
son Greg, and Raul Chapa are out on horseback now searching the
place over as much as they can with the water this high."

She sensed his frustration as she watched
his routine motions, feeling she watched a caged lion. "How long
will we be cut off by the flood?"

"Unless we get another downpour, the roads
will probably be open late today--tomorrow for sure." His attention
turned back to his guest as he let the soapsuds go down the drain
and turned his back on the draining dishes. "I'll check with the
sheriff when I call him about your car. In the meantime, you need
to be resting. Want another ice pack?"

The pounding in her head increased in
intensity. "No, but you're right about the bed. I really do need to
lie down now,"

As she slid off the bar stool, the pull of
the vinyl cover of the stool against her bare skin once again
reminded her that she wore only Will's pajama top. Where had her
good sense gone? She behaved totally unlike herself. It must be the
concussion.

She walked over to the table and closed her
briefcase. Carrying the briefcase, she walked as sedately as
possible back to the bedroom and crawled into bed. After covering
her legs she sank back onto the pillows with a sigh of relief. For
a few minutes she lay quietly to ease the pounding in her head,
then reluctantly sat back up in the bed to use the phone.

Her parents were just as upset as she had
feared they would be, even though she glossed over the loss of her
car, omitted most of her injuries, and carefully avoided any
mention of the encounter with the two would-be abductors. Her
father insisted on speaking with Will and apparently asked Will a
lot of questions. She wished she could have heard the questions,
especially when Will winked at her and laughed and then turned away
to give several of the answers to her father.

Her indignation rose. The nerve of Will,
trying to prevent her from overhearing his conversation with her
own father! By the time Will returned the receiver to her, however,
her father seemed greatly reassured.

Will sat on the side of the bed beside her
while he spoke on the phone, and he remained there after he
returned the phone to her. Again she reassured her parents that she
was all right and did not need either of them or her brothers to
come to her assistance.

When her mom asked for Will’s description,
Aurora sighed, knowing her mom was ready to pick out wedding
invitations the minute Aurora mentioned a man. “He’s short, fat,
and ugly as sin. Think Quasimodo.”

Will grimaced grotesquely and pretended to
be a hunchback and she had to turn away to keep from laughing.

Her mom wasn’t buying Aurora’s description.
“Okay, he’s six three or four, has gray eyes and sandy brown
hair...Yeah, a real hunk...About thirty to thirty-five.” Will held
up three fingers, so she added, “He says he’s thirty-three. Okay?
Is the Inquisition over?” She assured her mom she would continue on
her trip toward Colorado after remaining in the area only long
enough to settle her insurance claim. When she disconnected the
call, she gazed up to find Will giving her an assessing gaze.

"What?" she asked testily as she held out
her hand palm up in a questioning gesture. Pissed at being excluded
earlier, she’d like to know what her father had said that Will
found so humorous.

"You weren't exactly honest with your
parents, Aurora."

Sparks shot from emerald eyes. "I was
so...Oh...You mean lies by omission?" Aurora crossed her arms.
"They're somewhat overprotective. Even though the woman in Durango
who's selling her gift store is a friend of mother's, they wanted
me to stay in the Texas coast area."

She paused, heaved a great sigh, and
continued, "Since the break off of my engagement last December,
they think I must be having some sort of nervous breakdown to have
quit a great job and put everything on hold while I tour the
countryside." Her chin rose defensively again. "It would be
counterproductive to give them too many details and have them worry
even more when there's nothing to be gained by it."

He gently pushed a strand of errant hair
from her face. "And are you?"

She ran her hands over her hair, anchoring
each side behind an ear. "What? Oh, you mean am I having a nervous
breakdown? No, quite the opposite." Normally a very private person,
she realized with some surprise how much she wanted this man to
understand, even though no one else seemed to.

"I am determined to become an independent
businesswoman." Aurora paused

Will saw the wounded sheen in her eyes as
she fought to control her voice. His anger grew toward this Russell
guy as he heard the tremor in Aurora's voice. Her eyes glistened
with unshed tears.