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Meg couldn’t argue with that. She’d never been loved so thoroughly, so unselfishly. It was as if he’d memorized all the sex manuals ever written—something, she realized, he was perfectly capable of having done. No wonder he was a legend. He knew exactly how to drive a woman to her maximum sexual pleasure.
So why was she so disappointed?
Chapter Twelve
The club was closed the next day because of the holiday, so Meg did her laundry, then headed out to the cemetery to attack weeds with a couple of rusty tools she’d found near what was left of the storage shed. As she cleared some of the oldest headstones, she tried not to obsess too much about Ted, and when her cell rang, she didn’t even take his call, although she couldn’t resist listening to his message. An invitation to dinner Friday night at the Roustabout. Since Sunny and Spence would undoubtedly be part of their dining party, she didn’t return the call.
She should have known it wouldn’t be that easy to discourage him. Around three, he pulled up in his powder blue truck. Considering the way the town’s females primped for him, she was happy with her dirt-streaked arms, bare legs, and the tight-fitting Longhorns T-shirt she’d rescued from the trash bin in the ladies’ locker room, then modified by chopping off its sleeves and neckband. All in all, she looked just the way she wanted to.
As he stepped out of the cab, a couple of indigo buntings perched in the box elders burst into joyous song. She shook her h
ead in disbelief. He wore a baseball cap and another in his seemingly endless wardrobe of broken-in shorts—these were tan chinos—along with an equally broken-in green T-shirt sporting a faded Hawaiian print. How did he manage to make whatever haphazard piece of crap he’d tossed on that morning look like high fashion?
The memory of last night intruded, all those embarrassing moans and humiliating demands. To compensate, she came out swinging. “If you’re not planning to take off your clothes, you’re dead to me.”
“You California women are too damned aggressive.” He gestured toward the cemetery. “I send a maintenance crew out here once a month to clean up. You don’t have to do that.”
“I like being outside.”
“For a spoiled Hollywood brat, you have some unusual ways of entertaining yourself.”
“It beats hauling your clubs around.” She pulled off her baseball cap and swiped at her sweaty forehead with the back of a grimy arm. Her messy curls fell in her eyes and stuck to the back of her neck. She needed a haircut, but she didn’t want to part with the money. “I’m not going to the Roustabout with you on Friday. Too many Skipjacks.” She slammed her cap back on. “Besides, the less time we spend together in public, the better.”
“I never said they’d be there.”
“You didn’t say they wouldn’t, either, and I’ve had more than enough of them both.” She was hot, cranky, and determined to be disagreeable. “Be honest, Ted. This whole thing with the golf resort . . . Do you really want to let the Skipjacks ruin another natural area just so more idiots can knock around a stupid white ball? You already have the country club. Isn’t that enough? I know about the benefits to the local economy, but don’t you think somebody, like maybe the mayor, should think about the long-term impact?”
“You’re getting to be a real pain in the ass.”
“As opposed to being an ass-kisser?”
She’d genuinely angered him, and he stalked back to his truck. But instead of tearing off in a huff, he jerked open the passenger door. “Get in.”
“I’m not exactly dressed for an outing.”
“The only person you’ll see is me, which is a good thing, because you look like hell and I’m guessing you smell worse.”
She was glad he’d noticed. “Is your truck air-conditioned?”
“Find out for yourself.”
She wasn’t going to pass up a mystery outing so she could hang around here pulling weeds. Still, she took her time meandering toward the truck. As she climbed inside, she noticed a missing dashboard, some odd-looking controls, and a couple of circuit boards mounted in what had once been a glove compartment.
“Don’t touch those wires,” he said as he slid behind the wheel, “unless you want to get electrocuted.”
Naturally, she touched them, which made him surly. “I might have been telling the truth,” he said. “You didn’t know for sure.”
“I like living on the edge. It’s a California thing. Besides, I’ve noticed that ‘truth’ is a flexible word around here.” As he slammed the door, she poked a grimy fingernail toward a series of dials near the steering wheel. “What are those?”
“Controls for a solar-powered air-conditioning system that doesn’t work like I want it to.”
“Great,” she grumbled. “That’s just great.” As he pulled away from the church, she inspected a small screen set between the seats. “What’s this?”
“The prototype for a new kind of navigation system. It’s not working right, either, so keep your mitts off it, too.”
“Is there anything in this truck that does work?”
“I’m pretty happy with my latest hydrogen fuel cell.”
