Fortune's Heirs: Reunion: Her Good Fortune / A Tycoon in Texas / In a Texas Minute

No, that was a bit harsh, he thought. He had to give the woman her due. Talking to her, he’d come away with the feeling that although she seemed bullheaded, she also seemed to have something on the ball.

He’d done a little poking around into her background, looking into her past business dealings. From all appearances, she had done well in Denver. And there was every indication that she would have continued to do well had she remained there.

But she’d chosen to move back to Texas and start over again. Why?

Was it just to get away from an ex-husband and come home, or something else? Were there memories that haunted her, causing her to leave?

He could understand that. When Ann had died so suddenly, leaving him in an emotional abyss, he’d almost dropped out. He’d found himself unable to deal with seeing her face everywhere he went, remembering the times they’d spent together. It had been hell. If he hadn’t had only one semester to go and his father hadn’t been so persuasive, he might very well have just given in to his desire to become a beach bum.

Who was he kidding? He was far too much of a type A personality to be content sipping drinks out of a hollowed-out coconut shell and make that his life’s preoccupation.

So why had Gloria decided to suddenly uproot everything and start all over again? That was something he hadn’t been able to find out. He didn’t believe she’d just wanted to come home again. You went where the money was.

Reaching her shop, he saw that the glass doors no longer afforded a view of the interior. There was paper taped to the inside to keep passersby from looking in. Given her personality, he found that somewhat unusual. She struck him as someone who enjoyed an audience.

Jack tried the door and it gave.

Leaving the door unlocked was more like her, he mused. The next moment the realization that he thought himself familiar enough with the woman to be able to second-guess her stopped him in his tracks. He had no idea what she was capable of, he silently insisted.

Slipping inside, he saw that rather than a team of people, there was only one worker around, a slender youth bending over a can of paint, preparing to pour the contents into a paint tray. He had on a cap, pulled down low, and there was periwinkle-blue paint drizzled all over his coveralls.

The other workers were probably on a break, taking advantage of the woman, he decided. Good thing he’d decided to show up. Apparently she only knew how to order around one person at a time.

Coming up behind the youth, he addressed the painter’s back. “Excuse me, do you know where I can find Gloria Johansen?”

Startled, the painter swung around. The radio was turned on and although the music was soft, it had obviously masked any noise he might have made entering the store.

A grin flashed and he recognized it instantly. “What’s it worth to you?”

He scowled. Up close, he noticed the figure, even in coveralls, was pretty curvy. “Gloria.”

She set down the roller and laughed as she picked up a towel to dry her hands. “And here I thought you didn’t recognize me.”

He wished she’d stop smiling. It was infinitely more difficult hanging on to his annoyance with her smiling at him like that. “What are you doing?”

She pretended to consider the question. “Well, let’s see. Coveralls, paint, roller—I’ll take a wild stab at it and say I’m painting.”

“I know you’re painting.” He bit the words off. “Why are you painting?”

“Because I’m good at it,” she answered glibly, her eyes twinkling as she added in a hushed, amused tone, “And—and you’ll like this part,” she assured him, placing a hand on his wrist to keep him in place, a move that was far too familiar for his liking. “Because I can save money doing it myself.”

His frown only deepened, as did his annoyance. And yet part of him admired her enthusiasm. Not that he’d ever admit that, of course. “Don’t you have other things to do?”

“Lots,” she said. “And this was supposed to be going faster, but my brother dropped out on me.” She looked at him and obviously decided that he needed more information. “Jorge was supposed to come by to help but he was distracted at the last minute.”

He swore that every third sentence out of her mouth was an enigma. He needed a codebook to understand what she was saying. “Distracted?”

Her tone was resigned, forgiving. “I’m afraid that my brother’s libido is larger than his sense of responsibility when it come to promises he makes to his little sister.” Gloria moved her shoulders in a careless shrug beneath the coarse coveralls. “Maybe it’s for the best. He can be rather sloppy.” And then her eyes lit up again and she looked at him as though suddenly seeing him for the first time. He felt as if he was watching the birth of an idea. “You, on the other hand, would probably do an excellent job.”

He caught on before the sentence was out of her mouth. “If you’re trying to go all Tom Sawyer on me, I’m afraid it’s not going to work.” There were a hundred things he would do before agreeing to pick up a paintbrush or a roller.

Undaunted, she pressed on. He had a feeling that other than tight spaces, very little daunted this woman.

“As I recall, Tom Sawyer pretended he was having so much fun that the other boys begged him to let them try their hand at it and even offered to trade things for the privilege of whitewashing his aunt Polly’s fence.” She opened her eyes wide, the very picture of innocence. A picture he wasn’t buying. “I wouldn’t presume to try to suck you into doing something with a lie.”

She was a clever woman. Was she being transparent on purpose? “No, you’d use flattery.”

The innocent expression remained intact. “No way. Just observation. You’re a type A personality. You believe in being hands-on and you need to oversee everything yourself. People like that are too intense not to be good. Am I right?”

He watched in fascination as the smile on her lips blossomed and subsequently moved into her eyes. He supposed it wasn’t only Irish eyes, as the old song went, that smiled, but dark, mesmerizing Mexican ones, as well.

He found he had to force words to his lips. “I’ve never painted anything in my life.”

She nodded, as though expecting him to say as much. He felt as if he was involved in some kind of cosmic chess game.

“It’s not hard, really. You just put paint on the roller.” She picked one up to demonstrate, moving the roller up and down in the paint tray. “These rollers don’t allow you to drip and they absorb just the right amount to cover a given space.” She raised her eyes to his face. “You almost can’t fail.”

The look in her eyes dared him.

He found part of himself actually entertaining the idea and wondered if the paint fumes were getting to him. In the background he heard Blondie singing “‘I’m gonna getcha, getcha, getcha…’”

“I’ll get my suit dirty,” Jack continued.

She spread her hands to her sides. “Not a problem. I’ve an extra set of coveralls.” She nodded over to the side.

He didn’t bother looking to verify. For the moment, she had captivated his attention. He told himself he could walk away anytime he chose. So, for the time being, he chose to remain.

“You come prepared.”

“They were for Jorge.” Her eyes slid slowly from his head to his toes. Her smile widened as a tinge of triumph highlighted it. “I’d say that you were about his height, give or take an inch.”

“How convenient.” Maybe this woman could have shown old Tom Sawyer a trick or two, he thought, amused despite himself.

Her smile warmed him as it washed over him. “Yes, isn’t it? They’re in the back room if you feel like trying them on.”

He didn’t move an inch. “And why would I want to do that?”

Her answer came without hesitation. The space between them, he noted, seemed to have been whittled down to nothing without either of them taking another step.

“So that you can conquer something else,” she told him.

He wasn’t altogether sure if she was talking about painting or if “something else” referred to a whole different subject entirely. All he knew was that the chemistry that seemed to act up every time he got within ten feet of her was present as always.

She stood waiting for his answer. Her expression indicated that she was rather certain of the outcome. He knew he should just turn on his heel and walk out. That would have been the smart thing to do. After all, he didn’t like the smell of paint and he was far too busy a man to waste his time dipping a roller into a tray of periwinkle-blue liquid.

Finally, with a shrug, he turned away from her. But instead of heading for the papered doors, he walked in the opposite direction, toward the back.

So he’d try something new, he told himself.