Authors: Delores Fossen
Easier said than done.
His hair hurt.
He could feel every strand of it on his head. His eyelashes, too. Still, Logan forced himself from the bed, only to realize the soles of his feet hurt as well. It was hard not to identify something on him that didn't hurt so he quit naming parts and put on his boxers and jeans. Then, he had a look at what Julia had put in his pocket next to the box with the engagement ring.
A gold watch.
Not a modern one. It was old with a snap-up top that had a crest design on it. The initials BWS had been engraved in the center of the crest.
The inside looked just as expensive as the gold case except for the fact that the watch face crystal inside was shattered. Even though he knew little about antiques, Logan figured it was worth at least a couple of hundred dollars.
So, why had Julia put it in his pocket?
Since he was a skeptic, his first thought was that she might be trying to set him up, to make it look as if he'd robbed her. But Logan couldn't imagine why anyone would do that unless she was planning to try to blackmail him with it.
He dropped the watch on the bed and finished dressing, all the while staring at it. He cleared out some of the cotton in his brain and grabbed the hotel phone to call the front desk. Someone answered on the first ring.
“I'm in room...” Logan had to check the phone. “Two-sixteen, and I need to know...” He had to stop again and think. “I need to know if Julia is there in the lobby. She left something in the room.”
“No, sir. I'm afraid you just missed her. But checkout isn't until noon, and she said her guest might be staying past then so she paid for an extra day.”
“Uh, could you tell me how to spell Julia's last name? I need to leave her a note in case she comes back.”
“Oh, she said she wouldn't be coming back, that this was her goodbye party. And as for how to spell her name, well, it's Child, just like it sounds.”
Julia Child?
Right. Obviously, the clerk wasn't old enough or enough of a foodie to recognize the name of the famous chef.
“I don't suppose she paid with a credit card?” Logan asked.
“No. She paid in cash and then left a prepaid credit card for the second night.”
Of course. “What about an address?” Logan kept trying.
“I'm really not supposed to give that outâ”
“She left something very expensive in the room, and I know she'll want it back.”
The guy hemmed and hawed a little, but he finally rattled off, “221B Baker Street, London, England.”
That was Sherlock Holmes' address.
Logan groaned, cursed. He didn't bother asking for a phone number because the one she left was probably for Hogwarts. He hung up and hurried to the window, hoping he could get a glimpse of her getting into a car. Not that he intended to follow her or anything, but if she was going to blackmail him, he wanted to know as much about her as possible.
No sign of her, but Logan got a flash of something else. A memory.
Shit
.
They'd taken pictures.
Or at least Julia had with the camera on her phone. He remembered nude selfies of them from the waist up. At least he hoped it was from the waist up.
Yeah, that trip to hell in a handbasket was moving even faster right now.
Logan threw on the rest of his clothes, already trying to figure out how to do damage control. He was the CEO of a multi-million dollar company. He was the face that people put with the family business, and before last night he'd never done a thing to tarnish the image of McCord Cattle Brokers.
He couldn't say that any longer.
He was in such a hurry to rush out the door that he nearly missed the note on the desk. Maybe it was the start of the blackmail. He snatched it up, steeling himself up for the worst. But if this was blackmail, then Julia sure had a funny sense of humor.
“Goodbye, hot cowboy,” she'd written. “Thanks for the sweet send-off. Don't worry. What happens in San Antonio, stays in San Antonio. I'll take this to the grave.”
Copyright © 2016 by Delores Fossen
ISBN-13: 9781459294097
Lone Star Nights
Copyright © 2016 by Delores Fossen
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