“Dale… He’s—he’s gonnnnne!” More sobbing. “He left meeeeee!”
Piper squinted at Dancie’s eyes and added a little more shading to one. “Did he leave you and your money or just you?”
Hiccup. “Wh-what do you mean?”
“You gave him the money, didn’t you?”
“He needed it!”
“They always do.” Piper didn’t want to deal with this right now, which is why she hadn’t answered her phone.
“But—it was for his motorcycle! He couldn’t very well get to his job without his bike, could he?”
“He has a job? That’s different.”
Dancie winced.
“Yes, he does! In Wichita Falls.”
Piper glanced at the office wall clock. Taking the phone, she handed Dancie the denim skirt and a pair of flats. Dancie was clearly feeling guilty, because she put them on without protest.
“Are you in Wichita Falls now?” Piper asked.
“No—I’m in Lubbock. Dale was going to send for me when he found us a place to live.”
Piper closed her eyes and shook her head. “And he hasn’t sent for you.”
Sniff. “No.”
“And you haven’t heard from him.”
“That’s why I called the construction company! I thought maybe he’d been in an accident and was unconscious and—”
“They’d never heard of him.” Same thing over and over again. Her mother never learned.
Sobbing.
Pointing to the clock, Dancie slipped around Piper and closed and unplugged her laptop.
“I thought he loved me!”
“You always think that,” Piper said quietly. “How much, Mom?”
“Wh—That’s—”
“I’m in a hurry. I’ve got a meeting in a few minutes. Do you have any money left at all? Or did he take you for everything?”
“Penelope Ann Scott! Don’t you talk—”
Piper took her mother off speaker. “Tell me how much you need and where to send it.”
When she ended the call, Dancie was trying to sneak out the door. “I’m so sorry, Piper. I never would have answered the phone—”
“Forget it.” Piper planned to. Until the next time. “Put on the jacket.”
“But it’s pink,” Dancie said with heavy loathing.
“Blush khaki,” Piper corrected.
“If I were the khaki, I’d blush, too.”
“You wear pink.” Piper indicated Dancie’s tank.
“I got it at a breast-cancer awareness walkathon.”
Piper slipped the jacket over her shoulders. “And now, it’s complemented by the jacket.” It was a lucky break that Dancie was wearing that particular tank top today.
Dancie set her computer and folder down and put on the jacket. “I’m only wearing this because I feel horrible about answering the phone.”
“I know,” Piper said. “But I’ll take it—because you look great!” She gave Dancie a thumbs-up and followed her through the doorway.
“I didn’t realize you were still sending your mom money,” Dancie said as they started down the stairs.
“You have your mother issues and I have mine,” Piper said. “But right now, we need to concentrate on the meeting and getting you made partner.”
“Deal,” Dancie said. And then, “Oh, sh—”
“Language!” Piper cautioned with a laugh.
“—oot!” Dancie finished. “Shoot, shoot, shoot!”
They were at the final turn of the staircase and Dancie was staring across the foyer at the conference table in the old dining room.
Piper followed her gaze and saw the blue-eyed limper from earlier. “Okay, who is that guy?”
“Seriously?” Dancie asked.
“Yeah, why? I ran into him earlier.”
Dancie gave her a strange look. “And you didn’t recognize him?”
“Well…” As they reached the bottom of the stairs, Piper glanced into the room again. “I thought he seemed vaguely familiar, but honestly? All guys are beginning to look alike to me.”
“If all men look like that to you, then you’re working too hard.” Dancie nodded her head in his direction. “That’s Mark Banning, Travis’s star columnist, his big moneymaker.”
There was something more … Piper couldn’t quite remember.
“Oh, come on, Piper! The big-deal foreign journalist who got himself captured last year?”
“Right!” Finally, she made the connection.
“And the only reason I beat Travis in revenue is because Mark got injured. He’s been teaching a journalism course at UT instead of wowing all Travis’s readers with his insane adventures.”
Mark got injured … Now Piper remembered. It had been all over the news. Dramatic rescue and so on. Video clips of the photogenic Mark Banning had run incessantly, including one of him waving from a stretcher, bloodstained bandage wrapped around his thigh—right about where his hand had gripped it earlier, if Piper wasn’t mistaken. Ah.
Dancie exhaled. “I thought I had another quarter before I had to compete with him again.” She headed for the conference room. “Well, if Mark’s back, that must mean his leg has healed.”
“Or maybe not,” Piper murmured beneath her breath. Mark Banning had been stateside for months. If his leg was still that sensitive, then it most certainly had not fully healed.
As they walked into the room, Piper glanced at the famous Mark Banning and found him studying her in a way that meant Travis had filled him in on her identity. Not that either of them would ever have anything to do with the other— unless Mark needed dating tips. Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen. The only tip he’d need was how to fend off women, something at which he’d no doubt had a lot of practice.
He stood by the sideboard and sipped coffee, his other hand, left and ringless, for what that was worth, rested on the back of a swivel club chair. Long and lean in a leather jacket, surrounded by a cloud of confidence and testosterone. An alpha-alpha, the pinnacle of male desirability. Men wanted to be him. Women just wanted him.
Not even Piper was immune, although she had no intention of treating Mark Banning with anything other than clinical detachment.
A double-alpha male was a lot of trouble. Not only would his woman have to fight to catch him, she’d have to fight off other females to keep him. This type of man lived as though the world revolved around him because it usually did. He didn’t become a part of your life, he drew you into his.
Piper would never recommend a double-alpha male for anything long-term unless a woman was a double alpha herself. And if she was, she’d hardly be a client of Piper’s. The only other kind of woman for a man like that was the completely self-sacrificing type who was willing to devote her life to enhancing his—and willing to look the other way when she had to.
Believe it or not, there were women like that in the world. More power to them.
Looking