Big Sky (2 page)

Normally Joe called her Ronnie like everybody else. He only pulled out the formal Ms.
Cason
when he was disappointed with her. Something in his demeanor grated on every indignant cell in her body—like he was being condescending because she was a woman, and he’d been proven right on her incompetence.

“I’m sorry. All right? I’ve got some personal stuff going on.” The quasi-apology took all her willpower to muster.

“What personal stuff?”

If she told Joe her financial situation, he might feel some pity and help her out, but either way it would be all over the office by noon.

“Never mind.”

“I’m going to have to let you go, Ronnie.” Now it was the more personal form of address, the name to soften the blow and make him sound like a good guy who was simply left with no other alternatives.

If it had been Sandy, she would have collapsed into tears and begged. She would have sandwiched some flirting in there somewhere, and she would have walked out with a better office. But Veronica couldn’t bring herself to play the helpless girl card. It offended everything inside her. She turned and headed for her office.

Her boss’s voice stopped her. “Don’t you have anything to say?”

“What should I say, Joe? I already said I was sorry. I’m not delving into my personal life with you. I’m not going to grovel or cry or scream at you like some petulant child. You’ve made your decision. I’m going to pack my desk if you don’t mind.”

“Give me anything, Ronnie. Any indication that things will get better, here. You’re brilliant when you want to be, but you isolate yourself. I can’t help you if you don’t let me.”

“I didn’t ask for help. Are you firing me or not?”

“You’ve left me no choice.”

“What about unemployment? Are you going to put it down that I was laid off or fired?”

“You know Human Resources won’t let me say you were laid off. They watch that stuff more closely now.”

“Fine.”

Thirty minutes later, she was sitting on the marble slab that encircled the fountain in front of Brampton and Simmons. With her back to the building and her box of things in her hands—a fake plant, a book, and a handful of nice fountain pens—it was finally safe to cry. Since the sky had betrayed her again, opening to allow rain to pour down, she could do it with a small amount of privacy even in public.

She was so lost in her own misery that she didn’t realize she wasn’t alone until the dark brown cowboy boots were only a few inches away from her.

She scooted away. “What do you want?”

“Lose your job?”

“Well, look at the box and the pathetic girl crying in the rain. Figure it out, genius.”

“You’re rude.”

“Another brilliant observation,” she said. “You’ll make it great in the big city.”

The rain came down harder. The cowboy stood tall and steady in the downpour as if he were part of the elements and silly things like weather couldn’t touch him.

“Let me buy you a cup of coffee.”

Had he been lurking and waiting for her? “Why? Do you get off on being yelled at?” Just what she needed. One of
those
freaks.

In answer, he offered a hand to help her stand. It was a public place. And anyway, if he killed her, that might be a step up from the current situation. She had no idea what she was going to do. She’d considered bankruptcy—assuming she could afford the fees to file. But that was out now. It would make it that much harder to find another job, if anybody in the industry even wanted her now. She’d hopped from job to job over the past few years burning bridges with abandon. There might not be any left for her to walk across.

Veronica threw her box of things in the trash on the way to the diner. None of it had sentimental value, and it was all ruined anyway. She tried not to wince or scream at him as he led her inside, his hand resting at the small of her back like he was calling dibs on her and wanted to warn away all other males.

There were no other males in the diner—just the cook, whose name she didn’t know.

A familiar waitress came out and led them to a booth. “Oh sweetie, you look like a drowned sewer rat.”

“Thanks,” Veronica said.

“Let me get you a towel to dry off.”

Marlboro man looked somewhat drenched himself, but she didn’t offer him a towel, nor did he seem to care for one. It was possible Veronica was a lot more pathetic-looking than she thought.

“I’m Luke,” he said, after he’d ordered them some coffee and Veronica was seated in the booth with a towel wrapped around her.

There was a long pause where she couldn’t think what to say. He probably wasn’t going to kill her in the middle of the diner.

“Ronnie, is it? Is that short for something?” he finally asked. He must have heard Sandy say her name that morning.

“V-Veronica.” It was the chill from the rain that had made her stutter. Or that was the story she was going with. She couldn’t bring herself to be nasty to him again after he’d bought her a cup of coffee. This was the kind of thinking that got women lured into the middle of nowhere and killed.

“The reason I brought you in for coffee is that I have a ranch in Vermont. I could always use another hand out there.”

She looked up, startled. He really
did
plan to lure her to the middle of nowhere. With the way he’d watched her earlier that morning with Sandy, there was no way in hell. “I’m sorry, what?”

“It’s not advertising with a slick office, but it comes with room and board.”

Images of being kept prisoner by him in some barn filled her head. She tried not to be aroused by those images. Now wasn’t the time for those thoughts. It wouldn’t play out like her fantasies. He was just so attractive, it was hard not to think those thoughts.

“I’ll be fine. I’m really more of a city girl.”

“I make you uncomfortable.”

She made a face. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Veronica jumped when he went for his wallet, and he arched a brow. That eyebrow had a mind and life of its own.

He unfolded the smooth leather and slid an ivory business card across the table. The font was Palatino Linotype—classy, and not at all what she’d expect from a Rancher. She wondered if he’d picked it himself or if someone named Kimberly or Tiffany had suggested it. The ink was in burnt umber. There was a crude image—almost like a stencil—of a G with steer horns coming out of it—also in the brown ink. In the middle of the ivory rectangle were the words:
Granger Ranch, Luke Granger, owner.
An address and phone number were in the lower left, along with a website.

For the briefest moment, Veronica pretended she’d take his offer and that he wasn’t potentially dangerous. The business card painted a nice, peaceful scene far from the stress of the city.

“The guys convinced me to take a much-needed vacation, so I’ll be here til the end of next week. You can call me if you change your mind. That number is my cell. I always have it on me.”

“I don’t think I will.” She slid the card back in his direction.

He shrugged. “Suit yourself. Keep the card. I got a bulk discount.” He laid some money on the table and walked out of the diner.

The waitress sat two cups of coffee down on the table. “Is he coming back?”

“Probably not,” Veronica said, unsure if she was relieved or disappointed.

“Shame. He’s a fine looking cowboy. He could ride me any day.”

It seemed to be the sentiment of the day.

***

Veronica sat at the kitchen table with her pile of bills, credit cards, and a bowl of Ramen noodles, keenly aware of how close to nothing she was. Between the bad economy and her colorful job history, her industry as a whole seemed to have decided they were no longer buying what she was selling. Even crappy jobs outside her industry were in short supply these days. Moving to a new city required money she didn’t have, so that was out.

Being confronted with the reality of her finances and job prospects in such short order was bracing to say the least.

Luke’s business card sat to the side. It reminded her of a famous short story:
“The Lady or the Tiger” by Frank Stockton.
The only thing she remembered of the story was that a man was presented with two doors. Behind one of them was a beautiful woman who presumably he would take as his wife. Behind the other was a tiger that would maul him to death.

The Rancher’s offer felt like that kind of choice. She could choose to stay in the city and try to put her life back together. She could end up pulling it together and having a happy ending, or as a prostitute in an alleyway strung out on heroin. Similarly, if she went with Luke, she could end up safe and happy or in a hole in the ground. It was impossible to know which choice would result in her death, but she felt certain one of them would.

Her credit cards were laid out in a row, ready to be put in the appropriate pile:
maxed out
or usable. Given her current predicament, all maxed cards would have to be cut up, the others she’d have to live on sparingly, along with her last paycheck, until she could work something else out. She stacked her most current credit card statements in the order the cards were in.

“Maxed out, maxed out, maxed out, maxed out, usable, maxed out, maxed out, usable, usable, Victoria’s Secret...” Victoria’s Secret wasn’t maxed, but it had to go in the maxed pile. A card to a lingerie store couldn’t feed her—or actually it could, but she wasn’t about to go down that road. “maxed out, maxed out, maxed out.” The rest were department store cards which suffered the same unfortunate drawback of Victoria’s Secret.

Even with her income, it shouldn’t have been possible for her to acquire so many credit cards. And yet here she was: five Visas, four Mastercards, one Discover card, three American Express cards, and all the rest. Three cards were still usable. One Mastercard and two Visas. Each card had less than two hundred dollars available. She had one paycheck coming in two days and a final check in two weeks. A little under five thousand dollars to her name after taxes, including credit cards. Even if they weren’t maxed, she’d have to get rid of the American Express. The annual fees were too much on top of everything else.

Veronica cut up the bad cards, but rationalized keeping the store cards. After all, if she had no apartment, there was only so much she could carry with her. People needed clothes. She felt like a fugitive. She wouldn’t be able to get an apartment even as nice as the one she was in without proof of current employment. And if she dropped to the next level down, she might as well be the heroin-addicted whore in the alley.

Chapter Two

A week and a half later found her in a deserted park looking like a bag lady. She’d had to be forcibly removed from her apartment. She’d been to all the employment agencies, but the only things available—she was overqualified for. What did that even mean? If you could do more, couldn’t you just as easily do less and take the pay cut?

She’d ended up taking only a couple of bags of personal belongings; paying for storage would only get her in a soup kitchen line sooner. She’d thought about selling her stuff on eBay, but the logistics of running an online store from a cheap hotel room while she was running out of money stopped her. She’d be robbed blind if she brought most of that stuff to where she was currently staying, anyway.

It was only a matter of time before the money ran out, and she didn’t want to think about what would happen then.

“Ronnie?”

Veronica looked up to see Luke standing in front of her, as physically appealing as ever, while she was doing a great impersonation of a homeless person. She knew she looked like a deer in headlights. There was no other way to look. This wasn’t a public place. Technically it was, but the public was out doing other things. She and the cowboy were alone.

He sighed. “It’s only been a few days. What could have gone this far south in that period of time? Surely you have savings, friends, family... ?”

She didn’t want to give him any information but she was sure the expression on her face answered all of his questions. He sat beside her on the bench, and she inched away, trying not to be obvious about it.

“Has somebody hurt you? Is that why you’re scared of me?”

“No. You’re a stranger. And we’re alone. Isn’t that enough?” She left off the part about him watching her, and probably following her, and all the creepy pieces that added up to freaking her out. It was more than a little weird that he was pursuing her like this, offering her a job when she had zero experience of anything that wasn’t in a city.

“Maybe,” he said, unconvinced. “Anyway, I want to show you something.”

She jumped again when he reached in his pocket, but all he came out with was a phone. “I want to show you the ranch. We just set up the website last week. Would you like to see it? Maybe you could help keep it updated.”

Veronica nodded slowly, not liking the way she was being pulled into his trap one answer and small capitulation at a time. He pulled the site up and handed her the phone. The sun began to set, and she was uncomfortably aware of that fact. It would be dark soon. She needed to get away from him and back to her room and the small bit of safety life still afforded her.