Wildcatter's Woman Read online

  Race appeared to watch her until she was out of his sight, then slowly closed the door and turned. Vanessa was trembling with some violent emotion that she refused to name. It darkened her eyes to a deep purple that glittered with angry sparks.

  “A friend of yours?” Her voice was cloyingly sweet, sugar laced heavily with arsenic.

  “Now, how did you guess?” he mocked. “I’d offer you a beer, but I know you hate the stuff. And I don’t keep wine on hand. I’ve developed a strong aversion to it—and to women who like it.”

  It was a stab at her, since wine was usually the only alcoholic beverage she drank. She winced inwardly at the sharp sting of rejection. Why did he still have the power to hurt her?

  “It’s obvious that Marie likes beer.” The sharp edge stayed in her voice, despite her attempt to sound indifferent. Vanessa swung her gaze away from Race, fighting to keep the cool mask in place and hide the churning conflict within. “How nice that you share the same taste.”

  “That’s more than you and I could say—on just about everything.” There was a deliberately unkind note of derisive amusement in his reply. “I like my beer, and you won’t drink anything but wine. I’m happy with boiled shrimp, while you want oysters Rockefeller. The list is endless, so rather than continue in that ‘happy’ vein, I’ll just go take my shower and change. I’d suggest that you make yourself comfortable, but I know this place isn’t up to your standards.”

  For the first time, Vanessa took a really close look at the apartment and its furnishings. Ignoring the surface clutter of discarded clothes, beer bottles, unemptied ashtrays, and scattered trade journals and newspapers, it had all the personality of a hotel room. It was colorless and lifeless.

  “It hardly matters, since I don’t have to live here,” she retorted, giving the answer he expected to hear.

  “It doesn’t look like much,” Race admitted without apology. “But the rent’s cheap and it came furnished. It’s just a place to sleep.”

  “That’s all you ever wanted,” Vanessa accused in a burst of bitterness. “A place to sleep, and a woman to bed whenever the urge struck you. With Marie just across the hall, now you have both.”

  His expression became complacently aloof as he regarded her with lazy interest. “You sound just like the wronged woman, Vanessa.” It was the first time he’d spoken her name, and it curled around her throat. “You divorced me. Remember?” Race taunted, one corner of his mouth lifting.

  She whirled away from him, something shattering inside and releasing a torrent of pain. “It was probably the only intelligent thing I’ve ever done.” But she had to force the assertion past the huge lump in her throat. “Hadn’t you better take your shower?” Her control was slipping away fast.

  “Yeah.” It was a tired reply, weighted by the heaviness of resignation.

  Shutting her eyes tightly, Vanessa listened to the sound of his footsteps as he walked to the inner door leading to the bedroom and private bath. A broken sigh came from her throat when the door was closed behind him. She opened her eyes wide and took several deep breaths to stop the shaking inside.

  There were sounds of Race moving about in the next room, dresser drawers being opened and closed. Too on edge to remain stationary, Vanessa went first to a window, intending to open and let some fresh air into the stuffy apartment, but it refused to budge.

  Frustrated, she turned back to the room, her glance sweeping its contents. She twisted her fingers together, a nervous ball of energy. Waiting gave her too much time to think about the past. And she didn’t want to venture over old ground.

  Work had always proved to be the best distraction, so she crossed to a water-ringed end table where a black telephone sat. But when she picked up the receiver to dial the shop, the line was dead. Obviously it had been disconnected, even though the phone hadn’t been removed. In irritation, Vanessa slammed the receiver onto its cradle.

  The none-too-sturdy end table wobbled under the force of it. An empty beer bottle fell onto the floor. Vanessa automatically picked it up, and another one that was sitting near it. She spied a tall wastebasket in the kitchen area and deposited the bottles in it.

  From that point, her actions became purely instinct as she gathered up the rest of the beer bottles scattered about the room and emptied the overflowing ashtrays. She stacked all the petroleum trade journals in a pile on the coffee table and threw out the old newspapers.

  The shower was running when she picked up the lipstick-laden glass and carried it to the sink. It was the same shade of red lipstick that sexy Marie had been wearing. Vanessa took perverse note of another glass in the sink that had pink lipstick on it. It seemed ridiculous to be glad that Marie had competition.

  Leaving the red-stained glass with the other dirty dishes in the sink, she went back to the living area of the room and began picking up the dirty clothes left lying about. A plaid workshirt was draped over the back of the dark green sculptured couch. Vanessa added it to the armful of other clothes before she noticed another article of clothing had been accidentally hidden by the shirt.

  For a split second she was paralyzed by a shooting pain that rocked her whole body. Tentatively she reached for the pair of women’s nylon panty hose. The instant her fingertips touched the sheer fabric, her nails curled into it like the claws of a cat. She wanted to scream at the top of her lungs, and clamped her teeth tightly shut so she couldn’t.

  The connecting room from the bedroom swung open, its turning click resounding through the room. Vanessa realized that she couldn’t hear the shower running and pivoted as Race entered the apartment’s main room.

  The springing thickness of his hair had an ebony sheen, curling damply from the shower spray. Its wetness seemed to intensify the dark brown of his eyes and the bronze luster of his tan. Vanessa recognized the gray silk shirt as one that she had bought him for his birthday. It had been one of the last happy occasions they’d had together. Her heart was squeezed by the knowledge that she was standing there with another woman’s nylons in her hand.

  Race glanced at the pile of dirty clothes in her arm, then made a small sweep of the room, minus its previous clutter. There was a mocking curl to his mouth.

  “The proverbial woman’s touch,” he murmured. “I should have known you couldn’t resist it.”

  “Please don’t try to insinuate that other women haven’t left their little ‘touches’ in your apartment.” It hurt to speak, the rasping ache making her voice come out husky. “Or maybe you don’t classify this as decoration?”

  She tossed the tightly wadded ball of ladies’ nylons in his direction. They floated to the floor midway between them. Race walked casually over and picked them up, holding them loosely in his hand.

  Feeling that she was somehow betraying herself, Vanessa dropped the armload of clothes onto the floor. “The next time Marie pops over to borrow a cup of sugar, you’ll have to remember to return them to her,” she suggested with fake indifference.

  “It might prove awkward, since she insists she’s allergic to them. She swears she doesn’t own a pair,” Race taunted, subtly making it clear that they belonged to someone else.

  “You always were very good at remembering little details. It was just the big things you forgot,” she flared.

  Her hands were clenched into rigid fists at her side as Vanessa trembled with the force of her jealousies. It was a cruel truth. She was insanely jealous of the owner of those nylons, and furious, too, with Race for taunting her with the knowledge that there were many others willing to take her place. She averted her head and stared at the floor, breathing with difficulty. Her peripheral vision warned her of Race’s approach.

  “I do believe it bothers you to find some other woman’s nylons in my apartment,” he mused.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Vanessa snapped. “I couldn’t care less.”

  His fingers gripped her chin in a punishing hold and forced her to turn her head and look at him. She knew her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were s
himmering. He noted both facts with satisfaction.

  “Yes, you’re jealous,” Race stated with a slow nod. “You don’t want me, but neither do you want me to have the pleasure of some other woman. That’s very selfish of you, Vanessa, but you always were selfish.”

  “That’s not true,” she denied.

  “You still can’t see it, can you?” he murmured cynically. “I’d be gone four or five days, and when I’d come home, all I wanted was to be with you, but you wanted me to take you to some party. It didn’t matter what I wanted.”

  “You always wanted the same thing,” she accused.

  The corners of his mouth deepened in a smile, but the light in his eyes hardened. “Sex. You still can’t say the word, can you?” Race mocked, and deliberately lowered his gaze to her breasts, straining now in agitation against the thin fabric of her blouse. He knew how it disturbed her when he looked at her with such intimate knowledge. “You have an exciting body, Vanessa, but you were always afraid to enjoy it.”

  “Stop it,” she hissed desperately.

  “I think I got tired of constantly having to fight all of your inhibitions,” he decided, as if he had just reached that conclusion.

  “You’re implying that I’m frigid—and I’m not,” Vanessa protested.

  “No, you’re not,” Race agreed with a mild shake of his head. He let go of her chin to curve his hand along the side of her neck and run his thumb over her jaw-line. “You can be very passionate—as long as it’s the right time and the right place. But if it isn’t ten o’clock at night and you aren’t in the bedroom, then making love is out of the question as far as you’re concerned.”

  “I wanted to be more than just your sex partner,” she insisted in self-defense. “I wanted to be treated as your wife. Marriage is more than a license to make love, but that’s all ours was. You weren’t interested in a home or a family—”

  “Considering the way it turned out, it’s a damned good thing we didn’t have any kids, isn’t it?” Race challenged. “Your memory may be faulty, but mine isn’t. As I recall, you were the one who didn’t want to have a baby right away.”

  “That’s because we couldn’t afford it, Race,” Vanessa reminded him.

  His mouth thinned. “Which is another way of saying that you didn’t trust me to provide for us.”

  “Could you?” She was stung into retaliating by the contempt in his voice. The glitter of hard amethyst was in the darting glance she gave his apartment. “Is this an example of how you would have provided for us?”

  The hand on her neck tightened as he hooked an arm around her waist and yanked her against him with brute force. It stole the wind from her lungs and sent a clamor of alarm through her senses. The length of her body was crushed against his unyielding male form while her head was forced back. The chiseled angles and planes of his face wore the harshness of anger. Vanessa knew she had gone too far, indirectly insulting his manhood, but the things he’d said had hurt her, and she had wanted to strike back. His eyes narrowed dangerously on her face.

  “I went through hell with you once,” Race muttered on a savage breath. “And I don’t give a damn what you think of this place… or the women I entertain. And, yes, it’s women in the plural. I am a man, although you tried your damnedest to change me into something else.”

  “I didn’t,” she whispered, intending to add “not intentionally,” but Race didn’t give her the chance.

  “Like hell you didn’t,” he snarled, and roughly pushed her away from him, to stand rigidly. “No more,” he said thickly. “Never again am I going to let you tie me into knots until I’m nearly crazy.”

  She numbly moved her head from side to side in a mute denial, but Race didn’t take any notice. The tension in the air was so high that Vanessa could almost hear the static crackle of it. Then there was a sudden mocking slant of his mouth.

  “I thought I was over you. My God, that’s a laugh,” he declared with self-derisive amusement.

  She knew exactly what he meant, because she couldn’t be indifferent to him, either. Theirs had been a relationship of extremes—love or hate. They’d never found a comfortable middle ground where they could coexist. Four years of separation hadn’t changed that.

  “Race—”

  “Shut up, Vanessa.” There was a sudden flatness to his voice, as if all emotion had been pulled from it. “We were on our way to the hospital. This conversation isn’t going anywhere—unlike our marriage, which had a beginning and an end. So let’s get out of here.”

  “Yes,” she agreed, suddenly feeling emotionally drained, too.

  There was no sign of Marie when they left his apartment and walked down the hall to the stairs. Jazz music was muffled by her closed door, letting Vanessa know the woman was inside.

  It was a strange silence that enveloped them during the drive to the hospital. It was neither comfortable nor strained, as if each of them was alone in a private little space. Vanessa found hers lonely.

  A telephone message had been left at the nurses’ station for Vanessa, giving her the perfect excuse to let Race see his father privately. She meant to explain to Race that she hadn’t told the hospital they were divorced in case they wouldn’t allow her to visit Phillip, but it didn’t seem appropriate to bring that up now.

  She used the telephone in the waiting room to call her secretary, Carla Austin. It took only a few minutes for Carla to inform her of the day’s events and pass on the phone calls that had come in for her. Then Vanessa assured Carla that she would be in the shop tomorrow so there wasn’t any need to cancel her appointments.

  When she hung up the phone, it was hard to believe that all this had happened since this morning. Surely it was longer ago than that. Vanessa felt tired, mentally and physically exhausted. And hungry, she realized. She hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast, which had consisted of coffee and croissants. She decided to just look in on Phillip for a minute, then have a bite to eat at the hospital cafeteria before it closed.

  Entering the intensive-care unit, Vanessa noticed the oxygen tent was removed and Phillip was breathing on his own. Race had pulled up a straight chair and was sitting by the side of the bed, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. She walked to the opposite side of the bed. Phillip was conscious, his eyes alert and bright as he smiled at her, looking more like his old self. All the tubes and I. V. stands kept her from getting close.

  “You seem better,” she observed with a relieved smile.

  “Having the two of you here, I…” The older man choked up. “It’s good,” he concluded finally. “Race tells me that you personally tracked him down to let him know about me. Thank you.”

  “It was nothing,” Vanessa lied, because she didn’t want Phillip to know how her good deed had backfired into another one of their bitter arguments.

  With a slight turn of his head, he looked at Race. “Where were you? You never did say.”

  “Assumption Parish. I’m drilling a well there,” Race stated. “We spudded in about three months back, so it won’t be long before we reach total depth.”

  “Why won’t you give up, son?” There was acute sadness in his father’s voice. “I have wildcatters coming in and out of my bank every day, millionaires one time and begging for a loan the next. Those oil fields are just going to break your heart.”

  “We’ve been through this before, Dad,” he responded in a level tone, his glance flicking briefly to Vanessa.

  “How much have you got wrapped up in this well, Race?” his father asked with a certain wryness. “A half-million and more probably. You know as well as I do that the odds are nine to one against you. What happens if this one is a ‘duster’ too?”

  “I’ve acquired a lease on some prime acreage in Livingston Parish and I’m putting the capital together to start drilling there. It’s in the Tuscaloosa Sand Trend, one of the hottest plays in the Southeast.” That gleam was in his eyes, a reflection of that burning drive that wouldn’t let him quit. “If the Boar’s H
ead turns out to be dry or a ‘pickle factory,’” Race said, using the petroleum industry’s slang term for a well that produces salt water, “or even if it turns out to be a producer, I’ll be setting up another drilling operation near Baton Rouge.”

  “It’s always the next well, isn’t it?” his father sighed.

  “It’s the independent oil companies, the wildcatters, that drill nine out of every ten wells in this country, not the majors. For every four barrels of oil taken out of the reserves, we’ve managed to find three to replace them.” Race defended the worth of his profession and the vital role it played. “It’s a gamble every time the bit goes in the ground, but it’s my choice.”

  “But there’s no future in it,” his father insisted, and appealed to Vanessa. “Can’t you talk some sense into him, Vanessa? I control the board at the bank. All I have to do is tell them to put Race in charge, and he could take over tomorrow.”

  She avoided looking at Race as she smiled stiffly at his father. “He didn’t listen to me when we were married, so he isn’t likely to listen to me now. Why don’t you find another subject to talk about besides oil?” Vanessa suggested, because the two would never see eye to eye on it. “There’s no need for you to be getting upset, Phillip.”

  “I know,” he sighed heavily. “But he’s my son. How can I keep quiet when he is wasting—”

  Vanessa lifted a silencing hand. “Change the subject,” she advised. “Ask Race about his neighbor. I’m going to the cafeteria and grab a bite to eat.”

  She could have bitten off her tongue for suggesting that topic the instant she caught the gleam of dry amusement in Race’s look, but it was too late. As she made a hasty retreat, she tried to assure herself that it didn’t matter. Race had already guessed that she was jealous. Vanessa supposed it was natural, as he had implied, that she resented another woman sharing the intimacies they had once known with each other.

  The meal had a reviving effect on her, filling the emptiness that had contributed to her tiredness. When she returned to Phillip’s floor, Race was at the nurses’ station, leaning casually on the counter and talking to an attractive blond nurse on duty. She felt his challenging look, but didn’t meet it.