LITMIR.BIZ

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small percentage, yes,” he replied, relieved to have the hot tension die down. The sight of her in that dress wasn’t doing his self-control any good at all, and he hoped she was too green to realize that his bad temper was due to the new attraction he was feeling for her. “Eugene likes to have his finger in every pie he can find.”

      “I thought oil was a bad investment right now.”

      “The market’s down, but it will come up again. Like gold, it fluctuates. But as long as it’s a necessity, prices will eventually go up. Eugene and Harry Deal are smart enough to diversify. They’ll make out.”

      “Is there a problem with the equipment you made for Mr. Deal?” she asked.

      “He thinks so. I don’t.” He glanced at her and grinned. “I know the joker who’s operating the rig for him. He’s an old-line rigger and he doesn’t like trying new things. He’s probably put the damned part in backward or left it out altogether.”

      Which turned out to be exactly the case. Danetta, standing uncomfortably to one side while Cabe wrestled with an unfathomable piece of greasy equipment, saw the older man nearby turn red when the motor was turned back on and the part slid into place and worked with textbook precision.

      The rig was overrun with men—muscular, rough-looking men who seemed to find Danetta, even in her light car coat, quite an attraction. There were some women in that line of work, but not in Harry Deal’s crew. She felt all too conspicuous.

      She was holding Cabe’s jacket while he worked. Now he wiped his hands on a handkerchief that would never be white again and gave Harry Deal a speaking look.

      Harry, a white-haired, short man with a big nose, glared at his rigger. “Okay, I stand corrected,” he muttered. “Sam, you can explain all this to me later.”

      “Yes, sir,” Sam grumbled. He shot Cabe a hard glare and stomped off to the other side of the rig.

      “How’s your dad?” he asked Cabe.

      “Making money. He hopes you’re going to fund him a new Rolls with this strike.”

      “I’m doing my best.” He turned, pursing his lips at Danetta. “Still got the same secretary, I see. Not married yet, Miss Marist?”

      Danetta hugged Cabe’s coat to her breasts. “I did find one candidate, Mr. Deal,” she replied sweetly, “but he couldn’t change a tire and talk at the same time, so I gave him up.”

      Harry smiled unpleasantly. “Can’t change your own tire?”

      “I have to these days. Most men are so fastidious that they don’t like getting mussed up doing those difficult jobs.”

      Cabe saw disaster ahead. He took Danetta by the arm and led her away from a smoldering Harry. “Let me know if you have any more problems, Harry,” he called over his shoulder. “We have to get back to work.”

      “Thanks, Cabe,” the older man said shortly and turned back to his job.

      “Arrogant old dinosaur,” Danetta muttered, all too aware of the biting grip Cabe had on her arm even through the thick cloth.

      “You escalated things, honey,” he reminded her. “Now get in there and keep quiet until I get you out of earshot.” He gave her a faintly amused glance. “You’ve never talked back to Harry before.”

      “Maybe it’s the smell of oil and grease that did it,” she offered, smiling impishly. She felt free, now that she’d finally stood up to the old devil. Maybe working for Mr. Ritter had given her that bit of extra self-confidence. She’d had to stand up to him, and now it was getting to be second nature to stand up to other people. She’d…expanded emotionally, she thought.

      He chuckled softly as he put her in the Lincoln, leaving his jacket in her hands as he went around and got in. He was still trying to get the grease off his big hands.

      “Damned old-line riggers,” he said on a heavy sigh. “Harry needs to fire that son of a—”

      “Mr. Ritter!” She glared at him.

      “Sorry, Miss Lily-White.” He glanced at her as he started the car. “You ought to be used to my language by now.”

      “I ought to,” she agreed. She leaned back against the cushy seat with a long sigh and closed her eyes. “Just when I think I’ve heard it all, you invent new words.”

      He chuckled softly. “Do I?” He sat watching her with the engine running, his eyes curious. He slowly turned her face toward him, with a big, grease-stained hand. The smile left his hard lips. “You’re a little wildcat when you get started, aren’t you?” he asked in a tone he’d never used with her before. “You didn’t have that fire in the beginning. It took a few tears to bring it out, but you don’t back away from anything these days, do you?” he mused. His big thumb moved to her mouth and suddenly dragged across her lips while he watched her reaction with narrowed, intent blue eyes.

      The sensation that deliberate action caused shocked her. Her body went taut and hot all at once, and her breath caught audibly.

      Her response was sheer delight. He’d forgotten that a woman could be that sensitive to his touch. She was innocent, not like the jaded, very sophisticated women who frequently passed through his life. Almost everything sensual was new to her. His thumb moved again and pressed against her mouth so that she could taste tobacco and the faint smell of grease on it. He felt his body tighten as her face told him exactly how much pleasure she was feeling. His blue eyes glittered into hers at a proximity that made her muscles clench.

      “Did you know that your mouth was that sensitive, little one?” he asked huskily, searching her wide eyes. “That it could arouse you when a man played with it?”

      She swallowed nervously, her body tingling with new sensations. “The…men on the rig…” she whispered.

      “The windows are tinted,” he reminded her in a slow, deep undertone. His thumb moved again with sensual pressure and he bent closer, so that the cologne scent of his big body overwhelmed her. Her scent was in his nostrils and he wanted nothing more in life than her soft mouth. Reason and sanity seemed to go out the window as he watched with masculine delight the helpless reaction of her innocence to his experience.

      “Mr. Ritter…!” she murmured. He was overwhelming her, and she was afraid.

      “Have you ever been kissed properly?” he whispered, letting his eyes drop to her parted, swollen lips. “With your mouth open under a man’s lips?” he breathed, and she actually moaned. His jaw tautened. “It would be so easy. I could lower my head, just an inch or so,” he drawled softly, moving closer, “and let you taste my breath. And then I could slide my hand into your hair, like this—” he drew her face up under his with the pressure of his fingers at her nape “—and I could kiss you like that. I could part your lips with my mouth and drag you against me so hard that you could feel my heart beating…”

      She panicked at the mental pictures he was putting into her mind, and in one last burst of sanity she pushed at his chest, trying not to feel the hard warmth of hair-roughened muscles under the thin white shirt. “No! You…mustn’t,” she pleaded. “I work for you…!”

      “Work for me,” he echoed, his voice barely audible. He stared down at her soft mouth and felt his body clench with the need to take it. Work for him. The words echoed in his mind and he blinked and scowled down into Danetta’s shocked eyes. Danetta! His head jerked up.

      “My God, what am I doing?” he asked harshly. He let go of her abruptly and sat up, moving away from her to light a cigarette. He managed it with a brief fumble, which she was too shaken to see. “I’m sorry, Dan,” he said stiffly. His heart was shaking him, and the tautness of his body was unexpected and disturbing. She was only a child. “That won’t happen again.”

      He put the car swiftly into gear and pulled out onto the road without looking at her.

      Danetta tore her eyes away from

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