The Secrets of Bell River

Auteur·e

Kathleen O'Brien

Lectures

16,3K

Chapitres

Auteur·e

Kathleen O'Brien

Lectures

16,3K

Chapitres

Harlequin

Chapter One

IN TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS, Tess Spencer hadn’t ever felt like she truly belonged anywhere, and it took only one look at the snow-covered perfection of Bell River Ranch to know she didn’t belong here, either.

So what if the women who owned it were technically her “family”? She didn’t know them—hadn’t even heard of them until two months ago, when, on her deathbed, her mother had dropped the bombshell about Tess’s paternity.

The Wright sisters didn’t know Tess, either. Not even that she existed.

And they probably never would.

She’d left Los Angeles, where she’d lived all her life, and she’d come to Silverdell thinking she might, just might, tell them. That had been her mother’s dying wish—to leave a safety net for the only child she was leaving too soon. In Tess’s imagination, introducing herself to Rowena, Brianna and Penelope Wright had seemed possible. Terrifying, but possible.

But now that Tess saw the beautiful ranch, nestled in its rolling winter landscape like a warm brown egg in a silver-white fairy nest...

How could she tell these elegant, successful strangers—her “sisters”—anything? According to Tess’s mother, the three women seemed to be decent people. They’d known plenty of heartache as well as privilege. They probably wouldn’t even be terribly shocked to learn about Tess. Their dad, Johnny Wright, had done a lot worse in his life than take a mistress and father one secret illegitimate baby.

Eighteen years ago, he had killed his wife. Their mother.

Tragic, but...still. Soaring Greek tragedy and low, dirty squalor weren’t the same problems. Tess Spencer and the legitimate Wright sisters didn’t speak the same language. One was a struggling, divorced massage therapist who had lived in crummy apartments all her life, hand to mouth—and that was on a good day. On bad days, she went hungry. The Wrights were landowners, Colorado heiresses who, in spite of their childhood calamity, had always possessed every tree, rock, building and animal they could see.

The gap between their worlds was as wide as the gap between earthlings and martians.

Besides, though they might not be shocked to meet a secret sister, they would undoubtedly be dismayed. Obviously Bell River Ranch was working very hard to leave its scandalous past behind. Nothing proclaimed civilized and unsullied more than this well-kept, orderly cluster of buildings with sweet blue smoke curling out of chimneys and sunshine sparkling off pristine windows.

“Sorry, Mom,” Tess muttered as she parked the car beside the charming wood-and-glass building that housed the spa. “A bastard of Johnny Wright would be about as welcome here as a hole in a lifeboat.”

She killed the engine and regrouped. Okay, no thrilled surprise family reunion. She’d always known that was greeting-card schlock, anyhow, not real life.

But that didn’t mean she couldn’t work here. Work was something Tess knew how to do—and she desperately needed a good job. Her mother’s illness had cleaned her out emotionally, and the divorce from Craig had done the same financially.

All the Wright sisters had to do was hire her. That shouldn’t be hard to pull off. She was a damn good massage therapist with extensive training, enthusiastic recommendations and five years of experience. Hire her, pay her, maybe appreciate her talents a little, and she wouldn’t ask for anything more.

Well, she admitted as she got out of the car, she’d satisfy her curiosity about her birth father at the same time, of course. But that wouldn’t cost anyone anything.

“Hi,” she said as she opened the door to the spa. She was greeted by soft harp music, and the aroma of expensive lotions mixing with the sharp, piney scent of new construction. The spa had obviously been added quite recently, no expenses spared.

“Good morning,” the young blonde goddess behind the streamlined wooden reception desk said. She gave Tess the official “serenity” smile known to any spa employee. Cool, unflappable, full of grace.

You can be a goddess, too, the look was designed to whisper to the client. A few procedures, a small fee...

Tess felt like applauding. A fabulous, incredibly subtle sales pitch. But all wasted. The goddess obviously hadn’t yet figured out that Tess wasn’t a paying client.

A real client, a late-middle-aged woman in crisp navy blue pants and starched white shirt, sat in the waiting room, perched on the edge of one of the stylish armchairs. She’d been reading a celebrity magazine, but glanced up sharply when Tess entered.

“You haven’t forgotten me, have you? My appointment was five minutes ago.” The woman’s voice was as crisp as her clothes, but held an undercurrent of chronic dissatisfaction. Her frown had been so immediate, and the vertical lines between her eyebrows were so firmly grooved, that Tess had to assume scowling was her instinctive reaction to almost anything.

A fussbudget. Tess smiled—her own inner spa employee taking over—though she didn’t expect the scowl to go away, and it didn’t. She’d encountered clients like this, and she knew how hopeless it was. These people wouldn’t ever relax, not if massaged for a week with angel feathers.

“Of course not, Mrs. Fillmore,” the goddess purred, unfazed. “How could we ever forget you?”

Tess glanced at the goddess/receptionist. Was she imagining things, or did Blondie’s placid voice have an undercurrent of irony?

“I’m Tess Spencer,” Tess said. “I have an appointment with Rowena Wright.”

“Ah.” The young woman looked relieved behind that perfect smile. She wasn’t quite as cool and impenetrable as Tess had first thought. She actually said a lot with those blue eyes. “Good to meet you, Tess. I’m Bree. I’m sure Rowena will be here any minute, but—”

“Cancel the search-and-rescue team. I’m here!” Behind Tess, the door blew open with a swoosh of clean, frosty air. “I’m so sorry I’m late, Bree. Don’t shoot me. It’s insane at the house. Absolutely insane!”

Tess turned to see a willowy young woman shaking snow from a tangle of long, black hair. The flakes fell to the floor, adding to the crusty crystals left by the tread of her expensive boots. When she finished, she raked back her hair with one hand and lifted her face.

Tess stopped breathing for a second—not because the newcomer was beautiful, though she was absolutely that. When you worked with a pampered, well-heeled clientele, you got accustomed to physical beauty. This woman took Tess’s breath away with her sheer radiating vitality. And those green eyes—they seemed lit from behind, alive in an almost otherworldly way, like a forest animal, or a fairy.

It had to be Rowena. Or at least one of the other Wright sisters, since the blonde was Bree. Brianna, the middle sister.

Yes, this new woman was Rowena—and she was maybe seven months pregnant, her belly the one rounded spot on an otherwise lean, athletic frame.

Tess had done her homework. Most of the stories she’d found had been either archived ones about Johnny Wright’s murder case, in which most papers had been too delicate to print photos of the motherless daughters, or business stories about the opening of Bell River Ranch and its implications for Silverdell’s economy, also short on pictures.

She hadn’t been surprised. Why should women who had been through a public scandal at such a tender age seek publicity?

Still, she knew the basic facts. Rowena was the eldest, and the only one with gypsy-black hair. The youngest was Penelope, and the one picture of her as a child showed a honey-brown fall of hair half-hiding a sweet, timid face.

Rowena was obviously the pack leader. Her air of authority was unmistakable. It showed in her indifference to how she tracked slush into the pristine space, in her willingness to bluster into Serenity Central and never be cowed for a second.

Rowena was living proof that everything Tess had been thinking was true. Tess Spencer, the hard-scrabbling itinerant employee with a chip on her shoulder the size of Colorado, had nothing in common with the poised, ebullient Wright sisters.

“You must be Tess!” Rowena turned the amazing green eyes toward her, and her smile deepened, projecting warmth in spite of the chill that still clung to her gold sweater and cords. “I’m Rowena! I’m so sorry I’m late. Gawd, why do I keep saying that? I couldn’t help it, really I couldn’t. Some meddling fool called the health inspector, and now I’m going to have to dance him around, proving we’re not serving ptomaine every night for dinner.”

“Ro.” Bree pursed her lips, though her eyes had an inner light that hinted at repressed laughter. “You know you’re saying this stuff out loud, right? And everyone can hear you?”

“I can’t hear her,” a male voice called out from behind the reception area. “And I’m not planning a lawsuit as we speak.”

Rowena and Brianna burst into laughter. “You’d better not be, Jude,” Rowena said merrily, raising her voice a little to be sure the invisible man could hear her. “What would be the point? You know firsthand how broke we are. In fact, if you get paid this week, you’ll be lucky!”

“Ro.” Bree shook her head, giving the starchy client a meaningful glance. “Again. You said that out loud.”

Ro gave the woman a look of her own. “Oh, we don’t have any secrets at Bell River. Silverdell’s too small a town for secrets, isn’t it, Mrs. Fillmore?”

Tess raised her eyebrows. Again, the subtext of irony. These two didn’t like Mrs. Fillmore one bit. She wondered if the feeling was mutual, but the scowl on Mrs. Fillmore’s face was too firmly entrenched to be sure it meant anything.

“Indeed,” the woman said, pinching her nose with a sniff. “Too small, and sadly too addicted to petty gossiping.” She twisted her wrist to look at her watch. “Rowena, my masseuse is ten minutes late.”

Tess bristled. No one said masseuse anymore. It had been used too often as a substitute for activities a lot less professional.

“Your massage therapist is Ashley today, Mrs. Fillmore.”

One point for Rowena, who had corrected Mrs. Fillmore without making an issue of it.

“And?” Mrs. Fillmore seemed to find Rowena’s explanation inadequate.

“You know Ashley always gives everyone a little extra attention if they need it.” Rowena smiled warmly. “That’s why you always ask for her, I’m sure.”

Another sniff. Mrs. Fillmore looked down without answering, turning the pages of her magazine, as if intensely interested in the paparazzi photo spread.

How exactly that differed from petty gossip, Tess couldn’t say. But she didn’t have the job yet, and she couldn’t be snarky with the clients. Luckily, she rarely wanted to. Once she got her hands on a person, even a person like Mrs. Fillmore—

Tess was a tactile person. She thought, and heard, and spoke, and even learned, through her hands. It was her talent. Really, her only talent. If she’d had a choice, she would have chosen something far more lucrative, like computer programming or rocket science.

But she hadn’t had a choice. All she had was the ability to learn about a person by touching their skin, working their body. By hearing the tension in their muscles and the strain in their joints. By knowing which pressure points they responded to, what made their blood flow more easily, what drained the unhappiness from their faces.

Once she worked on someone, she understood them in a new way, and the urge to judge, or mock, or take down a peg simply vanished.

“I’m not worried about the health inspector, really,” Rowena went on, indicating to both Brianna and Tess in her explanation. “There’s nothing to find, so he can dig away. Whoever phoned is just causing trouble for the fun of it. The real problem is that I will have to dance him around, which means I won’t be available for the working massage, Tess. We’ll have to find someone else for you to work on.”

Rowena turned a hopeful gaze toward her sister, who shook her head implacably. “Sorry,” Bree said. “Much as I’d love to let someone work out these kinks, I’ve got nine eight-year-olds waiting to take a sleigh ride to see Santa in downtown Silverdell.”

Rowena made a raspberry of annoyance. “Drat. Forgot about that. Really, next year we are going to have to close from Thanksgiving to New Year’s, like we planned. Won’t that be heavenly? I’ll sleep the whole time.” She gave Tess a rueful glance. “This year, we can’t afford to close a single minute. Which is why we’re interviewing four days before Christmas, in case you thought that was nuts.”

Tess smiled neutrally. She had been part of start-ups before, and she knew the first couple of years were insane, and very touch-and-go, financially. Rowena might be optimistic to think they’d be on solid footing in twelve months.

Besides, Tess couldn’t bring herself to think about Christmas this year. Her mother had died two months ago, and the jingling bells and twinkling lights all over town were a jarring reminder of what she’d lost.

She didn’t intend to celebrate any holidays for a while. The only toast she’d raise this year was to a new beginning and an entirely new life.

“I’m glad you were,” she said, “since four days before Christmas just happened to be when I was looking for a job.”

Rowena accepted that logic with a nod, then turned to Bree. “What about Becky? Can’t she take over?”

“Nope. She’s leading Pilates. We’d have a mutiny if we canceled Pilates.”

“Mark? He’s good with kids!”

“Good with kids?” Brianna laughed. “Are you kidding? Mark threatened to tie Alec to a tree yesterday if he didn’t stop putting snowballs down Ellen’s back.”

“So?” Rowena grinned. “I threaten to tie Alec to a tree every day.”

“Well, you’re his stepmother. I think it’s written in the job description.”

“Hey,” Tess interrupted, finally realizing that if she waited for an opening she’d be here all day. “It’s okay. Really. I can come back tomorrow.”

Rowena shook her head. “No, that’s silly. I need you to start tomorrow, if everything works out. With Devon leaving in a week, there’s hardly any time to get you up to speed.”

Rowena chewed on her lower lip, narrowing her eyes with fierce determination. “There has to be a way...there must be someone.” Her eyes opened wide. “Mrs. Fillmore! Is there any chance you would be willing to let Tess do your massage today? She has excellent credentials, and we need some feedback on a working massage, so that—”

“No.” The older woman folded her magazine tightly, the paper crackling under the force of her fingers.

Rowena frowned. “Of course it would be a complimentary session, as you’d be doing us a favor. And if for any reason it wasn’t satisfactory, we could ask Ashley to—”

“No.” For a minute it seemed Mrs. Fillmore wasn’t going to elaborate, and would let the rejection hang there like a slap in the face. But apparently she realized how rude it sounded and bent a little.

“My sciatica is acting up today. Ashley is the only one who knows how to give me any relief. I’m sorry, but I just can’t take chances with a...” She paused, wrinkling her nose slightly. “A beginner.”

Heat flooded Tess’s face. Beginner was insulting enough, given that she had three degrees and five years of experience. But she had, in her intuitive way, “heard” all the other words that Mrs. Fillmore had considered saying. A nobody. A stranger. A loser. An urchin. A child.

It struck a nerve. Tess was always being taken for younger than she was. She was only five-three. She’d always been too thin, the kind of thin that broadcast the years of going to bed hungry when her mother got laid off. The kind of thin that made her breasts look ridiculous.

And she wasn’t one bit glamorous, didn’t possess an ounce of the confident gloss that rich, well-tended women acquired. She had a small chip out one of her front teeth that should have been repaired long ago, but there’d never been enough money. She worried off her lipstick and couldn’t be bothered applying mascara.

Her only real asset, a mass of curly brown hair that bounced and shone without spending a fortune on it, had to be pinned back ruthlessly when she worked. No one wanted the massage therapist’s curls tickling their bare back.

The compliment she’d heard most often from kind-hearted clients was that she had a sweet face. She knew that was shorthand for “not ugly, of course, a perfectly nice-looking girl, but...”

“Beginner? Beginner?” Rowena’s high cheekbones were tipped with red. “Tess isn’t a beginner, I assure you, Mrs. Fillmore. In fact, we’re quite lucky to get her. Her last job was at the—”

“It’s okay,” Tess said, wondering about Rowena’s temper. There was zero chance that Mrs. Fillmore would have heard of the Pink Roses Salon, the luxury spa where Tess had worked a year before her mother’s death. Impressing Mrs. Fillmore was impossible. “Really,” Tess added firmly. “Mrs. Fillmore is right. Sciatica can be debilitating. She should have the massage therapist she trusts.”

And Tess should have a fair judge of her talents. A woman bullied into accepting an unwanted massage didn’t look like the most impartial critic.

To her credit, Rowena seemed suddenly to get that. “Oh. Right.” She took a deep breath, clearly tamping down the irritation with the older lady. “Of course.”

Bree, who clearly either didn’t have a temper or knew how to hide it, smiled. “I know. What about Jude?”

“What about Jude?” The man’s amused voice came from behind the wall, and was followed by a rustling sound, then the appearance of a large body.

For a minute, Tess wasn’t sure he was real. Surely people that exquisite, that drop-dead gorgeous, didn’t just emerge from behind walls on command. Not even here, at the fairy-tale Bell River Ranch.

Tumbling black waves of hair. Eyes bluer than cornflowers. Lips, jaw, cheekbones, forehead—all chiseled Michelangelo perfect. Tall, lean, perfectly proportioned.

The beautiful creature was dressed as a laborer. A carpenter, probably, judging from the leather apron slung low on his trim hips, like a gunslinger’s belt. His weapons appeared to be screwdrivers, wrenches and other tools she was too ignorant to name.

She almost laughed. If he’d been sent to a movie set by central casting, the director would have rejected him instantly, on the grounds that no real person, carpenter or king, ever looked like this.

“Jude, this is Tess Spencer. She’s applying for Devon’s job.” Rowena spoke, but neither she nor Bree seemed surprised at the appearance of Adonis. “Tess, this is Jude Calhoun. Our carpenter and general woodworking genius. He’s single-handedly responsible for building the spa. And about half the other buildings at the ranch, too.”

Jude came forward, brushing his palms lightly across his back pockets, as if to remove sawdust. Then he held out his right hand to Tess. “She’s exaggerating, of course. Rowena doesn’t do anything by half measures, including compliments.”

Tess put her hand out, too, rather numbly.

His shake was warm and firm. “Nice to meet you, Tess.”

Rowena checked her watch. “I don’t mean to put you on the spot, Jude, but I’ve got to meet the inspector. Would you mind letting Tess do her working massage on you? You’ve gotta need one, after being on that ladder all day.”

Inexplicably, Tess felt her cheeks flushing, but she couldn’t demur about this recruit, too, not after rushing to rule out Mrs. Fillmore. She might look as if she were afraid to do the working massage.

At least this guy didn’t seem as if he’d be bitchy about it.

“Well...” He smiled at Tess, his cheeks dimpling about an inch from the corners of his lips. Of course. If he’d been a computer-generated image, the dimples couldn’t have been placed more effectively. “It’s a terrible imposition, being blindsided like this, and asked to accept a free massage. But I suppose I can take one for the team.”

* * *

TEN MINUTES LATER, Tess was ready. She’d received the quickie tour of the facilities from Bree, essentially killing time while Jude had a shower.

As they went through the spa, Tess noted again that the Wrights had spared no expense, and she congratulated their taste. One of the indefinables that characterized any successful retreat was a soothing, almost spiritual feeling. This one had it.

The cream-and-taupe marble was peaceful, and Tess recognized top-of-the-line products everywhere. But the real magic was the location. The spa had been brilliantly designed in a V shape, obviously to provide all the main rooms with a view of a waterfall mere yards from the building.

The small waterfall had frozen in this unnaturally cold December, and it sparkled like white crystal ribbons in the sun. Tess could only imagine how transcendent the view would be when the water spilled liquid diamonds in the summer.

“That’s Little Bell Falls,” Bree said. “It’s pretty, isn’t it? You should see it during wildflower season.”

Interestingly, Bree’s placid face didn’t register the same delight Tess felt, but she didn’t comment further. Was there a problem? Perhaps proximity to water presented a dampness concern? Had there been a debate about where to build the spa?

Tess was surprised to realize how curious she was to know everything about the Wrights and Bell River. Should a secret blood connection she’d discovered only three months ago, and which had been no part of her life for twenty-seven years, affect her so profoundly?

In the end, these people were strangers, and probably would never be more to Tess than amiable employers. And not even that, if she didn’t nail this massage.

“Sorry you can’t work in one of the cozier single rooms,” Bree said as she led Tess into a large space that obviously was set aside for couples massage. Two tables, a hot tub, its own nail station. “But we have just the two singles. Chelsea is using the Taupe Room, and Ashley’s got Mrs. Fillmore in the Blue Room.”

Mrs. Fillmore. Another nuance Tess would have loved to explore. Another detail that was none of her business.

“I don’t mind at all,” she said honestly. The frills—the decor, the candles, the music, the lighting—were mostly for the clients’ benefit. When Tess worked, she went into a zone and didn’t register anything except the body under her hands.

Bree seemed ready to leave Tess, but she paused about halfway to the door. She glanced down the hall, toward the faint, distant hiss of water where Jude had disappeared to “wash the work off.”

“You know, there’s nothing to be nervous about,” Bree said, turning to Tess with a disconcertingly sharp gaze. “He’s a nice man, very down-to-earth. Not an ounce of arrogance in him, amazingly.”

“It hadn’t occurred—”

“No?” Bree smiled. “Come on. We grew up with him. He’s always been around—he and Mitch, Rowena’s brother-in-law, are best friends, so he’s practically like a brother to us all. And yet sometimes even we can’t believe how good-looking he is.”

Tess shrugged. “I’ve lived in L.A. all my life. Even before I went to work for Pink Roses, I’d seen some amazing things.”

“Oh? I didn’t know that. That’ll give you something in common, then. Jude spent a little more than six years in Hollywood.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.” Bree’s elegant brow pinched a fraction. “Not that I’d mention it. It wasn’t an entirely happy experience for him.”

Tess tried not to bristle. Massage therapists weren’t priests, but discretion was definitely desirable. “I don’t tend to chitchat while I’m working. I need to concentrate, and the clients usually prefer to relax. Even if they talk, I mostly listen.”

“Good. Well, I guess that’s everything.” Bree fidgeted with her earring, clearly a bit uncertain about leaving Tess without supervision. “Except...I probably should mention that—”

“I’m fine.” Tess hoped her voice didn’t sound too tight. The hovering was a little annoying. Five years, remember? She’d worked her way up to some of the most demanding spas in the country, spas that catered to people who expected perfection, even in their massage therapists.

Yet Bree acted as if she were leaving a kid at kindergarten on the first day.

Tess forced a smile. “Really. I’ll be fine.”

Nodding, Bree turned, practically running into Jude, who stood in the doorway, wearing a white terry robe monogrammed with the initials BRR across the breast.

“There you are!” She patted his chest casually. “Okay, then, if you guys are both set, I’d better run. Remember, if you need anything, both Chelsea and Ashley are a shout away.”

“Thanks,” Tess said.

And then she and Jude were alone. For an awkward minute, she was ridiculously tongue-tied, forgetting her protocols as if she really were the newbie that Mrs. Fillmore and Bree took her for.

His coloring and perfect features had been striking enough, even in his work clothes, but like this, half-dressed, tousled and damp from the shower...

It was impossible not to have a purely female reaction. The robe hugged the lean contour of his hips, ending just above the knees. Long, trimly muscled legs extended bare beneath the hem. The casually knotted belt nipped the robe in at his narrow waist, but above that his chest and shoulders tugged the cloth apart, exposing golden skin and a light dusting of dark hair.

Pull yourself together, girl! She never did this. Never.

Once clients lay on the table, they ceased to be “people” in that way—they weren’t male or female, young or old, beautiful or homely. They certainly weren’t sexual.

They were simply exquisitely complex interlacings of muscle, tendon, nerves and needs. They were...well, it sounded silly but she sometimes thought of their bodies as works of art entrusted to her care. Art that had been damaged somehow. Misaligned. Knotted. Twisted, overtightened or blocked. Her job was to find the parts that had been disturbed and restore them to harmony.

Perhaps Jude was the most artful of all the works she’d ever been asked to restore. But so what? In her experience, athletes and body-builders and actors—all the physical perfectionists who populated Los Angeles—needed her help more than most.

They punished their bodies to take them to those heights of performance, and, once they relaxed, they proved to be masses of knotty pain and foreshortened tendons.

“Are there any injuries I should know about? Anything you’d particularly like addressed today?” She was glad to hear that her voice was normal.

He shook his head. “Nothing serious. I’ve got an ankle sprain that bugs me now and then, but massage helps, as a rule.”

Internally, she noted that.

“Okay, then. Good. There’s a sheet on the first table, and a light blanket, in case it feels a little cold to you. Make yourself comfortable, and I’ll be right back.”

Her crisp, competent tone made her feel less nervous, and Jude’s easy smile helped, too. “Sure thing,” he said.

She stayed away longer than was strictly necessary, giving him plenty of time to get covered, and giving herself plenty of time to get calm. Finally, she gathered the supplies she had chosen earlier, took a deep breath and moved down the hall, too.

He’d left the door open, so she walked in—slowly enough to alert him, and speaking as she entered. “Sorry. I don’t know where everything is, so it took me a minute to find it all.”

No response.

She moved to the counter nearest the massage table, where he lay on his stomach, his head not in the padded opening, but turned to one side, so that he presented his elegant profile. He was completely still.

“Mr. Calhoun?”

Tilting her head, she looked closer. He was so completely motionless he might have been dead...except that as she drew near he shifted once, sighed deeply and let out a low rumble that was...

Instinctively, she smiled. Yes, it was a snore. In the dim lighting, made more soothing with the addition of a few candles, with a Chopin Prelude playing on the sound system and the perfume of clean sheets and lavender oils floating in the air, he had fallen asleep.

She fiddled with her supplies, not banging things around, but not attempting to be particularly quiet. If he woke on his own, it would be much less awkward.

He didn’t. He wasn’t snoring anymore, but he remained utterly still, his eyes shut and his beautifully bowed lips slightly apart, glistening in the candlelight.

She allowed herself the indulgence of studying him. It wasn’t voyeurism. As a therapist, she could learn a lot by how he held himself, whether his shoulders relaxed into symmetry when he slept, whether his body twitched in those little ways that spoke of tension that dissipated only when the conscious mind shut down.

A couple of seconds passed before she could stop staring at his face, but when she finally transferred her gaze to his shoulders and back, she inhaled sharply.

The perfection stopped there. On either side of his spine, starting just below the neck and running down between the shoulder blades for at least five inches, were the unmistakable thin, thready scars left by a set of human fingernails.

She’d seen similar scars before, once or twice. But Jude’s were deeper than the average remnant of exuberant passion. These were more like...an attack.

“I suppose this is what Bree meant,” he said, “when she said she should probably warn you.”

Tess’s gaze flew to Jude’s face. His eyes were open, and he was smiling. She tamped down her momentary embarrassment and reached for her lotion.

She didn’t see any point in pretending she hadn’t been staring at the scars. His body was her business, right now.

“No need for a warning,” she said calmly. “I don’t think the scars present any special concern. They are clearly fully healed. Are they sensitive?”

“No.” He raised himself on his elbows and rubbed his thumbs across his eyelids, as if to scrape away the sleepiness. “I’m sorry I passed out. I was up all night with the baby, and I guess it caught up with me the minute I lay down.”

The baby?

The word surprised her. He didn’t look...

He didn’t look what? Like a father? How absurd was that? There was no “father” look. But then she realized that, on some subconscious level, she’d already observed that he didn’t wear a wedding ring.

Equally absurd. Her subconscious shouldn’t be registering such things in the first place, and, in the second place, wedding rings weren’t required in the baby-making process.

“No problem,” she assured him as placidly as she could. “You wouldn’t be the first client I’ve had who slept through a massage.” She warmed some lotion in her hands. “Though usually they do wait until I’ve begun, at least.”

As he chuckled, she touched gently between his shoulder blades. He automatically dropped down, as if he knew the drill well.

“Might make it tricky to rate your technique, though,” he said, his voice muffled by the cushion of the face support. He seemed about to speak, but the word dissolved into a contented “mmm” as she began to massage the lotion into his skin.

From then on, he didn’t utter a sound. She didn’t worry that his silence meant a lack of appreciation, or that he’d fallen asleep. He was her favorite kind of client, the kind who understood that the body spoke for itself.

When a tight muscle began to relax under her fingers, she didn’t need a murmur of bliss to tell her about it. And when she encountered a knot of pain, she didn’t need a wince to alert her. She read the ridges, valleys, ribbons and rocks of his body as if he were a story written in braille. Any decent massage therapist could do the same.

The irregular embossing of the scars was harder to read. They weren’t sexual in nature, she felt sure of that. The gouges had been too deep, caused by true violence, whether intentional or accidental. And they had been painful.

She thought she might, with time, be able to break down some of the collagen build-up and reduce the scars, but that wasn’t her mission today. She’d been asked to demonstrate a Swedish massage, the kind that felt great and left the client purring.

Besides, Jude might not have any interest in having his scars worked on. He didn’t seem to be a bit self-conscious about them. She could tell when she hit a client’s sensitive spot, either physically or emotionally. Some vibration under the skin, through the nerves and muscles, changed slightly, hitting a new note like a string on a guitar. His vibration didn’t alter an iota when her fingers skimmed along the scars.

She found plenty of tender spots. The external abdominal obliques, especially, were too tight. His job... He probably didn’t stretch enough after a tough day. And warmth pooled in the small of his back...sometimes that meant there was a gait problem, though she hadn’t noticed one while he walked.

The time vanished, as it often did. She always set a timer to buzz in her pocket as she needed to switch through the phases of the massage, because she knew she’d lose track of the hour if she didn’t. Today, though, she must have failed to do it. She worked on his back, then on the front, alternating long strokes and detail work on the pressure points.

She was lost—she couldn’t have said how long—in exploring the pressure points on the face and scalp when a light rap sounded on the door.

“So sorry, guys.” Chelsea’s throaty voice was soft as she cracked the door open. Tess recognized it instantly. Chelsea, the spa’s director, had put her through an extensive telephone interview before this working massage. No point bringing in Tess at all, unless she passed that initial phase.

Jude rose onto his elbows, stretching his neck slowly. “Time’s up already?”

“Yeah, sorry.” Chelsea waved two fingers at Tess. “I wouldn’t disturb you, except that we’ve got the Ardens out there, and they’re not the patient type.”

“No, of course.” Tess was annoyed with herself for letting the session run long. She liked to end with a short head massage, which seemed to make the transition to real life smoother. She began wiping her hands on a clean towel. “We were just about finished, anyhow.”

Chelsea nodded and ducked out. Jude sat up, keeping the sheet around his hips, and let out a long, satisfied sigh.

“Nice,” he said with feeling. He tested his shoulders, stretching out his obliques. “Oh, yeah. Very nice. Maybe the best I’ve ever had.” He grinned. “And that’s saying something, because I get a lot of massages.”

She smiled, but something in her eyes must have registered surprise, because he laughed. “I’m the official guinea pig around here. Ro always says she wants to check out new hires, but in reality she’s too busy. So...” He yawned and ran his hand through his hair, mussing it. Somehow the disheveled look suited him. “As I said, tough work, but someone has to do it.”

“Thanks,” she said, glancing away. Did that mean there was a high turnover of therapists at the ranch? She couldn’t ask, of course. “I’m glad you feel relaxed.”

She gathered her supplies and hurried toward the door. Behind her, she heard the soft whisper as the sheet fell to the floor.

Out by the front counter, the serenity had been jangled a bit. Rowena had returned, and was helping Mrs. Fillmore set up her next appointment. If the woman’s massage had relaxed her, she didn’t show it. She leaned over Rowena’s appointment book, as if challenging something, and reiterated in a brittle voice that she would accept Ashley and only Ashley.

In the waiting room, a long-limbed couple straight from the pages of Beautiful People Magazine were tapping manicured fingers against thousand-dollar boots and giving off restless vibes.

In that moment, Tess could easily imagine why there was high turnover of therapists at Bell River Ranch. It had positioned itself at the high end, and the clients were the entitled type, demanding and finicky. In Tess’s experience, these well-heeled clients often could be iffy, looking for any excuse to avoid tipping. Difficult clients, high turnover, possibly disappointing income...

That was three strikes....

But it didn’t matter. As she returned the lotions to the elegant chrome shelves, and listened to Rowena wryly but deftly handling Mrs. Fillmore, Tess realized the truth. She wanted to be a part of Bell River, even if only temporarily. Even if her true relationship were never revealed.

If she got the chance, nothing would prevent her from taking this job.