The Bad Boy. Leah Vale
had changed. “I’m sorry,” she repeated. “This must be very diffi—”
“Were you sent to fetch me? Because if you were, I’m busy.” His posture was stiff, and his tone was as sharp as Joseph’s had been when he’d reprimanded her.
But this was Alexander, whom she’d played with in the small lake on the property on sweltering summer days and who’d kept a stash of tissues in his pocket for her in the weeks following her father’s death. She planted her hands on her hips. “I swear, if one more person interrupts me today…”
He glanced at her, eyebrows raised curiously, then away.
She inhaled deeply and tried to calm down. “That’s not why I came to find you. Joseph understands your…your…” She trailed off, not wanting to put to words his obvious turmoil. That would not be the way to secure his help. “I’m here because I need to talk to you. About Cooper.” His name alone was enough to bring the heat back to her cheeks and the dampness back to her palms. Damn the man for rattling her so.
“What about him? Is he buying stuff already? Beats winning the lottery, if you ask me. He doesn’t have to wait all that long to get his money.” Alexander looked at her over his shoulder, his lip curled into an expression she’d never seen on him. “I imagine he’s in hog heaven.”
Thinking of a similar expression on Cooper’s face—a contempt born of hurt and betrayal—she shook her head adamantly. “No. Just the opposite. When I took his letter to him this morning he told me he plans to ruin the company.”
Alex heaved a sigh and faced her. “He plans to ruin the company? Why in the world would he say something like that?”
“He says he’s known since he was thirteen that he was Marcus’s son.”
Alex’s brows shot up.
She repeated what Cooper had told her on the county-jail steps—nearly word for word, because she really was a very good listener.
By the time she’d finished Alex was rubbing his temple. “Why didn’t you tell my da—my grandfather this?”
She heaved a similar sigh, unaccustomed to being brushed aside by the man who’d given her a top spot in the company despite her being only thirty. But Alexander had been needed to fill Marcus’s shoes while Marcus gallivanted around doing client relations. Now, there was a euphemism.
“I did. Sort of.” She pointed toward the house. “But he got to Joseph before me.”
“He?”
“Cooper. He arrived at the house first after I’d bailed him out of jail.”
“Jail?”
“Yes. The county lockup. Alison Sullivan—the private investigator Joseph hired—had been on her way out of town early this morning to deliver the Colorado letter—”
A muscle twitched in Alex’s jaw at her offhand mention of yet another half brother.
Sara swallowed and forged on. “When she noticed Cooper’s truck in the parking lot of a bar that should have been closed, and people were hauling broken chairs out the door. Clearly, there had been a ruckus of some kind. She stopped to check it out and was told that Cooper had been one of the people arrested last night for being involved in a fight at the bar. Joseph thought it best if I went immediately to get him out as discreetly as possible and give him his letter rather than waiting until the other letters were delivered.”
Alex closed his eyes and shook his head. “Jail. Beautiful.”
“Anyway, he gave Joseph some cock-and-bull story about telling me he was worried his inexperience would cause the company harm. Now Joseph thinks I just misunderstood Cooper.”
Alex leaned back against the workbench. “Could you have?”
She crossed her arms over her chest and raised her chin. “No. Absolutely not. He was very succinct.”
“Fine. So what would you have me do about it?”
She let her arms fall to her sides again, confused about why he’d ask such a question when the solution was obvious. “Stop him!” What was with these McCoy men?
“How?”
She started to pace, sorely limited by the small size of the tack room. “I don’t know…keep him from going to work for McCoy Enterprises or something.” Maybe that would protect the company her father had helped build at Joseph’s side.
Alexander shook his head again and turned back to the workbench to resume fixing the bridle. “Marcus’s will was equally succinct, Sara. Cooper is to be given a job at McCoy Enterprises befitting a ‘Real McCoy.’ We couldn’t keep him from the company even if we wanted to.”
She wrapped her arms around her middle to still her churning stomach. “Then what do you suggest we do about him?”
He waved a negligent hand. “You can baby-sit him.”
That stopped her dead. “What?” she croaked.
“You keep an eye on him, make sure he doesn’t do any damage.”
Her lungs refused to work properly and a feeling akin to panic spread through her. “Me? How? No!” Not after what had happened on the jail steps and in Joseph’s office. She couldn’t think clearly around Cooper “McCoy” Anders.
Alexander set the bridle down with a clatter and let out a noisy breath as he faced her. “Why not? If he really told you what he did—”
She unwrapped her hands from around her waist to plant her fists on her hips again. “He did. Why won’t any of you take my word for it?”
He raised his hands at her indignation. “Okay, he did. But why would he? Why would he admit such a thing to you, of all people.”
She rolled her eyes at the rough-beamed ceiling. “He thinks I’m some secretary the ‘McCoy machine’ sent as ‘eye candy’ to further sweeten the deal.”
She returned her attention to Alex in time to see him make a face and give a little shrug that said the assumption seemed a reasonable one to him.
“Alex!” Heaven help her if he and his newfound half brother proved to be more alike than she’d thought possible.
He rubbed a hand over his eyes, the weary air about him returning. “Sara, I need you to handle this. Considering…everything, I can’t deal with this, too.”
Her anger and frustration left in a rush. Everyone thought Alexander had moved on from being Marcus’s brother to his son with his usual aplomb. But it was clearly a struggle for him. His entire world had been shaken and stirred. The least she could do was deal with the issue of Cooper Anders.
She spread her hands in capitulation. “Any suggestion how?” The image of a muzzle and leash popped into her mind. But a bar-brawling guy like Cooper would probably like that, so she nixed the idea.
“I’ll think on it,” he said resignedly.
She started to leave, then stopped. As gently as she could, she said, “You’re going to have to meet him sometime, you know.”
He turned again and picked up the bridle. “I know. And I trust you to keep him from causing trouble.”
His faith in her filled her with warmth and renewed her determination. “I’ll do my best, Alex.”
“You always do, Sara.”
Sara left the tack room and stable nevertheless feeling as if she’d just been ordered to keep Judas in line. But that wasn’t the worst of it.
How was she supposed to thwart Cooper when, despite her best intentions, all she could do was think about how attractive and rightly tormented he was?
The memory of his handsome face near hers sent an unwelcome tingle along her skin and brought her up short at the