It Takes Two: Deep in the Heart, Book 1 Read Online Free Page B

grandmother’s suffering. It would hurt her to know that all she’d had in the world to pass down had come to nothing.”
    It was important for everyone to own land, or something of value. Half-Mexican himself, and struggling in an Anglo-oriented business climate, he’d had the need to call something his own. He understood the willingness to fight to get ahead.
    He understood ambition.
    What Zach didn’t understand was the overpowering attraction he felt for this lovely woman. He wanted Annie, wanted her in the worst way. With the same driving need that he’d wanted his successful climb to the top, he wanted her.
    But he would never cheat on LouAnn. He would never cheat on anyone. Not that he was suddenly ingrained with a moral streak or anything like that. But that was his one principle. Cheating on a woman didn’t do any good—his own father had proved that theory. And he wouldn’t dream of hurting Annie by acting on his desire for her. He wanted to kiss the ground her burnished feet walked on; he wanted to pour her bathwater into a martini glass and drink it.
    These were fantasies he could hold close to him at night—because he would never hold her close during the daytime, in the harsh light of reality.
    Zach knew he could never have Annie Aguillar.
    Deep in her heart, Annie recognized that the emotions Zach Rayez stirred up inside of her were unhealthy. She tried to tell herself it didn’t matter what he thought about her, that their worlds were so different he couldn’t possibly understand a way of life that mattered greatly to her. Yet some need inside her wanted Zach to appreciate why she felt the way she did.
    “Would you like a tour of the farm?” she asked suddenly.
    Zach hesitated, and for one awful moment, Annie was sure he was going to refuse. She perceived her invitation was out of the ordinary. Land deals required cool participation on the part of both parties; there was no room for sentiment. She knew that, but the truth was, it was the only excuse she could think of to entice him to stay a little longer.
    “Sure,” he said easily, looking at her with his intense gaze. “I’ve got some time to kill.”
    Shivers of something akin to pleasure tingled her spine. Intuition told Annie that Zach was glad for the excuse to linger. Of course, he might welcome a chance to view what he was supposed to be purchasing, Annie reminded herself.
    She stood up and walked out of the kitchen. A wave of self-consciousness swept over her when Zach followed. Did he find her appealing at all? Was she too tall and lanky, her hair and skin too dark to suit him? Or did he feel the same tightly triggered response she did whenever they stood close enough to touch?
    Walking onto the porch, she held the screened door open, allowing him to pass by her. His hard-packed physique brushed her arm, and the scent of an enticing, musky aftershave made her mouth go dry. Annie slowly let the door close, with the sharp recognition that part of the reason she was lapping up this man’s sex appeal like a starving kitten lapping milk was the fact that there weren’t many men like him in Desperado. Most of the men from around here were good ol’ boys, with no more sophistication than the cows they raised. Zach had a keen intellect, she sensed, sharpening it to manipulate people into doing what he wanted them to do.
    And while nice enough, the males in Desperado who weren’t already married were a picked-over lot, too—although that wouldn’t have mattered if she’d had a mind toward marrying again. The major problem was she’d grown up with these folks, learned her letters in school with them and outrun them during recess. She felt sisterly toward the men she knew. Zach raised a different kind of emotion in her altogether.
    He stepped off the porch, cursing when the snake flicked a maraca-rattle warning at him. Annie smiled as he strode away from the wooden box and turned to wait on her.
    “What are you going to do with that