The Reluctant Texas Rancher (Harlequin American Romance) Read Online Free Page B

homestead and shifted the conversation back to business. “When do you want to get started giving me the background information on the lawsuit against you?”
    Travis did not miss a beat. “How about tonight?”

Chapter Three
    An hour and a half later, tensions were high. And so, Travis thought, were his emotions.
    “Do you want me to help you or not?” Liz demanded, her frustration with him apparent.
    Travis figured she would be a hard-charging advocate. It was the reason he had hired her. It did not mean, however, that he wanted to bare his soul, to her or anyone else. He sat back in his chair and regarded her with unchecked irritation, taking in her upswept auburn hair. “How my relationship with Olympia started is irrelevant to the case.”
    Bracing her hands on her desktop, Liz leaned toward him. She looked at him as if she could read him right down to the marrow of his soul and was not exactly thrilled with what she found.
    She arched an elegant eyebrow and moved around to stand in front of the desk. “I will decide what’s relevant and what is not.” She stared at him with lawyerly intensity, then enunciated slowly, “Your job, as my client, is to answer my questions as openly and honestly as possible.”
    Telling himself he could handle her, even in full battle mode, Travis added, “And stop thinking like an attorney while I’m at it, right?” He was beginning to see what made her so formidable in and out of the courtroom.
    “It would help.” Frowning, Liz picked up the legal documents he had brought for her to peruse. “I don’t need you second-guessing me.”
    Then what did she need?
    Not that he wanted to go there. Especially with the trouble he was in.
    Travis slouched in his chair, reluctantly returning his mind to business. “That’s not what I was doing.”
    Liz looked down her nose at him in rigid disagreement. “You’re trying to run the defense.” As if finding it difficult to be that physically close to him, she abruptly straightened and moved away. “And you of all people ought to know better, because ‘a man who is his own lawyer has a fool for his client.’”
    Much as he wanted to, Travis could not argue with that. He sighed and glanced around Liz’s law office. Unlike the ultra-luxurious one he’d had at Haverty, Brockman & Roberts, this one was sparsely decorated, with beige walls, sturdy dark wood furniture and comfortable client chairs. The focal point here was Liz. With her hair twisted into a casual knot at the nape of her neck, her attitude unerringly focused and businesslike, she was clearly in her element.
    She belonged here, Travis thought. Not working the ranch.
    She picked up the yellow legal pad she’d been writing on moments earlier and settled herself in her chair. “Now, back to the beginning…” she continued.
    Travis tried not to groan.
    “How—and under what circumstances—did you and Olympia Herndon meet?”
    Not as accidentally as I thought. “I met her at a charity function we were both attending. I’d heard she was looking for new representation. Before I could approach her, she introduced herself to me.”
    Liz scribbled furiously. “Did you talk about her search?”
    “Not that evening, no. We just got to know each other a little bit.”
    Tapping her pen impatiently on the pad, Liz prompted, “And then what?”
    Already restless, Travis stood and prowled her office, inspecting the art—mostly black-and-white photographs of the Four Winds—on the wall. “I saw her again…socially…at a dinner party given by the senior partners and their wives. And then at another fundraiser.” He spun around. Lounging against a bookcase, he thrust his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “A few weeks later, I started representing her.” Aware that if they kept up the conversation they could be headed into dangerous territory, he compressed his lips. “Why does any of this matter?”
    “Because Ms. Herndon is asserting in her lawsuit that you did not