“I can’t say.”
“You can’t...” She looked up, those white flashes of fury blinding again as everything suddenly fell into place.
The billionaire cowboy, of course. Forget beating her to the property—he’d beaten her to the punch. Somehow.
Oh, she knew how. Money can buy anything. “Don’t tell me. Island Management is owned by an egotistical, smart-ass hotshot in a helicopter named Elliott Becker.”
“I’m not at liberty, nor am I required by law, to reveal my client’s identity.”
Disgust and anger roiled up, matched by the sound of Ozzie’s endless bark and Harriet’s desperate whines for Frankie to come and greet them. Next to the man, Clementine and Ruffles bleated softly, staring up at him like they were actually following the insane conversation.
Then all those sounds disappeared at the purr of a motor and the crackle of tires spitting dirt in the distance.
Turning, Frankie wasn’t even surprised to see a sleek silver sedan worth more than all twenty of the acres she was clinging to barreling onto her land. Coming in to hammer a nail in the coffin, Billionaire Becker? Oh, man, it was going to be fun to take this bastard down a few pegs.
Except, what if Nonno had signed a will? No. No, she refused to let herself even entertain that possibility.
“Oh, look, here’s your client now.” Still holding the paper, she whipped open the gate to go back out to the yard. Then she sucked in a slow, deep breath to be sure she had enough air in her lungs to give him holy hell. A strong hand clamped on her elbow.
“No one sent me,” the lawyer said. “Hold it.”
She yanked her arm free. “I know what this is about. Good guy, bad guy. You’re going to play hardball with some fake”—she flicked at the paper—“piece-of-crap forgery, and he’s going to throw insane amounts of money around. But trust me on this, neither one of you will get a thing.”
The sedan door opened and, sure enough, Elliott Becker emerged, this time without his stupid ten-gallon hat. Which, God help her, only made him more attractive. He stared at them, his head angled as if he were sizing up the situation. Wondering if she’d caved yet, no doubt.
“It won’t work, Becker!” she called.
Behind her, the other man grabbed her again. “Who is that?” he demanded.
He didn’t know? She threw him a surprised look and attempted to wrench her arm out of his grasp, but he held tight. “Let me go, asshole!”
“Hey!” Elliott’s voice boomed across the farm as he strode forward. “Let her go.”
Oh, yeah, good cop, bad cop. She wasn’t falling for it.
“You’re trespassing,” the man behind her barked.
True enough, but…they really didn’t know each other? Frankie looked from one to the other, then tried again to free her arm. “Let go of me!”
When he didn’t, Elliott charged closer, hoisting himself over the fence in one smooth move. “Get the hell off her,” he ordered through gritted teeth.
Clementine snorted while Agnes and Lucretia, the wee pygmy goats, trotted closer like kids on a playground attracted to a fight.
“You know this guy?” Elliott asked without looking at her.
“Don’t you?”
He threw her an incredulous look. “I landed on this rock less than an hour ago. Is he hurting you?”
The anger and protectiveness in his voice touched her, but she squelched the female reaction. “He just showed up here with”—phony papers and lies—“threats.”
Elliott’s eyes tapered even more as he practically breathed fire at the smaller man. “Get out of here.”
“I have business with Miss Cardinale.”
“Business to maul her?” he fired back, looming over the man. “Do you want him to leave?”
“Yes.” She wanted them both to leave.
“Get out.” He got his chest—a big, mighty, impressive as hell chest—right in the smaller man’s face.
“I have a legal docu—”
Elliott reached out and closed a sizable fist over the guy’s collar, jerking him toward the gate. “Get the hell out.”
The other man’s eyes widened as he fought to keep his composure. “Fine. Let me go.”
Elliott didn’t move, his nostrils flaring.
“Let me go,” the lawyer said again. “And I’ll leave.”
Very slowly, Elliott opened his fingers, and the lawyer tried to shake off the contact, brushing his polo shirt.
Elliott leaned in to make his point. “If you ever lay a hand on this woman again, you will regret it for the rest of your life.”
The threat hung in the air, until Arlene let out a long nay and nuzzled her flat nose into Elliott’s thigh. She might as well have sighed, “My hero!”
“You can keep that paper, miss,” the lawyer said as he opened the gate to leave the way normal men did. “The old man signed two copies, and I have the other one. You have exactly nine days to get yourself and your stinky animals off my client’s land.”
He walked away before she could react, but Elliott whipped around and looked at her. “What did he say?”
“You really don’t know him? You really didn’t send him?”
He gave her a shake of his head.
She stuffed the business card into the twisted wire of the gate like a little white flag of surrender. “Then you just became the lesser of two evils.”
Chapter Three
When the SUV disappeared around the bend, Elliott finally took a moment to drink in exactly where he was. In a cage full of strange-looking animals. Two no bigger than a medium-sized dog, and the bright orange one stuck its nose in his belly and started to bleat like a…
“Are these…nanny goats?”
“These are does,” she replied. “The buck is in another pen around there.”
“And that’s, like, a billy goat?”
“Only if you are a graceless clod. No one with any real class would call them nannies or billies unless you are referring to meat goats. Mine make milk and soap.” She closed her eyes as if an adrenaline dump hit her system. “I guess I should say thank you for getting rid of him. He was peskier than most.”
She raised goats? And scoffed at a legit offer of a million? More? He inched back, taking another look at her frilly skirt and sandals, the wild-from-the-wind long hair, and the natural cream of her skin, sizing her up in a second.
A hippie chick earth mother who might be hot as Hades but surely could be bought. Maybe a million didn’t make her go all gooey and send her on a beeline for the mall like most women, but a sweet little donation to her cause du jour and enough cash to take her critters to another farm? Easy peasy.