The Mercenary and the New Mom Read online

  “You don’t look much like a prince to me,” Sabrina tossed back. Her glance took in his partner standing beside a dusty red pickup. “Either of you,” she amended.

  Tall, lean and swarthy, the second man gave her a smile that lifted his well-groomed black mustache to reveal startlingly white teeth. But it was the blue-eyed charmer who responded to Sabrina’s remark. His grin widening, he shot a quick glance at his partner. When he turned back, his eyes were filled with laughter.

  “Appearances can be deceiving, sweetheart.”

  The lurch her stomach had taken a few seconds ago was nothing to the wild somersault it now performed. Good grief! This lean-hipped, jean-clad roustabout ought to come with a warning label!

  Dangerous when smiling.

  Dangerous even when not smiling, Sabrina suspected wryly. His kind always were. She had only the haziest memory of the too handsome bull rider her mother had run off with when she and her sister were toddlers. If Sabrina had to guess, she’d bet the rodeo cowboy had oozed the same outrageous sex appeal as this broad-shouldered hunk.

  Her sneakers slid off the stack of wooden crates. The iron lawn chair hit the porch with a thump. Pushing out of the chair, Sabrina tucked a straggling tendril of her shoulder-length sable hair behind one ear. She hadn’t heard these guys drive up, which wasn’t surprising considering the roar of the semi that had pulled out of the lot and the shrieking pump a few yards away.

  Thank goodness relief was at hand.

  “It’s about time you guys got here. I was just thinking about making another call to Wentworth Oil. This one wouldn’t have been as polite as the last.”

  The stranger thumbed back his ball cap, revealing a shock of short brown hair a few shades lighter than her own. “Is that right?”

  “Think you can fix it?”

  Older and wiser, Peg would have termed the look he gave her as pure-dy devil.

  “I can fix anything, sweetheart.”

  “You can drop the ‘sweetheart’ bit,” Sabrina said tartly, “It’s beginning to grate almost as much as your darned pump.”

  He followed her annoyed glance to the oil rig. The black pump head rode up on the walking arm, then plunged down again, like a giant grasshopper bobbing in an alfalfa crop. A particularly loud grind of metal on metal made Sabrina wince.

  “It’s been screeching like that since yesterday morning, annoying the customers and driving me nuts.”

  “Such a noise would drive me to nuts as well,” the black-haired, mustachioed roustabout standing beside the truck added with a grimace.

  Sabrina blinked at his odd phrasing. She couldn’t quite place his accent. He certainly didn’t hail from around these parts. Mexico, she guessed. Or perhaps from some place farther south. A good number of workers from the Venezuelan oil fields had migrated to Oklahoma and Texas in recent years.

  Hands on hips, she looked from him to his partner. “Well, are you two going to get to work or not?”

  They exchanged one of those male kinds of looks that could have meant anything from “Let’s have a cold beer first” to “Where’d this one come from?”

  “I guess we are, sweet—er...Miss...?”

  “Jensen. Sabrina Jensen.”

  The blue-eyed hunk tipped his ball cap. “I’m Jack, and this is my friend...Al.”

  The swarthy oil worker bowed from the waist. The gesture looked so ridiculous in the diner’s dusty back parking lot, and so astonishingly graceful, that Sabrina had to smile.

  “Pleasure meeting you, Al. You too, Jack. Now, you two had better fix that thing before we’re all permanently hearing impaired.”

  “Yes, ma‘am.”

  Hiding a grin, Jack Wentworth strolled back to the pickup where Ali Fashor Kaisal waited patiently, twirling one tip of his mustache.

  “I promised to show you some of back-road Oklahoma on the way to the airport in Tulsa,” Jack said, “but I didn’t intend to put you to work. This might delay your departure for a while.”

  “It is my plane,” Ali replied with a careless shrug. “It does not depart until I say it does.”

  “So, what do you think? Do you remember how to take an oil rig apart and put it back together again?”

  “Ah, my friend, some things one never forgets.”

  Grinning, the CEO of Wentworth Oil Works and the Crown Prince of the Royal House of Qatar stripped off their shirts. Jack tossed his carelessly in the truck bed. With the ingrained courtesy of the East, Ali carefully folded the shirt that he’d borrowed from his old friend along with jeans and a well-creased straw Stetson.

  The warmth of the sun on Jack’s back felt good, damned good. Almost as good as the prospect of working side by side with Ali again. More years than he wanted to count had passed since the first time he and the prince, then the disgraced younger son of the Emir of Qatar, had sweated together in the sheikdom’s rich oil fields. In the years since, Ali had become heir to one of the world’s richest sheikdoms after his older brother’s death, and Jack had moved up the corporate ladder at Wentworth Oil Works, but he knew darn well that neither one of them had forgotten the basic skills they’d learned under the blistering sun. The skills that formed their common heritage.

  “From the sound of it, I’d say the head joint on the walking arm has frozen up.”

  “It sounds so to me, also.”

  Rummaging in the storage compartment in the truck bed, Jack pulled out a toolbox. Good thing he’d taken a company vehicle when he’d offered Ali this impromptu tour of Oklahoma.

  “Should be a piece of cake to fix.”

  “But not too much of this cake.” Ali slanted a glance at the woman watching them from the back of the diner, one palm raised to shade her eyes from the glare. “It does not hurt to impress the so beautiful Sabrina with our prowess, no?”

  “Careful, Kaisal,” Jack warned. “The last time you and Hatmir met me for dinner in Paris, she swore she’d make a eunuch of you if you strayed again.”

  “She is much a woman, my Hatmir. But so, I think, is this one.”

  Jack thought so too, but he wasn’t about to admit it to the Playboy of the Middle East. As rich as he was powerful in the world of petro-politics, the Crown Prince of Qatar made a hobby of collecting beautiful women...and Sabrina Jensen certainly fell into that category.

  Jack stole another assessing look himself, only to catch her doing the same. Unconsciously, he puffed out his chest and hollowed his stomach. Just a little. He’d worked enough years in the oil fields and on offshore rigs to burn every ounce of fat from his body. He kept himself in shape even now, despite the fact that he spent most of his time hustling corporate mergers and international consortiums instead of twenty-foot lengths of pipe. He wouldn’t win any Mr. America contests, but it didn’t hurt his ego a bit to catch the delectable Ms. Jensen eyeing him with a hint of interest in her luminous green eyes.

  At that moment, she noticed him noticing her noticing him. With a flush, she swept back another wayward strand of brown hair so dark it appeared almost black.

  “I have to get back to work.”

  He barely caught her embarrassed mutter over the noise of the pump, but he couldn’t miss the heat staining her cheeks. Spinning around on one sneaker, she retreated inside the diner. The rear view, Jack decided, proved as exceptional as the front. No doubt about it, Sabrina Jensen was trophy quality.

  Dozing in the sun like a sleek, lazy cat, the woman had just about tied him up in knots. With her arms crossed atop her pile of dark hair and that slice of bare midriff peeking up at him, she’d made his throat go dry and dusty as a played-out well.

  Then she’d opened those striking green eyes.

  Jack was as much of a sucker as the prince for long legs and the firm, full breasts outlined so deliciously under Sabrina Jensen’s knit top. When they came packaged with the keen intelligence he’d glimpsed in her eyes and a mouth that stopped just short of sin, he’d decided on the spot to drive back this way after he’d delivered Ali to the entourage waiting
with his private jet.

  Damn! The entourage! Jack shook his head, thinking about the State Department representative who’d flown in with the prince’s entourage.

  “I’d better call Trey and let him know we’ll be delayed. He tends to get nervous about things like security and schedules.”

  Ali shrugged. “That one, he is always nervous.”

  He didn’t used to be, Jack thought as he reached inside the pickup’s cab for the mobile phone. The consummate State Department official, Trey McGill had set up a good number of the clandestine missions Jack had carried out for the government over the past ten years. Trey’s extensive experience had proved extraordinarily useful, although it was Jack’s own far-flung business and oil contacts that had provided his cover and his access to spots where most Americans weren’t welcome. He and Trey made a good team—or they had until Heather.

  Jack’s fingers fisted on the cell phone. Even now, two years after Heather Blake’s accidental death, guilt stabbed at him. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t known Trey had a thing for the blond, ambitious Washington D.C. lawyer. Or that she’d dropped McGill like a hot brick when he’d introduced her to the Oklahoma oil executive. Heather’s excessive drinking and stubborn reliance on pills had killed their brief affair almost before it got started, but she’d somehow convinced herself that Jack intended to marry her. At least, that was what she’d sobbed to Trey the night she OD’ed. Jack had been in South America on a mission then. Stonefaced, McGill had given him the news when he returned.

  Two years, and the guilt still ate at Jack’s conscience. Two years, and he hadn’t been able to bridge the yawning gap between himself and the man he shared so many missions and tense hours with. Blowing out a long breath, he punched in Trey’s number and his own ID code.

  The State Department rep answered on the first ring. “Where the hell are you?”

  “At a diner along a stretch of old Route 66, about fifteen miles outside Tulsa.”

  “A diner? The prince’s staff has a banquet ready to serve as soon as they take off, and you stop at a diner?” His voice sharpened. “What’s that noise in the background? What’s going on?”

  “Relax, Trey. Nothing’s going on. That’s a rusty walking arm you hear.”

  “A what?”

  “Never mind. Look, tell the aircrew to hang loose. We’ll be there in a couple of hours.”

  “A couple of hours! It doesn’t take that long to travel fifteen miles.”

  “We’re taking a break for a cool one.”

  Which they would, as soon as they freed up and lubricated the pump head.

  “Dammit, Wentworth, you know we had to get special clearance from Customs to bring the prince’s aircraft into Tulsa. It’s sitting on the runway in plain sight, a nice, juicy target for any nut with a grudge against Middle Easterners. I’ve got two dozen security folks sweating blood every extra minute this baby is on the ground.”

  Jack didn’t remind Trey that the State Department had suggested bringing the prince to Oklahoma in the first place. Using the cover of the endowment of a multimillion dollar energy research facility at OSU funded jointly by Wentworth Oil and the Sheikdom of Qatar, Jack and Ali had met secretly to go over the details of a new Arabian Peninsula accord proposed by the U.S. Ali was carrying the draft accord back to his father. Hopefully, the emir would agree to its content, if not its exact wording, and present the draft to the other powerful leaders who controlled the flow of oil out of the Persian Gulf. With the political situation so unstable in that region, all parties agreed that it was best to keep the negotiations secret until the accord was a done deal.

  “I’ll let you know when we hit the road,” Jack assured the agitated rep.

  Flipping the cell phone shut on Trey’s protest, he joined Ali at the back of the truck.

  “Ready to wrestle with some rusted iron?”

  Ali’s white teeth flashed under his mustache. “I am ready, my friend.”

  It took them exactly forty minutes to shut down the pump, remove the head casing, chip the rust from the main joint, and lubricate every moving part. Using sheer muscle power, they tested the up-and-down motion of the walking arm for resistance. The metal rod moved smoothly... and noiselessly, thank God. Grunting, they manhandled the casing back into place and took turns wrenching the bolts down tight.

  By the time they finished, sweat ran down Jack’s back. Ali’s mustache drooped at the corners and dripped in the center. Black grease and Oklahoma red dust streaked their arms and chests.

  Jack dropped the tools back in the box and tossed Ali a dispenser of the dry soap and the clean rags that no oilman’s truck was ever without. “Nice work for a man who hasn’t bent a wrench in twenty years.”

  “Ha! And you have, my friend?” Ali scrubbed the grime from his chest and arms. “Since your grandfather makes you chief operating officer of Wentworth Oil, you do nothing but complain about the paperwork and the meetings. I think that is why you undertake these so dangerous trips for your government. You crave the excitement we once found in the oil fields.”

  “Maybe. What I crave right now, though, is something long, liquid and icy cold. Hey, save me some of that stuff. I can’t go inside looking like this.”

  Ali tossed him the dry soap and dragged on his shirt. “That is, as you say, your problem. I shall go for you, yes?”

  “No!”

  “Don’t worry. I shall give the so beautiful Sabrina your order for something cold.” His black eyes gleamed. “And I, my friend, shall ask for something hot.”

  With a tip of his borrowed straw Stetson, he left Jack cursing and furiously scrubbing his arms and chest.

  Chapter 2

  Dammit!

  Shoving his shirttails into his jeans, Jack strode through the dusty parking lot toward the front of the flat-roofed, stucco diner. He should have known better than to let Ali have first crack at the soap and rags. Put him within a five-mile radius of a woman like Sabrina Jensen and the prince was like a hound with the scent of a doe up. If Jack didn’t watch it, he’d end up delivering two people to that plane in Tulsa...and Hatmir would have him for lunch the next time he was in Qatar.

  Even more to the point, he wanted to try his luck with the delectable Ms. Jensen himself.

  He followed the curve of round, squatty building to the front door. Above the few steps leading to the door, a peeling neon sign right out of the forties flashed the diner’s name and Good Eats in pink and faded turquoise. It was the kind of place that had dotted the roads during Route 66’s heyday. The kind of place that still catered to a crowd more interested in good food than fancy decor.

  Jack pushed through the diner’s heavy glass door, intent on defusing the million-watt charm Ali could turn on and off like a flashlight. Just inside the door, he stopped short, astounded. For an eerie moment, Jack wondered if he’d gone back in time.

  Shiny chrome, bright neon advertisements and pink leatherette seat covers screamed for attention, vying with the scrubbed and spotless black-and-white tile floor. Perry Como crooned from a massive Wurlitzer jukebox. Posters advertising chrome-laden Pontiacs and wood-sided Ford station wagons decorated the walls. Pool balls clattered in a smoky room off to one side, and truck drivers hunched over a gray-speckled Formica counter, wolfing down coffee and pie.

  Even more distracting were the mouthwatering aromas of fried onions and chili. Suddenly ravenous, Jack wove a path through the tables and joined Ali at the counter. His friend, he noted, hadn’t wasted any time. A half-devoured slice of banana cream pie sat before him.

  “You must try this,” the prince exclaimed between forkfuls. “It is most wonderful.”

  Straddling one of the round stools, Jack decided he didn’t want pie. He wanted a cold beer, a plateful of whatever was sizzling on the grill, and a few words with the woman in the kitchen. He could see her in the pass-through window dividing the counter area from the grill. Tendrils of dark hair lay in damp, feathery curls on her neck. Her white knit tank top clung to he
r body. With smooth efficiency, she wrapped the strings of a white apron twice around her slim waist and nudged aside the balding, barrel-chested cook.

  “You need a break, Hank.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Go on, get off your feet for a while.”

  The cook scowled around the unlit black cigar clamped between his teeth.

  “Bossy females. Between you and Peg, a man can’t chew, can’t spit, can’t smoke, can’t even call his kitchen his own.”

  Sabrina plucked the spatula from his fist. “You know the doc said you had to give those varicose veins a rest. Now, scoot!”

  Grumbling, the cook left her to man the grill. An expert flip of the spatula turned a heap of succulent, golden brown onions. Another flip and a hard press squeezed jets of fat from a juicy hamburger. Jack hadn’t seen one that big or that thick since his high school days. Saliva rushed into his mouth.

  Wielding the spatula with brisk competence, Sabrina called to him through the window. “You and your friend did a good job on that rig. I can hear myself think for the first time in two days.”

  “If you have any more problems, call Wentworth Oil.”

  “Ask for Jack,” Ali added with a wicked wink at the waitress. “This one, he needs the hard work to keep him from trouble.”

  “I can believe that,” she retorted. “What’ll you have, Jack?”

  “One of those hamburgers. With lots of onions. And a cold beer.”

  “Sorry. We gave up our liquor license a few months back. Iced tea okay?”

  “Fine.”

  “Damned bossy females.” The ousted cook settled on the stool beside Jack. “Just because some truckers got pie-faced and tore up the place a time or two, Sabrina decided we shouldn’t serve beer anymore.”

  Jack swept another glance around the gleaming diner. “Guess I can’t blame her. This place is a gem.”