Unbridled and Unsaddled [The Double Rider Men's Club 9] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (20 page)

“Did you see the article I helped put in the paper to publicize the County Western Day event?” Ben asked excitedly.

What the hell?

Kurt frowned. “Are you saying
you
were responsible for this?” He pointed down to his copy.

Ben smiled with a childlike exuberance, like he had just won the World Series single-handedly. “Yes. Indeed. I gave those two pictures off of my camera phone to a guy at the paper. He promised to do up a piece and mention the coming event. It’s attention-getting, right?”

“Why did you take those pictures?” Sabrina asked.

Ben looked away from the paper he held and noticed for the first time that he was the only happy person in the room. “Well, I was sort of following you.”

“Why?”

He looked suddenly guilty. He looked at the ground, toed the carpet with one foot, and said, “During the last job we worked on together, I found a note in a file on your desk. The note was the only piece of paper in the file. It was a call list with two names, Drew Montgomery and Parker Grayson. I was curious about why you were going to call them.

“So I had the research librarian at the library look up their names for me. I found out they were former rodeo stars and they had this big rivalry back in the day. That was the same morning Kurt told us about the County Western Day account coming to Peak Events. I thought you were getting a head start. I followed you and snapped those when you talked to them the first time.”

“You rifled through my desk and found contact names in my files?” Sabrina resisted the sudden urge to reach up and strangle him. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

“Well. Yeah. Maybe. But this”—he held up the newspaper and waved it back and forth—“made it all worthwhile. It worked out perfectly. I was able to locate the same guy who wrote the articles on their rivalry, and he jumped at a chance to do another story. After I saw one of the guys in your apartment a couple of weeks ago, I came up with the love triangle part. Clever, huh? You know what they say, sex sells.”

Kurt inhaled deeply. “Sit down, Ben. I need to explain some things to you.”

“What’s the problem? Why aren’t you two happy? I got us free publicity for the event. And the guy said he’d do more articles, too.”

Sabrina glanced at Kurt. His expression was stunned. Hers was probably equally incredulous.

“The problem is that I don’t particularly like to be made to look like I’m in the middle of a love triangle with two men. For the record, I’m not.”

Ben rolled his eyes. “Oh, that’s no big deal. That was just a catchy headline. You weren’t even mentioned in the article except that you were with Peak Events and the Western Day. And get this, tomorrow’s article is even better.”

“Tomorrow’s article?” Sabrina felt the blood drain from her face.

Kurt shook his head and then turned in his chair to face the bane of her existence. “The problem is, Ben, that as owner of Peak Events, I refuse to allow ‘free’ publicity in the newspaper in the form of sensationalized headlines and smarmy articles. Our sponsors are already implicitly unhappy with this first article. I’ve received countless unhappy phone calls all last night and this morning. I hope like hell I can placate everyone already attached and not have to cancel the event due to lack of support.”

“But—” Ben started to speak, but Kurt cut him off.

“No. Stop talking. It has never been clearer to me that you do not belong in this organization. I want you to pack up your things today and be gone in an hour.”

“You’re firing me?” Ben looked over at Sabrina as if she would help avert this unfair tragedy. She wasn’t going to.

Ben’s lips pressed together so tightly she expected them to crack into pieces. Then he relaxed a bit. “I’ll tell Jane.”

The threat to tell Kurt’s wife was another bad move on Ben’s part.

Kurt smiled. “Go right ahead. You know how she feels about publicity of this nature, don’t you? She’s your sister, after all. I
just
don’t think she’ll side with you in this matter. But I’d love to be there when you tell her what you did.”

Jane had once been found guilty in the court of public opinion for several slanderous and defamatory comments that she’d made while intoxicated at a private party. The media hadn’t been remotely kind to her during that long-ago scandal. Jane was the main reason Kurt didn’t like publicity of this nature.

Ben crumpled the paper in his hands and threw it on the ground before exiting the room.

“I’m sorry, Sabrina. I’ll do my best to keep the next article out of the paper. I don’t expect to be successful. I never have been before when dealing with the news media.” His shoulders slumped a little, and sincere regret etched his features.

Sabrina smiled. “I know. I appreciate your understanding. I didn’t know how on earth anyone connected those two guys with Peak Events.”

“Was it a private consulting job you did?”

“Yes.” She didn’t elaborate about the DRMC private rodeo from several weeks ago.

Thankfully, he just nodded and didn’t ask her to explain further.

The good news for today was that she got to keep her job. The better news was that Ben was now out of her life for good. Unfortunately, the rest was bad news. The really horrible news was the probability that Drew especially, and possibly Parker, wouldn’t want her anymore.

Drew had said upfront that he didn’t want any hint of their private lifestyle coming up in his public life. They hadn’t even gotten through the first day of their shiny new ménage lifestyle before their pictures ended up in the paper.

Did they think she’d been the one to try and build up her venue with the sordid news article? That would be worse. She could explain that Ben was the big mouth. Hopefully, they would believe her and understand.

Sabrina just wasn’t ready to hear that they had changed their minds about a future with her. She didn’t think she could take it if they left her and moved on. They’d probably be better off without her. The reason she continued to dodge their phone calls had more to do with not wanting to find out that they’d opted to leave.

No more bad news for today. She just couldn’t take any more. Not yet.

* * * *

Drew didn’t often have truly great ideas in times of trouble, but he’d had one last night. A call to Parker confirmed his brilliance, and to that end they were about to hopefully stop the seemingly endless titillation that had become a regular feature in the local section of the newspaper for the past few days.

They hadn’t seen or spoken to Sabrina since Sunday, and he missed her desperately. They had tried to give her space in light of the articles bombarding them each and every day. He figured she didn’t want to make things worse by visiting either of them or calling, but Drew was getting damned tired of waiting for all of this to blow over. Thus, his current plan to hopefully end all the newspaper articles.

Putting his personal problems on a back burner, Drew strolled into the local news studio ready to clear the air once and for all. He saw Parker already waiting for him inside. They had agreed to meet for a spontaneous press conference.

This rivalry crap was about to end for good.

They had taken a chance and asked Clay if he’d try to get a hold of Sabrina and bring her along to this conference. He wanted her to be there. Partly because he missed her so much and simply needed to see her face. But mostly because he wanted to end the foolishness with the rivalry in the newspapers.

He didn’t see her yet. A feeling of unease crept into his bones. The whole point of this press conference was to enable a reunion without having to hide and dodge the media like federally protected witnesses.

“How are you doing, old man?” Drew asked as he approached.

“Just fine, youngster,” he replied without pause.

The news manager approached and briefed them on the layout, the procedure for the conference, and if they planned to field questions. Drew had agreed to speak for both of them, but they weren’t going to allow endless questions. He’d give them three.

They seated themselves at the table set up for their big, exclusive
announcement
.

Drew hoped this brilliant plan would work.

“We’ve called this press conference, because there seems to be a lot of misinformation in the papers lately about why Parker and I have been meeting with Sabrina Lancaster for the last several weeks. We’d like to tell you why and set the record straight.”

The reporters in the seats in front of him seemed to lean forward as they waited expectantly for him to explain.

“Sabrina is a dear friend of both of ours. She contacted each of us a while back and brought us together to ask if we’d participate in the coming County Western Day event which is, as you all know, a fundraiser for a very worthy local children’s charity.”

Parker spoke, “Naturally, we said yes.”

Drew continued. “Initially, she had asked us if we wanted to be a part of a rodeo competition to help out. We both said that our joints ached at just the mere thought of it. We are both retired.”

Parker nodded vigorously. The crowd of reporters seemed to relax a notch.

“While we certainly enjoyed our stint in the rodeo long ago, I don’t competitively leap off perfectly good horses anymore to rope calves, and Parker here doesn’t purposely ride angry bulls to get thrown off after eight seconds anymore, either.”

“Amen to that,” Parker interjected. The reporters all laughed.

“But since the children’s charity is so worthy of support, we decided to become sponsors of the event in question, instead of participants in any kind of rodeo aspect.”

A few flashes went off in the room, blinding him momentarily. But this was also the first time he didn’t worry over his picture being taken with Parker. Now if only Sabrina would show up, he’d count this press conference a success.

Once he could see the front row again, he continued. “To that end, in the future you may see either me or Parker or the both of us with Sabrina Lancaster. Try to prepare yourselves.”

The reporters laughed again.

When he looked up, and his vision cleared, he noticed Clay was in the room. Standing next to him was his lovely Sabrina. Arms crossed loosely, she had an encouraging smile on her face.

He didn’t point in her direction, but the reporters must have seen him looking because in the next minute the flashes started again.

“That concludes our statement. Thank you for your time.”

A barrage of questions came next. He’d agreed to answer a few. The studio manager replaced him at the podium. Drew sat down next to Parker and readied to answer. He kept tabs on Sabrina, wanting to ensure she didn’t take off before they could all agree to meet.

“So does this mean your long-standing rivalry has come to an end?” a woman in the front row asked.

Drew smiled. “The truth is we never had much of a rivalry even back when we were in the rodeo circuit. But I’d have to say the answer is yes. Any rivalry between us has come to an end.”

“Any chance you’ll
ever
be talked into roping or riding competitively in the future?”

He and Parker exchanged a quick glance and then both shook their heads in the negative.

There were a few other questions regarding the charity, and then the studio manager wrapped things up and they were free to go.

They immediately went to where Clay and Sabrina stood. She hugged Parker first, and then Drew. The three of them posed for a picture or two, and then they were free to go.

Drew was elated that she was with them, but there were still too many reporters milling around for any kind of private conversation.

Once they were all outside, Clay said under his breath, “Why don’t you come with me to the property? You can talk there privately. I’ll even let you use the cabin again.”

Sabrina spoke for the first time. “Thanks so much, Clay.”

They all headed to the DRMC ranch. Anyone foolish enough to follow would get stopped at the gate.

Once they were all alone, seated on the leather sofa in front of a roaring fire, Drew felt safe enough to speak.

But Sabrina spoke first. “I’m so sorry I ran out of here several days ago. That’s so unlike me.”

Parker said, “It’s understandable. Don’t beat yourself up. We were willing to give you time to sort things out.”

“I didn’t even think you’d want to work things out. We weren’t even a day into our new relationship before being thrust into the limelight like a pack of vicious criminals.”

“True, but we made out just fine.”

“Great idea, by the way. Are you really sponsors of the children’s charity?”

“Of course we are,” Parker said. “My body rebelled at the idea of ever being thrown off a bull again. Writing a check is so much less painful.”

“That depends on the size of the check.”

“True. But the question of the day isn’t about money.” Parker grabbed one hand, so Drew grabbed the other.

She nodded. “I know.”

“Please say you’ll stay with us. We can all make this work.”

Sabrina laughed. “Of course I’ll stay with you. And after today’s press conference, I also believe we’ll be able to make this work, and without any candid shots from the press.”