Texas Cinderella / The Texas CEO's Secret: Texas Cinderella / The Texas CEO's Secret. Victoria Pade

mother’s cottage Tuesday night. The moment she stepped through the clearing in the bushes and magnolia trees she saw that he was watching for her and a small smile turned up the corners of his mouth.

      Why that sent something gooshy through her, she didn’t know, but that bare hint of him being pleased to see her was all it took to heat her from the inside out.

      Then his gaze went from her free-falling hair, down the teal T-shirt she was wearing to her flowing wide-leg slacks as she crossed to him. His smile grew bigger. And that internal heat took on a rosy, sensual glow.

      Stop it! she ordered herself, trying to keep uppermost in her mind that in spite of the fact that it was late evening, that they were suddenly together again, under a clear moonlit sky, this was about work. Only work…

      “Finally!” Tate muttered when she reached him, before she’d even said hello.

      “You just called me five minutes ago to tell me to come over,” she said, thinking he was making a comment about having to wait for her.

      He shook his head. “Finally we can get to what we had planned tonight.”

      “Ah,” Tanya said as she took the chair nearest him.

      What they had planned tonight was to look through his family albums. And since there was a stack of them on the table, she sat where they would each be able to see them. It didn’t have anything to do with the fact that she wanted to sit close to him. Want to or not, she swore that she wasn’t going to let this evolve into anything more than doing her job tonight.

      “I brought the wine I started on at dinner. Will you have some?” Tate asked then, picking up the open bottle and refreshing his own glass while he indicated the clean glass beside it.

      “This is supposed to be work for me,” Tanya reminded them both, holding up her notepad and pen to prove it.

      “Sometimes mixing business and pleasure is a good thing,” he enticed.

      “I hope that isn’t your philosophy when you do surgery,” she countered.

      That merely made him laugh and question her again by holding the bottle higher.

      She shouldn’t. This was work.

      And yet she heard herself say “Maybe just one glass.”

      She set her pad and pen on the table as he poured, using his averted glance as an opportunity to give him the once-over. The pool area where they were sitting was well lit and she could tell that he’d dressed for dinner and then undone some of it for this. There wasn’t a suitcoat or tie anywhere around, but he had on gray slacks and a crisp white shirt with the long sleeves rolled to his elbows. He was also clean shaven, the scent of his cologne just barely wafted to her and his slightly longish hair was neatly combed.

      Would it have helped if he’d looked grungy? she asked herself, knowing her vow to keep this out of the realm of another datelike evening with him was already weakening.

      But somehow she doubted that the way he was dressed made any difference. The man just seemed to hold an appeal for her that she didn’t fully understand. Maybe he’d unearthed some kind of deep-seated attraction to unavailable men that she hadn’t known she possessed.

      But he was unavailable—in so many ways—and she told herself not to forget that.

      When the wine was poured and the bottle replaced on the table, Tate handed her her glass and lounged back in his chair with a deep sigh of what sounded like relief.

      “Rough day?” Tanya asked as she took a sip of the wine.

      “Rough dinner,” he amended.

      There was talk among the staff about the tense state the family had been in since rumors had begun to surface that Tate’s mother had announced that her youngest son, Charlie, was a Foley. None of the staff knew any of the details, but they did know that Charlie had almost instantly gone off to settle back into college early, and that Eleanor had taken some time away herself.

      Tanya assumed that tensions over Charlie’s paternity were still the cause of the rough dinner, but Tate didn’t offer her any explanation as she took another sip of wine.

      “So, how far back would you like to go?” Tate asked with a nod toward the albums.

      Good, he is getting right down to business, Tanya told herself to ward off a ridiculous sense of disappointment that he wasn’t bothering with small talk tonight.

      “I did some background research today and thought about how I’d like to do this,” she said, trying to sound purely professional. “I’d like a clear picture of the McCords and your family history first. Once that’s accomplished, I can get into the story of the diamond and the treasure and of the feud with the Foleys, and the land and silver mines that changed hands, too. But for tonight, how about starting with just the family stuff?”

      “Whatever you want.”

      “And since it looks as though the feud between the Foleys and the McCords began with Gavin Foley and Harry McCord—”

      “My grandfather.”

      “—that seems like the furthest we need to go in McCord family history.”

      “Okay, Harry McCord it is,” Tate said, sitting up and reaching for the albums. He discarded two of the more ragged ones before settling on one that displayed old, poor-quality black-and-white photographs of a man who bore a clear resemblance to him. “These are of my grandfather in front of the silver mines that launched the McCord fortune and, ultimately, McCord’s Jewelers,” he informed her.

      Tanya flipped through page after page, noting that there were five mines, all of them with a large stone at their entrance, each with a petroglyph carved into it to name it. The Turtle mine. The Eagle mine. The Lizard. The Tree. The Bow.

      “Can I have a few of these pictures to use? I’ll make sure they’re returned,” Tanya said when she’d reached the end of that album.

      “I don’t see why not,” Tate agreed, taking them out and giving them to her.

      “So, was your father Harry McCord’s only child?” Tanya asked then.

      “No. My father was the oldest son. The younger—my Uncle Joseph—lives in Italy. You must know Gabby? My cousin?”

      Gabriella McCord was a famous model and it was nearly impossible to pick up any magazine, newspaper or tabloid and not find her face on the cover. So Tanya felt a little stupid for not having considered from where on the family tree Gabby McCord had sprouted. She didn’t admit it, though.

      “I know of her,” Tanya said. “The whole world knows of her. But it isn’t as if she was ever introduced to the housekeeper’s daughter on one of her visits, and I had no idea how she fit into the family—I guess I’d never really thought about it.”

      “Well, Gabby’s father is Joseph. Joseph married an Italian actress descended from royalty over there. They made their home in Italy, and Joseph oversees and manages the European branches of McCord’s Jewelers. My grandmother died in childbirth with Joseph.” Tate found a picture of his grandmother and a few of Joseph growing up and as an adult, showing them to Tanya.

      “So Harry McCord raised Devon—your father—and your uncle on his own?”

      “That’s the story. My father said one of his earliest memories was of going out to the mines with my grandfather, and that was where he and Joseph spent most of their time growing up—if they weren’t in school, they were working alongside my grandfather.”

      Tate moved on to the next album, flipping through more shots of the brothers Devon and Joseph until he reached one of them with Harry McCord, standing outside of McCord’s Jewelers.

      “That was the first store,” Tate said.

      Tanya took a close look at the nondescript glass storefront that could hardly compare