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“She makes a slug seem cuddly,” he was saying, his voice practically ringing with disgust. “I don’t know why you hired her in the first place. She’s just a fancied-up troublemaker.”

Fancied up.

What Sydney and Ariel had done, good as it was, hadn’t fooled him one bit. She still wasn’t enough for the likes of Rylan Rafferty. She never would be.

“Look, you’re the ones who wanted this piece done. I couldn’t care less. So get rid of her, now, or forget the whole thing. I’m good either way.” He ended the call, and she heard him mutter, “Damn that bitch.”

Fitting words, she thought numbly. Because that’s how she felt. Utterly and truly damned.

The moment he was out of sight she ran.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Ry scanned thesaloon again, searching for that vision in gold he’d spotted in the moment before Lily Highwater had dropped that little bomb on him. He’d thought she’d been headed for him, but apparently she’d been aiming for the ladies’ room. He’d been anxious to talk to her, since they hadn’t exactly parted on the easiest of terms.

It had taken him a while to process what she’d told him. For everything he’d learned about her to outweigh his gut reaction to the fact that the woman she apparently accepted as her boss had ordered her to sleep with him. And she’d done it.

But everything he knew about her told him that wasn’t why. She wouldn’t. She just wouldn’t. Not Kaitlyn. If he had to believe that, then he might as well give up right now because he was too stupid to live. That leveled him off, which in turn let him focus all his anger on the proper target: Jillian Jacobs.

So when Lily had cornered him in the back of the saloon, what she told him didn’t surprise him. But that didn’t make him any less angry.

“I recognized her the minute I saw her coming out of Yippee Ki Yay the other day,” Lily had told him. “I’d seen her before, at a media conference we were both at a couple of years ago. And I remembered the scuttlebutt I’d heard then, that she’s ruthless, lies with ease, and is always looking for the big scandal that will make her famous.” Lily’s nose had twitched as if in disgust. “And she’s been poking around town, looking for gossip.”

“Gossip?”

“About you. She was asking everyone about you. Hoping to find some dirt, I imagine. Obviously that was fruitless.”

Some juicy secret she can use.Kaitlyn’s words, uttered in that stricken voice, echoed in his head.

Lily had hesitated then, and he’d said, “What?”

“I talked to some people I know in Austin. Rumor is, your friend the former governor is going to make a presidential run.”

He’d been disconcerted by the seeming change of subject. “Not surprised. I know he’s been playing with the idea. But what’s that got to do with—”

“According to what I know of the way Ms. Jacobs works, and my friends agree, she’s quite capable of trying to find dirt on you to manipulate him into giving her his first interview when he announces. As in give her the interview, or she’ll go public and destroy you.”

He’d blinked. “But there’s nothing to go public with. Unless she thinks me getting hauled in by Shane’s dad for drinking with my buddies down by the creek when I was fifteen is life-destroying.”

“Ry,” Lily said gently, with a touch of pity in her voice, “do you really think she wouldn’t just make something up if she had to?”

The anger he’d been feeling, prodded by not being able to get to Kaitlyn, who had been turned into some kind of picture-perfect vision in gold, burst free. “That tears it. Who the hell does she think she is?”

“Queen of the muckrakers? The kind who gives all of us a bad name?” Lily suggested under her breath. Then she gave a sad shake of her head. “I could have warned you, if I’d known it was her.”

He’d been about to blurt out some choice words when his phone had rung, with a callback from the chief of staff at the magazine, where he’d already left an irate message after Kaitlyn had told him what Jacobs—she was reduced to a last name in his mind now—had told her to do. Lily had patted his arm and left him to it.

The conversation hadn’t been pleasant. He wasn’t one to normally badmouth anyone, but it wasn’t badmouthing if it was the truth, was it? Jackie had been soothing, saying she’d handle it, but he was mad enough calm didn’t come easily. That woman had used Kaitlyn, tried to manipulate her, and somehow that infuriated him more than anything. Kaitlyn had gone through more hell in her life than any person should have to. And damned if he’d stand by and let the woman he was half in love with be treated like that.

After some choice observations about Jacobs, he ended the conversation with an ultimatum, because at this point he truly didn’t care.

“Look, you’re the ones who wanted this piece done. I couldn’t care less. So get rid of her, now, or forget the whole thing. I’m good either way.” He ended the call muttering, “Damn that bitch.”

An image of Jillian Jacobs poking around Last Stand, looking for someone, anyone, to say something shocking about him was bad enough, but to then use that to try and blackmail the governor into an exclusive…and suddenly he’d almost laughed; if she thought she could manipulate that man, she had a surprise coming.

But the amusement faded when he’d put his phone away and looked around for Kaitlyn. It truly had taken him a moment to be sure it was her when he’d spotted her. He didn’t know what all Sydney and Ariel had done, but it had produced an amazing transformation. Kaitlyn had looked as if she could easily swim with Chelsea’s crowd.

Oddly—or perhaps not—while the look had been breathtaking, he now found himself wanting the real Kaitlyn back, that sweet, genuine, woman underneath the flash they’d added. He’d had enough experience with the flash to know that it was what was underneath it that mattered. Chelsea hadn’t had much.