Yet he’d thought about nothing but her since he’d left LA. He thought the distance would ease the fire inside him. Instead, it blew a steady puff of air and forced that flame to life.

The bartender tapped his arm. Hunter tossed a bill on the bar and grasped the drinks. By the time he turned around, someone had approached Gabi and was leaning over the table.

Hunter wove through the people crowding the bar and interrupted the stranger midsentence.

“I could most certainly quench your—”

Hunter wasn’t sure what the Texan was suggesting he quench, but Hunter set the drinks down and did something he never did . . . he wrapped an arm over Gabi’s shoulders and glared.

“Well.” The other man stood as tall as his boots would let him and smiled. “Looks like you do have a man attached to that ring.”

“I tried to tell you,” Gabi said as she shifted into Hunter’s side.

The infatuated man held out his hand, and in order to avoid a scene, Hunter had no choice but to grasp it.

“You’re a very lucky man,” the Texan said. He let go and sent Gabi a wink before wandering off.

Beside him, Gabi started to silently laugh.

“What was that?” Hunter asked.

“A bar hookup that failed,” she told him.

Hunter stared after the retreating back of the man hitting on his wife.

Her tapping hand brought his attention back. “You’re growling.”

He stopped. When he brought her back into focus, she was laughing.

“You’re enjoying this entirely too much.”

“More than you can possibly know.” She lifted her drink and clicked her glass to his. “You know what they say about payback,” she teased.

He was growling again.

Chapter Nineteen

Every once in a while, Gabi would catch Hunter watching her as they sat across from Frank and Minnie Adams. His gaze would capture her hand on the stem of her martini glass and linger.

She stroked it a few extra times until Hunter gently kicked her under the table.

Oh, the power . . . who knew she’d be so invigorated with it?

The older Texan couple were everything Gabi pictured as a happy pair entering the second stage of adult life. Their only child, Melissa, was grown, and from what Gabi could surmise, trying to find her place in Daddy’s company.

They were ordering coffee, deciding on a froufrou dessert to share, when Mr. Adams broached the subject of business.

“I like you, Blackwell,” Mr. Adams said as he leaned over the table. “Even though you’re ruthless and according to my lawyers, can’t be trusted—”

“Frank!” Minnie nudged her husband.

“They say you’re going to take over my company and bankrupt the oil production portion and dedicate all your devotion to new pipelines.”

Hunter sat beside her and listened, his eyes focused on the man in front of him.

“Pipelines are the future.”

“Without oil . . . what is the worth of the pipeline?” Frank opposed.

Hunter sat back. “Every oilman in Texas . . . in the US would need to go through Adams/Blackwell pipelines in order to deliver their crude. We’ll make money on every barrel manufactured regardless of whose land it stems from.”

“Monopolies are frowned upon.”

“We won’t be a monopoly for long. We’ll be the trendsetters.” Hunter sat forward. “Consider the phone in your pocket. The first cellular concepts were nothing more than ham radios . . . devices used in war and eighteen-wheelers. Eventually Motorola expanded the concept, and within a decade, others emerged . . . then came analog, digital . . . Bell held the monopoly . . . but not forever. US pipelines are the future in US oil, Adams. We both know it.”

“It’s risky.”

“Life is risky.”

Frank sat back and Gabi soaked in her husband at work.

“I want another ten percent,” Frank said.

“I’m putting up the capital.”

Frank shrugged. “You need me or you wouldn’t be sitting here. I need to protect my family. If I give you controlling interest, there is nothing keeping you from kicking me and my people to the Gulf. I want a merger, Blackwell . . . not an acquisition.”

Under the table, Gabi noticed Hunter fisting his hand and relaxing it. This was obviously not his plan.

Unable to help herself, Gabi interjected, “What are you willing to do for that extra ten percent, Frank?”

He offered a placating smile. One that irked her, but she didn’t call him on it.

She met Frank’s eyes and held them until he flinched.

“I have connections here in Texas, other oilmen who can be persuaded to hook up early on . . . lay down the infrastructure to deliver to the main pipe.”

“You’ve already told me that,” Hunter reminded him.

“I know politicians . . .”

“So do I.” Hunter glared.

Gabi let her thoughts run. “I would think pipelines . . . along with production, is the perfect plan for the future of our country. My guess is Carter would back a solid direction to remove our demand on foreign oil. And if I’m not mistaken, Carter has an uncle who’s in the Senate.” She was musing out loud, and captured the attention of all those at the table.

“What are you rambling about?” Frank asked.

Gabi directed her attention to Hunter. “Samantha is great friends with Carter and Eliza Billings. He recently left the governor’s seat in California. Word on the Republican block is he might be running for the White House in six years.”

“Might and could? Words that don’t mean anything to me,” Frank managed.