“You could fool them.You fooled Emmy Lou.And if everyone around here thought Brian Hastings was visiting my ranch, I could hold off the bank a while longer.”
With a sigh of deep regret, he leaned back in his chair.Like too many of the women he’d known, she was only interested in him because he looked like a famous movie star.“And then what happens when Hastings never shows up?You’re in the same fix as before.”
“But by the end of the summer I’ll have some money, and I can make a partial payment.I need to keep the bank at bay until then.”
“There may be other ways around this.It’s possible I could arrange for a line of credit from?—”
“No!”She held up her hand like a traffic cop.“I don’t want anyone else getting involved in my financial problems.If I go down, I’ll go down alone.’“
“That’s very noble but totally unnecessary.Jo, this is what I do for a living.I don’t know why I didn’t suggest consulting with you about it before, during the cab ride.”
“Consulting?”She raised her eyebrows.“I’m sure you don’t do that for free, Quinn.”
“Not normally.But we could work something out.”
“I’d rather struggle along on my own.If you’d just agree to be Brian Hastings for a week, that’s all I ask.”
“All?”Quin stared at her.“The guy’s a movie star and a director, so he knows the Hollywood scene inside and out.Besides that, he’s a worldwide sex symbol.Do you realize how intimidating that would be for an ordinary guy like me?”
“Nonsense,” Emmy Lou said.“You can do the sex symbol part with both hands tied behind your back.Just give the ladies that killer grin, throw in a wink or two, and they’ll drop like flies.”
Maybe, but he knew that when women found out for sure he wasn’t really Brian Hastings, they had a tendency to turn nasty, and he’d be in constant fear they’d find out.Besides that, he was sick of never being evaluated on his own merits, and he wanted no part of this scheme, no matter how nice it would be to spend time with Jo.As far as he was concerned, this wasn’t the way to handle her money problems, either.It was only a Band-Aid when she needed a tourniquet.
“As for the movie lingo, we can fake that,” Jo said.“Emmy Lou has seen every interview that Brian Hastings ever gave — Barbara Walters, Larry King, Oprah Winfrey.She can coach you on the show biz angle.”
Quinn shook his head.“Sorry.The whole idea goes against the grain.I’ve hated being mistaken for Hastings, and I sure as hell don’t want to deliberately bring that kind of chaos down on my head.Listen, Jo, don’t reject my financial advice out of hand.I might be exactly who you need.I could?—”
“No, thank you.I appreciate the offer, but I have no guarantee I’ll come out of this with the ranch intact.I don’t want to risk your good name.”
“You won’t ruin my good name, and even if you did, I’d rather involve myself that way than pawn myself off as some two-bit version of Hastings.”
“You’re not giving yourself credit.You’d be at least a four-bit version,” Emmy Lou said.
“That’s what you think.”The more closely Quinn evaluated this stunt, the more impossible it sounded.“He’s not only a Hollywood insider, he’s a cowboy.I can’t ride, I can’t rope, and if you put boots and spurs on me, I’d probably trip and fall down before I walked two feet into the local saloon.Let me do what I do best, which is manipulate money.”
Jo looked sad but determined.“I can’t let you get involved with my messy finances, Quinn.I just can’t.”
“And I have no interest in masquerading as Brian Hastings.”
“Then I guess that’s that,” Jo said.“But you’re welcome to stay.”
He hated like hell to turn her down, but he could see that a few days at the Bar None would be a nightmare as people continued to mistake him for Hastings.He pushed back his chair.“Thanks, but I’d better leave first thing in the morning.In the rush of coming out here to deliver Sir Lust-a-Lot’s last legacy I forgot about your Brian Hastings connection.Chances are everyone would react the way Emmy Lou did.I’d rather not put myself through that.”
Jo nodded.“I understand.Emmy Lou, would you please show Quinn his room?I need to go out and check on Betsy and Clarise before bedtime.”
“Come along, Quinn.”
Under Emmy Lou’s reproving glance, Quinn felt like a misbehaving schoolboy.He silently followed her up the stairs.
“ I don’t think it would kill you to do what Jo’s asking,” she said in a very schoolmarmish tone.
“That’s because you’ve never been surrounded by a hoard of women who wanted to rip your clothes off.”
Emmy Lou sniffed as she continued up the stairs.“I’m sure you’re exaggerating.Why, I thought you were Brian Hastings up until recently, and I never once considered ripping your clothes off.All I wanted was a button from your shirt.”
“See?It starts with the buttons.What harm’s in that?Then we run out of buttons, so somebody wants a sleeve.Then somebody wants my belt.Then it’s strip city.It only takes one person to start it off, and before I realize it I’m surrounded.I try to tell them they have the wrong guy, but do they listen?Not when they’re in their Brian Hastings crazed mode.There are at least twenty women walking around this world with a button or a sleeve or a back pocket of my pants, and all of them think their souvenirs came from Brian Hastings.”
“And I suppose this all happened in New York?”
