"No, I'm just… I'm okay. I can't think. My head's spinning."

"Take your time." Instinctively he plumped up the pillows behind her and eased her back. "Is there someone I can call to help you out?"

"No! Don't call anyone."

His brow lifted at her quick and violent refusal, but he only nodded. "All right."

"There isn't anyone," she said more calmly. "I'm traveling. I—my purse was stolen yesterday in Utah. My car broke down a mile or so out of town. I think it's the fuel pump this time."

"Could be," he murmured, tongue in cheek. "How did you get here?"

"I walked in. I just got here." Or she thought she had. It was hard to remember how long she'd walked around, goggling at everything. "I had nine dollars and thirty-seven cents."

"I see." He wasn't sure if she was a lunatic or a first-class gambler. "Well, now you have approximately one million, eight hundred thousand, eighty-nine dollars and thirty-seven cents."

"Oh…oh." Shattered, she put her hands over her face and burst into tears.

There were too many women in his life for Mac to be uncomfortable with female tears. He sat where he was, let her sob it out.

An odd little package, he thought. When she'd slid unconscious into his arms she'd been limp as water and had weighed no more than a child. Now she'd told him she'd hiked over a mile in the stunning late spring heat, then risked what little money she'd had on a yank of a slot.

That required either steel or insanity.

Whichever it was, she'd beaten the odds. And now she was rich—and for a while at least, his responsibility.

"I'm sorry." She wiped at her somehow charmingly dirty face with her hands. "I'm not like this. Really. I can't take it in." She accepted the handkerchief he offered and blew her nose. "I don't know what to do."

"Let's start with the basics. When's the last time you ate?"

"Last night—well, I bought a candy bar this morning, but it melted before I could finish it. So it doesn't really count."

"I'll order you some food." He rose, looking down at her. "I'll have them set it up down in the parlor. Why don't you take a hot bath, try to relax, get your bearings."

She gnawed her lip. "I don't have any clothes. I left my suitcase in my car. Oh! My bag. I had my bag."

"I have it." Because she'd gone pale again, he reached down beside the bed and lifted the plain brown tote. "This one?"

"Yes. Yes, thank you." Relief had her closing her eyes and struggling to calm herself again. "I thought I'd lost it. It's not clothes," she added, letting out a long sigh. "It's my work."

"It's safe, and there's a robe in the closet."

She cleared her throat. However kind he was being, she was still alone with him, a perfect stranger, in a very opulent and sensual bedroom. "I appreciate it. But I should get a room. If I could have a small advance on the money, I can find a hotel."