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She ignored Johnny’s smile and shrugged at the rest of her family. Her statement was true, wasn’t it?
Why would the man bring his cowboy hat to the dinner table anyway? At least he had the good sense not to be wearing it indoors, which would have set Granny on him like a pit bull on a piece of fresh meat.
Oh, who was she kidding? Jenn sighed inwardly, giving herself a mental shake. She was born and raised on a Wyoming ranch. All ranch hands had their boots and hats permanently glued to them.
“You may hang your hat on that peg over there,” Granny said, gesturing to a large pink and blue country pig plaque, with arms made for just that purpose. Scotty’s cavalry hat was already hanging from one of the pegs.
After doing as Granny suggested, Johnny returned to the table and pulled out a chair. But instead of seating himself, he offered it to Jenn, and then fussed around her until he was sure she was comfortable.
Playing his part.
And Jenn couldn’t have been more uncomfortable. Especially when he leaned down next to her ear and whispered, “I tried to brush my hat to get the grime off, darlin’, but I think the thing has near seen its last days.”
She didn’t know whether it was his warm breath on the nape of her neck, his leathery cowboy scent or the small endearment, but whatever it was, it was nearly her undoing. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. She wasn’t used to being this near a man—any man—and this handsome stranger was far too charming for his own good.
Or hers.
His sitting down next to her didn’t help one bit, never mind the cheeky grin and wink he gave her. She knew it was for her family’s benefit, but it still made her uncomfortable.
Not for long, though. It was only moments before Johnny was chatting comfortably with her family, making everyone laugh with his silly jokes.
She sighed inwardly, wondering once again what she’d gotten herself into. She was going to be a cowboy’s girlfriend for two solid weeks. Why, oh, why, did the man’s name have to be Johnny?
The family began passing the dishes around, the cheerful babble of voices never ceasing as they piled their plates full of food. No one picked up a fork, however, not even Jenn’s cowboy.
Granddad, seated at the head of the table, cleared his throat, and everyone became silent. With the quiet reverence Jenn remembered from her childhood, her grandfather folded his hands and bowed his head.
“Let us pray,” he said, the usual cheerful gruffness for once gone from his voice, replaced by the humble reverence he offered the Almighty.
Jenn followed suit with the rest of her family, though she shot a quick sideways glance at Johnny. He, too, had his head bowed over clasped hands.
Why, Jenn wondered, did Granddad always wait until after the food was served to say grace? Her plate was steaming with fresh beef, a pile of mashed potatoes made from scratch, and green beans.
The aroma of the feast was tantalizing and far too delectable to pass up, and Granddad’s prayers were often too long and windy, at least for Jenn.
“We thank you, Lord, for all the blessings of this day,” her grandfather began. “For the food you have provided, and especially for bringing a guest into our midst. We ask you to be with us this night, and to bless our good fellowship together as a family. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.”
There was a hearty echo of amens following the prayer, and Jenn even heard Johnny’s rich, deep voice in the chorus.
Jenn hoped Johnny didn’t notice that she didn’t join in. None of the rest of the family had, to her knowledge, ever noticed, thankfully, not in all the years since high school. Or if they did, they never commented on her lack of enthusiasm for anything related to praising and worshipping God.
It was one of the moments Jenn hated most about these reunions—the constant stream of prayers to a Heavenly Father she had long since stopped believing in. God was a myth, like Santa Claus. She’d gotten over it a long time ago, except here, in the midst of her family, where faith in God was all too real.
And too painful.
Granddad reached for his fork and havoc set in for the next few minutes as everyone sampled the feast and delighted Granny with their praises over her excellent cooking.
Almost everyone had contributed something to the meal. Even Jenn, who never cooked anything in the city, far preferring take-out to a mess in the kitchen, had been coaxed into snapping fresh green beans.
And boy, was she glad of it now. The thing she missed most about her childhood home, other than the family members themselves, was Granny’s mouthwatering home-style cooking. These were two weeks she didn’t care if the gravy on the mashed potatoes was clogging her arteries. The delicious meal was just too good to pass up.
It wasn’t long, though, before the family started chatting, and inevitably, the topic turned rather quickly to Jenn’s relationship with Johnny.
Jenn had thought Auntie Myra would lead the way into that territory, but it was Scotty who spoke up first.
“Now I know your secret, buddy,” Scotty said with an enthusiastic grin in Johnny’s direction.
Johnny wiped his mouth with the edge of his napkin before replying. “Oh, and what secret would that be?”
Scotty chortled loudly. “Why you were off hugging that laptop of yours every time we hit the bunkhouse. You hinted that it might be a girlfriend, but I had no idea it was my own sister.”
Johnny shrugged a shoulder, a forkful of beef hanging midair. “You caught me. I was trying to get to know this pretty young lady better. Tough to do when we’re riding the range.”
“My sister,” Scotty said, sounding amazed. “And I never guessed it.”
Johnny winked at Jenn.
“How did you two meet?” This time it was Auntie Myra doing the questioning, or rather, Jenn thought with amusement, the interrogation.
Jenn thought Johnny would field the question as he had the others, but he nudged her with his knee under the table. Apparently he thought it was her turn to do the talking.
Jenn smiled sweetly at Johnny but nudged him back.
Hard.
“We met through mutual friends,” she explained. “Really, it all started as a joke.”
“A joke?” Johnny queried. Jenn nudged him again with her knee. He wasn’t supposed to be asking any questions here.
“Well, yes, of course.” She looked deeply into Johnny’s eyes, sending him a silent warning to shut up and go along with her. “Mark and Julie were always nagging me, wanting to set me up with one of their friends or another. I don’t know why young married couples always think they need to share the wealth. Mark and Julie are happily married, so they assume I need to be, as well.”
“Hear, hear,” called Granny, holding her glass of iced tea in the air in a mock toast and making everyone at the table burst out in laughter.
“In any case, I finally gave in to their pressure and said I would meet one of their friends, on the condition that it be at their house, with them present.”
Johnny jumped in at that point. “I didn’t know anything about it,” he said, lifting his right palm out as if taking an oath.
Jenn’s eyes blazed intensely at Johnny before she forced a sickeningly sweet smile to her lips for his benefit more than that of her family. She wasn’t going to let him fluster her—not when so much was at stake.
“I arrived early,” Jenn broke in. “I think Mark and Julie planned it that way. So there I was, sitting on the sofa with Julie, when this man came in.”
Everyone’s eyes were riveted on hers.
Even Johnny’s.
And, as unusual as it was, not a single family member was speaking. Jenn started to enjoy spinning this yarn, though she still felt a little guilty for misleading everyone.
“I took one look at him and panicked. I thought my friends had gone completely crazy.”
“Because he was a cowboy?” Granny asked.
“Oh, no,” she said with a cheeky grin. “It was because he was short, bald, wore little round spectacles which looked like they’d come from the last century, and spoke with the highest-pitched, squeakiest voice I’ve ever heard in my life.”
The laughter in the room was deafening.
“Who was he?” Johnny asked curiously, then cleared his throat and continued, “I haven’t heard this part of the story before.”
Jenn chuckled, ostensibly about the story, but actually because of Johnny’s very truthful comment. Of course he hadn’t heard the story. He couldn’t have, since she was making it up on the spot.
“The bald man turned out to be a neighbor, just dropping in to say hi and return something he’d borrowed, I think.” She beamed at Johnny for her family’s benefit. “I cannot tell you how relieved I was to hear another knock at the door and see this tall, good-looking cowboy strutting in as if he owned the world.”
Johnny ruffled his fingers through his thick, dark, curly locks. “Wow,” he exclaimed. “I cannot say how truly thankful I am at this moment for this full head of hair of mine.”
If the story were true, Jenn thought, it might even have happened that way, Johnny being a cowboy or not. He was incredibly handsome in his nice, clean Western clothes, though she did wonder momentarily what he might look like in a business suit, his curls tamed with a palm full of hair gel.
But, no. That wouldn’t be Johnny; and at the moment, Jenn wasn’t sure she’d change him if she could. He was as wild and free as the Wyoming range, and he most definitely looked that way.
Oddly, Jenn found she couldn’t complain.
She realized she’d abruptly dropped her story with her daydreaming when Johnny picked it up.
“I don’t know for sure how it was for Jenn that night,” he said, smiling softly down at her, “but for me, at least, the moment our eyes met, I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that I was a goner.”
Her gaze met Johnny’s at that moment, as if their story had been true. His midnight-blue eyes were shimmering with amusement and just a touch of something else Jenn couldn’t quite identify. Then his mouth did that cute little twist and Jenn thought, if the circumstances she’d concocted were true, she might have been a goner, as well.
Even with her past. Even with her secrets.
Johnny was getting to her somehow, and she took a mental step backward, bolstering the defenses she’d relied on all her life.
She didn’t want to go there—to the past. And she wasn’t about to let Johnny, with his good looks and charming ways, take her there.
Johnny wondered why Jenn’s smile had turned so quickly to a frown, and he redoubled his efforts to make the light come back into her eyes.
That she had been hurt in the past, by someone or some circumstance, was a given. She was all bottled up inside. He could see it through her eyes even now, though her gaze had become distant.
The clatter of a fork against a fine china plate interrupted his thoughts. “Love at first sight,” exclaimed Auntie Myra. “It’s so romantic. Was it that way for you, too, Jenn?”
“Myra,” Granny snapped, “don’t push the young people. It’s their story. Let them say what they want to say.”
“Indeed,” Jenn’s mother agreed. “By all means, go on. We’re all anxious to hear the rest of the tale.”
Even Jenn’s father and grandfather nodded at that statement.
Jenn went from dark to light in a split second, startling Johnny more than he realized. Did lying come so easy to her? She definitely had a knack for storytelling, and she was a phenomenal actress, for her eyes now held warmth toward him.
It almost felt like love, not that he had any experience in that area. He’d never found a woman who instigated the bevy of emotions coursing through him. Whatever he was feeling, it disconcerted him until he could hardly think.
“Just like the love songs paint it, I’m afraid,” Jenn admitted with a wink. “Take a look at him,” she said, smiling up at him and brushing a stray lock of hair off his forehead with the tips of her fingers. “Who could resist him?”
Johnny swallowed hard. The simple touch of her fingers running through his hair made his heart jump into his chest, thudding so rapidly he thought everyone at the table might hear it.
Jenn was a beautiful woman. What man wouldn’t be attracted to those bouncy golden curls and bright blue eyes so full of life and intelligence?
But he was getting off-track, and fast.
He reminded himself mentally that her actions were for her family. Part of the ruse and nothing more. Her touch had seemed somehow intimate, yet he knew it was all for show.
It meant nothing. So why did he feel like it did?
“Our dinner together was a bit awkward, with us gawking at each other across the table,” Jenn said, punctuating her sentence with a laugh that, at least to Johnny’s ears, sounded forced. “I think Mark must have kicked Johnny underneath the table a couple of times to keep the conversation flowing.”
Johnny winced visibly, then gave a rueful grin.
“He walked me to my car afterwards,” Jenn said, as Johnny slid his arm around the back of her chair. “Talk about cliché.”
“He snuck a kiss!” Auntie Myra exclaimed, slamming both her palms down on the table in her excitement, making the silverware and glasses nearest to her dance. “How incredibly romantic!”
“He did no such thing,” Jenn protested, with a shake of her head.
Johnny winked at her, but he couldn’t help that a tiny bit of his male pride was bruised by her harsh statement. Due to the fast pace of his career and nonstop working obligations, he hadn’t dated much in the past few years, but did she really believe kissing him would be so terrible?
“He remarked on how pretty the stars were that evening, and then he asked if he could call me sometime.”
“Well, ya obviously gave him your number, didn’t ya?” teased Scotty.
Jenn scowled at her younger brother. “I didn’t have to,” she stated bluntly. “He’d already gotten it from Mark and Julie on the sly.”
Granny snickered behind her hand. “Quick thinking, young man.”
“Of course, Johnny was busy,” Jenn continued. “We spoke on the phone a few times—when he called, that is—the man never did give me his telephone number, no matter how many times I nagged him about it. Mostly we’ve gotten to know each other through e-mail.”
The statement shook Johnny like an earthquake. The way she described their meeting—that’s exactly how it would have happened, if it had happened, for he certainly couldn’t have given her his telephone number for where he really lived.
Unless he told her the truth about his identity. Unless she knew who he really was.
Maybe if things had been different…
He shook his head mentally. This was nothing but a charade. He needed to get his head back on his shoulders, and right quickly.
Auntie Myra held her hands to her cheeks. “This is so romantic. I think I may faint.”
“Oh, knock it off with the dramatics already, Myra,” Granny snipped.
His supper finished, Jenn’s grandfather pushed back his chair and stood. “Seems to me,” he said with a slow drawl, “that given the circumstances, we ought to be giving these two youngsters some alone time.”
Jenn’s eyes widened. Johnny quickly slipped his arm from the back of the chair to her shoulders, where he gave her a reassuring squeeze. He was certainly aware she hadn’t concocted this story in order to spend time with him—alone. She’d made that perfectly clear.
“I think that’s a fine idea, don’t you, darlin’?” Johnny asked softly. “Maybe Jenn and I could take a walk. It’s a nice night out, now that the temperature has dropped some. She could show me around the ranch a bit, help me get my bearings.”
