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Kaylee giggled again and held up two fingers like a peace sign.
There was nothing peaceful about this. He might not be dating a mother of eleven, but he was dating a mother of three. Not that an impromptu picnic counted as a date. This was just a friendly little picnic. After all, three-year-olds didn’t accompany their mothers on first dates.
Autry felt better. Not a date. Just a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and some fruit.
Still, he pulled at the collar of his polo shirt. It was strangling him. And granted, it was August, but was it a thousand degrees suddenly?
“There’s the park,” Marissa said, pointing down North Buckskin Road.
Autry glanced at the sign as they passed it. Rust Creek Falls Park. He didn’t spend a lot of time in parks or going on picnics. But it was eighty-one degrees and sunny, with a delicious breeze that every now and then blew back Marissa’s wavy hair, exposing her enticing neck. Perfect park weather. And it wasn’t very crowded. A few people walked dogs, a couple joggers ran on the path and a group of teenagers were sunbathing and giggling in the distance.
“Here’s a perfect spot,” Marissa said. “Right under a shade tree.”
“Hi, Mr. Autry,” Kaylee said, for absolutely no reason as she stared up at him. Gulp. She was looking at him with pure adoration in her twinkly brown eyes. She slipped her little hand into his.
Oh God. He wasn’t supposed to be charming the three-year-old! It was the elder Fuller he wanted to have looking at him that way. Instead, Marissa was focused on laying out the blanket she’d brought.
“Hi,” Kaylee said again. “Hi.” She rested her head against his hip.
“Hi,” he said, forcing a smile.
Yes. He had definitely entered another dimension of time and space. Where Autry Jones was in a park with a single mother and her three-year-old, about to eat sticky peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which, granted, were his favorite.
Make your escape. Any ole excuse will do. Bolt, man! Bolt.
But Autry’s feet stayed right where they were, his gaze transfixed on Marissa’s lovely eyes and a beauty mark near her mouth. Now he was staring at her lips. Wanting to reach out and—
“Mr. Autry, you’re lucky,” Kaylee said, snagging his attention as she sat down.
“Because I’m here with you guys?” he asked, tapping the adorable little girl on the nose as he sat at a reasonable distance. Did she have to be so stinking cute?
She tilted her head as though that was a dumb answer. “Because you get to eat dessert first if you want. You’re a grown-up.”
“Ah,” Autry said, smiling at Marissa. “But I always eat my healthy sandwich first. Then dessert.”
Kaylee shrugged, turning to look in the bags. Marissa pulled out a jar of peanut butter, strawberry jam and a loaf of bread, then some paper plates and plastic utensils.
“Allow me,” he said, taking the knife and peanut butter.
She raised an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, Autry, but you really don’t strike me as a man who eats a lot of PB and J.”
“You’ve never seen me at midnight, hungry for a snack while going over fiscal projections.”
Her cheeks grew pink. Hmm. That could mean only one thing. That she was imagining him at midnight, naked, eating peanut butter in his kitchen. Not that that was remotely sexy. Maybe she was just imagining him at midnight. Naked or not. She still wasn’t giving him any signals either way. She didn’t flirt. She didn’t laugh at every little thing he said, funny or not. She didn’t brush up against him to try to turn him on. He really had no idea if Marissa Fuller, mother of three, was interested in him in the slightest.
They ate. They had sandwiches. They had oranges. They had chocolate chip cookies. By the time Autry almost finished his sparkling water, Kaylee had fallen fast asleep on the blanket, using her little monkey backpack as a pillow.
“Three kids, huh?” he said. “That can’t be easy.”
Marissa took a sip of her water. “It’s not. But loving them is. Plus we live with my parents. In the house I grew up in. So I have backup 24/7.”
He noticed she kept her gaze on him, as if waiting to be judged.
“You’re the lucky one,” Autry said. “If you live with your parents, you must be close with them. And your kids and folks must be close. That’s gold, Marissa.”
She tilted her head. “I guess I’ve never really thought of it that way. But you’re right, we are close. Maybe too close!” She smiled. “Not you and your family?”
He looked up at an airplane high in the sky, watching it jet over the clouds. “No. We were never a close family. The Joneses were about business. Everything is about Jones Holdings, Inc. Interestingly, not even that managed to bring us closer. But I was never close with my brothers growing up. And there are five of us.”
“But you’re here,” she said. “Visiting Walker and Hudson.”
“I’m trying,” he said. “My father, the imperious Walker Jones the Second, feels like his namesake eldest son defected. Walker moved here. Opened a Jones Holdings office here. Is doing what he wants—here. And Hudson always marched to his own drum, which never involved the family business.”
“And you?” she asked. For a moment he was captivated by how the sun lit up her dark hair.
“All about business. But I try very hard not to be a workaholic. I never want to be like my father, who put the company above everything—family, birthdays, special occasions. He missed everything and still believes business comes first.”
“You just said you’re all about business,” Marissa pointed out.
“Because I don’t have other commitments or responsibilities. For a reason. No wife. No kids. When I work around the clock or fly off to Dubai for a month, I’m not hurting anyone. In fact, I’m making someone happy—my father.”
“But surely you want a family someday,” she said, popping a green grape into her mouth.
He reached for his water and took a long sip. Did he? If he were really honest, he didn’t know. He’d had his heart smashed, his trust broken, and all his tender feelings for that sweet baby he’d come to think of as his own had hardened like steel.
“So you’re divorced?” he asked, glad to change the subject. He wanted to know everything about Marissa Fuller.
“Widowed,” she said, taking a container of strawberries from the bag. “Two years ago in a car accident. My five-year-old, Kiera, has very little memory of her father. Kaylee here has none at all.”
“And the third daughter?”
“Abby. She’s nine.”
Nine? Marissa couldn’t be older than twenty-seven, maybe twenty-eight. She’d been a mother a long time, practically all her adult life.
He watched her bite her lip, seeming lost in thought. “Abby was seven when her dad died and remembers him very well. A few times a week, when Abby is saying her good-nights to her little sisters, I’ll overhear her telling them about their daddy.”
Marissa’s life was very different from his. What she’d been through. What she did on a daily basis.
“She sounds like a great kid,” he said.
Marissa nodded. “And one who had to grow up too fast. She mothers her little sisters all the time. Sometimes I even forget that life before their dad died wasn’t quite like the paradise Abby paints for her sisters.”
Her cheeks turned red, as though she hadn’t meant to say that aloud. She held out the container of strawberries and he took one.
“Well, I might not be married,” Autry said, “but I have no doubt that marriage is hard and takes work. And you clearly got married very young.”
“I got pregnant on prom night. Married and a mother at eighteen. Four years later, Kiera came along. And Kaylee was a surprise—a nice surprise, but maybe not the boy Mike ho—” She turned away. “I guess sometimes I start talking about all this and end up saying too much.”
He reached out and moved a strand of hair from her face, the slightest touch against her cheek, and yet he felt it everywhere. “Best way to get to know someone is to listen to them talk when they’re not guarded.”
She smiled. “You’re trying to get to know me?”
“Well, I only have three weeks in Rust Creek Falls, but yes. I want to know you, Marissa Fuller.”
“Marissa Fuller, mother of three. With baggage. With live-in parents. With a really busy schedule.”
“I’d like to steal up your free time,” he said.
She laughed. “Do I have free time? If I ever have time to myself, I always think I should spend it one-on-one with one of the girls. Or I should scrub the bathroom tub before my mother does, and she always gets to it before I can. My life isn’t exactly Italian restaurants and dancing and walks in big-sky country.”
He moved a bit closer to her. “But maybe you’d like to go to dinner at an Italian restaurant. Go dancing. Take a walk in big-sky country.”
“I’d love all that, Autry. But I’ve got responsibilities. Three young kids.”
He nodded. “Of course. But do you know who you sound a little bit like? My dad. He never felt comfortable taking a day off. He never relaxed or had fun. The business was everything, just like your home life is. As it should be, Marissa. Home and family—that’s everything. But you need some time to yourself, too. To recharge.”
“I wish,” she said. “But I’ve been doing this since I was eighteen, Autry. You’re what? Thirty-two? Thirty-three? I can’t even relate to that kind of freedom. I hear you jet all over the world for Jones Holdings.”
“Thirty-three and, yes, I do. Our corporate headquarters are in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where I grew up. I live in a skyscraper on the twenty-fifth floor. But I’m never there. I have a whole atlas of destinations in mind to build our corporate profile and assets.”
“And no woman has ever tempted you to settle down? Like your brothers?”
He frowned and turned away, hoping his expression didn’t match what he was thinking. He didn’t want to talk about Karinna or Lulu. “I don’t have the luxury of that,” he said. “Not if I want to keep Jones Holdings expanding globally. Just like you don’t have the luxury of going to a movie whenever you feel like it. In three weeks, I’ll be in Paris, likely for a year.” He paused and looked directly at her. “Maybe until I leave, we can keep each other company.”
“Exsqueeze me?”
He laughed. “I don’t mean in bed. I mean I’d like to spend time with you.”
“I’m a package deal, Autry. Even for three weeks in August.”
“Kaylee likes me,” he said. “I’ve already passed the Fuller daughter test.”
Marissa smiled. “I suppose you have. She’s not easy to charm.” She took a long sip of water. “Look, Autry. You’re tempting. Very tempting. But my life isn’t about fantasy or what I think about before I drift off to sleep.”
“Doesn’t mean you can’t have a little romance in your life.”
“Romance? I think I’m done with that, Autry.”
“Marissa—”
She took a deep breath. “My marriage wasn’t perfect. Many nights, Mike and I went to bed angry. It wasn’t easy for me to juggle working full-time with having three little kids and trying to take care of a home, so I became a stay-at-home mom. Money was tight, and Mike worked longer hours at the office to secure a promotion and a raise. We argued at times, the stress made it impossible not to, but we both agreed the sacrifices were worth it. Thing was, with so many added responsibilities, romance went out the window. That’s just the way it was and I wasn’t about to complain. I knew I had a blessed life. A home, a good husband, three healthy children. Till that one day when a drunk driver took Mike away.”
“I’m so sorry.”
She nodded. “I was so overwhelmed by grief and panic. I wasn’t really sure how I’d keep things going, but I just kept putting one foot in front of the other for the kids. The meager life insurance policy that Mike had helped for a while, but I worried about money constantly. So when my parents suggested we move in, I said yes. Ralph and Roberta Rafferty are wonderful grandparents, but I’m a twenty-seven-year-old woman living at home with Mom and Dad.”
“I admire you, Marissa. You did what you had to do at every step.”
He thought about how tough her life was—rewarding and full of love, yes, but tough. He didn’t date single mothers, but if he couldn’t break his own rule, what good was it? For the three weeks he had in Rust Creek Falls he wanted to give her the world. Her and her kids. It wasn’t like he’d fall in love. Marissa was a single mother of three. There was already a great barrier built right in.
“Well, I’d like to get to know you while I’m here,” he said. “I’d like to treat you and your daughters to a little fun. Good clean fun like this picnic. Hot-air balloon rides. Baseball games. You name it.” He paused. “But clearly, I’m very attracted to you, Marissa. I think you’re drop-dead gorgeous. I like spending time with you. I like you. So romance is definitely on my mind. I just want to put that out there.”
He’d enjoy his time with Marissa, cement a bond with his brothers, repair things with them and his dad, then he’d jet off to Paris—no heartache for either of them.
She stared at him with those brown eyes, and again he could see her thinking. Assessing. Considering. “You’re not looking for commitment and I’m not, either,” Marissa finally said. “So...friends. No strings attached.”
“No strings,” he repeated.
But their agreement left him a bit uneasy. It was one thing to say no strings and another to really mean it. And hurting Marissa—or her kids—was unacceptable.
Chapter Four (#u1d1145dc-5a75-5f3b-8154-b24677c7dce4)
At dinner that night, when it was Kaylee’s turn to share something special that had happened that day, a Fuller-Rafferty tradition going back generations, the three-year-old couldn’t stop talking about the nice man who came on their picnic and did magic tricks.
Yes, Autry Jones did magic tricks. The man was full of surprises. Big ones and little ones. At the two-hour mark of the unexpectedly long picnic, Marissa had had to wake up Kaylee so Autry could meet his brothers and Marissa could go pick up Kiera and Abby from their playdates, but Kaylee had been a little grumpy and still tired. Autry had plucked a clementine from the bag and made it magically disappear and reappear atop Kaylee’s head, which had brought forth belly laughs and “do it again, Mr. Autry.”
“Who was it?” Abby asked, reaching for the bowl of mashed potatoes.
Marissa slid a glance at her mother, who was pretending great interest in passing the platter of roast chicken to her husband, but was really hanging on to every word. Marissa didn’t often spend time with any men. Nice or otherwise.
“While we were shopping for our picnic in Crawford’s,” Marissa explained, “we ran into someone I met at the viewing party last night. So we invited him to join us. No big deal.”
“Who was that, dear?” Roberta Rafferty asked, so nonchalantly that Marissa smiled.
“Autry Jones.”
Fifty-five-year-old Ralph Rafferty paused with his fork in midair. “Autry Jones? Is he one of the millionaire Jones brothers?”
Marissa knew Autry was rich. Filthy rich. And he looked it. But somehow, the man she’d gotten to know a bit last night and today was a bunch of other things before millionaire. Kind. Thoughtful. Patient. A good listener. And so insanely handsome that just thinking about his face—and yes, that amazing body—gave her goose bumps. “Yup. He’s in town for three weeks visiting his brothers.”
“Wait,” Abby said, her brown eyes the size of saucers. “Do you mean to tell me that the man I saw with Walker and Hudson at the Ace came on your picnic?”
Marissa bit her lip. It was one thing for her daughter to notice a cute man for her mother to “date,” never having known her mother to date. It was another for that to become a reality.
Abby frowned and stared at her.
Uh-oh. This was new territory for Marissa. Though technically, she and Autry weren’t dating. They were friends. Who might kiss, maybe. Probably. Marissa sure hoped so.
“I can’t believe I missed the picnic!” Abby’s expression turned all dreamy, and if Marissa wasn’t mistaken, cartoon hearts were shooting out of her chest. “So you’re dating him? That’s so exciting!”
Marissa glanced at her mother, whose expression was its usual granddaughters-are-watching-and-listening neutrality. Roberta Rafferty would let Marissa know her opinion loud and clear later, when the girls were in bed.
“Abby, Autry Jones and I are not dating. We’re...friends. New friends, at that.”
“He does magic tricks,” Kaylee said. “Grandma, Grandpa, Mr. Autry made a little orange appear on my head!”
Her parents laughed, and mentally, Marissa thanked Kaylee for breaking the tension.
