by Hope Ramsay
“Do you have to rush back to Shenandoah Falls or is Mom okay to babysit?” Jason asked Danny.
“No. Mom’s in heaven. I have the night off.”
“You’re sounding seriously pussy whipped, dude,” Matt said, continuing to work his iPhone.
Danny refrained from responding. Matt was twenty-five and unattached, so he didn’t understand fatherhood. Danny’s love for his baby girl knew no bounds, and if that was the definition of being whipped, then so be it.
“Cool,” Jason said. “Let’s have dinner together.”
“I’ll text the gang,” Matt said. “How ’bout we meet at Jack Rose for happy hour?”
“Who’s the gang?” Danny asked.
“Andrew, Edward, Brandon, Grady, Laurie, and Roxy. You know, family, roommates, fiancées,” Matt said.
“Is one of you engaged to Roxy?” Danny asked, surprised.
“No, but she’s practically family,” Jason said. “Brandon is the engaged one. You met Laurie the other day.”
Jason held out his arms while the tailor took measurements. “Maybe we shouldn’t invite Grady or the Kopps.”
“Why not?” Matt asked, still studying his phone.
Jason rolled his eyes. “Because it might be awkward, that’s why.”
“Awkward how?” Matt asked.
“Because Amy turned Grady down. Let’s just say it’s a family thing.”
“And what about next time? If Amy’s too stupid to realize that Grady is a great guy, then that’s her problem. Not that Amy is the brightest light in the chandelier, if you know what I mean.” Matt finally raised his head.
Danny wanted to pull the damn iPhone out of his brother’s hands, get right up in his face, and remind him that Amy belonged to the family and deserved respect. But he refrained. He’d come home to mend fences and rebuild the bridges he’d foolishly burned eight years ago. So popping his brother in the face was out.
But Jason evidently felt no such constraint. “You know, Matt,” he said, “sometimes you’re a total dickwad. Amy is family. You ought to stand by her.”
“Yeah, and Grady is our landlord and friend. It’s too late anyway. I’ve sent out texts to everyone. If you want my opinion, we should be trying to fix this thing with Amy and Grady.”
“Are you out of your mind?” Danny asked. “When I talked to Amy yesterday, she wanted nothing to do with the guy.”
“She’s going through a phase,” said Matt. “She’ll get over it.”
Danny wasn’t so sure, but before he could make any judgments, he needed to meet this Grady guy. An hour and a half later he got his chance.
By the time Danny and his brothers finished with the tailor and arrived at Jack Rose, the “gang,” as Matt and Jason referred to them, had already settled into a half-circle booth at the back of the trendy restaurant. Extra chairs had been drawn up for the large crowd, and Danny found himself sitting right beside Roxy Kopp and across from a guy with sandy brown hair and a receding hairline who, by process of elimination, must be Grady Carson.
Danny had been living in LA and Vegas for the last eight years, so naturally he judged Grady on the externals first. His narrow sloped shoulders, thin, mousy hair, and pale washed-out complexion screamed geek and nerd. He was squirrely, and everyone knew that a guy like that could catch a beautiful woman if he had a big enough stash of cash.
But apparently Amy couldn’t overlook Grady’s hairline or bad teeth, because she’d made it clear that Grady’s millions didn’t impress her. Either that, or Amy really was a dewy-eyed romantic who still believed in true love.
Danny had checked his innocence at the door when he’d moved to Tinseltown eight years ago, but somehow he couldn’t help feeling that Amy deserved someone with a more vibrant personality. And after talking with Grady for five minutes, mostly about today’s stock market developments, Danny concluded that Grady Carson had a personality like wet tissue paper.
Having satisfied himself that Amy was, as usual, smarter than anyone in the family gave her credit for, he turned to his right and proceeded to admire Roxy Kopp. In her gray suit and white silk blouse, she looked the epitome of the young DC professional. Danny especially liked her blouse. She’d unbuttoned the top few buttons, enough for a hint of lace to show at the V of her neckline.
Yeah, she had a chest. And it turned him on.
What was wrong with him? He was about to be married, and Roxanne Kopp was practically a member of the family. As a kid, she’d been a total pest, the absolute bane of his existence who’d tattled on him with impunity. Of course he’d picked on her unmercifully, teasing her, pulling her pigtails, and a lot of other stupid stuff. Roxy was so easy to bait, and getting her all flustered had been pretty amusing for a troublemaker like himself.
In fact, it might be fun to see her flustered now, as a full-grown woman.
He let that thought linger as he ogled her cleavage and then mentally backed away. Scarlett’s father should behave like a gentleman, not a thirteen-year-old. The thought sobered him because he knew damn well that he was the closest thing to an adult in the crazy world that Scarlett had been born into.
So he leaned back and took a sip of his bourbon. “So, how’ve you been, Roxy?” he asked.
“Why don’t we bypass the family chat, okay? You aren’t interested in my dull and boring life.” Roxy flipped her dark hair over her shoulder. Man, she was one beautiful woman. Why the hell didn’t she have a steady boyfriend?
“I am interested in your life,” Danny said. “Matt told me that you work for a nonprofit raising money for kids with disabilities. That sounds like a good cause to me.”
She nodded. “Yeah. I guess I grew up to become a do-gooder. The truth is, I’m real good at hitting people up for money. And that’s the beginning and end of it.”
She gazed at her martini, the picture of a dissatisfied, unhappy woman. He wanted to explore that, to punch her buttons. “You haven’t ever forgiven me for the frog incident, have you?” he asked.
She looked up, blinking. “I’m surprised you even remember it.”
He laughed out loud and shook his head. “Roxy, you have no idea, do you?”
“About what?”
“I put that frog down your shirt hoping you’d get so freaked out that you’d take off your blouse. I had this deep need to see you naked from the waist up.”
“What?” She straightened in her chair and stared at him for about fifteen seconds while a blush crawled up her face.
“I wanted to get that out in the open, you know, because I didn’t pick on you because I hated you. I did it because I was a dickwad of a thirteen-year-old and you had a nice set of boobs even when you were only twelve.”
“I have to go.” She picked up her purse and dug in it for a moment, coming up with a twenty-dollar bill, which she placed on the table. Then she turned and headed through the crowded dining room.
Danny picked up the bill and followed her, catching her right before she slipped through the door. He handed the twenty back. “Your drink’s on me. And you don’t have to leave. I’m just being the same dickwad I always was.”
Her coffee-colored eyes grew bright. “I hate it when you tease me, Danny. So please stop. And I can pay for my own drinks.”
With that, she slipped through the door, leaving him standing there wanting more. But he couldn’t follow. Scarlett depended on him, and he would never let his little girl down.
Chapter Eleven
Amy couldn’t even manage to have a one-nighter with the Casanova of Shenandoah Falls without screwing it up. Had her kisses not been good enough for him? Or what?
She didn’t buy his line about the consequences of hooking up. Since when does a Casanova ever think about consequences?
Like never.
It had to be the whole boss-employee thing, which could get complicated, and both of them needed their jobs. Still, his retreat had humiliated her.
So on Wednesday morning she braced herself for her first glimpse of him, sure
that she’d get all tongue-tied and stupid. It would take a while to forget the taste of his mouth or the caress of his broad, working man’s hands on her backside. Unfortunately, all that hotness was indelibly burned in her mind and libido. And while her mind could work on forgetting, her libido had a memory like a steel trap.
Her angst proved unnecessary because Mario informed her that Dusty had the day off. Mario didn’t elaborate on the reasons, and Amy didn’t want to ask too many questions. So her imagination ran wild.
Was he sick? Was he a coward? Was there a family emergency? Had Willow found out about the kisses and fired him as a babysitter? She wanted to know the details right now, but that wasn’t in the cards.
So she shoved Tuesday’s kiss to the back of her mind and concentrated on doing her job to the best of her ability. She spent a lovely spring morning pruning and raking, while also consulting the Jefferson County Library’s field guide to shrubs. She managed to successfully identify half a dozen specimens.
She also gave Muffin a few leash-etiquette lessons at the same time. By lunch the dog had stopped pulling on her leash altogether, so Amy didn’t worry about taking Muffin into the dining hall. The dog settled down at her feet and took a nap.
Amy had just taken her first taste of the baked ziti on today’s menu when Courtney Wallace found her. “I gather from Dusty that you’re the one who fixed the centerpieces for the Ganis-McQuade wedding last Saturday,” Courtney said as she sat down in the chair across the table.
Oh great, that again. Couldn’t a girl enjoy her lunch without being chewed out by someone? Apparently not. “I’m really sorry, Courtney. I thought I could help out, but clearly I—”
“Wait, what? You did help. You pulled my ass out of the fire. I’d called at least a dozen florists that day, and I couldn’t find a yellow rose to save my life. I had been trying to come up with some plan to save the day when I went back to the workroom, only to discover that my prayers had been answered. The bride and her mother thought the addition of the forsythia was so dramatic. Where did you learn to arrange flowers like that?”
A deep, satisfying warmth percolated through Amy’s midsection. “I don’t know, exactly. My sorority sisters used to say I was a good improviser. But that’s mostly because I’m a genius at screwing things up and have to constantly figure out fixes for all of my many disasters. The truth is, I may have fixed the centerpieces, but Mr. McNeil bawled me out for taking the daffodils from the pool house flower beds.”
“Oh, don’t worry about him,” Courtney said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Dusty’s bark is worse than his bite. On the inside, he’s a marshmallow. But don’t get any romantic ideas. I know he’s like some unholy cross between Brad Pitt and Heath Ledger, but he’s commitment phobic. You should see the house he lives in. It’s a tiny A-frame he built for himself after tearing down the old house he’d grown up in. It’s just big enough for him and his fishing gear. I took one glance at that place and ran.”
Crap. That was more information than Amy needed to know. Had Dusty hooked up with Courtney? If he’d done that, then why not with her? Or had he hooked up with Courtney before the two of them came to work for Willow?
Dammit, she wanted details. The more she thought about last night, the more insulted she became. Why the hell had he run away? What was wrong with her?
“So,” Courtney said, leaning forward, pulling Amy from her obsessive thoughts, “I’m up to my eyeballs in weddings—especially your cousin’s circus-themed extravaganza. I was thinking I could maybe ask Willow if you could help me out on some things.”
Amy hesitated before responding. Up until today, Courtney had said maybe three words to her. Why suddenly was she sitting there suggesting that Amy could avoid working on the grounds crew?
“Let me think about it,” Amy said carefully.
“Well, if you want me to, I’ll put in a good word for you with Willow.”
Could it be that Courtney’s praise was genuine? It really seemed to be true. “Thanks,” she said.
On that note, the rest of Amy’s day floated past. By the time she settled down for bed, she’d learned the full Latin names of more than a dozen shrubs and trees, had trained Muffin to heel without the leash, and had managed to get a fire going in the woodstove.
On Thursday she decided to expand her dog training horizons. She grabbed her lunch on the run and headed out to the kennel where Sven spent his days. She had to pass the kennel numerous times during the day, getting or returning tools to the barn. And every time she passed the kennel’s gate, Sven’s loneliness made her feel sad.
Mario said that Dusty paid some attention to the dog, but for the most part, Sven spent his days alone until Natalie came home from school. And even then, Natalie had after-school activities that kept the dog from getting the attention he needed.
Amy approached the kennel carefully and opened the gate only wide enough to let her and Muffin pass, so this time Sven didn’t escape. Besides, the dog seemed happy to have human and doggie company.
It was funny. Amy had completely lost her fear of the dog once she’d come to realize that his bad behavior stemmed from his loneliness. She decided right on the spot that she would do something about that by eating her lunch here with him every day.
She did more than eat lunch on Thursday. She worked on some of the lessons from the dog training book, and after an hour of playing fetch and working with both dogs, she had Sven sitting on command. He still had trouble with “stay” and “heel,” but it was a start.
She made sure both dogs had water and left Muffin in the kennel to keep Sven company before she reported to Mario for her next assignment. Dusty still hadn’t returned to work, and no one on staff seemed to know why.
Was he staying away because of her? Amy didn’t think so. He must be sick.
A weird desire to make him some chicken soup settled into her head and heart. Not that she’d ever made chicken soup, except for heating up the kind that came from a can, but still.
The more she thought about it, the more she wanted Dusty’s kindness to be genuine and not something bought and paid for. So maybe she should repay his kindness with some of her own.
* * *
In the wee hours of Wednesday morning, Curtis Warner, the owner of the Broken Spoke Roadhouse, had awakened Dusty from a not-very-deep sleep to let him know that Daddy had gotten himself into a brawl and landed himself in the Winchester hospital.
Daddy deserved a comeuppance at the hands of a younger and meaner biker dude, but Dusty found no comfort in that. He called in sick and hightailed it to the hospital like the dutiful son he wanted to be, consumed by guilt and worry.
And right on cue, Daddy used that guilt like a weapon, blaming Dusty for his concussion, broken collarbone, and fractured radius. Daddy always blamed Dusty for everything that went wrong in his sorry-assed life.
The cops claimed they were still searching for the guy who’d beaten the crap out of Daddy, but Dusty doubted that Chief LaRue gave a rat’s ass about anyone with the last name of McNeil. So it was unlikely that Daddy’s assailant would be brought to justice.
The Winchester Medical Center had kept Daddy overnight on Wednesday, long enough for the docs to poke and prod him further and discover that Daddy had a failing liver, diabetes, high blood pressure, bad cholesterol, and a dozen other ailments that needed meds and attention. So when the hospital finally released him early Thursday morning, Dusty had no other choice but to call in sick for a second day and bring the old man home. He settled him down in the Murphy bed that took up every square inch of his tiny living room.
“You know, there would be room for me if you hadn’t torn down the old house,” the old man whined at least twenty times in the first two hours of his convalescence.
Dusty didn’t want his father home on a permanent basis, no matter how his conscience tweaked. He’d scheduled an appointment for Friday with a Jefferson County social worker. Since Daddy was older than sixty-five and had nowhere to go, Dust
y hoped the county could find him a place in a nursing home, or maybe a drug treatment program.
And if Daddy couldn’t qualify for long-term care under Medicaid, then Dusty would have to face reality—sell his land and use the money to set up a trust or something to help his father for a while. He figured Jamie Lyndon might be interested in buying the property at a price equal to what the county might give him. Then Jamie could deed the land to the county for a park, get a huge tax deduction, and once again be hailed as the town’s biggest philanthropist.
Dusty was up in his loft, hunched over a computer screen reading about Wyoming and seriously thinking about bailing out on his current life, when someone pulled into his driveway. The sound of tires on gravel served as Dusty’s doorbell out here in the meadow by the stream.
He scooted down the narrow staircase and around the bed where Daddy snored, fast asleep on the painkillers he’d been prescribed. Dusty opened his front door to find Amy Lyndon and her dog, Muffin, standing on the deck. She carried a paper grocery sack in one arm and had changed out of her baggy clothes and back into those holey jeans she’d been wearing the first day on the job—jeans that hugged her body a whole lot tighter than those ridiculous pants.
The spit dried up in his mouth, and lust pooled deep behind his navel. She was precisely the diversion he needed from the sucky mess his life had suddenly become.
He stepped through the door and shut it behind him.
“Hi,” she said with unmistakable concern in her voice. He warmed to that tone and lost himself in the spark that burned deep in her dark chocolate eyes.
“You look tired,” she said. “Did you catch Mario’s stomach flu? I brought chicken soup.”
He almost laughed out loud. “You made chicken soup for me?”
