“Can’t you see—”
“Leave them alone,” Jake said. “Your sister’s entitled to make her own choices.”
“But—”
“Randy, why don’t you take Faith back to the fire,” Jenny said. “Colt and I will gather up these things for you.”
“Thanks, sis,” Randy said. “Come on, Faith.”
“I’ll walk you back,” Hope said, reaching a hand toward her sister.
“I’m going with Randy,” Faith said, meeting her sister’s gaze, but not moving toward her.
Colt saw the shock and pain on Hope’s face as Faith took the hand Randy held out to her and began walking back to the fire, leaving Hope behind.
Colt would have stepped into the breach, but Jake beat him to it.
“I’ll walk you back,” he said to Hope.
“I don’t need an escort,” she retorted, turning and marching back toward the fire.
“I’ll make sure she gets back okay,” Jake said as he left Colt and Jenny alone.
Instead of picking up the blanket, Jenny sat down on it. “Join me?”
“We’re supposed to be chaperoning kids.”
“They’ll manage without us for a few minutes,” she said, patting the blanket beside her. “Join me.”
Colt wasn’t going to turn down the chance to be alone with Jenny under a moonlit sky. He sat down cross-legged on the blanket. “Now what?” he said.
“If I have to ask, you aren’t the man I think you are,” she said teasingly.
Colt leaned over and kissed her on the mouth. The sound of satisfaction in her throat made him ache. He reached out to palm her breast and heard a moan of pleasure that sent his blood thrumming through his veins. He lowered Jenny onto the blanket until they were fitted together from breast to belly. “We missed doing this as kids, didn’t we?” he said.
“Uh-huh.”
“I’ll make it all up to you, Jenny,” he promised.
“I only wish you could,” she murmured against his neck.
“What does that mean?”
“Only that some moments are lost forever, Colt. That’s all.”
The sadness in her voice made him want to weep. “Just promise you’ll let me try, Jenny.”
She leaned over and gave him the softest of kisses. “All right, Colt,” she said as she met his gaze in the moonlight. “I promise to let you try.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“YOU LOOK GOOD ENOUGH TO EAT,” COLT said.
Jenny blushed as she stepped farther into the living room. “Thank you, Colt.”
He held out his arms, and she walked into his embrace, letting her body settle against his. “This feels good,” she said.
“No argument from me,” he said. “I can hardly wait till you’re my wife. How’s that wedding gown coming along?”
“It’s not finished yet.”
Their wedding was one week away, but Jenny hadn’t finished making her wedding dress. There was a good reason for the delay. She still wasn’t sure there was going to be a wedding, for the simple reason she hadn’t yet told Colt her secret.
He’d become so dear to her that she couldn’t bear the thought of losing him. The temptation was overwhelming not to tell him at all. But how could she take vows “to love and honor and cherish” in the midst of such a deception?
Trust him, Jenny. He loves you. It won’t matter.
Colt’s arms tightened around her. “Is it my imagination, or are you losing weight?”
Jenny stiffened. “It’s this dress,” she said.
He held her out at arm’s length and critically surveyed the short black satin sheath held up by narrow rhinestone straps. It was cut low enough in front to reveal her modest cleavage and short enough to reveal her long, slender legs.
He whistled, long and low. “You’re one gorgeous lady, Miss Wright. But once you’re mine, I think we’re going to put a few pounds back on those beautiful bones.”
She didn’t dare meet his gaze, afraid he would find something in her eyes that would give her away. Worry had caused her to lose her appetite. But explaining even that much would require her to reveal the source of her anxiety—the secret she was keeping from him. “We’d better get going. Your mother and father will be wondering where we are.”
“I’m not sure I want to share you with anybody else just yet.”
“Randy will—”
“Randy left fifteen minutes ago to pick up Faith.”
“Your parents—”
“My parents won’t mind if we’re a little late to our own engagement party.”
“Colt, I don’t think—”
“Don’t think,” he murmured as he pulled her back into his arms. “Just let me hold you. I can’t believe this is real. For so many years I dreamed of moments like this, and now I want to enjoy every one of them.”
She hid her face against his neck and clutched at his shoulders. “I love you, Colt.”
She heard his sharp intake of air before he separated them so he could look into her eyes. “I’ve been waiting a long time to hear you say that.”
“There’s just one thing—”
His mouth captured hers in a kiss of claiming, preventing the words that might have torn them apart.
A frisson of pleasure shot through her. How could Colt make her feel so much, so fast? It had never been like this with Huck. Never. Her nipples peaked with the brush of his hand across the satin. He kissed her throat, then suckled, causing her insides to draw up tight. She moaned, a sound of desire and despair.
Her heart beat against her ribs like a butterfly caught in a jar, as he reached for the zipper at the back of her dress. It slid down easily, and the straps fell off her shoulders along with the top of the sheath. Beneath it she wore a black merry widow. The avid look in his eyes made her body quiver with anticipation. He reached behind her to unhook the bra, and she panicked.
“Colt, no!”
His hands paused, but his eyes quickly sought hers for an explanation. “What’s wrong?”
“I…” Her hands gripped his arms, as though to shove him away. Tell him. Tell him. Tell him.
“This isn’t the right time,” she said breathlessly. She saw the disappointment in his eyes, but, thank God, no suspicion. “We’re supposed to be at your parents’ home in twenty minutes.”
His lips curled in a lopsided grin. “I’m sure I’d enjoy making love to you however little time we took.” He held up a hand to stay her protest. “But I’m willing to wait, if that’s what you what.”
“It’s what I want.”
He lifted the straps back onto her shoulders and reached around her to zip up the dress. All the while, his hips were pressed against hers, so she could feel his arousal. She ached for him, yearned for him. And feared his discovery of the truth.
“It’s all right, Jenny,” he murmured in her ear. “I understand why you’re afraid.”
“You do?” she said, her voice catching in her throat.
He nodded solemnly as he brushed her hair back behind her shoulders. “You’re afraid it won’t be the same with me—” He swallowed hard and corrected himself. “As good with me, as it was with Huck. Just remember that I love you. If you want me to do something differently, all you have to do is ask.”
She wanted to tell him he was wrong, that he made her feel so much more than Huck ever had. But she bit back the words. It wasn’t Huck’s fault he hadn’t made her feel more. It wasn’t Huck’s fault she hadn’t been in love with him. She hadn’t known what a difference love would make. Until Colt had come along and shown her.
Jenny leaned forward and kissed Colt gently on the lips, feeling the need that arose whenever she touched him. “I love the way you touch me, Colt. I love the way you kiss me. I want to make love to you. But I need a little more time.”
“We’re getting married in a week,” he reminded her. “Do you want to wait until our wedding night? Is that what you’re telling me?”
She couldn’t wait that long. Col
t had to know the truth before they stood in front of a preacher and said vows that bound them for a lifetime. A lifetime. Who are you kidding, Jenny? She couldn’t mislead Colt any longer. It seemed time had run out.
Jenny swallowed past the lump in her throat. “Tonight,” she said. “After the party.”
“I’m going to hold you to that promise,” Colt said, leaning down to kiss her tenderly on the mouth.
As she stepped out onto the back porch, Jenny stopped abruptly. Parked at the door was a brand-new forest-green Jeep with a gigantic yellow bow on the hood. She turned to Colt, who was grinning.
“Do you like it?”
“Oh, Colt. It’s too much.” Especially when you may not want anything to do with me after tonight.
“I’d hand the world to you on a platter, if I could.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you like it.”
Jenny smiled. “I like it.” She stepped off the back porch and walked completely around the Jeep, peering inside.
Colt pulled the ribbon away from the vehicle, then reached into his trouser pocket to retrieve the key. “You want to drive?”
“Oh, yes, please.”
Jenny didn’t say much on the trip to Hawk’s Pride because her heart was lodged in her throat. This was all a dream, and she was afraid to wake up. Colt was everything Huck had never been—generous, thoughtful, helpful—and he made her body hum whenever he touched her.
But he wasn’t perfect. He had one fatal flaw. He couldn’t bear to be around sick people. She’d gotten the measles when she was sixteen, and Colt hadn’t come to visit her once until she was well again.
When she’d questioned him later, he’d admitted, “Something happens inside me when I see somebody I know who’s sick in bed.” He had put a hand to his belly. “My insides sort of squeeze up tight, and I can’t breathe.”
She’d laughed at him and asked, “What do you do when you get a cold?”
“Oh, I don’t have any problems when I’m sick. Only when somebody else gets ill.”
“What do you do when one of your brothers or sisters gets sick?” she asked.
“I stay away until they’re well.”
“You can’t mean that,” she said.
“I most certainly do.”
“You don’t even bring them magazines or something to drink?”
Colt shook his head.
“That’s awful!”
“I didn’t say I was proud of the way I act,” he said. “And believe me, I’ve tried to get over it. I visited Avery’s bedroom when he got the mumps, but it was a disaster. I was with him maybe a minute when my hands started trembling, and I broke out in a sweat. I barely got out of there before I lost my lunch!”
“Why do you suppose that happens?” she asked.
“I think I’m afraid,” he confessed in a low voice.
“That you’ll get sick, too?”
“That someone I care about will die.”
“People don’t die of a cold, Colt, and not very often anymore from measles or mumps,” she chided.
He grimaced. “I know that! I didn’t say what I feel makes sense. It’s just what I feel. I can’t help it. So don’t give me a hard time about it. Okay?”
In all the years she’d known Colt, she hadn’t once seen him visit anyone in the hospital. When her mother was sick, he only came by when he was sure he wasn’t going to catch a glimpse of her in bed. Another time, when he discovered Tyler and James had chicken pox, though he’d already had the disease himself, instead of coming inside, he offered to help with the chores in the barn.
Jenny wished she had told Colt the truth from the beginning. It was going to be much harder to give him up now than it would have been before he’d come to mean so much to her.
“For a lady on her way to a party, you don’t look very happy,” Colt observed.
Jenny made herself smile. She was determined to enjoy their engagement party, especially since it might be their last night together. “I was thinking how strange life is. If Huck hadn’t been killed…I would have missed so much.”
“I feel the same way. I miss him a lot, but if he were here, I wouldn’t have you.”
Jenny reached a hand across the seat to Colt, and he gripped it tightly. “I’m glad we found each other,” she said.
“Me, too.”
Jenny brought the Jeep to a stop at the back door to the Whitelaws’s ranch house. The whitewashed adobe house, with its barrel-tile roof, had been built in a square around a gigantic moss-laden live oak, and the party had spilled into the grassy central courtyard.
Jenny felt Colt’s arm slide possessively around her waist as he escorted her into the fray.
“Hey, there, Slim,” he said, shaking hands with an old high school friend. “Buck, Frank,” he said, shaking more hands.
“Congratulations, Colt,” Buck said. He dipped his head, touched the brim of his Stetson and said to Jenny, “We all wish you the best, Miss Wright.”
“Thanks, Buck,” she said.
There was something lovely about being surrounded by friends who’d known you since the days when you’d all played ring-around-the-rosie together. At the same time, it was unsettling to see the speculation in their eyes as they tried to gauge whether she and Colt might have been lovers when she was still Huck’s girl.
A huge beef was being barbecued on a spit, and there was a keg of beer, along with iced tea and soft drinks. A group of women, Amanda Carter among them, were setting up a buffet table with side dishes everyone had brought. Jenny’s brother Tyler was pounding on one leg of the sawhorse table with a hammer, while Colt’s brother Rabb held it up.
She looked for Jake and found him standing in a circle of ranchers and their foremen, including Zach Whitelaw, her brother Sam, Wiley Butler—and his daughter, Hope. She located Randy and Faith talking with a bunch of teenagers beneath an arbor of bougainvillea.
She looked at Colt and realized he was making a similar survey to locate his siblings and his myriad aunts, uncles and cousins. “You’ve sure got a big family,” Jenny murmured.
“Yeah,” Colt said. “And a close one. It was great growing up as one of the Whitelaw Brats.”
Jenny turned her eyes away. If Colt married her, he wasn’t going to be adding any branches to this awesome family tree. He’d said he didn’t mind, that she was enough for him. But seeing all these Whitelaws with their children and grandchildren made her realize how much Colt would be giving up if he married her.
It would be easier to push him away now than to endure the regret in his eyes for however much time they had together.
Stop it, Jenny. Stop looking for reasons to break up with Colt. Oh, you can come up with a few. He’d be happier flying jets than living with you. He’d be happier marrying someone who could give him kids. He’d be happier if he didn’t have to hang around and maybe watch you die. But isn’t the choice really up to him? Are you going to give him a chance to choose you?
That was the crux of the matter. Jenny wasn’t sure she had the strength to survive Colt’s rejection. It was easier to avoid that possibility by rejecting him first. She could drive him away. He wouldn’t stay where he wasn’t wanted.
But one of the lessons the past two precarious years had taught her was to reach out for happiness. Loving Colt made her happy. Making love with Colt would bring her joy. After that…Life was uncertain. No one got any guarantees.
Jenny turned to Colt and let him see the need she felt, the yearning to be held and loved. “How soon do you think we can leave without our absence being noticed?”
Colt’s eyes lit with a fire that warmed her insides. “My father wants to say a few words and make a toast. After that, I think we could slip away.”
“Why don’t you see if he wants to do that now?” Jenny said.
“Come with me,” he said. “We’ll ask.”
Colt’s parents were surprised that he wanted them to make their speeches so early in the evening, but they w
ere more than willing to accommodate their youngest child.
“May I have your attention, please,” Zach said, arranging Jenny and Colt between himself and Colt’s mother Rebecca. “Before we carve up that beef, I’d like to say a few words to my son and future daughter-in-law.”
The noise died down, but it didn’t get completely quiet. Babies still cried and children still played. But the adults gathered around them, drinks in hand, ready to offer toasts to their future happiness.
“First I want to thank Jenny for loving my son. And my son for being smart enough to settle down and marry her.”
There was general laughter, shouts of “Here! Here!” and clinking beer glasses.
“I want to tell my son how proud I am of him. How much we feel blessed for having been given the chance to make him a part of our family. I only hope he and Jenny find as much joy in raising their Whitelaw Brats, as we did in raising ours.”
There was more laughter, more clinking glasses.
Jenny felt her face turn to stone. She was afraid to look at Colt, afraid to look at anyone. She prayed that Colt would let the statement pass, that he wouldn’t feel the need to tell his parents, “My future wife doesn’t want children.”
From the corner of her eye, Jenny saw that Colt’s face was frozen in a smile. A muscle in his jaw jerked, and she realized his teeth must be clenched.
Then it was Rebecca’s turn to speak. Colt’s mother put her arm around Jenny and said, “We know you and Colt could live on love alone, but we’ve decided a little bread wouldn’t hurt. We hope you’ll let us pay off the mortgage on the Double D as a wedding present.”
There was a gasp and then applause.
Jenny’s heart was stuck in her throat. There was no way she could speak. She could barely breathe, she was so overwhelmed with joy and with pain. This good family had raised a wonderful son, and all she had offered him—all of them—was deceit.
“I’m sorry,” she blurted. “I can’t accept your gift. Because I can’t marry your son.”
COLT DIDN’T KNOW WHEN HE’D BEEN so angry with anyone in his life. “Don’t you dare run away from me,” he snarled, grabbing Jenny’s arm as she reached for the door to the Jeep. “What the hell’s going on, Jenny?”
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