Stern

“No problem, Beeker. I’ll start checking around immediately.”

Beeker entered her office. “Things were crazy off the bat this morning, and I didn’t get the chance to welcome you back and ask how things went last week.”

JoJo leaned back in her chair and smiled. “I brought down an elk on the third day.”

“That’s great, girl! You didn’t make my boy too mad, did you?”

Her smile widened. “Um, maybe just a little. But Stern will be fine.”

She couldn’t help remembering their final days at the lodge. They’d put up their hunting rifles and pulled out the playing cards and checkerboard. He had whipped her hands down in all the games except one, and she had a feeling he’d felt sorry for her and had given her that one.

JoJo always appreciated unwinding at the lodge with Stern and this past trip had been no exception. After their first conversation about her makeover, he hadn’t wanted to discuss her request again, which made her think he wasn’t crazy about the idea. But he had promised his help and she couldn’t ask for more than that.

“Did the 2010 Porsche come in while I was away?”

Beeker raised a brow. “No. Why?”

“Just curious. It’s a nice car.”

“You sure that’s all you admire?”

She held Beeker’s questioning gaze. “Yes.” Since her father’s death he’d stepped in as a surrogate father to her, but she didn’t want to worry him needlessly.

Beeker nodded. “So you think he’ll ever settle down and marry?”

Now it was JoJo who raised a brow. “Who?”

“Stern.”

JoJo frowned. How had they moved from the driver of the Porsche to Stern? “I don’t know. Why do you ask?”

Beeker shrugged. “There have been a lot of weddings in his family lately. His cousin Megan in June, Canyon last month, Riley later this month and Zane before the end of the year. The single Westmorelands seem to be falling like flies.”

“Stern dates a lot, but he doesn’t have an exclusive girl.”

Beeker chuckled. “If anyone would know, you would.” He checked his watch. “Let me know when you locate those tires so I can send Maceo to pick them up.”

Maceo Armstrong was her newest employee, fresh out of mechanic school. “I will.”

It took JoJo less than thirty minutes to make a few calls, find the tires and dispatch Maceo to make a run across town. It was only then that she allowed herself to consider Beeker’s question about Stern. Like she’d told Beeker, Stern didn’t have a serious girl right now. But she knew that didn’t mean he wouldn’t meet someone eventually. After all, as Beeker had said, there had been a lot of Westmoreland weddings and engagements lately. Because of her long friendship with Stern she also was close to his family.

She’d known that Canyon had been quite taken with Keisha Ashford three years ago, so his decision to marry wasn’t a surprise. But she had been surprised at Megan’s marriage, only because of the swiftness of the romance between her and Rico Claiborne. And Riley’s and Zane’s decisions to marry were definitely shockers. Could such a thing happen to Stern? What if Stern began seeing a woman seriously and the woman convinced him to end his close friendship with JoJo out of jealousy? So far it hadn’t happened, probably because none of the women he dated saw her as a threat.

Stern would be a good catch for any woman. Besides being handsome and wealthy, he was a nice person—insightful, kind and considerate. And she didn’t just think that because he was her best friend. He dated a lot, but he never treated any woman shabbily. He let them know up front where he stood in regards to relationships and he’d said more than once that he had no intention of settling down or thinking about marriage until after his thirty-fifth birthday. That meant he only had five years to go. And he’d only have that much time if some woman didn’t come along to sweep him off his feet. JoJo had never worried about that before, but the family trend seemed to be that the Westmoreland men were vulnerable to love.

JoJo shook her head. Vulnerable? She couldn’t imagine that word connected to Riley or Zane. And because she knew them so well, she figured that if they were making a long-term commitment, it was because they deeply loved the woman they were marrying.

And because Stern never did anything half-step, there was no doubt in her mind that one day he would meet a woman and fall in love just as deeply. And when that happened, where would it leave her? She knew the answer without having to think hard about it.

Alone.

That meant she had to move forward with her plan. It would be imperative to have someone special of her own before Stern met someone and married. Pushing away from the desk, she stretched her body before grabbing a clipboard off the wall. As she left her office she knew pursuing Walter Carmichael was more important than ever. In a few days she would know where he liked to hang out and then go from there. Wanda, her fiftysomething-year-old know-it-all receptionist, was on it and if anyone could find out the information it would be her.

Like Beeker, Wanda was another trusted employee who’d worked for the Golden Wrench for years—ever since JoJo was in high school. It had been Wanda who had explained to JoJo why it meant so much to her father that she take those etiquette classes and dance lessons, although she’d hated every minute of them. She much preferred being under the hood of a car instead of acting like a simpering idiot the way most teen girls behaved. She and her father had compromised. He would let her go hunting with him and Beeker and take the karate and archery classes she loved, if she learned what she needed to know to be a lady every once in a while.

She’d never been interested in boys the way other girls had been, mainly because the boys sought her out and not the other way around—it hadn’t been for her looks, but for her wheels. Thanks to her dad, she’d always driven a smooth-looking muscle car, a guy’s dream. And just as Stern had known the girls’ motives for faking friendship with her, she’d been very much aware of the guys’ motives. That was yet another reason her friendship with Stern meant so much to her.

Whether it happened in a few months or in the next year, one day he would be forced to end their friendship. And the last thing she wanted him to do was feel guilty about having to cut her loose.

Then there was that other problem she’d found herself contending with during their weekend away: her newfound attraction to him. More than once while they’d been playing cards, when his attention was squarely on the hand he held, her attention had been squarely on him. When had that little mole on his upper lip started to look so sexy? And when had long eyelashes on a man become a turn-on?

If those thoughts weren’t bad enough, when he had dropped her off at home and given her the usual peck on the cheek and hug, she had felt her heart pounding deep in her chest. Yes, she was into Stern bad, and the only way out of it was to turn her attention to another man.

Still, the memory of Stern singing in the shower, whistling through the lodge while he cooked breakfast or humming late at night while they sat together on the deck playing checkers was embedded in her brain.

She was so lost in remembering that she didn’t slow her pace when she rounded the corner until her body hit the solid wall of a man’s chest.

* * *

“Whoa. Going to a fire, Jo?” Stern asked, reaching out to steady her.

She seemed to blush, and he couldn’t help wondering what she had been thinking about. He had a feeling her thoughts hadn’t been on work.

“Stern, what are you doing here?” she asked, sounding somewhat breathless.

He lifted a brow. “Any reason I shouldn’t be here?” he asked, releasing her and then turning to fall in step beside her.

“No, but it’s Monday and we just got back yesterday.”

“I know but I met Riley and Canyon for lunch at McKays, and thought I’d check to see how things are going since I was in the neighborhood.”

“Oh.”

Was that disappointment he heard in her voice? Did she wish it had been that other guy—the one whose name she refused to give him—to show up unexpectedly and not him? That thought didn’t sit well with him. “You don’t sound too happy to see me.”

She glanced over at him. “Don’t be silly. I’m always happy to see you.”

He didn’t say anything for a moment. Was he being silly? Was the whole issue silly—the very issue that had nagged at him and kept him up last night to the point where he had snapped at his brothers this morning? Had he gotten chewed out by his oldest brother for nothing?

Pushing those questions to the back of his mind, he asked her, “What are your plans for later?”

“Um, nothing. I haven’t unpacked yet and will probably do that and laundry. Why?”

“No reason.”

They entered one of the bays where Beeker and another one of her employees had a car up on the lift changing out the struts. Stern greeted the men as he and JoJo passed through.

“How many cars do you have to work on today?” he asked as he continued following her to the bay she normally used. He watched as she glanced down at her clipboard. “So far there are only five scheduled. But you know how that might end up on a Monday.”