The Bride Wore Blue Jeans

He could only shake his head. “You don’t mince words, do you?”

She knew she was outspoken and made no apologies for it. “We live life at a different pace up here. We don’t move fast, but we don’t miss an opportunity to say what we mean, either. We’ve got earthquakes, avalanches and cabin fever, and there might not be another chance, so we don’t pass them up when they come.” She fixed him with a penetrating look. “And you’re avoiding the question. Why are you so sad?”

When she looked at him like that, he found he had trouble focusing his thoughts. “I’m not sad.”

“Now you’re lying,” she said with equal bluntness. June shrugged. “That’s okay, you don’t have to answer my question. To you, I’m just a nosy stranger.”

He didn’t want her to think that was the way he saw her. Or that he was deliberately shutting her out. June was family, even if just extended, and family was the most important thing in the world to him. It always had been. “My whole family’s up here. I miss them.”

The answer was simple from where she stood. “Then stay.”

She was very, very young, wasn’t she? “Things are more complicated than that.”

She decided she liked him. Really liked him. And as such, she decided that he needed her help. The man had to lighten up just a little or he really was going to become old before his time.

She placed a hand on his shoulder, commanding his undivided attention. “Things only get as complicated as you let them, Kevin.”

Chapter Four

June paused for a moment, letting her hand drop to her side, as if suddenly aware of crossing some personal line that needed to remain uncrossed. “You have a woman back in Seattle?”

“What?” Kevin was thunderstruck by the question.

Amusement curved her mouth. “A woman. A female companion. A softer version of you,” she added when he made no response. “Do you have one of those back in Seattle?”

He had no idea why he had to keep blocking the urge to touch her. “No, what makes you ask?”

She would have thought that was obvious. Kevin was looking at her oddly. Did he think she was interested in him? It certainly wasn’t meant to be a personal question on her part.

“Well, that’s the only complicating factor I can think of. You sold your business. You just said that everyone you care about is up here.” She connected the dots for him. “That means that you’re perfectly fancy-free if you want to be.”

Oh, when had life ever been that easy for him? He couldn’t think back that far. “You’re twenty-two, aren’t you?”

Because he was Lily and Jimmy’s brother, she fought her natural tendency to take offense. Instead, she kept her voice calm, even. “That has nothing to do with it. I was born old.”

Wasn’t that always the mantra with people who were too young? he mused. His eyes swept over her face. Her perfect, smooth, heart-shaped face. “You don’t look all that old to me.”

“I could say the same about you.” Her smile flashed, casting a spectrum like the northern lights. Mostly within him. “Of course you might need to take a little closer look at me. It’s daylight out here, but your eyes can still play tricks on you.” As if to underscore her point, June stepped closer to him, raising her face up for his inspection.

He doubted if he’d ever seen a complexion so flawless. Or compelling. The woman could have easily done commercials for soap.

“No, no tricks,” he murmured. Other than the one his own pulse was executing by vibrating faster than he could ever remember it having done before. “You still look as if the dew hasn’t come off your life.”

There it was again, that unintentional patronizing attitude. “You’d be surprised, ‘old man’.” The grin entered her eyes and then slowly, enticingly, faded as she looked up into his face. From out of nowhere came the feeling that everything had stood still and was holding its breath within her. It took her a second to find her voice, another to dig up her bravado. “So, do I kiss you, or do you kiss me?”

He suddenly couldn’t think of anything he wanted more than to do just that. To kiss her, to feel her lips against his.

But that would be as wrong as wrong could be.

He smiled for her benefit. “Neither. If I kissed you, I’d be robbing the cradle. If you kissed me, there’d be a riot scene.” He nodded toward the men standing just inside the Salty, many of whom were looking at them and trying hard to appear as if they weren’t.

The stillness within her left, to be replaced by the pounding of her heart as it tried to come to terms with anticipation and something that looked as if it wasn’t going to be.

“Afraid?” June challenged. She tossed her hair behind her shoulder in a movement that Kevin found impossibly sexy. “I would have never pegged you for being afraid of trying something new.” She turned neatly on her heel, heading for the entrance, her voice incredibly nonchalant. “Your loss.”

Yes, he thought with a deep pang, his loss. But you couldn’t miss what you’d never had, right? And he had a very odd feeling that kissing June would make him acutely aware of all that he had missed in his life. And would continue missing.

This way was better.

So he watched her thread her way back into the Salty and then entered himself, going in search of a familiar face to talk to.

Lily stepped away from the window and frowned deeply. “Well, that didn’t exactly go brilliantly,” she muttered, acutely disappointed. She’d been watching Kevin and June since the moment of their arrival, waiting for the sparks to come. That they hadn’t left an abysmal feeling in the pit of her stomach. She wanted Kevin to be happy, the way she was happy. And since love had done it for her, she felt it was only fair to assume that it would do it for him as well. It was time her brother found a little happiness. He’d been in charge of theirs all these years.

Max looked down at the surface of his beer, as if contemplating a deep philosophy. He took a sip, then raised his eyes to Lily’s face.

“Wars aren’t won and lost on the first encounter, Lil, or even the second. This kind of thing takes a while. Don’t give up.”

“A while,” she echoed with a deep sigh. “How long a while? The North and South went to fight the Civil War over the weekend and that lasted four years,” she lamented. The most impatient in the family, she always wanted things to happen yesterday.

Max understood where she was coming from and why she felt the way she did. He’d harbored the same feelings about June, worried that his little sister was more interested in resurrecting defunct engines than having a home and family. But unlike Lily, he knew the worth of patience and exercised it every day.

“There’ve been records of wars ending in under a month,” he told her. She looked at him, petulant. He kissed her temple, loving her more. “I’ve spent a lot of time studying people. Not much else to do up here when you’re isolated from the rest of the world,” he qualified. “Your brother’s been in a deep freeze for the past twenty years, Lily. Give him time. Give them both time. June hasn’t exactly had it easy herself. It’s going to take a while for them to realize that they just might be the best thing for each other. Or not,” he threw in, then laughed as Lily’s eyebrows rose so high they almost disappeared into her hairline.