Luke's Would-Be Bride

Jillian shook her head at Lisa’s reference to their friends who were planning to be married next month. “You, Lisa Markman, have a dirty mind.”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you for years.” After a slight pause Lisa added, “Do you think they miss us?”

For at least the thousandth time since she’d met Lisa, Jillian wondered what it would take to make her friend see herself for what she really was. At five foot five, Lisa was a little shorter than Jillian. Her hair was thick and straight, the ends reaching to her shoulders, heavy tendrils brushing her eyebrows. On the outside was a woman who wore bright clothes, had a sultry laugh and a figure to die for, but inside she was one of the most caring and loyal people Jillian had ever known.

“Are you homesick, Lisa?”

“Who me?” She straightened, visibly pulling herself together. “This is my home now. The Jasper Gulch Clothing Store is set to open in less than a week, and I’ve already met a good share of the bachelors here in town.”

A dozen men’s smiling faces flashed through Jillian’s mind, but only one unsmiling face remained. A strange kind of warmth started in her throat and slowly settled lower. Trying to think of something—anything—else, she said, “Did any of those men make a lasting impression on you?”

“I met so many of them in so short a time it’s not easy to remember their names. Let’s see. There was one man named Karl, and I think one of them said his name was Boomer. There was an Archie and a Ben and I remember a boy named Jason, and of course that sweet old Cletus McCully. And there was that woman named Mel who owns the diner and Isabell Pruitt, who, if you ask me, looks as if she makes a habit of sucking lemons, and I remember someone named Clayt.”

“And Luke.”

“Who?”

Jillian gave herself a mental shake. “Shouldn’t the loaf of coffee cake be cool enough to eat by now?”

Lisa reached for a towel then hurried away toward the front door. Jillian stood perfectly still at the kitchen counter in Lisa’s newly rented house. She could hear the sound her friend’s bare feet made on the worn linoleum. Otherwise the night was silent.

She’d always heard that the plains were supposed to be windy places. Tonight only the barest of breezes wafted through the open window. She wondered what the weather was like in Wisconsin. Although her life in Madison hadn’t been easy, it was still the one place in the whole world that she considered home. It was where she’d grown up, where her parents and grandparents were buried and where she’d met the three best friends she’d ever had. It had felt strange to leave Ivy Pennington and Cori Cassidy yesterday morning. But Cori was getting married soon, and Ivy, an older woman, who’d been the surrogate mother of them all, had encouraged Lisa and Jillian to check out the Jasper Gents here in South Dakota. Lisa had been so excited about coming to Jasper Gulch, Jillian hadn’t been able to turn down her request to come with her.

In all honesty she had been feeling at loose ends lately. And she was enjoying the change of pace. Her rent was paid on her apartment in Madison, and it was going to be fun to watch Lisa systematically search for the man of her dreams. But the one thing Jillian hadn’t figured into her summer holiday agenda was her reaction to Luke Carson.

“Jillian,” Lisa said, interrupting her train of thought, “where did you say you put that coffee cake?”

“Right there on the railing,” she said, hurrying through the quiet house and out onto the porch. “Right there next to the…”

Her voice trailed away the moment she realized she was looking in the exact spot the loaf should have been. Walking to the edge of the porch, she checked the bushes then peered at the dark houses all around them.

“Someone must have taken it,” she said incredulously.

“Someone stole our coffee cake?” Lisa whispered.

“It looks that way.”

“Who in the world would steal such a thing at a quarter to midnight in the little town of Jasper Gulch?”

“Does it make you nervous?” Jillian asked, looking sideways at her friend.

Lisa’s brown eyes lit up with excitement. “Are you kidding? We’ve only been in town for fifteen hours, and I’ve already had more fun than I had in an entire month in Madison. I wonder what other surprises are waiting for us in Jasper Gulch.”

Luke Carson’s image filtered through Jillian’s mind all over again. She tried to blink it away.

Yawning again, Lisa said, “I’m about ready to fall asleep on my feet. If you want to go on up to bed, I’ll turn out the lights.”

Jillian looked at the dark houses all around, then at the leaves that were stirring in the slight evening breeze. Keeping her voice as low as the murmur of insects hiding in the dry grass, she said, “You go ahead. I’ll be in, in a little while.”

“You aren’t afraid to be out here by yourself after what happened to my cake?”

Jillian shook her head. She’d been on her own for a long time and knew how to take care of herself. Giving the dark windows of the neighboring houses a cursory glance, she said, “There’s probably a perfectly logical explanation for that. Cletus McCully said that other than the ugly color of orange paint Bonnie Trumble used on the front of the Clip and Curl, the only crimes committed in Jasper Gulch are gossiping and jaywalking. So I doubt a hardened criminal stole our late-night snack. A stray dog probably took it, or maybe a raccoon. You go on ahead. I think I’ll sit out here for a while and unwind.”

Jillian sank to the top step and wrapped her arms around her knees, listening to the sounds Lisa made as she walked up the stairs. A short time later a pipe rumbled somewhere in the old house. And then the only sounds she heard were the squeaks of crickets and the wind in the eaves.

She sat there for a long time, the air slowly cooling her skin, the quiet slowly lulling her thoughts. When she’d agreed to accompany Lisa all these miles to Jasper Gulch, she’d wondered what she would do with herself. Just like that, she’d found a job. It had been completely unexpected, but not as unexpected as the longing she’d felt deep inside when she’d first looked into Luke Carson’s eyes.

She tried to tell herself that the reason her longing was so unsettling was because it had come out of the blue. Surely it had nothing to do with the husky undertones in his voice or the intensity in his gray eyes. It wasn’t as if she’d never experienced those feelings before. It was just that they had a way of leading straight to heartache. And Jillian didn’t think she could survive any more of that.

She rose slowly and went inside, where she closed the doors and turned out the lights. She tiptoed up the stairs, washed her face and donned a clean nightgown. Crawling between the sheets, she stared at the moonlit shadows dancing on the dark ceiling, thinking about everything she’d done that day. She couldn’t help wondering what tomorrow would bring.

She was certain of only two things. She was going to put an end to whatever it was she’d glimpsed in Luke Carson’s eyes today and to whatever it was that had answered deep in her chest. And she was going to make sure he didn’t get the wrong idea about her presence here in Jasper Gulch.

Yes, first thing tomorrow morning, that was what she was going to do.

“It looks as if you’re making a dent in that stack of folders.”

Jillian glanced over her shoulder and found her new employer leaning in the doorway. His arms were folded at his chest, his hat shading the upper part of his face. In the four hours she’d been there, he’d come and gone twice. She hadn’t heard him return either time.

He’d met her at the door a few minutes before eight that morning and quickly filled her in on the operation of his small clinic, explaining that since this was cattle country he did most of his work out of his truck. He kept this small office here on Main Street to examine dogs and cats and an occasional hamster, but unless it was an emergency, he only scheduled appointments for every other Thursday. He’d pointed to the file cabinets, poked his head into his one-and-only examining room and had pretty much given her free rein of everything in between. Other than taking a few telephone calls, she’d spent the morning familiarizing herself with the workings of his practice.

“Are you getting a handle on Brenda’s filing system?” he asked from the doorway.

Since she couldn’t very well say something bad about someone she’d never met, she gave him a small nod and turned back to her filing.

“Liar.”

Her double take didn’t quite make him smile, but it raised his lips enough to crease one lean cheek. Pushing away from the doorjamb, he said, “Come on, Jillian. This is Jasper Gulch. If we didn’t gossip, we’d have nothing to do. Everybody knows that the only way Brenda Townsend could figure out what letter came after T was to recite the entire alphabet from the beginning. So you don’t have to try to protect her reputation.”

She smiled to herself and reached for another stack of files. “Then it wouldn’t be wrong of me to surmise that the gum stuck on the bottom of the chair belonged to your former office assistant?”

“You catch on fast.”

She glanced at the name on the next file, wishing his simple compliment didn’t make her feel so…complimented. Last night she’d vowed to set Luke straight about her presence in Jasper Gulch. It hadn’t taken her long to realize that that was easier said than done. It wasn’t that she hadn’t tried. It was just that Luke Carson wasn’t an easy man to deter. He had a restless energy that didn’t permit him to stand in one place very long. She didn’t know how a man his size did it, but he moved like lightning…without the thunder.

Reining in her thoughts, she asked, “Where did this Brenda go? When she left Jasper Gulch, I mean.”

“To Sioux Falls. The girl hated to type, but she sure seemed to enjoy chasing me around the desk.”

Being careful to keep her voice neutral, she said, “I would have thought it was the other way around.”

He made a sound only men could manage and said, “Give me some credit. The girl was nineteen and thought the olden days referred to the years before microwaves were invented. Believe me, I never chased Brenda Townsend around the desk, and I give you my word I won’t chase you. But don’t worry, I won’t hold you to the same rule.”

Jillian hadn’t intended to turn around, but once she had, she couldn’t look away. There was a maddening hint of arrogance about this man that was impossible to ignore. He might have been a country vet, but he was no country bumpkin. He had his masculine swagger down to an art form, and his smiles, well, they were just rare enough and just unexpected enough to chase nearly every coherent thought right out of her head.

Jillian stared wordlessly at him from her side of the cluttered old desk. He was watching her, his gaze steady, his expression thoughtful. His skin appeared even darker beneath his dusty black cowboy hat, his jaw square, his chin strong. As far as she was concerned, she’d noticed entirely too much about him. In fact, the first thing she’d done when she’d stepped foot inside the office that morning was notice he’d shaved. The second thing she’d done was give herself a mental kick for noticing in the first place. She gave herself another one, this time keeping her expression under stern restraint.

“Trust me, Luke. You have nothing to fear.”