Luke's Would-Be Bride

He scooped his hat off his head with one hand and rubbed his face with the other. The Carson brothers may not have had much in the patience department, but they’d never had any trouble with women. Luke himself had turned a fair number of heads in his day, even with the lack of females in the area these past few years. Until about a minute ago he’d been confident that he could turn Jillian’s.

What the hell did she mean she couldn’t guarantee she’d be here next month? Where was she planning to go? He supposed he could wait until she came to work in the morning to find out. Wait, hell.

He crammed his hat back on his head and strode straight out to the sidewalk. He didn’t even bother to close the door.

It was high noon, and some of the people of Jasper Gulch were out and about. Cletus McCully was sitting in his usual spot on the bench in front of the post office, and Opal Graham and her spinster daughter Louetta were heading for the diner for their usual Tuesday lunch.

Luke spotted Jillian trying to cross the street in front of Josie’s Five and Dime. Shading her eyes with her hand, she glanced to the right and then to the left, waiting for Karl Hanson to move his old truck on down the street. Luke headed toward her, his long strides eating up the sidewalk in record time. By the time she stepped off the curb, he was only five yards away.

“Jillian, wait!”

She looked over her shoulder and came to an abrupt stop.

He slowed his steps and called, “You need a key.”

“A what?”

He took another step, feeling the heat rise off the pavement in waves. “A key. I never know when I’ll have to make an emergency run to one of the ranches. If it happens in the middle of the night or early in the morning, I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to open the office at eight.”

“Oh, in that case…”

Jillian’s lips continued to move, but an approaching car in dire need of a new muffler drowned out whatever else she was saying. From the corner of his eye, he saw a rusty splotch of brown and fleetingly wondered why Roy Everts didn’t break down and get that car of his fixed. The old man drove like a maniac, taking out fence posts and mailboxes every other day. Luke turned his head just in time to see Roy take the corner wide, barreling through the town’s only stop sign. In a flash Luke realized the old geezer was about to take out Jillian today.

“Jillian. Look out!” Luke reached her on the run, his feet moving before his brain had decided what to do. A horn blared just as his arm snaked around her waist. He pulled her to his chest so hard it knocked the wind out of her.

Roy missed her by two feet.

Craning her neck to look at the car, which had come to a stop in front of the Crazy Horse, she gasped, “Who was that?”

Another time Luke would have called Roy every name in the book. But right that minute all his concentration was fixed on the woman in his arms. He’d noticed she was slender the first time he’d seen her, but he’d had no way of knowing how soft and pliant she would feel in his arms. Her hair smelled of warm flowers, her white blouse a thin barrier between his callused hand and the soft skin at her waist. This close, her eyes were an even lighter shade of blue and were wide open, staring into his.

“His name is Roy. Don’t worry, Cletus is already giving him the tongue lashing he deserves. Not that it’ll do any good.”

She moved, her thigh brushing his, her breathing expanding her chest, which in turn expanded his. Her lips were parted slightly and so full he was tempted to kiss her, here and now.

“Luke, what are you doing?”

Her voice was a husky rasp, but it brought him to his senses. He wouldn’t have minded kissing her in the middle of Main Street. But first kisses were meant to be private, especially if they were going to lead to second kisses.

Loosening his hold on her, he said, “I’m saving your life, of course.”

She glanced around. And stiffly stepped back. “Oh. I suppose you’re right. Um. Well. I don’t know what to say.”

She sounded breathless. Luke didn’t blame her. His breathing was still ragged, too. But his mind was functioning normally, and as far as he was concerned, there were several things she could say. She could tell him she’d be happy to go out with him, for starters. And maybe she could follow that up with an invitation of her own.

Unfortunately she didn’t appear to be getting ready to say either of those things. She was looking decidedly ill at ease. Since he didn’t want to scare her away, he tugged on her hand, drawing her with him to the curb.

Without releasing her fingers, he said, “Why don’t you say you’ll have lunch with me.”

“Lunch?”

“Yes, lunch. Come on, Jillian. I just saved your life. In some cultures that would make you mine.”

Her chin came up, and her hand stiffened in his. If Luke lived to be a hundred, he doubted he would ever see a more serious expression on another person’s face. He felt his own eyes narrow and his adrenaline kick into overdrive, because he recognized the look of a woman gearing up to speak her mind.

Chapter Three (#ulink_b006d41c-c64c-5b30-b400-723933c799de)

Jillian tried not to bristle as she shot a quick glance at the people who were out and about on the narrow main street. She could hear Cletus McCully’s rusty old voice a half block away and an occasional grumble from the man who’d nearly run her down. Two women were standing beneath the diner’s faded awning across the street, and a handful of men were watching from the shade next door.

She remembered Luke telling her how the people of Jasper Gulch liked to gossip and realized that he was still holding her hand. This wasn’t the place she would have chosen to have this conversation, but she supposed saying what she had to say in front of the town’s watchful eyes had its merit.

After a long pause she firmly, deliberately, pulled her hand from his. “You may have saved me from serious injury, Luke. But my life is very much my own.”

He looked as if he would have liked to argue, but shrugged instead. “All right, Red. I can respect that. Now, how about that lunch?”

“My hair is not red.” Jillian’s mouth dropped open, his slow grin sending the air whooshing out of her lungs. What did she care what color he called her hair? And why did it feel as if her heart was doing a pirouette inside her chest?

“Red, gold, brown and amber. It’s beautiful. Now, do you want to stand here and argue or do you want to go inside Mel’s Diner—where it’s air-conditioned—and have lunch?”

For a full five seconds Jillian couldn’t speak. Feeling inordinately warmed in ways she preferred not to examine, she crossed her arms, doing everything in her power to conquer her involuntary reaction to this man.

“I’m not having lunch with you, Luke.”

“Aren’t you hungry?”

She released a huff of air at the poor impression he did of looking innocent. “Yes. No. I mean, my hunger has nothing to do with it.”

That got his attention. His eyes narrowed and he lowered his chin. “Would you care to explain what this does have to do with?”

Actually, she’d rather not, but didn’t see any way around it. “Look, if I have lunch with you, people will get the wrong idea about us.”

“And what idea is that?”

“They’ll think we’re a couple.”

He no longer looked as if he was trying to appear innocent. The mixture of surprise and curiosity on his face was definitely the real thing.

Jillian took a deep breath. She was doing this badly. She couldn’t blame Luke for jumping to conclusions. She had, after all, come to a town that had advertised for women, so it was no wonder he’d assumed she would be interested in dating the local bachelors.

Trying for a conciliatory tone of voice, she said, “I know this seems odd, but I didn’t come to Jasper Gulch to find a man.”

He made that sound again, the one a man makes when he’s holding on to his temper by a thread. His gray eyes darkened to the color of thunderclouds, and his voice dropped an entire octave as he said, “Let me get this straight. You saw the ad for Bachelor Gulch, so you moved here. But you aren’t looking for a man.”

“That’s right.”

“Then would you mind telling me why you’re here?”

“I came to help Lisa get settled, and to help her find the man of her dreams.”