“If one of us win, you have to ask Hannah out,” Zane said with a wicked grin.
Jeff knew he could bowl a three hundred if he concentrated hard enough. But he also knew if Hannah got in his line of sight at the wrong time, he’d probably bowl a gutter ball. He was just going to have to stay focused. There was no way he was going to back down from this.
“Okay, what do I get?” Jeff asked, wondering if he could get Zane to go along with the idea he had in his head, and figuring he didn’t have a chance.
“What do you want?” the other man asked with a cautious grin.
“I want you to leave me alone about her. Never bring it up again.” Jeff looked at Zane and watched as the wheels started turning in his mind.
“Not going to happen. So much so, you’re going to have to come up with something else. I’m not taking that chance. I wouldn’t be able to let it go even if we do lose. Which I still don’t think we’re going to, but if we do, I’m still going to try to get you and my sister together.”
“Fine. You have to at least leave me alone about her for six solid weeks, and this bet has to stay between the five of us. No telling the wives,” he said looking at Mark, Luke and James. “You think you could do that?”
“Six weeks,” Zane nodded with a frown. “Yeah, that I can do. And I can definitely keep it secret. Is that okay with you guys?”
“Sure,” they all said together.
Just then Jenny stepped up behind Mark with a curious look on her face. “You five are making a bet, aren’t you?”
“Yes, but that’s all you can know,” Mark said with a sour look on his face. He may have agreed to keeping the secret, but he really didn’t understand why he couldn’t tell her. She would be more than happy to keep it from Hannah.
“Okay, but don’t you think we should get going?” she asked Zane, poking him in the ribs just to watch him jump.
“Hey, watch it,” he growled.
She smirked, chuckling. “That’s what I was doing, but if we wait too long, there won’t be any lanes left,” she said, getting back to her topic of concern, giving Mark a curious look. She could tell he didn’t like having to keep this from her. “Baby, it’s okay. I know it’s just some bet between you guys. Nothing to worry about.”
Mark hugged her close. “I know, I just don’t like keeping things from you.”
“I’m sure Jeff will be okay with him telling you later, after the bet is over,” Zane chuckled, shaking his head at them. He was sure starting to hope the rest of them worked out their love lives soon. “And no worries,” he replied to her other concern. “We called ahead. George is reserving lanes for us, but we can go ahead and go, just the same.”
He turned back toward the porch in time to see a bunch of the others walk out onto the porch and was hit with another idea. “Hey, why don’t we double up in the cars, so we don’t have to take so many.”
He turned to look at Jeff with a mischievous grin. “Hannah, why don’t you ride with Jeff?”
“Sure, I don’t mind,” Hannah said, looking over at Jeff. “Maybe Michael or Alex could ride with us as well.” She had decided to try and make Jeff feel a little more comfortable. She could tell by the look on his face he was wanting to strangle her brother.
“No, I’m riding with Mark and Jenny with Abby,” Alex said, not even looking at his sister.
“That’s okay. I’ll ride with them,” Michael said, knowing he would be bugged less riding with Jeff and Hannah than if he ended up riding with Zane.
“So, Zane, is Amanda riding with you?” Phillip asked, eyeing his brother.
“Sure,” he answered, not even looking over at Phillip. “Is Christy riding with you?”
Phillip just laughed. “Of course. We had already decided that.”
******
Mark, Luke, James, Jeff and Zane, all had some kind of crazy bet going on who would win their game of bowling. Jenny was starting to suspect it had something to do with the rest of them trying to get Jeff to admit he really wanted to date Hannah. At the very least they wanted him to tell them why he wouldn’t ask her out. Her brother, Zane, had been trying like a madman to get him to tell him ever since last December, when him and Lisa had realized Hannah really liked the guy. A lot.
She was standing there trying to talk Mark into telling her what exactly the bet was, when she noticed Mike walk in. She was hoping Mark wouldn’t notice him. To ensure she had his full attention, she stepped closer and wrapped her arms around his waist. Due to the new status in their relationship, he didn’t find this suspicious, and he just wrapped his arms around her and pulled her closer. Thankfully he didn’t see Mike walk past. She breathed a sigh of relief, certain they were at least in the clear for now, and went back to trying to get him to tell her what their bet had been.
“No, I can’t tell,” he grumbled, shaking his head. He looked very disgruntled, and she could tell he wasn’t happy about that part. “That’s part of the deal with the bet. No one can tell. It would be pointless to have the bet at all, if it got out.”
She just pouted at him and leaned in and gave him a kiss anyway. She couldn’t help herself. She really enjoyed kissing him. She sighed, finally relenting. “It’s okay. I think I have an idea what it’s about anyway.”
“I’m sure you do, and I know you wouldn’t say anything, but I’m just trying to stick to the parameters of this bet.”
Zane walked over while they were still standing there and tugged on her ponytail. Payback for her goosing him in the ribs, she figured. He had a big grin on his face that made her wonder what was on his mind. Zane being Zane, she didn’t have to wait long to find out. “Maybe we should get Jeff drunk. It worked for you two.”
Jeff turned his head to glare at him and snarled, “I don’t drink.”
Her crazy brother just grinned back at him. “That’s a shame. Jenny got drunk in Vegas and came back married despite her fears about marriage. Of course, she doesn’t normally drink either. I wonder if it would work for you. We could slip it in your drink. Then we could lock you in a room with her.”
Jenny was seriously starting to wonder if her mom had dropped him on his head when he was little. He really was the craziest of them all. Even far crazier than her and Tonya.
“Shut up, Zane, or the bets off,” Jeff snarled. “You’re doing your best to break my concentration. That’s cheating. This is bowling after all.”
He nodded his head, giving the other man a rare serious look. “Okay, I’ll shut up while you’re bowling. But only while you’re bowling.”
“Fine,” Jeff grumbled and turned his back on Zane. Then proceeded to bowl a strike.
When he turned around, he didn’t say a word. He just walked over to where Christy sat talking to Phillip and sat down to wait for his next turn.
“Hey Zane, you know they do serve alcohol in this place. Do you think we could get enough in him slipping a little in his drink all night? We couldn’t put very much in there at a time, or he’d taste it,” James said, grinning at Jeff. “Of course, there are some alcohols that don’t have much taste.”
Luke shook his head and looked over at his brother-in-law with a chuckle. “Honestly, Zane, I think if we locked them in a room together for twenty-four hours, you wouldn’t have to worry about the alcohol part. I don’t think he’d have to be drunk. Just unable to get away from her for long enough. You know that’s how he’s resisting carrying her off now. He does his best to avoid her,” he said eyeing Jeff thoughtfully. “Of course, I think they would need Pastor Macy’s services afterward.”
Jeff could tell by the look on Luke’s face, he knew for certain what he was talking about. He couldn’t figure out how he did it, but Luke could read people better than anyone he had ever seen in his life.
Jeff looked over at Hannah wondering if she was following any of this, or if she was as clueless as he hoped she was. She must have felt him looking at her, because she looked over at him and gave him a strange look. Almost like she was a little irritat
ed. He just couldn’t tell by the look on her face what she was thinking. It might have made him a little nervous if he had known. She was thinking she’d like to know who he had finally decided he was interested in, so she could go rip her hair out. She hadn’t figured out yet, it was her he wanted.
Jeff shook his head and decided not to worry about it too much. There wasn’t a whole lot he could do about it, either way. He shrugged his shoulders, looking back over at Luke with a thoughtful expression, and asked, “Luke, can I ask you a question?”
“Sure, go for it. What do you want to know?” he asked, mildly curious what the other man was thinking.
“Was anyone on your mom’s side a shaman or medicine man? Whatever the word would be for the Sioux language.”
“My great grandfather was. Why?” Luke asked with a grin on his face. He knew what the other man was getting at and wondered if he realized he had as much as admitted he was right.
“I know you don’t try to heal people, but I just find it perplexing how well you can read people sometimes,” Jeff said, shaking his head. “There has to be some kind of explanation for what you do.”
“You know, you are the first person to ask me that. They all already knew,” Luke said, waving a hand toward Zane, Mark and the rest of the Townsend family. “But you are the first person to actually ask me about that specifically.”
Jeff just laughed and watched as Mark picked up a spare, then chuckled. “So, which of one of you is supposed to beat me?”
Luke just looked at him, trying not to grimace. “My guess is none of us will beat you. We’re going to have to be a lot sneakier to get you. I have a feeling you would never have made the bet if you weren’t really sure you could win it. Were you on a league in Kansas City?”
“Yes, I was,” he answered shaking his head. “There you go again. I don’t know that you would be a medicine man if you were in the tribe. You seem to read emotions and actions, but it is really weird the way you do that. Maybe we should call you the group oracle.”
Luke just laughed and took a bite of the nachos Mindi had just sat down in front of him as she took her seat beside him. “I’m guessing your average was pretty high.”
“It’s well over two hundred. I rarely bowl a game less than two fifty.”
“I thought so. We might as well chill out and just have fun, but there is no way Zane is going to give this up,” he said in warning, giving the other man a serious look. “He wants you to date his sister, and he knows you want her. You say I can read people, but I’m still trying to figure out what your deal is. My best guess, so far, is that something happened that made you really wary of relationships for some reason.”
He shook his head, giving a little shiver. “I really wish you would stop that. It freaks me out. I guess I’ll get used to it eventually, but it’s still weird.”
“So, are you saying I’m on the right track?” Luke asked with a grin.
“If I lied and tried to say no, would you know I was lying?”
He just laughed and shook his head. “Yeah, I would.”
Neither one of them noticed that Hannah had been listening and just caught on to the fact that they had been referring to her the whole time. She was the only one of the sisters old enough to date him, that wasn’t already attached in some way. Teresa was the only other one of the ones old enough that wasn’t already married, and her and Jake were planning to get married after she got out of college, if she couldn’t talk him into it sooner. And Hannah’s money was on Teresa. She was a Townsend, after all.
Jeff turned his head and looked at Mindi to ask, “How does that not freak you out?”
She just shrugged, snatching up a nacho. “I’m used to it. I grew up with it. He’s been doing it as long as I can remember. Well, my earliest solid memory was about ten or eleven years ago. I guess you could say, it’s sort of natural to me.”
“I bet you don’t have to tell him what you’re thinking most of the time.”
She shrugged, giving her husband an almost annoyed look. “Only when he makes me, but trust me, he’s not always right. Then there are times when he is right, that he questions himself.”
“Really?” Jeff asked, sounding doubtful.
“Yeah,” she nodded. “When we were going through all that mess with Tracy, before we got engaged, he knew I loved him, but he refused to trust it until all the ‘emotional turmoil’ was over with,” Mindi said, turning to give Luke that annoyed look again. “He was making me crazy.”
“Hey, it’s really easy to read people,” he replied a bit defensively. “When it doesn’t involve your own personal happiness.”
“Hey, Jeff. It’s your turn,” Zane hollered from where he stood by the ball return.
Jeff stepped up to the lane and started to pick up his ball just in time to see Hannah turn around with her back to the pins. It didn’t take him long to see what she was up to. She had the bowling ball in both her hands, and her feet spread apart. She leaned over and rolled the ball between her feet rather than face the lane and bowl the traditional way.
She stood up and turned around to watch the ball as it made its painfully slow trip down the lane. Wonders of wonders. She had managed to actually bowl a strike. Jeff couldn’t help but laugh.
“Hey, are we going to let her count that? She didn’t actually bowl the right way,” Michael complained.
“Yeah, we are,” Jeff said with a grin. “The idea is to get the ball down the lane and knock all the pins over. She did that.”
Despite his humor and lack of concentration, he was still able to bowl a strike. When he turned back around to go sit down, he saw the look on Zane’s face. He could tell his partner was starting to realize, for certain, they weren’t going to be able to beat him.
******
Jeff was on his last frame and hadn’t missed a single strike. All he had left was to pick up the last ten points for a perfect game. He was just getting ready to let go of the ball when he saw Hannah out of the corner of his eye several lanes down talking to Jeremy Hart. That was all it took to mess up his perfect game. The ball rolled down the gutter and he turned and looked at Zane.
His partner gave him a questioning look, obviously knowing something was wrong. All he did was point and sure enough Zane knew what the problem was. Jeff didn’t bother explaining, he just took off across the bowling alley with Zane.
By the time Jeff had got there, Zane had already stepped between Jeremy and Hannah. “Stay away from my sister. She’s not your type.”
“Hey, chill out. We were just talking.”
Zane looked over his shoulder at Hannah. He could tell Jeremy had to have just cornered her and she hadn’t been able to figure out a way to get away from him.
When Jeff stepped up beside Zane, he watched out of the corner of his eye as his sister took a step toward Jeff, like she seemed to know he would protect her if it came down to it. That puzzled him, because Hannah didn’t generally seek out protection by someone else. Jeremy must have said or done something that really made her nervous. Right now, he just wanted to get her away from him, so they could find out what had happened.
Zane looked back at Jeremy. “I don’t know what you think you’re after, but stay away from her, or your life is going to get incredibly difficult.”
“Wow!” the other guy smirked. “You are really over bearing.”
“No,” he said, shaking his head and taking a step closer. “The words you’re looking for are over protective. And I am. I know that and I’m okay with it.”
“So am I,” Hannah said, glaring at Jeremy.
That seemed to make him think better about trying to argue with Zane, and he just looked at Hannah and snarled, “See you later.”
The three watched as the guy walked off toward a table where his sister and another girl were sitting. Once he got out of ear shot, Zane and Jeff both turned around and looked at Hannah. Both of them crossing their arms in an identical fashion. All the sudden Hannah understood why Zane wanted her and
Jeff to get together. They were exactly alike, but totally different all at the same time. She couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped her lips while standing there staring at them.
“This isn’t funny Hannah. He’s dangerous,” Jeff said, barely controlling the urge to grab her and run. He didn’t like her being in the same building with the other man.
That just made her laugh harder. “Sorry. The thing with Jeremy isn’t funny, I agree,” she said crossing her arms over her chest, mocking them. “But you two are hilarious.”
Zane just looked at her and shook his head. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You two are so much alike, it’s scary.”
Jeff just rolled his eyes. “Very funny, Hannah.”
“What did he say to you before we got over here?” Zane asked, getting back to business. “Whatever it was, he obviously really spooked you.”
“He said we should hang out sometime,” she answered with a shiver. “He seemed very determined. He didn’t want to take no for an answer.”
“Hannah, you have to stay away from him,” Jeff snarled, tightening his fist so tight, he heard a few of his knuckles crack. He was just barely resisting the urge to carry her out of the building thrown over his shoulder.
“I don’t want anything to do with him. He creeps me out.”
“Hannah, you have to take this seriously,” Zane added, looking back over where Jeremy sat with his sister and the other girl, and wondered if someone should warn her. Jeremy had sat down beside her, and now she looked a little nervous.
“I know that. Don’t worry. He creeps me out more now than he did before. But I still wish you would tell me what it is he has done or said to make you give me this warning.”
“He...”
“Shut up, Jeff,” Zane snarled.
“Look, Zane, I think she needs to know.”
“There is no reason to tell her. She doesn’t want anything to do with him.”
“Zane,” the other man growled.
Married in Vegas (The Townsends Book 3) Page 16