Over the past two years, it had gotten harder and harder to be a good brother. Especially when he wanted his brother’s woman for his own.
To make matters worse, he wasn’t sure if Jake even loved Amanda. Even now, at a party to celebrate his impending marriage, Jake couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off Hope Butler. That little sex kitten really had her claws into his brother.
Rabb took a breath and let it out. Amanda would never be happy married to a man who didn’t love her. And Jake wouldn’t be happy living with a miserable wife. He owed it to both of them to make his feelings known...before it was too late.
The first problem was how to separate Jake from Amanda so he could talk to his brother. In the end, he decided the direct approach was best. He walked up to the two of them and said, “I need to talk to you, Jake.”
“Can it wait?” Jake said. He smiled at Amanda. “I’m a little busy right now.”
“It’s important,” Rabb said.
Jake turned to Amanda and said, “I’ll be right back,” then released her and followed Rabb.
Rabb led his brother to a deserted corner of the backyard where forsythia bushes had grown out of control.
“What is it?” Jake said impatiently.
“I don’t think you should marry Amanda Carter.”
Jake frowned. It was a look that would’ve cowed Rabb a few years ago, but he couldn’t afford to be daunted by his older brother’s displeasure. This was too important.
“You don’t love her,” Rabb said bluntly.
“How I feel about Amanda is none of your business,” Jake retorted.
“I’m making it my business.”
Jake’s blue eyes narrowed. “Did Amanda say something to you about us?”
“No, but—”
“Then how is my relationship with her any of your business?” Jake demanded.
“Do you love Amanda even a little?” Rabb asked. “Tell me you love her, and I’ll back off.”
Jake’s eyes narrowed even more. “I already told you—”
“You don’t love her,” Rabb accused. “Do you? That Butler girl has her claws in you so tight, you can’t see anything but those big brown eyes of hers and that knockout body.”
“Keep Hope out of this. And keep your voice down,” Jake said, shooting a glance at the gathered friends and family who were just out of earshot.
“Hope Butler is very much a part of this,” Rabb said in a low, urgent voice. “Because I think you’re in love with her.”
“How I feel about Hope is none of your business, either,” Jake said heatedly.
“You have to break off this engagement, Jake. You have to set Amanda free.”
“You know I can’t do that,” Jake said. “I proposed to Amanda, and unless she calls it off, I intend to go through with the wedding. Because she’ll make a damned fine wife!”
“You are the most stubborn, bullheaded—”
“If you’re done—”
“I’m not done,” Rabb said, grabbing at Jake’s shoulder to keep him from walking away. “If that sexpot Hope Butler wasn’t wagging her tail—”
Rabb never got to finish his sentence, because Jake swung a fist at his chin. He reacted quickly enough that the blow only grazed him, but even that was enough to knock him off his feet. Rabb lay on the ground staring up at his stunned brother.
“Damn it, Rabb. I’m sorry,” Jake said. “I don’t know—”
Rabb avoided the hand his brother offered and quickly got back on his feet. “I know exactly what’s wrong with you. You’re in love up to your eyeballs with Hope Butler, and you’re marrying Amanda Carter out of some misplaced sense of honor. You’re not doing either one of them any favors.”
“Hope’s too young for me,” Jake said bleakly.
“Yeah, I know. And because Amanda’s the right age you’re going to marry her and live miserably ever after. I’m giving you fair warning that I intend to do everything in my power to stop this wedding.”
“Amanda loves me, Rabb. I don’t want to see her hurt.”
Rabb was taken aback by Jake’s statement, because it was something he feared might very well be true. “Maybe she does. And maybe she doesn’t know her own mind.”
They were both distracted by a commotion in the gazebo.
“What the hell?” Jake muttered.
Hope screamed.
Rabb was left standing by himself as Jake raced to the rescue.
Rabb quickly followed after him, but while Jake’s attention was focused on Hope and the cowboy whose arms were wrapped tightly around her, Rabb had eyes only for Amanda.
She looked distressed as Jake marched up the steps of the gazebo and yanked Hope free of the cowboy’s drunken embrace. When the man took a swing at him, Jake ducked, then planted his powerful fist in the cowboy’s solar plexus.
The man stumbled backward, then went crashing through the delicate lattice that formed one of the five sides of the gazebo. That would have been bad enough, but as the drunken cowboy stumbled, he careened into another guest, who windmilled helplessly before smashing backward through another one of the fragile walls.
“Oh, no!” Amanda cried.
Rabb was beside her an instant later. “It’s all right, Amanda,” he said. “I can fix it.”
“I don’t care about the gazebo,” she shot back. And then realizing who was standing beside her amended, “Well, of course I do, but...”
He followed her gaze to the gazebo and saw what was really troubling her. Jake was gripping Hope Butler tightly by the arm, dragging her out of the gazebo behind him and hauling her toward the house.
“That poor girl,” Amanda said, staring after them. “I’d better go see what I can do to help.”
For a moment Rabb was tempted to let her follow his brother, because he had a pretty good idea of what was going to happen when Jake got Hope alone. But he didn’t want Amanda hurt any more than necessary. Which meant he had to distract her long enough for Jake to finish his “talk” with Hope.
“Wait,” he said, setting a hand on her shoulder. “Jake can handle Hope.” Which was probably the biggest lie he’d told in a good long while. “You’d better see to your guests,” he said, pointing toward the disaster in and around the gazebo.
She glanced once more toward the house, where Jake and Hope had disappeared, then turned back to the gazebo. “You’re right. I’d better see what I can do to smooth things over.”
Rabb went with her, to make sure the drunken cowboy didn’t repeat whatever insult had created havoc with Hope in the first place. He found Hope’s twin Faith standing beside the fallen cowboy, her boyfriend Randy at her side.
“I’m so sorry,” Faith was saying. “I swear I thought Hope said she liked you. But maybe it was some other cowboy,” she was explaining.
“You’d better saddle up and move along,” Rabb said as he approached the man.
“No argument from me,” the cowboy muttered as Faith’s boyfriend helped him to his feet.
The other guest who’d fallen turned out to be Amanda’s principal, Mr. Denton. And his arm was broken.
“I’m so sorry,” Amanda said as she stared helplessly at the older man.
“Aw, hell,” Denton said as Rabb helped him to his feet. “I’ve been hurt worse. But this is going to make it a little harder to put together some of the Christmas presents I bought the kids—bicycles, baby carriages and the like.”
“I can help you with that,” Rabb volunteered.
“I’ll help, too,” Amanda said. “Just let us know when and where to show up.”
“You got it,” Denton said.
Rabb could see Amanda’s hands were trembling as a couple of other teachers escorted Denton toward a car to take him to the hospital. “It wasn’t your fault,” he sai
d. “It could have happened—”
“I should have been watching more carefully,” she said. “I should have kept an eye on—”
“You can’t watch everyone all of the time,” Rabb interrupted.
“My beautiful gazebo,” she said as she stared at the destruction. Her chin was wobbling and tears began to brim in her beautiful blue eyes.
Rabb put an arm around her waist, wanting to comfort. “I can fix it, Amanda. Really, I can.”
She turned her face up to him and said, “Can you? Really?”
He wondered if she was talking about the gazebo...or her relationship with Jake. Amanda Carter was no dummy. She must have some inkling of what was going on between Jake and Hope. But if she did, why didn’t she call off the wedding herself?
A moment later, Amanda had her face pressed against his shirtfront, sobbing.
“I’ll start tomorrow,” he promised her. And be at her back door every day for the next two weeks, he promised himself. He enfolded her in his arms, rocking her and murmuring soothing words, his eyes warning the guests not to make anything of it. He was merely deputizing for his brother.
But where the hell was Jake? Why hadn’t he come back to comfort his fiancée?
CHAPTER TWO
HOPE
HOPE HAD BEEN TRYING ALL afternoon to get Jake’s attention. Now she had it. But after knocking down the cowboy who’d been bothering her, Jake’s blue eyes were cold, his granite features set in angry lines.
“I saw this coming from the moment you set foot in Amanda’s backyard,” he said as he grabbed her arm and hauled her out of Miss Carter’s gazebo—or what was left of it. Two of the five sides were lying splintered on the ground, a result of the brief fracas between Jake and the young cowboy who’d gotten drunk enough to lay a hand on Hope in a place where it didn’t belong.
Hope spared one glance for the cowboy, who lay groaning on the ground, before Jake’s implacable grip propelled her toward Miss Carter’s kitchen. This confrontation had been coming all afternoon, and she welcomed it. At least Jake would be forced to talk to her.
When they got to the kitchen, it was full of women, so Jake nodded curtly and kept moving. Down a narrow hallway. Through the parlor.
Up the creaking wooden stairs. Down another hallway. And into a bedroom that obviously belonged to Miss Carter.
The baby-pink bedspread was girlish, but that was the extent of the frivolity in the room. Miss Carter had always been a no-nonsense English teacher. Her bedroom gave proof that there hadn’t been much fun in her life.
A shepherdess figurine with a broken arm sat on the dresser, along with what appeared to be a plain wooden jewelry box. An iron lamp and a paperback book—a horror novel by Stephen King—rested on the bedside table. A painted green kitchen chair occupied the corner. A worn pink bathroom rug was all that stood between Miss Carter and the wooden floor on a cold morning.
Hope felt her heart sinking. If Jake knew where Miss Carter’s bedroom was, that probably meant he’d been here before. Which only made sense. After all, he and Miss Carter had been engaged for three years. It would have taken a miracle for Miss Carter to put Jake off that long. Hope hadn’t been able to resist his charms for three seconds.
Jake thrust her inside the room and shut the door, then leaned back against it with his arms crossed, his eyes narrowed on her. “Well, young lady, what do you have to say for yourself?”
Hope firmly believed that you didn’t get what you didn’t ask for. She’d been the one to pursue Jake all along. Nothing had changed in three years, but her gut still clenched as she said, “I love you, Jake. And I think we belong together.”
Jake sucked in a breath, and a muscle flexed in his jaw. She waited breathlessly for him to respond to her declaration, but his lips remained pressed flat in disapproval.
Which left her no choice but to act.
She closed the distance between them—two short steps—and stood with her breasts almost touching his crossed arms. He was a great deal taller than she was, but Hope refused to be intimidated by his size—or the forbidding look on his face. She glanced up at him from beneath dark, fringed lashes and said, “You love me, too, Jake. Admit it.”
That statement demanded an answer, and Jake didn’t disappoint her. “Damn you, Hope. Give it up.”
“Never.” Her chest felt like it was bound by an iron band, and she was having trouble breathing. She hadn’t been this close to Jake since she’d gone away to college, but her feelings hadn’t changed in the intervening years. She needed some proof that his hadn’t either.
Three years ago, when she’d cornered him in her father’s barn, the sexual sparks had flown. He’d gotten himself engaged to Miss Carter so quickly afterward, that she figured he must have done it to keep himself safe from temptation.
Her heart was pounding furiously with excitement—and with fear. What if he went through with the wedding? What if she couldn’t make him see what she’d known since the first moment she’d laid eyes on him?
“It’s destiny, Jake. We’re two halves of one perfect whole. We’re—”
“Cut the crap,” he said harshly.
Hope heard the revealing gurgle as she swallowed back the threatening tears. She laid her hands flat on Jake’s chest above his folded arms, undaunted by his rigid posture, and felt him inhale sharply. He wasn’t as unaffected as he wanted her to think.
“All right, if you don’t want romance, think of the practical ways I’d be a helpmate if you married me.”
Jake snorted.
“I have a degree in computer science with a minor in business. For a start, I’d be able to do the bookkeeping on the ranch.”
“I have an accountant who does that for me.”
“But you wouldn’t have to pay me,” Hope said with a smile meant to charm. It didn’t seem to be working, so she added, “And I’m very good with kids.”
“That’s because you’re a kid yourself,” he retorted.
“I’ve seen a great deal of the world,” she continued doggedly, “and I can tell you, Jake, there’s no place like home. I’d never leave you like...” Hope broke off as she saw the muscle flex again in his cheek. No sense bringing up memories of his previous failed marriage.
She knew Jake’s experience with a wife who wasn’t satisfied to live on an isolated northwest Texas ranch was part of the reason he didn’t trust his feelings for her. Once before he’d succumbed to the charms of a younger woman, and she’d left him high and dry. “I’m not like her,” Hope said softly.
“You’re exactly like her,” he accused. “Young and flighty and—”
“That’s not fair,” she said, her hands sliding down and clutching his folded arms. “There’s nothing ‘flighty’ about me. I’m dependable and hardworking and loyal—”
“And too damned young for me.”
She let the tips of her breasts graze his forearm and felt his whole body stiffen. “Maybe three years ago I was,” she conceded. “Not anymore. I’m twenty-one, a college graduate, a world traveler, a—”
“Baby!” he spat. “You’re a goddamn babe in the woods. How many men have you slept with, Hope?”
Hope blushed a rosy red, but she didn’t retreat. “I don’t want any man but you. I’ve never wanted any man but you. I’m a virgin, Jake, and I will be until you—”
“Shut up, Hope.” The muscles in his forearms had turned to stone. “Shut the hell up.” She could feel him withdrawing as her arms slid up his rock-hard chest toward his nape, but with his back to the door, there was nowhere for him to go. His eyes locked on hers, hot and hungry.
Suddenly, their positions were reversed. Jake had her by the shoulders, his body imprisoning hers against the door, and she could feel the hard male ridge against her abdomen that put a lie to all his protests. She saw the struggle in h
is eyes, felt the tautness in his body.
“I’m not going to do this,” he said.
“Then I will,” she said as she leaned forward and pressed her lips against his.
For a moment, he resisted her. For a fraction of a second, she thought all was lost. She softened her mouth against his, sliding the tip of her tongue along the crease of his lips.
His whole body quivered. He lifted his head and looked at her, his eyes heavy-lidded. “Aw, hell,” he muttered. His mouth came down on hers, and he took her fast and deep.
She’d forgotten how it felt to be kissed by Jake, like sliding down a fast chute where there was no end in sight. She was on her toes, her body clasped hard against his, and she could feel his heart pounding in his chest. She couldn’t catch her breath, couldn’t catch up, the feelings were so powerful, so overwhelming.
Suddenly, their positions were once more reversed, and she was standing the width of his outstretched arms away.
“You have to stay away from me, Hope.” The anger was back again. And she heard desperation in his gravelly voice.
“I’m going to marry Amanda. And I intend to be a faithful husband. Don’t do this again.”
“What is it I did, Jake?” asked Hope, whose anger matched his. “If you were really in love with Amanda, you would’ve let someone else rush to the rescue when that cowboy got fresh with me. And you wouldn’t have brought me here where we were sure to be alone. You wanted what just happened to happen. Because you l—”
“Don’t say it, because it isn’t true,” he interrupted. “I brought you here because it’s obvious to me—and it must be to anyone who cares to look—that you’ve got some kind of juvenile infatuation for me. It’s embarrassing to be mooned over by someone half my age.”
The insult hurt, as she was sure Jake intended it should. But she didn’t let it discourage her. “You were jealous of that cowboy. Admit it. You don’t want anyone touching me but you.”
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