Claimed!

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  She moved back into her office to answer Jack’s call. “Hey.”

  “Hey, yourself. It occurred to me that your brother might know by now whether or not he got the job he was interviewing for.”

  “He got the job.” She was a little surprised that Jack even remembered about it.

  “Then I have a big favor to ask. Would you let me talk to him?”

  “About what?” Josie’s pulse rate jumped at the very idea of these two guys having another conversation, even over the phone. The last time they’d met was a complete disaster.

  “For one thing, I mentioned the interview to Gabe, and he wants to ask Alex to handle the music for the reception. I said I’d do it and find out what he’d charge.”

  “You’re a strange choice as a negotiator if you really want him to say yes. But maybe you don’t.”

  “No, I do. I’m not planning to ask him over the phone. I’m going to see if I can buy him a drink tonight.”

  Josie closed her eyes. “Look, when I said you two should become friends, I didn’t mean you had to become drinking buddies this very night. There’s no rush. Maybe after the wedding, when life settles down, the two of you could—”

  “No, it needs to be right away. I should have apologized to him sooner than this, but I was guilty of thinking he’d leave and the whole stupid situation between us wouldn’t matter. But he’s not leaving, and it’s past time for me to talk with him.”

  During their six months together, Jack had never been eager to apologize for anything. Although his father’s death had obviously changed his attitude, she hoped it hadn’t made him prone to reckless confessions of guilt.

  “You’re not thinking of telling him about us, are you?” she asked. Visions of a bar fight to end all bar fights flashed through her mind.

  “I’m not a complete moron, Josie. I need to get him to tolerate me before he finds out that I’m—”

  “Good, but I’m still not sure about this, Jack.”

  “Give me a little credit, okay? It’ll be fine. Is he around?”

  She considered pretending Alex was nowhere in sight, but that would only prolong the agony. She knew Jack, or at least the old Jack, and once he grabbed hold of an idea, nobody could shake it loose. He’d decided to contact Alex, and he’d do it if he had to resort to smoke signals.

  “Hang on a sec,” she said. “He’s in the bar, but you won’t be able to hear each other in there. I’ll get him to come back to the office.”

  “Thanks, Josie.”

  “Don’t thank me yet. He might not want to talk to you.”

  “If you ask him, he will, especially if he’s in a good mood because of the job offer. People will do all sorts of things when they’re in a good mood. Look at me. I’m calling to talk to your brother, a guy who currently hates my guts.”

  That made her laugh. “So you’re in a good mood?”

  “After this morning with you, my whole body is smiling.”

  “Mine, too.”

  “Just think how you’ll feel tomorrow at this time. I have big plans for you.”

  Heat surged through her and settled in all her secret places. “Don’t say things like that. I’ve managed to convince Alex that all we do is ride, so if I get too perky, he’ll suspect we do more than that.”

  “That is all we do, Josie. First we ride horses, and then we ride each other.”

  “Stop it, Jack. I mean it. I can’t take this phone to Alex if I’m blushing.”

  “I wish I could be there to see you blush. Did you know you blush all over? Your cheeks, your neck, your breasts, your tummy, and especially your—”

  “Either you cut that out or I’ll have to hang up. I’m telling you, my brother has a sixth sense. Don’t forget that you want him to tolerate you before he finds out what you’ve been doing with his sister.”

  “You’re right, but I’d forgotten how much fun it is to tease you. I’ll shut up if you’ll go get Alex and put him on the phone.”

  “All right. I’m going now.” Josie laid her cell phone on her desk and walked back into the bar, breathing deeply the whole way. She wanted to appear calm and cool.

  Maybe Jack was right to jump on this immediately after Alex took the job. If she continued to see Jack, her brother would have ample opportunity to figure out the relationship and he’d be ticked that she hadn’t told him the truth. But if Alex learned to get along with Jack, then maybe the revelation that she was involved with him wouldn’t be such a big deal.

  As she approached the bar, Tracy was laughing at something Alex had said and Alex was looking at Tracy with way more interest than he had a day ago. Oh, boy. He might have recently had his heart broken, but he was fully capable of breaking someone else’s.

  She tapped him on the shoulder. “Can I see you in my office for a minute?”

  Alex turned and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “You betcha. Can I bring my beer? I’m celebrating.”

  “Of course you can bring your beer.” And if he’d bring his spirit of goodwill along, so much the better.

  She led the way, and once he was inside, she closed the door and picked up her cell phone. She stuck her thumb over the small mouthpiece. “Jack’s on the line. He wants to talk to you.”

  “Jack? Jack Chance?”

  “Yes. I told him about the interview, and he—”

  “Sure, I’ll talk to him.” Alex took the phone. “Hey, Jack? My sister says that she’s enjoying the riding lessons, but I just want to reiterate that I’m watching you, buddy. If Josie comes home with a single complaint about your behavior, I’ll be at your doorstep with a bucket of cement.”

  Josie rolled her eyes. So much for these two smoking a peace pipe.

  “No, she didn’t tell me about the ant hill and the honey.” A smile flitted across Alex’s face. “You want what?” He looked at Josie and shook his head. “I don’t know, Chance. Accepting a drink from you might compromise my principles.”

  Just as Josie was resigning herself to the call ending in an argument, Alex laughed.

  “I would hate to miss that. Oh, what the hell. We’ll have a damned drink together, and if that doesn’t work out, we can step outside and settle this the manly way. What? No, I don’t think dueling is legal anymore. We’ll have to do rock, paper, scissors. Something like that. Want to talk to Josie now?”

  She stared at him. They were joking with each other?

  Alex shrugged and handed her the phone. “What can I say? He made me laugh. It’s tough to hate a guy who makes you laugh.” Then he opened the office door and walked back out to the bar.

  Josie put the phone to her ear. “What did you say to him?”

  “That if he meets me at the bar for a drink tonight, I’ll demonstrate how I can hang a spoon from the end of my nose.”

  “You did not.”

  “I did, too. It worked with you, and he’s your brother, so I figured it would work with him.”

  “Jack, you’re insane.” But she remembered that the first night he’d started flirting with her at the bar, his opening act had been hanging a spoon from the end of his nose. She’d decided any guy willing to clown around like that in front of a woman he was interested in might be worth getting to know.

  And she’d been right. She’d had more fun with Jack than any man she’d ever dated, which was why the abrupt end to their relationship had hit her so hard. She hadn’t been able to believe that Jack could change that quickly from a good-time guy to a brooding recluse. Maybe he was emerging from the darkness at last.

  “I’m insane about you,” he said softly. “I don’t want bad blood between your brother and me to get in the way. I created the problem, so now I’ll fix it.”

  “By hanging a spoon off the end of your nose.”

  “You got a better idea?”

  “Nope. And you better believe I’ll be here to catch your act. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you perform that particular trick.”

  “I was counting on you being there.”


  “Just so you understand…you have to be careful to treat me like a good friend and nothing more.”

  Jack sighed. “I know, and it won’t be easy, but I’ll manage somehow. Just so you understand…the whole time I’ll be mentally undressing you.”

  AS JACK DROVE INTO TOWN that night, he remembered how often he used to do that, both before he got together with Josie and especially after. But he hadn’t done much socializing in the past ten months. Now that he was officially in charge of all ranch operations, that had seemed like a luxury he couldn’t afford.

  And yet, because Sarah and Gabe had insisted on it, he’d set up the riding lessons with Josie, which took time away from his supervisory role. Amazingly, nothing had gone wrong while he was out of touch. The hands actually seemed to be getting more accomplished in the past couple of days.

  Or at least that’s what seemed to be happening. Jack wasn’t sure he could trust himself to judge anything when he felt so damned good. The ranch could be falling down around him and he might not notice. That was worrisome, because it was that kind of inattention that had prejudiced his father against his relationship with Josie.

  Running the ranch had been Jonathan’s primary concern for as long as Jack could remember. Emmett had hinted at lapses in Jonathan’s perfect record. He’d lost focus after his divorce from Jack’s mother, Diane, according to his longtime foreman.

  There’d been the brief affair with Nicole O’Leary, Nick’s mother. But from the time Jonathan married Sarah until the day he died, he’d concentrated nearly all his energies on the ranch and the registered Paints it was famous for. He’d seemed to relish every minute of it.

  Jack wasn’t like that. He’d never really wanted to be in total charge of the ranch operation, despite his father telling him that was how it would be. Jack had resisted the idea from the beginning. He’d even tried to demonstrate that he wasn’t right for the job by slacking off, especially once he hooked up with Josie.

  Ironically, that behavior had landed him right where he hadn’t wanted to be—in charge. But for the past couple of days, now that he was seeing Josie again, the burden hadn’t seemed so heavy.

  Part of it might be that he’d allowed others on the ranch to assume responsibility while he was off with Josie. So maybe he didn’t have to oversee every last detail, after all. And part of it might be Josie herself, quietly offering him her support.

  Whatever the reason, he felt more like his old self tonight, which meant he was ready to show Josie’s brother that Jack Chance was an okay guy. If it took the spoon-balancing trick, then so be it. And Josie would be there. The prospect of seeing her again was enough to make him run the town’s only red light.

  Elmer Crookshanks had been behind the campaign to install the light a couple of years ago, and it was conveniently located at the intersection where his gas station happened to be. Jack, along with several others in town, had always suspected Elmer wanted the light in order to force people to stop long enough to notice his station sitting there. Sure enough, Elmer’s business had picked up after the light went in.

  It stood to reason. No matter when a vehicle came to the intersection, whether there was any traffic going the other way or not, the light turned red. That gave people time to see the station, check their gas gauge and perhaps decide to fill up.

  Jack had fallen into the habit of running the light on purpose, just for the hell of it. Elmer would report him to the county, and Jack would have fun arguing the ticket. He was in the mood to create a little chaos tonight.

  No one was in the intersection except Jack. Stepping on the gas, he ran the light. The minute he did, he saw a flash, as if someone had taken his picture. Now that was going too far. Hanging a quick left, he pulled into the gas station, climbed out of his truck, and walked into the small building with its permanent odor of gas and oil.

  Elmer chewed on a toothpick as he sat behind the battered metal desk that had been part of the station’s furniture forever. Nobody knew exactly how old wiry little Elmer was. His hair was gray and his skin weathered, and people had estimated him to be anywhere from forty-five to sixty.

  “Gotcha,” Elmer said.

  “Was that you with the camera, Elmer?”

  “I have it set up with a remote here in the office, so if somebody runs a red light, I can take a picture and send it to the sheriff’s department. They said they needed concrete evidence.”

  “For God’s sake, this is Shoshone, not New York City!”

  Elmer shifted his toothpick to the other side of his mouth. “Gotta obey the law everywhere. You ran a red light, Jack.”

  “Which brings up another point. How come the light is always red when I hit that intersection?”

  Elmer shrugged. “Bad timing.”

  “I think you’ve found a way to alter that signal, or maybe you manually operate it, just like the camera, so it turns red whenever someone gets there.”

  “How would you know? You never come into town anymore.”

  “That’s about to change, and this traffic signal nonsense is about to change, too. I’ll give you a few days to fix it so it cycles the way it’s supposed to. But the next time I come through here and there’s not another soul at the intersection except me, I expect the light to be green.”

  Elmer chewed his toothpick a little faster. “Maybe it will, and maybe it won’t. Can’t say for sure.” He looked worried, though.

  “I can, and it had better be green.” Once Jack was outside, he allowed himself to grin. Now that was fun. Next stop, the Spirits and Spurs. Jack was back.

  11

  JOSIE HAD ALWAYS been able to sense when Jack entered a room, so she knew immediately when he came through the front door of Spirits and Spurs. He glanced over at the bar, and she met his gaze. The cocky smile he gave her was like old times. This was the Jack she remembered.

  The four-person country band up on the small stage just happened to be playing a Martina McBride song they once liked dancing to, which only added to the feeling of déjà vu. Josie wasn’t foolish enough to believe they could recapture the past that easily, but seeing Jack here looking like his old self was a promising start.

  Tilting his hat back with his thumb, he maneuvered around the couples on the tiny dance floor and came over to lean on the bar. “Hi, gorgeous.”

  “Hi, yourself.”

  “Is your brother here?”

  “He’s over at the corner table behind you.”

  Jack hunched his shoulders and talked out of the corner of his mouth like an old-time gangster. “Thanks for the tip, doll-face. Is he armed?”

  Josie laughed. “You’re in a rare mood.”

  He gazed at her, his dark eyes sparkling with good humor. “I ran the light.”

  “Uh-oh. You know Elmer uses a remote control camera now.”

  “I didn’t know until I ran the light. He says the county needs the evidence. Is that true, or is he just pulling our chain?”

  “It’s probably true. I’ll bet the county got sick of him reporting everybody and then having them argue their cases. You were the most frequent offender as I recall.”

  “I thought of it as sport! Anyway, that signal is rigged, and if he doesn’t fix it, I’m going to prove it’s rigged. Plus the camera’s got to go. It offends me.”

  She smiled as she handed him his favorite brew. “We’ve missed you, Jack.”

  “Obviously that’s true, if nobody else has the cajones to do something about the doggone light. Anyway, you got a spoon I can borrow?”

  “You’re not really going to do the spoon trick, are you?”

  “I’m not only going to do it, I’m going to attach that spoon here and walk over to your brother’s table without letting it fall off.”

  “Here’s a spoon, but wait a minute. I still have a couple of drinks to mix, but I want to walk over there with you.”

  “Okay, then I’ll practice.” He began rubbing the bowl of the spoon over his nose.

  “Dear God. I’m so sorry I lef
t my camera upstairs.”

  “A still camera could never capture the artistry of this move. You’d need a Hollywood film crew.”

  “I’ll remember to call you the next time we get some Hollywood types in the bar.”

  “Go mix your drinks.” Jack unsnapped his cuffs and rolled back his sleeves. “I have work to do.”

  Josie somehow managed to put together a gin fizz and a strawberry margarita, although it took her twice as long because she kept glancing down to where Jack was practicing with his spoon, much to the amusement of the others sitting at the bar.

  When she’d placed the drinks on a tray for Carolyn, the night waitress, she hurried back to Jack and lifted the hinged part of the bar to join him on the other side. “Let’s go.”

  “What?” He turned to her, his eyes crossed, and the spoon dangling from his nose.

  She lost it, laughing so hard her ribs hurt.

  “You need to walk ahead and announce me.” Jack turned around slowly, and the spoon remained suspended on his nose.

  “If I can catch my breath.” Gasping helplessly, she started over toward Alex’s table.

  Alex stared at her as if she’d lost her mind, which she probably had. Jack had that kind of effect on her.

  “Presenting Jonathan Chance, Jr., and his famous suspended spoon act,” she said. “Don’t try this at home.” She stepped aside and swept a hand in Jack’s direction.

  Jack walked slowly forward, and by now half the patrons of the bar were watching his progress and cheering him on.

  “I’ll be goddamned.” Alex began to grin. “You weren’t kidding.”

  “I wouldn’t kid about a skill this impressive,” Jack said. “I dare you to try it, Keller.” Still balancing the spoon, Jack sat down across from Alex. With a flourish he removed it.

  Alex stared across the table at Jack. “I’ll take that challenge, Chance. Josie, another spoon, if you please.”

  “I have one!” said someone at a neighboring table. “I always wanted to learn to do that.”