Sheesh. After today, she’d be avoiding him like crazy.
And vice-versa judging by his expression and the way his fingers strangled the lead line in his hand.
Still, something in her grandmother’s words revealed she was wavering between the fiction in her mind and the reality in front of her. She’d mentioned Logan’s farm, which meant on some level, she recognized he wasn’t Luke.
“Gram? We should let Logan get back to work,” Joy suggested gently. “Grandpa has lots of work for him today, and then he has to go back to his own farm to get chores done there.”
The light blue gaze that met hers sparked with awareness, and then shadowed with dismay. Joy quickly hugged her, whispering, “It’s okay. Come on, now. Sweet Pea is waiting for us to walk to the pond.”
Gram nodded, her head buried against her granddaughter’s shoulder. Joy mouthed, I’m sorry, to Logan before guiding her in the direction of the pond.
Once they reached the privacy of the woods, frail shoulders shook beneath her arm, and her grandmother broke down.
“I hate this,” she sobbed. “Why is this happening to me?”
Joy had no answer to give to explain the horrible disease slowly robbing her grandma of her life. Swallowing hard against the lump lodged in her throat, she blinked against the tears burning her eyes and simply held the woman she loved like a mother.
The day went from bad to worse, and Joy was mentally exhausted by the time she tucked her grandmother into bed shortly after seven. The older woman’s cognitively aware times were weighed down by depression over the dementia, and the broken engagement.
No matter how many times Joy tried to explain things just hadn’t worked out between her and Luke and it was okay, her grandmother was convinced it was her fault. That Joy moving back to help with her illness was the cause of the break-up.
The only times a glimmer of happiness appeared was when her memory slipped and she talked of the upcoming wedding and the arrangements that still needed to be made.
Dress fittings. Cake tasting. Picking out flowers. Invitations. Table centerpieces.
It broke Joy’s heart. Not because she’d already done those things herself only to have them wasted, but she felt bad about not including her in those preparations because of the many states between them at the time. Now, she would give anything to keep the smile on her grandmother’s face for more than a fleeting moment.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t like she could create a pretend wedding for Gram to help plan.
Toward the end of the afternoon, though, that exact idea refused to go away despite the fact it was absolutely crazy.
It stuck with her through a couple of very…um, interesting dreams during the night, and all through Saturday morning while she took care of the barn chores on Logan’s day off. It was her day off, too; one of the three days a week they had their outside nurse, Bonnie, come in to give her and grandpa a break, but she didn’t mind the physical work. It took the edge off her nerves as she solidified a plan.
Jenny and Tara were due out for their weekly trail ride, but Joy texted them to go ahead without her when they arrived at ten. Then she saddled a newer rescue palomino gelding named Buster, and rode out at an easy canter.
It was a little after nine-thirty when she reached Logan’s farm. His old truck sat in the yard halfway between an impressive two story brick house, and the large barn that desperately needed a coat of paint. The weathered wood was so gray, she couldn’t tell what color it used to be.
A small herd of cattle grazed in a field in the back, and a full wagon of hay waited to be unloaded near the open double doors of the barn. She shifted her attention around the yard as she rode closer, debating where to begin her search. The unexpected sound of music drew her gaze back to the barn.
Not a radio, she realized, but a guitar.
The melody kept stopping and starting over again, along with the faint sound of a low, male voice singing. Curiosity had her straining to catch the words as she dismounted and wound Buster’s reins around an old hitching post outside the barn doors. It had to be Logan, but her mind couldn’t quite picture the man she knew playing the chords her ears heard.
She walked inside slowly, quietly, almost afraid to make a sound that would cause him to stop before she could confirm the phenomenon with her own eyes. Standing beneath the opening to the hayloft, she could definitely make out Logan’s voice, and listened with amazed wonder as he continued to test lyrics with the melody.
Who knew Logan Walsh could sing?
He wasn’t pitch perfect, but the low, husky tone of his voice was effective enough to set off a whole kaleidoscope of butterflies in the pit of her stomach.
Her friend Kevin in Nashville would’ve charged up the ladder already, but Joy crept up the worn rungs and carefully peeked her head through the opening. Logan sat on a bale of hay with his back partially facing her, guitar resting on one jean-clad knee as he played snippets of a song about home, and the heart, and the dirt where one’s dreams were buried.
Again, the music cut off abruptly, and he leaned over the instrument to pick up a pencil and scribble on a notebook resting on the hay in front of him.
She studied his profile as he paused, eyes closed, lips moving to form words she couldn’t quite make out. When he opened his eyes again, quick, rough movements struck through whatever he’d previously written, the pencil was dropped, and his fingers returned to the guitar strings. Whatever he’d discarded was replaced by a stroke of inspiration.
He played for almost a full minute, working the strings as he repeated the same chorus over and over to get it just right, each time sending chills down her spine. The gruff emotion in his voice put a lump in her throat.
By the time he paused to write again, she felt like she was intruding on a private moment, and decided to leave. Her riding boot slipped on the round, wooden rungs worn smooth from years of use. She frantically scrambled to hold on, her alarmed squeak echoing up into the rafters.
Logan startled and whirled to face her as she regained her balance. Above his stubble-covered jaw, anger flushed his cheeks red. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“I came to talk to you,” she explained, her voice high from the slip and being caught. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
He set the guitar aside as he surged to his feet. “How long were you there?”
She hesitated, debating to stay or beat a hasty retreat. In the end, the heartfelt music and lyrics prompted her to finish her climb into the loft and face him despite the heat burning her own face. “Long enough. I didn’t know you played.”
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”
He could say that again. She’d have never expected the poignant words from a moment ago to have come from his mouth.
“You’re pretty good. Do you ever play at the local bars or any music festivals? I wouldn’t mind listening sometime.”
His expression tightened as he shook his head and stepped forward, between her and the hay bale where his guitar rested. As if to protect the instrument from her. Or hide it. Either way, he was clearly not willing to talk about music with her.
“Why are you here?” he demanded. “What do you want?”
You.
But it wasn’t like she could come right out and say that. It wouldn’t sound right at all, and the way he’d hear it was definitely not the way she’d mean it. Her gaze swept down over his snug, faded red T-shirt and jeans. Then again—
No, don’t go there!
She jerked her attention back up. “I wanted to talk to you about my grandma. Yesterday afternoon…”
His anger eased slightly, giving way for a hint of sympathy. “Yeah. That was different.”
“Well, in her mind, you’re Luke. Unfortunately, it’s only going to get worse with you at the ranch every day.”
He stiffened as a frown furrowed his brow. “I’ve been at the ranch almost every day for a couple years now.”
“I know, bu
t for some reason, she’s suddenly convinced herself that you’re Luke.”
“Great. So, what, am I fired? You want me to quit?”
Joy reared her head back in surprise at the return of his anger. “No, of course not. In fact…”
She trailed off as the rest of her sentence played in her head. Cripes, he would think she was as loony as her grandma. She cringed—sorry, Gram, I know you’re not crazy. But I think I might be.
“In fact, what?” Logan prompted.
She drew in a deep breath, and forged ahead. “I think I have a solution that might work for all of us.”
“And what would that be?”
“We can…play along with her.”
He stared at her as if she’d grown a second head. “You mean pretend to be engaged?”
“Yes.”
His expression said no.
Not only no, but hell no.
“I’d pay you, of course. Enough to save your farm.”
That got her a humorless laugh. “Yeah. Sure. It would take a half-million dollars to save this farm.”
“Okay.”
His head dipped and eyebrows shot up in disbelief. “You have that kind of money?”
“I do.”
“To be clear, we’re talking about you, not your grandfather.”
“Yes.” She shrugged, suddenly embarrassed at the amount of money sitting in her accounts when he was faced with foreclosure in the near future. “My parents had a large life insurance policy,” she explained. “It sat in a trust from the time I was two until I was twenty-one, and I don’t spend much.”
He stared at her a moment more, then swung away, toward the hay bale where his guitar rested. “Un-frickin’-believable.”
“What?” She took a couple steps closer. “I’m offering you a chance to save—”
“I don’t want your charity,” he ground out.
“It’s not charity. If it makes you feel better, consider it an exchange of favors.”
He spun back around and stalked toward her. His expression clearly conveyed that had been the wrong choice of words.
“Or…ah…a job,” she amended.
The intensity of his dark glare made her heart skip a couple beats before thudding hard and heavy in her chest. She took an involuntary step back, and a grim smile curved his lips as he closed the distance between them. This time she held her ground.
“An exchange of favors?”
She nodded, her throat tight. “You help me with my grandma, I help you with your farm.”
“A half-million dollars to pretend to be your fiancé?”
With him standing a mere twelve inches away, all she could manage was another nod.
“Who exactly would we be pretending for?”
“Besides Grandma?”
“Yeah, besides Grandma.”
She thought of the pitying looks if the truth got out. “Um, everyone…I guess.”
“For how long?”
She winced, but forced the words out. “As long as it takes to plan the wedding.”
His eyes widened a tiny bit. He drew in a controlled breath and let it out again. “And will I be expected to actually participate in this wedding?”
The quiet of his voice was contradicted by the agitation in his eyes. The calm before the storm—only she didn’t understand why he was so upset when she was offering him plenty of money to help her.
She shook her head no this time. “We’ll stretch the planning out. As long as it takes before…”
Before Grandma forgets us all.
She didn’t have to say the words, she saw his understanding in the tightening of his jaw.
In the silence that fell, she was aware of every breath he took as he stood a mere foot away. Every beat of her own heart reverberated through her body. The fresh shower scent of him that seemed magnified by the heat of his anger inundated her senses, scrambling her thoughts.
He shifted closer still, and when his hands rose to grasp her arms, she flinched. He noticed, though it didn’t stop him. Neither did she. His work-roughened grip was definitely setting off alarm bells, but they had nothing to do with fear.
“We don’t even like each other,” he said, his voice low as his gaze bored into hers.
She lifted one shoulder, dropping her focus to the neckline of his faded T-shirt. “Well…I wouldn’t exactly say that.”
“I would. And engaged people are usually in love.”
The husky whisper ramped up the butterflies already panicking in her stomach. His fingers flexed against her skin before he skimmed one hand down her arm, tracing calloused fingers along the inside of her wrist. Her breath hitched at the trail of heated sensation burning along her skin.
“They’re expected to hold hands,” he continued. But instead of threading his fingers with hers, he slid his arm around her waist to tug her body tight up against his. “Get close.” His head dipped until his breath feathered over her lips. “Kiss.”
Oh, God, yes please.
Chapter 4
‡
The whole damn thing was meant to make Joy rethink her idiotic idea. When her body trembled against his and she wedged her arms up between them, Logan figured it worked, that he’d jolted her common sense to attention. But then she made no move to stop him when he lowered his head.
Instead, she closed her eyes.
Damn it all, he didn’t stand a chance in hell of keeping his mouth off hers now.
Her lips were soft and pliant beneath his. She let him explore for a moment, her only reaction the fisting of her fingers in his shirt right above his pounding heart. He couldn’t tell if she was being passive, or holding back.
He ran the tip of his tongue along the seam of her mouth, testing her response. A hint of coffee and something sugary on his taste buds made him suck lightly on her bottom lip. She uttered a small sound of surrender before sliding her hands up to the back of his neck to lock him close as her head tilted and her mouth opened beneath his.
Definitely holding back—but not anymore.
He slipped his tongue inside to twine with hers and explore every bit of her intoxicating, sweet heat. He tightened his hold around her waist, holding her captive as he bent her over his arm in an attempt to delve deeper.
She stumbled back a step, and he followed, until one of the barn’s large support beams brought them up short. Logan pressed her up against the solid wood with the entire length of his body. The move freed up his hands, and he slipped them beneath the hem of her curve-hugging V-neck shirt. Soft skin teased his fingertips, tempting him higher, until his hand spanned her ribcage, right up against the underside of her breasts.
Joy made no move to stop his advance. She met every thrust and parry of his tongue while raking her fingers through his hair. The scrape of her nails against his scalp sent tingles down his spine. Desire exploded, pulsing through his body to settle in his groin with an insistent throb.
When he trailed his lips along her jaw, to the hollow of her neck, she arched her head back and to the side to give him unrestricted access. Logan pressed his hips into hers, letting her feel his arousal as he sucked at the sensitive skin below her ear, his unshaved chin scraping against her neck. She whimpered, and her denim-clad thigh slid up against the outside of his, until her hips cradled his erection.
Geezus. It’d been so long, he’d take her right here against the beam if she’d let him—and with the way she was now pulling at his shirt, he didn’t doubt she would. As her hands skimmed the bare skin of his back, reality slammed into him, and he shoved away.
Joy’s eyes flew open, green now eclipsed by brown, and full of unbridled desire.
Sonofabitch. If she kept looking at him like that—
Desperation made him yank his shirt back down. “Didn’t figure any of that into your little plan, did you?”
The sneer extinguished the heat in her eyes. Her already flushed skin deepened to crimson while she copied his movements and covered the temptation of the flesh he’d exposed
at her waist. All the while she stared at him, a bit wide-eyed as she fought to catch her breath.
“Uh, not quite.”
He shook his head—to get rid of the idea of kissing her again, and to send her on her way before he gave in to the need pulsing through his veins.
Raking his hands through his hair, he backed up another step. “The answer is no. I’m not pretending any damn thing with you, no matter how much you offer to pay me.”
She took a step forward. “Logan—”
“No. Go home, Joy.” He held up a hand as he spun to grab his notebook and guitar. She stood between him and the ladder down below, so he crossed to the loft’s open second floor sliding door and leapt down from there. Buster startled in surprise, pulling back against his reins.
Logan was a couple feet from the front porch of the house when he heard the thunder of the gelding’s hooves as Joy galloped away. He took the three stairs in one stride to avoid the sagging middle, and glanced back to see Palomino and redhead round the bend in his driveway, tail and hair streaming out behind them in the wind. Once they were out of sight, he leaned his guitar against the side of the house and sank down into his dad’s old, paint-chipped rocker.
Holy shit. What had just happened back there?
Elbows braced on his knees, he rubbed his hands over his face, raked his fingers through his hair, then sat back and closed his eyes as the scene replayed in his head. Never in his wildest dreams had he expected such a wild and uninhibited response from spoiled princess Joy Dolinski.
Only, he now knew she wasn’t nearly as spoiled as he’d originally thought. Taking care of June seemed like a full-time job these days. An emotionally draining task, judging by the strained expression on both their faces yesterday morning.
Al had told him playing along in June’s world helped to keep her from getting so upset, but Joy asking him to play fake fiancé was a little—no, a lot—overboard. And paying him a half-million to do it? As he’d said before, un-frickin’-believable.
Say You'll Marry Me (Welcome to Redemption #10) Page 3