A Bride For Mr. Right (Redbud Romance Book 2)

by Carol Hutchens

  “Losing my grandmother is all.”

  “Why do you think she wanted you to move to Redbud?”

  “She didn’t have anyone else.” Long dark lashes covered her eyes. Shrugging, she said, “And I wanted to show her how much her caring meant to me.”

  The food in his mouth tasted like cardboard. He hadn’t intended to cause her pain. “Tell you what. I’ll get that office back in shape first thing. You have my word on that.”

  Her dark eyes roamed his face for long seconds. Then like the sun coming out after a storm, she smiled and slid out of the booth. “It’s not the office I’m worried about. I want the job you offered me.”

  Mouth open, J.T. watched as she walked toward the door. Finally, he managed to swallow. And swallow. And he tried to swallow again, but his mouth was dry as sawdust.

  Grabbing the glass, he gulped ice tea and tried to think. He wasn’t sure, but he was very much afraid the twisting in his gut meant he had just gone down for the count.

  What had Edee Cutt done to him?

  ***

  That whole incident had been wrong! Just wrong.

  Edee stomped down the street as if she were squishing bugs and thought about the people confronting J.T. in the diner.

  Couldn’t they see what a decent man he was?

  She had been around him…what? A few days? And she could tell. No one with that sparkle in his eyes and a low drawling voice calling her ‘ma’am’ could be bad. Could he?

  But a little voice reminded her that she had been quick to jump on him when she found him with the little dog. And then again, when he asked her to move out of the office. She sighed. It was true, in the last twenty-four hours, she had changed the way she regarded J.T.

  And she had good reasons for changing her mind. Serious study of her bank balance had shown her need for a steady income. And J.T. Knight had offered her a job.

  Not in an area she felt qualified in, but parts of his job description appealed to her. His offer would give her a chance to build up clients for her own business and she was desperate to prove her grandmother’s faith in her wasn’t misplaced.

  Some day she would thank him for forcing her to face facts and take action, but for now, she would hold out for the job he had retracted. He had some reason for changing his mind about the job. Did he think she wasn’t capable of doing the work? She wanted a chance to prove she could support herself while she worked on a client list.

  From the first moment they met, she had admired his enthusiasm for life. His return to his hometown had impressed her. Probably because it touched on her dream of having a place to belong, but she was learning there was more to that choice than she had expected.

  Her longing to have roots seemed simple. She would work to save the business and establish herself in Redbud. But J.T. had to face his past while trying to build his future and his efforts earned her admiration.

  Blowing air past her lips, she continued down the street, feeling the teasing warmth of the late April sunshine.

  Maybe it didn’t take much to impress her, since she had never had a town to call home, but in her book, there was something special about J.T.’s return. He had made the choice to come back to the place where he had been born. He had returned to his roots.

  Longing swept over her so strong her knees threatened to crumple. Her parents didn’t remember where she had been born. It had been on the road as they traveled to the next new chance to make it big.

  They had driven half-a-day before finding a doctor’s office to have her checked out, and that was the town listed on her birth certificate.

  A tumbleweed. That’s all she had ever been.

  Couldn’t the people in Redbud see how lucky they were to have J.T. return to his hometown?

  People in this town had warm hearts because of the way they had welcomed her. The incident in the diner had left her feeling sad. It was time people showed J.T. the same kindness they had to her when she was a stranger.

  By the time she reached the office, her emotions were in turmoil. Thoughts of J.T. interrupted her constantly as she tried to sort through old files. She feared admitting her interest, even to herself, but those moments in the diner wouldn’t leave her head.

  The memory of the hard strength of his body pressed against her turned her insides to jelly. Even without closing her eyes, she could still feel the iron strength of his arm under her hand and his tension as she had stepped close to prevent him from responding to the complaints thrown at him.

  She had pinched his arm…as much to keep her focus on the situation…as to capture his attention. The look of surprise on his face almost made her smile, but memory of his shock when she pulled hairs on his arm made her laugh.

  J.T. Knight wasn’t used to having someone tell him what to do…even if they were trying to help, but her warning glance, and another tug on of the hair on his arm had made him snap his mouth shut.

  Remembering the startled expression on his face, she laughed but her amusement faded as her body quivered at the memory of being pressed close to his side. The longing to stay safe by his side almost made her forget she didn’t dare show her need to be loved.

  J.T. Knight could take care of himself, but this time he had needed help. That’s all she was offering, right? Help? And…maybe friendship? The past had taught her not to expect anything more.

  ***

  J.T. couldn’t get thoughts the feisty female and her rush to his defense out of his head. Being around Edee made everything more complicated. No one had ever defended him with such unleashed energy. Yet, as they stood close, facing the people in the diner, he had felt her trembling against his side.

  There for a few seconds, he wasn’t sure which one of them was supporting the other, but he was sure of one thing as he turned into old man Jensen’s drive. He liked having Edee on his side.

  Working on Jenson’s place claimed his attention. He let the familiarity of the run-down buildings wash over him and heaved a sigh. It was good to be home, but another emotion nagged at him as Claude Jensen stepped out of the tool shed, looking a shadow of the man he had been, the black dog trailing at his heels.

  Watching the man and dog, J.T. saw how much Jensen missed his wife, and realized he wanted what the elderly couple had shared. He wanted that special partnership that made a man and woman a team for life. The problem was, none of those dreams of a family seemed to work for the men carrying his genes.

  Shoving the truck door open, he shook his head, shoving thoughts of settling down with a real family from his head. “Hey, Mr. Jensen, still working on that tractor?”

  The old man shook his head. “Naw, just puttering.” His faded, eyes squinted toward the house. “Singles came. Porch posts, too.” He turned a sharp look on J.T. “You didn’t have to do that, boy.”

  “The house needs repairs.” J.T. forced the words past the lump blocking his throat. Funny thing about being back in town, he noticed the little things. “I need to get started before the sun gets too hot.” Bending down, he scratched the wiggling black dog’s head. “Right, Rascal?”

  ***

  “Settle down,” Pauline Morgan’s voice boomed over the numerous conversations in Ellie’s quilt shop. “We need to get this planning session under way so we can send announcement to the newspaper.”

  “Have you seen today’s paper?” Emily Proctor demanded.

  “No, but—“

  “Silly business—”

  “Trying to save her grann—”

  “Emma Margaret would turn over in her gr—”

  “These young people just don’t have—”

  “Stop!” Pauline held up both hands. “I can’t hear if you all talk at once.” Tugging her belt in place, Pauline turned to the police chief’s wife. “Now, Emily, what are you nattering about? What’s in today’s paper?”

  Voices exploded, all saying something different.

  “Stop!” Pauline screeched.

  “It’s Edee,” Stella’s gum popped, “she’s adv
ertising for clients for her grandmother’s bookkeeping service.”

  “Here, read for yourself.” From her seat in the front row, Brandy Reed shoved a newspaper toward Pauline. The smear of flour on her left cheek hinted she’d had a busy morning in the bakery.

  Pauline glanced at the advertisements. Edee’s ad was simple. She offered bookkeeping services and web design Pauline choked on a sound between a snort and a laugh, and glanced at the noisy group. “The girl has spunk, I’ll hand her that.” Her shoulders shook with laughter. “But name one person in Redbud who has a website.”

  “I can name two,” Ellie spoke up from her seat on the end of the front row. “Sam is going to answer the ad, and so am I.”

  After a snorting laugh, someone in the back asked, “Why advertise? Everyone in Redbud knows about the quilt shop.”

  Chin high, Ellie glanced around at the group. “I want to support Edee’s attempts to save her grandmother’s business, and to reach people outside Redbud.”

  Emily Proctor lifted a slender hand as she twittered. “That’s nice, dear, but why wasted the money? Redbud is such a small town.”

  “I think Ellie is right.” Pauline pulled on her Queen Bee expression, the one that made strong men stutter, and stared at the women. She had taken a liking to Edee Cutt. Something about a young woman dressing like her grandmother to keep her memory alive had warmed Pauline’s heart. “We owe it to Emma Margaret’s memory to help her granddaughter if we can.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “No buts, how many of you have a sister, or an aunt, who sews and might enjoy shopping here?” Several hands lifted. “Do you want to watch this town shrivel up and die?” Pauline turned to Emily?”

  Everyone in the room knew Emily Proctor’s sister sewed for the public to support her two children after her husband died. “Have you told her about Ellie’s quilt shop?”

  The police chief’s wife gave an emphatic shake of her head. “I will now. And I’ll mention she might want to use Edee to design a website to advertise her quilts.”

  “There!” Pauline waved the paper. “Give the girl a chance. She wants to be one of us.”

  The bell over the shop door jingled. All eyes watched Edee come through the door.

  “Come on in, Edee, we haven’t started yet.” Ellie called out. “Sit here beside me.”

  Pauline locked eyes with Edee and waved the newspaper. “Just reading your ad, girl.”

  The room went silent.

  “What did you think?” Edee held her breath as she marched across the room to the chair beside Ellie. Gathering confidence once the chair was holding her up, she looked at Pauline. “Do you know anyone who needs a designer for their web site?”

  A collective sigh escaped in the room, followed by murmurs.

  “Afraid not, part of living in a small town is the ‘see all, tell all,’ technique of advertising.” Pauline dropped the newspaper in Brandy’s lap and stepped in front of Edee. “But you have a wicked humor, girl, I’ll hand you that for having the nerve to try to make this work.”

  She thumbed through the pages of the notepad in her hand and looked down her nose at Edee. “Course, I knew that when you started dressing like my twin.” Her glance roamed over Edee’s outfit and she lowered her voice to a near whisper. “Don’t you think it’s time you started dressing for your age and stopped making me look bad?”

  Heat crawled up Edee’s neck, but she met Pauline’s sparkling blue stare and let her shoulders relax. “You want me to call you Mrs. Mayor?”

  Pauline’s lips twitched and she patted her full hips, “Not especially…but you make these dresses look so good, I can’t hold my end up.”

  Edee laughed as tension drained away. Pauline and Ellie joined in, making everyone ask what they had missed.

  Still chuckling, Pauline called the meeting to order.

  As she turned away, Edee caught the hem of her skirt. When Pauline looked down, Edee grinned and said. “I’ll take your advice.”

  ***

  Be the best person you can be and they’ll accept you.

  Her mother’s advice for her first day in a new school whirled through Edee’s head the next morning as she dressed to go to work.

  Packing up her grandmother’s office meant lifting boxes and she was bound to get dirty from packing years of stuff crammed in the file cabinets. So she told herself that was why she had dressed in jeans and a t-shirt.

  Wearing her own clothing gave her renewed confidence.

  She liked who she was. Dressing like her grandmother had kept memories alive for a few days, but as time passed, Edee hadn’t found as much comfort in wearing the vintage dresses.

  Pauline Morgan and Stella had tried to tell her from the first day she appeared in her grandmother’s clothing. It was time she followed their advice.

  Today, Redbud would see the real Edee Cutt and her stomach churned. Would they like her any better? By now, almost everyone in town would have read her advertisement in the newspaper. At least in jeans and athletic shoes, she could run if they ganged up on her and tried to force her to close the office.

  Laughing at that thought, she jumped in her older model black Honda Accord and started the engine. Visions of being chased down the street by a group of older women tickled her funny bone, but she remembered the customers at the diner the previous day and the smile left her face.

  She hadn’t known half the people in the diner, but she could still feel the negative emotions aimed at J.T. Past events flared to life in her head. She remembered many experiences of the first day in a new school, and she felt bad for him.

  But she had more to lose now that he had offered her a job. If his business failed, she lost her chance at employment and faced bigger problems of how she could build her business. If her heart quivered at thoughts of working with J.T., she refused to admit it. She needed his offer of employment to give her time to rescue her business. If J.T. Knight failed, she failed.

  She had to help him.

  She was determined to do something, but what. J.T.’s pride was almost as rigid as hers was. She knew why she protected her heart, but what was his excuse. Un until yesterday’s events she would have bet money he could twist anyone around with his sunny charm.

  Now she had doubts…but failure for one of them, meant failure for both, and she would not stop until she had tried everything in her power to save the bookkeeping service.

  Checking the address she had looked up the previous afternoon, she turned in the direction of Jensen’s farm. This was a risky move. She should probably wait until J.T. came by the office, but she didn’t have time to waste. She needed that job.

  According to Stella, Mr. Jensen had taken J.T. under his wing when he was barely a teenager. He had been the one to vouch for J.T.in that business about taking the engine out of the principal’s truck.

  But she didn’t want to wait for J.T.’s return. After that scene in the diner yesterday, she wanted answers. Her chance at success for her business was tied to J.T. Knight. As long as she kept her mind on business and off emotions, she was convinced she could make things work.

  J.T. wouldn’t thank her for asking questions, but she had been the new kid too many times to let the anger aimed at him pass unnoticed. She remembered how it felt, thinking there was no one on her side, and admired J.T. for returning to his hometown. Especially, considering he had left under less than favorable circumstances, according to what she had heard.

  He acted as if the past didn’t matter. She knew better. That’s why she was desperate to put down roots. The past didn’t define who a person was, but it gave them connections, and she desperately wanted to feel connected to this town.

  J.T. had experience she didn’t have, but in the long run, leaving ends loose came back to tangled you up. Her father’s refusal to settle down had created tension. His failure to stay in touch with his own mother had denied Edee a chance to have her grandmother in her life. In the end, his failure to connect left Edee feeling unloved and i
nsecure.

  She wanted a different life for the future. If she could uncover something about the past that helped J.T. end the tension in his hometown, maybe he would appreciate her efforts and look on her as a friend.

  Friends were good. Friends formed connections.

  ***

  Spotting Mr. Jensen’s name on a rusty mailbox, Edee parked the Honda along side the road. Movement on the roof caught her attention. A slight breeze lifted J.T.’s hair, as he slung a hammer with his muscular arm.

  The sight of his powerful shoulders glistening in the bright morning sun caused a hitch in her breathing. Gripping the steering wheel tight, she swallowed. It was one thing to guess at his strength, but seeing his muscles flex in the bright sunlight added new complications.

  Her reaction to the sight of J.T. did not belong in a good working relationship. That’s all she had in common with him. He didn’t know images of him kept her awake at night, but fantasy was a long way from a real relationship. And what did she know about relationships?

  Taking a deep breath to steady her nerves, she climbed out of the car. Though he didn’t know it, yet, J.T. Knight was going to make good on the job he had offered her …one way or another.

  Walking down the driveway, Edee surveyed the old buildings on the property and wondered about the owner as she kept one eye on the man on the roof. When he hadn’t spotted her by the time she reached the foot of the ladder, she made a snap decision.

  Testing the stability of the ladder and finding it firmly anchored in the soil, she climbed one rung at a time until her head and shoulders appeared above the roof. “Morning, boss.”

  “What the—” J.T. dropped the hammer and brought his thumb to his mouth. Sending her a glare as colorful as the words spewing under his breath, he grunted. “Sorry.” Then he turned back to the shingles. “What are you doing here?”

  “You offered me a job.”

  “I told you yesterday. I changed my mind. Get down off that ladder. I don’t have time to waste on giving you first-aide.”