“Dear God.” Bethany sank to the edge of her bed and gulped for air.
“Don’t panic, sweetie. It’s not true, and you’ll be vindicated. But I’d rather they didn’t show up at the Triple G and find a dump. So is it one?”
Bethany felt light-headed. “Not exactly.”
“What do you mean, not exactly? Is it just a little run-down, or does it look like it’s got a date with the wrecking ball?”
Bethany gulped. “From the outside, it’s kind of bad. We’ve been working on the inside of the house, but—”
“You know the importance of first impressions, honey. They’ll film the outside and think they have their story. How fast can you get everything in shape?”
“I don’t know. How long do I have?”
“Hard to say. I doubt they’ll be out there tomorrow, but they might show up in a couple of days. Here’s my advice. Hire as many people as you need to bring it up to snuff in the next twenty-four hours. If it’s a money issue, then I can—”
“No, Opal. Thank you, but I can handle this.” She had the money. The logistics were the problem, but Nash would help her figure it out. Just thinking of him calmed her frazzled nerves. “Thank God you heard about it.”
“Honey, Opal Knightly sees all and knows all. And sometimes tells all.” Her rich laughter spilled over Bethany like warm maple syrup. “Call me tomorrow, okay? I want to know what kind of progress you’re making.”
“I will.”
“Good. Gotta run. Time for my massage. ’Bye, sugar.”
“’Bye, Opal.” She said it even though she knew Opal had hung up. Thank God for Opal Knightly. She owed that woman so much that she’d never be able to repay her kindness. Opal had invited her on the show when her first book had come out, and without that boost, Bethany’s career might never have taken off.
But Opal hadn’t stopped there. She’d continued to support Bethany’s career and they’d become friends. Well, not the kind of friends who went shopping and hung out at coffee shops together, but the kind who respected each other’s work and cared how each other’s lives were going.
She’d confided in Opal as she’d tried to decide how to deal with her depressed father during the past eighteen months. She’d felt that if Opal was endorsing her career, she should know about the skeleton in Bethany’s closet. Now that truthfulness had paid off.
Ironically, the new crisis had evolved from her father bragging about her to his caretakers. That knowledge wrapped her in a warm blanket of parental approval she’d never felt before, and tears slid down her cheeks. He had loved her, had been proud of her, and that filled an empty place in her soul. The invasion by Real News wasn’t welcome. Still, evidence of her father’s pride healed wounds she’d barely acknowledged, but had felt all the same.
Yet he’d left her with a big problem, and she had no idea how she’d pull off this miracle of giving the ranch a makeover in one day. Maybe Nash would have some ideas. Nash! She glanced at the time on her phone and tossed it on the bed. He would be here in twenty minutes, and she must not be late. That wouldn’t start the evening off well.
Her shower was quick and her makeup application even quicker. She slipped on the dress, added a silver belt and silver hoop earrings and grabbed her black sling-back pumps just as she heard his truck pull in. Stepping into the pumps, she dashed into the living room as he walked through the screen door.
When he saw her, he stopped abruptly and stared in the way that all women longed for when they dressed up for a man. He didn’t even glance at the bed. “Wow.”
She’d hoped for a comment along those lines. “You said I should emphasize that I’m a city girl.”
“You’re emphasizing more than that, sweetheart.” He walked slowly toward her. “I would kiss you, but I don’t want to muss you up.” His gaze raked over the flirty little dress. “And if I started kissing you, I’d want to muss you up.” He made a soft growling sound.
She laughed, feeling suddenly lighter just because he was here. “How do you like the bed?”
“Oh.” He turned toward it as if only now realizing it was there beside him. “Looks good. I hope you didn’t rob some little old lady’s garden to get the rose petals.”
“I most certainly did not.”
“So where’re they from?”
“My secret.”
His gaze flicked from the bed to her. “Damn. You and rose petals on a big ol’ bed. I sure would love to—”
“Later.”
“It’ll seem like an eternity. But I guess we’d better go.”
“Take a peek into the master bedroom first.” She walked to the doorway and reached inside to flick on the overhead.
Nash whistled in approval. “You’re not only sexy and honest, you polish up a floor real good. That looks terrific.”
“I think so, too.” She turned off the light. “I was planning to start on the living room tomorrow, but I’ll have to postpone that job.”
“Oh? Why?”
“I’ll tell you on the way.” She grabbed her purse from where she’d hung it on the back of the doorknob. “Want to do the honors of locking up?”
“Sure, why not?” He pulled his key, which was still attached to the Yellowstone National Park key ring, out of his pocket. “I’ve been carrying this around ever since you gave it to me. It makes the whole thing seem more real.”
“I’m glad.” Knowing how happy he’d be living here helped ease her sorrow about leaving at the end of the week. She walked out to the porch. “You washed your truck.”
“Sure did. Vacuumed the inside, too. I can’t show up for a date with a dirty truck, especially after I made such a big deal with Sarah that I was doing the gentlemanly thing by fetching you.”
“So we’re on our first official date?” She smiled at him as she navigated the uneven dirt of the yard in her pumps.
“I think this qualifies. You’re a dinner guest at the Last Chance and I’m your escort. Let me get the door and help you in. That way I can ogle your legs.”
She stuck her tongue out at him.
“Hey, I like that tongue routine. I read that as a potential French kiss coming up. Or maybe you’re subtly suggesting that something even more exotic will happen with that tongue of yours before the night is over. This is going to be one hell of a first date.”
She was laughing so hard she had trouble buckling her seat belt.
“I like it when you laugh,” he said as he climbed into the driver’s seat and closed the door. “You do this funny little hiccup thing that’s sort of dorky but I like it.” He started the engine and backed the truck around so it faced the road.
“I like it when you laugh, too,” she said. “Sometimes you snort.”
“I do not.”
“Yeah, you do.”
“Okay, maybe sometimes. But not a lot. Occasionally.” Smiling, he turned to her. “Ready to lose a few fillings out of your teeth?”
“Go for it.” Because the road was so bumpy, she decided to wait until they hit pavement before broaching her news. After he turned down the two-lane highway toward the Last Chance, she told him about Opal’s call.
He listened intently and muttered a few swear words during the explanation.
“So there’s my problem,” she said. “Any ideas?”
“I’m thinking.”
“Opal suggested I hire as many people as I need to, but I wouldn’t know where to begin. I was hoping you could help me figure that out.”
“I will, but since your cover is blown you might as well lay all this out at dinner and see if anyone has a suggestion.”
She took a deep breath. “Guess you’re right.”
“You sound reluctant.”
She glanced over at him. “I hadn’t realized until now how much I’ve enjoyed bein
g out of the spotlight for a few days. It’s been fun being just...a woman spending time with a man.”
Reaching over, he slid his fingers through hers. “I know what you mean.” He gave her hand a squeeze.
Her throat tightened as she squeezed back. They might have a few stolen moments together after this, but it wouldn’t be the same. That feeling of being cocooned from the world had ended, and she ached to have it back.
14
IN A WAY, NASH WAS RELIEVED that he wouldn’t have to watch every word out of his mouth tonight. Sure as the world Sarah would keep everyone’s wineglasses full, and he could easily forget and make some remark that revealed Bethany’s secret. But that was a small thing, really, compared to the larger issue.
Their playtime was effectively over, and they both knew it. The world had intruded on their private relationship. If he’d worried about the dinner affecting things between them, that was nothing compared to the impending arrival of a news team with an attack-dog mentality.
He’d already decided to ask for the day off tomorrow so he could personally work at the Triple G. Under the circumstances, he thought Jack would give it to him. He hoped that the combined brainpower sitting at the dinner table tonight would figure out a way to transform the little ranch into a showplace, at least enough to fool a TV crew.
But that discussion had to wait until they were all gathered around the long dinner table in the Last Chance’s formal dining room. Located just off the large dining room used for lunch with the hands, the more intimate one was lit by a Western-styled wood-and-metal chandelier. The table had been set with polished silver, gleaming crystal and cloth napkins. Nash smiled when he saw the cloth napkins. Both Sarah and her cook, Mary Lou, insisted on them.
Surprisingly, it was an adults-only gathering tonight. Taking her usual seat at the end of the table with Pete on her right, Sarah announced that Emmett and Emily had organized a cookout for the youth-program boys and had roped Emily’s husband, Clay, into helping. Luke Griffin had volunteered to babysit the grandkids upstairs.
Nash and Bethany sat across the table from his mother and stepfather. So far Lucy had been friendly but cautious toward Bethany. Ronald had followed her lead.
All three of the Chance boys were there with their wives, which was always a treat for Nash. He might not have lucked out in the matrimony department, but his friends had. His buddy Jack had shown great taste when he’d hooked up with Josie. Gabe was obviously crazy about his wife, Morgan, and Nick, the middle son, had found the perfect match in Dominique.
Just last summer the family had expanded to include Jack’s half brothers on his mother’s side. Diana, the woman who’d abandoned Jack as a toddler and cut off all contact, had remarried and produced twin boys, Wyatt and Rafe. Nash had come in on the tail end of the drama that had ensued when Jack discovered he had two more brothers.
But everyone had adjusted, and even the wayward Diana, now divorced, was allowed to pay periodic visits to the Last Chance. She wasn’t here tonight, though, and Nash was grateful for that. Chaos seemed to follow that woman, and they didn’t need additional problems.
Wyatt, who owned an adventure trekking company, was leading a group through Yellowstone and his wife, Olivia, had tagged along. Rafe and his fiancée, Meg, were at the dinner table, though. Nash got a kick out of how Rafe, a city slicker from San Francisco, had gone country. Looking at him now, no one would suspect he hadn’t been born and bred in Jackson Hole.
Seeing all the happily-ever-afters gathered around the table made Nash wish for his own...with Bethany. It was a futile wish, considering her high-profile career, although her earning power didn’t bother him anymore. She wasn’t Lindsay and would never lord finances over him. But that didn’t matter. Her life was elsewhere.
Sarah raised her wineglass. “A toast to our former neighbor, Bethany Grace, and to our new neighbor, Nash Bledsoe.”
“Hear, hear!” Jack lifted his glass in Nash’s and Bethany’s direction.
Everyone else followed suit, including his mother and stepfather. Nash smiled at them in appreciation for their acceptance of the situation. His mother might wish that he had a good woman to love as well as a ranch of his own, but that would have to wait.
“Thank you all for inviting me tonight,” Bethany said. “As it turns out, I desperately need your advice.”
Nash pressed his knee against hers under the table to subtly give her moral support.
She described the situation, not sugarcoating any of it, but not blaming her father, either. In fact, the bitterness she’d displayed toward him when Nash had first met her seemed to have disappeared. Nash was glad about that.
“I need a lot of work done and I only have one day to do it,” Bethany said. “I’m happy to pay the going rate, but I don’t know who will be available on such short notice.”
“That’s easy.” Jack’s dark eyes glittered in a way that Nash recognized. His buddy loved a challenge. “We’ll do it.”
“You?” Bethany stared at him. “But you all have a ranch to run, and a million things to do, and—”
“And it can wait one day,” Sarah said. “Jack, if you hadn’t said it, I would have.”
“And if he hadn’t, I would have,” Gabe added.
Nick laughed. “I doubt I would have gotten a word in edgewise, but I’m all for it. We can take most of the hands over there, too.”
Nash had never been so proud of his friends in his entire life. He’d hoped they’d have suggestions. He’d never expected this, but it fit with the kind of people they were.
“I’d like to offer those eight boys,” Pete said. “They’re not skilled, but they’re eager, and this would teach them the value of being a good neighbor and helping someone out in a time of need. They can fetch and carry while everyone else works. I’ll supervise them.”
“I’ll help, too,” Ronald said. “I’m still a fair hand with a hammer.”
Nash’s mother looked across the table at him. “I can paint like nobody’s business. And I know what color you want on those outbuildings, too, Nash Bledsoe. Dark red.”
He gave his mother a big grin. “Thanks, Mom. But I’ll take whatever color’s available. This isn’t the time for me to be picky.”
“It is, too. It’s going to be your ranch. You might as well get it fixed the way you want it.”
“So, Bethany.” Sarah directed a question at her. “Will this work for you?”
Nash glanced over at her. Tears brimmed in her eyes, and when she nodded rapidly, a couple spilled onto her cheeks.
He put his arm around her and gave her a quick hug. He didn’t give a damn who took note of that, either.
She sniffed and wiped away her tears. “I don’t know what to say.” Her voice was choked. “I...I’m overwhelmed.”
Josie’s voice was gentle. “Say yes. I’ve learned that when the Chance family takes you under their wing, you’d best settle in and prepare to be gifted by their generosity. They can’t help themselves. It’s in the genes.”
“That’s right.” Dominique nodded in agreement.
“In other words,” Morgan said, “relax and enjoy it.”
“Then...thank you all. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.”
Sarah smiled at her. “It’s our pleasure, Bethany.” Then she turned back to the rest of the group. “Eat up, everybody. After the meal, we should all drive over to the Triple G and assess the situation.”
“What a great idea!” Nash’s mother clasped her hands together in obvious joy. “I’ll get to see the house my boy will be living in.”
Nash hoped he was the only one who’d heard Bethany suck in a breath. He wondered if she was thinking the same things he was. First of all, the charred remains of the recliner still sat in the front yard. Nash had never told anyone at the Last Chance about the flaming recliner.
The chair stood in mute testimony to the depth of Bethany’s anger at her father. Nash thought maybe her feelings had mellowed, which might make her even more embarrassed to let the Chance family see that chair. But he doubted that was the only reason she didn’t want everyone trooping over to the Triple G tonight.
They couldn’t deny this group a peek into the house after this outpouring of goodwill. But anyone walking through the front door would find a very large bed covered in rose petals. Bethany was leaving at the end of the week, but Nash wasn’t, and he’d never live this down. Jack would make sure of it.
* * *
ONCE BETHANY WAS BACK in the truck with Nash, she started plotting their strategy as they led the parade of vehicles to the Triple G. “Park right next to the front porch and block the steps if you can. Then distract everybody while I run in and scoop up those blasted rose petals.”
“I don’t think you’ll have time to get them all. Besides, the bed will still be there, all made up and ready to go. We’re not fooling anybody, Bethany.”
She sighed and flopped back against the seat. “I know that, but we don’t have to rub their noses in the fact that we’re having sex.”
“You can’t do anything about the bed, so I say let’s brave it out. In fact, leave the rose petals. Then at least my mother will have to acknowledge there’s romance involved. Without the rose petals, it’s just sex. With them, it’s romantic sex.”
“It’s still extremely embarrassing. I love how everyone’s willing to help, but I wish they weren’t coming over tonight. I shouldn’t have made the bed. If I’d left the sheets in the package, and—”
“Nope, it’s better this way. My mother’s a sucker for the romantic touch. So is everybody at the ranch, come to think of it.”
“So you’re planning to let everyone come in the house?” Bethany started to sweat. “I thought only your mother wanted to see it.”
“She’s the one who spoke up, but Morgan will want to get a look at the floor, and next thing you know, they’ll all parade in there. Might as well be prepared for that.”
I Cross My Heart Page 15