She sought his gaze, which was shaded by that cowboy hat, and she wished she could just whip the thing off him so she could see what he was really thinking.
But, just like most of the time, he was unreadable.
“If you planned to be so sorry about kissing me,” she said, “you wouldn’t have done it in the first place.”
He lowered his hands. She let him go.
And, just like that, their moment was over, just as if it’d never happened at all.
Where had it gone?
He stuffed his hands into his jeans pockets, gazing toward the condos. “I’ve been wanting to do that for months now, you know.”
“You have?” She couldn’t help but smile at him, encouraging him to go on so they could get their moment back.
She already missed it, even though it was probably for the best. Wasn’t it?
“But,” he said, facing her, “just because I wanted it doesn’t mean it was a good idea to actually do something about it.”
Her pulse was tripping along at the same crazy speed as it’d been when he’d kissed her; it hadn’t slowed a bit.
“It’s too bad,” he said, “because now we have...this.”
“This?”
He motioned to the space between them.
“Oh,” she said, repeating his gesture. “This.”
It was an acknowledgment that they were attracted to each other. It was a wide space that neither of them knew what to do with now that it had become awkwardly apparent.
He was right, though. Just because they had shared a moment didn’t mean this very guarded man had let down even an inch of his well-fortified defenses, and it didn’t mean that she was all of a sudden equipped to deal with a relationship that had the potential to make her vulnerable again.
“So,” she said. “What’re we going to do now?”
He didn’t say anything for a second. He only bent to pick up their mugs.
It was terribly clear that the two of them had no business kissing each other, even if she was craving another one with every awakened, needful cell of her body.
She laughed a little, just to cut the tension. “It’s okay, Jared. I understand that you’re not going to be around St. Valentine for the long term. You’re here for Tony Amati.”
And not for stolen kisses.
He stood directly in front of her, and there she went, holding her breath all over again.
“Now can I tell you I’m sorry?” he asked.
“For being curious?” She grinned up at him. “No, you can’t. Because I was wondering just as much as you were, and now we can just get on with being friends.”
That last word sounded strange, but it was what it was. A girl could never have too many friends, anyway.
They both started to walk back to her condo, her heartbeat still humming as if contradicting everything she had just told him.
As if insanely, impossibly hoping he’d kiss her again someday.
* * *
It was a night full of misspent dreams for Annette, who kept repeating the kiss over and over again in her head—the initial flare of hormones as her lips had touched Jared’s, the giddy afterglow just before reality had set back in for her.
And, the next day, when she reported to the diner for her shift, her head wasn’t much clearer. Neither was her heart, which still jumped every time someone came through the door, then sank when she saw that it wasn’t Jared.
Luckily, Fridays were generally busy; people cashed their paychecks and started their weekends early by going out to lunch. And because the Valentine’s Day Festival was just around the corner, everyone seemed to be in a good mood, wearing red-and-white sweaters and humming along to the romantic music on the stereo.
Annette told herself that all of it just made the time pass more quickly, and as she manned the counter, she wholeheartedly threw herself into the spirit of things.
She cleared some plates from the counter after a couple of customers left, wiping down the Formica until she got to the end, where the “Chess Nerds” were lost in one of their frequent games.
George Manderly and Dexter Lars had their board set up and were stroking their gray beards and hunching on their stools. Annette was filling their coffee mugs for about the third time when George glanced up at her as if he’d forgotten she even existed.
“He lives,” she said.
Dexter was still staring at the board as George stretched his wiry, flannel-clad arms. “Got to check in with reality sometime or another.”
As she turned to walk away, she noticed George peer at her tummy.
Then she noticed him wrinkle his eyebrows.
Joy. Here it was—the day when somebody in the diner finally said something about the baby bump she couldn’t hide anymore.
His gaze traveled back up to hers, and she just smiled.
Dexter said, “What’s keeping you, old-timer?”
Then he followed the direction of his partner’s flummoxed stare.
Right away, he turned back to George, his voice a growl. “Don’t you dare miss a good chance to shut up.”
A red-faced George very quickly got back on his game, burning a hole in the chess board with his gaze. Dexter peeked back at Annette, blushing, too, then went back to considering his pieces.
Annette sighed, especially when she realized that everyone else in the general area had gone stone silent, eating their pies and sipping coffee as if all their concentration was required to complete the activities.
All right. To announce the obvious or not to announce? That was Annette’s question.
But was her pregnancy really anyone’s business?
A cowboy, a woman and a darling little girl with dark curls that matched her mother’s left their booth across the diner, then came to the cash register, cutting Annette a break. She greeted them after placing the coffeepot on its burner.
Conn Flannigan and Rita Niles smiled at Annette as Rita’s four-year-old daughter, Kristy, peeked over the counter in anticipation. Annette grinned as she reached into the drawer below the register and gave the girl a lollipop.
“Prepared for the weekend?” she asked Conn and Rita after Kristy said thanks.
Conn had his arm casually draped around Rita’s shoulders as he handed over their money. “Normally the hotel is light on business this time of year, but we had a rush. Looks like this weekend’s going to be fully booked.”
Rita, the owner of the historic St. Valentine Hotel, looked at her fiancé. “It’s because of the Valentine’s Day Festival lights at the Helping Hands Ranch. It was bound to draw a crowd.”
Rita rested her hands on her rounded tummy, absently rubbing it while allowing her adoring gaze to linger on Conn. She couldn’t seem to keep her eyes off him every time they came in here. He always returned the affection, clearly in love.
“The lights should really be something,” Annette said, ringing up the sale.
Kristy was already sucking on her lollipop, staring directly at Annette’s tummy. She looked at her mom’s rounded stomach, then back at Annette’s.
Taking the candy out of her mouth, the little girl said, “You’re just like Mommy.”
Annette could just about see everyone in the booths nearby going still again, their ears perking up.
Leave it to a child to voice what everyone else had been thinking.
Rita laughed uncomfortably, taking her daughter by the hand. Conn suddenly focused all his attention on cramming the change Annette had just given to him into his wallet.
Heck, no sense in pretending now that her swollen tummy was invisible.
“You’re right,” Annette said to Kristy. “I’m going to have a baby, just like your mom is.”
Someone at the end of the counter coughed. One of the Chess Nerds.
; Rita paused, as if assessing just how mortified Annette might be at having to address this in front of a crowd. But when she saw everything was fine, she smiled again.
“How far along?” she asked, one mom to another.
She might as well get used to answering, just as she’d announced to Jared. “Third trimester.” Annette nodded to Rita’s baby bump. “You?”
“Nearing the third, but I’m bigger than you are.”
It was as if a social bomb had been defused, although Annette saw that the elderly couple in the closest booth—Janet and Philip Bacon, who owned the mercantile—didn’t look terribly happy that a single girl was running around St. Valentine pregnant without a dad around.
Kristy wasn’t done with her questioning, and she innocently asked, “Where’s the daddy?”
Annette bit the bullet. Looked like it was time to set the stage for the bigger lies to come. “The dad was in a car accident before he found out about the baby,” she said. “So he never knew.”
“Oh.” Rita’s gaze was sympathetic. “I’m so sorry to hear that.”
“Thanks.” She touched her belly, feeling like a jerk for lying, even though it was the safest way for Annette to go. “We’re doing just fine, though.”
She made sure everyone heard that last part because it was as close to the truth as she was probably going to get with the public. But she didn’t have a choice, if she wanted to keep her life private and take no chances that Brett would ever get wind of his runaway bride and the baby.
Both Conn and Rita gave her encouraging smiles. Then Rita said, “If there’s anything you need, you just let us know.”
“I’ll do that.” She’d heard some talk around St. Valentine about Rita’s past—how her first husband had abandoned her with Kristy and left her for another woman. It would’ve been a sad tale, too, if Conn hadn’t come into Rita’s life and swept her into a true love story.
The bell on the door sounded, and Annette’s stomach flipped, just as it always did when she looked to see who was coming in.
This time, though, her tummy did about three revolutions at the sight of Jared strolling inside, tilting back his hat when he saw her.
He gave her a slight smile that spun her around even more as he took one of the open seats at the counter.
“Well,” Conn said, his arm still around Rita. “Congratulations about the baby. Maybe you and Rita ought to start up some kind of mom group.”
“Pregnant and Proud,” Rita said with a laugh.
At the counter, Jared slowly turned his gaze to her. Annette offered a slight shrug.
The elderly couple who’d given Annette the stink eye earlier took a good look at Jared at the counter. Mrs. Bacon raised her eyebrow to her husband as they abandoned their booth, leaving money on the table without waiting for the check.
Little Kristy waved to Annette’s bump. “Bye, baby!”
Her parents led her out of the diner, waving, and Annette went back to work, pulling out her order pad and getting her pencil ready while standing in front of Jared.
He was still giving her a surprised stare.
“Cat’s out of the bag,” she said.
The only other customers remaining at the counter—the Chess Nerds—seemed very determined not to look at her or to make it seem as if they were still listening in. It was bad enough that, whenever Jared entered some place in St. Valentine, the room went stock-still. Now she’d only added fuel to the gossip fire with her own drama.
Jared sat there for a moment longer, then seemed to come to some sort of decision. “If the cat’s out of the bag,” he said, getting up from his stool, “then it’s time for some adjustments.”
She had no idea what he was up to when he grabbed an empty stool and slipped behind the counter with it.
“Hey—” she said.
He guided her to sit, then went back to his stool as if he’d done nothing out of the ordinary.
One of the Chess Nerds chuckled. Probably George.
Jared scanned the menu in front of him as Annette just sat and stared.
At that moment, both of the other waitresses on shift—Corie, a redhead with long braids, and Liza, a short-haired brunette—moseyed out of the kitchen with full trays. They’d been putting together salads for a party of ten in the back room.
They both took brief note of Annette on her stool before George chimed in.
“Now don’t be yelling at Annette for slacking. She’s preggers.”
Liza looked back over her shoulder as she passed. “No duh.”
Corie followed her. “We thought it’d be rude to just come out and say something about it.”
Both women turned the corner by the pie display as Jared slid his menu away from him.
“I’ll have the usual,” he said, just as if everything were the same as it ever was.
And as if he’d forgotten all about that kiss they’d shared last night. It was as if the man defined the word cool.
Annette had it up to here with the cool. “You think you’ve got the right to be sitting me down on stools whenever you please?”
He leaned his elbows on the counter. “The cat’s out of the bag now, so why not? It was probably time for you to rest anyway.”
“I know how to take care of myself,” she said. She didn’t tell him about the support hose she’d taken to wearing at work or the bland Large-Marge bras she’d just purchased at the nearest superstore. Both were rather embarrassing but necessary, and she had it all under control.
Next to Jared, Dexter Lars muttered, “He’s not the only one who’ll be keeping an eye on you here. Get used to it.”
George Manderly grunted in agreement.
“See?” Jared said. “I’m not the only one.”
Corie returned to the kitchen window, where Declan had set out one of her orders. She flipped a braid over her shoulder and grabbed the plates, talking to Annette at the same time.
“You’re lucky you’re about to get off shift. We’re gonna get slammed tonight.”
“Then you’re lucky you’ve got two more waitresses coming in,” Annette said.
“What’s going on?” Jared asked.
Dexter didn’t look away from the chess board as he answered, setting some kind of record for the amount of words he’d ever, in all these months, addressed to Jared.
“The Valentine’s Day Festival lights are going on,” he said. “That’s what’s happening.”
As Corie brushed by, carrying her plates, she added, “The Chamber of Commerce set up some kind of internet broadcast for it.”
“Why?” Jared asked.
Annette couldn’t believe he was actually interacting with others. Interesting times. “Davis Jackson set up a bunch of elaborate light displays out at the Helping Hands charity ranch on the outskirts of town,” she explained. “Get it? St. Valentine? Valentine’s Day? They thought they’d tie the two together.”
“Got it.”
“It’s a sort of warm-up for that big Cowboy Festival they’re planning for March. You’ll be able to see the light designs from high above, and the chamber of commerce thought the novelty of that would stir up some publicity for the town.”
George added, “Davis hired an airplane to film it.”
“Ah,” Jared said, and that was that.
But why should he be all that excited when he had no future in this town?
Annette tried not to let that bother her, but it did. Imagining a day without him at the diner counter or even in her backyard just seemed...
Empty.
George Manderly continued his run of chatter. “Times, they are a-changin’. Just this summer St. Val’s was down in the dumps, and come March...”
Dexter finished for him. “It could be just as if the mine closure never made a ding
on us.”
He moved his queen. “Checkmate.”
“Checkmate, my a—” George cut himself off, then let out a curse.
All the while, Jared remained silent.
But there was a small grin on his face for some reason. As usual, though, Annette had no idea why it was there.
Not until she got off work.
* * *
After putting in a short day at the Harrison ranch, Jared had stopped by Annette’s condo for only the briefest of time before he’d gone to the Orbit Diner for some grub.
And, as soon as he’d walked in and seen her, all his senses had scrambled.
The kiss. The feel of her skin against his.
He hadn’t been able to get any of it out of his head. The memories had stuck with him all night and day, and seeing her again had just made the urge to hold her that much worse.
There was no denying it—Annette got to him like no other woman had before. He’d been young and green when he’d gotten married all those years ago, and he’d also been reeling from a storm of personal revelations about being adopted and unwanted to boot.
And then there’d been the buckle bunnies on the rodeo circuit. No comparison there, for certain.
Annette just burrowed deep into him, into places he’d kept everyone else out of. Jared didn’t know if that scared him or made him feel something else entirely that he couldn’t identify.
But there he’d sat at the counter of the diner anyway, as if he couldn’t stay away.
When she got off work that night, he couldn’t help testing his boundaries then, either, speaking before he’d fully thought out just what he was doing.
“Big plans for the night?” he asked, rising from his stool as she came out from the back room of the diner, where she’d grabbed her long felt coat and purse.
“Nothing more than being a homebody,” she said.
He’d already paid his bill, so he followed her out the door. But when she started to head toward her old cherry-red Pontiac GTO in the parking lot, he snagged her coat.
She looked up at him, wide-eyed. Was she wondering if he meant to pull her into his arms again?
As much as he ached to do that, he knew he shouldn’t. But he didn’t want to let her go, either.
The Cowboy's Pregnant Bride (St. Valentine, Texas) Page 7