He parked and headed toward the building, watching as people carried out various plants and herb arrangements in colorful pots. Scanning the interior, he stopped, heart clenching, as he saw Jenny bent over a flat of tomato plants, speaking to a middle-aged woman. She reached out her fingers to gently touch the leaves of the plant as she spoke, the other woman nodding and smiling at something she said.
Owen had thought he knew Jenny, had spent what felt like hours memorizing every nuance of her features, but that morning she was a revelation to him. All the wariness and worry that she normally carried were gone, replaced by a look of contentment he could feel like a tangible force from across the space.
Wearing a pair of faded, low-slung jeans that hugged her small frame perfectly, she bent to open the cabinet below the shelf and took out a bag of potting soil. She dipped her hand in and pulled out a clump of rich brown dirt that she held with all the reverence of a priest carrying a chalice. The woman standing with her pinched a bit of the soil between her fingers, then nodded. The smile that Jenny gave her literally took away his breath.
“She’s in her element,” a voice said next to him. “It doesn’t take being in love with her to see how happy she is around all these plants and flowers and whatnot.”
He glanced down into the blue eyes of a rail-thin blond who looked vaguely familiar.
“Dina Sullivan,” the woman said, holding out her hand. “We met at the reunion.”
Owen blinked and tried to figure out why the woman who had seemed to be Jenny’s mortal enemy was standing in the garden barn, wearing the same green apron as Jenny, a smudge of dirt on her nose like she was on the job.
“I got my hair cut,” the woman said, tugging at the ragged ends. “That could be why you don’t remember.”
“Probably,” he agreed, even though he hadn’t noticed her hair.
“But Jenny’s talked about me, right?” Dina seemed to be studying his reaction far too closely. “She told you my kids and I are staying with her for a little while? She said you thought it was a good idea.”
So he and Jenny had talked about the tiny woman with the butchered blond hair? Good to know. Of course, it would have been better to hear it from Jenny, who looked up from her conversation at that moment. Her eyes widened as they darted between Dina and him, and she gave a slight shake of her head.
“I’m an expert at planning parties,” Dina was saying. “Better than I am at helping at a nursery.” She held up her fingers for him to inspect. “My nails are wrecked. But it was nice of Jenny to give me a job.” She laughed softly. “Jenny Castelli has a huge heart. Who would have guessed it?”
Owen had known it the first time he laid eyes on the redheaded spitfire. A huge heart along with the ability to crush his into a million pieces.
“Anyway,” the woman continued, “if you need help with the wedding . . .” She broke off with a small laugh. “Not that you can’t afford to hire the best wedding planner, but I’m available if you two need it. I also cook. Jenny said you might be coming to dinner tonight if your schedule allows it? I think it’s cute that you two have standing date nights, like you’re already married.”
Standing date nights? Already married? What the hell . . .
“Hey, Owen,” Jenny said as she approached them. “This is a surprise. I didn’t expect to see you here this morning.” She grasped his arm and squeezed, a little tighter than necessary. The sense of contentment was gone, replaced by a cord of tension he could feel despite her bright smile.
“Of course he’s here,” Dina said. “You have a man who loves and supports you. Go ahead and kiss him.” She pointed to Jenny. “It won’t bother me, and everyone can see how much you want to.”
Owen’s gaze shot to Jenny, who bit down on her lower lip as color crept up her cheeks. “You know you want to,” he repeated, keeping his voice teasing even as his whole body went tight.
She lifted onto her toes, aiming for his cheek with her mouth. At the last second, Owen turned so that their lips met. As always, it felt as if sparks lit the air between them. Such a chaste kiss, totally appropriate for a Saturday morning in full view of the garden center shoppers. It was clear Jenny hadn’t expected it because for a moment her mouth was soft against his. The next, she pulled back, and her cheeks had gone bright pink.
Dina sighed. “I remember when it was like that. I’m going to check on Cooper and my kids. Make sure they don’t have him tied to a chair.”
“Are you sure you weren’t involved in sports?” Jenny muttered as the other woman walked away. “You’ve got pretty quick moves.”
“Total nerd,” Owen told her. “I excel at science. Motion and reaction time are all about physics.”
She rolled her eyes.
“I hear I support your one-time nemesis as a houseguest.”
“She walked out on her rat-bastard cheating husband.”
“And ended up on your doorstep?”
“Yes,” she said on an exasperated breath. “I told her to leave him and she did. What was I supposed to do?”
He couldn’t stop his mouth from curving at one end. The woman acted so tough, but she had a heart as soft and sweet as a pile of kittens. “I guess you were supposed to take her in, offer your son as a babysitter, and put her to work.”
She narrowed her eyes. “It’s temporary.”
“Will she go back to him?”
“I don’t know.” Jenny gave a mock shudder. “The guy is slicker than an oil spill. He came out here last night and took the kids to dinner. Flowers arrived this morning. He wants her back, but he’s not going to stop hurting her. I want her to understand she has options.”
“Can I help in any way?”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “I haven’t told her about our arrangement,” she said quietly.
“I gathered that. You don’t plan on it?”
“Not now. I don’t trust that it wouldn’t get out and then you’d be at the wedding with no date and everyone knowing you tried to hire a fiancée for the week.”
“So you’re doing this for me?”
“And the ring,” she added, although it wasn’t true.
“Ah, yes. The ring that is soon to make all your dreams come true.” He glanced down at her empty finger. “Does this mean you’ll start wearing it again?”
With another exaggerated eye roll, she reached up and pulled a chain from under the top of her faded denim shirt. The diamond flashed in the sunlight as she held it against the pale skin peeking out where she’d left the shirt unbuttoned at the top. “Dina was freaking out that I didn’t have it on. She thinks it’s bad luck, so I had to do this.”
Seeing the ring he’d bought on the chain around her neck was like a kick to the gut. He had to remind himself that their arrangement was temporary. This woman had hurt him, betrayed him, and he’d made the choice to walk away. He didn’t want her in his life beyond the weekend of Jack’s wedding. It was a business transaction. Nothing more. He cleared his throat. “We’re engaged until the end of the month.”
“Yep.”
He nodded. “I’m also coming to dinner for our standing date night?”
“Sorry about that,” Jenny said with a grimace. “She caught me off guard.”
“Right. We’ve established that you have no poker face.”
“That’s not true.”
“Does this mean I get to amend the rules?”
Her eyes widened. “No,” she shouted, drawing the attention of several customers standing nearby. An older man waved her toward him, lifting a potted plant as if to ask her opinion.
“Jenny.” Owen gently wrapped his fingers around her wrist.
“Thanks for not ratting me out with Dina, but seriously, why are you here?”
“I was on my way home from the office—”
“On a Saturday?”
He inclined his head. “Anyway, I wanted to see . . .” He was about to say you, but that felt like too much to reveal, so he finished with “what the barn loo
ked like in the daylight with customers.”
“What do you think?” She stilled, her caramel-colored eyes wary as she met his gaze.
“What you’ve done here is amazing.”
Her lips parted, and he could almost see the wheels spinning in her brain, as if she’d taken his compliment and was dissecting it to figure out where to extract the underlying criticism.
“I’ve got to get back to work,” she said after a moment.
He let her go and she moved toward the customer, her features relaxing again as she spoke to the man.
Owen turned to go only to find Cooper standing behind him.
“Dina told me you were here,” the boy said. “She’s putting her son down for a nap.”
“It’s nice of you to help with them,” Owen answered. “You’re a good kid, Coop.”
Cooper shrugged but Owen could see the corners of his mouth turning up.
“The barn is crowded today,” Cooper said. “Mom asked me to refill the stock as people buy it. We’ve got another flat of tomatoes and peppers out in the greenhouse.”
“Want some company?” Owen asked. He’d planned to go back home and work more on a report he was supposed to review for his CFO. But the beautiful day and the rich scent of earth filling the air made him want to do something that would take his mind off everything going on with work.
Cooper flashed a full-on grin. “Yeah, you can help.” He led Owen out of the barn and around the side toward the small greenhouse on the edge of the property. “Are you trying to suck up to my mom?”
“Not exactly.” Owen nudged the kid. “Maybe I’m trying to suck up to you. Let’s go haul some plants.”
The smile Cooper gave him made Owen’s crappy morning fade to a distant memory.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“You hit the man-jackpot with that one.”
Jenny turned from setting the table to where Dina stood in front of the sink, staring out the window with a goofy smile on her face.
Don’t walk over there. You don’t care about the man in your backyard. It’s a game. It’s an act.
But even as she mentally repeated every excuse she could think up, she felt her feet moving her closer.
Dina turned off the water and made room for Jenny in front of the sink. Her breath caught as Owen ran by the patio carrying Dylan on his back. The boy laughed wildly while Cooper chased them, holding tight to Emma’s hand as he did. Jenny loved the flagstone patio with its old-fashioned planter boxes and view of the mountains far in the distance. She’d added a table and chairs with an oversize sun umbrella and spent as much time as she could out there in the evenings.
“I thought they were playing soccer,” Jenny muttered. “That looks like chase.”
“It looks like fun,” Dina said, her voice wistful. “Do you know the last time John played with our kids?” She rolled her eyes. “Never. My dad spent hours with us in the backyard. Kids need that.” She glanced at Jenny. “Did you have a fun dad?”
“I didn’t have a dad.” Jenny grabbed the sponge from the back of the sink and wiped at an invisible spot on the counter. “Cooper doesn’t either, and he’s turning out fine.”
“Now he has Owen. He’s great with the kids.”
“Yeah,” Jenny said. “Imagine that.” Her skin got the same hot, prickly sensation she’d had the night of the party where she’d set it up to look like she was cheating on him.
Owen Dalton was a man she could easily fall for, and she’d learned a painful lesson from the two men she’d been foolish enough to love—first her father and then Trent. If she made herself vulnerable and gave her heart to someone, she was certain to have it broken. Jenny had spent her whole life aching for the dad she never knew and a good portion of it bitter after being deserted by the callous teenager who’d walked away from her and her unborn son.
She would not make that mistake again. No matter how perfect Owen seemed, she couldn’t trust him. Or herself. Mostly herself.
The problem was her. She couldn’t be certain about her father, but Trent had gone on to marry and have a wife and kids. He simply hadn’t wanted her or their unborn child enough.
The boy who was the center of her world.
As she watched, Owen dropped to his knees in the grass at the edge of the patio. For a few seconds Emma rode him like a horse, then he pointed to a nearby bush. All of the kids gathered around him to peer at whatever was in the branches.
Like it was the most natural thing in the world, Owen sat back on the lawn, putting an arm around Emma and lifting Dylan to his lap. Cooper turned to the three of them, his expression animated.
A thick ball of emotion clogging her throat, Jenny walked to the oven and peered in. “I think your casserole is done. I’ll pour milk for the kids.”
“Oh. My. God.” Dina’s voice sounded dazed.
“What happened?” Jenny hurried back to the window and felt all the blood leave her head and rush south to the girly parts of her body, which were doing frenzied flips and cartwheels like some sort of overcaffeinated gymnastics team.
Cooper, Emma, and Dylan were taking turns drinking out of the hose. Owen, who had obviously just been sprayed by the kids, wiped off his face with the hem of his gray T-shirt.
The shirt was hiked up around his waist and . . .
“Holy crap, he has abs,” Jenny murmured.
Not just any abs. A six-pack, all rigid planes and rippling muscles with the sexiest damn happy trail she’d ever seen leading down into the waistband of his dark jeans.
He hadn’t been ripped like that before, had he? They’d taken things slow, but surely she would have noticed that kind of body. A little whimper escaped her lips. Five days in a house with that man. How would she survive?
Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Dina staring at her and turned. “He’s all mine,” she said quickly, hoping to cover the fact that—
“Why does it sound like you didn’t know he had those abs?” Dina asked.
Jenny scoffed. “I knew. Of course I knew. But he’s been working out more lately, and it seems like his body changes every time I see him.”
Dina stared, her brows scrunched together like she definitely wasn’t picking up what Jenny was laying down.
“It’s hard to find time for . . . you know . . . getting down to business with Cooper around.” She nodded when Dina’s features relaxed the tiniest bit. “I have to set a good example, and we’re not married yet.”
“You should go on a real date night,” Dina suggested, giving Jenny a tight hug. For someone who was a total mean girl, Dina certainly liked to break the barriers of Jenny’s personal space. Jenny tolerated her friend Chloe’s affectionate nature, but there was room for only one hugger in her life. “You’ve done so much for me; I’d be happy to watch Cooper.”
“He’s twelve,” Jenny answered, pulling away. “He doesn’t really need a babysitter.”
“Then you have no excuse.” Dina’s tone was firm. “Don’t get into a rut with Owen. That’s what got John and me in trouble.”
“John’s wandering penis got the two of you in trouble,” Jenny said.
Dina made a face as she grabbed two pot holders from the counter. “That, too. I’m going to pull out the casserole. Would you call everyone in for dinner?”
As soon as Jenny stepped onto the patio, Owen’s dark gaze found hers. A heat that was becoming quickly familiar spread through her as he flashed a boyish grin.
“I think dinner’s ready,” he said to the three kids. Cooper scooped up Dylan and took Emma’s hand, leading the way toward the house.
Owen turned off the spigot at the back of the house, then joined Jenny on the patio. “I don’t have to stay.”
“Are you kidding?” With the pad of her thumb, she wiped a drop of water off his cheek. “You worked your ass off the better part of the day and you’ve proven you could have a second career as a nanny. It will break Dina’s heart if you leave right now.”
Ever so slightly he leaned into her t
ouch. “Dina’s heart isn’t my concern.”
His body crowded hers, but she didn’t step back. This close, she could see the golden flecks around the edges of his brown eyes and feel the heat of his body. She wanted to reach out her hand, snake it up under the hem of his shirt, and flatten her palm against his hard belly. To press her nose into his neck and lose herself in the scent of him.
“I don’t know,” she said with a small laugh, trying to distract both of them. “After we break off our arrangement, she might be in line to become the real Mrs. Dalton.”
One side of his mouth curved. “You think there’s a line?”
“I have no doubt.”
“There’s no line.” He leaned in so close she could feel his breath on her skin. “And I’m going to kiss you now.”
Her eyes darted to the house, but Dina and the kids were nowhere in sight. She should have protested. It was definitely a violation of one of the rules.
But right now she needed Owen’s mouth on hers in the same way she needed to breathe. She licked her bottom lip with the tip of her tongue and heard him growl low in his throat. The next moment, he cupped her face in his palms and his mouth met hers, sending sensation swirling through her. Their bodies remained a few inches apart and he didn’t make a move to pull her closer. But the way he kissed her made her know he wanted more.
She wanted more. She wanted everything.
That thought had her breaking the contact, and she tried to force her heartbeat back to a normal rate.
“We should go in for dinner,” she said, clearing her throat so that it wouldn’t be so raspy.
“Dinner,” he agreed, and took her hand as they walked toward the house.
She was going to have to add no hand holding to the list of rules. For now, she simply enjoyed his touch.
They’d reestablish the rules tomorrow, when her brain was working again.
Almost two weeks later, Jenny sat in a coffee shop in the Highlands neighborhood northwest of downtown, her knee jiggling erratically under the table. It would be helpful to blame her nerves on too much caffeine, but she’d taken to drinking decaf. Her turbulent emotions didn’t need any more of a jolt. She and Owen were leaving for West Virginia in three days and she was terrified at how quickly she’d come to depend on him in her life.
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