White Pines Summer

by Sherryl Woods

  “I haven’t told him, but I can’t speak for any of the direct witnesses or participants,” Dani said. She glared at Jenny again. “If I were you, I’d fill him in before someone else does.”

  “That was my plan,” Jenny said. “I would have last night, but he was already in bed when I got home.”

  Dani regarded her worriedly. “Were you that late or did he go to bed much earlier than usual?”

  “It was early. Mom said he spent most of the day out riding. He was tired. He went to his room right after dinner.”

  “He was probably taking a last nostalgic look at the property this jerk intends to try to steal from him,” Dani said. “How could you, Jenny? How could you consort with the enemy?”

  “I’ve explained that. I’m not going to do it again. And for the record, I’m just as upset about Chance’s threats as anyone else. Don’t forget, a share of that property is going to be mine one day. My ancestors on my mother’s side were robbed of it or land very much like it generations ago by white men.”

  “Maybe if you signed over your share to Chance, it would satisfy him,” Dani suggested with an edge of bitterness. “Then Grandpa Harlan could stop worrying himself sick and Uncle Cody wouldn’t be afraid that the ranch he loves is going to get carved up like a Thanksgiving turkey to satisfy some old grudge.”

  “No,” Sharon Lynn said sharply, startling them both. “Jenny shouldn’t have to give up one single acre she’s entitled to. We all need to stick together on this. That’s what Grandpa Harlan wants. As for whether or not Jenny spends time with Chance, that’s up to her. Maybe it’ll be a good thing to have a spy in this man’s camp.”

  Jenny had had enough. First they called her a traitor. Now they wanted her to become a spy. The whole mess was rapidly getting out of hand. She slid off her stool and tossed a dollar on the counter to pay for her soda. “I am not in his camp. I am not spying. I am going home.”

  “Enjoy it while you can,” Dani said. “Unless, of course, you figure you’ve got an in with the prospective new owner.”

  “Dani!” Sharon Lynn protested.

  “Well, I can’t help it. I agree with you that we should all stick together and present a united front, so cozying up to Chance Adams over pizza strikes me as being pretty darned close to treason.”

  Jenny sighed. “You’re entitled to your opinion.” Dani’s judgment hurt her more than she’d expected. She forced a smile for Sharon Lynn. “Bye. Stop in on your way home if you have the time.”

  Sharon Lynn shot a worried look at Dani, but nodded. “I think I will.”

  Dani frowned at both of them. “Well, isn’t that just peachy. Doesn’t anybody but me see how ludicrous this budding romance is?”

  “There is no romance,” Jenny said impatiently. “None, zip. Nada.”

  Dani shook her head. “Try telling that to Grandpa Harlan and see how well it flies.”

  Jenny intended to do just that. Her father was the only person in the family to whom she owed any explanation at all. Somehow she would have to make him see that she hadn’t betrayed him last night and that she didn’t intend to in the future. Harlan would believe her. He was much more reasonable than Dani.

  Most of the time, Jenny thought with a sigh.

  If last night had been a disaster, tonight was already showing promise of being a full-scale calamity. And like it or not, thanks to her decision to take on the fourth grade this year, instead of sticking with eighth-grade history, she was smack-dab in the middle of it.

  6

  Jenny was so distracted when she walked out of Dolan’s she slammed right into what felt like a brick wall. The unexpected encounter rocked her back on her heels. Large callused hands clamped her arms to keep her upright. She promptly felt the sizzle of the contact right down to her toes.

  In fact, that sizzle was her first clue to the identity of the solid wall of muscle she’d run into. Only one man had ever made such a devastating impact on her senses with little more than a touch: Chance Adams.

  Her startled gaze flew up and clashed with his. He seemed amused. Come to think of it, he usually did around her, which was darned irritating. She had not been put on this earth to provide him with entertainment. Obviously Petey hadn’t reported in yet about being banished to the hall, or Chance’s mood wouldn’t be quite so lighthearted.

  “What are you doing here?” she demanded, taking her annoyance with Dani and Sharon Lynn out on him. It was his fault she’d fought with them in the first place. And the timing of his arrival today struck her as particularly suspicious. He probably intended to add to the impression that they were newly inseparable, thereby widening the rift between her and her family.

  “It’s a public sidewalk,” he said blandly.

  “And you just happened to be strolling by at this precise moment?”

  “It is possible, you know.”

  She shook her head. “No way. I don’t believe it.”

  “If you don’t believe in coincidence, what do you think I’m doing here?”

  “You came by intentionally because you knew I was going to be here with Dani and Sharon Lynn,” she accused. “Even though I specifically told you to stay away.”

  “Why would I want to do that?” he asked.

  A baby couldn’t have looked more innocent. Jenny wasn’t buying his act for a second.

  “To stir up trouble,” she said flatly.

  He gestured toward the drugstore. “Is that what happened in there? The three of you had a fight?”

  Still stinging from her nieces’ verbal assault, she admitted, “Actually it was primarily the two of us, me and Dani. Sharon Lynn pretty much tried to mediate, but it was a lost cause. Dani’s got her dander up. There’s no one on earth fiercer than an Adams who’s all riled up.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  The soft-spoken, sincere-sounding apology was the last thing she’d expected. She stared into his eyes and thought she recognized a genuine flash of sympathy.

  “Are you really?” she asked, unable to hide her skepticism. He was probably getting exactly the results he wanted: chaos in the Adams ranks.

  “Yes,” he replied emphatically. “Believe it or not, family is every bit as important to me as it is to you. After all, why would I waste my time coming here to settle an old score between my father and his brother if it wasn’t? I’d never seen White Pines. I’d never met your father. It wasn’t my grudge to start with. It was my father’s. He asked me to come here on his deathbed.”

  “You would never have come here on your own?” Jenny asked skeptically. “Are you sure about that?”

  “Nope. This was all my father’s idea.” His expression turned vaguely rueful. “As a matter of fact, he manipulated me into it. He pulled out all the stops, including filling Petey’s head with tales of his ancestors and the way both Petey and I had been cheated out of our heritage right along with him. Petey would never have forgiven me for not doing as his granddaddy asked.”

  Chance regarded her evenly. “It wasn’t until I got here that I turned it into my own battle. I suppose I’d always thought Daddy was exaggerating about what had been taken from him. Once I saw White Pines and heard about Harlan Adams and his power, I realized Daddy’s bitterness was justified.”

  Jenny could have enlightened him a bit on that point, but she figured that was her father’s story to tell if he ever chose to.

  “Okay,” she said, instead. “So you’re just a loyal son. That doesn’t mean you’re not also just a greedy bastard who saw an easy way to make a claim on some valuable land.”

  Chance’s expression darkened and his eyes glittered dangerously. “Maybe you ought to take a minute one of these days and look at this from my perspective.”

  It was a reasonable suggestion, but Jenny wasn’t feeling particularly reasonable. “Why would I want to do that?” she asked.

  “Because
my situation isn’t all that different from the one you were in when you first came to town.”

  The mild comment startled her. Jenny thought back to that tumultuous period of her life. She’d been an angry teenager, bent on getting into trouble and resentful of every adult, especially those who were rich and powerful like the Adamses. It was so long in the past, so wildly different from her attitude now, that she’d virtually forgotten that time in her life.

  She’d also thought it forgotten by everyone else in Los Piños. Her gaze narrowed. “What do you know about that?”

  Chance grinned and settled one hip against the fender of his truck. He hooked the heel of his boot on the bumper. No one on earth could have looked more at ease or more inclined to let her simmer for a bit and wonder who’d been filling his head with tales of her misadventures.

  Jenny wished she could convey the same sort of calm. She suspected her churning emotions were plain on her face. She’d never been able to hide what she was feeling. Not for more than a minute, anyway.

  When she’d first arrived in Los Piños at fourteen, everyone had known exactly how angry and bitter she was about her parents’ divorce, about the move from New York, about the sins she felt had been committed against her Native American ancestors. All that rage had taken the form of some very stupid actions. She really hoped Chance hadn’t heard all the sordid details.

  “Forget it,” she said finally, tiring of whatever game he was playing to torment her. “It doesn’t matter what you think you know.”

  “Oh, I know quite a bit,” he taunted. “Wilkie was feeling talkative when I got home last night.”

  “Really?” Jenny said, fighting to keep her tone neutral.

  “Yep. He told me about how you and your mama came here all worked up about righting old injustices to your Native American ancestors. He said you’d even told Harlan that his land had really belonged to your granddaddy and that, by rights, it should be yours.” He regarded her speculatively. “Was he telling the truth about all that?”

  “I suppose,” she muttered, seeing now why he’d drawn the comparison between the two of them.

  Chance grinned. “Thought so. Wilkie’s not prone to telling tall tales. So how did you and Harlan work it out? The way I have it figured, your mama took the easy way of assuring she got what she wanted. She married Harlan to make sure she got your ancestors’ land back, right?”

  “Of all the twisted, outrageous accusations,” Jenny sputtered. “How could you even think such a thing without ever having met her or having seen the two of them together? She married him because she loves him. She’s not getting one acre of his land.”

  “And you? What’s your stake in White Pines?”

  She hesitated for a moment, then admitted, “I’m entitled to the same share as Luke, Cody, Jordan and Lizzy—one-fifth of the land. I never even asked for that, by the way. It was Harlan’s idea. He drew up the papers and gave them to my mom on their wedding day. Cody’s the one who actually gets the ranching operation, though. We’ve all agreed he’s entitled to it after all the work he’s done over the years. His son, Harlan Patrick, will probably take it over after him, if he can stop chasing girls long enough to concentrate on learning the business side of things.”

  “I see.”

  Something in his tone alerted Jenny that she’d just blabbed an important piece of family business. Not that the division of White Pines was much of a secret. Everybody in town had probably guessed the terms of Harlan’s will, including the chatty Wilkie. Some were purely speculating. Others had probably wrangled insider information from one Adams or another. They all knew exactly how Harlan’s estate had been set up. He thought each of them had a right to know where they stood so there would be no wrangling among themselves after he was gone.

  That didn’t mean she had to confirm all the details for this man who was so intent on disrupting everyone’s lives. That was her problem—she was impulsive. She tended to open her mouth and say whatever was on her mind without thinking about the consequences. Add the fact that Chance could probably charm a spiteful old spinster out of her life’s savings, and she was bound to blab way too much sooner or later.

  “I have to be going,” she said, backing away. She didn’t like the fact that she had a hard time doing it. It was as if there were an invisible force pulling them toward each other. She actually had to consciously fight to escape it.

  “Scared of getting caught with me again?” he asked, amusement twinkling in his eyes as he glanced toward the drugstore.

  “I’m not scared of much,” she retorted.

  Despite her claim, she followed his gaze toward the window just the same to be sure that Dani and Sharon Lynn weren’t peering out. If they were, Jenny would never hear the end of it. They might not be able to make out the words being exchanged, but Chance’s presence alone would be enough to stir them up, especially Dani.

  Assured that the two women were still at the soda fountain, she added, “Most folks around here know I’m a risk taker.”

  “Really?” His tone was filled with disbelief. He trailed a finger down her cheek, his eyes fastened on hers. “What kind of risks are you in the habit of taking, Jenny?”

  She felt the heat climbing into her face. A quick little shiver danced down her spine. She prayed Chance wasn’t aware of either, but the quirk of his lips suggested otherwise. He knew he affected her. He knew he scared her more than the prospect of tripping over a rattler in the desert.

  “Have dinner with me again,” he suggested softly, still caressing her cheek. “Just the two of us. Two grown-ups with an attraction that needs exploring.”

  “I don’t think so,” Jenny said, exasperated at being barely able to get the words past the yearning clogging her throat.

  “Must be scared, after all,” Chance said.

  “I am not scared,” Jenny insisted. “It just doesn’t make sense for you and me to spend a whole lot of time together. It’s asking for trouble.”

  “Why? Because you’re afraid you’ll stop fighting me one of these days and we’ll wind up in bed?”

  “Absolutely not,” she replied at once, probably with a little too much vehemence. “Why would I be afraid of something that I would never in a million years allow to happen?”

  Chance grinned. “A simple no would have been sufficient.”

  “I doubt it,” she said defensively. “The word doesn’t seem to register with you. Maybe you haven’t heard it enough.”

  “I understand the concept,” he said dryly. “I can also tell the difference between conviction and desperation. You, sweet thing, sounded just a trifle desperate.”

  Jenny stared at him in disbelief. “What on earth would I have to be desperate about?”

  “Oh, I think you’re downright panicky that you won’t be able to persuade me to back off, and that one of these days you’ll just give in to what you’re feeling.”

  “That is absolutely ridiculous,” she declared, despite the fact that he was right on the money. She didn’t like the wickedly sensual feelings that came over her when he so much as grazed her cheek with his finger, much less the heart-stopping breathlessness stirred up by his kiss. She couldn’t control them and she really liked being in control of herself and her destiny. Always had, ever since she’d been uprooted from New York all those years ago without any say in the matter.

  “We’ll see,” he said, his voice low and husky.

  “We will not see. I am not changing my mind.”

  “I’ll give you a few days to think it over,” he said, clearly pleased with himself for the magnanimous gesture.

  Exasperated, Jenny poked a finger into the middle of his chest. “Save your breath. Ask anyone around town just how stubborn an Adams can be.”

  He laughed at that. “Darlin’, that’s just the point. You might have the name. You might have latched on to the habit of being contrary.
But I’m the one with Adams blood running through my veins. When it comes to stubborn, I’d say you’ve met your match.”

  He was still chuckling when Jenny whirled away and took off as if a herd of cattle was stampeding down the road behind her.

  * * *

  Jenny broke every speed limit between Los Piños and the gates at White Pines, cussing a blue streak the entire way. Chance Adams figured at the center of that blue streak. Low-down sneaky scoundrel was one of the milder labels she pinned on him.

  The truth was, he had shaken her. In fact, she couldn’t recall the last time any man had shaken her so badly. She had stood on the sidewalk in front of Dolan’s caught in the grip of emotions so powerful and so conflicting it had taken her the entire trip home to sort them out.

  More than once she had wanted to slug the man, to land a shot to that handsome square jaw that would prove to him once and for all she was not a woman to be messed with.

  Then, an equal number of times, she had felt very much like throwing herself into his arms and kissing him again. Only the nearby presence of Dani and Sharon Lynn, not good judgment, had kept her from acting on the almost irresistible desire to discover if his kisses were consistently bone melting, or if the one she’d experienced had been a once-in-a-lifetime aberration.

  How was it possible for a man to stir such contradictory reactions, especially in the space of a few heartbeats? How was it possible she could feel anything but contempt for a man who threatened the happiness of her family? Was she simply edging toward middle-aged desperation, after all? Was she subconsciously feeling the ticking of her biological clock? Or was it specifically Chance who had the ability to turn her inside out?

  Not that for one single instant the thought of marriage had entered her head, she told herself staunchly. Chance didn’t make her think about marriage or babies or growing old together. He made her think about sex. Big difference. Huge difference. She sighed. Intolerable difference.

  She bounded up the front steps and stormed through the front door, slamming it behind her with enough force to rattle it on its hinges.