“Tell me you don’t still feel it.”

“Feel what?” Jenna asked, ignoring the way his gaze kept drifting to her lips.

Jake hauled her against him. “This.”

The next thing Jenna knew, Jake had wrapped his arms around her back and lowered his lips to hers. His kiss was hot, sure and so sensual it took her breath away. Despite herself, she had missed this, missed him and the special…and yes, powerful way he made her feel.

Jenna knew if they didn’t stop soon they would end up in one of the beds upstairs. And while that was all she had wanted when they had been together before, she also knew this was no way, and no place, to lose her virginity….

Dear Reader,

It’s another wonderful month at Mills & Boon American Romance, the line dedicated to bringing you stories of heart, home and happiness! Just look what we have in store for you….

Author extraordinaire Cathy Gillen Thacker continues her fabulous series THE LOCKHARTS OF TEXAS with The Bride Said, “Finally!” Cathy will have more Lockhart books out in February and April 2001, as well as a special McCabe family saga in March 2001.

You’ve been wanting more books in the TOTS FOR TEXANS series, and author Judy Christenberry has delivered! The $10,000,000 Texas Wedding is the not-to-be-missed continuation of these beloved stories set in Cactus, Texas. You just know there’s plenty of romance afoot when a bachelor will lose his huge inheritance should he fail to marry the woman he once let get away.

Rounding out the month are two fabulous stories by two authors making their Mills & Boon American Romance debut. Neesa Hart brings us the humorous Who Gets To Marry Max? and Victoria Chancellor will wow you with The Bachelor Project.

Wishing you happy reading!

Melissa Jeglinski

Associate Senior Editor

The Bride Said, ‘Finally!’

Cathy Gillen Thacker

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

CATHY GILLEN THACKER is a full-time wife/mother/author who began typing stories for her own amusement during “nap time” when her children were toddlers. Twenty years and more than fifty published novels later, Cathy is almost as well-known for her witty romantic comedies and warm family stories as she is for her ability to get grass stains and red clay out of almost anything, her triple-layer brownies and her knack for knowing what her three grown and nearly grown children are up to almost before they do! Her books have made numerous appearances on bestseller lists and are now published in seventeen languages and thirty-five countries around the world.

Books by Cathy Gillen Thacker

MILLS & BOON AMERICAN ROMANCE

102—HEART’S JOURNEY

134—REACH FOR THE STARS

143—A FAMILY TO CHERISH

156—HEAVEN SHARED

166—THE DEVLIN DARE

187—ROGUE’S BARGAIN

233—GUARDIAN ANGEL

247—FAMILY AFFAIR

262—NATURAL TOUCH

277—PERFECT MATCH

307—ONE MAN’S FOLLY

318—LIFETIME GUARANTEE

334—MEANT TO BE

367—IT’S ONLY TEMPORARY

388—FATHER OF THE BRIDE

407—AN UNEXPECTED FAMILY

423—TANGLED WEB

445—HOME FREE

452—ANYTHING’S POSSIBLE

456—THE COWBOY’S MISTRESS

472—HONEYMOON FOR HIRE

483—BEGUILED AGAIN

494—FIANCÉ FOR SALE

506—KIDNAPPING NICK

521—BABY ON THE DOORSTEP‡

526—DADDY TO THE RESCUE‡

529—TOO MANY MOMS‡

540—JENNY AND THE FORTUNE HUNTER

556—LOVE POTION #5

568—MISS CHARLOTTE SURRENDERS

587—A SHOTGUN WEDDING

607—DADDY CHRISTMAS

613—MATCHMAKING BABY

625—THE COWBOY’S BRIDE††

629—THE RANCH STUD††

633—THE MAVERICK MARRIAGE††

673—ONE HOT COWBOY

697—SPUR-OF-THE-MOMENT MARRIAGE††

713—SNOWBOUND BRIDE*

717—HOT CHOCOLATE HONEYMOON*

721—SNOW BABY*

747—MAKE ROOM FOR BABY

754—BABY’S FIRST CHRISTMAS

789—DR. COWBOY**

793—WILDCAT COWBOY**

797—A COWBOY’S WOMAN**

801—A COWBOY KIND OF DADDY**

837—THE BRIDE SAID, “I DID?”†

841—THE BRIDE SAID, “FINALLY!”†

Dear Reader,

The fictional town of Laramie, Texas, exemplifies everything I know and love about the state. The people are warm and friendly and helpful as can be, their desires bold, their dreams big. It’s a place where opportunity is limitless and people are encouraged to live and enjoy life to the fullest.

So much so that I knew when I started writing the books about John and Lilah McCabe and their four sons that I'd also write another series set in Laramie. But this one would be about a family of four sisters who, like the McCabes, find the love that has eluded them in Laramie.

Look for the first two books about the Lockharts in August and September 2000. The third and fourth books will be published in February and March 2001.

In the midst of all this, I am also writing a bigger, more in-depth story about Sam McCabe, John and Lilah McCabe’s nephew. A widower with five lively boys, he returns to Laramie when his life soars out of control. TEXAS VOWS: A MCCABE FAMILY SAGA, will be published in March 2001.

I hope you enjoy them all as much as I enjoyed writing them.

Happy reading!

Cathy Gillen Thacker

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter One

“I need a favor. And I need it from you,” the low, distinctively male voice drawled.

As the velvety sound surrounded her, tingles of awareness slid down Jenna Lockhart’s spine. She knew that rich, familiar murmur. Unless she was hallucinating…The blood rushed hot through her veins. She turned slowly toward the door, telling herself all the while she had to be imagining it. That the romantic notion was prompted by the equally shocking elopement of her sister, Dani, and Beau Chamberlain several weeks before. Just because Dani had found the man of her dreams and married him, just because wedding fever was sweeping the town of Laramie, Texas, did not mean that the man of Jenna’s dreams would waltz back into her life on a moment’s notice. Did it?

Drawing a deep breath, Jenna lifted her eyes, curious to see who had entered her exclusive boutique just seconds before she closed for the day. And promptly felt her knees turn to jelly. Well over six years had passed since she had seen the man who had broken her heart all to pieces, but Jake Remington hadn’t changed a bit. Except, perhaps, to become even more handsome and self-assured. He was a good six inches taller than her five-foot-nine-inch frame, with a penchant for casual clothes, and an even more casual manner that belied his enormous wealth and good fortune.

“What are you doing here?” Jenna demanded.

Looking completely at ease with himself in the ultrafeminine surroundings, he circled around the one-of-a-kind wedding and evening dresses on display. Once at her side, he tipped back his black Stetson, revealing layers of thick jet-black hair. As he scanned her from head to toe, reluctant pleasure tugged at the corners of his lips. “I wanted to congratulate you on your success.” Jake lifted his glance back to her eyes. “Your clothing designs have been in the news all month. Dani created quite a stir when she wore one of your dresses to the premiere of Beau Chamberlain’s new movie. Reportedly, every starlet in Hollywood now wants one of your originals.”

That was true. Due to her growing success, Jenna was booked solid with appointments. She was taking the time between now and then to prepare for the onslaught. And perhaps look at hiring someone besides Raelynn to help her in the shop. But not wanting to disclose all that to Jake, Jenna merely shrugged and returned his steady glance, albeit with a lot less admiration. “You’ve done very well for yourself. I hear J&R Industries is a multimillion-dollar conglomerate.”

Jake pushed back the edges of his black sport coat, and placed his hands on his waist. His sexy grin widened. “You’ve kept up.”

Jenna turned away, trying hard not to notice how taut and trim his midriff was beneath his olive-green shirt and snug black jeans. “Hard not to, if you read the business pages of all the major Texas newspapers—and I do.”

Following her around the shop, Jake said, “I would have called for an appointment, but I didn’t think you’d see me.”

Struggling not to recall how good it had felt to be held against that warm, strong chest, Jenna refused to look at him as she shut down her computer for the night. “You were right.” She remembered without wanting to how much he had hurt her, abandoning her the way he had. “I wouldn’t have.”

Jake looked at her steadily, serious now. “What happened between us was a long time ago.”

Funny, Jenna thought. It seemed like just yesterday to her. Though in reality it had been six years, eight months, ten days and…nineteen hours. But who was counting?

She smiled thinly. “What’s your point?”

Jake’s expression was suddenly as vulnerable as it was grave. “I want us to be friends again.”

Jenna didn’t want to think of Jake as vulnerable, because if she did it meant he had a heart, and that was definitely not true. Jenna locked her cash register. “Not possible.”

He leaned across the sales counter. “How will you know unless you try?” he asked.

Every muscle in her body went stiff with tension. “I’m not interested in trying, Jake,” she told him flatly, ignoring the unsettling way her senses stirred at his close proximity.

Jake regarded her with so much smug male assurance it took her breath away. “Same old stubbornness and fiery temperament.”

“Same old arrogance and conceit,” she shot back, refusing to be distracted by the enticing, woodsy scent of his skin.

Instead of being insulted, Jake merely grinned, and looked all the more entranced. “Jenna, I have a proposition for you.”

As Jenna recalled, what he’d said was that he needed a favor from her. In her opinion, those were two very different things. “I’ll just bet you do,” she replied. Grabbing a clear plastic garment bag, she slipped it over a wedding dress on the overhead rack.

“I need you to make a complete wardrobe.”

Jenna knelt and gently folded the edges of the beaded satin gown into the bag. “I don’t design men’s clothing.” And even if she did, she wouldn’t design anything for him!

Jake also knelt to help, holding the bottom of the bag straight. “It’s for the lady in my life.”

Resisting the urge to deck him, Jenna zipped the garment bag closed. “Now I’m really not interested.”

Jake stood, and hand beneath her elbow, gallantly helped Jenna to her feet. “I’ll do anything you want.”

Still tingling from his brief, but sure touch, Jenna carried the gown back to the storeroom. Wishing her heart would stop pounding and resume its normal beat, she carefully hung the gown on the rack. “I’m still not interested, Jake.” To her dismay, Jake showed no signs of leaving despite her less-than-gracious hints.

He moved back to let her pass and continued speaking as if she had already agreed to accommodate him. “The thing is, it’s a rush job.”

Her exasperation mounting by leaps and bounds, Jenna strode back out into the carpeted showroom. She went to the desk behind the sales counter and reached for her Rolodex. “I’ll give you some names and send you on your way.”

“I don’t want anyone else. I want you.”

“Too bad,” Jenna replied, forcing herself to remember how much he had hurt her instead of how very well he kissed, “because you’re never going to have me.” Ever again.

Jake quirked a brow. Desire, pure and simple, was in his eyes. “Don’t make promises you may not be able to keep.”

Her temper flaring, Jenna poked a finger at his chest. “And don’t you presume to know what is in my heart or on my mind.”

Outside, a red sport utility vehicle with tinted windows pulled up to the curb and parked just ahead of Jake’s charcoal gray truck and Jenna’s sporty white convertible.

Obviously perturbed by the interruption, Jake glanced at his watch and frowned. “She’s early.”

Like that matters! Jenna thought, incensed.

Unable to believe his audacity, never mind his lack of consideration for her feelings, Jenna turned to Jake furiously. “You are so out of here,” she said just as the driver alighted from the truck. To Jenna’s amazement, it wasn’t some glamorous young babe Jake was dating, but a plump, pleasant-looking woman in her mid to late fifties, wearing jeans, boots and blue denim work shirt. She had a straw cowgirl hat pulled over wild salt-and-pepper curls and a red bandana tied around her neck. She walked to the rear door on the passenger side. Realizing this woman was only the chauffeur, Jenna began to frown again.

Jake moved between Jenna and the window, adeptly blocking her view. He tugged her behind a three-mannequin display of evening wear in the boutique window. Meanwhile, though the chauffeur had opened the passenger door and was holding it wide, no one was getting out.

“Look, I’m begging you,” Jake said urgently. He clamped both his hands on Jenna’s shoulders and held her there in front of him when she would have bolted. “Alex’s been through a really rough time. When she saw your designs on TV she fell in love with them. I promised her I’d get you to design her some dresses, just for her. Exactly what she wants. Down to the very last detail.”

Finding his request more unbelievable than ever, Jenna snapped at him, “So break the promise. That’s certainly not anything you’ve hesitated to do before.”

Reminded of the heartless way he had betrayed her in the past, he showed a moment’s regret. Then, recovering, he went on matter-of-factly. “It’s not that simple, Jenna.”

Jenna scoffed again. “It is to me. Besides, I have confidence in you,” she continued sweetly, favoring him with a long, withering look. “You’ll think of something, Jake. You always have.”

The driver turned to Jake and lifted her hands in exasperation. Jake nodded his understanding signaling the driver to wait.

“I’ll double your usual fee,” Jake said urgently, fastening his attention on Jenna once again.

Jenna shook her head, thinking, This man really needs to have his head examined. “No!”

“Triple.”

Jenna rolled her eyes. “You must really be desperate.”

Jake muttered, lifting one hand from her shoulder and, rubbing the back of his neck. “You have no idea how much.”

Jenna wasn’t sure whether to tell Jake what she really thought of him, or just pity him. “Find some other ex-girlfriend to torture,” she said in a low, bored tone.

Jake dropped his other hand, stepped back. Where he had gripped her shoulders, Jenna continued to tingle warmly. Too warmly.

“There is no one else,” he said, dispirited.

Looking into his mesmerizing silver-gray eyes, still feeling the awareness that shimmered through her at his touch, Jenna could almost—almost—believe that. Which only proved that once a fool, always a fool, she reprimanded herself. “No one else who knows how to operate a sewing machine, you mean,” she replied archly.

Without warning, the limo driver snapped to attention once again. Sensing something was about to happen, Jake and Jenna both looked in the direction of the car. Seconds later, Jake’s “lady” vaulted out, clutching what looked to be a squirming bullfrog in both hands. She was muddy, unkempt, with a baseball hat planted backwards on her head, covering a mop of long and tangled strawberry blond hair that obviously hadn’t seen a brush all day. Olive-green overalls and a dingy T-shirt, several sizes too big, hung from her slender figure. She wore pink-rimmed sunglasses, high-topped basketball sneakers. A backpack in the form of a monkey was slung over one shoulder. Relief and amusement—and irritation at Jake for not having explained further—flowed through Jenna in equal quantities, making her want to deck him all over again.

“This is the lady in your life?” Jenna asked, guessing the little girl’s age to be about five or six.

“The one and only,” Jake smiled as the little scamp marched toward him. Jake turned to Jenna, sexy mischief in his eyes. “What did you think I meant?”

Too late, Jenna realized it had been a test, to see if she still had feelings for him, and she had failed. Hardening her heart against any further involvement with him, she said, “I don’t design children’s clothing, either.”

Outside, the chauffeur waved cheerfully at Jenna, gestured to Jake she’d be back in a minute, then took off down the street after she ushered the child toward the shop.

“I was hoping you’d make an exception for Alexandra, here,” Jake continued as the child sidled up to him for a one-armed hug.

“That’s okay, Daddy.” Alexandra leaned against Jake’s side, her head resting against his waist. “I didn’t want any dresses anyway. And stop calling me Alexandra. You know I only wanta be called Alex.” Carefully transferring the frog to one hand, she grabbed onto the sleeve of Jake’s casual black blazer with the other and tugged fiercely. “Let’s go, Daddy.”

His eyes still on Jenna, Jake shook his head. “Not yet, honey. I’ve got business to do.”

The pout that formed on Alexandra’s pretty face was immediate—and potent. “You’ve been doing business all day,” she grumbled as the frog leapt from her hand and hopped across the floor of the shop. “I want to go to the ranch house now,” she repeated stubbornly. Racing after her frog, she called over her shoulder, “It’s brand-new. Daddy built it just for us, so I’d have somewhere I could play outside, and have horsies and dogs and cats and stuff. Only I don’t have none yet.”

Jenna looked at Jake, too surprised by his revelations to be concerned with the amphibian escapee. “I didn’t think your family was summering here anymore.” They had stopped at the time of Jake and Jenna’s failed elopement.

“My folks don’t, although they keep the ranch for an investment and loan out the house to friends from time to time.”

“Then why would you build a place here, if you no longer have family vacationing in the area?”

Jake shrugged. “I loved coming to Laramie when I was a kid.” He shot a glance at Alex, who had throw off her monkey backpack and pink sunglasses and was hopping around after her frog, well out of earshot. “I figured Alex would love it, too.”

Jenna smiled, unable to resist a dig after the way his family’s snobbish attitudes had hurt her. “Are you sure that’s wise? Laramie is a great place. Friendly. Warm. Caring. Intimate. But on the social register—well, we really can’t compare with your native Dallas now, can we?” She looked at him steadily, daring him to claim otherwise.

Jake stared back, regarding her with the same steady intensity. “I never thought you’d be a snob.”

“Me?”

“Okay, reverse snob,” Jake amended.

Before they could continue their discussion, Alex’s chauffeur stepped into the shop. Jake turned to the older woman, affection etched on his face. It was, Jenna noted curiously, a feeling that was returned. “Jenna,” Jake said warmly, “this is Clara, our housekeeper, the lady who keeps us all sane. Clara, I’d like you to meet Jenna Lockhart, the lady I’ve been telling you and Alex about.”

“I heard you two knew each other as kids,” Clara said.

Jenna nodded. “We used to see each other every summer. But that ended a long time ago. We haven’t seen each other since.”

Jake gave Jenna a look that said: “And it’s a loss to us both.”

Jenna gave Jake a look that said: “Speak for yourself.”

Alex popped up from behind the sales counter. She waved the bullfrog in the air. “Hey, everybody, I got him!”

“Well, nice meeting you all, but as you can see I’m closing my shop for the day.”

“Goody! Did you hear that, Mr. Froggie? We get to go to the ranch!” With a wave at Jenna, Alex darted back out the door.

“Nice meetin’ you!” Clara said, waving as she headed out the door after Alex.

Jake frowned at his daughter, who was already climbing back in the truck. “This probably isn’t a good time for us to talk,” he conceded with a frown.

Jenna breathed a sigh of relief. “I’m glad you finally realize that.”

“We need to go to dinner together,” Jake said firmly.

Jenna’s eyes widened. Determined not to put herself in an emotionally vulnerable position with him again, she scoffed derisively. “In your dreams!”

Jake’s eyes darkened with legendary confidence. “I’ll be by to get you around eight o’clock,” he promised as she stalked away from him.

Jenna concentrated on putting the Closed sign on the front door. Then opened it and held it wide for him. “Don’t hold your breath,” she muttered sweetly as she waved him toward the exit.

But clearly, Jake was counting on getting his way. As always. “Wear something casual,” Jake advised as he sauntered toward the door. “I want you to be comfortable.” He gave her a smile that reached his eyes. “We have a lot to talk about.”

“THE NERVE of that man!” Meg Lockhart fumed short minutes later at the emergency meeting of all four Lockhart sisters. Having come straight from work, she was still in her nurse’s uniform.

“I’ll say!” Kelsey agreed with a snort of disgust as they all gathered around the dining table in Jenna’s apartment above her Main Street boutique. Kelsey put down the stack of catalogs of ranch gear she’d brought in with her, pushed back her cowgirl hat and pulled up a chair.

“To come around after all these years, acting as if nothing much at all had happened!” The happily married Dani shook her head in a reproach too deep for words. A movie critic by profession, she liked drama and excitement as much as anyone, but this was too much—even for her!

Dani leaned toward Jenna urgently. “I mean, I know how much you loved him once, Jenna. But for him to think—after all this time, no less!—that you would still be carrying a torch for him…How foolish is that?”

Pretty foolish, Jenna thought, aware it was uncomfortably close to the truth. As much as she hated to admit it, no man had ever come close, before or since, to engendering the passionate emotions in her that Jake Remington, captain of J&R Industries, did.

All four sisters sipped iced tea with lemon, their heads bent together thoughtfully.

“Actually, I think the smartest thing would be for you to go on that date,” Meg decided after a moment as she took the pins out of her long auburn hair and shook it out.

Everyone turned to Meg—the oldest and most responsible of them all—in shock. Meg regarded them determinedly but saved her advice, which came straight from the heart, for Jenna. “You need to prove to him once and for all that you are so over him it isn’t funny,” Meg told Jenna sternly. “Let him wine and dine you and even pull out all the stops if that’s what he wants to do. Just play along with nary a word of protest and let him go for it. And then—” Meg paused and raised a cautioning hand “—when he’s expended his full bag of rich-boy tricks, let him know straight out there’s no going back to the way things were when you were teenagers. Let him know it’s over, once and for all.”

More discussion followed. By the time her sisters left to take care of their own dinnertime commitments, consensus had been reached. Meg’s plan was the one Jenna was going to follow. So Jenna dressed in the prettiest, sexiest sundress she owned, for the express purpose of making Jake Remington eat his heart out and realize what he gave up when he dropped her like a stone after their failed elopement.

PROMPTLY AT NINE o’clock, Jake bounded from his truck and took the exterior steps leading up to Jenna’s apartment above the shop two at a time. He rang the bell, wondering all the while if she was even going to be in. Part of him wouldn’t blame her if she did stand him up this time.

A second later the door swung open. He took her in and immediately had the exact same thought he’d had earlier in the day. Damned if she wasn’t the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. And damned if she wasn’t the only woman who could make his heart turn cartwheels in his chest. Especially in that body-hugging off-the-shoulder white sundress that made the most of her high perfect breasts, slender waist and trim but oh-so-curvaceous hips. High-heeled white sandals and a hem considerably shorter than the one she’d had on earlier made the most of her sexy showgirl legs.

And her wish to drive him mad with desire had not ended there.

She’d taken down her thick red-gold hair and let it fall around her shoulders in tousled sexy layers that teased her shoulders and framed her delicate, oval face. She’d scented her soft ivory skin with perfume, the same kind she had worn when they were young and in love. Her clear blue eyes were bright with challenge and an I-dare-you-to-try-anything-cowboy sass. Jake had always been the kind of guy who loved a challenge. And nothing more than the challenge Jenna Lockhart presented. He just regretted it had taken him so long to get back to her. But since he had, and since she was still so clearly ticked off, maybe it was best he slow down a tad, take it nice and easy. And to that end, he waggled his eyebrows at her and teased, “You going out with me or someone else?”

Jenna propped her hands on her slender hips. She still looked like she’d like nothing more than to take a swing at him. “What do you think?” She plucked her purse and keys off the entryway table and, her head held high, strode past him.

Jake held the door for her, followed her out and waited while she locked up. “I think if anyone else shows up, intending to squire you around, he’s going to have to do battle with me first.”

Jenna pinned him with a debilitating glare. “I figured we should just get this over with,” she said dryly.

Jake grinned at her fiesty tone, liking the warm flush of color that had come into her high, elegant cheeks. “Such enthusiasm,” he drawled.

“What did you expect?” Jenna watched her step as she headed down the stairs. “Me to jump up and do a cheer the moment you waltz back into my life?”

Jake grinned at the thought of Jenna in the short pleated skirt and sleeveless sailor top that had comprised the Laramie High School cheerleading uniform when Jenna was in school. “You used to be pretty great at that,” he said, recalling how good she had looked in burnt orange and white. “In fact, I loved seeing you cheer at the few games I was able to get to.” Jake opened the door, and gave Jenna an unasked-for hand up into his truck.

Her delicate brow arched as he climbed behind the wheel and started the engine. “What do your parents think of you asking me to create a wardrobe for their granddaughter?”

Jake frowned as he shifted into Drive, turned onto Main Street and headed out of town. He had known they would have to talk about all the things that had separated them before; he hadn’t expected to do so this soon. “I don’t have to ask my parents for permission anymore, Jenna,” he replied quietly, slanting her a glance.

Jenna’s clear blue eyes radiated both hurt and unhappiness. “Meaning they don’t know,” she guessed, just as quietly.

Jake’s shoulders tensed and he had the urge to rip off the tie he had put on just for her. “Meaning I don’t care if they do or don’t know. Meaning I am a man with my own life now. Just like you’re a woman with your own life.” He speared her with a look, wanting to be clear about that much.

Jenna cut him off, her voice unexpectedly devoid of joy. “Speaking of your life, where’s Alex?”

Jake relaxed as they passed the last of the traffic lights and headed out into the Texas countryside toward their destination. He smiled as he thought about his daughter, and Jenna’s interest in her. “Alex’s back at the ranch.” Jake turned down the air conditioner. “She’s supposed to be in bed. But I imagine she’s talked Clara into letting her stay up late and they’re playing potato-chip poker and chomping on cigars about now.”

Jenna quirked a brow. Jake grinned. “Alex’s, of course, will be made of bubble gum.”

“What about your wife?”

Jake could tell by the way Jenna looked at him, the fact she was even here with him, that she—along with everyone in Laramie and half the people in the state of Texas—had heard about his divorce from Melinda Carrington the year after Alex was born. Melinda had wanted—and won—a large chunk of Jake’s trust fund from his parents. He had considered it a small price to pay for his freedom and custody of his beloved only daughter. “Melinda is in Europe, getting over the end of yet another romance, this one was with an Italian count. She’s upset because she really wants to get married again, to someone who can give her the kind of ultraglamorous life I never did. Apparently, the allure of single life has worn thin.” Jake understood that. He was tired of being alone, too. Tired of regretting the way his romance with Jenna had ended. The way both of them had been hurt.

“I’ve seen her pictures on the society pages of the Dallas papers. She’s very beautiful.”

“On the outside,” Jake confirmed.

“And well-bred,” Jenna continued in a way that let him know she was determined to lay all their cards on the table. “Your parents must have approved of her.”

And still did, unfortunately despite everything. But he didn’t want to get into that now, and certainly not with Jenna on what was supposed to be their night. Jake slowed the truck as he approached the turnoff, some fifteen miles outside of Laramie. The native limestone country inn was set back from the highway in a grove of live oaks. It was softly lit from within. The grounds were landscaped and very private. Glad to see the owners had followed his instructions to a T and cleared everyone else out, including the staff, before they arrived, Jake parked in front and cut the motor. “I hope you don’t mind. I selected the place.”

“Obviously not in Laramie,” Jenna added, her accusatory look reminding him of all the times they had seen each other on the sly when they were teens. Too late, Jake realized how it seemed to Jenna. She was wrong if she thought he was ashamed to be seen with her. Quite the contrary. “I wanted something more private, so we could talk without interruption,” Jake explained. “So I rented the inn for the evening.”

“You mean the dining room?” Jenna ascertained.

Jake shook his head, “The entire inn.”

Shock widened Jenna’s eyes, then turned them an icy blue. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope.”

Once again, to Jake’s dismay, Jenna obviously suspected his intentions were not at all chivalrous or forthright. “You really are pulling out all the stops,” she said, clearly displeased.

Jake got out of the truck, his hopes of a lovely intimate dinner with the only woman he had ever loved fading fast. He knew he’d made mistakes in the past where Jenna was concerned. Whether she was ready to admit it or not, she had done the same by him. Nevertheless, he was getting tired of defending himself, and having her look at him as if all he were trying to do here was take her to bed. He circled around to open her door. “I have money. I’m not afraid to put it to good use. Getting you on my side—and Alex’s—is very good use.”

Reluctantly, Jenna allowed Jake to escort her up the front steps and across the porch. “Speaking of Alex, you really should be home with her this evening.”

“Funny.” Jake held the door and guided her through the wide front hall to the beautiful dining room to their left. The long table for sixteen had been pushed against the wall. It was covered with a linen tablecloth and a variety of silver chafing dishes. A smaller table had been placed in front of the huge stone hearth, and was beautifully set for two. In deference to the summer heat outside, and the air-conditioning inside, there was no fire. Instead, a dozen lit candles were artistically arranged in the grate. Vases of freesia and baby’s breath—Jenna’s favorite—abounded. Soft music from their youth filled the room.

“And yet,” Jenna continued, looking at Jake as if he were anything but a good guy to have around, “you’re here with me.”

Jake uncovered their salads and poured the wine. “In order to get you to help out Alex and me.”

Jenna accepted the wine with a nod. “Texas is full of designers.” She kept her eyes on his as Jake sat down opposite her.

“But only one of you,” Jake countered, trying to imagine what it would be like to have Jenna back in his life again, not as the grief-stricken teen she had been when they parted, but the strong, self-assured woman she had become.

“Why me?” Jenna whispered, suddenly looking as torturously unhappy as he had felt all these years without her. “Why now?”

Jake wasn’t about to apologize for doing what should have been done years ago. “Because I haven’t been able to stop thinking of you.” Because all this time I thought I had hurt you enough and I was doing you a favor by staying away. And then I saw you on TV and realized I would never love anyone the way I loved you.

For a moment, Jake thought Jenna felt the same way, but the feeling faded, and the sweetly nostalgic look in her clear blue eyes faded and turned to ice once again. “That’s a shame,” Jenna said crisply. “There’s nothing worse than wasting energy or time. Which is exactly what this is.” She started to rise.

Jake caught her wrist and pulled her back down into her seat. He wanted nothing more at that moment than to haul her into his lap and kiss her soundly. But—for Alex’s sake, for the sake of them—he kept his mind strictly on the business at hand. The business that would have Jenna and him spending time together and getting to know each other again. “You haven’t heard my proposition,” he pointed out calmly, releasing her only when he was sure she wouldn’t try to flee.

Not looking at him, Jenna speared a piece of lettuce with her fork, lifted it to her lips. “I don’t want to hear your proposition.”

“Sure now?” Jake taunted as he too dug into his crisp, delicious salad. “It could do wonders for your design business.”

Jenna paused. So it was true, Jake noted, with equal parts satisfaction and disapproval. Her design business did mean everything to her.

“I’m listening,” she said eventually.

Jake reached into the inside pocket of his blazer and pulled out a neatly drawn-up business agreement. “I’m offering to provide the financial backing via J&R Industries to make and distribute a clothing line bearing your name.”

Jenna put down her fork and studied the paperwork for an extraordinarily long time. “And the catch is…?” Jenna said eventually.

Jake polished off his salad and took a sip of wine. “Alexandra needs a wardrobe.”

Jenna narrowed her eyes at him and observed with a faint note of disapproval in her voice, “Why, when she seems to have one she is perfectly happy with?”

Jake shook his head, cutting Jenna off. “She needs to look like a little lady,” he said firmly. “The sooner, the better.”

Jenna arched a delicate brow and went back to eating her salad. “Says who and why?”

Famished, Jake broke open a roll and lavishly spread it with butter. Reluctantly, he imparted, “Melinda is concerned about Alex’s tomboyish phase. She thinks it proves I’m not capable of rearing Alex on my own.”

Jenna paused, her fork halfway to her lips. “But you have custody, don’t you?”

Jake took another sip of wine. “Sole custody since she was two, yes.”

Jenna’s brow furrowed. Finished with her salad, she also reached for the bread. “Isn’t that unusual?”

Jake shook his head. “Not when the mother doesn’t want custody. And Melinda didn’t. All she wanted in the settlement was money. Which, as you and everyone else in the Lone Star State knows, she got.”

“I’m sorry,” Jenna said. “For Alex. I know how tough it is to lose a mom when there’s no helping it. To have that happen when it doesn’t have to be that way, well, it’s got to be tough.”

Jake sighed and got up to retrieve the main course, blackened redfish, scalloped potatoes with jack cheese and French beans. “When Alex was younger, she didn’t seem to mind the fact that her mother lived in Europe and rarely jetted over to see her.” Jake filled the plates and brought them over, one at a time. He sat down opposite Jenna and dug in. “The truth is, even when we were still married, when Alex was a baby, Melinda never paid much attention to her. So when Melinda moved out—well, Alex couldn’t miss what she’d never had. I wasn’t about to leave her home alone. And though my parents would have taken her, that wasn’t an option, either. I didn’t want Alex adopting some of their snobbish attitudes. So she traveled with me on business. Everywhere I went, Alex went—with Clara usually coming along and doubling as driver and nanny, depending on what I needed at that moment.”

Jenna regarded Jake with the inherent kindness that was so much a part of her personality. “And Alex was happy with the arrangement?”

“Very.” Jake exhaled. “But when she went to school this past fall and all the other kids in her kindergarten class had moms fussing over them and picking out their clothes, it hit her hard. And suddenly, she just started refusing to wear dresses—not that she’d ever really liked them. But at least when I needed her to brush her hair and wear a dress so I could take her to some fancy restaurant, I could get her to do so.”

“But no more?” Jenna guessed, as the CD player switched from a Trisha Yearwood album to one of Garth Brooks’s.

“No more. I guess Alex figured if she couldn’t be like everyone else and have a mom and a dad living at home with her, she’d just be different. And that was when Alex went full-bore into this tomboy stage. I thought it was a phase and just didn’t push it. But now Melinda has heard about Alex’s increasingly disheveled appearance from mutual friends. She’s embarrassed, upset. Thinks it reflects poorly on her. Next thing I know she’s threatening to sue for custody and planning to leave Italy—where she’s been living the past couple of years—for good.”

Jenna looked at him quizzically. “You don’t want Melinda to come back to the States?”

Jake sighed, knowing it sounded lousy of him, but also knowing if he was going to drag Jenna into the middle of this mess, he owed her the plain, unvarnished truth. “If I thought it would do Alex some good,” Jake hedged. “If I thought Melinda would be any kind of loving mother, or positive influence in Alex’s life, I’d be lobbying for it in a red-hot minute.”

Jenna’s eyes softened compassionately. “But you don’t think that’d be the case.”

Jake sighed. “Bottom line, Melinda doesn’t have a maternal bone in her entire body. She cares about money and appearances and finding another husband whose only goal in life is to make her happy, and that’s it.”

“So in coming to me you’re trying to head Melinda off at the pass.”

Jake nodded, more sure than ever now—from Jenna’s sympathetic reaction to his dilemma—that he had been right to come to her. “Unfortunately, clothes aren’t all she needs.” Jake looked at Jenna seriously. “Alex needs a crash course in being a lady before her mom gets back.”

Jenna made a face, no longer quite as eager to help out or get involved. She went back to polishing off her redfish. “Can’t you get your mother to help with that?”

Jake shook his head, knowing that as much as he loved his mother, and he did, that she was long on lecturing and interfering and short on patience. “My mother is not the one for the job,” he said firmly. “You are.”

Jenna looked at him as though he had lost his mind. Finished with her entrée, she got up to see what else was on the side table. Jake stood up, too.

“Think of it this way,” he said as Jenna helped herself to very small slivers of chocolate cake, praline cheesecake and warm peach-and-blueberry cobbler. “You’d be doing something for me I desperately need.” Jake settled on just the chocolate cake. “I’d be doing something for you that you desperately need. We’d be helping each other.”

They returned to the table in silence. Jenna shook her head in silent censure, even as she enjoyed her dessert. “After the way you treated me—” she said, as if unable to believe his gall.

Tired of taking all the heat for what had happened between them, Jake angled a thumb at his chest. “Hey! I’m not the one who got cold feet and refused to elope at the last minute!” In fact, he still felt if Jenna had just gone off with him then, they would be married today.

Jenna rolled her eyes as she got herself a cup of coffee. “We were caught, suitcases in hand, by your parents!”

Jake discounted that with a shrug. “We still could have gotten away,” he said levelly, pouring his own cup of coffee. “What would they have done? Chased after us?” He mocked her with a lift of his brow. “I don’t think so. That’s way too undignified for my folks.”

As for the rest of the complications, they had thought about everything. Jenna was underage, but she was also just a couple of weeks away from her birthday. As long as she went willingly with Jake, and they didn’t cross any state lines, and waited until Jenna was legally of age to actually consummate the marriage, then they wouldn’t be breaking any laws. Of course, if they married without the permission of her guardian their marriage would have been technically invalid. But they had that covered, too, deciding if they just waited until after Jenna’s birthday to return to Laramie that no one would kick up a fuss about what was more or less a “done deal” for nearly three weeks. They recognized that his family’s lawyers could easily take care of any legalities, even if it meant another quickie ceremony.

Jenna sighed. “Okay, so maybe there wouldn’t have been a car chase or some big scene at the justice of the peace, even if your parents had managed to figure out exactly where we were going as well as physically head us off before we got there.” She waved a lecturing finger beneath his nose. “But your folks still would have tried to convince you to have our marriage annulled when we returned and my big sister probably would have done the same thing.”

“So what?” Jake argued right back. “If we had already been married, a baby potentially on the way, my parents and Meg both would have backed off, if only to avoid an even bigger scandal than just us running off and getting married.” He knew Meg. She cared about Jenna and wanted her to be happy. And he knew his folks. No way would they want any grandchild of theirs born out of wedlock, or Jake taking advantage of a young innocent girl. In fact, it was their training on that fact that had kept Jake from ever making love to Jenna in their younger days. Even at the very end, when she’d been willing, he had insisted on waiting until they were actually married. And, truth to tell, as much as he still wanted to make love to her, he still didn’t lament that fact. He was glad he had treated Jenna with respect, glad they had waited until they were old enough and or the time was right. The truth was, as much as they had wanted to be married then, they hadn’t been ready for it.

“Your parents didn’t approve of me, Jake. Not from day one. They didn’t even want us being friends.” She looked at him steadily, all the hurt she had felt, then and now, in her clear blue eyes. “Over the long haul, a marriage between us never would have worked and you know it.”

Jake reached across the table and covered Jenna’s hand with his own. “All I know is that we let our relationship go,” he confessed huskily, “and I’ve spent every day since regretting it.” He didn’t want to spend the rest of his life the same way, and if he were right in his assessment of her feelings, Jenna didn’t, either.

Jenna jerked her hand from his. She pushed away from the table angrily and vaulted to her feet. “If that were true, you would have come after me then. You would have called, tried to see me. Something. Anything—”

Remembering how miserable they both had been, Jake pushed to his feet, too. “I wanted to,” he said roughly, going after her.

“Then why didn’t you?” Jenna squared off with him, tears glistening in her eyes.

Jake clasped her shoulders. “Because I couldn’t,” he told her with a weariness that came straight from his soul. “Not without destroying your life. And that of your sisters.”

Chapter Two

Jenna stared at Jake in raging disbelief. What did he think he had done in abandoning her, if not ruin her life?

“My parents said if I pursued you in any way, they’d use our reckless elopement as proof that Meg was not a proper guardian for you and your younger sisters. They said that in even asking you to marry me, as young as you were, given what had just happened to your folks, that I was taking advantage of you in the worst way. You and I might view the situation romantically, but it was quite possible Meg and the police would view the situation as my parents did—as simply running away. They reminded me that if the authorities stepped in to help locate you that you could have been deemed a juvenile delinquent just for attempting to marry without your guardian’s permission. And that I could be put in jail for contributing to the delinquency of a minor, whether Meg agreed with the court’s decision or not. They said if I wasn’t strong enough or mature enough to walk away while you and your sisters put your lives back together that they would do ‘the right thing’ for me. They promised to do everything in their power to see the courts removed Meg as your guardian, split you and your sisters up and put the youngest two—Dani and Kelsey—in foster care.”

Jake shoved a hand through the tousled layers of his inky-black hair. “You would, of course, have been legally free after your eighteenth birthday to do what you wanted. But for Dani, who was sixteen-and-a-half at the time, and Kelsey, who was fifteen, it would have been devastating.” Jake paused, his eyes filled with a mixture of regret for all the time they’d lost and compassion for what they’d been through. “I couldn’t do that to you. There was no doubt in my mind my parents would follow through on their threat. They really thought they were doing the best thing for you and your sisters. And knowing how devastated you all were by the sudden loss of your parents, I began to think maybe my folks were right, that I was wrong to take your youth from you like that, that you deserved the same chance to go to college and be a normal teenager that I’d already had.” Jake shrugged, pain sharpening the handsome lines of his face. “So I walked away from you, and didn’t look back.”

Doing her best to absorb all he had told her, Jenna felt for a chair and sat down. Jake slid a chair over and sat down in front of her, so they were sitting knee to knee. “You should have told me what was going on,” Jenna said, trembling.

Jake leaned forward and took both her hands in his. “How would that have helped you?” he asked softly. “To be told you needed to choose between being with me and the continued welfare of your sisters? Do you think that would have made you feel better to be put in a situation like that, after all you’d already been through?”

Jenna sighed. Of course it wouldn’t have. If he’d told her, made her choose, it would have torn her apart, and caused even more stress and heartache for her and her sisters.

Jake shook his head, recalling. He searched her eyes as he continued filling her in. “I wanted to fight my parents—you don’t know how much—but at the same time I had to be realistic about the odds of success. I was only twenty-two. I had not yet inherited the trust fund from my grandparents. I didn’t have the means or influence at that point in my life to help keep you and your sisters together on my own. Plus, you know the age thing, the fact I was four years older, finished with college, and you were still in high school had always been an issue. It’s not much of an age difference now, of course, but back then…well there’s a big difference between being in high school and being in college.” Jake sighed and ran a hand through his hair, “As mature as you were, there were times when I did feel I was pushing you to grow up too fast, so the two of us could be together the way we felt we were meant to be. So I felt guilty for ever asking you to elope with me. I felt like I’d been really unfair to you.”

Jenna saw the regret shimmering in his eyes and knew this was true. “I knew you were incredibly vulnerable, that you weren’t in any state of mind to even be thinking about taking such a monumental step. But at the same time I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t know how to help you then, how to make it better, except by loving you.”

“Which you did,” Jenna said softly, recalling how good and warm and safe he’d made her feel in the first dark days after her parents had died. Jake had been there, holding her when she cried, attending the funeral with her, helping her take it one day, one moment at a time. Even now, she didn’t know how she would have made it through those first dark days if he hadn’t been there.

Jake swallowed hard. His hands tightened over hers. “But when we were caught, suitcases in hand, and when I saw your doubt, when you called it quits before we’d even gotten all the way out of Laramie, and said you had changed your mind, you didn’t want to elope with me, I knew you probably did need to be with your sisters more than me. That you needed the chance to grow up, free of any serious entanglements or pressures from anyone else—the chance I’d already had.”

Jenna recalled the euphoria she’d felt as she packed a bag, sneaked out of her house and met up with Jake in the Laramie High School parking lot, well after midnight. Then the humiliation and dismay when she realized his parents had followed him to the secret rendezvous. She only had to look at Patricia and Danforth Remington’s faces as they stepped from their Mercedes to know they were dead-set against her marriage to their only son. “Of course I had second thoughts,” Jenna defended herself hotly. It had been natural to back out of the elopement at that point. Withdrawing her hands from Jake’s grasp, she pushed back her chair, got up and began to pace. “I’d just lost my parents. I wasn’t going to willfully separate you from yours, which was what a hasty marriage to you would have done. So yes, of course I called it off.”

Jenna swallowed around the growing knot of emotion in her throat. “When you said you’d call me as soon as you could, I believed you, Jake.” She hated to think how many hours she had sat by the phone, just waiting for it to ring. How many nights she had gone to sleep with it in bed beside her. “I didn’t expect you to walk away from me forever,” Jenna murmured as she went to the window and turned her back on Jake. She’d thought—hoped—they’d continue to see each other and wait a few years. Hoped with time his parents would come to know her and realize how much she and Jake loved each other and change their minds, even endorse the marriage. She shook her head as she stared out at the dark Texas night. “I thought you’d come back for me as soon as you got things straightened out with your parents,” she confessed in a low, choked voice. “I thought we’d figure things out together.” Arms folded in front of her, she whirled around to face Jake. “Instead, I never heard from you again—not one word, not ever, until today!”

Jake grimaced and stood. “I thought I was doing what was best for you and your sisters in walking away. I thought I was being selfless and gallant. If it helps to know—I’ve regretted it ever since.”

Jenna glared at him, her heart thudding in her chest. “Not enough, apparently, to stop you from getting married to Melinda that same summer,” she shot back.

Jake stepped closer. “It was a mistake, a rebound thing. Although,” he amended with a frown, “I didn’t know it at the time.”

Jenna, who’d eventually had her own rebound fling, equally disastrous, understood that. But just because she understood it didn’t mean she was willing to trust him again. Now or ever. “It still doesn’t answer my question, Jake.” Hands on her hips, she regarded him contentiously. “Why did you come to me for help with Alex? Why now?” Why hadn’t he left well enough alone? Yes, she was hurt, but it was a hurt she had recovered from. This new hurt was something else indeed.

Jake blew out a weary breath. He looked deep into her eyes and said firmly, “Because I want us to be friends again.”

“Friends.” Jenna studied him carefully, knowing with the two of them it had never been platonic. “Or more than friends?” she asked bluntly.

Half of Jake’s mouth slanted up in a slow, sexy smile. “You choose.”

Jenna lifted her brow and, her eyes holding his all the while, challenged dryly, “You sure don’t ask for much, do you?” Even if, in his dark blue sport coat, casual khaki slacks, light blue shirt and tie, he was as sexy as ever in that distinctly blue-blooded Texan way.

Jake closed the distance between them and clasped her hands between the two of his. “Tell me you don’t want the same thing and I’ll go away,” he whispered, his warm callused palms caressing the backs of her hands. “But if you do—if you have it in your heart to repair our relationship and at the same time help me with my little girl—” Again, that slow sexy smile that always turned her knees to water. “I’ll owe you, for a long, long time.”

WASN’T THIS what she had wanted? For him to come crawling back to her on his hands and knees? Okay, six plus years had passed, but he was still back. Eligible—handsome as ever. And he was offering to make all her business dreams come true, to boot. So what was wrong with this picture? Why, despite everything, did his incredibly presumptuous proposition look and sound so good to her? Why was she suddenly so willing to forgive him for taking her heart and stomping it to pieces? It wasn’t like she was still in love with him—or would ever love him again.

Jenna looked him square in the eye, determined to let him know where they stood before things progressed any further. “I’m not going to sleep with you.”

Jake merely grinned at her, as if to say: I wouldn’t make bets on that if I were you. Shrugging, he held her gaze and retorted dryly, “I didn’t expect you would. It may surprise you to know that making love with me is not usually part of my business deals.”

“Let me guess. But in our case, you’d be willing to make an exception.”

His deliciously mischievous grin broadened all the more. Jake rubbed his jaw thoughtfully, allowing finally in a deep, sexy murmur that sent shivers coasting up and down her spine, “We never did have that wedding night.”

Jenna flushed despite herself as she reminded him, “We never had the wedding, Jake.”

“Then, sure.” Jake spoke as if now were a different matter entirely.

“We won’t now, either,” Jenna continued flatly. Figuring this had gone on long enough—much more of it and she’d be fantasizing about his return to her life in a romantic sense, too—Jenna pushed past him. Wishing all the while, as she glared at him, that he didn’t have the power to rile her so. She didn’t need this kind of all-encompassing emotion in her life. She didn’t need him. And if she had her way, and she planned to, she never would again, either.

Looking as relaxed as she was upset, Jake paused to drop an envelope on the table, then swaggered after her as she turned to head for the door. She was nearly there when he clamped a hand on her bare shoulder. Ignoring her resistance, he gently guided her around to face him. Looking down into her face with an intensity that took her breath away, he taunted softly, “You’re telling me you don’t still feel it?”

Jenna swallowed hard and forced her knees to stop trembling. Darn it all, why had she worn such a sexy dress, anyway? She could have worn something casual that wasn’t the least bit provocative. She could have worn something not designed to make him eat his heart out for all he’d given up. “Feel what?” she asked instead, ignoring the way his gaze kept drifting to her lips and the exposed swell of her breasts.

Jake hauled her against him. “This.”

The next thing Jenna knew Jake had wrapped his arms around her back and lowered his lips to hers. His kiss was hot and so sensual it took her breath away. Furious, Jenna made a muffled sound of protest. But then she was surrendering to the emotions swirling through her at breakneck speed, threading her hands through his hair and kissing him back with every fiber of her being. Loving the taste and feel and scent of him, so dark and male and sexy. Loving the way he had always kissed her, as if he didn’t care how many roadblocks she threw in their way, as if he meant to possess her, heart and soul. Damn, but she had missed this, missed him and the special…and yes, powerful way he made her feel. Jake deepened the kiss even more and stroked his tongue intimately with hers, as if she were the only woman in the whole world for him.

JAKE HADN’T MEANT to kiss her while they were at the inn, maybe not at all that night. He’d wanted to take things nice and slow this time. Show her how much he still cared about her, and always would, before asking anything remotely intimate or physical in return. But when she looked at him like that, as if she were just daring him to love her, he never had been able to resist, even if his hot-blooded pursuit of her was likely to incense her. He wanted to feel the softness of her body cuddled against his. He wanted to taste the honeyed sweetness of her lips, feel the sensual twining of her tongue as it wrapped around his, inhale her sexy perfume, and thread his fingers through the thick red-gold waves of her hair. He wanted her to tell him—by the passionate nature of their embrace—how she felt about him. Even if she wouldn’t admit it out loud.

JENNA KNEW if they didn’t stop soon they would end up in one of the beds upstairs. That was exactly what she had wanted when they had been together before—the ultimate culmination of their love in the most physically intimate union a man and woman could enter into. But she also knew this was no way, and no place, to lose her virginity.

Furious that Jake had managed to evade all her carefully erected defenses—again—Jenna splayed both her hands across his chest, tore her lips from his, and pushed him away.

Stumbling backwards, Jenna glared at him. “You haven’t changed one bit,” she sputtered angrily. Darned if he hadn’t turned her whole world upside down, and with just one measly, heart-stopping kiss!

Jake grinned and rubbed his jaw. He looked like one thoroughly satisfied male, pleased as punch that it had taken her a good five minutes to summon up the will to make him stop. “The kiss was that good, huh?” he teased.

Even better, Jenna thought wistfully, not above admitting—to herself, anyway—that she had the same physical desires and needs, not to mention emotional yearnings, as every other woman in Texas. But she couldn’t let her desire for Jake sway her. So what if the two of them together had passion unlike anything she had ever felt before or since? So what if he alone had the power to make her tingle from head to toe and want him with every fiber of her being just by being in the same room with her? Physical desire still did not equate happiness. Jenna looked him up and down disparagingly. Seeing the depth of his desire, she returned her gaze to his face. “You still think everything and anything is there for the taking. You only have to want it badly enough for it to happen.”

The happiness in Jake’s eyes faded. It was replaced by irritation. “Everything and anything is there for our taking,” he shot right back. “And don’t give me that woe-is-me look, either, honey. ’Cause you have done your fair share of setting your sights on something—like being the premiere new clothing designer—and making it happen.” Jake regarded her steadily, then finished with velvet determination, “So there is no reason on earth you can’t do the same thing in regards to your personal life. You just have to want it.”

Guilt assailed her anew. “Well, I don’t want it!” Jenna jerked away from him, angry that he was making her want more than what she had, what she couldn’t—and never would—have: a satisfying love life with him.

He sized her up, skeptical of her self-serving fib. “Could have fooled me.”

JAKE DROVE her back to Laramie in silence. Jenna slammed out of his truck and stormed up to her apartment above the shop. To her dismay, he didn’t even attempt to follow, just made sure she was inside safely and then drove off. Not loudly, with a screech of tires, as he might have after one of their quarrels in his impetuous youth, but calmly and quietly.

Tears streaming down her face, Jenna locked the door behind her, muttering invective about his character all the while. Then, really letting her temper fly, she slammed her purse against the wall, and for good measure, kicked off her shoes, too.

Without warning, Kelsey’s head rose over the back of the sofa, nearly scaring her to death. Jenna gasped and slammed a hand against her chest. She had forgotten Kelsey was bunking here with her until she and her partner, Brady Anderson, could move out to the old Lockhart ranch. That wouldn’t be possible until the contractor they’d hired had finished sanding and varnishing all the floors and cabinets and installing new electrical wiring and plumbing. Meanwhile, the two had plenty to do, staking out pastures and putting up fences that would divide their property into separate cattle and horse operations, one half of the ranch being his, the other half hers. It was quite an undertaking for two people, who—up until a month or so ago—had been strangers, and all the Lockharts, save Kelsey of course, were feeling a little nervous about it. They just hoped their baby sister knew what she was doing. Which was more than Jenna could say for herself, given the thoroughly unrestrained way she had just kissed Jake Remington, behaving as if the two of them had never been apart!

Kelsey studied Jenna’s face. “The date was that good, huh?”

Jenna scowled at Kelsey. “The man is absolutely impossible! Not to mention arrogant, assuming and antagonizing.”

Kelsey nodded with exaggerated indignation. “And those are just the As.”

Jenna gave Kelsey a warning look. She was in no mood for jokes. “I mean it.” Feeling like she was burning up all over, Jenna lifted her skirt, peeled off her pantyhose, then padded barefoot to the refrigerator. “I’d hoped otherwise, but that Jake Remington hasn’t changed one bit.”

Kelsey followed Jenna to the kitchen and accepted a cold beer. “Neither have you, apparently.”

Jenna paused, her hand curled around the bottle cap in mid-twist. “What’s that supposed to mean?” She set the long-necked brown bottle on the counter and finished opening it with a sharp twist.

“Come on, Jenna.” Kelsey grinned as she opened her beer and took a long thirsty drink more suitable for a rough-and-tumble cowboy than the fine Texas lady she’d been reared to be. “This is your baby sister you’re talking to here.” She waggled her eyebrows at Jenna. “The one who used to sneak into your room at night and hear all about your clandestine dates with Jake. All those summers you two sneaked around to see each other, so his parents wouldn’t find out he was smitten with a poor local girl instead of one of the rich debs from Dallas they wanted him to marry.”

Jenna went to the pantry and brought out a bag of blue corn tortilla chips and an unopened jar of salsa. “He did marry one of them. He married Melinda Carrington.”

Kelsey shrugged and leaned against the counter, her Texas Rangers baseball-style pajamas molding her slender frame. She watched as Jenna poured chips and salsa into serving dishes and carried them back into the living room. “Yeah, and from what I heard Jake divorced her, too.”

“Your point, being…?” Jenna asked, as the two settled back onto the sofa.

“That,” Kelsey spelled out gently, “it’s pretty clear you never stopped loving him. And he probably hasn’t stopped loving you, either. Or else he wouldn’t be here.”

“The only reason he is here is because he thinks he can make money off my clothing designs. Lots of it. And, as a matter of fact, I do, too,” Jenna confided as she rubbed her tense shoulders with her hands. “I’ve known that for a long time. All I’ve needed was the money—and the backing—to expand.”

Kelsey loaded a chip with salsa. “I hate to burst your bubble, sis, but Jake could make money off dozens of other businesses in Texas, if that’s all he’s after.”

Unfortunately, Jenna knew that was true, too. She sighed and took another sip of beer. “He also wants me to help turn his little girl, Alexandra, into a lady and get her outfitted in some pretty dresses.”

“There are hundreds upon hundreds of children’s clothing shops in this state. Why come to you for that, when you don’t even design children’s clothing?”

“Because Alex is hard to please,” Jenna answered, remembering without wanting to how cute and lively Jake’s little girl had been, even if she had been out of control.

Kelsey shrugged and reached for another chip. “People who specialize in selling to the super-rich are well versed in ‘difficult,’ Jenna. Probably even more so when it comes to their spoiled-rotten kids.”

Irritated at having her theories shot down one by one, Jenna frowned at her baby sister, and continued trying to convince them both that Jake’s actions were not due to any long lost love for her, as he claimed. “There is no where else in Laramie to go for lah-de-dah clothing. He just built a ranch here. He and his daughter are living here now.”

Kelsey made a dissenting face. “He could still drive to Dallas.”

“His ex-wife will be here in two days.”

Kelsey rolled her eyes. “It’s a two-hour drive there, even less to San Antonio from here. So don’t give me that. He could easily go there to buy dresses for Alexandra if he wanted to.”

Jenna sighed.

“Face it, sis.” Kelsey leaned forward earnestly. “Jake Remington is here for one reason and one reason only. He wants you back in his life. Probably as his wife. Which is why he’s trying so hard to get you and his daughter together. Before he can make a real move on you, he’s got to make sure the two of you can get along.”

Kelsey had never stayed any guy’s girlfriend for long—she was way too fickle for that—but she was very good at analyzing what was going on between a man and a woman. Too good sometimes, Jenna thought, as her baby sister’s words hit close to home. “That door is closed,” she retorted stubbornly, refusing to let herself hope, even for one second, that her sister might be right about Jake’s intentions.

“I see.” Kelsey grinned and peered at her in a parody of Dr. Ruth. “And iss that vhat you told him vhen he kissed you?”

Jenna’s jaw dropped open. Her hand flew to her mouth. “How did you—?”

“Please.” Kelsey rolled her eyes, her exasperation with her older sister mounting. “With the two of you alone on some romantic excursion! With Jake in hot pursuit? Don’t forget, I used to hear about those kisses.” Kelsey clasped her hands to her chest and pretended to be overcome with an intense longing of her very own. “Just hearing about them was enough to make me swoon.”

Deciding it was high time she got in her nightclothes, too, Jenna vaulted to her feet and headed for her bedroom, Kelsey right behind her. Jenna was still flushing self-consciously as she took off her earrings and dropped them onto her vanity. “I was young then. Impressionable.” She lifted her hands to her neck and began struggling with the clasp of her necklace.

Kelsey gave her a knowing look as she stepped behind her to lend a hand. “And now you’re old enough to do all the things you used to only dream about,” she teased, releasing the clasp.

It was Jenna’s turn to roll her eyes. She dropped her necklace beside her earrings and turned. There was really no way to tell how experienced Kelsey was—she acted like she had done everything there was to be done and then some—but Jenna had a feeling that was all an act, meant to intimidate the guys and keep them at bay. Jenna shook her head. “You’re incorrigible.”

Kelsey acknowledged this with a mischievous grin. Then her smile faded as abruptly as it had appeared. She looked at Jenna steadily, her eyes brimming with concern, then said softly, “And you’re dreaming if you think a man like Jake is just going to go away.”

Jenna steeled herself against the hurt she was sure would come if she didn’t shield her heart. Jake had devastated her before. It had taken her years to recover. She didn’t care what he said, she was not going to let him do it again. She folded her arms in front of her stubbornly as she slipped out of her dress. “I don’t care what he wants! He’s not going to get it this time.” Jenna stomped over to her closet and hung up her dress. “I’ll do business with him. I’ll outfit his daughter, but that’s it.”

JENNA WAS HALF HOPING Jake would send his daughter over to her shop with someone else to order a few dresses, but of course that didn’t happen. The next morning, his charcoal-gray truck pulled up in front of her shop and parked at the curb, followed by the red sport utility vehicle with Clara at the wheel. Jake and Alexandra stepped out of the truck, Clara stepped out of the S.U.V. Clara waved and headed off down the sidewalk on some other errand. A few seconds later, Jake held the door for his daughter and Alexandra Remington stomped in with all the petulance an almost-six-year-old could muster. While Jake put his briefcase down next to the sales counter and took off his black Stetson, Alex planted her hands on her hips and glared at Jenna as if she were the enemy. “I figure I might as well tell ya straight out,” she said, in a cute imitation of her take-charge daddy. Her scowl deepened, as did the fire in her blue-gray eyes. “I don’t want ta be here.” Her lower lip shot out stubbornly. “I’d rather be home looking for a new frog—Daddy made me let Mr. Frog go last night, so if I want to play with one I’m gonna hafta find another one, and maybe a snake, too, this time.”

Jenna’s eyes widened with distaste at the mention of reptiles, as Jake frowned and looked down at his daughter. “Alex. No snakes,” he said firmly. “I mean it. Snakes can be poisonous. And so can some frogs, for that matter.”

Alex sighed loudly. Tilting her head to one side, she sized up her daddy and decided, against all odds, to try again. She put her hands out to her sides and balanced herself on one foot. “You could always buy me one that’s not poisonous,” she suggested hopefully.

“No.” Jake’s mouth was set, his attention only on his daughter.

“Why not?” Alex challenged, her chin shooting out pugnaciously once again.

“Because I don’t like snakes,” Jake explained.

Neither did Jenna. In fact, she shuddered just thinking about them.

“You might if you had one,” Alex countered optimistically.

Jake’s expression remained firm and unyielding. “Well, we’ll never know, because we’re never getting one. And I explained to you why we had to let Mr. Frog go—he is a wild frog and wild frogs belong in nature. Mr. Frog would have died if we had kept him in captivity too long.”

“What other kind of pets do you have?” Jenna asked, guiding Alex over to her long, cozy sofa.

Alex sighed and looked all the more dejected and disappointed. “I don’t got any.”

Jenna shot Jake a look. Given Alex’s obvious love of animals, this was a surprise. “We just moved from a high-rise in Dallas,” Jake explained. “The building did not allow pets. I’ve been hoping to rectify that, now that we’ve moved to the ranch. I just haven’t had time.”

“Ah.” Jenna got out her sketch pad and seated herself on the sofa next to Alex. That sounded better. To her, not necessarily to Alex. Jenna began to sketch a simple, princess-style dress with a pinafore. Ignoring Jake entirely, she smiled down at Alex. “What kind of pet would you like to have, if you had your choice?”

Alex pushed the brim of her cowgirl hat out of her eyes and rested her chin on her hand. She crossed her blue-jeans-covered legs. “Maybe a zebra or a bear cub.”

“I think kittens and puppies make better pets,” Jenna said.

“How come?” Alex asked.

Jenna smiled. “Because they’re soft and fluffy and fun to cuddle and they’re meant to be indoors.”

“Maybe I’ll get a kitten then,” Alex said after a thoughtful pause. “Or a puppy. Maybe both.” Her eyes lit up enthusiastically as she drew a yo-yo from one pocket and a cap gun from the other.

“That might be possible, if you cooperate and start wearing dresses again, when I ask you to wear a dress,” Jake said.

Alex slid off the sofa and fired her cap gun at the ceiling. Loud pops and acrid smoke permeated the air. “Maybe you should get me a kitty and a puppy first and then I’ll see if I feel like wearing a dress,” Alex countered.

Jake confiscated the cap gun and shook his head. “Behave first.”

Alex shook her head. The stare down between parent and child continued. “I don’t hafta wear dresses at school,” Alex said finally, when she realized her daddy wasn’t any more likely to give in than she was.

“No, you don’t,” Jake said calmly. “But you could wear a dress if you wanted to wear one. And what’s more you’d look very pretty if you did.” He gave her a gentle, coaxing smile.

Alex made a face and with a loud sigh flounced back over to sit beside Jenna. “I don’t want to look pretty.” She leaned over to see how Jenna’s sketch was progressing.

“How do you want to look?” Jenna asked as her pencil flew across the page.

“So right now.”

“You can look ‘so right now’ in a dress,” Jake said enthusiastically.

Alex glared at Jake.

“Can’t you, Jenna?” Jake said, looking to Jenna for moral support.

Jenna shrugged and refused to take sides. “Depends on the dress,” she said. Pausing, she looked at Alex, who had gone back to playing with her yo-yo. “What’s your favorite color crayon?” Jenna asked.

That, Alex had to think about. “Red,” she said.

“What else?” Jenna prodded, making a few notes to herself on the side of her page.

“Blue.”

“Dark blue or light blue?”

“Both.”

“What about green?”

“It’s okay,” Alex replied seriously, “but I like blue and red better.”

“Okay. What grade are you going to be in next year?”

“First. I went to kindergarten last year.”

“Did you learn about letters and numbers?”

Alex nodded vigorously. “I can sing the alphabet song.” She paused to demonstrate. “And I can count to twenty!” She demonstrated again.

“All right! Way to go!” Jenna enthused, and won a shy smile from Alex that made her smile in turn. “Did you draw pictures?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

Jenna finished the sketch and then filled it in with Alex’s favorite colors. “What was your favorite thing to draw?” she asked.

Alex furrowed her brow. “Kitties and puppies. And one time I drawed a kite and a big tree with lotsa leaves.”

Jenna nodded. Clearly, she and Alex were on the same page now. “I want to show you something in the storeroom.” Indicating Alex and Jake should follow, Jenna rose and went to the back of the store, where there were bolts of fabric. She pulled down three different shades of blue. “Which of these do you like best?” she asked Alex. “The dark blue, the medium blue or the light blue?”

Alex touched each of the three bolts of fabric. “I like the one that looks like blue jeans.”

“Ah yes, indigo. Okay. Now…what about these reds? Scarlet, fire-engine or rose?”

“Fire-engine.”

“Good choice.” Jenna went back out to the showroom. She sat down, picked up her sketch pad and colored pencils and added the hues Alex had just selected. “Well, what do you think?”

Alex looked down at the short blue-denim jumper and fire-engine-red blouse. The jumper was adorned with kittens and puppies and letters of the alphabet, and paired with red cowgirl boots and a saucy blue cowgirl hat. “Now, granted, this is a dress, but it’s not your average dress,” Jenna said. “’Cause the jumper—the blue part here—is going to be made out of blue denim and looks more like overalls, except of course it’s not. And I’ve got you wearing boots instead of black patentleather shoes. Do you think you could wear something like this?”

For a second, Jenna thought Alex was going to shout a resounding yes or a Texas-sized Yee-ha! But her delight faded as soon as it appeared, replaced by a pout as big as the Lone Star State. “No. No dresses. Not even ones with kitties and puppies on ’em. Daddy, I want to go now.”

Jake knelt down in front of his daughter. He shot Jenna a brief grateful glance then turned back to Alexandra. “Alex, we talked about this. You have to have a few dresses now, like it or not.”

“No.” Alex dug in even more stubbornly. She folded her arms in front of her. “I don’t. I want to go home now. And I know you got to go to work. Can you please have Clara take me back to the ranch?”

“Honey—” Jake looked both exasperated and desperate. The clock was ticking. Before they knew it, Melinda would be here, and Alex wasn’t anywhere near even picking out a dress, never mind putting one on.

Jake shot an anxious look at Jenna.

“I think we’ve done enough for now,” Jenna said, knowing there were just some things that couldn’t be rushed, like it or not. “Clearly, Alex has other things she’d rather be doing. And I for one think she ought to have that opportunity.” Jenna looked at Alex. “Are you busy this afternoon?”

“Why?” Alex glared at Jenna suspiciously, clearly not about to be tricked into wearing any dress.

Jenna shrugged in a way that let Alex know she at least wasn’t going to force her to do anything she didn’t want to. Aware Jake was watching her every move, she knelt down so she and Alex were at eye level with each other. “I thought I might come over to play, say around one o’clock, if it’s okay.”

Alex blinked in a combination of surprise and delight. “You want to play with me?”

Jenna nodded. This was one little girl in need of some tender loving care if she’d ever seen one. “If your daddy say it’s okay.”

Alex looked up at Jake.

Clearly at a loss as to what Jenna was up to now, Jake shrugged. “It’s okay with me if it’s okay with you, pumpkin.”

“Okay, I’ll see you then. Bye, Daddy.” Alex kissed Jake goodbye, then skipped out the door to the curb, where Clara was leaning against her vehicle and talking to Wade and Shane McCabe.

Jake waited until they’d driven off, before he turned back to Jenna. “You were supposed to back me up on this dress issue.”

Jenna gathered up her sketch pad and pencils and carried them back to the storeroom, Jake right on her heels. “Oh, relax, would you?” she said, wishing he weren’t so close, and that he didn’t smell so good, like soap and man and woodsy, masculine cologne.

Jake’s silver-gray eyes darkened sexily. “You do remember what kind of time schedule we’re on here, don’t you?”

Jenna rolled her eyes and tried not to notice how very close he had shaved that morning. “Rather hard to forget with you breathing down my neck like that.”

Hands braced on his waist, pushing the edges of his sport coat back, Jake said, “You were supposed to convince her to at least order one dress.”

Ignoring the way he was towering over her, Jenna held her ground. “I did. Didn’t you see her face? Alex loved the alphabet dress I designed just for her. Granted, it’s a little casual,” Jenna shrugged, “but we have to start somewhere.”

Jake’s frown deepened all the more. “So she loved it for a second, before she dug in her heels,” he countered, exasperated. “She is still not going to wear it.”

“Yes,” Jenna retorted patiently, “she will. But only when she wants to.”

“Which is where you were supposed to come in,” Jake added.

Jenna made a face at him, designed to show him how ridiculously panicky he was being. “Which is where I am still going to come in if you will just take a chill pill and let me do my thing.” She turned on her heel and headed back out into the showroom.

Jake followed. “You have a plan?” he asked, the hope in his low voice as annoying to Jenna as his scolding had been.

“Of course I have a plan. I always have a plan,” Jenna snapped back irritably, wondering when Jake would give her some credit. She paused, aware her emotions were starting to get out of control again—something that happened frequently when Jake was around. She drew in a bolstering breath. “I’ll work on it this afternoon, when I go over to play with her,” Jenna finished calmly as she walked over to the sales counter and checked her schedule—she had been rescheduling appointments with customers right and left to make room for Jake.

“Oh.” The wind temporarily knocked out of his sails, Jake paused and raked a hand through his hair. He blew out an uneasy breath, looked at her seriously. “Good. ’Cause you know what is riding on this.”

“Absolutely.” Jenna smiled tightly, reminding herself to keep this strictly unemotional and aboveboard. She wanted this discussion with Jake finished within the next ten minutes, which would leave her plenty of time to prepare for her next appointment. “The expansion of my business.”

Briefly, disappointment flickered in Jake’s eyes. “And Alex’s custody,” Jake added, as he sauntered around to join her behind the sales counter.

“And Alex’s custody,” Jenna agreed, then paused as her next thought hit. She tilted her face up to Jake’s, so she could see into his eyes. “Does Alex know what’s going on between you and her mother—that Melinda is threatening to sue you for custody because Alex is such a tomboy?” Jenna asked curiously.

“No.” Jake rested his shoulders against the wall. “And I don’t want her to know. Bad enough we’re divorced and Melinda has shown practically zero interest in her since day one.”

“Did you expect this to happen?”

“No, but I probably should have. My attorney warned me at the time of the divorce that custody arrangements are often challenged after several years have passed. Sometimes for money. Sometimes because one parent doesn’t approve of the way the other parent is rearing the child. She was particularly worried in my case because Melinda so easily gave up all rights to Alexandra. She thought Melinda might eventually realize she’d made a mistake and want to become more a part of Alex’s life.”

“Surely Melinda couldn’t win,” Jenna said, concerned.

“When it comes to fighting over a child, no one ever wins. The whole point is to avoid the battle,” Jake said. “And in this case, also to placate Melinda so she won’t be compelled to overreact to make up for lost time and opportunity. Right now, as far as I can figure, Alex is an accessory to Melinda’s life that doesn’t quite fit. Alex’s tomboy ways are embarrassing Melinda. Melinda doesn’t like being embarrassed. If I weren’t here, she’d probably send Alex off to boarding school to keep her out of sight of all our mutual friends in Texas. Since she can’t do that, more drastic action is called for. One way or another, Melinda is going to make sure that Alex doesn’t detract from her mother’s public image.”

“Or in other words,” Jenna guessed, “as long as Alex is a perfectly behaved little lady, the fact that Melinda’s not around never comes up. But let Alex be ‘clearly needing a mother in her life’ and Melinda’s absence is all people talk about.”

“Right. Which brings us back to square one,” Jake sighed wearily, looking for a moment as if the weight of the world were on his shoulders. “How to get Alexandra in a dress, so all this unwelcome attention will go away.”

“Simple.” Jenna smiled victoriously. “You just have to make her want to wear a dress.”

Jake gave Jenna a droll look. “That’s what I’ve been trying to do,” he explained.

“Yes, I know. But a master is on the scene now. So leave it to me, and stop worrying about it. And start worrying about how you’re going to pull the expansion of my business together by the time I get your daughter into a dress.”

Jake opened his briefcase. “Actually, I’ve already been working on this. I think we should come up with a complete line of designs—formal, casual and business wear—to be mass-marketed and then try and sign up a whole host of department stores to carry it. From there, we’ll contract with factories to make the clothes and—”

Jenna cut him off with a look. “No.”

Jake blinked as if he hadn’t heard right. “No?”

“I want a single, small but distinct, line of clothing bearing my name,” Jenna said firmly. “Marketed at one store. Made in one factory, right here in Laramie.”

Jake regarded her in consternation. “Jenna, I know you are used to being a one-woman operation, more or less, but you don’t have to limit yourself that way.”

Jenna folded her arms in front of her and regarded Jake sternly. “I want to keep things small so I can insure the quality.”

Jake put his papers back in his briefcase. “Obviously, you’ve thought about this.”

“A lot. I always knew I would expand and do it in a carefully controlled way. Do we have a deal?”

Jake nodded, his eyes never leaving her face. “I’ll start looking for a factory site this morning.”

“I already have one.” Jenna smiled. “The old carpet warehouse about twenty minutes outside of town. It’s standing empty and it’s for sale.” It would be the perfect place for them to set up shop.

Jake paused. He leaned against the sales counter and clamped his arms over the rock-solidness of his chest. “I’ll look into it, see what the asking price is.”

“Maybe we could go see it this afternoon, after I spend some time with Alex.”

Jake looked through his calendar. “Four o’clock?” Jenna nodded and handed him his hat. “I’ll see you then.”

“LOOK, DADDY, we’re having a tea party!” Alex said, several hours later.

Giddily she spun around showing off her wool beret, long chifon scarf and white elbow-length gloves. “And I even got high heels and pearls!” All of which she had added to her usual T-shirt and jeans. Beginning to see where Jenna was going with all this, Jake grinned and joined the group where they were gathered around the table in the second-floor playroom at the ranch, sipping from child-sized cups, and eating tiny little tea sandwiches and petits fours. “And what a nice tea party it is,” Jake answered, admiring the cozy camaraderie that had cropped up between the women in his life. Jenna in particular looked very happy and content. He wondered what it would be like to have the full wattage of Jenna’s smile aimed at him once again.

“And tomorrow we’re going to have another one and really play dress-up, too,” Alex enthused.

Jenna met Jake’s eye and grinned as she adjusted the silk stole around her shoulders and the genuine bridal-shop tiara perched on her head. “I didn’t have time to dig through the treasure trove in my storeroom,” she explained, “but tomorrow I’ll bring some sample garments and the clothes my sisters and I used to wear as kids.”

Aware the J&R ranch house hadn’t been filled with this much love and laughter since he, Clara and Alex had moved in, Jake took off his hat, and pulled up a chair. “You still have them?”

Jenna nodded. “Mom never could bring herself to get rid of them. She thought her grandkids might use them someday, and as it turned out, Meg’s son Jeremy has, as well as his friends.”

Jake was glad Jenna and her sisters had done what they could to preserve the Lockhart family heirlooms, with their sentimental value. No doubt they’d mean a lot to them all someday. “How old is Jeremy?” Jake asked, as a bonnet-and-shawl-clad Clara handed him a plate.

Jenna’s lips curved fondly. “Same age as Alex, almost six.”

Alex tugged on Jenna’s sleeve. “Can Jeremy come to our tea party, too?”

“If his mom says okay,” Jenna allowed kindly, before shooting a look at Jake. “But you’re going to have to ask your dad.”

Alex looked at Jake for permission.

“Sure, honey.” Jake smiled, happy Jenna had become buddies with Alex and Clara so quickly. “Go ahead and invite him.”

Alex studied Jake as Clara handed him the plate of peanut-butter-and-jelly and cucumber-and-cream-cheese sandwiches. “Daddy needs a funny hat, too.”

Jenna gave him a flowered-brim garden hat. Alex giggled riotously. “Not that one, silly. Let him have…this one.” She ran to her toy chest and returned with a child-sized magician’s hat.

Jake put the small black top hat on his head. “Much better.”

Alex beamed. “Would you like some apple juice?” Being careful to be very prim and proper, instead of rowdy and out-of-control, Alex reached for the tea set.

“Don’t mind if I do, thank you,” Jake told Alex. While Alex poured Jake some apple juice, Jake traded glances with Jenna, silently telegraphing his appreciation.

“The petits fours are delicious,” Clara said.

“They’re from Isabel Buchanon’s bakery, over on Main Street,” Jenna explained. “If you haven’t been there yet, you ought to give it a try. She’s got the best baked goods in town, no question.’

Clara smiled. “We’ll have to run by there.”

The pager clipped to Clara’s belt began to beep. Clara looked down at the number flashing across the screen. “That’s my daughter, Lisa.” Jake reached into the pocket of his blazer and handed over his cell phone. Clara made the call, said hello, and listened. “Honey, you can’t be in labor yet. You’re not due for another two weeks—oh, dear. Yes, that’s a definite sign. Have you called your obstetrician? Is Randall on the way? Of course I’ll meet you at the hospital, honey. I wouldn’t dream of missing this.”

“Problem?” Jake said.

Briskly, Clara untied her bonnet and removed the shawl from her shoulders. She looked calm and in control. “Lisa’s water broke and she’s started having contractions.”

“Do you want me to drive you to the hospital?” Jake said.

Clara shook her head. “This being a first baby and all, there’s no telling how long it will take.”

Jake stood and helped Clara with her chair. He wrapped his arm around the older woman’s shoulders and gave her a hug. “Give Lisa and Randall our love. Let me know if there’s anything they need.”

Clara hugged Jake back. “I will. Bye, precious.” Clara knelt down to give Alexandra a hug and a kiss.

“Can I see your new grandbaby after it’s borned?” Alex asked.

Clara smiled. “You sure can.” She said goodbye to Jenna then was off.

Silence fell over the playroom. Suddenly, no one was much in the mood for a tea party. But that was okay with Jake. He looked over at Alex. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

Alex perked up immediately. “You do?”

“It’s on the back porch.” Jake smiled at his daughter, but did nothing to give away the nature of the surprise. “Want to see?”

Alex vaulted out of her chair and wobbled over to him on her high heels. “Can I wear my dress-up clothes?”

Jake frowned. Now that Alex was actually wearing something feminine, even if only for dress-up purposes, he hated to have her take it off. But given what he had on the porch, there was no helping it. “I think you better take them off for this,” he said.

“Okay.” Alex sighed, clearly disappointed, but not about to give up her surprise for the sake of arguing. She ripped off hat, gloves, scarf and high heels, but hesitated at the long double strand of pearls—which looked a little ludicrous with her jeans, T-shirt, and buckskin vest. She looked over at Jenna hopefully. “Can I keep these?”

“Sure,” Jenna said, smiling, as she too took off her tiara and stole and excess jewelry.

“Thank you,” Alex promised sincerely, giving Jenna an admiring look. “I’ll take good care of them. I won’t lose them or anything.”

Jenna reached over to squeeze Alex’s shoulders. “I know you won’t, sweetheart.”

Jake waited for Alex to put on her boots. “Ready?”

Alex nodded. She took his hand, glanced over at Jenna. “You come, too, Jenna.”

Jake nodded, seconding the invitation with a frank, sexy look.

Obviously curious, Jenna followed as Jake took his daughter’s hand in one of his, Jenna’s in the other, and led the way downstairs, past the dining room, through the kitchen and onto the large and homey screened-in back porch.

To Jake’s amusement, at first Jenna—like Alex—saw nothing amiss. Both scanned the rough-hewn furniture with red plaid cushions, the abundance of green, leafy plants and blooming geraniums, the Navajo rugs strewn across the cool cement floor and the ceiling fan whirring overhead. Then they heard it. The quick, frantic scampering of little feet. A yelp. A howl. A hiss. Alex and Jenna barely had time to draw surprised breaths before they caught sight of a fast-moving bundle of butterscotch fur and a pair of lively dark brown eyes. And an even faster bundle of gray fur. Both dashing past in a blur.

“Daddy, you did it!” Alex exclaimed, clapping her hands together with all the delight Jake had expected.

Jenna turned to Jake. “Did you ever!” she agreed dryly.

Chapter Three

“You look…surprised,” Jake said, a little irked Jenna didn’t look more impressed by what he had done. To his relief, his daughter, however, had no such reservations. Alexandra was already down on the floor, tumbling around with the cutest golden retriever puppy Jake had ever seen while her fluffy gray-and-white-striped kitten watched from a distance.

Jenna paused and bit her lip. “I am.”

Jake edged closer, until their arms were almost touching. “Because…?”

Jenna shifted slightly, her shoulder brushing the curve of his biceps. “You got her a kitten and a puppy.”

Jake shrugged, unable to see what the big deal was, and for whatever reason Jenna did seem to think this was a big deal. “I didn’t want her out hunting down snakes and I thought this would keep her busy.”

Jenna knit her brows together. “It’ll do that, all right,” she drawled, the hint of bemusement in her clear blue eyes.

Jake refused to feel inferior just because he had never been allowed to have any pets as a kid. Whereas Jenna, who’d grown up on a ranch, had nurtured an abundance of them.

“Just out of curiosity, Jake…” Jenna clasped a soft, slender hand around his upper arm and tugged him out of earshot. She backed him up against the exterior limestone wall that separated the porch from the interior of the house. “Have you ever house-trained a puppy?”

“No,” Jake said uneasily, unable to help thinking how pretty Jenna looked in her two piece turquoise cotton dress, with its loose, cropped blouse and long flowing skirt. “But how hard can it be?”

In response, Jenna just shook her head. And sighed—loudly. Her high, perfect breasts rising and falling against the demure button front of her blouse. “Did you at least get their shots?”

Jake’s eyes traced the glimpse of creamy skin visible in the open collar of her blouse. He liked the way the armholes were cut on it, dipping in slightly to reveal Jenna’s slender shoulders and pretty upper arms. “Uh, actually we have an appointment to do that at five, at the Laramie Animal Clinic. I thought we could run by the warehouse, take a quick look, then go straight to the vet’s office and the pet-supply store from there.”

“We,” Jenna repeated, lifting a skeptical brow and planting both hands on her hips.

Jake gestured off-handedly. “Well, I would have asked Clara to help with the pets.” And hoped like heck Jenna, a real animal lover if there ever was one, would volunteer to help out some, too. “But since Clara had to go off to Laramie Community Hospital to see her new grandbaby born…” Jake shrugged, to show there was no way he could have foreseen Lisa going into labor a good two weeks early.

Jenna blinked in surprise. “Clara’s married daughter lives here in Laramie, too?”

Jake realized they hadn’t covered that earlier. He nodded. “It’s one of the reasons we moved here. So Clara could be close to her daughter and son-in-law. She’s been with us since Alex was an infant and has rearranged her life on more than one occasion on our account. I thought it was time we did the same for her.”

Jenna studied him with a mixture of blatant approval and suspicion. “What were the other reasons?” she asked warily.

That was easy, Jake thought, relaxing all the more. He smiled down at Jenna, said softly, “My happiest memories of growing up were all here. I thought it’d be a good place to bring up Alex, too.”

Before Jenna could respond, Alex ran up to him. “Daddy, my new kitty is hiding behind the sofa and she won’t come out.”

“She’s probably just shy,” Jake said as the puppy began to bark. He glanced at his watch. “I think we better get these animals rounded up in their carriers.”

“Why?” Alex asked, clapping her hands over her ears to shut out the high-pitched noise. Smiling, Jenna knelt and scooped up the puppy, cradling him close to her chest. To everyone’s relief, the frantic barking stopped immediately.

Briefly, Jake explained what they had to do next, which was take both kitten and puppy to the vet for their vaccinations and exams, and then go by the grocery store to pick up pet food and other essentials.

“In that case, maybe we should reschedule looking at the warehouse and do that tomorrow morning,” Jenna said as she continued to pet Alex’s new puppy with gentle, loving strokes. She buried her face in the puppy’s fur, looking as ecstatic as Alex to have access to such a cute and cuddly animal. Jenna pressed a kiss to the puppy’s head and was promptly rewarded with a slurpy lick on the chin. “Given everything else we have to do this afternoon and evening,” she continued.

Jake studied Jenna, realizing all over again how much he had missed having her in his life. “You wouldn’t mind?” He didn’t want Jenna to think she was playing second-fiddle to anything that was going on here, because she wasn’t.

“Not at all.” Jenna looked down at Alex, who was now cradling her kitten in much the same way Jenna was holding the puppy. “Meanwhile, these two critters need some names, Alex. Any ideas?”

Alex grinned. “I want to call my puppy Buster.”

“Good choice,” Jake beamed his approval. As did Jenna.

Alex kissed her kitten and cuddled her close. “And I want to call her Miss Kitty.”

“I HAD NO IDEA one puppy and one kitten could be so exhausting,” Jake told Jenna three hours later as they brought the carriers into the house and set them down on the floor. Alex followed, carrying a plastic sack filled to the brim with kitten and puppy toys.

While Alex stayed with her new pets, Jenna and Jake headed back to his Jeep for the rest of the stuff they had purchased. Jenna slanted him a glance, noting that he did look exhausted and out of his element. “You’ve only owned them for a couple of hours,” Jenna said cheerfully as she lifted out the sack of kitty litter and the litter box. It was sort of fun to see the oh-so-confident Jake unsure of himself. “Just wait until tonight.”

Jake got a panicked look in his eyes as he hefted the bags of puppy chow and kitten food into his arms. “What happens tonight?”

Alex came running to get them as they headed back inside. “Daddy,” she said, “we had a disaster.”

Unfortunately, Jenna and Jake soon discovered, Alex wasn’t kidding.

“You can’t leave Alex and me alone with this puppy,” Jake said, after he and Jenna had finished cleaning up the puddle on the kitchen floor.

Hoping to avert a similar disaster, Jenna set up the litter box for the kitten in the laundry room. While Jake watched, she made sure there was nothing either animal could get into, and that all electric cords and so on were out of reach of even the most curious agile kitten or puppy. “Because?” Jenna asked as she washed her hands in the laundry-room sink.

Jake dropped the dirty paper towels into the trash, put away the floor cleaner, then went to wash his hands. “We’ll never survive.”

That, Jenna thought, with equal parts amusement and pity, was no doubt true.

Jake had taken on much more than he knew.

But there was no going back now. He had given Alex the two pets simultaneously. They would just have to muddle through. Jenna smiled at Jake, and because he seemed badly in need of some encouragement, touched his cheek. “Your heart was in the right place.”

Jake chuckled wearily. “Even if my head wasn’t.”

Before Jenna could reply, Alexandra barreled in. She went straight to Jake and plucked on his sleeve. “Daddy, I’m hungry.”

Which in turn, Jenna noted, caused Jake to look all the more desperate.

Jenna relented, figuring it would be cruel to make him ask. “Okay, I’ll stay through dinner.”

Alex cheered and Jake’s sexy grin widened. “How about the whole evening?” he asked as Alex, satisfied food would soon be on the way, raced back out again to check on Buster and Miss Kitty.

“Well?” Jake said, when Jenna didn’t answer right away.

Jenna shook her head and started for the door. “Typical Jake,” she drawled. “Always wanting it all—now.”

Jake caught her arm before she could exit the room and turned her to face him. “You’re telling me you’re not the same?”

That was just it, Jenna realized uncomfortably, as she looked up into his handsome, suntanned face, taking in the rugged line of his jaw, the stubborn set of his chin, his blade-straight nose and those sensually chiseled lips that really knew how to kiss. She was the same as him in that regard. But there was no sense in admitting it to him when she knew he would just use her weaknesses to his own advantage.

Jenna extricated herself graciously from his grip. “I’ll show Alex how to feed Buster and Miss Kitty.”

Jake’s eyes twinkled knowingly. Looking delighted to have her there with them, for whatever reason, he murmured happily, “And I’ll see what I can do about rustling us up some grub ASAP.”

While Jenna and Alex tended to the pets, Jake made the thirty-minute round-trip drive back into town. Jenna had her excuses all ready—she was going to use the opportunity to bow out—but when he returned with a mouthwatering bucket of crispy fried chicken, containers of mashed potatoes, gravy, creamy coleslaw and half a dozen fluffy, golden-brown biscuits, she found herself weakening. She was hungry, after all. He had enough food to feed an army. It would be a shame to see it go to waste. And even more cruel to disappoint Alexandra, who by now was as desperate as Jake to have her stay and eat with them. So she did.

And the three of them had a very good time, talking and laughing about Buster and Miss Kitty’s antics as they ate. Not surprisingly, by the time they had finished the delicious meal, Alex was visibly drooping. It was all Jake could do to get her upstairs, into her pajamas and into bed.

“She was asleep almost before her head hit the pillow,” Jake reported minutes later as he joined Jenna in the kitchen.

Jake frowned, seeing she had just about finished cleaning up after dinner. “I was going to do that.”

Jenna refused to let him win her confidence this easily. He might think he was a changed man. But she still knew the way he had deserted her once because of family and social pressure and she knew he could probably do it again. All too readily, if and when his own interests were at stake or he felt the situation called for it.

Jenna gave him a deadpan look meant to provoke. “You know how?” Jenna scoffed in a disbelieving tone as she put a twist tie around the garbage sack and set it by the back door.

The hot-tempered denial she expected never came. Jake merely picked up a dishrag and began mopping the tabletop. While his palm moved across the table with long powerful strokes, he said. “I’ve learned a lot since we last saw each other.”

Jenna’s eyebrows rose in cool disbelief as he went back to the sink and submerged the cloth into the soapy water. She watched him wring it out again and tackle the counters. “So it seems,” she said, refusing to be impressed. After all, any moron could competently clean a tabletop. Or run into town for her all-time favorite take-out meal. All it meant was that he was trying to get into her good graces so she would make a designer-quality wardrobe for Alex, quick as could be, and help get Melinda off his back.

The phone rang. Clearly resenting the interruption as much as she welcomed it—she didn’t want to be alone with Jake, and certainly not like this, in such an intimate setting!—Jake strode across the kitchen and plucked the receiver off the wall after the first ring. He barked a hello, then frowned intently, his mood softening visibly as he listened to whoever was on the other end of the line. “Stay as long as you need to,” he said. “No. Don’t worry about a thing here. Jenna and I’ve got everything under control. Just give Lisa and Randall my best.”

Jenna quirked her brow as he hung up. “How is Clara’s daughter doing?” she asked curiously.

Jake frowned. “She’s still in labor. It looks like it’s going to be a long night, for all of them.”

And for Jake, too, Jenna thought, given the new pets in the household.

Jake looked around. “Where are Buster and Miss Kitty?”

“Sleeping in their crates on the back porch. They’re as exhausted as Alex.”

“Speaking of Alex…” Jake took Jenna’s hand and led her into the living room, further delaying her departure. “It looked like you had a really good time together today.”

Realizing she did want to sit a moment, after the way they had been running around all afternoon, Jenna let Jake settle her on the sofa and drop down beside her. Jenna kicked off her sandals and curled her legs up beneath her. “We did.”

Jake watched as Jenna smoothed her long cotton skirt over her legs and feet. “You do realize, however,” he pointed out, “that a whole day has gone by and you still haven’t gotten her into a dress.”

Jenna grinned as she thought about their tea party, and how much fun she’d had. “But I did get her into hat, scarf, pearls, gloves and heels,” she bragged. Given Alex’s attitude toward all things feminine, that had been no small accomplishment.

Unfortunately, it did little to appease Jake, who frowned worriedly and raked a hand through his hair. “Somehow I don’t think that’s going to satisfy Melinda. And we can’t just go out and buy a dress at the store. Melinda’ll throw a fit if she sees her daughter in off-the-rack anything.”

Melinda sounded like a real piece of work. If she was really as snotty as Jake described her, he had reason to want to steer clear of her. And shield Alex from any snobbish maternal explosions, too. Jenna just hoped she did not have to meet or deal with Jake’s ex. “Never fear, cowboy. I also got this.” Tranquilly, Jenna reached into the pocket of her skirt and handed him a folded piece of paper.

Jake stared at the letters and numbers scribbled on the page. “What is it?” he demanded, completely clueless.

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