Allison Leigh - Montana Passions

“He was so busy putting a move on her, he didn’t even see that I was watching,” Katie said. “I heard him tell her how he’d like to, uh, ‘jump her bones,’ but he couldn’t afford to. He had a ‘rich one’ on a string and he wasn’t blowing that ‘til he’d clipped at least a couple of her millions.”

“I hope you reamed him a new one right there and then.” Justin sounded as if he wouldn’t have minded doing that for her.

She laughed—and it felt so good. To think about something that had hurt so much at the time and realize it was just a memory now, one with no power to cause her pain. “In case you didn’t notice, I’m not big on public displays.”

He chuckled. “Well, yeah. As a matter of fact, I did notice. So, what did you do?”

“I went home to my apartment. Eventually, Ted must have realized I’d left. He came knocking on my door. I confronted him then. He started laying on the sweet talk. But I wasn’t buying. Once he saw he couldn’t talk his way back into a relationship with me, he said a few rotten things, trying to hurt me a little worse than he already had. But he knew it was over.”

“And that made you sure every man you met would be after your money?”

“Well, there was another, er, incident.”

“At CU?”

“No. Right here in town, not long after I came home to stay and took the job as librarian. He was a local guy, Jackson Tully. He’d grown up here and gone to Thunder Canyon High ten years before I did. After high school, he’d moved away—and then moved back and opened a souvenir shop on Main. He asked me out and he seemed nice enough. We had several dates and…oh, he was funny and sweet and I started to think—”

“That he was the one. “

She made a face at the shadowed rafters above. “Oh, I don’t know. I thought that we had something good, I guess. That it might really go somewhere.”

“As in wedding bells and happily ever after?”

“That’s right.”

“So then…?”

“Well, he proposed.”

“Marriage?”

“What else?”

He made a low sound. “I can think of a few other things, but I won’t go into them. So the moneygrubbing shop owner proposed and you said yes.”

She pushed the blankets down a little and rested her arms on top of them. “Well, no. I didn’t say yes. I did…care for him, but I wasn’t sure. I said I wanted to think about it. And while I was thinking, his mom came to see me. She’s a nice woman, Lucille Tully is. A member of the Historical Society, as a matter of fact.”

“Isn’t everyone?”

“In Thunder Canyon?” She considered. “Well, just about everyone over forty or so is.”

“And Lucille Tully said…”

“That she loved her son, but I was a ‘sweet girl’ and she couldn’t let me say yes to him without my knowing the truth.”

“Which was?”

“Jackson had had two bankruptcies. His souvenir shop—which Lucille had given him the money to open—wasn’t doing well and he’d told his mother more than once that as soon as he married the librarian, she could have her money back. He’d close the store. Why slave all day long, catering to pushy tourists in some stupid shop when he’d be set for life and he could focus on enjoying himself.”

“Spending your money, I take it?”

Katie sighed. “Lucille cried when she told me. I felt terrible for her. It just broke her heart, the whole thing.”

“So you said no to the gold-digging Jackson Tully.”

“I did.”

“And where is he now?”

“Couldn’t say. His shop went under and he left town. So far as I know, he hasn’t been back.”

“And what about the mother?”

“What do you mean?”

“Come on, Katie. I’ve known you for two whole days and I can already guarantee that you took care of her.”

“Well, if you must know, I had Caleb buy the shop.”

“With your money.”

“That’s right. Caleb made sure Jackson paid Lucille back. Then Caleb sold the shop for me. At a profit. Everybody came out all right—financially, at least. And by then, Jackson had moved on. Lucille doesn’t talk about him much, not to me, anyway—and you know, now I look back on both Jackson and Ted Anders, I realize I was pretty darn lucky. At least I didn’t marry them. At least I found out what kind of men they really were before I took any kind of irrevocable step.”

There was silence from the narrow cot on the other side of the room.

She grinned into the darkness. “Justin? Have I put you to sleep?”

“I’m wide-awake.”

“You sound so serious…”

A pause, and then, “Those two were a couple of prime-grade SOBs—and you’re right, at least you didn’t marry either of them.”

“No, I didn’t. And Justin…”

“What?”

“I did have a nice boyfriend or two. Nothing that serious, but they were good guys. I actually enjoyed high school. How many people can say that?”

“Good point.” The way he said that made her sure he was one of the ones who couldn’t.

“And I went to both proms—junior and senior. For my senior prom I wore a—”

He made a loud snoring sound.

She sat up and the bed creaked in protest. “I might have to unscrew one of these pineapple finials and throw it at you.”

He sat up, too. “Please don’t hurt me.”

They looked at each other through the darkness. For pajamas, he’d found a pair of cheap black sweats in the storage room. In the minimal light, he was hardly more than a broad-shouldered shadow. But then his white teeth flashed with his smile.

She flopped back down. “I promise to let you go to sleep. Soon.”

His blankets rustled. “No hurry. As it happens, I don’t have any early appointments tomorrow.”

“Okay, then. But remember. I offered to shut up…”

“And I turned you down.”

She raised her arms and slid her hands under her hair, lacing them on the too-fat pillow, cupping her head. “Sheesh. I’m starting to feel as if I know you so well. But I don’t even know where you live—in Bozeman, right?” He made a noise in the affirmative. “Your house…what’s it like?”

“Four thousand square feet. Vaulted ceilings. Lots of windows. Good views.”

“And redwood decking, on a number of levels—with a huge hot tub, right?”

“How did you know that?”

“Oh, Justin. How else could it be? And come on. Fair’s fair. Women?”

He let out a big, fake sigh. “Okay. What do you need to know?”

She thought of the way he’d kissed her out in the shed—and when they got “married.” And she realized it had never occurred to her that there might be someone special in his life. A live-in girlfriend, or even…

A wife.

No. No, that couldn’t be. He could never have kissed her like that if there already was a special woman in his life—not the way he had when they’d pretended to get married.

And certainly not the way he’d kissed her out in the shed.

And if he could…

Oh, God. Here she’d made such a big deal about asking him if he was after her money. And she hadn’t bothered to find out if he had a wife.

“It’s too damn quiet over there.” His voice was deep and rough—and teasing.

“Justin, are you married?”

There was dead silence, and then, “What the hell made you think that?”

“Nothing. It’s just that I never asked—and you never said.”

He swore under his breath. “I’ve done one or two things I’m not…thrilled I had to do, I’ll admit.” She wondered what, exactly. But before she had time to ask, he said, “But I never will do that—play one woman when I’m married to another.” He sounded totally disgusted with the very idea.