Laurie Paige - Lone Star Rancher

“But you’re the one who put in the hours of work,” he reminded her. “In the store your father displayed pictures of you at your first job. I have to admit I wouldn’t have recognized you. You looked very different from the long-legged teenager I remembered.”

Jessica felt heat skim her cheeks. She hoped he didn’t also remember that, at nineteen, she’d had a terrible crush on him. She’d wanted to make him notice her.

Looking into his eyes, she suddenly understood the dark moodiness in those depths. He, Clyde Fortune of the famous Fortune family, was attracted to her.

Instead of feeling elated, she was disappointed. He was attracted to the persona developed by her career—the casual, laughing and oh-so-sexy summer blonde who was poised, outdoorsy and cosmopolitan.

That was the way the fashion photographers saw her and what they picked up in the photo sessions. It was the persona she and Sondra had decided to cultivate long ago, but whether in New York, Paris or Milan, she knew, at heart, she was simply a Texas gal a long way from home.

She focused her attention on the task at hand and away from the banked embers of interest that resided in his gaze. It needed only a spark between them to set the flames to a fiery glow. She wouldn’t provide that spark.

He headed for the door. “I’d better get the grill started so we can eat. Miles should be in soon. The folks are staying at the Double Crown, so they won’t be spending the night.”

“Are they here for the funeral?”

He frowned. “What do you know about that?”

“Violet explained the connection to Ryan Fortune. It was also in the San Antonio paper. My sister read it and called me.”

“Did she also relate the local gossip?”

Jessica shook her head. She and her sister had speculated on the dead man’s relationship to the mighty Fortunes of Texas, but she wasn’t sure what gossip Clyde referred to.

“Some people think Ryan might have murdered Christopher Jamison to keep his father’s true origins a secret.”

Jessica was shocked at the idea. “No one knowing Ryan Fortune would believe that.”

“No?” Clyde questioned. “Then you don’t know your fellow Texans as well as I assumed you did.”

With that, he left. She continued preparing the salad. When she finished, she stored the stuff in the refrigerator, which was now filled with all kinds of healthful food, including nonfat milk and yogurt, two of her usual food staples.

After pouring a glass of iced tea, she went outside. She found Clyde on the other side of the pool/guesthouse at a built-in grill.

“Well, what have we here?” an appreciative male voice inquired. “Ah, yes, the fair Jessica.” Miles, the youngest of the triplets, looked her over. “Very fair indeed. The duckling has changed into the swan, brother. You didn’t mention that when you reported she’d arrived.”

“Hello, Miles,” she said, holding out her hand.

Instead of shaking it, Miles tucked her hand into the crook of his arm and led her to a table under an arbor covered with rose vines. He held a chair for her, then took the one beside it.

“So start at the beginning and tell me of your life in the big city,” he invited. He took a drink of beer and gazed at her in open admiration.

Jessica was used to this kind of attention, so it didn’t rattle her at all, unlike the black scowl she was getting from Clyde. She tried to figure out if she’d done something wrong. Nothing came to mind.

“Both Violet and I have been busy,” she began. “We try to meet for lunch at least once a week.”

From the side of the house came the tinkling laughter of his mother. Patrick and Lacey joined them on the patio. She held a posy of late summer blossoms in her hand.

“A centerpiece for the table,” she said. “Miles, come help me find a vase for them. Are we going to eat out here or in the house?” she asked Clyde.

“In the house. We’ve had a new hatch of mosquitoes since the storm.”

Lacey smiled at Jessica. “They leave terrible itchy bumps on me, but never seem to bite the men.”

“That hardly seems fair,” Jessica murmured, wishing a swarm would descend on Clyde. What the heck had she done to tick him off?

“The steaks will be ready in ten minutes,” he said. “Miles, if you’ll bring the shrimp when you come back out, I’ll put them on.”

When the other three went inside, Jessica surveyed the grounds and didn’t glance at Clyde, who now wore dark slacks and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up on his arms.

“Miles, you might recall, is something of a tease,” Clyde said without preamble. He gave her a stern glance.

“Yes? Is there a message for me in that statement?”

“Don’t get your hopes up that it means anything when he flirts with you.”

She did a slow burn. “Actually,” she murmured wickedly, “I have my hopes centered on you.”

He choked on his beer.

Smiling, she took a long, cool drink of iced tea.

“I really don’t see why I have to come along,” Jessica said on Sunday afternoon.

“So I can keep an eye on you,” Clyde answered.

“No one knows where I am. Except your family,” she added. “Now everyone will.”

“The people in Hanson Park probably won’t recognize you,” he said calmly. “Keep your sunglasses on and the hat pulled low.”

She felt like a latter-day Mata Hari, on a mission and trying to keep up a pretense of disguise. Clyde had insisted she attend the funeral of Christopher Jamison rather than stay at the ranch alone all afternoon and evening. It would be very late before they returned home, he’d said.

His parents would be with Ryan Fortune and his wife, Lily. Miles was coming in his own truck. She and Clyde were in the station wagon, which was clean and more comfortable for the trip than the pickup, he’d told her.

She didn’t recall his being so bossy years ago.

After flicking a piece of lint off the navy blue pants suit, she sighed, settled into the seat and gazed at the landscape, a cloud of depression hovering over her. Funerals were hardly joyous occasions.

Unfortunately, where the rich and famous congregated, the press also made an appearance.

“I told you I shouldn’t have come,” she muttered.

“The police will keep the reporters at bay,” Clyde said, driving through an ornate wrought-iron gate to a private parking area after an officer had checked his identity and waved them through.

Two reporters pushed forward, but they were ordered back behind the police barriers that cordoned off the lane leading to the church and cemetery.

When she and Clyde got out of the station wagon, Jessica kept her wide-brimmed lacy hat on, effectively covering her hair, which she’d twisted up on the back of her head. Very dark sunglasses hid her trademark blue eyes.

The funeral chapel was filled to overflowing. The entire Fortune family was there, it seemed. Jessica recognized most of those from Texas. Ryan’s twin daughters, Vanessa and Victoria, were present with their husbands.

Jessica nodded to them, then to Lily, Ryan’s wife. His third wife, she recounted. Apparently they’d been in love long ago, but fate had intervened. Now they were together again and very happy in their marriage, according to Violet.

Clyde made sure she stayed close to him, as if he’d put a claim in on her. Whenever his suit sleeve brushed her arm, shimmering tingles flowed through her like champagne bubbles dancing through her blood. It was disconcerting to be so aware of another person.

The last time she’d felt so utterly alive, she’d been nineteen and in the throes of her first great love.

With him.

“Clyde, Jessica, this is Blake and Darcy Jamison,” Lacey introduced the parents of the deceased young man. “You’ve already met Clyde. Jessica is a longtime friend of our daughter, Violet.”