Ruth Dale - Fiance Wanted

“Hear you got yourself a new beau,” he said cheerfully. “That Dylan Cole is a fine man. You could do worse, Katy.”

Katy felt her cheeks flame with embarrassed dismay. “What are you talking about?” she demanded. “All I did was go to happy hour with the man and you’re turning it into a lifetime commit—” She caught herself up short. That was exactly what they wanted everyone in town to believe, she remembered belatedly.

“Don’t bite my head off,” John said. “All I know is what a little birdie told me.”

Yeah, Katy thought, a little birdie named Brandee. John Reynolds had the best network of contacts she’d ever seen. Heaven help her if she tried to put anything over on him.

By lunchtime, she was running scared; everyone she met looked at her with that speculative little gleam in their eyes. Hoping for sanctuary, she called Laura and wrangled an invitation to lunch.

“I don’t think I realized what I was letting myself in for with this crazy scheme,” Katy complained, reaching for the tuna salad sandwich Laura had placed before her. “This town has the healthiest grapevine I’ve ever seen or heard tell of.”

“You should have known,” Laura said serenely, taking her seat. “You remember all the gossip when Matt and I were just starting to get together? I seem to recall someone explaining to me that they meant well, so I shouldn’t let it bother me.”

“Sounded good when I said it,” Katy agreed dourly. “But this is happening a lot faster than I ever expected. I thought it would take us at least a few weeks of being seen together before anybody believed us.”

“Maybe the sight of the two of you making out in the parking lot at the Painted Pony speeded things up.”

Katy’s jaw dropped. “We were not making out!”

“Hugging, kissing—most people would call that making out.”

“Well, it wasn’t.” Distracted, Katy dropped her sandwich back on the plate, appetite gone.

“What was it, then?” Laura prodded.

“Just two people pretending.”

“Pretending.” Laura cocked her head, a question on her face. “So how was it?”

“Laura! I’m shocked you’d ask me a question like that.” And shocked at the wave of heat in her own cheeks.

“Sorry, I couldn’t resist.” Laura’s smile was devilish. “It’s just that you seem to need some sage advice and all I have is curiosity, just like everyone else.”

Jessica trotted into the kitchen with her younger brother at her heels. “What’s sage?” she asked. “I already know about advice.”

“Sage advice,” her mother said, “is very wise advice. That’s what Aunt Katy needs right now. Unfortunately, I’m all out of it.”

Jessica grinned broadly. “I’ve got some sage advice,” she declared. Turning to Katy, she took her hands and peered deep into her eyes, radiating sincerity. “Aunt Katy, when you want sage advice, like, why don’t you just wave your magic wand? That’s what it’s for, to make things right. Right?”

“Right!”

Jessica gave her mother a triumphant glance and trotted on through to the yard. Zach followed without ever having said a word.

Katy looked helplessly at Laura. “Magic wand, right. But if I’m not mistaken, it was that darned magic wand that got me into this mess!”

“BUT I DON’T want to have lunch with you Friday,” Katy declared. “I’m too busy. I have places to go and people to see. I don’t have time. I lack the inclination.”

Dylan leaned his hands flat against her desk and waited for her to run out of steam. Then he said, “I don’t care about any of that. If we’re gonna make this work, we have to be seen together. Friday’s the only time I can make it. I have to come in anyway for supplies so I can kill two birds with one stone.”

“I’m not particularly fond of being likened to a dead bird,” Katy sniffed. “If you think…” Her indignation wound down and she sighed. “Do I have to?”

“Yeah, you have to.”

“All right.” She gave in ungraciously, punctuating her words with a condemning glance. “What time and where?”

“I’ll pick you up at—”

“I’ll meet you.”

“Noon at the Rawhide Café.”

“That should guarantee an audience, all right. Okay, I’ll be there.”

“Great.”

“You don’t have to get sarcastic.”

“Maybe I do.” For a moment he looked down at her with a slight frown. Then he straightened and walked out of the room without another word or even a glance.

Katy gritted her teeth in annoyance, but she didn’t have time to ponder. She had a story to write, a story questioning expenditures by the Rawhide Chamber of Commerce.

This turned out to be harder to do than she’d expected. Sure, the story was going to tick off chamber officers and members alike but as a reporter, it was Katy’s job to print the truth and raise hell without fear or prejudice. No, something else was on her mind, making it hard to concentrate….

Seeing Dylan so early in the day really messed with her mind. That kiss in the parking lot had proven impossible to forget. Over and over again she reminded herself that it was only Dylan. But she didn’t seem able to talk herself out of the thrill she’d felt when he took her into his arms and pressed his lips to hers….

“Katy!” John stood before her desk, his thick white hair sticking out in all directions and a frown on his round face. “Am I going to get that story or do I have to find something else to fill the hole on the front page?”

“Sorry.” She pulled her thoughts up short and hunched dutifully over her computer screen. “I’m hard at work, see?” And she was—hard at work trying to forget the unthinkable.

Dylan rode the big bay gelding up to the corral behind the Bear Claw ranch house and stepped down out of the saddle. A big black Mercedes was parked in front and he wondered who’d come to visit.

Whoever it was could wait while he took care of his horse. Quickly he stripped off saddle and bridle before reaching for a currycomb. When he heard footsteps, he glanced over his shoulder without pausing in the long, precise strokes, then did a double take.

Brandee Haycox’s father, Edgar. Now what?

“Edgar,” he said in greeting.

“Cole.”

The man’s face was even more florid than usual. Dylan led the horse to the gate of the corral and turned him loose. “What brings you to my neck of the woods?” he inquired, knowing he wouldn’t like the answer.

“This!” Edgar waved a newspaper through the air with angry swipes. “That woman has gone too far!”

Dylan suppressed a groan. “What woman?” Like he didn’t know.

“That Andrews woman, who else? Always out muck-raking and rabble-rousing. She’s got to be stopped!”

Dylan wasn’t too crazy about the way this conversation was shaping up. “I don’t see how you can fault her for raking muck if it’s there for the raking,” he said reasonably. “I also don’t see why you’re telling me all this. Shouldn’t you talk to her, or to her editor?”

“John won’t listen to a word against her,” Edgar grumbled. “And when I try to talk to her, she just starts writing down every word I say and egging me on to say more.”

Dylan stifled a smile. He’d seen Katy do that: deflect angry criticism by offering—some called it threatening—to quote the speaker verbatim. The easiest way to hang a man, she once said, was to do it with his own words exactly as he said them.

But he wanted to sooth Edgar Haycox, not stir him up even more. “That still doesn’t explain why you came here to shout at me,” he said reasonably. “Why don’t we go inside and I’ll make a pot of coffee. Then maybe we can talk.”