Читать онлайн книгу «Man, Wife And Little Wonder» автора Robin Nicholas
Man, Wife And Little Wonder
Robin Nicholas
JUNE BRIDESBundles of JoySometimes small packages can lead to the biggest surprises!THE BAD BOYJohnny Tremont had once worn rebellion and recklessness as ruggedly as his black leather jacket. But now he was father figure to his young, needy niece, and he was determined to do right by her, no matter what it took.THE BRIDEWhat it took was the hand of a childhood friend Grace Marie Green. Marriage to this pert, upstanding beautician would guarantee him custody of her namesake, Gracie, and would give his little girl the perfect maternal role model…for a little while.THE BUNDLE OF JOYBut Johnny hadn't realized what an amazing effect a desirable wife and a darling little wonder could have on a man like him….Celebrate a month of joyful marriages with Silhouette Romance!
“She wakes up at night crying.” (#u6c43db9b-7ef7-5a4b-bf9d-36a85a6dc246)Letter to Reader (#u22ec0c87-9d8a-587e-a2ba-e543932e71d0)Title Page (#uc7e8c105-eeb7-5d21-bba4-40fe9cd2cb5d)Dedication (#u06a8e2c4-7482-57d5-a595-a16bb1fcba15)Acknowledgments (#u0699afb2-8cbe-5283-8bf6-fbe7e3d30110)About the Author (#ud113ac39-f073-5aef-a9dc-47ff36398147)Letter to Reader (#u0e7afd7d-e006-5290-92ab-efe86f78f628)Chapter One (#uc2e7ed99-bad3-5f3d-af40-bd0189b0e456)Chapter Two (#u5b1cbe4d-dea8-5ef7-8868-39149fb02cf9)Chapter Three (#ub3e8eb5d-80bd-5b42-8919-a0501c059a0f)Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“She wakes up at night crying.”
Johnny spoke as if the image his words conjured pained him. He turned to her then, more serious than she’d ever seen him. “I realize we won’t have one of those one-in-a-million kind of marriages, Grace, but we’ve got friendship going for us, haven’t we?”
His blue eyes were intent, warming her clear to that place in her heart that had always been just for him. She recognized the yearning inside her, just as she saw quite clearly that Johnny knew no such feeling, that because of his parents, he had no true concept of what love was.
He reached out and tentatively covered her hand with his. “I know it’s asking a lot. But I’m asking for Gracie’s sake. Will you marry me?”
Hadn’t she seen right away that Johnny would do anything for Gracie?
Even marry her.
And Grace said softly, “Yes.”
Dear Reader,
Traditionally June is the month for weddings, so Silhouette Romance cordially invites you to enjoy our promotion JUNE BRIDES, starting with Suzanne Carey’s Sweet Bride of Revenge. In this sensuously powerful VIRGIN BRIDES tale, a man forces the daughter of his nemesis to marry him, never counting on falling in love with the enemy....
Up-and-comer Robin Nicholas delivers a touching BUNDLES OF JOY titled Man, Wife and Little Wonder. Can a denim-clad, Harleyriding bad boy turn doting dad and dedicated husband? Find out in this classic marriage-of-convenience romance! Next, Donna Clayton’s delightful duo MOTHER & CHILD continues with the evocative title Who’s the Father of Jenny’s Baby? A woman awakens in the hospital to discover she has amnesia—and she’s pregnant! Problem is, two men claim to be the baby’s father—her estranged husband...and her husband’s brother!
Granted: Wild West Bride is the next installment in Carol Grace’s BEST-KEPT WISHES series. This richly Western romance pairs a toughened, taut-muscled cowboy and a sophisticated city gal who welcomes his kisses, but will she accept his ring? For a fresh spin on the bridal theme, try Alice Sharpe’s Wife on His Doorstep. An about-to-be bride stops her wedding to the wrong man. only to land on the doorstep of the strong, silent ship captain who was to perform the ill-fated nuptials.... And in Leanna Wilson’s latest Romance, His Tomboy Bride, Nick Latham was supposed to “give away” childhood friend and bride-to-be Billie Rae—not claim the transformed beauty as his own!
We hope you enjoy the month’s wedding fun, and return each and every month for more classic, emotional, heartwarming novels from Silhouette Romance.
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor Silhouette Romance
Please address questions and book requests to:
Silhouette Reader Service
U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269
Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3
Man, Wife And Little Wonder
Robin Nicholas
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Marilyn Sue Lemmon for her generous support of my
career, and for giving me the kind of encouragement only
another writer can give.
SPECIAL THANKS
To attorney-at-law and fellow author Lauren Phelps for her help with the legal technicalities.
ROBIN NICHOLAS
lives in Illinois with her husband, Dan, and their son, Nick. Her debut book, The Cowboy and His Lady, was part of the successful Silhouette Romance CELEBRATION 1000 promotion. Her current BUNDLES OF JOY feature is her third book for the line, and her fourth Romance novel will be available in the fall of 1998.
Dear Reader,
Having a book chosen for the BUNDLES OF JOY promotion is a very special occasion for me. My son, Nick, is certainly the greatest joy of my life. Through Nick and his cousins, Beth, Kris, Katie, Kyle, Nicholee and Garrett, Shandee and Micah, Justin and Lauren, I have found a constant source of pride, inspiration, laughter and love.
BUNDLES OF JOY celebrates the belief that the wonder of a child can bring to light the love between a man and a woman. I invite you to celebrate that belief with me, as well, in the story of Johnny, Grace and little Gracie in Man, Wife and Little Wonder.
I hope you enjoy the book.
Sincerely,
Chapter One
He was back.
Grace Marie Green tightened her grip on the open door to the Grace Marie Salon. A hot August breeze fanned her face while ribbons of heat rose from the glossy black and silver motorcycle parked diagonally at the curb. Straddling the bike, looking much like the teenage boy she’d once secretly worshiped, was Johnny Tremont.
Johnny pulled off dark glasses and took in his surroundings. Grace caught the gleam in his blue eyes as he removed his helmet, freeing his thick black hair. He stared straight into her green eyes, seeming to absorb all the changes of the past ten years in a matter of seconds. Then, flashing the smile that had once convinced her to let him siphon gas for his Harley from her daddy’s John Deere, he said, “Gracie needs a haircut. And I need you to marry me.”
The noonday heat hit her full in the face and Grace braced herself with a hand on the door frame. She felt almost faint. And she thought she’d just heard Johnny say he needed her to marry him. It had to be this hot weather, causing some kind of hallucination....
Her heart caught as a small body leaned from behind Johnny’s back, a child clad in pink T-shirt and jeans and wearing a pink and black helmet that probably cost more than a year’s worth of spiral perms. Johnny lifted the helmet from the child’s head, revealing dark hair and blue eyes. She knew without a doubt that this pretty child of four was Johnny’s niece, and her namesake, little Gracie.
“Is now okay?”
Johnny’s innocent voice drifted over her, as the sun slanted down, casting a deceptive halo over his gleaming black hair. Grace drew a deep breath. Johnny had said Gracie needed a haircut. She had only imagined the rest. Though it was Monday and the salon was officially closed, she said automatically, “Now is fine.”
“We can talk about getting married afterward,” Johnny said.
That feeling of faintness assailed Grace again.
It hadn’t been a hallucination....
Johnny dismounted and lifted Gracie, carrying the child past her, making brief but potent contact as his arms and legs and hips touched hers, his breath whisking her bangs across her forehead. Grace thought how little her life had changed over the years. But as Johnny brushed by, she could sense a change in the air.
Grace shut the door. What was going on here? Why had Johnny, who had always seen her as a pesky second sister, said such a thing? Hearing the words she’d once dreamed of hearing as an awkward teen only made her angry with him now.
Gracie observed her from where Johnny settled the child on her feet, and Grace’s heart softened. Too solemn, Grace thought, and as the little girl glanced away, too shy. Johnny’s sister, Janelle, had been shy, and Grace felt the same protective instinct for Gracie that she’d felt for her best friend. The feeling was compounded by the accidental death of Gracie’s parents one month earlier, which she assumed had left the child under the guardianship of her maternal grandparents. Too distraught to make the three-hour drive to Chicago, Grace hadn’t attended the funeral. She tried, but failed, to imagine Gracie being raised by the highbrow Tremonts.
Conscious of Johnny’s watchful gaze, Grace stepped into the room, a wariness coming over her that she recognized from years ago whenever Johnny would try to draw her and Janelle into one of his pranks.
I need you to marry me.
Johnny had been smiling as he spoke and Grace realized he’d been teasing. He’d probably gotten a charge out of the shock value of his words. She’d fallen for his joke, of course, just the way she used to.
Most likely, Johnny had brought his niece from Chicago to the country to see where her mother once lived.
Johnny leaned down and whispered in Gracie’s ear. Then Gracie ran over to one of the styling stations and climbed into a chair. With her hand, she pushed off from the counter to set the chair twirling and creaking. Her hair, damp with sweat from the helmet, hung limply to her shoulders and clung to her head.
Grace planted her hands on her hips, frowning at Johnny. “That little girl has no business riding on a motorcycle.”
Though he’d taken a lazy stance, Johnny’s lean body seemed to simmer. His once shaggy hair was now cut in a stylish wedge, short on the sides, long on top. His T-shirt was plain white, devoid of snakes, chains or four-letter words. He wore jeans that looked soft, faded by design rather than as a show of rebellion, and a pair of pricey white high-top tennis shoes, which replaced the leather boots he used to favor. To the average eye, Johnny appeared to have changed.
But Grace had never seen Johnny in the same light as any average person, and with just a glance, she knew better. Johnny Tremont hadn’t changed.
“We only drove from the motel at the edge of town.” His nonchalant tone failed to reassure her. “A friend hauled us and the Harley down from Chicago last night.”
“So you could marry me.” Grace laced her voice with sarcasm, letting him know he hadn’t fooled her with his “proposal.” She was twenty-five, not fifteen. She didn’t have stars in her eyes anymore.
But her sarcasm bounced right off Johnny.
“That’s right.” There was purpose in his step as he drew closer, resolve in his voice as he lowered it to tell her, “In their will, Janelle and Grant named me Gracie’s legal guardian. Now Mother and Dad are suing for guardianship on the grounds that I’m unfit to raise her. I intend to keep Gracie, but to do that, I need a wife. I need you to marry me.”
Johnny’s words hadn’t lost any of their shock value with repetition. On an indrawn breath she whispered a sentiment once shared by all of Ashville, Illinois. “You’re crazy, Johnny.”
“I’ve never been more sane—or serious—in my life,” he responded without hesitation, his jaw set, his eyes more grave than she’d ever seen them.
Johnny, a father figure? The idea defied imagination. But apparently he’d served as one since Janelle and Grant’s deaths.
“Mother’s playing the part to impress her friends. Dad’s indulging her.” His voice grew bitter. “They don’t really want Gracie.”
Grace recalled how the wealthy Tremonts had originally bought the acreage outside of town, near the Green farm, with the hope that quiet country life would keep fifteen-year-old Johnny out of trouble and coax Janelle out of shyness. But their busy lives hadn’t allowed them time for Johnny and Janelle. They’d paid for Johnny’s pranks and had been relieved when Janelle found a friend to keep her amused.
She realized Johnny was right. The Tremonts had never seemed to want Johnny and Janelle. Why would they want Gracie?
“I want to raise Gracie here in Ashville,” Johnny went on. “But the court won’t allow it unless I can provide a better life for her than my parents.”
“That doesn’t necessarily mean you have to marry,” she insisted, her sense of self-preservation kicking in full tilt.
“According to my lawyer, it does.” Johnny’s reply was grim. Marriage had not likely been his first solution to his problem. But it was evident he meant to follow through on his lawyer’s advice, that he meant to marry her.
“I realize I’m asking a lot. But I intend to make this worth your while by paying off the mortgage on your farm, whatever the outcome in court.”
Heat burned Grace’s cheeks. He was paying her to marry him. Nothing could have made it more clear—he still saw her as something less than a desirable woman.
“Once I have guardianship of Gracie, and Mother gets back to her tea parties, we can divorce.”
Nothing except that.
Grace felt a flare of indignation. Worse, she felt all of fifteen again, desperate for Johnny to see her as a woman. A woman in love with him...
Her heart missed a panicked beat. She couldn’t do this.
She was about to tell Johnny so when his gaze cut to Gracie, and she saw a fierce protectiveness come into his eyes, tinged with a trace of desperation. She caught her lip. Johnny, who had never needed anything but his motorcycles and the successful dealership and repair shop he’d started in Chicago, needed her help with Gracie.
Suddenly aware of the quiet, she realized the chair had stopped creaking and Gracie sat watching them, her eyes revealing the sadness inside her.
A sense of fate rolled over Grace. But she only whispered to Johnny, “I don’t know. I need time to think.”
But she couldn’t think clearly standing so close to Johnny. She walked over to the styling station and summoned a smile for Gracie. She pumped the chair as high as it would go, rewarded when Gracie’s lips curved and the little girl leaned to watch the floor descend. She didn’t use the booster chair, because she wanted Gracie to feel like a big girl.
“Just, uh, cut a little off the bottom...” Johnny’s voice trailed off at her baleful stare.
Grace spun Gracie to face the mirror. “How would you like your hair cut, Gracie?”
Gracie stared at her pink tennis shoes. Johnny shifted, and this time Grace warned him clearly with her gaze to keep quiet.
“Like yours,” Gracie finally said.
“Excellent choice.” Grace smiled, her heart turning over. No one had ever wanted to look like her before.
She set to work, tying a pink plastic apron beneath Gracie’s chin. Aware of Johnny’s close regard, she wondered if he noticed that her once long brown hair now swung neatly at her shoulders, that she wore a touch of makeup and a fashionable denim jumper over her crisp white T-shirt. She thought of the ill-fitting clothes and unstyled hair she’d had in high school. She hadn’t exactly been prom material.
But then, in his own way, neither had Johnny.
She parted Gracie’s silky hair while Johnny circled the room, skirting hair care displays and the potted plants she’d been watering. His straight nose wrinkled over the lingering scents of solutions and shampoos. He eyed the photos on the wall of models with elaborate hairdos, coming to a halt before the cash register. Behind it, she’d hung a picture of Elvis sporting a ducktail, in deference to the retro look.
“I remember that picture,” he said.
Of course he remembered. Her parents had been Elvis fans, in their thirties during Elvis’s heyday of movies and songs, when they’d fallen in love. The front hall of the old farmhouse where Grace had lived since her parents’ deaths had been decorated with photos of Elvis when she and Janelle and Johnny were teens. The one time she’d danced with Johnny had been in the living room to a slow Elvis tune.
“Can’t Help Falling In Love.”
Grace shook off the wistful feeling that came over her and gazed at Johnny with a critical eye. He was handsome with his hair cut in that crisp wedge, falling sexily over his forehead. With a ducktail he would look like a devastatingly young Elvis.
He turned then and caught her staring. Hiding her attraction, the way she’d always done, she said haughtily, “A shampoo and trim would do wonders for you.”
Johnny’s gaze glinted right back at her. “I have a barber in the city. And he doesn’t give shampoos.”
Grace turned away to hide her grin. She’d missed the exhilarating rush that came with sparring with Johnny. She’d missed Johnny. Before she could stop the thought, Grace imagined, as she had long ago, what it would be like if he really wanted to marry her.
But he’d come back for Gracie’s sake.
They needed to talk and so she hurried little Gracie’s trim along. Grace was aware from the way Johnny jingled his keys in his pocket that his patience was running out.
Johnny managed not to reach up and push his hand through his hair. He was due for a trip to the barber but he’d be damned if he’d sit in that chair with a pink bib tied around his neck.
Gracie seemed to enjoy getting her hair cut, though. And her smile cut right through to Johnny’s heart. He knew the pain that lurked beneath the surface, knew how Gracie cried in the night, how she clung to him if he had to leave her for a short while, afraid that, like her parents, he wouldn’t come back.
Johnny didn’t leave Gracie anymore. He ran his business by phone. He’d stopped partying, stopped everything for Gracie. He’d turned his world upside down to make her happy. He wasn’t going to lose her now to his parents.
Which meant, according to his lawyer, that he had to clean up his act. Provide a loving home life to rival that of his respectable, wealthy parents. What a joke.
Gracie wasn’t going to grow up in the same cold environment he and Janelle had. Not if he could help it. Not if Grace would marry him.
Frowning, Johnny contemplated Grace. She and Janelle had exchanged occasional letters. Through Janelle he’d learned that Grace was hanging on to that farm by a thread, and that there was no special man in her life. Maybe his proposal was a little sudden, but he could see that she wanted to help Gracie. He couldn’t understand what held her back.
But then, Grace had always been independent. Though she’d never let him down, she’d never been as easily swayed as Janelle to help him in and out of mischief.
He trailed his gaze the length of Grace’s body, over the soft curves that rounded the angles she’d had as a teen. Grace had almost seemed like a sister to him back then, but now...
Snipping little Gracie’s bangs expertly with scissors, Grace caught his gaze. “What?”
“I’d pictured you married by now,” he lied, a little shocked to think he’d imagined that slip of a dress falling to her ankles.
“I pictured you married by now to a bleached blonde wearing spandex.” Grace pursed her lips against a smile. “Spandex over silicone.”
He laughed. A spark of fun had always lurked within Grace even though her life, which had revolved around her mother’s Alzheimer’s disease and resulting financial struggles, had forced her to be responsible and serious. It occurred to Johnny that she didn’t deserve to wind up married to someone like him, even for a little while. She deserved a happily-ever-after kind of guy, one who believed in the game of hearts and flowers and rings. One who believed in love.
But she was just the kind of girl he needed to marry, with her wholesome country upbringing. And he knew she would be good for Gracie, the way she’d been good for shy Janelle.
Grace leaned to snip Gracie’s bangs, her dress hugging her curves—a woman’s curves. Johnny narrowed his gaze. Grace might have acquired a boyfriend in the past month. She might already be engaged to some other guy. He scanned her busy fingers for a ring, but she was moving this way and that, clipping Gracie’s hair, and he couldn’t see. He shifted impatiently.
Gracie, meanwhile, sat like a queen, her little chin lifted in clear imitation of Grace. He was counting on Grace to draw Gracie out of her shell, the way she had Janelle. But he hadn’t expected the effect of Grace’s personality to rub off so quickly. He was more certain than ever that Grace would be good for Gracie, and that he’d done the right thing in coming here.
Grace sensed Johnny’s scrutiny, his impatience. She gave little Gracie’s hair a final combing, then smiled. “In the drawer by the cash register, there’s a box of ribbons and barrettes. You can go pick out some if you’d like.”
Gracie gave a quick nod and climbed from the chair, hurrying over to open the drawer. Grace watched her, while a keen awareness of Johnny’s slow approach radiated through her.
“We need to talk,” he said, echoing her earlier thought in a low voice. He stood close, and she caught the scent of him, still with that hint of motor oil. His belly was flat as it had been when he left town at eighteen, and he looked solid and strong in his white T-shirt. His gaze was unwavering, and it was hard to believe Johnny needed her for anything.
Then the light in his eyes changed, and her heartbeat changed with it. That dark promise she read in Johnny’s gaze was not the kind of promise a brother made to a sister.
But before she could be sure of it, before she could take it to heart, Gracie ran over to them, diverting Johnny. Holding a pink ribbon in each hand, she told him, “I’m hungry.”
Johnny gave Grace a beguiling smile and, as if they were already married, asked, “What’s for lunch?”
With a brief glare for Johnny, Grace smoothed little Gracie’s hair. “How would you like to have lunch on a farm, Gracie?”
“Is there a cow?”
She couldn’t help but laugh. “No cow. But there are kittens you can play with and flowers you can pick.”
Gracie’s smile was Janelle’s smile. It was both endearing and heartbreaking. Grace turned away, but there was no escaping her sorrow, a sorrow that didn’t begin to compare to Gracie’s. Grabbing a can of styling spray, she said quickly, “First, let’s fix those ribbons in your hair.”
Gracie looked longingly at the pink can of spray, the kind her mom used to buy. “Can I, Johnny?”
No “uncle,” just Johnny, Grace noted. Leave it to Johnny to waive the formalities.
He gave his consent in the form of a wary shrug, standing well away from the spray while Grace lightly misted Gracie’s hair. Minutes later, they exited the shop.
Little Gracie was adorable and Grace felt a pride in Janelle’s child, a pride she supposed Janelle had felt tenfold. She imagined herself brushing Gracie’s hair each morning, tucking her into bed at night.
She imagined tucking Johnny into bed, too....
“Hey, Gold Groceries is still open?” Johnny said, pointing just down the street at the store’s sign.
Grace always thought it had been Johnny who’d thrown the rock that broke the bulb that lit up the “G,” leaving the sign to read “old” Groceries.
“Let’s walk down there and I’ll get some stuff for lunch.”
She glanced uneasily at Johnny. “I have plenty of food at the farm.”
“Bet you don’t have the right kind of peanut butter. Come on, I want Gracie to see Gold’s. I remember hanging around there, drinking pop and watching girls.”
“I remember you were banned from the store,” Grace muttered, hoping by get some stuff for lunch, Johnny meant he would pay for it. His parents had paid dearly for the fireworks he’d stolen.
Grace started after him, certain Henry Gold wouldn’t share Johnny’s enthusiasm if he knew Johnny was coming to his store.
As they walked down the street, Gracie skipped before them, never more than two cracks in the sidewalk ahead. Grace thought all of Ashville must be watching and wondering over Johnny’s return. She imagined the last thing they would think was that he’d come back to marry her.
Although, watching Gracie’s carefree skipping, Grace could understand Johnny’s desire to raise his shy niece in the quiet town of Ashville as opposed to the city. She pressed her lips wryly. She could understand, as well, why Johnny’s lawyer thought marriage would make the court more amenable to his keeping guardianship of Gracie.
Johnny drifted closer to her side, until his arm brushed her shoulder and their hips met occasionally, the skirt of her jumper ruffled by the brush of his jeans. She wanted to look up at him, see the blueblack shine of his hair in the sun, but she ignored the impulse. Instead, she contemplated the prospect of Johnny raising Gracie, when all he’d ever raised was Cain.
She wanted to help Gracie, too. But the truth was, she didn’t know much more about kids than Johnny. Her mother’s struggle with Alzheimer’s had resulted in her spending many hours at home or at the Ashville Nursing Home, instead of baby-sitting like most teenage girls. And the idea of marriage to Johnny, once a dream of hers, seemed only a painful prospect, with the knowledge that he didn’t love her.
Gracie spotted the store, interrupting Grace’s thoughts with her excitement as she read her initial, G, on the sign to Johnny.
Johnny grinned. “Just seeing that place makes me want a beefstick and a cola.”
“Hardly an appropriate lunch for a little girl,” Grace pointed out, certain that was just what he had in mind.
“I like peanut butter,” Gracie said.
“With celery,” Johnny added. “Let’s go.”
Inside, the store was cool and dim and quiet. Henry came from behind the counter, wearing a clean white apron over his bib overalls. His frown had left wrinkles over the years, and his drawn eyebrows were now white, matching the wispy hair on his head. Johnny towered over him at six feet, but that didn’t keep Henry from aiming his famous glare at Johnny.
“Well, if it ain’t Johnny Tremont. Heard you was in jail and heard you was rich. Which is it?”
“Well, I’m not in jail,” Johnny said pointedly, leaving Grace to hope he would mind his temper.
“Humph. I got mirrors now.” Henry pointed his gnarled finger over the door and to a back corner of the little square store. “And alarms.” Henry nodded toward Gracie. “Who have you got there?”
Grace expected little Gracie to wilt beneath Henry’s perpetual glare. But Gracie only stared at Henry, a funny little smile on her face.
Johnny rested his hand on Gracie’s shoulder. “This is my niece, Gracie.”
As much as was possible, Henry’s face softened. “I was sorry to hear about Janelle.” Then he added meaningfully, “She was a good girl.” He frowned down at Gracie. “Are you a good girl?”
Gracie nodded vigorously. “Johnny said so.”
“Humph. Don’t break anything in the store. If you don’t break anything, I’ll give you a candy.” Henry shuffled behind the counter, mumbling about apples falling close to the tree.
Johnny drew a deep breath and headed down the aisle to the peanut butter. Grace knew he would find it in the same place that it had been ten years ago.
“He’s Grumpy,” Gracie chimed, looking back at Henry.
“Old grouch hasn’t changed any, that’s for sure,” Johnny muttered.
“No, like Grumpy the dwarf,” Gracie explained.
Grace laughed. “You mean the dwarf in Snow White?”
“Johnny reads it to me,” Gracie said, choosing peanut butter and leaving Grace to contend with the appealing image of Johnny reading a fairy tale, his niece cuddled beside him.
In all her years of daydreaming about Johnny, it was certainly not something she’d ever imagined before.
Gracie’s presence seemed to have quite an effect on Johnny. Years ago, Johnny and Henry had had a running feud, Johnny laughing off every battle. Now he almost seemed bothered by his lingering reputation, most likely because of Gracie.
Along with Gracie’s peanut butter, they chose oranges and celery and ham. Grace insisted she had anything else they might need, but when they reached the counter, Gracie wanted cupcakes. Johnny immediately went in search of the treat with Gracie, holding his niece’s hand. Grace dug in her skirt pocket for quarters to buy Gracie candy, thinking maybe Johnny had changed some after all—
A crash came from the back of the store, followed by the thunder of rolling canned goods.
Grace closed her eyes. Maybe not.
Chapter Two
Gracie.
Grace dropped her quarters on the counter. Henry glared into the mirror over the door, that look of old in his eyes. Ignoring him, she ran to the pyramid of soup cans she’d seen at the back of the store.
She found Johnny holding Gracie safe in his arms, cans rocking to a halt at his feet.
His anxious gaze met Grace’s over top of the little girl’s head. His breath rushed out. “She’s all right.”
Grace felt the tension leave her, only to have it rise again as Henry came to survey the damage, something he’d done often in Johnny’s presence. In the quiet aftermath, the whir of a ceiling fan brought to mind the time Johnny had dropped a bag of flour in front of Henry’s old floor model fan. Grace caught her lip, recalling the shouting match that had ensued. Actually, it had seemed funny at the time.
Henry glowered at Johnny. “Figured it was you.”
Gracie clutched her arms about Johnny’s neck. “Johnny didn’t do it.”
“Humph. Heard that before.”
Gracie’s soft little arms squeezed the defiance right out of Johnny. He wasn’t going to get in a yelling match with old Henry, not with Gracie listening—and Grace.
Johnny narrowed his gaze. Grace was trying not to laugh, her eyes sparkling at him. A sense of déjà vu washed over him. He recalled Grace laughing at him that way years ago, as he stood in this store, powdered with flour, Henry dusted with it, too, while the old man called him a delinquent.
And they said you couldn’t go home again.
Johnny stood rooted in the past, recalling the way Grace had laughed at him that day, her long hair spilling past the shoulders of the faded shirt she wore. In some ways, she’d changed. Her hair now swung across her shoulders, which were covered in the soft white cotton of a formfitting T-shirt beneath the sassy little dress she wore. She looked sexy as hell.
But in another way, she was still the same Grace, daring to laugh at him with those green eyes.
And that was sexy, too.
“You clean this up, Johnny Tremont. I’ve got a customer. And don’t forget, I’ve got mirrors.” Henry turned toward the front of the store, muttering about dented cans and delinquents.
Grace grinned openly and Johnny shot her a menacing look. She’d watched him sweep up flour years ago, grinning at him over the rim of a cola bottle. “Are you going to help stack these cans, or just stand and watch?”
Gracie squirmed, wanting down. “Can I help?”
Johnny set little Gracie on her feet. “You bet. We’ll rebuild the pyramid and you can put on the top can. Do you think we should let Grace help?”
Gracie gave a quick nod.
“You’re in,” Johnny said, smirking at Grace.
She was a good sport—too much so, Johnny decided. Grace crouched in her flirty dress, giving him flashes of smooth slim thigh as they worked toward the center of the pile from opposite directions. Little Gracie had a great time, while Johnny suffered.
Until the moment he saw Grace again, Johnny had only thought of marriage to her in terms of keeping guardianship of Gracie. Now he found himself rethinking the idea on a more primal level.
There were a lot of cans, and he gave Gracie a break, sending her to put the cupcakes on Henry’s counter. He and Grace had inched almost nose to nose, and as their knees brushed, she wobbled. He reached out and curled his hand about her arm, and the softness of her skin stilled him.
He knew Grace felt his tension when she paused. He smoothed his thumb across her skin and got a jolt out of her direct gaze.
He wondered what she’d do if he kissed her.
Never one to wonder for. long, Johnny leaned closer. Grace smelled heavenly. Sweet and womanly, a potent combination. Her eyes seemed to glaze over, focused on his mouth as he eased it toward her pink parted lips—
“Henry’s got mirrors,” she whispered, not quite breaking the spell. They hovered inches apart, Johnny not giving a damn about mirrors, yet aware it probably mattered to Grace, who likely remembered what a kiss with Johnny Tremont used to mean to a girl’s reputation in Ashville—never mind if a kiss had been all that had happened.
Gracie came running back then and Johnny didn’t miss the quick way Grace backed off. Even faster than he. He could feel her wary gaze upon him, though, likely seeing him in a new light. She’d probably always thought of him as a pesky older brother, in the same way he’d thought of her as a sister. So all these sexual vibes bouncing between them had to be as much a shock to her as they were to him.
Johnny stacked the remaining cans, lifting Gracie to place the last one on top as promised. Their task accomplished, the three of them headed for the front of the store. Johnny was aware that Grace kept her distance.
Under Henry’s watchful eye, Johnny paid for his purchases. He hoisted the sack in his arms and led the way to the door.
“Come get a candy, little girl,” Henry called to Gracie, amazing Johnny. Even more amazing, Gracie ran back and Henry handed a lollipop down to her.
“Thank you,” Gracie said in a near whisper.
Johnny couldn’t have been more surprised if Gracie had shouted. Not that Gracie was ill-mannered; she was usually just too shy to. talk, without Johnny by her side to prompt the conversation. But then, Gracie thought Henry was a dwarf.
Johnny’s imagination didn’t stretch quite that far.
After a moment Gracie hurried over, beaming.
“I said I was sorry I spilled the cans. And he said I’m a good girl.”
“You are a good girl,” Johnny said proudly, gratified to think that a month spent with him hadn’t changed that fact, the way his parents thought it would.
Then he noticed Grace staring at him, probably contemplating the fact that he’d taken the rap for Gracie. After all, she “knew him when.” But Grace’s eyes were soft and warm and the emotion in them somehow embarrassed him. Out of earshot of Gracie he muttered, “Old grouch never gave me candy.”
“He always gave licorice to me and Janelle,” Grace recalled, her wistful tone telling Johnny she was missing Janelle the same as he. The sweet sharp coil of desire for her unraveled inside him, leaving a bittersweet compassion. He thought Grace’s pain must be as great as his own, she and Janelle had been so close.
They left the store, following Gracie down the sidewalk. “Janelle married a great guy,” Johnny said abruptly. “She was happy. But she always regretted that his work took her away from here, away from you.”
“Thank you for telling me.” Grace smiled up at him and he felt his heart stutter. “You can be pretty nice when you want to, Johnny Tremont.”
Johnny was disconcerted to realize just how nice he wanted to be.
The three of them came to a halt by his Harley. Gracie grabbed her pink-striped helmet and Johnny winked down at her. “Gracie likes the hog, don’t you, Gracie?”
Gracie gazed adoringly at Johnny. “I like the hog.”
Grace didn’t appear to share that sentiment. “Gracie shouldn’t ride that thing down the highway. We can take my car to the farm and you can leave the bike here.”
“Leave the Harley?” Was she crazy? If she’d told him to leave little Gracie, Johnny wouldn’t have been more appalled. “It might get stolen.”
“The police station is right over there.” She pointed up the block, across the street. “Who in Ashville is going to steal it anyway? Mrs. Cromwell?”
Johnny remembered Mrs. Cromwell, the florist. The thought of her plump body, clad in a floral dress and seated on his bike, made him wince.
“If you’re really worried, you could ask Eddie from the gas station to keep an eye on it.”
Johnny shuddered. Eddie of the hit-and-miss repairs was the last person he wanted around his bike.
“Remember the time you hauled the Harley in Dad’s truck?” Grace smiled wistfully. “I wish that old Ford still ran.”
Johnny wished it did, too. He wished it was parked here right now, with the Harley loaded in back because Grace was right. He didn’t want to take Gracie out on the two-lane highway on the bike. He could follow Grace along on the Harley, but he was certain little Gracie wouldn’t go in the car without him.
“I’ll lock up the bike and leave it.” Johnny swore he felt physical pain as he did just that. He grabbed his helmet and the three of them climbed into Grace’s car. They buckled Gracie in the back with her lollipop.
Johnny couldn’t help but approve of Grace’s little blue coupe. Like her salon, it was neat and clean. There were magnets shaped like hair bows holding small notes on the dash. One reminded her to pick up clothes from the cleaners. Another read, “C.S.—Saturday.”
He frowned at the second note. A date? Grace’s bare ring finger had ruled out a fiancé, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t a man in her life. For Gracie’s sake, he was duty-bound to find out.
Checking to find Gracie busy with her lollipop and looking out the car window, Johnny tapped the note and asked idly, “Who’s C.S.?”
Grace raised her brows in a what-business-of- yours-is-it? look. Most likely because he’d asked her to marry him, she deigned to answer. “A customer.”
Johnny immediately relaxed. Probably one of those little old ladies who liked their hair fixed like a French poodle’s.
“Chase Sinclair. He’s one of my regulars.” While he stared at her, Grace braked for a stop, proceeded with caution and added casually, “We’ve dated a couple of times.”
Johnny stared harder.
Chase. He had never liked that name. And he didn’t like the familiar way Grace said it, or the unfamiliar ill humor he felt at her words. He hoped she realized that for Gracie’s sake, the dates had to stop if they were to marry.
With forced nonchalance, he said mockingly, “Chase and Grace. Sounds like a cartoon.”
Gracie giggled. Grace glowered. “That’s juvenile, Johnny.”
“You used to have a sense of humor,” Johnny noted.
“I had to,” Grace muttered. “Or I’d have been mad at you all the time.” At his look of protest, she added, “Take that time you put gum in my hair.”
Johnny winced, effectively chastened. Grace had had to cut bangs in her hair after that prank. Still, Johnny liked to think he’d inspired her life’s work.
“And the time you scared me and Janelle when we camped on my porch.”
Ah, yes. Her father had threatened to shoot until he realized who had made the girls scream. Grace and Janelle had had to sleep in the house the rest of the night. And all over a harmless garden snake.
A sense of nostalgia swept over Johnny and he suddenly missed Janelle more than ever. He caught Grace’s gaze, saw the grief she couldn’t quite mask. This trip down memory lane had gone on long enough. He turned in the seat. “We’re almost there, Gracie.”
“Why did you put gum in her hair?” Gracie asked.
“Ah...”
“Because Johnny was a tease. Does he like to tease you, too?” Grace asked.
There was a moment’s pause, then little Gracie overcame her shyness to tattle. “He tickles me. But he stops if I say he has to.”
“That doesn’t sound like the Johnny I know,” Grace murmured.
He frowned. Couldn’t she see he wasn’t the same person he’d been one month ago, let alone the rebellious kid he’d been as a teen? His world revolved around Gracie now.
He ran his business from Janelle’s fine home, having given up his bachelor apartment. The last date he’d had was when he took Gracie to the cinema to see Snow White. Oddly, he hadn’t missed that aspect of his life until Grace had stirred up his hormones.
Still a little surprised by that turn of events, he took a discreet survey of Grace, just testing his reaction. As she braked for the turn into the gravel lane that led to the Greens’ farmhouse, Grace’s skirt inched up her leg. Her skin looked silky smooth, and she wasn’t even wearing stockings. The strap of her sandal around her ankle riveted his attention. He imagined his hand wrapped there, his lips there...
Johnny dragged his gaze away.
The car came to a halt as Grace parked before the square garage. He remembered hiding in there once, after he’d sprayed Janelle and Grace with the hose. Grace had only been thirteen when he’d chased her and gotten her shirt all wet. He imagined she would look a little different now in a wet T-shirt.
“Here we are.”
He jerked his gaze from Grace’s shirtfront, a hot sweat breaking out on his skin. He hadn’t counted on this. Hadn’t counted on having sexual feelings for Grace. He wasn’t going to look at her that way again, wasn’t going to think about her that way. He wasn’t going to marry her.
Then little Gracie climbed out of the car and cried with delight, “This is like the house in my farm book. Where are the kittens?” she asked excitedly.
Looking at Gracie’s happy face, Johnny guessed he was getting married after all. But he was damn well going to keep his hands to himself. These feelings he was having for Grace seemed downright immoral.
Little Gracie was so excited, he was more than happy to crawl halfway under the porch and catch the kittens. They were a rambunctious trio of calicoes, everything Gracie could have hoped for. She sat cross-legged in the grassy shade of an elm, kittens crawling in and out of her lap.
Grace had taken the groceries into the kitchen. Johnny looked toward the house, aware this was a good time to speak privately with her, yet feeling oddly reluctant. Telling Gracie to stay put, he left the little girl with her new friends and went inside.
The house was cool and quiet, the shades drawn against the sun. He noticed the upstairs was boarded off, heard the hum of an air conditioner that hadn’t been part of the house years ago. Otherwise, the place seemed unchanged.
Having moved from city to city in his early childhood, Johnny could only imagine what it must feel like to grow up and live in the same house all of your life, how it must feel to risk losing such a part of your past. Funny, how he’d only come to the Green farm to pester Grace and Janelle when he was bored, yet it was here that some of his happier memories took place.
Prints and posters of Elvis had once been framed on the walls of the hall. In the living room, the Greens had kept an old phonograph that spun forty-fives of Elvis tunes. He imagined that stuff was tucked away in the attic. He hated to think Grace would have parted with it.
Johnny wandered into the living room. A life-size poster of Elvis had once been propped in the corner, where Grace now kept a potted plant like those in her salon. Johnny grinned, thinking Elvis had more aesthetic appeal.
“When Mama was in the nursing home, we took the poster of Elvis there,” Grace said from behind him as if reading his thoughts. “Dad said it kept her company.”
Johnny turned to face Grace where she stood in the doorway. She looked all of fifteen again, missing her mother long before Mrs. Green had been physically gone. He said simply, “That was nice.”
“Dad left it there after Mama died. Every time I go back, they’ve got it propped in a corner somewhere.”
“You still go to the nursing home?”
“I give haircuts to some of the residents. Mama had a lot of friends there. Now they’re my friends.”
Johnny suspected that over the years, Grace had spent too much time at that nursing home.
But she smiled as she spoke of the people there. “Mama turned them all into Elvis freaks.”
“Fans,” Johnny corrected. “Fans of the King.”
“Now you sound like my dad.”
Johnny didn’t feel like Grace’s father. Right now, his thoughts probably had her dad rolling in the grave.
He shouldn’t be thinking about making love with Grace. He couldn’t possibly have sex with Grace.
Oh, yeah, he could.
Oh, no, he wouldn’t.
He’d have to handle this carefully, he realized. He wanted Grace, and he was certain that wanting wasn’t all one-sided, however reluctant Grace appeared. But she wasn’t the kind of girl you had a fling with, not even a married fling.
The best way to approach this marriage, he decided, was on the basis of past friendship. No hearts involved.
And no sex.
“Where is Gracie?” Grace asked suddenly, stepping into the room.
“Playing with the kittens.”
“Good. We have to figure some way short of marriage that you can keep guardianship of her.”
Johnny frowned at her words, only just remembering what he’d come in here for. Then Grace walked over, stopping before him. In the dim light that filtered through the shades, she seemed suddenly, intimately close. Johnny fought to curb his adolescent reaction to her nearness. On pure reflex, he took a step back, a new dance for Johnny Tremont.
“Hold still. You’ve got cobwebs in your hair from crawling under the porch.” Grace seemed amused and reached up to brush them away, her nearness creating a potent charge between them. When she pressed briefly against him, the snug denim over her breasts touched his chest. Johnny absorbed the shock to his system and tried not to short-circuit. With each sweep of her hand, Grace’s fingers seemed to slip farther into his hair, her sweet-smelling wrist near his face, her skirt weaving about his jeans-clad legs, her sandaled feet nudging his tennis shoes. Overwhelmed, Johnny eyed the distance between Grace’s mouth and his.
“You have really thick hair,” Grace murmured. The brush of her fingers seemed to slow as they pushed their way through the strands. “A lot of women spend hours at the salon, trying to have hair this thick and dark.”
Johnny struggled to focus his muddled thoughts.
Friends, not lovers.
A memory of dancing with Grace here in this room flashed through his mind. Sun had streamed through the window onto her shiny hair. He’d been singing along with Elvis. She’d been laughing at him. Then she’d rested her head against his shoulder, pressed her slight body to his—
I can’t help falling in love...
As Johnny’s hair filled her palm, Grace stilled. She was suddenly conscious of the scant space between their bodies, aware that a deep heat burned in Johnny’s eyes. A longing from years ago surfaced. Grace reminded herself that Johnny was here on a mission, that he was used to having what he wanted from women. What she was feeling for him could hurt her now more than ever.
She drew back her hand, but her eyes fluttered closed as Johnny’s warm breath caressed her face. She felt him anchor his hands at her waist, and for a moment she suffered conflicting fears—that he would push her away...that he wouldn’t. Johnny seemed to sense the restlessness that moved through her. He touched his lips to hers gently, giving the kiss she’d imagined Johnny giving her when she was a girl.
But she wasn’t a girl anymore and the sweetness of his kiss didn’t soothe her. Grace only felt more restless. With his hot hands, Johnny settled her body against his. He seemed to know how, when and where to touch his lips to hers, to press her body closer, drawing a response she couldn’t hide. Yearning speared through her. And yet...
She loosened the hold she’d taken on Johnny’s shirtfront. But before she’d uncurled her fingers from the soft cotton, he raised his mouth from hers, his hands at her waist again, setting her away from him. Hearing the screen door slam, Grace wanted to think it was because of Gracie. But her cheeks grew hot as Johnny stepped back and shoved his hands in his pockets.
He hadn’t meant to kiss her.
“Johnny!” Gracie called from the hall. “Come and see what the kittens can do!”
“I’ll be right there,” Johnny called in answer. The door slammed again. Johnny didn’t move. But his gaze was evasive, those quick hands of his still hidden in his pockets.
Grace burned. From desire, from anger, from embarrassment. Had she only imagined those looks he’d been giving her? That tense moment in the store? Grace recalled Johnny’s lack of reaction—other than to joke around—when she’d purposely mentioned dating Chase with the hope of seeing some spark of jealousy. How could she have been so foolish as to forget that he intended to pay her to marry him, that he did so because of Gracie?
So why had he kissed her?
“I’m sorry, Grace. I guess I just—I mean it’s been a long time—”
That was why. Grace smiled sweetly, but she simmered inside. “Has Gracie been cramping your style?”
Johnny stilled in the act of pushing his hand through his hair. She could still feel the softness of those dark strands on her fingers. “Yeah. That explains it.”
Johnny looked so relieved, Grace wanted to smack him. But Gracie was waiting outside for him, so all she said was, “Apology accepted. You’d better go see to Gracie.”
“Yeah. I’ll do that.” Johnny turned away in unflattering haste. Then he turned back. “Gracie really does need me. She needs us. Just think about my offer, about the mortgage and getting married.”
Johnny left the room. A moment later Grace heard the screen door softly close.
Think about us getting married.
There’d been a time when she hadn’t dreamed of anything else. Then Johnny had left town and unwittingly broken her heart.
She couldn’t let that happen again.
She went to the kitchen and jerked open the refrigerator door, reaching for lemonade, letting the blast of cold air chill her face before swinging the door shut.
Who else but Johnny had the nerve to return after ten years to ask a favor like marriage? Why, Johnny had no more desire to be married than he did to sell his Harley for scrap metal. As for raising a child—Grace let out a breath of disdain. Johnny had never been responsible for anything but cleaning the carburetor on his bike. That was play to him. That was why he’d made it his life’s work.
Grace poured lemonade and fixed sandwiches. She plunked the glasses, along with the plates, onto a tray and marched with it out the front door. While she arranged their lunch on the redwood table, Johnny led little Gracie from beneath the tree and into the house to wash her hands.
The screen door banged behind them. Grace stared as it settled, contemplating their mission in a different light than she once would have. If Johnny had his way, he’d be responsible for making sure Gracie washed her hands until she was grown.
He probably still had trouble remembering to do so himself.
When they returned, Gracie ate quickly, wanting to get back to the kittens. When the little girl scampered over to the elm, Johnny turned to straddle the bench, resting his elbow on the table top. He watched Gracie so long, so intently, Grace thought he must have forgotten she was there. She saw the way his mouth alternately tensed and curved as he watched Gracie, the way his eyes grew light, then dark with worry. Grace’s anger lifted with the breeze that ruffled through Johnny’s hair.
He finally said, “Janelle was a wonderful mother, and Grant a great father. That’s a tough act to follow.”
She didn’t detect any resentment there, just a genuine lack of confidence in his ability to raise his niece—a justifiable doubt, she had to agree. Johnny seemed to truly love little Gracie, to want this role he’d chosen in her life. But Grace couldn’t help thinking of all he must have given up to do so.
“For Gracie’s sake, my parents have agreed there will be no interim hearings and no scenes in front of Gracie. Still, things haven’t been easy for her. I talked to her doctor and he agreed that bringing her here to the country would do her good.”
As if in affirmation, Gracie held a kitten to her cheek and smiled, her eyes closing in what Grace thought must be a rare moment of peace in the recent turmoil of her young life.
“You’d be good for her, too,” Johnny said quietly.
Grace filled her lungs with warm summer air. She wanted to help Janelle’s child. But it was hard not to imagine having her heart broken in the process.
And, like Johnny, she lacked confidence in her ability to meet Gracie’s needs. “I don’t know much about kids, Johnny. I never even baby-sat when I was a teen.”
“You’re a woman. Child rearing is supposed to come instinctively,” Johnny said with the blithe ignorance of a man.
“That’s a myth. Even women have to learn about children. I’ve spent more time with the elderly than I have with kids.”
Johnny grinned then. “Same thing. We all revert as we get older. We start watching cartoons again, start wearing bright colors. We actually decrease in size. By the time we kick the bucket, we’re bald as babies and have just as many teeth.”
Grace couldn’t help laughing. Johnny was irreverent. He always had been, and all the girls had been in love with him for it, herself included. But her laughter dwindled and Johnny’s did, too. There was so much at stake where little Gracie was concerned.
“She wakes up at night crying.” Johnny spoke as if the very image his words conjured pained him. “She cries if I leave her, afraid I won’t come back.”
Oh, Janelle. Tears burned Grace’s eyes, for she knew little Gracie’s unhappiness would break Janelle’s heart. She reminded herself that Janelle was at peace in heaven with Grant. But Gracie... Gracie needed her.
“My parents won’t give Gracie the love she needs,” he said simply, and Grace wondered if he realized how revealing that sentiment was where he and Janelle were concerned. “And there’s little chance the court will let me keep her unless I marry.”
He turned to her then, more serious than she’d ever seen him. “I realize we won’t have one of those one-in-a-million kind of marriages like Janelle and Grant had. But we’ve got friendship going for us, haven’t we?”
Grace couldn’t deny it. Hadn’t Johnny always fixed the chain on her bicycle? Driven her and Janelle into town to see the movies?
Friends...
Johnny was watching her, his blue eyes intent and warming her clear to that place in her heart that had always been just for him. She recognized the yearning inside her, just as she saw quite clearly that Johnny knew no such feeling, that because of his parents, he had no true concept of what love was.
He reached out and tentatively covered her hand with his atop the table. The yearning within her spread and deepened. Instinctively, Grace curled her fingers into a protective ball.
He let go of her hand. “I know it’s asking a lot. But I’m asking for Gracie’s sake. Will you marry me, Grace?”
A warm breeze fanned her face; the sun flashed through the tree leaves into her eyes, making them burn, making her blink.
Hadn’t she seen right away that Johnny would do anything for Gracie?
Even marry her.
And Grace said softly, “Yes. I’ll many you, Johnny.”
Chapter Three
She’d said “yes.”
Standing on the porch with his hot palm curled around an icy glass of lemonade, Johnny watched Grace as she reclined on the grass with Gracie, playing with the kittens. He was going to be married. Moisture dripped from the sides of the glass onto his sneakers.
He couldn’t remember ever feeling nervous over anything. Except maybe that time the police impounded the Harley...
But he felt nervous now, all those worries over being a parent compounded by the prospect of marriage—even a short-term marriage. He’d never given much thought—any thought—to either possibility until Janelle and Grant had died.
Gracie laughed out loud at something Grace whispered to her, and a sense of gratitude welled within him. No one could stay in a shell around Grace. It was like trying to stay out of the sun in a desert. He’d been right to think she could make Gracie happy.
He’d been wrong to expect she would still seem like a sister to him.
After he kissed her, he’d started to tell her how much she’d changed, and how much she hadn’t, and how much the combination affected him. Thank God she’d misunderstood and thought he was suffering from sexual frustration.
Grace stretched in pursuit of a kitten, her skirt creeping tantalizingly high. Tension skittered through him. He was suffering from sexual frustration.
Grace settled back, and Johnny’s pulse relaxed, too. He watched her and little Gracie herd kittens between them and swore once again that he would keep his hands to himself. Gracie’s future depended on him. Taking a long pull of cold lemonade, he walked over and sat atop the picnic table.
“What are their names?” Gracie asked, corralling the kittens, and Johnny smiled over every word directed at Grace.
“Well... they could use good names,” Grace said, and Johnny knew that she’d already named them, that she was letting Gracie give them new ones. “Do you know any good names?”
“I know the names of the Seven Dwarfs.”
“All seven names?”
“Grumpy, Dopey, Sleepy, Sneezy...Doc and Happy and Bashful.” Gracie scooped a wandering kitten into her hand and held it close to her face. “He’s smiling. His name is Happy.”
Caught up in the game, Grace picked up another kitten. “This one looks kind of Grumpy.”
“No, Grumpy is the man at the store. He’s...” The kitten yawned and Gracie named it appropriately. “Sleepy.”
Johnny was enchanted by little Gracie as he’d never been before. Since Janelle and Grant’s deaths, she’d never been this animated with others, not even when he was right there with her.
Gracie seemed to have forgotten him, seemed to have found peace. As that sense of peace flowed over him, too, Johnny realized how closely his emotions were tied to little Gracie’s.
Gracie traded her kitten for the last one, who tried to hide its face ostrich-like in her hands. “He won’t look at me, so he’s Bashful. Grandmother Tremont calls me Bashful when I won’t look at her. She said I’m just like my mother.”
Johnny’s serenity vanished with Gracie’s words. Damn his mother’s thoughtlessness. As if being like her mother was something Gracie should be ashamed of.
He was no shrink, but he figured if you told an impressionable kid she was shy too often, she would start to. believe it, and to accept it. He straightened, planning to undo his mother’s damage, when Grace’s soft voice stopped him.
“You are like your mother.” Johnny saw the effort with which Grace tempered her words for little Gracie. “She was my best friend, did you know that?”
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Robin Nicholas
JUNE BRIDESBundles of JoySometimes small packages can lead to the biggest surprises!THE BAD BOYJohnny Tremont had once worn rebellion and recklessness as ruggedly as his black leather jacket. But now he was father figure to his young, needy niece, and he was determined to do right by her, no matter what it took.THE BRIDEWhat it took was the hand of a childhood friend Grace Marie Green. Marriage to this pert, upstanding beautician would guarantee him custody of her namesake, Gracie, and would give his little girl the perfect maternal role model…for a little while.THE BUNDLE OF JOYBut Johnny hadn't realized what an amazing effect a desirable wife and a darling little wonder could have on a man like him….Celebrate a month of joyful marriages with Silhouette Romance!
“She wakes up at night crying.” (#u6c43db9b-7ef7-5a4b-bf9d-36a85a6dc246)Letter to Reader (#u22ec0c87-9d8a-587e-a2ba-e543932e71d0)Title Page (#uc7e8c105-eeb7-5d21-bba4-40fe9cd2cb5d)Dedication (#u06a8e2c4-7482-57d5-a595-a16bb1fcba15)Acknowledgments (#u0699afb2-8cbe-5283-8bf6-fbe7e3d30110)About the Author (#ud113ac39-f073-5aef-a9dc-47ff36398147)Letter to Reader (#u0e7afd7d-e006-5290-92ab-efe86f78f628)Chapter One (#uc2e7ed99-bad3-5f3d-af40-bd0189b0e456)Chapter Two (#u5b1cbe4d-dea8-5ef7-8868-39149fb02cf9)Chapter Three (#ub3e8eb5d-80bd-5b42-8919-a0501c059a0f)Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“She wakes up at night crying.”
Johnny spoke as if the image his words conjured pained him. He turned to her then, more serious than she’d ever seen him. “I realize we won’t have one of those one-in-a-million kind of marriages, Grace, but we’ve got friendship going for us, haven’t we?”
His blue eyes were intent, warming her clear to that place in her heart that had always been just for him. She recognized the yearning inside her, just as she saw quite clearly that Johnny knew no such feeling, that because of his parents, he had no true concept of what love was.
He reached out and tentatively covered her hand with his. “I know it’s asking a lot. But I’m asking for Gracie’s sake. Will you marry me?”
Hadn’t she seen right away that Johnny would do anything for Gracie?
Even marry her.
And Grace said softly, “Yes.”
Dear Reader,
Traditionally June is the month for weddings, so Silhouette Romance cordially invites you to enjoy our promotion JUNE BRIDES, starting with Suzanne Carey’s Sweet Bride of Revenge. In this sensuously powerful VIRGIN BRIDES tale, a man forces the daughter of his nemesis to marry him, never counting on falling in love with the enemy....
Up-and-comer Robin Nicholas delivers a touching BUNDLES OF JOY titled Man, Wife and Little Wonder. Can a denim-clad, Harleyriding bad boy turn doting dad and dedicated husband? Find out in this classic marriage-of-convenience romance! Next, Donna Clayton’s delightful duo MOTHER & CHILD continues with the evocative title Who’s the Father of Jenny’s Baby? A woman awakens in the hospital to discover she has amnesia—and she’s pregnant! Problem is, two men claim to be the baby’s father—her estranged husband...and her husband’s brother!
Granted: Wild West Bride is the next installment in Carol Grace’s BEST-KEPT WISHES series. This richly Western romance pairs a toughened, taut-muscled cowboy and a sophisticated city gal who welcomes his kisses, but will she accept his ring? For a fresh spin on the bridal theme, try Alice Sharpe’s Wife on His Doorstep. An about-to-be bride stops her wedding to the wrong man. only to land on the doorstep of the strong, silent ship captain who was to perform the ill-fated nuptials.... And in Leanna Wilson’s latest Romance, His Tomboy Bride, Nick Latham was supposed to “give away” childhood friend and bride-to-be Billie Rae—not claim the transformed beauty as his own!
We hope you enjoy the month’s wedding fun, and return each and every month for more classic, emotional, heartwarming novels from Silhouette Romance.
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor Silhouette Romance
Please address questions and book requests to:
Silhouette Reader Service
U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269
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Man, Wife And Little Wonder
Robin Nicholas
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Marilyn Sue Lemmon for her generous support of my
career, and for giving me the kind of encouragement only
another writer can give.
SPECIAL THANKS
To attorney-at-law and fellow author Lauren Phelps for her help with the legal technicalities.
ROBIN NICHOLAS
lives in Illinois with her husband, Dan, and their son, Nick. Her debut book, The Cowboy and His Lady, was part of the successful Silhouette Romance CELEBRATION 1000 promotion. Her current BUNDLES OF JOY feature is her third book for the line, and her fourth Romance novel will be available in the fall of 1998.
Dear Reader,
Having a book chosen for the BUNDLES OF JOY promotion is a very special occasion for me. My son, Nick, is certainly the greatest joy of my life. Through Nick and his cousins, Beth, Kris, Katie, Kyle, Nicholee and Garrett, Shandee and Micah, Justin and Lauren, I have found a constant source of pride, inspiration, laughter and love.
BUNDLES OF JOY celebrates the belief that the wonder of a child can bring to light the love between a man and a woman. I invite you to celebrate that belief with me, as well, in the story of Johnny, Grace and little Gracie in Man, Wife and Little Wonder.
I hope you enjoy the book.
Sincerely,
Chapter One
He was back.
Grace Marie Green tightened her grip on the open door to the Grace Marie Salon. A hot August breeze fanned her face while ribbons of heat rose from the glossy black and silver motorcycle parked diagonally at the curb. Straddling the bike, looking much like the teenage boy she’d once secretly worshiped, was Johnny Tremont.
Johnny pulled off dark glasses and took in his surroundings. Grace caught the gleam in his blue eyes as he removed his helmet, freeing his thick black hair. He stared straight into her green eyes, seeming to absorb all the changes of the past ten years in a matter of seconds. Then, flashing the smile that had once convinced her to let him siphon gas for his Harley from her daddy’s John Deere, he said, “Gracie needs a haircut. And I need you to marry me.”
The noonday heat hit her full in the face and Grace braced herself with a hand on the door frame. She felt almost faint. And she thought she’d just heard Johnny say he needed her to marry him. It had to be this hot weather, causing some kind of hallucination....
Her heart caught as a small body leaned from behind Johnny’s back, a child clad in pink T-shirt and jeans and wearing a pink and black helmet that probably cost more than a year’s worth of spiral perms. Johnny lifted the helmet from the child’s head, revealing dark hair and blue eyes. She knew without a doubt that this pretty child of four was Johnny’s niece, and her namesake, little Gracie.
“Is now okay?”
Johnny’s innocent voice drifted over her, as the sun slanted down, casting a deceptive halo over his gleaming black hair. Grace drew a deep breath. Johnny had said Gracie needed a haircut. She had only imagined the rest. Though it was Monday and the salon was officially closed, she said automatically, “Now is fine.”
“We can talk about getting married afterward,” Johnny said.
That feeling of faintness assailed Grace again.
It hadn’t been a hallucination....
Johnny dismounted and lifted Gracie, carrying the child past her, making brief but potent contact as his arms and legs and hips touched hers, his breath whisking her bangs across her forehead. Grace thought how little her life had changed over the years. But as Johnny brushed by, she could sense a change in the air.
Grace shut the door. What was going on here? Why had Johnny, who had always seen her as a pesky second sister, said such a thing? Hearing the words she’d once dreamed of hearing as an awkward teen only made her angry with him now.
Gracie observed her from where Johnny settled the child on her feet, and Grace’s heart softened. Too solemn, Grace thought, and as the little girl glanced away, too shy. Johnny’s sister, Janelle, had been shy, and Grace felt the same protective instinct for Gracie that she’d felt for her best friend. The feeling was compounded by the accidental death of Gracie’s parents one month earlier, which she assumed had left the child under the guardianship of her maternal grandparents. Too distraught to make the three-hour drive to Chicago, Grace hadn’t attended the funeral. She tried, but failed, to imagine Gracie being raised by the highbrow Tremonts.
Conscious of Johnny’s watchful gaze, Grace stepped into the room, a wariness coming over her that she recognized from years ago whenever Johnny would try to draw her and Janelle into one of his pranks.
I need you to marry me.
Johnny had been smiling as he spoke and Grace realized he’d been teasing. He’d probably gotten a charge out of the shock value of his words. She’d fallen for his joke, of course, just the way she used to.
Most likely, Johnny had brought his niece from Chicago to the country to see where her mother once lived.
Johnny leaned down and whispered in Gracie’s ear. Then Gracie ran over to one of the styling stations and climbed into a chair. With her hand, she pushed off from the counter to set the chair twirling and creaking. Her hair, damp with sweat from the helmet, hung limply to her shoulders and clung to her head.
Grace planted her hands on her hips, frowning at Johnny. “That little girl has no business riding on a motorcycle.”
Though he’d taken a lazy stance, Johnny’s lean body seemed to simmer. His once shaggy hair was now cut in a stylish wedge, short on the sides, long on top. His T-shirt was plain white, devoid of snakes, chains or four-letter words. He wore jeans that looked soft, faded by design rather than as a show of rebellion, and a pair of pricey white high-top tennis shoes, which replaced the leather boots he used to favor. To the average eye, Johnny appeared to have changed.
But Grace had never seen Johnny in the same light as any average person, and with just a glance, she knew better. Johnny Tremont hadn’t changed.
“We only drove from the motel at the edge of town.” His nonchalant tone failed to reassure her. “A friend hauled us and the Harley down from Chicago last night.”
“So you could marry me.” Grace laced her voice with sarcasm, letting him know he hadn’t fooled her with his “proposal.” She was twenty-five, not fifteen. She didn’t have stars in her eyes anymore.
But her sarcasm bounced right off Johnny.
“That’s right.” There was purpose in his step as he drew closer, resolve in his voice as he lowered it to tell her, “In their will, Janelle and Grant named me Gracie’s legal guardian. Now Mother and Dad are suing for guardianship on the grounds that I’m unfit to raise her. I intend to keep Gracie, but to do that, I need a wife. I need you to marry me.”
Johnny’s words hadn’t lost any of their shock value with repetition. On an indrawn breath she whispered a sentiment once shared by all of Ashville, Illinois. “You’re crazy, Johnny.”
“I’ve never been more sane—or serious—in my life,” he responded without hesitation, his jaw set, his eyes more grave than she’d ever seen them.
Johnny, a father figure? The idea defied imagination. But apparently he’d served as one since Janelle and Grant’s deaths.
“Mother’s playing the part to impress her friends. Dad’s indulging her.” His voice grew bitter. “They don’t really want Gracie.”
Grace recalled how the wealthy Tremonts had originally bought the acreage outside of town, near the Green farm, with the hope that quiet country life would keep fifteen-year-old Johnny out of trouble and coax Janelle out of shyness. But their busy lives hadn’t allowed them time for Johnny and Janelle. They’d paid for Johnny’s pranks and had been relieved when Janelle found a friend to keep her amused.
She realized Johnny was right. The Tremonts had never seemed to want Johnny and Janelle. Why would they want Gracie?
“I want to raise Gracie here in Ashville,” Johnny went on. “But the court won’t allow it unless I can provide a better life for her than my parents.”
“That doesn’t necessarily mean you have to marry,” she insisted, her sense of self-preservation kicking in full tilt.
“According to my lawyer, it does.” Johnny’s reply was grim. Marriage had not likely been his first solution to his problem. But it was evident he meant to follow through on his lawyer’s advice, that he meant to marry her.
“I realize I’m asking a lot. But I intend to make this worth your while by paying off the mortgage on your farm, whatever the outcome in court.”
Heat burned Grace’s cheeks. He was paying her to marry him. Nothing could have made it more clear—he still saw her as something less than a desirable woman.
“Once I have guardianship of Gracie, and Mother gets back to her tea parties, we can divorce.”
Nothing except that.
Grace felt a flare of indignation. Worse, she felt all of fifteen again, desperate for Johnny to see her as a woman. A woman in love with him...
Her heart missed a panicked beat. She couldn’t do this.
She was about to tell Johnny so when his gaze cut to Gracie, and she saw a fierce protectiveness come into his eyes, tinged with a trace of desperation. She caught her lip. Johnny, who had never needed anything but his motorcycles and the successful dealership and repair shop he’d started in Chicago, needed her help with Gracie.
Suddenly aware of the quiet, she realized the chair had stopped creaking and Gracie sat watching them, her eyes revealing the sadness inside her.
A sense of fate rolled over Grace. But she only whispered to Johnny, “I don’t know. I need time to think.”
But she couldn’t think clearly standing so close to Johnny. She walked over to the styling station and summoned a smile for Gracie. She pumped the chair as high as it would go, rewarded when Gracie’s lips curved and the little girl leaned to watch the floor descend. She didn’t use the booster chair, because she wanted Gracie to feel like a big girl.
“Just, uh, cut a little off the bottom...” Johnny’s voice trailed off at her baleful stare.
Grace spun Gracie to face the mirror. “How would you like your hair cut, Gracie?”
Gracie stared at her pink tennis shoes. Johnny shifted, and this time Grace warned him clearly with her gaze to keep quiet.
“Like yours,” Gracie finally said.
“Excellent choice.” Grace smiled, her heart turning over. No one had ever wanted to look like her before.
She set to work, tying a pink plastic apron beneath Gracie’s chin. Aware of Johnny’s close regard, she wondered if he noticed that her once long brown hair now swung neatly at her shoulders, that she wore a touch of makeup and a fashionable denim jumper over her crisp white T-shirt. She thought of the ill-fitting clothes and unstyled hair she’d had in high school. She hadn’t exactly been prom material.
But then, in his own way, neither had Johnny.
She parted Gracie’s silky hair while Johnny circled the room, skirting hair care displays and the potted plants she’d been watering. His straight nose wrinkled over the lingering scents of solutions and shampoos. He eyed the photos on the wall of models with elaborate hairdos, coming to a halt before the cash register. Behind it, she’d hung a picture of Elvis sporting a ducktail, in deference to the retro look.
“I remember that picture,” he said.
Of course he remembered. Her parents had been Elvis fans, in their thirties during Elvis’s heyday of movies and songs, when they’d fallen in love. The front hall of the old farmhouse where Grace had lived since her parents’ deaths had been decorated with photos of Elvis when she and Janelle and Johnny were teens. The one time she’d danced with Johnny had been in the living room to a slow Elvis tune.
“Can’t Help Falling In Love.”
Grace shook off the wistful feeling that came over her and gazed at Johnny with a critical eye. He was handsome with his hair cut in that crisp wedge, falling sexily over his forehead. With a ducktail he would look like a devastatingly young Elvis.
He turned then and caught her staring. Hiding her attraction, the way she’d always done, she said haughtily, “A shampoo and trim would do wonders for you.”
Johnny’s gaze glinted right back at her. “I have a barber in the city. And he doesn’t give shampoos.”
Grace turned away to hide her grin. She’d missed the exhilarating rush that came with sparring with Johnny. She’d missed Johnny. Before she could stop the thought, Grace imagined, as she had long ago, what it would be like if he really wanted to marry her.
But he’d come back for Gracie’s sake.
They needed to talk and so she hurried little Gracie’s trim along. Grace was aware from the way Johnny jingled his keys in his pocket that his patience was running out.
Johnny managed not to reach up and push his hand through his hair. He was due for a trip to the barber but he’d be damned if he’d sit in that chair with a pink bib tied around his neck.
Gracie seemed to enjoy getting her hair cut, though. And her smile cut right through to Johnny’s heart. He knew the pain that lurked beneath the surface, knew how Gracie cried in the night, how she clung to him if he had to leave her for a short while, afraid that, like her parents, he wouldn’t come back.
Johnny didn’t leave Gracie anymore. He ran his business by phone. He’d stopped partying, stopped everything for Gracie. He’d turned his world upside down to make her happy. He wasn’t going to lose her now to his parents.
Which meant, according to his lawyer, that he had to clean up his act. Provide a loving home life to rival that of his respectable, wealthy parents. What a joke.
Gracie wasn’t going to grow up in the same cold environment he and Janelle had. Not if he could help it. Not if Grace would marry him.
Frowning, Johnny contemplated Grace. She and Janelle had exchanged occasional letters. Through Janelle he’d learned that Grace was hanging on to that farm by a thread, and that there was no special man in her life. Maybe his proposal was a little sudden, but he could see that she wanted to help Gracie. He couldn’t understand what held her back.
But then, Grace had always been independent. Though she’d never let him down, she’d never been as easily swayed as Janelle to help him in and out of mischief.
He trailed his gaze the length of Grace’s body, over the soft curves that rounded the angles she’d had as a teen. Grace had almost seemed like a sister to him back then, but now...
Snipping little Gracie’s bangs expertly with scissors, Grace caught his gaze. “What?”
“I’d pictured you married by now,” he lied, a little shocked to think he’d imagined that slip of a dress falling to her ankles.
“I pictured you married by now to a bleached blonde wearing spandex.” Grace pursed her lips against a smile. “Spandex over silicone.”
He laughed. A spark of fun had always lurked within Grace even though her life, which had revolved around her mother’s Alzheimer’s disease and resulting financial struggles, had forced her to be responsible and serious. It occurred to Johnny that she didn’t deserve to wind up married to someone like him, even for a little while. She deserved a happily-ever-after kind of guy, one who believed in the game of hearts and flowers and rings. One who believed in love.
But she was just the kind of girl he needed to marry, with her wholesome country upbringing. And he knew she would be good for Gracie, the way she’d been good for shy Janelle.
Grace leaned to snip Gracie’s bangs, her dress hugging her curves—a woman’s curves. Johnny narrowed his gaze. Grace might have acquired a boyfriend in the past month. She might already be engaged to some other guy. He scanned her busy fingers for a ring, but she was moving this way and that, clipping Gracie’s hair, and he couldn’t see. He shifted impatiently.
Gracie, meanwhile, sat like a queen, her little chin lifted in clear imitation of Grace. He was counting on Grace to draw Gracie out of her shell, the way she had Janelle. But he hadn’t expected the effect of Grace’s personality to rub off so quickly. He was more certain than ever that Grace would be good for Gracie, and that he’d done the right thing in coming here.
Grace sensed Johnny’s scrutiny, his impatience. She gave little Gracie’s hair a final combing, then smiled. “In the drawer by the cash register, there’s a box of ribbons and barrettes. You can go pick out some if you’d like.”
Gracie gave a quick nod and climbed from the chair, hurrying over to open the drawer. Grace watched her, while a keen awareness of Johnny’s slow approach radiated through her.
“We need to talk,” he said, echoing her earlier thought in a low voice. He stood close, and she caught the scent of him, still with that hint of motor oil. His belly was flat as it had been when he left town at eighteen, and he looked solid and strong in his white T-shirt. His gaze was unwavering, and it was hard to believe Johnny needed her for anything.
Then the light in his eyes changed, and her heartbeat changed with it. That dark promise she read in Johnny’s gaze was not the kind of promise a brother made to a sister.
But before she could be sure of it, before she could take it to heart, Gracie ran over to them, diverting Johnny. Holding a pink ribbon in each hand, she told him, “I’m hungry.”
Johnny gave Grace a beguiling smile and, as if they were already married, asked, “What’s for lunch?”
With a brief glare for Johnny, Grace smoothed little Gracie’s hair. “How would you like to have lunch on a farm, Gracie?”
“Is there a cow?”
She couldn’t help but laugh. “No cow. But there are kittens you can play with and flowers you can pick.”
Gracie’s smile was Janelle’s smile. It was both endearing and heartbreaking. Grace turned away, but there was no escaping her sorrow, a sorrow that didn’t begin to compare to Gracie’s. Grabbing a can of styling spray, she said quickly, “First, let’s fix those ribbons in your hair.”
Gracie looked longingly at the pink can of spray, the kind her mom used to buy. “Can I, Johnny?”
No “uncle,” just Johnny, Grace noted. Leave it to Johnny to waive the formalities.
He gave his consent in the form of a wary shrug, standing well away from the spray while Grace lightly misted Gracie’s hair. Minutes later, they exited the shop.
Little Gracie was adorable and Grace felt a pride in Janelle’s child, a pride she supposed Janelle had felt tenfold. She imagined herself brushing Gracie’s hair each morning, tucking her into bed at night.
She imagined tucking Johnny into bed, too....
“Hey, Gold Groceries is still open?” Johnny said, pointing just down the street at the store’s sign.
Grace always thought it had been Johnny who’d thrown the rock that broke the bulb that lit up the “G,” leaving the sign to read “old” Groceries.
“Let’s walk down there and I’ll get some stuff for lunch.”
She glanced uneasily at Johnny. “I have plenty of food at the farm.”
“Bet you don’t have the right kind of peanut butter. Come on, I want Gracie to see Gold’s. I remember hanging around there, drinking pop and watching girls.”
“I remember you were banned from the store,” Grace muttered, hoping by get some stuff for lunch, Johnny meant he would pay for it. His parents had paid dearly for the fireworks he’d stolen.
Grace started after him, certain Henry Gold wouldn’t share Johnny’s enthusiasm if he knew Johnny was coming to his store.
As they walked down the street, Gracie skipped before them, never more than two cracks in the sidewalk ahead. Grace thought all of Ashville must be watching and wondering over Johnny’s return. She imagined the last thing they would think was that he’d come back to marry her.
Although, watching Gracie’s carefree skipping, Grace could understand Johnny’s desire to raise his shy niece in the quiet town of Ashville as opposed to the city. She pressed her lips wryly. She could understand, as well, why Johnny’s lawyer thought marriage would make the court more amenable to his keeping guardianship of Gracie.
Johnny drifted closer to her side, until his arm brushed her shoulder and their hips met occasionally, the skirt of her jumper ruffled by the brush of his jeans. She wanted to look up at him, see the blueblack shine of his hair in the sun, but she ignored the impulse. Instead, she contemplated the prospect of Johnny raising Gracie, when all he’d ever raised was Cain.
She wanted to help Gracie, too. But the truth was, she didn’t know much more about kids than Johnny. Her mother’s struggle with Alzheimer’s had resulted in her spending many hours at home or at the Ashville Nursing Home, instead of baby-sitting like most teenage girls. And the idea of marriage to Johnny, once a dream of hers, seemed only a painful prospect, with the knowledge that he didn’t love her.
Gracie spotted the store, interrupting Grace’s thoughts with her excitement as she read her initial, G, on the sign to Johnny.
Johnny grinned. “Just seeing that place makes me want a beefstick and a cola.”
“Hardly an appropriate lunch for a little girl,” Grace pointed out, certain that was just what he had in mind.
“I like peanut butter,” Gracie said.
“With celery,” Johnny added. “Let’s go.”
Inside, the store was cool and dim and quiet. Henry came from behind the counter, wearing a clean white apron over his bib overalls. His frown had left wrinkles over the years, and his drawn eyebrows were now white, matching the wispy hair on his head. Johnny towered over him at six feet, but that didn’t keep Henry from aiming his famous glare at Johnny.
“Well, if it ain’t Johnny Tremont. Heard you was in jail and heard you was rich. Which is it?”
“Well, I’m not in jail,” Johnny said pointedly, leaving Grace to hope he would mind his temper.
“Humph. I got mirrors now.” Henry pointed his gnarled finger over the door and to a back corner of the little square store. “And alarms.” Henry nodded toward Gracie. “Who have you got there?”
Grace expected little Gracie to wilt beneath Henry’s perpetual glare. But Gracie only stared at Henry, a funny little smile on her face.
Johnny rested his hand on Gracie’s shoulder. “This is my niece, Gracie.”
As much as was possible, Henry’s face softened. “I was sorry to hear about Janelle.” Then he added meaningfully, “She was a good girl.” He frowned down at Gracie. “Are you a good girl?”
Gracie nodded vigorously. “Johnny said so.”
“Humph. Don’t break anything in the store. If you don’t break anything, I’ll give you a candy.” Henry shuffled behind the counter, mumbling about apples falling close to the tree.
Johnny drew a deep breath and headed down the aisle to the peanut butter. Grace knew he would find it in the same place that it had been ten years ago.
“He’s Grumpy,” Gracie chimed, looking back at Henry.
“Old grouch hasn’t changed any, that’s for sure,” Johnny muttered.
“No, like Grumpy the dwarf,” Gracie explained.
Grace laughed. “You mean the dwarf in Snow White?”
“Johnny reads it to me,” Gracie said, choosing peanut butter and leaving Grace to contend with the appealing image of Johnny reading a fairy tale, his niece cuddled beside him.
In all her years of daydreaming about Johnny, it was certainly not something she’d ever imagined before.
Gracie’s presence seemed to have quite an effect on Johnny. Years ago, Johnny and Henry had had a running feud, Johnny laughing off every battle. Now he almost seemed bothered by his lingering reputation, most likely because of Gracie.
Along with Gracie’s peanut butter, they chose oranges and celery and ham. Grace insisted she had anything else they might need, but when they reached the counter, Gracie wanted cupcakes. Johnny immediately went in search of the treat with Gracie, holding his niece’s hand. Grace dug in her skirt pocket for quarters to buy Gracie candy, thinking maybe Johnny had changed some after all—
A crash came from the back of the store, followed by the thunder of rolling canned goods.
Grace closed her eyes. Maybe not.
Chapter Two
Gracie.
Grace dropped her quarters on the counter. Henry glared into the mirror over the door, that look of old in his eyes. Ignoring him, she ran to the pyramid of soup cans she’d seen at the back of the store.
She found Johnny holding Gracie safe in his arms, cans rocking to a halt at his feet.
His anxious gaze met Grace’s over top of the little girl’s head. His breath rushed out. “She’s all right.”
Grace felt the tension leave her, only to have it rise again as Henry came to survey the damage, something he’d done often in Johnny’s presence. In the quiet aftermath, the whir of a ceiling fan brought to mind the time Johnny had dropped a bag of flour in front of Henry’s old floor model fan. Grace caught her lip, recalling the shouting match that had ensued. Actually, it had seemed funny at the time.
Henry glowered at Johnny. “Figured it was you.”
Gracie clutched her arms about Johnny’s neck. “Johnny didn’t do it.”
“Humph. Heard that before.”
Gracie’s soft little arms squeezed the defiance right out of Johnny. He wasn’t going to get in a yelling match with old Henry, not with Gracie listening—and Grace.
Johnny narrowed his gaze. Grace was trying not to laugh, her eyes sparkling at him. A sense of déjà vu washed over him. He recalled Grace laughing at him that way years ago, as he stood in this store, powdered with flour, Henry dusted with it, too, while the old man called him a delinquent.
And they said you couldn’t go home again.
Johnny stood rooted in the past, recalling the way Grace had laughed at him that day, her long hair spilling past the shoulders of the faded shirt she wore. In some ways, she’d changed. Her hair now swung across her shoulders, which were covered in the soft white cotton of a formfitting T-shirt beneath the sassy little dress she wore. She looked sexy as hell.
But in another way, she was still the same Grace, daring to laugh at him with those green eyes.
And that was sexy, too.
“You clean this up, Johnny Tremont. I’ve got a customer. And don’t forget, I’ve got mirrors.” Henry turned toward the front of the store, muttering about dented cans and delinquents.
Grace grinned openly and Johnny shot her a menacing look. She’d watched him sweep up flour years ago, grinning at him over the rim of a cola bottle. “Are you going to help stack these cans, or just stand and watch?”
Gracie squirmed, wanting down. “Can I help?”
Johnny set little Gracie on her feet. “You bet. We’ll rebuild the pyramid and you can put on the top can. Do you think we should let Grace help?”
Gracie gave a quick nod.
“You’re in,” Johnny said, smirking at Grace.
She was a good sport—too much so, Johnny decided. Grace crouched in her flirty dress, giving him flashes of smooth slim thigh as they worked toward the center of the pile from opposite directions. Little Gracie had a great time, while Johnny suffered.
Until the moment he saw Grace again, Johnny had only thought of marriage to her in terms of keeping guardianship of Gracie. Now he found himself rethinking the idea on a more primal level.
There were a lot of cans, and he gave Gracie a break, sending her to put the cupcakes on Henry’s counter. He and Grace had inched almost nose to nose, and as their knees brushed, she wobbled. He reached out and curled his hand about her arm, and the softness of her skin stilled him.
He knew Grace felt his tension when she paused. He smoothed his thumb across her skin and got a jolt out of her direct gaze.
He wondered what she’d do if he kissed her.
Never one to wonder for. long, Johnny leaned closer. Grace smelled heavenly. Sweet and womanly, a potent combination. Her eyes seemed to glaze over, focused on his mouth as he eased it toward her pink parted lips—
“Henry’s got mirrors,” she whispered, not quite breaking the spell. They hovered inches apart, Johnny not giving a damn about mirrors, yet aware it probably mattered to Grace, who likely remembered what a kiss with Johnny Tremont used to mean to a girl’s reputation in Ashville—never mind if a kiss had been all that had happened.
Gracie came running back then and Johnny didn’t miss the quick way Grace backed off. Even faster than he. He could feel her wary gaze upon him, though, likely seeing him in a new light. She’d probably always thought of him as a pesky older brother, in the same way he’d thought of her as a sister. So all these sexual vibes bouncing between them had to be as much a shock to her as they were to him.
Johnny stacked the remaining cans, lifting Gracie to place the last one on top as promised. Their task accomplished, the three of them headed for the front of the store. Johnny was aware that Grace kept her distance.
Under Henry’s watchful eye, Johnny paid for his purchases. He hoisted the sack in his arms and led the way to the door.
“Come get a candy, little girl,” Henry called to Gracie, amazing Johnny. Even more amazing, Gracie ran back and Henry handed a lollipop down to her.
“Thank you,” Gracie said in a near whisper.
Johnny couldn’t have been more surprised if Gracie had shouted. Not that Gracie was ill-mannered; she was usually just too shy to. talk, without Johnny by her side to prompt the conversation. But then, Gracie thought Henry was a dwarf.
Johnny’s imagination didn’t stretch quite that far.
After a moment Gracie hurried over, beaming.
“I said I was sorry I spilled the cans. And he said I’m a good girl.”
“You are a good girl,” Johnny said proudly, gratified to think that a month spent with him hadn’t changed that fact, the way his parents thought it would.
Then he noticed Grace staring at him, probably contemplating the fact that he’d taken the rap for Gracie. After all, she “knew him when.” But Grace’s eyes were soft and warm and the emotion in them somehow embarrassed him. Out of earshot of Gracie he muttered, “Old grouch never gave me candy.”
“He always gave licorice to me and Janelle,” Grace recalled, her wistful tone telling Johnny she was missing Janelle the same as he. The sweet sharp coil of desire for her unraveled inside him, leaving a bittersweet compassion. He thought Grace’s pain must be as great as his own, she and Janelle had been so close.
They left the store, following Gracie down the sidewalk. “Janelle married a great guy,” Johnny said abruptly. “She was happy. But she always regretted that his work took her away from here, away from you.”
“Thank you for telling me.” Grace smiled up at him and he felt his heart stutter. “You can be pretty nice when you want to, Johnny Tremont.”
Johnny was disconcerted to realize just how nice he wanted to be.
The three of them came to a halt by his Harley. Gracie grabbed her pink-striped helmet and Johnny winked down at her. “Gracie likes the hog, don’t you, Gracie?”
Gracie gazed adoringly at Johnny. “I like the hog.”
Grace didn’t appear to share that sentiment. “Gracie shouldn’t ride that thing down the highway. We can take my car to the farm and you can leave the bike here.”
“Leave the Harley?” Was she crazy? If she’d told him to leave little Gracie, Johnny wouldn’t have been more appalled. “It might get stolen.”
“The police station is right over there.” She pointed up the block, across the street. “Who in Ashville is going to steal it anyway? Mrs. Cromwell?”
Johnny remembered Mrs. Cromwell, the florist. The thought of her plump body, clad in a floral dress and seated on his bike, made him wince.
“If you’re really worried, you could ask Eddie from the gas station to keep an eye on it.”
Johnny shuddered. Eddie of the hit-and-miss repairs was the last person he wanted around his bike.
“Remember the time you hauled the Harley in Dad’s truck?” Grace smiled wistfully. “I wish that old Ford still ran.”
Johnny wished it did, too. He wished it was parked here right now, with the Harley loaded in back because Grace was right. He didn’t want to take Gracie out on the two-lane highway on the bike. He could follow Grace along on the Harley, but he was certain little Gracie wouldn’t go in the car without him.
“I’ll lock up the bike and leave it.” Johnny swore he felt physical pain as he did just that. He grabbed his helmet and the three of them climbed into Grace’s car. They buckled Gracie in the back with her lollipop.
Johnny couldn’t help but approve of Grace’s little blue coupe. Like her salon, it was neat and clean. There were magnets shaped like hair bows holding small notes on the dash. One reminded her to pick up clothes from the cleaners. Another read, “C.S.—Saturday.”
He frowned at the second note. A date? Grace’s bare ring finger had ruled out a fiancé, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t a man in her life. For Gracie’s sake, he was duty-bound to find out.
Checking to find Gracie busy with her lollipop and looking out the car window, Johnny tapped the note and asked idly, “Who’s C.S.?”
Grace raised her brows in a what-business-of- yours-is-it? look. Most likely because he’d asked her to marry him, she deigned to answer. “A customer.”
Johnny immediately relaxed. Probably one of those little old ladies who liked their hair fixed like a French poodle’s.
“Chase Sinclair. He’s one of my regulars.” While he stared at her, Grace braked for a stop, proceeded with caution and added casually, “We’ve dated a couple of times.”
Johnny stared harder.
Chase. He had never liked that name. And he didn’t like the familiar way Grace said it, or the unfamiliar ill humor he felt at her words. He hoped she realized that for Gracie’s sake, the dates had to stop if they were to marry.
With forced nonchalance, he said mockingly, “Chase and Grace. Sounds like a cartoon.”
Gracie giggled. Grace glowered. “That’s juvenile, Johnny.”
“You used to have a sense of humor,” Johnny noted.
“I had to,” Grace muttered. “Or I’d have been mad at you all the time.” At his look of protest, she added, “Take that time you put gum in my hair.”
Johnny winced, effectively chastened. Grace had had to cut bangs in her hair after that prank. Still, Johnny liked to think he’d inspired her life’s work.
“And the time you scared me and Janelle when we camped on my porch.”
Ah, yes. Her father had threatened to shoot until he realized who had made the girls scream. Grace and Janelle had had to sleep in the house the rest of the night. And all over a harmless garden snake.
A sense of nostalgia swept over Johnny and he suddenly missed Janelle more than ever. He caught Grace’s gaze, saw the grief she couldn’t quite mask. This trip down memory lane had gone on long enough. He turned in the seat. “We’re almost there, Gracie.”
“Why did you put gum in her hair?” Gracie asked.
“Ah...”
“Because Johnny was a tease. Does he like to tease you, too?” Grace asked.
There was a moment’s pause, then little Gracie overcame her shyness to tattle. “He tickles me. But he stops if I say he has to.”
“That doesn’t sound like the Johnny I know,” Grace murmured.
He frowned. Couldn’t she see he wasn’t the same person he’d been one month ago, let alone the rebellious kid he’d been as a teen? His world revolved around Gracie now.
He ran his business from Janelle’s fine home, having given up his bachelor apartment. The last date he’d had was when he took Gracie to the cinema to see Snow White. Oddly, he hadn’t missed that aspect of his life until Grace had stirred up his hormones.
Still a little surprised by that turn of events, he took a discreet survey of Grace, just testing his reaction. As she braked for the turn into the gravel lane that led to the Greens’ farmhouse, Grace’s skirt inched up her leg. Her skin looked silky smooth, and she wasn’t even wearing stockings. The strap of her sandal around her ankle riveted his attention. He imagined his hand wrapped there, his lips there...
Johnny dragged his gaze away.
The car came to a halt as Grace parked before the square garage. He remembered hiding in there once, after he’d sprayed Janelle and Grace with the hose. Grace had only been thirteen when he’d chased her and gotten her shirt all wet. He imagined she would look a little different now in a wet T-shirt.
“Here we are.”
He jerked his gaze from Grace’s shirtfront, a hot sweat breaking out on his skin. He hadn’t counted on this. Hadn’t counted on having sexual feelings for Grace. He wasn’t going to look at her that way again, wasn’t going to think about her that way. He wasn’t going to marry her.
Then little Gracie climbed out of the car and cried with delight, “This is like the house in my farm book. Where are the kittens?” she asked excitedly.
Looking at Gracie’s happy face, Johnny guessed he was getting married after all. But he was damn well going to keep his hands to himself. These feelings he was having for Grace seemed downright immoral.
Little Gracie was so excited, he was more than happy to crawl halfway under the porch and catch the kittens. They were a rambunctious trio of calicoes, everything Gracie could have hoped for. She sat cross-legged in the grassy shade of an elm, kittens crawling in and out of her lap.
Grace had taken the groceries into the kitchen. Johnny looked toward the house, aware this was a good time to speak privately with her, yet feeling oddly reluctant. Telling Gracie to stay put, he left the little girl with her new friends and went inside.
The house was cool and quiet, the shades drawn against the sun. He noticed the upstairs was boarded off, heard the hum of an air conditioner that hadn’t been part of the house years ago. Otherwise, the place seemed unchanged.
Having moved from city to city in his early childhood, Johnny could only imagine what it must feel like to grow up and live in the same house all of your life, how it must feel to risk losing such a part of your past. Funny, how he’d only come to the Green farm to pester Grace and Janelle when he was bored, yet it was here that some of his happier memories took place.
Prints and posters of Elvis had once been framed on the walls of the hall. In the living room, the Greens had kept an old phonograph that spun forty-fives of Elvis tunes. He imagined that stuff was tucked away in the attic. He hated to think Grace would have parted with it.
Johnny wandered into the living room. A life-size poster of Elvis had once been propped in the corner, where Grace now kept a potted plant like those in her salon. Johnny grinned, thinking Elvis had more aesthetic appeal.
“When Mama was in the nursing home, we took the poster of Elvis there,” Grace said from behind him as if reading his thoughts. “Dad said it kept her company.”
Johnny turned to face Grace where she stood in the doorway. She looked all of fifteen again, missing her mother long before Mrs. Green had been physically gone. He said simply, “That was nice.”
“Dad left it there after Mama died. Every time I go back, they’ve got it propped in a corner somewhere.”
“You still go to the nursing home?”
“I give haircuts to some of the residents. Mama had a lot of friends there. Now they’re my friends.”
Johnny suspected that over the years, Grace had spent too much time at that nursing home.
But she smiled as she spoke of the people there. “Mama turned them all into Elvis freaks.”
“Fans,” Johnny corrected. “Fans of the King.”
“Now you sound like my dad.”
Johnny didn’t feel like Grace’s father. Right now, his thoughts probably had her dad rolling in the grave.
He shouldn’t be thinking about making love with Grace. He couldn’t possibly have sex with Grace.
Oh, yeah, he could.
Oh, no, he wouldn’t.
He’d have to handle this carefully, he realized. He wanted Grace, and he was certain that wanting wasn’t all one-sided, however reluctant Grace appeared. But she wasn’t the kind of girl you had a fling with, not even a married fling.
The best way to approach this marriage, he decided, was on the basis of past friendship. No hearts involved.
And no sex.
“Where is Gracie?” Grace asked suddenly, stepping into the room.
“Playing with the kittens.”
“Good. We have to figure some way short of marriage that you can keep guardianship of her.”
Johnny frowned at her words, only just remembering what he’d come in here for. Then Grace walked over, stopping before him. In the dim light that filtered through the shades, she seemed suddenly, intimately close. Johnny fought to curb his adolescent reaction to her nearness. On pure reflex, he took a step back, a new dance for Johnny Tremont.
“Hold still. You’ve got cobwebs in your hair from crawling under the porch.” Grace seemed amused and reached up to brush them away, her nearness creating a potent charge between them. When she pressed briefly against him, the snug denim over her breasts touched his chest. Johnny absorbed the shock to his system and tried not to short-circuit. With each sweep of her hand, Grace’s fingers seemed to slip farther into his hair, her sweet-smelling wrist near his face, her skirt weaving about his jeans-clad legs, her sandaled feet nudging his tennis shoes. Overwhelmed, Johnny eyed the distance between Grace’s mouth and his.
“You have really thick hair,” Grace murmured. The brush of her fingers seemed to slow as they pushed their way through the strands. “A lot of women spend hours at the salon, trying to have hair this thick and dark.”
Johnny struggled to focus his muddled thoughts.
Friends, not lovers.
A memory of dancing with Grace here in this room flashed through his mind. Sun had streamed through the window onto her shiny hair. He’d been singing along with Elvis. She’d been laughing at him. Then she’d rested her head against his shoulder, pressed her slight body to his—
I can’t help falling in love...
As Johnny’s hair filled her palm, Grace stilled. She was suddenly conscious of the scant space between their bodies, aware that a deep heat burned in Johnny’s eyes. A longing from years ago surfaced. Grace reminded herself that Johnny was here on a mission, that he was used to having what he wanted from women. What she was feeling for him could hurt her now more than ever.
She drew back her hand, but her eyes fluttered closed as Johnny’s warm breath caressed her face. She felt him anchor his hands at her waist, and for a moment she suffered conflicting fears—that he would push her away...that he wouldn’t. Johnny seemed to sense the restlessness that moved through her. He touched his lips to hers gently, giving the kiss she’d imagined Johnny giving her when she was a girl.
But she wasn’t a girl anymore and the sweetness of his kiss didn’t soothe her. Grace only felt more restless. With his hot hands, Johnny settled her body against his. He seemed to know how, when and where to touch his lips to hers, to press her body closer, drawing a response she couldn’t hide. Yearning speared through her. And yet...
She loosened the hold she’d taken on Johnny’s shirtfront. But before she’d uncurled her fingers from the soft cotton, he raised his mouth from hers, his hands at her waist again, setting her away from him. Hearing the screen door slam, Grace wanted to think it was because of Gracie. But her cheeks grew hot as Johnny stepped back and shoved his hands in his pockets.
He hadn’t meant to kiss her.
“Johnny!” Gracie called from the hall. “Come and see what the kittens can do!”
“I’ll be right there,” Johnny called in answer. The door slammed again. Johnny didn’t move. But his gaze was evasive, those quick hands of his still hidden in his pockets.
Grace burned. From desire, from anger, from embarrassment. Had she only imagined those looks he’d been giving her? That tense moment in the store? Grace recalled Johnny’s lack of reaction—other than to joke around—when she’d purposely mentioned dating Chase with the hope of seeing some spark of jealousy. How could she have been so foolish as to forget that he intended to pay her to marry him, that he did so because of Gracie?
So why had he kissed her?
“I’m sorry, Grace. I guess I just—I mean it’s been a long time—”
That was why. Grace smiled sweetly, but she simmered inside. “Has Gracie been cramping your style?”
Johnny stilled in the act of pushing his hand through his hair. She could still feel the softness of those dark strands on her fingers. “Yeah. That explains it.”
Johnny looked so relieved, Grace wanted to smack him. But Gracie was waiting outside for him, so all she said was, “Apology accepted. You’d better go see to Gracie.”
“Yeah. I’ll do that.” Johnny turned away in unflattering haste. Then he turned back. “Gracie really does need me. She needs us. Just think about my offer, about the mortgage and getting married.”
Johnny left the room. A moment later Grace heard the screen door softly close.
Think about us getting married.
There’d been a time when she hadn’t dreamed of anything else. Then Johnny had left town and unwittingly broken her heart.
She couldn’t let that happen again.
She went to the kitchen and jerked open the refrigerator door, reaching for lemonade, letting the blast of cold air chill her face before swinging the door shut.
Who else but Johnny had the nerve to return after ten years to ask a favor like marriage? Why, Johnny had no more desire to be married than he did to sell his Harley for scrap metal. As for raising a child—Grace let out a breath of disdain. Johnny had never been responsible for anything but cleaning the carburetor on his bike. That was play to him. That was why he’d made it his life’s work.
Grace poured lemonade and fixed sandwiches. She plunked the glasses, along with the plates, onto a tray and marched with it out the front door. While she arranged their lunch on the redwood table, Johnny led little Gracie from beneath the tree and into the house to wash her hands.
The screen door banged behind them. Grace stared as it settled, contemplating their mission in a different light than she once would have. If Johnny had his way, he’d be responsible for making sure Gracie washed her hands until she was grown.
He probably still had trouble remembering to do so himself.
When they returned, Gracie ate quickly, wanting to get back to the kittens. When the little girl scampered over to the elm, Johnny turned to straddle the bench, resting his elbow on the table top. He watched Gracie so long, so intently, Grace thought he must have forgotten she was there. She saw the way his mouth alternately tensed and curved as he watched Gracie, the way his eyes grew light, then dark with worry. Grace’s anger lifted with the breeze that ruffled through Johnny’s hair.
He finally said, “Janelle was a wonderful mother, and Grant a great father. That’s a tough act to follow.”
She didn’t detect any resentment there, just a genuine lack of confidence in his ability to raise his niece—a justifiable doubt, she had to agree. Johnny seemed to truly love little Gracie, to want this role he’d chosen in her life. But Grace couldn’t help thinking of all he must have given up to do so.
“For Gracie’s sake, my parents have agreed there will be no interim hearings and no scenes in front of Gracie. Still, things haven’t been easy for her. I talked to her doctor and he agreed that bringing her here to the country would do her good.”
As if in affirmation, Gracie held a kitten to her cheek and smiled, her eyes closing in what Grace thought must be a rare moment of peace in the recent turmoil of her young life.
“You’d be good for her, too,” Johnny said quietly.
Grace filled her lungs with warm summer air. She wanted to help Janelle’s child. But it was hard not to imagine having her heart broken in the process.
And, like Johnny, she lacked confidence in her ability to meet Gracie’s needs. “I don’t know much about kids, Johnny. I never even baby-sat when I was a teen.”
“You’re a woman. Child rearing is supposed to come instinctively,” Johnny said with the blithe ignorance of a man.
“That’s a myth. Even women have to learn about children. I’ve spent more time with the elderly than I have with kids.”
Johnny grinned then. “Same thing. We all revert as we get older. We start watching cartoons again, start wearing bright colors. We actually decrease in size. By the time we kick the bucket, we’re bald as babies and have just as many teeth.”
Grace couldn’t help laughing. Johnny was irreverent. He always had been, and all the girls had been in love with him for it, herself included. But her laughter dwindled and Johnny’s did, too. There was so much at stake where little Gracie was concerned.
“She wakes up at night crying.” Johnny spoke as if the very image his words conjured pained him. “She cries if I leave her, afraid I won’t come back.”
Oh, Janelle. Tears burned Grace’s eyes, for she knew little Gracie’s unhappiness would break Janelle’s heart. She reminded herself that Janelle was at peace in heaven with Grant. But Gracie... Gracie needed her.
“My parents won’t give Gracie the love she needs,” he said simply, and Grace wondered if he realized how revealing that sentiment was where he and Janelle were concerned. “And there’s little chance the court will let me keep her unless I marry.”
He turned to her then, more serious than she’d ever seen him. “I realize we won’t have one of those one-in-a-million kind of marriages like Janelle and Grant had. But we’ve got friendship going for us, haven’t we?”
Grace couldn’t deny it. Hadn’t Johnny always fixed the chain on her bicycle? Driven her and Janelle into town to see the movies?
Friends...
Johnny was watching her, his blue eyes intent and warming her clear to that place in her heart that had always been just for him. She recognized the yearning inside her, just as she saw quite clearly that Johnny knew no such feeling, that because of his parents, he had no true concept of what love was.
He reached out and tentatively covered her hand with his atop the table. The yearning within her spread and deepened. Instinctively, Grace curled her fingers into a protective ball.
He let go of her hand. “I know it’s asking a lot. But I’m asking for Gracie’s sake. Will you marry me, Grace?”
A warm breeze fanned her face; the sun flashed through the tree leaves into her eyes, making them burn, making her blink.
Hadn’t she seen right away that Johnny would do anything for Gracie?
Even marry her.
And Grace said softly, “Yes. I’ll many you, Johnny.”
Chapter Three
She’d said “yes.”
Standing on the porch with his hot palm curled around an icy glass of lemonade, Johnny watched Grace as she reclined on the grass with Gracie, playing with the kittens. He was going to be married. Moisture dripped from the sides of the glass onto his sneakers.
He couldn’t remember ever feeling nervous over anything. Except maybe that time the police impounded the Harley...
But he felt nervous now, all those worries over being a parent compounded by the prospect of marriage—even a short-term marriage. He’d never given much thought—any thought—to either possibility until Janelle and Grant had died.
Gracie laughed out loud at something Grace whispered to her, and a sense of gratitude welled within him. No one could stay in a shell around Grace. It was like trying to stay out of the sun in a desert. He’d been right to think she could make Gracie happy.
He’d been wrong to expect she would still seem like a sister to him.
After he kissed her, he’d started to tell her how much she’d changed, and how much she hadn’t, and how much the combination affected him. Thank God she’d misunderstood and thought he was suffering from sexual frustration.
Grace stretched in pursuit of a kitten, her skirt creeping tantalizingly high. Tension skittered through him. He was suffering from sexual frustration.
Grace settled back, and Johnny’s pulse relaxed, too. He watched her and little Gracie herd kittens between them and swore once again that he would keep his hands to himself. Gracie’s future depended on him. Taking a long pull of cold lemonade, he walked over and sat atop the picnic table.
“What are their names?” Gracie asked, corralling the kittens, and Johnny smiled over every word directed at Grace.
“Well... they could use good names,” Grace said, and Johnny knew that she’d already named them, that she was letting Gracie give them new ones. “Do you know any good names?”
“I know the names of the Seven Dwarfs.”
“All seven names?”
“Grumpy, Dopey, Sleepy, Sneezy...Doc and Happy and Bashful.” Gracie scooped a wandering kitten into her hand and held it close to her face. “He’s smiling. His name is Happy.”
Caught up in the game, Grace picked up another kitten. “This one looks kind of Grumpy.”
“No, Grumpy is the man at the store. He’s...” The kitten yawned and Gracie named it appropriately. “Sleepy.”
Johnny was enchanted by little Gracie as he’d never been before. Since Janelle and Grant’s deaths, she’d never been this animated with others, not even when he was right there with her.
Gracie seemed to have forgotten him, seemed to have found peace. As that sense of peace flowed over him, too, Johnny realized how closely his emotions were tied to little Gracie’s.
Gracie traded her kitten for the last one, who tried to hide its face ostrich-like in her hands. “He won’t look at me, so he’s Bashful. Grandmother Tremont calls me Bashful when I won’t look at her. She said I’m just like my mother.”
Johnny’s serenity vanished with Gracie’s words. Damn his mother’s thoughtlessness. As if being like her mother was something Gracie should be ashamed of.
He was no shrink, but he figured if you told an impressionable kid she was shy too often, she would start to. believe it, and to accept it. He straightened, planning to undo his mother’s damage, when Grace’s soft voice stopped him.
“You are like your mother.” Johnny saw the effort with which Grace tempered her words for little Gracie. “She was my best friend, did you know that?”
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