did you?”
“No, because I found homes for every single one.” She looked up at him speculatively. “Maybe they’d like a new kitten at White Pines. I’ll bet there are mice there and everything. A kitten would be a big help.”
“I’ll ask,” he told her, wondering what his mother would have to say about a kitten scratching her precious antique furniture.
“Promise?”
“Cross my heart.”
A radiant smile spread across her face. “Thanks, Jordan. I really, really think you should take one, too. So you won’t be lonely.”
Actually, he had another idea for staving off loneliness. He glanced up and saw the very woman he had in mind standing in the barn, hands on slender hips, a challenging spark in her eyes as she regarded her daughter.
“You have your work cut out for you, young lady,” Kelly announced, barely sparing a glance for Jordan. “There are seven kittens in here. Francie’s tuckered out and so am I. See to it that Francie has some fresh food and water.”
“Cream, Mommy. Don’t you think she deserves cream just this once? Having kittens is hard work.”
“Fine, bring her some cream.”
Dani tore off across the lawn as fast as her churning little legs could carry her.
“And don’t put it in a good china bowl! Use plastic,” Kelly shouted after her. Finally she glanced at Jordan. “What brings you by on a Friday night? You didn’t mention anything about coming home when we talked earlier in the week.”
Jordan shrugged. He was struck by an uncharacteristic twinge of uncertainty. He tucked his hand into his pocket and tightened his grip around the jewelry box for reassurance. “Just an impulse.”
“Come on in. I’ll make us some tea. Chamomile, I think. You look almost as frazzled as I feel.”
“You don’t look frazzled,” he noted even though it was a charitable remark. Her hair was tousled, her makeup nonexistent, her clothes caked with mud and hay and other stains that didn’t bear too close a scrutiny.
Inside the cozy kitchen, which was shadowed in the gathering twilight, she smiled at him. She took down two china cups and placed them on the kitchen table. “And you’re a lousy liar, despite all that practice you get dispensing your charm all over Houston. How’s the oil business?”
“Challenging.”
Attuned as always to his moods, she paused while filling the teakettle with water. “Bad week?”
“No worse than most.”
Her gaze narrowed. “That doesn’t sound convincing, old chum.”
Jordan picked up the empty cup and turned it slowly in his hands. The fine porcelain was cracked and chipped, but he found the delicacy oddly enchanting. Flaws, he’d discovered over time, often made people, like china, more interesting. He wondered what flaws Kelly had. After all these years, he could think of none. Discovering them suddenly struck him as a fascinating pastime.
“Jordan?”
He looked up from the fragile cup and saw that Kelly was regarding him with a puzzled expression. Those huge brown eyes of hers were filled with concern.
“Everything okay?” she asked.
“Rexanne broke the engagement,” he announced casually.
“Good,” Kelly replied without the slightest hint of sympathy.
“Damn,” he muttered irritably. “Did everybody dislike her except me?”
“I didn’t dislike her,” Kelly corrected. “I just thought she was all wrong for you.”
“Why?”
“She was using you.”
“Weren’t they all,” he said dryly.
“As a matter of fact, yes,” she said as she poured the boiling water into the pot, tossed in a handful of tea leaves and waited for it to steep.
“Have you ever approved of any woman I’ve dated?”
Kelly took the question he’d intended to be sarcastic seriously. “There was one, back in college. I think her name was Pamela. You dumped her after the first date.”
“And she was right for me?”
“I didn’t have all that long to check out her sincerity,” she reminded him, “but, yes, I think she could have been. She was sweet.”
Jordan scowled. Sweet? Perhaps innocuous would have been a better description. He didn’t even remember a Pamela, which didn’t say much for either her or him.
“Actually, I think my taste is improving,” he said, his gaze fixed on Kelly’s face. There was no immediate reaction beyond a faint flicker of something in her eyes, something he couldn’t quite identify. She seemed slightly more alert, perhaps even a little wary.
“You’ve already found a replacement for Rexanne? Isn’t that a little cavalier?”
“Not really. I told you a long time ago that I thought it was time for me to settle down.”
“Right, so you proposed to the first woman to cross your path after that, and look where that got you.”
“She wasn’t the first woman to cross my path,” he protested. “I was seeing several women at the time. Rexanne seemed like the best choice.”
“Maybe out of that lot, but did you ever stop to consider there was slim pickings in that bunch?” She waggled a slender finger at him. “I’ll answer that. No, you did not. You just decided you wanted to be married and filled the opening as methodically as you would have a position at your company. You probably had a stupid checksheet.”
She wasn’t all that far off the mark, though he wouldn’t have told her that for another gusher in his oil fields. “Well, I’m not going to be so hasty about it this time,” he said.
“You just told me you’ve identified the woman you want to marry. It’s been what? Two days? Maybe three since your engagement broke off?”
“Four, actually.”
She rolled her eyes. “Definitely long enough,” she said with a touch of unfamiliar sarcasm. “Jordan, why can’t you just relax and let nature take its course?”
He gave her a disdainful look. “I don’t have a lot of faith in nature.”
She gave him a wry look. “You would if you’d been in that barn with me an hour ago.”
“I don’t think the fact that your tomcat can’t keep his paws off of Francie is a testament to nature in its finest moments.”
She shrugged, a grin tugging at the corners of her mouth. “Okay, you may have a point about that. So, who’s the latest woman to capture your fancy?”
He leveled a look straight into her eyes and waited until he was sure he had her full attention. “Actually, it’s you.”
Kelly—calm, serene, unflappable Kelly—succumbed to a coughing fit that had her eyes watering and Jordan wondering if he’d gone about this in an incredibly stupid way. It wouldn’t be the first time the direct method had failed him.
Still, he was determined to make her see the sense of this. All of those lectures he’d given himself about dressing it up with a little sweet talk flew out the window. He set out to hammer home the logic.
“It’s a perfectly rational decision…” he began.
“You’re not serious,” she said when she could finally speak.
He pulled the jewelry box from his pocket and placed it on the kitchen table in front of her. Since she was eyeing it as if it