One Winter Wedding. Barbara Hannay

      “More than a few.”

      “More than a few hundred, if your aunt and uncle had anything to say about it.” The teasing tone stayed in his voice, but Kelsey could tell her family’s poor opinion of him still rankled. He was clearly out to prove the Wilsons wrong, but Kelsey suspected he had as much to prove to himself. “And here I’ve been a perfect gentleman.”

      “Well, not perfect,” she argued. But who wanted perfect? Perfect was for women like her cousins; Kelsey much preferred the real thing to Ken-like perfection.

      “I’m crushed. Señora Delgado will be so disappointed.”

      “Señora Delgado?”

      “Javy’s mother.”

      “How did you and Javy meet?”

      “We went to school together. Mrs. Brown’s sixth-grade glass.”

      “And you two became fast friends?”

      “Nah, we hated each other. I can’t even remember why. Oh, wait, it had something to do with a girl. We thought we were pretty hot stuff on the playground. Both trying to impressAlicia Martin. Unfortunately for us, she had a thing for older men.”

      “Eighth grader?” Kelsey guessed, playing along to maintain the teasing mood.

      “Worse. P.E. teacher. And man, the guy was old. Like twenty-five. Anyway, we bonded over a couple of cafeteria juice boxes, and I started hanging out with him at his mother’s restaurant. Before long, I was washing dishes and bussing tables. If the Delgados hadn’t fed me through most of junior high and high school, I don’t know what I would have done. Probably would have dropped out to work full-time if Maria hadn’t stopped me.”

      Kelsey knew the drop-out rate was horrible, especially in Arizona, but as much as she’d hated school, she never once considered not finishing. “How did she stop you?”

      “By telling me I should,” Connor said wryly. “She said anyone foolish enough to give up a free education didn’t deserve one.”

      Smiling at the woman’s use of reverse psychology, Kelsey said, “I think I’d like to meet her. Not every woman has enough influence to keep a boy in school and teach him to clear dishes off a table.”

      “You’re on. Let’s go to the Delgados’ restaurant. Maybe Maria will be there.”

      Kelsey swallowed. Was Connor asking her out? On a date? She waited for the little voice in her head to tell her this was a bad idea, but she didn’t hear it. Possibly because it was drowned out by the big voice screaming, “Go for it!”

      She knew the voice of reason would be back, loud and clear, and ready to say “I told you so” if she let herself fall for Connor. But that worry, like the voice, seemed far off, and she couldn’t resist the chance to spend more time with Connor.

      “I’m a mess,” she said in weak protest. “I can’t go anywhere looking like this.”

      As Connor’s gaze swept over her, Kelsey felt her face heat. She could only imagine what he saw. She had spackle under her nails, drywall dust in her hair, and more splotches of paint than freckles covering her arms. She was sweaty and disheveled, and even though Connor had worked as hard as anyone, he looked—

      Gorgeous, she thought with a sigh, taking in the lock of dark hair he’d constantly pushed back from his paint-streaked forehead, the hint of five o’clock shadow shading his jaw, the damp T-shirt that molded to his shoulders and chest.

      “I’ll pick you up at your place in half an hour,” he said as he stood and reached down to pull her to her feet.

      Kelsey shook her head, ready to refuse, and yet when she opened her mouth she said, “An hour.”

      “Forty-five minutes.”

      “An hour.” She laughed as she shoved him toward the door. “And not a minute sooner.”