A Wedding in Wyoming

Jenn waved him off with her hand. “Now you’re starting to sound like my family.”

He laughed and stretched like a lazy cat. He was so large he dwarfed the armchair he was seated on.

“I still don’t understand where I come in,” he said after a minute.

“You don’t,” she stated emphatically. “This is all one big misunderstanding.”

“I got that much. So who is—and more to the point where is—this fellow Johnny your family was clearly expecting?”

She groaned and put a palm to her forehead. “That’s the thing,” she muttered. “There is no Johnny.”

There was another long moment’s pause as Johnny considered her words, and then he shook his head. “I don’t get it.”

She chuckled. “No, you wouldn’t. I did something stupid, at least in hindsight it appears that way. My family always teases me mercilessly about getting married and starting a family, so I made up a man.”

“You did what?” He fingered the dusty Stetson in his hand.

“It’s not as complicated as it sounds—at least it wasn’t, until you showed up and announced your name was Johnny.”

“My name is Johnny,” he said with a low chuckle.

“Unfortunately,” she muttered, and then clapped a hand over her mouth. “I’m so sorry. I really didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

He laughed. “I didn’t think you did.”

She liked his laugh. He threw back his head and chortled wholeheartedly, his blue eyes glittering.

Okay, so she was harboring a little resentment toward the man, even if she knew perfectly well it wasn’t really his fault she was in this predicament. Fortunately, he couldn’t tell how she was really feeling, this convulsion of emotions coursing through her heart and head.

At least Johnny appeared to be taking her revelations with courtesy and maybe a touch of humor, which, Jenn thought, said a lot about the kind of man he was. He didn’t seem mad at her.

Yet.

He hadn’t heard the whole story. Johnny might appear to be a nice enough man for an unpolished cowboy, but he still had no idea how big a quandary he’d innocently walked into.

There were limits to any man’s patience, and Johnny’s, she had to think, must already be stretched close to its limit.

Jenn was about to continue her convoluted explanation when her mother interrupted. Clearing her throat loudly to announce her presence, Jenn’s mother entered with two steaming mugs of freshly ground and brewed coffee. Jenn inhaled the lovely aroma of hazelnut and crème, her favorite.

Mom didn’t say a word. She set the mugs on the table and, with an encouraging smile to each of them, backtracked into the kitchen, closing the French doors that separated the rooms firmly behind her.

“I sent myself flowers,” Jenn announced as soon as she and Johnny were once more alone.

“That’s it?” Johnny asked, cocking an eyebrow. “That’s all you did? Signed the card Johnny and let everyone think what they may?”

“Not exactly,” she said, chuckling. “I signed the card, Love, Me.”

He laughed heartily, and Jenn was certain her family could hear that from the next room.

“Clever,” he said. “Ingenious. This story gets better and better. So what happened when the flowers arrived?” He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, as if anxious to hear the rest.

In that, he would be disappointed. “There isn’t much to tell. The family made a big deal of it, of course, and started nagging me for a name. I’d only just blurted out Johnny when you and Scotty showed up.”

“Hmm,” he said, stroking his strong jaw between his thumb and forefinger. His face was unshaven, as he’d been out on the range for a good week at least, Jenn thought.

She wondered why she didn’t find the scruff unattractive. Stubble had never appealed to her before.

He sat back in the chair. “My showing up puts you in a bit of a pickle, doesn’t it?”

“Let’s just say it was a major jolt to my system, and leave it at that. I was really freaked out there for a while. But now that I’ve had a chance to settle down and think about it—and to talk to you—it’s really not so bad. We—I, that is,—just need to come clean with the facts. I simply have to tell my family there’s been a misunderstanding and you are not my Johnny.”

“And yet, here we’ve been sitting alone all this time like we’re catching up.”

The man did have a point. Jenn felt herself blushing again. She hated that. “I can’t think of how to explain that part—yet.”

Johnny grinned. “I can.”

But before he could say more, the family emerged from the kitchen, flooding back into the living room with expectant gazes on their faces. Apparently, they’d collectively decided they’d waited long enough to get the scoop on Jenn and her new beau.

Even Scotty looked curious. How could he think for one second that…

Her thoughts were cut off when Johnny stood, and with the athletic agility of a rugged cowboy, slid into the spot next to her on the sofa and slipped his arm around her shoulders, effectively sealing the deal.

She couldn’t think. She couldn’t breathe. The temperature in the room seemed to suddenly have spiked to well over two hundred degrees.

What was the crazy cowboy up to now? Didn’t he realize he was making things worse by the second?

And how was she going to explain herself to her family, when Johnny was acting so cozy with her?

There was only one answer to that question.

She couldn’t.

Chapter Two

“Relax,” he whispered close to her ear, his soft drawl sending a shiver down her spine for any number of reasons. “I’m doing you a favor.”

What? Her mind scrambled for an answer to his riddle, but she couldn’t put two thoughts together rationally to save her life.

Steady, she coaxed herself mentally. Relax. Think. Try to locate your brain.

“Thanks, folks,” Johnny said, addressing her hovering family. “It was nice to have a few minutes alone with Jenn to get—er—reacquainted with this lovely lady.”

His arm tightened around her shoulder for just a moment. She didn’t know if the gesture was meant for the family’s benefit or if he was sending her some kind of unspoken message.

Maybe both.

Because she was sure, now, what he was doing.