Falling For Fortune. Nancy Robards Thompson
he was one of the paparazzi, he’d be out here now, snapping more photos.”
“Then why did we have to leave?”
“Because I wasn’t up for a photo shoot—no matter who was behind the lens—or what kind of camera it was.”
Besides, amateurs sold photographs to the tabloids all the time—something the Fortune Chesterfields knew too well.
Jensen slowed their pace as they were outside and in the clear, then he walked Amber to her pickup.
“If you don’t mind,” she said, “I’d like my jacket now.”
“I’ll go back inside for it.”
She crossed her arms, ignoring the gooseflesh which had risen to the surface of her skin. “Not so fast. What’s the deal, Jensen?”
“You’re going to freeze out here. Are you just plain contrary?”
“It’s the principle. I make my own choices when it comes to my wardrobe—and to my inner thermostat. When I was hotter than blazes inside, you wanted me covered up. And I’d like to know why.”
“Sorry. I just didn’t like seeing all the men in there ogling you.”
She lifted a brow. “But it’s okay for you to do it?”
When she stated it that way, he supposed it wasn’t. Although he liked the black lacy blouse—and the way it revealed her tiny waist and sexy midriff.
But he wasn’t being the least bit fair, was he? Not when there wasn’t a chance in hell that the two of them would make any kind of match—lasting or otherwise.
Well, perhaps otherwise might be an option, but he’d be damned if he knew how to broach a subject like that. He might have his share of ladies offering to be his lovers, but he wasn’t what you’d call a Casanova.
He’d never had to be.
Yet, again, that wasn’t fair to Amber. So if their friendship or relationship went in that direction, the decision would have to be hers to make.
“I had a lovely evening,” he said.
She stopped, turned, slapped her hands on her denim-clad hips and completely disarmed him with a look of astonishment. “Did you just completely ignore my question?”
“The one about your top and how sexy I found it this evening? Why, yes. I was moving on to a safer topic.”
“And my sexy blouse is dangerous because...?”
She was provoking him, setting him up. Prompting him to continue.
All right. He’d take the bait. Perhaps it would lead to the direction he’d like things to take—her choice, of course.
“Because a conversation like that would surely lead to me kissing you senseless in the parking lot, especially since we seem to be the only two out here, without any witnesses to sully your reputation.”
For a couple of heartbeats, silence played cat and mouse in the moonlight.
“And kissing me would be a bad thing?” she asked.
“You tell me.”
With that, the lovely, irrepressible and delightful Miss Amber Rogers—no relation to either Roy or Rod—did better than that.
She showed him by rising up on tiptoe, wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him...utterly senseless.
Her scent—something that reminded him of ripe peaches in full harvest—enveloped him. His hands sought to draw her close, to hold her, to capture the essence of the woman who tempted him beyond reason, while his tongue dipped and twisted and mated with hers.
Then, just as quickly as it all started, she pulled her sweet lips from his, dropped her arms and spun around.
Before he could blink or think, she reached into her tiny purse, pulled out a key fob and said, “I’ll see you later.” Then she climbed into her pickup and turned the ignition as if nothing between them had happened.
And perhaps it hadn’t. Because a couple of heartbeats later, she drove off, leaving him standing in the moonlight, bewitched, bothered and more than a little befuddled.
* * *
It had taken every ounce of Amber’s strength and willpower to control her weak knees, trembling arms and pounding heart to leave as if she was completely unaffected by that good-night kiss. But what she might lack in sexual experience and worldliness, she made up for in gumption.
Jensen may have thought he’d made her feel better about things, but he hadn’t. And that’s mostly because there was a whole lot he didn’t know, a whole lot she hadn’t told him.
How would he react when everyone in town, including the Cross Town Crier, learned that she’d accepted the job of riding in the Cowboy Country USA Wild West Show? Or that she’d been asked to audition for a part in Madame LaRue’s Lone Star Review—which meant donning a saloon-girl costume that Gram was stitching up for her because Elmer Murdock suggested it would give her a “leg up”—the pun very much intended?
Not that she’d decided to try out for sure. But doggone it. She was certainly tempted to do just that because she could almost hear Patrick Swayze’s voice booming out in the cab of her truck: No one puts Amber in a corner.
Okay, so Dirty Dancing had always been one of her mom’s favorite movies, and Amber had watched the DVD a hundred times.
But bottom line? Amber was both a competitor and maybe even an entertainer at heart. And she wasn’t meant to spend her entire life marooned on a ranch. Of course, that didn’t mean she didn’t love the Broken R or Horseback Hollow or Texas, for that matter. They would always be home to her.
It’s just that, deep down in her heart, she’d wanted to shine and to be someone. And now Cowboy Country USA was providing her an opportunity to have it all. Well, if Jensen ever got wind of her involvement, that would surely put the end to anything that might come of any romantic opportunities there.
But who was she kidding?
A few heated kisses didn’t mean anything without an invitation to go along with them. And at this rate, this thing or friendship or whatever you wanted to call it, wasn’t apt to go anywhere—nor was it going to last more than a week or two at the most.
And even if they did sneak off and do more than just kiss, the whole thing would fizzle out soon enough. They were a mismatched pair—and nothing could ever come of it.
So why did she dare even harbor the slightest little hope that things could be different?
Actually, the way he wanted to keep things secret made her mad as heck and fired her up.
Who whisked their dates out under the cover of darkness to a quaint little out-of-the-way place, treated them to a romantic dinner and shared a soul-stirring, knee-wobbling good-bye kiss only to let them go their own way?
Okay, so she’d been the one to leave. And just like Cinderella at the ball, she’d left her suede jacket behind when she ran off in a rush to escape the inevitable reality of the situation.
He’d called her an hour later to make sure she’d gotten home all right and to tell her he had her suede jacket. She’d thanked him, and they’d made small talk for a while, although they didn’t broach anything remotely serious, like jealousy or heated kisses.
But she clearly wasn’t Jensen’s type. Nor did she belong in his world. She was a fool to even entertain a fleeting dream that they could ever share more than a few sneaky dates and a couple of stolen kisses.
And Gram and Pop didn’t raise her to be no fool.
* * *
Amber pulled the rig into the side yard just after dark. It had been a long day and she’d just delivered a couple of