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I shook my head, knowing it wasn’t possible. It had been almost two months since Rafe and I were together. “You’re both projecting.”
Hope snorted and shook her head, standing at my side as Casey took her spot and posed for a few test shots. “We’re projecting? I’m getting laid all the time. All of the time,” she repeated a little bit louder. “Casey is a hot young model in cowboy country, she has all the sex she wants. That covers us, how about you?”
“Who ever said you were nice and bubbly?”
Hope flashed a wide smile and shrugged. “It’s a rumor I started.”
“There’s nothing going on with me. Period.”
“See,” she said to Casey, “people lie.”
The model snickered again and left the room in search of fresh air, or just a little less insanity. “What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing. I’m just trying to find out who’s making your skin glow like that,” she said breezily. “That, and wondering if we could double date some time?”
“Whoa! You’re getting way ahead of yourself, woman.” I shook my head in disbelief. “No one said anything about dating, single, double or otherwise.
“Ha! So, there is somebody. I knew it!”
Dammit, my shoulders sank inward at her glee. “Are you vying for a spot for the Biggest Mouth in Tulip?”
“Not the biggest, just one of the biggest,” she clarified with more attitude than a woman her size should be capable of. “Tell me. It’s you and Rafe, isn’t it?”
“What? No!” I shook my head back and forth with more energy than the move required. By the time I stopped, I wondered if I was in an alternate universe, because standing there in the middle of a half put together living room scene, was the matchmakers. All four of the women stared with a disapproving eye, for me or the lingerie, I wasn’t sure. “What can I do for you ladies?”
“Oh nothing,” Eddy said, doing her level best to look anything other than suspicious and failing miserably. “We can wait until you’re done if you don’t mind an audience?”
I looked to Casey and Hope for confirmation and when they gave it, I nodded for the women to stay. “Just don’t interfere. Please.”
Eddy pretended to zip her lip along with Betty and Helens. Elizabeth arched her brows and rolled her eyes. Figuring it was the best answer I would get, I shrugged and turned back to the photo shoot.
“I wonder if Rafe is seeing anyone,” Helen pondered aloud, on purpose I was sure.
“Probably, he’s been walking around with a smile lately,” Betty said with a sly smile. “We should find out who she is.”
That was the last thing they should do, but I kept my mouth tightly shut. “She has to be well dressed, well traveled and brilliant. A woman to keep that handsome devil on his toes,” Elizabeth Vargas added in an admonishing tone that said she was regretting their impromptu trip. “She needs to be gorgeous and exciting too.”
The woman they described sounded incredible, even to me, and if they ever found her, I would stand a less than zero chance with Rafe. Not that I wanted a chance with him, I didn’t.
At least I didn’t think I wanted that.
Hell, I didn’t honestly know, but this little game of his was physically and mentally draining. And besides all that, nothing the matchmakers said was wrong. Rafe did need, and probably wanted all those things in a woman. And I wasn’t that woman.
“There might not be anyone like that in town who’s not already taken,” Helen Landon said in her signature gruff voice, but I’m sure we’ll find her by casting a wider net.”
A wider net, like he needed help reeling in women! “That’s just rude,” Betty interjected, and all four women started bickering but it slowly faded along with the sun. Just like that, they were gone.
“Don’t listen to them,” Hope insisted, sympathy in her eyes. “Despite what they think, those women have very little to do with the love matches in town. Sure, they manipulated to help them spend more time together, but the feelings are either there or they aren’t. There’s nothing those old girls can do about the love part.”
“Maybe you’re right,” I told her, though I wasn’t sure I believed it. Not yet. Maybe the matchmakers had just gotten lucky, and chose people who were close to falling already. No one really knew, and no one really seemed inclined to question it. Maybe all of that was true, but they weren’t wrong about Rafe. I wasn’t the kind of woman he needed, not by a long shot. I didn’t dress up unless it was absolutely necessary, and even then, I volunteered to photograph events just to get out of dressing up. I didn’t like being the center of attention and preferred to keep the camera as a barrier between me and most of the world. “But, it doesn’t matter to me, Rafe and I are barely friends.”
