Page 5 of Love’s Silver Bullet

“Good man,” he said with a firm slap on Jake’s back, tossing a grin over his shoulder on his way to the door. “Then this’ll be our secret, Jake, all right?”

“Yes, sir. Jake’s eyelids sank with a heavy sigh at the memory of that conversation with Finn he wished he’d never had. He suddenly jumped when Blaze cuffed him on the shoulder, jolting him back to the present where his best friend had just hog-tied him to temptation. “Thanks, buddy. We owe you for putting our minds at ease, knowing Sher is in good hands with a man we can trust.”

A man we can trust.

Stomach in knots, Jake watched as Blaze walked out of the barn, burden free while his best friend carried the weight of the world on his shoulders.

Now if I can just trust myself …

CHAPTER TWO

“So … what do you think, chica?” Carefully adjusting the gauzy peasant-style blouse slightly off Sheridan’s shoulders along with her chemise, her friend Sophia Lopez stepped aside with a gleam of pride twinkling in her black eyes. “Es bueno, no?”

Sheridan blinked in front of her wardrobe mirror, cheeks warm over the hint of cleavage she saw at the scoop neck of a blouse that was as thin as the camisole beneath. Swallowing hard, she studied Sophia’s handiwork with a wary chew of her lip, wondering if this was going too far.

Sophia’s embroidered blouse certainly emphasized Sheridan’s full breasts far more than any calico dress, proving she was definitely a woman. And her long blonde hair caught in a leather tie at the back of her head did, indeed, expose more of Sheridan’s neck and shoulders, which Sophia’s older sister Lolita insisted would be a good thing. More heat stormed Sheridan’s cheeks. “Uh, I’m … not … completely sure about this, Soph …”

“Ay-ay-ay!” Throwing her hands in the air, Sophia stood back with a firm fold of her arms, tapping a toe in impatience. “You look … how do you say, ‘voluptuosa,’ chica, which Lolita said is a must to convince that thick-headed man you are no longer a little bebe. Think about it, Sher. Other than the rodeo dance last year, this will be the closest you get to that Irish mula of yours, so you have to make the most of it, si?”

“He’s not my ‘Irish mula,’” Sheridan whispered, fully aware that Sophia was right, which prompted an immediate square of her shoulders. At least … not yet.

“Lolita said he could be your Irish mula, you know,” Sophia said with a sympathetic slope of brows. She leaned in close, as if afraid anyone other than she, Sher, and their other best friend Kathy Jean Rightler might hear in spite of Sheridan’s locked bedroom door. “If you got close enough to steal a kiss …”

“Sophia Adriana Lopez!” Sheridan gaped in shock, the idea of kissing Jake first completely unnerving her. “B-But … but … I don’t know the first thing about kissing a boy!”

“No worries, chica.” Smile gentle, Sophia squeezed Sheridan’s hand. “Lolita said she would teach you with some of her most successful tips before she leaves for work.”

Sheridan’s cheeks burned crimson, and Kathy Jean’s weren’t far behind, the mere mention of Lolita’s “tips”—the most popular dance-hall girl at the Ponderosa Saloon—scorching both Sheridan’s mind and her body.

“For the love of all that’s decent, Sophia Lopez,” Kathy Jean said with a wide span of brown eyes, “that’s a little extreme, isn’t it?” Her usually shy smile was suddenly lost in a drop of her jaw. Definitely the prim-and-proper one of the three friends, Kathy Jean was what Sophia’s older sister Lolita affectionately dubbed a “fuddy-duddy” or “goody-goody.” Which, if Lolita had her way, is something her younger sister Sophia would definitely not be.

Sophia offered a sympathetic shrug. “Only if she wants to get her cowboy’s attention because it does not look to me like she has it so far.” With raven-black hair to match her almond-shaped eyes, Sophia had a modestly endowed figure that someday would, no doubt, compare to that of her voluptuous older sister. But Sophia was, thank goodness, far more studious and less provocative than Lolita, who was notorious for being an insatiable flirt. Which is why Sophia had asked for her sister’s advice in helping Sheridan win Jake’s heart.

But peeking at herself in the mirror with a hard swallow, Sheridan wasn’t so sure Lolita’s advice was the route she should take.

Sophia homed in on Sheridan’s obvious reluctance with a serious blink of black eyes in the mirror. “And who knows, chica? This could be your last chance.”

My last chance. Sheridan chewed a piece of skin from the edge of her lip, pretty sure Sophia was right. She had only a few months left to make Jake fall in love with her before Aunt Libby and Maggie whisked her off to college, and she sure wasn’t making great strides so far. Today was her third lesson with Jake on how to shoot a gun, and the man had yet to get within two feet of her.

Lesson number one had been on gun safety and terminology on the front porch—in front of her entire family!

Lesson number two had been on types of guns and how to clean and load them in the barn—in front of her brother Blaze and a number of the other cowhands.

And lesson number three? A shy smile tickled her lips. Actual stance and shooting at Lake Silver tomorrow, a mile or so down the road, where all the cowhands took gun practice.

“After lunch tomorrow,” Jake had said in that deadly serious tone he used with Sheridan ever since Blaze had strong-armed him into teaching her to shoot, “I’ll set up your shooting range at Lake Silver. Then you, Blaze, and Maggie will mosey on over at 1:30 p.m. or so for target practice, got it?”

Oh, she “got” it all right. After all, one wasn’t valedictorian of her class for nothing, no matter how inept her brothers and uncle thought her to be when it came to boys. The truth was that Jacob Michael Sullivan wanted nothing to do with being alone with her, which is why he insisted Blaze and Maggie join them at the lake for Sheridan’s first official shooting lesson after church.

A smile twitched as she peeked at herself in the mirror once again, teeth grating her lower lip while she imagined the look on his face when he realized Maggie and Blaze most definitely wouldn’t be coming …

“Maggie, please?” Sheridan had begged her sister-in-law a few days ago, pleading her case to the woman who had become both a friend and big sister since she’d married her brother Blaze three months ago. “It’s bad enough Uncle Finn is forcing me to go to Vassar against my will in the fall, leaving you and my family, but to leave Jake, too? Without ever getting the chance to be alone with him just once, so I can tell him how I really feel and hopefully convince him to see me as a woman?”

Maggie had studied her with a tender smile laced with sympathy as she gently brushed Sheridan’s hair over her shoulder. “I just don’t want you to get hurt if he turns you away, Sher, you know?”

“I’m already ‘hurt,’ Maggie,” she’d said quietly, staving off the quiver of her lip. “I’ve loved Jake Sullivan all of my life, and deep down, I just know he’s the one for me.”

“But how can you know that for sure? You’re so young—”