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“Then what?”
He gave a deep sigh. “For a smart lady, you sure are dumb.”
She regarded him more closely. Could he possibly be attracted to her? She drew herself up sharply. This was no time to indulge in fantasy. Besides, he was a playboy, and she was very nearly a dotty, dear thing.
“All right,” he said. “You win this round. You can stay at my ranch, but I’m charging you two hundred dollars a day rent.”
That would wipe out her profit. “One hundred dollars.”
“Two fifty.”
“All right,” she said hastily. “Two hundred.”
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nbsp; They drove for the next few miles in silence, but even the glorious scenery couldn’t lift her spirits. She didn’t want to dwell on her own troubles, so she made herself think of other things. Before long, her thoughts drifted back to Torie Traveler. “Don’t you find the similarity between my odd situation and your sister’s a bit too coincidental?”
“It’s not coincidental at all. A certain English busybody’s got her nose in where it doesn’t belong. And this time we’re not talking about you.”
“But Francesca knows nothing about my situation with Hugh.”
“Francesca knows everything. That’s how she’s been able to keep her television show on the air for so many years. She’s pretty much like God, except sexy.”
“I’m going to call her tonight and ask.”
He adjusted the sun visor. “You can ask all you want, but if Francesca doesn’t feel like telling, you won’t learn a thing.”
“Do you really think she has some plan behind throwing us together?”
“You bet I do.”
“But what could it be?”
“Sadism. You live with the Antichrist long enough, you turn mean.”
In the luxurious bedroom of a rented home in Palm Beach, Florida, an elegantly beautiful forty-four-year-old Englishwoman with chestnut hair and a heart-shaped face curled deeper into the pale peach sheets and gave a sigh of contentment as she gazed at the indentation in the pillow next to her. Time had only improved her husband’s lovemaking techniques.
The shower went on in the connecting bathroom, and she gave a soft laugh as she wondered how Emma and Kenny were doing. Putting the two of them together had been decidedly wicked, but irresistible—Francesca Serritella Day Beaudine’s own sentimental journey. Although it wasn’t exactly a case of history repeating itself, since Emma bore no resemblance to the spoiled little rich girl Francesca had been when Dallie Beaudine had picked her up on that Louisiana back road twenty-three years ago.
From the moment Francesca had met Emma, she’d felt a kinship with her. Beneath her friend’s deep intelligence and innate goodness, she’d glimpsed her loneliness.
Then there was Kenny Traveler . . . her darling, unhappy Kenny. . . . Francesca’s eyes drifted shut, and she recalled another too-handsome Texas golf pro who’d endangered his game by spending too much time fighting demons he wouldn’t let anyone else glimpse.
Still, Emma and Kenny? What could she have been thinking of? If it hadn’t been for Torie’s situation, she would never have thought to connect them in her mind.
Francesca’s sources were impeccable, and she’d learned about Beddington’s peculiar search for a bride almost as soon as it had begun, but she’d been stunned when she’d learned he’d latched on to Emma. Right away, she’d been struck by the similarities between Emma’s situation and Torie’s. That had made her think about Kenny, and then the most incredible image of Kenny and Emma together had taken shape in her mind. It was ridiculous, of course, to believe two such unlikely people could help each other. Still, stranger things had happened.
The water stopped running in the bathroom. She stretched lazily, even though she had a thousand things to do. First she needed to call her best friend, Holly Grace Beaudine Jaffe, who also happened to be Dallie’s first wife, and was now the mother of four boys—five if Francesca counted Holly Grace’s husband Gerry. Then she needed to get to work. Putting on a monthly television special didn’t happen by accident, and she had a long list of calls to make, beginning with her producer in New York.
The bathroom door opened, and she forgot all about her calls as her husband’s deep drawl drifted across the room.
“Come here, Fancy Pants.”
Kenny’s ranch sat in a valley just south of Wynette. He turned off the main highway onto a narrower road, then headed down a lane marked by a pair of rough limestone pillars topped with a rustic wrought-iron arch.
“My property starts here.” Emma heard the subtle note of pride in Kenny’s voice.
They drove through the entrance, past a peach orchard just beginning to come into bloom, and across a wide wooden bridge that spanned a stretch of shallow, crystal-clear river. “That’s the Pedernales. It floods during big storms and covers the bridge, but I still love having it in my front yard.”
