Jennifer woke up the next morning with a terrible headache. She felt out of sorts and needed coffee. Dragging herself out of bed to the nearest diner, she ordered breakfast and strong coffee. She thought about the conversation she would have with her mother and she didn't know how to tell her what she had learned.
"I'd love to buy you that breakfast," someone said next to her, and when she turned, she saw Sean Perry. He looked so much better than she felt and that made her annoyed with him all over again. “As you pointed out, yesterday, I have so much money flying around, might as well treat you to some bacon and eggs,” he grinned.
“I’m sorry about saying that,” Jennifer said stiffly. “I was angry and worried and it got the better of me.”
“May I sit down?” he asked pointing at the stool next to her. She nodded and couldn’t help but breathe in the scent of him as he moved closer to her. It was a clean smell, of soap and water, but there was something spicy and exotic underneath.
Jennifer forced herself to pay attention to her food.
“I thought I might find you here, staying at the motel an’ all,” he said. “I wanted to apologize about yesterday,” Jennifer looked at him and their eyes met. She could not look away.
“I wanted to tell you that I really liked Joanne, and my intentions were honest. I really did want to marry her. But she called me that night, told me that she had changed her mind and that she was sorry. The only thing was, she didn’t sound sorry at all.”
Jennifer thought about how much she was learning about Joanne over the past two days.
“Joanne was the older sister,” she said slowly. “But I always felt like the more responsible one. She was one for following her heart, I like to think things through. I wish I knew what was going through her mind….” Jennifer shook her head.
“She’s done things like this before?” Sean asked.
Jennifer told him how Joanne had broken off her engagement to her fiancé only two months before she started talking about marrying Sean. "I told her it was too soon," she said, shaking her head. Sean shifted in his seat, his thigh brushed against Jennifer and a shock of electricity went through her. She almost jumped into the air. It completely disorientated her.
“Looks like I might have been talking to the wrong sister all along,” he said in a low, husky voice, leaning closer to her. There was a mischievous twinkle in his eye and Jennifer knew he was having fun with her. She quickly got up, wiped her mouth on the napkin and grabbed her handbag.
“Thanks for breakfast,” she said with a tight smile. “I have to find out what happened to my sister.”
“Wait!” Sean grabbed her arm. “I could help you with that.”
Jennifer twisted her arm out of his grip. “No, thanks.”
"I'd like to help you," he said again, letting go of her arm, sounding sincere. "I feel sorry about what happened. I have a car, a telephone you could use. We were nearly related, for goodness' sakes?"
He had a point there, Jennifer had to admit to herself.
“I know you don’t want my help, but please, allow me?”
Jennifer didn’t know what to say. The cowboy with the voice like honey had the strangest effect on her. She found herself going to the motel to get her luggage, being driven back to the house where she was given a stunning guest bedroom on the ranch.
“It really is beautiful here,” she told Sean Perry.
"I dreamed of this place for years," Sean told her. "I made some money on the stock market, worked my backside off for years, then they got me for some bad trades." He shrugged. "I came out here to lie low for a while but found that I liked the lifestyle, breathing in real air, not recycled air-conditioning. So I bought the place. I wanted a wife to share it with, and I thought Joanne was the one."
He was standing very close to Jennifer. She didn’t know what to say. His life was completely alien to her, but his words spoke to her. She walked over to the window.
“It is very different to the city. It is so quiet, so refreshing with the lack of cars and sirens and buses. It’s the light, the colors…” her voice trailed away as she felt him come up behind her, standing close to her. She could barely breathe as she turned around and walked into his embrace, his mouth on hers, his arms folding around her, holding her close.
“Wait, no,” Jennifer pushed him away, shocked by his daring as much as by her own eagerness. Had she not been attracted to him from the beginning? She could not deny that she had wanted this to happen.
“This is wrong,” she said. “Take me back to the motel. Now.”
He picked up her bag, and they drove back to town without speaking another word. When she arrived, he turned to face her, but she shook her head and held up her hand, getting out of the door and rushing into reception.
The Keys sisters had made too many mistakes in Texas already, Jennifer thought as she booked her room again. She would not allow herself to make another one.