Shotgun Vows Read Free Page B

sweetly as possible. “But you’ve had so many more years than I’ve had to gather information. How do you remember it all?”
    He folded his arms over his chest. A very impressive chest, she noted with a small surprising flutter of her heart.
    â€œA world-class memory,” he said, one corner of his mouth lifting. “And fortunately, I’m not ready to take up residence in the geriatric ward yet.”
    â€œI’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way. It’s just that what you do boggles the mind. I’ve never been very good with numbers myself. I’m in awe of anyone who can make sense of it.”
    â€œA lot of what I do is guesswork and instinct. Just like you,” he said.
    She grinned. “But I bet your numbers don’t give you love and affection like my horses do.”
    He laughed. “You win that round. But I have no emotional investment in my numbers the way you do your horses. They can’t break my heart.”
    She saw a black look in his eyes. A remembered pain? She would have sworn that’s what it was, and in spite of who he was and how he tweaked her temper, she did feel sorry for him.
    â€œWho broke your heart?” she asked, automatically softening her tone as if she were working with one of the horses.
    Instantly the vulnerable expression was gone, replaced by a teasing grin. “What makes you think someone broke my heart?”
    â€œMother says a person doesn’t get through life without some heartbreak. And you’ve lived so very, very long,” she said teasingly. “Surely there are skeletons in your closet.”
    â€œOnly on Halloween.”
    â€œIsn’t there a saying in your country—no pain, no gain?”
    â€œI think I’ve heard that one.” He shrugged. “Either I’m emotionally backward, or I’ve managed to gain without the pain part. What about you? Was your mother right? Have you had your heartbreak in the year-and-a-half you’ve been on this earth?”
    â€œCute. I’m not that young.” What she was was inexperienced, thanks to her brothers. Except for one single, painful episode. But a stampede of determined Texas mustangs couldn’t force her to share the details of that humiliation with him.
    â€œFrom where I’m standing, you look hardly more than a baby.”
    Her back started to rise at his comment, making her want to show him that she was a full-grown woman. Her next thought was that he’d turned the conversation away from himself and back to her. Interesting. The words were spoken in a joking manner, but she sensed currents of emotion in him. Had someone broken his heart? Or was his pain from something else? She instinctively knew that if she asked, he would put her off.
    Instead she watched him, mostly his eyes, then noted the tension in his square jaw. Noted also that he was a very good-looking man, in an older, businessman sort of way. Her heart began to beat very fast, and she grew warm all over. She hadn’t felt this way but once, when she had been hardly more than a baby. Barely sixteen, she’d managed to elude her brothers long enough to develop a crush on a boy. The incident was a disaster.
    But Dawson was a man—the first she’d ever been alone with as a woman. Surely that was the reason her body responded this way when she was near him. That, and the fact that she was ready to become a woman in every way. She’d been ready for a long time, but she had way too many brothers who took turns never letting their guard down. The explanation for her reaction to this man had to be that simple. Because Mr. Prescott was absolutely not her type.
    But one thought struck her above everything else: her uncle Ryan’s comment about his “dynamite” employees. She had a feeling that if she wasn’t careful, this particular very male employee could light her fuse and blow up her whole world.

Two
    D awson helped Mattie set