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  “Rescinded,” she interrupted.

  “Not so fast,” he said, his tone soothing. “We need to get back to the single-ovary issue. I believe I’m your man.”

  She shook her head, visibly aggravated with him. “You are not my man.”

  “Well, you certainly don’t want a farmer.”

  “I would want a farmer, if he understood hearth and home, and that fighting never solves anything.”

  “Says the woman who just gave Daisy Donovan the haircut from hell.”

  “She needed that,” Jade said. “She’s had that coming for years.”

  He wanted to laugh, but held back to keep himself out of trouble. “Let’s talk about that baby you want. Or was that just a ploy to keep me from the fight?”

  She turned into the drive of the small farmhouse where she and Betty lived. “It was a ploy, and I do want a baby.”

  “So the offer’s still open.”

  “No. It’s not.” She got out of the truck. “You know what? This is so not a good idea. You can walk back, since I didn’t invite you into my truck in the first place.”

  He swooped her up, deposited her in the porch swing and sat down beside her. “Not until we finish the discussion you started earlier.”

  “It’s late.” Jade scowled at him, her expression clearly visible in the soft lights that decorated the wraparound porch.

  “There’s an important rule about never going to bed mad,” Ty said, reaching out to twine a strand of her hair around his finger. It was so soft, and she was so soft. He was dying to hold her again.

  “I’m fine with going to bed mad. I just want to go to bed.” Jade removed his hand from her hair. “Go away.”

  “I’ll be completely out of your hair in just a few days,” Ty said. “Let’s stay friends.”

  “Ty, you don’t understand. We’re sort of friends, the way we always were because we’re both from here. But you need to go, and I need to stay.” She looked sad. “Wherever you go, you’ll find trouble, I have no doubt of that.”

  She went inside, abandoning him. Ty thought he’d utterly struck out until the door opened again and she came out with a damp cloth.

  “Wipe your mouth,” she said, “I don’t want you bleeding all over the porch. It’s been freshly painted.”

  It had been; he could smell the paint, and the whiteness gleamed in the moonlight and lamplight. Garlands of pine twined around every banister, decorated with red ribbons. A big wreath hung on the door, very festive in the chilly weather. He dabbed at his mouth where it felt as if he’d split it again from grinning at Jade, and she sighed, reaching out to take the cloth from him, pressing it against the spot where he’d taken a slight punch earlier. Strangely, it didn’t seem to hurt as much now that Jade was ministering to him.

  “You scared me tonight,” she said. “I didn’t want you fighting, and getting yourself all busted up before you go to training. What would you have done if you’ve broken a hand or some fingers?”

  “It would’ve sucked,” he admitted. “But I had to back up my brothers.”

  “Those aren’t your brothers. Those are your bachelors.” Jade shook her head. “The problem with you is that you’re always working your plan.”

  He brightened, caught her hand in his, tossed aside the damp rag she’d been soothing him with and pulled her into his lap. “I’m trying to add you to my plan. Let’s get back to your problem. It’s more interesting.”

  “No.” She snuggled into him. “Go home, Ty.”

  “This is my home,” he said, looking around the small farmhouse. “I practically grew up here. Betty is like my mother.”

  “That would make us some kind of siblings, and that would be so weird.”

  He laughed. “Just because I love your mom doesn’t mean I feel brotherly toward you. Let me romance you, Jade. I’ll put such a glow on that ovary of yours it’ll be spitting out little Tys in no time.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “Nothing about that convinces me to let you anywhere near my ovary. And can we please stop talking about it?”

  “I don’t see how you expect me to stop talking about the most interesting proposition I’ve had in years. Make a baby with a sexy redhead? Hell, yeah!”

  She got out of his lap. “Begone.”

  “I know you want me, Jade Harper. You shouldn’t deny yourself the pleasure just because I had to defend the Hanging H from some hardheaded rascals. And may I just remind you one more time that you’re the one who did the most damage tonight? Daisy’s going to have it in for you like she’s never had it in for anyone before. You cut off the thing she loves the most.” He laughed, still amused by the spectacle of Jade at work on Daisy’s tresses. “You’re quite a fighter.”

  “Men are always so amused by women fighting.” Jade shook her head. “I wasn’t about to let Daisy get away with hurting Mackenzie and Suz. They’re my best friends.”

  “Besides me.”

  She looked at him. “Not even close, cowboy.”

  “So no goodbye party of the sexual variety?”

  “As I said, I changed my mind the minute I saw you throw the first punch. What were you thinking?” She put her hands on her hips, and Ty could tell she really was angry with him. “Don’t you realize how important your dream is to Bridesmaids Creek? You don’t have the right to throw it away on a stupid brawl.”

  “My dream?”

  “We’ve heard about your SEAL dream for years. We’ve watched you swim laps in Bridesmaids Creek for hours, watched you run for miles, half the time dragging a tire or something on your back for conditioning. When you came back to BC, we all thought you’d come just to say goodbye. None of us suspected you’d bring eligible bachelors to populate the town, and somehow, that made us think all the more of you.” Jade’s eyes softened. “You love Bridesmaids Creek almost more than anyone, and the last thing we want is to weigh you down.”

  He leaned back in the porch swing, astonished. “Weigh me down? This place is my touchstone. It’s not a weight.”

  “Then go achieve your dream. Most of us here will never leave, so we’re looking for a hero to live vicariously through.”

  “You could leave,” Ty said.

  “I don’t want to. I want—” Jade pulled him up from the swing and guided him off the porch “—you to go become a kick-ass SEAL. It’s going to be hard, and you need to be in the best shape possible, not all busted up from fighting. Trust me, if you come back in ten years, we’ll still be fighting here. It’ll be like you’re Rip van Winkle and just woke up and nothing changed.”

  “Jade—”

  “And you need to be in great emotional shape, not dragged down by our silly problems. We lived without your guiding hand while you were on the circuit, and we’ll be fine without you now. We’re tough here, Ty. We don’t need you to solve anything for us. So just go.”

  He stared at her, knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that the last thing he wanted was to leave this woman behind forever. “Were you serious about having a child?”

  “Yes. Absolutely. Betty needs to be a grandmother, and I want to be a mother.” For the first time tonight, Jade smiled. “I want exactly what Mackenzie has. And I’ll get it, too. Don’t worry.”

  “I’m not exactly worried.” He was practically staggered by the thought that she might find a farmer—or Sam—as soon as he was gone to training, and Ty would come home one day to find a mini-Jade following her mother around. “Damn, Jade, I’m pretty sure you need to let me tickle that ovary of yours.”

  She pointed to the road. “Go. Be the SEAL this town has always known you could be. We live to brag on our own.”

  She went inside, closed the door. Ty looked around in the darkness, his heart feeling as if it was bleeding. For a guy who considered himself smooth when it came to the ladies, he hadn’t put a dent
in Jade’s armor against him. Sudden armor, he reminded himself. She sure had seemed eager back at the bunkhouse.

  A woman didn’t turn off her feelings just because a man got involved in a tiny scuffle, did she? He sank into the porch swing, pondering what the hell had just happened to him. “First she says she wants to have a baby, and I’m the father she’s chosen. Then she cuts off Daisy’s hair.” A moment that had strangely afflicted him with a mixture of horniness, pride and admiration. He went back to his dilemma. “So the hair went poof, and so did Jade’s desire to give me a chance to rock that ovary she was so worried about not thirty minutes before.” He was so perplexed he felt as if the secure ground he’d been standing on had crumbled.

  She had tried to keep him from the fight, and she had used sex as a lure. And yet he’d sensed she was very serious underneath the obvious wish to keep him from fighting. Jade wasn’t being honest when she blamed her lack of desire to be alone with him on the fact that he’d jumped into the fight; he was going to be a SEAL, and anybody knew SEALs weren’t opposed to a little action.

  It didn’t make sense. But the redhead that gave his heart severe palpitations of the good kind had definitely closed up on him tighter than a clam, both emotionally and physically.

  If he hadn’t gone to help his brothers, would Jade really have made love with him? Did she really want his child?

  There was only one way to find out.

  He got up, banged on her front door.

  Chapter Eight

  Jade opened the door, which sort of surprised Ty because he wasn’t sure that she would.

  “Go away,” she said.

  See, that was exactly why she needed him—she didn’t know how sexy she was, and how much she fired him up, sassing him like that. Ty grinned. “Can Jade come out to play?”

  “Very funny. That worked when we were kids, but those days are long over.”

  “And to think I never even tried to play doctor with you, or Spin the Bottle, or any of the other kid games.”

  “I would have slapped you into next year.”

  He smiled bigger, couldn’t help it. That spunk had his name written all over it. “I need a shotgun rider. Drive out to the old place with me.”

  Jade’s eyes widened. “You’re really going to your family home?”

  He shrugged. “I’m leaving for a long time, won’t be back. I need to rattle the ghosts before I go.”

  “And you want a fellow rattler.”

  Ty smiled again. “If anybody is up to the job, beautiful, it’s you. Those ghosts don’t stand a chance against you.”

  “So you want me for protection.”

  He laughed. “Sure. Come on, cowgirl.”

  She came out onto the porch, closed the door. “You’re sure you want to do this?”

  “I don’t want to at all,” he admitted. He hated going out there. It wasn’t just the ghosts that got stirred up; it was the memories and the painful knowledge that he hadn’t been here for his father when he’d wasted away from grief. “It’s best if we face our ghosts. It’s the only way to kill them.”

  “I don’t know,” Jade said, but she went with him. “There’s something wrong with the idea of killing a ghost. I don’t think they ever die. Hence, ghost.”

  These ghosts could die, if time would let them. At least he hoped so. The freight train of sexual attraction he felt for Jade should send them scattering—and he could leave BC with a clear conscience.

  At least for a while.

  “When’s the last time you were there?”

  He shrugged as he started the truck. “Whenever I was in town last.”

  He felt Jade’s eyes on him. “You’re never curious?”

  “Nope. I know it’s in good shape because Madame Matchmaker goes out there with a cleaning crew a couple times a month. I get a list as long as your arm whenever there’s anything she deems needs to be fixed up.” He glanced across at the gorgeous woman in his passenger seat. “Cosette says the place is in museum-quality shape.”

  A testament to his father’s memory. Ty didn’t want a single possession of his dad’s moved or given away. He wanted to know, every time he returned home, that it was as if he was just coming home again, the way he had when he was a boy, to a father who’d loved him enough to adopt him. Honestly Ty didn’t want the ghosts disturbed; he wanted them staying just where they were. The good ghosts, at least.

  “You were a good son, Ty,” Jade said. “Mom says she felt like you were even a good son to her.”

  “I tried.” He really had tried to be helpful. When his dad had been at work, Betty’s house, close to the Hanging H, had been a welcoming place. He’d had the run of it, too. For a kid who might have ended up in an orphanage, he’d been aware of the need to stay in everyone’s good graces. He’d wanted so badly to belong.

  Then he’d found rodeo, and that family had welcomed him, as well. Suddenly, he didn’t have to be the extra addition in everyone’s homes; he had a home of his own—the road. His duffel was his portable chest of drawers, his truck his way to a livelihood.

  And always, his father told him he was proud of him.

  Ty shuddered past the guilt that his father had needed him, and that he’d let him down. “Hey, so about this baby thing. Were you trying to have sex with me because you want a baby, or because you were trying to keep me out of the fight? Tell me the truth and you win the prize.”

  He stopped the truck in front of his house, gazing at the porch lights, which were on though no one had lived there in years.

  “No one just wants a baby,” Jade said. “And it was both.”

  “It’s a lot to hang on a guy who’s leaving.”

  “Don’t be a wienie.” She jumped out of the truck.

  “A wienie?” he grumbled to himself. He got out and waited for her to get to his side of the truck.

  “I want a baby,” Jade said when she got close enough that he could smell her perfume and the scent of sweet cotton candy clinging to her. “But it doesn’t have to be you, so don’t get yourself in a twist.”

  He caught her to him. “I am in a twist, and if you say one more word about Sam and your ovary, I’ll probably have to spank you.”

  “No worries. Come on,” Jade said, pushing him away from her. “Go inside and quit stalling.”

  “I like stalling.” He pulled her back. “Let’s get in my truck and make a baby.”

  She gazed up at him. “No strings attached?”

  He kissed her. “Of course there’ll be strings attached. Don’t be weird.”

  She pulled back to gaze up at him. “Excuse me? I’m the weird one? And you’re what?”

  “Not weird.” He allowed himself to taste the sweet heaven of her lips again. It was really the only way to keep her quiet. Anyway, kissing her had the knock-on effect of getting that freight train roaring inside his head again, which was awesome, because it really did run off the ghosts and the past he didn’t want to examine closely. Or at all.

  “Listen,” Jade said, jerking away from him, taking a few deep breaths. “I’m just in this for a baby.”

  He laughed. “You’re such a fibber. You have a seriously hot thing going for me, Jade Harper.”

  She sniffed. “Wouldn’t you like to think that?”

  “I do think that.” He glanced at the star-speckled sky, delighted to have gotten under her skin. She simply didn’t want to admit that she was crazy about him. But she was here with him now, wasn’t she?

  “Whenever I kiss you,” Ty said, “my mind goes totally blank. All I can think about is you, and your mouth, and that body of yours.”

  She stared at him. “You’re a little hot yourself. A little.”

  He laughed out loud, picked her up, tossed her over his shoulder. Carried her up the porch steps over her protests, slapped
her rump once just to let her know he was the boss and that everything was going his way tonight, stuck his key in the lock and pushed the door open.

  The warm fragrance of his father’s pipe hit him, even though the man had been gone a few years. A combination of cherrywood and tobacco, the aroma brought the feeling of home rushing over Ty. He set Jade gently on her feet as he took in the single lamp that burned in the kitchen. The wood floors gleamed with polish, and not a speck of dust marred any of the furniture. If he listened hard, he could hear the sound of his father’s big boots coming down the stairs. Ty’s heart hammered; he held his breath, waiting for something that wasn’t going to happen.

  Those big arms weren’t waiting anymore to scoop up the little boy when he came rushing in the door from school, anxious to see his father. “Damn,” Ty muttered.

  Jade stood very still beside him, not intruding on his memories. After a moment, she very gently inserted her hand into his, and he tightened his grip, grateful for the contact.

  He took a deep breath, walked into the kitchen. Cosette had had a new refrigerator put in, a big silver affair that could hold an army’s worth of food. He smiled, liking the way it looked in the big kitchen. Many a meal had been consumed here, the three of them at the round table with four wooden chairs, in the nook window overlooking the garden, and past that, the fields. “Damn,” he said again, and Jade pressed up against his side, supporting him.

  He went out of the kitchen, walked up the stairs, Jade at his side. Three bedrooms at the top led from the central hall. Ty pushed open the door to his room, his heart thudding.

  The bedroom took up the entire east side of the upstairs. His toys and childhood memorabilia were in their right places, his trophies stacked on the shelves. Nothing had been moved.

  “It’s like a time capsule,” Jade said. “As if you never left.”

  But he had. And he wouldn’t have come back except that he wanted to say goodbye to the small town that had been his home. He’d had this grand dream that he could save the community, or weight the scales more in the favor of good.

  Tonight’s fight had shown how difficult that was going to be.