Wyoming True - Diana Palmer Page 0,63

hugged very often. Not since my first husband,” she added.

That dragged a soft laugh from the man holding her. His arms slid all the way around her and held her close. “I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable,” he said. “You’re still afraid of men, Ida. Even me.”

She ground her teeth together. How had he known that? “I’m trying,” she said after a minute.

He drew back and tilted her face up to his. Her blue, blue eyes were full of consternation, turmoil. “Don’t worry about it,” he said quietly. “You don’t really know me. But you’ll have all the time in the world. You don’t see people as they really are until you live together. You’ll find out that I’m messy, ill-tempered from time to time, unreasonable and bullheaded and impatient.”

“I’m messy, too, and I have a quick temper, but it’s mostly flash fire. I get mad and I’m over it.” She paused. “I can be unreasonable and bad-tempered, too. But I’ll try not to be.”

He chuckled. “We’ll both try not to be.” He looked down at her with faint affection. “We like the same things. We have a lot in common. Marriages have succeeded on far less. And infatuation is no reason to marry, because it quickly becomes disinterest.”

“I guess so,” she replied, and she thought of Mina, whom he loved. That had been no infatuation, and months after Mina had married the Texas cattle baron, Jake was still hung up on her. She would have to be patient. Mina was a sweet woman. Ida wished she knew how to dim Jake’s memory of her. She wondered belatedly if they’d even have a proper marriage, with her third husband in love with another woman. It hurt her pride, she told herself. She wasn’t jealous. She sighed. Yes, she was.

“Don’t worry,” he said softly. “It will be all right.”

She drew in a long breath. “Okay, Jake.”

The sound of his name on her lips made ripples in his emotions. He ignored that and smiled. “Okay.”

* * *

THEY WENT TOGETHER to see the minister, so that Ida knew who was going to marry them. Tolbert Drake was pastor of an interdenominational church in the middle of Catelow. He was tall and blond and had a live-wire personality. When Jake had asked him about marrying them, he’d responded positively at once.

“We have a very mixed congregation,” he told them. “Every race and gender and political affiliation known to man.” He leaned down. “And a former Mafia don, too,” he added with a chuckle.

“Goodness!” Ida exclaimed.

“So marrying you two is no problem for me. I think God is a great deal more forgiving than most people realize.” He glanced at Ida as he said it and she flushed.

Which made Jake feel oddly protective. “Her second husband abused her physically,” he told Tolbert. “Broke her hip and her spirit and now he’s making threats, because she’s rich and he has gambling debts he wants her to pay.”

Tolbert frowned. He hadn’t heard about that.

“I gave myself a red-hot reputation to keep men at bay,” Ida said in a subdued tone. “My first husband was a wonderful man. He was gay, and I didn’t know.” She smiled. “We were still close and loved each other, but he died. My second husband caught me at a weak moment. He seemed to be everything a man should be. And he was, until we were behind locked doors.” Her blue eyes were wide with painful memory as she stared up at the minister. “So you see, I have no judgment about men. I thought the best way to keep them away from me was to pretend I was so, well, educated intimately that I’d ridicule any man brave enough to ask me out.”

“You were dating the man Mina Michaels married,” Tolbert recalled.

She smiled. “Yes. He was like me, rich and worried about being just a walking wallet. We played chess together. Nothing else. I...” She swallowed, hard, and averted her eyes. “I don’t think I’m capable of being with a man ever again.” She stopped, horrified, as she met Jake’s eyes with apology in her own.

“I’ll explain,” Jake said gently and smiled. He addressed the minister. “It’s to be a marriage of friends,” he said. “We like the same things. We like each other. We have common interests. That will outlast any infatuation either of us might have felt in the past for other people.”

Tolbert saw more than they realized. He smiled at Ida. “Even ministers listen to gossip,” he