The 15 Lb. Matchmaker. Jill Limber

as she openly stared at the man, unable to look away.

      He needed a shave. The stubble on his chin made him look even more masculine. She could imagine the rasp a beard like that would make against her skin.

      Now she liked Montana even more than she had a moment ago. Feeling warm all over, she had to remind herself she’d sworn off men.

      He glanced over and caught her gawking, open-mouthed. Jolie bent her head over her newspaper so her hair would hide her face.

      Embarrassed to be caught gaping at a stranger, Jolie stared down at the want ads she had already read twice, then turned her head and dared a peek through a curtain of hair.

      The cowboy walked past her with enough of a swagger to convince her he had just gotten off a horse, and took a seat at a booth in the rear of the diner.

      Jolie dared one more glance in his direction, then turned her attention back to her problems. She needed a job, she told herself firmly, not a man who had the potential to star in a woman’s fantasies.

      She tried to ignore the man and think about her situation. Just outside of Billings, a deer had bounded across the highway. Swerving to avoid the animal, Jolie had skidded across the shoulder of the road and run into a telephone pole.

      She could almost hear her father scolding her. Jolie, he would say, as if she were still sixteen years old, never swerve to avoid an animal.

      Easy enough to say when you didn’t have Bambi looking at you with those big startled eyes.

      An hour ago, as she’d brushed the fine white dust that had exploded out of her car’s air bag off her silk shirt, the mechanic at Winslow’s had told her it might take three weeks to get the parts he needed for the repairs to her car.

      His exact words had been, “Don’t stock parts for these foreign jobs” in a tone implying she’d broken some kind of law in Montana by driving a car made in Germany.

      Now what was she supposed to do? Her car was wrecked, her father had cancelled her credit cards, and her Aunt Rosie was off backpacking somewhere in New York state.

      Jolie struggled to think positively and come up with a solution to her problem. Collision coverage would take care of the car, but the deductible she’d had to pay the mechanic to order parts and start work had left her with a measly fifteen dollars.

      She refused to call her father in Seattle for help. He’d predicted this trip would be a disaster and forbidden her to go. She’d left anyway, disobeying him for the first time in her life.

      Most children rebelled against their parents when they were in their midteens. Jolie had waited until she was almost twenty-five years old.

      She should’ve stood up to her father a lot sooner. Because she always went along with whatever he wanted just to keep the peace, she’d almost ended up married to a man she didn’t love.

      How could she prove to herself she could be independent if she ran to her father for help at the first sign of trouble? Besides, she was still furious with him for cancelling her credit cards to try to keep her from leaving.

      She had called New York and left a message for Aunt Rosie that she’d been delayed, but Rosie wasn’t due back from her trip until Sunday.

      Rosie’s newest man must be the outdoorsy type. She tried to picture her chic aunt in a pair of boots and a backpack, but couldn’t come up with the image.

      Jolie propped the heels of her Ferragamo flats on her suitcase and traced the outline of the state on the plastic place mat. She had no option but to stay right here in Billings and wait for the car.

      She needed a job.

      Jolie had planned to look for employment when she returned from her visit with her aunt, but it looked like her first work experience would be right here.

      Watching the waitress stop at the next table to pour coffee, Jolie figured she could manage to wait tables. That would pay enough to cover her expenses until her car was ready. True, she had never served food, but she had planned parties and supervised caterers for her father often enough.

      “More coffee, hon?” The waitress’s name tag identified her as Helen.

      “No, thanks. But I do need a job. Are there any openings here?”

      Helen laughed, then her eyes narrowed and slid over Jolie’s designer clothes, lingering on her gold jewelry. “Harry hasn’t hired anybody in over fifteen years. The only reason I got the job is ’cause I’m his sister-in-law.”

      So much for the idea of waiting tables, Jolie thought.

      Helen still hovered over her, staring. “What’s your name?”

      “Jolie Carleton.”

      Helen nodded. “Howdy, Jolie. Might be we could find something for you close by. You ever wait tables?”

      “No.” She’d never had a job.

      Helen raised one thinly plucked eyebrow. “Been a short-order cook?”

      “No.” Jolie felt her spirits drop another notch.

      “Any cashier experience?”

      Only from the customer’s side. “No.”

      “Well, honey, what have you done?”

      By now Jolie figured Helen wouldn’t be impressed with a list of her Junior League projects. “I have a degree in child development. Maybe I could work at a preschool.”

      Helen gave her a speculating look. “You ever actually take care of kids, Jolie?”

      Finally she could say yes to something. “I’ve taken care of my cousin’s children.”

      “How many?” she asked, her voice skeptical.

      “Three.”

      “How old?”

      Why would Helen care how old her cousin’s children were? Jolie felt protective of the children, probably because her cousin was like a barn cat. She had her babies and after a month or two paid no attention to them, resuming her ski trips and visits to friends in Europe.

      Reluctantly she said, “Five, three, and a baby.” Jolie hoped this was leading somewhere.

      Helen stared for another disconcerting moment, nodded as if she’d come to some kind of decision, then turned abruptly and walked away. Jolie watched her cross the café to the gorgeous cowboy.

      Helen and the cowboy held a whispered conversation, glancing frequently back at Jolie. Now, what was that all about?

      Knowing she was the subject of their conversation, Jolie didn’t know where to look. She stared down at the newspaper want ads, folded up on the edge of the table.

      The toes of two hand-tooled leather cowboy boots appeared in her line of vision. The faint scent of horse and hay curled up to her.

      She looked up, pinned in place by the cowboy’s incredible blue eyes. He was no longer smiling, and she could see lines of fatigue on his face. He looked older than she had first thought.

      “Ms. Carleton?” His deep voice rolled over her like a fog across Puget Sound.

      Startled, Jolie nodded and swallowed. “Yes?”

      Griff took a minute to take in the whole package. What the heck was a beautiful woman dressed like her doing in Harry’s Diner? he wondered.

      “My name’s Griff Price. I have a proposition for you.”

      He didn’t miss the way her big brown eyes widened at his choice of words, and in spite of his foul mood he suppressed a smile.

      “How do you do, Mr. Price?” Her speech was careful and polite, her expression wary.

      Sleek and sophisticated, she reminded him of a Thoroughbred horse. Generations of carefully chosen bloodlines came together to produce a woman this magnificent.