Back then, Betsy had been proud to be compared to her beautiful mother.
It wasn’t until she got a little older that she realized her mother wasn’t pretty. Not on the inside anyway.
“She was drunk when she hit the telephone pole,” Betsy said in the unemotional tone she’d cultivated over the years. “The police said she was going seventy. She barely missed a kid on a bike.”
“She was your mother,” he said softly. “Her death had to hurt.”
Betsy didn’t say anything.
“Is that why you moved back to Jackson?” His large hands encircled the tan coffee mug. “To settle her estate?”
“What estate?” Betsy gave a little laugh. “All she left was a bunch of bills.”
She wondered what Ryan would think if she told him the reason she’d stayed in Kansas City until now was because she’d refused to move back to Jackson Hole as long as her mother was here. He should understand. After all, as a friend of her brother, Keenan, he’d witnessed Gloria’s out-of-control drunken rages.
“I’d wanted to move back for some time,” Betsy said in a matter-of-fact tone. “And Adrianna Lee has been encouraging me to ‘return to my roots’ for years.”
Ryan’s eyes took on a gleam she couldn’t quite decipher. “That’s right. I’d forgotten you and Adrianna were good friends.”
“Since kindergarten.” A smile lifted Betsy’s lips, the way it always did when she thought of her oldest and dearest friend.
“It surprises me that some guy hasn’t snatched her up by now.”
“I guess she just hasn’t found Mr. Right.” Betsy kept her tone light. While Adrianna was beautiful and bright with a great job as an ob-gyn nurse-midwife, her friend had her own demons that made it difficult to trust men.
“I’ve seen her at Wally’s Place,” he said, referring to the popular sports bar that was at the top of everyone’s list. “Rarely with the same guy twice.”
“I wouldn’t know.” Of course she knew, but Betsy was beginning to get a little irritated. She had the feeling Ryan was more interested in talking about everything but his open position.
A sudden thought struck her. Could this be a pity interview? She sat down her cup of cocoa, finding it difficult to breathe. She needed this job. And she’d thought she had a real shot at it. But—
“Enough about her.” Ryan waved a dismissive hand. “Let’s talk about you. How did you like Kansas City?”
His gaze settled on Betsy, as if she was the only woman in the world. Or, at least, the only one who mattered. Even though it was a heady feeling to be the object of such focus, she knew this was simply Ryan’s way. The guy was a natural-born charmer, and she’d do well to keep that fact front and center in her head.
“I liked Kansas,” she said. “But Wyoming has always been home.”
“Your résumé said you graduated from KU with a degree in Political Science.” He smiled and a teasing glint filled his eyes. “Looks like you were planning to go to law school. Am I right?”
“I considered it,” Betsy admitted. “But I really love being a paralegal.”
Betsy went on to tell Ryan that after high school, she’d moved to Lawrence to live with a cousin. She’d worked for a year as a waitress, then decided to give higher education a shot. “After graduating from KU I moved to Kansas City and completed a paralegal program in Overland Park.”
“I bet you’re a dynamite legal assistant,” he said with such sincerity that tears stung the back of her eyes.
“My past employers all seemed to think so.” With the exception of Chad Dunlop, of course.
“Now you’re back in Jackson Hole to stay.”
Betsy nodded. “Shortly after my mother died, my great-aunt passed away and left me her house. Once the furnace is repaired and the city says it’s safe for me to occupy, I’ll move in.”
“The place sounds like a real gem.”
Another woman might have taken offense, but Betsy simply laughed. “It’s definitely a fixer-upper, that’s for sure.”
Having a place to stay rent free—at least once she could move in—was a big plus. But to survive in Jackson Hole, Betsy needed a job. Lately she’d considered practicing saying “Do you want fries with that?” but she enjoyed being a legal assistant and was darn good at her job. Before she gave up on the hope of getting a position in her field, she had to know she’d left no stone unturned.
“You got a great recommendation from the Kansas firm.” Ryan offered an encouraging smile. “Tell me about your duties there.”
“They were a large, diverse practice. Initially I worked for one of the older partners who primarily practiced family law. He had a stroke and was out of the office for an extended period. During that time I helped several of the other partners, which gave me a wide range of experiences.”
Betsy described her duties in greater depths. There were so many interesting stories that she was halfway through the third example when she realized he was smiling at her.
She stopped and raised a hand to her face, praying she didn’t have a hot cocoa mustache or something equally horrifying. “Do I have something on my face? In my teeth?”
“No. Why?”
“You were looking at me so strangely.”
He cocked his head. “Was I?”
“You know you were.” If this was a regular interview, she’d never have challenged him. But this was Ryan.
“I’m just impressed by the breadth of your experience.”
Was that honest-to-goodness admiration she saw reflected in those gorgeous eyes? Before she could respond, a gruff voice filled the air.
“Who let you in the front door?”
Betsy looked up into the grinning face of Cole Lassiter. The owner of the Hill of Beans coffee empire and another of Ryan’s many friends from high school had a devilish gleam in his eyes.
“Don’t think I didn’t notice the timing, Lassiter,” Ryan shot back. “You wait until I pay and then you show up.”
Cole chuckled, grabbed a chair from a nearby table and sat down at the edge of the booth. He gave Betsy a curious glance. Since moving back, she’d seen Cole, his wife, Margaret, and son, Charlie, in church, but only from a distance.
He was a handsome man with thick dark hair and vivid blue eyes. He and Ryan looked a lot alike—so much so that back in high school, those who didn’t know them well would often mistake one for the other.
“Aren’t you going to introduce me?” Cole’s gaze lingered on Betsy.
“Are you blind?” The look
