you want to marry her?”
Jack turned to his bride and took her hand, squeezing it in his own as he gazed deeply into her eyes. “Yes.”
“And do you want to marry Jack?” he asked the bride.
Her lips trembling uncontrollably, she could only nod her head.
John Lee lifted a shoulder. “That’s good enough for me.” He turned to Travis. “I’d say you’re fighting a losing battle, buddy.” He eyed him a moment longer. “Think you can behave yourself, now?”
“Yeah,” Travis muttered, though Lacey could see that there was still some fight left in him.
John Lee gave a nod to Jesse and Nash. “Turn him loose.”
Scowling, Travis jerked free of the two men, then dragged the back of his wrist across his mouth, swiping a trickle of blood from a lip that was quickly swelling. John Lee pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and offered it to him.
“Thanks,” Travis mumbled.
John Lee folded his arms across his chest and reared back to study him. “Judging by the resemblance, I’d say you’d have to be Jack’s twin.”
Travis shot his brother a glare, then turned to John Lee, sighing heavily as he stretched a hand out in greeting. “Yeah. Travis Cordell.”
John Lee smiled as he shook the offered hand. “Pleased to meet you, Travis. I’m John Lee Carter.” He leaned close. “Do you mind if I ask you a question?”
Self-consciously, Travis lifted a shoulder. “No, I guess not.”
“Do y’all always scrap like this?”
The brothers exchanged an indefinable look, then Travis mumbled, “Yeah. Mostly.”
John Lee chuckled and slapped a companionable arm around Travis’s shoulder. “That’s what I figured.” He turned Travis toward the door. “How about you and me go and grab us a beer and let these folks get on with their business?”
Though the wedding had proved to be more entertaining than Lacey had expected, she wasn’t sure how much more of this family-ness she could take. With the reception now in full swing and Mandy busy playing hostess, Lacey’s patience was quickly wearing thin as she waited for the promised meeting with her half sisters. She couldn’t count the number of toasts that had been made to the newlyweds, or how many times a camera flash had gone off in her face. She quickly stepped out of the path of a pair of towheaded kids, squealing and laughing while they played a game of chase through the crowd of well-wishers.
With a sigh, she glanced around in hopes of catching Mandy’s eye, but instead her gaze settled on the groom’s brother, who stood on the fringe of the festivities. She couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. Though she couldn’t agree with his methods, she figured his heart had been in the right place when he’d tried to stop the wedding. And at the moment, he looked as if he felt as out-of-place and miserable as she did. Sensing a kinship of sorts, she moved to stand beside him.
“How’s the lip?”
He lifted the ice pack he held at the corner of his mouth and muttered, “It hurts,” then replaced it.
Lacey stepped in front of him, squinting her eyes to better see his face in the glow from the torches lining the fan-shaped patio. “That eye looks pretty bad, too. Have you put anything on it?”
He puckered his brow, obviously unaware of the injury, and lifted a hand to inspect it. He flinched when his fingers grazed the raw flesh.
She bit back a grin. “I guess you haven’t.” She glanced toward the house, wondering if she could find a first-aid kit in the kitchen, then shuddered when she saw the sea of people she’d have to wade through in order to reach the back door. Squaring her shoulders, she hooked her arm through his. “Come on, killer. I’ve got some horse liniment in my trailer.”
“Horse liniment!” he cried, jerking her to a stop. “I’m no horse.”
She chuckled and gave him a tug, all but dragging him toward the barn where her truck and trailer were now parked. “No, but judging by the show you put on earlier, you could be a distant relation. A jackass,” she explained at his questioning look.
He snorted, then winced at the pain the action caused him.
Chuckling, she slipped her arm from his and opened the side door that led to the trailer’s sleeping quarters. She stepped inside, pausing to flip on a light. Moving easily in the confined space, she opened a cabinet door and pulled down a first-aid kit. When she saw that Travis still stood outside, watching her warily, she gestured for him to join her. “It’s okay, killer,” she said, holding up the box. “I’ve got medications for humans, too.”
Reluctantly he climbed inside. She waved him toward a wide, padded bench that she hoped to someday convert into a bed for use when she was traveling the rodeo circuit. “Have a seat and I’ll take a look.”
He dropped down, his look guarded as he watched her flip open the box and remove a packet.
“Pre-soaked antiseptic gauze,” she said, responding to the suspicion in his eyes.
When she tried to apply the gauze to the cut, he reared his head back and grabbed her wrist, stopping her. “You hurt me,” he warned, meeting her gaze, “and I’ll have to hurt you back.”
The strength in his hand surprised her, but it was the emotion in his brown eyes that had the breath backing up in her lungs. Anger, frustration, concern. They all churned there, but it was his concern—a concern she instinctively attributed to his lingering worry over his brother’s marriage—that squeezed at her heart. Hoping to distill the sympathy she felt building, she teased, “Sissy.”
His scowl deepened, but he loosened his grip on her hand.
Mindful of his warning, though she sensed he wasn’t the kind of man who would make good the threat, she kept her touch gentle as she dabbed the gauze at the cut, cleaning it. “That brother of yours has a mean right hook.”
“Lucky punch,” he muttered disagreeably.
She bit back a smile. “Maybe,” she conceded, and continued to cleanse the wound. “Was it really worth all this to try to stop his wedding?”
“It would’ve been if I’d succeeded.”
“You said he was crazy.”
“Poor choice of words.”
“What is he, then?”
“Confused. Grieving.” He sighed heavily. “He lost his son and his ex-wife in an automobile accident less than a year ago. He’s been on the run ever since.”
“Tough break.”
“Yeah, you could say that.”
“So you think he’s marrying on the rebound?”
“It’s a possibility. A strong one.”
“He
