all the same in that lovely way of hers.
Wyatt wiped his mouth with his cloth napkin and as unobtrusively as possible, leaned toward Jane and whispered, “Meet me at that bar across the street after this? We need to talk.”
Her seething look said, Yes, we certainly do.
Chapter Three
“What in the world is wrong with that man?” Jane demanded, upon entering the bar, not even bothering to sit down.
Wyatt had selected a table in the far corner, wanting privacy and anticipating that this conversation might get loud at some point. Not thinking she’d walk in and stand there, all puffed up and mad, trying to glare down at him. A ridiculous attempt, given how tiny the woman was.
Even sitting down, he could very nearly look her in the eye.
And she was really adorable when she was spitting fire like that. Not that Wyatt would dare tell her. She already had a terrible opinion of the men in his family.
“Is he demented in some way that isn’t quite obvious to a person untrained in geriatric medicine?” Jane asked, hands on her hips, still filled with anger.
“Unfortunately not,” Wyatt told her.
“Unfortunately?” She enunciated each syllable like he might be demented himself and didn’t quite understand the big word.
“Yes. If he was actually impaired in some way, he’d have some excuse for his behavior,” Wyatt admitted. “Jane, I’m very sorry, but there’s simply no excuse. It’s just the way he is. Always has been. He’s like a kid in a candy store where women are concerned.”
He had her agreeing with him for a minute, maybe even sympathizing, and then she started seething again.
“Kid in a candy store? Like women are all laid out in a row, his for the taking, waiting for him to pick which one he wants?”
“Unfortunately, yes. He’s just that…“ Wyatt would have said confident, but stopped himself. He thought she might have hit him, if he had. “Look, I know it’s…offensive, especially to someone like you—”
“Someone like me?” She practically spit the words at him.
“A modern woman,” he said, trying desperately to save himself now. “An enlightened woman. A strong, successful, extremely capable woman.”
Who doesn’t think she needs a man for anything at all. He got it. He understood her perfectly, he believed. Oh, yes, he did, because his last words placated her a bit.
“Look, the man was born in a different era. He was raised to see women and relationships differently than we do today,” Wyatt tried, not about to explain that his father, twenty years Leo’s junior, thought of women the same way and that he’d been raised much in the woman-as-candy-in-a-store philosophy, too.
“That’s really no excuse for his behavior,” Jane said, not quite as militant-sounding as before.
“I know. Believe me, I do, and I’m sorry.” Wyatt dared to pull out the seat next to him and offer it to her. “Jane, please, sit down. Let’s talk about this. Let me get you a drink. God knows, I need one after dealing with Uncle Leo.”
She looked a bit miffed, like she’d been winding up for a really great fight or a rant on women’s rights, and he was depriving her of that opportunity by agreeing with her and apologizing. It was one of Wyatt’s greatest weapons—being able to soothe outraged females. He was a master at work right now, even if he did say so himself, much like Leo in that gigantic candy store of women.
Jane sat, still looking as if she didn’t trust him a bit, but not foaming at the mouth or anything. With Jane, he decided, that was progress.
He motioned for the waitress who’d been hovering a few feet away, figuring out if they were really going to start a fight at the bar and how she might handle it. She came to the table, looking a bit nervous but calming down as Jane stayed silent.
At his quiet question about her drink preference, Jane looked a bit sheepishly at the waitress and murmured, “White wine spritzer, please.”
Wyatt tried to contain a grimace at the idea of wanting to dilute good wine with anything, at the idea of such a sissy, girly drink. Jane didn’t seem girly at all. Maybe she didn’t approve of really drinking. She was prim and buttoned-up after all.
“You’re going to make fun of my drink?” she asked, apparently not going to let him get away with anything.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Wyatt insisted. Then asked for a bourbon, straight up.
Jeez, the woman was prickly.
The waitress nodded, promised to bring their drinks right away, and then escaped, looking quite happy to get far, far away from them.
Wyatt sat back in his chair, trying to look relaxed and in perfect control of the spitfire that was Jane. “So, as I said before, my uncle’s attitude toward women is inexcusable. Outdated, sexist, arrogant, immature. I realize that. I freely admit it and apologize sincerely for it.”
Jane gave him an odd look, hopefully discarding the next three insults she had planned to hurl at him over Leo’s behavior.
Good. They were getting somewhere.
“If there was anything I could do to change the way he behaves, believe me, I would have done it years ago. It’s caused him and me enormous amounts of trouble and grief. But I fear, at eighty-six—”
“Eighty-six? He told Gram he was only eighty-one.”
“Well, he’s not,” Wyatt went on. “Honestly, a woman can’t believe a word that man says, and unfortunately, I simply cannot change him. I’ve tried. So, at this point, all I can do is be completely up front about…how he is…and hope that saves women like your grandmother and great-aunt from being hurt by him.”
“That’s it? That’s your solution?”
Wyatt shrugged, trying to look both reasonable and helpless at the same time. “I don’t know what else to do. He’s a grown man. I have virtually no control over him. Any more than you can control your grandmother—”
“My grandmother’s not the one running around with two different people at the same time.”
Wyatt could only pray it was merely two women for Leo at the moment.
“I was just hoping,” he explained quietly, “that your grandmother might be more…reasonable…to deal with than my uncle. That once we explain to her…the way he is…”
“You want to tell her that he’s a complete cad and a liar?” Jane asked.
“Better than her finding out on her own. And, actually, I thought you might tell her. That the news might be easier coming from you. But if you think it should come from me, of course, I’ll do it.”
Jane’s mouth fell open, literally.
The waitress returned with their
