Fortune Found by Victoria Pade Read Free Book Online Page A

noticed the not-so-veiled attempts at matchmaking.”
    Flint laughed again and Jessie wished she didn’t like the sound of it as much as she did.
    â€œYou thought I hadn’t noticed that we’re being dispatched to paint rooms together, to go to the store together, to do everything they can possibly get us to do together? That seating arrangements always put us side by side—”
    â€œAnd now this—” Jessie interjected, raising both hands in the air and glancing around “—getting everybody out of here so we’re alone.”
    Flint grinned that great grin that drew such sexy lines on his handsome face. “Yep, I noticed. Impossible not to. It seems to be a conspiracy.”
    â€œBut Kelsey is the mastermind.”
    â€œI think her intentions are good,” Flint allowed.
    â€œOh, they are,” Jessie was quick to confirm. “She just wants what she thinks is best for me.” And it was a compliment to Flint that Kelsey thought he was it.
    â€œThe two of you are really close, aren’t you?”
    â€œShe’s not only my sister, she’s also my best friend.”
    â€œAnd your folks, have you all always lived together?”
    â€œNo, they retired about the same time I lost Pete. They’d both worked for a small, independent paper company. They had planned to sell their house and do some traveling when the time came, but instead they moved in here with me to help get me through the loss and to lend a hand with the kids. They’ve been a godsend. Between them and Kelsey moving back to Red Rock eight months ago, I don’t think I could have made it without them. But the matchmaking…all I can do is say I’m sorry.”
    Flint smiled again, not seeming perturbed by what her family—and his brother—were doing.
    â€œIt’s not so bad,” he said in a tone that seemed as if it might have held some innuendo, except that Jessie thought she was too out of practice with men to be sure. “I just don’t know how that roof is going to get fixed if I don’t get up there and give Coop a hand with it.”
    â€œI’ll try again to reason with Kelsey,” Jessie said asFlint got to his feet, apparently ready to follow Kelsey and Cooper home.
    Jessie stood, too, and without thinking about it, began to walk with Flint to the gate that connected her backyard to Kelsey’s.
    â€œMaybe instead of that,” he said along the way, “we should give them a little of what they want.”
    Jessie didn’t have any idea what he was talking about that time. “Give them what they want?”
    â€œMaybe we should pretend to go on a date together, come back and say we just didn’t click. Maybe then they’d relax.”
    An instant wave of dejection—or maybe rejection—washed through her at the thought that Flint had decided they didn’t click. That decision shouldn’t have been jarring—after all, they didn’t need to click beyond the friendly superficialities that were already in effect. There was no reason for anything more than that.
    And she didn’t want there to be anything more than that, Jessie reminded herself. This was strictly a distant, siblings-of-in-laws relationship.
    And yet it was somehow demoralizing to hear that Flint didn’t think they clicked…
    Especially when she was so intensely aware of him in every way.
    She hid her feelings behind what she hoped was nothing more than a curious expression and as they reached the gate, said, “A pretend date?”
    Flint opened the gate, stood in the opening and turned to lean one shoulder against the six-foot-high side post so that he was facing her. “We’ll go out alone, have dinner someplace innocuous— Not Red, where all eyes would be on us.”
    Red was the local restaurant owned by the Mendoza family, who were extremely close friends of the Fortunes. They even had family ties with