Emilio looked at the horse again. “Everyone has been very nice to me here. But you have so many cousins. It makes me...”
“Dizzy?” Kelly supplied for him with a smile. “I know the feeling. This isn’t my family, Emilio. They aren’t my cousins. I’m a foster kid, too.”
He looked at her in surprise. “You are?”
“I used to be. When my mother became too ill to take care of me, I was placed into a foster home with Brynn D’Alessandro, Lindsay’s niece. Brynn and I have remained close friends and I’ve gotten to know her family very well during the past couple of years. They’re wonderful. But I still know how you feel. Sometimes I’m very much aware that I have no family connection to the others.”
His dark chocolate eyes focused intently on her face. “I would never have known you aren’t related to them.”
“Most of the adult members of this family have been in foster care at one time or another. And Jared and Cassie, who own this ranch along with Shane, have taken in foster sons several times during the past few years, though they don’t have one in residence at the moment. They know how important it is to make newcomers feel welcome. And they know it is always possible to make room in the family for more.”
Emilio thought about her words for a moment, and then smiled. “It’s a nice family.”
“Yes,” Kelly agreed, and she was glad now that she had chosen to come to the barn. Both she and Emilio had needed this talk.
The boy’s smile suddenly turned a bit mischievous, making him look more his age than the somber expression he’d worn before had. “But can you name them all?”
“Not only can I name them, I can do it in order.” Lifting her chin in response to the challenge, Kelly drew a deep breath. “Jared’s the eldest. He’s married to Cassie, and they have Shane and Molly. Then there’s Layla, who married Kevin Samples and had Dawne, Keith and Brittany. A brother named Miles died on his eighteenth birthday. His daughter—my friend, Brynn—was born after he died. She married Joe D’Alessandro. Then come the twins—Joe Walker, who’s married to Lauren and has a little boy named Casey, and Ryan Walker, who married Taylor and has twin boys, Andrew and Aaron. Michelle and her husband, Tony D’Alessandro, have four children, Jason, Carly, Katie and Justin. And finally there’s your foster family, Lindsay, who married Nick Grant, and their two children, Jenny and Clay.” She finished on her last gasp of breath.
Emilio laughed. “Okay, I’m impressed.”
“And so am I.” Shane stepped out of the shadows of the barn, his eyes on Kelly.
Emilio stiffened. “We were just looking at the horses,” he said quickly.
Kelly wondered what in Emilio’s background made him go so quickly on the defensive. Had he often been falsely accused of misdeeds?
“How would you like to take a ride?” Shane offered.
The boy’s face lit with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. “I don’t know how.”
Shane clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll know by the time you leave here today,” he promised.
Shane had begun to wonder if he would ever have a chance to talk to Kelly in private that day. It seemed that there was never a moment when they weren’t surrounded by other people. Either it was simply coincidence—not so hard to believe, considering the number of guests that day—or Kelly was taking pains to keep from being alone with him.
He wasn’t at all pleased by that possibility.
From several yards away, he watched as she organized a game of Simon Says with the children late that afternoon. She looked particularly nice today, he thought, admiring the pumpltin-colored sweater that clung so enticingly to her small, firm breasts, and the way her dark indigo jeans cupped her tight bottom. He wouldn’t have been a normal male if he hadn’t noticed those details, along with the attractive flush of pink in her smooth, fair cheeks and the glittering strawberry highlights in her short, tousled blond hair. He’d always liked long hair on other women, but Kelly’s wispy cut suited her, emphasizing her big green eyes and slender throat.
He suddenly frowned and shifted his weight, shoving his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. Damn, what was this? Surely he wasn’t standing here getting all warm and itchy just from looking at Kelly. And why was he suddenly remembering the way she’d felt in his arms, the taste of her mouth beneath his?
What the hell was going on between them lately? Why was he suddenly having trouble thinking of Kelly as just another member of the family? Or was this really all that sudden? The truth was, he’d been drawn to her since the day he’d first seen her lying in a hospital bed, broken and hurting, but with a spark of spirit in her emerald eyes that had refused to be extinguished.
Okay. So they were exceptionally good friends, he told himself. Such close bonds were rare and precious. He wasn’t about to screw things up, the way Cameron had with Amber.
But he still wanted a chance to talk to Kelly alone.
H
e found that opportunity soon after her game with the children ended. It was getting cooler as the day wore on, and the guests were beginning to drift inside the ranch house. No one seemed in a hurry to leave, and soon they would pull out the leftovers from lunch for an evening meal. Always the conscientious hostess, Cassie suggested organizing various games, grouped by age and interest, in several rooms of her house. Charades in the living room, poker in the den, board games on the dining room table, Trivial Pursuit in the extra room they used as a computer room and library. Football games were tuned in on a couple of different television sets for those who chose to watch rather than play.
“Shane, we’re almost out of canned soft drinks,” Cassie commented, pushing her unruly mop of red hair away from her face, which was still fresh and unlined as she approached her fortieth birthday.
Giving his stepmother an affectionate smile, he nodded. “I’ll go fetch the ones we stashed in my fridge. Kelly, can you give me a hand?” he asked, as if on a sudden impulse.
He saw what might have been a quick flare of nerves in her eyes, but she masked it quickly and nodded. “Sure. I’d be glad to.”
Cassie smiled in satisfaction. “Thanks, you two. I appreciate it. Now I’d better go make sure everyone’s found something interesting to do.”