Page 49 of Rocky Mountain Home

Dare snapped her mouth shut to stop from swearing or laughing or shrieking, or any of those responses that would be inappropriate.

“It hit me the other day that this would be a smart idea for us. I’m a good father, and you’ll never have to worry about being alone to take care of the baby.”

There must’ve been some sort of hallucinogenic in her breakfast porridge. “I don’t believe this.”

He squeezed her fingers. “Will you marry me? We could set it up for this coming month.”

She stared at him in horror. “Get off your knees. My God, has the whole world gone crazy? No. I can’t marry you. You’re my big brother.”

“We both know we’re not really related.”

Somehow she got out from where she was trapped between him and her chair, stepping to the edge of the porch. “Caleb, I’m not marrying you. You don’t think of me in that way, and I’m not marrying somebody just to get Buckaroo a daddy. Not you, not Jesse. No one. And I’m not having sex with you ever as that would be gross beyond belief. Holy hell, my skin is crawling.”

His lips twitched. “Way to stroke a man’s ego, Dare.”

“Don’t make me crazy. You don’t want to have sex with me.” She made a face.

“This isn’t about sex, it’s about raising a family.”

“It’s also about sex, because I’m twenty-six, and you’re thirty-four. You can’t tell me that you’d be satisfied never having sex for the rest of your life, because that’s what would happen if we got married, because ick. Double ick.”

This day was just too much.

She pulled open the door and glanced back at him, wiggling herself toward safety. “Okay, thank you. That was very sweet of you and I appreciate it, but don’t ever think about doing that again. Ever.”

She escaped into the house, all but running to her room where she threw herself on the mattress and buried her face in her pillow. Only then did she let loose all the frustration and horror and sheer twistedness of her morning. Laughter welled up from deep within her, rolling over again and again as she tried to bring her amusement under control.

Thank God Luke was already engaged. The only thing that would have made this day even more funky was a proposal from Walker.

Or, no, from Ginny.

It wasn’t as funny as all that, but it was. If she was intent on doing the right thing by the baby, and if Caleb had asked her two months ago, she might have answered differently.

But now knowing Jesse was in the picture, and knowing he wanted to be involved, changed everything.

The fact that spending time with him made her heart pump and turned her insides to a quivering mess didn’t weigh in her calculations. Not one teeny bit.

Liar.

But, hey, she had to give Caleb points for actually going down on one knee to propose. She didn’t flunk out completely on inducing chivalrous gestures.

Yay, her.

By the time she’d pulled herself together and washed her face she had to hurry to make it to the gardens on time to meet Ginny.

She checked her mail en route and discovered another message from Jaxi.

Hey. Thanks for letting us know Jesse hasn’t fallen off the face of the earth. He hasn’t answered my email, but that’s typical. Still love the jerk.

I’ve been reading your blog and…umm.

God—there is no way to ask this without being right in your face about it. You mentioned you’ve got Buckaroo on the way. I hope it’s appropriate to offer you congrats.

This is really forward, but since I can’t ask my stubborn jackass of a brother-in-law, I’ll just take a risk and ask you. I haven’t seen any mention on your blog of a man in your life. Other than that shot of my brother-in-law…

Is there a chance that Buckaroo is going to be a niece or nephew to me? Because if yes, I want you to know that if you need anything—

Heck, let me reword that. Even if you’re not pregnant with a Coleman baby, honestly, I’m the kind who’s enough of a busybody to want to help everyone out. You need anything, let me know. I’ve done the kid thing a few times. Checking the current baster button, I’m ready to pop in about a month, so things are pretty fresh in my memory.