Free Sun Kissed by Catherine Anderson Page A

fine upholstery and lots of curlicues in the wood, the dishes were dainty, patterned with tea roses and trimmed in gold, and almost every room sported an imported area rug that had cost the earth. He’d loved it all at first and determinedly ignored the ceaseless ribbing from his brothers, who were all men’s men with rugged tastes. Tucker loved fine things, and he was confident enough in his masculinity to surround himself with them.
    Only now that the newness had worn off, he wondered sometimes if he’d made the right choices for long-term living. Yes, crystal decanters and fine bone china appealed to him, but practically speaking, they weren’t things he wanted to use on a daily or even monthly basis. His finger wouldn’t fit through the handles of the teacups. The decanters dribbled out booze when he preferred a generous slosh, and when he wanted a mixed drink in the evening, he always sought out a sturdy tumbler. For hislibrary, he’d also broken down and bought a comfortable chair, which looked blockish and far too massive for the room, rather like Tucker himself.
    In short, he was a bull living in a dollhouse with a huge, graceless rottweiler named Max as a roommate. Max chewed knucklebones on the fine area rugs, his black fur constantly drifted on the currents of circulating air, and the teacups on the rack in the formal dining room performed the singular purpose of collecting dust. It wasn’t a wholly practical situation, and Tucker had been toying with the idea of making a change, the only problem being all the merciless teasing by his brothers that he would have to endure if he sold his Victorian home and bought a place on a larger acreage better suited to his lifestyle.
    “The mad cow threat makes a man afraid to eat beef,” Tucker’s father said. “I wish we still raised our own. Buying meat at the supermarket, I could wake up some mornin’ mad as a hatter and drooling at the mouth.”
    “Just don’t eat the brains, spinal tissue, or vital organs,” Tucker muttered. It wasn’t easy to speak clearly around an ice pack, especially with a numb upper lip. “Not much danger otherwise.”
    “I’m still not talking to you,” Jake said, his voice laced with teasing gruffness. “My one big chance to meet Frank Harrigan, and you didn’t even think to introduce me. You knew I was right upstairs in the cafeteria.”
    “I’m sorry,” Tucker said, not for the first time. “I don’t know where my head was.”
    And that was the truth. Tucker hadn’t felt so nervous since going to pick up a girl on his first date. What hadher name been? His head was too foggy to remember. He recalled only being so tense that he stuttered and tripped over his own feet.
    Until this afternoon, he’d believed himself to be over that awkward stage. But meeting Frank Harrigan had plunged him back into it, leaving him uncertain what to say and worrying about the impression he’d made. How crazy was that?
    Tucker wondered if his numb lip had wandered all over his face when he smiled. And had he gripped Harrigan’s hand firmly enough? Ranchers judged a man by his handshake. And— oh, damn —had he really been leafing through a fashion article, looking at the best- and worst-dressed people of the year, when Samantha’s father approached?
    Why Tucker cared, he didn’t know. Then he decided he was lying to himself. He was taken with Samantha, and it was important that her father approved of him. How else could he hope to make any headway with the woman?
    Cheyenne Lee, Jake’s fifteen-month-old daughter, let loose with a shriek from somewhere upstairs, followed by the sound of running footsteps. “Young lady, you get back here!” Molly cried.
    The next thing Tucker knew, his baby niece stood on the landing overlooking the living room, her plump, naked body rosy from her bath, damp chocolate curls framing her cherubic face. Peering down at him through the log railing, which had been constructed for toddler safety, she