She didn’t seem to be convinced. “That might work. The ‘soul of an artist’ kind of thing. But you have to be honest and open with me. I can’t turn in a bunch of clichés. Not if I plan to keep my job.”
“Got it.” He would be spilling his guts so Jess Granger could remain employed. That was not at all what he’d planned to do with this interview. There would have to be some kind of payback. “But I want something in exchange.”
“And what would that be?”
“The same access. To you.”
Her hazel gaze went wary. “You’re not writing an article.”
“If I have to drop my defenses, you should, too.”
“I don’t have any defenses.”
“Right. No problems at all with the foster care issue.” Her cheeks flushed. He stared at her until she looked away. “Deal?”
A long silence stretched between them. “Okay. Deal.” She pulled in a deep breath. “So tell me something I can use. Something about your abstract work. What were you thinking when you created those pieces?”
Dylan propped his hip on the corner of the table under the fox and drew a deep breath of his own. “Okay. My second semester in college, I took a sculpture class with Mark Thibault. You know him?”
“Sure. He’s a well-respected critic in contemporary art. He introduced you to the scene. ‘The biggest talent I’ve come across’ was the quote, I believe.”
“Yeah, well. Mark exaggerates. Anyway, he challenged me to explore abstraction. No figures, no representative stuff. If I submitted that kind of project, he promised to fail me for the semester.”
“You cared about grades? Artists are usually rebels in that respect.”
He chuckled. “I had three older brothers who were paying, in one way or another, for that class. I owed them good grades. So I worked my butt off for Mark, but he was never satisfied. He kept criticizing, rejecting, pushing me harder and harder. The deadline was approaching for the final project, and I still didn’t have a passing grade.”
Her hands went into her back pockets. “What happened?”
Dylan gazed up at the ceiling he and his brothers had insulated and paneled with finished boards. “I was sitting in the dorm with some friends, drinking beer out of cans. As guys do, we’d squash the cans when we emptied them and pile them on the table.” He cleared his throat. “In my intoxicated state, I started studying the cans, the shapes of them after they’d been deformed. I chose three that seemed interesting and worked on sketches, playing with their relationships to each other. When I sobered up, I figured out how to make forms using rusted oil drums and a hammer, filled them with concrete and then ripped parts of the drums off.”
Jess was grinning. “And Mark loved it.”
“Oh, yeah. I did, too—it was great to work on a larger scale, to physically manipulate such harsh materials. I felt like I’d opened a door and found a wild new world.”
“Did Mark learn the source of your inspiration?”
“After that sculpture won a blue ribbon, I confessed. He just said, ‘Whatever works, son. Whatever works for you.’”
She gave another of those rich, deep laughs of hers. “And an art prodigy is born.”
“There you go.” He glanced at the window and saw with surprise how long the shadows from the trees had grown. “We’re going to miss dinner if we don’t head for the house.”
“Dinner sounds terrific.” She brought her hands out of her pockets, relaxing the pose that distracted him. “Something about all this fresh air makes me hungrier than usual.”
“Wyoming affects people that way.” He opened the door for her to walk through. “But afterward,” he warned her as they walked up the hill, “it will be your turn to bare your soul.”
* * *
WHEN SHE AND DYLAN entered the house, Jess saw all the Marshall brothers in the same room for the first time. Four handsome cowboys, cleaned up and smiling at her, was enough to set her heart to pounding.
She fanned her hot face with her hand. “Taken together, you guys are a little overwhelming.” Dylan looked especially fine, something she’d been trying to ignore ever since he’d surprised her in the studio.
Cheeks flushed, every one of the brothers hooked his thumbs in his front pockets and gazed down at the floor. Jess chuckled. “There’s definitely a family resemblance.”
An expression of horror crossed Dylan’s face. “Say it ain’t so!”
Garrett snorted. “You should be so lucky.”
“Caroline’s supervising cleanup in the bunkhouse,” Ford said, ignoring his brothers. “She’ll be over when the kids are done.”
A voice spoke up behind Jess. “Dinner’s ready. You all should come sit down.”
Hearing the unexpected voice, she pivoted to find a blonde woman standing in the doorway to the dining room. A curly-headed little girl peeked around her hip.
“Susannah and Amber Bradley are staying with us for a while,” Dylan explained as they moved toward their seats. “And Susannah’s making sure we’re all going to have to buy a larger size in jeans.”
Jess couldn’t believe the table full of food, all for an ordinary evening meal. A steaming bowl of stew occupied the center of the feast, surrounded by dishes of mashed potatoes, rolls, green beans and a tossed salad. “I can see why. I’m sure it’s all delicious.”
Before she could pull out her chair, Dylan had done it for her. Garrett did the same for Susannah, after she’d gotten the little girl settled in a booster seat. Opening doors, pulling out chairs—compared with everyday manners in New York, all this chivalry would take some getting used to.
A sense of unreality stayed with Jess as she ate. When had she last sat at a family table? For Thanksgiving or Christmas, maybe, at the last foster home she’d lived in. Not in the middle of the week, though. And that foster mother hadn’t been very skilled in the kitchen.
“I was right. This food is amazing,” she said, taking another helping of stew. “It’s a lucky thing I’ll only be here a few days.” She met Susannah’s gaze across the table. “You’re a wonderful cook. Or maybe I should say chef.”
Susannah laughed. “Cook, definitely.” Her crisp accent hinted at an East Coast upbringing. She wore her fair hair in a knot at the crown of her head, with wisps escaping to frame her face—a beautiful woman in a household of handsome single men. The possibilities for romance were certainly plentiful, but she must already be married.
“Does your husband work on the Circle M?” Jess asked, following that train of thought.
Susannah winced. An uncomfortable silence fell over the room, till Dylan stirred in his chair. “Susannah’s husband is...trouble. She and her kids are here to stay safe.”
She felt her cheeks heat up. “I’m so sorry. Being nosy is a job qualification. But I didn’t mean to touch on a sore subject.”
“Of course not.” The other woman had recovered her control. “You couldn’t possibly have known. Don’t worry about it.” She glanced around the table. “Can I get anyone more to drink? Do we need more food?”
Groans answered her and for a few minutes they all concentrated on their meals, which Jess figured was a polite way to allow her to save face. She was quite sure she’d never met a family so mannerly.
But then, the families she’d grown up with weren’t always the most respectable members of society. Some of them had tried. Some...had not.
“Jess,