Ryder snorted. “No. Or fun.” He said the latter under his breath as he moved down the bar to help someone else.
My eyes burned, because the quip hurt and yet they weren’t wrong. I was serious. Life was a disorderly mess that needed serious, focused people to keep it from spinning out of control.
“You know, maybe if you were more serious, you wouldn’t be stuck tending bar and strumming your old guitar in Salvation,” I called out to him.
“Now why are you picking on ole Ryder, here?” Mr. Bigalow said as Ryder poured him his usual scotch.
“Don’t get mad,” Sinclair said. “You know how he likes to poke at you.”
“You think I’m not fun? You think I should go through life like him?” I jerked my thumb toward Ryder. “Not a care in the world? No plans for the future. Is he going to be eighty years old, still tending bar and plucking his old guitar because he can’t afford to retire?”
Sinclair pursed her lips. “They’d be perfect for each other,” she said to Wyatt.
“How so?” he asked.
“Yes, how so?” I demanded.
“Well, you’re right, Ryder could use a little focused planning for his future, and you’d offer him that.”
“What he needs is a kick in the—”
“But you’re too far in the other direction. You’re so obsessed with order and control, you’re missing out on the joy of spontaneity. He could help you with that.”
“I can help with what?” Ryder asked, returning.
“You two could balance each other out,” Sinclair said.
He grinned, looking intrigued. “Oh really? What are you going to balance for me, Katrina?”
Why was he using my full name? “Your face?”
“You two are opposites. She could make you more serious in life and you could help her have fun.”
“I know something about fun,” he said, winking at me.
Grr. “This is the dumbest idea.”
He leaned forward. “What are you … chicken?”
I leaned into him. I could see the irises of his blue eyes. “You’re an ass.”
His gaze dropped to my lips making me shiver. He looked into my eyes again. “And you’re full of shit.”
3 Ryder
“Okay, play nice now, children,” Sinclair said in response to my comment to Trina. Maybe what I said was a little over the top, but Trina, for all her vim and vinegar, was being a coward. Sure, this dare was silly, but it also revealed how uptight and lacking in humor she was. She couldn’t experience the basic joy in doing something crazy.
“This is nuts. The idea is nuts. You’re all nuts.” Trina glared at each of us and then took a long gulp of her beer.
I shrugged and straightened, reaching for Wyatt’s glass to refill it. “You’ve just proved their point,” I said to Trina.
“I did not,” she snapped.
“Sure, you did. Your point is that it’s easy to pretend to be married, but you’re coming up with excuse after excuse, because in truth, you can’t do it. It’s too hard for you. I guess it’s not that easy after all. You have to put up or shut up.” I was feeling triumphant as I gave Wyatt his refill back.
“And you think you could do it?” Trina smirked at me.
“Sure, I could.” I gave her a smile that said it would be a piece of cake. Okay, a piece of cake might not be accurate. Trina was a prickly woman. I was sure it would be a challenge to pretend to be married to her. But it was a challenge I was eager to meet.
“You think you could live with me for a month?” she pushed.
“I know I could. You don’t scare me, Katrina.” I loved the way her blue eyes flashed with surprise each time I called her by her real name.
“She scares me sometimes,” Sinclair murmured into her beer.
“What?” Trina’s head swiveled toward Sinclair, who shrugged.
“Maybe she’s not up to the challenge. It’s not like her farm is at stake,” Wyatt offered. I wasn’t sure if he was goading Trina or helping her by letting her off the hook.
“So you did marry me for the farm?” Sinclair said to him. “I thought you said you fake married me to get me.”
He smiled at her and rubbed his hand up and down her back. “I did fake marry you to win you, because yes, fake married plans are crazy. But clearly Trina isn’t head over heels for Ryder, so she needs a bigger incentive.”
Sinclair turned her attention to me. “What’s your incentive?”
I considered telling the truth: to get Trina to see me in a new, more positive light. And maybe give me a chance to show her how much I wanted her. But I was sure that would scare Trina away from this bet.
Before I could respond with anything, Wyatt said, “If he can do it, I’ll give him my grandfather’s old steel guitar.”
I whistled as the deal just got even better. I’d coveted that instrument since I first set eyes on it as a kid, one of the few times that I played over at Wyatt’s house growing up.
“It definitely deserves a home that will love and respect it,” I said. “It’s a fucking tragedy that it’s collecting dust.”
“And what if he loses?” Trina asked. I smirked at her, knowing she was wishing for some sort of medieval torture.
“How about he has to write a song and tell us about how wrong he was,” Sinclair said. “He could sing it at the Harvest Festival.”
Trina rolled her eyes. “That doesn’t sound like a punishment.”
“Some might say living with you is punishment enough,” I quipped.
Wyatt and Sinclair made an “ooh” sound.
Trina glared at me.
“Not me though. I look forward to it.” I winked at her and then sauntered off to the other end of the bar to refill drinks. I couldn’t decide if we were still debating a hypothetical fake marriage or if we were negotiating terms. But I was a patient man, and I could continue like this until either Trina admitted she was wrong about how hard a fake
