McFarlane's Perfect Bride by Christine Rimmer Page B

reality, it wasn’t okay. Not okay in the least.
    â€œHe would never hurt me.” Jerilyn swallowed more sobs. “Except that when he loses his job and we can’t pay the bills and…well, that will hurt me. That will hurt me really bad.”
    â€œThat’s not going to happen.”
    Jerilyn sagged against Tori with a long, sad sigh. “Yeah. It is. It is going to happen.”
    Tori took her by the shoulders. “Look at me. Do you trust me?”
    â€œYou know I do. Totally.”
    â€œI’m going to call someone who can help, okay? I’m going to do everything I can to bring your dad back to you, to make sure he doesn’t lose his job.”
    Jerilyn blinked away the tears. “Who are you going to call?”
    â€œSomeone who’s been through exactly what your dad’s going through. Someone who managed to survive. Someone who will know what to do.”
    Â 
    Tori’s father, Dr. Sherwood Jones, caught a one-o’clock flight to Bozeman and rented a car. By four that afternoon, he was sitting in Tori’s living room.
    â€œI can’t promise anything,” he warned a pale-faced Jerilyn, who looked at him through red, puffy eyes. “And I can’t even talk to him unless he’s sober.”
    â€œHe should be, by now. Unless he’s started in drinking again.”
    â€œYou say he’s never hit you or been in any way violent with you?”
    â€œNo. He wouldn’t. He…hasn’t. Not ever. He’s just so sad and lonely for my mom. They were always so close. She was his very best friend in the world. Without her…it’s killing him, Dr. Jones. It’s hurting him so deep.”
    â€œI understand.” He glanced over at Tori, who sat across the coffee table from him and Jerilyn. Tori gulped down the sudden lump in her throat. Her dad did understand. They both did. He told Jerilyn. “Tori and I losther mother when Tori was a couple of years younger than you are.”
    Jerilyn’s eyes filled with tears again. She turned her gaze to Tori and tried a wobbly smile. “I know. Ms. Jones told me that, right after my mom died.”
    Sherwood clasped Jerilyn’s shoulder. “I think we should go to your house now, see if maybe your dad is sober, and willing to talk with me. Are you okay with doing that?”
    Jerilyn’s dark eyes were wide—and determined. “Yes. I think we should. We should go now.”
    â€œWell, all right then,” Sherwood said, with that gentle smile that always warmed Tori’s heart.
    They were at the front door when the phone rang. Tori told them, “I’ll just get that and be out in a sec.”
    Her dad and Jerilyn headed for the car as Tori answered the phone on the side table in the great room.
    It was Connor. “I just called to tell you I really hope Jerilyn said yes about tomorrow. I told CJ she would be there and suddenly he can’t wait to go to a picnic at the Hopping H.”
    His voice, so warm, threaded with wry humor, made her wish he was there, right then, at her side. She would lean into him and he would put his strong arms around her and she would feel she could handle anything, even the rough family problems of her star student—and what was she thinking?
    He was never going to be the kind of man she could lean on. She really had to remember that. He was leaving when summer was over—and in the meantime, he was going to cause trouble in the town that she loved.
    â€œTori? You there?”
    â€œRight here. I…haven’t invited her yet.”
    â€œWhat is it? What’s happened?”
    â€œIt’s a long story, one I just don’t have time to go into right now.”
    â€œWhat can I do? Anything.”
    She almost smiled. When he talked like that, so ready to rush to her side if she needed him, she could almost forget that in his real life, he was a ruthless corporate shark determined to buy out the Thunder