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“Looks like every man and woman in Virginia came to try out for this show,” Joe commented as he got out of the car.

Elaine slid into the driver’s seat, taking his place behind the wheel. “Joe, why don’t you forget about this and just come home?”

“Because I want to keep coming home and it won’t be home if I don’t win this.” He looked across the street at the ever growing crowd in front the Body Beautiful Fitness Center. This was where the producers of The Journey, the newest reality program to catch the country’s attention by storm, were looking for contestants.

The irony of the situation made him smile. He had to be the only one in the country who had never watched a reality show. Even his mother was a faithful viewer of one of them. And now here he was literally betting the farm, or in this case ranch, that he could come up a winner on this one.

According to the article he’d read, twenty contestants were to be chosen. It looked as though several thousand had shown up.

It was going to be a long afternoon.

Joe leaned over and kissed his mother’s cheek through the open window. “I’ll give you a call when it’s over.” He winked. “You can pick up the pieces.”

Knowing she couldn’t talk her oldest son out of something after he’d made up his mind, Elaine wished him luck and then drove off.

Joe braced himself. It looked as if he was going to have a long wait ahead of him. Taking out the portable mp3 player Sandra had given him the last Christmas they’d had together, he attached the small headphones then placed them on his ears. He slid the almost flat player into the back pocket of his jeans.

When he’d gotten the gift, he’d laughed and said it was just something else he wasn’t going to use. But now that Sandra was gone, he played the memory stick full of tunes she’d selected for him often. It made him feel closer to her.

Crossing the street, he approached the end of the ever growing line. Another would-be applicant came up from the rear at the same time he did. Since the laws of physics hadn’t been amended and two objects weren’t capable of taking up the same space at the same time, Joe found himself colliding with a very soft, yet at the same time firm, surface.

An athletic-looking young woman with short, curly black hair and eyes the color of a rich chocolate sundae recovered herself in time to keep from ignobly meeting the pavement. The earphones were still on his head. The woman was saying something to him, and her lips were definitely not in sync with what Toby Keith was singing about into his ear.

Joe slid the headphones off, leaving them hanging around his neck. He flashed an apologetic grin. “Hey, sorry.”

Neither the grin nor the abbreviated apology appeared to do it for her. The woman looked summarily annoyed. “Look, mister, if you haven’t learned how to walk and pay attention to where you’re going at the same time, maybe you shouldn’t be trying out for the show.” Her eyes widened as she heard the tune he was listening to emanating from the headphones around his neck. She didn’t recognize the song, but was apparently familiar enough with the mode of music to allow a smirk to cross her generous mouth.

The chocolate eyes rose to meet his face. “Country and western — well, maybe that explains it.”

He wasn’t a big fan of country and western music — that had been Sandra’s thing. But he didn’t care for the woman’s superior attitude. Normally polite to a fault, he felt annoyance taking hold of his tongue. “And what’s your excuse?”

The mark of a fighter about her, he watched the woman’s chest swell indignantly. He had to admit, despite the confrontational situation, it was a rather attractive sight. It surprised him to feel something stirring inside. “Inside” had been dead for a very long time.

The woman looked ready to tangle with him right then and there. Her chin shot up as several people around them began to pay attention to the exchange. “What?”

“You walked into me just as much as I walked into you,” Joe pointed out.

She found his voice annoyingly low and controlled. It only made her more irritated. “Look, cowboy -”

“Is there a problem here?”

A burly-looking man wearing a short-sleeve shirt and short, stubby tie that definitely looked out of place with his bulging muscles and size-eighteen neck seemed to materialize out of the crowd. His manner labeled him as being with the producers and the talent scouts. His job was security or, more to the point, to keep the peace.

Joe became aware of another man standing behind the first, holding a camera, apparently filming the potential contestants standing out in eighty-seven degree weather. Obviously the powers that be were anticipating short tempers and shorter fuses.

The woman tossed her head, her dark curls bouncing. Her firm breasts seemed to rise up a notch. “No problem. Nothing I can’t handle.”

The man turned his attention to Joe. Joe inclined his head toward the woman. “What she said.”

With a huff that was meant to be taken as a warning, the man withdrew, taking the cameraman with him. The latter drifted over to another section of the endless line.

Joe reined in his temper, regaining control over it. He wasn’t out to make enemies, just to get this over with. Leaving bad feelings to fester was only going to make things worse.

“Joe Cooper,” he said, putting out his hand.

Surprised, the woman with the picture-perfect, taut body looked at him a second before finally placing her own hand in his.

“Theresa Knight.” Her eyes locked with his. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being challenged on a very basic, earthly level. Theresa was nothing if not the picture of confidence. “And I’m going to win this thing.”

A beat passed. He realized that he was still holding her hand. Joe opened his fingers, letting go. “First you have to qualify,” he told her quietly.

“That’s already a given.” Theresa shifted slightly, aware that his eyes were washing over her. Was that judgment she saw? It wouldn’t be the first time, but she always reacted as if it were. “What? You think I’m too small to go white-water rafting and rock climbing? You think just because you’re a guy and bigger than I am that for some reason —”

“No.”

He cut short whatever tirade was in the making. He hadn’t come out here to argue with anyone. He hadn’t even come out here to compete against anyone. He’d just come out here because his mother needed the money and this was the only thing he could do in short order. That he had to win was not a question. It was a statement.

With that, he turned and faced forward. Picking up the headphones, he slipped them back on his ears and drowned out everything else that was going on around him.

Including the rather stunning woman fuming at his back.

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