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Riley slipped on her jacket. “It was so nice to hang out with you.” Her gaze went to Marlowe. “It’s too bad you can’t make it to dinner on Sunday.”

Marlowe glanced at Jace. There was a family dinner on Sunday?

Jace swallowed uncomfortably. “I told them you were busy because it’s the only day you can get away to see your friend in the Bozeman prison.”

Seriously, Jace had invented prison friends for her? No way was she letting that stand. “About that,” Marlowe said brightly, “turns out the DNA test exonerated him, and he’s been released.” She put a hand to her chest. “I knew he was innocent all along. Justice prevails.”

Riley cocked her head in confusion. “Your old college roommate is a man?”

Yikes, that made her response worse. Now the Clarks would think she’d shacked up with some questionable guy during college. How to play this now?

Marlowe let out a sound that was half laugh, half choking from embarrassment. “Oh, you mean that prison friend. Yeah, my old roommate was arrested for…” What did people get arrested for that wasn’t actually bad? “Chaining herself to a tree to stop loggers from cutting down a forest. She’s always protesting something. They let her out on bail.”

Riley’s head was still cocked. “Jace said it was for theft.”

“Right. Because after the loggers cut through her chains, she managed to jump into their bulldozer and drive off with it, scattering loggers in her wake.” Marlowe threaded her hands together. “The state frowns on that sort of thing.”

Everyone stared at her. Lucas was a former police officer, and if he asked her any questions that involved police procedures, it would be more than evident that she didn’t know what she was talking about.

“Sounds like you have really interesting friends,” Riley said.

“Yeah,” Marlowe replied.

Lucas zipped up his jacket. His eyebrows drew downward, either in doubt or in silent judgment of Marlowe’s law-breaking roommate. “So you’ll be coming to family dinner after all?”

When she’d first insisted she was free on Sunday, she’d been trying to contradict Jace’s narrative. This was what she got for being contrary. She’d be stuck making small talk with his family. “Sure. What time is it again?”

“Five o’clock,” Lucas said.

“I guess I’ll see you there,” Riley added with a wave, and the two of them headed to the door holding hands.

Jace turned to Marlowe and searched her face. “You want to have dinner with my family on Sunday? I gave you an out to miss it.”

She folded her arms and narrowed her eyes in disapproval. “You gave me a shady criminal friend.”

“Good thing you cleared that up.”

Right. Because now she had two criminal friends.

Marlowe glared at him. “What other things did you tell your family that aren’t true?”

He slid his hands in his pockets and looked contemplative. “We’ve inadvertently covered most of what I told them. Although I did mention that you put the purple stripe in your hair to match your aura. And also that at some point you were a roadie for a hard rock band.”

Great. “You couldn’t have made it country music? That, I wouldn’t mind so much. I don’t know any hard rock songs.”

He shrugged. “Sorry. My parents hate hard rock. Mom is convinced it’s evil.”

“I agree with your mom on that one. Hard rock gives me headaches.”

“You don’t have to actually listen to it. Just pretend to be the sort of woman they don’t like.”

Standing there in the dim light of Legends, Marlowe realized something about herself. She cared too much about what other people thought of her. Either that, or her contrary streak was even stronger than she first supposed. Because right then, Marlowe had a new goal. She was tired of being the person who never measured up, the one people were always slightly disappointed in.

While she was around Jace’s family, she was going to be the perfect girlfriend. She was going to be so nice to his parents that by July, they would love her and beg him not to go back to Jennifer.

And it would serve him right.

CHAPTER 9