All in the Game by Barbara Boswell Page A

the others in his family? Doing something that seemed perfectly reasonable—even good!—when it was obvious to others from the start that it wasn’t?
    Did the Howes possess a defect in the ethics gene? Or was it an insidious element absorbed from growing up a Howe. His honesty gene could be afflicted, too.
    Maybe that would explain why he had lied to Shannen about losing all his money. He and his mother and sister Jessie Lee all remained independently wealthy despite the rest of the family’s travails, thanks to their own irrevocable trust funds.
    Or had his reply been a self-protective response after hearing Shannen admit she’d liked the idea that he was very rich? Her words resounded in his head and he still wasn’t sure if she’d been serious or sardonic when she uttered them.
    From the time he had first learned that some people were nice to you only because they wanted what your money could buy—be it candy or baseball cards or jewelry or a luxurious life as a pampered wife—Ty had been on the alert.
    Who knew if he’d been dishonest or cautious when he told Shannen that whopper tonight? Certainly he didn’t.
    Nature versus nurture. Had that conundrum ever been solved? He should offer himself up to be studied, Ty thought grimly. For the past seven years—since the first family scandal broke, bringing down the others in turn like a crashing line of dominoes—he had seen himself as a good Howe. The one too good to be saddled with the perfidiousHowe name, so he’d become a Hale, determined to make it a name to be proud of.
    He wasn’t feeling proud of himself now. Shannen wanted to win Victorious fairly, and though it had been unintentional, he’d tried to sabotage her.
    But had it been unintentional? The question rocked him. Had he deliberately tempted her because he didn’t want her to win? And was he also testing her by pretending he’d lost his portion of the Howe fortune? After all, she was in this game to win a million dollars. He’d been filming what she was willing to go through to get it.
    He did want Shannen to win, Ty insisted to himself. Or more precisely, he didn’t want to see her hurt, and it surely would be hurtful for her to be voted out of the game.
    But if she were to win…
    He could envision the aftermath of a win easily, simply by recalling past winners in the early popularity days of the reality game shows. The winner would be whisked between New York and Los Angeles for appearances on TV talk and radio shows. There might be offers from companies to star in commercials. If the winner was a girl, a plethora of men’s magazines would dangle plenty of cash as an incentive to pose nude.
    Ty’s blood chilled at that thought. Cortnee could accept a nude centerfold offer and he wouldn’t blink an eye; he wouldn’t even buy the issue. But if Shannen were to pose nude…
    He pulled off his clothes and threw them on the ground, cursing as he swung himself down on his hammock to lie inside his sleeping bag.
    For the past nine years Shannen had been lost to him, and now that he’d found her again, now that he knew she felt something for him—and her responses to him definitely told him that—he was not going to share her with zillions of slavering males who pinned a nude layout of her on their walls.
    He closed his eyes, picturing her naked. A sweet torture that guaranteed he wouldn’t be falling asleep anytime soon.
    As he lay there, common sense eventually reasserted itself. Shannen wouldn’t pose nude for any magazine. She wouldn’t take a nibble of a sandwich when she was hungry and she wouldn’t strip naked for a centerfold layout.
    But if she won the game, her life would definitely change from her current one as a hospital nutritionist in the small town of West Falls. She claimed it wouldn’t, but he knew otherwise.
    Money changed everything. And why would a beautiful young