He had a point. There really was nothing worse than a fake cowboy. “Okay city boy,” I conceded and nodded at his convertible. “Where do you need directions to? I’m afraid we’re about forty minutes from the interstate, but I-”
“This is where I’m supposed to be,” he interrupted. The way he said it sounded like he meant it in more ways than one. It sounded so sure. The intensity in the way he looked directly into my eyes made the power behind his words that much more affirming.
“Well,” I said, rounding his vehicle and leaning over to unabashedly peek in the backseat. “You don’t look like the veterinarian.” I noted the suitcases on the butter leather seats and continued walking around, running my finger across the layer of road dust that had formed over the beautiful paint job.
His body turned to follow my path around the car. I had to give it to him; he didn’t look at me lewdly. Instead, he looked at me like he was trying to memorize my movements.
“No,” he said, stepping closer to me as I rounded the hood of his car. He put his palm out. “I’m J.J. Julian Jameson. I’m renting a cabin here for four weeks.”
Ah. I eyed him shrewdly. I looked at his hand before meeting his steady gaze and reluctantly put my hand in his. Instantly, I felt the pull that had only been teasing me from afar. His eyes widened for a moment and I knew he felt it too. This wasn’t the insta-love of teenage romances. It was totally honest insta-lust. I resisted the sudden urge to lick my lips in anticipation.
“Andra,” I said, after discreetly clearing my throat. “I wasn’t expecting you for a couple more hours.”
Instead of letting go of my hand, Julian stepped closer and lifted his left hand to hold the outside of my right hand, which was still grasped with his. His touch was warm and sure. It only enhanced the electricity around us.
“Andra,” he repeated, seeming to roll the word around his tongue. I swallowed hard. He tracked the movement of my throat with his unwavering intensity before continuing. “Well, I hate to keep a lady waiting,” he replied, smiling softly while running his thumb over my knuckles. The touch sent goose bumps up my arms. Shaking my head, I pulled my hand away as casually as possible.
“I think you’ll find that I don’t sit around and wait for anything, Mr. Jameson,” I replied pointedly and then gestured to the steps up to the entrance to the big house. “If you’d follow me, I’ll get you checked in and set up for your stay.”
As I climbed the stairs, I shook my arms, trying to release the tension. I couldn’t remember the last time a man had affected me so intensely. I was going to have to keep my hormones in check for this one.
“You can call me J.J,” he said from behind me, interrupting my thoughts.
I grabbed the door handle and turned around to him while opening it. “I prefer Julian.” I smiled sweetly at him, in challenge, a little annoyed that he’d affected me so much with just the brush of his thumb over my knuckles earlier.
We stood on the porch just staring at each other for a moment before he grinned widely at me. He stepped closer and I didn’t allow him the pleasure of seeing me step backwards in retreat. He lifted his hand to my face and I kept my eyes glued to his as his fingers paused at my hairline for a moment before tucking a wayward tendril behind my ear. His thumb traced the bottom of my ear lobe in a warm whisper before he leaned down to that same ear. “As you wish,” he replied before stepping back and walking through the open doorway, the scent of sandalwood following him. My ear tingled.
I lifted my hand to my ear, and felt my fingers trembling. What the hell was that? Three minutes after meeting him and I was practically panting like a dog in heat. I tugged my earlobe stubbornly.
I followed Julian in and rounded the reception desk, making sure to keep a safe distance from him. I grabbed the set of keys from the drawer and slid the signature pad in front of him. I typed his name into the software we used to keep track of reservations. “Since you already electronically signed our rules and policies contract, there’s not much I need from you besides your driver’s license and credit card for incidentals.”
After he fished the two cards out of his wallet and slid them to me, I recited our disclaimers while documenting the license and credit card into our system. After handing both back to him, I grabbed the map of the property we provided each guest. “Here,” I said, leaning over the paper and circling a cabin on the map, “is your cabin. This is obviously the big house. Here are the pastures and the horse stalls. Please remember not to go into these areas unless accompanied by staff and please do not feed the horses. Since you’ll be here for an extended duration of time, you’ll probably see people in the barns, out in the pastures, or training in the arena with the horses. They are the owners of the horses we board.”
I brushed a tendril away from my eyes and looked at him to make sure he was paying attention. He was. Completely. My eyes locked onto his chocolate-colored ones for a moment before I swallowed hard. This man was wholly focused on me. It was simultaneously thrilling and terrifying.
“We have paddle boats and mountain bikes available to rent at no cost to all guests. ATVs can be rented, but we ask that you keep them on the trails mapped out on this map,” I said, gesturing to the maps to side of the desk. “You can arrange to take a horse on the trails as well, though we require that you hire a guide to join you for your own safety and the safety of our horses. And helmets are supplied and required for riding any bike, ATV, or horse.” I straightened to stand and avoided looking back at him.
I passed the keys over and was more than a little disappointed when Julian’s hand didn’t linger on mine when he took them from my palm. “If you need anything, you can ask Rosa or me. Rosa runs this place; you’ll know her when you see her. Any of the ranch hands can help you if you feel inclined to ride the horses. You can usually find me in here, by the cabins, or out by the gardens in the back.”
With my arm extended, I motioned for us to move back onto the porch. “You’re in cabin ten. Cabin one is used as a full-time residence for the lead ranch hand, Dylan. If something goes bump in the night, he’s the one you call. Just dial 01 for his cabin.” I walked down the steps, heading towards cabin ten. I heard his footsteps crunching the grass behind me, and lengthened my stride. I hesitated for a moment before saying the next part. “I’m in cabin fifteen. Call me if you need something more basic.” I heard Julian cough-choke behind me before I turned around to face him.
“Basic?” he choked out.
I smiled up at him and walked closer, happy I finally had the upper hand in our verbal challenge. “Yes,” I said huskily. I ran one finger down his sinewy forearm and licked my lips. “Like…” I started, inhaling his sandalwood and Julian scent. I locked gazes with him and then dropped my hand from his arm and grinned, “Towels, shampoo, more pillows, etcetera.” I turned my back to him and opened the door back up to his cabin before turning back around to where he was, affording me a smile for my blatant flirting.
Julian hadn’t moved from his spot. He started to laugh, a rich, full-bodied sound punctuating the air between us. “There’s a lot of promise in that etcetera, Andra.”
Despite the teasing, I knew I couldn’t ignore the innate pull I felt whenever I caught his intense gaze. One thing I didn’t like was playing games. If I was attracted to someone, I didn’t make them guess what my feelings were. I respected and appreciated that Julian understood where we were inevitably headed.
“Perhaps,” I replied with a small smile before turning around and sauntering back to the big house.
I’d been staring at the computer screen for seven hours and was in serious need of a break. I leaned back in my office chair and stretched my arms, staring at the ceiling above me. I put my feet up on my desk and leaned forward, stretching my legs and arms as I grasped my toes. And then, when I felt the stretch deep in my muscles, I let out a deep breath and leaned back again.
Leaning in the chair as far backwards as it would go, I bent my head towards each shoulder, trying to str
etch the taut muscles of my neck when my eyes wandered to the cabins out my picture window. Cabin ten was lit up like a Christmas tree, and Julian’s shadow passed in front of the windows every once in a while, indicating he hadn’t left the cabin since I’d shown it to him. Not that I was paying any attention to him.
I didn’t realize how long I’d been staring out that picture window until Rosa spoke from behind me.
“What do you think?”
I dropped my feet from the desk and straightened my chair in supersonic speed, embarrassed at having been caught staring.
I turned my face back to my computer screen and rubbed my neck. “Insurance is coming due on the ATVs and cabins soon, so that’s going to eat a solid chunk next month. But that family reunion will more than make up for that, as will the wedding the weekend after they leave. I did the bank reconciliation for our main checking account and we are ahead anyway, thanks to the unseasonably warm weather we’ve had. Utilities have been lower than they were last year.”
Rosa leaned over my shoulder to see the figures I was showing her. “Hmm,” she said, peering through her glasses. “That’s good to know, but you and I both know that’s not what I was talking about.”
Crap. I couldn’t play innocent on this one. I looked at her, trying to hold back a smile. Rosa threw her head back and laughed. “Annie, honey, you’re about as discreet as an elephant in a chicken coop.” She put her hand on my shoulder as we both looked out the window at Julian’s cabin. “Besides,” she said before sighing, “he’s got one hell of an ass.”
Laughing, I shut the computer down and turned off the screens. “It’s not bad.”
“Don’t pretend you haven’t been staring at his cabin since he got here. I heard him pull in and saw your interaction with him. He’s a charmer, that’s for damn sure.”
I rolled my shoulders as I stood up, trying to alleviate the tension from being hunched over my desk for so many hours. “You need to remind Clint I need his receipts for this week,” I said, yawning.
“Go to bed, Andra. Receipts and reports can wait,” she said, nudging me out the side door. “I’ll lock up.”
Impulsively, I turned around and wrapped my arms around Rosa. I was reminded of how my life had been without her in it, and couldn’t imagine not waking up and coming to work with her every day. Best friend, confidant, mother. I felt her arms wrap around me and I closed my eyes, relishing the feeling of home Rosa gave me, and silently thanking whoever upstairs was keeping an eye on me, and bringing me this goodness.
“If this is you buttering me up for French toast on tomorrow’s breakfast menu…” she started. She pulled back from me and set her hands on my shoulders, “You can count on it. And not because I’m moved by hugs or any of that nonsense, but because hugging you is like hugging a sack of bones,” she said with a raised eyebrow.
I laughed out loud, knowing she didn’t mean that. While I was fit from working on the ranch, I was far from being a sack of bones. But I knew emotions made Rosa uncomfortable, and we both knew she had a soft spot for me. “My plan worked then, I see.” I winked at her and walked out the side door, down the steps.
I ran down the stairs and walked along the cabins, smiling to myself. There was nothing better than a warm summer night. And living as far out in the wilderness as we did granted us the most amazing view of the sky at night. I slowed my steps after passing Dylan’s cabin and lay down on my back in the grass. The yard was silent except for a few noises from the stables and crickets that took shelter in the tall grass around me. The grass felt cool beneath me and I blew out a breath, enjoying the peace that settled over me. This was a ritual for me, on warmer nights. Lie in the grass, close my eyes, and soak up the comfort of the noises that made my home. This was my meditation, my church, my choice of relaxation. The fact that I had a choice at all was something I never took for granted. This life, this place, these people – all choices I’d made.
I took a deep breath in and out and closed my eyes before sending up my nightly prayer, in a whisper.
I wasn’t a big fan of organized religion. I didn’t attend church services or participate in Bible groups. I believed in God, but I didn’t believe in taking everything the Bible said so literally. More than anything, I believed in goodness. And I believed that all the goodness around me was something to be thankful for, and the least I could do was honor the one I believed had brought the goodness to me.
“That’s beautiful.” His voice came out from the dark, right after I’d whispered my Amen. The interruption startled me and I quashed the instant embarrassment that he’d heard me pour my heart out in my prayer. No one was ever a witness to my nightly prayers, not since I was a child. Instantly, tension took hold of me and I turned my head to see him standing ten feet from me in the darkness, illuminated only a little by the lights on the big house.
His gaze, while ever intensely focused on me, was soft. I wasn’t sure if it was a trick of the muted light on his face or his expression itself.
I sat up and looked down to pick at the invisible lint from my jeans. “How long were you standing there, Julian?” I asked, refusing to look at him.
I heard him move through the grass towards me before he swiftly and gracefully sat beside me. He had changed from business attire into sweats and a fitted tee. Still yummy, perhaps even more so.
“I heard a door shut from the big house,” he motioned towards the porch I’d departed from minutes before. “I watched you walk across the grass and then you were gone. I was worried, so I came out.”
I tamped down the instant pleasure I felt from his words and tried to turn his words into a joke. “Watching me, huh? Kind of creepy.” I grinned at him. It didn’t meet my eyes, I knew. I still felt uneasy, suddenly thrust into an awkward situation with a complete stranger. I never shared this part of myself with anyone. It would be like giving them a looking glass to the inside of my brain. I suppressed the shudder I felt at that. Even I didn’t relish spending too much time inside my own head.
Julian didn’t return the forced smile. He looked at me for a long moment with bemused brown eyes before reaching his hand down between us to pull up a blade of grass. “It’s nice out here,” he said, examining the blade of grass in his hands, holding it up so the light from the house washed over it. “I spend so much time inside, on my computer; I forget that there is another world outside of the machines I surround myself with.”
I looked at his profile, silhouetted by the light. His eyes were focused away from me, out into the blackness of the forest we faced. The stubble on his jaw made him appear more effortlessly handsome than I remembered.
“This is my entire world,” I said, gesturing the land, the big house, cabins, and the forest. It was a brave thing to admit to him, but after being witness to my nightly prayer, he might as well have seen me naked.
“It shows.”
I looked over at him. His eyes were on me again, steady, sure. I was unused to such singular concentration by any man. He didn’t look at me simply to look at me; it was as if he saw the holes inside and wanted to reach his hands in and open them up, to get a better look. But all he’d see was darkness.
I pulled my knees up to my chin and wrapped my arms around them, trying to stifle the tingle I was suddenly feeling.
“Cold?” He asked.
I shook my head. “You disarm me,” I admitted, out loud, looking at my nails. Chipped nail polish. Perfect metaphor for how my armor felt around Julian.
When he didn’t say anything, I turned my head his direction. He was staring at me like I was a puzzle he couldn’t solve. I laid one side of my head on top of my knees, face turned towards him. “What?”
“Do you always talk this way? Openly, honestly?” he asked, turning his body so that he was fully facing me.
“I don’t much care for playing hard to get,” I said while shrugging, not completely answering his question.
“Why? Don’t like being chased?” he asked, mouth quirked up in a half smile.
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My head snapped up off of my knee in alarm and blood boomed in my ears before I blew out a breath. Chill out, Andra. “No,” I answered, more firmly than I intended to. His eyebrows rose at that, so I scrambled for an answer. “I don’t run very fast.”
He laughed, brushing away my unease at the idea of being chased by anyone. He scooted closer to me. The hair on my arm stood on end.
“What about delayed gratification?” he murmured, now close enough to hear my sudden intake of breath.
I turned my body so we were now facing each other. “I’m afraid I prefer instant gratification, actually. I already know what the end game is, so why spend so much time getting there? Why hold back? Why wait?”
Julian frowned. It did delicious things to the shape of his mouth. “What are you saying? That we might as well hit up your cabin and knock boots?”
I laughed out loud at the phrasing. “Well, no, of course not,” I started. “It would be your cabin, naturally. I’d feel bad booting you out of mine when this-” I gestured with my hand back and forth between Julian and me “was done. And besides, you don’t have boots to knock.”
Julian looked at me thoughtfully before rubbing the facial hair lining his jaw. “You’ve just made yourself a challenge.”
I stopped smiling. “What do you mean?”
“I am going to challenge you to find pleasure in delayed gratification,” he said. “Come on a date with me. Tomorrow. I can prove to you that some things are worth waiting for.” His gaze on me was intensely focused. As usual.
One date wasn’t a total deal breaker for me on my path of avoiding commitment. “Okay. What time?”
Julian grinned, eyes crinkling at the edges. He was a beautiful man, but when he smiled, he was absolutely dazzling. I felt my stomach clench with impatient desire. “I’ll pick you up at seven.”
“Perfect,” I agreed before launching up off the grass onto my feet. I brushed my hands over the back of my jeans before instinctively reaching a hand down to help pull him to his feet. As he reached his hand up to clasp mine, I pulled back like I’d been burned. His hands on me did scary things to my composure. “Never mind, you’re capable.”
He Found Me Page 3
