by Kim Law
“I got a glimpse of this earlier,” he told her.
“So?” Her breath forced the word out as he held it up in front of her.
“So . . .” He reached behind her once more, and her chest lifted as she caught her breath. He inhaled the scent of oranges as his fingers closed over the pointed tip of the black pencil, and after he slid it from her pocket, he held it up for her as well. “This is my pencil.”
He knew the throatiness of his voice gave him away. He was insanely turned on, merely from being this close to her. From breathing in the citrusy smell that had to be coming from her hair.
“I have a cupful of them on the desk in my office,” he explained.
Her eyelashes fluttered at his declaration, and this time when she spoke, her words were as unsteady as his. “Are you implying you’re the only one who could use that type of pencil?”
He dropped his gaze to her mouth. It would take no more than the dip of his head to put his lips to hers. “I’m saying”—he cleared his throat when the words barely squeezed out—“that you didn’t use this pencil. That you’d already finished checking your list before you got here today, and that you grabbed this particular pencil off my desk to make it look like you were busy. And I know this”—he waved the pencil back and forth in front of her—“because the check marks on your list were made with ink.”
Heather forgot to breathe.
Damn the man, he wasn’t supposed to have noticed that.
She snatched the paper from him and shoved it back into her pocket, and when she saw laughter in his eyes, she bumped her forearms against his chest to shove him away.
“Scoot back,” she grumbled. “And quit crowding me.”
He scooted back. But he also laughed at her.
“And stop it.” She glared. “How rude.”
“Rude to point out that you were in here waiting for me or rude for laughing?”
She scowled even harder. What a jerk.
And what a moron she was for hanging around to begin with.
She took another step forward and shoved him in the chest again, forcing him to move a couple more feet back. “Just rude,” she told him, and he laughed at her yet again.
“I might be rude, but I still want to know. You going to tell me why you were waiting for me, Heather?”
“I wasn’t waiting for you.” She bumped him again, and before she knew it, she’d backed him all the way across the aisle.
Ollie watched as if curious who’d make the next move, and Heather forced herself not to get all the way up into Waylon’s face. Not to appear as if she wanted to pin him there in front of her. She stood a foot away, breathing hard—mostly in embarrassment—and crossed her arms over her chest.
“I don’t know why all the women in town think you’re all that, anyway,” she complained. “You’re nothing but a coarse, smelly—”
“Smelly?” He looked affronted.
“—jerk of a man,” she continued, without breaking stride, “who thinks he’s God’s gift to women. And yes,” she confirmed, “smelly. You smell like a horse.” Mixed in with sunshine and the earth, she silently added. He smelled like a man should smell. She jabbed a finger in his face. “And no man is a gift to women.”
The bastard laughed at her again. So she slapped a hand over his mouth.
“Stop it,” she growled.
“Then tell me why you waited on me,” he mumbled under her fingertips.
“I didn’t wait on you!”
“Yes, you did.”
“No, I didn’t!” she yelled again. But she totally had waited on him. And that was not like her. Not the twenty-nine-year-old her. She’d seen him outside when she’d pulled up, intending only to drop off the last of the supplies, and she’d simply been unable to get back in her car and drive away. Not without talking to him first.
But why?
She yanked her hand away from his mouth when she realized she was still holding it there, and took a step back. What was she doing? She wiped her fingers on her jeans as if it would erase the feel of his lips. She didn’t get worked up like this. She was the “calm one” as Jill and Trenton liked to point out. That’s why she’d been the spokesperson for their business for all these years. People liked her. They responded well to her. And she didn’t lose her cool.
But with this man . . .
She forced herself to calm down, and took another step away from him. This man—whom she didn’t even know—might be trying to drive her insane, but she didn’t have to voluntarily tag along for the ride. He stood watching her now, wearing a similar expression to that of the ball-less horse standing directly behind him, and though she was fairly certain her current demeanor did imply that she’d returned to calm . . . she still wanted to scream. At both of them.
Waylon for being so frustrating and Ollie for growing on her so fast that she thought it was cute that he and his owner wore the same expressions.
“For the record,” Waylon said after the silence had stretched on several seconds too long, “I’m glad you waited. I wanted to see you again.”
The humor disappeared from his eyes, and the gentle way he made the statement had her chest deflating. What was going on with them?
She shook her head. “There’s no reason you should want to see me again.” Just as there was no reason she should have hung around and waited for him. “You don’t even know me.”
“We could change that.”
“I don’t want to change it.”
“Are you sure?”
His eyes were an odd shade of brown. Lighter than most brown eyes she’d ever seen, yet solid enough a color that she didn’t think they could be called hazel.
She looked him over as she stood there, taking in his plaid button-down with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows and the worn jeans covering strong thighs and ending at dusty boots. He was 100 percent cowboy. He stood feet shoulder-width apart and rocked back on his heels, and he wore his hat pulled low on his head. The man exuded buckets of confidence by doing nothing more than simply standing. Yet at the same time, something about him said “uncertainty” to her.
She replayed their last few words, trying to figure out where the uncertainty might be coming from, and decided that she wasn’t even certain of anything at the moment. Why she’d waited there for him. Why she was so drawn to him.
Whether she wanted to get to know him better or not.
She hated that he had the reputation he did.
“How old are you anyway?” When she finally spoke, he looked as startled by her question as she’d probably seemed when he’d asked why she’d sung to his horse.
“Why do you want to know?” he returned.
“Because I do.” Because he was young. She just hadn’t heard how young.
But if she knew for a fact that he was too young for her, then maybe she could stop this nonsense.
She thought about some of the things she had heard over the last few weeks. He’d apparently been in ranching only for the last couple of years, and immediately before that had lived in Vegas. He was originally from San Antonio. And in years past, he’d been inclined to orchestrate regional poker tournaments.
Those tournaments had drawn in several guys from Red Oak Falls, more than one of whom insisted that Waylon had been a little “too good” at cleaning them out of their money.
“Why do you want to know how old I am, Heather?”
His question pulled her out of her thoughts. “Can’t a person just wonder these things?”
“Sure they can.” His feet went into motion the second he finished speaking, and this time he backed her across the aisle. His long strides made it so she had to quickly scurry backward to keep from being stepped on, and once he had her pinned against Beau’s stall—standing far closer to her than she’d been to him—he looked her straight in the eyes. “But often there’s a reason for it. Are you trying to figure out if I’m old enough for you?” His voice was deep and seemed to vibrate through her body. “Because trust
me, I am.”
She didn’t want to trust him.
And then it occurred to her what he’d just implied. She propped both hands on her hips and shot him an incredulous look. “Did you just call me old?”
“Not too old for me.” He waggled his brows at her. “I like my women mature.”
She huffed out a breath in disgust. “You don’t even know how old I am.”
“You’ll be thirty in December.”
That had her pausing. How did he know that?
How did he know anything about her?
“I’ve heard things about you, too,” he said, as if she’d asked the question out loud.
“What have you heard?” Who would be talking about her? “And from who?”
“Just from Cal.” Waylon’s voice softened, his eyes following suit. “He mentioned how the three of you came to be friends,” he said gently. “And during our conversation, it came up that you were six months younger than Jill.” He shrugged, looking vaguely repentant. “Jill’s birthday is in June. They got engaged three days after.”
Did the man have an eidetic memory or something? “What else did he tell you?”
“Pretty much just your age.”
His gaze flickered away, and she assumed he was holding something back. But whether Cal had shared her story or not, it was easy enough to find out. Her parents had burned to death in a barn fire that had been started by an electrical short. They’d died trying to save the horses—and likely each other—and Heather had been placed at Bluebonnet Farms shortly thereafter.
“And you just happened to remember my age out of the conversation?” She didn’t push for what he wasn’t telling her, because she didn’t like talking about her parents’ deaths.
“I just happened to remember your age,” he repeated.
“Then how old is Trenton?”
She didn’t know why she asked, other than to turn the conversation away from her. As if he instinctively understood her intent, he produced an instant sultry look. “Trenton is twenty-seven. But as I said, I like my women older.”
“I’m not your woman.”
“You’re not yet.”
She laughed under her breath at his audacity, and the tension of the previous moment snapped. “You have got to quit laying it on so thick,” she mumbled. “You’re as bad as Big Red.”
“Who’s Big Red?”
Crap. She hadn’t meant to say that.
But also . . . was that a hint of jealousy that flickered over Waylon’s face?
Interesting.
“No one that you need to worry about.” She wasn’t about to share anything about Len, because the last thing she needed was for Waylon to figure out that she had a thing for redheaded men. And if he ever happened to meet Len? Well, she was sure the other man would take great pleasure in working that into the conversation.
She let her gaze trail over Waylon’s trim beard before inching back up to the dark copper peeking out beneath his hat. He really was a fine specimen of redheaded man.
“I feel like you’re lying to me again,” he accused. “Just like you lied about waiting for me in the barn. But that’s okay.” He lowered his chin and shot her an unwavering stare. “I’m excellent at figuring out secrets.”
Heather laughed again. Because the man was not only hot as hell, but he had a ton of little-boy cuteness going for him as well. “Big Red is no secret,” she assured him. “Trust me. He’s nobody. He was a cameraman for Texas Dream Home, that’s all. And a ridiculous flirt.”
“Ah. So you like men who flirt?”
“I don’t . . .” She blew out a breath. “Len is just a friend, okay? He’s big and brash—”
“And smelly?” Waylon offered, and Heather burst out laughing.
“No. Len isn’t smelly.”
Waylon made a face. “I’m quite certain that I’m not, either.”
She didn’t give him the response she knew he sought. Instead, she simply shrugged her shoulders in a “whatever” kind of way, and Waylon narrowed his eyes.
“I’m not,” he insisted.
“Whatever you say, Mr. Peterson.” She fired off a grin that she knew highlighted her dimples the best, and though she was also aware she probably shouldn’t taunt the man, the female inside of her patted herself on the back when his eyes heated to a combustible level.
“You’re fun, Heather Lindsay. And I do like fun.”
“I . . .”
He captured her hand in his, and instead of moving in closer as she’d expected, he tugged her closer to him. “I also like flirting.” He glanced at her mouth. “Specifically, with you. I like that as much as I like it when you smile at me the way you just did.”
Heather only blinked at him. Because she had no idea what to say to that. The man was excellent at turning the mood in the room.
He glanced at his watch, and regret filled his face. “But I am going to stop flirting with you for today. I’m afraid I’ve—”
“Already got a hot date?” Heather asked. It was Friday afternoon, after all. The beginning of the weekend.
His brown eyes studied her, and there was no apology in them at all. “The hottest.”
Humiliation had her tugging at her hand, but he didn’t let go. Instead, he reeled her in even closer, then he put his mouth to her ear. “But I’ll see you again next week.”
Goose bumps lit down her body.
“We’ll pick up right where we’re leaving off. Me getting to know you, you getting to know me.” He leaned back and peered down at her. “Me flirting with you, you flirting with me.”
“I’m not flirting with you.”
“Yes, you are.” His thumb slid over her knuckles. “And I like that, too. A lot.”
His phone rang before he could taunt her any further, the sound breaking whatever sorcery he’d been casting. Without hesitation, he lifted his cell to check the display, and then his features morphed into something Heather had yet to see from him. Anger.
He released her, his eyes going instantly dark, and answered the call as he turned and took the stairs to his apartment three at a time.
After his door closed behind him, Heather remained where he’d left her, shocked at his abrupt departure. She also found herself concerned over who was on the other end of that call. Because that had not been the look of a man anxious to talk.
Chapter Four
“Never allow the seeds of fear to be planted so densely that nothing else has the space to grow.”
—Blu Johnson, life lesson #47
Waylon stood on the porch that ran the length of the small stone house, key in hand, and fought to keep the pride that threatened to overwhelm him in check. Yes, this small home was now his. Yes, it had the potential to change his life for good—and he’d do absolutely everything in his power to ensure that it would do just that. And yes, he loved the eighty-year-old run-down cottage in a way he’d never thought possible.
But dang, he absolutely hated the fact he’d had to borrow money from his father to make it happen.
A car passed on the street behind him, slowing, no doubt, to get a good look at the newbie to the neighborhood, and he shrugged off the demons of his past and slid his key into the front door. His father was a good man. Waylon wouldn’t dispute that. The man had proven himself over the last four years—and especially within the last six months—and he continued to insist he wanted to do more. And more would be terrific. Waylon’s hope was that their relationship would only continue to improve.
At the same time, it was hard to put too much stock in someone who’d already chosen a different life over sharing one with Waylon once before. And his father had found it far too easy to do.
Waylon pushed open the wooden door, a creak accompanying the motion, and let the emptiness of the home fill him. The house had sat unlived in for several years, and though the foundation was stable and the bones were good, it did need a lot of work. Work he was more than willing to put in. But work that wouldn’t happen overnight.
He entered the small foyer that widened into the living room, and immediately started opening windows to air out the place. Truth be told, he should probably handle quite a few of the renovations before moving in. But that simply wasn’t going to happen. It was Wednesday afternoon now, and though no furniture would be delivered until that weekend, he would be staying in the place starting tonight. He had a bedroll in his truck, and he didn’t need more than that. This was his home, and he’d live in it even if it were falling down around him.
His footsteps echoed as he moved from one room to the next, the hardwood under his feet in rough shape, but at least a portion of it salvageable. He caught himself reaching out to touch the walls as he passed through each of the doorways. The arched entries were one of the features he’d loved most about the house, as well as the stone that covered the exterior.
There were three bedrooms, none of which were terribly large, a small bathroom with the original pedestal sink and claw-foot tub, and a U-shaped eat-in kitchen that also had the original fixtures and cabinetry. And they were in rough shape. The cabinets had been painted a coral color at some point in the past, and the eat-in area had been papered in an enormous flower pattern with the occasional bird sprinkled throughout. It was atrocious.
But it was his.
He tugged at the corners of the wallpaper that had come loose in every room, and eyed the handful of fallen pieces long ago chewed on by mice. Before closing on the house, he’d had an inspection done of the electrical, which he’d been surprised to learn had been upgraded in the last couple of decades. It was in decent shape, as was the plumbing. The roof, though, was another matter. He stared at the largest of the yellowed water stains in the master bedroom, and made a mental note to begin looking for a roofer the following day.
Then it occurred to him that he could call the Bluebonnet crew and let them handle it. Or better yet, ask for Heather specifically. It would give him an excuse to have her around.
