Gretchen returned and slid his plate in front of him. “Can I get you anything else?”
“Just keep the coffee coming, gorgeous.”
Gretchen beamed, and something inside Logan told him he shouldn’t have encouraged her.
“So you going to ask Skyler out again?” Elissa said, obviously timing her question so Gretchen would hear it.
Gretchen’s smile dimmed some, though she tried to hide it. Then she was off to tend to other customers.
Logan took another slow drink of his coffee before turning his gaze toward Elissa. “Maybe.”
“Be warned. She’s probably going to try to avoid you like she is me.”
“I can be persuasive when I want to be.” And contrary to his normal M.O., he did want to see Skyler again. Maybe if he could coax her into bed one more time, he could get her out of his system and move on. Because that’s exactly what he’d be doing after the rodeo in a few days, moving on.
“Good to know.” With a satisfied smile, Elissa slid off her stool and headed toward the front door.
Logan dug into his breakfast as he considered how he might win over Skyler to his way of thinking, that they could have a lot of fun together while he was in town. As he scooped the last of his eggs into his mouth and downed the rest of his coffee, a plan slid into place. He tossed a generous tip down for Gretchen and headed toward the front door, a grin of confidence tugging at his lips.
* * *
SKYLER STARED INTO her bathroom mirror, trying to decide if there was any way someone could just look at her and know what she’d done the night before. It’d been a miracle she’d made it back to the inn without someone seeing her. Now all she had to do was act normal so she didn’t end up telling on herself.
She shook her head, still not quite able to believe the night with Logan was real. But her body told her as soon as she’d woken that her time in his bed had been much more than a vivid dream. If she were the type of person to believe in such things, she would swear she’d been possessed by some sex-crazed maniac.
Well, there was no way to go back in time and erase her mistake, so she just had to go forward. She’d dive into work, occupy her mind with something other than the memory of Logan Bradshaw’s muscles straining above her in the dim light. Skyler closed her eyes and took several slow, deep breaths before leaving the bathroom and her reflection behind.
Work didn’t totally take her mind off Logan, but at least it kept her busy. Other than doing the usual tasks that filled her day, she pulled out her sketches for the revitalized Wren Cove Park. As luck would have it, the cause benefiting from the upcoming rodeo was the rebuilding of the park at the bottom of the hill below her inn. Blue Falls families had picnicked and launched canoes from the park for decades until a flood two years ago had destroyed the dock and the picnic shelters. And because of budget cuts, the city hadn’t been able to rebuild it.
In fact, the city council had been considering selling the property until Skyler suggested one of the new benefit rodeos be used to raise funds for the rebuilding of the park. When the city officials still hadn’t been sure, she’d offered to attach the running of the park to that of her inn. The next thing she knew, she’d been agreeing to buy the property for a rock-bottom price with the understanding that she could use the rodeo proceeds for the rebuilding.
The moment she’d signed on the dotted line, she’d nearly had a panic attack. But India had managed to calm her, pointing out that she now had control to redesign the park however she liked. With that thought in her head, new ideas had started forming almost faster than she could write them down. She just didn’t know how many of them would be feasible until the rodeo was over.
The rodeo she would have to go to, where she could run into Logan.
Somewhere, she imagined Fate laughing her ass off.
Skyler pushed the thought away and added a sand volleyball court at the edge of the park sketch. When she flubbed one of the lines, she erased the entire addition and started over. If the rodeo could generate enough money, hopefully she could get the work done and families could start enjoying the park by early- to mid-fall.
At the sound of approaching footsteps, she looked up. Elissa strode into the office and plopped herself down in the chair opposite Skyler’s desk. India positioned herself behind the other chair and placed her hands on its back. Skyler got a really bad feeling in the pit of her stomach. She glanced back at Elissa, who sat with an expectant look on her face.
“What?” Skyler asked.
“You had sex with him, didn’t you?”
Skyler’s heart thumped extra hard as she looked out the office door to see if anyone was nearby who might have heard. “Oh, my God. Do you think you could talk a little louder?”
“You did, didn’t you?” Elissa wasn’t one to be easily steered off track.
“What are you talking about?”
“You disappeared with him and then didn’t respond to any of our texts or calls.”
Skyler gestured toward India. “I texted India back that I came home and was going to bed.”
“Alone?”
“Yes, alone.”
“I told you,” India said.
Elissa looked confused. “That’s not the impression I got from Logan.”
Skyler stiffened. “What did he say?” She knew the moment the accusatory words left her mouth that she’d made a tactical error.
Elissa clapped her hands together. “I knew it!”
India rounded her chair and sat on the edge of the seat. “Are you okay?”
Skyler let out a sigh. “I’m fine, unless you count temporary insanity.”
“What’s insane about being with a drop-dead gorgeous guy?” Elissa asked.
“I just met him,” Skyler said low so no one outside the office would hear.
“I told you all that holding back was going to blow up one of these days.”
“Hush,” India told Elissa.
“Why? I think it’s great.”
“You think it’s great that I slept with a complete stranger?”
Elissa leaned forward. “Hon, you are wound up way too tight most of the time. Are you going to sit there and tell me that it didn’t feel good to let go a little?”
“I wouldn’t call that a little.”
Elissa quirked a brow. “That so?”
Skyler leaned back in her chair and covered her face with her hands. “This isn’t me.”
“Precisely my point,” Elissa said. “I’m not saying you become a serial bed hopper, but it’s not healthy to be alone all the time, to be so tense about every little thing you do.”
Skyler dropped her hands to her lap. “Well, I think I can mark off about ten years’ worth of letting myself go, so you can stop worrying about it.”
“Ten years. That good, huh?”
Skyler stared at her friend. “What do you want, a play-by-play?”
Elissa gave her an evil grin. “Only if you want to.”
“Keep on wishing.”
“You’re no fun at all.”
“I just want to forget it happened, and you’re not helping.”
“So he wasn’t that good?”
“I didn’t say that.”
Elissa squealed, and even India smiled at that revelation.
“But it was a one-time thing, a mistake.”
“Why is it a mistake?” India asked. “You were safe, right?”
“Of course. I’m not a complete idiot. It’s just...I have a million other things that I need to focus on.”
“You have to go to bed at some point,” Elissa said. “Why do it alone?”
“Have you had someone warming your bed lately we don’t know about?”
Elissa jerked a little at the question, making Skyler wonder if she�
�d hit a sore spot.
“No.”
“Then maybe you don’t need to concern yourself so much with who’s in mine.”
Elissa didn’t have a comeback. In fact, she stood and headed for the door. “I’ve got to get to work.”
Skyler stared at her friend as she left the office without another word. “Okay, did she just pull a Jekyll and Hyde right in front of me?”
India sighed. “I know she’s a bit much. She drove me batty when she was trying to push Liam and me together, but I do think she means well.”
“I know. I’m just rattled this morning. I felt like I was someone else last night.”
A couple of moments passed before India spoke. “Maybe that’s not such a bad thing. I didn’t realize I was cutting myself off from everyone, from the possibility of getting hurt, until I was shoved out of my comfort zone. And it’s been so worth it.”
“Yeah, but this is different. Logan Bradshaw is not Liam.”
“Maybe not, and maybe he’s not the love of your life. But I also think that what happened isn’t worth beating yourself up over. Maybe you were just lonely.”
Skyler met India’s eyes and realized that the quieter of her two best friends was that way for a reason. She was busy observing and seeing what others didn’t. Skyler averted her eyes, unable to stand seeing the truth reflected back at her. She searched for something to say but came up empty.
India stood. “I think maybe you’re not the only one who is lonely and doesn’t know exactly how to deal with that loneliness.”
Was she talking about Elissa? How could Elissa be lonely? If she ever wanted a date, she had one. The girl was almost always in a good mood and surrounded by people. But then, Skyler was often surrounded by people, too. She realized in that moment that there wasn’t just one type of loneliness.
She looked up at India to find her friend had left the office while Skyler was lost in her own thoughts.
For the next hour, Skyler tried to refocus her mind on work, but it proved a waste of time. She kept thinking about how maybe she should consider opening herself up to finding someone to spend her life with, but every time she tried to imagine it the old fear came back. She liked her independence. It was comfortable, familiar, safe. Yes, there were times when she was lonely, but maybe she just needed to fill those hours with more projects, perhaps a new hobby. Anything that wouldn’t let her down in the end, the way her father had her mother. The way... No, she didn’t want to think about the past anymore. That’s why it was the past. Done, finished, over with. You couldn’t change it, so why dwell on it?
Why was she letting one lapse in judgment tie her up in knots and make her doubt all the other decisions she’d made in her life?
Feeling as if the walls of her office were closing in on her, she stood with the aim of walking down to the park for some fresh air and perhaps some new inspiration for her vision of what the park could become.
She headed up the hallway toward the lobby. She was a few steps into the lobby before she recognized the person standing at the front desk. Her mouth dropped open as Logan turned with an army duffel on his shoulder.
He smiled and damn if her knees didn’t weaken a little. “Good morning,” he said as he crossed toward her.
“What are you doing here?” She kept her voice low and tried not to appear as freaked out as she felt.
“I’m staying here.”
“No, you’re not. You’re staying at the Country Vista.” She needed him to stay at the Country Vista, well away from her and her traitorous hormones.
“I’ve heard so many good things about the Wildflower Inn that I thought I’d check it out.” He winked, then walked past her.
No, no, no. This wasn’t a rodeo-cowboy kind of place. But short of running after him and dragging him out the front door, she couldn’t do anything.
She noticed Amelia, the front-desk clerk on duty, watching her with an odd expression. “I’m heading down to the park for a few minutes.” Then she made for the exit, forcing herself not to run or show any sign that anything was wrong.
She was halfway down the concrete path to the park area before she got her heartbeat under control. Logan was staying at the inn. So what? It wasn’t as if she had to spend time with him. While she was friendly with all her guests, it wasn’t a B and B, where a lot of interaction was expected. She’d just stick to her office and her apartment, and she’d be fine. It was only a couple more days until the rodeo, and then he’d be gone and her world would snap back to normal.
When she reached the park area, she walked to the edge of the water, closed her eyes and raised her face to the sun. She let the lapping of the water on the shore soothe her frazzled nerves. It reminded her of when she’d spent one of her spring breaks from college at the home of her roommate, Tara, in the mountains of northeast Alabama. Tara’s family’s property had a creek on it, and Skyler had spent an entire afternoon sitting beside it, listening to the water burbling over the rocks, letting it soothe her wounded heart. Breakups sucked, especially when they came the day before you were supposed to spend a week at the beach with said boyfriend.
“Looks like this place has seen better days.”
The sound of Logan’s voice jerked Skyler out of her memories and back to the present. She spun toward him. How had she not heard him approach?
“Are you stalking me?”
He had the nerve to grin. “Not in a restraining-order sort of way, no.”
“Oh, well, I feel safer already.”
Logan walked toward her, and she forced herself not to retreat. When he was a few steps away, he stopped, grinned, then looked at the empty posts where the dock had been. “I take it a flood did all this.”
“Yeah.” Yes, talk about the park. That would be a good neutral topic until she could make a getaway that didn’t look like a getaway. “This used to be a popular canoe-launch and picnic area. We’re hoping to rebuild it with the proceeds from this weekend’s rodeo.”
“You working on this?”
“I own the park now, so yeah.”
“I’d think you’d have enough to do running the inn.”
“I seem to have a problem saying no.” Crap, had she just said that? By the way Logan’s mouth twitched a little at the corner, she could tell his thoughts had shot right to last night, when all she’d seemed to be able to say was yes.
Instead of jumping on that opening, however, he turned to take in the rest of the park. “How far does the park property go?”
She pointed farther up the shore. “To where those trees are at the curve in the shoreline.”
“You’ve got a lot of room, then.”
“Yeah, I’ve mapped out several ideas.”
He turned back toward her. “Such as?”
Why did he even care? He wasn’t from Blue Falls, and come Sunday this town, this park and she would all be miles away in his rearview mirror.
“Rebuild the dock, add a canoe rental for people who don’t have their own, new picnic shelters and grills, basketball and volleyball courts, a snack stand.” She didn’t know why she was telling him all this. Well, other than the fact that he’d asked and there was no reason not to.
“You like planning stuff, don’t you?”
“Why do you say that?”
He shrugged. “The look in your eyes just now. Like you were more excited with each thing you said.”
That was a little too perceptive to be comfortable. “Things need to be done, and I do them.” Some would say she paid too much attention to detail, but she didn’t agree with them. How could something that gave her peace be wrong?
She glanced out across the water and noticed the Lady Fleur paddle-wheeler taking its midday cruise.
“It seems you’ve got your work cut out for you,” Logan said.
“It’
ll get done eventually. Will have to go in stages.”
“You never know. We might rake in a lot of dough for you this weekend.”
She smiled a little at that before she realized what she was doing. “I’ll be happy if we make enough to do the cleanup and rebuild the dock.”
“I’ll put out the word to some friends, drum up some business for the rodeo.”
She met his eyes. “Why would you do that?”
“Because I want to.”
“But why? You have no stake in this.”
“I don’t have to have a stake in something to think it’s worthwhile, do I?”
“I guess not.”
“Plus, maybe I’m trying to impress you.”
Her insides fluttered a little at the way he was looking at her, as though he was remembering the taste and feel of her. She had to set him straight for good.
“Listen, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea because of last night. I’m not that kind of woman.”
“What kind is that?”
“One who just jumps into bed with a stranger.”
“I never said you were. In fact, I’m pretty sure you’re the exact opposite of that.”
Why did his words sting? Did he think she was as big of a fuddy-duddy as her friends did?
“So I was a challenge for you, then?”
“Yes.”
Heat flooded her face.
Logan held up his hand, palm toward her. “Don’t get the wrong idea.”
“Why do you think I’m getting the wrong idea?”
“Maybe the look on your face that says you’d like to knee me in a tender place.”
She lifted an eyebrow as if that wasn’t a half-bad idea.
“I think anything worth having should be a challenge,” he said.
Part of her wanted to admire that outlook on life, and maybe she would if he didn’t unsettle her so much. She didn’t like things that turned her life on its head. She’d had plenty of that with her dad’s comings and goings. A nice calm, orderly life, that’s what she wanted. That kind of life didn’t include a carefree cowboy who jumped out of airplanes and had near-death experiences.
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