He looked at the kid and then laughed. “You gotta handshake that you’ll eat all your dinner so your mom doesn’t bust us.”
Parker shook his hand and then they completed a pinky swear to seal the deal.
*
“Um.” Talon paused and twirled a lock of her sunshine-blonde curls around her finger. Her face colored pink and Colt stopped, fascinated, in the act of drying a dish. “Ah, we haven’t talked about sleeping arrangements.”
The dish towel stopped mid-swoop.
“I mean—” Talon knew how that sounded and for more than a moment she wished she had the nerve to say what she really meant, deep inside her heart. “I mean while you are in town you can stay in the cabin or the main house or where ever you want because, really, it’s your place, and we really should talk about me paying back rent and…”
“It’s not my house.”
She stopped mid-conversation. “But…” She stopped as his face darkened forbiddingly, but Talon ignored that. She paid her way. Always.
“Hear me out.” She held up her hand and blew off his stare down. “Parker and I can move out, but I will need at least a week to pack and find something.”
She wouldn’t have her financial aid check yet for the summer semester of school, but she’d figure out how she’d come up with first or last month’s rent and a deposit. She had been putting money in a separate account because she knew that at any time Mr. Meizner’s heir could show up. She also had the issue of transportation. Her car was dead and she’d have to have it towed to the garage, which would cost a lot before repairs even got started. Anxiety began to crank up.
“Or we can move into the cabin, and you can rent the house out. Or sell it, and I can take care of it, keep it up, and clean until you have a buyer. I would pay rent of course.”
“Why do you think I have a say in this house?”
“Didn’t an attorney contact you?”
“Yes.”
She nodded. “She contacted me as well, saying that Mr. Meizner’s heir had been notified, although obviously,” she hastened to add not wanting him to think she was nosy. “She didn’t tell me anything.”
“He wouldn’t leave me anything,” Colt returned to drying the dishes and putting them away. “And if he did, I wouldn’t take it.”
“Colt, he was your family. Not everyone gets to have that.”
“Not everyone wants that.”
“Do you have any other family in Marietta?” she asked curiously.
The alarm on his watch went off. He pressed it and again Talon marveled at how intense his watch looked. A serious watch for a serious man, the kind of watch in a Bond movie or one that looked like he could pilot a plane with it.
“Saved by the bell,” she said cheerily and prepared another bottle for the puppy that was still being rejected by its mother. The rejection made her ache inside and she’d twice had to wipe away tears this late this afternoon and now evening.
She knew it was nature and that when she’d set out to pursue a career where she worked with animals, she’d have some dead ones. Still, this one she seemed to be taking a little too personally.
He didn’t answer her question, and his closed off expression didn’t invite any more. He scooped up the pup that was now wrapped in a flannel pillowcase instead of his shirt, which Talon had washed for him while she’d made a salad and he’d grilled out steak kabobs.
“How many times do you have to feed him at night, every two hours, really?” Colt asked.
“Yes. For the first week. Then three hours the second through fourth weeks,” she said. “They don’t have any glycogen stores so once the milk is digested, they need immediate energy.”
She took the bottle out of the warm mug of water and tested it against her wrist.
“I’ll do it this time,” Colt said, taking the bottle and tilting the puppy horizontal like she had showed Parker and him earlier in the day. He squeezed both sides of the bottle and watched a drop drip into the puppy’s mouth. The puppy began to suck, weakly at first but then a little more strongly.
“You workin’ tomorrow?”
“Yeah. Breakfast service. Six to ten, since Deanna worked my dinner shift last night so I could volunteer.”
“Oh-six-hundred,” he said. “Ouch. I’ll play a bugle for you.”
“Please don’t. My alarm is obnoxious enough. He’s doing well.” She reached over to stroke the puppy, but instead her hand touched his chest.
She snatched her hand away. “Sorry,” she whispered. “Um Colt?”
He still held the puppy, but was in the process of cutting off the feeding as she’d told him too much of the milk substitute protein could aspirate the puppy.
“Listen, I know we’re sort of strangers, but…”
“Have you come up with a date yet?”
“A date?”
“A choice. You need to choose something for us to do together.”
“I kinda did that,” she said. “We spent the whole day together almost.”
“Today wasn’t a plan.”
“You don’t have to plan the best days.” She objected. “They can just happen. Like the pancakes and the walk and climbing the tree. Then we rescued the dog I’ve been worried about but not able to catch in the live trap. And the puppy that didn’t die.”
“And the one that did. And now you’ve got one you need to feed every two hours on top of your work, school, and mom schedule.”
“Somebody’s a glass half empty guy,” Talon said. “We’re going to have to work on that.”
He still was holding the puppy, looking down at it. She watched him in profile, marveling at how classically handsome he was in a pure, masculine way. High-cut cheekbones, long, narrow nose, stern mouth, a bit hard, but his fuller lips were sensuous and then his square jaw, determined chin with the cleft really put an exclamation point on the whole hero thing.
He could have been in an ad for the military. Military recruiting offices would have been overwhelmed by young women shedding their panties and signing up with no idea what they were really in for.
“I’ll take him tonight,” he said, turning his golden-brown eyes on her. “So you can sleep.”
Her lips parted in surprise.
“Yes, really.” He walked across the room toward her.
Even with his boots, and his bulk, he made no sound.
“Colt.” She put out her hand as if to stop him, but that would have been the stupidest thing she could have done because who in their right mind wouldn’t want all that six-plus foot of masculine beauty and muscle coming at them, golden eyes burning? “We should talk about some things,” Talon said. There was so much up in the air.
“I’m more a man of action.”
She could definitely be down with some of his action right now.
He was close enough to kiss, and she could feel her breathing elevate, her nipples peaked, visible through her thin t-shirt, and she could feel heat uncoiling deep within her body, her vagina quickening. She moistened her lips and watched him, watching her. Her body felt heavy and hot, and she let her eyes walk down him and thrilled that her perusal made him adjust his pants a little.
“You have no idea what I want to do to your mouth.” His deep voice was practically a growl.
“You can show me.”
He sucked in a breath and then took a step back away from her.
“We should go slow.”
“That’s a role reversal,” she said.
“Don’t tell that to the three stooges I ran into in town.”
“They give you a hard time about being with Parker?”
“Nothing we couldn’t handle, but I couldn’t help noticing that on your shopping list you didn’t put down condoms.”
“Seemed presumptuous.” She blushed. “And Parker was with you and I figured that you probably had a jumbo-size box in your bag.”
“You over estimate my appeal.”
“I don’t think that’s possible,” she said dead serious.
“It’s the puppy.” He swaggered across the room, puppy in the cradle of his arm. “Women love puppies.”
Watching him, Talon swallowed hard. The puppy couldn’t compete with him. “I had fun today,” she said.
He looked down at the puppy then up at her, his expression impossible to read. “I did, too.”
“No need to sound that surprised,” Talon said.
He looked at her for a while. “Think of a date, yet?”
“A date? I’m not really sure what that means, Colt. We spent the day together. You don’t owe me anything beyond that.”
Unless you want to. Please want to.
Talon hated that voice inside her. The one that craved a deeper connection always, and when he didn’t answer, she felt her stomach sink, but like with everything in her life, she wasn’t willing to just walk away without trying.
Go big or go home.
He might say no and she’d be disappointed, but she’d be in the same place where she would have been without trying.
“Today doesn’t count,” he said.
“It counted for me.”
He focused on the puppy, gently stroking its belly in a circular motion. “I didn’t mean it like that, Talon. I’m not…I’m not good with words.”
“You’re fine with words,” she said. “And if you are set on me thinking of some experience that will free you from your debt.” She made a face, because she didn’t want to be an obligation like she’d been her whole life. She wanted to be a want. “There is something I’d like you to do, that if you’d agree, that would be my top choice.”
“Yeah?” He looked up and, for once, his face was fairly open, not remote. “Shoot.”
Talon even thought she saw a hint of a smile and her whole body woke up, and she almost lost her nerve because she didn’t think he’d go for it, and she felt stupid for suggesting it and ruining the mood, but she gulped in a breath. “I’d like you to work with Parker to help him make a tree house.”
Whatever he’d been expecting, it was not that. Up went his guard. Down went the light in his eyes, out went the sexual interest.
“Parker.”
She pressed her lips together and her hands to her side to keep anything from trembling. She nodded.
“I’m not expecting anything fancy. Maybe just the platform being safe and a railing all the way around and, if it’s possible, a little roof part. Nothing like the tree house show on cable.”
He stared at her for the longest time, and she really had no idea what he was thinking. Not arousal like last night. A totally different look. Cool calculation.
“There’s a TV show about building tree houses?”
“Yes.” She sighed in relief because he hadn’t barked a no at her. “This guy in Washington state has a whole business and a crew, and they go around the country and build these really amazing tree houses, and it’s so interesting because—” She broke off, embarrassed by her enthusiasm over something he must think was ridiculous. He had faced horrendous circumstances in war. She must seem stupid and selfish to be sitting back in Montana, safe, watching shows about tree houses. “I just thought it would be special for Parker because it really took off in his imagination when Mr. Meizner would walk around with him before he got too sick. He would tell him stories. Parker doesn’t get a lot of experiences with men, and this would be something special, and then he’d have a place where he could hang out and read and dream and maybe have a friend over on a weekend like a normal kid,” she said. “Something that could be done in a day or two. And I’d like him to participate.”
“I thought you wanted to move out.”
She tried to swallow the dread lump, but there it squatted. Cold. Bitter. Familiar.
“I don’t want to, but obviously you are going to need to do something with the house and the land. If you want a caretaker, I’d apply. If you want to sell, I’d love to rent from you until it sells. But deciding to stay without knowing your plans is not within my realm of choice.”
She bit her lip. She was totally rambling again. And dreaming. She was spinning out a scenario as if Colt would be staying in the cabin for his leave, not traveling or camping with his friends. Meeting women in the Wolf Den because that was where men like him went.
“I was just thinking that if Parker could build something with a man, you know, a project, it would be an experience he could have like a regular kid. With my schedule at the diner, I can’t sign him up for scouts so he doesn’t get to do boy things except sports.”
She couldn’t sound more pathetic and inadequate if she took a college course in it. The tree house idea was dumb. She was meddling. Trying to mend things that were broken. She wanted something for Parker. But she also thought if Colt finished the project he’d started as a kid, maybe he’d build a good memory here. Maybe he’d feel like someday he could come home.
“I’m shipping out in less than a month, Talon.”
“I know.”
He stared at her. That look. That said so much if she could just read his mind. But maybe she could and that was the problem.
“I know it would just be one thing, a memory of something good. Something he built and could be proud of. Like a mentor experience.”
“So Parker and I build a tree house. What do you get?”
“Parker would… have an accomplishment. Someone else take an interest in him for a couple of days.”
Even to her it sounded pathetic and inadequate.
“And then I walk away.”
Those words. Always those words. Talon nodded. “Yes. Parker would understand that.”
And she would, too, she told herself bravely.
The air between them seemed to stretch and grow and growl, fraught with an entirely different tension than before. He walked towards her. She counted the steps. Six. And wished she had the right to touch him. To be held by him.
“I don’t think it works that way, Talon.”
She knew it didn’t. But still she’d had to try. “Something’s better than nothing,” she said in low voice, forcing the words out even though she knew they were useless.
And the words fell on the floor between them like dropped jello, quivering obscenely, impossible to clean up easily.
“Your car’s broken, you said.”
She nodded. She wondered if he knew anything about cars. That would have been a more practical ask. But expensive. But maybe he could tow it into the shop with his truck, and she would have at least saved the towing fee.
He picked up the bag of supplies for the puppy. “You need to be at work by six?”
“Yes, but…you don’t have to…” She trailed off.
“I’ll pick you up at 5:30.”
“Colt, I’m so sorry.” She could barely stop the tears from pooling in her eyes. She pinched her leg hard and reminded herself fiercely that crying never helped and only made her feel powerless. “All your friends are having a fun time and you…” She waved her hand to encompass the whole thing.
The bad memories of his house and childhood, her with her stupid ask for a tree house for her kid, the stray dog giving birth, and his run into town for supplies and groceries that he hadn’t let her pay for. And what had she given him? Dinner that he’d grilled. He’d given her a precious memory and a present, a mixed box of chocolates from Sage’s.
“I’m sorry,” she said again, wishing she could rewind the whole thing. Be normal. Cool. Beautiful. Sexy. Ask for some reasonable experience that wouldn’t be a hassle and dredge up bad memories. “It’s too big an ask and you’ve already given so much.”
He brushed past her, opened the front door and paused.
“No, Talon, it’s too fucking little.”
Chapter Twelve
Colt sank his final ball in a corner pocket.
“That’s it,” Gavin said, handing off his cue to Code. “Even though you made it tonight, you buy the next round.”
Colt went to the bar and ordered three more beers and a club soda with three
limes for himself.
“So that’s why you’re so sour,” Gavin said. “That’s the secret. Limes.”
They returned to the table where Nick and Code were in a spirited game.
“So?” Gavin took a long pull at the local microbrew. “Your date call your bluff? Did she choose anything? Tell me she chose a long weekend of nothing but sex.”
“She chose a long weekend of nothing but sex.”
“She has a kid,” Nick said. “A funny, mouthy kid who has one of those goofy hairlines like Colt’s. Maybe he’s been making secret trips to Marietta all these years.”
“Kid’s not hers biologically and they moved here only a year ago.”
“Damn, there goes my hope for scandal.” Nick missed his shot and Code walked around the table.
“The hot mama chose babysitting and to have Colt, with all his expertise, to run errands.” Code sounded mock disgusted. “And from the tight look on Colt’s face, sex isn’t in the offing.”
“So what does she want?” Gavin asked.
All three of his friends from high school turned and looked at him, and Colt felt a strange sense of disconnect. He knew them in the past. But not really. He hadn’t told anyone about his life at home. His uncle’s drinking binges. Rages followed by silence for weeks at a time. As an adult, he understood it better. A disease. Alcoholism. Another disease. Depression. He’d felt so separate from other kids so he’d separated himself further. Football had been his only outlet because his uncle had respected and understood and accepted football, so Colt had played hard, even though he had no particular love for the game.
Another thing that had separated him.
“Her name is Talon. She lives in my old house.” He finished his club soda. “She helped to nurse my uncle when he died a few months ago. Like a housekeeper person for room and board.”
“That’s the most I’ve heard you speak in one go,” Nick said. “Must be love.” He hit a shot and missed.
“She wants me to build a tree house for her kid,” he surprised himself by saying.
“Come again?” Gavin demanded. “A tree house?”
Colt expected them to laugh. To mock his manhood and all the other things guys did except talk about the real issues. They’d already teased him about “Dude,” the puppy he had in a box in his truck and had left to feed about half an hour ago. Now he stared moodily into his empty club soda glass and debated another beer. He’d only had one. But he didn’t want to feel the need for one.
Seducing the Bachelor (The Bachelor Auction Returns Book 3) Page 11
