Tough Luck Cowboy

by A. J. Pine

  Her mouth went dry, and she struggled to swallow. His lips had been both rough and soft—insistent yet yielding, as if he was willing to give as much as he took. And when his fingers had tangled in her hair…

  An ache burned low in her belly.

  “It’s gonna take more than a little thing like you to bring me down, sweetheart.”

  She groaned through gritted teeth but secretly thanked him for breaking whatever trance she’d been in. “I’m not your sweetheart.”

  And without giving him a chance to respond, she turned back to the table filled with eggs and a rambunctious chicken.

  “You must be Luke’s aunt Jenna,” she said, straightening her bag on her shoulder and shifting the plant to her left hand so the two could shake. She didn’t know much about the woman who looked way too young to be the aunt of three grown men, but she knew enough from the times she’d seen her with the Everetts that they were close. Her heart squeezed at this. The only family Lily knew anymore was her mom, and she hadn’t been back to Phoenix to see her since long before things went south with Tucker.

  “I’m Lily,” she said. “A friend of Jack and Ava’s. We may have met a time or two at—”

  “BBQ on the Bluff!” Jenna said. “Y’all have the best corn bread I have ever tasted, and believe me when I say I am a harsh judge.”

  The lilt of her Texas accent reminded Lily the woman wasn’t a California native, and for a small moment she felt a connection to the otherwise stranger—someone else who possibly came to the California coast looking for something better.

  Jenna’s eyes brightened. “You run the place with your husband, right?”

  Lily’s cheeks burned. “Ex-husband, actually, as of a few signed documents and short court appearance.” That word. Ex-husband. Would it ever just roll off her tongue? She shrugged and forced a laugh. “Didn’t last nearly as long as the wedding, and there were a lot less gifts.”

  She expected Jenna to do that thing that others did when she told them she and Tucker had separated, tilting their heads to the side with that puppy-dog-eyed look of sympathy. But instead the woman clapped her hands together and grinned.

  “Well look at you, darlin’! You get a fresh start. A do-over. When it comes to matters of the heart, it’s never too late to get it right.” She leaned in close. “I’m thirty-six, and I know my Mr. Right is still out there. He’s just hiding real good, waiting until our time is the right time.”

  Lily narrowed her eyes. “I guess that’s one way to look at it. I don’t know if I believe in that whole Mr. Right thing, though. Maybe Mr. Rebound?”

  The chicken flapped her wings again, and Jenna pulled the bird into her arms, pinning the wings to her sides. “Lu-cy!” she scolded once more. Then her eyes met Lily’s. “Sorry. She gets a little excited when she can sense heightened emotions.”

  Jenna’s gaze flickered over Lily’s shoulder and narrowed.

  “Don’t you go doubtin’ the power of Miss Lucy’s intuition, nephew. She only tries to fly when someone’s emotions are on the rise.”

  Lily heard Luke chuckle behind her, and something in the sound made her giggle softly, too.

  Jenna put Lucy back on the table and rested her hands on her hips.

  “Y’all are mocking me now?” she said, her Texas twang even more pronounced.

  Luke strode past Lily and bent over the table to kiss his aunt on the cheek.

  “Of course not,” he said. “You have a psychic chicken. There’s nothing in that worth mocking.”

  Lily’s hand flew over her mouth. She didn’t want to insult Jenna and certainly didn’t want to give Luke the satisfaction of having made her laugh, so she bit the inside of her cheek and focused on doing anything but.

  Jenna swatted Luke away. “I need a break from you, you pain in the ass. Last time Jack puts me on babysitting duty.” Luke’s smile fell away as quickly as it had appeared, but he said nothing. “You got more shopping to do, honey?” she asked, and Lily nodded. “How about this, then? Save the eggs for last. You can leave your pretty plant here, and since y’all are friends, please take him with you so I can get him out of my hair for an hour or so? His brooding is driving Lucy crazy, and I swear that’s the first smile he’s cracked since we opened shop—even if it was at Lucy’s expense.”

  Lily opened her mouth to protest, but Jenna was already reaching for her plant. “I’ll give you two for one on the eggs. Just please give my stir-crazy nephew something to do.”

  “I don’t need something to do,” Luke insisted. “I’m a goddamn grown man, and you all have me under lock and key.”

  Jenna squinted into the sun and pursed her lips as she faced her nephew once more. “You’ve got the whole morning to spend under this great big blue sky with a pretty girl and no shortage of good food around every corner. Most people would jump at the chance to be locked up like you keep complaining you are. You could have your big brother watching your every move if you prefer.”

  Luke kicked the toe of his battered boot into the dirt, and for a second Lily saw what he must have been like as a child—petulant yet endearing. The thought unexpectedly warmed her.

  “Only because I’m stranded here with you—”

  “And because you love your aunt.” Jenna raised a brow and then leaned forward, Lucy still in her arms, offering him her cheek to kiss once more.

  He did, and then he kissed Lucy, too.

  “That’s just to show I love her even though she’s the worst psychic on the planet,” he said.

  Jenna laughed and swatted him away, but Lily knew this was the Luke everyone knew and loved, the one she saw that first night when she’d met him and Tucker, and the one who—for some reason—felt nothing but disdain for her.

  And there it was. Thanks to a not-so-psychic chicken, she was spending her morning with the one man she swore she’d stop thinking about—whose kiss she swore she’d stop replaying in her head.

  Yeah, she thought to herself. Good luck with that.

  “I can’t believe you just haggled over squash,” Luke said before pulling an apple from Lily’s tote bag and sinking his teeth into it.

  “Hey!” She backhanded him on the shoulder. “That’s for my ravioli! Or maybe they’d prefer soup.” She shook her head. “Whatever. It doesn’t matter. The point is, it’s mine.”

  He grinned, a hunk of apple between his front teeth. “Take it back,” he said around the fruit, and she just rolled her eyes and kept walking.

  “I still overpaid for the squash,” she said. “But he was the only guy who had butternut, so I guess the law of supply and demand wins.”

  He bit off another piece of the Red Delicious, wiping the dribble of sweet juice from the corner of his mouth with his bare forearm.

  “You’re barbaric,” she said, and he barked out a laugh.

  “Sorry. I forgot my pocket hanky,” he said, still chewing. “Does being so high-strung keep you from making a mess when you eat?”

  She stopped short, her tote of apples, squash, and God knew what else she carried slipping off her shoulder. She huffed out a breath, readjusted the bag, and crossed her arms, leveling him with her glare.

  “I am not high-strung,” she insisted.

  He winked. “That’s exactly what a high-strung person would say.”

  She groaned. “I’m organized. I’m efficient. I’m—well thought out.”

  He snorted, and she fisted her hands at her sides.

  “What? You’re saying I’d be better off if I didn’t give a shit what was happening one day to the next? If I used my sleeve as a napkin? My body as a plaything?”

  He raised a brow.

  “I didn’t mean like that,” she insisted. “You want to know the difference between you and me?”

  “I lie awake at night thinking about it,” he teased. “So, yes. Please. Do enlighten me with your wisdom, sweetheart.”

  She breathed in deep through her nose, let it out, and a certain calm fell over her. “It’s really quite simple,” sh
e said. “I care.”

  “About what?” he asked.

  “Everything.”

  She stalked off toward the next designated booth where she’d probably haggle over a goddamn potato.

  “I care about shit,” he mumbled. But then he found himself making a mental list.

  His brothers and aunt.

  Tucker.

  The ranch…and soon-to-be vineyard.

  Getting his eight seconds and qualifying for the finals.

  Wasn’t that enough? He kept what was important close and didn’t give a shit about the rest. The less that mattered, the less a guy could lose.

  Damn her for making him doubt himself. She cared too much. That’s what it was.

  He tore off the last chunk of apple and tossed the core in the trash. One thing was certain. He sure as shit didn’t care what Lily thought of him. He’d made himself believe that a long, long time ago.

  He found her haggling for potatoes this time, russet, baby reds, and Yukon gold—because apparently there weren’t just potatoes.

  “I’m going to lose a third of my product after I cut out all those eyes,” she said emphatically, blowing her long, blond bangs out of her eyes. “The only way I’m giving you that price is if you throw in those three gorgeous sweet potatoes for nothing.” She picked one up and smelled it, eyes closing as a rapturous smile spread across her face.

  He swallowed, throat suddenly dry. Christ. How did she make a root vegetable look sexy? He shook his head, realizing it wasn’t the vegetable at all that was stirring shit up below the belt.

  “You all set there, sweetheart?” he asked as she filled a second tote—another extra thrown in by the vendor—with her potato haul. “Because that apple ain’t holding me over. So if you’re still chaperoning—making sure I don’t take off on a bull or something—I’m going to hit the corn dog stand.”

  Her brows drew together, and she wrinkled her nose.

  “What now?” he asked.

  “Why is there a corn dog stand at a farmers market?”

  He waggled his brows. “Because they’re the best damned corn dogs in the state. Possibly the country. No. The world.”

  She scoffed.

  “You got a problem with corn dogs?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “Of course not. We served them at the restaurant. I mean, I’m sure Tucker still does if he can get the line cooks to follow my recipe. Hell, I don’t know how a business major is gonna run a restaurant without his head cook.”

  Luke broke eye contact, but that didn’t keep him from hearing her gasp.

  “She’s runnin’ the restaurant. Isn’t she?”

  “Shit,” he said softly. While he did enjoy pushing Lily’s buttons, it was another thing to actually see hurt in her eyes—and for him to be the one to put it there. “Come on.” He hoisted her bag of potatoes onto his good shoulder and started walking. He’d just have to think of a way to distract her.

  “You’re not supposed to carry heavy things. Are you?” she called after him.

  He spun so he was walking backward. “Come on,” he said again, and this time she started moving.

  He didn’t stop until he’d found it—the Cali Corn Queen’s Crispy Corn Dogs cart.

  He dropped the potatoes to the ground.

  “Hey!” she said.

  He grabbed her other tote and laid it down with the potatoes.

  “Two,” he said to the vendor. “With mustard.”

  In a matter of seconds, they were each holding a corn dog that sported a stripe of yellow from root to tip.

  “Eat that and tell me it doesn’t make you want to say Fuck you to all the other bullshit getting in the way.”

  She looked at the corn dog. Then at him, eyes narrowed.

  “It’s. A. Corn dog.”

  “Best you’ll ever have.”

  Luke tore a monstrous bite from his, but she still just stood there, probably imagining Sara Sugar in the kitchen where she had worked the past three years. A kitchen he was sure she still thought of as her kitchen.

  “Hell, that is good.” He took another bite. “If you don’t move quick, I’m gonna finish this one and go straight for yours.”

  Her mouth fell open. “You—you are not.”

  He shrugged and lopped off the rest of his, skimming his teeth along the stick. “I bought it. Technically it’s mine.”

  She pointed at him with the delicacy in question. “You are an absolute child.”

  He made like he was going to take a bite, and she reacted defensively, shoving it into her own mouth.

  He watched her close her lips around it, her teeth clamping down, and then he saw it. It was the same face she’d made when she’d sniffed that damn sweet potato.

  “Oh my gaw,” she said, her mouth full, her eyes fluttering shut for a few quick seconds.

  He swallowed the food in his own mouth, pretending not to notice how his throat tightened at the sight of her like this. “See?” he asked. “I know what the hell I’m talking about.”

  She nodded and took another bite, a glob of mustard catching on the corner of her mouth.

  “So good,” she said, oblivious. “Your aunt thinks she’s a harsh judge of corn bread? I wrote the damned book. And this batter? I’ve never tasted anything like it.”

  He could leave that yellow splotch. It wasn’t that noticeable. If you couldn’t see.

  Shit. No one would take her seriously with her haggling if she had food all over her face. And while he could get his rocks off watching her give some poor farmer a stern talking-to while looking like the Joker dressed in yellow, he wasn’t that much of an asshole. Besides, Jenna would never let him hear the end of it.

  He reached forward, his hand cupping her cheek, and let his thumb swipe at the leftover condiment.

  Her eyes widened.

  “Mustard,” he said, his voice low and soft. “You had a little—”

  She seemed to be searching for something over his shoulder, so he followed her gaze.

  “That the sheriff and that woman?” he asked as the two figures darted behind the tent of another stand.

  She nodded, then cleared her throat as he turned back to face her.

  He licked his thumb clean and watched her swallow as he did—watched her watch him, knowing that whatever she was thinking probably rivaled his own thoughts, and that all of it was a bad, bad idea.

  Then he saw that he’d left a tiny yellow speck on the edge of her bottom lip.

  And once he was there, touching her again, it was like someone had flipped a switch, and he couldn’t flip it back. Because damn if being bad didn’t feel so good.

  He brushed his thumb over that full bottom lip, one that was always the better half of a pout she seemed to wear just for him.

  She swallowed again, the movement slow and visible and somehow hot as hell.

  Shit.

  He leaned forward, his lips so close to hers he could feel her warm breath tickle his skin. Anyone who saw them would think he was kissing her. And he wanted to. Hell, he wanted to. But before he could finish what they had started last week, she said something that stopped him short.

  “Why do you hate me so much?” she asked, a slight tremor in her voice.

  His hand still cupped her face. This wasn’t the time to lay his cards on the table. He didn’t think there’d ever be a time for that.

  “Why do you need everyone to like you?”

  She blew out a shaky breath. “That’s not an answer. Besides, you don’t get to ask me those kinds of questions. You haven’t earned that right.”

  “What right is that?” His thumb stroked her cheek. He should pull away. He needed to pull away. They were standing out in the open at the goddamn farmers market in front of God and everyone, but he couldn’t fucking do it.

  “To act like you know me,” she said. “When all you really know is what Tucker’s told you.”

  He raised a brow, deciding on another tactic to get past the surface—the only part of her she see
med to let anyone see. “Okay, then. How about you tell me why you hate me.”

  She opened her mouth, then shook her head and stepped back, breaking their connection.

  “This is ridiculous,” she said, grabbing her bags and hoisting them over her shoulders again. “We can’t do this.”

  Then she spun on her heel and stormed away.

  This time, though, he went after her.

  And damn she was fast when she wanted to be. He blamed the broken ribs for not being able to keep up, giving his ego a virtual pat on the back and letting it know they were okay. But when he finally made it to her car, he was hurting enough that he had to brace a hand on the side of the vehicle to counteract the pain.

  She dropped the bags next to the driver’s-side door and threw her hands in the air. “What are you doing? In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not the best chaperone for you. Last week you were hurting minutes after Ava left you with me, and now you’re overdoing it for what? To get the last word? Fine, Luke. You win. Okay? Because your aunt is gonna kill me if I don’t send you back in one piece, and then I lose my two-for-one discount on the eggs.”

  He forced a smile and straightened, the pain subsiding. “So the eggs are what’s at stake here?” he asked.

  “Everything’s at stake!” She groaned. “I’m catering my ex-husband’s wedding. Who is marrying a famous pastry chef. You know you could have told me who she was the other day before I got myself all wrapped up in this mess to begin with.”

  He gritted his teeth. “I. Tried. But you have this habit of steamrolling everything that gets in your way when you want to.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Whatever. I’m in it now. And if I mess this up, I’m finished before I start, and I can’t fail at this, Luke Everett.” She poked him in the chest. “I. Can’t. Fail.”

  He wrapped his hand around her wrist on that last poke, and she didn’t pull away.

  “You hate me,” she said softly.

  Hell, if she only knew the depths of his—hatred—that it was his only choice. Because the alternative wasn’t an option, never had been. Yet here he was.

  “You think everything needs to be perfect. That’s irritating as hell.” And it wasn’t a lie. He couldn’t measure up with a girl like her. He knew it the day they met just as much as he knew it now. “So it’s a good thing you hate me right back.”