by Radclyffe
“What about goats?”
“Sorry?”
“I read somewhere that goats are actually really good investments. Milk, cheese, yogurt—it’s a biggie now, right?”
“That’s true. I suppose I have the prejudice of being raised a dairy farmer, but I like goats. They’re funny and cute and smart. Goats are a possibility.”
Kip forked some hash browns into her mouth and pointed her fork at Jordan as she swallowed. “I think definitely goats.”
Jordan didn’t see goats, cows, or crops in her future, but for the first time in a very long time, it didn’t hurt to dream.
Chapter Sixteen
Kip proved good to her word and showed up every morning for the next week at four a.m. to ride along with Jordan on her predawn rounds. Jordan shouldn’t have been surprised that Kip followed through on what she said she would do, but she still experienced a jolt of pleasure every morning when she arrived and Kip was there. They worked easily together, loading the flats of baby lettuce, spinach, and arugula that Tya had harvested, washed, and packed the day before; stacking boxes of spring broccoli, cauliflower, and brussels sprouts in the truck for Mr. Liu and several other of his restaurant friends; sharing coffee and discussing news in the truck as their breath steamed the windshield. Spending the first hours of the day in the close confines of the truck, cocooned from the world while wending her way through the still-quiet streets of New York, or at least as quiet as New York ever got, was as natural as anything she’d done since growing up on the farm where chores were chores, but every one brought some small moment of pleasure too. Her childhood chores had never been as exciting as her mornings with Kip, though.
This morning Kip wasn’t waiting when Jordan turned down the alley, and the lock on the gate was closed. Kip wasn’t inside, then, measuring for some construction plan or wiring a security light. Inwardly chiding herself for getting used to Kip meeting her, Jordan swept aside a sharp pang of disappointment. She’d more than gotten used to their morning routine—she looked forward to it. Often, her last thoughts before falling asleep at night were of seeing Kip in a few hours. And wasn’t that a bad habit to get into. Kip wasn’t likely to be thinking about her or the project once she left for the night.
Expecting Kip to keep her hours was unreasonable too. Kip had earned a little time off. She’d been pulling her share, more than her share, every day at the project when all she had to do was show up and put in the minimum of effort. Instead, she worked nonstop at whatever Jordan needed her to do, and seemed to enjoy it. Lunch breaks had gotten to be shared events, with Jordan and Kip and Tya lounging on a bench in the sun or sheltering in the trailer when it rained, spending a companionable hour over sandwiches and carefully avoiding personal topics. They always found plenty of other things to talk about. Jordan couldn’t quite figure out why Ty was still so reticent, not just reticent, but a little bit suspicious of Kip. She would’ve liked Ty to see what she saw in Kip—a sensitive woman who listened and offered support without asking for anything in return and without probing her silences. But then, Ty couldn’t know Kip the way she did, hadn’t spent hours sharing bits of herself as Jordan had, even the parts she usually didn’t want to face herself.
Jordan glanced at the take-out black eye she’d gotten for Kip, sitting in the tray next to the stupid scones she’d so carefully chosen. She knew she shouldn’t start to count on her, but it was hard not to. It was even harder not to look forward to seeing her during the private hours of the early morning, before Ty arrived and the demands of the day intruded on their personal moments. She could name a million reasons she shouldn’t get attached, even if the circumstances had been different. If they’d met anywhere else, she still would’ve been smart to remember they came from different worlds, practically from different generations, and that mattered.
Damn it. When had she gotten so careless, when exactly had she started letting Kip in? Smiling despite herself, she thought of their first meeting and Kip’s almost irresistible way of charming her way past Jordan’s defenses. She’d been on shaky ground with Kip from the beginning, and maybe it was time to admit she was getting seduced by Kip’s undeniable sexual magnetism. Jordan sighed. Hell, she hadn’t had that kind of energy even when she’d been twenty-five. She never thought she’d find a younger woman attractive and ought to remember passion ran hot and fast—for a while. Time to come down to earth.
“Hey, thought I’d missed you,” Kip called.
Jordan spun around, every argument she’d so carefully constructed against giving in to her attraction fleeing at the sight of Kip jogging through the dark morning toward her, a cardboard tube of some kind tucked under her arm.
“I thought you’d probably come to your senses and decided to sleep in,” Jordan said, holding out Kip’s cup of coffee.
“No way. Had to go back for the plans—I thought we could go over them later.” Kip took the coffee and leaned against the side of the truck, the security light she’d installed at the top of the gate shining on her face. She grinned. “No way would I miss our morning date, especially when you bring me coffee and…what’s in the bag today?”
Jordan hesitated, tripped up by the word date. Their morning rendezvous weren’t dates. Dates were something you got dressed up for and went to some special place and most of the time didn’t have a chance to talk to the woman you hardly knew, or worse, ran out of things to say. They weren’t hours spent working side by side as conversation flowed nonstop from one topic to another, punctuated by laughs and sometimes even a sad memory or two, memories that, once placed back in storage, felt just a little bit less painful than they had before. Dates were sometimes awkward moments after a kiss or two when you fumbled for a way to say you really didn’t feel anything deep inside and trying to connect wasn’t worth the effort, and it definitely wasn’t fair to suggest you wanted to step outside your nice safe life for the sake of a night’s company. Dates absolutely weren’t moments when you glanced over at the woman beside you and forgot what you were about to say, captured by the sunlight on her face, mesmerized by the intensity in her eyes or the quicksilver flash of her teasing smile.
Moments like that had nothing to do with dating and happened more than she wanted to admit when she was with Kip.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t stop at the bakery.” Kip pressed a hand to the center of her gray T-shirt, a wounded look on her face.
Jordan banished images of dating and kissing and Kip. “No, no, no, I did. Sorry, though. No scones.”
“Oh.”
Kip’s pained expression almost made Jordan laugh, and she couldn’t keep up the ruse. Laughing, she squeezed Kip’s shoulder and reached into the truck. “Maple walnut just came out of the oven. And your usual blueberry.”
Kip let out a sigh and slid the cardboard tube into the backseat. “That was cruel.”
Jordan handed her the bakery bag. “I’m sorry. I’m just glad to see you.”
“So that’s how you treat me?” Kip shook her head and peered into the bag. “You’re not kidding. These look great. But it was still cruel.”
“My version of frogs, I guess.”
Kip looked up. “Oh yeah? You wanted to get my attention?”
“Maybe.” Jordan shrugged a little sheepishly at her own foolishness. “I thought for a minute you weren’t coming, even though I told you about a hundred times you didn’t need to.”
“I like starting the day with you,” Kip said quietly.
“So do I, but you know you don’t have—”
“Yeah, Jordan,” Kip said with a little heat. “I do.”
Before Jordan could move, Kip leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the mouth. “Thanks for the scones. I would miss them first thing in the morning, almost as much as you.”
Jordan froze. Even the breath stopped in her throat. Her heart thudded erratically behind her breast. A buzz saw of arousal erupted in her midsection, hungry and threatening to devour everything in its path—which at the moment was her s
anity.
Kip set the bakery bag back inside the truck. When she turned back, her eyes were dark and blazing. “I’ve been wanting to do that for quite a while now. I won’t do it again if you don’t want me to.”
“I…” Jordan swept a hand through her hair. “I’m not sure how I feel about it. For now, I think I’d just like to not talk about it.”
“Okay.” Kip framed Jordan’s face, happy with action instead of words. She didn’t feel like talking either. She felt like doing what she’d been thinking about nonstop for what felt like forever. “No talking, then.”
When Jordan closed her eyes, Kip kissed her closed lids, then the corner of her mouth. She’d never seen Jordan off balance before, but she was now. She didn’t look unhappy, or angry, but her eyes were filled with questions. It took everything Kip had not to kiss her for real again. Not to answer those questions with the truth of how certain she felt, of how much she wanted her. She shuddered and brushed her thumb over Jordan’s slightly parted lips. Her voice shook. “I just need one more little kiss.”
Kip expected Jordan to pull away, but she tilted her head ever so slightly, and Kip kissed her, as slowly and gently as she could. Jordan tasted of sugar and a hint of coffee and, beneath it all, of wild heat.
“There now,” Kip gasped. “We should go. Mr. Liu will be looking for his vegetables.”
Jordan touched her fingertips to her mouth, her gaze fixed on Kip. “That was a very little kiss.”
“I can do better.”
Jordan laughed, a bit shakily, and caught her lip between her teeth. “Oh, I’m absolutely certain you can.” She held up a hand when Kip clasped her hips to pull her closer. “And I don’t want a demonstration. Trust me, you don’t have to prove it.”
“I planned on waiting,” Kip said, “but I just couldn’t help myself.”
“It’s the scones, isn’t it?” Jordan asked breathlessly.
“I’ll admit, they undo me.” Kip brushed her fingers through Jordan’s hair, let her hand drop when she felt Jordan stiffen. “But not as much as you. You keep me awake at night, you know that?”
Jordan swallowed. “That’s not a good thing?”
“I don’t mind losing sleep, when I’m thinking about you. The only problem is it makes me a little crazy.” Kip lifted a shoulder. “It’d be a hell of a lot more satisfying if you were there for real.”
Jordan’s breath was coming faster and faster. She tried very hard not to think about Kip lying in the dark thinking about her, tried not to imagine Kip tossing and turning like she did until the ache between her thighs could only be quieted with her own hand. Tried not to think how much she’d like to be the one driving Kip to the edge. “I know what you mean.”
“Do you?” Kip said slowly, her voice growing deeper, husky and slow. “Do you think about me at night?”
“Yes.”
“Does it keep you awake?” Kip stroked one finger down Jordan’s neck.
“Yes.”
“Do you think about kissing me too? Because I think about kissing you a lot.”
“Don’t.” Jordan leaned back, her throat tight, her skin ablaze. “Don’t make me tell you things I don’t want you to know.”
Kip stepped closer. “Is that what you do? Keep secrets so I won’t know you want me?”
“I have a hard time keeping secrets from you.” Jordan closed her eyes. “Kip, we can’t…”
“Yes, we can.” Kip skimmed her hand beneath Jordan’s hair and cupped the back of her neck. Her thumb stroked up and down Jordan’s neck, turning the muscles in her legs weak. “You don’t have to tell me your secrets if you don’t want to. But I want to hear them.”
“Why?” Jordan didn’t recognize her own voice, so wispy and wanting and so damn needy. This was insane and she couldn’t stop herself. She slid her hand inside Kip’s denim jacket, pressed the tips of her fingers to the center of Kip’s abdomen. Kip’s muscles were as hard as she’d imagined them to be. She hadn’t expected the heat that poured from Kip’s body like a furnace. “You’re so hot.”
Kip grinned. “Somehow I don’t think you mean that the way I want you to.”
“Take it any way you want, it would be true.”
“If you don’t want me to kiss you, you need to move your hand.”
Kip’s voice was low and gravelly, barely recognizable. Her eyes glowed golden and hot with a kind of wild fury Jordan had never seen before, like those of an animal caught in her flashlight beam in the absolute darkness of the countryside. “I can’t. I can’t say no just this moment.”
“Good.”
Kip’s mouth covered hers, hot and firm and surprisingly gentle. Jordan slipped both arms around Kip’s waist, pressing into her, desperate to feel all of her. Kip’s hand tightened on the back of her neck. Her lips slipped silkily over Jordan’s, teasing and tugging in a request to enter. Jordan opened for her as thirstily as a parched field drank in the rain. She heard a moan, felt it in her throat before she knew she’d made a sound. Her breasts tightened and her nipples chafed against the inside of her soft flannel shirt, so sensitive she wanted to cry. She angled her head, caught Kip’s lower lip between her teeth, and sucked slowly.
The sound Kip made, a barely restrained growl, detonated a need to possess, to demand, to claim. Jordan dug her fingers into the rigid columns of muscle along Kip’s spine and pressed her thigh between Kip’s legs. Kip jerked, cursed under her breath, and drove her tongue into Jordan’s mouth, no longer teasing. Jordan bit down, a taunting challenge. She would make Kip as hungry for her as she was for Kip.
Kip groaned, holding her fast with a hand on her nape, her free hand fumbling with the zipper on Jordan’s old farm jacket. She tugged it down, pushed her hand inside. She cupped Jordan’s breast and Jordan shuddered.
“God, wait,” Jordan gasped, her legs shaking.
“Sorry.” Kip rested her forehead against Jordan’s. “Sorry. I’m going too fast.”
“No need for sorry. Just…I’m…” Jordan shook her head. Not ready? Oh, she was ready. Ready for Kip’s hands all over her, ready for her mouth to take her. Ready for…too much. Too crazy much. “No time. Not…time. God, I can’t even talk.”
“I want to keep kissing you all day.”
Kip’s chest heaved. Her gaze was unfocused, and the muscles under Jordan’s fingers quivered. Jordan loved feeling Kip’s need, wanted to make her as crazy as she was. Wanted her to ache the way she ached. She clutched at the last little bit of reason and lightly gripped Kip’s hips, moving back.
“Sooner or later we probably have to stop.”
“Why?” Kip kissed her throat. “I think we’re just getting started.”
“Mr. Liu will undoubtedly send someone out looking for his vegetables.”
Kip laughed and kissed the underside of her jaw. “I want you.”
“Kip,” Jordan said with a small shake of her head.
“Can’t you feel how much I want you?” Kip raised her head, let Jordan see the need in her eyes.
Jordan caressed her face. “You’re making me all kinds of crazy, but can we just slow this down?”
“Only if you promise not to think yourself out of wanting me.”
Jordan started to protest, but couldn’t lie to her. “I can’t. Promise, that is.”
“Why? I want you. You want me.” Kip frowned. “It’s right.”
“That makes no sense.”
“Oh yeah, it does.” Kip stepped back. “And not saying it doesn’t make it not true.”
Jordan didn’t argue. Not acknowledging what seethed between them might not make the wanting go away, but it might stop her from heading right into heartbreak.
Chapter Seventeen
“I’d say that was a successful morning all around,” Kip said as they walked back to the truck from the Plum Blossom restaurant.
“Uh-huh.” Jordan had a feeling Kip meant a lot more than just the outcome of their restaurant visits, and she was trying very hard to keep her mind on business. T
he task wasn’t made any easier by being shut up in the truck with Kip, where the slightest hint of her scent or a brief glimpse of her tousled hair and cocky grin could set her blood raging again.
She tossed her clipboard into the backseat of the truck and started the engine. She probably should get into the habit of taking notes on her iPad, but she just couldn’t give up the pen-and-paper lists she’d been using all her life. There was something comforting about being able to hold the page that displayed the evidence of her morning’s achievements. She’d get it all into a spreadsheet as soon as she got back to the trailer. Five more names of local businesses. Five accounts that would go a long way toward building their presence in the community and bringing in some much-needed revenue.
Kip pulled her seat belt down and hooked it. “I’m pretty sure Mr. Liu has a crush on you.”
Jordan laughed and pulled out into traffic. “I doubt that very much.”
“Oh, I don’t know, he seemed pretty frisky there.”
Nothing could be further from the truth. At first she’d had trouble reading Mr. Liu’s stoic baseline expression, but she was getting used to his fake orders, which were really requests cloaked in the form of finger-pointing commands.
You will bring me broccoli.
“He’s been a huge help with his referrals, and I enjoy seeing him every day,” Jordan said. “We’re really making progress.”
“You mean you’re making progress,” Kip said.
“Not just me. None of these accounts would make any difference if we didn’t have anything to bring them. Ty deserves most of the credit for keeping watch over the gardens. And it wouldn’t help much if we didn’t have any way to get the produce delivered.” She patted the steering wheel. “For which we have you to thank.”
“So far, my contribution hasn’t amounted to much.” Kip stretched her legs out into the wheel well, never finding a comfortable position to ride in the cab of the truck unless she was driving. “When we get back and you have a chance to look at the plans, maybe I can get started on something that will matter.”
