by Anne Jolin
“Well, seein’ as it’s the next day and all,” he said with a smirk, “I’m wonderin’ if you’ve changed your mind yet.”
I scowled, and he raised one hand in mock surrender while the other held up a box. “I brought donuts.”
Hmm. I liked donuts.
“Oh, cowboy. You better hope you’ve got Maple Dips in that box,” Nora said, leaning forward in her desk chair.
Owen looked at me. I wiped the coffee off my chin with the back of my hand and shrugged. “Well?” I asked. “Do you have Maple Dips in that box or not?”
He lifted the lid and winked.
“Give it then.” Nora made grabby hands for the box as she stood.
Pausing halfway to her, he whispered, “Think you can put in a good word for me with this one if I do?”
“I take bribes,” she confirmed with a laugh.
“Perfect.” He grinned and held out the open box to her.
She pretended to look for just the right one, and I pretended not to like the way Owen looked in a plaid button-down rolled up at the sleeves. Nora eventually took one of the Maple Dips. Once she’d chosen hers, I reached for the box, but he pulled it just out of my grasp.
I glared at him.
“First things first, darlin’.” He smirked another damn smirk. That smirk was starting to get under my skin…
I rolled my eyes. “What?”
“How ‘bout it? Go out with me sometime?”
Putting my coffee mug on the desk, I shook my head. “No,” I told him.
“Hmm.” He put the box down on the desk. “I won’t be holdin’ it against you just yet.”
Unlike Nora, I went straight for the Maple Dip in a greedy fashion.
I shoved a bite of the donut shamelessly into my mouth as he rested his knuckles on the desk.
“What’s this I hear ‘bout your roof leakin’?” he asked.
Shaking my head as I chewed, he stifled a laugh. “It’s nothing,” I said as I finally swallowed.
Much as I worked on horses, I ate like one too. There wasn’t a carbohydrate on this earth I had met that I didn’t enjoy eating. Somewhere along the way, I gave up hope that eating as much as I did would give me curves, it didn’t. I had the shape of a two by four and I stopped caring about it a long time ago.
“Want me to take a look?”
I took another bite and watched him. I couldn’t figure out why he was being so persistent with me. Maybe he didn’t have any friends.
This time, I waited until I’d swallowed the bite completely before acknowledging him. “No, thanks.”
The door chime sounded, and my eight a.m. walked in.
“Good morning, Mrs. Baker,” Nora said in greeting. “How’s Moose?”
I only half listened to their conversation as I raised what was left of my donut in the air, like a carb cheers, I guess. “Well, I’ve got to get back to work. Thanks for the donut.”
Owen leaned forward on his knuckles and stopped just a few inches from my face.
There was an excellent chance I’d stopped breathing during those few seconds.
He dipped his head, and my heart raced.
Looking at me from behind dark lashes, he lunged and his teeth tore a bit off my donut.
“Hey!” I yelled as he started to back away from the desk.
He grinned and tipped the brim of his cowboy hat down. “Have a good day, darlin’.”
I rolled my eyes and fought the smile tugging on the edges of my mouth.
“Nora. Mrs. Baker,” he said, acknowledging them both before disappearing through the door.
“He ate my donut,” I said dumbfounded to no one in particular.
Mrs. Baker snorted. “That’s what men do, honey. Knock you up and eat your donuts.”
“That’s why I married a woman, baby,” Nora said matter-of-factly.
The room fell silent for a beat until I burst out laughing and Moose, Mrs. Baker’s hound dog, howled at the noise.
“Come on, Moose.” I chuckled. “Let’s see what’s going on with you today, big guy.”
The rest of the day went by quickly, albeit far more uneventful than the morning.
Pulling down the driveway to our little house at six o’clock that Monday evening, I frowned at the disaster that had become our front yard.
The house had belonged to my dad, though he lived closer to town now, and it was just a ten-minute drive to the clinic. It was a three-bedroom white rancher, with a little porch, and great bones. He let me buy it from him for a steal because it was run down and needed some work. I knew my way around a paintbrush and had been happy to call it home.
However, the little yard was now overrun by tarps, tools and a makeshift workbench that took up half the driveway, if you could even call it a driveway given that most of the gravel couldn’t be seen through the overgrown grass anymore.
“In the name of all that’s holy, what the…”
I looked up to see him, shirtless and sweaty, standing proudly on my roof.
The sight wasn’t all that hard to look at, but he’d crossed a line, and I could feel my temper flaring thus eclipsing the state of his undress. Slamming the car into park and throwing open the car door, my blood boiled, but before I could speak, he did.
“It’ll take me ‘bout a week, but it’ll be done before the weather hits,” Owen hollered down.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I all but screamed at him.
It didn’t help his case that my mind had become irritated at the way my body still stirred, and not necessarily in a bad way, around him.
Even from the ground, I could see his eyes widen at my harsh demeanour but they quickly became distracted and moved over my head to something behind me.
“Who are you?”
I twist my body to see my nine-year-old daughter, Ryley, jumping out of the backseat.
“He’s just the man fixing our roof, honey. Go inside,” I said to Ryley before turning back to my unwelcome visitor.
“I’m Owen.” He tipped his cowboy hat her way. “Nice to meet you, little lady.”
Lifting my eyes, I glared at his stunned but pleasant expression.
Why didn’t he seem upset? Why did I kind of like that he didn’t seem upset? God, I’m insufferable.
“Hi, Owen,” she said waving enthusiastically. “Why aren’t you wearing a shirt?” she asked before turning to me. “Mom, he’s not wearing a shirt.”
This, as any woman with a pulse would be, was something I was already painfully aware of.
“Ryley. Inside. Homework. Now.”
My “mom voice” was something she recognized well. Grabbing her backpack, she hauled it over her shoulder as she walked by me. “Bye, Owen.”
“See yah.” He waved at her.
I waited for her to go inside and closed the door behind her before my fury imploded.
“What is wrong with you?” I shouted and stomped over to the base of the ladder.
Squatting down at the edge of the roof, he lifted his cowboy hat from his head and wiped the sweat off his forehead with his discarded shirt. “Seein’ as I’m here fixin’ your roof out of the goodness of my heart, darlin’,” he placed the hat back on his head and adjusted it before looking at me again, “I ain’t seein’ a whole lotta bad wrong with me at the moment.”
Blood pounded in my ears. “You’re unbelievable!” I screamed. “Don’t you have any respect for people’s boundaries?”
“You got a kid?” he asked, ignoring me completely.
My lips pursed together at his evasion. Two could play that game. “Please go.”
“Sure looks like you,” he said, smiling like I wasn’t currently in the middle of blowing a gasket.
I decided to give him a grain of salt, hoping he’d take it and go. “Yes, she’s my daughter and she doesn’t need strange men around our home. Now, please go!” The anger in my voice snapped a little at the end. I was doing a poor job of keeping it together it would seem. That didn’t stop my heart from doing
a barely there skip as he licked his lips before speaking.
“I ain’t got much left needs doin’ today, but soon as it’s done, I’ll be on my way.” He nodded.
“No,” I growled. “I want you to leave now!”
Turning his back to me, I saw the tattoos on his arm move onto his back—they were almost distracting. “Supposed to rain tonight, darlin’, so unless you want that kid of yours doin’ homework in the rain, I’ll be finishin’ what I got left for today.”
As much as it felt like he’d taken my right to having boundaries and stomped all over them, he had a point.
“Fine!” I threw my hands in the air.
Owen chuckled. “Fine it is.”
“Insufferable,” I muttered. Turning on my heel, I stomped up to the front door and slammed it behind me.
I mulled over whether I’d have conceded if he’d sported say, a keg instead of a six-pack… I decided that probably wouldn’t have mattered if he still had that butt.
Blowing a breath of air out dramatically, I watched the lock of hair on my face blow away and then come back. Stupid hair.
“I’m pretty sure you aren’t supposed to yell like that in front of kids, especially with shirtless guys,” Ryley piped up from her place at our kitchen table where she was obediently working on her schoolwork.
I pushed off the door and came to stand behind her. “Sorry, honey.”
She shrugged. “He’s right. Our roof sucks.”
“I know.” I kissed the top of her curly, brown hair.
“And he’s nice.” She looked up at me and winked.
Sighing, I shook my head at her. “Yah.”
I gave her shoulders a squeeze and wandered over to our fridge.
Ryley got off school at three in the afternoon. Afterwards, she walked to Sadie and Nora’s with their son and stayed there until I could get away from work. Their son, Mason, is only two years older than Ryley, so even in the six months we’d been here, he had picked up the role of being her big brother. Regardless of how busy I was, we always ate dinner together. That was our thing.
Except for Wednesdays, which was the exception to our rule. Wednesdays was movie night for her, Mason, Sadie, and Nora.
It was a win/win and made the transition to Willow Bay a much easier one for us to manage. Truth was, with taking over the clinic, I was now working more hours than ever and I didn’t want Ryley to pay the price for that.
“I’m thinking homemade pizza for dinner?” I asked her, my head still in the fridge.
“Do we have ham?” she asked.
Pulling open one of the drawers, I searched a bit before answering. “We do.”
“Yessss.” I turned in time to see her fist pump into the air.
She let her homework be, and we set about making ham and cheese pizza. They were just about done in the oven when I heard three loud knocks on the door.
I knew who it was. I’d been trying to ignore the sound of him working on our roof for the last hour but it was futile. He was noisy.
Wiping my hands on a dishtowel as I walked to the front door, I took a deep breath and yanked it open. “Yes?”
“I’m headin’ out,” Owen announced, T-shirt back in place.
“Okay?”
I was being rude, but sometimes men like Owen needed a strong hand, or they’d just keep coming.
Lifting his hand, he waved a set of keys in the air. “Left your car runnin’. Figured you might be needin’ it tomorrow.”
“Oh.” I stuck my hand out, and he dropped the keys in my palm.
“Night, Ryley,” he hollered into the house.
There was some fumbling in the kitchen, followed by a, “Night, Owen.”
Ryley had always taken to men. Although, I think it had more to do with fascination than it did actual feeling. That was my fault.
Owen’s sparkling greens landed back on me. “Sweet dreams, darlin’,” he said with a tip of his cowboy hat, then turned to walk off my porch into the sunset.
Of all the clinics, in all the towns, that stubborn cowboy had to walk into mine.
“Mom! Pizza’s ready!” Ryley yelled.
I watched him for one more second, climbing into that pickup truck before I shut the door.
“Coming!”
HELLUVA LOTTA THINGS MAKE FOR a good man. Thick head and a big heart sure as the day was bright had to be some of ‘em.
Least I was hopin’ she might think so.
Lookin’ down the drive, I heard her tires on the gravel before that death trap of a car came ‘round the bend. I was bettin’ she’d be madder than a hornet in an old Coke can seein’ me back on her roof, but fact was, I didn’t much care. Maybe the truth was I liked gettin’ under her skin. Wasn’t real sure I knew why just yet.
She pulled that blue bug that had to be older than this house, next to my pick up, burnin’ rubber like a bat outta hell.
When I checked my watch, I seen she was six o’clock on the dot again. Woman had a routine.
“Hi, Owen,” the little lady, carbon copy of her momma, less those big blue eyes of hers, hollered out the open window in the backseat.
I stood on the roof from where I was workin’ and tipped my hat down. “Evenin’, Miss Ryley.”
Her smile spread so wide, thought her face might just split in two. I hadn’t been expectin’ the vet to have a kid. No one had said nothin’ ‘bout it as long as I’d been home. Wasn’t nothin’ to me, though. Always liked kids. Didn’t see that changin’ anytime soon.
“What are you doing here?” Rayne glared at me, that mess of wild hair wipin’ ‘round her face in the wind as she got out, leanin’ that little body against her car door.
“Still a roof needin’ fixin’,” I told her, grabbin’ my shirt from the back pocket of my jeans.
Got hot workin’ up here, bakin’ in the sun. I figured workin’ men didn’t got no use for a shirt, and seein’ her little nose flare at my bare chest wasn’t given me no reason to put it back on.
“I told you to leave yesterday.” She sighed.
Liftin’ my hat, I wiped the sweat from my forehead. “Yesterday ‘n today ain’t the same, darlin’.”
She was tuggin’ on them scrubs, black ones today, like a nervous tick. “Don’t you have a job or something?”
Woman tried to be meaner than a snake when she got nervous. Fact was she didn’t have no bite to her bark, and I knew it. Think she did too.
“Rodeo’s my job, darlin’.” I put my hat back on my head, tuckin’ the shirt in the pocket of my jeans. “And unlucky for you, they ain’t expectin’ me back ‘til April, so I’m all yours.”
She groaned, and Ryley covered her mouth with her hand. Seems she thought the whole thing was pretty darn entertainin’. Had to say, I agreed with her.
“If you’re going to stay, at least let me pay you for the trouble.” Rayne gave an inch and seein’ as I was a man and all, I took a mile and ran like hell with it.
Shakin’ my head, I turned and put one boot on the top rung of the ladder. I was ignorin’ her, makin’ her wait on my answer ‘til I got down there, which I knew she hated. It made her more nervous, ‘cept the woman was a flight risk still holdin’ those keys in her hands, so I thought it best to be close enough to catch her, ‘case she ran.
My boots hit the ground and I turned on her, prowlin’ like men do to a woman they fancy.
“I say it was a trouble bein’ here?” I asked her, gettin’ closer, crowdin’ her space.
“N-n-no,” she stammered.
“Ain’t much sense in you payin’ me for troubles I don’t got then, darlin’, is there?”
I looked at Ryley, head still hangin’ out the window of that back seat like a lab on the first day of huntin’ season, and winked. She grinned, and I settled eyes back on her momma.
“I can afford to have the roof fixed, Owen,” Rayne growled, and her voice dropped real low. “We are not a charity case.”
Leanin’ forward, I felt her breath hitch as I wrapped a han
d around hers, the one still clutchin’ that shirt. “Don’t remember sayin’ nothin’ ‘bout charity.”
She opened her mouth and closed it again, hard to refute that I suppose.
“Best you leave the worryin’ to me. Seems you ain’t all that good at keepin’ it in check.”
I held her hand a little tighter in mine, and she pressed a little deeper into the door of that bug. Wasn’t ‘til Ryley climbed from the backseat that the tension ‘round us eased up a bit.
“He doesn’t even have shirts, Mom.” She laughed to herself. “Just let him fix the roof.”
My chuckle came from deep in my belly—seemed she was a funny one.
“Fine.” Rayne nodded in her direction and then mine.
I let her hand go and shrugged. “Fine by me, seein’ as that’s what I was plannin’ on doin’ anyhow.”
Hitchin’ her backpack up on her shoulder, Ryley clapped her hands together and laughed before steppin’ into the house. That was two days in a row she’d done that. Seemed they didn’t bother lockin’ it ever. Best we had a conversation about that.
“Two pretty ladies livin’ alone ought not to be forgettin’ to lock their doors, Rayne.”
Rollin’ her eyes, she started walkin’ backward away from me. “No one locks their doors in this town.”
“You best start,” I growled. “Ain’t safe.”
She turned away from me and shook her head at the sky.
Then I saw it again, and grinned.
“You gonna keep that car runnin’ all evenin’ again?” I asked her backside as she stormed in the direction of the house.
Stoppin’ abruptly, she turned around and glared at me, then at the car. “No.”
Stormin’ back over, she pushed past me and leaned forward into the open driver’s side window to turn off the ignition.
I let my open palm come down on her backside.
“What the in the ever loving fuck, Owen?” she growled, yankin’ her little body out of the car.
Tippin’ my hat, I walked away from her. “Look your damn doors, Rayne.”
I felt her glarin’ daggers at the back of my skull the whole way back up that ladder, followed by the sound of her slammin’ that front door so hard the hinges should have broken.
