She should’ve known he was a flyer. Wild, unpredictable, and dangerous to that little organ pumping erratically in her chest.
His gaze stayed steady on her. If he recognized her, he was doing a dang good job of hiding it. “Only thing we rubbed on our pumpkin was luck. What are you? Senior in college? Grad student?”
Not anytime in the past decade. “Didn’t your momma teach you it’s not polite to ask a lady’s age?”
“Word of advice, Pixie-lou. You want to build a machine like this, gotta get out of your momma’s house and live a little outside the books.”
Pixie-lou?The man was asking to have a firecracker aimed up his nether regions. “You have no idea?—”
“Ihave no idea, but it’s okay for you to come over here, flash your boobs at my friends, and accuse us of cheating?”
She refused to flush again. He’d liked her boobs just fine a few weeks ago.
Until he up and left in the middle of kissing her like she was his oxygen.
Lordy, she was about to have a hot flash. She gritted her teeth. “The laws of physics don’t lie, and the laws of physics say it’s impossible for you to stay within the rules of this contest and still launch an intact pumpkin that far. Your takeoff speed was too high for the surface tension of a normal pumpkin.”
“Or maybe it was just right. We didn’t grease our gourd. And even if we had, it’s still within the rules.”
She sucked in a breath.
Wasit within the rules?
“Can’t help that you didn’t win,” the fresh-faced one said, “but I’d be happy to comfort you tonight.”
Oooh, these flyers weresostinkingarrogant.
Her dark-haired, sinful-eyed nemesis smirked at her. “We’re gonna go get our prize. Load her up, boys. Time to celebrate.”
An irrational disappointment flooded her chest. “You’re robbing eight hardworking ladies of a prize they deserve.”
“Happy to introduce you to someone who can teach y’all how to be gracious losers. Good life skill.”
Several of the men snickered while they broke away from her and headed toward the makeshift stage.
Her daddy never would’ve acted like that. And she was horrified that she’d actually considered taking that man home.
Thankgoodnesshe’d up and left her panting at the bar.
“Hope that trophy keeps you warm at night,” she muttered. “Because there’s not a woman in town who’ll take the job.”
Except the judge, apparently. And half the women out here today.
And Kaci herself.
Lordy. She had issues.
The fresh-faced kid slapped the pompous, dark-haired loser-proclaimer on the back. “Thumper here ain’t ever had a problem with that, miss. None of us do. But we appreciate your concern all the same.”
The lot of them laughed at that.
Thumperdidn’t spare her another glance.
“They really built that themselves, Dr. Boudreaux?” Zada said when she returned to their group.
“So they say,” Kaci said.
“And their pumpkin wasn’t rigged?”
