“We’ve always got a man at dinner—a handful of them and a few women too.” Most of the veterans who stayed at the farm were men, but over the past couple of years they’d had women stay with them for varying lengths of time.
“It’s not the same,” said Millie as if that explained everything.
“You don’t know if Liam is planning on being here at dinner time. I’m sure he has somewhere else to be.” The idea of having the Viking in her kitchen again made her flush. After their ride to the back field, she didn’t have to wonder how hard his muscles were; she knew. And what his hands felt like. It would be a lot more difficult to ignore him in her space this time.
“He’s staying.” Millie said it as if it was settled and Andy couldn’t find a good reason to argue with her. When the old woman set her mind to something, it was usually safer to get out of the way.
If she was lucky, the blond giant would stay long enough to visit with his friend and then move on his way and out of her life. She chastised herself before she even finished the thought. An afternoon with Liam wouldn’t be enough to turn things around for Jake and if the other man could help him open up and start to find his way back to the living, Andy would find a way to get him to stay as long as possible. She’d just have to find a way to convince her body not to pay attention every time Liam walked into the room.
Unless he had a girlfriend. Or a wife. Of course he had a girlfriend.A man who looked like that probably had dozens of women following him around. It was the dangerous bad boy thing. And the muscles, the chiseled jaw. It would be like catnip for most women. Not that she cared. The last thing in the world she was interested in was Liam’s sex life. She wasn’t interested in her own. Or she wouldn’t be if she had one. Why would she care about his?
“That’s up to Liam,” she said, responding to Millie but still preoccupied with unwanted thoughts of the big man being chased by hordes of willing women. She’d clearly lost her mind.
“What’s up to Liam?” asked an infuriatingly familiar voice.
Andy turned and saw the hulking man standing in the open doorway. She glared at him—no one ever taught him to knock?—but instead of looking appropriately sheepish, he watched her, his blue eyes too dark and his gaze too perceptive.Well, hell.
“Can I help you with something?”Stupid, assuming jerk.Okay, she might be making a whole lot of wild leaps there, but honestly, it was her kitchen.
“I’m sorry,” he said looking anything but. “Jake went to wash up. He told me to meet him here for lunch.”
“Don’t you pay any attention to her,” said Millie, hurrying to take him by the arm. “You come sit down here. Andy will get you some chili.” She shot Andy a look that could peel the paint off the side of a barn.
“I don’t expect to be waited on, ma’am. And I’m sorry, I should have knocked.” He glanced over Millie’s head and pinned her with a look filled with mock innocence.
She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from rolling her eyes or doing something even more childish. Like stick out her tongue. Even thinking about tongues in the same room as Liam was dangerous territory.
“Nonsense. Andy.”
Millie commanded her with a single word. If she didn’t owe the older woman so much, she might have revolted. But she owed her more than she could ever repay, so she reached into the cupboard for a stack of bowls. Taking one off the top, she ladled it half full of chili and plunked it on the table in front of Liam.
Hollering at her with her eyes, Millie picked it up before he could take a bite and filled it to the top. “Here you are,” she said, hurrying off to get the corn bread.
Andy set the bowls and spoons on the counter, which was further than she usually went getting lunch ready. Meals—for the most part, anyway—were self-serve, with everyone coming in and getting what they wanted whenever they had time for a break. Sometimes it meant they sat down together, sometimes not. Tired of Millie’s Tennessee Williams performance, Andy microwaved a carton of vegetarian chili and emptied it into her bowl. She was the only one who didn’t eat meat but it was easy enough to pull a couple of servings out of the big batch before Millie added the hamburger and pop them in the freezer for later. She’d toyed with the idea of replacing the meat with texturized vegetable protein, but she figured she’d have a full-scale mutiny on her hands if she tried. Snagging a spoon, she took her bowl to the opposite end of the table from Liam. Just because the older woman wanted to play gentleman caller didn’t mean she had to be a part of it. Scowling, she took a spoonful of chili, only relaxing a fraction when the sweet taste of peppers hit her mouth. She glanced up in time to see Liam watching her, an expression she couldn’t quite read on his face.
“What?” She’d spent less than an hour with the man, and he already drove her nuts. She didn’t know what she was going to do if he spent the rest of the day.
“What’s wrong with the chili the rest of us are eating?” He motioned with his spoon toward the pot on the stove.
“I’m vegetarian.” She hadn’t always been. She used to eat her steaks rare and often, but once she started working with animals, she found she had a hard time eating them.
“Figures,” he said, sounding so smug she considered lobbing her bowl at his head, but it would be a waste of perfectly good chili.
“So you’re the owner of the rolling manifesto.” He tipped his head in the direction of the driveway and her car.
“The what?”Unbelievable. Smarmy bastard.He was actually going to sit at her table and judge her.
“You know, the political bumper stickers,” he said, looking uncomfortable.
Served him right.She didn’t put political bumper stickers on her car. It was stupid to think that even with similar experiences, people held identical views. The last thing she wanted to do was make things harder for the people staying at the farm. Politics was a sure-fire way to do that.
“I wasn’t aware that messages about vegetables and coexisting were political.” Her teeth were clenched so tight she was going to give herself a headache. But it was either that or stab him with a fork. Blood on the tablecloth would piss Millie off.
“You’re right,” he said, just conciliatory enough to keep her from resorting to physical violence but not enough to make her believe him. “You were talking about me when I came in.” He didn’t ask a question, simply stated it as a fact and then waited, clearly expecting her to fill in the blanks.
“Millie was planning your day for you.”
He arched an eyebrow, and she fought the urge to ask him how he’d gotten his scar. Or to run her finger over the place it bisected his brow. How could she want to murder him and touch him at the same time? She was so screwed.
