A group of local women joined Tory, Carly, and Brittany, either working with the men or helping keep everyone fed and hydrated during the hot early June day.
By the time the sun had slipped below the horizon, the barn had been completed exactly as planned. Exhausted men and women gathered around makeshift sawhorse tables where a potluck supper waited. Plastic plates were loaded with slices of beef from the big haunch Josh provided, plus homemade casseroles, salads, and desserts.
Strings of sparkling white lights hung above rented tables and chairs. Everyone grabbed beers or poured glasses of wine from ice-filled tubs, then wandered over and sat down to eat.
Tory and the other moms fed their kids first, then Ivy went to play with friends she had made that afternoon. Tory hadn’t seen her daughter so happy since before she had moved in with Damon.
She sighed. Even if it didn’t work out with Josh, maybe they could stay in Iron Springs. She could rent a place, find a job, make it work.
Tory refused to think how seeing Josh with other women would make her feel. She would handle it, she told herself.Somehow.
She was smiling when she felt Josh’s beautiful blue eyes on her.
“You made this work today,” he said softly. “I don’t think the barn raising would have been half as successful if you hadn’t pulled it all together.”
“I had help. It wasn’t just me.” Still, she couldn’t resist feeling pleased.
“You organized everything. The day ran like clockwork because of you.” He leaned over and kissed her, and something she was afraid to feel stirred deep inside her.
“I’ll be over tonight,” Josh said in that soft, deep voice that sent a warm flush over her skin. “If that’s okay.”
Oh, yeah. It was more than okay. Her body was already thrumming just thinking about it. “Umm . . . sure.”
People stayed awhile longer, but after such a tough day, everyone was exhausted. Families packed up their leftovers, loaded their cold boxes into their cars, and headed home.
Since there was a ton of cleanup, Mrs. Thompson took Ivy home with her. Tory had a hunch Mrs. T. wasn’t just being helpful but doing a little matchmaking, as well.
Cole offered to drive Brittany home, and she was thrilled to accept. Noah and his wife, Natalie, a svelte, black-haired beauty whom Tory had liked immediately, also remained.
As Josh and Cole finished folding and stacking tables, Noah walked up. “Looks like we may have a problem.”
“Yeah, what is it?” Josh asked.
“We got company and it doesn’t look friendly.” Noah turned toward the road leading into the ranch, a scowl on his face.
Tory heard the roar of engines growing louder as they approached. In the distance, a group of bikers rolled down the dirt road toward the house, their headlights drilling shafts of white through the darkness.
Her pulse kicked into gear, began to race as fast as the engines. There were eight of them, guys in black leather on low-slung, customized motorcycles with extended front wheels.
“What the hell?” Josh and Noah walked up next to Cole, the three men forming a protective wall against the uninvited visitors.
Tory hurried up on the porch out of the way and Britt and Natalie joined her. Instead of stopping, the bikers revved their engines and began circling the yard, doing wheelies in the dirt, knocking over stacks of chairs, jerking down strings of lights, destroying everything in their path.
One of the bikers deliberately rammed a cold box, smashing it to pieces. Several headed for the supplies left from building the barn. One leaned down to grab a bucket of nails, then tossed the contents all over the ground. Another grabbed a power saw and slammed it against the barn wall, sending pieces of metal flying.
Josh suddenly moved. One of the bikers shouted a curse as Josh grabbed him by the back of his black leather vest and yanked him off the motorcycle, which raced off and slipped over into the dirt. Josh spun him around, drew back and slammed a fist in his face, then swept his legs out from under him as he went down. The biker hit the ground hard, shouting a string of obscenities.
Josh dragged a guy with a handlebar mustache off a metallic red Harley and knocked him down, while Noah hooked his good arm around the neck of a guy with greasy black hair and tattoos, jerking him backward off the bike into the dirt.
Cole took over, grabbing the guy by the front of his black T-shirt, hauling him up, and punching him in the face. When the man swung back, Cole ducked and drove a fist into the guy’s stomach, doubling him over. He followed with a blow that sent the biker sprawling in the dirt.
The rest of the bikers slid to a halt, jammed down their kickstands, and rushed to join the fray. Josh and his friends were outnumbered more than two to one, but they were marines trained to fight.
Josh threw solid punches, drove an elbow into a biker’s stomach, brought a knee up hard beneath his chin. Whirling, he lashed out with a boot, kicking one of the men squarely in the groin. The biker grabbed his privates, doubled over, and rolled on the ground in pain.
Tory stood frozen but Josh kept moving. Hitting, kicking, throwing left jabs and right punches. When he pitched a red-bearded biker over his shoulder, sending him flying up on the porch, Tory’s trance was broken. She grabbed an empty lemonade pitcher and crashed it over the biker’s head.
Glass went flying and the man went down. He groaned, but managed to crawl away. She didn’t miss Josh’s quick grin before he turned and swung at a gigantic biker with a gray goatee and a sleeve of tattoos on each arm. The big biker’s nose exploded in a geyser of blood.
