Caroline ducked her head, eliminating any opportunity to kiss her. The clean, soapy scent of her hair hit him, and Dawson dang near fell down.This woman, he thought.
“I just need a couple of days to figure out how to talk to her. See if she has a good day or a good hour where I can mention it.”
“I stole you away from a community event yesterday,” he said. “What did you tell her?”
“That the sight of those potatoes made me see red, and I had to go up to your ranch for the owls anyway, and you made me—us—breakfast.”
Dawson ducked his head, positioning his mouthclose to her ear as he laughed almost under his breath. “I don’t think things went in exactly that order.”
“No,” she said breathlessly. “But sort of. It’s a tiny white lie so as not to hurt her.” She curled one hand around the back of his head, and oh, Dawson had not been touched like that in a long time.
He didn’t want to move away from her, but everything inside him told him he better. She wasn’t ready to start a relationship, and he could never do what Lincoln had done a couple of summers ago and date someone casually.
No, Dawson played for keeps, and he was dead serious about the things—and people—he chose to spend his time on.
So he backed up and cleared his throat. “I should go. It’s dark and late, and I get up early to run.”
“Of course you do,” she said with plenty of whip in her voice.
He gave her another head-nod without truly meeting her eyes and stepped past her. “It was great to see you, Caroline.” It took all of his willpower to force himself to walk away from her, their lunch date tomorrow canceled and nothing on the calendar for when he might see her again.
He made it several steps before Caroline’s soft, pretty voice said, “‘Bye, Dawson.”
He lifted his hand in a wave over his shoulder and kept on going. Otherwise, he’d go back and do somethinghe’d probably regret, though he’d never regretted a kiss with a woman. The last several he’d tried relationships with had been like kissing his sister, but he knew without a doubt his first kiss with Caroline would call down all the stars in the heavens.
The rain abated and didn’t pick up again, which meant no one flooded. Dawson didn’t have to field dozens upon dozens of texts and arrange schedules to go help out other ranches. No one was going to have to come up to the Rhinehart Ranch.
He did have to work through some mud and muck in the morning that put him behind, but that didn’t matter, because he didn’t have to be back to the cabin at any particular time. He didn’t even want to go by himself, so despite his growling stomach, he texted Brandon to say he had work to do in his office, and he’d eat some snacks there.
I’ll bring you a sandwich, Brandon said.Give me a half-hour.
“Right,” Dawson grumbled to himself. “A half-hour.” In Brandon-time, that meant an hour, and he was probably texting the new woman he’d met through his dating app. He liked talking to lots of different people, and Brandon’s biggest problem was having too many chances to take someone to dinner.
His mood worsened as he tromped through the mud, not having seen his crows, to the chicken coops. Ruffin worked with him today, and Dawson did calm when he saw his chickens. The big rooster, Rusty, strutted toward him, and Dawson found a smile touching his mouth.
He loved the low warbling of the chickens, as they always seemed to be making noise in the purest way possible. A squabble broke out, and Dawson looked on as Lulu scattered away from some of the other hens.
They had a pecking order, for sure, and Dawson could only deal with the aftermath, and while he loved Lulu, none of the other hens did. It looked like she’d lost a few more feathers, and he clucked at Peach, Pearl, and Ruby. “You guys leave ‘er alone,” he said.
The hens clucked and looked at him with their beady eyes that clearly told him they thought they were right. He fed them, his last task before he could escape to the barn-office, and his boots and the bottom of his jeans weighed ten pounds more by the time he’d tromped through the mud to make sure they had what they needed.
He cleaned his boots on the boot scrubber he kept outside his office, deciding to take off his shoes once he got inside. “Can’t do nothin’ about the jeans,” he grumbled, his mood worsening again.
He just needed to get inside and go through his checklist, see his sticky notes lined up, grab a snack and adrink, and calm down. Once that happened, Dawson could finish the day on a high note.
He pushed open the door and stepped up into the office just as someone called his name. His grouchiness flew off the charts as he turned to find Alex Baxter jogging toward him.
“What are you doin’ here?” he called.
Alex lifted a paper grocery sack and said, “I’m here for our lunch.” As he came closer, his grin grew larger. “You forgot, didn’t you?” He chuckled and shook his head. “I knew you’d forget.”
Dawson’s heart pounded in his chest, because he had forgotten. And now he had at least four men to try to figure out how to feed, like, right now.
Chapter Ten
Finley Ackerman pulled up to Dawson Rhinehart’s cabin, and he found another truck parked there, as well as two horses. That meant he, Paul, Henry, and Libby had arrived last.
“You sure it’s okay that we all came?” Paul asked, peering at the front door.
