Cole’s voice was distant enough that Jesse and I didn’t spring apart, still held in each other’s stare.
‘Not today,’ I called back, keeping my focus on Jesse, knowing he’d read between the lines. ‘Soon, though.’
‘Promise?’ he whispered, his thumb tracing my lower lip for a moment.
I almost lost it there and then, only just withstanding the violence of the urge to consume him, to let him consume me right there.
I nodded, not sure there was a choice any more. Knowing, with more certainty than I’d known anything before, that I wanted him right back.
CHAPTER10
JESSE
‘So, you going to tell me why we’re going into town right now, in the middle of the working day?’ I asked Cole, trying to work out why his eyes were darting all over – up to the house, the cabins, the drive. ‘Or do I get some kinda prize if I guess? Maybe you’ll finally open that dusty-ass wallet and buy me that drink you owe me?’
Cole just side-eyed me as we shrugged our shirts back on, skin still warm and damp from working in the sun all morning. Truth was, I was just glad to have a break from my own thoughts, especially the ones that pulled up emotion so deep, they scared the shit out of me – like the memory of Hestia meshing so quickly and easily with my family. Not to mention the other thoughts that wove alongside them and hardly let me look at her, even from a distance, without wanting her.
‘I’ll buy you a drink if it means you shut the hell up,’ he offered, fastening buttons as the sleeves strained over his arms. He had the kind of definition gym bros trained for their whole lives and never achieved.
‘We going shirt shopping or something?’ I replied, ignoring him, ignoring my own head and enjoying the way he was fighting not to smile at me. There was something satisfying about cracking Cole, whose hardened, gruff exterior made most folks assume he had an attitude to match his physical dominance. But really, just below that grumpy mule layer was a guy to trust your life with – and one hell of a drinking buddy. ‘You sure that’s not one of Lottie’s shirts? It looks like—’
‘Jesse Bennington!’
We both spun round to see Bailey marching over, her face set as firmly as her words.
NowCole smiled, shaking his head as he did up the last button. ‘What did I do –’ I began as he chuckled, taking a step to the side as if to let Bailey have a clear shot at me.
‘How long have we been friends?’ she asked, resting her hands on her hips as she reached us.
‘I . . . err . . . I don’t know? About ten years, maybe?’
My brain scrambled, flipping back through memories, landing on the rodeo season after graduating high school. She’d been in Clara’s year, the one above mine. Always a familiar face, but not one I knew well until we started meeting regularly on the circuit.
‘Ten goddamn years,’ she hissed, taking another step towards me. ‘And I have to find out second-hand from Clara that you finally took someone home to meet your mom? That Hestia, youroh so goddamn casualfriend, was the one you introduced to them as the most beautiful woman you’ve ever met?’
I was gonna fuckingscalpClara.
‘I – well, look, it was actually Mom that suggested it,’ I retorted, knowing how lame it sounded. Cole’s raised eyebrows and Bailey’s glare confirmed it. ‘Ugh, okay, fine. Yeah, I wanted her to meet Hestia, and my nosy, big-mouth sisters. I just thought, well . . .’
Bailey shook her head, rolling her eyes.
‘I’m fucking with you, you dumbass,’ she crowed, her expression breaking out into a huge grin. She punched me on the arm. ‘I’m just happy about it, that’s all. I know what you’re like in keeping your family outta your love life. So, y’know, it’s good to see somethin’ change.’ I shrugged, smiling as Cole snorted. ‘Hestia’s a goddamn riot and I want her to stay around, so I’m glad she might just be finding a reason to.’
I looked up at her, holding tight to the thought that Hestia might just stay; the thought of what was slowly unfolding between us.
‘Anything else you need to know ahead of time?’ I asked, only just dodging another punch on the arm. I turned towards Cole’s truck as he beckoned me over, the trip into town clearly still at the forefront of his mind.
‘Enough of your sass, Bennington. But yeah, when you guys make it official, if I hear that through anyone other than you or her, you’ll be wishing you were facing down a bull and not me.’
I laughed, climbing into the cab and flipping her off with a grin as she did the same.
‘I fucking knew it,’ Cole murmured as we wound down the drive, his smile smug. ‘So, are you guys . . . together, or . . .?’
‘Oh, no, no. This isn’t about me and Hestia. You’re not off the hook, dude. Are you gonna tell me why we’re about to get half-trampled by tourists in town when it’s over eighty degrees?’ He glanced at me, a mix of amusement and exasperation in his eyes, keeping his mouth firmly shut. ‘This better be good,’ I grumbled, turning over the possibilities, the reason why the smile at the corner of his mouth never faded out, not for the whole way in.
We parked up in Jackson, using one of the free spaces behind Dee’s store. It was on permanent loan to any of us from the Diamond Back, an arrangement Lottie had brokered recently to allow us to drop off and pick up guests easily among the hordes of tourists.
‘She’s smart, huh?’ I murmured to Cole, clarifying as he gave me a questioning glance. ‘Lottie. Everything she’s done for the ranch since she arrived. Small things like this, right up to getting us booked out for the whole season.’
