Sawdust clung to his sexy frame, and somehow hestilllooked like he’d walked off a magazine cover.
It wasn’t fair.
The market was small and familiar, the way everything was in Red Oak Mountain.
The faint scent of freshly baked bread drifted over from the bakery corner, and bundles of dried herbs hung near the entrance alongside locally made preserves.
The days of our fake dating agreement had rolled along too quickly, and we were more than halfway through it already. Amos didn’t know it, but he was actually theperfectboyfriend.
Although the lack of sex was getting harder. Even I had to admit that. Last night on my couch we’d gotten particularly steamed up, before Mina had come home unexpectedly, halting us in our tracks.
It had just been one kiss, butmygod, what a kiss.
If she hadn’t come home, we might have tumbled into my bed together.
My pussy was begging me to please, please, please rent a motel room with this man since we didn’t have anywhere private we could go.
Amos grabbed a squeaky cart before I could and pushed it ahead of him with one hand, lazy and easy, like he’d been grocery shopping with me his whole life.
“Romaine lettuce,” I said, dropping a head into the cart.
He peered down at it with deep suspicion. “That’s rabbit food.”
“It’s asalad.”
“For rabbits.”
“If you ever get married, your wife is going to make you eat rabbit food. You might as well practice tonight.”
His eyes grazed across mine as he growled, “Will you marry me if I promise to eat your rabbit food?”
“Sure, Amos. That was aperfectproposal. Um, you’re going to need to work on it. Women expect diamonds, not a promise to eat salads.” I laughed and reached past him for a bag of cherry tomatoes.
His hand came to rest briefly at the small of my back as he leaned in to look over my shoulder. He probably didn’t even realize he’d done it, but I felt his toucheverywhere.
Just that simple intimacy set off fireworks inside me.
That was the thing about spending time with Amos in ordinary places. He wastenderin ways that the rest of Red Oak Mountain never got to see, and every small moment felt like a revelation as I dug deeper into what made this man tick.
And that was the problem.
The more I saw of him, the harder it would be to let him go.
It was hard to stay in the present moment when a deadline was ticking over our heads.
I spotted our friend Kelly across the store, counting canned goods on a shelf near the end of the aisle, and I touched Amos’s arm. “I’ll be right back.”
He gave Kelly a big wave from across the store and hollered, “Look! She’s making me eat rabbit food! If that’s not love I don’t know what is!”
He was so loud that Mrs. Tuttle, who was hard of hearing, started tittering. She gave me a cheeky look as she wheeled by and said, “Shelly, dear. You need to marry that man.”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” I told her as she disappeared down the next aisle.
Kelly put her tablet down when I reached her, taking a pause in her ordering.
“Well, look at you,” she said warmly. “You finally tamed him.”
“He isnottame,” I said. “Look at him.”
