“Ah-ha,” she said, grinning at him with her baby in her arms. “I knew Uncle Trap would be home for lunch. We knew it, didn’t we, Jade?” She came in and quickly closed the door behind her to seal in the air conditioning.
Trap grinned at them. “I’m home for lunch.”
“I just wanted to go over the Larkin order,” she said. “I need a second pair of eyes on it.”
Trap nodded and popped a chip into his mouth. He got up and turned toward the stove to flip his sandwich, and when he turned back to his table for two, Ruby sat there with Jade curled into her lap. She put a folder on the table, and Trap moved to pick it up. He swallowed and said, “There’s chips and salsa, and I can make you a sandwich.”
“No, it’s fine,” she said. “I’m headed over to Glory Rose’s, and we’re going to have lunch over there.”
Trap nodded, something tight in his stomach he didn’t understand. He’d entertained a healthy crush on his cousin’s wife in the past, but thankfully, that had passed, and Trap didn’t feel like such a blubbering fool around Ruby anymore. They worked together, and she trusted him, and he trusted her.
He told himself that was the kind of relationship he needed to have with Lila Mae—not a fumbling, staring, blinking, confused schoolboy who had to fight his hormones in front of the apple cider display at a small town farm store where anyone could see him.
He sat down, loaded up another chip, and put it in his mouth before he flipped open the folder.
The Larkins owned a small hobby farm on the northwest side of town, but they’d aged to the point where they no longer used the land as a farm. Their daughter had recently gotten divorced and needed somewhere to live, and they’d hired Trap and his daddy to remodel their hay barn into a house for her and her two kids.
All of the construction had been completed, and that was the point when Ruby and her team moved in to get the interior decorating and design exactly right. Trap sat in with Ruby on all final client meetings, and she did the same for him. It was a system that his parents had set up as a way to check each other and make sure they both knew what was happening with any given project.
“I don’t know about this.” He took the top page and handed it to Ruby. “Didn’t she say she wanted blue curtains to go with her butter yellow walls? That says pink.”
“She texted and changed it,” Ruby said.
Trap trusted her, so he nodded. “Wow, outdoor furniture. She decided to do the patio?” He looked up and found Ruby nodding.
She reached out and took a tortilla chip and broke off the end to give to Jade. The little girl slobbered constantly as she was teething all the time now, but Trap loved her with a fierceness he didn’t know he possessed.
“And Petra Larkin wants her outdoor space done too,” Ruby said. “They want power washing, a new layout, and new furniture.”
“Huh.” Trap grunted as he continued to check through the list. “This looks right, Ruby.” He took the first paper back from her and placed it over the second back in the folder. He got up to get his sandwich, saying, “Let’s send Sawyer with you for that outdoor consult. He’ll do the power washing, and you can go over furniture.”
“I’ll have Tammy check his schedule,” Ruby said.
Trap slid his sandwich onto a plate and rejoined her at the kitchen table. “Sounds like this one is almost done.” He grinned at her, and then down at the beautifully golden, toasted sandwich he’d made for himself.
When Ruby didn’t thank him and get up and leave right away, he knew she’d come for a secondary reason. He raised his eyebrows at her. “You better just ask me. I want to eat in peace.”
“How do you know I want to ask you something?”
He cocked one eyebrow. “Because you’re still here—and something tells me it’s not business, or you would’ve already asked me.”
“Fine,” she said. “It is a personal request, but it’s not what you think.”
“How do you know what I think?”
“You think I’m going to set you up on a blind date.”
“Well, you have in the past. And it was terrible, by the way, so my answer is already no.”
“Well, it’s not that,” she said. “So you can’t say no.” She huffed and broke off another piece of chip for Jade. The fifteen-month-old could grip it pretty easily, and she grabbed it and put it in her mouth. “It’s something for JJ,” she said. “And he’ll never ask you, and it’s driving me nuts.”
That caught Trap’s attention. His gaze didn’t leave Ruby’s as he lifted his sandwich to his mouth and took a bite. The ooey-gooey cheese stringed off, and he managed to get it all into his mouth while she laughed.
“That does look really good,” she said.
Trap chewed and swallowed. “I really can make you one.”
“No, no, it’s fine.” She drew in a deep breath. “JJ has a naughty horse,” she said. “One of those Gypsy Vanners that he’s added to the ranch.”
