Maybe that was why he’d been unable to get her out of his head over the last twenty-four hours.
He shoved the thought aside. From this point forward, he was going to keep it professional. He had to.
“Matty? What are you doing here?”his cousin Zinnia asked.
Mathew rolled his eyes as he shoved the door to his car shut. He could ask himself the same thing. Penny wasn’t the only one who called him by that nickname. Zinnia, the youngest of the Taylor cousins, refused to call him anything else.
Like her sisters, she sported red hair and freckles. She currently leaned against the railing of the porch, her arms folded and a bright smile on her lips. Her blue eyes sparkled like she knew something he didn’t.
That gave him pause, and he couldn’t help but look around for someone in particular. It had been a couple days since he’dtreated River for the cut, assuring her the stitches would dissolve so he wouldn’t have to remove them. Seeing as she didn’t call him about an infection, he could assume everything had gone according to plan.
“Looking for River?”
He startled and stared up at Zinna again. Well, great. “Did Rose say something?”
Zinnia merely smiled wider.
Mathew sighed, dragging a hand down his face. “Look, I’m here to help Uncle George and my dad. He messaged me last night saying he needed some extra help with baling some fields.”
His cousin’s eyes swept over his body and she snickered.
“What?”
Zinnia shrugged. “I’ve never seen you in cowboy gear.”
“Well, take a mental picture because you’re not going to see it again anytime soon.”
“Shame. It suits you.”
He ignored the compliment, half-wondering if River would think the same.
The thing was, he wasn’t here for River. He was here because his dad had asked him to come.Andbecause he always felt the need to try and make his dad feel proud of him.
But, if he was honest, he’d been looking for excuses to come back out here ever since River’s apartment. Not to chase her. Not really. But because the farm felt… more peaceful than the hospital. Less noise.
Was there a small part of him that now associated this farm with River? Absolutely. That might have been part of the reason he’d succumbed to his father’s request.
“So, you know where they are or not?”
Zinnia’s eyes drifted toward the large hangar. “I think I saw them heading out to get the balers ready.”
Mathew couldn’t see why his father needed him out here when there were two balers and two men who could run them just fine.
Still, he’d shown up. But he might have used his off day to go visit his mom.
After that, he probably would have made some excuse to go into the hospital. Paperwork or checking up on patients. Either way, the farm wasn’t usually his idea of a good time.
He trudged toward the hangar without another word to his cousin, then stopped short when one of the most beautiful girls he’d ever seen exited the structure. With a rag in her hands, she wiped them clean, then froze when her eyes met his.
There was a slow perusal of his body before one side of her mouth quirked upward. “Hey, there, cowboy.”
A jolt of electricity shot through him at her coy tone and pet name. He couldn’t help but smile right back at her, even as he disagreed. “A cowboy needs a hat, don’t you think?” He gestured toward the Rockies ball cap he currently wore backward on his head. “Doesn’t exactly say cowboy, does it?”
She shook her head. “I guess we’ll have to remedy that.” Then she gestured toward the rest of his body. “But you pull off the jeans and boots nicely enough. You look ready to go egg collecting.”
He arched a brow. “Egg collecting?”
She laughed, and the sound was… music. There was no other way to describe it. “Yeah, egg collecting. That’s something a cowboy does, right?”
