“That’s not?—”
“I’m sure it’s going to be fine, bud. I gotta go. We’re busy. I’ll try to look at her car this afternoon, but probably won’t get to it until tomorrow at the earliest. Tell Mom she has help for at least a few days.”
And then he hangs up on me.
Fuck.
Fuck.
I carry the light bag of clothes upstairs. Luna’sright—this floor would be all theirs, since Dax is on the road and Cash has moved to town. It’s possible to give them lots of space, create a safe harbour for them here until the car is ready.
But as I put the bag on the never-used guest bed, I can already feel a too-curious tug in my belly, low and persistent. I’ll give them space, but I won’t be able to forget they’re up here.
For every second of every minute of every day that Hope and Bellamy are on my ranch, I’m going to be painfully aware of them—and that’s too close to the raw, real nature of my personality for comfort.
I don’t want to be that kind of man.
No, that’s not good enough.
I can’t be, won’t be that kind of man.
By the time I walk back across the yard toward the greenhouse, I’m composed. I’m fine. I’m a man who helped his mother with a logistical problem and is now going to go back to his afternoon.
Hope is standing just outside the greenhouse door. Her daughter tugs on her, wanting up. I’m transfixed as Hope reaches down and scoops her up. There’s a small wince as she settles the girl on her hip, because Bellamy grabs hold of her mom’s hair.
I’d like to tangle my fingers in those waves, too.
God damn it, those thoughts are hard to suppress.
But the afternoon sun makes the wavy strands look like they’re made of spun rose gold, and it’s an immediate test of my resolve.
It’s also hard to look away because of how closely entwined the two of them are, the way they bow their heads together.
How fragile but strong they are.
They have nothing, but they have each other. Twenty years ago, that was my family, but instead of one little girl, my mother had four rowdy boys who wouldn’t stop wrestling around her.
I know the instant Hope feels my attention, because her whole body changes. Her shoulders come up, her back stiffening under that soft cotton shirt. The same wariness that she had when I stopped behind her on the road yesterday, when I was a stranger.
I’m still a stranger to her. Still dangerous. But I’m also the man whose house she’s sleeping in tonight.
Something goes cold and flat behind my sternum, and instead of closing the gap between us, I shift course and head for my truck. I have chicken feed to pick up.
Luna can give them the tour of the house.
I don’t look back.
It’ll probably take a few days for Cash to get parts in for the car, and he’s juggling different jobs at the garage. Odds are good she’s here for a week.
Luna will love the help, and I can already see that stretching longer if she works out as a ranch hand.
Fuck. Me.
At least seven days of a woman I can’t stop looking at sleeping two floors above me. A week of Hope flinching every time I walk into a room because her body reads me correctly and mine has the audacity to be surprised about it.
I put the truck in gear.
I can be a ghost in my own house for one week. I’ll stay out of her way so she doesn’t have to noticeme.That’sthe only problem that she has that I have any business trying to solve, because it’s the one that’s wholly in my control.
