Grant’s hand tightened around his glass, thumb rubbing once along the stem. He leaned back slowly in his chair, studying her in the candlelight.
“You miss your friend,” he said quietly.
The softness of the observation caught her off guard more than the question itself.
Izzy looked down, smiling faintly into her wineglass. “Yeah,” she admitted after a second. “Turns out she took a lot of the noise with her.”
Grant’s gaze stayed on her a second longer than necessary.
And for the first time since she’d arrived at Bridlepath Farm, she didn’t look polished or untouchable.
She looked human.
And that, somehow, was more dangerous than the version of her who’d stepped out of that ridiculous car in silk and sunglasses.
He reached for his glass. “So,” he said, voice lower now, “what else haven’t you told me?”
Izzy tilted her head. “About what?”
He glanced once toward the barn in the distance.
Then back at her. “About you.”
She held his gaze.
Didn’t answer right away.
And he didn’t look away.
The candlelight threw soft gold across the strong lines of his face, shadowed his mouth. Awareness prickled along the back of her neck at the steadiness of his attention, at the way the blue of his eyes had gone darker.
Then—“You’ll have to earn that,” she said.
There were things she didn’t hand out just because someone asked nicely.
Grant gave a slow nod, his gaze dropping briefly to her mouth before settling back on her eyes. He swallowed once, throat working, and if she hadn’t been watching him so closely, she might’ve missed it.
In the shifting light, he looked entirely too at home across from her, like this—him, her, a table between them, and a night stretching wide and quiet—was something he could get used to.
That felt dangerous all by itself.
Yep, Izzy thought, her pulse giving a treacherous little kick. That could be fun for a minute.
She could see the appeal of the cliché—the summer guest and the rugged rancher. A few days of something fast and hot. A story she could laugh about later over cocktails in Denver.
But as soon as the thought formed, it went cold.
This was Burke’s brother. The man who’d be sitting across from her at Caitlin’s wedding. The man she’d have to make polite conversation with at every holiday and milestone if her best friend stayed in Sylva.
She couldn’t do casual here. It would be a wreck.
And Caitlin would be standing in the middle of it.
She took a long, steady sip of her wine and pulled herself back together.
Look, but don’t touch, Moreno.
Under the table, her knees had drifted toward his somewhere in the middle of the conversation. She made herself ease back an inch.
