A few minutes later, Jasper came out, my phone in his hand.
“Well?”
“Looks like you’ve got a bunch of crickets in your trailer.”
I blew out a breath, sending the hair that had fallen in front of my face sailing. “Thank you. I actually made it that far on my own. How are you going to get rid of them?”
“I’m not.”
“What do you mean, you’re not?”
He glanced at his watch. “It’s almost one. I’ll come back in the morning and deal with it when it’s light out.”
“But I can’t sleep here tonight.”
“I’m not asking you to. Come on, I’ll take you back to my place.”
My eyes went wide, just about bugging out of my head like the crazy-eyed cricket who’d started the whole mess. “I can’t go back to your place.”
“You have another suggestion?” He cocked his hip and ran a hand through his unruly hair. “If you want to call someone else, I’d be happy to run you somewhere. I imagine Lacey’s asleep. Suzy’s probably still up. You want me to see if she can put you up tonight?”
The idea of sleeping on Suzy’s couch, underneath the watchful eye of that menacing bobcat, was enough for me to seize Jasper’s offer. “No, I don’t want to bother her.”
“It’s settled then.” He shrugged off his button-down shirt and handed it to me. “Here, put this on.”
I shook my head even as I took in the sight of how his white undershirt molded to his muscular chest. “I don’t need your shirt.”
“You sure about that?” His gaze raked over me, from my feet, up my legs, pausing at my chest before landing on my face.
A shiver raced through me that had little to do with the cool night air and a whole lot to do with the way his fingers twitched like he wanted to reach out and touch me. My nipples perked, and I clamped my arms even tighter against my middle.
“Fine.” I snagged the shirt out of his hand and shoved my arms through the sleeves. His scent overwhelmed me. A hint of campfire mingled with the muskiness of a hot-blooded man. When was the last time I’d worn a man’s shirt? The intimacy of the moment threatened to make my knees weak.
“You want to grab anything from inside?” He tore his gaze away from my face, and the heat between us cooled by a few degrees.
As much as I’d love to go back in and pack a few things, I didn’t dare.
His tone softened. “If you tell me what you need, I’ll go in and get it for you.”
“I’d love a change of clothes. And maybe my toothbrush.”
“Why don’t you sit in the truck and warm up. I’ll be back in a sec.” He took a step toward the trailer. “Where are your keys? I’ll lock it up.”
“On the hook just inside the door.” My cheeks flushed as I climbed into the cab of his truck and watched him go back inside. I should be able to handle a few bugs. It’s not like I needed a man to rescue me from a couple of crickets. As the ridiculousness of the situation settled around me, I debated whether to go back in and relieve Jasper of his bug-fighting duties.
But then I pulled the collar of his shirt up to my cheeks. My heart warmed as I imagined his arms wrapped around me instead of his shirtsleeves. My desire to stand up for myself and prove I could take care of myself warred with my need to sit in the warm cab of his truck and let someone take care of a problem for me for a change.
As I sank even deeper into the passenger seat, his shirt drawn up around my ears, I decided I’d let someone else look out for me. Just this once. And if he happened to be a buff, hazel-eyed cowboy who looked like a Greek god, well what was the harm in that?
Jasper
A change of clothes.I pulled open a drawer of the built-in dresser. Surely, she had a pair of jeans and a T-shirt sitting around. Faced with a draw full of ladies’ unmentionables in a rainbow of colors, I slammed the drawer shut. Fuck. Seeing Delilah’s panties folded up in neat little squares shouldn’t send a bolt of heat straight to my dick. But it did.
I could only imagine what seeing one of the lacy thongs on her actual backside would do to me. On second thought, it would be a really bad idea to imagine that. I’d shoved the drawer closed but it did nothing to wipe the image out of my head.
Great, now I was snooping around her private things with a raging hard-on. Frustrated by my lack of self-control, I grabbed a handful of items from each drawer and shoved them in a plastic shopping bag I’d found under the sink. I flipped off the lights and grabbed the keys from the hook.
Taking in a few deep breaths, I tried to clamp down on the budding attraction to the disheveled beauty queen. I didn’t need any more complications in my life. And adding a woman to the mix would definitely constitute a complication. After my relationship with Adeline imploded, I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t get played by a woman again. Not even if she looked like an angel who’d come straight down from heaven.
