by Kadie Scott
Beth shook her head. “I’m sure Jason can give me a ride. Even if he can’t, I’m five blocks from here. I’ll walk.”
After a second, he gave a casual shrug. “Suit yourself, short stuff.”
So stupid to feel remotely disappointed that he didn’t argue with her. That kiss followed by the way he’d seemed to try to block her date with Jason a second ago had her thoughts twisted up. Of course, he didn’t care.
“I’ll call you about the first meeting with my student as soon as his current foster mom agrees to things. Hopefully, I can introduce you this week, and then you can get started on those community service hours.” As well as helping the kiddo in question. That was the important bit.
She hoped like hell she’d done the right thing, setting this up.
Autry gave a slow nod of acknowledgement. “About Friday. I’ll come pick you up around five. Does that work for you?”
Pick her up? That smacked of date. “You don’t have to. I’ll drive out there.”
He shook his head. “My mother would have a fit.”
For once in her life, Beth wished good old-fashioned Southern manners weren’t a thing. “Five is fine then.”
“Good. Have a nice date.”
Beth resisted the urge to stick her tongue out at him. “Thanks.”
She froze when he suddenly leaned down and kissed her cheek, which seemed to be becoming a habit with him. “Just remember… I saw you first, Beth Cooper,” he murmured, low and sexy, in her ear.
He was halfway to the truck before she snapped out of the trance he had put her in. Say something witty, dummy.
“You’d only be so lucky, Autry Hill,” she yelled after him. Only to get a raised hand in response. He didn’t even bother to turn around.
Two older ladies going into Lucy’s, the jewelry store across the street, paused to stare at her, shock written in the tight lines of their lips and the way they shook their heads as they fell to whispering. They ducked inside with another couple of disappointed glances aimed her way. That probably was not the away to avoid continued gossip about her and the local playboy.
The glass door behind her swung open and Jason stepped out. “You ready?” he asked.
Beth pasted on her brightest smile for him. “As I’ll ever be.”
Inside the glass-fronted jewelry store across the street, at least two sets of eyes stared as a man different from the one she’d just been hollering at escorted her down the street.
Chapter Five
“Ms. Cooper?”
Beth raised her head from the lesson plan she was working on, taking careful notes in her notebook, to find Dylan Marsh standing in her doorway with the perpetual scowl that never seemed to leave the boy’s face firmly in place.
Of her fifth grade students, Dylan was the most disruptive, most likely to refuse to participate, and hands down the most argumentative. With adults, though, he tended to shut down, turning recalcitrant and even shy. Even so, he’d become one of her favorites of this year’s bunch. Not that she’d ever admit to anyone that she had favorites. She loved all her kids. But on top of those traits, Dylan was also spunky, funny, creative, and smart as a whip.
Besides, she’d always had a soft spot for the kids who couldn’t stand to sit still all day. Diagnosed with ADD herself at a young age, she’d been one of those kids. She suspected Dylan might be the same. However, having grown up in the foster system since he was a toddler meant much of his behavior could also be attributed to lashing out at the world.
Either way, she wanted to give the kid a big squeezy hug every time she saw him. Not that he’d remotely be interested in letting her. Big brown eyes half-covered by floppy brown hair watched her with a wariness that about broke her heart. He’d been her student all year, with only a few months left to go, and still he couldn’t bring himself to quite trust her.
“Dylan. You done already?”
He glanced around the classroom as if looking for something. Or someone. Not that anyone else was in the room with her. “Where’s this guy I’m supposed to listen to?”
Beth frowned. Was Autry not here? She glanced at the clock hanging over her door. He should’ve been here twenty minutes ago. With effort, Beth kept her rising ire concealed behind a practiced pleasant expression and tried to search for any excuse for the man. “I thought you were supposed to wait in the front office?”
Dylan shook his head, but ducked at the same time, not before she caught a secret grin. Ah, so he’d been hiding again. Maybe Autry was around here trying to find him. “Why don’t you sit down while I call him?”
With an uncaring shrug, he sloped the rest of the way into the room and dropped his backpack to the floor with a thud. Beth didn’t get a chance to fish her phone out of her purse though.
“Dylan?” a woman’s voice floated through the door from down the hallway.
Dylan’s brown eyes went wide. “That’s Mrs. Wright. Don’t tell her this guy didn’t show. Please.”
Why not?
Before she could move past that thought, a tall blonde dressed in a pristine gray suit, with pearls no less, sailed through the doorway on a wave of cloying perfume. In the ten years Mary Wright had lived in La Colina, she still hadn’t figured out that she’d moved away from the big city of Dallas to a small town predominantly full of ranchers. Not that Beth had anything against fashionable clothing, especially not with Juliet and Lexi as sisters. Just when that fashion was paired with being stuck up higher than a light pole, she had to remind herself to be kind. If Dylan was one of her favorite students, his current foster mother was one of her least favorite parental figures to deal with.
“I thought so,” Mary said when she spied Dylan there. “Mr. Hill forgot to show up.”
Uh-oh. Beth hadn’t been the one to deal with getting Mrs. Wright on board with these “big brother” times for Dylan, but she’d heard enough from the school counselor and Cindy, the local DFPS worker, to know it hadn’t been an easy sell.
“No ma’am,” Dylan shook his head, floppy hair flying. “He didn’t forget. He…” The poor kiddo cast his gaze about the room, as if searching for an excuse an adult would accept.
Beth stood, wincing as her chair screeched across the generic tile flooring. “He called and asked me to watch Dylan until he could get here. An emergency on the ranch.”
Beth crossed her fingers behind her back, as she’d seen her kids do, and hid a cringe behind what she hoped was her best calm façade. What am I doing?
Dylan’s eyes went wide, but the grateful look he beamed at her made her feel a little better for the lie. Autry Hill was going to owe her big-time for covering his butt. Again.
How hard was it to show up for a first meeting on time? Or at least call?
Beth approached the older woman and held out her hand. “It’s nice to see you again, Mrs. Wright.”
Unlike most of her other students’ parents, where her interactions were limited to parents’ information night and glimpses at a few of the holiday parties or festivals the school put on, Beth met with Mary Wright almost weekly it seemed. The entire school year. Controlling didn’t begin to describe the woman. Disdainful meetings accompanied by hundreds of notes and emails exchanged about her foster son’s education. Or lack thereof in her esteemed opinion.
“I haven’t talked to you in a few weeks. I’ll take this opportunity while we wait to mention that he’s more than ready for the state tests coming up. Dylan is such a smart kiddo.”
Standing to Mary’s side, Dylan’s skinny chest puffed out a bit.
“He needs to work on his multiplication facts more,” Mary said. “But, yes, we are aware.”
There went the puffy-chested pride. Why couldn’t this woman, in this instance, see when the child under her care needed to be praised rather than pushed? He’d been through so much. Love was needed. Not strict rules and discipline.
“Excuse me.” Beth would recognize that low growl of a male voice anywhere.
Huffing as though he’d
been running, Autry rushed into the room pulling up short when he encountered Mary Wright’s chilly regard. “Hello. You must be Mrs. Wright? You didn’t need to come.”
“Yes,” Beth jumped in. “I was explaining to Mrs. Wright that you had called me about the emergency on the ranch and asked me to keep an eye on Dylan until you could make it.”
“Errrr…” Autry glanced between the three of them. “Yeah. The… uh… emergency.”
“What kind of emergency? Couldn’t the rest of your family handle it?” Mary snapped. “If this is your way of showing how you’d be a good role model for Dylan, I am unimpressed—”
Autry jumped in before she could gain more steam and ride that thought all the way down the tracks. “All my family is away today, ma’am. There’s only me and the hands to deal with things,” he explained in what had to be the best cowboy-style aw-shucks voice Beth had ever heard. And she’d heard a few.
Mary Wright sniffed. “Perhaps we should do this another day, then. When you’re not so busy with work.”
Sheesh, first the woman had implied Autry was a lazy bum, and now he was a workaholic. Not that Beth should be blaming her. He was late, and without a real excuse as far as she could tell.
“No, ma’am. I’m here now, and I have been looking forward to this all week.” He grinned down at the kid who gazed back with the kind of unimpressed expression only a ten-year-old could pull off.
“Very well,” Mary Wright finally conceded after a long, frosty consideration. “Thank you for taking care of Dylan.” The last she directed to Beth before she turned and marched out of the classroom and down the hallway, her heels clacking on the tiled floors with each step, the sound fading as she moved further away.
Autry blew out a long breath and ran his hand through his hair. “Hey, buddy,” he said to Dylan. “I’m sorry I’m late.” He held out a hand. “My name is Autry Hill. It’s nice to meet you.”
Dylan glanced down at his hand, then back up. He didn’t shake. “Yeah.”
Autry didn’t give up. He left his hand out there and fixed the boy with a stare somewhere between hard and understanding. “Where I come from, the measure of a man is taken by how he shakes your hand.”
A duel of stares commenced, and Beth watched in silence as Dylan’s expression shifted from annoyed to mulish and eventually to resigned. Autry didn’t once look away. Finally, Dylan grasped his hand and Autry gave a satisfied nod.
“Why don’t you go load up your stuff in my truck. It’s parked right out front. You can’t miss it. It’s not the one with the hot pink sticker on the back.” He lifted a teasing gaze to Beth with the last bit.
“Whatever.”
“Yes, sir,” Autry corrected.
“Huh?” Dylan paused picking up his backpack.
Autry raised his eyebrows, not repeating himself.
Dylan scowled. “Yes, sir,” he muttered. Then grabbed up his backpack and sloped back out the door the same way he’d come in.
A speculative smile curving his mouth, Autry watched him go before slowly turning to face Beth. “Thank for saving me. I didn’t think you knew how to tell a fib.”
Not to be swayed by his rugged good looks, and charming, boyish smile—or the memory of how his lips felt against hers—Beth moved back around her desk and started shuffling papers.
“You smell like horses and hay.” She wrinkled her nose like she found his scent unappealing, which was the furthest thing from the truth. She’d grown up on a ranch. Those smells reminded her of home and happy days spent in the sun. The problem was, Autry, casual in well-worn jeans and a faded blue plaid button-down, suddenly came across as more approachable, if that was possible. No longer the player. Just a good ol’ boy putting in hard time on the land.
He lifted an arm to sniff his shirt. “It’s not that bad. I didn’t have a chance to shower.”
Rather than chase the rabbit down that hole, Beth returned to the real issue. “Please tell me I did the right thing, lying to Mrs. Wright.”
Autry crossed the room to lean a hip against the side of her desk, crowding her personal space. “Why did you?”
She couldn’t very well say she didn’t like Dylan’s foster parent, or that something about Autry Hill made her trust him. She always had, and the skunk thing only made her trust him more. Maybe because in school he’d been nice to everyone, one of those guys who didn’t care about cliques or coolness. Genuinely nice.
“Dylan,” she said simply.
Autry seemed to get what she meant by that, because he nodded slowly. “Would it make you feel better to know you weren’t lying?”
Beth paused in her shuffling to look at him with raised eyebrows.
“I really did have an emergency. One of our guys got kicked in the chest by a horse and needed to go to the hospital.”
“Oh, jeez.” Beth grimaced. She’d been kicked in the shin by a horse once, and she never wanted to repeat it. Accidents like that came with the territory on a ranch, no matter how careful one was around the animals. “Is he okay?”
“Yeah. I tried to call the school but had no cell phone reception.”
No mistaking the sincerity in those hazel eyes, more green today in the sunlight streaming in through the wall of windows to her right. “That does help. Thanks. You should tell Dylan, too.”
That kid had enough disappointments in his life. No need to add to it, when the reason was real.
“I will.”
She went back to packing up, fully expecting Autry to leave, but that didn’t happen. Instead, he stood and moved around to stand beside her. Too close for her personal levels of comfort.
She tipped her chin to stare him down. “Can I help you with something else?”
“How was your date with the lawyer?”
She couldn’t mistake the teasing light in his eyes, but if Autry was expecting her to tell him about any of it, he had another thing coming. Honestly, she hadn’t felt much of a connection with Jason. He’d been nice, funny, smart, and not bad to look at across the table… but no zha-zha-zing. However, a contrary part of her didn’t want to admit that to Autry. “Fine.”
His eyebrows went up. “Yeah? Is it a love connection?”
Why did he even care? “It was lunch.”
Autry shrugged. “Either you feel it, or you don’t.”
Beth scoffed. “Yeah. You feel that love connection often, do you?”
Instead of taking offence, Autry grinned. “Touchy subject? Must not’ve gone well, I guess.”
She plonked her hands on her hips. “As a matter of fact, we’re going on another date. Dinner this time. Satisfied?”
“A second date, huh?” he mused as he slipped his hands into the back pockets of his jeans.
Wanting to get off the topic, Beth redirected. “Dylan’s waiting for you.”
“I’m just waiting on you.” He gave her desk full of papers a pointed look.
Beth frowned. “I’m not going with you.”
“Sure, you are. Because after we drop Dylan at his house, you’re coming to my family thing like we agreed.”
“Like you insisted,” she pointed out. “I assumed you’d pick me up at home when you were done.”
He shook his head. “And I assumed you’d join us. Give him someone familiar, at least this first time around.”
The idea sort of made sense. Except Beth worried that particular logic was more about her making up excuses to spend time with Autry. She was starting to get addicted to the buzz she got during their little exchanges. A concept that scared her to bits and pieces. Besides, this was about Dylan. Speaking of which… “I doubt Dylan would want me there. I’m his teacher. How’s he supposed to relax?”
Autry cocked his head. “I think he trusts you.”
“You’ve met him for all of a handful of seconds. How could you possibly know—”
“Hey.” He stepped closer to put a hand on her shoulder. “He ran to you when I didn’t show. Not the front office. Not another teacher. Not Mrs. Wrigh
t. He trusts you.”
Autry topped it all off with a smile that frustratingly had an adverse effect on her knees. If she could’ve, without looking like a lunatic, Beth would’ve glared at her knees. With determination, she reminded herself Autry Hill would flirt with a wall if it appeared to be a female wall.
She deliberately sat down, which effectively removed his hand. “I have a lot of grading—”
“Aw, come on, honey.” He reached out to tug on a loose tendril of her hair. “What does it take to get you to help a guy out?”
Touching was like breathing for Autry, he probably didn’t even notice he’d done it. Twice. Unfortunately, every nerve inside her body took notice, coming to tingling, heated life, and all she could think of were those damned kisses.
“Only if you promise not to flirt.” The words were out of her mouth before her brain engaged her filters.
Autry’s hand froze midair. As he blinked down at her, Beth got the distinct impression that she’d hurt his feelings.
He cleared his throat. “With other women or you?”
“Me.” Although she was tempted to say both, but then she’d be contradicting herself.
Autry tipped his head, gaze searching, lips tilting into a barely-there smile. Irritation sizzled through her. Was she funny to him?
“Why not? Flirting can be…” He dropped his gaze to her lips. A deliberate, well-practiced move, she had no doubt. Even knowing that she still held her breath. Just a little. Was he thinking of those kisses, too?
“Fun,” he said. The last word came out lower, gruffer.
How did he do that? Beth forced herself to ignore the flare of answering heat. Fun, he said? Ha. Fun that ended in heartbreak for her. Not to mention the humiliation of being one in a long line of women and the whole town would know. No, thanks.
She pinned him with a direct look. “You make me uncomfortable.”
Autry straightened at that, the smile disappearing from his lips. Had no woman ever told him that before? Beth mentally rolled her eyes at herself. Of course, no other woman had told him that.
*
Given how he hadn’t been able to get that kiss out of his mind, Beth’s declaration sideswiped him, to say the least.