by Sosie Frost
Julian turned. My stomach flopped back into the mud.
This man took my breath away. Which was good. It’d put us on even ground once I punched him square in the gut. But that wouldn’t be very professional as a representative of Sawyer County.
I’d get him audited instead.
I extended a hand. A glop of mud dripped from my fingers. At least it made the java brown of my skin shine. Not that I wanted to exfoliate with the sticky, clumpy mess of debris that churned in Julian Payne’s backyard.
I sucked in a breath, tempered my anger, and attempted to introduce myself.
“I’m—”
His riotous, exceedingly inappropriate laugh carried across his untended farmland—land that would stay empty if he insisted on misbehaving.
“What the hell…” He stared at me—eyes greener than any weed sprouting in his fields. “What happened to you?”
His was a question that would take an afternoon in a spa, a soak in a tub, and a dinner of pure carbs and an entire bottle of wine to answer.
It’d started when I’d busted the corrupt Chief of Police in Ironfield and ended around the time the city fired me for whistle blowing. Fast forward six months of unemployment, and suddenly I was changing the tire of the hand-me-down Sawyer County Crown Vic with three hundred thousand miles, no air conditioning, and an accelerator that tended to stick. Add to that an afternoon dip in a mud puddle and fifteen minutes of clawing through a swamp to get to his front porch, and I had quite the tale to tell Mr. Payne-In-My-Ass about my punctuality and sludgy appearance.
Of course, that was the moment my shock, rage, and absolute lust for this cowboy coalesced into a knot that bound my tongue, heart, and a place a bit lower that—frankly—could have used a good hogtie in the past six months.
“Someone…” My words sputtered out in a most unflattering, incoherent jumble. I stumbled forward, my bare toes sinking into yet another slimy, cold layer of gunk. “There’s…a…it was locked…”
The man with the baby offered me the little girl’s blanket to, presumably, un-mire myself. It wouldn’t help. I needed a damned hose to clear the mud from every nook and cranny on me—places I’d worked so hard to keep clean.
The job wasn’t supposed to be like this.
My life wasn’t supposed to be like this.
I didn’t belong in the dead-end, rural, farming town of Butterpond.
And I sure as hell didn’t deserve to be treated like a inconvenience by Julian Payne when I’d been trying to help.
I swallowed the irritation and gestured down the quarter-mile of sludge that was the farm’s driveway.
“The gate was locked.”
Julian hadn’t stopped laughing.
“I had to get out of the car…open it…the mud was…everywhere.”
His cayenne smoky laugh gutted me. This was a bastard who’d rot in hell for watching my toes wiggle in the grass.
My words turned to a hiss. “You…are you Julian Payne?”
For half a second, I prayed I had the wrong man, wrong farm, wrong anything.
If he was the whip and cream on my chocolate sundae, he’d just melted my entire dessert.
“Yeah,” he said. “Who the hell are you?”
Unfortunate. He was the one man I’d hate to hate.
I straightened my dress as best I could and attempted to wipe some of the mud from my face. No good. It only smeared yet another line across my cheek.
“I’m your appointment,” I said. “And I would have been here sooner if someone hadn’t locked the driveway gate. I fell in the mud and had to claw my way here.”
I received no pity from him. Julian scowled. Damn the man for looking so good even while irritated.
“Look, swamp thing. Sorry you got a little dirty…that’s life on a farm. This is what happens when you’re working the land, not pushing papers.”
Like he had any idea how to do my job. I clenched my fists, wishing a layer of gunk hadn’t squished from between my fingers. My voice cracked with rage. Not the most intimidating.
“Well, I’m here now,” I said. “Let’s get this over with.”
“Hell, no. I’ve got an appointment with Mr. Micah Robinson, not…”
He gestured over my curves. He couldn’t be that stupid. All brawn and no brains.
Julian shook his head. “I’m not meeting with his secretary.”
If I wasn’t so sure I’d lost my earrings somewhere by my flattened tire, I’d have ripped the hoops out and prepared to rumble.
Bad day to fall in love.
Bad day to have my heartbroken by a jackass.
Bad day to mess with me.
“You know, cowboy…” I used the term loosely. His farm had no crops and no animals, and it’d probably stay that way. “I intended to do you a favor.”
“What’s that?”
“I came out in person. I wanted to survey the farm. Meet this Julian Payne everyone keeps talking about.”
And they talked a lot.
The Paynes were the glue that held together a town comprised mostly of a grocery store that stocked nothing organic and a roughneck bar that didn’t serve Cosmopolitans or even understand the meaning of the word.
Small couldn’t begin to describe Butterpond—but financially insolvent got close. Maybe it was the family’s charity from years ago, or maybe it was the trouble caused these last thirty years by his five sons, but the Paynes dominated the town gossip. Tales of wild nights and fires, eligible bachelors and warring siblings added a bit of mystery to the usual stories of the town’s bingo cheaters, not-so-secret affairs, and warnings about the feral cats overrunning the county fairgrounds.
But Julian Payne?
This man could do no wrong.
Giving up a potentially lucrative career with the Ironfield Rivets just to come home and take care of the family farm, his grieving family, and the responsibility as head of household? Supposedly, the man was a rural messiah who still had enough connections to score the occasional Rivets’ ticket.
That would teach me to listen to idle gossip again.
Especially when it wasn’t about me or threats to my employment.
I raised my chin and pretended the mud was just another layer of Sephora foundation. “And here I thought you could use some help…and you’re gonna need it. You submitted an application to rebuild a barn that’s been demolished for five years.”
“Burned down,” Julian said. “Long story. It burned down.”
“Yes, well, you haven’t attempted to rebuild it within a permitted time frame which makes it exempt to any grandfathered building codes and requirements. Since the structure’s destruction, Sawyer County has passed a new set of zoning regulations which you must adhere to. Your application—which did not include the required set of architectural drawings or a survey of your property—”
“It’s just a barn.”
“—Was not only incomplete, but it lacked the relevant detail to even consider approval for the new construction of an accessory structure on this chosen location.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
It meant this would have felt a hell of a lot better if I wasn’t covered in mud for the reveal.
“It means…I can tell you right now what the decision will be regarding your barn.”
“Oh, yeah?”
I tasted the anger. It tasted a lot like mud. “It’s gonna get denied.”
“What?” Julian blinked. He held his arms out. “That’s it?”
“Don’t bother helping me with the gate. I can manage this time.”
“Don’t let it knock you on your ass on the way out.”
Maybe then he’d stop staring at it, curves barely covered by a designer skirt ruined by the mud and gunk. I hobbled across the driveway just as the skies opened and my luck torrentially poured on me. The saturated material clung to my curves—curves which might’ve been a grand accomplishment for any lady who was not attempting to maintain a level of professionalism within
her newfound career. I hadn’t intended to literally storm to my car, but I crossed my fingers for a flash flood to whisk me away.
No amount of hand sanitizer would clean this mess. Especially not before my two o’clock meeting with the mayor and council. I couldn’t go back to the office looking like this. Then again, I doubted I could even make it back to my car.
The mud snowballed around my feet, mixing with the rain to become as heavy as cement. I’d have to cancel the meeting with the council meant to save my job. Too many complaints in government usually meant a municipal employee was doing something right. But in a town where everyone knew each other’s names, kids, properties, secrets, and vulnerable insecurities, one-too-many High Grass and Weed citations didn’t commend me for community outreach. It pissed off the wrong people.
I groaned.
This was his fault.
That sexist, arrogant jerk of a man.
I wouldn’t have gotten muddy if I hadn’t come to his stupid farm. Wouldn’t have popped the tire if I hadn’t volunteered to meet him. Wouldn’t have been late to the meeting to save my career if I hadn’t offered to help that egotistical son of a—
My foot plunked too deep into the mud. My ankle didn’t go with it. I twisted and collapsed to the ground.
“Not again…”
The rain made everything stickier. I wiped the hair out of my eyes with a stroke of my hand. Mistake. The mud smeared over my nose, in my eyes, over my lips.
Gross.
Dress—ruined.
Hair—embedded with twigs.
Foot—stuck in a hole.
Career—over.
I hobbled upright and kicked. Nada. The earth sucked me in but didn’t have the courtesy to bury me six feet under.
Screw it. I’d gnaw my damn ankle off if it meant getting the hell off this farm.
Another yank and I fell forward once again. My Louis Vuitton purse abandoned me, tumbling into a puddle. The vibrating cell phone rolled from the front pocket and splashed in murky water.
Great. I’d die in a backwoods mud pit.
I reached for the phone. My fingertips just grazed the vibrating case before a sun-warmed rumble of a voice piqued my blood pressure.
I’d either jump his bones or bury them in his own backyard.
I didn’t bother glancing at Julian Payne. I’d remember exactly what he looked like tonight in my dreams. It’d take more than a bottle of wine and evening with my showerhead to forget that face.
I spoke through gritted teeth. “You expected someone different?”
“Yeah.” Julian circled me, the mud practically hardening under his boots. Jesus walked on water, Julian could traverse through mud. Less of a god and more a pig. “I thought I was meeting a guy—the zoning officer.”
“Do you even know what a zoning officer is?”
“Yeah. He’s the asshole who won’t let me build a barn.”
And that was why I wouldn’t waste my breath explaining how the municipal code forbid the construction of a new structure so close to the property lines or why a barn of that size would be denied based on the township’s maximum permissible square footage calculation.
Hell, even breaking the regulations down wouldn’t work. A thick head like his wouldn’t understand no build here, too big.
I ignored him and attempted to dislodge my foot from a property that was one blue heron away from a wetlands designation. Then he’d really be pissed when he couldn’t build anything.
“Need help?” Julian asked.
Was he joking? “No.”
“You sure?”
I squirmed. Wiggled. Juked.
And sunk deeper into the mud.
I gritted my teeth. “Yes, I’m sure.”
“Cause…to me?” Julian snickered. “Looks like you’re about to become part of the foundation for my new barn.”
Now I did glare at him. And I regretted every single pelting raindrop that splattered his shirt and stuck the material to his thick muscles.
“What barn?” I huffed. “After today, you’ll be lucky if you can plant a damn tomato without a permit.”
“Not sure who made you princess of the county…” Julian enjoyed my plight a little too much. “But lemme help you.”
“I don’t need help.”
“You’ve never spent a day outside your office, have you?”
Not that he needed to know. I warded him away with a swing of a very muddy hand. “I’m fine.”
“Not from around here, are you?” He smirked. God, it was a great smirk. “Most of the locals don’t try to swim through the mud.”
“I wouldn’t have needed to swim if someone had remembered to open the gate.”
“Might’ve opened the gate if someone were on time for her scheduled appointment.”
“Would have made it on time if you had opened the gate.”
“Would have had the gate open if you’d called to tell me you were here.”
Julian didn’t ask permission before sliding his arm around my waist. With a graceful shrug, he lifted me out of the mud and freed me from the hole.
With any other man, in any other time, in any other moment when I wasn’t coated head to toe with muck, I might have offered myself for his ravishment.
It wasn’t the classiest or most realistic of expectations, but it had been a long time since a man had grabbed these hips, and sometimes a girl needed an excuse to get dirty.
But not with him.
Not with a man that arrogant, that aggravating…
That attractive.
“You sure you’re old enough to be a zoning officer?” He hadn’t released me, smirking as I swung my legs above the ground. “I should just keep you in my pocket. Might get the build done faster—”
I kicked. My foot connected a little too hard with the part of him that fed his ego. With a groan, he dropped me. We both clattered to the ground. Me, smooshed into the mud.
Him?
Julian landed over me—all two hundred pounds of pure muscle and small-town mischief.
The skies drenched us in buckets of warm, summer rain. The mud had cushioned our fall. I laid beneath him, pinned, staring into eyes as green as the ominous clouds overhead. Probably a sign to find better cover than under the body of the town’s most frustratingly handsome farmer.
Embarrassment choked me. Or maybe that was lust. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. Couldn’t unburrow from the muck and mire to ensure my dress hadn’t hiked too far up my thighs
The bastard still held me in his arms. I squirmed, clenching my jaw and my legs tightly shut. Didn’t help. A new heat sizzled the raindrops against my skin. Julian stared at me, bright eyes under thick brows, a stoic nose slightly bent from years of abuse, a hardened jaw teased with a scruffy, five o’clock shadow.
A face worthy of cuddling against a pillow or burrowing between my thighs. I hated the thoughts and banished the flutter of warmth aching inside me.
He caught his breath and adjusted the injured part of him. “Are you—”
He’d rubbed his face, leaving a trail of mud along his cheek.
A wriggling, dark little spec remained.
A nightmare of nightmares.
I screamed and punched him square in the nose.
“Leech!”
Julian fell backwards with a grunt. I scrambled to safety.
“Oh, God.” I’d hyperventilate before I could climb a tree or escape into my car to flee from the leeches. “Ew, ew, ew.”
I whipped my hands over any exposed skin, but it wouldn’t do any good.
I’d lain in that oozing, sticky mud.
A million of those creepy crawly disgusting creatures might have latched onto me. The panic set in. So did the lightheadedness. I clutched my clothes and struggled to check all over me before the leeches gorged themselves on every last drop of my blood.
But where could I run? Hide? Fight? I lamented my bare feet and scrunched up tight, sacrificing my right foot to the mud. Hopefully, they wouldn’t
strip it to the bone in mere minutes.
Or maybe that was piranhas?
Oh, God, I didn’t want to find out.
“What the hell is your problem?” Julian touched his nose. No blood, but he winced anyway.
He didn’t have to thank me. I’d never stop retching. “You had a leech on your face!”
“No, I didn’t, you maniac.” Julian held out his hand, exposing the little black wiggler. “It’s a fucking blade of grass.”
I still didn’t let it touch me. I nearly collapsed, my breath heaving in uneven gasps. Julian watched, eyebrow rising.
“Have you ever been outside before?” he asked.
Forget the glass of wine. Tonight I’d take the whole damn bottle into the tub. “I don’t often make farm calls. Usually the applicants properly fill out their applications.”
“Never thought I’d have to sweet talk a dirty girl for my barn.”
Hardly appropriate. “Don’t you dare sweet talk me, Mr. Payne.”
“Oh, I forgot. You’re county royalty, princess.” He waggled his eyebrows—the bastard. “I’ll take you out to dinner instead.”
“How could that possibly help?”
“Better than propositioning you in the mud.”
He had to be joking. “You aren’t propositioning anything.”
“Drinks?”
I shoved past him. “I’d need to be drunk to accept that offer.”
“Dinner?”
“Your application has been denied.”
Julian didn’t quit. A smile tugged at his lips. “Dancing.”
I ignored him and trudged away. To my displeasure, he followed.
“Come on, princess.” He loved this. “Those hips were made for more than mud wrestling.”
No one had ever talked to me like that before. I sure as hell didn’t approve of it.
But I wasn’t sure I hated that good ol’, small-town charm.
“Look, cowboy…” I spun and poked him in the chest. “I don’t take bribes.”
“And I don’t sleep with charity cases, but I’ll do whatever it takes for this barn.”
The insolent, conceited asshole! “You’re a real bastard, you know that?”
“Are my tax dollars paying for that mouth of yours?” He grinned. “Wish I could put it to better use.”