“I’m just glad this isn’t really a date,” Cooper said when he settled.
“Why’s that?”
“Because you still owe me one date,” he replied smoothly.
Well, damn. Now he got her on a technicality.
Sneaky bastard.
Chapter Eleven
By the time Tuesday evening rolled around, Cooper was giddier than a teenage boy on prom night hoping to get laid for the first time. And despite his body’s desperate ache, he found he longed to spend some uninterrupted time with Tessa. Maybe a chance to talk like they had at breakfast, although he would certainly ensure he didn’t pick the wrong topics this time.
Suffice it to say, he was more interested in talking as opposed to just the possibility of sex. He wanted to say that as far as the sex was concerned, he could take it or leave it. However, if it were actually a multiple choice question, he would absolutely pick sex. No questions asked.
Either way, he just wanted to see Tessa again.
He hadn’t bothered to tell her anything about where they were going, so when she called him at three o’clock to ask about what she should wear, his anxiety level had ratcheted up at least one hundred notches. Luckily, he managed to keep a firm grip on his man card by not running straight to her house, and he’d gone over to his new house – new to him, which was certainly the only thing new about it – to take care of a few things.
With electricity and water on, he had opted to head back to the motel and pack up his things, followed by a trip to the big box department store just outside of town. He wouldn’t have any furniture until the movers delivered his things on Thursday, but it wasn’t like he didn’t know how to rough it for a night or two.
Now that he was pulling up to Tessa’s house, the rest of his concerns and priorities flew right out the window. The only thing he could focus on was seeing her.
He was greeted in her front yard by her two dogs. The ones he’d seen the last time he was there, but neither of them seemed any more worried that he was walking up to the house this time than they had last time, so he took that as a good sign. Figuring it couldn’t hurt to butter them up a little, he squatted down on his haunches and gave them each a rub when they sauntered his way.
The front door was only a few steps away, but for him, it seemed like a mile. In all honesty, aside from their impromptu breakfast at IHOP last Friday, Cooper hadn’t been on a real date in longer than he could remember. He’d had his fair share of women over the years, but much to his dismay, he never had to work for it. They were generally waiting for him, some of them even managing to sneak on his tour bus a time or two. And weren’t those just fun times waiting to happen. No challenge whatsoever.
But with Tessa, he didn’t have to worry. The woman was undoubtedly a challenge, and he loved that about her.
As he watched the stunning woman through the screen door as she made her way toward him, all of the women from his past faded away, and he felt like a damn virgin standing naked – even though he was fully dressed – in front of a woman for the first time. Then she smiled at him, and he thought he was going to have to sit down.
“Hey,” he greeted, realizing he didn’t sound all that sure of himself, but shit, he could barely form coherent thoughts, much less words.
The cowgirl was standing not three feet in front of him in a white cotton sundress, her sexy, tan legs beneath the hem that rested just above her knees. Her pink toenails peeked out from her sandals, and all of a sudden, his entire body went hard. Lord have mercy, he wanted to know what she had on under that damn dress.
“You ready?”
Tessa nodded, but her smile didn’t fade, so Cooper accepted that she was still speechless after their phone call earlier. Not only had he told her what she should wear, he also told her what he'd like for her to be wearing – which had consisted of absolutely nothing. Needless to say, the conversation after that was laced with enough sexual innuendos that he worried he wouldn’t be able to sit down for a couple of hours.
He pulled open the screen door and waited while she locked up the house and then he followed her with his hand pressed firmly on her lower back. When they reached his truck, Cooper opened her door and then waited while she climbed inside, shutting the door behind her. He took his time walking around the truck, trying not to seem too excited, but if the smile on his face was anything to go by, then Tessa clearly knew he was anxious for this night.
“Where’re we going?” she asked as they were backing out of her driveway a minute later.
“Well, if I told you, it wouldn’t be a surprise, now would it?”
“You didn’t say anything about surprises,” she retorted as she leaned casually against the door, the weight of her gaze heavy on him as he drove.
“I meant to.”
Her throaty chuckle lit him up from the inside, and Cooper suddenly wondered whether what he had in mind was actually a smart idea or not. Taking her to a public restaurant probably made more sense than taking her to a secluded place where he didn’t have to worry about anything other than enjoying her company.
♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
“What’s that smell?” Tessa asked, turning toward the backseat where the delicious aroma seemed to be coming from. “Is that food?”
“I sure hope so because I’m starved,” he said, not taking his eyes off the road.
“So you aren’t taking me to dinner?”
“I thought I’d bring dinner to you,” he answered easily.
Tessa turned back around, peering out the window to see where they were going. She knew the town like the back of her own hand considering she’d lived there her entire life. It was clear based on the landmarks that they were headed south toward the Deluth farm, better known as Cooper’s new house.
Tessa wasn’t sure exactly how she felt about that. She was having a hard time convincing herself that she should be upset that Cooper had upended her dreams so easily. In fact, she feared she was actually starting to like the guy more than she should.
For the better part of the afternoon, she had ridiculed herself for her reaction to him the other night when they were at the bar. Had he not shown the type of restraint that she obviously didn’t even possess, she would’ve had sex right there in the middle of her bar with Cooper Krenshaw and this date would probably not even be happening.
And then she had risked sending him running in the opposite direction by opening up to him when he had asked about her mother. That hadn’t been her smartest move. Tessa, as a rule, did not open up to people, so she didn’t know what had happened between them that night. Thankfully, she had her thoughts back under control, locked up safe and sound, which meant she didn’t have to worry about tonight.
So this morning, once she had finally talked herself back off the ledge and decided she wasn’t going to cancel on him, she had primped in front of the mirror more times than she was willing to admit. To find out that he wasn’t even taking her out, she was a tad bit disappointed, but oddly relieved at the same time.
Was he expecting her to sleep with him? Was she going to sleep with him? If the other night was any indicator, it was highly likely that she would take him right there in the bed of his truck if he just kissed her once. Except now in the bright light of the day, that option didn’t seem so simple anymore.
For the last several hours, she had thought of nothing else except this man, and she’d come to a conclusion. She was far more attracted to Cooper than for just his incredible body or his country charm. Or his deep, soothing voice.
There was something else about him that appealed to her on many levels, the least of them being sex. Although, she wouldn’t deny that they could probably create one hell of a science project just by the chemical reaction the two of them created when they were together.
For the last two weeks, he’d been the perfect gentleman and she’d been a hot, ogling mess. Ever since the first night he walked into her bar, put his arms around her in order to keep her on her feet, Tessa had to a
dmit that she was seriously intrigued by the man – despite her many reasons not to be.
At first, there was no doubt that it had all been based on physical attraction. However, that appeared to be morphing into something deeper. Sure, she would’ve preferred to keep her interest on a more superficial level, but Tessa knew ultimately, she wasn’t built that way. And the more she learned about him through their various conversations during slow times, the more she found herself liking him. In the same sense, he was somehow getting her to open up to him about things she didn’t talk to anyone about. And yet he wasn’t running away.
Cooper turned the truck down the dirt driveway that led to the farmhouse sitting several acres off the road, and that’s when the butterflies erupted in her stomach. Tessa wasn’t sure what she was so nervous about, but whatever it was, the closer they got to his house, the worse it got.
“Now, don’t go panickin’ on me, darlin’.” Cooper’s voice was gentle, and Tessa wondered whether he could feel her apprehension in the congested confines of the truck cab.
“What are you talking about?” she asked, trying to appear unaffected. She wasn’t sure she succeeded, but thankfully Cooper opted not to challenge her. Figuring she should keep the conversation going so that she had less time to think about what it actually meant to be alone with him, she asked, “When do you plan to move into the house?”
“Already done.”
Tessa snapped her head in his direction, trying to determine whether he was serious or not. “You just closed on the house yesterday. How’d you manage that?”
“Technically, I don’t have anything in the house. I just brought the things I had with me. The movers will be here on Thursday with the rest of my stuff.”
“You know, I never did ask, but where’d you live before this?” Tessa realized there were a lot of things she didn’t know about this man.
“About twenty minutes outside of Nashville.” When Cooper didn’t elaborate, Tessa realized they’d parked in front of his house. She stopped asking questions so she could help get the items from the backseat.
They didn’t say anything more until they were walking up onto the front porch, each of them carrying a large plastic sack filled with small containers of food.
“If your furniture isn’t here, where do you plan on eating?”
“I was thinking on the porch if you don’t mind. If I had my way, it’s where I’d have supper every night. Come on, I want to show you the view from the back.”
Tessa slowed, staring at Cooper’s back as he continued to lead her toward the rear of the house. She admired how his muscles flexed and bunched as he moved while she was still processing what he’d said. Was she being overly sensitive or was it just too coincidental how much they had in common?
Shrugging off the thought, she followed Cooper around the wood planked wraparound porch, noticing the areas that were in desperate need of patching. Much of the wood was rotting and some of the planks were broken in half. Her heart ached at the memory of her time spent there with Mr. Deluth. Over the last year, she’d spent more and more time with him, trying to convince him to let her help fix the worst of what was broken, but he always seemed more content just to spend their time talking.
“Watch your step. I think this’ll be my first project, trying to get this thing back to its original glory.”
Tessa wasn’t sure this old farmhouse was ever really glorious, but she certainly understood its appeal. She had always loved old country farmhouses and actually had hoped one day to own this particular one. In the meantime, she was renting her current house from her brother Jack. Considering Deluth’s land had been the prime location for what she’d spent her life dreaming about, she knew finding something else wasn’t going to happen anytime soon.
But tonight she didn’t want to think about that.
When they arrived at the back of the house, their apparent destination, Tessa noticed that there were two plastic chairs and a diminutive plastic table sitting in the middle of the porch.
“I have to admit, I’m jealous of this porch, Krenshaw,” Tessa said, going for casual.
At the moment, she was feeling anything but, and she wasn’t sure why that was. Just being with him, alone like this, was so incredibly intimate, she wasn’t sure she was going to be able to eat with all her nerves churning in her belly.
“Yeah? It’s a little on the neglected side, but the promise of what it could be was what appealed to me.”
“I know exactly what you mean,” she mumbled, hoping he didn’t hear her. For as long as she could remember, she’d loved this old house. Especially the solitude to be found on the property.
Taking the bag from her hand, Cooper set up the food on the table after signaling for her to take the opposite chair. She noticed the chair was new, even having the stickers attached to it, and she smiled.
“I tried to think of everything. I don’t have any furniture on the inside, so I figured this would do. Not that I need anything more than that porch swing over there. It seems more than adequate for a bed if you ask me.”
Tessa looked over her shoulder at the swing he was referring to and had she been drinking something, she would’ve choked. The dilapidated swing appeared to be hanging by a thread as opposed to the two rusty chains that actually secured it to the wood rafters. Jerry had never wanted to replace it for as long as she could remember.
“Don’t worry, I checked. It’s stable. It’ll do for a while.”
Tessa wasn’t sure she believed him, but she nodded her head anyway.
When the food was laid out between them, the plastic utensils and the paper plates within reach, Tessa looked up at Cooper. “This is great, by the way. I was worried you’d be the fancy type, and I won’t lie, I’m not big into that stuff.”
“I think I knew that,” he replied, grinning.
“What are you trying to say, Krenshaw?” Tessa tried to sound stern, but her smile probably gave her away.
“We’re a lot alike. I’d much prefer to sit out here all night as opposed to wine and dine in some fancy restaurant. I’m claustrophobic in social scenes like that. I like wide open spaces. I don’t think Marcus ever truly understood that.”
Tessa knew he was referring to his manager, and she noticed the frustration that lingered briefly in Cooper’s eyes. For the last couple of weeks, she’d overheard bits and pieces of several of his phone conversations, and although she only ever heard a few words, she sensed that he still wasn’t happy with Marcus or what he was telling him.
“Do you plan to just walk away from your career?” she blurted as she watched him scoop potato salad onto his plate.
Cooper’s eyes met hers, his lips a thin line as he seemed to be trying to read her intention. Smiling, she made an effort to lighten the mood. “Don’t worry, I’m not planning to go talk to the tabloids.”
He smiled back, but it didn’t reach his eyes. Feeling as though she overstepped and invaded his personal space, she followed up with, “Sorry. We can talk about whatever you want.”
“No, I’m good. Where you’re concerned, I’m an open book.”
Tessa wasn’t sure she wanted him to be an open book because that would mean he would expect the same from her and there were too many things that she shied away from talking about. Her history was one of them.
“I like this,” he said as he motioned with a tilt of his head toward the fields, “but I don’t want to give up my career altogether. Maybe slow down some. I want to do something more. There’s a part of me that is constantly looking for a challenge. I think I found that here.”
Tessa wondered whether he was referring to the potential of the farm or her.
“And you’re up for the challenge of a farm?”
Cooper tilted his head, as though studying her again and Tessa fought the urge to squirm.
“It’ll be the biggest challenge of my life no doubt. Not only will it take a tremendous amount of time, but the back breaking work will keep me occupied.” Cooper pau
sed, his gaze still intently focused on her. “Financially, I can help in a lot of ways, such as getting the center off the ground, but I know it won’t be enough for me. Being able to work with children and horses and to see the benefit of them together, that’s where the true reward is.”
“What made you want to work with kids?” she asked.
There was a distant sadness in Cooper’s eyes that made Tessa’s heart ache in response, but for the first time, he didn’t answer her. Open book, huh? Well, it looked like he had some things he wanted to keep to himself, so Tessa didn’t feel so guilty about not sharing her life story with him just yet.
Changing the subject, she asked, “So, you don’t want to stop performing?”
Cooper forked potatoes in his mouth, his gaze intently focused on her to the point she was about to start fidgeting when he finally spoke. “No, I don’t want to stop altogether. The fans are the reason I keep doing what I do. But, honestly, I like The Rusty Nail,” he replied, sounding serious.
“So, what? You’re going to give up all the world traveling and just sing at a small town bar a couple of nights a month?”
“I’m thinking about it.” She had to break the eye contact, fearful that he would see the lust that was slowly building inside of her as she watched him eat. Luckily, the food looked wonderful, effectively redirecting her attention.
Cooper hadn’t skimped on dinner. According to the napkins, he ordered from Charlie’s Restaurant: roasted chicken, potato salad and corn on the cob. She remembered he was a man of routine and couldn’t help but think that this was definitely not his normal meal.
“Would that bother you? Me hanging around your bar indefinitely?”
Tessa grinned. She couldn’t lie to the man. “I kinda like you hanging around.”
“Well, that’s good because if I have anything to say about it, I’ll be hanging around for a long time.”
They ate in silence for a few minutes, both of them glancing out over the landscape as the night descended upon them. When they were finished, Tessa helped Cooper clean up the mess, using a large black trash bag to dispose of the containers since he didn’t yet have a trash can.
Chasing Dreams (Devil's Bend) Page 10