“You’re dirty,” she said and it was all I could do not to grab her and take her right there. Her face reddened and I bit my cheek. “I mean dirt. You have mud on you.”
“Spring planting,” I explained, enjoying this exchange a whole lot more than my signed contract probably allowed.
“What are you doing here?” she blurted, blue eyes still wide.
“I live here,” I pointed out, crossing to the fridge and yanking on it. I grabbed a beer—bottles, fancy—and kicked the door shut, popping the top. All the while, Jordan stared at me, dumbfounded. And all the while I pretended not to have a raging erection hanging between us. Maybe she was too drunk to notice.
“Right, but…” Jordan blinked. “I mean, I thought you’d be working late again,” she said and then reached for her phone. The music shut off.
“You could leave it. Good song,” I said on a shrug and downed some of my beer.
Jordan tapped the screen, the song restarting as she went back to stirring. The music filled the dead space between us. Even from here, I could see her biting her lip, evidently trying to concentrate herself into soberness.
My mouth quirked.
“What are you making?” I asked, coming closer to sniff appreciatively.
“Dinner,” she said, shoving me back, but her hand slipped and she brushed my bicep instead. I planted my feet and raised a brow at her, pretending my heart didn’t pound at the slight contact. God, almost two weeks of trying to put her out of my mind and one pair of booty shorts later…
Then, I finally noticed her expression. She looked pissed. I ran through a quick mental check and came up empty. I’d done nothing. Hell, I hadn’t been home long enough to piss her off. Which meant for the first time since meeting her, Jordan’s wrath was directed at someone other than me. “What’s the occasion?” I asked.
“For what?”
I nodded to the beer.
Her lip curled. “Can’t a girl drink for no reason at all?” she demanded. “In fact, can’t a girl come to a small town in the middle of nowhere for no reason? Stay for a while with no plans, no ties, nothing to hide? Huh?” She ran a hand through her hair, tucking it away from her face. “Can’t a girl do that and not tell everyone her business?”
“Um, yes?”
“Damn right. I don’t have to do something just because Gavin said it’s time. Or because my dad decided to make my life miserable even from his grave. He can’t control this, not anymore. I do what I want when I want.” She nodded like that made it official and I didn’t argue.
Who the hell was Gavin?
And how was her dad making her life so bad from his grave?
She went back to stirring the mystery dish on the stove and swigging her beer. I stood watching her for a minute, sipping my own bottle and wondering what kind of shit storm I’d walked into. Whatever was going on, Jordan had been carrying something around that she’d decided to set aside for tonight. I wasn’t sure if that meant I should ask about it or leave it alone.
I decided to leave it alone—for now.
“So … how was your day?” I asked, wary now that I could see what bubbled under the surface.
She sighed before her face contorted again. “My day was useless. This town is full of prejudiced … conniving … underhanded …”
“Whoa,” I said, holding up my hands and backing away slowly. “I did not mean to challenge the bull.”
She stalked toward me, brandishing the spoon at me, red sauce dripping as she came. “I am not a bull. I’m a fucking ray of sunshine. And all those women—even men, even when I flirted a little though I’m not proud of it—they’ve all got it in their heads that just because I didn’t grow up here and don’t know everyone’s middle name or goddamn favorite color, I deserve to be shut out—”
“Okay, calm down. Take a breath. Who is shutting you out over middle names?”
“All of them!” The spoon did a wild arc above her head, landing red sauce in her hair that went unnoticed. Over her shoulder, I caught sight of the pot on the stove bubbling more than it had before. Dangerously close to the rim.
I met Jordan’s heated glare. “Do they have first names that we know of?” I asked, desperate now to figure this out. If for no other reason than to save dinner.
Her brows drew together in some fascinating combination of concentration and irritation. “Harriet something-or-other is the one at the desk every damn time. But Lyle Hendrickson is the one in charge.” Her lips thinned until her teeth were bared. “He’s a real piece of work,” she muttered until it all digressed into imaginative cursing.
“Okay, Lyle, Harriet, I know them,” I began, putting my hand up higher to try and ward off the spoon’s splatters. But what was a little marinara over the layer of soil I currently wore?
She rolled her eyes. “Of course you know them. You all know everyone—except me.” Abruptly, her anger died and her expression crumpled. She lowered the spoon and a chunk of tomato fell on the floor. “If I get fired because I can’t get the damn permits, what the hell am I going to do then? I can’t leave yet. Not until I visit them.”
I opened my mouth, ready to spout off a flippant response, but then she sniffled and I stopped short. She was crying? What the fuck was I supposed to say to her now? I had no idea how to come back from tears. Sarcasm. Anger. Cynicism. Those I could do in my sleep. But this was unmapped territory.
And if my hunch was right, I knew exactly who she meant by them.
“Look … Harriet can be a beast so I’m sorry about that,” I said, approaching slowly. But she didn’t move. Didn’t even look up. Just sniffled again and let her shoulders hang limp. Her hair fell into her face and I seized my opportunity.
I took one giant step and landed in front of her. In one move, I snatched the spoon away as gently as I could and put my other arm around her, pulling her to me. “I’m sorry they’re giving you the run-around up there. Nobody has anything better to do, apparently.”
Jordan’s hands came around me and she leaned into the hug, resting her cheek against my chest. “Apparently,” she mumbled and I almost smiled at the way her anger held on even in defeat.
Without pulling away, I managed to work my phone out of my pocket and dial Harriet’s home number. She picked up after the first ring. I could just picture her wide eyes as she recognized my number on the caller ID.
“Casey Luck, that you?” she said by way of greeting, her voice coming through the phone overly loud. I suspected she’d taken her hearing aid out again.
Jordan yanked herself away and stared at me in muted horror.
“Yes, ma’am, sorry to bother you at dinnertime,” I said, winking at Jordan. She glared.
“No bother, Casey. You call anytime. Everything all right? You wreck that dirt bike in my woods again?”
“No, ma’am, calling about a permit I could use some help with,” I said, cringing at the memory of the full afternoon I’d spent with her last month. I’d accidentally taken out a portion of Harriet’s back fence after I’d landed wrong and ate shit on that latest jump I’d built.
Three cups of tea and twenty millions questions about Frank’s love life later—I rebuilt my dirt course in the other direction. Frank had laughed for twenty minutes straight when I told him.
“What kind of permit you need?” Harriet asked, her curiosity practically oozing out of the phone.
“Not for me. For Summer’s new place. Jordan, the architect from New England, is handling the job. Heard she might be having some problems getting the paperwork through.”
Jordan clenched her fists and scowled.
I was glad I still held the spoon.
“Well, now, I think she misfiled her reports and surveys on that one,” Harriet said with a sniff, “but we’re working hard to get it fixed for her.”
“Uh-huh, good to hear. She’s new to Grayson, and I’d hate to give her a rough impression of us right off,” I said. And before Harriet could argue, inspiration struck and I went with it. “Matte
r of fact, Frank’s taken her under his wing. Says she’s the best building designer he’s ever seen this side of the Appalachians. He’d be disappointed to know she was getting stuck behind paperwork holdups.”
“We’re in the Appalachians, genius,” Jordan muttered.
I ignored her and waited.
“Frank said that, did he?” Something rustled in the background and Harriett rushed through her words. “Well, Frank, well, yes, of course. You tell Frank I’m fixing her papers right as rain first thing tomorrow. It’s all set and we’re happy to help Miss Jordan with anything she needs. You tell her to come see me. Matter of fact, if Frank likes, he can come on down with her and see for himself. Tell him I said so.”
I smiled, knowing full well Harriet’s voice carried without the need for speaker-phone. Jordan eased up and propped a hand on her hip, still eyeing me.
“Will do, Harriet. And thanks, Frank will be happy to know it,” I said.
Harriet responded with some sort of jilting laughter and I hung up.
“Did she just titter?” Jordan asked, one brow cocked, arms folded.
“She did.” I pocketed the phone.
“Over Frank?”
“She may have a crush.”
“What’s not to crush on,” she said with a shrug and I wasn’t sure of a safe response so I left it. “Dirt bike accident?” she asked.
“I crashed on a jump and took out her fence a few weeks back. As penance, I spent an afternoon with Harriet getting caught up.” I shuddered and Jordan snorted. “It’s not funny. It taught me a valuable lesson that I think an architect like yourself can appreciate,” I said solemnly.
“What’s that?” Jordan asked.
“Be careful where you build.” I shuddered again.
Jordan laughed.
“You sound like Frank when I told him. He was just glad it wasn’t him who had to spend the day there. At least this time it only took a phone call.”
“And Frank’s name,” she added.
“Frank’s name carries weight in this town,” I agreed.
“Damn.” She shook her head.
“What?”
Her eye gleamed and her scowl turned to a smirk. “Apparently, I moved in with the wrong guy.”
Before I could formulate a response, she grabbed her beer off the counter and swaggered out. Now it was my turn to scowl.
“You meant thank you,” I called after her.
I waited for her to reply.
No answer.
Just when I’d given up on her, she appeared in the doorway again, grinning. She strolled up and planted a quick kiss on my cheek. “Thanks, Case. I owe you one,” she said.
Her hips swayed as she spun and doubled back for the door, her ass lifting in a way that made it hard to concentrate. My mouth opened but no sound came out. By the time I found my voice she was already gone again.
“What about the sauce?” I called just as the screen door creaked.
“You’ve got the spoon,” she yelled back and the door shut behind her.
I looked down at the white spoon hanging limp in my hand and scowled. Motherfucker. She was right.
Chapter Eleven
Jordan
I spent Saturday nursing my beer-headache and trying to remember why I thought it’d be a good idea to drink in the first place. I didn’t even like beer. But that’d been the only choice at the corner store yesterday. I wasn’t surprised. Small hick town with only bottom-shelf beer for sale? Go figure.
Casey was up and gone with the daylight along with his dirt bike. I wasn’t sure if he’d gone to work or just out with some friends. Curiosity pricked at me over the possibility that any of his friends might be girls. Not that I had a right to ask.
Despite my promise to Gavin about today, I wasn’t sure if borrowing Casey’s truck included free time or just work. So I stayed put. Getting caught up on emails and laundry and the rest of the unpacking I hadn’t done. I wasn’t sure when it had happened but somewhere along the way I’d accepted that I was going to spend some time here in Grayson.
And I wasn’t nearly as broken up over it as I’d been that first day. In fact, Casey’s place was starting to feel downright comfy. And Casey himself … well, at least he’d stopped walking around half-naked with a pickup line on his tongue.
Then again, last night I’d been the one to cross lines.
Embarrassment had flooded me when I’d first woken remembering the way I’d literally cried on his shoulder. Not to mention how I’d obviously ogled him when he’d walked in all dirty and smelling like fertilizer—how was that even hot to me?—but in the end, I couldn’t hang on to it.
Casey had helped me out by calling Harriett, without judgment or making me feel silly or stupid. That made us friends. And it felt good to have someone on my side. Gavin was the only one I had for that and with him stationed in Virginia, having Casey go to bat for me had lessened the ache of loneliness.
With the permit situation cleared up, and Casey and I finally in a solid place, I was thinking maybe it wouldn’t be completely awful to spend some time here.
Except for seeing my grandparents. And if Gavin asked me one more time if I’d gone over there…
A knock on the front door startled me and I dropped my armload of clean clothes in front of the dryer. I left it behind and found Summer on the porch, smiling through the screen.
“Hey, neighbor,” I said, ushering her inside.
“Oh, good, you’re home,” she said, twisting her fingers together nervously.
“Is everything okay?” I asked, stepping back as she entered.
“What? Oh, yeah, fine. I was just hoping … well, to be honest, I was planning to take advantage of the fact that you probably didn’t have anywhere else to be and enlist your help with something.”
“What do you need?”
“Tonight is the annual bonfire. Well, we do a couple actually, but usually after the spring planting is done and everyone can go back to normal working hours, I throw a bonfire party. S’mores, drinks, music. Nothing too fancy. Casey and Ford usually help me set up but Ford’s in Roanoke all day for a horticulture thing and Casey’s…” She paused to look around pointedly at the otherwise empty house.
“He’s out,” I finished.
“Right, so I was hoping…” Summer trailed off, wiggling her eyebrows until I laughed.
A refusal was on the tip of my tongue so even I was surprised when I heard the words come out of my mouth, “Okay, consider me hired. What do you need me to do?”
***
I hefted the last bale of hay from the back of the flatbed trailer and let it roll into place along the row I’d created for seating. A few yards away, Summer was setting a disposable tablecloth over a folding table. A keg sat on ice nearby and I averted my eyes, unable to enjoy the sight of more beer just now.
Country music floated around us from the speakers we’d already set out. Girl bands singing radio hits all about female power and country love. I rolled my eyes at that. Country love, hay bales by the fire, a keg party outside by the woods. I was a walking redneck cliché. If Dad could see me now…
He’d probably enjoy it. And Gavin too. I was the only DeWalter still holding onto that well-deserved grudge. Even Mom had decided to let bygones be bygones. Well, mostly. She wasn’t exactly planning a family reunion but she didn’t live with a chip on her shoulder either.
I, on the other hand, didn’t plan on letting go of it anytime soon. But Dad had made his final request to me clear: come here, see the grandparents who had disowned us twenty years ago, and hear them out. And I had to do it alone.
All that stood in the way of getting on with my life, including heading back to New England and opening the doors of my own design firm, was a short drive to the next county over … Yet, here I was, wasting time hefting hay bales.
“Well, I think that’s it.” Summer finished setting the red Solo cups out and rejoined me, her hands hooked in her back pockets as she surveyed the rows of hay I�
��d set out for later on. “Not too close to the fire, good,” she said, nodding at my handiwork.
“Looks like we’re all set,” I said and we headed for the ATV we’d used to pull the trailer up here.
I caught sight of the view and slowed my steps. Beyond the hilltop we stood on lay fields and fields all still barren of growth until the first sprouts. To my right, Summer’s future home site rose up, the tallest of the peaks that enclosed Heritage Plantation’s borders. At the edges of it all, woods, heavy with leafy, green branches, stood tall against the open blue sky above. I took a deep breath and held it before letting it go again.
“Pretty, isn’t it?”
I found Summer watching me with an understanding smile.
“It is,” I agreed, breathing deep. “And such fresh air.”
“A lot cleaner than the city,” she agreed as she climbed into the driver’s seat and strapped in.
“You went to college in the city, right?” I asked, climbing in beside her.
“Yep. Four years.” She shook her head. “It’s so funny when I think back to how badly I wanted to get away after high school. How much I hated coming back here last year. And now,” she looked around appreciatively as she turned the small key in the ignition. “I could never imagine being happy anywhere else.”
“You think life is better in the country?” I asked, genuinely curious.
Summer didn’t answer for a moment. I looked over and found her lost in thought, her eyes slightly narrowed as she contemplated. “I think life is best lived where you can be close to your roots,” she said finally.
I didn’t respond to that.
Her words sounded too much like the ones my dad had always told me his parents had uttered the last time he’d seen them. Right before they’d disowned him for wanting to leave in the first place—and kicked him out without a penny to his name or any piece of family left.
Those kinds of roots could kiss my ass. And I intended to tell them so just as soon as I saw them.
A Bet Worth Making (Grayson County #2) Page 8