“This is stuck,” Beau said, trying to roll his thumb across the grooves to tighten the wrench.
“Maybe I can help.” Ashlee got down on the floor and started to slide in beside Beau.
“This isn’t helping,” Beau grumbled as she crowded into the small space.
“I haven’t even tried to help yet, so stop complaining,” she said, settling into place. The edge of the cupboard dug into her lower back. She guessed that was the reason Beau had turned on his side. “Wow, this is kind of a tight fit,” she said, turning towards him. “Good thing I’m not claustrophobic.”
“Good thing I’m not,” he said, eyeing her warily. “I don’t think this was made for two people to be under.”
“I think you’re right.” She smiled and nudged his leg with her knee. “But we’re making it work.”
A grin tugged at the corners of his full lips. “This is a dumb conversation.”
“It kind of is.”
They both smiled. Their eyes connected, and that crazy pull of attraction arced between them. Beau liked her. And not just liked her. He liked her liked her.
Underneath a sink wasn’t exactly the ideal spot for a kiss. Besides, with all the twisting pipes it wasn’t really possible. Not to mention, it smelled like pine scented cleaner and Clorox.
A single drop of water yielded to gravity and plopped down on Beau’s cheek, breaking the magical moment. “Can you hold this right here?” he asked, indicating the wrench already fitted to a pipe.
“Sure.” She grabbed the tool and enjoyed several seconds of heated contact as they made the transition of hands.
Beau maneuvered his body so he could fiddle with the adjustable wrench with both hands. Ashlee watched the muscles in his forearm flex as he worked the stubborn roller. “Got it,” he said, twisting around to fit the wrench to the pipe.
“What do I need to do?” she asked, enjoying being this close to him. It gave her a chance to notice little things, like the dark whiskers shadowing his jaw, the faint laugh lines at the corner of each eye, and the tiny flecks of gold and green in his hazel eyes.
“Just keep holding it steady.” He rolled his thumb and then rotated the wrench to tighten the fitting.
“Did you fix it?” she asked when he stopped moving.
“I think so.” Their eyes met, and he smiled crookedly. “I just need to turn the water back on to be sure.”
“Are you gonna do that with me holding the pipe?”
“That was the idea.”
“I think it’s a bad idea.” She jiggled the wrench a little. “What if you twisted it the wrong way and water sprays everywhere?”
“Then we’ll know I need to do it the other way.”
“Beau, do you have any idea how long it takes me to do my hair?”
“No.” He smiled. “How long?”
“At least an hour.”
“It shouldn’t get that wet,” he said, moving his hand toward the water valve. “And if it leaks at all, I’ll immediately turn it off.”
“If I get wet at all, you owe me big time.”
“What will I owe you?”
“I don’t know.” She looked directly at his smiling mouth. “But I’ll think of something good.”
“Right.” The skin around his eyes crinkled. “Well, here goes.”
Ashlee squealed and shut her eyes, waiting to be doused with water. When nothing happened, she opened her eyes to find Beau watching her with a little smirk.
“I guess I don’t owe you big time.”
“I guess you don’t,” she said. “But we still have the faucet, so you might not be off the hook.”
He chuckled and reached to take the wrench from her. She purposely kept a hold of the tool so she could soak up a little more accidental contact. Beau didn’t seem to be in a hurry, even though the space under the sink was growing more and more uncomfortable by the second.
“You’ll have to let go,” he said, moving his fingers over hers. The delicious sensations his touch created effectively blocked any discomfort she felt from the edge of the cupboard.
“I will. I’m only holding on to make sure it doesn’t fall and hit you in the face.”
“I appreciate that.”
They were having another moment from the prolonged eye contact when Miss Nora’s face peered at them. “Hello there,” she said with a grin. “Are you havin’ any luck?”
“Yep,” Beau said, grasping the handle of the wrench firmly. “The connections were loose, but I tightened them up so it shouldn’t drip anymore.”
“Fantastic!” Miss Nora said.
Since the romantic interlude was over, Ashlee dropped her hold on the tool and wiggled her way out from under the sink.
“I asked my daughter if the date we talked about for the party is okay,” Miss Nora said, “but she and her husband already have something scheduled that day.” She showed Ashlee a piece of paper with a few different dates written on it. “Do any of these days work?”
“I can check,” Ashlee said, digging her phone from her front pocket.
Her home screen was filled with alerts from the dating app. It was kind of getting old, and she wished Beau would just ask her out so she could delete it. There was another message from Kade, asking her to let him know if they could hang out so he could make plans.
Miss Nora saw his comment. “Mr. Kade is quite persistent, isn’t he?” she said, wiggling her eyebrows up and down. “And he seems like a nice young man. Do you think you’ll tell him yes?”
Beau stood up and gazed at Ashlee with a simmering and intense look as he wiped his hands with a paper towel. If her dating someone else bothered him so much then why wasn’t he doing anything about it?
“Maybe.” Glancing away from him, Ashlee tapped on her calendar. “What day did you decide to have the birthday party?”
“Either the first or the second will work if you aren’t booked.”
Ashlee tapped on the first and scrolled through her commitments that day. She had daily reminders, like to exercise, or to remember to take her multivitamin, but nothing else. “I’ll text my boss to let her know,” she said, creating another reminder so she didn’t forget.
Miss Barbara returned with the pie. While the two older women dished up the dessert, Ashlee walked over to Beau. He was crouched down again to turn the water off.
“Hey,” she said, when he stood up and didn’t look her way. “Need any help?”
“I got it,” he said, rummaging through the tool box to find a flat-head screwdriver. Then as if he remembered his manners, he looked at her and gave her a small smile. “But thanks for asking.”
Ashlee watched him work for a little while, fascinated he knew what to do. She found him totally sexy and wished they were alone again so she could tell him. Miss Nora asked her to come look over her profile before she submitted it to the dating site, so Ashlee left Beau to do his work.
“It looks good,” she said after reading through it quickly.
“Here goes nothing,” Miss Nora said, clicking on the submit button. She giggled and placed her hand over her heart. “I’m so nervous. What if nobody wants to meet me?”
“I’m sure you’ll get a few bites,” Miss Barbara said. “You’re still an attractive woman, Nora.”
Ashlee hoped a nice man would contact Miss Nora. She appeared younger than her age listed and had a fiery personality to match her hair.
Beau joined them at the table and delivered the verdict on the faucet. “It needs a new valve. We can check online for a replacement part, but if we can’t find it then you’ll need to get a new faucet.”
Miss Nora didn’t want to bother finding a replacement part and told Beau she’d order one online. “I can pay you if you’re willing to install it for me?” she asked, hopefully.
“You don’t need to pay me,” he said, taking a drink from the bottle of water Miss Nora had given him. “It won’t take me long to do.”
The moment of truth was here as Miss Barbara handed out th
e pie. Ashlee was too nervous to take the first bite. She took her time cutting off a small piece with her fork while the others all tasted it.
“This is really good,” Beau said, shooting Ashlee a warm glance.
“Really?” she asked, hoping he was telling her the truth.
“Delicious,” his grandmother concurred.
“I’m so relieved.” Ashlee lifted the fork to her mouth. “I officially know how to make something other than cold cereal.” At least she hoped she could do it again without Addie’s supervision. If she tried it again, she might have to FaceTime her sister-in-law to walk her through the steps.
As if on cue, her phone signaled an incoming FaceTime call from Addie. “I better answer this. It’s my sister-in-law,” she said, scooting her chair back. She exited through the backdoor to a small patio and tapped the accept button to connect the call.
“Oh, thank goodness,” Addie said. “Chase and I were on our way home and saw your car abandoned on the side of the road. We were worried something had happened to you.”
“I ran out of gas,” Ashlee admitted sheepishly. “But you don’t need to worry about helping me.” Glancing quickly over her shoulder to make sure she was alone, she slipped through a gate and made her way to a small grove of trees. “Because Beau rescued me,” she said, making her eyes go wide to indicate how awesome that was.
“Sweet!” Addie said, pumping her fist in the air. “He must have liked the pie.”
“What pie?” she heard Chase ask in the background. “And why did Beau get it instead of me?”
Addie turned her face, presumably to look at her husband. “Because, while you were gone today, I helped Ashlee learn how to make Aunt Janie’s pecan pie. Since Beau didn’t get a slice at the reception, Ashlee decided to take it to him for the first taste test.”
“Poor guy, was it any good?” Chase asked.
“As a matter of fact, yes,” Ashlee said indignantly. “Even his grandmother approved.”
“Anyway,” Addie said, “so you ran out of gas before you even got to his house?”
“No, it’s a long story.” She peeked around one of the trees and saw Beau walking toward her. “I’ll tell you about it later.”
“Everything okay?” Beau asked, nodding toward her phone.
Ashlee held up the screen. “Fine, Chase and Addie saw my car and were worried.”
“Hey, Beau,” Addie said, waving at him.
“Hey,” he said, waving back.
“Thanks for helping Ash out,” Chase hollered.
Addie flipped the phone so they could see Chase driving. Then she turned it back to herself. “Yeah, thank you. I guess Izzy has been a little fussy and asking for her daddy to hold her, so it’s nice we don’t have to stop to get gas.”
“No problem,” Beau said. “I hope Izzy is okay.”
“She’s a daddy’s girl,” Addie said, glancing away from the phone. “I don’t blame her. He is kind of hot.”
Chase said something they couldn’t hear, but it made Addie giggle. Her face appeared on the screen again, her cheeks a light shade of pink. “Y’all didn’t hear that, did you?”
“No,” Ashlee said. “And please don’t tell me what I missed.”
Chase said something else that made Addie snort a laugh. “Um, I think it’s probably time to end this conversation.”
“I think so too.” Ashlee’s phone flashed a warning that she needed to plug her phone in. “My phone’s about to die anyway,” she said and quickly ended the call. She shoved her phone into her pocket and glanced at Beau. “Those two still act like they’re newlyweds.”
“I know,” Beau said. “I hope my wife and I will be the same way.”
Chapter 16
Beau watched Ashlee’s eyes go wide. He hadn’t really meant to say that out loud.
“Your wife?” she asked, as if she believed he already had one and was hiding her or something.
“I guess I should’ve said my future wife.” He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t look so shocked. I plan on getting married one day.”
He shouldn’t have said that out loud either. This was not the conversation he wanted to have with Ashlee right now. He was still trying to wrap his mind around what Miss Nora had said earlier. Although she’d been joking about finding a younger man for a husband this time around, he believed that part of her was being serious. He wished he could flat-out ask her if she regretted marrying an older man.
“Do you have to have a plan for everything?” Ashlee asked abruptly. “Don’t you ever do anything spontaneously?”
Beau had never been impulsive. Joining the Army had been just about the only thing that came close to being impulsive. Still, the decision hadn’t been made in the spur-of-the-moment. He’d deliberated it for a few days before finally going through with it.
He considered her for a few seconds, trying to determine if her question was more of an accusation, because that’s exactly what it felt like— an accusation.
“Are you suggesting I should spontaneously get married?”
Her chin went up defiantly. “Is that something you’re even capable of doing?”
“Spontaneously getting married or getting married in general?” he asked, taking a step closer.
“Both,” she said, like it was a completely reasonable question.
He deliberated about telling her he’d asked his previous girlfriend to marry him, but didn’t want to get into all of that right now. Besides, Ashlee would dig deep enough to discover it had taken him nearly a year of planning before he’d actually proposed.
“I already told you that getting married is part of my future plans.” Taking another step, he closed the distance between them until they were only inches away from each other. “But if I’m going to do something spontaneous, do you really think getting married should be the first thing on my agenda?”
“No, that would be ridiculous.” Challenge glimmered in her light blue eyes. “But there are plenty of things you can do without deliberating every possible outcome.”
“Every action has a consequence, Ashlee.”
“True, but all consequences aren’t dire.” A smile curved her lips, tempting him to jump right into a world of impulsiveness.
He was a heartbeat away from spontaneously kissing her when his phone blared out Start a Band by Brad Paisley, the ringtone he and his two best friends had downloaded specifically for each other a long time ago.
“You better get that,” Ashlee said with a sigh. “The odds are it’s my annoying brother.”
Beau let out a pent-up breath, grateful for the disruption. He pulled his phone out and glanced at the screen. It was Chase. Having Ashlee’s older brother call right in the middle of them kissing would’ve been messed up.
“Hey, what’s up?” he said, hoping he didn’t sound as distracted as he felt.
“Hey, I need Ash to pick up some medicine before she comes home. I tried callin’ her, but her phone’s dead.”
“Who’s sick?” Beau asked.
“Izzy has a low-grade fever. We had enough to give her one dose of ibuprofen, but it would be nice to have more on-hand in case she needs it again.”
“Okay, I’ll tell Ash,” Beau said, meeting her eyes. She looked concerned, so he added, “I’m glad Izzy is doing okay.”
“Thanks, bro. I’ll talk to you later.”
“What’s wrong with Izzy?” Ashlee asked the moment he ended the call.
Beau relayed Chase’s message. While she looked relieved it wasn’t an urgent matter, they both decided it was probably time to go get her car before it got any later.
After saying goodbye to his grandmother and her neighbor, they got into Beau’s car and headed for the nearest gas station. The tension between them was back to normal. Well, their “new normal”, which for him was a continuous level of awareness he knew wasn’t going away.
“Do you care if I charge my phone?” Ashlee asked, pulling a white cord from her purse.
“Go for it,” he said,
removing his charging cord and setting it on the center console.
After she plugged it in, Beau could see her staring at the screen. At a stop sign, he glanced over and saw that, other than the outline of a battery, the screen was blank. “Staring at it won’t make it charge faster.”
“Ha ha,” she said, turning it over. “I admit I’m addicted to technology. I feel like I’m missing out or something when I’m not connected.”
As Beau proceeded through the intersection, he thought about all the guys trying to connect with her on the stupid dating app. He had taken a few minutes to search for Darren Hastings on Facebook and sent him a friend request. But even without being friends, Beau found out all he needed to know from the posts he was able to view. Darren was still into partying, boasting about how drunk he’d been at one party or another.
“Yeah, about that dating site,” he said without looking at her. “You need to block Darren Hastings.”
“Oh really?” The tone of her voice told him she was annoyed with him. “You’ve decided this without even talking to him?”
“Don’t have to talk to him. I friended him on Facebook, and his posts tell me all I need to know.”
“You aren’t on Facebook. You hate social media.”
“See the sacrifices I make to keep you safe?”
“Whatever,” she said, turning her phone over. “By the way, I changed my mind about having you vet my potential boyfriends… you’re fired.”
“You can’t fire me.”
“I just did.”
Beau didn’t argue back, because he actually didn’t want the job of screening potential boyfriends for Ashlee. The truth was he wanted to be her boyfriend. He mentally winced when he considered how Chase would react to that. Shoot, just mentioning that he wanted to date Ashlee could potentially ruin their friendship. It might be too weird for Chase, and he might not ever approve of Beau dating his baby sister. Even if he did give his approval, he and Ashlee might not work out. And then what? He doubted his friendship with Chase would ever be the same.
His fingers tightened on the wheel as he merged into the turn lane. He wished he and Ashlee could date without telling anybody, even if it were just for a week. Without the pressure from her family, Beau would have time to explore these new feelings. He could take her out on a real date, maybe hold her hand. For all he knew, his attraction might fizzle out once he gave himself permission to touch her. And if they kissed during that week… he couldn’t finish his thoughts as warmth flooded his chest. She was making him crazy.
Blue Moon Kisses: Georgia Moon Romance Book 3 Page 15