Chapter 16
All I want for Christmas is you…naked.
The first official day of the festival was wrapping up and Scout was beyond exhausted—but also riding a high like no other.
This was the first year she’d done it alone. Well, alone wasn’t right because there’d been a huge team of people helping her and she would be forever grateful. But it was the first year without her grandpa and she hadn’t bombed.
And she’d sold out everything from her personal booth of goat soaps and other small gifts, so she was glad she’d opted to add a booth this year.
Her grandpa had always said she shouldn’t and she’d never disagreed with him—out loud.
But it felt good to do things her own way.
Being responsible for everything on the farm, including herself and her animals, she needed to make money any way she could.
As she headed across the makeshift parking lot (a field she’d sectioned off for the event) to pick up some trash left behind, she waved as Chloe, the woman who ran one of the food trucks, pulled out.
“Scout?”
She turned to find Zack Willman following her.
She was surprised he was still here since almost everyone had gone home.
She still needed to clean up then collapse into a heap.
But also shower. And probably eat. At least Hudson had been in charge of feeding most of the animals.
She still needed to check on her girls, but that would be later.
“Mr. Willman.”
His smile was tight and she couldn’t help but wonder where Hudson was. “You can call me Zack.”
She nodded politely, but kept walking. She wanted to make sure she stayed within sight of others still cleaning up. “Okay.”
He kept pace with her as she picked up another stray piece of trash, surprising her by picking up a couple wrappers and bottle caps himself. “I wanted to talk to you the other night at the diner but wasn’t sure I should do it in front of your…boyfriend?”
She simply smiled again, still wary. There were enough people around within shouting distance that she didn’t feel unsafe. “Talk about what?”
“I know I’ve brought it up before, but I would like to seriously talk to you about buying some of your property.
Just along the border of our lands. I’m looking at about forty acres or so.
And for the record, I didn’t realize my brother was over here hassling you, so I apologize for that again.
He gets ahead of himself sometimes and just doesn’t think. ”
She hoped her expression didn’t give her away.
She wasn’t good at lying. At least she had her sunglasses on even though the sun was setting.
“I’m not averse to that idea.” Lies. “But I want to get through the holiday rush and the festival before deciding anything. If you have an idea of exactly what land you’re looking at and the amount you’re willing to pay, send it to me and I’ll let my Realtor and lawyer look it over. ” She still needed to find a lawyer.
“Oh, okay then.” He seemed surprised by her answer.
She frowned at him. “Were you not serious about buying?”
“No, I mean yes, I am. I just thought…never mind.” His body language relaxed as he smiled at her again. “Okay. I’ll get a proposal together and send it to you. I’ve got your email address.”
Okay, then. At least she’d managed to put him off for now. And she really did want to get through the festival. And sleep tonight. Because her whole body was tired. This was a different kind of tired than from her normal daily chores though. It wasn’t just physical exhaustion.
This was the kind that stemmed from having to talk to people all day.
By nature she was an introvert, and today had been a whole lot of interaction.
And there would only be more of it for the next two weeks.
She was playing around with changing things next year to only one week, then adding a couple other festivals throughout the year to freshen things up.
She liked the people of Candy Cane for the most part, but it was still mentally draining to have to interact with people all day when she was used to solitude.
Her llamas were a lot easier than humans.
Speaking of, she needed to find them. And Hudson. For most of the day she’d had him within her line of sight. It had almost been as if he’d been trying to stay close to her—or maybe that was wishful thinking.
But now she didn’t see him or Sarah anywhere.
By the time she made it to one of her girls’ favorite places to shelter—near the chicken coop—she could hear Hudson and Sarah talking in hushed tones nearby.
Instead of revealing herself, Scout eased up to the outside of the shelter, feeling only a little bad at eavesdropping.
Okay, lies; she didn’t feel bad at all. She wanted to know everything about Hudson, even if she’d been mostly avoiding him the last week. But come on, getting involved with a temporary worker she barely knew was a terrible idea. Even if he was the sexiest man she’d ever met.
And she’d been replaying his words in her head for a solid week. He wanted to kiss her. And she wanted that too, very much.
So. Much.
“I’m telling you, I recognized him,” Sarah said. “I don’t know for sure, but his face is familiar and it’s driving me crazy. I just can’t place where I know him from. I wish I could have gotten a proper picture of him.”
“You got half his face, that’s something.”
“I guess,” she grumbled. “I don’t like how he kept his face angled down so that none of the cameras got a good picture either. It was like he had similar training. Even if he didn’t know where the cameras were—and how would he—he was clearly avoiding any possible ones.”
“I know. And Elli just got back to me, said she can’t find his face anywhere online. None of her facial recognition software searches turned up anything. Even half of it should have yielded something.” This from Hudson. His voice was tight, tense.
She wondered who they were talking about.
“Well then, what are the chances he’s like us? I’m thinking he’s really good.”
There was a long beat of silence. “I need to get a tracker on his vehicle in case he is like us. I won’t risk it if he’s here to hurt Scout.”
Like us? Hudson had told her he’d been black ops, just dropped that bomb the other night. Maybe Sarah had been too? It was hard to imagine that looking at her, but something was going on and she wanted answers.
“If he comes back tomorrow, we’ll know something is up.”
Okay, she was done eavesdropping. She moved quickly, her dusty boots silent as she rounded the front of the green and white shelter for the llamas. “What are you guys talking about?” she demanded, earning surprised looks from both of them.
Sarah blinked at her, looked at Hudson, then stalked off without another word.
“Seriously?” Scout called out. “Coward!” Then she focused on Hudson, who was trying to bypass her. “Talk, now.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.” He was moving fast, his longer legs eating up more distance than hers, so she had to half-jog to keep up.
The sun was mostly set by now and the sensor lights combined with all the Christmas ones had lit the place up as if they were right downtown. “Hudson, I’m not letting this go.”
He didn’t slow, but made a beeline straight for her house.
So she kept pace with him, her annoyance skyrocketing with every step. “You can’t ignore me forever,” she added once they reached the back porch. “And the door is unlocked.” She’d stopped by earlier and hadn’t bothered to lock it since almost everyone had been gone at that point.
“I’m not ignoring you.” He opened the door for her and she went in first.
As soon as he shut the door behind them, she turned and poked him in the chest. “Whatever is going on, you’re going to tell me.
What does ‘like us’ mean?” She poked him again, advancing on him until he was pressed up against the back door.
“And who is Elli, and why is she running facial recognition software? Are you still in black ops or whatever? Was that even real?” She had more questions, like who the hell they thought was a threat?
Clearly it had been someone at the festival today.
She hadn’t seen anyone that looked off. Her stupid ex hadn’t shown up at least. And even Zack Willman had been normal enough. Not that she trusted him, but that couldn’t be who they were talking about because he was a known entity. They wouldn’t have to run his face through software.
It had to be a stranger.
“I’ve already told you that I won’t lie to you.”
“You’re damn right you won’t. I feel like I’ve been pretty flexible about some of your choices. I haven’t asked a lot of questions with…things,” she stressed.
She was pretty sure that Hank and Lane were gone for good, and well, that was that.
They’d tried to kill her and her girls, had wanted to burn down her farm.
She was trying really hard to compartmentalize all that and had shocked herself by doing a good job of it.
But that didn’t mean she was going to look the other way about everything.
When he didn’t respond, just stared at her, she resisted the urge to stomp her foot. Because she wasn’t Lucy. “So, what? You just aren’t going to talk to me?” She poked him in the chest again and to her surprise, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her close.
She sucked in a breath at the sudden contact, her entire body going rigid, then melting into him as if she had no sense.
And maybe she didn’t where he was concerned. She’d been obsessing about the man with dark, soulful eyes who’d been looking out for her since he’d shown up at her farm, and oh, was he leaning down to kiss her?
Yep.
Was she going to stop him?
No. Hell no.