Chapter 26
Magnolia
I didn’t quit.
Was I helpful? Probably not.
But I didn’t quit, and that’s something I’m really happy with myself for because my body hurts. I hurt so badly that I would like to just lie down on this gravel driveway and die.
But I’m not going to get to do that because Max and Nash are coming from the barn.
I told them I was going to head up to the house and start cooking dinner, but I haven’t been able to walk up the slight incline toward the lodge.
I hear their voices behind me and turn to look, embarrassed that they’ve caught me still standing here.
“I thought you were going up to the house?” Max asks.
“I was just admiring the view,” I manage to spit out.
Nash gives me a knowing smile, and he walks over to stand in front of me.
“Are you a little sore from that horse ride?” he asks with a cheeky grin. His arm brushes against mine and even in my exhausted state I’m very aware of him.
He still smells good even after a day of working. Modern-day deodorant deserves a Nobel Prize.
I scrunch up my nose and look up at him. “Not really.”
His grin widens. “All right. I’ll race you up the hill.”
I glower at him. “Fine. I might be a very teeny, itsy-bitsy sore.”
“See? That wasn’t so hard to say,” he says with a chuckle.
“Actually, it was pretty difficult,” I snap.
“It’s a good thing you waited for us to come out then,” he says with a grin, and then he bends down and lifts me into his arms and starts walking toward the house.
“Nash, put me down.” I attempt to wiggle out of his hold, but I’m too tired to put up much of a fight.
Nash ignores me and keeps walking.
“It was going to take you another year to get up to the house. I figured I might as well carry you.”
“I am not light. Put me down. You’re gonna strain something.”
Nash pretends to drop me, then catches me when I shrink back, pulling me up even higher and closer to his chest. “I promise I will not drop you.”
“Maybe she just wants someone bigger and stronger to carry her,” Max butts in.
Nash gives him a flat look. “Let me know when you find someone.”
Max throws back his head and laughs, taking off his cowboy hat and tapping it against his leg. “You two are too funny. I’m glad you found such a great fake fiancée, Nash. Why don’t you just keep her? I didn’t hear a single word of complaint from her today.”
“Magnolia is good people. We should see what we can do about keeping her,” Nash agrees.
Something jumps in my chest at his words. I know he’s just teasing, trying to make me feel at ease and not embarrassed about the fact that I’m sore after a day of physical labor. But hearing him say he wants to keep me in some way gives me an odd case of butterflies in my stomach.
“I am so embarrassed that I can’t even walk.”
“Don’t be,” Nash says. “You spent a long time riding horses this morning and the rest of the day working hard. It’s a big switch from an office job, and you jumped right in and worked alongside us. You’re better than most people we can hire.”
I know he doesn’t mean all people because that would be a blatant lie, but he is sweet to tell me that I was helpful. Maybe after today, I can add “calf ear piercer” to my resume.
“I was going to go to the house and make some dinner, but then I was having trouble walking up the driveway,” I admit.
Nash says, “I don’t think we have any food in the house anyway. We’re gonna have to go into town and get something to eat.”
I do my best to smile, but the thought of having to go into town and possibly walk into a store and do some grocery shopping, then come home and cook dinner sounds miserable.
Nash seems to pick up on my thought trail and says, “Don’t worry.
There’s a great bar and grill in town. We like to go get hamburgers and fries and milkshakes after a long day of work.
It makes those sore muscles feel one million times better.
I promise there’s something magical in those milkshakes. ”
I smile at him. “I guess you would be the expert since you live here.”
Nash stops at the beginning of the sidewalk to the lodge. “Oh, I definitely am,” he says, giving me a wink.
I could get lost swimming in that gaze, I’m sure of it. Those eyes make me feel like I’m the only woman in the world he would dream of looking at. They’re the kind of eyes that make me want to tilt my head to the side and kiss him.
My eyes widen as I realize I’m slowly leaning toward him.
Thankfully, my wayward thoughts are interrupted.
“I’ve got to run over to my house and get cleaned up,” Max says, ruining the moment.
“We can take my truck into town.” Then he turns and heads to the bunkhouse behind the lodge.
I didn’t even see the bunkhouse when we pulled in last night because it’s down a path behind the main house.
But Max calling it a bunkhouse is slightly comical since it’s an adorable two-story farmhouse.
Nash explained earlier today that Max lives here only sometimes because he splits his time between this ranch, and the other half of the ranch which is forty-five minutes away.
“Why did you come here then?” Nash asks him.
“I didn’t want to miss the show.” He grins and hurries to leave. Nash’s glare is probably burning a hole in the back of Max’s shirt.
“You know, you can set me down now,” I tell Nash. Before I do something that will embarrass both of us, I think.
“I could, but there’s a bathtub upstairs that you might like to take a closer look at.”
“A big one?” I ask, shifting my arms to rest one behind his neck and the other on his far shoulder. “A bath sounds like a little piece of heaven.”
“I’m not gonna lie,” he says while carrying me up the stairs. “I’m sore today too. Too much time in town doing office work.”
He’s only slightly winded by the time we reach the top, and I realize that this man has carried me all the way from the barn, up a fairly inclined driveway, to a big house, and upstairs. He really is all that.
“I’m not going to lie; I think I could get used to being carried around. Where have you been on my regular leg days?”