Chapter 15 #3
A few more people walked in. Two of them were parents of a student I’d had a couple of years ago and then another guy I’d gone to high school with.
They sat at a table on the opposite side of the room from the guys by the window. After I finished taking their order and preparing their drinks, a few more people walked in. We usually got a Wednesday night after-church rush before closing.
Summer tapped me on the shoulder. “You sure you’re okay if I take off?”
“I’m fine. Gideon will be here soon.”
She didn’t look confident. “Okay, but I’ll have my phone on me. Call if you need a ride.”
“He’ll be here.”
“He is here.” A deep voice broke in.
I turned and blinked. A guy with a dusty navy-blue ball cap stood behind me. An olive-green hoodie clung to his broad shoulders, matching the piercing green eyes. “Gideon?”
“You expected someone else?”
Summer’s stare bored into me. Yes, I was gawking at the man I’d married.
“God help me if you have boots on.” My mouth was dry, and my pulse was speeding up. My body knew exactly how this man could make me feel, but seeing him all countryfied was giving me palpitations.
He frowned at his footwear. “They’re new, but they don’t look like it after today.”
I leaned over the counter. He was wearing black square-toed cowboy boots, also as gritty as the rest of him. I groaned. “It’s even better than I imagined.”
Summer choked behind me.
Gideon leaned forward and gave me a peck on the lips. My eyelids fluttered shut like it was my first kiss ever. The pressure of more eyes on me poked into my skin. Was this for show? Or did he want to kiss me in public for more reasons than to cement the idea we were a real couple?
“I’m dirty and irritated,” he murmured against my lips. The brim of the hat shaded his eyes. “This is what gets you?”
My heart thumped a steady beat against my ribs. The guy was fire in a suit. So damn good-looking. But all scruffed up, with his five o’clock shadow showing through the sun- and wind-burnished skin? Be still my raging hormones.
“It makes you look less like you want to punch everyone,” Summer said. “Except now, you look like you want to punch them and then run them over with your tractor.”
“Accurate,” he replied. “Present company excluded,” he finished, tipping his hat.
Aw, he wanted Summer to know he wasn’t insulting her.
“Don’t be so sure. I’ll be a pain in your ass if I think you need it.” She knocked on the counter. “I’ll get going, then. Call me if you need anything.”
I said goodbye to her, and when I looked back at Gideon, he was watching me with those hooded, intense eyes.
There went my butterflies. “Okay, I’m irritated about my brothers keeping me out of their brainstorming for the bar. Why are you irritated?”
His eyes narrowed. “You need to tell your brothers to knock it off.”
“I do.”
“Use the same authority you handled me and Deon with. Pretend your brothers are just third graders who don’t listen well.”
If I did, I might start giggling, but also . . . I talked to my brothers like a younger sister. Maybe I needed to bring more of my teacher persona along for the conversation. “You have a point. Enough about me. Why are you upset?”
The glower returned. “Hank’s work ethic has changed to whatever, whenever. He’s fixing fence that doesn’t need to be repaired. It does, but not by him. And he stopped right in the middle, claiming he had to head to town.”
“Just like that?”
“He didn’t tell me his business, nor did he tell me why he won’t sell to me, other than he lumps me in with some city slicker who’ll hire out a ranch manager.”
“At least you’re a local boy.”
He slid onto a stool. “Meaning the town won’t like it if I hire out a ranch manager?”
I put a large ice cube in a squat glass and dug out my special bottle of bourbon. Autumn’s Summit.
His gaze landed on the bottle. A dry chuckle escaped him. “It never dawned on me before. There’s one for each of you.”
“I thought you banned it from Silver’s premises.”
He took a sip, his jaw moving as he rolled the fluid over his tongue. His throat worked with his swallow. “I make it my business to know my competition.” He studied the fluid in the glass.
I laughed. “You didn’t know I was staying at the Silver last weekend.”
His burning gaze flipped up to mine and held me immobile.
“You knew?”
“I wanted to be notified if a Bailey ever came into the casino. I’d be remiss if I left the Kerrigan sisters out.”
“You were watching me?” I picked up a rag and swiped at the bar. The butterflies went dead silent. Mortification did that to them. “Our meeting wasn’t a coincidence?”
“I wouldn’t say that. Like I said at your mom’s, I was heading to Glitter anyway. Running into you in the elevator was still mildly surprising.”
“Huh.” I should be creeped out. Scandalized. But the sense that we’d been entangled since before we’d met was calming. It gave me hope I shouldn’t have. This was exactly why Summer was worried.
“I have some bad news.”
I stopped wiping the counter. “What?”
“I didn’t have time to get to Bozeman. The good news is that the next drink on my tongue will be you.”