Chapter Three #3
“Well, you don’t look a thing like your brother Baker.
” She pushed her glasses atop her head to scrutinize me closely.
Then she lowered them back to her nose. “Nope, no family resemblance at all, which, given Baker’s past behaviors, is a good thing.
” Her smile was bright. Baker’s drunken shenanigans paled in comparison to what I’d done on that dark night in February.
“I’m Wendy Pebbles, Aiden’s aunt on his mother’s side.
We have a lot of Pebbles in the county. Our ancestors were some of the original settlers of Bastian Grange.
There had been rumors that one of my kin was set up to marry Isiah Bastian, but she came down with a fever and died.
Tragic, isn’t it? We could have been related. ”
“Yes, tragic.” I had no clue what to say about a lady who died over a hundred fifty years ago or whatever. “Did Adian mention anything to you about me coming out?”
“Mm-hmm. You’re to help with his backlog of notes.
Not a moment too soon either!” The phone rang.
She held up a finger to take the call. I stood there with my hat in my hands until she got a horse in need of a Coggins test scheduled.
“Right, so yes, he did say you were coming. Let me go fetch him. He had an early call for a bad calving out at the Spillman farm and needed to shower when he got back. Can you watch the phone while I dash over to his house?”
“Oh. Yes, okay.” I slid around the desk, sat down, stared at the computer screen with a bouncing calf screensaver, and moved my sight to the phone.
Wendy rushed off through a side door, the spring on the screen door twanging.
She returned a moment later. I shot to my feet to vacate her seat. “No one called.”
“You did well. He’s coming right along,” she said and sat back down and opened some files on her computer.
A schedule, by the looks. The twang of the spring pulled my eyes from the screen to Aiden coming in.
My mouth dried up like a desert. He was shirtless, with dark, wet hair, wearing jeans that were too tight and too low.
I think he was carrying a shirt. Not sure.
I couldn’t focus on anything but all that manly flesh.
My gaze darted to his nicely furred chest to the deep Adonis belt that turned the Sahara in my mouth to an ocean.
Swallowing the drool, I yanked my gaze from his tight belly to his face.
He smiled lightly, one corner of his mouth twitching before a confident grin nearly knocked me to my ass.
“Nice to see you, Ford.” He walked right up to me, hand out, the brisk scent of his soap or shampoo—maybe both—enveloping me.
I clasped his hand. “You smell nice.”
Shit. Shit. Why did I say that out loud?!
“Thanks.” He chuckled as we shook hands. His grip was strong, fingers rough, hands of a working man for sure. “It’s a marked improvement, trust me. I was up to my shoulder in a very stressed cow.”
“Oh, is she okay?” I pumped his hand madly but couldn’t seem to stop. For some reason, he let me.
“She’s fine now, and the baby is as well. It was an unplanned breeding. Bulls do have a way of busting through fences when they’re in the mood for love.”
Wendy rolled her head around to watch us over her glasses.
“Maybe you should show him the back office, Aiden?” Wendy interjected into our stupidly long shake session. Cheeks hot, I released his hand as if it were a rattler.
“I’m not sure if I should. He might take one look at the boxes of printed notes and hightail it out of here.
” He gave me that wink of his, pulled his shirt over his wet hair, which was a damn shame, and waved me into a room that used to be an exam room.
Inside, there was a desk with a lamp, an inflatable raft still inflated, a life-size cardboard cutout of Woody from Toy Story, and two stacks of egg-shipping cases. “So the boxes are my notes.”
I looked at him in shock and horror. He had the good grace to grow sheepish.
It only made him sexier. “Yeah, I know. They start maybe in 2020. During the pandemic, I sort of lost interest in being neat about such things and…yeah, well, I kept being lazy. Paperwork and I are in a love/hate relationship. Actually,” he rubbed at the back of his neck, “it’s more a hate/hate relationship.
I’d never end up lying in bed, spent, sharing a cigarette with a stack of invoices. ”
“Only thing he won’t take to his bed,” Wendy shouted from the front.
Aiden snorted in amusement and shrugged. “She’s not totally wrong. Can I help it if I enjoy the company of a handsome man instead of boring old medical notes?”
“Uhm. No?” I ripped my sight from those beautiful dark brown eyes. Staring at the boxes of papers to be put into order helped keep my dick from growing fully hard. “This is a mess.”
“It is, but I have no doubt that you’ll have it whipped into shape in no time. So do you think you want to tackle this job?” He waved at the egg-shipping cases. I shouldn’t have glanced over at him, but I did. Foolish, weak man that I am. And I got just as lost in his eyes as I always did.
“Yes, I will tackle this job.”
“You’re amazing. Thank you, Ford.”
Happiness sprouted deep in my breast. I couldn’t wait to get home and tell the family. They were always nudging me to be more outgoing. They’d be so pleased.