Chapter 9
GINNY
I hear the front door open.
Please be Graham. Please don’t be Everett. Please be Graham. I can’t handle being alone with Everett.
Then I bite the head off the frosted angel sugar cookie I’m holding.
I should be able to handle being alone with Everett. Over the next several years, working together, we’re probably going to be alone together a few times. My heart can not get all tangled up every single time.
Of course, we were not alone at the Come Again for the past couple of hours, but here I am, heart tangled up anyway.
I can’t believe I’m jealous.
But I fucking am.
“I was hoping you’d still be awake.”
I look toward the doorway. It is Everett. Just Everett.
Crap.
“You’re back earlier than I expected,” I say. “How did things go with Jack?”
After karaoke wound down, Jack Bennett and Everett finally had a chance to talk a little business.
Jack has been farming with his dad, Tucker, since he moved back over a year ago.
He plans to take over completely at whatever point Tucker decides to retire, but Tucker is bringing Jack in on everything from buying new animals to equipment purchases to who to hire.
I figured he was the perfect one to talk to about converting his farm with IES and IAS, and I’d been right. He’d been open, asked a lot of great questions, and was eager to meet Everett.
Jack isn’t completely new to farming. He earned an agribusiness degree in college, but he worked for a seed company in Iowa before moving back to Sapphire Falls.
I don’t think Sapphire Falls had been in his long-term plans, but neither had been losing his wife to cancer and becoming a single dad to three young daughters.
He’d moved home for…help. He’d been grieving. His little girls were grieving. He needed his friends and family, of course.
He's getting better. They’re all getting better. But I think Jack has realized he wants to settle here, close to home, with his girls now.
“Great.” Everett settles at the breakfast bar on a stool next to me. “Of course, he already knew everything about the program because you had explained it. And he was excited, because you sold it perfectly. He’s basically ready to sign on the dotted line.”
Everett reaches past me for a cookie, and I can’t help it, I take a big, deep inhale of his cologne.
“Well, that’s great,” I say. “I’ll expect my Christmas bonus by the twenty-fifth.” I bite into my cookie.
He grins and bites into the reindeer he chose. We both chew quietly for a moment.
I’m not getting a bonus because I’m not officially employed by IES until January first, but I don’t mind.
Getting Jack Bennett on board now only benefits IES, and me, down the road.
Besides, January first is only a few days away.
And I’ll be compensated very well when that happens.
The contract Graham and Everett offered me is fantastic.
Of course it is. I know they both value me and know I’ll be a great addition to the company.
Of course, that will also officially make Everett my boss.
But it will be good. For both of us.
I silently repeat everything I’ve been telling myself for the past month: The job will allow me to use all of my professional skills to their fullest, to be appreciated by both our clients and my employers, and to do something truly meaningful with my work.
And I’ll be a huge asset to Everett and Graham, allowing them to expand what IES does, and not only making them more money but helping them do more good in the world. It's a win-win.
And if Everett and I never kiss again, that’s a small price to pay for all of that good.
I take a breath.
With that breath comes another whiff of Everett’s cologne, and I don’t feel any better after all of those words.
So I’ll just keep reminding myself of all of that over and over again until it really sinks in.
“Graham didn’t come home with you?” I ask.
“He and Margot want to spend as much time together as they can. She hasn’t seen him in over a week.”
When Margot and Graham are both in Sapphire Falls, they stay at their respective parents' houses. Separately. I grin, “Poor babies.”
“I was definitely feeling like a third wheel,” he says.
“Well, it’s only fair since Graham’s probably felt that way out in New Mexico,” I say flippantly.
Then I mentally kick myself.
I was not going to mention New Mexico. What the hell? Everett doesn’t need to know that hearing about Sofia bothered me.
It did. But Everett doesn’t need to know that. And it doesn’t matter if it bothers me. I’m the one insisting we can’t have a relationship, and if that’s the case, I can’t expect him not to have any other relationships.
Everett looks at me. “Why would Graham feel like a third wheel in New Mexico?”
Oh my God. He’s going to make me say it. I roll my eyes. “Never mind.”
He shifts so that he can face me more fully. “No, I really want to know.”
“Graham mentioned Sofia,” I say. “He probably just felt a little awkward hanging out with you while you were romancing the new girl.”
I stubbornly do not look at him.
Everett sets his cookie down, brushes his hands free of crumbs. Then he leans his elbow on the bar as he watches me. “What did Graham say about Sofia?”
“That she’s the Spanish me,” I say. Yuck. I hate that.
Everett chuckles.
I look over at him. “That’s funny?”
“Not funny. I guess it’s accurate. I just hadn’t thought of her that way.”
“Is it accurate?” I ask.
“Well, she’s the daughter of the man we want to do business with. She’s smart and knows everything about her father’s business, so she often comes to meetings and helps interpret. Actually, literally sometimes, because her dad’s first language is Spanish.”
“And she’s gorgeous from what I hear,” I say. Fuck it. If I’m going to embarrass myself, I might as well go all in.
“She’s very beautiful,” Everett agrees.
I do not want to talk about this. I pop the last bite of my cookie into my mouth and turn to leave.
Everett's hand on my arm stops me. “Ginger.”
That fucking nickname. I look back at him. “What?”
“Is that why you left the bar early? Not because you thought Jack and I should talk, but because Graham mentioned Sofia?”
That was exactly why I left the bar early. I sigh. “Your ego is out of control.”
He grins. “That’s not a no.”
“If you have a new girlfriend, good for you. But you need to quit flirting with me. Quit saying things like you miss me.”
His hand tightens around my arm. “I do not have a new girlfriend.”
“Well, I know you just met Sofia. But it sounds promising. Graham says she really likes you.”
“Did Graham tell you how I feel about her?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“Well, maybe you should. But ask me.”
This reminds me of our time in the kitchen after Thanksgiving.
The light above the sink is the only light besides the ambient light from the yard.
The room smells like sugar and vanilla. It’s warm and cozy, full of memories.
And I love that he seems so comfortable here. He’s also so damn good-looking.
“Fine, how do you feel about Sofia?”
“I’m glad we have her help with this project.
She’s helping us ease her father's concerns about our proposal and is talking with other area farmers who know her family well. If her father decides to work with us, four of his friends will as well. She understands the science behind what we’re doing and is enthusiastic about the positive environmental impact.
” His gaze tracks all over my face. “And I kind of like that she’s making you jealous. ”
“I’m not jealous,” I say. But we both know that’s not true.
He stands so he’s towering over me. Then he leans, bracing both hands on the counter behind me, very in my personal space.
My entire body reacts. It heats, my nipples harden, my clit tingles. Every inch of my body wants him to touch it.
“I was invited to stay out there,” he says. “And all I could think about was getting here. To see you. One smile from you in your mom’s bakery was worth the trip.”
I shake my head. “That’s what I mean. You have to stop saying stuff like that.”
“If I had a girlfriend, I wouldn’t say it.”
“I can’t be your girlfriend. Even if I get jealous about gorgeous women named Sofia in New Mexico.”
“Then just be the woman that I eat Christmas cookies with and obsess over for the next few days.”
“Is that really enough?” I ask him.
“No. But if that’s all I can have, that’s what I’ll take.”
What am I supposed to say? I like him. I want him. I like that he wants me. Too much. And yes, I’m willing to buy this whole he’s not really my boss right now to make these quiet, intimate moments in the kitchen okay. “Okay,” I say softly.
“You didn’t ask me what eating Christmas cookies with me is like,” he says, his voice gruff, his gaze on my lips.
I smile. Probably because I hope what he’s going to say is going to be very dirty.
“What is eating Christmas cookies with you like, Everett?”
“Well… it gets kind of messy.”
“I’m not very good at messy,” I admit. I’m really fucking trying to avoid it, in fact.
“Me either. That’s why this is such a good idea. We could probably both use a little stickiness in our lives.”
Oh my God. He’s kind of a dork, but I really like him. And I really want to get sticky with him.
I reach over and grab a Santa face cookie. I swipe a finger through his white beard, then paint it over my lower lip. “Like this?” I ask.
He leans in and licks the frosting off my lower lip. I make a little moaning sound.
I lean back. “Kind of. But not exactly what I was thinking.”
One of the things I love best is his bluntness, so I say, “Tell me what you were thinking.”
“Ginger, you will make me the happiest man on this planet if you let me lick buttercream frosting off of your nipples.”
See? Never fails. I think my entire body clenched with that one.
Then I don’t say anything, but I set the cookie down. I reach up and unzip the hooded sweatshirt I’m wearing.