Chapter Nine
Grady
“Grady?”
Dammit, I curse under my breath, Parker’s big voice booming through Dusty’s Dry Goods as I wheel my cart around the wine aisle, still deciding between red and white. I knew I should have taken the quick drive over to Carson City and gone to the Super Mart one town over instead.
“Parker?” I ask, as if it could be anyone else striding big as you please straight up to me and my overloaded shopping cart. “What are you doing here?”
Naturally, Pistol Creek’s most eligible bachelor is swinging a little basket from one of his big, rawboned hands. “I should ask you the same,” he says, admiring my wares with a practiced eye. “Aren’t you supposed to be babysitting our Hollywood VIP this week?”
“I was,” I gush, glad I’ve just covered my most embarrassing future purchases in a layer of hot dog and hamburger buns. “But I’ve got him all tucked in for the night, so I figured ... why not do a little shopping while I’ve got the chance, right?”
His shrewd eyes take in the contents of my cart like an FBI agent studying a perp through binoculars from his stakeout car across the street. “Sure thing,” he muses, not buying it for a minute. Not one stinkin’ minute. “They having a sale on buns, or are you just stocking your freezer, Bro?”
“Just, you know...” I scratch the back of my neck awkwardly, looking as out of place as I feel in my suddenly countrified getup.
I may be from Pistol Creek, born and bred.
But Country Boy? Not really my style, if we’re being honest. “I’ve been going nonstop since the move from campus, so .
.. just taking a little ‘me time,’ you know?
” I’m talking too loudly. I do that when I get nervous. Or horny.
And suddenly? Tonight? I’m a little bit of both.
“Uh huh.” He ignores me completely, reaching in to scrape away the hot dog buns to find the hidden gems underneath. “Heart-covered boxer shorts?” he teases prissily, picking them right the fuck up and waving them around like a flag on Independence Day. “These for ‘me time,’ Grady?”
He’s giggling as I try to snatch them away, his rugged athleticism far superior despite my longer arms. “Yes, Parker,” I hiss, scanning the wine aisle for random passersby and, thankfully, finding none at the moment.
“If you must know, I love wearing themed boxer shorts during ‘me time.’ Now give them the fuck back.”
“Fine, yes.” He sighs, taking a gander at the waistband before tossing them right across my face, the former jock prick that he is. “And don’t take this the wrong way, but ... you’re not a medium anymore, kiddo.”
Even though they’re not for me, obviously, I’m still pretty fucking offended. “They run big here, okay, asshole?”
Parker’s still chuckling, rifling through my wares as big as you please. “Sure they do, Kid. You buy all your undergarments at Dusty’s?”
“Hardly, but I didn’t want to make a bunch of stops along the way, you know.”
“Sure,” he oozes triumphantly, having dug all the way to the bottom of my cart. “That would explain the candles and bubble bath and more candles and ... condoms? Hold up, player ... edible condoms?”
“Parker! Jesus!”
He chuckles, giving up his fun and hoisting his hands in mock surrender. His basket swings in the process, revealing a surprisingly similar shopping list in his own mini-cart. “I could ask you the same thing, Bucko,” I tease, finally having the upper hand.
An uncharacteristic blush crosses his chiseled face like clouds across a wide, barren plain. “Fine, you caught me, Grady. My afternoon delight fling with Ginny turned into a ... well ... late-night rendezvous, I suppose you’d say.”
“Good for you,” I gush, eager to toss the hot potato of questionable shopping cart contents back in his lap. “Better hurry before she gets cold feet.”
“Not a chance,” he oozes with his usual big dick swagger. “After that loving I gave her this morning? It’ll be months before that gal cools down.”
“Gross.”
Seeing my disgust, Parker piles it on all the more. “Oh yeah, Kid. I’m going to need oven mitts just to smack her ass when I get back to her place.”
“Jesus.” I bury my head in my hands. Why, oh why didn’t I just go to Carson City in the first damn place?
“Anyway, enough about me, Lover Boy.”
“Waddya mean?” I sputter. “This is ... this is just a little stocking up trick for another lonely night on my own.”
“Save it for your stepmother,” he drawls, dragging his phone out of his back pocket like some teenage girl about to take a selfie of her latest coffee concoction. “Juniper Junction gets a little lonely after dark, what with all those other empty cabins around.”
“What ... what ... whatever do you mean?”
He rolls his eyes, swiping a few times across his phone screen until he shows it to me: a crystal clear view of the “Y’all Come in Now” welcome mat in front of Cabin #3.
“Don’t worry,” he teases, yanking the phone away before I can see what else he’s got pulled up on the screen.
“Renter’s Rules say we can only have exterior cameras in the new development, so .
.. as long as you don’t go streaking later, your secret’s safe with me. ”
“What secret?” I huff, struggling to regain my ground. Cameras! The stupid front door cameras. How could I have forgotten? “Chet had a room booked at Betty’s Bed & Breakfast and—”
“God no!” Parker has the same reaction I did: abject terror! “No wonder you whisked him away to a deserted development no one else has moved into yet!”
“I didn’t, that’s not ... why,” I insist. “It was just the first property I could think of where we’d be sure to have a vacancy.”
“Sure it is.” Parker sighs, nodding at my disassembled cart, hot dog buns, and burger patties scattered to all four corners. “And this is just some big oversized Welcome Basket, I suppose?”
I sag with defeat. “If you must know,” I insist, since he’s just going to see me on the front door camera in a few minutes anyway. “After our not-so-very meet-cute this morning, I took your advice, apologized and, well...”
“One thing led to another, huh?” His phone is bleating, a familiar sound since I hear it from across the hallway all day and night. “Damn, this girl just can’t get enough.”
He silences it, but I can see him inching gently away, as if maybe Ginny’s not the only one who “just can’t get enough” lately. “Lucky you,” I blurt before I can help it.
He winks, flicking the brim of his cowboy hat for good measure. “From what I could see earlier?” he teases, wagging his phone before taking the call. “You should have no problem getting lucky tonight, partner.”
“Ginny!” He beams into the phone speaker, swaggering off in his too-tight jeans, well-worn cowboy boots thundering across the vinyl laminate flooring beneath them. “Hold your horses, sweetheart. I’m almost to the ‘Ten Items or Less Aisle.’”
I chuckle at the interaction, so predictably embarrassing and yet? Somehow? So fitting. After all, who better to catch me shopping for a romantic date night than the one guy in Pistol Creek who knows which way my hog swings?