5. Absolutely Insufferable （and Drop-Dead Sexy）
Selene
“You again?!” I snap, my voice echoing off the bare walls of the town hall assembly room.
I’m already in a terrible mood. I showed up here, swallowing my pride, clinging to the faint, naive hope that Aunt Tina would bend the rules and let me go on the reality show solo.
Instead, the woman reacted with borderline-hysterical enthusiasm, throwing her hands in the air so dramatically that her damn clinking bracelets nearly gave me a headache.
“I have the perfect solution!” she shrieked. “The audience is going to lose their minds! They’ll eat it up!” and a bunch of other nonsense before disappearing into the back room to dig through paperwork.
I came here under duress, looking for a distraction, and to get away from… this.
From these fucking hypnotic blue eyes. From those ridiculous, illegal dimples framing his mouth. From those thick forearms exposed beneath his rolled-up flannel sleeves, corded with veins so prominent they should be illegal that…
Christ, my mouth is watering.
Why do I keep running into this damn cowboy?
“Darlin’…” Ron Willers spreads his massive arms, stopping two steps away from my chair. “It’s a really small town. It’s almost impossible for us not to run into each other.”
He looks so damn smug.
Too smug.
I hate him. I hate his swagger. And, above all, I hate how shamelessly attractive he is with every fiber of my being.
“Tina called me,” he adds, leaning toward me and cupping a hand over his mouth to whisper. As if there’s any risk of someone overhearing us. The room is completely empty; it’s just the two of us and rows of folding chairs.
I mutter a curse to a few pagan deities under my breath.
He smiles. A slow, open smile. What the hell does he find so amusing? I hate his smile. I hate that it’s so hopelessly… irresistible. So disarming. So fucking sexy.
“Pickle?”
He shoves a grease-stained paper bag toward me. His smile grows wider. "They put you in a good mood."
I cross my arms over my chest, pinning him with the coldest glare I can muster. “I’m not your dog.”
Ron takes a step back, pressing a hand to his chest and feigning a dramatic look of pure horror. Too over-the-top, too exaggerated to feel real. “Are you kidding? These are fried. I would never offer these to Ollie. I actually care about his diet.”
I roll my eyes. This man is truly bizarre.
“I meant,” I enunciate clearly, challenging his crystal-clear gaze, “that you can’t offer me food to tame me or get me to do what you want.”
Silence falls for a second. Then Ron’s expression changes. The good-natured playfulness vanishes, instantly replaced by something darker and predatory. His gaze turns shamelessly wicked, sliding from my mouth down the line of my neck.
Oh, damn.
Why do I forget how to breathe when he’s in the room?
“Wanna bet?” he murmurs, his raspy voice dropping lower. “You can play some pretty nice games with food.”
Holy. Fucking. Shit.
My brain completely short-circuits, replaced by an obscene parade of images of him doing exactly what he just said.
Ron Willers wiggles his eyebrows shamelessly, reaches into the bag, and slowly bites into a fried pickle, never taking his eyes off me.
The temperature just spiked, right?
Yeah. There’s no other explanation. I must be having a hot flash. I’m hot. Burning up. I am literally on fire.
“Here you are!”
Aunt Tina’s shrill yell slices through the air, saving me from spontaneously combusting. She barrels back into the room like a tornado, squeezed into an emerald-green dress with massive floral prints that makes her look like a psychedelic flower field. She’s clutching a stack of crumpled papers.
At least it shifts my attention.
“Ron, darling! Thank you for coming so quickly!” she trills, bustling over.
She licks her fingertip to thumb through the pages. Blech. I look away for a second, disgusted.
“You haven’t decided who you’re doing the show with yet, have you?” Tina asks, her eyes gleaming behind her purple glasses.
“No, ma’am,” he replies, slipping right back into his usual insufferable, picture-perfect charm. “I’m still flying solo.”
“PERFECT!” Aunt Tina’s scream makes my ears ring. “I JUST FOUND YOU THE PERFECT MATCH. MEET SELENE DUSK!”
Wait.
Whaaat?
Huh?
Are we insane?!
“Whaaaat?!” I snap, jumping to my feet, horrified and utterly panicked.
In that exact, tiny fraction of a second, Ron Willers pulls off his Stetson, presses it to his chest, and gives me an altogether too-smug smile, that dimple practically victorious on his cheek.
“Pleasure, miss.”
“Stop, you can’t do this!” I snap, snatching up my bag and storming out of the assembly room to chase after him.
Ron has already crossed the threshold and is strolling down the town hall corridor with his usual insufferable king-of-the-world swagger. But when he hears my voice, he slows his pace, glancing back at me over his shoulder.
“Well, look how the tables have turned,” he murmurs. That damn smugness vibrates in his voice. “Now you’re the one chasing me.”
I roll my eyes so hard I’m afraid they might launch straight into the stratosphere. “In your dreams, cowboy.”
He stops completely, leaning one shoulder against the peeling wall of the hallway. “Yeah, well… I’m pretty sure there’s plenty of material for wet dreams between us.”
I freeze in my tracks. I feel my cheeks ignite. I part my lips to blast him with a biting insult, but the words die in my throat when he runs the tip of his tongue over his lower lip, wetting it.
“Come on, I’m just messing with you!” he backpedals, holding his hands up in surrender, though the ghost of a smile still lingers in his blue eyes. “I mean, not really… but I don’t want to upset you. It’s just, well, I didn’t get the feeling that you didn’t have a good time that night…”
“It’s not that,” I cut him off sharply. The last thing I need right now is to keep replaying the memories of that night on a loop. I already do that too much. Way more than I’d like to admit to myself, especially when I’m alone in the dark of my room desperately trying to sleep.
His face lights up instantly. He pushes off the wall and takes a step toward me. “So you did have a good time?”
“Ron!” I scold him, dropping my voice and looking around in a panic.
“I like it when you say my name,” he murmurs, closing most of the distance between us. His voice drops even lower. “You know… it sounds a hell of a lot better than new-cowboy. But hey, call me whatever you want. I’m not picky.”
God, he talks so much. I take a deep breath, trying to gather whatever shred of dignity and rational thought I have left. “Listen… let’s get one thing straight. I am absolutely not looking for a relationship.”
“Me neither.”
My lips part in surprise. Is he lying? I stare into his clear blue eyes, searching for a trace of deceit.
He doesn’t look like a playboy at all; he looks like a fucking human golden retriever ready to fetch you a cold drink on the porch.
But then, the memory hits me hard—how he knew exactly how to make my head spin, and not just my head.
And, most importantly, I remember my golden rule: all men are, inevitably, pieces of shit.
“Okay. Perfect,” I declare, squaring my shoulders. “We’re on the same page.”
Ron smiles. He reaches up, grabs the brim of his black Stetson, and settles it low over his brow with one fluid, shamelessly masculine move.
Since when do I find men in cowboy hats this sexy?
Arrrrgh! I scream in my head, fighting a losing battle against my own traitorous hormones.
“Listen…” I start again, crossing my arms over my chest. “You have to drop out of the show.”
He throws his head back and laughs out loud. A warm, open sound that echoes down the hall. “Not a chance in hell, darlin’! I’m the owner of the haunted ranch,” he declares, suddenly dropping his voice into a dark, theatrical, movie-villain rumble.
A hot, inappropriate shiver runs down my spine. I suddenly have the desperate, insane urge to hear him read my novels out loud. To hear my darkest fantasies, the dialogue of my lords of the night, spoken by him in that raspy, vibrating tone.
God, Selene, get a grip.
“You’re the owner? Why on earth?” I croak, trying to clear my throat.
“Because… I bought it,” he answers simply, shrugging his broad shoulders like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. Then with disarming ease, he points toward the glass doors. “Wanna get some ice cream? There’s a little stand right outside.”
I huff, exasperated by his ability to pivot so smoothly. “Okay, listen to me. I have to do this ridiculous show. I’m contractually obligated. My agent backed me into a corner, and I need some kind of extreme experience to find inspiration and get unstuck on my next book.”
Ron stares at me in silence. The playful amusement fades from his features, and his gaze softens in a way that makes my stomach clench. He steps even closer, invading my personal space.
“Well, what’s the problem?” he whispers, tilting his head. “We’ll do it together. We’ll make a great pair.”
That is the problem.
The problem is that I can’t stop undressing you with my eyes.
The problem is that I haven’t been able to stop fantasizing about you for fourteen damn days.
And I have to stop. I don’t want to complicate my life.
“Come on… I know your books,” he adds, lowering his voice even further into an intimate, almost conspiratorial whisper that brushes against the bare skin of my neck.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Is that my heart? Why is it going crazy at the mere thought of him reading the smut I write?
“I could be a great asset in giving you… inspiration.”
Dammit.
My brain, already hopelessly compromised by his proximity, translates his words into pure, raw eroticism. Sure… for writing certain scenes, doing the show with him could definitely provide more than enough hands-on material.
But… did he mean that? His blue eyes gleam with a silent promise that makes my knees weak.
Yeah, doing a reality show in an isolated house with this man is a massive mistake. A recipe for absolute disaster.
But… do I really have a choice?
Me: Please void the clause forcing me to do the reality show.
Jessica: Not a chance in hell.
Me: It's completely out of line.
Jessica: It's absolutely perfect. you'll thank me.