13. You Make Me Hard Drinking Coffee
YOU MAKE ME HARD DRINKING COFFEE
WILLA
“Remanded into custody. Remanded into custody? You literally used the phrase remanded into custody to the medical staff and had it printed on my discharge papers. I have no words.”
“On the contrary, you’ve had nothing but words for me for the last hour.” The corner of his mouth tips up from his spot in the driver’s seat of my car.
I want to growl.
I have no clue how he got it from my house or found the keys.
I know I’m not firing on all cylinders. Between the whack to the head, the meet-cute with the sidewalk, and the lack of caffeine, my cognitive skills are compromised.
Who am I kidding? That’s the lack of caffeine alone. The other two just add to the fun.
“Does the warden allow coffee?”
“The warden encourages coffee, its consumption, and will head to the ward’s favorite dispensary at her request.”
“Are you always this cute?”
“Cute, Miss Jayne,” he pauses for dramatic effect, turning to meet my gaze, “is the wrong word to describe me.”
“Yeah, you’re seriously cute,” I add. “There!” I point to a coffee kiosk in the middle of a parking lot ahead and bounce a little in my seat until I remember it hurts. “Ugh! So over this. When can I take something?”
“With your coffee. Besides, the caffeine will send it through your bloodstream faster. It’ll be accelerated even more so with sugar.”
“Gosh,” I say, like a teenager from the sixties. “Today must be my lucky day.”
He says something, but it’s quiet and under his breath, but I catch the ending. “What’d you say?”
“Nothing, dragon slayer.” A wicked grin breaks across his face as he pulls into the line of cars at the drive-through.
“Try again.”
“Let me enunciate, then. I said, ‘I’d like to fuck that smart mouth.’”
I gasp and move my hand to my mouth, pretending to be appalled. “Mr. Ranger, how could you? What do my papers say about that?”
“About what?”
“About you fucking my smart mouth.”
“I swear, Willa Jayne, you might just be the perfect woman.”
“This is true,” I deadpan. “Extra-large mocha, extra shot, extra whip, and a pastry with fruit, like a blueberry muffin or a cranberry scone.” I stare at the menu as if it holds the answers to all my problems. To be fair, it holds the answer to the most pressing one.
“And a large black coffee, please.”
“Sure,” the woman at the window replies. “Did you want the muffin or the scone?”
“Both,” we reply in unison.
“Jinx!” I throw out there.
He shakes his head and mumbles something about women in his life being born in the wrong decade. I don’t question it though, since he passes warm cardboard cups through the window, and the smell of coffee wafts inside the car.
It highlights the brisk—well, brisk for Texas—spring morning, and I look out the foggy windshield and hum with my first sip.
“You have no idea what you do to me, do you?” Exton asks as he pulls the car back onto the highway and rolls up his window. My window, but that’s semantics.
“What do you mean?”
“Woman, you make me hard drinking coffee. This does not bode well for me.”
The smile that splits my face is real. That feeling is becoming normal when I’m with Exton, and I like it.
“Where are we going?” I finally ask after several minutes on the road and enough coffee to be coherent.
“The ranch.”
“I… I can’t go to the ‘ranch.’ One, I don’t even know where it is. Two, I have no clothes for being on a ranch. Three, I have clients and appointments today and the shop opens at noon on Fridays. Four, I don’t know what four is, but I’m sure it’s legitimate.”
“One, it’s southwest of here by another forty-five minutes.
Two, you don’t need ‘ranch clothes’ as you won’t be working.
Besides, Bright can probably take care of you.
Three, the owner called your clients, explained the situation, and your head injury”—he emphasizes the word while holding my gaze—“and rescheduled you. Four, remanded into custody, remember?”
“What’s Bright?”
“Brighton is my pesky, but brilliant, little sister. She’s a little shorter than you, and lives in town, but still has a room at Pop’s house. I’m sure there are some jeans and sweatshirts that will work.”
“Shit. You’re taking me to meet the family?”
“In all fairness, you met half of them last night.”
“I wasn’t thinking straight last night and didn’t put that all together.”
“It’ll be fine. They’re low-key. Layton lives near the lake, so he may come by but isn’t always there. Braxton’s house is on the property. Brighton comes and goes, sometimes with her dog in tow. And there’s Pop.”
“Whose name is…?” I leave it dangling. “Can’t very well call him Pop.”
“Kimpton.”
“Kimpton, Exton, Brighton, Layton, Braxton? What’s your mom’s name?”
“Emilia. Mom’s name was Emilia.”
“Was?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thanks.”
We drive in silence, enjoying the bright morning sun after the haze burns off, and eventually take enough twists and turns that I’m lost.
We turn onto a dusty drive with a metal gate that has two horses reared up at each other with the word Ranger on it.
Holy shit.