Chapter 17 #2
Once the deal was finalized for his new land, Knox intended to ask Lottie to move to Spanish Fort and help him build an estate on a little larger plan.
He envisioned ten new homes with five acres of land for each one.
While he was getting the land marked off, wells drilled, and electricity for each place, and all the building permits taken care of, he would begin advertising for prospective buyers.
He was pretty sure his sister Bo and her husband would be the first ones to jump on the chance.
The prospective buyers could design their own homes, or they could work with him to draw up blueprints.
Lottie could move her trailer to the backyard, and after a while, he would ask her to move into the house with him. If they proved that they could live and also work together, they could possibly wind up in a permanent relationship.
Knox silently scolded himself for making big plans after being only two kisses into the real deal. He warned himself to back up and slow his roll. Just because his brothers had found their soulmates was no sign that he had to jump into the fire.
Lottie laid out the first board and measured the next one. “What are you thinking about? You’ve got that look on your face.”
“What look?” Knox frowned.
“The one that says something is going on in your mind,” she replied.
“I was making plans for the future, which is crazy, because I don’t even know if the plans I am making will work.”
She laid the second board down. “Ain’t that the truth, but what is it that has you in a turmoil?”
“I have quite a bit of equipment, but I wouldn’t mind buying some of this extra stuff from Jack when this project is finished.” He didn’t actually lie since he had been thinking about that very thing.
“It will most likely go to Walter since he’s the one buying out the business,” Lottie said with a long, drawn-out sigh. “You disappoint me.”
“What did I do?”
“You could have said that you were arguing with yourself about kissing me,” she teased.
He slid a wicked wink her way. “That could be arranged, but I’m not sure I could stop with one. And right now, we should probably work, and kiss later. I promise I will not disappoint you again.”
“I’ll hold you to that promise.”
She finished laying out the sill plates, picked up a second drill, checked the battery, and began to sink the pilot holes for Knox. “Hey, I forgot to ask about Cheeto. I didn’t hear him crowing this morning. Did he die?”
“How did you get from kissing to drunk roosters so fast?” Knox asked.
“I have an Oprah mind,” she answered.
“What is that?”
She picked up a high-powered drill. “It means that I can multitask.”
“ He must still have a hangover because he didn’t crow when I peeked under the towel this morning. I will let him out of his jail cell this evening. He is eating and drinking water, so I think he will live,” Knox answered.
“Then I will use the earplugs tonight.”
Knox followed behind her with the heavy bolts needed to hold the plates down so that the walls could be firmly attached to them.
Lottie’s father had been right that framing out a house was a lot like building a family.
Love made the foundation firm. Sill plates were like the commitment that everything was attached to.
When the house was in the dry, it became a private place of safety and peace.
Did that mean he was in love with Lottie? He liked her enough that it could possibly grow into love, just like the walls he was working on right then. She could become his soulmate, but he was in no hurry to rush the idea.
* * *
Lottie took Knox by the hand, led him to her bedroom, and closed the sliding door. “If you are right about all the hours we’ve spent together, we are long past due for a night together—even if we are dog tired.”
“Yes,” Knox whispered softly in her ear.
Desire swept through her body like a Texas wildfire when he gently pushed back her blond hair with his fingertips.
She’d had an attraction to men before, but nothing like this.
She wanted things to go slowly, to enjoy every single minute of this first experience with him, and at the same time, she desperately needed to feel his whole body next to hers.
She slipped his shirt over his head, and he did the same with hers.
His lips found hers as their bodies pressed together. Heat had flowed between them before, but when her bare skin touched his, there was no comparison to the former chemistry. Even her toes tingled when he slipped his tongue into her mouth.
He unfastened her bra with one hand and caressed her back. She was already panting when he slipped the straps down from her shoulders, and sheer passion like she had never felt before engulfed her whole body.
Just as he started easing her sweatpants down, all hell broke loose. Sirens blasted and startled her so badly that she had redone her bra and pulled on her shirt before she even realized what she was doing.
“Trespassers,” he gasped about the same time that lights lit up the area.
“Damn it!” Lottie swore and headed toward the door, tripped over Prissy, who was making a mad dash to hide under the bed, and started to fall. Knox caught her before she hit the floor, and they both fell backward back onto the bed.
“If a bunch of”—she panted—“drunk teenagers…” She sat up and tried to stand but got tangled up on Knox’s shirt she had tossed on the floor and fell back onto the bed again.
He caught her a second time and held her tightly. “I have to go to my trailer to turn off the alarm, but I’ll check everything out and come right back.”
“I’ll go with you,” she said. “But this is not our night, is it?”
He picked up his shirt from the floor and jerked it down over his head. “Probably not, but it’s also not our only night.”
“If we have vandals, you better hold the gun tonight and let me do the video business,” she grumbled as she followed him.
“And if it’s one of our own?” he asked as he jogged toward his trailer.
“Then God help them,” Lottie answered.
She followed him all the way to his trailer, but waited outside, keeping her eyes peeled for intruders.
Cheeto had been released from the cat carrier as soon as he appeared to have recovered from his hangover, and he sat on the top of Knox’s truck, his little head thrown back and looking like he was squawking, but Lottie couldn’t hear it over the shrill noise of the siren.
“It’s okay, boy,” she assured him. “When I find who did this, they are going to be in big trouble.”
The ringing in her ears slowly eased when the noise died down and the lights went off. Cheeto gave the all-clear warning and then hopped down to the bed of the truck. Bally ran out the open front door, and Lottie scooped the kitten up in her arms.
“We’ve both had a very bad night, haven’t we, little girl?” she crooned. “But it’s over now, and someone is going to pay if one of our own caused all this.”
Bally buried her nose in the crook of Lottie’s arm and purred.
“Is this an omen that things are moving too fast?” she whispered.
“What the hell was that?” Thomas yelled from down the row of trailers.
Soon all the guys were standing around her and Knox in a huddle.
“The alarm works,” Knox answered.
“I’d say it does.” Jack chuckled.
“I’m going to do a walk-around,” Knox said. “I’ll be right back. Wait right here?”
She shoved the kitten back into the trailer and closed the door. “I’m going with you.”
Jack nodded and said, “I’ll grab a couple of flashlights in the rec hall and go with y’all.”
“We’ll all help,” Eddie said. “We are all here and accounted for, so it wasn’t one of our team that tried to sneak in. But if those lights and noise didn’t scare the trespassers away, they could still be hiding on the property.”
“Are you sure that none of you set that thing off?” Lottie raised her voice.
All the men looked from one to the other as if they were taking roll call, but not a single guy said a word for several seconds. None of them looked sheepish or owned up to driving into the site after the alarm was set.
“If any of you are guilty, then this is your first warning,” she said. “Just speak up so we don’t have to spend time checking out the whole site.”
“It wasn’t one of us,” Vincent finally answered. “We can make short order of the search if we all get our flashlights from our trailers and get with it, rather than standing around here.”
“When we catch the sorry suckers that woke me up, I want first dibs on the bunch of them!” Thomas growled and held up his flashlight. “I came prepared.”
“They are all probably running like scared little bunnies. No telling where we will find them, so check every nook and cranny.” Jack raised his voice and headed toward the rec hall.
“Give me time to put on my boots,” Micah called out. “I’ll check out between the trailers and under them.”
“I’ll help you do that,” Eddie said.
“If you find anyone, Thomas has to stand in line behind me to get at them,” Lottie growled and jogged around the trailer to catch up with Knox. “There’s lots of places for them to play hide-and-seek, but the bunch of us out here shining lights might scare them into running.”
Jack came out of the rec hall and handed a flashlight to whoever needed one.
“If whoever set off the alarm was in a vehicle, I imagine they put it in reverse and hightailed it away from here. But if they were on foot, they could still be on the property. Y’all go check out the first cabin.
Mandy will have my hide if they use spray paint on the walls and she has to wait to move in. ”
Knox and Lottie both nodded and started that way.
“I’ll check around the whole cabin,” Lottie said.
“I’ll go on in and make sure everything is safe inside. Now that it’s in the dry, and it’s ready for the cabinets, there’s lots of nooks and crannies for hiding.”
Lottie stopped at the porch and sucked in a lungful of air, then let it out in a whoosh.
“Did you see something?” Knox asked.