Alphas of Red Moon Ranch(7)
Holly couldn’t help herself—a laugh escaped her and she instantly covered her mouth with her hand. You’ve got to be kidding me. The professor and the rancher—this was a doomed pairing if she ever knew one. There was no way in hell this was going to work out.
He blinked and—to his enormous credit—kept his composure, giving her a cool smile. “Good ride up?”
She tried to scoop up the rattled bones of her poise and nodded, easing into a smile. “Yes. Sorry. I’m—” She extended a hand. Professional. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Bites.”
Now he looked amused. He took her hand—his was large, rough palms—and gave it a squeeze. “Pleasure’s mine, Ms. Apples. Lemme get that.”
He grabbed her luggage and his hand brushed hers again. She released the handle and flexed her fingers when the electricity of his touch lingered.
“A gentleman,” she said.
“I’ve got my moments.” But the skin around his eyes crinkled when he said it and she got the impression that there was a rogue under his gentlemanly exterior. He leaned over and pressed a small kiss to the side of her face. She felt his stubble brush her cheek and it sent shivers through her body, straight to her core. “I’m glad you made it,” he murmured into the shell of her ear. His voice was deep, strong, like a growl.
She swallowed. Contain yourself, Holly. “Me too,” she said.
Chapter 6
Jacob drove an old dirt-red pickup truck and Holly gripped her seat as it rattled down the road. The ride was predictably awkward, and while he seemed perfectly content to linger in silence, his fingers drumming against his thigh to the 70s rock pouring from the radio, she couldn’t help but feel like she was doing something wrong. Before she left, Alice had grabbed her shoulders, squeezed, and told her, Don’t forget, you’re the one in charge here. He’s the one who invited you up. You can leave whenever you want. Take the lead; don’t sell yourself short.
She started running through the questions she’d written down earlier in her head. “So,” she started. “MeetYourMate. What made you chose that site?”
“A couple reasons,” he said, his eyes glued out the window. “I don’t have time to date. I work all day and I’ve got a large family to take care of. Etna’s also a small town. And it doesn’t have what I’m looking for.”
“Which is?”
“A wife. A partner.”
“They don’t have wife material here?”
His thumb rubbed into the leather of his steering wheel. “The women here tend to be looking for something a little less…permanent.”
“Oh,” she said. In her mind, she made a pro and cons list. Title: Man-whore. Pros: experienced, knows what he wants. Cons: careless with intimacy, awkward encounters with ex-lovers while on dates.
He took his eyes away from the road to turn his attention on her briefly. “What about you?”
“Me?”
“You. What makes a beautiful woman like you turn to an online mail-order service?”
Her cheeks colored. “Um…well. I teach, so my hours are demanding. Doesn’t give me a lot of time to date.”
Was it too early to bring up her fifteen-year-old marriage? It wasn’t exactly great small talk. As she ran through another pros and cons list, he asked, “Who burned you?”
She blinked back at him. “What?”
He gave her a knowing look. She sighed. “It’s, um…my high school sweetheart, Chris, and I…we got married a long time ago. We’ve been divorced for three years now, but…it’s complicated.”
“It’s hard to let the past go,” he said.
“Yes,” she said. “Exactly.” She turned to look at him. “Do you have anything like that?”
“Something that haunts me?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Fair used to come into town one year. Me and my dad would go to see it. He worked all day so we got in late at night, after most everyone had gone. We get in, I turn around…and I see the most terrifying thing my little nine-year-old eyes have ever laid sight on. This guy was dressed up in a clown suit, having a cigarette in the shadows. Wearing this big, nasty frown. Scared me half the death.”
It took her a second to realize he was teasing her. When she did, she frowned.
“My dad and I,” she huffed.
“Come again?”
“You wouldn’t say: me went to the fair. You would say: I went to the fair. It’s my dad and I, not me and my dad.”
“Ain’t you a barrel of monkeys, princess?” he said with a sly grin.
Aren’t, she thought to herself as she crossed her arms. Aren’t I a barrel of monkeys. This was turning out to be one heck of a first impression. Holly just wondered how she was going to survive a full weekend of this.