Once Upon a Rose(43)

Which, given that he spent all of May immersed in pink and green, was really ridiculous.

“I wish Tante Colette had warned me I was fixing that house up for her,” he said suddenly, restlessly.

“Yes, I noticed that was a bit of a shock to you,” Tristan said dryly.

“I mean—there are all kinds of unfinished projects still. I didn’t know someone was going to be living in it so soon.” He gave a huff of frustration and glowered at the gorge falling away as they climbed up out of the valley. “I would have prioritized.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Tristan gazing at the road with a bizarre blend of amusement and affection, perfectly comfortable half-naked against his leather seat. “Never too late to get them done.”

“Yeah, but Bouclettes—I mean, Layla—nearly split my eardrums yesterday when she found me in the kitchen,” Matt said, despairing and grouchy.

Tristan’s eyebrow went up. “Umm, Matt…was she expecting to find you in her kitchen?”

“It’s my valley,” Matt said indignantly. How many times did he have to remind people? “Besides, I told her I was going to fix it.” He glowered through the window. His arm was starting to realize it hurt. “And I think I still have a concussion.” From hitting his own head on the underside of the counter. Thinking he was alone, peacefully working in a house to get it all right, and then suddenly hearing an ear-splitting female scream from a few feet away had scared the hell out of him. It had taken about an hour for his heart rate to calm down.

Actually, his stupid heart still didn’t seem to have calmed down.

But that might be more to do with all the things she had said after she stopped screaming. Like about him looking so much better naked.

His glower started to ease away, despite the throbbing in his arm, as his butt tightened into the memory of her hand sliding into his pocket to get the key.

“Bouclettes, hmm?” Tristan grinned a little at the road. “Like Goldilocks?” Boucles d’Or. “I like it. Are you the three bears?”

His cousins were so annoying. Matt grunted.

Tristan’s grin widened. “Excellent grunt. Great role-playing there. I bet you get the part of the biggest bear.” His expression went innocently wicked. “Wasn’t he the one whose bed fit just right?”

Oh, yeah, Matt would like to see how she fit in his big, white bed, when he…he caught himself and glared at his cousin. “Don’t make me hit you while you’re driving.”

“No,” Tristan agreed solemnly. “After all, look at how close we are to a cliff’s edge here. You wouldn’t want to find yourself suddenly falling too hard would you?”

No. He wouldn’t. Because Tristan was wrong about his fairy tales. The biggest bear was the one the curly-haired interloper never chose. Everything about him was too hard and too big.





Chapter 9


“It’s people like you who make my taxes so high. Going to the doctor for a scratch like that.” Pépé beckoned Matt over and peeled back the gauze enough to eye the arm Matt held out in resignation.

Matt double-checked Bouclettes. She sat near the head of the table where his grandfather was, with Damien and Raoul and Allegra, who must have come out of her dissertation-writing hole to join them.

He hadn’t expected to find Layla still there when he got back, under the great old plane tree near the original family home from which Pépé still reigned over the family, that table full of memories, where they often lunched together during peak season when his cousins pitched in. He’d kind of thought she would have fled by then, having found out that all those silken, sweet roses came with a lot of grit. Hot sun, thorns, bee stings, long, repetitive hours, and people who acted like idiots.

Run off and sold her land to a hotel chain or something because it wasn’t worth her time—too boring or annoying or difficult.

But here she was, taking on his grandfather. He’d arrived to hear Pépé blandly referring to times when a man had to shoot a threat to his valley and Layla defiantly complimenting him on his routine for scaring tourists. From the way Damien and Raoul had been choking with their efforts not to laugh, he’d missed some of the good parts. Unfortunately, his grandfather had immediately gotten distracted by Matt himself and the excessive gauze the doctor had insisted on putting around his arm.

“You would have had much neater stitching from Colette.” Pépé dropped the edge of the gauze in disgust. Steri-Strips covered most of the stitches, but that didn’t stop Pépé from making a judgment of them.