“What about fish?” he asked.
“What are you talking about?” Had she been so lost in her argument with herself or in the pictures she’d conjured up in her mind of him half-naked that she missed something about going fishing?
“You said you don’t like squirrel. Do you eat fish?” he asked.
She nodded. “Any kind long as it’s cooked. I’m like Granny when it comes to sushi.”
“And that is?” He smiled.
She stood up and took a couple of steps toward the door. “Raw fish is called bait in our world.”
Blake followed her. “Alora Raine? Where’d you get that name?”
“Is this twenty questions or something?” she asked.
He leaned a shoulder against the wall beside the coatrack. “It could be. I was trying to get you to stay longer.”
“We’ll have to play that game another time. I’ll see you later. App weather forecast on my phone says no bad weather until tomorrow, so my stuff will be all right on the trailer until after church. I’ll cover it with a tarp.” There she went talking too much again.
Her arm brushed against his when she reached around him and picked her coat off the rack. The scent of his cologne mixed with a manly soap filled her nostrils every time she inhaled.
“Do you miss your family?” she asked as she slipped her arms into her coat and buttoned it up the front. One more layer of protection, not against him but herself.
“More than I thought I would. We went to my grandparents’ house every Sunday for dinner after church.” He straightened her collar. “Cousins fought. Men sat on the porch with a beer and talked crops and cattle. Women gathered in the kitchen to talk about girl things. I wasn’t interested in the kitchen, but I learned to love ranchin’ out there listenin’ to those old men talk about cows and hay and spring plantin’.”
The warmth of his fingertips on her neck sent electricity bouncing all around her. Did he feel it, too, or was it just her?
“But you did learn to cook,” she said.
Blake stepped back. “Only because I had to. Most of my expertise starts with a big stew pot. I can’t fry chicken worth a damn and it’s my favorite food. Deke says you hate to cook. Was he teasing?”
She slowly shook her head. “He was telling the truth. I hate to cook but that doesn’t mean I can’t cook. I can fry chicken that will melt in your mouth.”
“Biscuits?” His eyes twinkled.
She nodded.
“Gravy? The good stuff with no lumps?” A grin tickled his sexier-than-the-devil mouth.
Another nod.
“Will you marry me?” he asked bluntly.
Had he seriously just proposed? “I might fry chicken for you to celebrate when we finish this house, but I’m never getting married again.”
“I don’t take rejection well.” He laid a fist over his heart and dropped his head in a fake pout.
Allie took another step toward the door. “Sorry about that, cowboy. You’ll have to get over it.”
He sighed. “Will you attend my funeral on Sunday? I promised my brother, Toby, if I ever found a woman who could fry chicken like my mama, I would ask her to marry me. It’s going to kill me to tell him that the woman of my dreams has turned me down.”
“You’re full of horse shit.” She laughed.
Allie deliberately stayed out late that evening, hoping to avoid Mitch and Grady. The Friday-night date with her sister and the two guys had been postponed at the last minute until tonight, so she didn’t want to go home until she absolutely had to.
Instead, she decided a little retail therapy at the mall might be in order until she was sure they’d be out of the house. She meandered through three stores and bought a new pair of skinny jeans, a beautiful dark green sweater dress, and two shirts. Then she grabbed dinner on her own, wishing the whole time that Deke and Blake were sitting with her at the table.
It was a little after eight when she made it to Dry Creek and saw Mitch’s truck right there in the driveway. Damn! She slapped the steering wheel but the truck did not disappear.
She tiptoed across the porch and eased the front door open, then closed it behind her so carefully that it didn’t make a bit of noise. She didn’t realize she was holding her breath until she reached the landing and it came out in a loud whoosh. Quickly peeking over the banister to make sure they hadn’t heard her, she sucked in another lung full of air and hurried into her room. Without turning on the light, she slid down the backside of the door and wrapped her arms around her knees.
“Alora, let me in.” A soft whisper on the other side of the door startled her. She hopped up and opened the door a crack to find Irene in her red flannel pajamas.
Her grandmother held up a package of chocolate chip cookies in one hand and a soda pop in the other. “I snuck in the kitchen and up the stairs and they didn’t hear me.”
“Who’s down there?” Allie pulled her grandmother inside and flipped the light switch.