"Oh, is that what that thing is, then?" she asks, rubbing on Lucy's ears. Lucy is practically melting into a puddle of goo at her feet.
I glance behind me at my trailer. I don't need a damn house, don't need to put down roots when all I do is travel, contract work chasing fires during the summer, snowboarding and fucking snow bunnies in the winter – not in West Bend, though. I avoid this place like the plague.
Now I'm back here, on account of what happened to my mother.
"Did you come here to insult me?" I ask. "This thing is my house, as a matter of fact."
"I didn't mean to insult you," she says. She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. "It's a nice place."
"Where's your kid?"
"She's with her nanny," she says.
The nanny. Well, la-de-fucking-dah. Her kid's too good for a regular babysitter, I guess.
"Didn't think I should drag her out here with me, chasing down some strange man I just met," she says, smiling.
"No shit," I say. "I could be a psycho or something. Or you could be. I mean, at least I didn't show up at your house like an obsessed stalker."
She cocks her head to the side. "You kind of did, actually," she says. "But that's besides the point. I forgive your boorish behavior and –"
"Wait a fucking second. You forgive me?"
"Of course," she says. "For yelling at me in front of my child and following me into my house and cursing in front of her and –"
"Hold up." I put my hand out, ready to stop this conversation. This chick might but hot, but she's obviously a lunatic. "I saved your ass and your damn orchard, despite your best efforts to burn it the hell down. So maybe you want to stop with the holier-than-thou lecture about yelling at you in front of your kid, and just calm your tits down just a smidge."
"Calm my tits?" she asks, walking toward me. Are her nostrils flaring? I think they are. She looks mad. It's been a while since I've been around a girl who would get mad about that phrase.
Shit, it's been a while since I've spoken to a girl this much outside of the bedroom. Usually they're getting angry on the way out the door. I'm not like my stupid brother in that regard. Shit, Elias meets a fucking movie star and he's suddenly a family man. Relationships and I were not meant to be.
The Girl with No Name stands in front of me, her breath short. Those tits I was telling her to calm? Yeah, they're not calm at all. Instead, they're moving up and down as she inhales and exhales. "Yeah, that's what I said. Calm your tits."
"Eyes up, bucko," she says. "Stop looking down my shirt."
I shrug. "You just said tits. Where the hell am I supposed to look?" It doesn't help matters that she's wearing a t-shirt that's cut in a V, revealing the very top of her cleavage. The thin fabric basically caresses the curves of her breasts before it follows her trim figure down to her waist.
"Damn it. I say eyes up and yours go further down," she says, her voice disgusted. "You know what? Forget I even came here." When she whirls around, I stand there watching her walk back toward her SUV, just to see her ass move in those fitted jeans, before I realize she's about to leave. And I still didn't get her damn name.
"Hey, wait!" I call after her.
She pauses. "What?"
"Why'd you drive out here, anyway?"
"Are you going to stop gaping at my boobs like you've never seen a woman before in your life?" she asks, her eyes flashing.
Shit, she's really hot when she's angry.
I don't bother to stifle my laugh. "Not likely."
Her eyes get big, and she huffs before opens her car door. "Then, never mind why I drove out here."
I watch as she slides into the driver's seat. "Suit yourself," I call. I'm half turned on and half irritated by this girl. She's so goddamn argumentative about nothing.
She drives away, and I realize I still don't know her fucking name.
Why the hell are women so damn difficult?
CHAPTER FOUR
Autumn
Ugh. That guy. What a juvenile, immature dickhead. He's so damn…cocky, shit-sure of himself with that stupid grin on his face and the calm your tits bullshit. I bet he gets away with murder, just because he's hot. He's that kind of a guy.
And he is hot…
Heat rushes through me, following the adrenaline and irritation that flood my veins.
Luke Saint. He's no saint, that's for damned sure.
He's also young. Too young for me to be thinking the way I'm thinking about him right now. I'm too old to be getting flustered and red-faced over some guy who might look pretty but has an ego the size of Texas. I'm a mother, for goodness' sake.
And Pretty Boy is a total player. That is something I'm a hundred percent sure of. He's one of those guys who oozes sex from every pore of his body.
I don't know what I was thinking, going out there to see if I might be able to offer him a job. The thought of finding a new foreman right now, in the middle of harvest, makes me groan out loud.