The stars were out in full force, and Mel knew she needed to head home. She had snuck home after Break #1, managed to avoid Caleb and Dad, and had returned to Dan—no, Dan’s ranch—and put in eight full hours of work on preparing his stables for llamas.
Okay, and two breaks.
Really awesome breaks.
How much longer could she let that go on?
Worry about it later. Yeah, much later.
“Did it ever freak you out as a kid?” he asked.
She glanced back at Dan, who was sitting on the fence they’d just expanded, the llama not too far to his right. The damn thing still tried to bite her if she got that close to it, but it seemed to understand Dan was its meal ticket.
“Did whatever freak me out?” she asked, patting down her pockets to make sure she had her keys and wallet. She couldn’t deny she didn’t want to head home any more than she could deny she needed to go check in on things.
He motioned his chin toward the sky. “Look at all that. So big and vast and bright and we’re just…these little blips. Gives me the creeps. Like aliens are watching me.”
She snorted. “City boy. Just wait till you see the Northern Lights.” Oh, wait, he probably wouldn’t be here to see those, would he? She turned her gaze back to the sky. It was vast, with bright dots and trails of stars and cosmos and whatever else was up there, the world around them completely dark.
It had never been her favorite part of the day. Darkness had always meant too much time for thinking. The fuzzy reminder of something she wasn’t sure was a dream or reality.
Mom whispering good-bye in the dark.
“I have to go.”
“You could stay.”
“Unfortunately, I really can’t. Dad’s nurse quit yesterday, and…” She had never mentioned Caleb’s issues to Dan, not in detail, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to now. “I just need to make sure he’s okay, start trying to make some alternate arrangements.”
“Anything I can do to help?”
Tempting, but she needed to be careful about where she let Dan help. Distractions, yes. Family stuff, that had to be a no. Because it was her family, and she would always be bound to them. She would not always be bound to Dan. She wasn’t bound to Dan, period.
She might do good to remind him of that as well as herself. “Not unless you can find some pretty nurse to charm into working for me three days a week.”
“I’m only interested in charming one pretty rancher at the moment.”
She did not like the little flip in her stomach one bit. That little flip, a hop of hope, a burst of excitement, that was the kind of thing that was going to get her in to trouble if she trusted it too much.
“Then, I guess I’m out of luck.” She pulled her keys out of her pocket and jangled them from her fingers. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Though she could just barely make out his form in the dark, she could tell he hopped off the fence and advanced on her. The kind of advance she should retreat from, but she was not a woman who believed in retreat.
Especially if standing her ground meant a kiss. Which it did. His mouth on hers, soft and warm against the cool of the evening. Strong arms around her, capable when they wanted to be. Sturdy.
Quite a dangerous illusion.
“You know, if you want to think of me tonight while you’re drifting off to sleep,” he said against her mouth, bodies still pressed together, “I wouldn’t be offended.”
“Ha.” Only she was already getting a little squirmy thinking of him and the things he’d done to make her feel good. Really, really good. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Dan.”
“Yes, ma’am.” After a pause he released her and she pulled her hat back down after the kiss had knocked it precariously up.
“Come by early tomorrow. I’ll make you breakfast again.”
She stopped her backward retreat, that annoying flip taking a few extra turns this time. “You don’t have to feed me.”
“Maybe I’m not one hundred percent innocent in my motivations,” he said, and, oh hey, there were all those squirmy feelings again.
Worse, there were other feelings. Those things he made her want that she’d spent so much of her adult life trying not to ever consider. Someone to take care of something so she didn’t have to. Someone to care.
But he didn’t care. Not in that way. This was about attraction and sex and maybe some mutual fondness, but not care. “You know, there are plenty of women in town who’d sleep with you.” She meant it as a flip comment, a reminder that sex was all this had been.
It didn’t even take the whole sentence getting out of her mouth for her to realize it didn’t sound flip. It sounded nasty and mean, and he didn’t deserve that.