CHAPTER NINE
WHEN OLIVIA WOKE up the next morning her phone was glowing on the couch. She had a raft of texts from her mother. And before she could bend down to pick the phone up, there was a knock at the door.
“Darn it,” she whispered, picking up the phone and holding it to her chest.
She walked to the front door, the white carpet plush beneath her feet. Usually a comfort in trying times, but nothing was comforting to her now.
“Coming,” she muttered as the knocking became more insistent. She had absolutely no illusions as to who it was.
She opened the door and came face-to-face with her mother.
Tamara Logan closely resembled Olivia, only older and more elegant. She was an inch or so shorter than her daughter, still as trim and petite as she had always been. There were fine lines next to her eyes, and not even one strand of gray in her brown hair. If that was accomplished by a hair salon, she would never say, and no one would be brave enough to ask.
“Thank God you’re here,” her mother said, breezing past her and walking into the room. She looked around her, as if she expected to see something out of place. Olivia had a feeling she was expecting, dreading, the possibility that she might find Luke Hollister in the house somewhere, enjoying a morning after.
“I’m alone,” Olivia said.
“Good,” Tamara answered, looking visibly relieved. “I can’t tell you how many texts and phone calls I got about you and Luke. Kissing.”
“I went on a date with him,” Olivia said, wrapping her arms around herself. “It wasn’t a big deal. It wasn’t even a very serious kiss.” The one in the bar that anyone had seen. She left out any mention of the kiss that had happened after.
She wasn’t even going to think about that kiss, much less talk to her mom about it. She suddenly felt like she was thirteen again and staring down her very disappointed mother after the skinny-dipping fiasco.
Whose fault was this, Olivia? I can hardly believe it was yours.
Olivia swallowed hard.
“I’m not sure he’s a very good man for you to be going on dates with,” her mom said, frowning. “And I thought you wanted to try and patch things up with Bennett. I’m sure that by now he’s regretting breaking up with you.”
“I broke up with Bennett,” Olivia said, realizing that she hadn’t exactly explained the whole story to her parents. “He didn’t break up with me.”
Shock flitted over her mother’s face. “But you were so devastated...”
“I know,” she said, shifting in place, feeling about two inches tall. “I just... I don’t want to be broken up with him. I didn’t want to be. But, you know, I wanted to get married and...”
“He didn’t?”
“Not as quickly as I did. I don’t know. I’m questioning my decision making now.” She was questioning a lot of things. And it was way too early in the morning for her to be trying to explain any of it to her mother, when she could hardly process what had happened the night before, much less what all had happened in the past month.
“I don’t like not knowing where you are,” her mom said. “I texted you so many times last night.”
“I came home early,” Olivia said, lying only a little bit, “and I went to sleep. Sorry.”
Her mother looked so genuinely concerned that Olivia felt guilty. It was one thing to feel indignant in the moment, like her leash was too short. It was another to fully face the reasons she consented to that leash.
Her parents never knew where Vanessa was. They heard from her maybe twice a year, and it was rarely comforting. They deserved to have one child they didn’t have to worry about constantly. She also knew that her parents worried about her even more because of Vanessa. Because they already had one child that was lost to them for all intents and purposes.
They had enough sleepless nights without adding Olivia to their list of worries, and for her part, she had done everything in her power to make sure that she wasn’t doing that.
But last night she had. In a few different ways. And now guilt sat heavily on her chest like a rock, joining all of the other muddled feelings she was contending with.
“Nothing is happening with Luke,” Olivia said. “It’s not. I went out with him because I wanted to prove to Bennett, and to myself a little bit—” she said a small prayer asking for forgiveness for the lie “—that I could go out with someone else if I wanted to. But I promise I’m not blind to anything about Luke. I know him too well.”
Tamara sighed heavily, that burst of energy she’d come in with clearly beginning to run out of steam. Her mother reacted with fear first. It was fear, Olivia knew that. She understood it. “It’s all right if you want to go on dates.”
“I know,” Olivia said, feeling a little bit silly that she was twenty-five years old, standing there in a house on her parents’ property offering justifications for a date she had gone on. Now she felt silly and guilty. So that was fun.
“But, I am relieved to hear that it wasn’t serious. I’m sure that Luke is a nice enough man,” Tamara conceded, “but I wouldn’t say he was suited to you.”
“No,” Olivia said, agreeing with that wholeheartedly. And tried not to think about the way his hands on her body had seemed to suit certain purposes.
“Bennett is a much better choice. He’s from such a good family. And he’s such a good man. He’ll take care of you.”
Her mother’s eyes shone with conviction. The absolute certainty that Olivia needed to be cared for. But then, her mom and dad took care of her now. So of course they thought she might need someone to take care of her later. Bennett had been an ideal someone to them.
To Olivia, too.
But she was starting to be concerned she had blown that potential future up, and that there would be no getting back to it. That felt hopeless. It felt scary. Like the future in front of her was blank, and the past behind her was slipping out of reach.
She’d had a plan. But in that space between the bar and her house, something had happened. Something had happened with Luke. And it had done something to her.
“We’ll see what happens with Bennett,” Olivia said. “I know what I want. I don’t know what he wants.”
Those words tasted like a lie, too.
“You can always talk to me about these things,” Tamara said. “I broke up with your father more than once before we ended up getting married. He was dragging his feet.”
“Dad dragged his feet?”
“Terribly. And sometimes the breakup really is what you need to get some perspective. So, hopefully that won’t be a long time coming for him.”
“Hopefully,” Olivia said.
Tamara leaned forward, pulling Olivia into a hug. Olivia suddenly felt very small, and young. Rumpled. Nothing made her feel more fragile than hugging her mother. She took a shaky breath, her shoulders shuddering, and tried to hold back the tears that were building. She was tired. She really needed coffee. Or she was going to fall apart.
“If he doesn’t, then he’s not the right one,” Tamara said, taking a step back and patting Olivia on the shoulder.
“I guess so,” Olivia said, taking a deep breath.
Words like right and wrong felt all jumbled and confused inside of her. Along with everything else.
“Everything will work out right for you, Olivia,” her mom said. “You’ve done everything right. You don’t have anything to worry about.”
“Thanks, Mom,” Olivia mumbled. “I need coffee.”
“Okay. I’ll leave you to that. I’m going out for breakfast with some of the ladies. Though, that new cook at Sugar Cup doesn’t have the best customer service.”
Olivia knew that her mother was referring to the very unpersonable Frederick Holt, who made a habit of serving up scrambles with a scowl.
“I’m sure if anyone can make him smile, it’s you.” Not necessarily because her mother was the friendliest, but because she was more formidable than most anyone. Hell on high heels. Always tactful, but never a pushover.
“We’ll see,” her mother responded. She gave Olivia’s hand one last squeeze before breezing back out the door and getting in her little red sports car, the perk of turning fifty, she had called it.
Olivia closed her white front door, then stood there for a moment looking at her entryway. It was perfect, undisturbed as ever. Her mother had decorated the little cottage that Olivia now called home. And it was as perfect now as it had been the day she moved in five years ago.
There was a little rose garland with a ribbon on it above the door, framing it in a very charming fashion. Shabby chic furniture and country details were spread throughout the room. Cute little roosters and splashes of red amidst pale yellow and white.
Olivia loved it. But she was suddenly very aware that she had moved into a life created for her by her parents.
Neat, pristine, contained.
For some reason she thought of the dollhouse she’d played with when she was little. It had been an antique even then, an old wooden ranch house with two floors. A gift from her grandma. For her and for Vanessa, although Vanessa had never played with it.
When she’d been a little girl that was the life she’d imagined. A simple house. On a ranch.
Nothing quite like this artfully staged cottage she called home.
That was silly. She had a good life. A good house. And there was no point having an issue with all of the wonderful things she’d been given. Not when she benefited from it so much. If it weren’t for them, her job at Grassroots wouldn’t be enough to pay her bills. She loved her job. She loved the people that she interacted with; she loved the people she worked with.
Her mother was right. She had always done the right thing. A momentary lapse in her judgment was hardly going to undo all of that.
She would make sure of it.
* * *
LUKE KNEW THERE was no way he was going to make it through the day without an interrogation from someone in the Dodge family.
What surprised him most was that it ended up being Bennett.
He had expected to get a lecture from Wyatt. Or to maybe get punched by Jamie, with her tiny fists and the fury of a younger sister whose older brother had been hurt.
The Dodges looked out for each other—that was a fact.
But Bennett was apparently in the mood to handle it himself.
Luke was working on digging a trench to deal with some of the drainage issues down by the cabins that sat closer to the river when Bennett approached, looking hard and stoic.
It was the first time that Luke was aware—in a practical sense—that Bennett Dodge was no longer a boy. But a man. A man who was none too happy with him and looked about ready to start a fight.
Luke wasn’t the kind of guy to start a fight. Now, he’d joined his fair share of bar scuffles in his day. But he didn’t usually do much to rate someone coming after him. And when he did, he was pretty good at smoothing things over. He usually ended up having a drink with the person instead of punching anyone.
Bennett didn’t look like he wanted to have a drink.
“You said that there was nothing going on between you and Olivia.”
“When last we talked there wasn’t.”
“You’re an asshole, Luke,” Bennett said. “You can wander around with that don’t-give-a-damn smile, thinking that nobody’s going to see that, but I do. You’re selfish. You don’t do a thing but what you want. Olivia’s not like that. If you hurt her, I swear to God...”
“You hurt her,” Luke said, his temper going from zero to a hundred a hell of a lot quicker than he expected it to. “She felt like you promised her things you didn’t deliver. So if I were you, I wouldn’t be up in my face about hurting Olivia.”
“She’s not the kind of girl you mess around with,” Bennett said. “She doesn’t know the rules to that kind of thing. And you don’t know the rules to having a relationship with a woman like her. There’s not another outcome.” Bennett continued on as though he hadn’t heard the warning note in Luke’s voice. As though he didn’t hear him at all. “You could trick her far too easily.”
“Look,” Luke said, “first of all, Olivia’s not a girl. She’s a woman.” A woman who had come apart in his arms last night. He might have known Olivia for more than half of her life, but he didn’t see her as a kid. Not anymore. “And if there’s one thing I am, it’s honest. I’ve never promised Olivia Logan a damn thing. Not one thing. If she wants to spend time with me, that’s her business. But I’m not the one that pretended I was in love with her. I’m not the one that pretended I might marry her someday when I never had the intention of doing that. Don’t you dare lie to me and say that you did, Bennett. Because we both know that if you wanted to marry that woman I wouldn’t have been at the bar with her last night. You’re the one who lied to her. Not me.”
“I never lied to her,” Bennett said.
“Neither did I,” Luke said, letting the shovel fall to the ground, crossing his arms over his chest. “I offered her a drink and a good time. If she wants to take me up on those things, that’s her business. And you know whose business it isn’t? Yours. Because you gave that right up.”
“I didn’t give up the right to care about her,” Bennett said. “To be worried about her. She deserves a man that’s going to take care of her. Not one that’s going to play with her. She’s been through enough.”
Luke frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Everything with her sister. You know Vanessa went off and got herself in all kinds of trouble. She and Olivia used to be close. Olivia doesn’t need to be hurt or abandoned by anyone else.”
Luke only vaguely knew Vanessa Logan. She had never hung around the ranch as much as Olivia, and definitely not when she would have been the right age for him to pay any attention. He knew, of course, that she was involved in crappy stuff. Because it was a small town and it was impossible not to hear bits and pieces of everyone’s life from time to time. Particularly when that person was tied to a family that had as much local fame as the Logans had.
Still, Olivia never brought her up, and Luke hadn’t spared her any thought.
“What’s happening with Olivia and me has nothing to do with that. It has nothing to do with permanence, so abandonment certainly isn’t going to figure in.”
Bennett looked like he was holding himself back from punching him. And Luke had had about enough. “If you want to have a fight, Bennett, then go ahead and hit me. I’m not going to take it lying down. But I’m not going to be the first one to throw a punch, either. So make up your damned mind. And then maybe make up your damned mind about what you want with Olivia.”
“I want to keep her safe,” Bennett said. “That’s what I want. You’re not going to do that.”
“Safety isn’t any fun,” Luke said, knowing he was really tempting Bennett’s temper at this point. But Luke was in the mood to see it.
Somewhere in all of this, he realized that what he was doing might or might not help what he had promised Olivia he would help with. But he didn’t care.
Because last night he was the one who had tasted Olivia. He was the one who had pulled her up onto his lap and let her ride him until she found satisfaction. Yeah. That was him. And that hadn’t had anything to do with Bennett, either.
“Yeah, you say that because none of your shit has ever stuck to you,” Bennett said. “Because you don’t know anything about how hard it is to care for somebody and not be able to protect them.”
Bile rose in Luke’s throat. He was tempted to laugh, except Bennett was so damn full of bull that he could hardly stand it. Of course, he wasn’t going to break a lifetime commitment to keeping his own stuff to himself just because Bennett had poked at his temper.
Luke curled his hands into fists, resting them at his sides. Right about now, he wouldn’t mind throwing a punch at that Hollywood-square jaw of Bennett’s. Maybe he could get himself fired and he wouldn’t have to go to the trouble of quitting. Wouldn’t have to figure out that middle ground between being at Get Out of Dodge and being gone. He could just burn it all down. Except he wasn’t that man. He didn’t do things he couldn’t take back. He knew too well how those decisions destroyed people caught in their wake.
“You’re right,” Luke said. “I wouldn’t know anything about that. Are you going to throw that punch or not?”
Bennett shook his head. “It’s not worth it.”
“Why? Because you know I’ll kick your ass?” Apparently he was more interested in goading someone into a fight today than he usually was.
“Because I’m trying to appeal to your better nature, and I’m not sure that you have one.”
He wasn’t going to punch Bennett. He wasn’t. So instead, he smiled. A fight would only satisfy Bennett. A smile... That would piss him off.
“It’ll be interesting to find out, won’t it?” Luke asked.
He watched as Bennett grappled with his rage. And for a moment he really hoped the other man would haul off and hit him, because a fight would make him feel better, too.
But then Bennett took a step back and shook his head. “Sometimes you’re like a brother to me, Luke. And other times I’m very much reminded that you’re not one of us.”
Much like the smile Luke had treated Bennett to, that comment landed a hell of a lot harder than a punch.
Luke watched Bennett walk away, and no matter how much he wanted to, he couldn’t even be mad. Because it was true. He might have spent the past twenty years working on the Dodge ranch, but he wasn’t a Dodge, and he never would be. He was the son of a woman whose name he hadn’t spoken out loud since that dark day when he’d found her unresponsive in her room.
The son of a woman who had imagined that he—and the rest of the world—would be better off without her, and had taken her own life, leaving nothing but money in her place.
Money he hadn’t touched.
Money it was starting to look like it was time to use.
The only thing worse than suspecting that his mother might have killed herself in order for him to have that, to have those opportunities, was not taking them.
He grabbed hold of his shovel again and punched the sharp tip through the ground, the force a satisfying release.
Bennett didn’t think he understood loss. He didn’t think he understood taking care of someone.
Luke understood worse than taking care of someone. He knew what it was like to try to take care of someone, to try and hold somebody to a world, to a life they didn’t want to be a part of, and to lose that battle.
There was nothing on earth that could fix it. Nothing that could change the way it had gone. Not recriminations, not confessions. Certainly not confessions made out back behind a dude ranch between the river and the cabins, digging trenches. Made to the ex-boyfriend of the woman he had just about made love to last night in spite of every bit of better judgment saying it was wrong.
Yeah, there was no point to any of it. He was just going to keep digging trenches. Until everything with the land and Quinn Logan was settled. Until he had talked Olivia into giving her father a recommendation for him.
Because if there was one thing he knew, it was when to move on.
This place had been a comfortable one for two decades, but it wasn’t a good fit anymore. For a few different reasons.
Olivia Logan was only one of them.
* * *
RARELY WAS OLIVIA cranky over having a day off, but today she certainly was. It all came back to wishing she had something to keep her mind occupied, when she categorically didn’t.
She was sick of her own company and her house by the time she got dressed in a pair of leggings and an oversize sweater and plodded into town to grab some coffee.
She walked quickly down the sidewalk and pushed open the door to Sugar Cup, which was heavy and wooden, black paint worn down to reveal the natural grain beneath. She peeked cautiously inside, hoping that her mother and her mother’s friends weren’t in residence, and was gratified to see that they weren’t.
She really didn’t want to face that level of rumor mill in her current state. Though, she was well aware that by leaving her house she had opened herself up to the possibility of having to talk about Luke and what had transpired at the bar last night.
It was a tacit agreement that one made between themselves and their small town after controversy was stirred. And while she knew that, she was also willing to chance it today. She just couldn’t spend another minute cooped up and in her own head.
She was confused, and she didn’t know what she wanted to do. Whether or not she wanted to keep hammering at this thing with Bennett, or just hide in her bedroom for the rest of her life and get a cat or twelve and try to find some kind of work that allowed her to never have to put on pants with challenging waistbands ever again.
Yes, that was another option.
It wasn’t like her plan to make Bennett jealous was going to work very well if she told everyone that nothing was happening with Luke and herself, but for some reason the subterfuge didn’t feel easy when there was something real to it.
That thought stunned her, standing there in the middle of the coffee shop. She looked up at the large, wrought iron chandelier that hung down at the center of the rustic room. Then she looked back down at the distressed barn wood floor, revelation all but slapping her in the face.
That was the problem.
That saying there was something going on between herself and Luke had truth to it.
If it had been a lie, if all of it had been made up, it would have been much easier.
But it wasn’t.
It was clear as the cold January day all of a sudden, and just as biting. That was the itch beneath her skin. The restlessness she felt whenever he was around. The restlessness she had felt whenever he was around for the past several years.
She was attracted to him.
A stupid revelation to have standing there dumbly in front of the extremely unamused-looking cashier, but a revelation she was having nonetheless.
She thought back to that day they’d all gone down to the beach, bringing several trucks and coolers and barbecues. They had spent the whole day down there, and she had spent all that time artfully avoiding contact with Luke, who had seemed bound and determined to harass her on some level or another every time she turned around.
He hadn’t been wearing a shirt, and she had found it obnoxious, in spite of the fact that most of the men there had been without shirts, since they were swimming.
But there was something about Luke’s partial nudity that had seemed gratuitous. By virtue of the fact that he was Luke.
She had tried to tell herself it was because he was annoying, and therefore his shirtlessness was also annoying.
But the fact that she remembered his body in great detail even now, a couple of years later, told her something else entirely.
She hadn’t been dating Bennett then, but she had been fully committed to the idea of being with him someday.
Luke, and his broad shoulders, muscular chest, well-defined abs and general self, had been an obnoxious blight on the whole afternoon.
Which seemed ridiculous, because Bennett had a fantastic body. In fact, there was not a single muscle that Luke possessed that Bennett didn’t.
So why were Luke’s muscles emblazoned in her memory?
“Are you ready?” The blonde behind the counter with her high, messy bun, overly lined eyes and dour expression looked out of patience with Olivia.
That made two of them.
“What’s the special?” Olivia asked, desperately seeking a sign.
“A Big Hunk Mocha. It’s—”
“Is it sweet?” Olivia asked.
“Yes. It will make your teeth fall out.” Her expression didn’t lighten at all when she said it.
“Perfect.” She needed sugar. Indulgence. Something to make her feel good in the midst of all the uncomfortable she was having.
If there was one thing she’d learned over the past few weeks it was that you couldn’t eat healthy and also be sad. You had to pick one. And since happiness had been thin on the ground, sugar had been thick on it. So to speak.
“Olivia Logan.” That hot voice, rough as a back road, washed through her. “As I live and breathe.”
Luke. Of course it was Luke.
It was exactly what he had said to her when he had found her broken down on the side of the road. She wondered if that made it their thing. She wasn’t sure how she felt about having a thing with Luke Hollister.
But then, given her thoughts of the past few minutes, she supposed it was undeniable that to an extent she did, whether she wanted to or not.
She really wished not.
She turned slightly, suddenly feeling a bit dumpy and far too casual in her sweater and leggings. Like the overabundance of knit and stretch she was currently swimming in announced the fact that she was feeling low, and that she had needed clothing that was kind and unchallenging in order to grapple with the rest of life. Which, she currently found unkind and far too challenging.
He was bound to know it was because of him.
“I didn’t know you frequented coffeehouses,” she said, sounding much more clipped and snippy than she intended. Then she looked up, her eyes colliding with his, her senses fully taking in all that was Luke. He was everything she wished he wasn’t. Everything she wished that she built up to extremes in her imagination. Because surely no man could be so extravagantly handsome. Couldn’t reach past every barrier, so carefully erected and tended over the past ten years, and get to her quite so effectively. But he was.
And he did.
“I didn’t exactly want to hang around the ranch today,” he said. “Figured I would take my break in town.”
“Why is that?” she asked, wandering over to the other side of the counter, where she knew her drink would appear in a few moments. She clasped her hands in front of her, then lifted them slightly, then lowered them again. She felt restless. She didn’t know what to do with her extremities, which was ridiculous. It wasn’t like they were a new discovery.
She knew that she must stand and make conversation without feeling so incredibly conscious of her elbows and her wrists and where she was supposed to rest them. She must do it all the time. But she couldn’t exactly remember how she accomplished that.
Luke placed an order that she couldn’t quite hear, and the sullen cashier smiled at him, treated him to quite a bit more warmth than she had treated Olivia to. Then Luke walked over to wait where she was waiting for her coffee.
She felt tiny standing next to him, her head resting a couple of inches beneath the top of his shoulders. Typically, she wore shoes that added at least two inches to her diminutive height. But this morning she had gone for a pair of easy ballet flats, keeping with the theme of clothing that would nurture her wrung-out little body.
Sadly, what it accomplished with Luke in residence was making her feel fragile. Making her feel so much more aware of the fact that he was masculine to her feminine. Large and strong where she was soft and small.
And then she remembered what it was like to be folded up into all that strength, held close against that well-muscled chest, her thighs spread on either side of his...
Heat crept up her neck, into her face, and she knew that he could see the evidence of her train of thought written there across her pale skin.
“I got you a treat,” he said.
“You didn’t have to do that.” She looked determinedly ahead, fixing her eyes on the scarred, wooden counter, gritting her teeth.
“I wanted to.”
“Well, I didn’t want you to.”
“Too late.”
Just then, her drink appeared on the counter in a mug that was meant to stay in the coffee shop, rather than beat a hasty exit. She found herself rooted to the spot anyway, because as much as she wanted to run away from Luke, she also wanted to stand there and talk to him. And she had no idea what that was about.
Don’t you?
“Why are you trying to escape the ranch?” she asked, reaching out and grabbing hold of her mug.
“Bennett’s not too happy with me,” Luke said.
Images of the night before flashed before her eyes and she felt her mouth dropping open in horror. “He doesn’t... He doesn’t know...”
“He saw us together in the bar,” Luke said, his tone maddeningly calm. “Remember?”
“Oh,” she said.
Luke’s coffee arrived—in a to-go cup, which just irritated her—and then a plate with a large cinnamon roll appeared.
“That’s for me?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, grabbing both the cup and the cinnamon roll and leading the way to one of the empty tables at the far end of the room.
Olivia followed him, and she felt a little bit like an obedient terrier, following after Luke’s every move. It was the cinnamon roll. She was following the cinnamon roll.
“He doesn’t like me associating with you,” Luke said, taking a seat and placing the cinnamon roll at the center of the table. She noticed that there was only one fork.
Olivia sat across from Luke, clutching the mug, the warmth from the drink seeping through into her fingers. “Well, good,” she said. “That’s kind of the idea.”
Luke shrugged. “Yeah.”
She took a sip of her Big Hunk Mocha. It was indeed very sweet. “Did he say anything about...wanting me back?”
“I doubt that was a conversation he was ever going to have with me, kiddo. He told me to keep my hands off you.” A smile touched Luke’s wicked mouth. And she could confirm for a fact the mouth was wicked—it was no longer supposition.
“Well,” Olivia said, feeling marginally pleased by that. “That’s something.”
Except, it also forced her to remember when Luke had put his hands on her in the truck. When it had had nothing to do with Bennett. She felt flushed again.
“We definitely caused trouble,” she said. “My mother was filled with questions this morning.”
Luke leaned back in his chair, lifting his hand and pushing the brim of his cowboy hat upward with his knuckle. “Was she?”
Olivia looked down into her drink. “She said you’re not good for me.”
Luke frowned. “That’s true enough. Of course, I don’t want your parents being angry at me, considering I want to buy that land from your father.”
“I don’t think he’ll stay angry with you when all is said and done. And anyway, he’ll care more about what I have to say about you than he’ll care about any kind of town gossip. My mother, too. She was worried, but...”
“What must that be like?”
“What?”
His lips quirked into a half smile, his large hands moving around his coffee cup, sending a strange shiver through her body. “To be the hen.”
She let out a long, slow breath. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m the fox,” he said. “No two ways about it, Liv. The predator. The one that everyone knows they need to protect their daughters from. Protect their virtue from. I’ve always been that. Nobody knew who my people were, nobody knew where I came from. And even though I had Quinn Dodge to vouch for me, people have always been a little bit wary of me. I know what that’s like. I don’t mind it. I’ve found a lot of ways around it.”
His words sat uncomfortably with her. With her image of him as that good ole boy who got along with everyone and everything. “Everybody likes you,” she pointed out.
“Sure,” Luke said. “Everybody likes me, but when push comes to shove they don’t want me anywhere near their daughter, right?”
She blinked. “I suppose that’s true.”
“So I just wonder... I wonder what it’s like to be the one everybody’s worried about.” He looked at her, long enough that it made her feel uncomfortable. Long enough that she had to look away. “Does it irritate you, kiddo?”
She frowned. “I don’t know any other way. People worry about me because... I’m me...”
“Does it have something to do with your sister?”
She looked up, startled, her eyes crashing into his. “Vanessa? What made you think about Vanessa?”
“Bennett brought her up when he raked my ass over the coals this morning.”
“He shouldn’t have,” Olivia said, looking down into her coffee again, her heart thundering sickly in her throat. “She doesn’t have anything to do with this.” She sighed heavily. “Or maybe she does. Vanessa is sad. And, I feel like underneath all of her rebellion she was obviously fragile. Because the world got to her. Addiction. Drugs. She just couldn’t find a way out once she got in. Like when you put your foot in the river and it’s moving a lot faster than you think. That’s what I always think happened.”
“Sorry,” he said. “Do you think that makes other people worry you might be fragile, too?”
He was treading on such a tender place inside of her, and he didn’t even realize it. Didn’t realize that she probably worried about her susceptibility to the weights that had dragged her sister down more often than anyone else ever did.
For some reason though, she wanted to tell him. Because his words—his honesty—were echoing in her head. What’s it like to be the hen?
There was something painful in that question. An acknowledgment that no one had ever worried for him.
She couldn’t deny his question. The man had had his tongue in her mouth after all. So this wasn’t more intimate than that, surely.
“My parents worry about me, because she’s not even around for them to worry about. She rarely makes contact. She’s impossible to find. For them, it’s about protecting the child they can protect,” she said slowly. “For the town? I don’t know. It’s like being the star of their favorite soap opera.”
“Everybody thinks you and Bennett are perfect for each other. It’s like watching your favorite couple on TV get destroyed by a very obvious interloper. A villain.” He flashed her a smile that looked not villainous in the least, and somehow the fact that it lacked malice made it all the more dangerous.
That was the thing about Luke. Like he’d said, everybody liked him, but nobody wanted him to get too close. He was easy, and he was a nice guy, a helpful and accommodating guy. But he was a predator. She could sense that. Could sense that one wrong move and she could find herself being hunted.
“That’s probably it,” she said, trying to speak around her tightened throat.
“We’re sure giving people something to talk about.”
Olivia looked around the room and noticed that half the people in it were looking at Luke and herself quite avidly.
She put her head down. “I should have stayed home today.”
“But then we wouldn’t have run into each other.”
Exactly. But she didn’t say that out loud.
Suddenly, his green eyes turned serious, and that sent her stomach into a free fall. She could handle Luke when he was being an ass. She could handle him when he was teasing her. It was a lot harder to handle him when he looked at her like this. Like he might say something grave. Or lean forward and kiss her again.
When it quit being a joke, quit being a show and became something much more real.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me,” he said.
Her stomach hollowed out, her fingers feeling restless. She wiggled them, tapping them against the mug. “You don’t think I should be afraid of you?” she whispered.
“I didn’t say that.” She chanced a glance at him again, caught his eyes, and then held them. “I said you don’t have to be afraid of me. You maybe should be. But you could push it aside for a little while, too.”
Her heart skidded to a halt, then began to beat rapidly, flinging itself against her chest as if it was on a desperate mission to get itself out of here. To get away from him.
Her body was smart. At least, parts of it were. The parts that housed emotions, fear. Other parts...
Her breasts felt heavy, and that thick ache had started up between her thighs again. Those parts of her wanted more of what Luke had given her last night.
Because, of course, only Luke had ever made her feel that way. She had actively avoided ever making herself feel that way, and she had put such a careful distance between herself and Bennett physically. And it had been easy.
Bennett, who was such a beautiful man, had been easy for her to resist.
Bennett, with his broad shoulders and physique comprised of all lean, well-honed muscle. Bennett, with his dark hair, brown eyes and square jaw. She had been able to resist him. Had been able to put up that wall and stay firmly on the right side of it.
She wanted desperately to be able to do that with Luke and couldn’t seem to.
That was galling.
“I think fear might be for the best,” she said, her lips numb.
He lifted a shoulder. “Possibly.”
She looked down at the cinnamon roll, at the melted icing pooling at the center. She wanted to lick it. But that was better than wanting to lick Luke again. “I’m not sure I’m hungry.”
“Do you have to be hungry to eat a cinnamon roll?” he asked.
“You should be. That’s the point of food, Luke. You’re hungry, and you eat it.”
“But sometimes you just eat it because you want to. Because it tastes good.”
Suddenly, she had a feeling that the food in question was becoming a metaphor. She would rather it didn’t. But then, as with all things related, it didn’t seem to matter what she wanted and what she didn’t.
“I don’t,” she said, sniffing loudly. “I don’t believe in indulgence for the sake of it.”
He reached out and grabbed hold of the fork, taking a large slice off the cinnamon roll and putting the bite in his mouth slowly. So very slowly. It was gratuitous. It forced her to watch the motion of his lips, the play of his throat as he swallowed.
“I do,” he said finally. “Whiskey and cinnamon rolls. I do it because it feels good.”
“Not me,” she whispered. She wouldn’t have been able to make her voice louder now if she wanted to.
“Try it,” he said, his voice holding more temptation than all the butter in the cinnamon roll ever could. “You might find it’s not as scary as you think.”
She looked down at her hands, which were curled into fists on the table, her nails digging into her palms. Her heart was pounding, her throat dry. And she felt... She felt like she was being asked to make a choice she didn’t think she could make. To jump over a hurdle she wasn’t sure she wanted to clear. “That’s what scares me most.”
He swept his fork through the roll again, getting another bit and holding it out toward her.
In spite of herself, her mouth watered. “I’m really not hungry.”
“But do you want it?” he pressed.
Yes, yes she wanted it. The cinnamon roll. And, worse, the metaphor attached to it.
He held the fork out and she parted her lips wordlessly. And allowed him to give her the bite. Flavor exploded over her tongue and she couldn’t keep herself from groaning. Luke smiled. And suddenly the fox-and-hen comparison seemed all too apt.
She felt like a little cornered hen, shivering in the back of her coop, facing down a gleaming-eyed fox who most definitely wanted to eat her.
What a strange thing that was. That feeling. Being wanted. Hunted. Pursued. And for it to be something other than unpleasant.
But the worst part was, part of her wanted to rush out of her corner and offer herself to him, even knowing how it would end.
This was the kind of thing she’d avoided. Because she knew there was no good end to this, and she had to do what was right, not what was indulgent.
You’re in charge here. You know what you want. You want Bennett. Luke and his hotness are just a distraction.
He leaned back in his chair, looking as self-satisfied as if he’d just beaten her at a game of darts. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
“That’s the problem,” she said once she had swallowed. “It’s not bad tasting. That doesn’t mean it isn’t bad for you.”
“Then you go work outside a little bit. The physical equivalent of Hail Marys.”
“That doesn’t work with everything,” she pointed out.
He reached out, and her heart stopped as he pressed his thumb against her lower lip, dragging it along the edge. “You have a little frosting there.”
Then he pulled his hand back and stuck his thumb in his mouth, licking the frosting that had just been on her lips off his skin.
An intimate shiver went through her.
“Maybe not,” he said. “I still think it might be worth it.”
Olivia pulled the cinnamon roll toward her and took the fork from his side of the table. Then she proceeded to eat it far more quickly than anyone should eat a giant cinnamon roll. But she couldn’t sit there and have Luke watch her like that. Couldn’t sit there and allow him to feed her. It was too much. She needed the cinnamon roll to just be a cinnamon roll.
She needed her body to go back to being her own.
She needed some sanity, and she was worried that she might not get it.
“Are you done with your coffee?” She was afraid that if she finished the coffee she might die of glucose trauma. Between the drink and the cinnamon roll it was all a bit more sugar than she had anticipated.
She was prosugar, but she had a feeling any more and she wouldn’t be able to pass a sobriety test. Walking in a straight line would be above her pay grade.
“Yes,” she said.
“Great,” he said, standing. “Why don’t you drive out to that property with me.”
“What?”
“I figure,” he said, “that since you’re a Logan and it’s Logan property, you’re free to show me around.”
Olivia felt like she’d been bulldozed. Seeing as she was typically the bulldozer in such scenarios, it was a bit shocking. She hesitated. “I suppose so.”
“Are you busy?”
She was not. It was why she was tramping around in leggings in the middle of the day. “Well, I had some things I thought I might do,” she said. Lying, obviously.
He smiled. “What things are you doing?”
“You know. I was thinking I might go get...a manicure. Or maybe have coffee with a friend.”
“You already had coffee with a friend,” he said, that smile widening.
“Not what I meant.”
Actually, she kind of would like to have coffee with a friend. Maybe with Lindy, or with Lindy’s sister-in-law Sabrina. Somebody who might be able to talk to her about all of the things that were going on right now. Except, then she would have to admit them. She would have to verbalize them, put them into words. She wasn’t sure she could do that. She was having enough trouble thinking about them as it was.
“Well, you’re done with your coffee. And, I don’t actually think you need a manicure.”
“And you’re an expert on things like that?”
“I’m an expert on women’s hands,” he said pointedly. “Hands I think I might want on my body. And let me tell you, yours would do just fine.”
Her eyes caught his and her stomach tightened. Because while she had expected to see that smart-ass glint in his eye, it wasn’t there. It was that grave, serious face again. The way he’d looked before he’d kissed her in the bar last night.
And again in his truck before he’d pulled her onto his lap.
“Luke...”
He put his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “I promise I’ll behave.”
“You never behave.”
He lifted a shoulder. “Fine. I promise I won’t touch you.” He paused for a moment. “Unless you ask me to.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“Okay.”
Then, he headed out of the coffee shop and she stood, scrambling after him. What was it about him that compelled her to follow him? She could just let him walk out, and yet, there she was, following his lead, walking with him to his truck.
“Thank you,” he said, opening up the passenger side door for her, just like he had done last night. She rolled her eyes and got in, allowing him to close it for her.
Luke started the engine and they went down the highway, in the direction of Get Out of Dodge, headed out to the old family property that Olivia hadn’t been to in years.
“It’s strange,” she said as Luke turned his truck down the dusty road that badly needed to be regraveled. “My family owns so much land here in the county and I never go to much of any of it. I just go into town, go home, go to my job. I’m not really that conscious of it.”
“Have you ever thought of moving to one of the bigger properties? Setting a place up for yourself?”
No, she hadn’t. Because her entire goal had been to marry Bennett. Which meant that she would be moving to Dodge land. And that meant that Logan land didn’t factor in.
“Okay,” he said, adding no further commentary.
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing. I’m just saying okay. If you’ve never thought about doing anything on any of your family’s land, that’s not totally abnormal, I would suppose. I don’t know what it’s like to grow up with all of that.”
“Where did you grow up?” It occurred to her then that she actually didn’t know.
“A ways from here,” he said. He offered up nothing more.
Olivia looked out the window and took in the scenery. It was a beautiful piece of land. Pastoral, with a heavy ridgeline of pine trees around the edge of the fenced-in fields, mountains rising up beyond. “What are you going to do with this place?”
She didn’t know why on earth she should care. Only that she did.
That was almost scarier than kissing him.