Page 12 of A Cowboy in the Streets

Adam appeared, looming over Ben like the Rockies over the plains. Glowering, of course. “You coming in or what?”

I blinked, my smile wavering ever so slightly. What was it about this man that always made me feel like I had been caught doing something naughty?

Worse, made me want to do something naughty. Just to see what he would do about it. He was all roped forearms and broad shoulders. Furrowed brow. Scowling mouth. This man had buttons I wanted to push. Hard.

I stepped inside. Ben disappeared, leaving us alone in the foyer, staring at each other. I lifted the dish higher, like a peace offering. Not that we were at war. It was just…tense. “I brought cobbler.”

He frowned. Literally frowned. As though my cobbler was a personal affront. He had that mean teacher vibe. Like he was on the brink of issuing detention to a precocious student.

Unfortunately for him, I had always been precocious. So, really, it was his fault that when he reached for the cobbler, I said, “Careful. You wouldn’t want to accidentally kiss me again.”

A muscle in his cheek popped as he stared at me. Then his gaze trailed from my face down my body to the cobbler in my hands, all the way down to my pink boots and back up again. His voice was perfectly flat when he said, “That’s not going to happen.”

Clearly, he found me lacking.

It would have been unnerving if I hadn’t had a lifetime of experience disappointing men. Maybe I should give him my dad’s phone number. Let them commiserate.

I maintained eye contact, smiling the whole time, as he relieved me of the cobbler. He didn’t smile back. Maybe that was a good thing. Scowling, he was already the most beautiful man I’d ever clapped eyes on. Smiling? That might be too much. He was my boss. We needed to keep this relationship strictly professional, which would be hard to do if his smile melted the panties off my body.

The scowl was dangerous enough as it was.

“Thank you,” he forced out, like the words were physically painful in his mouth. The tips of his ears were red beneath the glints of silver in his dark hair. Was he blushing? Or merely annoyed?

“You’re welcome,” I said.

Once again, we were staring at each other. Awkwardly.

Okay, no. We could not go on like this. This job was too important to me to allow something as stupid as an accidental kiss to mess it all up. I had won over psychopath stallions with murder on their minds. Could one grumpy cowboy really be that hard?

Other than his very hard shoulders, obviously.

“Do we have a problem?” I asked. “I mean, I realize the way we first met was…” I waved a hand in the air, lacking words to adequately describe what that was. “But we’re both adults, right? We can move past it. We have to move past it if we’re going to work well together.”

His brows pushed together. “We don’t have a problem.”

“Oh,” I said. “Great. Your scowl sure had me fooled there for a second.” I offered him a cheeky grin.

His scowl deepened, if that was possible. “I’m not—” He lifted his hand to his forehead and mouth to verify. He blinked, his expression changing to baffled exasperation. “Well, shit.”

I burst out laughing and he blinked again, like it had caught him by surprise. “That’s okay, boss. Now that I know you have Resting Grump Face, I won’t take it personally.”

“Hey, there you both are. We’re all in the kitchen.” A man who matched Adam in height, but was slightly slimmer through the shoulders, appeared in the hallway. He took the pan from Adam, gave it an appreciative sniff, then turned to me. With the cobbler balanced on one palm, he extended his other hand out to me. “I’m Braxton Hale. Brax. You must be James Campos.”

“That’s me.” His large hand engulfed mine, but I held firm.

His eyebrows went up. “Nice grip.”

“All the better to hold on for the ride.”

Adam’s eyes narrowed into slits as he looked between us, but Brax laughed, his blue eyes glinting. “Spoken like a true horsewoman. Mom would have loved you. Welcome to Lodestar Ranch, James.”

Well. That was a nice change from his older brother. “Thank you,” I said. “I’m happy to be here.”

“Good. Because we’re happy to have you.”

The scowl on Adam’s face suggested otherwise, but at least this time, it wasn’t directed at me. It was aimed squarely at his brother. Maybe his Resting Grump Face really wasn’t about me at all.

I was happy about that. Truly I was. I didn’t want my new boss to hate me. But maybe there was a tiny, stupid part of me that felt a sharp jab of jealousy, like I wanted to keep all his scowls to myself.

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