Page 23 of Something Like Sunflowers

“Seriously, Dev, you could get carbon-monoxide poisoning. You’re not driving it.”

“Really?” she asks, nose scrunched as she scrolls through her phone to confirm the validity of my statement. “I don’t see that here in the article. It just says—”

“Cut the shit, babygirl. You and I both know there ain’t a chance in hell of me lettin’ you drive yourself away in that poison pumping gob of bubble gum, and there isn’t a chance in Heaven that God didn’t put me here in the same place to help you out, so just pop your trunk so I can get your bags and get in my damn truck.”

She looks mad as hell, but damn, it’s sexy.

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

Fine.

Chapter 11

Devyn

Don’t smell his shirt. Don’t smell his shirt. Don’t smell his shirt.

Ohmygod, that smells so good.

Fuck.

Chapter 12

Devyn

Ican carry my own bags, you know.” I roll my eyes because I certainly don’t at all enjoy watching Hunter hoist a third Classy Country zip-up tote onto one of his biceps. It can hold a lot of weight. It’s really freaking strong.

As thick as my thigh? Quite possibly.

Moving my eyes down to his thighs, I appreciate just how much he’s changed since we were teenagers. He’s Hunter, but he’s so much more now.

He’s all man.

And muscles.

With a farm.

I stare at the boy I once loved, no longer a boy. He’s a real-life cowboy. Just like he always said he’d be one day. And that makes me so damn happy for him. Maybe this is pride?

Pride and lust are feeling like sisters right now, though. It’s hard to tell them apart while he keeps making semi-grunting sounds in his throat that I’m not even filing away in my sound bank for future sordid purposes at all.

Two more bags go on his other arm, and he pulls me back to the real world.

“Babygirl, I’m not sure you can carry your own bags when you’re too busy checkin’ me out to realize I’ve emptied the whole trunk already.”

Shit.

He walks toward the house, but not before he gives me one of those thirst trap winks of his, and I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t make me really freaking thirsty.

I need him to leave so I can be far enough away from him to remember to stay Far. Enough. Away from him. I shake away the goosebumps he just caused and pray my body behaves as I follow him up the stone path to Dustin’s front door.

A smile breaks across my face when I take in the front porch. Some things never change. The door is still bright red. My brother liked how it made the house pop. It was the first thing he did when he bought the place at eighteen. He and Hunter were roommates at the time, and it was covered in take-out boxes, protein powder, and empty bags of Doritos. It was pretty disgusting. I only saw it a few times before I left for the city.

Dustin’s made some updates to the place over the years. They take my breath away. It’s the new siding, the picket fence that lines the perimeter of the tomato plants, the wraparound porch that was most definitely not there before…damn, this place looks good.

I walk in behind Hunter who seems to act like he still lives here—great—and just waltzes in without knocking. Before I know it, we’re standing in the living room and Hunter’s chucking my bags onto the floor by the sofa. I stand in my brother’s house, wide-eyed and breath stolen from me as I take in the gorgeous mahogany flooring and pinstripe siding beneath pristinely painted white chair railing.

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