Page 29 of Sweet and Salty

I busy myself around the barnyard, picking up and securing whatever I can find that needed tying down before the storm wreaks its havoc.

When I glance over at the paddock ten minutes later, my heart leaps. Not only is Einstein curled at Jesse’s feet, but Lucretia Borgia is letting him stroke her haunches. He rubs and massages her sides, and the little hussy huffs in pleasure. With a well-practiced motion, Jesse doesn’t stop rubbing her with one hand while he drapes the end of the lead rope across her back. The donkey doesn’t even blink, not even when Jesse swipes the halter up and over her muzzle a few moments later.

“Got her,” he calls to me, a bright smile splitting his face. My ovaries are magnets, drawing me toward him, but I tell them to hush. “I’ll lead her into the barn.” Lucretia Borgia follows him like he’s the Pied Piper of stubborn donkeys.

The pull deep inside me won’t relent, so I ride it, and follow him toward the barn door. If I lean against the jamb, it won’t look like I’m desperate to have those very same hands all over me. It’s a good thing the power is going to go out. The darkness can hold all of the filthy fantasies I’m going to play out alone in my head tonight.

He leads Cree into a stall and closes the door, petting her muzzle and then removing the halter. “Is there anything else you need help with?”

“Don’t think for a second that I like you better because you charmed my ass,” I say. I don’t know where that sass comes from, but I like it. I thought Chris had bored it all out of me, but no, there’s Sassy New Laura, waiting to come out to play.

His gaze flicks toward me before he kneels beside Einstein. “Maybe she wasn’t the ass I wanted to charm,” he says, almosttoo softly to hear, but the barn has surprisingly excellent acoustics.

Zinging hot alarm bells of desire rocket through me. Me? Does he mean me? He might have, and dear holy sweet goddesses, I—

I need to shut this down. “So you’re harboring a whole stable of donkeys at your rundown cabin? That sounds like an animal welfare problem. I should call my brother.”

Rising to his feet, Jesse shrugs. “I mean no one any harm.”

I suspect he means that. There is a gentleness to him, now that he isn’t trying so hard to be obstinate and contrary.

Outside the barn, the skies open in a waterfall of rain. Since I’m standing in the doorway, water splashes all over me, and I leap into the warmth of the barn, away from the deluge. “They weren’t wrong about this storm.”

Jesse dashes past me and pulls the barn doors closed, cocooning us with the animals and the scent of fresh alfalfa bales and sawdust. It’s far too intimate a setting, even as Einstein walks over and curls on top of Jesse’s feet. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, yeah.” I wrap my arms around myself, shivering. “It’s just water. I have an umbrella somewhere in the old tack room. I’ll give the weather a moment, and then we can go to the house. I owe you coffee at least.”

“I can’t drink coffee this late in the day. It gives me reflux.” He says it while staring up at the roof of the barn, as if wondering if that will hold us. “Do you have a space heater? I don’t want you to catch a chill or anything.”

Yup, ovary magnet activated. It isn’t even a regular old magnet, but an electromagnet, pulsing deep in my belly. “I’ll be all right.”

He glances over at me, his storm-cloud-gray eyes filled with concern. “I know you can take care of yourself, Laura. I just—Iworry about you sometimes. I like helping you. I hope that’s all right.”

Giant klaxons ring throughout my body. If I don’t shut this down in the next few moments, I’m going to jump all over him, and then where will that leave me? Heartbroken and alone. Again.

“The rain’s letting up.” I brush past him on my way to the tack room and ignore the thrill of pleasure that rushes through me at the small touch. “We should get to the house while we can.”

“Right.”

He doesn’t follow me into the tack room, which I appreciate. There is an old wooden tack box there that would be excellent for—

Things that I’m not thinking about.

I find the umbrella without too much trouble, since it’s exactly where I left it. Good thing about being a control freak, no matter what my exes say.

I exit the tack room to see Jesse standing by the pigs while Lucretia Borgia and Einstein bask in his presence. He’s singing to them, actually singing to my pigs. Be still my heart.

At least until I hear the song is “Humpty Dumpty.”

“I have the umbrella,” I tell him, and that surprised smile when he turns and sees me? Double swoon with a cherry and whipped cream on top. “Let’s make a run for it.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Jesse

I chaseafter her through the rain, our feet splashing water and muck into the air, the umbrella doing absolutely nothing to keep us dry. I don’t care. Her laugh as she holds the broken umbrella aloft despite its futility makes me feel warm and dry.

She throws open the kitchen door and I shuffle in beside her, toeing off my muddy, wet boots. “I’m so sorry, I’m dripping all over your floor,” I say.

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