Page 71 of Extreme Romancing in Idaho

I stood and padded at the water on my ass, sending Angie into another fit of giggles.

Her creative ways of torturing me had increased tenfold since the day on the trail. Though I still had access to Oscar, she never gave me a job where I could use him. Instead, I’d spent the last two weeks hoeing miles of burs in the beet and bean fields. It took me a week to finish the beets and then another to tackle the beans. Sunup to sundown, I took out weeds that’d grown up to my armpits, only to have the ones in the first field already grown back as if I hadn’t done any of it.

It was psychological anguish.

There had to be a more efficient way to farm. Maybe they didn’t have the money to pay for weed killer, or they were going for certified organic produce. Either way, I tried to flag down the crop duster planes whenever they buzzed overhead.

Please drop some of your magic dust from the sky and put an end to my misery.

Even with the intensity of the monotonous mind-mushing chore, that kiss had been worth it. I’d go back and do it all over again. The true agony came from the long hours spent in the fields where I had nothing to distract me from reliving it. Her delicate skin, the feel of her body under me, her response which had totally undone me.

I’d never lost control like that, and I couldn’t think of the last time a simple kiss took over my senses so completely.

It’d crossed a boundary, a turning point in our relationship, and Angie had made it clear she wasn’t interested in any sort of intimacy where I was concerned. With this deal hinging on Angie’s acceptance, sleeping with her would make buying her land trickier than bagging flies—nearly impossible.

Therefore, the only way forward was backward. If only I could get Angie to go back to the teasing, argumentative, talkative women I enjoyed sparing with, maybe I could forge a friendship between us.

Anything was better than this awkward silence.

“Well, as fun as this has been, the tractor’s waitin’ on me.” Walking to the dining table, she crouched next to Tony and placed a kiss on his forehead, resting her hands on his bony ones. Tony’s weight loss had snowballed the past couple of weeks.

“Bye, Papa. I’ll come back and finish our round of Skip-Bo in a couple of hours.” Knocking two stacks of mail together that her father had been sorting, she moved swiftly toward the front door.

Not caring what her parents thought, I jogged after her. As I passed the table, a bright-red foreclosure notice caught my eye, along with a couple of past dues stamped on the bottom of what looked like medical bills.

If the Johnsons weren’t so stubborn, I could make all that go away.

“Wait.”

“I don’t have time right now. That hay’s not going to bale itself.”

Much of farming was repetitive. Alfalfa growth, followed by cutting, letting it dry, raking, then baling and stacking. It felt like we’d barely finished that job and now we were well into the second go ’round.

I lowered my voice. “You can’t avoid me forever.”

She tilted her head. “Hmm … actually I can.”

She retrieved her truck keys from the dish and went to open the doorknob.

I caught her elbow and turned her around to face me. “Look … about the kiss.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“We need to—”

“No, we don’t.” She cut me off. “All I need to do right now is get back in the tractor. And you …” She looked me up and down. “… need to go change your shirt.” She smirked.

“Fine,” I conceded. We wouldn’t talk about the obvious energy snapping between us, but I wouldn’t let her out of my sight until I got one promise out of her. “You can’t go dirt biking with Smoot. You’ll hurt yourself. Do something else, like go-carting. Something in a controlled environment.”

“Are you trying to act like my father now? My brother?” She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “I can handle myself.”

“Please, Angie.” I dropped my gaze to study the wood grains in the floor. Slowly releasing my breath, I lifted my eyes to meet hers. “I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if you got hurt.”

The smirk dropped from her face. Her brief glance down at my mouth told me I wasn’t the only one thinking about our time under the tree. She gave me a short nod. “Okay. I’ll ask him if we can do something else. He rescheduled anyway. Something came up.”

Code for ‘I forgot about my daughter’s recital, and now I have to spend time with my wife and kids.’ Or code for ‘my girlfriend surprised me with a weekend away.’ Being a player myself, I spoke their language, and this guy was playing Angie hardcore. I wish I could make her see it. Smoot didn’t give off the cheater vibes, but his over-the-top use of climbing lingo made me think he was a pretender.

I pressed my lips into a flat line. This wasn’t exactly the assurance I wanted, but it was better than I expected.

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