Page 7 of Bravo

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I reply with a smile. After offering me a wave, she rushes back across the street and toward the diner. I watch for just a moment, doing my best to stifle the darkness of what I’ve seen as it tries to creep back into my mind.

Then I turn to head back toward the barber shop and smack into a soft frame.

“Oh, sorry!” Instinctively reaching out, I settle my hands on top of slender shoulders then find myself losing the ability to breathe as I stare down into the most gorgeous blue eyes I’ve ever seen. They’re impossibly blue, really. Like the sky on a cloudless day.

“I’m sorry,” the woman says, pulling back.

I withdraw my hands from her shoulders, and because I’m not sure what to do with them, I shove them into my pockets. “My fault. Sorry.”

Wearing jeans, boots, and a Carhartt jacket, she’s dressed like a rancher, though I’ve never seen her. Honey-colored hair isbraided over her shoulder, and a baseball cap is tucked on her head. It takes me a few seconds to realize that it’s my family’s brand on the front of it. An HF with cattle horns coming off each letter.

“Oh, Hunt Ranch?” I point to the hat.

“Yeah.” Color paints her cheeks. “I am sorry, I didn’t mean to run into you like that?—”

“Bradyn Hunt,” I reply, holding out my hand.

Those impossibly gorgeous blue eyes widen as she reaches out and takes my hand. “The eldest brother returns home, then?” she asks with a hesitant smile.

Why is she affecting me this way? Like I’ve been struck by lightning and can’t remember how to function?

I clear my throat. “It would seem so.”

“I started work at your ranch about a month ago and have heard nothing but stories about how you were off on an adventure, saving the world and all that.”

After withdrawing my hand, I rub it over the back of my neck in an attempt to ease the heat enveloping me as she stares up at me with wide eyes I would happily drown in. “Yeah, well, I wouldn’t go that far.”

“Everyone else would.”

Because I have literally no idea what else to say, I just stare at her—because that’s what a hardened soldier does, right? Stares at a beautiful woman because he has no idea what else to say?

“Well, I need to get to the post office. It was good meeting you, Mr. Hunt.”

“Bradyn, please. And your name is?—”

“Sammy,” she replies. “I’ll see you around, Bradyn.” Without another word, she turns and heads down the street toward the post office, all while I continue staring after her like an awestruck teenager.

Somewhere close by, a bell dings.

“Bradyn?”

“Huh? What?” I finally turn away from the direction Sammy walked in, only to find Floyd standing in the doorway of his shop, grinning like he just caught my hand in the cookie jar.

Which actually happened once at a Hunt family barbeque when I’d been trying to get my hands on dessert before dinner.

“I thought that was you. Are you planning on coming in?”

“Yeah, sorry. I just?—”

“Oh, I saw.” He chuckles. “She’s a looker, for sure. Come in so we can make you at least mildly presentable for the next time your paths cross.”

CHAPTER 3

KENNEDY

“Just this today?” the aged man behind the postal counter asks as he sticks a stamp onto the postcard I just handed him. “I bet your grandfather misses you something fierce.”

The words make my stomach churn. “I miss him, too. And yeah, just that, Shep, thanks.”

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