Page 41 of Between a Rock and a Hard Cowboy

“Always,” she returned without looking up.

He smiled. She was a good eater. She didn’t shy away from carbs or anything else.

“How about I go downstairs, grab us both something, and bring it back up here so you can keep working,” he said, feeling like he needed an excuse for his plan to eat with her in private.

“Good. Don’t forget French fries. And a cupcake. And coffee.”

So she did hear him when he talked to her while she was on the computer. Or perhaps it was just selective hearing. Apparentlyfood basedselective hearing.

“All right.” He nodded, not pushing his luck by asking anything else. He’d figure it out on his own.

He left the door unlocked, not trusting her to actually hear him and let him back in when he returned with the food. By then he figured she’d be too far down the rabbit hole and in an unbreakable trance.

He was wrong.

Linc opened the door, take-out bag of food in his hand, and found Eva’s eyes on him, wide with excitement.

“Sorry. Did I frighten you?”

“No.” She could barely control her smile, which caused him to frown.

“What happened while I was gone?”

It hadn’t been that long. Fifteen or twenty minutes maybe. Just long enough for Rosie to grill them up a couple of burgers and pack it all up to go. And Eva definitely hadn’t been in this mood when he’d left.

“I found something,” she said, still looking like she was bubbling over.

“Okay. Would you like to enlighten me?” He put the bag down on the table and folded his arms, waiting.

She latched her teeth onto her bottom lip and his gaze inevitably followed. He shouldn’t be looking at her mouth. He really shouldn’t imagine biting on that lip himself.

“Not yet,” she said with a cringe.

That wasn’t the answer he’d been expecting. At least the surprise knocked him out of his foolish lust filled fantasy about Eva’s mouth.

She was…oddtoday. Or, odder than usual. He could feel the energy coming off her in waves. He’d seen it before. Had felt it himself. After battle, when the adrenaline high hadn’t dissipated yet and the excess energy had nowhere to go.

Eva looked like that now. Like she was riding a wave of adrenaline from whatever she’d found on her computer—her battlefield. But unlike his wartime experience working as part of a tight unit, Eva wasn’t a team player. She was a loner. And she wasn’t sharing.

“Um. Okay. So, uh, we’ll eat then?” he suggested.

“Yeah. Let’s eat,” she said with a smile that he was sure had nothing to do with the hamburgers and French fries inside the bag.

Eva made short work of the food he laid out on the table. She must have been hungry since she even moved her laptop to eat.

Conversation was in short supply, but he didn’t mind. Theirs was a comfortable silence. They’d spent enough hours together in silence recently he was well used to it.

“You done?” she asked.

He raised his gaze from the half-eaten cupcake he’d gotten for himself. A match to the one he’d gotten her.

“Why? Are you kicking me out?”

If that were the case, the cupcake was coming with him. Now he knew why she was obsessed with them. They were fucking delicious. He might have to switch up his usual order of hot apple pie with vanilla ice cream.

“No. I’m not kicking you out.” Eva stood, shoving her chair back so she could round the table and make her way to him.

Frowning, he leaned farther away from the table as she planted one hand on his chair back. When she raised one long leg and stepped over him before settling in his lap facing him, his eyes widened.

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