Page 52 of His Tenth Dance

He could talk to Briar anytime he wanted; he’d never had a problem talking to women.

Tuck’s phone rang. “This is my brother,” he said. “He said he’d call about Molly.” He swiped on the call as he walked away. “Hey, Hunt.”

Tarr looked back over to the goat enclosure, which still had plenty of work that needed to be completed. So he got back to work.

A few minutes later, he heard the clicking of dog claws on gravel, and he lifted his head from the bottom rung of the fence he was currently attaching to find Wiggins running toward him. Pure joy seeped onto Tarr’s face in the form of a smile, and he crouched down and opened his arms for the dog. “Heya, buddy.”

Wiggins ran straight at him, and Tarr scrubbed the dog up and down his back and along his sides. “How are you, bud? What’ve you been doing? You been chasing rabbits again? I bet you’ve been chasing rabbits.”

The arrival of Wiggins meant Briar couldn’t be far behind, and Tarr looked to the same corner of the barn while he showered love on the canine. She didn’t appear, but Tarr heard the shifting of gravel, and he stayed down scrubbing the dog as Briar came around the corner of the barn—this time lugging a sign that had to be a two-by-twelve plank at least ten feet long.

He instantly got to his feet and started toward her. “Let me,” he said.

She froze as if his voice had that effect on her and did nothing but stare as he approached.

He’d never felt more naked as he took the sign from her. The tall, blocky letters in bright blue readLambulancejust the way they’d have looked on the side of the emergency vehicle.

“I’m not sure where Bobbie Jo wants this one,” he said.

“She said she was going to put it on the side of a wagon,” Briar said.

Tarr backed up several steps so he could turn around without hitting her with the board. Then he walked away, expecting her to join him.

She didn’t.

Wiggins followed him, and he leaned the sign up against the side of the barn. “Oh, right. The wagon. I’m building the box for that, but it’s coming after the enclosure.”

“You mean the Goatel?” Briar asked with a smile.

She still had not moved, and it seemed as though her feet had planted themselves in the ground and grown roots.

Tarr grinned in her direction. “Oh, yes. Excuse me. TheGoatel.”

He indicated the enclosure. “I’ve got it done, and she wanted me to see how the sign looked on it and send her a picture. I guess she’s doing a video call with her mom about the catering for the wedding.”

Briar nodded. “Yeah, that’s what she told me.”

She did an about-face and started walking away. “I’ve got the sign in the back of my truck.”

Tarr wasn’t sure if he could follow her or not, but the Southern gentleman inside him got him to move. Briar had parked at the opposite corner of the barn, and he caught up to her easily due to his height and longer legs.

“How you been?” he said. “I haven’t seen you much this summer.”

“I see you every day, Tarr,” she said.

“Yeah, maybe. I guess I meant we hadn’t talked.”

She’d already lowered the tailgate on her truck, and he jogged ahead a couple of steps so he could reach the sign first. He pulled it out, creating a grating sound against the bed of her truck. She hissed out a small sound while he watched her shoulders box up before she released them. She pressed her eyes closed and exhaled.

“Sorry,” he said. “But look how pretty this is.” He lifted it as if she hadn’t seen the lettering and golden wood grain.

This sign had also been done completely out of wood. The wordGoatelhad been done in a scripty font and arranged in an arch along the top of the sign, which also belled up. A wooden goat had been cut out and painted white with brown spots and placed beneath the words.

Tarr grinned at it, so much appreciation moving through him. “You’re really talented, Briar.”

She blinked at him and then looked at the sign. “Thank you?”

“Why’d you phrase that like a question?” he asked, throwing her a minor glare. “How’d you do this? You got a machine?”

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