Page 19 of Boston
“Right now, it still depends,” Cora answered honestly. “Faced with a gorgeous summer day and mac and cheese, yes. When I walk into my cabin and see the dust and disarray?” She brushed her hair over her shoulder, praying Boston liked brunettes. “Not so much.”
He gave her that delicious chuckle. “Sounds reasonable.” A truck honked nearby, and Boston jogged in front of her and opened the passenger door of a beautiful truck. “I hope you don’t mind that it’s brown. She runs great.”
Cora came to a stop and looked at him, his wit flowing through her with such warmth. “Brown trucks are fine.”
“Fine? This truck isamazing.” He kicked a grin at her, and oh, she wanted him to do that and do that and do that.
“I just hope the air conditioning works.”
“Get in and find out.” Boston nodded his cowboy hat to the passenger seat, and Cora gave him what she hoped was a fun,flirty look as she stepped past him and put her heeled sandal on the running board.
“Careful there,” he murmured, his hand settling on her upper back. She dropped into the seat; his hand fell away; Cora noticed the spark that thrummed through her body—all of it starting from where he’d touched her.
He got behind the wheel and let out a great sigh. “Okay.” He started the truck and looked over to her. He seemed like he wanted to ask her something, and she watched the warring pass through his expression.
Her heart started pumping a bit harder, suddenly unsure if she wanted to answer a bunch of questions. She focused on pulling her seatbelt across her body and clicking it into place.
“Ready?” Boston asked, and Cora swallowed her nerves.
“Yeah,” she said, committing herself to being stuck with him in the cab of this truck for the next forty-five minutes, whatever questions may come. “I’m ready.”
“Great.” Boston pulled out of his parking space and headed for the exit. He pulled onto the highway and adjusted the air conditioning and then the radio.
Cora recognized his movements as nervous, especially when he adjusted his cowboy hat for the third time in as many minutes. “Are you okay?” she asked.
He cut her a look. “Maybe.”
“I don’t know what that means. Is this like your ‘sort of’ with the client?”
“It was my cousin,” he said. “I was talking to her and her fiancée about showing them our best spots for their photos.”
“Oh, are they getting married at Silver Sage?”
“Yep,” Boston said. “So it was sort of a client and sort of not.”
Cora smile and tucked her hair behind her ear. “And they won’t have questions about why you had to go so suddenly?”
He chuckled and shook his head. “I doubt it. My family is…enormous. Conversations move like lightning, and no one really thinks too much of it.”
“Define enormous,” she said.
He sighed again. “Oh, wow. Uh, what would be big to you?”
“I don’t know. I have a sister and a brother-in-law.”
Boston burst out laughing, and Cora basked in the sound of it. Amid his chuckles, he said, “Oh, honey, I haveeightuncles.” He looked fully at her then. “And that means eight aunts. I have a step-sister and two half-siblings in my own family. Every aunt-and-uncle family is like that.”
Cora blinked at him, mentally doing the math. “So enormous is bigger than five.”
He laughed again, though she hadn’t phrased her sentence as a question. “Sure, we can go with that definition.” He drove in a much more relaxed manner now, with one hand draped over the top of the wheel and the other in his lap. “When we get together for stuff—like the Fourth of July coming up—we need acreage. That’s how I’d define enormous.”
She giggled too. “Yeah, if you need acreage to host everyone, that’s enormous.”
“You could meet them,” he said, immediately clearing his throat. “I mean, Joey? Who I was just talking to? She and Adam are having a bonfire in their backyard next week, and it’s only for the cousins, and they’re letting us bring a….” He trailed off, and Cora watched him swallow.
“A what?” she asked, wanting or maybeneedinghim to say it.
“A friend,” he said, the word strangling him on the way out. “A significant other for some. A plus-one for others.” He gripped the wheel with both hands now. “Or a friend.”
