Page 52 of Saddle and Scent
"I know."
I want to hug her again, want to kiss her goodbye, want to stake some kind of claim that saysmineto anyone who might be watching. But I settle for a smile and a wave as I head back to my truck.
As I drive away, I catch sight of her in the rearview mirror.
She's standing on the porch, coffee mug cradled in both hands, watching me go.
The morning light makes her look like something out of a dream, beautiful and untouchable and absolutely worth the wait.
Welcome home, Junebug.
9
UNEXPECTED DELIVERY
~JUNIPER~
Iwatch Wes's truck disappear down the muddy road until it's nothing but a dust cloud and exhaust fumes, my coffee mug warming my hands against the morning chill.
The question that's been nagging at me since he showed up blooms into full-blown paranoia:Did he hear me in the shower?
The timing was too perfect, showing up right after I'd finished my little...stress relief session.
And the way he'd looked at me, that knowing glint in his blue eyes, the slight quirk of his lips when he asked if I'd had a rough night.
The way he'd looked at me—that slow, deliberate once-over, the kind you can't decide if you should slap or kiss him for—was infuriatingly effective at both making my knees weak and my hackles rise. There was a knowing glint in his blue eyes that said, clear as day, he had clocked every beat of my morning routine: the rushed towel dry, the hurried dressing, maybe even the half-muffled, desperate little noises I'd lost to the water.
My face heats at the memory, and I take a long sip of coffee to hide behind the mug. If he did hear, he was gentleman enough not to mention it.
Though with Wes, "gentleman" is a relative term.
The man's always walked the line between charming and trouble, usually landing on whichever side caused the most chaos.
The hug, though.
That was unexpected. The way he'd held me, careful but sure, like he was afraid I'd bolt but couldn't stop himself from trying.
And that whisper against my shoulder—welcome back, Junebug—delivered with such raw honesty it made my chest ache.
I'm so lost in thought that I almost miss the vehicle rumbling up the road. Not another truck—thank God, I can't handle another Alpha ambush this morning—but a mail delivery car, the kind that looks like it's held together by rust and pure determination. It lurches through the puddles and potholes with admirable tenacity, finally grinding to a halt near the porch.
The mail carrier's car hasn't even fully stopped rattling when the driver's side door slams open with the force of someone twice her size, and out pops a woman who is, for a moment, almost too colorful to register against the overcast gray at her back. That's not just orange hair. It's traffic-cone, hazard-warning orange, styled in a blunt pixie cut that practically broadcasts its own weather alert. She stands a moment surveying her battlefield—Boots, meet Slop. Slop, meet Boots—with an air of resigned hilarity, as if the universe has once again delivered her the punchline to a joke only she finds funny.
She's maybe twenty-five, twenty-six tops, but her posture is all swaggering adolescent boy: slouched shoulders, hands dug so deep in her pockets her uniform shirt hikes up a fraction, revealing a tattooed sliver of something geometric just aboveher waistband. Her USPS shirt is untucked, the official blue faded almost to periwinkle, and the name patch—N. FLETCHER—is partly obscured by a row of enamel pins with slogans like "I Came, I Saw, I Delivered" and "NOT YOUR POSTAL SWEETHEART." Every inch of visible skin is punctured or inked or both; I count at least three nose rings, a silver bar through one brow, and enough earrings to make her ears resemble bedazzled chain mail. Her postal cap is cocked back on her head, revealing eyebrows dyed a shade darker than her hair and eyes that glitter with competitive curiosity as she clocks me standing on the porch.
She plants her boots in the ooze with theatrical care, as if expecting one to be claimed by the mud monster that haunts rural delivery routes, and immediately locks eyes with me. No fear, no hesitation, just a challenge: your move, Ranch Girl. We stare each other down for a beat, two strangers in a standoff mediated by caffeine and rain boots.
She sizes up the porch steps, the slick mud, the precarious foothold, and lets out a sigh so dramatic it's probably audible in three counties. Then she grins, revealing a tiny gap in her front teeth that inexplicably makes her look both like a cartoon felon and the most trustworthy person I've ever met. She grabs a battered shoulder bag—patches, more pins, duct tape repairs—and slings it crosswise, marching up the steps like a soldier on a doomed mission.
"Jesus fucking Christ," she mutters, surveying the muddy battlefield between her car and my porch. "How the hell do you even get up this road? I swear I left half my undercarriage back there with what's probably the ghost of my alignment."
I can't help but grin.
"Welcome to Bell Ranch, where the roads are more suggestion than reality."
She eyes my truck with something like professional appreciation.
"Ford F-250? Good choice for out here, though you might want to think about bigger tires. The mud in Saddlebrush is like nothing I've ever seen, and I've delivered mail in some pretty questionable places. I swear nature up here has it out for anything with wheels."
