Page 19 of Playing Cowboy
“Anyway, enough about me, Lover Boy.”
“Waddya mean?”I sputter.“This is ...this is just a little stocking up trick for another lonely night on my own.”
“Save it for your stepmother,” he drawls, dragging his phone out of his back pocket like some teenage girl about to take a selfie of her latest coffee concoction.“Juniper Junction gets a little lonely after dark, what with all those other empty cabins around.”
“What ...what ...whatever do you mean?”
He rolls his eyes, swiping a few times across his phone screen until he shows it to me: a crystal clear view of the “Y’all Come in Now” welcome mat in front of Cabin #3.“Don’t worry,” he teases, yanking the phone away before I can see what else he’s got pulled up on the screen.“Renter’s Rules say we can only have exterior cameras in the new development, so ...as long as you don’t go streaking later, your secret’s safe with me.”
“What secret?”I huff, struggling to regain my ground.Cameras!The stupid front door cameras.How could I have forgotten?“Chet had a room booked atBetty’s Bed & Breakfastand—”
“God no!”Parker has the same reaction I did: abject terror!“No wonder you whisked him away to a deserted development no one else has moved into yet!”
“I didn’t, that’s not ...why,” I insist.“It was just the first property I could think of where we’d be sure to have a vacancy.”
“Sure it is.”Parker sighs, nodding at my disassembled cart, hot dog buns, and burger patties scattered to all four corners.“And this is just some big oversized Welcome Basket, I suppose?”
I sag with defeat.“If you must know,” I insist, since he’s just going to see me on the front door camera in a few minutes anyway.“After our not-so-very meet-cute this morning, I took your advice, apologized and, well...”
“One thing led to another, huh?”His phone is bleating, a familiar sound since I hear it from across the hallway all day and night.“Damn, this girl just can’t get enough.”
He silences it, but I can see him inching gently away, as if maybe Ginny’s not the only one who “just can’t get enough” lately.“Lucky you,” I blurt before I can help it.
He winks, flicking the brim of his cowboy hat for good measure.“From what I could see earlier?”he teases, wagging his phone before taking the call.“You should have no problem getting lucky tonight, partner.”
“Ginny!”He beams into the phone speaker, swaggering off in his too-tight jeans, well-worn cowboy boots thundering across the vinyl laminate flooring beneath them.“Hold your horses, sweetheart.I’m almost to the ‘Ten Items or Less Aisle.’”
I chuckle at the interaction, so predictably embarrassing and yet?Somehow?So fitting.After all, who better to catch me shopping for a romantic date night than the one guy in Pistol Creek who knows which way my hog swings?
Chapter Ten
Chet
“This country enoughfor you?”
Grady stands in the foyer, resplendent in cowboy boots, baggy blue jeans, a clingy white t-shirt, and a battered red ball cap, looking for all the world like he’s just stepped off of a racy romance novel, cowboy edition.From each hand hang a smattering of plastic shopping bags.
