Page 13 of Total Jane Wreck

Must be Axel Rose, using the stable shower stall to wash off the barn smells before she goes home to her husband. She and I have already gotten past modesty—working with horses can do that real quick. So I round the corner, clutching a battered plastic caddy armed with brushes and bottles. But what I see stops me in my tracks.

It’s Chet—clearly naked—standing behind the flimsy, nearly transparent shower curtain. He’s lathering his hair with one hand, a glob of white shampoo streaked across his scalp and tangled in the dark, wet curls. The water sluices over the sharp rise of his shoulders and (God help me) down his chest, forming beads that linger on the thicket of hair at his pecs and then funnel toward the trail of muscle that dips beneath his navel.

I’m not moving. But I am staring, like an absolute creep whose feet have grown roots.

He must sense my presence, because his head snaps toward me. “Did you need something, Jane?”

“Sorry!” Now I try to dart away, but I only end up dropping my bucket with the brushes and bottles. They clatter to the stable floor, a couple of them rolling away, one dangerously near the shower stall. I scurry to pick them up, but when I bend over, I accidentally catch a glimpse of, well—way more of Chet than I ought to see. And there’s a lot of him to see.

Lordy.

“Sorry!” I yell again. “I’m leaving now. Promise!”

Hightailing it out of there, I fervently wish that time-travel was an option. You know, rewind and prevent what just happened from happening.

Three minutes later, Chet bangs on my trailer door.

“I’m not home,” I yell.

“Clearly you are,” he yells back.

“Fine,” I cry, still talking through the trailer door. “Guess you saw through my ruse. But if you came here to fire me, don’t bother. I’ll be packed and gone by morning.”

There’s a pause. “Open the door, Jane.”

“I’d really rather not.”

“Please,” Chet says. “I didn’t come here to fire you. I came to apologize.”

That gets me. I swing open the door. Thankfully (I guess), he’s fully dressed, his T-shirt clinging to his still-damp chest, beads of water dripping from his hair and onto his neck.

“You came to apologize?” I ask. “For what?”

“For putting you in that position,” he answers. “I wasn’t thinking, showering where you might walk in on me. Especially when I have a perfectly good bathroom inside. But I got dirty mucking out the stalls, and I didn’t want to drag any of that in—”

“You were mucking out the stalls?”

He nods.

“Why?” I ask. “Isn’t that what you pay Axel Rose and me to do?”

“Not really. Axel Rose is like the ranch manager, and you’re here to help the horses adjust and give them the care they need.”

I lean against the door frame. “Right. But mucking out the stalls is part of what we’re paid to do.”

Chet holds my gaze for a moment. “Before my mom married my stepdad, she was a maid. And she used to tell me that there’s honor in cleaning up someone’s mess. Every now and then, it’s good, reminding myself of that.” He sighs. “Anyway, I’m sorry if I made things awkward between us.”

“Thanks,” I reply. “No harm done.”

Chet gives me a brisk nod and starts to walk away. I stop him with my voice.

“Hey!” I call. “Are you sure you’re a billionaire?”

As he pivots toward me, Chet’s cheeks turn pink. “Half the time I’m sure,” he says, grinning. “The other half, I’m so busy hating other billionaires that I forget to hate myself.”

If his words confuse me—which they do—I’m even more confused by Chet’s momentary slip into self-deprecation and humility. But I needn’t worry.

It doesn’t last long.