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Staring up at the black sky and the crystalline snow falling in fluffy clumps, I was rethinking every decision I’d ever made up until now. Abey had also confirmed that Frank wasn’t on duty tonight and that he was definitely at home, so I was counting on Frank giving me a ride later, but maybe that hadn’t been my brightest idea in this weather.
I should’ve asked Abey for Frank’s number and called him directly to tell him I had something I wanted to give him, like an actual adult. Instead, I’d called everyone else I knew, digging for information on the hot boy I liked. If Frank had known that, he probably would’ve laughed at me.
Once again, our age gap reared its ugly head.
Finally, there was nothing to do but go for it. I had to walk to the door and make my presence known, or I could trudge the five miles back to town in the snow with my tail between my legs.
Here goes nothing.
Frank answered his thick wooden door three seconds after I knocked, and I could almost feel my uterus contract, trying to suck in not-yet-ejaculated silver-fox sperm, for all the good that would do. The sight of him twisted the conversation with my dad into a pretzel in my stomach. What would my parents say if they knew I’d gone on a date with a guy nineteen years older than me? One who definitely wanted kids? I could imagine their disapproval perfectly.
I could feel my own disapproval as I stood there. If he’d known I couldn’t have kids, he probably wouldn’t have wanted to go out with me. “Always imagined I’d have a family by now.”
And now, there he was, trying to hide the smile on his lips as he looked me over, from the top of my beanie to the soles of my boots. Slowly. Had Abey called him to tell him I was coming? Oh God, you should’ve threatened her and Billie into silence.
I tried to ignore the guilt I felt for not being up front with him, which was almost easy because he was quite literally the sexiest man I’d ever seen.
Dressed in gray sweatpants and no shirt, he was breathing rapidly. Clearly, I’d caught him in the middle of a workout. The sweats fit him like cotton muscle-hugging gloves, and his brown and silver chest hair glistened, wet with sweat in the moonlight.
The seemingly enormous outline of his… manly bits, tucked snug inside the sweats, was enough to make me blush. I felt the heat creep up my neck to my face, and then it felt like a four-alarm fire erupted on my cheeks.
His feet were bare, and even they were attractive.
It was extremely difficult, but I finally raised my eyes to his steely gray ones. “Hi.”
A twitch of his mouth betrayed the surprise he was trying to act out as he wiped the sweat from his face with the navy blue T-shirt in his hand. So he’d known it was me knocking on his door, and he chose to open it half naked, muscles primed and pumped?
My knees felt weak.
I held my pink sprinkle cake up in front of my chest to hide the wobbling. I’d even tried to write “Happy Birthday, Frank & Sam” on top with an icing gun, but it looked more like “Hoppy Barflay, PranK + Smm,” which was even more embarrassing, but I pressed on. “Happy birthday.”
His face was a stone. “Happy Birthday, Samantha.”
Holding the cake up higher, grinning like a fool, I said, “I made us a cake.”
“I see that. Thank you.” He pressed his lips together in a flat line. “It looks…”
“It’s a disaster. I’m sorry, but I think it tastes good.”
Stepping back, he opened his door wider. “Would you like to come in?”
“Oh.” A snowflake landed on my bottom lip. Frank’s eyes fixed on it, and I licked it off. “Sure. Thanks.”
I felt his gaze follow me in, but when I risked a glance at him, it flicked back out at the snowfall getting heavier by the moment. “That snow looks like it could be a problem.” He shut the door, and I spun around, ignoring the masculine décor behind me. I could’ve sworn there was a dead deer head above his fireplace, but I was afraid to confirm that.
“A problem?” I asked as his cell phone buzzed on the kitchen table to my right.
“’Scuse me. That’s the station.” Taking the cake container from my hands with a nod, he set it next to his phone and answered his call, and I watched the way his abdominal muscles flexed as he turned, and then I had no choice but to explore his house. If I hadn’t, I would’ve just been standing there, staring at his back muscles and the way they narrowed as they took my eyes down to his ass, and then I would’ve drooled again.
I tried to lower my bag to the floor behind his couch gingerly, but it fell to the hardwood floor with a plop. All the doors in the hallway at the back of the house were closed, but I heard Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run” playing softly somewhere as I perused his living room, and it reminded me of my dad. He was the biggest Boss fan. He tried to work one of Bruce’s songs into every movie my parents directed, much to my mom’s dismay. She only listened to classical. And poor Bruce was probably sick of being asked for the rights.
Ugh. Get your freaking parents out of your head!
Frank’s house was a cabin, basically, made out of logs, and even though there were forest-green and black plaid accents everywhere, and yes, dead animal heads fixed on the wall, it was cozy. The fire in the fireplace gave the living room a glow that had my toes warming quickly and my cheeks heating. Framed photographs hung on either side of the fireplace, the black-and-white images portraying dusty American plains with hills in the distance. Texas, maybe?
The ten-point buck in the center of the wall above the fireplace disturbed me, and I wondered if Frank had killed the poor animal himself. Probably. Why else would it be there?
Get over it, Sam. This is the mountains. You’re in the Wild West. It wasn’t like I’d never seen one before, just not so close-up. I hoped he’d at least used all of the animal and hadn’t shot it just for decoration. But no. That wasn’t Frank. I knew that already.
