He narrowed his eyes, looking fiercer by the second. “Tell me what you’re going to do, little girl, when—”
“My name’s not ‘Little Girl’.” I shot back with a generous helping of sass. Some men needed to be handled strongly. And this was one of them. “It’s Poppy. Nice to meet you, Corbin. Why don’t you try calling me by my name going forward? I’mnobody’slittle girl.”
If my speech fazed him, he didn’t show it. Not at first, anyway. But the signs slowly started filtering in that I’d had an effect on him.
It felt a little silly to talk that way when the man had me pinned against my car, towering muscles locking any exits.
But his sexy lips started working as he decided what to say to me next. The pulse in his neck started beating fast, and I could tell he was worked up even if he was pretending he wasn’t.
“As I was saying,” he growled, “what are you going to do when that tree falls on the driveway, locking you in? You don’t have a way to call for help if you don’t have a satellite phone. You don’t have a chainsaw to hack your way through. And even if youthinkyou’re tough, I promise that you’ll be crying with every axe swing as it takes you two weeks to chop your way out of here. And it’ll getmightycold when the winter turns real and your power goes out. You could die out here…little girl.”
Oh, this man was putting me on edge.
I found myself getting caught up in his fight. I wanted to bite back fiercer. Call him a fucking dickhead, put him in his place.
But that wasn’t who I was.
And even if he wanted to pick a fight with me, I wasn’t going to let him. He’d win any fight we had, because that’s what he was looking for. A fight.
So I lifted my chin until my lips tilted up towards his, met his dark, brooding eyes with my own, and told him, “I might look sweet on the outside, but I’m made of grit. And I’m the first in my family to own a patch of land. I’d rather die out here than lose it. So, if there’s a big storm and that tree comes down. You better believe I’ll find a way to deal with it.”
I could tell he’d listened to me because he paused for a beat before he answered, his eyes serious and unwavering. “Well, deal with it sooner rather than later, because when it comes down, I’m not helping. It’s onyourproperty. That makes ityourproblem. Not mine.”
Unfortunately, everything he was saying was true.
A few of my friends were big and strong, and they’d promised to come out and cut it down. But with the holidays approaching, they couldn’t get out here until January.
Violet had tried to talk me into waiting to move in until it and a hundred other details were sorted. But I wanted to put this month’s rent towards home repairs instead. So here I was, planning to camp out in my own house while I tried to make it livable.
At least the electricity was getting turned on today. I wanted to see what shape the furnace was in.
I swallowed hard. Nothing he’d said had shaken me, except this bit about the oak.
I’d noticed the tree was leaning, and just this morning I’d wondered if it was leaning a little further than before. But I had athousand things to take care of, and I might be mountain tough for a girl, but I’dneverused a chainsaw before. Not on a big, old oak like that. Just on smaller trees that were already down.
“I promise you one thing, Corbin. I’ll take care of that tree. And when I do, I expect you to stop calling me little girl. If we’re going to be neighbors, we should be neighborly with each other. And nicknames like that don’t create a path towards peace between us.”
I tried to ignore the stubborn set to his jaw, and his sexy, unruly beard. Or the way I seemed to be getting lost in his eyes as we stared at each other.
Or the fact that my pulse was racing at being so close to the man. I could hop up on my tippy-toes and kiss him right on his mouth. Wouldn’t that surprise the hell out of him?
A tiny smile lit up my face at the thought of it, but I stayed silent.
We were having a classic standoff on Red Oak Mountain.
Chapter 4
Corbin
I felt like a damn fool.
I’d tried to intimidate Poppy by pinning her between me and her car.
But all that had happened is I’d found myself getting sucked in.
Her pretty lips moved, and only sweetness came out of them.
The last guy who had owned this place had communicated to me with shotgun shells.
