He took my hand and laced his fingers through mine. “It’s the best I’ve ever had becauseyoumade it for me.”
I sighed. “Oh.”
He cut another bite and held it to me. I let him feed me. And then he fed himself. No hesitation.
“I had a routine. Work hard on the ranch. Fall asleep exhausted. Get up and do it all over again. I swore I’d never fall in love. But you messed it all up.” He smiled softly.
“I did, huh?”
“You yelled at me for calling youma’am.And it was like my entire body had been electrocuted,” he said. “When I saw you for the first time . . . I was done for, Freckles. That was the moment.”
“The moment?”
“Where I was determined to make you fall in love with me.”
My heart drummed in my ears. “You didn’tmakeme do anything.”
“No?”
I slowly shook my head. “You were just you. And you’re perfect. For me.”
He leaned across the table and with his free hand grasped my chin between his thumb and forefinger. He brought my lips to his. He tasted like bananas, butter, and sugar.
He tasted like home.
“Take me to bed,” I whispered against his mouth.
Brooks rosed from the table and gently tugged me up. He then scooped me into his arms and carried me to bed.
“I lied to you,” I said.
We sat in bed, eating the rest of the banana bread right from the loaf tin—crumbs be damned.
His fork stilled on the way to his mouth. “About what?”
I couldn’t stop the grin. “The mama moose and her baby crossing the road. I told you they were the reason I swerved and wound up in a ditch. It was a possum. I swerved so I wouldn’t hit a possum.”
He let out a lusty laugh. “Why did you tell me it was a moose and her baby?”
“I thought it made for a better story,” I admitted with a sheepish expression. “All that to save a possum?”
Brooks shook his head. “You said I was perfect, but damn, Freckles. You’re the one who’s perfect.”
My body was jelly from our earlier coupling, but his words warmed me from the inside out.
He held up the last bite of banana bread to me, but I shook my head. “You finish it.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” he said with a grin that made him all too boyish.
After he finished, he set the loaf tin aside on the nightstand and then settled down. He patted his chest, and I snuggled into his embrace. His fingers traced a path up and down my arm. I was full and sated and happy.
“Archer and I aren’t actually brothers. We’re cousins.”
“Cousins,” I repeated. “Oh, that explains it then.”
“Explains what?”
“You two don’t look alike. I mean, some similarities maybe, but overall. No.”
