“Next town with lodging is about fifty miles south. But without a car...” He trailed off, almost apologetic.
I stared at my phone as my brain offered increasingly unhinged suggestions.
“Do you know a kid with a tree house that would take chips as payment? There has to be a barn somewhere? Cows have tosleep don’t they and they’re so cute.” I bit my nail, my brain racing. “I could sleep in my car?” I said to the universe at large. “A park bench?”
Lou shook his head. “Sheriff’ll cite you for that. Town ordinance.”
“Right. Of course.” I laughed. That was the way my luck was going today. “Okay. I’ll figure something out. I always figure something out.”
Lou studied me for a long moment, then his face brightened. “Actually. Hold on. I might have just the thing.”
“A secret hotel?”
“Better. Come on.”
He wiped his hands on his coveralls and headed toward the back door of the garage. I put my phone in my purse and followed, because what else was I going to do?
We walked out into the afternoon sunshine. The main street stretched ahead, slow moving and picturesque in that small-town Montana way. We passed a couple walking hand-in-hand and I saw a dog sleeping on a porch and wondered if he’d mind sharing tonight.
Lou led me past the general store, past the diner with its faded awning, toward what had to be the town square—literally a large square of grass with a gazebo and an overabundance of benches.
And that’s when I heard it.
The buzz of a chainsaw.
Loud. Aggressive. The kind of sound that made you think of lumberjacks and horror movies in equal measure.
Lou walked right toward it.
“Um,” I said, almost having to run to keep up. Lou, despite his age, was quite spry. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
We walked to the other side of the square and I stopped dead.
There was a man on the square, surrounded by wood chips and sawdust, holding a chainsaw.
And not just any man.
He was easily six-three, maybe more. He wore a white t-shirt that clung to muscles that had no business existing outside of a gym. Dark hair, messy and slightly too long. Scruff that looked like he’d forgotten to shave for a few days and somehow made it work.
Tattoos ran up both arms and vanished under his sleeves.
Red hot mountain man,my brain supplied helpfully. Because of course that’s what he was. Tall, tattooed, holding a chainsaw, covered in sawdust. Every romance novel cover I’d ever seen, standing in the middle of a tiny Montana town like he’d been waiting for me to break down on his doorstep.
He was carving something out of a huge tree trunk. I couldn’t tell what yet, but the way he moved was mesmerizing. Precise. Controlled. Powerful.
The chainsaw cut through wood like butter.
I got a little sad. Why? Because men who looked like that didn’t usually look twice at women who looked like me. I knew that. I’d made peace with it years ago. Curvy girls got attention, sure, but not from men like him. Guys like him went for the willowy, athletic types with abs of their own. I had hips that demanded a dress with a little stretch.
So, when he stepped back, killed the chainsaw, and turned to look right at me…
Naturally, I forgot how to breathe. And a new rule popped into my head.
Rule #22: Never drool over a man holding a chainsaw.
Who would have thought I’d need to add that as a rule, but I was mentally plugging it one of the spaces that Momma had left me.
