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She rolled her eyes. “I’m fine.”
“Uh-huh. Is that why you’re staring down an udder with a look of terror on your face?”
“I don’t remember inviting you into my barn in the first place,” she said with a forced smile.
“You were very inviting the other night.”
That clearly caught her off guard, and it caught him off guard, too. She tore down his walls, and the guy he used to be before becoming a dad tried to rise to the surface. A man. A man who wanted a woman and knew how to talk to her. To tempt her. To spar with her. And damn it, Charlotte was the perfect sparring partner.
“The other night is over,” she said. “We both agreed on casual. One night.”
True. But he was stuck with her now. He just couldn’t come out and tell her he felt obligated to her grandmother. Didn’t want to relive why. No. He’d stick to his mission and keep it as cordial as possible. No problem.
He looked at her mouth, pursed with anger, and wanted to bite that plump bottom lip.
Damn it.
“We’re still casual,” he said, coming to kneel behind her. He grabbed her hand and put it on the udder. She jumped and tried to bite back an “eeew,” but he heard it under her muffled gasp.
“Stop acting like you’ve never touched a nipple before,” he said.
She scoffed, but there was a small smile on her lips.
Progress.
If he had to be stuck with her so Gram’s farm didn’t burn to the ground, he’d take mild pleasantness over a cold shoulder any day.
He showed her how to grip the nipple. “Start at the top, and squeeze while sliding down.”
He showed her a few times, spitting milk into the bucket.
“You try,” he instructed.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked.
So he could make sure Gram didn’t lose her livelihood. It had nothing to do with his dick, currently standing at attention. Nothing at all.
“Just being neighborly,” he said through clenched teeth.
“Casually neighborly?”
“Only way I know how to be,” he said. She looked at him, her lips hovering near his, and he wanted to close the last two inches between them and take her right there. Damn it, what was wrong with him? He needed to get a grip. But her expression was open, those big eyes looking deep into his…leaning closer.
Then he was hit with a blast of milk in the face.
“What the fu—”
He glanced over to see Charlotte holding the teat and aiming it at him. “Well, I think I’ve got the hang of it,” she said way too happily.
He ran the back of his hand over his face and rose.
“Enjoy your newfound chores, darlin’. And when you’re ready to come crawling my way for help, I hope I’m feeling charitable.”
“Never was much of a charity case,” she said. And he believed it. Charlotte clearly had her own way of doing things, and damn anyone who got in her way. But he smiled, knowing she would have to come for him soon. She may not know it yet, but he had the one thing she needed if she wanted to harvest those pears. The same one he’d let Gram borrow every season.
Yep, any day she’d come to him. For now, he’d just have to wait out her stubbornness.
With a tip of his hat, he let himself out.
