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Wrapping her legs around his waist, she had two choices. She could let go of her hold on him, get dressed, and go home to spend the afternoon finishing some school work—the school work she hadn’t finished because she’d high-tailed it out of her classroom yesterday to be with Dakota.
Or she could tighten her hold on him and go wherever he took her.
“Let’s shower,” Dakota said.
Choice B it is.
An hour later—an orgasm later, technically—she was seated next to Dakota in his truck and on her way to Brenton Lake Hall to help with decorations.
“How big is this shindig tonight?” she asked. If veritable outsiders like herself and Carter had scored invitations, were there any peoplenotattending?
“I’d say eighty percent of Maplehaven will be there.” Dakota took a left down a street that rimmed Brenton Lake.
With the autumn colors fading now, everything had taken on that rusty-brown tinge that would eventually lead to the grays and whites of winter. Leah was happy she’d be around to see a Vermont winter. She’d been uncertain during a Vermont summer because she’d just moved and had wondered if she’d made a terrible mistake. A Vermont autumn was going exceptionally well with her job, being settled in her cottage, dating this super-hot mountain man sitting beside her right now.
What will winter bring?She couldn’t wait to find out.
“What’s wrong with the twenty percent that didn’t get invited?” she asked.
“Nothing. They were invited too, but they had other commitments, I guess.” Dakota shrugged. “In any event, this birthday bash will be the biggest event Maplehaven has seen in a long time.”
“Not many epic occasions in this little town?”
Dakota shook his head. “Nope. Which is good. It’s part of what makes Maplehaven so relaxing. Not a lot of fanfare, you know?”
“What place have you visited that has the most fanfare?”
His eyebrow quirked at that question, and she was sure he registered her curiosity on the pro-travel side of the debate. “New Orleans. Party on every street corner. Fun, no doubt, but also exhausting. You forget to sleep.”
She wondered if he went on those adventures alone, but didn’t want to add any more tallies to the pro-travel side by asking more questions. Her mind couldn’t help picturing him partying in New Orleans with some beautiful woman wrapped around him though. How could anyone see him walk by and not want to interact with him?
Not wild about this line of thinking, she switched topics as they passed a sign for Brenton Sawmill. “Heidi told me the fourth graders tour Brenton Sawmill every year.”
“Yeah.” Dakota smiled. “Dad looks forward to that every single year. He makes sure to have tree cookies ready for each kid to take home.” He held up an index finger. “And don’t go thinking tree cookies means dessert.”
“Shouldn’tcookiesalways mean dessert?” Wasn’t it cruel if it didn’t? “What does it mean then?”
“Tree cookies are cross sections of trees so you can count the rings and tell other things about the tree’s history. He makes inch and a half discs of different species of trees and explains what the marks the students observe mean.”
“Cool. That sounds fun.”
“It is. When he makes the joke about them wanting milk with their cookies, that’s when things get corny.”
“Your dad is adorable.”
“Yes, I inherited that from him.”
“You’re too sexy to be adorable.” She shifted a little closer to him as he parked the truck in front of the hall.
He shut off the engine and angled to face her. “Is that right?”
She folded her arms across her chest. “As if you don’t already know.”
“I honestly didn’t know.” His voice was uncertain, as if he was truly not sure if he was sexy or not. “No one has ever told me I was sexy.”
“Get out of here.” She gave his shoulder a shove. “Do you actually expect me to believe that?” When his serious expression didn’t waver at all, she grabbed his forearm. “You’re telling me the truth.”
“I make a habit of not lying, Miss Greenstead.” His cheeks were a little pink as if he were embarrassed about his admission of never being called sexy.
