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“I see some,” Xenia coos, sounding excited enough to make my heart hurt.
Like I tend to do, I fall back into my head. I don’t engage. I become a ghost.
“Hobo?” Xenia asks softly after returning to my side.
I hear the question behind my name. I’m acting weird, turning her off, ruining our time together.
“Where’s the best spot to eat?” she asks, cupping my jaw.
Her cheeks are flushed red. The heat will send her on her ass soon.
“Are restaurant kitchens hot?” I ask and take her hand. “With all the burners on and the ovens, is it warm back there?”
“Yes,” she says, walking with me toward the tent.
Xenia hesitates as we approach it. At first, I figure she’s scared of what I might do to her. Her wary gaze flashes to the tent and then me. Only the tent is freaking her out.
“I keep tents around the Valley like I do my rides.”
Xenia instantly relaxes. “Thank God. I thought we might have to talk to someone today.”
“Didn’t want to share me, huh?”
Xenia hides nothing when she smiles and shakes her head. This woman should be able to conceal her heart more than she does.Am I her weakness or is she just that easy to read?
I unzip the tent, finding the inside just as I left it. An inflatable mattress rests at the back. A bag of clothes and supplies are shoved in the corner. I see the space from Xenia’s viewpoint. The tent feels empty like my life never amounted to anything.
“Can we eat in here?” she asks when I don’t say anything.
Eyeing her, I exhale deeply. “I feel bone-tired. Talking now is asking too much.”
Xenia strokes my jaw, slides off her backpack, and ducks into the tent. She rests her sweet ass on the mattress and starts unpacking her picnic meal.
“You don’t need to talk, Hobo. I don’t have much to say, either. My life was dull, leaving me with none of those funny stories people tell when they’re trying to impress someone.”
Her warm reaction breaks me free from the gloom I’m stewing in under the hot sun. I join her inside the tent. Watching this woman set out our food inside a place I consider home erases more of my bad mood. Xenia is so beautiful, and she wants to be here with me.
“Tell me you’re hungry.”
“Starving. I forgot to eat earlier.”
“Lovesickness causes that,” Xenia says and grins at her words. I watch a blush of embarrassment form over her already flushed cheeks. “I didn’t eat anything earlier. I wanted to be hungry for now.”
“I’m curious what you made for our first date.”
Xenia exhales shakily, getting herself worked up about the “date” part.
“Have you ever had a boyfriend?” I ask while she produces homemade lemonade.
“No. I’ve been on a ton of first dates and endured more than a few one-night stands,” she says, sounding endearingly pathetic and honest. “I did have one guy who pursued me. I wasn’t really interested, but I thought maybe I should force myself to date him. He seemed suitable, you know?” she says while resting out weird-looking sandwiches on paper plates. “I was working a lot around that time. I just never got around to returning all his texts. Eventually, he stopped sending them.”
“What was wrong with the guy?”
“He only wanted to talk about cooking, restaurants, and food. At first, I liked that part. But then, I realized I already spent my days talking about those things with other people.”
“Was the sticking point really his personality or was he just too plain for you?” I ask and grin. “We’ve established how shallow you are.”
Xenia laughs in a sexy, unguarded way. “I can’t believe how many sexy, rugged men live in this town, and how I got the best one to pay attention to me.”
