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When they left the root cellar, she felt oddly better.
Because she had affirmed what she’d been working toward this whole time. She didn’t have to know.
And when they finished with all their baking, and they packed up some goodies to each take home, and she went outside, expecting to carpool with Elsie like she had coming over, Gus was out there standing up against his truck instead.
“I don’t think I need a ride home now,” she said.
And the look of blazing intent on his face made everything in her burn.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
HEMOVEDAWAYfrom the truck and walked over to her, and her stomach swooped.
This was complicated. He was complicated. This rough, gorgeous man.
He had occupied this elevated space in her mind. In her life. Almost immortal, and now she felt...close to him. Next to him.
Much more aware of all the ways they were the same. And even more intimately aware of all the ways that they were different.
She squeezed her thighs together just subtly. Something to ease the ache that spread in her so instantaneously the moment she laid eyes on him.
“Come on, mite.”
And his nickname for her sent a little rush of pleasure all over her.
“Bye,” she said to everyone else, scampering quickly to the truck and getting inside. He rounded the front and got in slowly, closing the door behind them and looking at her. “I brought a picnic,” he said.
“You did?”
“Yeah. I thought...you’ve been cooking so much.”
“I literally have a bushel of freshly baked bread with me.”
“There’s never so much food that you can’t have fresh-baked bread.”
She laughed. “Okay. That’s true.”
They started driving, but they took the dirt road that went past McClouds’, way up toward the hills.
There were no fields on that part of the ranch. Not much really but wild timber and craggy mountain peaks.
“Where are we going?”
“It’s just a spot I like,” he said, dismissive.
But that was how he was, she realized then.
There was so much about Gus McCloud that wasn’t quite what he seemed. And she had always thought that the big lie that he told was that he was mean, when in reality he was really quite a nice guy.
But now she was thinking that Gus wasn’t the lie he appeared to be. He was nice; it was true. He was also mean. Intense and rabid like a wounded animal when things got too real.
He fancied himself blunt and honest, and she didn’t think that was true either. And even now, he minimized whatever it wasthiswas.
But Gus didn’t do anything accidentally. Every single thing he did was with intent. From marrying her to setting down the ground rules.
Because hedidwant her. And hehad. And the way that he played that off from the moment they’d gotten married had been a lie. Laughing at her when she’d asked about sex. Pretending he’d never thought of it.
So now she had to suspect everything.
