Bad News Cowboy

Plus, the man was so hot it was entirely possible that women’s clothes incinerated on contact. And if that happened, what was a guy to do but say yes?

She clicked her teeth together, annoyance at her own self coursing through her veins. She was making excuses for him. And for her.

So, two things she knew. She wanted him. And she shouldn’t.

The rest she would have to figure out later.

CHAPTER SIX (#ulink_2d6e669c-3903-510b-8684-17d7fdd50754)

THE ONLY PROBLEM with the weekday at the Farm and Garden was that it provided far too much time for thinking. Kate didn’t want to think. Not right now. At the moment her thoughts were lecherous and traitorous and she didn’t really want to deal with either thing.

But there had been very few customers today and she’d spent the past forty-five minutes dragging a giant hose around and watering the plants in the back. Which meant thinking.

About last night. About her misguided flirting attempt with Chad. About what a jerk he’d been. About the way Jack had looked when he’d strode up looking like an outlaw ready to start a gunfight. And then he’d punched Chad. She had no idea how something like that could be...sexy. Yes, it had been sexy.

Oh yeah, there was also the fact that she was acknowledging that Jack was sexy now.

Thankfully, there were still no customers or they would all have been looking at her blushing right now.

Then there was the flirting thing. He had offered to teach her how to flirt. With other men.

She’d spent the entire night in her bed tossing and turning, trying to figure out what to do with that offer. It was a weird, patronizing offer. One she would normally have been tempted to tell him to shove up his ass. But given her recent revelation, she was looking at it a little bit differently.

She was attracted to Jack. He had punched a guy for her, and it had been sexy. He wanted to teach her to flirt.

Doing the Jack math on that equation was leading her to some interesting places.

If he was giving flirting lessons, they would potentially find themselves in some interesting situations.

Situations that might give her an opportunity to try to seduce him.

She dropped the hose into the planter that was right in front of her, covering her face with both her hands. Seducing Jack. She’d never even thought of seducing a man before. Much less this man. The idea filled her with a strange kind of tingly horror and an excitement that mixed together so well she couldn’t sort out which one was which.

She supposed at this point it was all the same, really. The fear of the unknown, the fear of a missed opportunity.

But one had far fewer consequences, that was for sure. Because Jack was a person she had to deal with on a fairly regular basis. Of course, the problem with living in a small town was that any guy she chose to get involved with would be someone she had to deal with on a regular basis.

She was not in the market for relationship. She wanted to go pro with her barrel racing and that would mean traveling all over the place, which would not leave any time for a guy. Which, provided things wouldn’t get all weird after, actually made Jack the best bet of all. Because he wouldn’t want anything more, and neither did she. Because she knew him, knew he wasn’t, like, a secret ax murderer or anything. And because she trusted him.

That all had to count for something.

She pointed the hose at a little azalea that was placed in a pot on the ground. She was so focused on that, and on her seduction thoughts, that she didn’t realize she had company until said company spoke.

“If you keep making that face, it will get stuck that way.”

She jumped and splashed water on her hands with the hose, looking up to see Jack standing there grinning at her. “You scared the piss out of me!”

He made a face. “So that’s not all just from the hose?”

She looked down and saw she’d misdirected the stream and that the water was puddling at her feet. She scowled and directed it at the plants again. Her face was hot, embarrassment over her choice of words lashing her. Which was stupid, because she shouldn’t be embarrassed to say the normal things she always said in front of Jack. Seduction plans or no.

“What are you doing here?”

“You have two strikes against you already, Katie bear,” he said, dodging the question.

“How did I get strikes? I’m not playing baseball. I’m watering azaleas.”

“In the flirting game, little missy.”

She decided to ignore the fact that he’d called her little missy. “Is it three strikes in flirting, too?”

“No idea.”

“You’re supposed to be the expert.”

A slow grin spread over his face, the expression positively wicked. “I don’t know, because I’ve never struck out before.” She felt the heat in her face intensify, spread over her cheeks. “I made you blush. So I’m doing something right.”

“You’re not supposed to be practicing on me. I’m supposed to be practicing on you,” she said, irritated that she was so transparent.

“You might want to turn your hose off.”

She scowled and turned around, twisting the faucet handle then discarding the hose. “There. Off.”

“Lesson one—don’t look at the object of your affection like you want to stretch his scrotum out and wrap it around his neck.”

“But what if that’s what I want to do?” she asked, keeping her face purposefully blank.

“I didn’t realize you were kinky,” he said, arching a brow.

She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from reacting. “There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Jack.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah, really. I’m a complex woman and shit.”

“Of course you are.” His blue eyes glittered with humor, and anger twisted her stomach. He still wasn’t taking her seriously. Still looking at her as if she was a little girl playing dress-up.

She’d never played dress-up in her damn life. Her mother had left when she was a baby, taking every frill, every pair of high heels, every string of pearls with her. And Kate had seen two things in her household. She had seen her father sit on the couch and waste away, and she had seen Eli and Connor get out every day and bust their butts to make a better life for her, for themselves.

So she’d worked. From the moment she’d been able to. And none of it had been a game.

If Jack thought this would be any different, then he hadn’t been paying attention.

“Somehow I don’t think you believe me,” she said, keeping her eyes locked with his.

“Sure I do.” He reached toward her, and her heart stuttered. Then he grabbed ahold of the end of her braid and tugged lightly, in that patronizing, brotherly way that he did.

And that was the end of her rope.