But everything he wanted to say, everything he needed to tell her, got stuck in his throat. And in the end, all that came out of his mouth was, “If you’re tired, I can finish up.”
Just as quickly as she’d opened herself back up to him, she shut down, looking at the artichoke in her hand rather than up at him.
“I’m not tired.” She took off her cowboy hat, then, and hung it from a nail on the wall.
Her taking off the hat felt like an omen, a bad one. Where he’d wanted to yank it off and toss it into the street the day before, now he wanted to pick it up and jam it back down onto her head.
But before he could say or do anything more, he heard the crunch of tires over the gravel on the drive. Eric walked into the barn a minute later. “Hey, Grayson, sorry about the schedule change today.” When he saw Lori, the usually taciturn young farmer broke out into a huge grin. “You must be Lori.”
She grinned at Eric in exactly the way she hadn’t been smiling at him as they shook hands. “It’s so nice to meet you, Eric. And thanks for your suggestions about what else to try feeding Sweetpea. I’m going to try the liver tonight. I’ll let you know how it goes.”
What the hell? First she was lighting up for Eric and then it turned out that they’d already swapped cat-feeding tips with each other? Had she also told Eric what an ass her boss had been since the second she’d signed on as his farmhand?
“Wow,” Eric commented when he looked at the boxes of produce, “these look great this week.” His smile was all for Lori. “Must have needed a woman’s touch.”
Without a word to either of them, Grayson started carrying the boxes over to Eric’s truck. Lori and Eric chatted like old friends the entire time, with Eric happily answering each of Lori’s rapid-fire questions. “So how do the pick-ups work? Is there a check-off list? Do you know everyone? Are they all locals or do they come from other towns? Do people bring their kids and pets and hang out or are they just in and out?”
Telling himself this was the perfect way to get her out of his hair, Grayson cut off Eric halfway into his lengthy explanation of how the evening’s pick-up would work. “Go and see for yourself.”
He didn’t have to offer twice, as Eric and Lori immediately grinned at each other and said, “Great!” at the same time.
Grayson’s hands would have fisted had he not been carrying three heavy boxes stacked on top of one another. Eric and Lori were perfect together. Both of them had a ready smile. Both of them could talk your ear off for hours. They even looked good together, Eric blond and muscular next to Lori’s dark-haired grace.
“Oh, I almost forgot,” Eric said to Grayson when he finally managed to yank his gaze away from Lori. “A journalist called right before I came over here. He’s doing a story on the popularity of CSAs, but when I told him that I’m just the pick-up guy he asked if you could give him a call back.” Eric reached into the front pocket of his jeans. “I’ve got his number here.”
“I don’t need the number.”
Lori frowned at him as Eric asked, “You sure? He sounded like a nice guy, even told me that he’d heard about your CSA from several people who said you’re running the best one in the area.”
“I’m not interested in press, thanks.” Grayson couldn’t stand the thought of anyone poking into his past, not when he could guess how fast the story would turn from one about his farm and CSA into a “tragic” story of love and loss. He had never spoken to anyone about his story, and he never planned to. Putting the final boxes into Eric’s truck, he said, “Looks like you’re all set to go.”
“I’ll make sure to bring Lori back safe and sound in a couple of hours.”
Grayson barely kept himself from growling that Eric had better do just that or he’d make sure the other man paid for it.
Lori was just leaving the barn when she suddenly turned around and grabbed the cowboy hat off the nail. When she plopped it back on her head, Eric grinned at her and said, “Great hat.”
“Thank you.” Her smile at his compliment was so bright it could have lit up the entire town.
And as Grayson watched them get into Eric’s truck and then drive away, he wondered what in the hell he was doing sending her off alone with Eric. It wasn’t that he thought the other man would do anything to hurt her or frighten her. On the contrary, Eric was a good-looking young guy. He didn’t have any issues, didn’t have any reasons not to make a play for Lori and hope that she played, too.
* * *
The two hours that Grayson spent working with his hammer on the new cottage roof, so hard and fast that his shoulder ached, didn’t bring him any closer to erasing the way Lori had smiled at Eric. And when Grayson finally heard the truck come back up the drive, he was hard pressed not to yank her out of it and claim her as his once and for all with a kiss that would have both of them forgetting anything but how good they could be together.
Of course, Eric came around and helped her out of his truck like a gentleman. She gave him a hug good-bye and then stood in the driveway and waved as he drove away. Her smile was still intact as she said, “That was so much fun!”
Grayson’s heart swelled in his chest at seeing her so happy, even if he hadn’t been the one to make her that way. But when she finally looked up and realized he was standing by the side of the barn watching her, her smile fell away.
“I can’t believe you don’t do the pick-up here,” she said, evidently no longer giving him the silent treatment. “Your customers are the neatest people and they’re so grateful for the food you grow for them. Don’t you want the satisfaction of seeing how happy they are—or at least give them a chance to say thank you?”
She’d only been back for sixty seconds and already she was laying into him. How could he have been upset about her earlier moratorium on chatting?
Knowing she was going to keep glaring at him until he answered, he told her, “I’m too busy.”
She made a sound of disbelief. A loud one. “You can’t spare two hours once a week to actually interact with your customers and community, but Eric told me you give away free food to people who can’t afford to subscribe to your CSA every single week.” She shook her head. “I don’t understand you at all, Grayson. Not even a little bit.” With that, she headed inside the house and slammed the door.
The sick truth was that he didn’t understand himself, either, didn’t know how he could be feeling what he was feeling for her so quickly. She’d only been with him for a few days, and had pushed every one of his buttons repeatedly—and likely on purpose—more than half the time.