When a rebellious rancher meets the pastor’s daughter, it’s a match made in...Copper Ridge! From New York Times bestselling author Maisey Yates!

Sheltered from her own desires for so long, Hayley Thompson wants to experience life. A new job at Gray Bear Construction is a start. The work she can handle. It’s her boss—reclusive, sexy Jonathan Bear—who’s scrambling her mind and her hormones...

No matter how successful he becomes, Jonathan’s reputation will always precede him. And his type of woman is usually nothing like prim, innocent Hayley. Yet he can’t resist unleashing the fire beneath her pent-up facade—even if seduction means losing his heart...

“You can’t play these kinds of games. You don’t know the rules.”

“I don’t know what your problem is. You don’t want me, so what do you care if they do?”

“Hayley, honey, I don’t want to want you, but that is not the same thing as not wanting you. It is not even close. What I want is something you can’t handle.”

She tilted her head to the side, her hair falling over her shoulder like a glossy curtain. “Maybe I want to be shocked. Maybe I want something I’m not quite ready for.”

“No,” he said, his tone emphatic now. “You’re on a big kick to have experiences. But there are much nicer men you can have experiences with.”

She bared her teeth. “I was trying! You just scared them off.”

“You’re not having experiences with those clowns. They wouldn’t know how to handle a woman if she came with an instruction manual. And let me tell you, women do not come with an instruction manual. You just have to know what to do.”

“And you know what to do?”

“Damn straight,” he returned.

“So,” she said, tilting her chin up, looking stubborn. “Show me.”

* * *

Seduce Me, Cowboy is part of New York Times bestselling author Maisey Yates’s Copper Ridge series.

Seduce Me, Cowboy

Maisey Yates

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MAISEY YATES is a New York Times bestselling author of more than thirty romance novels. She has a coffee habit she has no interest in kicking and a slight Pinterest addiction. She lives with her husband and children in the Pacific Northwest. When Maisey isn’t writing, she can be found singing in the grocery store, shopping for shoes online and probably not doing dishes. Check out her website, www.maiseyyates.com.

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To the whole Harlequin team.

This is the best job ever.

Thank you for letting me do it.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

One

Hayley Thompson was a good girl. In all the ways that phrase applied. The kind of girl every mother wished her son would bring home for Sunday dinner.

Of course, the mothers of Copper Ridge were much more enthusiastic about Hayley than their sons were, but that had never been a problem. She had never really tried dating, anyway. Dates were the least of her problems.

She was more worried about the constant feeling that she was under a microscope. That she was a trained seal, sitting behind the desk in the church office exactly as one might expect from a small-town pastor’s daughter—who also happened to be the church secretary.

And what did she have to show for being so good? Absolutely nothing.

Meanwhile, her older brother had gone out into the world and done whatever he wanted. He’d broken every rule. Run away from home. Gotten married, gotten divorced. Come back home and opened a bar in the same town where his father preached sermons. All while Hayley had stayed and behaved herself. Done everything that was expected of her.

Ace was the prodigal son. He hadn’t just received forgiveness for his transgressions. He’d been rewarded. He had so many things well-behaved Hayley wanted and didn’t have.

He’d found love again in his wife, Sierra. They had children. The doting attention of Hayley’s parents—a side effect of being the first to supply grandchildren, she felt—while Hayley had...

Well, nothing.

Nothing but a future as a very well-behaved spinster.

That was why she was here now. Clutching a newspaper in her hand until it was wrinkled tight. She hadn’t even known people still put ads in the paper for job listings, but while she’d been sitting in The Grind yesterday on Copper Ridge’s main street, watching people go by and feeling a strange sense of being untethered, she’d grabbed the local paper.

That had led her to the job listings. And seeing as she was unemployed for the first time since she was sixteen years old, she’d read them.

Every single one of them had been submitted by people she knew. Businesses she’d grown up patronizing, or businesses owned by people she knew from her dad’s congregation. And if she got a job somewhere like that, she might as well have stayed on at the church.

Except for one listing. Assistant to Jonathan Bear, owner of Gray Bear Construction. The job was for him personally, but would also entail clerical work for his company and some work around his home.

She didn’t know anything about the company. She’d never had a house built, after all. Neither had her mother and father. And she’d never heard his name before, and was reasonably sure she’d never seen him at church.

She wanted that distance.

Familiar, nagging guilt gnawed at the edges of her heart. Her parents were good people. They loved her very much. And she loved them. But she felt like a beloved goldfish. With people watching her every move and tapping on the glass. Plus, the bowl was restricting, when she was well aware there was an entire ocean out there.

Step one in her plan for independence had been to acquire her own apartment. Cassie Caldwell, owner of The Grind, and her husband, Jake, had moved out of the space above the coffee shop a while ago. Happily, it had been vacant and ready to rent, and Hayley had taken advantage of that. So, with the money she’d saved up, she’d moved into that place. And then, after hoarding a few months’ worth of rent, she had finally worked up the courage to quit.

Her father had been... She wouldn’t go so far as to say he’d been disappointed. John Thompson never had a harsh word for anyone. He was all kind eyes and deep conviction. The type of goodness Hayley could only marvel at, that made her feel as though she could never quite measure up.

But she could tell her father had been confused. And she hadn’t been able to explain herself, not fully. Because she didn’t want either of her parents to know that ultimately, this little journey of independence would lead straight out of Copper Ridge.

She had to get out of the fishbowl. She needed people to stop tapping on her glass.

Virtue wasn’t its own reward. For years she’d believed it would be. But then...suddenly, watching Ace at the dinner table at her parents’ house, with his family, she’d realized the strange knot in her stomach wasn’t anger over his abandonment, over the way he’d embarrassed their parents with his behavior.

It was envy.

Envy of all he had, of his freedom. Well, this was her chance to have some of that for herself, and she couldn’t do it with everyone watching.

She took a deep breath and regarded the house in front of her. If she didn’t know it was the home and office of the owner of Gray Bear Construction, she would be tempted to assume it was some kind of resort.

The expansive front porch was made entirely out of logs, stained with a glossy, honey-colored sheen that caught the light and made the place look like it was glowing. The green metal roof was designed to withstand harsh weather—which down in town by the beach wasn’t much of an issue. But a few miles inland, here in the mountains, she could imagine there was snow in winter.

She wondered if she would need chains for her car. But she supposed she’d cross that bridge when she came to it. It was early spring, and she didn’t even have the job yet.

Getting the job, and keeping it through winter, was only a pipe dream at this point.

She took a deep breath and started up the path, the bark-laden ground soft beneath her feet. She inhaled deeply, the sharp scent of pine filling her lungs. It was cool beneath the trees, and she wrapped her arms around herself as she walked up the steps and made her way to the front door.

She knocked before she had a chance to rethink her actions, and then she waited.

She was just about to knock again when she heard footsteps. She quickly put her hand down at her side. Then lifted it again, brushing her hair out of her face. Then she clasped her hands in front of her, then put them back at her sides again. Then she decided to hold them in front of her again.

She had just settled on that position when the door jerked open.

She had rehearsed her opening remarks. Had practiced making a natural smile in the mirror—which was easy after so many years manning the front desk of a church—but all that disappeared completely when she looked at the man standing in front of her.

He was... Well, he was nothing like she’d expected, which left her grappling for what exactly she had been expecting. Somebody older. Certainly not somebody who towered over her like a redwood.

Jonathan Bear wasn’t someone you could anticipate.

His dark, glittering eyes assessed her; his mouth pressed into a thin line. His black hair was tied back, but it was impossible for her to tell just how long it was from where she stood.

“Who are you?” he asked, his tone uncompromising.

“I’m here to interview for the assistant position. Were you expecting someone else?” Her stomach twisted with anxiety. He wasn’t what she had expected, and now she was wondering if she was what he had expected. Maybe he wanted somebody older, with more qualifications. Or somebody more... Well, sexy secretary than former church secretary.

Though, she looked very nice in this twin set and pencil skirt, if she said so herself.

“No,” he said, moving away from the door. “Come in.”

“Oh,” she said, scampering to follow his direction.

“The office is upstairs,” he said, taking great strides through the entryway and heading toward a massive curved staircase.

She found herself taking very quick steps to try and keep up with him. And it was difficult to do that when she was distracted by the beauty of the house. She was trying to take in all the details as she trailed behind him up the stairs, her low heels clicking on the hardwood.

“I’m Hayley Thompson,” she said, “which I know the résumé said, but you didn’t know who I was... So...”

“We’re the only two people here,” he said, looking back at her, lifting one dark brow. “So knowing your name isn’t really that important, is it?”

She couldn’t tell if he was joking. She laughed nervously, and it got her no response at all. So then she was concerned she had miscalculated.

They reached the top of the stairs, and she followed him down a long hallway, the sound of her steps dampened now by a long carpet runner the colors of the nature that surrounded them. Brown, forest green and a red that reminded her of cranberries.

The house smelled new. Which was maybe a strange observation to make, but the scent of wood lingered in the air, and something that reminded her of paint.

“How long have you lived here?” she asked, more comfortable with polite conversation than contending with silence.

“Just moved in last month,” he said. “One of our designs. You might have guessed, this is what Gray Bear does. Custom homes. That’s our specialty. And since my construction company merged with Grayson Design, we’re doing design as well as construction.”

“How many people can buy places like this?” she asked, turning in a circle while she walked, daunted by the amount of house they had left behind them, and the amount that was still before them.

“You would be surprised. For a lot of our clients these are only vacation homes. Escapes to the coast and to the mountains. Mostly, we work on the Oregon coast, but we make exceptions for some of the higher-paying clientele.”

“That’s...kind of amazing. I mean, something of this scale right here in Copper Ridge. Or I guess, technically, we’re outside the city limits.”

“Still the same zip code,” he said, lifting a shoulder.

He took hold of two sliding double doors fashioned to look like barn doors and slid them open, revealing a huge office space with floor-to-ceiling windows and a view that made her jaw drop.

The sheer immensity of the mountains spread before them was incredible on its own. But beyond that, she could make out the faint gray of the ocean, whitecapped waves and jagged rocks rising out of the surf.

“The best of everything,” he said. “Sky, mountains, ocean. That kind of sums up the company. Now that you know about us, you can tell me why I should hire you.”

“I want the job,” she said, her tone hesitant. As soon as she said the words, she realized how ridiculous they were. Everybody who interviewed for this position would want the job. “I was working as a secretary for my father’s...business,” she said, feeling guilty about fudging a little bit on her résumé. But she hadn’t really wanted to say she was working at her father’s church, because... Well, she just wanted to come in at a slightly more neutral position.

“You were working for your family?”

“Yes,” she said.

He crossed his arms, and she felt slightly intimidated. He was the largest man she’d ever seen. At least, he felt large. Something about all the height and muscles and presence combined.

“We’re going to have to get one thing straight right now, Hayley. I’m not your daddy. So if you’re used to a kind and gentle working environment where you get a lot of chances because firing you would make it awkward around the holidays, this might take some adjustment for you. I’m damned hard to please. And I’m not a very nice boss. There’s a lot of work to do around here. I hate paperwork, and I don’t want to have to do any form twice. If you make mistakes and I have to sit at that desk longer as a result, you’re fired. If I’ve hired you to make things easier between myself and my clients, and something you do makes it harder, you’re fired. If you pass on a call to me that I shouldn’t have to take, you’re fired.”

She nodded, wishing she had a notepad, not because she was ever going to forget what he’d said, but so she could underscore the fact that she was paying attention. “Anything else?”

“Yeah,” he said, a slight smile curving his lips. “You’re also fired if you fuck up my coffee.”

* * *

This was a mistake. Jonathan Bear was absolutely certain of it. But he had earned millions making mistakes, so what was one more? Nobody else had responded to his ad.

Except for this pale, strange little creature who looked barely twenty and wore the outfit of an eighty-year-old woman.

She was... Well, she wasn’t the kind of formidable woman who could stand up to the rigors of working with him.

His sister, Rebecca, would say—with absolutely no tact at all—that he sucked as a boss. And maybe she was right, but he didn’t really care. He was busy, and right now he hated most of what he was busy with.

There was irony in that, he knew. He had worked hard all his life. While a lot of his friends had sought solace and oblivion in drugs and alcohol, Jonathan had figured it was best to sweat the poison right out.

He’d gotten a job on a construction site when he was fifteen, and learned his trade. He’d gotten to where he was faster, better than most of the men around him. By the time he was twenty, he had been doing serious custom work on the more upscale custom homes he’d built with West Construction.

But he wanted more. There was a cap on what he could make with that company, and he didn’t like a ceiling. He wanted open skies and the freedom to go as high, as fast as he wanted. So he could amass so much it could never be taken from him.

So he’d risked striking out on his own. No one had believed a kid from the wrong side of the tracks could compete with West. But Jonathan had courted business across city and county lines. And created a reputation beyond Copper Ridge so that when people came looking to build retirement homes or vacation properties, his was the name they knew.

He had built everything he had, brick by brick. In a strictly literal sense in some cases.

And every brick built a stronger wall against all the things he had left behind. Poverty, uncertainty, the lack of respect paid to a man in his circumstances.

Then six months ago, Joshua Grayson had approached him. Originally from Copper Ridge, the man had been looking for a foothold back in town after years in Seattle. Faith Grayson, Joshua’s sister was quickly becoming the most sought after architect in the Pacific Northwest. But the siblings had decided it was time to bring the business back home in order to be closer to their parents.

And so Joshua asked Jonathan if he would consider bringing design in-house, making Bear Construction into Gray Bear.

This gave Jonathan reach into urban areas, into Seattle. Had him managing remote crews and dealing with many projects at one time. And it had pushed him straight out of the building game in many ways. He had turned into a desk drone. And while his bank account had grown astronomically, he was quite a ways from the life he thought he’d live after reaching this point.

Except the house. The house was finally finished. Finally, he was living in one of the places he’d built.

Finally, Jonathan Bear, that poor Indian kid who wasn’t worth anything to anyone, bastard son of the biggest bastard in town, had his house on the side of the mountain and more money than he would ever be able to spend.

And he was bored out of his mind.

Boredom, it turned out, worked him into a hell of a temper. He had a feeling Hayley Thompson wasn’t strong enough to stand up to that. But he expected to go through a few assistants before he found one who could handle it. She might as well be number one.

“You’ve got the job,” he said. “You can start tomorrow.”

Her eyes widened, and he noticed they were a strange shade of blue. Gray in some lights, shot through with a dark, velvet navy that reminded him of the ocean before a storm. It made him wonder if there was some hidden strength there.

They would both find out.

“I got the job? Just like that?”

“Getting the job was always going to be the easy part. It’s keeping the job that might be tricky. My list of reasons to hire you are short—you showed up. The list of reasons I have for why I might fire you is much longer.”

“You’re not very reassuring,” she said, her lips tilting down in a slight frown.

He laughed. “If you want to go back and work for your daddy, do that. I’m not going to call you. But maybe you’ll appreciate my ways later. Other jobs will seem easy after this one.”

She just looked at him, her jaw firmly set, her petite body rigid with determination. “What time do you want me here?”

“Seven o’clock. Don’t be late. Or else...”

“You’ll fire me. I’ve got the theme.”

“Excellent. Hayley Thompson, you’ve got yourself a job.”

Two

Hayley scrubbed her face as she walked into The Grind through the private entrance from her upstairs apartment. It was early. But she wanted to make sure she wasn’t late to work.

On account of all the firing talk.

“Good morning,” Cassie said from behind the counter, smiling cheerfully. Hayley wondered if Cassie was really thrilled to be at work this early in the morning. Hayley knew all about presenting a cheerful face to anyone who might walk in the door.

You couldn’t have a bad day when you worked at the church.

“I need coffee,” Hayley said, not bothering to force a grin. She wasn’t at work yet. She paused. “Do you know Jonathan Bear?”

Cassie gave her a questioning look. “Yes, I’m friends with his sister, Rebecca. She owns the store across the street.”

“Right,” Hayley said, frowning. “I don’t think I’ve ever met her. But I’ve seen her around town.”

Hayley was a few years younger than Cassie, and probably a bit younger than Rebecca, as well, which meant they had never been in classes together at school, and had never shared groups of friends. Not that Hayley had much in the way of friends. People tended to fear the pastor’s daughter would put a damper on things.

No one had tested the theory.

“So yes, I know Jonathan in passing. He’s... Well, he’s not very friendly.” Cassie laughed. “Why?”

“He just hired me.”

Cassie’s expression contorted into one of horror and Hayley saw her start to backpedal. “He’s probably fine. It’s just that he’s very protective of Rebecca because he raised her, you know, and all that. And she had her accident, and had to have a lot of medical procedures done... So my perception of him is based entirely on that. I’m sure he’s a great boss.”

“No,” Hayley said, “you were right the first time. He’s a grumpy cuss. Do you have any idea what kind of coffee he drinks?”

Cassie frowned, a small notch appearing between her brows. “He doesn’t come in that often. But when he does I think he gets a dark roast, large, black, no sugar, with a double shot of espresso.”

“How do you remember that?”

“It’s my job. And there are a lot of people I know by drink and not by name.”

“Well, I will take one of those for him. And hope that it’s still hot by the time I get up the mountain.”

“Okay. And a coffee for you with room for cream?”

“Yes,” Hayley said. “I don’t consider my morning caffeination ritual a punishment like some people seem to.”

“Hey,” Cassie said, “some people just like their coffee unadulterated. But I am not one of them. I feel you.”

Hayley paid for her order and made her way to the back of the store, looking around at the warm, quaint surroundings. Locals had filed in and were filling up the tables, reading their papers, opening laptops and dropping off bags and coats to secure the coveted positions in the tiny coffee shop.

Then a line began to form, and Hayley was grateful she had come as early as she had.

A moment later, her order was ready. Popping the lid off her cup at the cream and sugar station, she gave herself a generous helping of both. She walked back out the way she had come in, going to her car, which was parked behind the building in her reserved space.

She got inside, wishing she’d warmed up the vehicle before placing her order. It wasn’t too cold this morning, but she could see her breath in the damp air. She positioned both cups of coffee in the cup holders of her old Civic, and then headed to the main road, which was void of traffic—and would remain that way for the entire day.

She liked the pace of Copper Ridge, she really did. Liked the fact that she knew so many people, that people waved and smiled when she walked by. Liked that there were no traffic lights, and that you rarely had to wait for more than one car at a four-way stop.

She loved the mountains, and she loved the ocean.

But she knew there were things beyond this place, too. And she wanted to see them.

Needed to see them.

She thought about all those places as she drove along the winding road to Jonathan Bear’s house. She had the vague thought that if she went to London or Paris, if she looked at the Eiffel Tower or Big Ben, structures so old and lasting—structures that had been there for centuries—maybe she would learn something about herself.

Maybe she would find what she couldn’t identify here. Maybe she would find the cure for the elusive ache in her chest when she saw Ace with Sierra and their kids.

Would find the freedom to be herself—whoever that might be. To flirt and date, and maybe drink a beer. To escape the confines that so rigidly held her.

Even driving out of town this morning, instead of to the church, was strange. Usually, she felt as though she were moving through the grooves of a well-worn track. There were certain places she went in town—her parents’ home, the church, the grocery store, The Grind, her brother’s brewery and restaurant, but never his bar—and she rarely deviated from that routine.

She supposed this drive would become routine soon enough.

She pulled up to the front of the house, experiencing a sharp sense of déjà vu as she walked up to the front porch to knock again. Except this time her stomach twisted with an even greater sense of trepidation. Not because Jonathan Bear was an unknown, but because she knew a little bit about him now. And what she knew terrified her.

The door jerked open before she could pound against it. “Just come in next time,” he said.

“Oh.”

“During business hours. I was expecting you.”

“Expecting me to be late?” she asked, holding out his cup of coffee.

He arched a dark brow. “Maybe.” He tilted his head to the side. “What’s that?”

“Probably coffee.” She didn’t know why she was being anything other than straightforward and sweet. He’d made it very clear that he had exacting standards. Likely, he wanted his assistant to fulfill his every whim before it even occurred to him, and to do so with a smile. Likely, he didn’t want his assistant to sass him, even lightly.

Except, something niggled at her, telling her he wouldn’t respect her at all if she acted like a doormat. She was good at reading people. It was a happy side effect of being quiet. Of having few friends, of being an observer. Of spending years behind the church desk, not sure who might walk through the door seeking help. That experience had taught Hayley not only kindness, but also discernment.

And that was why she chose to follow her instincts with Jonathan.

“It’s probably coffee?” he asked, taking the cup from her, anyway.

“Yes,” she returned. “Probably.”

He turned away from her, heading toward the stairs, but she noticed that he took the lid off the cup and examined the contents. She smiled as she followed him up the stairs to the office.

The doors were already open, the computer that faced the windows fired up. There were papers everywhere. And pens sat across nearly every surface.

“Why so many pens?” she asked.

“If I have to stop and look for one I waste an awful lot of time cussing.”

“Fair enough.”

“I have to go outside and take care of the horses, but I want you to go through that stack of invoices and enter all the information into the spreadsheet on the computer. Can you do that?”

“Spreadsheets are my specialty. You have horses?”

He nodded. “This is kind of a ranch.”

“Oh,” she said. “I didn’t realize.”

“No reason you should.” Then he turned, grabbing a black cowboy hat off a hook and putting it firmly on his head. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours. And I’m going to want more coffee. The machine is downstairs in the kitchen. Should be pretty easy. Probably.”

Then he brushed his fingertips against the brim of his hat, nodding slightly before walking out, leaving her alone.

When he left, something in her chest loosened, eased. She hadn’t realized just how tense she’d felt in his presence.

She took a deep breath, sitting down at the desk in front of the computer, eyeing the healthy stack of papers to her left. Then she looked over the monitor to the view below. This wouldn’t be so bad. He wasn’t here looking over her shoulder, barking orders. And really, in terms of work space, this office could hardly be beat.

Maybe this job wouldn’t be so bad, after all.

* * *

By the time Jonathan made a run to town after finishing up with the horses, it was past lunchtime. So he brought food from the Crab Shanty and hoped his new assistant didn’t have a horrible allergy to seafood.

He probably should have checked. He wasn’t really used to considering other people. And he couldn’t say he was looking forward to getting used to it. But he would rather she didn’t die. At least, not while at work.

He held tightly to the white bag of food as he made his way to the office. Her back was to the door, her head bent low over a stack of papers, one hand poised on the mouse.

He set the bag down loudly on the table by the doorway, then deposited his keys there, too. He hung his hat on the hook. “Hungry?”

Her head popped up, her eyes wide. “Oh, I didn’t hear you come in. You scared me. You should have announced yourself or something.”

“I just did. I said, ‘hungry?’ I mean, I could have said I’m here, but how is that any different?”

She shook her head. “I don’t have an answer to that.”

“Great. I have fish.”

“What kind?”

“Fried kind.”

“I approve.”

He sighed in mock relief. “Good. Because if you didn’t, I don’t know how I would live with myself. I would have had to eat both of these.” He opened the bag, taking out two cartons and two cans of Coke.

He sat in the chair in front of the table he used for drawing plans, then held her portion toward her.

She made a funny face, then accepted the offered lunch. “Is one of the Cokes for me, too?”

“Sure,” he said, sliding a can at her.

She blinked, then took the can.

“What?”

She shook her head. “Nothing.”

“You expected me to hand everything to you, didn’t you?”

She shook her head. “No. Well, maybe. But, I’m sorry. I don’t work with my father anymore, as you have mentioned more than once.”

“No,” he said, “you don’t. And this isn’t a church. Though—” he took a french fry out of the box and bit it “—this is pretty close to a religious experience.” He picked up one of the thoughtfully included napkins and wiped his fingers before popping the top on the Coke can.

“How did you know I worked at the church?” she asked.

“I pay attention. And I definitely looked at the address you included on your form. Also, I know your brother. Or rather, I know of him. My sister is engaged to his brother-in-law. I might not be chummy with him, but I know his dad is the pastor. And that he has a younger sister.”

She looked crestfallen. “I didn’t realize you knew my brother.”

“Is that a problem?”

“I was trying to get a job based on my own merit. Not on family connections. And frankly, I can’t find anyone who is not connected to my family in some way in this town. My father knows the saints, my brother knows the sinners.”

“Are you calling me a sinner?”

She picked gingerly at a piece of fish. “All have sinned and so forth.”

“That isn’t what you meant.”

She suddenly became very interested in her coleslaw, prodding it with her plastic fork.

“How is it you know I’m a sinner?” he asked, not intending to let her off the hook, because this was just so fun. Hell, he’d gone and hired himself a church secretary, so might as well play with her a little bit.

“I didn’t mean that,” she insisted, her cheeks turning pink. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a woman blush.

“Well, if it helps at all, I don’t know your brother well. I just buy alcohol from him on the weekends. But you’re right. I am a sinner, Hayley.”

She looked up at him then. The shock reflected in those stormy eyes touched him down deep. Made his stomach feel tight, made his blood feel hot. All right, he needed to get a handle on himself. Because that was not the kind of fun he was going to have with the church secretary he had hired. No way.

Jonathan Bear was a ruthless bastard; that fact could not be disputed. He had learned to look out for himself at an early age, because no one else would. Not his father. Certainly not his mother, who had taken off when he was a teenager, leaving him with a younger sister to raise. And most definitely not anyone in town.

But, even he had a conscience.

In theory, anyway.

“Good to know. I mean, since we’re getting to know each other, I guess.”

They ate in relative silence after that. Jonathan took that opportunity to check messages on his phone. A damn smartphone. This was what he had come to. Used to be that if he wanted to spend time alone he could unplug and go out on his horse easily enough. Now, he could still do that, but his business partners—dammit all, he had business partners—knew that he should be accessible and was opting not to be.

“Why did you leave the church?” he asked after a long stretch of silence.

“I didn’t. I mean, not as a member. But, I couldn’t work there anymore. You know, I woke up one morning and looked in the mirror and imagined doing that exact same thing in forty years. Sitting behind that desk, in the same chair, talking to the same people, having the same conversations... I just didn’t think I could do it. I thought...well, for a long time I thought if I sat in that chair life would come to me.” She took a deep breath. “But it won’t. I have to go get it.”

What she was talking about... That kind of stability. It was completely foreign to him. Jonathan could scarcely remember a time in his life when things had stayed the same from year to year. He would say one thing for poverty, it was dynamic. It could be a grind, sure, but it kept you on your toes. He’d constantly looked for new ways to support himself and Rebecca. To prove to child services that he was a fit guardian. To keep their dwelling up to par, to make sure they could always afford it. To keep them both fed and clothed—or at least her, if not him.

He had always craved what Hayley was talking about. A place secure enough to rest for a while. But not having it was why he was here now. In this house, with all this money. Which was the only real damned security in the world. Making sure you were in control of everything around you.

Even if it did mean owning a fucking smartphone.

“So, your big move was to be my assistant?”

She frowned. “No. This is my small move. You have to make small moves before you can make a big one.”

That he agreed with, more or less. His whole life had been a series of small moves with no pausing in between. One step at a time as he climbed up to the top. “I’m not sure it’s the best thing to let your employer know you think he’s a small step,” he said, just because he wanted to see her cheeks turn pink again. He was gratified when they did.

“Sorry. This is a giant step for me. I intend to stay here forever in my elevated position as your assistant.”

He set his lunch down, leaning back and holding up his hands. “Slow down, baby. I’m not looking for a commitment.”

At that, her cheeks turned bright red. She took another bite of coleslaw, leaving a smear of mayonnaise on the corner of her mouth. Without thinking, he leaned in and brushed his thumb across the smudge, and along the edge of her lower lip.

He didn’t realize it was a mistake until the slug of heat hit him low and fast in the gut.

He hadn’t realized it would be a mistake because she was such a mousy little thing, a church secretary. Because his taste didn’t run to that kind of thing. At least, that’s what he would have said.

But while his brain might have a conscience, he discovered in that moment that his body certainly did not.

Three

It was like striking a match, his thumb sweeping across her skin. It left a trail of fire where he touched, and made her feel hot in places he hadn’t. She was... Well, she was immobilized.

Like a deer caught in the headlights, seeing exactly what was barreling down on her, and unable to move.

Except, of course, Jonathan wasn’t barreling down on her. He wasn’t moving at all.

He was just looking at her, his dark eyes glittering, his expression like granite. She followed his lead, unsure of what to do. Of how she should react.

And then, suddenly, everything clicked into place. Exactly what she was feeling, exactly what she was doing...and exactly how much of an idiot she was.

She took a deep breath, gasping as though she’d been submerged beneath water. She turned her chair sideways, facing the computer again. “Well,” she said, “thank you for lunch.”

Fiddlesticks. And darn it. And fudging graham crackers.

She had just openly stared at her boss, probably looking like a guppy gasping on dry land because he had wiped mayonnaise off her lip. Which was—as things went—probably one of the more platonic touches a man and a woman could share.

The problem was, she couldn’t remember ever being touched—even platonically—by a man who wasn’t family. So she had been completely unprepared for the reaction it created inside her. Which she had no doubt he’d noticed.

Attraction. She had felt attracted to him.

Backtracking, she realized the tight feeling in her stomach that had appeared the first moment she’d seen him was probably attraction.

That was bad. Very bad.

But what she was really curious about, was why this attraction felt different from what she’d felt around other men she had liked. She’d felt fluttery feelings before. Most notably for Grant Daniels, the junior high youth pastor, a couple years ago. She had really liked him, and she was pretty sure he’d liked her, too, but he hadn’t seemed willing to make a move.

She had conversations with him over coffee in the Fellowship Hall, where he had brought up his feelings on dating—he didn’t—and how he was waiting until he was ready to get married before getting into any kind of relationship with a woman.

For a while, she’d been convinced he’d told her that because he was close to being ready, and he might want to marry her.

Another instance of sitting, waiting and believing what she wanted would come to her through the sheer force of her good behavior.

Looking back, she realized it was kind of stupid that she had hoped he’d marry her. She didn’t know him, not really. She had only ever seen him around church, and of course her feelings for him were based on that. Everybody was on their best behavior there. Including her.

Not that she actually behaved badly, which was kind of the problem. There was what she did, what she showed the world, and then there were the dark, secret things that lived inside her. Things she wanted but was afraid to pursue.

The fluttery feelings she had for Grant were like public Hayley. Smiley, shiny and giddy. Wholesome and hopeful.

The tension she felt in her stomach when she looked at Jonathan...that was all secret Hayley.

And it scared her that there was another person who seemed to have access to those feelings she examined only late at night in the darkness of her room.

She had finally gotten up the courage to buy a romance novel when she’d been at the grocery store a month or so ago. She had always been curious about those books, but since she’d lived with her parents, she had never been brave enough to buy one.

So, at the age of twenty-four, she had gotten her very first one. And it had been educational. Very, very educational. She had been a little afraid of it, to be honest.

Because those illicit feelings brought about late at night by hazy images and the slide of sheets against her bare skin had suddenly become focused and specific after reading that book.

And if that book had been the fantasy, Jonathan was the reality. It made her want to turn tail and run. But she couldn’t. Because if she did, then he would know what no one else knew about her.

She couldn’t risk him knowing.

They were practically strangers. They had nothing in common. These feelings were ridiculous. At least Grant had been the kind of person she was suited to.

Which begged the question—why didn’t he make her feel this off-kilter?

Her face felt like it was on fire, and she was sure Jonathan could easily read her reaction. That was the problem. It had taken her longer to understand what she was feeling than it had likely taken him. Because he wasn’t sheltered like she was.

Sheltered even from her own desire.

The word made her shiver. Because it was one she had avoided thinking until now.

Desire.

Did she desire him? And if she did, what did that mean?

Her mouth went dry as several possibilities floated through her mind. Each more firmly rooted in fantasy than the last, since she had no practical experience with any of this.

And it was going to stay that way. At least for now.

Small steps. This job was her first small step. And it was a job, not a chance for her to get ridiculous over a man.

“Did you have anything else you wanted me to do?” she asked, not turning to face him, keeping her gaze resolutely pinned to the computer screen.

He was silent for a moment, and for some reason, the silence felt thick. “Did you finish entering the invoices?”

“Yes.”

“Good,” he said. “Here.” He handed her his phone. “If anyone calls, say I’m not available, but you’re happy to take a message. And I want you to call the county office and ask about the permits listed in the other spreadsheet I have open. Just get a status update on that. Do you cook?”

She blinked. “What?”

“Do you cook? I hired you to be my assistant. Which includes things around the house. And I eat around the house.”

“I cook,” she said, reeling from the change of topic.

“Great. Have something ready for me, and if I’m not back before you knock off at five, just keep it warm.”

Then he turned and walked out, leaving her feeling both relieved and utterly confused. All those positive thoughts from this morning seemed to be coming back to haunt her, mock her.

The work she could handle. It was the man that scared her.

* * *

The first week of working with Hayley had been pretty good, in spite of that hiccup on the first day.

The one where he had touched her skin and felt just how soft it was. Something he never should have done.

But she was a good assistant. And every evening when he came in from dealing with ranch work his dinner was ready. That had been kind of a dick move, asking her to cook, but in truth, he hadn’t put a very detailed job description in the ad. And she wasn’t an employee of Gray Bear. She was his personal employee, and that meant he could expand her responsibilities.

At least, that was what he told himself as he approached the front porch Friday evening, his stomach already growling in anticipation. When he came in for the evening after the outside work was done, she was usually gone and the food was warming in the oven.

It was like having a wife. With none of the drawbacks and none of the perks.

But considering he could get those perks from a woman who wasn’t in his house more than forty hours a week, he would take this happily.

He stomped up the front steps, kicking his boots off before he went inside. He’d been walking through sludge in one of the far pastures and he didn’t want to track in mud. His housekeeper didn’t come until later in the week.

The corner of his mouth lifted as he processed that thought. He had a housekeeper. He didn’t have to get on his hands and knees and scrub floors anymore. Which he had done. More times than he would care to recount. Most of the time the house he and Rebecca had shared while growing up had been messy.

It was small, and their belongings—basic though they were—created a lot of clutter. Plus, teenage boys weren’t the best at keeping things deep cleaned. Especially not when they also had full-time jobs and were trying to finish high school. But when he knew child services would be by, he did his best.

He didn’t now. He paid somebody else to do it. For a long time, adding those kinds of expenses had made both pride and anxiety burn in his gut. Adjusting to living at a new income level was not seamless. And since things had grown exponentially and so quickly, the adjustments had come even harder. Often in a million ways he couldn’t anticipate. But he was working on it. Hiring a housekeeper. Hiring Hayley.

Pretty soon, he would give in and buy himself a new pair of boots.

He drew nearer to the kitchen, smelling something good. And then he heard footsteps, the clattering of dishes.

He braced his arms on either side of the doorway. Clearly, she hadn’t heard him approach. She was bending down to pull something out of the oven, her sweet ass outlined to perfection by that prim little skirt.

There was absolutely nothing provocative about it. It fell down past her knees, and when she stood straight it didn’t display any curves whatsoever.

For a moment, he just admired his own commitment to being a dick. She could not be dressed more appropriately, and still his eyes were glued to her butt. And damn, his body liked what he saw.

“You’re still here,” he said, pushing away from the door and walking into the room. He had to break the tension stretching tight inside him. Step one was breaking the silence and making his presence known. Step two was going to be calling up one of the women he had associations with off and on.

Because he had to do something to take the edge off. Clearly, it had been too long since he’d gotten laid.

“Sorry,” she said, wiping her hands on a dishcloth and making a few frantic movements. As though she wanted to look industrious, but didn’t exactly have a specific task. “The roast took longer than I thought it would. But I did a little more paperwork while I waited. And I called the county to track down that permit.”

“You don’t have to justify all your time. Everything has gotten done this week. Plus, inefficient meat preparation was not on my list of reasons I might fire you.”

She shrugged. “I thought you reserved the right to revise that list at any time.”

“I do. But not today.”

“I should be out of your hair soon.” She walked around the counter and he saw she was barefoot. Earlier, he had been far too distracted by her backside to notice.

“Pretty sure that’s a health code violation,” he said.

She turned pink all the way up to her scalp. “Sorry. My feet hurt.”

He thought of those low, sensible heels she always wore and he had to wonder what the point was to wearing shoes that ugly if they weren’t even comfortable. The kind of women he usually went out with wore the kinds of shoes made for sitting. Or dancing on a pole.

But Hayley didn’t look like she even knew what pole dancing was, let alone like she would jump up there and give it a try. She was... Well, she was damn near sweet.

Which was all wrong for him, in every way. He wasn’t sweet.

He was successful. He was driven.

But he was temporary at best. And frankly, almost everyone in his life seemed grateful for that fact. No one stayed. Not his mother, not his father. Even his sister was off living her own life now.

So why he should spend even one moment looking at Hayley the way he’d been looking at her, he didn’t know. He didn’t have time for subtlety. He never had. He had always liked obvious women. Women who asked for what they wanted without any game-playing or shame.

He didn’t want a wife. He didn’t even want a serious girlfriend. Hell, he didn’t want a casual girlfriend. When he went out it was with the express intention of hooking up. When it came to women, he didn’t like a challenge.

His whole damned life was a challenge, and always had been. When he’d been raising his sister he couldn’t bring anyone back to his place, which meant he needed someone with a place of their own, or someone willing to get busy in the back of a pickup truck.

Someone who understood he had only a couple free hours, and he wouldn’t be sharing their bed all night.

Basically, his taste ran toward women who were all the things Hayley wasn’t.

Cute ass or not.

None of those thoughts did anything to ease the tension in his stomach. No matter how succinctly they broke down just why he shouldn’t find Hayley hot.

He nearly scoffed. She wasn’t hot. She was... She would not be out of place as the wholesome face on a baking mix. Much more Little Debbie than Debbie Does Dallas.

“It’s fine. I don’t want you going lame on me.”

She grinned. “No. Then you’d have to put me down.”

“True. And if I lose more than one personal assistant that way people will start asking questions.”

He could tell she wasn’t sure if he was kidding or not. For a second, she looked downright concerned.

“I have not sent, nor do I intend to send, any of my employees—present or former—to the glue factory. Don’t look at me like that.”

She bit her lower lip, and that forced him to spend a moment examining just how lush it was. He didn’t like that. She needed to stop bending over, and to do nothing that would draw attention to her mouth. Maybe, when he revised the list of things he might fire her for, he would add drawing attention to attractive body parts to the list.

“I can never tell when you’re joking.”

“Me, either,” he said.

That time she did laugh. “You know,” she said, “you could smile.”

“Takes too much energy.”

The timer went off and she bustled back to the stove. “Okay,” she said, “it should be ready now.” She pulled a little pan out of the oven and took the lid off. It was full of roast and potatoes, carrots and onions. The kind of home-cooked meal he imagined a lot of kids grew up on.

For him, traditional fare had been more along the lines of flour tortillas with cheese or ramen noodles. Something cheap, easy and full of carbs. Just enough to keep you going.

His stomach growled in appreciation, and that was the kind of hunger associated with Hayley that he could accept.

“I should go,” she said, starting to walk toward the kitchen door.

“Stay.”

As soon as he made the offer Jonathan wanted to bite his tongue off. He did not need to encourage spending more time in closed off spaces with her. Although dinner might be a good chance to prove that he could easily master those weird bursts of attraction.

“No,” she said, and he found himself strangely relieved. “I should go.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” he said, surprising himself yet again. “Dinner is ready here. And it’s late. Plus there’s no way I can eat all this.”

“Okay,” she said, clearly hesitant.

“Come on now. Stop looking at me like you think I’m going to bite you. You’ve been reading too much Twilight. Indians don’t really turn into wolves.”

Her face turned really red then. “That’s not what I was thinking. I don’t... I’m not afraid of you.”

She was afraid of something. And what concerned him most was that it might be the same thing he was fighting against.

“I really was teasing you,” he said. “I have a little bit of a reputation in town, but I didn’t earn half of it.”

“Are you saying people in town are...prejudiced?”

“I wouldn’t go that far. I mean, I wouldn’t say it’s on purpose. But whether it’s because I grew up poor or it’s because I’m brown, people have always given me a wide berth.”

“I didn’t... I mean, I’ve never seen people act that way.”

“Well, they wouldn’t. Not to you.”

She blinked slightly. “I’ll serve dinner now.”

“Don’t worry,” he said, “the story has a happy ending. I have a lot of money now, and that trumps anything else. People have no issue hiring me to build these days. Though, I remember the first time my old boss put me on as the leader of the building crew, and the guy whose house we were building had a problem with it. He didn’t think I should be doing anything that required too much skill. Was more comfortable with me just swinging the hammer, not telling other people where to swing it.”

She took plates down from the cupboard, holding them close to her chest. “That’s awful.”

“People are awful.”

A line creased her forehead. “They definitely can be.”

“Stop hugging my dinner plate to your shirt. That really isn’t sanitary. We can eat in here.” He gestured to the countertop island. She set the plates down hurriedly, then started dishing food onto them.

He sighed heavily, moving to where she was and taking the big fork and knife out of her hands. “Have a seat. How much do you want?”

“Oh,” she said, “I don’t need much.”

He ignored her, filling the plate completely, then filling his own. After that, he went to the fridge and pulled out a beer. “Want one?”

She shook her head. “I don’t drink.”

He frowned, then looked back into the fridge. “I don’t have anything else.”

“Water is fine.”

He got her a glass and poured some water from the spigot in the fridge. He handed it to her, regarding her like she was some kind of alien life-form. The small conversation had really highlighted the gulf between them.

It should make him feel even more ashamed about looking at her butt.

Except shame was pretty hard for him to come by.

“Tell me what you think about people, Hayley.” He took a bite of the roast and nearly gave her a raise then and there.

“No matter what things look like on the surface, you never know what someone is going through. It surprised me how often someone who had been smiling on Sunday would come into the office and break down in tears on Tuesday afternoon, saying they needed to talk to the pastor. Everyone has problems, and I do my best not to add to them.”

“That’s a hell of a lot nicer than most people deserve.”

“Okay, what do you think about people?” she asked, clasping her hands in front of her and looking so damn interested and sincere he wasn’t quite sure how to react.

“I think they’re a bunch of self-interested bastards. And that’s fair enough, because so am I. But whenever somebody asks for something, or offers me something, I ask myself what they will get out of it. If I can’t figure out how they’ll benefit, that’s when I get worried.”

“Not everyone is after money or power,” she said. He could see she really believed what she said. He wasn’t sure what to make of that.

“All right,” he conceded, “maybe they aren’t all after money. But they are looking to gain something. Everyone is. You can’t get through life any other way. Trust me.”

“I don’t know. I never thought of it that way. In terms of who could get me what. At least, that’s not how I’ve lived.”

“Then you’re an anomaly.”

She shook her head. “My father is like that, too. He really does want to help people. He cares. Pastoring a small church in a little town doesn’t net you much power or money.”

“Of course it does. You hold the power of people’s salvation in your hands. Pass around the plate every week. Of course you get power and money.” Jonathan shook his head. “Being the leader of local spirituality is power, honey, trust me.”

Her cheeks turned pink. “Okay. You might have a point. But my father doesn’t claim to have the key to anyone’s salvation. And the money in that basket goes right back into the community. Or into keeping the doors of the church open. My father believes in living the same way the community lives. Not higher up. So whatever baggage you might have about church, that’s specific to your experience. It has nothing to do with my father or his faith.”

She spoke with such raw certainty that Jonathan was tempted to believe her. But he knew too much about human nature.

Still, he liked all that conviction burning inside her. He liked that she believed what she said, even if he couldn’t.

If he had been born with any ideals, he couldn’t remember them now. He’d never had the luxury of having faith in humanity, as Hayley seemed to have. No, his earliest memory of his father was the old man’s fist connecting with his face. Jonathan had never had the chance to believe the best of anybody.

He had been introduced to the worst far too early.

And he didn’t know very many people who’d had different experiences.

The optimism she seemed to carry, the softness combined with strength, fascinated him. He wanted to draw closer to it, to her, to touch her skin, to see if she was strong enough to take the physical demands he put on a woman who shared his bed.

To see how shocked she might be when he told her what those demands were. In explicit detail.

He clenched his jaw tight, clamping his teeth down hard. He was not going to find out, for a couple reasons. The first being that she was his employee, and off-limits. The second being that all those things that fascinated him would be destroyed if he got close, if he laid even one finger on her.

Cynicism bled from his pores, and he damn well knew it. He had earned it. He wasn’t one of those bored rich people overcome by ennui just because life had gone so well he wanted to create problems so he had something to battle against.

No. He had fought every step of the way, and he had been disappointed by people in every way imaginable. He had earned his feelings about people, that was for damn sure.

But he wasn’t certain he wanted to pass that cynicism on to Hayley. No, she was like a pristine wilderness area. Unspoiled by humans. And his first inclination was to explore every last inch, to experience all that beauty, all that majesty. But he had to leave it alone. He had to leave it looked at, not touched.

Hayley Thompson was the same. Untouched. He had to leave her unspoiled. Exploring that beauty would only leave it ruined, and he couldn’t do that. He wouldn’t.

“I think it’s sad,” she said, her voice muted. “That you can’t see the good in other people.”

“I’ve been bitten in the ass too many times,” he said, his tone harder than he’d intended it to be. “I’m glad you haven’t been.”

“I haven’t had the chance to be. But that’s kind of the point of what I’m doing. Going out, maybe getting bitten in the ass.” Her cheeks turned bright red. “I can’t believe I said that.”

“What?”

“That word.”

That made his stomach feel like it had been hollowed out. “Ass?”

Her cheeks turned even redder. “Yes. I don’t say things like that.”

“I guess not... Being the church secretary and all.”

Now he just felt... Well, she made him feel rough and uncultured, dirty and hard and unbending as steel. Everything she was not. She was small, delicate and probably far too easy to break. Just like he’d imagined earlier, she was...set apart. Unspoiled. And here he had already spoiled her a little bit. She’d said ass, right there in his kitchen.

And she’d looked shocked as hell by her own behavior.

“You don’t have to say things like that if you don’t want to,” he said. “Not every experience is a good experience. You shouldn’t try things just to try them. Hell, if I’d had the choice of staying innocent of human nature, maybe I would have taken that route instead. Don’t ruin that nice vision of the world you have.”

She frowned. “You know, everybody talks about going out and experiencing things...”

“Sure. But when people say that, they want control over those experiences. Believe me, having the blinders ripped off is not necessarily the best thing.”

She nodded slowly. “I guess I understand that. What kinds of experiences do you think are bad?”

Immediately, he thought of about a hundred bad things he wanted to do to her. Most of them in bed, all of them naked. He sucked in a sharp breath through his teeth. “I don’t think we need to get into that.”

“I’m curious.”

“You know what they say about curiosity and the cat, right?”

“But I’m not a cat.”

“No,” he said, “you are Hayley, and you should be grateful for the things you’ve been spared. Maybe you should even go back to the church office.”

“No,” she said, frowning. “I don’t want to. Maybe I don’t want to experience everything—I can see how you’re probably right about that. But I can’t just stay in one place, sheltered for the rest of my life. I have to figure out...who I am and what I want.”

That made him laugh, because it was such a naive sentiment. He had never stood back and asked himself who the hell Jonathan Bear was, and what he wanted out of life. He hadn’t given a damn how he made his money as long as he made it.

As far as he was concerned, dreams were for people with a lot of time on their hands. He had to do. Even as a kid, he couldn’t think, couldn’t wonder; he had to act.

She might as well be speaking a foreign language. “You’ll have to tell me what that’s like.”

“What?”

“That quest to find yourself. Let me know if it’s any more effective than just living your life and seeing what happens.”

“Okay, now you’ve made me feel silly.”

He took another bite of dinner. Maybe he should back down, because he didn’t want her to quit. He would like to continue eating her food. And, frankly, he would like to keep looking at her.

Just because he should back down didn’t mean he was going to.

“There was no safety net in my life,” he said, not bothering to reassure her. “There never has been. I had to work my ass off from the moment I was old enough to get paid to do something. Hell, even before then. I would get what I could from the store, expired products, whatever, so we would have something to eat. That teaches you a lot about yourself. You don’t have to go looking. In those situations, you find out whether you’re a survivor or not. Turns out I am. And I’ve never really seen what more I needed to know.”

“I don’t... I don’t have anything to say to that.”

“Yeah,” he returned. “My life story is kind of a bummer.”

“Not now,” she said softly. “You have all this. You have the business, you have this house.”

“Yeah, I expect a man could find himself here. Well, unless he got lost because it was so big.” He smiled at her, but she didn’t look at all disarmed by the gesture. Instead, she looked thoughtful, and that made his stomach feel tight.

He didn’t really do meaningful conversation. He especially didn’t do it with women.

Yet here he was, telling this woman more about himself than he could remember telling anyone. Rebecca knew everything, of course. Well, as much as she’d observed while being a kid in that situation. They didn’t need to talk about it. It was just life. But other people... Well, he didn’t see the point in talking about the deficit he’d started with. He preferred people assume he’d sprung out of the ground powerful and successful. They took him more seriously.

He’d had enough disadvantages, and he wouldn’t set himself up for any more.

But there was something about Hayley—her openness, her honesty—that made him want to talk. That made him feel bad for being insincere. Because she was just so...so damn real.

How would he have been if he’d had a softer existence? Maybe he wouldn’t be as hard. Maybe a different life would have meant not breaking a woman like this the moment he put his hands on her.

It was moot. Because he hadn’t had a different life. And if he had, he probably wouldn’t have made half as much of himself.

“You don’t have to feel bad for wanting more,” he said finally. “Just because other people don’t have it easy, doesn’t mean you don’t have your own kind of hard.”

“It’s just difficult to decide what to do when other people’s expectations feel so much bigger than your own dreams.”

“I know a little something about that. Only in my case, the expectations other people had for me were that I would end up dead of a drug overdose or in prison. So, all things considered, I figured I would blow past those expectations and give people something to talk about.”

“I just want to travel.”

“Is that it?”

A smile played in the corner of her lips, and he found himself wondering what it might be like to taste that smile. “Okay. And see a famous landmark. Like the Eiffel Tower or Big Ben. And I want to dance.”

“Have you never danced?”

“No!” She looked almost comically horrified. “Where would I have danced?”

“Well, your brother does own a bar. And there is line dancing.”

“I can’t even go into Ace’s bar. My parents don’t go. We can go to the brewery. Because they serve more food there. And it’s not called a bar.”

“That seems like some arbitrary shit.”

Her cheeks colored, and he didn’t know if it was because he’d pointed out a flaw in her parents’ logic or because he had cursed. “Maybe. But I follow their lead. It’s important for us to keep away from the appearance of evil.”

“Now, that I don’t know anything about. Because nobody cares much about my appearance.”

She cleared her throat. “So,” she said. “Dancing.”

Suddenly, an impulse stole over him, one he couldn’t quite understand or control. Before he knew it, he was pushing his chair back and standing up, extending his hand. “All right, Hayley Thompson, Paris has to wait awhile. But we can take care of the dancing right now.”

“What?” Her pretty eyes flew wide, her soft lips rounded into a perfect O.

“Dance with me, Hayley.”

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