* *
What sounded like a shotgun went off when I was in the shower. The boom shook the small window and made me scream and drop the shampoo.
I clutched my heart, felt it hammering beneath my wet skin, and tried to suck in enough oxygen to not pass out.
‘This is like that movie about the house where everything keeps going wrong. What next? The tub falls through the floor?’ I muttered.
I rinsed my hair and the shower gel from my skin. I’d skip my normal ten minutes of simply standing in the pounding, hot spray. I needed to know if part of my house had just blown up or what.
Wrapping myself in a tattered blue robe, I shoved my feet into horrible fuchsia plaid mukluks that had been a gift from a fellow bartender last Christmas. I twirled my hair up in a towel and took the steps slowly so I didn’t trip over my own slippered feet.
‘What the fuck. What. The. Fuck.’
I opened the door to a raised hand – knuckles cocked to knock – and fierce green eyes. That unruly lock of raw honey-coloured hair was brushing sensually along his eyebrow and that cocky half-smile had taken over his mouth.
‘Hi,’ Coop said, putting his hand down, taking a step toward me.
I took a step back, clutching my robe to me for all I was worth. It had not escaped my notice that my heart was pounding again and my body was humming with an electric warmth. ‘Hi. What the hell was … that?’
He poked his head in, taking one more step up onto the threshold. Without thinking, I took a step back into the foyer, effectively inviting him in.
So he came in and I felt a tug of arousal in the core of myself. Crap.
‘That was a pot.’
‘What the fuck kind of pot sounds like that?’ I gasped, hands still shaking. ‘And whose pot was it? And how did a pot make that much –’ I cocked my head and felt a rogue strand of hair drip shower water down the shoulder of my robe.
In an almost surreal state, I watched him reach out and brush my soaking wet lock back. ‘It was a pot, up on the power lines. We need a new one. So currently, you have no power. But I’m guessing you were in the shower so you might not know.’
His finger trailed lightly over the shoulder of my robe where the water had darkened the fabric. It was as if he were touching me. My bare skin. My nipples spiked and my tummy tickled and my pussy gave over a slippery flood of juices.
For a split second I feared he could smell my arousal. Sense it. As if I were dealing with an animal and not a man.
‘That’s just residuals from the dream,’ I told myself.
‘Pardon?’
I cocked my head and then blushed. I had said that aloud. I hadn’t meant to.
‘Nothing. Not enough coffee,’ I said, willing myself to move back and going nowhere. ‘And I guess I won’t be getting any more now will I?’
I laughed stupidly – nervously – and cringed to hear it.
‘I can make you coffee if you want more,’ he said, moving past me, his boots thunking on my wide plank wood floor.
He moved like a force of nature. Big and bold but controlled. He made me feel hot and cold at the same time, being so close to him. It was awful. It was wonderful. It had me feeling on edge, like I might laugh or weep at any given moment.
I felt a rush of guilt thinking of Deke and then reminding myself I was not in for anything serious. No long haul. No love at first sight or any off that bullshit. I was not ready to tie myself down to anyone before I had a handle on the life I wanted.
Whatever the hell that was.
This man, this big lean man, waltzed into my kitchen like he owned it. He took my red enamel pot and filled it with two coffee cups full of water.
'Matches?' he asked.
I handed him the box from the counter. Then Coop turned the burner until we heard the gas hiss and lit it with a wooden kitchen match. 'Gas and electric men, we always have tricks.' He grinned at me and then he opened the junk drawer and rifled through it. When he didn’t find what he wanted, he asked, ‘You have a small strainer?’
‘How small?’ I almost whispered. It was hard not to just watch him and his economical movements.
‘Size of a tuna can?’
‘Nope.’
‘Coffee filters?’
I opened a box on the counter and felt my robe gape a bit. I also felt his eyes on me and it made me flush hot, like I was out in the sun. I rummaged, clutching my robe with one hand, rifling with the other. Finally, I yanked out a package of filters and handed it to him.
‘Another pot? A bowl? A large measuring cup?’
More rummaging and I handed him a glass measuring cup with a spout.
‘Thank you, Farrell,’ he said. ‘Where are you off to today?’
‘Applying at a dog salon,’ I snorted.
He smiled at me, stunning me a bit. Turmoil started in my stomach and much, much lower. I nodded, unable to speak.
Deke made me feel bold and wild. Coop made me feel barely in control and on edge, constantly off kilter and unsteady. It was oddly pleasant to feel after so many years of trying so very hard to pilot a destiny that did not want to behave.
Which reminded me to be nervous about my looming dog salon job interview. I couldn’t decide if it was a step up or a step down from working at a bar. Or maybe it was just a lateral move. And maybe that was okay.
When the water came to a boil he asked me, ‘Strong or weak?’
At first I thought he meant me. And I almost said strong … I hope. But then I realised he meant coffee and I stuck with my original answer. ‘Strong.’
I stared at my ugly mukluks and my freshly shaved legs and waited. Embarrassed that I looked so bad, but partly relieved too. It’s not like I looked sexy or enticing. I was a wet, ugly robe-swaddled mess.
He dumped four tablespoons of coffee into the water and twisted my egg timer to three minutes. It started to tick.
‘You okay?’ He had a way of setting his jaw after he asked a question, as if daring you to disappoint him. I found it unsettling because the thought of upsetting Jim Cooper was distressing. And there was no logical reason it should be.
‘I’m wet.’
I didn’t even backpedal verbally when he cocked that half grin at me. I just dropped my eyes and shook my head and sighed.
‘Literally,’ I said.
A soft chuckle.
‘My hair. My robe. And I want coffee and something that sounded like a cannon shook my windows.’
He waved a hand at me when the egg timer gave a shrill sound.
‘Get used to it, the pots around here blow all the time. They’re old lines and overtaxed and need to be replaced.’
‘Well you’re power, can’t you do that?’ I asked, watching him start to slowly pour the brewed coffee into the filter he’d suspended over the large measuring cup. He patiently, steadily, held it aloft while coffee dribbled through the paper into the cup.
‘Hey, I tow the lines and repair and all that. I don’t control the budget.’
‘Oh.’
One more rush of rich dark liquid and then he was pouring us mugs of coffee from the measuring cup. ‘Just takes some patience,’ he said.
He clinked his mug to mine and I watched him study me. It was such an intimate gaze that I felt my cheeks colour again. The man was a mind fuck to say