In all truth, she’d hoped she’d find Mr. Franks, like she’d planned, and he’d have a huge stomach hanging over his belt buckle, a man always eager to eat. She would’ve appealed to his appetite and secured the job with ease. So much for meditation and envisioning her future. Why did she even bother to listen to online self-help podcasts?
The Not-Mr. Franks, the well-built man who obviously watched what he ate, stepped toward the window, so she leaned over to give him the also-neon-pink-flyer-styled menu. Maybe she should have rethought the color before targeting construction jobs. Her fingers touched his at the handoff. Zip, a tingle ran up her arm. Well, that hadn’t happened in a long time. Odd. Had he felt it, too?
He removed his hard hat while he perused her face. Hair that was longer than she’d expected swept across his forehead and covered half of his ears. Nice waves. Nice suntan. Nice smile lines. Wait, he was smiling at her.
She forced a tense, overwide smile. “See anything you like?”
His eyebrow shot up as his gaze held firm with hers. Oh, crud, she hadn’t meant to say it like some old come-on line. Understandably, he could totally take it wrong, but she hadn’t meant it that way! His steady stare with the one raised brow said otherwise and made her wonder what was going on in his mind. Really, dude? Her thoughts quickly slipped to insecurity. “Food-wise,” she added hastily.
His green eyes twinkled playfully for an instant before he gave her a benevolent smile and glanced back at the menu. “What do you recommend?” Thank goodness, he hadn’t taken the lowbrow tease route, because these days she wouldn’t work for a man who did.
“If you allow me to fire up my grill, I’ll make you the Chicken Done Right wrap. Oh, and I’ve got all the permits to operate and the health department certificate, if you’d like to see them.” Being in construction, the man had to know all about the importance of pulling permits.
He thought, his lower lip pushed out the tiniest bit, and, darn, that was a sexy look, which she had no business noticing. “Chicken sounds good. And I can see your permits from here.” They were posted in frames on the kitchen wall. All she’d needed to do was gesture to them, but no, she’d gone her usual route of explaining too much.
“How much time do you need?” He broke into her self-doubt and chronic overthinking.
“Since the grill needs to heat first, ten minutes?” Her index finger went up, thinking fast. “But if I was serving your guys, it’d only take five minutes.” She tightened the elastic on her ponytail, glad she’d put a word in for herself and her short-order-cook abilities. “Because the grill would already have been heated up.” There she went, repeating herself again, but only because she understood the importance of being redundant when necessary. Then, with his nod to go ahead, she turned on the grill and gave him another wide smile. “I pride myself in being fast.”
Both of his brows shot up this time, accompanied by an amused expression. Yeah, she seemed to be on a roll. Thank goodness, she only had two feet to stick in her mouth. She blinked and took a tiny inhale, avoiding his tolerant gaze by getting busy.
Why did she keep feeding him old lines, and why were his reactions pointing in all the wrong directions? Because he’d started it by not getting her puns in the truck logo? Wrap her up and take her home? Or because of him, and the fact he was total construction-god material and everything about him spelled S-E-X, and…
No way was she in any mental or emotional state to think about such things. And yet he’d taken her there on a zip line. Not good.
Her hand flew to wipe a wisp of hair out of her eye, not having felt this nervous about cooking for someone in ages.
“I’ll be back in ten,” he said, ignoring her jitteriness and thankfully not taking the usual route of many men. You pride yourself in being fast? Well, then, I’d really like to try that out. Duh and har-har-har.
Not him. Maybe all the hoopla from recent sexual-harassment scandals had all men—and it was about time—on their best behavior. Even at construction sites, leaving her looking like an old-school ditz. Which she definitely wasn’t! She slid on the ponytail hairnet and put her bright pink toque in place. May as well complete the picture, because no way would she ever let one of her easily identifiable hairs land in her food.
Seriously, though, he didn’t strike her as the type to not respect women. Just a hunch, but there was something kind about his demeanor beneath that hard hat. Something she recognized. Remembered?
Zackery.
An eerie chill tiptoed down her spine, suddenly transporting her back twenty years to when she used to accompany her dad to his work sites during summer vacations right here in Little River Valley. The first huge crush of her lifetime had been on a grown-up. Well, in reality, the guy was probably a teenager, but in her little-girl eyes, that was an adult. A handsome construction worker. She still remembered his name. Zack. Blond. Green eyes. Long wavy hair, back then, really long. Swoonworthy in a Thor kind of way. She and her immature heart had vowed to never forget him.
Except she had until just now.
A full body shiver nearly had her missing the sizzling grill with the marinated chicken concoction. It was him, had to be, except twenty years older and, in her opinion, sexier than ever. Because what had she known at eleven about sex appeal?
She’d had the most amazing and superinnocent daydreams about him then. Simply because he’d been nice enough to smile at her and tease her about her copper-red hair. You look like a new penny. Maybe I should call you Penny instead of Lacy? In her little-girl fantasies, he’d held her hand and told her how beautiful she was. They’d walked through meadows of wildflowers, and, as dreams go with little girls, he’d delivered her first kiss. Her idea of what a kiss would be like, anyway. A chaste kiss, because again, what had she known about any of that back then?
His mouth came to mind, while he’d read her menu with that lower lip man-style pout. She wouldn’t mind trying out everything she’d learned about kissing with him since she’d grown up. She snorted and made a dry swallow. Whew, was the grill superhot or something?
Wait. In her rush, she’d forgotten to turn on the vent and open the back windows. After a quick push of the chicken around the grill, she slid open the extra windows and wiped the tiny sheen from her upper lip. Where had she left the water?
Finding the bottle, she took another drink and focused on making the best dang wrap she could. Her welfare depended on it since she’d recently quit her other job. While she was at it, she’d warm one of her apple hand pies from the batch made fresh last night. Wasn’t that every man’s favorite?
For the sake of the next phase of her career, she sure hoped so.
Ten minutes to the second later, Zack Gardner strolled from his office toward the bright food truck. The sight of it made him smile, but he kept it to himself. Wouldn’t want to encourage her when he had zero intention of letting the redhead set up shop. That girlie rig was meant for kids’ parties and Santa Barbara beach volleyball games, not construction sites. Any serious business person should know it, too.
A flash of her natural red hair while she cooked sent a memory whirling through his mind. The color was the kind so many women tried to match in salons, but usually fell flat. Hers was nothing short of stunning, and he’d only met one other person with that shade in his life. He’d gotten his first summer temporary job in construction when he’d been nineteen. He recalled that he couldn’t believe how hard the job was and how ravenous he’d been, all the time. There’d been a long line of jobs and food trucks over the past twenty years, all blurry. But he remembered his first real job and first food truck just like it was yesterday because, well, everything was the first back then. The Winters Breakfast