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A tall figure clad in the complete ranching uniform she’d come to appreciate around town—a Stetson, button-down shirt, jeans, and snakeskin boots—walked the edge of the two properties. Where the girl’s brightly colored hair had stood out, this man looked the same as all the men in Deer Creek. Just half their age.

“Who’s that?” she asked.

Jax glanced over. “Probably someone here to answer Bennett’s advertisement.”

“Hmmm. Looks young.”

“He does. Maybe that means he’s hungry and will stick around a while.”

Will you? she wanted to ask. Stick around a while?

“What brought you over here, anyway? Because I know it wasn’t to help me fix this piece of crap,” she asked instead.

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll run it by you later. Right now, we’ve got some more common ground to find.” And there was his other signature gesture—his million-watt smile that somehow turned her skin hot and her insides to mush.

“Oh, yeah? Whataya have in mind?”

Jax’s smile turned positively wicked.

“Jackson Marshall—”

“No, not that, Henley. Get your mind out of the gutter. But I promise it’ll be fun and productive.”

“Productive, hmm?” She wiped a trickle of sweat from her brow, but it was like throwing deck chairs off the sinking Titanic. She needed a thorough scrubbing to wash off the start to her day. “Well, when you put it that way…” She smiled, and her brain coughed out a warning.

Stick to the plan. Finish this month with Steel Born in the black and get an ownership stake in the company. Get the internship program up and running. Then she could flirt with the handsome cowboy.

On paper that was a good plan, but the sun beat down on her shoulders and a breeze carrying the scent of wildflowers ruffled her matted hair. It tickled her skin, reminding her of the almost-forgotten pleasure of summers outside as a child. She closed her eyes and let the day settle warm on her skin.

When had it changed to all work, work, work? She didn’t mind diligently pursuing her passion, but this was an unexpected joy, the pleasure of working hard, manual labor that produced results.

Well, results half owed to the man she’d been trying fruitlessly not to think about, but still…

Now that he’d helped her with the tire, saving her at least an hour’s worth of work, she could afford a little break, couldn’t she? Anyway, wasn’t fun okay when it was productive?

Not even her brain could conjure a response to that, so she nodded and took the hand he offered, ignoring the heat that pulsed between them. That was not at all productive.

“Okay, Marshall. Lead the way.”

Chapter Six

The creek came into view, and Jax gripped Jill’s hand tighter. It hadn’t been a complete lie when he’d promised a productive afternoon, but the way he planned to deliver had absolutely nothing to do with work.

He didn’t want her heading for the hills when she put the details of his plan together.

The gentle cascade of water over stone laughed as if the creek were a living, breathing thing. Which it was, in a sense. Within its fluid borders it held the carp and shiners Jax, Matt, and Bennett used to nab on their fishing lines when they were nothing but tadpoles themselves. Dodging the fish were mosquitos, gnats, and horseflies that tap-danced on the water’s membrane, hoping for another day out of the mouths of those bigger than them and hungry.

Jax understood that on a visceral level, but that wasn’t why he’d brought her here this afternoon.

“The water is beautiful,” she commented, a serenity in her smile that had been missing the past month. Something had shifted, but he couldn’t tell what. “It looks like a clear ribbon someone’s shaking on the other side of the canyon.”

He smiled. “I like that image. Like a puppeteer behind the sandstone.”

“Exactly.” She released his hand, and though it pulsed with longing in her absence, the view in front of him wasn’t awful. Jill bent down, her strong, slender shoulders outlined by her thin tank top. Her backside was entirely too tempting not to stare at, but when she turned around, a smile on her face, he wished he hadn’t.

Her cheeks blossomed into deep scarlet rosettes.

“You are the least subtle man I’ve ever met, Jackson Marshall. Could you at least pretend you’re not ogling?”