Page 2 of Ready, Willing and Abel (Dog Tags #6)

chapter

two

Abel

She hung her hat on my dick.

That’s my pervasive thought as we walk from the field to this woman’s house. Of all the asinine things I could get myself into, this one might be the worst.

I hold the hat in place as I follow her to her house, which thankfully isn’t that far.

She wasn’t wrong about cutting my jeans off.

The spines still hurt, but at least I can move without making it worse.

I carefully avoid stepping on or into any of the other cacti we pass.

The fact that I still have a goddamn erection is pissing me off.

It might help if I stopped watching Cactus Girl’s plump ass sway as she navigates the terrain.

She must recognize me. She has to. But she hasn’t said anything. She didn’t grab her phone and take pictures of my junk, so that’s gotta be a good sign.

Still, I do my best to think about other things so my dick will go back to normal. You’d think the pain from the cactus spines in my hip and ass would make that easier. Or the fact that the goats are following us, and one keeps getting closer and closer to my ass.

“Do your goats bite?” I find myself asking. “Well, that’s not a question I thought I’d ever need to ask.”

She giggles. “They do sometimes. They’re goats, but it’s never very hard.”

“Perfect. This one is trying to climb up my ass.” I skirt around his furry nose.

“Bruno!” she says sharply. “Leave it. Go eat the poison ivy like your sisters,” she tells him.

He makes a weird little noise, then turns and goes back to the other goats.

“This has gotta be the weirdest fucking day of my life,” I say.

“Life on a farm is never dull,” she quips. “It’s not much, but it’s just me, so it’s the right amount of space.”

She motions to the house in front of us, and it is very small. From out here it looks like it could just be one room.

“So you live out here all alone making jam from murder plants?”

“And my goats.”

“Right. Your murder goats. Can’t forget about them.”

She laughs, and somehow it feels like sunlight inside me. In my chest. Warm and bright. Okay, clearly the cactus spikes are poisoning me or at least making me woozy. “I think I need to lie down,” I say.

At least point she’s got the front door open and is ushering me inside.

“Let’s see, I could have you lie on the couch, but it’s on the smallish side, whereas you are on the tallish side.” She taps her lips with one finger.

It draws my gaze to her mouth and then the rest of her face.

She’s beautiful in that natural, earthy way some women have.

Thick, dark hair that falls in slight waves behind her back.

Equally dark eyes that seem to shine with intelligence and mischief.

But those lips and that smile. They do things to me; things I don’t understand.

Like the urge to make her laugh. Or the desire to get her to talk to me. About anything, just so I can see the animated way she has about her. If I had to guess, I’d say she’s Latina in heritage. Her warm brown skin speaks of more than just a sun tan.

“Bed it is. Come on, then.” She leads me down a very short hallway into a bedroom. It’s tidy and doesn’t have a ton of furniture, but it is a riot of color, from the brightly colored bedding to the framed posters on her wall.

In one swift movement, she pulls back her bedding to reveal bright yellow sheets.

I just look at her.

“You said you needed to lie down. Also, I need to pull those spines out of your skin before they dig further in.”

I hold out her hat. “Here.”

“You can keep it. It’ll be something to remember me by.”

“Pretty sure the scars on my body will do that. I think your goat bit my ass.” Her bed is soft and smells amazing.

Like her, I’m assuming, but I haven’t actually been that close to her.

Well, except when she was kneeling at my feet and cutting off my pants.

But we were outside, and I could mostly smell the goats.

I inhale and note that it smells like oranges and cloves. Like Christmas. She smells like Christmas.

For not the first time in the last hour or so, it occurs to me that I should have this girl sign an NDA. My team would throw a fit if they knew I was here for this long, that the girl had gotten my pants off and now had me ass up on her bed… yeah, they’ll be furious if they ever find out.

But she still hasn’t said anything about recognizing me, and I’m enjoying the anonymity. Or at least the illusion of such.

She comes back into the room and sits on a stool next to the bed. “Okay, so while I do this, you should distract yourself.”

My first thought is to hump her bed. What the fuck is wrong with me? I never lose control. I don’t let women tempt me. I need to get away from this woman as quickly as possible.

“Tell me what you did to screw up things with your brother and his fiancée, did you say?”

“Yeah. Her name is Marley. She’s the veterinarian in town.”

“Oh yeah, I met her once. Emergency with Bruno, and Lily, the large animal vet, was dealing with some cattle.”

“Is Bruno considered a large animal?” I ask.

She laughs. “No, I suppose not, but Lily does most of the farm animals. Okay, so Marley… “ she prompts.

“Right. My brother, Evan, we’re twins. Paternal. All I knew when I came to town was that he’d gotten a woman pregnant and that they barely knew each other.”

“And, let me guess, you came in with guns blazing to protect your brother?”

I’m annoyed that she figured it out. That she somehow can see inside and knows what a jackass I was.

I exhale slowly. “Yes. I assumed she was after money or whatever. I offered her a sizable amount, and she basically told me to go fuck myself.”

Her laughter is like a soothing balm to the skin where she’s pulling out those spikes.

Something about this woman soothes my soul in a way no one else ever has. And that’s a terrifying thought. I don’t need or want a relationship. Or at least I didn’t. Until I met a woman whose smile is like sunshine and who smells like Christmas.

Yep, I definitely need to get out of here sooner, rather than later.