Merry cleared her throat and darted a look at Shane’s truck. Had he told someone he was working for her? Just how pissed would the board be if she admitted that—? Wait a minute. She was buying into the conspiracy theory about mailbox destruction she’d committed.
“I can’t think of anything. But listen, Mr. Cannon, if hiring me improves the visuals of this case, wouldn’t moving forward with some of the renovations be even better?”
“Well… Yes, in theory. But we really hadn’t planned for you to…um.” His words, which had started out awkward and hesitant, died into pregnant silence. Her skin crawled with humiliation, but she forced herself to ignore that.
“I understand now that you may have hired me as more of a figurehead than a curator. I’m not saying I’m okay with that, and we’ll have to have a different conversation about it later, but I can do this, Mr. Cannon. I may have only been at my previous position for a year, but I was a workhorse, and my superior was…” As old as you. “She was easing into retirement, so I carried a lot of responsibility.” She took a breath.
“I’ve already sorted through the wood we have on hand here. I’m not going to go wild and head out to a lumber store for new pine and woodscrews. We’ll use the original wood, and I even found a bucket of handmade nails. They’re rusty, but I’ll be sure that Sh—um…any contractor is up-to-date with tetanus shots, and I’m sure they use gloves, anyway, right? And when we run out of those nails, I found a place online that forges them.”
When she finally stopped to catch her breath, Mr. Cannon sighed. “Merry, listen. I can tell how much you want to work, and I admire that, especially in someone your age, but we—”
“I just want a chance. Please. I need a chance. We could get this place up and running faster than you think. The house I use as a base of operations is totally safe. And the saloon only needs a little work. And the church! The church is beautiful. I’m brainstorming a brochure now and—”
“Work on the brochure,” he interrupted, latching onto that idea with a sigh of relief. “Work on that, and I’ll…I’ll talk to the others about freeing up a little money. A little.”
“Oh, my God. Thank you. Thank you!”
“I’m not promising anything! You just sit tight, okay?”
“Sure,” she said, her face flushing with guilt.
“And work on a brochure. Holding something like that in their hands could help the board loosen up the purse strings a little.”
“Thank you, Mr. Cannon. I’ll get right on it.”
Merry dragged her chair inside and sat at the beat-up old table Mr. Bishop must have moved in at some point. She’d found little clues like that all over the house, proof that Gideon Bishop had been using the house as an office, gathering up ideas for the ghost town. She’d only poked around gingerly before, too afraid of spiders to settle in, but the sunlight was too bright to do this kind of work outside, so Merry set her iPad on its stand, fired up her portable keyboard and got to work.
She worked so hard she nearly forgot entirely about Shane. She noticed when he stopped in that night to say he was leaving. And she vaguely noticed the next day when he came by around 5:00 p.m. to do a couple of hours of work. She even wandered out once or twice to be sure he was doing only the work they’d agreed on.
But she didn’t go out to watch him hammer, or to marvel at the wide stretch of cloth across his shoulders or the tight wonder of his jeans. She didn’t notice the way hair glinted on his strong forearms when he moved. She didn’t notice any of that until he stopped by on the second night and delivered a moment of grace that hit her like a wave of lust.
“Don’t worry about paying me for this now, all right? Catch me next month.”
“What?” she asked, visions of the brochure fading from her eyes like a clearing fog. She repeated, “What?” in a breathless voice.
“It’s okay. You seemed stressed out, and I don’t want my bill to add to your stress.”
“Oh, I can pay it. You don’t have to—”
“Really, Merry. It’s no problem.”
Well, that was embarrassing. Just the sound of his mouth forming her name gave her goose bumps. Or maybe it was the effect of looking up at him as he stood so close to her. Those shoulders loomed above her. Those forearms flexed as he slipped off his hat and ran a hand through his hair. And this late in the day, his jaw was rough with stubble again. As he moved, she could actually smell him. The laundry detergent on his clothes, and another more intriguing scent: his skin, hot from the sun, a touch of sweat.
Shane cocked his head in question, and she realized she’d been staring up at him as if he was a work of art she wanted to study.
“You’re really sweet, Shane.”
“Ah. Not so much.” His cheekbones flushed a little as his eyes shifted past her. “Is that for Providence?”
“Yes! But don’t look yet.” She covered the screen with her hand. “I’ll finish the layout tonight and then I’ll show you. Okay?”
He smiled. “Sure. Are you going to be here long? I hate to leave you out here alone this late.”
Merry looked out the window to see startlingly long shadows stretching across the sagebrush.
“I’d feel better if you let me walk you out.”
Now Merry was the one flushing. “Thank you, Shane. And thanks for coming out here at all. I know you already put in a full day. It means a lot that you’re doing this for me.”
He picked up the computer stuff as she turned it off. “It’s nothing. No need to thank me.”
God, he was so cute. No matter what he said about not being a real cowboy, he had that modest chivalry she associated with movie cowboys. And that steadiness. That self-possessed silence.
She snuck a look at him as they walked toward her car, noting how much taller he was than her. Four or five inches, maybe. She’d never been with a guy as tall as Shane was, but, then again, she’d never been with most types of guys. Two men did not make a control group.
Regardless, she was intrigued by him. His height and strength, the scarred hands and blunt fingers. What would it feel like to be held by him, to be taken? What would it feel like to be up against a wall with this man’s body pressed against her? With those rough, strong hands sliding up her shirt? Would he—?
When he glanced at her, Merry almost melted in sheer embarrassment. They were friends. Maybe just acquaintances. If he knew she was having those kinds of thoughts about him, he’d likely recoil in horror and find a way to never be alone with her again.
“Everything all right?” he asked.
“Sure!” she chirped. “I’m excited.” Excited. Right. “I mean…I can’t wait to finish the brochure layout tonight!”
“Well, I can’t wait to see it.”
“Great!”
She was excited about the brochure. But she was also excited about something very different. Something she hadn’t felt in a very long time. Hopefully the layout wouldn’t be her best work of the night.
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