MacKenzie Fire(63)

“Okay, well, whatever. You guys are boring. See you later.” Hannah leaves us standing there.

“Is she gone yet?” Ian asks, his eyes rolling around kind of crazy.

I can’t help but laugh. “Yes. Thank God.”

He lets out a long sigh of relief. “Good. Man, that girl … she’s a real piece of work.” He drinks from his beer and the moment we were having fades away.





Chapter Twenty-Nine





I CAN FINALLY BREATHE NORMALLY again. Searching for something to say that sounds cool, I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind. “I’d love to hook her up with Bradley. Andie’s ex. They’d make the perfect couple.” Where did that come from? I have no idea, but I’m going with it. My super-brain is on auto-pilot again, and that’s always a good thing.

“Do it. Then she’d finally be out of our hair.”

“Yeah, she could move to my town.” I pause to think about that. Maybe my super-power brain is malfunctioning a little after all that medication. “On second thought, never mind. I don’t want that girl anywhere near my city.”

Ian turns us around so our backs are to the wall and we’re looking out at the groups of people standing and sitting around the room. Every single person has a long-neck bottle of beer in their hands. Some have one in each hand. Several of the girls have cowboy hats on and some are dressed like country prom queens in the off-season. Hannah is one of the latter group.

“What’s your city like?” he asks.

“West Palm?” I shrug. “It’s hot a lot of the time. Humid. But it’s a nice place. They’ve put a lot of money into their two main downtown areas. There are lots of places for people like us to hang out, have fun.”

“If I came to visit, what would we do?”

My heart does a triple flip inside my chest as I think about what he might be suggesting. But instead of letting my heart get ahead of reality, I keep my voice calm and answer.

“Well, first I’d take you to my salon so I could get my hands on your hair.”

“Oh yeah?” He takes his arm from my shoulders and lifts his hat up, rolling his eyes to his forehead as if he can see his hairdo without a mirror. “Something wrong with my hair?”

Another heart somersault. This time it’s a little painful. “No, your hair is gorgeous. Hair is my thing, so when I see a nice head of it, I want to get my hands on it.” I shrug. I know it makes little sense to someone outside the business.

He puts his hat back on and I nearly melt with happiness when his arm goes back across my shoulders. After taking a swig of his beer he smiles at me. “I do love me a good shampoo massage.”

“I have good hands,” I say in a low voice.

“I’ll just bet you do,” he says back.

Aaaaand cue the mood breaker…

“Hello, Ian.”

A girl’s voice breaks apart the sexy cloud I was falling into with Ian. I look up at her, dazed, my blood going cold when I see who it is.

“Hello, Ginny. You remember my girl, Candice.” Ian tips his bottle towards me. It makes me feel kind of cheap the way he does it.

Before she even answers, the echo of his words bring back the scene in the hospital with her, and then everything comes crashing down on my head. Flashbacks of him flirting with me here and being so nice, and then how we ended up coming here in the first place. The scene with Ginny in the hospital cafeteria is why we’re here. Oh my god. This is all just an act!

I pull to the side a little, enough to make Ian’s arm fall off my back. “Hi, Ginny,” I say, holding out my hand. “It’s nice to see you again.”

“You too,” she says, shaking my hand. Her grip is firm. “Are you enjoying our little town?”

I laugh through the pain that’s beating me up inside. “Oh yeah. Except for the lions and stuff.”

“Lions?” She turns her questioning gaze to Ian. Her ex-fiancé. The guy who is trying to trick her into thinking we’re together.

Dammit, how could I be so stupid?! I forgot he was doing this on purpose, that this was why he agreed to come to this party with me and the reason why he’s hanging all over me. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“Yeah, we were out checking cows early yesterday and we ran across a cougar.” Ian sounds like he’s talking about the weather, he’s so cool. “But we took care of it.” He points at my arm with the edge of his bottle. “My girl took a hit, though. Had to get some stitches.”

“Really?” Ginny nods at me slowly. I can’t tell if she’s feeling some respect or hates my guts. “Impressive. And on your second day here, too.”

“Yep.” I have nothing else to say. I’m too sad to put the words together. One-way crushes suck big dicks.

“How long are you staying again?” she asks me.

“Two weeks.” Before when Ian and I were getting along and I was pretending it was all real, I was wishing it was three weeks. Now I wish I had a flight out tomorrow.

“Two weeks, huh? Imagine what kind of trouble you could get into in all that time.” She smiles warmly.

Ian and I answer at the exact same time.

“A lot,” he says. “None.” I say.

I hurry to explain. “I’m going to be focusing all my attention on Andie and the baby. Plus I have a calf I’m taking care of, so that’s going to be a lot of work. I don’t have time to get into any more trouble.”