Need You for Mine (Heroes of St. Helena)(52)

“I want you, Harper, but I don’t want to complicate a good thing.”

“So you’re saying you want me, but you can’t have me because you want to be friends more?” she asked sourly. “Oh my God, I must be totally cursed.”

“You’re too sweet to be cursed, and I want both,” he clarified, leaning down and kissing her on the cheek. Then because her lips were right there, pouting and sad, he kissed those too. Pulling back only after they were both breathing hard. “See you tomorrow.”

Only he didn’t move toward the door.

“To clarify, you’re saying that if I took off my bra, right now, it would be a waste of time, because this is not going to happen?” Her fingers played with the strap, driving him right out of his mind.

With a pained groan, he headed for the door. “Not tonight.”

“So then you aren’t going to kiss me tomorrow?”

He paused at the threshold and thought about that long and hard. Thought about what it would be like to wake up in the morning and kiss her until bedtime. Then thought about how she deserved extraordinary. “Nope.”

“It’s not nice to lie. It kills innocent unicorns,” she called out.

“It’s not a lie, it’s a fact. And I won’t see you tomorrow since I’ll be at the sheriff’s station finalizing the booth locations and handing out registration forms.” He opened the door. “But put on the Honeysuckle and I might reconsider. Night, sunshine.”



Adam remained true to his word.

The day was almost over and he had not kissed Harper. Not when he spotted her at the Sweet and Savory getting her morning sugar fix, nor when he saw her walking her grandma’s dog down Main Street. He hadn’t even called her over for a quick peck when she pulled two of her students outside to have a nice “chat.”

A chat with boys who were three feet tall, which, with Harper wearing ridiculously adorable heels, had her bending over to get eye level. An action that, from a distance, brought her hips to Adam’s level—and the hem of her flowy dress inches from exposing whether she was wearing Honeysuckle.

But since he was in the sheriff’s department, surrounded by his brothers and a bunch of pistol-toting guys, mapping out booth placement for Beat the Heat, he didn’t think he was in much danger of breaking his word.

“That’s never going to work.” Jonah reached over Adam’s shoulder to flick the quarter off the map and onto the floor. “It puts the second generator too close to the St. Paws booth. Shay won’t have it.”

“I’m not moving a generator to increase the odds of you getting laid,” Adam said.

Jonah shrugged. “Your call, but last year, Ida’s pet duck waddled too close and burned off its tail feathers, blowing the generator. This year, Shay’s bringing that flock of geese that got lost in the migration last year.”

“And we can’t move Shay?”

Jonah laughed. “She had to bribe last year’s planner to get a corner spot, so unless you are offering her street-facing property, no way will she give it up.”

“Could you at least ask her?”

“Do I look like I want to sleep on the couch?”

“You look like you should trade in that gun for your Deputy *cat hat,” Adam mumbled, then pulled another quarter out of his pocket and placed it by the stage.

“Too close to the coffee stand. The ladies will complain about having to talk over the noise,” Jonah said and flicked it off the map. “Plus, it blocks the walkway to the porta-potties, which is never a good call.”

“Where do you learn this shit?”

“Planning a wedding teaches important skills.”

“What? Like how to make a table decoration of out fishbowls and where bathrooms should go?” Adam pulled another quarter out and placed it by the oak tree.

“Don’t underestimate the power of event planning.” With a flick, Jonah sent it flying.

“Seriously, you knock one more quarter on the ground and you’ll understand the power of my fist,” Adam said, running a hand over his face.

He’d been at this for hours. Trying to map out a hundred vendor booths, a half dozen games, eating areas, and porta-potties in their small community park was harder than he’d originally thought. He had the basic layout from last year, but over the past week they’d grown their vendors by ten percent and added a food truck—which meant two more generators. The public bathrooms were closed for renovation, hence the porta-potties, and Harper had managed to convince some guy who owned a party games rental company to donate a few of the smaller casino games for the weekend—free of charge.

The woman was magic.

“Just because you’re not getting any doesn’t mean you get to hate on the rest of us,” Dax said from his desk a few feet away. He was flipping through a file, his boots kicked up on his desk. And he was grinning.

“Who says I’m not getting any?”

Jonah and Dax both burst out laughing. Flipping them the finger, Adam walked behind the counter to pick up the quarters.

“The way you were hobbling down Main Street was a pretty good indication,” Dax said, pushing farther back in his chair. “Your balls were so neglected they were singing the blues.”

Adam paused for a beat before setting “generator three” on the counter. “You might think spying is charming, since that’s how you managed to snag Emerson, but it’s not, man. It’s just creepy.”