Maisey Yates - The Rancher's Baby

“You have food for breakfast?” he asked, that voice persistently gravelly and interesting, and much less like her familiar friend’s than she would like it to be. She needed some kind of familiarity to latch on to, something to blot out the vision of his muscles. But he wasn’t giving her anything.

Jerk.

“No,” she said, keeping her voice cheery. “I have coffee and spite for breakfast.”

“Well, that’s not going to work for me.”

“I’m not sure what to tell you,” she said, flinging open one of her cabinets and revealing her collection of cereal and biscotti. “Of course I have food for breakfast.”

“Bacon? Eggs?”

“Do I look like a diner to you?” she asked.

“Not you personally. But I was hoping that your house might have more diner-like qualities.”

“No,” she said, opening up the fridge and rummaging around. “Well, what do you know? I do have eggs. And bacon. I get a delivery of groceries every week. From a certain grocery store.”

He smiled, a lopsided grin that did something to her stomach. Something she was going to ignore and call hunger, because they were talking about bacon, and being hungry for bacon was much more palatable than being hungry for your best friend.

“I’ll cook,” he said.

“Oh no,” she said, getting the package of bacon out of the fridge and handing it to Knox before bending back down and grabbing the carton of eggs and placing that in his other hand. “You don’t have to cook.”

“Why do I get the feeling that I really do have to cook?”

She shrugged. “It depends on whether you want bacon and eggs.”

“Do you not know how to cook?”

“I know how to cook,” she said. “But the odds of me actually cooking when I only have half of a cup of coffee in my system are basically none. Usually, I prefer to have sweets for breakfast. Hence, biscotti and breakfast cereals. However, I will sometimes eat bacon and eggs for dinner. Or I will eat bacon and eggs for breakfast if a handsome man fixes them for me.”

He lifted a brow. “Oh, I see. So you have this in your fridge for when a man spends the night.”

“Obviously. Since a man did just spend the night.” Her face flushed. She knew exactly what he was imagining. And really, he had no idea.

That was not why she had the bacon and eggs. She had the bacon and eggs because sometimes she liked an easy dinner. But she didn’t really mind if Knox thought she had more of a love life than she actually did.

Of course, now they were thinking about that kind of thing at the same time. Which was...weird. And possibly responsible for the strange electric current arcing between them.

“I’ll cook,” he said, breaking that arc and moving to the stove, getting out pans and bowls, cracking eggs with an efficiency she admired.

“Do you have an assignment list for me?” he asked, picking up the bowl and whisking the eggs inside.

Why was that sexy? What was happening? His broad shoulders and chest, those intensely muscled forearms, somehow seeming all the more masculine when he was scrambling eggs, of all things.

There was something about the very domestic action, and she couldn’t figure out what it was. Maybe it was the contrast between masculinity and domesticity. Or maybe it was just because there had never been a man in her kitchen making breakfast.

She tried to look blasé, as though men made her breakfast every other weekend. After debauchery. Lots and lots of debauchery. She had a feeling she wasn’t quite managing blasé, so she just took a sip of her coffee and stared at the white star that hung on her back wall, her homage to the Lone Star State. And currently, her salvation.

“Assignment list,” she said, slamming her hands down on the countertop, breaking her reverie. She owed that star a thank-you for restoring her sanity. She’d just needed a moment of not looking at Knox. “Well, I want new hardware on those cabinets. The people who lived here before me had a few things that weren’t really to my taste. That is one of them. Also, there are some things in an outbuilding the previous inhabitants left, and I want them moved out. Oh, and I want to get rid of the ceiling fan in the living room.”

“I hope you’re planning on paying me for this,” he said, dumping the eggs into the pan, a sizzling sound filling the room.

“Nope,” she said, lifting her coffee mug to her lips.

Knox finished cooking, and somehow Selena managed not to swoon. So, that was good.

They didn’t bother to go into her dining room. Instead they sat at the tall chairs around the island, and Selena looked down at her breakfast resolutely.

“Are you okay?”

“What?” She looked up, her eyes clashing with Knox’s. “You keep asking me that.”

“Because you keep acting like you might not be.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m alive,” he responded. “As to being okay...that’s not really part of my five-year plan.”

“What’s your five-year plan?”

“Not drink myself into a stupor. Keep my business running, because at some point I probably will be glad I still have it. That’s about it.”

“Well,” she said softly, “you can add replacing my kitchen hardware to your five-year plan. But I would prefer it be on this side of it, rather than the back end.”

He laughed, and she found that incredibly gratifying. Without thinking, she reached out and brushed her fingertips against his cheek, against his beard. She drew back quickly, wishing the impression of that touch would fade away. It didn’t.

“Yes?” he asked.

“Are you keeping the beard?”

“It’s not really a fashion statement. It’s more evidence of personal neglect.”

“Well, you haven’t neglected your whole body,” she said, thinking of that earlier flash of muscle. She immediately regretted her words. She regretted them more than she did touching his beard. And beard-touching was pretty damned inappropriate between friends. At least, she was pretty certain it was.

He lifted a brow and took a bite of bacon. “Elaborate.”

“I’m just saying. You’re in good shape, Knox. I noticed.”

“Okay,” he said slowly, setting the bacon down. His gray eyes were cool as they assessed her, but for some reason she felt heat pooling in her stomach.

Settle down.

Her body did not listen. It kept on being hot. And that heat bled into her cheeks. So she knew she was blushing brilliant rose for Knox’s amusement.

“I’m just used to complimenting the men who make me breakfast,” she said, doing her best to keep her voice deadpan.

“I see.”

“So.”

“So,” he responded. “There’s nothing to do other than work,” he said. “Lifting hay bales, fixing fences, basically throwing heavy things around on the ranch. Then going back into the house and working out in the gym. It’s all I do.”

Well, that explained a few things. “I imagine you could carve out about five minutes to shave.”

“Would you prefer that I did?”

“I don’t have an opinion on your facial hair.”

“You seem to have an opinion on my facial hair.”

“I really don’t. I had observations about your facial hair, but that’s an entirely different thing.”

“Somehow, I don’t think it is.”

“Well, you’re entitled to your opinion. About my opinion on your facial hair. Or my lack of one. But that doesn’t make it fact.”

He shook his head. “You know, if I had you visiting in Jackson Hole I probably wouldn’t work out so excessively. Your chatter would keep me busy.”

“Hey,” she said. “I don’t chatter. I’m making conversation.” Except, it sounded a whole lot like chatter, even to herself.

“Okay.”

She made a coughing sound and stood up, taking her mostly empty plate to the sink and then making her way back toward the living room, stepping over her discarded high heels from yesterday. She heard the sound of Knox’s bare feet on the floor behind her. And suddenly, the fact that he had bare feet seemed intimate.