nice—”
“Since when am I ever nice to you?”
“It’s been known to happen.”
Mia laughed. “Really, Sam, it’s no big deal. It seems pretty important to her to have a little break right now from life in Butte. Once she settles in, I’ll try to find out why.”
Finally her sister caved. Thanking Mia a half dozen times, she promised to call Brittany in a few hours to tell her she could stay
if
she found a job and
if
she didn’t cause her aunt any trouble.
“Don’t worry about a thing.” Mia managed to get a word in finally when Sam wound down. “You just go and have a spectacular honeymoon.”
“I’ll try, damn it.” Her sister exhaled. “It’s my third one. I’d better have a handle on it by now, don’t you think?”
Mia decided to make one stop on her way to Winny’s cabin. She veered off Squirrel Road and onto the long wide drive leading to Sage Ranch, hoping Sophie would be home.
Ever since Aiden’s birth, Sophie had begun doing quite a bit of the baking for A Bun in the Oven right in her own kitchen. There was a good chance she’d have some of her special cinnamon buns at home, or else brownies or a pie Mia could mooch to bring to Aunt Winny.
After all, what was supper without dessert? she thought as she pulled up behind a black Explorer she didn’t recognize.
Hurrying to the front door, she knocked lightly in case Aiden was asleep.
How many times did I stand at this door, waiting for Lissie or her mom to welcome me into this house?
she thought, a smile lifting the corners of her mouth.
She and Lissie and Sophie had all spent hours running around the ranch as girls, playing hide-and-seek in the barn and hayloft, tramping through the woods, hiking all the way to Sage Creek and back, then trailing in, exhausted, to flop into kitchen chairs while Mrs. Tanner served them pecan cookies and milk.
Having grown up living near town, it had been a treatevery time she visited the ranch. She’d felt inexplicably happy here, connected somehow not only to all the Tanners but to the valley itself, to the horses, the creek, the wide pastures and meadows riotous with wildflowers—or, in winter, cloaked in mounds of snow.
Not that she hadn’t loved the house where she grew up. It was home and it was hers—small, neat, and absolutely charming, with its eggshell blue walls and hickory floors and six high, curtained windows facing the backyard and garden. Larkspur Road was also conveniently close to town and to the middle school where she taught.
But Sage Ranch had always felt like a second home.
She knocked once more, rapping slightly harder than she’d intended on the solid oak door.
The baby might be asleep. Sophie, too,
she realized in chagrin when there was still no answer and she turned quickly away.
Aunt Winny will just have to get by without dessert….
When the door behind her whooshed open she spun back, an apologetic smile on her lips. “Please tell me I didn’t wake…”
The words turned to dust in her throat.
It wasn’t Sophie or even Rafe who stepped out onto the porch.
It was Travis.
Travis Tanner.
A towering six feet, one inch of rough, hard-bodied male.
And he was naked from the waist up.
This is so not fair,
Mia thought desperately as every word in her vocabulary seemed to erase itself from her brain.
Fate was playing a nasty trick on her. Not only was Travis in town—and why the hell hadn’t Sophie
told
her that?—but she’d obviously interrupted him in the midst of a shower. His dark hair glistened with water and small droplets of it clung to the hair on his very broad, very ripped chest. He smelled deliciously of soap and leather and man.
She felt her breath catching in her throat. He was wearing jeans.
And nothing else.
Unless you counted that sexy, oh-so-male smile tipping up the corners of his mouth. A mouth whose taste and shape and texture were embedded in her memories, even after all these years….
“I…dragged you out of the shower, didn’t
“Since when am I ever nice to you?”
“It’s been known to happen.”
Mia laughed. “Really, Sam, it’s no big deal. It seems pretty important to her to have a little break right now from life in Butte. Once she settles in, I’ll try to find out why.”
Finally her sister caved. Thanking Mia a half dozen times, she promised to call Brittany in a few hours to tell her she could stay
if
she found a job and
if
she didn’t cause her aunt any trouble.
“Don’t worry about a thing.” Mia managed to get a word in finally when Sam wound down. “You just go and have a spectacular honeymoon.”
“I’ll try, damn it.” Her sister exhaled. “It’s my third one. I’d better have a handle on it by now, don’t you think?”
Mia decided to make one stop on her way to Winny’s cabin. She veered off Squirrel Road and onto the long wide drive leading to Sage Ranch, hoping Sophie would be home.
Ever since Aiden’s birth, Sophie had begun doing quite a bit of the baking for A Bun in the Oven right in her own kitchen. There was a good chance she’d have some of her special cinnamon buns at home, or else brownies or a pie Mia could mooch to bring to Aunt Winny.
After all, what was supper without dessert? she thought as she pulled up behind a black Explorer she didn’t recognize.
Hurrying to the front door, she knocked lightly in case Aiden was asleep.
How many times did I stand at this door, waiting for Lissie or her mom to welcome me into this house?
she thought, a smile lifting the corners of her mouth.
She and Lissie and Sophie had all spent hours running around the ranch as girls, playing hide-and-seek in the barn and hayloft, tramping through the woods, hiking all the way to Sage Creek and back, then trailing in, exhausted, to flop into kitchen chairs while Mrs. Tanner served them pecan cookies and milk.
Having grown up living near town, it had been a treatevery time she visited the ranch. She’d felt inexplicably happy here, connected somehow not only to all the Tanners but to the valley itself, to the horses, the creek, the wide pastures and meadows riotous with wildflowers—or, in winter, cloaked in mounds of snow.
Not that she hadn’t loved the house where she grew up. It was home and it was hers—small, neat, and absolutely charming, with its eggshell blue walls and hickory floors and six high, curtained windows facing the backyard and garden. Larkspur Road was also conveniently close to town and to the middle school where she taught.
But Sage Ranch had always felt like a second home.
She knocked once more, rapping slightly harder than she’d intended on the solid oak door.
The baby might be asleep. Sophie, too,
she realized in chagrin when there was still no answer and she turned quickly away.
Aunt Winny will just have to get by without dessert….
When the door behind her whooshed open she spun back, an apologetic smile on her lips. “Please tell me I didn’t wake…”
The words turned to dust in her throat.
It wasn’t Sophie or even Rafe who stepped out onto the porch.
It was Travis.
Travis Tanner.
A towering six feet, one inch of rough, hard-bodied male.
And he was naked from the waist up.
This is so not fair,
Mia thought desperately as every word in her vocabulary seemed to erase itself from her brain.
Fate was playing a nasty trick on her. Not only was Travis in town—and why the hell hadn’t Sophie
told
her that?—but she’d obviously interrupted him in the midst of a shower. His dark hair glistened with water and small droplets of it clung to the hair on his very broad, very ripped chest. He smelled deliciously of soap and leather and man.
She felt her breath catching in her throat. He was wearing jeans.
And nothing else.
Unless you counted that sexy, oh-so-male smile tipping up the corners of his mouth. A mouth whose taste and shape and texture were embedded in her memories, even after all these years….
“I…dragged you out of the shower, didn’t
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