“It’s nice,” Luke said, sliding his seat back to accommodate his longer legs. “Why did you need a new car?”
“Oh, uh.” She laughed lightly and wished she’d pulled her hair up for this drive. An hour trapped in the car with this man. What in the world were they going to talk about? “I had a little mishap a week or so before Christmas, and my old car got filled with river water.”
“Filled with river water?” Luke chuckled, and Hannah dared to look at him. Their eyes met, and the ice broke into tiny shards. She laughed with him. “That doesn’t sound like a little mishap, Hannah.”
He drawled her name out like a true Texan, and this time, the warmth filling her body was comfortable and wanted.
“I sense a good story,” he said, buckling his seat belt. “You can tell me on the way.” He was so calm, and Hannah wondered how he did that. He probably didn’t have feelings for her anymore. That was how.
Too bad hers hadn’t disappeared, despite her relationship with Chuck Knight. They’d only been seeing each other for a month, but he’d kissed her on the second date, and she could admit that she liked Chuck a whole lot.
They had a decent level of electricity between them, but nothing like the spitting, crackling lightning she felt when Luke got within ten feet of her.
“I want a good story from you too,” she said, putting the car in reverse.
“Oh, I can’t promise that,” he said with a grin.
“You’ve been gone for four months,” she said. “Surely you’ve had at least one interesting thing happen in that time.” She eased past the cars and trucks parked in the gravel lot and turned around to leave the ranch and go over the bridge covering the river.
She turned toward town and reached for her coffee. “I’m assuming you want me to go first.”
“Hmm?” Luke looked up from his phone, clearly distracted. “I hate to say this, but my flight just got delayed.”
“Oh.” Hannah eased up on the accelerator. “Should we go back? How much of a delay?”
“About ninety minutes,” he said. “I was thinking we should go to breakfast.” He looked at her, hope in those dark eyes.
“Breakfast?” Hannah squeaked.
“Yeah,” he said with a playful smile. “Did you eat already?” He let his eyes drift down her body, though she was sitting, and she could tell he already knew the answer to his question. Of course she hadn’t eaten that morning. It was barely light, and she’d showered, curled her hair, put on makeup, and the cutest clothes she owned…for an hour-long drive to an airport.
“I could eat,” she said.
“Great,” he said. “There’s that pancake place that everyone loves.”
“You sound like you don’t love it.” She looked at him out of the corner of her eyes and caught a half-shrug. “I’m going to take that as a no,” she said. “Okay, I know a place we can go.”
“You do?”
“Sure,” she said. “I grew up out in the country here. We had to drive forty-five minutes to get to Sweet Water Falls just to buy groceries. Well, we did have a tiny country store, but they sold more supplies than groceries. We could get bread and milk and the very essentials there.”
“Did you like it?” Luke asked. “Living out in the middle of nowhere?”
“I didn’t hate it,” Hannah said. “Not sure I liked it either. It’s nice only driving a few minutes to town. Our whole family would go one Saturday a month, and the trip took all day long.” She sighed as if she’d actually run a marathon not just gone shopping for apples and shoes.
“I grew up in Beeville,” he said. “We lived right in town, and I could walk across the street to a store that had everything we could want.”
“Stop bragging,” she teased, and he laughed. Hannah relaxed even further, and she made the turns that would take them to Madam Croque. She arrived in the parking lot, noting that it wasn’t very busy this morning. She loved the old, brick building, all of the vines on the pillars, and the vibrant flowers in the springtime. Now, in the winter, the landscape still held a certain beauty in the form of tall, brown grasses that grew straight up in bundles.
“This place has real food, right?” Luke asked, peering out the windshield.
“I’m offended,” Hannah said, putting the car in park. She reached for her purse. “You’re going to love this place.”
“I’m kind of a diner type of guy,” he said. “This looks…fussy.”
“I know good food,” she said. “And you are not a diner type of guy. You like good food, right?”
“Yeah,” he said slowly.
“Put your cowboy hat on then, Luke. You’re going to be blown away.” She got out of the car, hoping Jared was cooking this morning. He had a way with eggs that no one else did, and Hannah enjoyed his cooking and that he took a few minutes to come out and see how his patrons liked the food.
She reached the door first, but Luke jumped in front of her. “I got it,” he said, smiling at her.
“Thank you.” She smiled at him, admiring those broad shoulders in that burnt orange shirt. It had a collar and a couple of buttons down the chest, with thick fabric that still seemed to stick to the ripples in his muscles.
He wore jeans and work boots, with a belt and a buckle that indicated his Texan heritage. With the cowboy hat, he almost looked like he belonged at Hope Eternal. The boots gave him away, though Hannah had seen him ride a horse and he certainly knew how.
Inside, Lana said, “Hannah, how are you?” as she grinned and picked up two menus. “Two?” She didn’t bat an eyelash as Luke came to her side. “This way.”
“You know her?” Luke asked.
“I may or may not eat here a lot,” Hannah said. She loved the quaint booths, each one decorated with something unique to Texas. Her favorite one bore a table with pressed bluebonnets under a thick sheet of glass.
“I had no idea you were fussy, Miss Hannah,” Luke said, his mouth practically touching her ear.
She shivered and giggled, instantly hating how girlish it made her sound. She sucked in the laugh and followed Lana through the restaurant to the Marble Falls booth. This table had maps and trail guides beneath the glass, and Hannah peered at them.
“Have you been out to the Hill Country?” she asked Luke.
“Couple of times,” he said, sliding onto the bench across from her. “Look, I should be honest with you.”
Hannah picked up her menu but kept her eyes on him. “Okay.”
“I’m from Beeville, right?”
“Yes,” she said. “You said that.”
“My mother is a Bee,” he said. “She, uh, owns ninety percent of the town, and well, a couple of the bigger resorts out in Hill Country too.”
Hannah didn’t know why this made him uncomfortable. “Sounds like a lot of work,” she said.
Luke blinked at her and started laughing again, and Hannah didn’t know what she was doing. This felt like a date, and he wasn’t her boyfriend. At the same time, she didn’t want to say goodbye to him in another couple of hours.