Week three, start working on her mental health. She’d come far after her husband’s death. But reminders of her high school sweetheart and beloved Jackson were everywhere she turned. His celebrity status as a bull rider who was at the peak of his career when he tragically died also put her in the spotlight as his grieving widow.
A year and a half later, she felt she’d turned a corner on her journey, but she had a ways to go, which was what landed her in Crossroads.
All the weeks after three kind of blurred into a lump of getting her business on track again and making more friends than the two people she knew here. Dominick Cole and Jackson had been tight, so when Dom suggested she move east and start fresh, she knew she’d have support from him and his new wife Jada.
With the bottle of wine in a cute cloth bag in hand, Sadie stepped out of the winery into the bright sunshine. She threw a look across the parking lot toward her pickup and skidded to a halt.
It’d been a long while since Sadie gave any man a second glance. She’d only recently reawakened the sexual part of herself and bought a vibrator. As she looked on, she grew mesmerized by the pretty view.
A pair of long, muscled legs in faded denim extended from an equally faded truck. The owner of the legs—and truck—appeared next, and he straightened to his full height, which must top six feet with boots and Stetson.
Country boy white T-shirt clinging to a broad torso that shifted overtop of the slabs of muscle a man could only put there by hard physical labor.
Her insides coiled as he twisted toward the winery…and looked right at her. An odd hitching sensation hit her chest, as if there wasn’t enough air to fill her lungs out here in the wide open countryside where air was free for the taking.
With his hat shading his features, she couldn’t tell if he had the face to match the strong body. But then he started toward her and she got a look at his chiseled jaw, cheekbones to match and full lips that were enhanced by the cut of his jaw.
He walked with a confidence she hadn’t seen since…well, Jackson. And thinking about her late husband while she simultaneously gawked at a hot cowboy didn’t make sense to her mind.
The cowboy’s eyes were creased as he squinted into the sun, but when they got within five paces of each other, she saw they twinkled like two warm brown gems.
He reached up and tugged the brim of his hat in a country greeting.
Stunned speechless, her cowgirl boots fused to the Georgia dirt, she could only nod in return. He passed her and entered the winery without so much as a ‘hell yeah and howdy.’
After a heartbeat, she unglued her boots from the ground and walked to her truck. As she set her purchase on the floor and started the engine, she threw another look to the front of the winery. Would it be terrible for her to sit here and wait for the cowboy to come out?
Was she even ready to admire a man again, after her long months of grief?
She didn’t know what she was doing, but why did she come to Crossroads if not to take chances? She told herself she was simply moving up week four or five on her list by making a new friend.
She’d followed Jackson on the rodeo circuit and talked to cowboys. Her ability to make small talk topped any fear she might say something stupid. So when the cowboy exited carrying a box instead of a single bottle in a cloth bag, Sadie was leaning against her truck waiting for him.
Bold? Yes. Stupid? To be determined.
As he approached and saw her, he slowed his steps. The way he held the heavy box, as if it weighed nothing, only showcased his strength. She felt her lower belly tighten in a way it hadn’t in so long.
“Howdy,” he drawled out, closing the distance between them with his long, sure strides. He looked straight at her as he lowered his tailgate and placed the box in the bed of his truck. “Anything I can do for you?”
“Uh…” She knew how women came on to men. Enough buckle bunnies in the rodeo threw themselves at her husband. But personally, she never had to do it, because she and Jackson had been together since she was fifteen.
She waved to her truck hood. “I started the engine and I think I heard a sound. You wouldn’t be willing to have a look, would you?” She tipped her head back to meet his stare and offered him a smile.
“Sure thing. You wanna pop the hood for me?”
She eyed him up. Whatever madness had come over her to make her gawk at the cowboy, wait for him by her truck and then tell a fib about an engine problem took total hold of her.
She wanted to pop more than a hood for him. Maybe a few buttons too?
If she didn’t know better, she’d say the country air was more polluted than the smog in Dallas where she’d come from, and it was affecting her mind after only hours in Crossroads.
She strolled around her truck, opened the driver’s door and popped the hood. When she straightened, she noted the cowboy hadn’t moved from the spot and he quickly flicked his gaze up her body, away from her ass to her face.
Heart pulsating faster, she followed him to the front of the truck. He propped up the hood and peered inside. Wiggling a few hoses and checking connections drew her attention to how big his hands were. Rough too.
A shiver of desire rolled through her body, leaving her breathing faster and feeling a bit damper—everywhere.
He threw her a look from under the brim of his hat. “Can you start the engine for me?”
Oh it’s already started.
“Sure.” She pushed off the front and walked around the side. She swore she felt his eyes tracking her and asked herself what in the world had come over her. After she started the engine, she joined him under the hood again.
He cocked his head, listening to the purring engine. Of course she knew there wasn’t a thing wrong with her truck—she’d gotten it a good tune-up and check before driving it across country. The last thing a woman needed on a solo road trip was to be broken down alongside the road in the middle of nowhere.
The cowboy’s gaze settled on hers. “You from out of town? Haven’t seen you before, and it’s a small town. I know everybody.”
“Not from out of town anymore. I just rolled in today. I was out house hunting when I came across the winery.”
He gave her a full-lipped, toe-curling smile that accompanied a twinkle of interest in those warm brown eyes. “Is that so? What’s your name?”
“Sadie.”
“Well, Sadie, welcome to Crossroads. I’m Theo.”
The syllables tumbled through her on his deep, rumbling, country drawl.
She extended a hand, which he clasped in his, his long fingers folding around hers and making her feel perfectly dainty and feminine—something it’d been too long since she felt, since her vibrator didn’t offer it.
The engine continued to trundle along without a hitch, but Theo didn’t seem all that interested in her truck.
He released her hand and turned back to the engine. “I don’t hear anything odd. Did you say it was a knocking noise?”
She hadn’t said, but she nodded anyway. Going on tiptoe, she edged closer to him as she leaned over the hood as far as she could. When she glanced over her shoulder at Theo, she found his stare riveted firmly on her ass. An ass she had great pride in, as she ran every day and did a Brazilian butt workout the other ones. Jackson had loved her ass, and so had a lot of other men in her life.
“Hmm,” she said, dropping back to her heels. “I don’t hear it anymore.”