He gave her his best broody farmer look.
She patted his cheek. “Lighten up, Horner. You’ll feel fine when you see the farmers’ market bursting with people,” she said, scooping up his cats, Park and Eastfield, then placing them in his arms.
“I don’t want people to come just because they want my body,” he said, adjusting the cats in his arms. The poor orange Tabbies had no idea what they were getting themselves into.
“I only want your body,” Mabel replied, pressing her lips together to suppress a grin as she lined up the shot.
“I can live with that. It’s the other people that freak me out,” he answered, frowning into the camera.
“Like it or not, you’ve got abs that make women weep,” she replied, setting up a shot from another angle. “And we need them to show up and buy some cheese, kale, and fancy mushrooms. It’s not a huge ask—especially if they get to gawk at you.”
He held the unsuspecting cats as Mabel snapped picture after picture when the alarm on his phone went off. Mabel gasped. Keeping their naughty escapades on the down-low was no easy feat.
“I have to go!” she said, staring down at the bedsheet. “And I can’t run out of the cottage and climb up the lattice in this.”
“Hand me your phone,” he said, smooshing Park and Eastfield in one arm.
She frowned. “Why?”
“Because you’re getting in on this farm porn before you go.” He gestured with his chin for her to join him.
She gave him a skeptical look but handed it over. “Cal, we don’t have a lot of time!”
She was right. Her father would be up in a matter of minutes, and the Garver brothers would be here to check on the animals soon. Plus, with it being the first Saturday farmers’ market, he could only assume that everyone would be up a little earlier today. Still, he wanted her in the shot with him.
He pegged her with his gaze. “I’m not doing this alone. If you want more farm porn, you have to be a part of it.”
She cocked her head to the side. “What will people think? You know they can’t know about…”
Her cheeks grew crimson, and he loved that he could elicit that kind of response.
“All the sex?” he supplied.
She gasped, but that dirty little twinkle in her eyes let him know she liked their arrangement as much as he did.
“Put on my T-shirt. No one will assume anything. We’re with a couple of cats, for Christ’s sake,” he said, then scratched between Park’s ears.
She watched him closely, not appearing to be sold on the idea.
He needed to make his case.
“You and I are together in a ton of pictures on the Eat Elverna social media feeds, and nobody’s said anything. Everyone in town knows we’re working together,” he added. But there was more. The piece of him that he’d locked away. The part that had survived without her for so long loved seeing them together. Smiling and showcasing everything Elverna had to offer, the two of them were all over the Eat Elverna posts, and he could only hope that her wide grin and sparkling eyes meant what he hoped it did.
She could be happy here. He could make her happy in Elverna. Who needed the world when they had each other?
Mabel dropped the sheet, and now it was his turn to ogle as she twisted into his T-shirt.
“We’ve had a lot of sex with cats nearby, Cal,” she said, glancing over her shoulder. “I think that’s why Mabel the Kitten’s been so cantankerous. These cats thought you were their one and only, and then I show up and—”
“And you can’t get enough of me?” he teased.
How he loved this! How he needed this! He needed her. He’d carried the weight of this town on his shoulders for years. Now, he wasn’t alone in that endeavor. He didn’t drive the country roads alone anymore. And he didn’t want to. He wanted every day ushered in with the scent of honey and lavender and every night brought to a close with her, warm and sated from making love, in his arms.
She nestled in next to him. “Take the damn picture, broody farmer!”
He held out the phone. “Say cheese.”
Mabel glanced up at him. “Cougar Mom Kathy, four-four-five-six. Meee-ooow,” she purred instead. Of course, she wouldn’t take the conventional route, but it didn’t matter. The photo was perfect. With two cats under one arm and Mabel snuggled in, they looked genuinely content—blissfully besotted.
It was everything he’d ever wanted.
“Cal! Stop staring at your perfect abs and sex god smile,” she chided, swiping the phone from his hand.
“Perfect abs and sex god smile? I sound like quite a catch,” he threw back, not about to cop to the fact that he was picturing their happily ever after like some kind of country music song.
Mabel hammered out some copy, then posted the picture to the Eat Elverna social media sites. “You should watch out for Cougar Mom Kathy, Cal. She’s posted a couple more times and sounds ready to chain you up in her basement and make you her boy toy.”
He cringed. “If any Kathies come to the Muldowney Farms booth, you’re taking care of them.”
Mabel laughed but abruptly froze when she glanced at the clock. “That’s if my father doesn’t kill us first. Look at the time!”
She was right. And it wasn’t like he would let her walk out the door alone. Even though it was literally a thirty-second jaunt from his cottage to the side of the main house with her bedroom window, he always walked her back.
“Okay, let’s go,” He swiped a flannel off the hook near the door as Mabel hurried back to the bedroom and got dressed.
“I’m ready!” she whisper-shouted as a rush of warmth washed over him. She hadn’t taken off his T-shirt, and there was something primally satisfying about seeing her in his clothing. But there wasn’t time to allow his mind to wander down a love-sick Mabel Muldowney-inspired daydream where she walked around his place in nothing but that shirt.
He glanced out the door. “The coast is clear.”
As if they’d robbed a bank, they bolted down the path, then pasted their backs against the house. Huffing and puffing, Mabel pressed her hand to her mouth to stifle a laugh.
“This is crazy!” she whispered.
He shook his head. “No, it’s perfect.”
It was. He had her back. She had to know that he was there for her. Now, he had to convince her to stay. A twist in his belly told him that it wouldn’t be easy, but he pushed the thought away.
Mabel glanced up at her open bedroom window, then met his gaze. “Are you going to kiss me goodbye?”
“Don’t I always?” He cupped her face in his hands, admiring her jaw-dropping beauty, and hardly able to believe the past ten days had happened.
He caressed her cheek with the pad of his thumb as the morning sun peeked through the clouds and lit her in a honey-golden glow. Despite the many pictures of her on the Eat Elverna social media sites, this one would be for him—and only for him.
“Cal?” she breathed, her voice light and airy.
He smiled down at her, and his gaze slid from the M charm to her face. “Sorry for the delay. I wanted to take a photograph of you to keep in my head,” he whispered against her lips.
Cheesy?
Yes.