“Morning,” Amber trilled, stopping right in front of Dot. “I heard you had the hottest date last night, with the hottest cowboy bachelor in all of Three Rivers.”
Dot’s mind blanked, though she was very aware of Ward’s low chuckle on the other end of the line.
“She did,” Wendy said, taking Amber further into the store. “Now come on, she’s talking to him right now, and I need you to….” Her voice faded as they moved further from Dot.
Her face burned and her stomach swooped. She turned away from her store and her friends and stepped back outside.
“Lunch, sweetheart?” he asked. “I’m assuming Wendy just handed you your deliveries.”
“Amber is twenty-three,” Dot blurted out. “She’s just a little…eager to know the details of my love life.” She sucked in a breath, the last two words that left her mouth making embarrassment shoot through her. “I mean—”
“Love life?” Ward asked, his voice that rough, demanding one that annoyed Dot.
She pressed her eyes closed and took a deep breath. “Are you aware there’s a gossip network in Three Rivers?”
“There is?”
“You cowboys are always a little dense about this kind of stuff,” Dot said, hoping her voice sounded flirtatious enough. She honestly wasn’t sure how to flirt with Ward Glover. “Everyone seems to know we went out last night, and that you…that I…that we kissed.” Her voice lowered with every word until she whispered the last couple of words.
“Do they?”
“Yes,” Dot said. “Bella knew, and Wendy, and you heard Amber. That’s women from twenty-three to sixty.” Dot wiped one hand through her hair before realizing she’d pulled it back into a ponytail like she normally did for work. She exhaled, trying to decide if she cared about this or not. At least everyone in town would know who Ward Glover belonged to.
She pushed against the thought, because a man like Ward didn’t belong to anyone. He was his own man, and Dot could barely think of him as hers to begin with. She also wasn’t one-hundred percent sure she wanted to keep dating him.
Her heartbeat shouted at her, and Dot warred with herself.
“I guess I’m kind of isolated up at the ranch,” Ward mused. “I had no idea people would be talking about us.”
“Tyson did cause a scene,” Dot said. The breeze kicked up, reminding her of the winter temperatures. Calvin came outside, his deliveries secured in his folder, reminding her she had work to do.
“I can’t have lunch with you today,” she said. “It’s Bella’s birthday, and we’re having a big party for her here at lunchtime.” Her mind spun, and she thought of feeding some new gossip to the mill. “How about you come here for that?”
“Really?” Ward asked, plenty of surprise in his voice.
“We won’t be alone,” Dot said. “Obviously. But then you can talk to Wendy about scheduling your thirty-five.”
“Mixing business and pleasure, I see,” Ward commented, his tone full of meaning.
Dot smiled to herself and the weak winter sun filling the sky with gold and light. “Yes,” she said. “I think you’re seeing that right.”
“All right, Dot,” he drawled, her name in that delicious cowboy voice almost more than she could handle. “I’ll be by around noon? Is that when the party is?”
“Noon, cowboy,” she said, ending the call. She drew in a deep, cold breath and turned back to the building. She needed her coffee and breakfast bar to go with her on her morning deliveries, and she couldn’t even pick up a shovel without her leather gloves.
“All right, all right,” Wendy Lewis yelled. She’d raised five children, and she had a loud voice and a no-nonsense personality when it came to business. Dot had let her handle Ward’s demands over the past couple of years, and she stayed out of the way now too.
She leaned against the wall near the back of the room, facing the only way in and out. Ward should’ve been here five minutes ago, and the man wasn’t known for being late. At least Dot had never known him to be tardy.
The group, which included all the employees of From the Ground Up, a couple of their major contractors Dot used when she couldn’t handle her business herself, and Bella’s boyfriend, settled down.
Dot cast one more look toward the doorway and told herself not to do it again. She felt like she’d been stood up, and she couldn’t help the pinch behind her lungs.
“All right,” Wendy said again, this time smiling around at everyone who’d obeyed her. “We have a very special musical number planned for Bella’s birthday, and then we’ll eat. It’s simple. Sandwiches and cake.”
Dot had already taken her insulin so she could enjoy the chocolate cake Wendy had ordered from Three Cakes—and Holly Ann Glover. Those Glovers seemed to be everywhere, that was for sure.
Silence covered the room, and then Amber said, “Oh my….” and let the words drip there.
Before Dot could find the woman to see what she was looking at, the strumming of a guitar filled the room. Her eyes flew to the doorway she wasn’t going to look at again, and this time, Ward Glover’s tall frame and broad shoulders filled it.
He’d already fitted the neck of his guitar through the doorway, and as a smile exploded onto her face and her heartbeat crashed against her ribs, his voice started the first strains of “Happy birthday to you….”
Everyone joined in by the third or fourth word, but not Dot. She couldn’t tear her eyes from the best-looking cowboy in the state. Maybe the country. Fine, perhaps the entire world. He called to her in a way no one else had, not even her fiancé.
She could only stare as Ward played and sang, his fingers moving easily on the strings without him having to look. It was as if he knew one of her kryptonite weaknesses was a man with a guitar in his hand.
As the song ended and Bella leaned forward to blow out the candles on her cake, Dot finally took her eyes from the cowboy. She felt everyone watching her, not Bella, and that shifted in a single breath too. She still caught the way Wendy watched her, that matronly smile on her face that said she knew exactly what was going on in Dot’s mind and body.
Dot felt like she needed to step outside and get some air, because her normal bodily functions had stopped working properly. Part of her wanted to run, though her tall frame had never enjoyed the activity much. Her knees were too knobby and her chest too big, and running was actually painful in a lot of ways.
But if she didn’t have to greet Ward in front of all of her employees? Running away sounded like her best option while everyone cheered for Bella. They surged forward then, picking up paper plates and chattering with one another.
Dot stepped around them and over to Ward, who removed the strap from around his shoulder and head and set his guitar in the corner. He straightened to face her, hope and handsomeness streaming from his face. “Hey, there,” he said, easily taking her into an embrace.
He didn’t hold it for too long. Just long enough for her to say, “Hey, yourself, you country music star.”
He chuckled as he stepped back. He wore a dark brown cowboy hat today, and Dot asked, “Do you keep a spare hat at your sister’s?”