I like what they’ve all brought to the town, but yikes. I do not like mixing dating with business. In fact, I don’t like mixing dating with anything these days, and Cooper knows this. And he’s baiting me. And I’m falling for it.

  “Yeah, a new salon would be a good idea,” I say dumbly.

  He stands there and studies me for a beat. To say that I feel self-conscious is an understatement.

  Cooper takes the folded paper under his arm and looks at it thoughtfully. “Speaking of this town growing on me, I have to do something.”

  Yeah right. Do something.

  He’s probably headed to my brother’s garden center—again—to buy fruit trees for my yard that I did not ask for.

  Does he know that I know he’s been following me to school every day and home again?

  Does he know I can see him sitting in his car, watching me go to and from school?

  Not that I’m complaining.

  With Summer around less, the house has been too much for me to keep up with. And I do like the idea of someone looking out for me.

  I narrow my eyes at Cooper. “What are you up to?”

  He gives me a mischievous grin.

  “I’ll tell you when the deed is done,” he says. He touches the paper to his forehead in salute, and backs out the door.

  Why do I feel as if I’m not going to like whatever this “deed” is?

  chapter

  eleven

  Cooper

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  I look up from trimming the overgrown hedge and wipe the sweat from my brow.

  Owen, who’s started expanding the garden center at the feed store, has become a font of helpful knowledge lately. From him, I learned that the hedge growing in my new front yard is called arborvitae, a fast-growing cypress that provides good privacy. Not the best choice for a hedge to leave unchecked along the front of a house, though, as it quickly overwhelms the space.

  Playing dumb, I reply, “Yard work.”

  Harmony’s eyes scan the surroundings.

  “Have you finally succumbed to heat stroke? You’re at the wrong house.”

  With my pruning shears in hand, I turn to inspect the house number.

  “Nope, that’s my address.”

  Turning back to face Harmony, her eyes bug out. “Your address? Cooper, what the heck is going on?”

  I lean on the fence post and tug off my gardening gloves.

  “What’s going on? Well, the other morning I couldn’t help but notice that you wanted me to find another way to occupy my time. So I found one.”

  She blinks, her golden, all-knowing eyes taking in her surroundings: me, the pruning shears, the street, the house.

  “You bought this house?”

  I turn and gaze proudly at the three-bedroom, two-bathroom bungalow that matches Harmony’s abode across the street.

  “Yep.”

  “Why? You have a perfectly suitable twelve-bedroom estate thirty minutes from here!”

  My fingers comb my sweat-soaked hair. “You know, something about these old mill-worker bungalows speaks to me. I guess I just wanted to preserve a piece of history.”

  When I turn back to face Harmony, her arms are crossed over her chest. “You just had to have one directly across the street from my house?”

  “When you put it like that,” I say, “it does seem like a strange coincidence.”

  “Cooper!”

  “Harmony!”

  “This has gone too far.”

  “What’s gone too far?”

  I pride myself on my ability to play dumb, but now I regret that. Harmony is infuriated.

  “I’m not going to date you!”

  My answer is too quick. “Harmony, have I ever asked you out?”

  She takes a step back.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Have I ever asked you out? Or tried to make a pass at you, or anything like that? Have I ever been frustrated by being your friend? Have I ever made you feel bad since the day you made it clear that you only wanted to be friends?”

  Her pretty brows come together, and she chews on her bottom lip, like she’s trying to figure me out.

  “No. You’re the first to not complain about being friend-zoned.”

  I drop my pruning shears and she jumps when they clank against the ground. “I hate that phrase. It’s stupid. It assumes that the default setting is that men and women can’t be on the same page. I fucking hate that shit.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry. I like being your friend. Seeing you every day is awesome. Doing things for you is fun, because I like it when you interrupt my work to talk to me. I like getting to know you as a person. I like everything about you. I can simultaneously want to grind your ex-fiancé into the ground and also want to chill and hang out and do nothing.”

  I’m standing too close to her. I know she hates it when I don’t wear a shirt.

  But before I can pull back, she reaches for me.

  chapter

  twelve

  Harmony

  How dare he?

  How dare Cooper MacKenzie do this to me?

  How dare he say all this to me, telling me about all of these shenanigans while shirtless and sweaty and dirty and acting like all of this is completely normal and…oh god, his lips.

  I kiss him because I didn’t have any words left.

  I kiss him because I couldn’t stand the thought of him thinking that our friendship could never be more than that.

  I kiss him because life is too short.

  And mostly, I kiss him because I wanted to feel those lips.

  Cooper tastes like salt and clean sweat and smells like fresh-cut grass, turning me on beyond comprehension.

  The world around me crystallizes into this one thing. The birds chirping in the trees. Flash barking somewhere two streets over. Kids splashing in a pool next door. The flutter of his lashes on my cheek. The grip of his arm braces my waist, holding me tight against his torso. The damp slide of Cooper’s mouth against mine. His tongue teasing my lips.

  Someone’s going to see us.

  Maybe that’s fine. Maybe a school parent.

  Maybe I don’t really care.

  I open to his prodding tongue and Cooper licks into my mouth.

  It’s too good. Too delicious.

  A hand goes to the back of my neck, and my body surrenders, my shoulders slack and my knees weak.

  I would wonder how I’m still standing except that arm bracketed around me is everything.

  “C-Cooper,” I say, breathless when we finally pull apart.

  His chocolate-brown eyes are intense, his gaze hot as he looks over my face.

  He drags me behind the hedge and presses me against the siding. I’m between the wood and the massive wall of man, his body and the overgrown hedge shading me from the afternoon sun.

  I don’t ask what he thinks he’s doing, dragging me behind the hedge. Instead, I splay my fingers over the planes of his hot, sweaty, dirty chest, my heart kicking against my ribcage.

  Acting on only need and instinct, I reach down and unzip his fly, the noise amplified in my mind, telling me there’s no going back to being just friends after this.

  His jaw tics as he swats my hand away. My eyes widen in shock as he steps forward, crushing his mouth to mine.

  He hitches up my skirt and finds the front of my panties, as if he’s done this a dozen times before. How did his hand get between my legs so quickly?

  Do I care?

  No, because it feels too good to care. There he is, rubbing his fingers over the material, working my pussy until I’m soaked through.

  It’s only when I can’t take any more of that and my body jerks, involuntarily riding his hand, that he pulls back and tugs the gusset aside.

  The new sensation of skin on skin has me gasping.

  “Oh!”

  He shushes me with his mouth on mine, his tongue spearing down my throat, stifling the noise.

  At the same time, his rough fingers explore my damp pussy, roughly slipping between my folds. I’m so wet. The noises we make are shocking — scandalous — as he probes, finally finding my clit and sliding a finger along either side of it.

  The fabric stretches as he works me over.

  I fist the front of his shirt, my fingertips digging into his chest.

  Neither of us says a word, not a single word as we do these things to each other.

  Yet our bodies are in sync somehow. Our needs have reached a breaking point.

  Cooper then slips the tip of his middle finger into my pussy like he owns it. His thumb works over my clit, strumming it back and forth in a pleasing, teasing rhythm. That finger sinks in deeper, roughly stroking my inner walls.

  My mouth gapes but no sound comes out. I’m in shock at how good this feels.

  When I come, it’s like lightning. I close my eyes and let my body do what it wants to do, coming all over his wicked fingers.

  When I open my eyes, Cooper’s dark gaze is on me. Daring me to look away.

  The fabric stretches some more, and finally, there’s nothing left to give. It tears, biting into my skin.

  It hurts a little but I don’t care. The next thing I know, Cooper is nudging his thick, hard cock against my center.

  A million thoughts run through my head. This is happening. I’m having sex outside. In broad daylight. Okay, we’re hidden by some arborvitae but we are doing it. Standing up. Anybody could walk up and see us. The mail carrier, the UPS driver. Anybody.

  Would I care?

  I get lost in his dark gaze as he moves, lubing up his cock in my wetness. He reaches down between our bodies, claiming it all. Using my arousal to coat himself.

  I don’t have to look down to know what he’s doing. And neither does he break eye contact. Under my shocked gaze, the muscles of his shoulder bunch and ripple as he readies us both.

  Oh god, I can hear…everything.

  For half a second, he teases me with it. The nerves explode in my overstimulated clit at the contact.

  With a half smile, he rips my panties off the rest of the way, then hoists both my thighs skyward, wrapping my legs around his middle.

  He doesn’t have to tell me to hold on tight. He just gives my outer thighs a squeeze with those large, rough hands.

  I circle my arms around his neck and get ready for the ride.

  Cooper slides in quickly, deeply, pausing for half a second, his eyes on mine. He sees the urgency in my face, my flared nostrils, the wild look no doubt painting my face. I haven’t had it in a while and now that he’s presented me with an opportunity, there’s no going back. He’s reawakened my needs and he’d better follow through.

  Cooper sinks to the hilt, and he’s so big I feel like I may split in two.

  I let out a little surprised shriek, which he stifles with a hungry kiss, dipping his head down between his two bracketing arms.

  Being stretched by him is the most glorious, dirty feeling.

  He’s definitely going to leave a mark.

  Cooper wastes no time finding his rhythm. He moves in me, and out of me, like the devil is chasing him.

  It’s all heat, sweat, spit, and dirt as we hump in the hedge like two rabbits in heat.

  Like two people who just need to feel something.

  That’s all this is.

  And that’s perfectly fine.

  He didn’t ask me on a date.

  He didn’t ask me to marry him.

  He never asked me to trust him, but he’s earned my trust as a friend.

  The realization hits me. We have the perfect scenario, really.

  Cooper can be my friend and be—whatever this is. It’s been too long, and I am a woman with needs.

  Why shouldn’t we fuck? We’re grown adults and no one can judge us.

  Cooper’s pace quickens. Deepens.

  And then for half a second, he goes perfectly still, as if I’m looking at a man about to have a seizure. His eyes roll back in his head. Every cord on his beautiful neck stands out in relief, and his face is tight and drawn.

  Then he surges forward with a preternatural sound from deep in his chest. His teeth are bared.

  It’s almost frightening, but then the next second his face is buried against my collarbone, forcing me to hold him closer.

  I get no warning when he explodes inside me, filling me with his seed in hot, pulsing streams.

  Cooper heaves a long, low, languorous groan against me.

  I pull him closer, reveling in that damp, bare chest pressed against my breasts.

  His rough palms slide backward, squeezing my hips possessively.

  The notion that he achieved those delicious callouses by playing frisbee golf for hours and hours in college somehow wakes me up.

  This is not your future boyfriend or husband. This is not the carpenter in your dreams who earned his delicious callouses from hammers and drills and hauling wood.

  Cooper is not that guy. He’s a lot of wonderful things, including a bro who hangs out in the woods and throws frisbees around. Or, he was, in college. There’s nothing wrong with that but …that’s not the guy I was picturing for myself.

  My ex was an office character. The next guy was supposed to be rough and tumble and sweep me off my feet.

  What the hell is wrong with me? I’m a schoolteacher!

  What if one of my students’ parents walks up? What if someone comes to my house to look for me and wanders across the street to ask if a neighbor has seen me?

  True, no one would be looking for me on a Saturday, and nobody would come over unannounced.

  Then again, I don’t have my phone.

  Wait…I don’t have my phone! What if the school’s on fire and everyone has been trying to reach me? While I’m here, having sex against a house in front of everybody!

  And we didn’t even use a condom!

  I push him away.

  “I’m not ready for this,” I say.

  He will be so disappointed that I’ve led him on and now I’m hitting the brakes, but that’s what I have to do.

  “Okay,” he says evenly.

  Okay?

  I wasn’t expecting okay.

  A part of me is disappointed that he’s super cool with me not being ready to take things to the next level after screwing him in front of God and the neighborhood dogs and everyone in Fate.

  As if reading my mind, he brushes a lock of hair that the wind has pushed into my eyes and tucks it behind my ear.

  “It’s really okay. Whatever you want is completely fine with me, dream girl.”

  I swallow the emotions that come up when he says that nickname to me.

  Nodding, I turn and will myself across the street, going into a full sprint when I hit my driveway.

  “I’m not ready. I’m not ready,” I repeat, panting as I run home, hoping that if I say it enough, I’ll believe it.

  chapter

  thirteen

  Cooper

  The moving truck arrives, along with my brother.

  I ignore that fact as I follow Harmony across the street.

  I knock on the door. “Harmony? Are you okay?”

  She doesn’t answer.

  “Hey, Cooper!” That’s my brother with the moving truck. “You moving in with Harmony already?”

  I roll my eyes.

  I knock again.

  Finally she responds. “I’m fine. I just need a minute.”

  I turn to my brother and cross the street to help him unload my things.

  He listens while I tell him everything that happened.

  Almost everything.

  Mainly, I’m confounded that she’s so upset I moved here.

  “I wish she understood that this life is normal for me. Not the giant estate with a fucking moat.”

  Carter says, “Then you need to tell her that.”

  Together, we lug my mattress up the stoop and through the front door.

  I’ve already assembled my bed frame, which I hauled in my SUV from the estate.

  Once the mattress is situated in the back bedroom, we unload the TV.

  “I can’t believe you’re moving out,” Carter says. “After you had the pool and the entire backyard dug up and redesigned.”

  He has a point.

  “I mean, what will we do with Aunt Gabby’s house? Have you thought about that? If it’s sitting empty it’ll cost us a fortune in utilities just to keep the lights on,” Carter prods.

  “It’s not sitting empty,” I tell him after we have my living room furniture more or less situated. “You still live there.”

  “Yeah, until Summer and I build our house. Then what?”

  “I don’t know. We could rent it out?” I say, not quite believing it. The thought of strangers trashing the place — the place where our aunt took care of us after our parents died — makes my stomach queasy.

  Carter explains the downside of that, and the cost of hiring property managers while we unload boxes and more furniture. He peppers me with more questions and lectures about practicality until my eyes glaze over.

  “Thanks for your help,” I tell him when we’re finished, and he waves off my offer of beer and delivery pizza.

  “I have to help Summer close up Little Spoon,” he says. “Think about what I said.”

  Which part? “Has anyone ever told you you’re exhausting?”

  Carter slaps my shoulder before heading out. “Has anyone ever told you they were proud of you?”

  This throws me for a loop. “No. Not since Aunt Gabby.”

  “Well, take that to mean I’m proud of you, brother.”

  I blink at him. “For what?”

  He looks around. “A lot of people need words. But she’s not a girl that needs a lot of talking. Harmony needs you to show her what you mean to her.”

  “She’s not ready.”

  “She will be.”

  I watch my brother leave with the moving truck, then stand on the stoop and stare at Harmony’s house. The light is on in her kitchen.

  My stomach growls. I wonder what she’s making in there.

  I won’t get to find out, because it’s pizza night for me.

  chapter

  fourteen