Had Lee not stopped by her office, she would have. “Listen, honey,” she said, crouching down in her heels. “Mommy has to go out again tonight. Tess said you could come to her house and play with Baylor. Doesn’t that sound fun?”

  Autumn looked at her with hope and wonder in her eyes. “Can I wear my penguin costume?”

  Rosalie grinned at her daughter. “I don’t see why not.”

  Autumn whooped and ran toward the house. “I’m going to go change right now!”

  Rosalie let her go, but she sighed as she stood. She kicked off the offending heels, having enough of them for one day. She’d put all the proper pieces together again tomorrow, even though it was Friday, and she’d go into the office where she worked alone.

  She was so tired of being alone. She didn’t want to be the only one in charge of Autumn, or the house, the yard, Thumper, the car, all of it. The weight of that responsibility crushed her, and she wished James had not left Sweet Water Falls.

  At the same time, she couldn’t help thinking that if he hadn’t, she wouldn’t be as ready or as excited to go out with Lee Cooper as she was.

  With a jolt, she turned back to the house. She didn’t have time to stand around in the yard and contemplate her life. She had a hot date with a handsome cowboy to get ready for.

  “I don’t know how late,” Rosalie said, giving her friend and neighbor a smile. “I brought her pajamas, but she can honestly just stay in the costume.” She smiled at her daughter, who’d run right over to Tess’s five-year-old, Baylor. He wore a superhero costume, and no one in the house seemed to think adding a penguin to the mix was a problem.

  Gratitude for that, for Tess always saying yes whenever Rosalie asked her to babysit Autumn, and for all she had swept through her.

  “Who are you going out with?” Tess asked.

  Rosalie swallowed, not sure why she didn’t want to say Lee’s name. At the same time, she knew exactly why. Tess was a stay-at-home mom who got together with a lot of other stay-at-home moms. They talked. They fueled the rumor mill in a small town like Sweet Water Falls, and she didn’t want to be the subject of it.

  “Uh, can I tell you after? Maybe it’ll be terrible.” She smiled as if she really expected the forthcoming date to be simply awful. Besides, all Tess had to do was stand at her front window and watch to see who pulled into Rosalie’s driveway in only ten minutes. Then she’d know. Then the whole town would know.

  Panic poured through Rosalie. She needed to cancel this date. At the very least, she needed to call Lee and tell him she’d meet him somewhere. Anywhere but her front porch.

  Tess gave her a sympathetic smile. “Sure, hon. You tell me after.” A crash sounded in the kitchen, and Tess’s attention got diverted in that direction. “Benji!” she yelled, already hurrying toward the white cloud of flour as it lifted high enough to be seen over the countertop. “I told you to stay out of that flour!”

  Rosalie took that as her cue to leave, and she quickly slipped out the front door while Autumn was playing happily with her best friend. She’d already kissed her, as well as given her explicit instructions to listen to Tess and her husband Frank, and to go to bed on time. They had to be at the office in the morning, and if she didn’t go to bed on time, she couldn’t come with her.

  Autumn loved coming to the office with Rosalie, so she didn’t expect any problems. She crossed the lawn between their two houses and hurried inside. She still had to feed Thumper, who stomped his foot at her angrily for leaving for five minutes.

  “I know, bud,” she said to him. “Your turn. I’ll leave the light on for you tonight. Don’t worry.” The rabbit didn’t like being left home alone, and certainly not in the dark. He refused to go in a cage, and Rosalie had often wanted to install a video camera so she could see what the bunny did in her absence. He wasn’t a killer rabbit or anything, and he didn’t chew shoes or furniture. She honestly thought he probably hippity-hopped into Autumn’s room and took a nap on her bean bag.

  She opened the fridge, sure she had some carrots and celery for the rabbit. As she opened the produce drawer, she knew there wasn’t anything inside. “What happened?” she asked. She’d hurried inside after Autumn and found the girl wrestling with her penguin costume. Charity had already gone.

  Once her daughter was ready, Rosalie had taken her into her bedroom and put a movie on for her, and Autumn had snuggled into her bed to watch it while Rosalie proceeded to try on several different combinations of clothing. This jacket with those jeans? These slacks with that blouse?

  In the end, she’d settled on an animal print faux wrap-around dress that showed her wild side. Rosalie didn’t really have one of those, but she sure did like a fake leopard print, especially when the spots came in a deep navy blue and not black.

  She hadn’t eaten, but she’d fed Autumn a peanut butter and honey sandwich and a cut-up apple. She stepped back from the fridge and looked in the sink, finding the remains of a veggie bowl there. “Did you already get fed?” she asked the rabbit.

  He stomped quite vehemently that he had not. So Autumn had had the baby carrots with ranch, as was now drying in the sink. Rosalie sighed, but she couldn’t be angry with Charity or Autumn for eating vegetables.

  She simply didn’t have anything to feed Thumper, and she couldn’t just leave him. “I’ll see what I have in the pantry,” she said, yanking open the door at the same time the doorbell rang.

  Thumper stomped three times in a row in quick succession, almost like he was the one standing on the front porch knocking. Rosalie turned that way, her mind clearing of every other thought.

  Lee was here.

  An alarm on her phone chimed, and sure enough, the hour had struck six-thirty. She hurried toward the door, her first inclination to remove the gate so he could come in. At the very least, she wouldn’t have to step over the gate in her knee-high skirt. Humiliation filled her at the thought. She really should’ve arranged to meet him somewhere. Everything seemed to be tilting sideways tonight, and if this date went bad, she didn’t want it to be her fault.

  She opened the door, and she wasn’t surprised to find Lee standing there. He wore the exact same clothes as before, but now he held a couple of items in his hands.

  “Howdy,” he said, quite pleasantly too. He lifted a box of candy. “I had some help at the grocery store, and someone told me your daughter likes lemon drops.”

  Rosalie’s eyes traveled to the yellow box of candy, a brand-new door in her heart opening wide. It was just big enough for this cowboy to walk through.

  He lifted the other hand, which held a plastic grocery sack. “And a little birdie told me that you had a…wily rabbit who might like these things.”

  Rosalie almost burst into tears. She took the bag from him, still trying to control her emotions. He’d brought the perfect gifts—not flowers, or chocolate, or stuffed animals, but cabbage, carrot tops, and red leaf lettuce.

  She looked up, wonder running through her. Whoever he’d run into at the store was her guardian angel. Or else Lee Cooper was.

  “Can I come in?” he asked, and Rosalie stepped back, her mouth still unable to form words.

  5

  Lee couldn’t describe how he felt as he lifted his leg and stepped over the knee-high gate keeping him from Rosalie. Shiny, maybe. It was almost like light beamed from him—his smile, his eyes, his very soul—as she stepped back to make room for him in the aisle she’d made between the wall and the couch she’d placed facing into the living room.

  He’d never been happier to run into Karyn Harlow at the organic grocery store. He didn’t even care that the baby carrots had cost twice as much as he ever would’ve paid. Seeing the wonder and gratitude on Rosalie’s face had been worth every penny.

  “Just in here?” he asked, moving past her and toward the kitchen at the back of the house. Her home smelled like powder and perfume, and Lee ducked his head and smiled to himself. That wasn’t her house. That was her, and he sure did like it. He liked the scent of her a whole lot.

  His heartbeat scampered through his whole body, but he managed to lift the veggies to the counter just as something thumped loudly to the right and behind him. Surprise tugged at him, but he turned and looked.

  A white rabbit sat right at the end of the hallway. Anyone who hadn’t run into Karyn would’ve thought it was the cutest little family pet. His little pink nose wiggled, and Lee wondered if rabbits were like dogs. Could he smell the cabbage?

  Lee chuckled and tugged the head of greenery free from the bag. “Do you just chop it up, or…?” He glanced over to Rosalie, who’d come a little closer to him. She currently pressed her palms together, a nervous look on her face.

  That gave him pause, but she wiped all of her emotions away in the next moment, her brilliant, professional smile appearing on her face. “Sure,” she said, finally speaking. “I can do it.”

  “I know how to chop things,” he said smoothly, a blip of irritation firing through him. He turned in his cowboy boots, looking for a knife block next to the stove. Rosalie had set up her kitchen like most people, and he pulled the large chopping knife from the wood smoothly.

  She bent and pulled something from a lower cabinet, then set the cutting board on the counter next to his unpacked vegetables. “You cook?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he said, trying to decide how much to tell her. Lee didn’t like putting too much out there too soon, which was why he’d preferred the online dating apps in the past. “Every Wednesday for my whole family, actually.” He gave her a ghost of a grin and sliced off a huge chunk of cabbage. “How much do you feed him?”

  With her standing so close, that sexy dress hugging her waist and curves, Lee could hardly think. The dark blue leopard spots sat against a cream background, and she wore a pair of off-white sandals on her feet. She made his mouth water, and he couldn’t think about anything but dropping the knife and taking her into his arms.

  The rabbit stomped again, sending three loud booms through the house. Rosalie giggled—another kick to his defenses—and moved behind him. “Thumper, knock it off. You’re being rude. He’s making your dinner.”

  “Thumper,” he repeated. “Sounds like the perfect name for him.”

  “Autumn named him,” she said. “His full name is The USS Thumper, but she allows us to call him by Thumper.”

  “Like a ship?” Lee made quick work of the cabbage and carrots, still not sure how much to make for the rabbit. He did seem unusually large, and Rosalie didn’t frown or complain when Lee slid everything into a big bowl he’d found in a cupboard beside the fridge.

  “Yes,” Rosalie said, placing the bowl on the floor for Thumper right where he sat. She straightened, her eyes blazing out dark fire as she met Lee’s. “Her father is in the Navy.”

  “Ah.” Lee nodded and watched the rabbit chow down a long string of cabbage. He nodded to the lemon drops. “Well, those are for your daughter. I have something for you in the truck.”

  The fire turned into dancing lights. “Is that right?” Rosalie took a step toward him, seeming to realize as she did that maybe she didn’t want to. She halted after the single movement, and Lee really didn’t want tonight to be stilted.

  He cleared his throat, so many things running through his mind. He didn’t normally just let words come out he hadn’t thought about thoroughly. “Rosalie,” he said, reaching out one hand. She moved toward him then and slid her fingers between his. He watched as their hands joined, something kicking and screaming and firing through him.

  Nerves. Desire. Fear.

  He looked up at her, seeing all the same things in her expression too. “You’re not going to be the CEO tonight, are you?”

  She blinked those long lashes at him, confusion running through her eyes now. “What?”

  “Earlier, a minute ago,” he said. “You seemed real…nervous, and then you just wiped it away like it was nothing.” His brain told him to stop talking, and stop talking right now. Instead of listening to the very rational side of himself, he kept going. “I’m nervous too, but I don’t want to go if it’s not going to just be…real.”

  Rosalie started to tug her fingers back, but Lee held onto them. She stilled. The air quieted as the air conditioner in her house switched off. Even Thumper had taken a break from his feast.

  “I’m a little nervous,” Rosalie said. “I haven’t been out with anyone since the divorce.”

  Lee nodded, a smile creeping its way across his mouth. “I’ve seen you polished and perfect, Rosalie. You’re flawless. Tonight, I want to go past that.” He brought his gaze back to hers. “Do you still want to go? I’ve got reservations at Montague’s.”

  Her eyebrows went up. “You do? How did you manage that?”

  He grinned fully at her. “My sister has some connections.” Cherry really had come through for him. Karyn had too. Lee felt like the Lord had stitched everything together just right for tonight, except for maybe Lee himself.

  “Flawless, huh?” she asked as if seriously considering canceling on him. Lee could see she wouldn’t. She’d taken great care with her clothes, her hair, her makeup. She wanted to be flawless, and he stopped himself just in time from thinking she’d done so for him. She probably felt more confident when she wore her hair back on the sides the way she did and put on just the right dusting of pink powder on her cheeks.

  “Perfectly flawless,” he confirmed.

  Rosalie tilted her head and stepped toward him, turning at the same time. She linked her arm through his. “All right, Mister Cooper. I suppose I can stomach dinner at Montague’s with you if I’m flawless.”

  Lee continued to shine as he walked with her toward the front door, because she hadn’t sneered out the word Mister this time. In fact, it sure seemed like this woman was flirting with him. Lee had been out of the real dating pool for a while, so he wasn’t going to jump into the deep end yet. He was simply going to beam sunshine from every pore in his body.

  They both stepped over the gate, and Rosalie pushed the door closed behind her. “What about you?” she asked, sliding her hand along his forearm and sending shivers down his hip and into his leg from her touch. “Have you dated a lot in the past six years?”

  “No ma’am,” he said. “I wouldn’t say a lot.”

  “What would you say?”

  Lee exhaled as he went down the steps. Free from the roof over the porch, he looked up into the brilliant Texas sky, evening still a ways off as summer came closer and closer.

  “I’d say I’ve struck out,” he said. They continued toward the truck, and Lee saw all of her imperfections as they approached. He’d never minded, but he suddenly wanted a golden chariot to escort Rosalie everywhere.

  She didn’t say anything as they rounded the hood. Not until he’d opened her door for her and stepped back did she even look at him. “I’m not sure what you mean by struck out.”

  “I mean, I’ve been out with three women in the past six years,” he said. “And every relationship was a disaster.”

  “Three women in six years?”

  Lee ducked his head. “Well, Rosalie,” he said, trying to think of something funny and flirty. He was probably going to fail spectacularly. “We can’t all be flawless, and we don’t all regularly get out into schools to meet surly cowboys who won’t clap for us after a perfect presentation.” He looked up, his hope soaring toward heaven.

  Her smile already sat on her face, and she reached one hand to slide along the side of his jaw. “You’re not surly,” she said.

  “I assure you, I am.” Perhaps he shouldn’t take her to dinner tonight. Someone was bound to have some problem he’d have to deal with, which would absolutely put him in a foul mood. He couldn’t hide how he felt very well, and most of the time, he didn’t even try.

  “I would’ve said handsome,” she said. “There’s a reason I noticed you weren’t clapping. Have you thought about what that was?”

  “No ma’am,” he whispered, his skin burning with her touch. Her fingertips touched his earlobe, and Lee wanted to lean into her hand with everything he had. He fought against that movement and stayed very still.

  “Hmm.” Rosalie pulled her hand back and stepped to get into the truck. Lee closed the door behind her, released the breath he’d been holding, and told himself not to mess up this date as he went to get behind the wheel.

  Over and over and over, he begged the Lord to, “Please help me tonight,” he murmured at the tailgate. “Please.”

  He managed to curtail his pleas before he got in the truck, and he gave the old girl a pat the way he always did. She started right up, which was why Lee didn’t much care to get a new one. He was comfortable in this truck, despite the rusting spots and the boxier shape compared to other pickups.

  “Did you just give your vehicle a little pat?” Rosalie asked.

  Lee’s face burned, and he focused on flipping the gear shift into reverse. “Maybe.”

  “Does she have a name too?” The woman was teasing him. Teasing.

  Lee had no idea what to do with that. “No,” he said, reaching the road and getting them moving in the direction of Montague’s. “Do you name your cars?”

  “I did when I was in high school,” she said airily, as if all girls of such an age did such a thing. Lee wouldn’t know. He’d worked the farm six hours a day in high school, on top of everything he had going on academically. “I had a cute little two-door sedan we named Peanuts.”

  “We?” Lee asked.

  “My sister and I,” Rosalie said, her voice turning a bit quiet as she looked out her side window. “Her name is Natasha. She and my mother are coming to visit this weekend.”

  “You were texting with her earlier,” Lee said. He hadn’t gotten any information about her family from Karyn. Only the bit about the lemon drops and the angry rabbit who liked to bolt the moment the front door opened.

  “Oh,” he said before Rosalie could respond. “Your present is sittin’ right there.” He kept both hands on the wheel as he nodded with the brim of his hat toward the package on the seat between them. When he’d dated Martha, she’d scoot all the way over and ride with her thigh pressed against his. Lee wondered if Rosalie could scoot in her dress, and even if she could, if she’d want to sit so close to him.