“That doesn’t sound like him.”

  “Yeah, I know. He’s usually more confident than that. But even when I’ve tried to look up specific details about how safe Ferris wheels are, to help reassure him, he doesn’t want to hear it. He says even thinking about that kind of thing just makes him that much more freaked out.”

  “Well, we better get you on that wheel while we have the chance,” Mac said. “Come on.”

  “What about Peanut?”

  “What?”

  El pointed to the stuffed puppy.

  “His name is Peanut?”

  “He’s my dog. I can name him what I want.”

  Mac laughed. “I’m sure the ride operator will hold on to him for us while we take a spin. Let’s go check it out.”

  But they didn’t make it to the Ferris wheel. “El!” a familiar voice called, and El turned to see Jeff and Marilyn walking across the midway toward them, their two older kids in tow.

  She blinked. “Jeff? What are you doing here?”

  “That’s the greeting I get? Your own brother?”

  “I’m glad to see you guys, of course,” she said. “But I wouldn’t have expected you to want to travel so soon after having the baby — wait, where is he? You didn’t lose him, did you?”

  Jeff laughed. “Marilyn’s parents are watching Jace for the weekend,” he said. “We wanted to get away, and the state fair was in town.”

  “Not even your own state fair.”

  Jeff shrugged. “Everything’s bigger in Texas. Plus we figured we’d come see you and Mac tomorrow. Nice dog,” he said, looking up at the stuffed animal. “You win that at balloon darts?”

  “He’s a natural,” El laughed. “We were just about to go check out the Ferris wheel.”

  “How about another round of balloon darts for the kids first?” Jeff grabbed Mac’s forearm, leaned in, and murmured, “Get them small prizes. I don’t want to haul one of those massive things around.”

  Mac chuckled. “You got it.”

  El started to follow them back over to the games, but Jeff stopped her. “Walk with me,” he said, his voice low. “I want to talk to you.”

  Concerned, El followed her brother.

  CHAPTER 11

  EL

  “All right,” Jeff said. “Talk to me, El. What’s going on?”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “I mean, we were going to drop by the ranch tomorrow to visit you two. We had no idea you were going to be at the fair. What are you doing here?”

  “We’re just having a little fun,” El said, bewildered. “You didn’t think I was going to be working round the clock, did you? Is that what this is about?”

  “Of course I didn’t think that,” Jeff said. “But I also didn’t expect to come down here and find you two on a date.”

  “Oh my God.” El burst out laughing. The laugh sounded false to her own ears. She had been thinking of it in those terms herself, of course — Jeff was right on the nose. Still, she tried to protest. “It’s not a date. It’s just a night off.”

  “Right, okay,” Jeff said. “You guys drove all the way from Boldsprings together for a random night off at the state fair, where he went on to win you one of the biggest prizes at any of the game booths — I mean, what are you even going to do with that thing?”

  “I’ll put it in my room. What’s the big deal, Jeff? It’s just a stuffed dog.”

  “It’s too big to fit through the door of your room!”

  “Don’t exaggerate. What’s your problem, anyway? You don’t want us to have fun?”

  “See, even the fact that you’re being this defensive about it tells me that you know what I’m talking about.” He fixed her with a gaze. “You have feelings for him, don’t you?”

  El groaned. Her brother had always been able to see right through her. “They’re not feelings,” she said. “He’s just… fun. Good-looking. A distraction.”

  “A distraction?”

  “I haven’t dated anyone since Dean,” she said, blushing a little. “It’s nice to get out.”

  “You’re not still hung up on Dean, are you?”

  “God, no. Getting rid of him was probably the best decision I ever made. But I haven’t felt like getting back out there. You know that.”

  “I do know,” he agreed. “I’ve wanted you to. I thought it would probably help you. But I never wanted to push.”

  “Yeah, you were right not to,” she said. “I don’t know if I was ready. I still don’t know that I am, really — are you annoyed that I’m having fun with Mac?” She felt anxious, suddenly. She hadn’t thought about this. Mac was a good friend of Jeff’s, after all, and if for some reason things went sour between her and Mac, Jeff would be forced to take a side. “I don’t think Mac is taking it seriously,” she added quickly. “You don’t need to worry.”

  “I’m not worried about him,” Jeff said. “I’m worried about you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve never seen Mac take a woman seriously in all the time I’ve known him. I don’t know if he’s even capable of getting his heart broken. But you… well, you’re different.”

  “Don’t treat me as if I’m made of glass,” she warned him.

  “That’s not what I’m doing at all. I know how strong you are, El, believe me. I saw you pull through that Dean thing. Hell, you were the one who ended that. That took guts. I know you’re strong, don’t worry about that.”

  “Then what is all this about?”

  “Even strong people can get hurt,” he said. “And I don’t want to see that happen to you, El. I love Mac. He’s my oldest friend. But I have never seen him take a relationship seriously, and I just don’t want to see you invest too much in him. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “I’m not going to get hurt,” she said. “We’re just colleagues blowing off a little steam together. It’s no big deal.”

  “Except that you’re flirting.”

  “Jeff, I’m not flirting,” El said.

  “I saw you from across the midway, batting your eyes at him. Flipping your hair.”

  She felt herself blushing. “Look, it’s just fun not to think too hard. There’s nothing serious between us.”

  “As long as that’s the way you both feel about it,” Jeff said.

  “You were never like this,” El said. “Not even when I was a kid and you didn’t like my boyfriends.”

  “Yeah, well, I figured you’d make your own mistakes. I don’t want to be overprotective.”

  “But you don’t feel that way now?”

  “Not when it comes to Mac. I’ve watched that guy break too many hearts to stand back and let yours be the next one. I’m just saying this because I care about you, El.”

  El nodded. “You don’t have to worry,” she said. “I appreciate what you’re doing here, Jeff. But my heart isn’t on the line. I’m not falling in love with Mac. It just feels good to flirt a little. I guess he’s not the only one who needed to get back on the horse.”

  Jeff chuckled. “All right, all right,” he said. “I trust you. I just wouldn’t be much of a big brother if I didn’t at least check in on you about this.”

  “I get it,” El said. “And I do appreciate it, Jeff. Don’t worry. I’m being careful.”

  But as the two of them walked over to rejoin Mac, Marilyn, and the kids, El found herself wondering whether Jeff might not have reasonable cause to be worried.

  I’m not in love, she told herself as she watched Mac step up to a food truck to buy cotton candies for the kids and cups of beer for the adults. And she knew it was true. It would be ridiculous to say that what she felt for Mac was love.

  But she did feel something. That was also true. And it was getting hard to ignore, much as she might have liked to.

  It was no longer just the fact that he was handsome enough to be on the cover of a magazine — although that fact certainly wasn’t helping her to keep her cool. But the more she got to know him, the more she found herself caring about him. She had been moved by the way he’d admitted to his frustrations with people pressuring him toward retirement. He probably hadn’t meant to be understood as well as he had been, but she could see that he was afraid of losing something he considered foundational to his identity, and she found that relatable. She was also impressed with the way he’d acted after their argument. Although it was disappointing that he had pressured her into answering his question in the first place, she respected the fact that he had realized he was wrong and had come to her to apologize. Dean wouldn’t have done that.

  But even with all of that, she hadn’t truly come to feel anything for him until tonight at the fair. It was watching him throw the darts to win her that stuffed animal that had done it. She’d seen a side of him that she had never known existed. He was usually so serious and somber, but tonight he had been relaxed and easygoing, almost playful. It had changed what she thought of him, and for the first time, she had been able to imagine what it might be like to actually be with him.

  Or rather, she thought as Jeff handed her her beer, she hadn’t been able to stop herself from imagining it. It was a vision she’d been trying to avoid since she’d come to Texas, because it wasn’t something that was going to happen. All else aside, she wasn’t going to be here permanently. This was a temporary thing.

  So Jeff was right. Flirting was fine. Having a little fun was fine. But she needed to stay on top of her own feelings. She needed to make sure this didn’t go too far. Because she didn’t want to get hurt again — he was right about that too.

  “Jeff,” Marilyn said, “the kids want to go on some rides.”

  “What rides?”

  Mac shot a glance at the Ferris wheel and a smirk crossed his face. El jabbed him in the side with her elbow. If he told Jeff she’d been making fun of his fear of Ferris wheels, she was going to give him hell later.

  “I don’t know,” Marilyn said. “I think they’re just hyper because of all the flashing lights. Can you take them on some of the rides, please?”

  “Yeah, okay,” Jeff said. He glanced at El and Mac. “Unless you two wanted to do it?”

  “We’ll let you take this one,” El said with a laugh. “Mac and I were going to check out the Ferris wheel before we ran into you, so maybe we’ll go do that.”

  Jeff gave her a swift, stern look, but he said nothing — of course he wouldn’t in front of everyone. “All right,” he said, keeping his tone measured. “Why don’t you two go do that, then, and we’ll meet you in twenty minutes in front of the tent where the band is playing — how does that sound?”

  “Sounds good to me,” Mac said, but El noticed that he was standing a bit farther away from her than he had at any other time during their evening at the fair. It made perfect sense to her, of course; Mac must be trying to prevent Jeff from seeing that there had been any sort of tension between the two of them. It was strange, but the distance he was keeping only confirmed to El that he had actually felt it just as much as she had.

  They separated, and Mac and El headed back to the Ferris wheel. For several moments, neither of them spoke.

  It was Mac who finally broke the silence. “Was he looking at me strangely?”

  “He might’ve been,” El admitted. “I guess he’s a little taken aback about running into the two of us here. To be fair, I’m surprised to see him too. I would’ve thought he would tell me if he was coming for a visit — but I guess he wanted it to be a surprise.”

  “Sure,” Mac agreed. “I can understand that. He looked kind of annoyed, though.”

  “He’s not annoyed,” El lied. The truth was that she thought Mac probably had the right idea. Jeff probably was annoyed by the whole situation. But nobody had overstepped their bounds. She wasn’t about to start feeling guilty for spending time with the only person she knew in Texas just because it made her brother a little anxious.

  Nothing bad was going to happen. It was just a day at the fair, that was all.

  “So,” she said. “Are we doing this Ferris wheel thing?”

  “Oh, definitely,” Mac said.

  They approached the ride. El reached for her wallet to buy a ticket, but Mac waved her off. “I’ll get it.”

  “No,” she said. “You won the puppy for me. Let me buy us our ride tickets.”

  “Well, when you put it like that…” He grinned.

  El pulled out a ten-dollar bill to pay for two rides. As she handed it over, she couldn’t help observing that the whole thing had just been made that much more date-like. And the way he’d smiled at her when she’d offered to buy his ticket… yeah, that had definitely kicked up a whole flock of butterflies in her stomach.

  The Ferris wheel ground to a halt and the ride operator ushered them aboard. They took their seats, side by side, so close that their thighs were pressing together, and then they were up and away.

  CHAPTER 12

  EL

  As the Ferris wheel swept them upward and they left the ground behind, El felt as if her problems were falling away beneath her too. What did it matter, really, what Jeff thought about the fact that she was here with Mac?

  Unfortunately, being alone with him at the top of the world like this only opened the door to a whole new set of problems.

  Why on earth had she chosen to sit down so close to him? There was a whole foot of space on her other side, but she could hardly slide over now. She’d have had to stand up to do it, and the lap bar was holding her too securely in place. She glanced over at Mac to see whether he had left a similar space on his other side — whether he was sitting so close by choice, or whether she was the only one who had moved toward the center of their little seat. The perspective made it impossible to be sure.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Mac asked quietly.

  She followed his gaze. He was looking out over the fairgrounds. From up here, it was all blurred lights and shadows. You couldn’t see the trash on the ground or hear the ringing of the carnival games. “It is,” she agreed.

  “It’s enough to make me wish that the fair was in town year-round,” he confessed.

  “You don’t really strike me as the type to spend a whole lot of time at a fair,” El said. “But then, what do I know? I didn’t think you were the type who would want to come to one tonight, either. I feel like I’m learning a lot about you.”

  “Oh, I don’t know if I’d come or not,” he said. “It’s more about the possibility of it. Do you know what I mean? It’s about knowing it’s here, and that I could come, if I wanted to.”

  “I think I do know what you mean,” she murmured, wondering whether either one of them was really talking about the fair. She suspected not. There were a lot of things she thought seemed a lot more possible, in this moment, than they had in a long time. And like the fair, the moment they were in right now was going to end. The Ferris wheel would swoop back down to the ground and drop them back in the reality of their lives—

  It came to a halt. They were sitting at the very top, completely isolated from the rest of the world.

  “Letting more people on,” Mac murmured.

  El looked down. It looked as if one of the passengers who was being brought on board was transitioning out of a wheelchair. “I think we might be here for a while,” she said.

  “Good,” Mac said.

  He didn’t elaborate, leaving El to wonder what he’d meant by that. Was he just saying he liked it when Ferris wheels stopped at the top like this?

  Did he mean he liked it this time specifically, because it was with her?

  She thought about edging closer to the side of the seat, trying to put a little more distance between them. But there was no way to move without calling attention to how close they had been in the first place, and anyway, she didn’t really want to. The places they were touching felt energized. Supercharged. It was like lightning was passing between them. She had no desire to put an end to that feeling.

  The seat rocked gently back and forth in the wind.

  “I think I know what Jeff’s problem is,” Mac said suddenly.

  “Do you?” She wondered if that was possible. Could Jeff have talked to him about it too? She hadn’t seen the two of them go off together, but then, she supposed anything could have happened. Jeff could have texted him. Maybe Marilyn had even said something.

  “He’s the one who suggested you coming here,” Mac said. “But now he’s feeling weird about it, isn’t he?”

  “I think so,” El agreed.

  She felt a twist in her gut at the admission. Talking about it like this felt like choosing a side, like saying her loyalty was to Mac rather than to Jeff. They’re not on opposite sides, she reminded herself. No one was asking her to pick one of them over the other. But even so…

  “This has happened before,” Mac said.

  “What do you mean?”

  He hesitated, gazing out over the fairgrounds, and she could tell he was debating whether or not to elaborate. “When we were in high school,” he said at last. “My prom date was a good friend of his, and he got upset about it. At the time, I wrote the whole thing off. I told myself he was just jealous, and that if he was interested in her he should have asked her out first.”

  “I’ve never known Jeff to get jealous,” El said.

  “No, I don’t think that was it either,” Mac said. “Jeff goes for what he wants. He was afraid I was going to break his friend’s heart.” He glanced at El. “He thinks I’m going to do that to you.”

  El’s heart raced. “Which is ridiculous,” she said, hoping that he couldn’t hear the tremor in her voice. “I’m not your prom date. I’m your ranch hand.”

  “Right,” Mac agreed. “Exactly.”

  “Jeff’s always been protective,” El said. “I think it’s because he’s so much older than I am. He sees himself almost as a parent figure to me.”

  “I remember him being pretty fired up when you had your first boyfriend,” Mac agreed. “Or maybe it wasn’t your first boyfriend. I don’t know. That guy you were dating in high school. Steve something.”