She’s pretty amazing. Even if she does dye her hair pink. Raine mixed a special color just for her. I have to say, it works for Ava. Her natural hair is light brown, and her eyes are a searing blue that she got from her mother, Ruby Steel.
She’s gorgeous. But she was never homecoming queen. The only Steel woman not to make it her year. Well, that’s not exactly true. Gina, Angie, and Sage weren’t queen either, but they were homecoming attendants. Brianna Steel was the queen their year. They couldn’t all be queen, and four Steel women graduated that year, along with my sister Maddie, who was the fourth attendant.
The real reason Ava Steel wasn’t the homecoming queen is because she refused to compete.
She’s definitely her own person.
“Hey, Maya,” Brock says as we enter the bakery. “Is my cousin around?”
Maya wipes her hands on her apron. “In the back. You want me to get her?”
“Only if she’s not too busy.”
“Not a problem. What can I get you two?”
“I’ll have the Brock, of course.”
I smile. All Ava’s sandwiches are named after family members.
“How about you, Rory?”
“I think I’ll have the Jade.”
The sandwich named after Donny’s mother is a grilled cheese with tomato, one of my personal favorites.
“Make that on sourdough, please,” I add.
“You got it. I’ll get you some waters, too.”
“Thanks.” Brock leads me to a vacant table.
“So what are you up to today?” he asks. “You have any lessons this afternoon?”
“No, I’m done for the day.” I check my watch quickly. It’s already after one o’clock. “How did you know where I was?”
“Your car was parked in the back, so I went up to the studio, but you weren’t there. No one was waiting out in the hallway for their kid for a lesson, so I came back down and then I saw you through the window of the salon. I figured I’d stand by your car and wait for you.”
“What if I was getting my hair done?”
“Nice try. Willow hasn’t opened yet.”
“Maybe she opened for me. Privately.”
He smiles, shakes his head, and then reaches across the table and grabs one of my hands.
Something smolders within me at his touch.
It’s scary.
And also…not so scary.
“I was wondering,” he says. “Would you like to go out with me sometime?”
“Isn’t that what we’re doing now?”
He laughs then. A Steel laugh. One of those laughs that just jumps up from the belly and rings out like joyous bells. “This is lunch. This is not the Brock Steel experience.”
I can’t help a soft chuckle. “There’s a Brock Steel experience?”
“Rory, for you? There’s definitely a Brock Steel experience.”
My cheeks are warming, and I’m not sure I appreciate what my body is doing. It’s rebelling against me. It’s showing Brock Steel how attractive I find him.
Then I laugh. I really laugh. From embarrassment? Nerves? Who knows?
“You find that funny?”
“No. I mean, yeah. I do find it kind of funny. But I get it. You’re Brock Steel. All the Steels are magnificent looking, and you’re at the top of the heap. Of course there’s a Brock Steel experience.”
He quirks his lips upward. My God, he’s sexy.
“Top of the heap, huh? You should understand what that’s like.”
Man, this guy has an ego the size of Texas. “I should understand that?”
“Rory Pike is the most beautiful woman in Snow Creek. Everyone knows it. And it’s not just your gorgeous face and hair. But that body…” He shakes his head, licks his lips.
Yeah, and this is the guy I want to father my child? Granted, he’d be beautiful. He’d also be maddeningly annoying.
“So you get it,” he continues. “When two attractive people like us meet, fireworks explode in the sky.”
“First of all, we met a long time ago.”
“Yeah, but you were always with someone, and so was I.”
This time I let out a huge laugh. “Since when have you ever been with anyone, Brock? You flit from one woman to the next like they’re shots of tequila laid out on the bar.”
“Let me be honest with you,” he says.
“You mean you haven’t been honest up to now?”
He shoves an unruly tress of hair behind his ear. “You don’t even give a guy a chance, do you, Rory? But you know what?”
“I notice you didn’t deny my women-like-shots-of-tequila comment.”
“Why should I? I’m an honest guy. I like women.”
“So do I,” I can’t help adding.
“Yeah. You do. But you also like men.”
“Guilty.” I take a sip of the water that Maya just set in front of me.
“I have to tell you,” he says. “There’s some shit going down in my family.”
“Mine too,” I say.
He lifts his eyebrows. “There is?”
“Hasn’t Donny filled you in?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Callie probably asked him not to.”
“Then he definitely wouldn’t. My cousin is a man of his word. We all are.”
His tone is sincere. Very sincere. And I get it. Brock Steel may be a total womanizer, but he’s also a good man.