4
Spur decided Olli had called one of his brothers and asked them all of his favorite things. A face mostly without makeup. Check. Subdued colors. Check. The scent of crisp linen and something citrusy. Check. Heck, the woman even had horses on her blouse.
Every single thing about her called to Spur, and he had no idea what to do about it. He’d spent most of the day wondering why he’d never done anything about his feelings in the past, and he cursed—and praised—those silly sheep for bringing this date to fruition.
He opened Olli’s door for her and held it while she used the runners on his truck to get to her seat. She even did that with a delicate femininity that had Spur wanting to put his hand on the small of her back or her waist to steady her.
He managed to keep his hands to himself, because that touch-barrier hadn’t been broken yet. She’d flipped his tie slightly, but there’d been no skin-to-skin contact. Spur closed the door and swallowed, his mind racing ahead through that night. He’d hold her hand. Laugh with her. Put his arm around her…
Maybe, he sternly told himself as he went around to the driver’s seat. So much a maybe.
If he did all that, he’d be playing his real hand. This was supposed to be a friendly date where they got to know one another so they could pull the wool over someone’s eyes. Friendly, he reminded himself.
Annoyed with himself for having to remind himself of what was really happening here, and the fact that he’d used a sheep metaphor in that reminder, he got behind the wheel and looked at Olli. “Is Six Stars okay?”
She looked at him, excitement in her eyes. “Spur Chappell, do you dance?”
A chuckle flowed from his mouth as easily as breathing. Everything about being with Olli was easy, and he couldn’t believe he’d missed that too. He also really liked his full name in her soft, Southern drawl.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, ducking his head and starting the truck. “My momma taught all of us boys. Said it was a life lesson a man ought to be able to do.”
“Well, I’ll be,” Olli said with a smile. “I like your mother more already. Six Stars is great.” She laughed, and Spur liked the sound of that too. Surely there would be something about Olli he wouldn’t like, and he thought of Katie as he pulled around the circle drive in front of Olli’s house.
“She’s a character, my mother,” Spur said, his mind working overtime. “Listen, uh, I just found out about a family picnic this weekend. I was thinking…” He couldn’t quite finish, because he’d been thinking so dang much that his thoughts had started to cross. He went to the end of her driveway and turned toward the highway that led into town.
They lived in a sprawling, small town in the Lexington hills, and Spur had loved growing up in Horse Country, specifically Dreamsville. The town was founded by the three Dreams brothers, and there were descendants of the family still living there.
Spur wasn’t particularly romantic, but he felt like dreams really did come true in Dreamsville, and while he traveled somewhat for his job, he always loved coming back home.
He reached to adjust the volume on the radio, one of the classic Garth Brooks songs coming on. No sooner had he pulled his hand back than Olli stretched out and lowered the volume again. “You were thinking what?” she asked, peering at him more closely now.
Spur shifted in his seat as he looked past her to see if there was any oncoming traffic. “What did I say?”
“You said you found out about a family picnic this weekend, and you were thinking—dot, dot, dot.”
He liked that she hadn’t just let him off the hook. At the same time, that blasted hook had lodged in his throat, and he couldn’t spit out the words. He made the turn and told himself to stop acting like he was twenty years old. He was most decidedly not twenty, and he could just say what was on his mind.
“I thought we should go,” he said.
“Together?” Olli asked.
Spur hated the surprise in her voice. He hated it so much that he frowned at her. “We’ll have all this week to get to know each other. Get our story straight. Your guy is coming in a couple of weeks, right?” He barely glanced at her, though this long stretch of road didn’t require much attention from him.
“Yes,” she said.
Spur shrugged, hoping to play this off as nothing. If she’d reacted differently, he might be spilling his guts right now. “Well, my mother is extraordinarily good at seeing things she shouldn’t. I figured the picnic might be a great dry run for us. You know, a halfway point, to see if we can come off as a convincing, committed couple.”
He looked out his window as the Dixon Ranch came up on his left. They ran an amazing operation too, and Spur had a lot of respect for Bethany Dixon and all she’d done since her husband’s death two or three years ago. Spur had used the idea of her and her ranch many times to keep his cool about things happening—or not happening—at the Bluegrass Ranch. He told himself that if she could produce champion horses with just herself and a half-dozen cowboys, he certainly could with just himself and his seven brothers.
They had a lot more help than that at Bluegrass, but it was also ten times the size of Dixon.
“A trial run,” Olli mused, and Spur pulled himself back to the present. “It’s not a terrible idea.”
“Thanks,” he said dryly.
Olli giggled, and though he knew she was in her forties, he wasn’t sure which number came after that initial four. “I remember Ginny Winters decorating your whole place with black balloons and streamers and all that a few years ago,” he said. “I can’t recall exactly how many.”
“Mister Chappell, are you asking me how old I am?”