His father chuckled, then coughed. “Too damn long. But I raised you to be smarter than me.” His dad slapped him on the shoulder as he stood up. “Don’t be an idiot like I was and waste half your life building up the courage to ask the woman out.” His father glanced out over the field. “You never know how long you got.”
His father walked inside, leaving him sitting on the porch with the dogs, wishing he really was smarter than his old man.
ChapterThree
The following day, Kara woke with a start when she heard pounding outside. She lay there for a moment thinking she’d dreamed the noise, then she heard a drill and jumped out of bed.
Without thinking, she rushed to the front door and yanked it open to see Nick kneeling inside the doorway. He was holding a drill in his hands and had several long screws held between his lips.
When she yanked open the door, his eyes flew to hers.
“What in the hell are you doing?” she asked, angrily.
She watched his eyes move away from hers to slide down her body. It was then that she realized what she was wearing. Realized that she hadn’t grabbed her robe.
Her bright red and white candy-striped pajamas with the massive reindeer head in the middle of her chest had been a Christmas gift the year before. They were her most comfortable pajamas, and she normally wore them on chilly nights. She also wore them on nights she struggled with menstrual pain, as was the case last night.
When Nick’s eyes returned to hers, he smiled and removed the screws from his mouth. “Christmas is still over two months away,” he pointed out.
“What are you doing?” she asked, gritting her teeth.
His smile slipped a little. “Fixing your screen door. When you slammed it in my face yesterday, it almost came off its hinges.” He got back to work.
She wanted to argue with him, but she had noticed it and had added it to her own to-do list. She watched him putting in a few long screws and realized she wouldn’t have thought to replace the screws with longer ones. Over the years, she’d just tightened the ones that was there, which meant she had to do it more and more often.
Not wanting to argue with the man, she slammed the front door and headed in so that she could shower and dress. She didn’t want Nick to get any more of a head start on her. After all, this was supposed to be her time to show her parents that she was capable of running the place on her own.
If Nick did everything, she was sure he would pass that bit of information along to her father when he returned.
After showering, she pulled on a pair of comfortable jeans and put a warm flannel shirt over her tank top. Wiping the steam from her mirror, she frowned at her reflection.
It had stung what Nick had said yesterday. She’d hated that it had. How many times had she wished she could be something different. A girlie girl. One that liked to wear pink. Liked dresses. Knew how to do her hair and makeup like all those videos she watched at night. But whenever she tried, she just looked… strange and ended up wiping it all off.
It wasn’t as if she was a total tomboy. She did like wearing earrings, necklaces, and the little blue ring her mother had given her long before she’d died. She even liked the thought of wearing dresses. When summer came around, she’d pull out her sundresses for church or special occasions. She loved summer.
But to work around the property, she normally wore worn jeans, T-shirts (or flannels during colder days), and work boots. Her long straight dark hair was nothing special. Its color reminded her of mud. Just plain old mud. One year she’d convinced her dad to allow her to get highlights. She’d ended up hating them after everyone had made fun of her.
She pulled her hair back into a ponytail and took a moment to put on a little eyeliner and mascara. If she did anything more, Nick would assume she was doing it for him.
Deep down in her heart, she knew she sort of was. She hated that thought, as it was obvious that he didn’t think of her in that way. All his ex-girlfriends had been the cheerleader type. Two were even past beauty queens. One had been the town’s Miss Christmas in the previous year’s parade.
Nick, along with every other guy in town her age, went after the girlie girls, not the tomboy type that she was.
Stepping into the kitchen, she almost screamed when Nick held up a mug of coffee.
“What are you doing in here?” she asked.
“Coffee?” he said, ignoring her question.
Since she needed the boost and it was already made, she took the mug.
“You didn’t lock the door.” He turned to make another cup for himself.
“That’s not an invitation for you to just waltz in and make coffee.” She took a sip of the coffee, swallowing the moan of pleasure. After three sips, she set the mug down and walked over to the freezer to pull out some frozen waffles.
“That’s not breakfast,” Nick said, shaking his head.
“It’s what I’m having,” she said, popping two waffles into the toaster.