War and Peace by graf Leo Tolstoy (latest ebook reader .TXT) 📕

place was ruthlessly neat. Probably a holdover from his years in the Army. Was the lack of stuff a sign he hadn’t gotten over the expectation that he had to be prepared to roll out for a mission at any moment? That had been his life as a Ranger for years. It was why he’d left her after high school, breaking her heart in one fell swoop rather than by degrees by trying to make it work.

They eyed each other from opposite sides of the couch. Maybe she should just lay one on him like she had at the wedding. If they got on to the naked portion of the weekend, they’d probably both be more comfortable. And she could relegate him back to the status of sexy boy toy. Maybe.

“Will Duke be okay on his own here for a couple hours?”

Paisley blinked away her visions of stripping Ty out of that shirt. “As long as I feed him first and hook him up with his toys. Why?”

“I thought we’d head into town for dinner. It’s early enough yet you can get a little tour of the place before we hit up the tavern. You still like pizza?”

“Is the sky blue?”

He cracked a smile that left her feeling flustered and out of sorts. That smile had always made her a little stupid.

She hadn’t expected to go out. In all honesty, she’d expected them to hole up and exhaust each other for the weekend. Dinner in town was…date-like. It felt like the kind of thing you did in a relationship. They’d both been very clear that wasn’t what they were doing. But she was more than a little curious about what his normal life was like here, and she wasn’t about to turn down the chance to spend more time with him—in or out of bed.

“We can get dinner to go.”

Ty pulled his attention back to Paisley, holding in a wince. He was being a lousy date. “What? No, it’s fine.”

One dark brow winged up. “Are you sure? Because you seem about as jumpy as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.”

He hoped like hell that impression was more because she could read him than that he’d lost all ability to compartmentalize as a civilian. But she wasn’t wrong. His instincts had been jangling since they got to town.

“Sorry I’m so distracted. It’s just, we’re being followed.”

The blood drained out of her face and the fingers on her Yuengling bottle went bone white. “What?”

Alarmed at her reaction, Ty reached across the table to gently extract the beer and tangle his fingers with hers. “Hey, no. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. It’s not like some kind of enemy operative. It’s just a boatload of the town busybodies. Like Betsy Schoemaker back home.”

Old Betsy Schoemaker had been a notorious snoop, who delighted in calling the cops on any couples who were fool enough to use the dirt road cutting through her heavily forested back forty as a lover’s lane. He and Paisley had only made that mistake once, and they’d gotten away before the officer had arrived. But that hadn’t stopped Lieutenant Petrie from stopping by to put the fear of God into Ty about the seriousness of trespassing and safe sex. To this day, Ty didn’t know whether Betsy had some kind of wildlife camera on the road that had caught pictures of his truck or if she just camped out with field glasses and watched.

Paisley’s breath gusted out and color returned to her cheeks. “Oh.” Not bothering to pull her hand away, she reached for her beer with the other and tipped it back for a long swallow.

“What, exactly, were you imagining?”

“Don’t mind me. Writer brain goes zero to ninety with little provocation.”

Was it really her writer’s brain on overdrive or did it have something to do with why she’d seemed just a little off since he talked to her last night?

She made a visible effort to relax, focusing those whiskey-gold eyes on him. “So, why exactly are the town gossips of Eden’s Ridge following you?”

“Us. They’re following us.” He’d spotted the first tail as he’d helped Paisley out of his truck a couple blocks down from Crystal’s Diner. Jolene Lowrey, famed for her blue-ribbon-winning red velvet cake, had been coming out of Moonbeams and Sweet Dreams. She’d snapped a none-too-subtle photo of them with her phone and, shock of shocks, there’d been multiple faces pressed to the diner window as they’d strolled past. Reverend Hodgson’s wife, Patty, was next, hanging back as he’d given Paisley the fifty-cent tour of downtown. She’d turned off abruptly into the hardware store when he caught her looking. Estelle Murchison hadn’t even bothered trying for subtle. She’d just about gotten whiplash from watching them walk into the tavern.

“Us?” Paisley paused, considering. “I take it Eden’s Ridge is cut from the same cloth as Coopers Bend.”

“Bingo.” She’d always been quick to pick up on precisely what he meant.

“So, tongues are wagging already, wondering who I am and whether I’ve taken one of the town’s most eligible bachelors off the market.”

“It’s a distinct possibility.”

“That explains the death glare our waitress shot me when she thought I wasn’t looking.”

He’d missed that but wasn’t surprised. Trish Morgan hadn’t been subtle in her interest this past year. “I don’t know why they keep trying to matchmake me.”

She snorted. “You’re single, gorgeous, and new in town.”

He’d also been more than a little bit of a train wreck when he’d moved here. Not that he’d advertised that fact. With a lot of work, he’d moved past the worst of it, but he still wasn’t what he’d consider good relationship material.

With a wry quirk of his lips, he picked up his own beer. “They’re overlooking the rather salient point that I’m not interested.”

“Psh. Since when does that stop a bunch of wannabe grandmas from trying to snare you for their daughters?”

“Grandmas?” Ty felt the blood drain from his own cheeks. Taking a firmer grip on