She cared what Sawyer thought. Deeply.
Her older brother was the best man in all the world. And he had ended up doing half the raising of her after her mother had run off and their father had died.
She wanted him to be proud of her. She supposed that added a little bit of tension to everything all the time. Because she wanted to be her own person, but she also wanted to be someone that Sawyer approved of. Not that he was a prude or anything like that. It was just that anything new felt tenuous. She wanted to be established in it, sure of it, before she brought it to him.
“All right,” Sawyer said. “He should feed you, though, if he’s going to have you working late.”
“I’m not worried about it,” Elsie said.
“I am. I don’t want him using you for cheap labor just because we’re friends. You’re an expert with horses, Elsie, and he’s not doing you a favor by having you do work there. You’re benefitting him.”
Her brother’s words warmed her. That he cared so much and thought she was good mattered so much. But she didn’t want him thinking Hunter wasn’t being good to her, when in reality he actually was helping her.
“He doesn’t treat me like cheap labor, Sawyer. He’s been more than fair. Actually, he’s great to work with and he’s really excellent with the horses.”
“You’re...defending Hunter?” Sawyer looked up at the sky.
“What?” Her gaze followed his.
“I’m just looking for a flying pig.”
“Hey, he might be a pain in the ass, but he is actually a good boss.” Though she nearly choked on the word boss. “And I swear to you, he’s not taking advantage.”
She felt bad because tonight wasn’t about work at all, and technically Hunter was doing her a favor. But she didn’t feel bad enough to tell Sawyer the truth.
“Like I said, I’ll text you,” she said.
She got into her truck and started the engine, waving at her brother as she pulled out of the driveway.
And a couple of minutes later she was at Hunter’s cabin. And for some reason her stomach fluttered. Maybe because she hadn’t really thought through the fact that he had asked her to dress the way that she would pick up men, which meant that he was going to be passing some kind of judgment on what she was wearing.
And she and Hunter had never had a discussion about what she was wearing ever. Not once.
It made her feel weird and exposed, and she didn’t like it. Her pace slowed. And then she went to the door, taking a deep breath. This was ridiculous. She had just seen the man an hour ago.
She started to knock, and the door swung open. His dark gaze raked over her quickly, neutrally. Sort of to an upsetting degree.
“What?” she asked.
“That’s what you’d wear?”
“Yeah,” she said. She crossed her arms defensively. “Does a girl have to be caked in makeup and sparkly shit to get attention?”
“No,” he said.
“Well, then, is there something wrong with this?”
“Come in,” he said.
“All right, I’m in. Now explain.” He said nothing, and it only made her mad. “Hunter, I’m counting on you to be straight with me. You’re the one who told me I was tone deaf and should not sing in the Four Corners talent show, and I listened and did calf roping instead and I was better off for it. You told me why I couldn’t pee standing up like my brothers when I was six. You told me my mom wasn’t coming back. So don’t go getting soft on me now. Give me honesty. I need it.”
He still hesitated.
“Don’t get the wrong idea,” he said. “Your figure’s cute. Which means whatever you wear is cute.”
He said that so offhandedly, and it made her feel... It made her feel like he had dumped the room on its head. And somehow she was still standing there right side up. Her figure was cute? He thought her figure was cute.
“I...”
“Statement of fact,” he said, moving past it quickly. “I guess the question is this. What exactly do you want from Travis?”
“I don’t want to marry him,” she said.
He sighed. “Well, do you just want to fuck him or...?”
Her face went hot. All over. “No! I didn’t say that. I... I want to... I don’t know, isn’t there some middle ground in there?”
“Never personally walked upon it, but I hear tell.”
“I want something normal. I want to feel like if I like a guy I can... I don’t know. Hang out with him, kiss him, sleep with him without weird hang-ups. Isn’t that fine?”
“I just want to know what you’re after,” he said, maddeningly unflappable in the face of her total embarrassment. “Because if the only aim is for you to hook up, I’m going to have to have some plausible deniability so Sawyer doesn’t kick my ass.”
“He can’t possibly think I’m going to be a virgin for the rest of my life.”
That right there made Hunter’s face do something weird. His brows went flat, his mouth too, and his jaw looked tight. He didn’t say anything.
What had he thought? That she wasn’t a virgin? That she’d found someone to hook up with before this? She thought of the absolute dearth of men in her life who would have been both available to her before this and also appealing to her. There really wasn’t any crossover. She’d thought that was obvious.
Apparently not.
“Whatever, don’t think too hard about that,” she sniped. “Just... I want to get where it’s not a big deal and I feel normal and nobody treats me like a kid.”
“And somehow you see this thing with Travis as a gateway to that?”
“You have to take the first step, right? Climb the first mountain? Get on your first horse? There’s always that first one and then after that it’s no big deal.”
He coughed, but she didn’t think it was genuine. “Sure.”
“What?”
“Sex isn’t riding a horse, though, is the thing,” he said.
“Which is too damn bad because if it was, I wouldn’t need your help, would I?”
He huffed a laugh that sounded awfully like a cough. “So, what, you want to be able to talk to men?”
“Yeah and like...let them know I’m interested? Like, I count. I’m a woman. I’m here.”
“You could always just walk up to him and offer to hop in the sack, he’d probably take you up on it.”