Noah was about to delete the message when the woman added—
“And my associate has already called the woman who was interested in your sample to inform her that she’ll have to look for another donor. So there’ll be no more stress for you from that direction, either.”
“Shit,” he cursed, closing his voice mail with a jab of his thumb. He dropped to the floor to look under the bed for his socks and shoes even as he scrolled to Yasmin’s contact number and hit call.
This was all another huge misunderstanding, courtesy of Screw-Ups-R-Us Sperm Bank. All he had to do was get Yasmin on the line, and he could explain this away in a second. Or at least, he hoped he could. Surely she would believe him if he swore to her that he hadn’t been the one to ask that the transfer date for the samples be moved up.
But when he called Yasmin, he was sent straight to voice mail. She must have turned her phone off, so Noah did the only logical thing to do at a time like this. He googled Yasmin’s parents’ number and called Li-Mei Wang North, owner of generations of prize-winning roosters and a woman who clearly didn’t enjoy hearing that her daughter’s emotions had been toyed with.
As soon as she found out who Noah was, she made a growling sound and warned, “You’d better be out of the house before I get over there, mister, or I’ll put my rooster on you. Maybe I’ll put him on you anyway. Thanks to you my daughter is leaving town again, just when her father and I were sure we had her back to stay.”
“What?” Noah said, his pulse speeding all over again. “Because of this? But it’s all just a big—”
“Because of you,” Li-Mei interrupted. “Because she doesn’t want to live in a town where you’re planning to make your home. As soon as she picks up her Mud Run tee shirt, she’s gone. She’s not even going to stay for the race, and those silly runs are her favorite part of the festival.”
The Mud Run. Noah glanced at the clock above the stove. The registration table wasn’t due to open until nine a.m. If he hurried, he could be there before Yasmin had a chance to claim her tee shirt and stop this from getting any worse.
“I’m going to bring her back, Mrs. North,” Noah said. “I’m not a liar. I’m wild about your daughter, and I’m going to make her happy, no matter how many rabid roosters I have to fight to do it.”
“My roosters are not rabid. Only mammals can get rabies. You have a long way to go before you’re ready for the farm, Mr. O’Sullivan,” Li-Mei huffed. “But if you make my Yasmin happy we’ll see about getting you on Sampson’s good side.”
Noah smiled. “Copy that.”
Less than a minute later, he was in his truck, pushing the speed limit down the highway, hoping he wouldn’t be too late to keep his girl from getting away.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Yasmin
Yasmin lurked in the shade of the oak tree near the sign-up table, doing her best not to make eye contact with any of the other runners warming up in the grass.
She wouldn’t be making the journey with them and really didn’t deserve her tee shirt, but she hadn’t scored a mud run tee in years and the custom shirts from each year inevitably became collector’s items. The design team behind the Mud Run tee was kept top secret, but they were clearly some of the most brilliant creative minds in Lonesome Point. If she had been forced to give up a Mud Run tee shirt as well as her hopes, dreams, and romantic fantasies, Yasmin was pretty sure she would have laid down on the ground beneath the oak tree and never gotten up again.
Noah O’Sullivan may have broken her heart, but by God, he wouldn’t rob her of a Mud Run tee.
The thought made her press her lips together, fighting the stinging at the back of her eyes. She couldn’t believe she’d done it again, fallen hook, line, and sinker for a liar. Sure, the lie wasn’t a deadly lie or even a dangerous one, but it still hurt like hell. It was what the lie represented that hurt the worst—another man who couldn’t be trusted, another time Yasmin’s judgment had proved to be shitty and flawed. But this was even worse than the times before. She’d already been having happily ever after dreams starring Noah as the leading man.
Idiot. She deserved a bad case of heartache. That’s what she got for falling head over heels for a man she barely knew, even if he did have the kindest eyes she’d ever seen and had made her feel, for one amazing night, like the sexiest, most irresistible woman in the world.
“Yasmin!” The voice seemed to come straight from her subconscious, summoned by memories of her epic night with Noah O’Sullivan. But then it came again, louder this time. “Yasmin! Wait!”
She turned to see Noah racing across the square toward her. His shirt was untucked and his hair stood up in a wild, rumpled, bed head tangle and his cheeks were covered with quite possibly the sexiest morning stubble she had ever seen. Even now, he looked beautiful. Beautiful and worried and excited to see her all at the same time. It was enough to make her want to smash her fist into a tree. Or maybe his face.
Yes, his face would be better.
How dare he come here looking handsome and sexy and worried when he was the one who had ruined everything?
“Go away.” She pointed a finger toward Bayer Street, where she could see his truck parked beneath a tree. “I have nothing to say to you.”
“But I have a lot to say to you,” he said, stopping in front of her, his breath coming fast. “Actually, no, I don’t have that much to say. Just that this is all a big mistake and that you can’t go.”
“I can do whatever I want. It’s called free will, Noah. The same free will you used when you sent your stupid samples back to San Francisco.”
“I didn’t send them!” He thrust his arms out to his sides as if he had nothing to hide. “At least not yesterday. I had them scheduled to ship on Tuesday. The crazy woman at the bank decided to move up the date on her own. I had nothing to do with it. And I certainly never told her to call you.”
Yasmin scowled. “I don’t believe you.”
“You don’t believe that the sperm bank that sold you a storage client’s sperm by accident might have made a mistake?” Noah rolled his eyes. “Another mistake. That place is a fucking nightmare. If I were a different person, I would sue their asses for everything they’re worth.”
Her frown trembled, and a sliver of unease snaked through her self-righteous anger. “But you were never going to agree to the insemination,” she said in a softer voice, keenly aware that they were starting to attract attention. The other runners were keeping their distance, but every word of this conversation would be making the gossip rounds by the time the starting pistol rang. “Admit it. You were just stringing me along.”
“I was not stringing you along,” he said, his eyes pleading with her to believe him. “Yes, the chances that I would have agreed to the procedure were slim, but that’s only because I was—”
“See!” She crossed her arms at her chest, shaking her head back and forth. “See, you already talk about it in the past tense! Like, it’s all been decided, even though it’s only Friday and as far as I know your sperm maker isn’t broken.”