So if I lump Flint Jackson into the category of men who will never be satisfied with who I am, it’s much easier to tolerate this unwelcome attraction.
One of my friends who’s a therapist says it’s self-protection.
I say I really don’t want to look deeper than that until I know who I am and am safely on the path to working for what I want.
“We won,” Flint says abruptly. “What happened to you?”
“It’s not important. Did Junie score?”
There’s that You are not right look again. “Game-winning goal.”
“Dammit.”
He sighs.
“I don’t mean dammit that she did well. I’m thrilled that she did well. I’m disappointed that I wasn’t there for her. Especially for this game. That’s all that meant.”
“I know.”
“You know?” Translation: you’ve noticed me and think there are parts of me that are worthy? Squee!
Damn right he did. We’re hot, my vagina reminds me.
He finishes attaching the hose and cranks the handle. “Haven’t missed any other games, have you?”
Stop being a ball of hormones, I order myself when I want to squeal in my head that he has noticed I’ve been there, as if I haven’t made an effort to at least say hi and compliment him on his coaching every single game. Concentrate on Junie. “I worry about her. I know moving during high school is hard. And I missed too many games the past three years, so—aaaaaaahhh! ”
The wave of cold water shoots out of the end of the hose and smacks me square in the nipple.
He jerks the hose away from my body. “Shouldn’t have come out that fast,” he mutters.
“Seems to be a theme around this place,” I say around gasps for breath.
I get another look.
This one clearly says Keep talking.
Right.
People who arrive at your house when you’re covered in mud and who saw the bear running away will have some questions.
“It’s really not an interesting story,” I tell him.
“Earl doesn’t run.”
“Do you call all of the bears around here Earl, or is there something about him that you recognize? Does he have some special marking that I should pay attention to?”
“Only bear around here. What happened?”
“But how do you know he’s the only bear around here?”
“Because I do. And so does the local wildlife expert. Earl’s a fluke. Runt as a baby. Shouldn’t have made it. Did, and wandered over our way. Don’t usually have many bears around here. Better habitats for them a little west. What. Happened?”
“Are you going to spray me again if I don’t answer?”
He growls.
And then, yes, he turns the hose back on me. But this time, he grabs me by the shoulder, aims down my back, and crimps the hose enough to minimize the blast of pressure.
I stifle a squeal.
It’s cold, but it’s honestly not the coldest I’ve faced today.
“The bear, Maisey. What happened to him, and is he hurt?”
I pretend the water coming out of the hose and getting swished down my back is a warm natural spring, ignore the heat coming off Flint’s hand as he brushes mud clumps off my arm, and concentrate on Earl. “We were having a showdown. I was being big, you know, like this—”
I lift my arms wide and go up on my tiptoes, and I get a shot of water in the armpit. “Hey!”
“If you’d quit moving—”
I spin to glare at him. Yes, he’s helping me. Yes, my mother would tell me I should be nice to the handsome man who brought my daughter home.
But he’s pushing my buttons. And then every time I look at him, a primal part of me swoons like I don’t freaking know better, and then I get cranky all over again.
But Flint Jackson is all wet.
His Hell’s Bells Soccer Demons jersey is plastered to his broad chest and puckered nipples, highlighting his wide collarbone and the muscles straining his arms too.
Those tattoos on each of his biceps are peeking out from beneath his sleeves, and I’m positive one’s a wolf and the other’s some kind of geometric design.
And his jeans?
Also soaking wet.
Plastered to his trim hips.
His solid thighs.
The bulge behind his fly.
No.
Nope nope nope.
I didn’t see that. It doesn’t mean he’s hard or semihard or just packed under there. He’s probably wearing a cup.
Yep.
A cup.
To protect himself from errant soccer balls to the groin while he’s standing there on the sidelines doing his coaching thing.
Men wear cups with jeans all the time.
All the time.
I am so bad at lying to myself.
“Do you want help or not?” he spits out.
Is he irritated with me?
Or is he irritated that I noticed that he might not be irritated at all?
I gulp.
Then I point to my other arm. “It’s starting to dry here.”
He grips me by the elbow, shoots a stream of hose water down my biceps, and I feel like his touch has just branded me for life.
I swallow hard again and try to go back to normal. “So I was trying to be big and intimidating, and the bear—Earl—was standing up on his back feet and staring at me. I knew I needed to find something to make me even bigger, but I didn’t want to break eye contact, and then the universe stepped in, or maybe it was Uncle Tony, I don’t know, but one minute, I was thinking I was going to die, and the next minute, this geyser shot up out of the ground right underneath him and scared the living hell out of him.”
“Geyser?”
“There’s a ridiculous amount of pressure coming out of the well here, which should not be a thing, because physics, and I thought I solved it, but apparently there was something I overlooked, and there was too much pressure on a soft spot in a pipe. Don’t worry. I shut that valve off. We won’t waste the whole county’s groundwater supply with a flood here.”
He mutters something that I sincerely hope he never mutters in the classroom.
“I know. Replace all the piping to the house and the cabin and the bunkhouse wasn’t on my bingo card, but then, so few things have been out here. I’ll roll with it. Kinda have to. Hey, how’s the water in the gatehouse? Do I need to tackle that too? Actually, I haven’t asked if you need anything fixed there at all. I should’ve. Everything running smoothly?”
He sighs again while he twists me to tackle my back.
I stifle a yelp when the water hits my spine. And then I stifle another yelp when he swipes his other hand down my back.
It’s merely been too long since I’ve been touched by a man, and this one is hotter than the sun. He’s like a flaming ball of gas that just doesn’t stop, but replace gas with testosterone, and that’s Flint Jackson. He’s the testosterone sun.
And I clearly need a very large bottle of water with a margarita chaser and about three days of sleep if that’s how I’m thinking of him.
“How’d you get so muddy?” he asks as his hand approaches the danger zone—a.k.a. my ass—four times over.
I swallow again. “I noticed standing water by the wellhead out at the bunkhouse, so I was a little wet and muddy by the time I figured out what was wrong and got it fixed, but once the leak was taken care of, the showers exploded at the pressure and the shutoff valve was broken, so I had to shut it off at the well, but my fix had blown, so it was an entire mud puddle that I was swimming in by then to get everything shut off.”