Crank (The Gibson Boys 1)

My mouth waters as I try to look away, my face certainly flushing from the knowledge of how wet my panties are right now.

“What are you doing?” I exclaim. “How did you get behind me so fast?”

“Find the hayfork?” His lips twist, clearly entertained, as he crosses his arms in front of him.

“Um, no. Not yet.”

He looks at me, then my phone, and back to me again. “Let me see your phone.”

“No.”

“Come on,” he says, holding out his hand. His palm is streaked with grease, beet red in some spots from grinding against the machine. “Let me see it.”

“Why?” I ask, my breathing getting shallow.

“You were looking up those tools, weren’t you?”

“What? I . . . Why would you think that?”

“You were, weren’t you?”

His tone is teasing, but there’s something else in his eye that tells me it’s more than a joke to him. It’s almost as if he’s angry or bothered. Either way, it makes me self-conscious.

While I’m trying to figure him out, in one abrupt move, he snatches my cell out of my hand.

“Hey!” I say, leaping for it but missing. “Give me that back!”

“Were you or were you not looking up those tools?”

His eyes narrow and I narrow mine right back. If he thinks he’s about to make me feel bad for trying to help him, he has another think coming.

“What’s it to you?” I ask, mimicking his stance. “Why do you care how I found them?”

“Just admit it.”

“Fine,” I all but growl. “I didn’t know what a pin was or lubricating oil or a socket. But I figured it out to help you, you asshole.”

He flinches, not expecting my tirade. Glancing at my phone, he quickly offers it back. I snatch it out of his palm without touching him.

“I don’t understand you,” I tell him, turning away. “You’re an impossibly frustrating man.”

Heading across the garage to where I set my things, I gather the garbage from dinner and toss it in the trash can. I feel his gaze on my back, the crackle of the energy between us as confused as I am, but refuse to turn around.

Instead, my phone goes into my purse, along with the paper and pen I was doodling on earlier. When I do finally turn around, I’m surprised to see him smiling. My head spins, one way with irritation, another with lust, another with confusion as to what he’s even smiling about.

“Thank you for helping out tonight,” he says. His eyes swirl with a softness to them that pulls at my heartstrings.

“Why do you do that?” I ask.

“Do what?”

“Act like you’re so hard, like nothing bothers you. So black and white. And then I see in your eyes that you might not be that way at all.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he dismisses me. Even as he says this, I know even more assuredly I’m right and that just eggs me on.

“Oh, I think I do.”

His jaw sets. “You think you have everything figured out, don’t you?”

“No, quite the opposite. I don’t think I have the first thing figured out about you.”

The silence is heavy, like a wet blanket, almost strangling us with its weight. We have a standoff, the wits of two hard-headed people going to battle and neither wanting to give in.

Grumbling under his breath, he stands straight. I’m not sure if he’s going to walk out the door or climb back under the tractor, but he surprises me. He walks towards me.

My breath catches in my throat, the bite of the metal table behind me scratching into my back as I lean away, needing distance between myself and this man stalking my way.

With each drop of his boots, I struggle harder to seem unfazed by his posture. Hooded eyes. Squared, flexed body. With each second he gets closer, I breathe faster. Gulp quicker. Feel the spot between my legs get wetter.

“Why do you keep coming around?” he asks when he’s standing right in front of me. The top of my head is just beneath his chin, his chest at eye-level. It’s rising and falling as quickly as mine as he takes over every inch of my personal space. With every inflation, a whiff of his cologne shuffles to my nose and my senses continue to be obliterated, completely consumed in every way by him.

“I don’t know,” I say. “It surely isn’t because of your award-winning personality.”

I think he’s going to laugh, but he doesn’t. Just like every time I think he’s going to resemble a normal person, he stops himself. “Then why?”

“You want me to stop? Is that what this is about? Because I was just trying to help you tonight, Walker.”

When he doesn’t answer, doesn’t flinch, I throw out an exasperated sigh.

“You win. Whatever game you’re playing with me, you win. I quit,” I say, reaching for my purse. “Figure out what I still owe you and send me a text. I’ll get you the difference on Monday.”