I’d always had a sensitive nose. Even now, I grimaced and held the stinky clothes away from my body. Growing up, my foster brothers used to purposely leave smelly things hidden in my room to drive me crazy.
I sighed as I lifted the lid on the washer and tried to figure out the buttons. The machine was avocado green and probably forty years old. I pushed the dial, and the water began to fill the basin.
I dropped the clothes in, then poured some soap in from the box on the shelf. I was used to the little pod things and had to hope I wouldn’t suds the cellar. On my way up the stairs, I heard knocking.
I must be close to ovulation because my nipples hardened even before I had the conscious thought that it might be Rob, my cocky cowboy.
God, that kiss! A million—no a trillion—times better than Markle’s. Markle’s wasn’t even a kiss in comparison. No, Rob Wolf had curled my toes last night, for sure.
The next time you come, it will be beneath me.
He was wrong. I’d come last night with the massaging showerhead thinking about him. And he was the guy I couldn’t stop thinking about last night as I fingered myself to sleep again afterward.
But yes, I was definitely considering his offer. I’d been considering it non-stop since the moment he sauntered off into the darkness. And who walks in the dark, anyway? There was no moon last night at all, and the guy didn’t have a flashlight.
He probably thought he could see in the dark. I remembered when I was a kid, I could. Until my foster brothers locked me in a dark closet to prove I was wrong. Then whatever superpower I thought I possessed drowned in a new fear of the dark.
The knock came again. When I opened the warped door, a dark-haired woman in her early thirties stood there with a smile and a plate of brownies in her hands.
“Hi.” I pushed open the screen door.
“Hi! I’m Audrey Ames-Wolf, your new neighbor.”
Wolf. I peered past her at the Wolf Ranch, as if that would clarify who this woman was. Hopefully she wasn't Rob’s wife because that would make him a cheater, considering how he’d kissed me last night.
“I heard my brother-in-law barged in on you yesterday. I’m sorry about that. We didn’t know you’d already arrived. Rob’s been looking in on the place. He was close with your uncle and felt responsible while you were away.”
Brother-in-law. Good. “Yes, I met Rob.” She didn’t mention just how I met him, and I wasn’t going to. “Come on in.” I stepped back to invite her in.
“Here.” She pushed the plate at me. “Brownies. I made them, but you can just throw them in the trash. My sister, Marina, is the baker in the family, and you’ll meet her soon enough. She’s… engaged to my husband’s brother.”
I stood there and stared at her trying to figure it out. “You married one Wolf, and your sister’s engaged to another?”
She grinned. “That’s right. But not Rob. He’s not married. Single. Very single.”
“Okay. Got it.”
“Back to the brownies. They’re a housewarming gift, but the gift may be that I tell you not to eat them. I’m a doctor, not a chef.”
I led her toward the kitchen. “How about something to drink, and we won’t eat the brownies?”
She laughed. “Sounds great. I hope Rob didn’t make too bad of an impression. He seems gruff and grumpy, but he’s actually a softie.”
Softie?
Nope, it was plenty hard.
“Um, it wasn’t so much gruff and grumpy...” My pussy clenched remembering the sight of his very long manhood straining his jeans. The sensation of it pressed against my belly. My mouth twisted into a wry smile. “It was more cocky.”
“Oh!” Her laugh was musical. “I thought that was my husband’s specialty. I guess all the Wolf boys have that in spades, though.”
I shoved away my sudden interest in finding out everything there was to know about these Wolf boys. They hadn’t come up in any part of my investigation, which meant they weren’t involved with Markle. I liked the guys more just for that. I had Markle to worry about. That’s why I was here, not to have a fling with a sexy rancher.
Oh God, I really wanted to have a fling with the sexy rancher!
I set the brownies down on the table. “I don’t have much to offer you, yet, but I did buy some of these flavored seltzer cans. Are you a fan?”
“Sure,” Audrey said.
I opened the fridge and stared at the cans. “Lemon or mandarin orange?”
“Mandarin, thanks.” She took it and cracked it open while I opened a lemon one.
“So do you all live together there?”
She cocked her hip against the counter. “No. Boyd and I have a little cabin west of the ranch house, and I—we—also have a little house in town, which is easier when I’m on call or at the hospital late. I’m an Ob/Gyn.”