Danni Rose (The Sherwood)

“I do. I like having you there, you know.”

He chuckled at her. “You can take care of yourself,” Walker told her.

“I can but it’s nice knowing you are so close.”

“Okay,” he mumbled. She knew that he was getting uncomfortable, so she dropped that subject.

They talked about everything else until Danni couldn’t stop yawning. The things they talked about, some might consider boring. Matt’s tobacco crop. The latest book they were reading. They both loved to read. Danni got books from the library for them. When they both had read them, they discussed what they liked and disliked about the books. Unless it was one of Danni’s romances then Walker wouldn’t read it.

She didn’t want to, but Danni Hatfield still believed in romance and love. She had seen him without his shirt. She imagined running her finger down his solid chest. Kissing the exact spots on his skin after she touched them. Hearing a deep moan escape from him as she did naughty things on her knees.

Danni just didn’t want to get hurt again and liking this big fella sitting next to her was going nowhere. She propped her chin in the palm of her hand and gazed at him with longing and lustful thoughts in her brain. It wasn’t often that Walker was this talkative which surprised her.

“Danni, did you hear me?” He asked.

She hadn’t. She had been imagining doing all kinds of things with Walker that were beautiful and nasty. Crazy, she knew. He had never been anything but friendly. Never flirtatious but she couldn’t get the sexy images out of her addled brain.

Danni knew from a few conversations over breakfast that Walker just wanted to stay out of trouble and that’s what he did. Nobody needed to know about this arrangement they had made especially not Matt, her brother. Danni didn’t really know how Matt would feel about this. It didn’t hurt anyone so there was no need to tell anybody.

She had known Walker since she was a little girl when Matt used to bring him home after baseball or football practice. Even then she had a little girl crush on young, Walker Wild.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t,” Danni replied.

He shook his head at her. “Day dreaming again,” he said.

“I was.” About you. She had seen him in shorts without a shirt playing basketball with her brother when he was younger. She knew what he looked like as a man without a shirt, in jeans and work boots and her fantasies had sparked even hotter.

Sweat dripping down his chest. His dark, wavy hair a tousled mess like she had run her fingers through it. His skin kissed by the warmth of the sun. His body hard from working out and working hard on her brother’s farm. An ass she wanted to slap as she passed him as any lover would, but she wasn’t Walker’s lover. Danni sighed.

“What’s wrong?” He asked.

I’m frustrated, she wanted to say but couldn’t. “Nothing,” she replied. “Just tired.”

He might be an ex-con, but he was so much more than that. Walker needed a break and someone to show him that they still cared about him when he got out of prison. Her dad was always giving odd jobs to people in need. Her dad had always liked Walker. He picked him up at the prison and hired him.

His mother had raised Walker and his brother as a single parent from the time they were small boys. She did a good, job with Walker, but nothing could save Jesse from the criminal element. Danni was sure that whatever had possessed Walker to confess to dealing drugs had something to do with his brother’s influence. She just didn’t know what.

Her eyes traveled up to Walker’s face as he stood and reached for her. She placed her hand in his and he helped her stand. Every now and then, like tonight, Walker cupped her face in his hands and tilted her head down. Then he kissed her forehead. She smiled when his lips touched her skin. He

said, “Go to bed, you have to work early in the morning.”

“Goodnight,” Danni whispered unable to keep the huskiness out of her voice.

Then Walker released her and stepped back waiting on her to go inside. She looked back once before she shut the door to the cabin. She went to her room and laid the laptop on the dresser. Then she tucked herself into her lonely bed.

Chapter 2

Walker watched her until she shut the door, then he headed across the yard to her barn. She didn’t know he and Matt had planned this. Would she be angry with him? Most definitely. His mother had neighbors, Danni did not. He didn’t know how to protect them both from Jesse. He couldn’t be in two places at once, so he was here, and his mother’s neighbors watched over her.

He slipped inside the barn, she called a shed. It was too big to be a shed. He laughed at her description of it. Then he yanked the shirt over his head and dropped it behind him on the cot that she put out here for him. His feet hung off the end. Matt had laughed at the site of the cot that he knew was way too small for his large, frame.

Secrets. He didn’t like to keep them but since Jesse started making noise about a year and a half ago he had to be close to Danni. Too close. He didn’t like it. She wasn’t a little girl anymore. He wasn’t a teenager either and Walker didn’t feel like the protective older, brother anymore. He felt like a man who wanted that woman in her bed right now. He kept fighting these feelings for her.

He slipped out of his shoes and socks and laid on the cot. It would be better if he wasn’t near either of them, his mom or Danni but he couldn’t stay away. He couldn’t trust that would keep Jesse away from them. Matt and his dad, Simon had agreed. So, he stayed close to Danni, night after night, pretending he needed a place to stay when he very well could have stayed with Matt or his mom.

He could buy his own home if he wanted to. He had some money. Not a fortune. His grandparents had left both him and Jesse a good amount of money if they took care of it. He had invested his inheritance. It was making him money. Jesse had squandered his. He was only seventeen when they died. His mother had put it in trust with her name on it. She took care of it for him, doing what he told her to and Walker took care of her.

Walker Wild appreciated family. The Hatfield family were like blood to him because he had only them and his mother. Jesse was lost to them by the time he turned sixteen. He laid back on the cot, leaving his jeans on, in case he had to move quickly in the night. He crossed his arms behind his head and stared at the ceiling.