He just smiled. Softly. Tenderly. “I like you here.”
At his sweet confession, I felt my cheeks heat.
I liked me here too.
Too much for my own good.
The temptation to give in to my attraction to Roane was great, and my willpower was weakening by the second.
“It’s, uh . . . it is a tad warm in here. Isn’t there something I could help you do today . . . outside?”
He studied me a moment, expression unreadable, then he nodded. “Aye. We need to bring the rest of the sheep in out of this heat and into the hoop house. It needs to be done in shifts. You can help Shadow and me herd them.”
In all the time I’d known Roane and Shadow, it had never occurred to me that Shadow was a working dog. “Wait, Shadow herds sheep? I thought border collies were the best for sheep farming.”
“They are.” Roane rubbed Shadow’s head affectionately as we wandered out of the sitting room to the porch to put our boots back on. “And Danes aren’t the go-to for it. But I trained Shadow. He’s a big gentle giant and knows when to stop being playful and get down to business.”
And that was how I spent my afternoon. I wasn’t particularly helpful as we drove out to the fields in a high-bed, high-sided truck with Bobby. The truth was, all I really did was stand there and enjoy watching Roane as he and Bobby unlatched the ramp on the truck so the sheep could climb up into it. Shadow and Roane herded a flock up the ramp onto the truck, while I kept an eye out for any strays.
We then drove back to the second hoop house and unloaded the sheep, only to drive back to the fields to load up more.
It was slow work, and I could feel rivulets of sweat trickling down between my breasts. Roane’s T-shirt was soon soaked through like Bobby’s, with damp patches across his back and under his arms.
Perhaps it was the heat, or perhaps it was weeks of denying myself, but my body was tingling and throbbing with need as I watched Roane at work. I found myself mesmerized by the beads of sweat that trickled down the back of his neck, and the way the muscles in his biceps flexed as he helped Bobby fix the ramp to the truck.
The veins in his forearms held particular appeal.
I was in a state.
Slick with sweat and need, throbbing deep in my core.
When we got back to the hoop house and unloaded the last of the sheep, my thighs were damp, and my limbs were trembling. After counting the sheep, they realized there were three not accounted for, so Bobby took off to find the strays that had wandered away from the larger flocks.
Roane, completely unaware of how he was affecting me, cursed under his breath once the sheep were behind the pens, and whipped off the T-shirt that was sticking to every inch of his torso.
My jaw hit the floor as he strode past me, oblivious, and bent toward an old-fashioned water pump that I hadn’t even noticed situated by the side of the house. He ducked his head under it, yanking on the pump handle, the movement making his muscles known.
When he stood, he flicked his head, water flying off the ends of his unruly thick hair.
I think I might have moaned.
It was like watching Darcy coming out of that pond or Poldark cutting the fields with his scythe.
Was I drooling? I felt like I might be drooling.
Roane bent down under the metal channel beneath the pump, pulled out a water bowl, and began to fill it. Shadow was already at his side, waiting for the offering, and eagerly bent to the bowl when Roane put it down for him.
When Roane straightened, he looked toward the hoop house, his brow furrowed as if he was contemplating something.
And I ogled.
He wasn’t roped and ripped the way a man who had time for visits to the gym might have been. No, he was something better. Although broad shouldered, Roane was lean and muscular from daily physical activity on the farm. Plus, he wasn’t waxed to an inch of his life. There was a fine sprinkling of hair over his chest, and he had a happy trail.
I hummed under my breath.
He was sexy and strong without making me feel bad about my own lack of gym visits.
Roane was what Greer called “naturally manlicious.”