Her Blind Date Cowboy - Taylor Hart Page 0,6

The woman who’d nearly broken him was at his fingertips and he needed to talk to her.

She put her sunglasses in place, slipped her flip-flops on, and traipsed away from him. “Oh, but I do.”

He found himself rushing to catch up with her. “Wait, can we just talk?”

She didn’t stop, gaining speed until she was booking it for the parking lot. “You don’t want to talk to me.”

“Evie!” he demanded as he reached her side.

The trouble was that, just as he caught up to her, she was stepping over a parking concrete barrier; in balancing all of her stuff, though, she was distracted enough that she ended up catching her foot on the barrier and stumbling. He caught her, but not before the beach chair opened and her bag tumbled to the ground.

His hands were on her waist.

They were close, extremely close. He looked at her lips before helping her stand. “Sorry.”

She shook her head. “You’re here,” she said quietly. She closed her eyes, and he saw a tear trickle down her cheek.

If anything made him want to talk to her, if anything made him suspect that something had been very misunderstood all those years ago, it was this moment. “I’m here.”

Her eyes flashed open. She bent and picked up her bag and chair. “I have to go, Liam.”

Chapter 4

Evie rushed to her car and shoved the chair and bag and towel into the trunk. She felt like an utter mess. Liam Summerville. Liam Summerville. Liam Summerville. He was right here.

“Wait!” he called, making her embarrassment worse. “Evie, please …”

“Look,” she snapped, slamming the trunk closed. “I have to go to work.” There was no way she could … talk to him. No way.

He stepped in front of her, blocking her path to her car door. “Just give me a sec. Don’t you think you owe me that?”

An urge to fight pulsed through her, but she tamped it back. He was right. “Fine. What?”

He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and she tried not to think about all those romance novels her friend’s mother had read when she was in middle school. There had been shelves of Fabio, who was always shirtless, with his long blond hair flowing in the wind and a woman clinging to his side. Though his hair was dark, she could definitely picture Liam on those covers. His hair was longer, and his muscles were ripped.

She knew that strength was just part of his life, since he worked on the ranch and at the auto body shop. But for the past year on his rise to fame, she’d stalked him a bit and seen his workouts, taking note of his clean eating habits. Despite her best efforts, she’d been fascinated by him. It was easy to look up the Summervilles. They were the new thing. It was easy to cry over her cereal at midnight and torture herself by staring at Liam on YouTube.

“I really do have to go,” she said, wishing for an easy escape. The problem was that he wouldn’t move.

“No.”

“Liam.”

“Where’s Trey?” he asked, his voice low.

Evie winced, trying to keep her face neutral. “Uh, he’s not here. Excuse me.”

“Five minutes, Evie. I need five minutes so I can find out why you shattered my heart three years ago.”

Adrenaline shot through her, and she wanted to run, but that tiny part inside of her knew the truth: he did deserve five minutes. He deserved so much more. She nodded and looked up into his eyes. “Five minutes.”

Liam crossed his arms and adopted his thinking face. It was a familiar expression, the same one he used when he was trying to write a song and the lyrics weren’t coming. In a sadder example, he’d shown it when she’d told him she was engaged to Trey.

“Five minutes are ticking …” She tapped her Fitbit on her wrist, embarrassed by her own attitude.

He threw his hands up. “Where’s your wedding ring?”

“Didn’t work out.” She said placidly.

His face-hardened. “What does that mean?”

She cleared her throat. “We didn’t get married.”

“You didn’t marry him?” His tone was quiet.

“No,” she said. Her heart was nearly bursting out of her chest, and the attraction between them was so thick she was sure she could cut it with a knife.

He shook his head, as broody and attractive as he’d ever been. “So what happened?”

No. She’d gone through too much therapy, spent so much time pulling herself back together. She could not get into all of this. “It didn’t work out.”

“And your father? What did he