rescue like a guy scooping a flapping, injured bird off the ground.
Daralyn was fully limp in his arms, her eyes on his, her expression satisfyingly flushed and dazed at once. “Thanks,” he said. “Thanks for always seeing me as a man. No matter what’s happening.”
Her eyes darkened, and her hand covered his on her face. “I’ve never seen you as anything else.”
He was ready to get his day back on track, but his body had other ideas. He could push himself through a grueling workout, do a full day at the store, no problem. Yet when something happened like what had gone down with the tractor, no more than freaking ten minutes of his life, the mental exhaustion became a full body clamp. He needed to recharge, and Daralyn and Johnny both noticed. They were shooting him concerned looks, and ping-ponging the same with one another. Like he couldn’t see that.
Daralyn sidled up to him behind the counter. “It’s been pretty quiet this afternoon,” she said carefully. “You could probably take off if you have other stuff you need to do before dinner.”
Like a nap. She wouldn’t say it, even if it was as clear in her face as the yearning for it in his head.
“Like prepping for the NASA summit and curing cancer?” He spoke tightly, so her half-smile in response was nervous. “I’m good. I mean it. It’s okay.”
She nodded and went back to what she was doing, but he knew he was struggling. He felt warm, a light perspiration on his upper lip. Shit. If he got a fever, that could fuck their plans to head to Florida in the near future.
A car pulling in drew his attention, but it wasn’t a customer. It was his mother. Goddamn it.
When he glanced toward Daralyn and saw her and Johnny exchange a significant look, his temper went from spark to full flame.
“I told you I was fine,” he said sharply.
Daralyn froze in place where she’d been stocking boxes of nails. Johnny, sharpening a brace of knives, paused and looked his way.
“When I say I’m fine, I’m fine,” Rory said. “I don’t need either of you texting my mom.”
Johnny gave him a puzzled look. “I didn’t, man.”
Rory turned his searing gaze back toward Daralyn, but one glance at her stricken face told him she hadn’t, either.
For the past week or two, Elaine had been busy with a church bazaar thing. However, on a normal week it wasn’t unusual for her to stop by at least once a day. She’d helped his dad run the place for years, and she liked to keep her hand in, a reminder to them she was available to help.
So her arriving right now was just plain old Murphy’s Law—nothing more.
“Crap,” Rory muttered, and ran a hand over his face.
Elaine breezed in, the store bells announcing her entrance. Johnny had merely shrugged and returned to what he was doing, Rory’s crankiness dismissed in typical male fashion. Daralyn’s expression was carefully closed, though, and he wanted to fix that now. His asshole meter with her today was beyond the max.
His mom put a tote bag on the counter next to him. “Sally Wilson gave me some more of her preserves. Said you were low when she stopped in the other day.”
He was summoning a casual response when she glanced at him and took a second, harder look. “You look flushed, son. Are you running a fever?”
She reached out with curled fingers to brush them against his brow. He drew back. “I’m fine.”
Johnny was smirking at him. What he would normally do when Rory’s mom was being a mom. When Johnny’s mom stopped into the store, it was no different. Rory knew that, knew his mother hadn’t done a single thing different from usual to warrant Rory getting his hackles up.
“Maybe you should take a couple hours off,” Elaine said, and turned to Johnny and Daralyn. “You two could handle closing if he—”
“Mom,” he snapped. “That’s my call, not yours. I run the store. I said I was fine.”
When Elaine’s startled gaze flicked to him, he couldn’t help his involuntary glance toward Daralyn.
While his mother needed reading glasses for almost everything now, she still managed to see like a hawk when it came to her kids. Her gaze became thoughtful, then faintly amused. As if he was twelve, and she thought it adorable that he didn’t want to be babied in front of a girl.
Him not wanting to be treated like a kid in front of a woman