She slid her gaze back to her own task at hand and separated one leaf from the rest of its pack. She was as unsuccessful at blocking him out of her peripheral vision as she was blocking out how enticingly companionable it felt to be standing there with him.
She focused even more attention on the lettuce, methodically tearing the leaf into bite-size pieces that she dropped in the bowl. She repeated the process with a couple of more crispy leaves and was feeling quite proud of the precisely sized results. Then she finally ran the bowl under the faucet and shook it as dry as she could get it.
In the same amount of time that she’d taken to tear up a few lettuce leaves, however, Archer had filled his cutting board with a huge mound of chopped vegetables.
His eyes crinkled with amusement when he caught her comparing her small pile with his. “Size doesn’t matter.”
She managed to keep her response contained to a bored, raised eyebrow. “That’s what all men say.”
He gave a soundless laugh and swiped half of his cutting board bounty into another bowl. He dropped a pair of salad tongs on top and handed it to her, then carried the cutting board and the rest of its contents, along with the enormous steak, out of the kitchen.
She pressed her tongue against her teeth and eyed the painting on the wall. The squiggly lines racing around the canvas might as well have been the pattern of her crazy heartbeat.
Afraid he’d come back in and find her standing there like that, she hastily dumped her lettuce pieces in with the rest of the veggies and flipped it all around a few times with the tongs.
It was the only kind of salad she really liked. One that was less green stuff and more chunky vegetables. He’d even sliced the kernels off a fresh cob of corn.
The man had probably never poured prepared salad out of a bag in his life.
She set the salad bowl in the center of the table and then poked around the kitchen enough to find a couple of plates and flatware.
She set them out on the table and then, with no other reason to keep hiding in the kitchen, followed him outside.
He was standing in front of the grill. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to his elbows and his shirttails were hanging loose over his jeans.
She had a mad desire to slide her hand beneath the shirttail and run her palm up the length of his spine. To discover if his skin still felt as warm and supple where it stretched over sinewy muscle as she remembered.
She lifted her glass so fast to take a drink that she managed to spill water down her chin and the front of her blouse in the process.
“Having a problem there?”
She wanted to sink through the deck and the Wyoming earth beneath.
She swiped her chin and set the glass on the wide beam of wood at the top of the deck railing. The steak was sizzling on one side of the grill, sending up a delicious aroma that had her mouth watering. At least she hoped it was the primary reason behind that particular reaction.
Yes, Archer was insanely attractive. Always had been. But she flatly refused to believe he could actually make her mouth water.
“Want a taste?”
He was holding up a chunk of red bell pepper with grill marks on it and before she could even offer a yay or nay, he’d slid it past her surprised lips.
It was deliciously charred and terribly hot. She chewed quickly, gingerly, chasing it with the rest of the water in her glass. “Give a girl some warning,” she managed when she finally swallowed. But then she ruined her protest by stepping closer to him and the grill. “Can I have another one?”
On the other half of the grill, he’d dumped the vegetables atop a thick piece of foil and was slowly turning them with the tines of a long-handled fork. He jabbed another chunk of pepper and handed it to her.
She carefully took it from the fork, holding it between her fingertips. While she waited for the morsel to cool a bit, she studied him from beneath her lashes. “When did Vivian discover she had a tumor?”
“Before she moved to Weaver,” he answered immediately. “I think it’s what prompted her to come to Wyoming. Feeling her mortality. Wanting to set things right between her and my father and uncle.”
Because of the summer after her mom died when she’d accompanied Ros on her forced visitation with Meredith, Nell knew enough about his family to remember that his father, Carter, was a retired insurance agent and his uncle was a pediatrician. And that they’d lived in Wyoming for as long as Ros knew, anyway. “Why did things need to be set right?”
“Vivian wasn’t always the philanthropic, kindly old lady you know and love.”
Nell let out an abbreviated laugh. Vivian was, indeed, philanthropic. But in just the last week Nell had learned the woman was not at all the “kindly old lady” type. She was sharp, decisive and demanding. She also wasn’t above manipulation when a situation called for it, which explained the cocktail party that she’d decided to throw.
“It’s too early to love, much less claim to know her very well, but I do like her,” Nell said. “She’s a force, just like you said. Kind of hard not to be impressed by her.”
“True enough.” He adjusted the heat under the vegetables and leaned against the rail next to her.
She told herself it was just coincidence that his hand happened to land on top of hers where it rested on the smooth wood. Particularly when he moved it away again a moment later to fold his arms across his wide chest.
She quickly averted her eyes from the way his shirt tightened around his biceps.
“My father and uncle, on the
