He placed his hands beneath hers, and it was all she could do not to shiver. Oh. My. Goodness. She couldn’t not feel the electricity of their connection, but she could do her damnedest not to show it.
“Now this is just a damn shame, baby girl.” Lewis rubbed his thumb over her half-healed blister. “You’ve been treating it? Keeping it clean and using antibiotic cream?”
“I have. I used to get the odd blister when I was in school, in track and field. This is the first time for one on my hand.”
“Using tools requires what’s referred to as PPE—personal protective equipment.”
Randy had headed out before she’d approached Lewis, but now he was back and walking toward her. He handed what he carried to Lewis, who released her hands and gave the new-looking work gloves to her. Michaela tried not to think about the loss of contact. She felt positively bereft. A feeling that was offset by the aroma of Randy as he stood just a bit closer. His dark blond hair looked as if he’d run his fingers through it a lot, and his soft blue eyes just made her want to sigh.
“You’ll want a smaller pair, eventually, but until you get those, use these,” Lewis said.
Michaela wrenched herself back to the conversation. Lewis met her gaze. “And when you go get your gloves, we want you to buy safety goggles and work boots that have a steel toe and a steel shank. The guys told me you can get all of that stuff at Darryl’s Duds in town.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He leaned forward and placed a kiss on her cheek. “We’ll see you Friday? At the party?”
It was all she could do not to close her eyes and clamp down on the erotic waves that washed through her just because Lewis Benedict had kissed her cheek.
He said party. Michaela nearly asked what party, but at the last moment she remembered. Jenny was having a party for Parker’s birthday, and it happened to be on the one Friday she had off in the month. She’d been invited before she’d met these way-too-tempting Benedicts. For one moment, she considered saying no.
But she’d promised Jenny she’d be there, and Tammy was looking forward to going with her, too. The fact that she was attracted so strongly to these men was her problem. She would not let that get between her and her coworker or bff.
So instead of refusing, she nodded slowly. She looked from Randy to Lewis. “Yes. I’ll be there.”
Michaela carried the warmth of their smiles with her for the rest of the day.
* * * *
“I don’t think I fully appreciated just how hot it got here,” Lewis said. Along with his cousin Randy and their brothers, he was at new-to-him Cousin Carrie’s large dining room table. Chase and Brian were there, of course. But Alan and Duncan, the two wranglers who’d been with the twins since the beginning of the combined ranching operation. were over in their own house, having supper with their wife—and their nearly four-month-old daughter, Angelica.
“It’ll get hotter,” Trace said. He and his brother, Lucas, took turns holding, feeding, and burping their daughter, little Zoe Diane. Randy’s sweet little niece was going to be five months old in a week. At the moment their wife, Laci, was putting in a few hours at the roadhouse. For the most part, supper was done. Carrie had excused herself, telling the table she had a “date” with her main man, her son Donny, who’d turn one next month. The men would pitch in and clean up, once they’d finished jawing.
“It sure will,” Lucas said. “But you get used to it. Eventually.”
“When Cord and Jackson first came to Lusty, we didn’t understand that getting acclimated was a real thing.” Chase, one of his Texan cousins, said. “Because, well, we’ve been here all our lives and the weather is what it is. And then a year ago, we took Carrie for a mini vacation—a week in Colorado. It was in the dead of winter, and swear to God, I’ve never been so cold in my life.”
“Imagine having to go out and look for cows in a snowstorm,” Lewis said. “Breaking ice off the ponds—what you down here call tanks—so they can drink. And then getting food out to them, once you find them, because there sure as hell is no grass they can eat then.”
“That’s the same thing Cord said,” Brian said. “He also said that even at its hottest, he’d take Texan summers over Montana’s winters.” And then he grinned.
“You look so much like Randy when you smile like that,” Lewis told Brian.
“I know, right?” Trace said. To Brian, he said, “That was one of the first things I noticed about you.”
“We Benedicts have damn good genes.” Brian said.
There wasn’t much any of them could say about that. Lewis realized that, over the last month, he’d gotten pretty used to having good, relaxing, and fun evenings in the presence of so many Benedicts.
“I have one question.” Parker sat back from his now totally cleared plate. He looked at Lewis, and his head tilted in a way that told him was going to say something Lewis might not like.
“And that would be?”
“That tender moment today at the roadhouse—between the two of you and Michaela. Just wondering if you were thinking of starting something there.”
“We’re all kind of protective of her,” Lucas said. “She lost her dad not that long ago. Plus, she’s taken on fixing up her place, and so far, she has turned down every single offer of assistance every single Benedict, Jessop, and Kendall has made.”
Lewis looked over at Randy. They’d spoken about Michaela, of course they had. They’d coaxed her into sitting with them for her break a couple times at the roadhouse. They’d kept it light, of course.
But with each passing day, it was getting harder and harder to ignore the growing attraction they felt for her. The woman got to him,
