surrounding it brought back the painful memory he would never be comfortable talking about with anyone, let alone a stranger—no matter how attractive she was.
Instead, he did what he always did when he wanted to avoid something. He winked and made a wisecrack. “You’d need to have security clearance to get that type of information out of me.”
Vivienne’s hand rested casually on the edge of the sink as she faced him and wiggled her eyebrows. “As the wedding planner, you’d be amazed at some of the insider intel I can access.”
His glance dipped down to the V of her dress as he considered how far she might go in her fact-finding mission. A throbbing of awareness below his belt buckle yanked him back to reality. When he dragged his eyes up to meet hers, she was staring at him in a way that made him feel completely exposed.
Cole purposely broke eye contact by reaching for a couple of pink washcloths in the cabinet before handing one to her. “Why’s that?”
“In addition to organizing everything, my job is to be part psychologist, part coach, part fortune teller and a full-time mediator. I have to get all the data I can about not only the couple, but also their friends and their families, to prepare for a multitude of possibilities.”
“But it’s just a wedding. What could possibly go wrong?” he asked as he began cleaning the binder in one of the bathroom sinks.
She used a washcloth at the other sink to wipe the spot of mud on her dress, looking in the mirror as she spoke. “I need to know which uncle—or aunt—is likely to have too much to drink. I have to make sure that there aren’t any bickering cousins sitting together at the head table or any exes coming as someone else’s plus-one. It helps to find out in advance if the father of the bride has any food allergies and what the mother of the groom’s favorite song is for the...” Regret dawned in her eyes and, thankfully, she caught herself just before saying the words mother and son dance.
But the image was already out there for Cole.
His mom.
The woman who’d dreamed of being a dancer on Broadway before she’d fallen in love with a rancher from Montana. The woman who’d taught them all how to do a basic waltz and an electric slide before they were in sixth grade. The woman who used to stop whatever she was doing when the perfect two-stepping beat came on the radio, grab whichever boy was nearest to her and then laugh and sing as she twirled a kid around the house.
Diana Dalton would never get to dance at any of her sons’ weddings. The thought was like a punch to Cole’s gut.
“I am so sorry,” Vivienne began, but he held up a palm. Hearing her pity would only make the guilt twist deeper inside of him.
“Don’t worry about it.” He forced his tense lips into a casual smile, but his reflection revealed that it was more of an uncomfortable grimace. They were looking at each other through the mirror, and even though it wasn’t direct eye contact, it was still too much. He grabbed a towel off the rack behind him, buying himself a few seconds to regain his composure before he turned back.
Vivienne’s own hands had stilled under the stream, so he shut off the water and passed her the clean binder. His voice sounded normal enough when he said, “Here. Good as new.”
Then he reached for another brightly colored hand towel and held it out to her. She opened her mouth, but before she could apologize, he cut her off. “Don’t tell my brothers this, but when we moved to the Circle D, I purposely drew the short straw because I’ve always been partial to the color pink anyway.”
Then, as if to prove that everything was fine, he gave her another wink in the mirror before walking out.
Vivienne lingered in the bathroom a few more minutes, mentally berating herself for slipping like that and bringing up Cole’s mother. Bracing her hands on the counter, she bent her head and tried to reason that she hadn’t technically been referring to his mother. Still, the angst that had flashed across his face was due to a freshly painful subject that she’d brought up.
She pinched her eyes shut. Vivienne was usually much more sensitive in her dealings with clients, even if they looked like ruggedly tough cowboys who were quick to tease. But she hadn’t been herself since the moment she’d driven up. When she’d gotten out of her car earlier, she’d been surprised to see Cole outside, his shirtsleeves rolled up and working with that horse like a hero out of some Western novel. Something had stirred inside of her and she’d tried to distract herself with the task of getting too many things out of her trunk at once.
Then she’d accidentally flashed him when her wraparound skirt had blown apart, and she’d dropped everything she’d brought, including her pride. She’d been speechless and muddy and completely vulnerable, which must’ve been the reason she’d willingly followed the man into his bedroom of all places.
It had taken every last bit of nerve she possessed to look Cole in the eye and make small talk with him as though having conversations with strange men in the tight confines of their bathrooms was the most normal thing in the world. Vivienne had been forced to focus on his face so that her eyes wouldn’t dart off and stare at the shower just behind where he’d been standing. She had done her best to maintain an ounce of professionalism while simultaneously imagining what he would look like all damp and steamy, wrapped in nothing but the small towel hanging on the hook beside the beveled-glass-door shower stall.
They had been inches apart at side-by-side sinks for goodness’ sakes! Was there ever a more intimate environment to be in with a man? How would she know? The few relationships she’d had in college were with guys who lived in different dorms, and she’d never seen a need to sleep over. After graduation, she’d made her job her top priority and had gone on only a handful of dates since then—none of which required the sharing of a bathroom.
Vivienne looked back at the boy-band poster taped to the wall behind her. Okay, so maybe this particular bathroom wasn’t that intimate of an environment. But Cole had been wearing those jeans and doing that lazy smirk, and her brain had gone all cloudy. Obviously, she hadn’t been in her right mind or else she never would have mentioned mothers at all.
Sure, he’d bounced back from her inept comment fairly quickly, graciously acting like nothing was wrong. He’d even delivered a saucy wink that was so believable she’d all but dropped her stupid binder a second time on the ivory-and-pink rag rug.
Vivienne frowned at the binder. She preferred to keep most of her work on an electronic tablet, but Estelle insisted on having hard copies of everything. The three-ring notebook made her feel as though she was back in middle school, a trusty Trapper Keeper in her arms the only thing separating her from the cute boy who had the locker right next to hers.
It also made her feel as though she was constantly lugging her boss around with her, a not-so-subtle reminder that she was supposed to be booking more clients. Not only did she need to be professional and do her job, she needed to do it well enough that others would be willing to hire her, as well. And flirting with the groom’s brother in the bathroom was not the way to accomplish her career goals.
Standing up straighter, she decided that she’d already hidden out in Cole’s bathroom long enough. Plus, she was pretty sure she heard voices coming from somewhere outside, so it was time to get to work.
Vivienne wished she had paid more attention to the house
