style="font-size:15px;"> Gabe Sloan didn’t know how lucky he was.
Chapter Three
“Hi. Mind if I sit here?”
Gabe choked on a bite of his pulled-pork sandwich. Where the devil had she come from? Glancing at Arianne Waide’s pixie features, he speculated that perhaps she’d used fairy dust to simply materialize here.
Before he could answer that he did mind—and that there were at least half a dozen unoccupied tables nearby—Arianne sat on the wooden bench opposite him. She impatiently moved aside the tabletop roll of paper towel between them. The restaurant didn’t boast impressive interior decor, but the barbecue was phenomenal.
If Gabe were a better person, he’d think it was a shame more people didn’t know about this hidden treasure. By all rights, it should be just as crowded as the Dixieland Diner. But he was selfishly glad he never had to wait in a long line during the lunch hour and that he wasn’t jostling elbows with locals like Arianne.
“I’ve come to ask you a favor,” she declared.
“What is wrong with you?” This time he knew he hadn’t done anything to encourage her attention. So what was she doing stalking him to the far side of town at his favorite hole-in-the-wall?
“Careful.” She wagged her index finger at him. “Last time we spoke, your manners were a bit rough, but I’m willing to overlook that and start fresh.”
“How nice.” Was she deranged? The explanation seemed likelier with each passing moment. “To what do I owe this magnanimous oversight?” Whatever he’d done to earn it, he’d make sure not to repeat.
“I’m naturally kindhearted,” she drawled.
Looking alarmingly as if she were settling in for a prolonged conversation, Arianne propped her elbows on the table and rested her cheek on her fists. It was the kind of posture that should have appeared youthful. Except that when she brought her arms together like that, it pushed together a surprising amount of cleavage in the scooped neckline of her fuzzy green sweater. He couldn’t recall what she’d been wearing Wednesday night, but he was sure it had been looser. And that it hadn’t seemed so damn touchable. Annoyed that he’d even noticed, he clenched his fingers into a fist on his thigh.
In spite of her small stature and wavy locks, she was definitely all woman. A woman whose company I didn’t ask for.
“Look, kid, I’m not kindhearted. I’m an ill-tempered misanthrope. Fancy word for someone who doesn’t like people.”
Most females would get huffy over his condescension and implied aspersions on their maturity. Arianne widened her smile.
“I understand,” she assured him. There was so much commiserating sincerity in her tone that it took him a moment to realize she was reflecting his patronization right back at him. “You’re a genuine ogre. Probably live in a swamp, hang out with a talking donkey—”
“You have an odd strategy for asking favors,” he informed her as he stood.
“You’re leaving?” She shot an incredulous glance toward his plate, which still held most of his onion rings, the last quarter of his sandwich and a pickle spear.
“Lost my appetite.”
“In that case.” She reached unabashedly for an onion ring, closing her eyes and making a near-purring sound in her throat. Once she’d swallowed, she beamed at him in approval. “Wow, those are good.”
“I know.”
“Why don’t I eat here more?” she wondered aloud, popping another hand-battered onion ring into her mouth. With a final resigned glance at the food, she stood, too.
Gabe had the terrible suspicion that she’d fall in step with him and trail him wherever he went. That if he went to the parking lot and drove away, she might actually follow; if he tried to evade her by going into the men’s room, she’d simply wait him out. He doubted he could squeeze through the window.
“I should have been clearer earlier,” she said, her voice suddenly brisk and businesslike. “When I said I came to ask a favor, that was true, but it’s not just how you can help me, it’s how we can help each other.”
The old cynicism burned in his gut. If she suggested in husky tones that she could scratch his back if he scratched hers, he would lose all respect for her. And it startled Gabe to realize that even though he barely knew her and had spent the majority of this encounter wishing she’d disappear in a puff of smoke, he did respect her. She had an…implacability that was commendable.
That slight admiration kept him from telling her point-blank to get lost. Instead, he crossed his arms over his chest. “I have a busy afternoon ahead of me—we don’t all work for our daddies. You have thirty seconds.”
“You remember Quinn Keller, the teacher who hired you to repair her roof last June?”
He nodded. Quinn was a decent sort. She’d tipped him for the work he’d done without winking over the check as though he was supposed to add some extra service—something more than one town matron had hinted in his younger years. Quinn would bring out freshly squeezed lemonade on hot days but seemed unnerved enough by him that she kept their conversations brief.
Unlike certain blondes who seemed determined to chat him up from now until the Second Coming.
The moment he’d inclined his head, Arianne hurriedly continued as if mentally counting down the time he’d allotted her. “Quinn’s cochairing the committee for Whiteberry’s fall festival and needs help with some of the labor—assembling booths, hooking up electrical equipment—but she doesn’t have much of a budget. After all, the whole point is to raise money for the school. So we wanted to ask you to do it for free.”
He snorted. The lady had a bottomless supply of gall. “And I’d be doing this out of the nonexistent goodness of my heart? You have a nice day, Miss Waide.”
He headed for the door with a deliberately long stride, but what she lacked in long legs she made up for in unholy tenacity. No sooner had he stepped into the cool afternoon air than that voice once again sounded at his ear—or rather, six inches below it. With her nonstop chirping, he would have expected her to have a shrill tone or maybe something nasal, with a hint of whine. She actually had a low, melodic pitch. It wasn’t hard to imagine that she’d used that voice to convince plenty of people to do her bidding.
“Gabe,” she chided, “don’t you think it’s silly to run away? It’s not like you can hide from me in a town this size.”
She had a point. After all, he periodically crossed paths with Shay’s parents and heaven knew they weren’t actively seeking him out the way Arianne was threatening. “No reason to hide when I can outdistance you, short stuff.”
“You can try. I’ll get a scooter and keep up. Ask my brothers if you don’t believe me.”
Oh, he did. He just wasn’t sure how he’d become the object of her persistence. For months she’d simply been the checkout girl at the most reliable place in town to get hardware supplies. Then she’d dropped that bombshell of a dinner date on him, and suddenly he had a smiling thorn in his side who smelled like raspberries.
“Miss
