A minute later, he heard some clanking as Mittens scurried out of the way, and Frankie muttered a few choice words of her own.

Finally, she was headed back his way, the front view just as appealing, and Mittens followed her like a lovesick dog. Nate could relate. Only Frankie wasn’t bringing back a nail gun, she was rolling a tire that came up to her shoulders, was wider than the front door, and had the circumference of a Pinto. She rolled it right past Nate, past the habitat, and to the back steps where she tipped it over on its side.

His turn to be amused, he leaned against the porch rail. “And what is that? Mittens’s breakfast?”

“Nope.” She walked up the steps to the wide back porch and pulled an old towel off the railing, tossing it inside the tire. “It’s a simple solution to a simple problem. Mittens. In.”

And just like that, the damn mule hopped inside of the overturned tire and curled up, tucking his little hooves underneath so he resembled the sphinx. Humming with glee, he rested his head on the tire wall and blinked his big lashes up at Frankie.

“Traitor,” Nate mumbled. He’d been feeding Mittens apples and carrot stems all day. Giving him chin scratches while reaffirming that he was loved. But the second Frankie came into the picture Nate was regulated to back-up friend. “You think he’s just going to sit there peacefully and not wander around eating the grapes? This isn’t a dog. You can’t crate train him.”

“Says the man with a cedar-lined crate.”

“At least my way will keep him contained. Your way isn’t a long term solution. Watch.” Nate pulled out a handful of carrot tops. Mittens’s lashes fluttered and his big nose started working time-and-a-half. “Come here, boy.”

Mittens hummed louder and then cantered to his feet. He took a big whiff, an even bigger step and—

“No,” Frankie said, inspecting her cuticle. “Sit.”

Mittens sat.

“Plus, we don’t need long term, he’s not staying,” Frankie said and Mittens let out a distressed nicker. She looked at the animal. “You’re not. We’ve had this discussion. I don’t do animals. Or roommates.”

“Yeah, well, looks like you’ve got both, at least for a while. So we might as well build him a bed or the second you turn around he’s going to start nibbling his way to a stomachache.” Nate held out the carrot tops. “Come here, boy.”

Mittens looked from Nate to Frankie, contemplating.

“Stay,” she said and walked away. And the alpaca stayed. Even when Nate set an apple slice on the edge of the tire.

“How did you do that?” Nate asked when Frankie reached the back door.

“Get him to listen?” She laughed and turned to face him. “He’s isn’t a kid, he’s an animal, which means outside of food and water, he needs discipline and affection. In that order. And you have to make him work and earn the second by following the first so he knows where he stands.”

“Since he’s the unsure one here, wouldn’t it just be easier to give the guy a little scratch under the chin and an apple every morning so he knows he’s not going to be shipped off?”

“Maybe.” She gazed out at the barn and gave a little shrug. There was a vulnerability to the set of her shoulders as she shrugged that he hadn’t expected.

A gentle breeze picked up, and she wrapped her arms around herself. Man, when she stood like that, emotion pushing its way through, she appeared so soft and fragile and Nate wondered how he ever bought the unaffected, nothing-gets-to-me act.

“But boundaries are good. It clarifies the rules and eliminates the chance for confusion.”

Nate’s heart about broke for the scared woman in the tough-girl package standing in front of him. What a way to grow up. To constantly work at earning things that should be freely given. As though no matter how much she loved, the only way she expected love in return was with conditions so that when the bottom fell out there was a rational reason to explain away the hurt and pain.

Both Frankie’s dad and grandfather had made it clear to her, and to everyone who watched her grow up, that she had to work twice as hard to receive half of what they so readily gave to her brothers. And every time Nate was around, he managed to create more ridiculous conditions for her to overcome.

“What is that?” Frankie raised a hand and shielded her eyes from the sun. The sudden tension in her body didn’t bode well for their growing ease with each other. Especially when she said, “Damn it, I told Walt that I wasn’t ready to order the tank.”

“I ordered it,” Nate said, feeling his gut sink even lower. He was about to set her up again just so she could crash into a pile of more unattainable expectations.

“You ordered it?” She sounded mad, which was not how he pictured this moment. He’d expected her to be, hell, he didn’t know, grateful. Instead, things got serious real fast. “This is my property.”

“It’s my property too,” he said, not wanting to have this discussion now. Not when they were finally finding common ground after the near-kiss last night and the one three months ago.

“Yeah, too, as in two of us have a say.” Frankie hopped over the railing and charged toward the truck. Before Tanner even unsnapped his seatbelt, she was standing on the running board, firmly planted in the man’s face.

“Oh, no you don’t,” she said, projecting enough fuck-you vibes to have the crew who’d pulled up behind Tanner shutting their doors and barricading themselves in the cab of the truck. “I didn’t order that. I don’t want that. And if you don’t start up your truck and drive out of here I will—”

“Morning, Frankie. You look nice,” Tanner said, resting his forearm on the doorframe and leaning out the window and, with his easygoing smile in place, cutting her off.

Her mouth opened and closed, her face an adorable combination of confusion and irritation. Nate made a mental note of Tanner’s Frankie-silencing method. Who knew being nice could silence the ball-buster?

“Are you fucking with me?” she asked. When he just smiled and tapped the front of his ball cap, she turned to Nate, jabbing her thumb over her shoulder at the construction truck. “Is he fucking with me? Because I swear to God the next man who screws with my life is going to find himself short one tool in the toolbox.”

“Morning, Tanner,” Nate said, walking toward Frankie.

“Nate, how’s it going?”

“It’s going.” Nate rounded the truck and didn’t stop.

“Hello?” she yelled, proving that she could be the biggest pain in his ass. Arguing about a water tank was not on his TO DO LIST, but he could tell by the stubborn set of her shoulders that she would grab the shotgun if necessary. “Am I not standing right here? Is this some kind of lame game, ignore the—”

He didn’t let her finish, didn’t let her prepare. He kissed her. Just like that. No warning, no chance for her to knee him in the sac. He just put his mouth to hers and, man, he kissed the argument right out of her. At first she didn’t respond, her mouth firm and resistant, but then he felt her lips soften, slowly give way and part beneath his, and he knew she was as gone as he was.

Her arms slid around his neck, and she melted into him. The taste of her filled his head, as she opened her mouth to him, taking it from a simple kiss to an invitation to get hot and sweaty. An invitation he wanted to accept, badly. And would have, had it not been for Tanner and his crew two feet away.

When they were both breathing heavy, he eased back and watched with a smile as Frankie’s eyes slowly fluttered open. She was looking up at him like she had no words. Which was his goal.

“Wow, when you kiss me like that, I forget that I’m supposed to hate you,” she whispered, her eyes still on his lips and her hands, he noticed, dangling from his belt.

“You don’t hate me,” he whispered back.

“Yes. I do.” Finally her eyes met his. Hooded and heated and eating a hole right through his normally infallible restraint. “Was that to calm me down?”

“No. That was to shut you up. This is to calm you down.” And he went back for seconds. And man oh man, had there not been an audience, he would have picked her up and taken her to that master bedroom so they could see just how big the bed was.

But they did have an audience. And sleeping with Frankie was a bad idea. So he gave one final tug of her lower lip and pulled back.

Without breaking eye contact, he took Frankie’s hand and said to Tanner. “Can you give us a second?”

“Take all the time you need,” Tanner said, and Nate didn’t have to look up to know that the guy was laughing his ass off. “I’m on the clock.”

Ignoring the crew all but high-fiving him across the field, Nate pulled a very pliant and very flustered Frankie toward the back porch. Mittens, surprisingly, was still in his tire.

He considered taking her to the kitchen, but decided to have their little discussion on the back steps, since the kitchen was closer to the bedroom. It also had lots of countertops, six if Nate remembered correctly—not including the table.

“Look, Frankie,” he started, but she put a hand over his mouth. Her eyes narrowed and the look on her face was anything but flustered or pliant. Frankie was back.

“You kissed me!” She smacked his chest.

He caught her hand, holding it there. “You kissed me back.”

“To shut me up,” she accused. Incredible. Zero to irate in two seconds flat.

“No, that was just a surprise bonus,” Nate joked. Not even a chuckle from her. He released a breath and decided he’d have to ride this one out.

“You bought a water tank.” She jabbed a finger in his chest—hard. “Without asking me.”