A Bet Worth Making (Grayson County #2) by Heather Hildenbrand

guy.”
    Before I could formulate a response, she grabbed her beer off the counter and swaggered out. Now it was my turn to scowl.
    “You meant thank you,” I called after her.
    I waited for her to reply.
    No answer.
    Just when I’d given up on her, she appeared in the doorway again, grinning. She strolled up and planted a quick kiss on my cheek. “Thanks, Case. I owe you one,” she said.
    Her hips swayed as she spun and doubled back for the door, her ass lifting in a way that made it hard to concentrate. My mouth opened but no sound came out. By the time I found my voice she was already gone again.
    “What about the sauce?” I called just as the screen door creaked.
    “You’ve got the spoon,” she yelled back and the door shut behind her.
    I looked down at the white spoon hanging limp in my hand and scowled. Motherfucker. She was right.

Chapter Eleven
    Jordan
     
     
    I spent Saturday nursing my beer-headache and trying to remember why I thought it’d be a good idea to drink in the first place. I didn’t even like beer. But that’d been the only choice at the corner store yesterday. I wasn’t surprised. Small hick town with only bottom-shelf beer for sale? Go figure.
    Casey was up and gone with the daylight along with his dirt bike. I wasn’t sure if he’d gone to work or just out with some friends. Curiosity pricked at me over the possibility that any of his friends might be girls. Not that I had a right to ask.
    Despite my promise to Gavin about today, I wasn’t sure if borrowing Casey’s truck included free time or just work. So I stayed put. Getting caught up on emails and laundry and the rest of the unpacking I hadn’t done. I wasn’t sure when it had happened but somewhere along the way I’d accepted that I was going to spend some time here in Grayson.
    And I wasn’t nearly as broken up over it as I’d been that first day. In fact, Casey’s place was starting to feel downright comfy. And Casey himself … well, at least he’d stopped walking around half-naked with a pickup line on his tongue.
    Then again, last night I’d been the one to cross lines.
    Embarrassment had flooded me when I’d first woken remembering the way I’d literally cried on his shoulder. Not to mention how I’d obviously ogled him when he’d walked in all dirty and smelling like fertilizer—how was that even hot to me?—but in the end, I couldn’t hang on to it.
    Casey had helped me out by calling Harriett, without judgment or making me feel silly or stupid. That made us friends. And it felt good to have someone on my side. Gavin was the only one I had for that and with him stationed in Virginia, having Casey go to bat for me had lessened the ache of loneliness.
    With the permit situation cleared up, and Casey and I finally in a solid place, I was thinking maybe it wouldn’t be completely awful to spend some time here.
    Except for seeing my grandparents. And if Gavin asked me one more time if I’d gone over there…
    A knock on the front door startled me and I dropped my armload of clean clothes in front of the dryer. I left it behind and found Summer on the porch, smiling through the screen.
    “Hey, neighbor,” I said, ushering her inside.
    “Oh, good, you’re home,” she said, twisting her fingers together nervously.
    “Is everything okay?” I asked, stepping back as she entered.
    “What? Oh, yeah, fine. I was just hoping … well, to be honest, I was planning to take advantage of the fact that you probably didn’t have anywhere else to be and enlist your help with something.”
    “What do you need?”
    “Tonight is the annual bonfire. Well, we do a couple actually, but usually after the spring planting is done and everyone can go back to normal working hours, I throw a bonfire party. S’mores, drinks, music. Nothing too fancy. Casey and Ford usually help me set up but Ford’s in Roanoke all day for a horticulture thing and Casey’s…” She paused to look around pointedly at the otherwise empty