Independence: #4 Hayley by Karen Nichols Page A

don’t think we notice that?” Jack asked, his head shaking. “Some guys are like girls, Hayley, we like to be appreciated for more than our…muscles.”
    She thought about their conversations. About how they’d started their construction company and wanted better than just cheap in the buildings and tons of money in their bank accounts. About how it had taken a few years to find the right clients and the work they did in the meantime to keep eating. Yes, they had more than just their looks going for them. A lot more. And for some reason, they wanted to share it with her.
    Friends. And more.
    Heat flushed through her and she turned to look out the window as they rode through the streets and onto the highway. “It’s not far from the ranch…maybe twenty minutes down the highway.”
    “Did you need something from your place, Hayley?” Jack asked, meeting the gaze she turned from the window.
    “Oh, no…just thinking it wasn’t that far. Not by this area standards, at least,” she told him with a smile.
    “Claire included the hangers, so you can just remove all the tags and hang them in the closet.” Dane caught her gaze in the mirror and winked at her.
    “I can put groceries away,” she volunteered.
    “Jack’s pretty particular about his kitchen,” Dane warned after a little bit of a frosty silence.
    “Jack is organized, not particular,” came the prickly response.
    “I’ll open the cabinets and match things up,” she said with a laugh at Jack’s sarcastic tone.
    “A smart man doesn’t argue with help,” Jack returned with a grin at her. “Especially pretty help. We’ll haul for you. Leave the lunch stuff out and we’ll have big sandwiches.”
    “Good. I’m hungry,” Hayley decided she liked the idea and loved their kitchen. “You know the owner of the shop, don’t you?”
    “You might, too, Hayley,” Dane told her, snapping his belt open as they pulled before the house. “I don’t know how many people you know that go to the club, but I know Claire is a friend of Dianna’s and Bailey.”
    “The Helping Hands shelter,” she said softly, her head nodding. “I know Claire. I didn’t see her…she must be swamped with only a few days left before Christmas.”
    “She was bouncing between her office and customers while you were changing,” Jack told her. “Some things she hadn’t ordered were on the road…somewhere…and she was trying to locate them. She said she’d catch up with you tonight at the club.”
    Hayley swallowed hard. “Claire goes to the club?”
    “Hyperventilating,” Dane said softly, bringing his palm down sharply on her thigh. Her eyes went wide and her mouth opened seconds before it slammed shut. “Hayley, we have to deal with this thing about people uncovering your little secrets. It won’t make either of us terribly happy to scoop you off the floor if you pass you.”
    “I don’t know how,” she answered honestly when he stepped onto the concrete and waited for her to join him. Jack had the back of the truck open and was hauling bags to the front porch.
    “Let’s start with what are you afraid they’ll do to you? You’re over twenty-one.” Jack tapped in numbers to the key pad and then disarmed the alarm on the inside. He blocked the door wide and carried a load of bags to the counter in the kitchen. He stared for a long minute at his neatly arranged kitchen and hoped he knew what he was doing. It was one thing to have an OCD attack in front of your best friend, a completely different matter to let the girl you’re considering wooing to see you lose control over a misplaced box of cookies.
    He winced. He was an adult and could deal with someone else in his kitchen.
    “Jack?” Hayley came up behind him, the bags she carried set on the counter next to his. She placed a hand on his arm and offered a little smile. “I think I’m the same way when I let my uncle or Conner use my examining room. I used to spend hours worrying they’d put things in