Hometown Courtship. Diann Hunt

      “Coral.”

      Her comment visibly jarred him.

      “The polish.” She wiggled her fingers. “It’s not a color you hear about much, you being a guy and all.” And what a guy, at that! “You like it?”

      With a blank stare he said, “Look, I don’t mean to be rude, but as you can see, we serve coffee and donuts here—”

      Yes, she had noticed and was ever so grateful.

      “—so if you skip your trip to the bakery in the morning, you might actually make it here on time.”

      Her happy day paled a bit. “Is it the nail polish?” She studied her fingernails. “Admittedly not a great color for me.”

      He said nothing. She suddenly noticed the people around them, the number of which was growing by the second. She looked back up at him to find his gaze drilling into her.

      For a moment she wondered if she should give her coffee to him. Some people had been known to snap without it. “I’ll skip my trip to the bakery in the morning,” Callie said. “Now if you’ll excuse me.” He no doubt was a busy man, and she didn’t want to take up all his time. At least not yet.

      “Wait. I’m not finished.”

      “Yes?” she asked.

      “So, you’ll be here by eight-thirty tomorrow morning, right?” Noticeable edge to his voice here. Okay, she had to admit his attitude was causing a teensy stir in her stomach, like a simmering pot on the stove.

      “Callie?”

      Why was he pressing her this way in front of everyone? Wait. Did his foot just tap with impatience? She was pretty sure she saw that. Thoughts of her elementary-school principal, looking down at her over black-framed glasses, came back to her. She’d been in trouble that day, too.

      The simmering in her stomach worked up to a full boil. It took a lot to get her riled but when she did—well, someone should warn him.

      As the crowd grew, Callie’s heart pounded so hard against her chest she was sure it would break through and beat this man half to death. She’d always heard there was a fine line between love and you’d-better-run.

      “Right.” She smiled again, but could feel it falter under the weight of her anger.

      “Good.” He then explained the program to her, but she didn’t hear a word of it. She couldn’t imagine how this rude, arrogant, man was the same suave, debonair man she’d met at the bakery.

      “You need a hard hat.” He pointed to her gym shoes. “And boots. Hard-toed boots.”

      The way he stared at her shoes made her feel as though she had a bad pedicure. She wanted to hide her feet. “No one told me.”

      He blew out a sigh. A very manly, husky sigh. She ignored it. No one messed with her toes and got away with it.

      “There’s a pair of women’s boots in my truck over there. Best put them on.” He strode away without so much as a backward glance.

      She couldn’t believe she’d given up a perfectly tasty peach scone for this jerk. It wouldn’t happen again.

      

      “So how did your morning with the parking ticket dodger go?” Brad’s sister-in-law asked as she placed a bowl of chili in front of him on the table.

      “Now, Brianna, let the man alone. He’s no doubt had a hard day on the job,” Ryan teased.

      “Yeah, like you ever leave me alone.” Brad had indeed had a hard day. He hadn’t meant to sound so harsh at the job site. But people were watching and if he hadn’t used Callie as an example, he’d have total chaos on the job. Though they were volunteers, he still needed people to be punctual and treat the project as a real job or they’d never finish on time or produce a quality home.

      Ryan shrugged and sprinkled shredded cheese over his chili. “Yeah, you’re right. So how did it go?”

      Across the table, their seventeen-year-old daughter, Olivia, snickered.

      “Not you, too,” Brad said.

      “Sorry, Uncle Brad.”

      “Did you find a job yet, Olive?” Brad was the only one who could get by calling her that.

      “Not yet. I’ve tried everywhere. I hope I don’t get stuck babysitting the Graber twins again this year. I’m so ready for a real job.”

      “Nice way to change the subject, Brad,” Ryan said. He turned to his daughter. “Honest work is honest work. It pays the bills. And right now you’re saving for college. Which reminds me, did you go to the library and check on those scholarship options yet?”

      “Dad, can we talk about this later?”

      “We can and we will,” Ryan said in an unmistakably firm tone.

      Olivia turned to Brad and smiled. “So, tell us about your day.”

      “I’ll get you later,” he hissed at his grinning niece.

      Brad explained how he’d run into Callie at the bakery and how she’d turned up late at the job site. When he finished, everyone was quiet. He could feel Ryan studying him.

      “What?” Brad tried to appear nonchalant.

      Ryan exchanged a glance with Brianna, then turned twinkling eyes to Brad. Judges’ eyes weren’t supposed to twinkle.

      “Nothing.” Ryan looked at Brianna once again. “Did I say anything?”

      “I didn’t hear anything,” she said.

      He turned back to Brad. “Nothing here.”

      “Look, Ryan, I’ve told you. I’m not interested in a relationship. I’m waiting for my next missionary assignment in South America. I’m only here because of Mom.”

      “I don’t know why when there’s plenty to do here,” Ryan said.

      “I don’t question why you want to be a judge.”

      “You’re not getting any younger,” Ryan said.

      Brad took a bite of the spicy chili in front of him. It was fiery hot but he didn’t let on.

      There was no denying that Callie Easton was eye candy, but he’d seen her type before. He couldn’t deal with the nail polish, the hair, the makeup….

      “She primps, plucks and pedicures, Ryan.”

      “They all do that.”

      “Remember, Nicole started out that way, obsessing over her appearance. One thing led to another until—”

      “You can’t compare every woman who dabs on nail polish to our sister. She had issues. She was sick, Brad.”

      “I don’t want to talk about it.”

      “Okay, matter dropped,” Ryan said, followed by a moment of silence.

      Brad knew he had been hard on Callie, but he didn’t want her around the job site. She was a distraction, and he figured she liked it that way. The sooner they could get through this job, the better.

      “You know, little brother, you could use a haircut.”

      He goes from one complaint about me to another. Brad’s hand rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s not that bad. But my barber retired, so I’ll have to find someone soon.” Brad swirled the chili around in his bowl.

      “I go to that place behind the bakery you said you visited this morning. It’s called the Peaches & Cream Salon. As far as I’m concerned, it’s the best place in town. You ought to check it out,” Brianna said.

      Brad turned to Ryan. “Do you go there?”

      He shook