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Her eyes flew open to find Zeke stopped in the middle of the trail, the hardness from previous interactions returning. Agatha wrapped her light jacket around herself tighter and nodded in the direction she’d come. “I only came out here to ask you if you’d like to join me for breakfast.”
She wasn’t certain, but in the early morning light, it almost looked like his expression had softened. That small change had her heart on edge, fluttering like this was a meeting between two lovers rather than two strangers who really had no business spending time together.
“You want me to join you for breakfast.”
“That’s what I said.” She forced her voice louder, praying it would cover the fact that he unnerved her. “And if you’d like to join me for breakfast from this point forward, I’m turning it into a standing offer. I’ll not have you out here cooking over a fire while you work on my house.”
His lips twitched. “So it’s not an invitation. It’s a demand.”
The fluttering went into hyperdrive, and her stomach tightened. “I won’t force you to do anything, Mr. Callahan—”
He waved his hand at her. “Call me Zeke. You’ve used my name before. There’s no need to be so formal.”
It was as if her insides had decided to go on some thrilling fair ride where she didn’t know if the contraption would even remain in operating condition. Her stomach went in one direction while her lungs went in another. Agatha had to force her eyes away from him in order to regain some semblance of composure.
Enough with the formalities? Was he suggesting that they were shifting into something more… personal?
Agatha turned away, biting back a smile. Her thoughts were in a whirlwind. She’d gone from distrusting him and not liking him to suddenly thinking he wasn’t such a bad guy. It was possible he was exactly who he presented on the surface.
Were there things that rubbed her the wrong way? Sure. But there wasn’t a single person who didn’t have their flaws. She certainly did. Who was she to judge Zeke? There was no reason for it.
“You’re going the wrong way.”
Stopping, Agatha let her gaze sweep the immediate surroundings. No, this was the trail she’d come from. There was no way she’d gotten turned around.
“I don’t know how you got all the way out here, but I’m guessing you made a wrong turn,” Zeke’s gruff voice called out to her.
This time she turned to face him. “No, I’m certain I came from this direction.”
“You keep heading that way and you’re going to find yourself at a creek. It’s beautiful, but I wouldn’t go out that way this early in the morning. You’re most certainly going to meet up with some animals that would consider you to be their breakfast.”
She swallowed hard. “I thought you said there weren’t any animal tracks around.”
Zeke chuckled, a small smile appearing on his face—one of the first genuine ones he’d given her. “I didn’t say the creek was close. It’s a good half-hour walk in that direction. But I’m sure with your determination, you could make it there in half that time.”
Another compliment? Or was he teasing? Based on his expression, she didn’t have a single clue.
He nodded to her left. “That’s the way you want to take.” Without waiting for her, he trudged off in that direction. She followed behind him, glancing over her shoulder a couple times as if doing so would help her make sense of how she’d gotten so turned around.
It didn’t help even one iota.
The second the cabin loomed in front of her, the disorientation seemed to right itself. She didn’t know how she managed to get so off course, but at least Zeke had been in the right place at the right time. That seemed to be happening more and more lately.
Zeke strode right up to the front door, then waited. She stopped a few feet from him, confused. “Is something wrong?”
He gestured toward the door. “I don’t live here.”
The puzzle pieces in her mind still didn’t connect. “But it’s your cabin.”
“Ms. Birch, I would never enter a woman’s home even if I owned the property.”
The initial surprise at his perspective faded as she focused on one thing. He didn’t use her first name. She placed her hand on her hip and gave him a pointed look. “What happened to being less formal?”
His face crinkled as he tossed her a smile.
Agatha rolled her eyes, letting out an exaggerated sigh. A smile of her own crossed her face as she strode past him. She opened the door, then gestured in a sweeping motion. “Guests first.”
Zeke removed his hat and headed inside.
