Free Forever's Affection (Forever In Luck Series Book 3) by J. Darling

the
defensive.
    “What?”
    Pulling
into the farmyard, he put the truck in park and looked over at her. “You hunt?”
    “Yeah,
you got a problem with that?”
    He
sighed, albeit very quietly, then asked, “What do you hunt?”
    “Big game and waterfowl. You want to
make something of it?”
    She
was going to bring him to his knees. “Can I show you something?” he asked, as
they got out of the truck.
    Stopping
at the question, she rolled her eyes again. “Let me guess, you want to show me
your gun. Haha . No thanks.”
    He
started laughing, then took her hand and pulled her along. “Come on, don’t be
so cynical. Besides, it’s not a gun, it’s a rifle.”
    “ Mmhmm ,” she answered unimpressed. “That’s what they all
say.”

 
    *****

 
    Opening
the door to the outbuilding and flipping on the light switch, he stepped
inside, moving over so she could see what he wanted to show her. Walking
further inside and looking all around, she studied the walls and tables, then smiled brightly. Glancing his way, her eyes twinkled,
and she nodded appreciatively. “This…is nice. Real nice. I’m impressed. So, you’re a taxidermist?”
    He
went all robin breasted proud. “Coming from you, I’ll take that as a
compliment. No, I’m a farmer who has too much time on his hands in the winter
months. So, I come out here and putter around. My family informed me the night
of the storm that I’m becoming feral, and as you pointed out, I need to get out
more. So there you go.”
    She
chuckled. “That wasn’t very nice of them.”
    “No,
but sadly, I’ve come to realize it’s true.” Walking to a tall cabinet, he
maneuvered the lock and opened the door. Smiling, he turned and looked at her.
“You still not interested in seeing my gun?”
    Looking
him straight in the eye, she said with a glimmer, “I thought it was a rifle?”
    “It
is, but these here are my guns, take a look, you might find something
intriguing.”
    She
laughed a little, as she stepped closer. “Okay, just a peek. At
the guns. In the gun cabinet.” Stopping, she
smiled heartily. “A collector of Winchesters I see. Nice. Can I touch?”
    Oh
yeah. “Please,” he answered with a glint in his eye, the energy between them
crackling. “I wish you would.”
    She
laughed and shook her head. “Naughty, naughty, naughty.” Reaching out, she sighed, appreciating what she saw. “Oh baby, come to mama,”
she said, taking out the best of the bunch. Loving the rifle with her hands,
she turned it from side to side, then put it up in
aiming and firing position. “A prewar model seventy,
four fifty-eight magnum, sweet, very sweet.”
    She
froze and shifted her eyes over to him when he groaned. Coughing, he tried to
cover it up, shuffling his feet in the process.
    Catching
his eye, she quizzed him, “What?”
    “You
know your way around a gun.”
    She
went back to studying the gun. “ Mmhmm . Sure do. Does
that surprise you?”
    “I
find it sexy as hell. What do you use?”
    Putting
the gun back, she grabbed another, studied it, and put it through its paces.
“I’m a Remington gal, mine’s a Remington seven hundred bolt action, seven
millimeter magnum, but I have others, it just depends on what I need it for.”
    He
had to ward off a hard-on while standing and watching her open, close, lever,
aim, and trigger his firearms. “What do you like to hunt?”
    “It
would be easier to say what I don’t like to eat. I hunt so I have food to eat,
but I suppose elk would be my answer, deer work too.”
    He
smiled, unable to stop himself, the words just rolling off his tongue, he said,
“I like you.”
    She
let out a grunt. “All because I know how to handle a gun and
eat game.”
    Man,
she really had been treated poorly. “No, not even remotely close to that, it
goes further. It’s because you’re by far the sharpest, most interesting person
I’ve ever met.”
    “Yeah right.” She shook her
head as she put the gun back, not believing him in the