Chapter 1

1

CASSIE

S omewhere in this neighborhood was a hot mountain man. And I was going to find him before my friends did.

I didn’t see where my other two friends went, but Sloane headed straight for the trailer. That was where we, as volunteers, would be expected to go to check in.

A tornado had swept through this town early Friday morning. It was now mid-morning on Monday and, after a video had gone viral of a guy everyone nicknamed the Cyclone Stud, my friends and I decided this was exactly where we needed to come.

What we hadn’t discussed was the fact that we all four had our eyes on the same guy.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

The sound echoed through the morning air, only pausing the chirping birds for a few seconds before they picked up their song again. Tracing the direction of the noise was the real challenge.

I glanced back over my shoulder, verifying I was all alone on this particular street, then picked up my pace. I was pretty sure the sound came from a few houses in front of me, but I hoped like hell it would start up again so I’d be able to trace it before I went too far in the wrong direction.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

I smiled. Yes, those noises were definitely made by the Cyclone Stud. It was fate. I’d known it from the second I saw him on the screen.

Okay, so I hadn’t felt actual love for the guy or anything. He was the guy who’d take my virginity, that was all. He was hot but definitely not my type. A little too dark and mysterious.

I liked a guy with a sense of humor. A rough exterior, but deep, deep down, he had a heart of gold, and that was a side he only showed to the woman he loved.

The noise had stopped, but I didn’t need that beacon anymore. There was a work truck parked in a driveway up ahead. It bore the name of a construction crew on the passenger-side door. That construction crew was the one our Cyclone Stud worked for.

My heart was pounding so hard, I could hear it in my ears as I approached the front door to that house. Only as I turned the doorknob did it hit me that construction companies employed more than one person. That’s why they called them construction crews . What were the odds our Cyclone Stud was the one crew member inside this house—the one I’d just barged my way into?

“Hello?” I called out.

The word fell out of me, my mouth not having caught up with my brain. I’d been planning to yell my greeting once I got inside, but now that I was having second thoughts about this being my guy, I hesitated.

It was too late to turn back now, though. So I closed the door behind me and started walking.

“Hello,” a male voice called back.

Yeah, that definitely didn’t sound like a reclusive loner guy. This was not my Cyclone Stud. This voice sounded friendly, approachable.

“In the kitchen,” he said.

A sudden image flashed through my mind. It was of my dream guy, standing in the kitchen, cooking. If I were imaginative enough, I’d have him naked, maybe wearing only an apron. But no, in my fantasy, he wore a white T-shirt and jeans, bulging muscles stretching the limits of the sleeves.

The guy in my imagination wasn’t the Cyclone Stud, though. This guy had darker hair and a warm smile that softened his expression, but only when he looked at me.

I could turn around and walk out now. This guy would never know I’d even been here. But then what? I’d just go house to house, looking for the Cyclone Stud? No, curiosity was drawing me toward the male voice.

The kitchen was straight back, down the hallway and past a flight of stairs. As I neared the doorway, I crossed my arms over my chest, bracing myself for what I was about to see. But nothing could have prepared me for what I found in the kitchen.

He wasn’t at the stove. Instead, he was on a stepladder on the other side of the kitchen. He held a hammer in his right hand, while his left flattened a board over what I assumed was a window. But everything else about him matched my fantasy.

Okay, so I’d never really put a face on the guy. Not a clear one, anyway. But the dark hair, the muscular build, and the sleeves of the T-shirt that were stretched by bulging muscles? All of it was straight out of my imagination.

Then he turned and looked at me, and the scowl on his face was exactly what I imagined a gruff mountain man would have. In real life, though, it made me want to crawl further into myself and hide there.

“May I help you?” he asked.

The question came out sounding pretty harsh. I winced in response. If looks could kill, lasers would be shooting out of his eyes right now, and I’d be flat on the floor.

“I’m just…”

I paused there. No other words came out. What? Looking for Jax? That was the Cyclone Stud’s name. I could say that, and maybe he’d direct me toward the guy.

But I didn’t want to walk out of here and go hang out with the Cyclone Stud. No, I wanted to spend more time around this guy. I had to see if beneath that crusty exterior was a heart of gold that beat for only one woman. The woman he loved.

“I’m here to help,” I said. “Drove here from Chattanooga. Someone said to come to this house. That you needed help.”

It was a long shot. The guy could very well not even be helping with tornado recovery. Maybe the homeowner had hired him to come board up the window. Or he could be the person who owned this house—with a wife off at work somewhere and a kid or two in daycare.

The guy stepped down from the ladder, setting the hammer on the top rung. Then he turned to face me, arms crossed over his chest.

“Who?” he asked.

I frowned, the question having thrown me off guard. “Who what?”

“Who sent you here?”

Oh, shit. I didn’t have a good answer for that. I shrugged and said, “I don’t know. Some guy.”

I could have said “you mountain men all look alike,” but this guy stood out to me in every way. I hadn’t felt this kind of attraction to anyone going back as far as I could remember. Maybe ever.

“Fine,” he said. “Hold these nails.”

He grabbed a box from the second rung of the ladder and handed it over to me. Then, hammer in hand, he moved the stepladder to the right and climbed up on it again.

He reached a hand toward me. “Nail.”

I moved into place next to him, holding up a nail. He didn’t even look at me as he reached over. As a result, his hand collided with mine, sending sparks shooting through me.

Eyes wide, I looked up at him just in time to see the hammer drop. With the loudest bang ever, it slammed against the tile floor.

“Fuck,” he said, withdrawing his hand. “Shit. Fuck.”

I winced at each shouted profanity. I grew up in a relatively quiet household with a stepdad who rarely raised his voice and a mom who meditated or drank a glass of wine when she was stressed.

But for some reason, I was attracted to grumps. Guys with big muscles who shouted when they dropped a hammer. I just wasn’t quite prepared for how loud it would be.

“I’ll get it.” I knelt to reach for it at the same time he moved on the ladder, sending it tilting slightly toward me.

I overcompensated as I swayed backward. That was how I ended up on my butt with a box full of nails on the floor all around me.

And then I was the one screaming, “Fuck” as I tried to deal with the embarrassment of making a complete fool of myself in front of this guy—the most handsome man I’d ever met.

So much for seducing him. I couldn’t even get past the “getting to know you” portion of the day.

But I could make this happen. I just had to stop being so nervous and start being the kickass woman I knew I could be.