His dark blue T-shirt and worn, faded jeans wouldn’t have looked better on a fashion model. But really, it came down to the scuffed workboots. This guy was the real deal.

“You’re looking at my feet.”

River nodded. “Anything you need to know about a person, you can tell by their boots.”

An eyebrow rose over one skeptical eye. The other eye kept watch on her hands, like he thought she might pull out a weapon on him.

“I’m not going to rob you,” she sighed, exasperated as he pulled onto the road, driving far too slowly.

“You’re wearing tennis shoes,” he said.

“So?”

“What’s that say about your feet?”

“That they’re tired of everyone being a pain in my ass. Jessie? Hey, can you hear me?”

He kept glancing at her out of the corner of his eye and not in an appreciative way.

She pulled her scarf away from her neck and waggled it at him. “The microphone is in the scarf. It’s small so no one sees it, including looky-loos.”

“Looky-loos?”

“One who slows down to see whatever’s happening on the side of the road,” River explained.

“Ma’am—”

“I left Wyoming a long time ago, and the ma’ams along with it. My name’s River. Turn right up here.”

“I wasn’t being a looky-loo. I was being a neighborly, concerned individual.” His low rumble sounded like rocks rolling down a roadcut. “Which I’m regretting more and more every minute. Let me see the scarf.”

“No, I have it in perfect position.”

“I’m not going in the woods with you unless I see it.”

After her morning from hell, seeing him squirm made River finally laugh. “You’re actually scared of me. You? Of me?”

His beard twitched. “I’m not one to discount a woman’s ability to kick my butt. Not with a sister who’s done so more times than I can count.”

River tried to imagine what a female version of this man would look like. “Your family tree frightens me.”

“It frightens me too, ma’am. About that earpiece…”

He had to be ma’aming her on purpose because otherwise, he was the densest person on the planet. Rolling her eyes, River pulled her carefully placed headset out of the scarf and waggled it at him. “See?”

Warm, brown eyes looked at her, not the blacktop in front of them. And it didn’t matter if they were the prettiest eyes she’d ever seen on a man, River wasn’t about to die on the side of the road because he drove them both into a tree.

“Focus, big guy. Eyes on the road. Hands at ten and two.”

Exhaling a low chuckle, he did as he was told. For a moment. “You’re not shy, are you?”

“Why would I be? And turn right.”

He turned right, although not with as much enthusiasm as she would have hoped.