Her voice trailed off, but there was no doubt what she meant. Burl clearly took her meaning with no offense. “No. He’s fine. It’s just a tough time of year for him is all, and he likes his space after twelve years in the military.” He nodded thoughtfully at Suzanne, his astute old gaze running over her as if she were a prize mare. “Do him good to have some company for a change.”

Suzanne wasn’t as confident about that as good old Uncle Burl. Grady had made it clear he didn’t want anything to do with her, but she smiled and said, “Why don’t you join us?”

“I’d love to, but my wife’s the jealous sort.” He cracked himself up, which left Suzanne in zero doubt his wife was the exact opposite. “I gotta keep going. Just came in to pick up some of Annie’s cobbler. Best in the county.”

“Best in the state, Burl,” Annie quipped in a crotchety voice from over at the counter where she was taking someone’s order.

“Yes, ma’am,” Burl agreed, winking at Suzanne and Winona before bidding them goodbye.

Suzanne watched Burl head for the counter, aware of the weight of Winona’s gaze settling on her profile. “Are you sure you’re going to be all right out there, babe?”

Dragging her gaze off Burl to face Winona, she smiled. “Of course. I’m not worried for my safety.” If anything, Suzanne felt safe as houses with Grady’s brooding presence just down the way. There was something about the man that screamed protector. Probably those twelve years in the military. “I just wish he wasn’t so…”

“Un-neighborly?”

Suzanne shook her head. Rugged. Capable. Cowboy. “Interesting.”

Winona leaned forward, her curls following as a light switched on behind her eyes. “Bug-under-a-microscope interesting? Or hot-piece-of-ass interesting?”

Taking another mouthful of heaven allowed Suzanne to stall and forget for a moment about Grady’s ass walking away from her earlier, cupped to perfection in a faded pair of Wranglers.

“He’s very…manly.” Which was a gross understatement. Suzanne was sure he could probably impregnate the entire female population of the United States with just one of those long, silent looks.

“Ah. Manly.” Winona’s lips twitched as the glint became a full-on blaze. “So a manly, surly military type? Sounds like an erotic author’s wet dream to me.”

Suzanne cringed at her friend’s word choice, reminding her how badly she’d run her mouth. He probably thought she was a ditz. Or some sexually depraved artiste from the city who painted abstract shapes of a vaguely sexual nature. Like her mother. But his brooding silence had made her feel too awkward to stay quiet.

“Maybe you should take my bed at the boardinghouse,” Winona continued, her voice light and teasing. “And I’ll go live at the cottage.”

No. The word reverberated around her skull, her muse jerking at the suggestion. She had no barometer for sarcasm. “I think I want to…paint him.”

Even now, Suzanne’s muse twitched restlessly, like a tempest beneath her skin. Images and colors, light and shadow, flow and symmetry swirled through her mind in a kaleidoscope of sensation that was dizzying.