Hot Westmoreland Nights - Brenda Jackson [11]
But still, she would be the first to admit that just the thought that Ramsey Westmoreland’s gaze was on her bottom almost made her breath catch in her throat. His eyes, whenever she looked into them, were filled with intensity and she could actually feel that intensity now focused directly on her.
Not able to stand it a minute longer, she swung around and frowned deeply. “We can talk now.”
His dark eyes remained steady on her, even when he nodded and said, “All right. First I want to say you did a heck of a job with lunch today. The men were impressed and so was I.”
She blinked. A compliment hadn’t been what she’d been expecting. The man definitely had a way of delivering it with mixed emotions. His words were syrupy and sweet, while the texture of his voice was brooding. “Thank you, I’m glad everyone enjoyed it.”
“They also enjoyed you.” At the lift of her brow he clarified and said, “Enjoyed you being here I mean.”
She wondered where he was about to go with that comment and figured she would know soon enough. “I enjoyed being here as well,” she responded as she placed the dishes in the sink. It was time to come clean and let him know her real purpose for being there. “Mr. Westmoreland, I think that you—”
“Ramsey. I prefer you call me Ramsey. Everyone around here does. Some even call me Ram.”
She couldn’t help but smile at that.
“You find something amusing, Ms. Burton?”
She met his gaze and her smile widened even more. “You can call me Chloe, and what I find amusing is the fact that a ram is a male sheep and you are in the sheep business. Unique, don’t you think?”
He shrugged muscular shoulders. “Never gave it much thought.”
She lifted a brow. “Are you trying to tell me that no one has ever made the connection before?”
“If they did, they knew better than to mention it.”
Chloe wanted to just throw her hands up in the air and give up. It was quite evident that even when they were trying to hold a civil conversation they had the ability to rub each other the wrong way. That made her wonder about him, the man she wanted to be on the cover of Simply Irresistible. He looked better than chocolate cake oozing with deep, rich chocolate icing—her favorite—but it was becoming quite evident he was a complex man. She couldn’t help wonder what made Ramsey tick? What would it take to make him become relaxed, more laid-back? she wondered. Although she could see that around his men he was pretty mild-mannered and friendly. It was obvious they had a good working relationship while maintaining a degree of respect. That meant he was reserving his uptightness mainly for her. She wondered why.
The research she’d done indicated he dated when the mood or the urge probably hit him. Yet he didn’t have any steady woman in his life. His last serious relationship had been with the woman he’d become engaged to, a woman by the name of Danielle McKay. However, she had ruined what was to have been his wedding day by stopping the minister in the middle of the wedding and walking out. That had been over ten years ago. Surely he’d gotten over that incident by now.
In addition to the cover photo for the magazine, she wanted an interview with him and had a feeling getting him to talk would be just as difficult as getting him to agree to the cover photo. Talk about pulling teeth. She had planned to send one of her seasoned reporters to talk to him and now she could clearly see that just wouldn’t work.
Suddenly an idea popped into her head. She might as well go about killing two birds with one stone. She wanted him to do the magazine cover and she wanted an article