“Because you’re wearing a two-thousand-dollar dress, and I’m buying you a burger and fries.”

“Who says you’re buying?”

“I’m from Texas.”

She smacked her hands dramatically over her ears, signaling her unwillingness to learn where he was from. “La, la, la, la-”

He playfully pulled one of them away. “You can already tell that by my accent.”

“Just because you grew up in Texas doesn’t mean you live there now.”

“I do.”

“Quit breaking the rules,” she warned him.

“There are rules?”

“Yes, there are rules. We agreed.”

“Well, the rule in Texas is that a gentleman always buys a lady’s dinner.”

“This is Colorado.”

They came to a halt beside the drive-through window, and he peered up at the lighted menu board. “And this isn’t exactly dinner.”

A teenage girl in a navy-blue-and-white uniform, her hair pulled back in a ponytail revealing purple beaded earrings, slid the window open. “What’ll you have?”

“A mountain burger,” Abigail decided. “No onions, extra tomato and a chocolate shake.”

“Same for me,” said Lucky, extracting his wallet. “But I’ll take some fries with that.”

Abigail decided not to press the issue of payment. What point would she be making? That she was an independent woman? That this wasn’t a date? Date or not, she doubted a five-dollar dinner would make any man feel entitled to so much as a good-night kiss.

Not that she’d necessarily mind kissing Lucky. She found herself stealing a glance at his profile while he handed the girl a twenty. He was an incredibly attractive man. As tall as her brothers, easily over six feet. He had gorgeous brown eyes, thick, dark hair, full lips, a straight nose, with a square chin that was slightly beard shadowed. He wasn’t cowboy. She’d call it urbane. With an edge. She liked that.

“Cherry turnover?” he asked, turning to catch her staring.

She quickly blinked away her curiosity. “No, thanks.”