Page 143 of The Nanny and the Beefcake
“I’m fine, thanks to you.” She tried to get a read on him when a familiar voice called to her.
“Wow, Libby, you can really move with that donkey!” Phoebe Gale called, skipping toward them with a hot dog in each hand and another tucked under her arm. “You were running faster than Raz and that golden-haired guy.”
“Debatable,” Raz uttered, trying to play the role of the self-assured joker, but he couldn’t hide the look in his eye that gave him away. The man was shaken, even off-kilter. He’d flown in like her white knight, but now something was off.
“And who got to town first, Phoebe? The golden-haired guy or Raz?” she asked.
In the runaway donkey melee, she’d almost forgotten about the impromptu battle of the donkey beasts.
“Go on, Phoebe, tell Libby what you saw,” Raz said with a slight shake to his voice.
She looked him over. “Are you okay?”
He nodded as Phoebe waved the hot dogs.
“Here’s what happened. I was eating my third hot dog,” the girl whispered, then glanced around as if the hot dog police might jump out at any moment. “And then, I looked up and saw them. They were zooming down the trail super-duper fast like they had rockets hooked up to the donkeys.”
“And…” Raz coaxed.
“And Raz was the first one off the trail.”
If she wasn’t shaking from the donkey catastrophe, she would have done cartwheels across the square. Instead, she adjusted Plum’s bridle. “I see. And where’s Doug?”
“He needed to get back to the donkey rescue since Maud and Bob are helping with the festivities,” Raz answered.
“Did you part on good terms?”
Raz shrugged.
That was a no.
“Raz was smiling when I came up to him, and he let me give Beefcake a hot dog bun.” Phoebe’s expression darkened. “And then he looked up and saw you and got really scared.”
“Did he?” Libby asked, studying the man.
“Yeah, he was happy, and then he turned the color I turn when I eat too many cookies. But Raz didn’t throw up like I always do. He started running up the trail.”
Raz cleared his throat. “It wasn’t quite like that.”
Phoebe took a bite of the hot dog. “Yeah, it was, and you said more. You said, I’m not losing my girl again. And I said, Libby’s not your girl. You have a boy named Sebastian.”
My girl?
She glanced at Raz. He was doing his best to hide it, but the runaway donkey situation really frightened him.
No, it was more.
The thought of her in harm’s way had scared him.
“Where is everyone, Phoebe? Where’s your uncle and Sebastian?” she asked, drawing the focus away from Raz.
“They’re with Beefcake, over by the place where there’s water and stuff for the donkeys. When Sebastian zoomed down on his bike, he saw Oscar and rode over.”
Libby checked the donkey corral and spied Sebastian, safe and sound, with their friends. The group had missed the excitement and were chatting with Maud and Wobbly Bob.
“Would you like to lead Plum over to them, Phoebe?” she asked, needing a moment alone with her beefcake.
Phoebe stuffed the rest of one of her hot dogs into her mouth to free up a hand. “Yeah, I can do it,” she answered as she chewed.
