A Match Made in Texas (19 page)

From there, things got completely out of hand. Without a bit of his usual finesse, he pumped into her hard and fast. He should’ve felt guilty; instead, he just felt wild. Like an animal that had been unleashed from its cage after a lifetime of captivity. And Bri welcomed his out-of-control lust as if it were the reason for her very existence. When Dusty thought he couldn’t take a second more, she tossed back her head and moaned out her satisfaction.

The noise triggered his own release, and he was swept into an orgasm so intense he wondered if he might black out. He could have. He opened his eyes and found himself half laying on Bri, the tight hold of her legs the only thing keeping him from slipping to the floor.

He got lost in the blue of her eyes for a moment before he found his voice.

“I’m sorry.”

Bri smiled. “I’m not. In fact, could we do it again?”

Chapter Nineteen

B
RI FELT BUOYANT.
Like she could float right up to the ceiling if Dusty’s body wasn’t pinning her to the counter. Too bad he looked about as buoyant as a lead balloon. With a grunt, he pulled away from her and turned to adjust his clothing.

She sat up and smoothed down her skirt. “I’ll take that as a no.”

He turned back around, the edges of his shirt flapping open and revealing a strip of ripped stomach that she couldn’t seem to look away from.

“Good guess.” He jerked the shirt together and started snapping it closed.

“My, aren’t we grumpy.” She got down off the counter. But since her legs were still a little wobbly, she sat down in the chair.

Once he had his shirt tucked it, he stepped closer, placing his hands on the arms of the chair so his face was inches away. “Damn straight, I’m grumpy. I don’t like being manipulated. And you just manipulated the hell out of me.”

Bri smiled. “Funny, but I don’t think I was the one who picked you up and had my way with you against a mirror.”

His eyes darkened. “No. You were just the one who planned this entire seduction. From the no panties to the condom in your bra. I wouldn’t be surprised if you sent Twyla out of town and somehow lured Travis here to make me jealous.”

Bri perked up. “So you were jealous.”

Dusty released a growl before he turned and headed for the door.

“Fine.” She got up from the chair. “I’ll admit that I planned to seduce you. But Travis—” He buckled the gun belt around his waist, and there was something so masculine and sexy about it that she forgot what she was going to say.

“Was your alternate plan if I didn’t show up?” He took his hat off the hook.

Desire drained right out of Bri, and she bristled. “Of course. After all, one man is as good as another.” Without one more word, she turned and walked back to the station, picking up brushes and combs on her way. She had just set them on the counter when Dusty took her arm and spun her around.

“What do you want, Brianne? And don’t give me any more of your lies. I want the truth.” He stared back at her with eyes that were no longer angry. Just intense with a small splash of pain. It was the pain that pulled at Bri’s heart. The pain that had the truth spilling from her lips.

“Maybe I just want you.”

“But why—ahh, I get it. You’ve read that crazy
Fifty Shades
book and have a little submissive fetish going on. And you figure an officer of the law will have all the right equipment to make you his slave.”

She laughed. “No. Although I do like your equipment.” She glanced down at the handcuffs. “And I don’t think I’d mind being your slave.” She looked back up into his confused eyes and revealed more to him than she’d ever revealed to another man. “But the truth is that you’re the first man who has ever made me breathless.”

An awkward silence followed where Bri pretty much wanted to crawl beneath the counter and never come out. Instead, she just stood there staring into eyes that changed from confusion to something she couldn’t quite read. He leaned closer and his lips parted, but before he could kiss her or tell her to take a hike, his radio crackled, and Cora Lee’s voice broke the spell.

“Hey, boss, are you there?”

Dusty stared at Bri for one second more before he unclipped the radio and answered. “Yeah,” he said in a voice that sounded a little strained.

“Heather called, and she sounded pretty upset. I think you better call her back ASAP.”

“Thanks.” Dusty wasted no time clipping his radio back on his belt and pulling his cell phone from his front pocket.

Bri could only watch and wonder who in the heck Heather was as he dialed a number and moved away to stand over by the stairs. She bent down and continued to clean up the items on the floor, but her focus was entirely on Dusty’s conversation.

“What’s going on, Heather?” he said in a low voice that quickly turned concerned. “Is she okay?” There was a long pause. “So why the hell didn’t you let her call me?” He ran a hand through his hair. “Fine. Put her on now.”

Bri had started to put the pieces together, but the puzzle became complete when Dusty spoke again.

“Hey, Nugget.” There was a wealth of love in the words. So much that it brought tears to Bri’s eyes. “Now what’s this I hear about you refusing to eat? And don’t give me any nonsense about Elsa not making anything you like. You love her cooking—much better than you like your pa’s. Remember that burned pizza I made you?” He paused and cradled the phone with both hands as if he was actually cradling the person talking. “You can’t not eat, Emmie, just because you want to come see me. Don’t I call you every day so we can talk?”

Bri watched his shoulders tighten, and even from that distance she could feel his pain.

“Aww, baby,” he said, “I miss you, too. But this is our weekend. Just a couple more days, and I’ll be there. In fact, we need to start planning what we’re going to do when I get to Houston. You want to spend the day at the park, or go to the zoo again, or… princesses?” Most men would’ve continued to toss out suggestions, anything to keep from playing princesses, but Dusty didn’t hesitate to give in to his daughter. Which made Bri’s heart soften into gooey marshmallow cream.

“Princesses it is,” Dusty said, and a few seconds later, he laughed. “Well, I don’t know if I’d call my house a castle, but it’s getting there. And I promise you’ll be able to come see it soon.” There was another pause, but this time he slowly turned and pinned Bri with a steely glare. “My housekeeper Brianne? No, she’s not a princess. In fact, she was just there for a day—yes, sort of like your mother’s Mini-Maids. Now I want you to give the phone back to your mother and go eat your breakfast.”

Bri knew when Emma’s mother got on by the hard, cold tone in Dusty’s voice. “I went along with you about not calling Emma at night, but if she wants to talk with me anytime, then she can damn well talk to me. And I don’t care what the judge said.” He hung up the phone, and for a minute, Bri thought he was going to toss it across the room. Instead, he gripped it tightly in his hand and turned his anger on her.

“You talked to my daughter?”

Bri shrugged. “Briefly. I answered your phone because I was worried it might be an emergency.”

He continued to stand there, anger and pain radiating off of him like a furnace. She had the strong urge to walk over and wrap her arms around him. But she had been around enough stubborn, volatile men in her life to know that sympathy was never well received. So instead, she walked over and picked up the plastic cape from the floor.

“How about if I finish that haircut? Or at least blow your hair dry? You don’t want to catch a cold, do you?”

It took a while for the tension to leave his shoulders. But finally he walked over and sat down, slipping the phone back into his front pocket.

“Don’t scalp me.”

She picked up the comb and scissors. “I wouldn’t think of it.”

For the next few minutes, the only sound was the snip of the shears and the squeak of the chair as Bri used her knee to turn it one way and then the other. Dusty had beautiful hair, thick with different colored strands of blond running through it. She had just turned him around to work on the front when he spoke.

“Emma lives in Houston with her mother.”

Bri nodded and continued to cut.

“Her mother has full custody.” He released his breath, and his shoulders slumped. “I wanted Emmie. I wanted her so damned much that I screwed up.” He swallowed hard. “I lost my temper in the courtroom and ended up adding fuel to Heather’s accusations that I had anger issues and shouldn’t get joint custody.”

Bri hesitated with the scissors poised. “But that’s crazy. Anyone can see that your bark is worse than your bite.”

Dusty tipped his head up, pulling the strand of hair from her hands. “And what makes you think so? I haven’t exactly been nice to you.”

“I don’t know about that. What just happened was kind of nice.” Before he could say anything, she tipped his head down and continued to cut. “Besides, I haven’t exactly been an angel to you, either.”

He snorted. “Angel doesn’t even come close to describing you. A little devil is much closer.”

Bri laughed. “I do believe I like the sound of that. So you lost your temper in the courtroom and that’s all it took for them to give your wife full custody?”

“No. Her father also has the judge in his back pocket.”

She stepped back to examine her work. “Well, all I can say is that I hope you’re not going to let your wife get away with it. You need to get a lawyer and fight that judgment. It sounds like Emmie wants to be with you as much as you want to be with her, and it’s a shame she can’t talk to you when she wants to.”

She went to pick up the clippers so she could trim the back of his hair, when he grabbed her hand, turning the chair until he faced her.

“How do you know what kind of father I am?”

She smiled. “Because I happen to have the most wonderful father in the world, and he talks to me exactly like you talk to Emmie.”

His hand tightened on her arm, and he pulled her closer… and closer. But before his lips touched hers, his radio crackled again.

“Sheriff.” Cora’s voice was filled with panic. “We got us an officer down.”

Bri tried to follow Dusty out to the Henhouse, but in the Smart Car it was a losing battle. In fact, by the time she pulled into the circular drive, there was no sign of Dusty’s car or an ambulance. In fact, there weren’t any cars parked in front or in the parking lot.

When she got inside, the house looked completely deserted. She had to take the elevator down to the basement before she found the hens. The Jungle Room was one of the few rooms that were off limits to the guests. Bri had been in the room before but was still taken aback by the garish décor. The carpet was purple shag, the furniture animal-print, and the paintings vibrant splashes of oranges and reds.

“Don’t just stand there.” Minnie’s voice came from somewhere in the dimly lit room. “Come on in and join us, Brianne.”

She moved around a cluster of huge plastic plants to discover Minnie sitting in an orange fur chair. Sunshine sat across from her on the zebra-skin couch while Baby stood behind the bar, pouring brandy into glasses. Bri waited until she had passed the glasses out before she took the chair next to Minnie’s.

“So what happened?” she asked. “How did Kenny Gene get shot?”

Minnie downed the brandy in one swallow. “We’re not sure. Olive was out in the barn when she heard the shot. By the time she found the deputy in the lilac garden, whoever had shot him was long gone.”

“Where are Olive and Starlet?”

“Sheriff Hicks took Olive back to Culver so she could meet with the feds for questioning. And Starlet is in the ballroom. She was pretty upset about the deputy getting shot, and playing her music seems to calm her nerves.”

Bri took a sip of her drink and, wrinkling her nose, set it down on the African drum end table. “Isn’t it possible that Kenny Gene shot himself? I hear that he’s not exactly proficient.”

“Well, you’d have to be pretty proficient to shoot yourself in the back,” Minnie said.

Bri’s heart sank. She had hoped that it had merely been an accident and Kenny’s wound was nothing more than superficial. “Is he going to be okay?”

“The paramedics didn’t say much,” Minnie said, “but since Kenny Gene was still yammering when they took him away, I’d have to say yes.” She shook her head. “Dusty looked worse than Kenny Gene. No doubt, he blamed himself for giving Kenny the duty of protectin’ us hens from Alejandro.”

“So you think it was Alejandro who shot Kenny.”

“Who else could it be?”

Bri shrugged. “It just doesn’t make any sense that he’d show up here for revenge and risk getting arrested again. Especially when a sheriff’s car is sitting right out front.”

“Maybe he came for the money,” Sunshine said in her breathy voice.

“What money?” Bri asked.

“Baby,” Minnie said, “why don’t you and Sunshine go change the sheets on Miss Hattie’s bed? I don’t care if the feds are sending men to keep an eye on things. With a lunatic running around, I don’t want Olive sleeping out in the barn. She can bunk with Starlet, and Brianne can sleep in Miss Hattie’s room.”

The two hens got up to do her bidding, but as soon as the elevator doors closed behind them, Bri repeated her question.