Crazy Little Thing Called Love (18 page)

“Where’s your date?”

“Jenny Sue was at the table with the others
last I checked.”

“I meant the cowboy.”

Oh. She pursed her lips and tried to gauge
why he was asking before smiling sweetly, “Jimmy or Austin?”

“Don’t get smart with me.” He smirked.

“You’re so worried about my nonexistent date,
where’s yours?”

“You mean Vicky? She’s not my date.” He shook
his head and took another pull of the beer.

“She hates being called Vicky.”

“I know.” He wiped the back of his hand
across his lips and grinned.

She found herself smiling up at him despite
herself. He was such a mystery. Maybe that’s what got to her. She
couldn’t explain it but the sexual chemistry brewing between them
was off the charts. Still, she knew better than to play with fire.
She’d barely gotten out of the situation the last time.

“Is that why you insist on calling me
Bluebell? Because I told you I didn’t like it?” She perked an
eyebrow curiously.

“No. I like your name. I told you that. It’s
pretty and it fits you.”

She hated the butterflies that danced around
in her stomach when he said ridiculously nice things like that. He
had all the charm of a true southern gentlemen but he knew how to
work it better than most. And he had that dark edge that said he
wasn’t quite as nice as a woman might want to believe. He was
hazardous to her wellbeing and she stayed away from men like that
these days. You live, you learn, you stop dating recklessly
handsome men with silver tongues and dusty halo’s.

“Sounds like a line.” She shrugged.

He snorted and finished off her beer before
setting it aside, “I don’t use lines. I may not be the most…
gentlemanly… of cowboys but I don’t lie to women. Ever.”

She shivered at the dark way he said
gentlemanly. Oh he was good. Too good. She should go inside. Being
alone with him had yet to end well. But then he stepped closer and
she could feel his body heat and her feet wouldn’t move. One of his
big hands came up and cupped her chin, forcing her to look up and
meet his eyes.

“How are you holding up?”

“Against you? I thought I was doing okay
there for a minute.” She admitted and he chuckled lightly.

His thumb lightly stroked across her cheek,
“I meant with your dad. It can’t be easy for you to see him like
that.”

She swallowed hard as she met those soft
green eyes. This man she barely knew was the first one to ask her
how she was doing, really doing and look like he actually meant it.
He looked like he cared. Her pulse danced and she had to take a
deep breath before she could respond.

“I um… I’m holding my own there too.”

His gaze slid to her mouth and then back up.
His lips pursed like he didn’t really believe her. She stared him
down. Just because he said he didn’t lie to women didn’t mean she
didn’t lie to men and she wasn’t about to get into her daddy issues
with a near stranger no matter how sexy he was.

“You look exhausted.”

“The last time I ran into you, you said I
looked like hell. I suppose I should take exhausted as an
improvement.” She pulled her chin away from his hold.

He grinned, “I might have still been a little
angry with you then.”

“You’re not angry at me anymore?”

“Frustrated might be a better term for
it.”

“I’m sure Victoria is much less frustrating.”
She snorted.

“Victoria wants a boyfriend. Definitely more
frustration than she’s worth.”

“Oh? You don’t do the whole boyfriend thing?
Shocking.”

She’d called that one from the minute he
stepped out of that truck hadn’t she? He wasn’t one of the nice
boys. He wasn’t the let’s go on three dates and try the bases
guy.

“I don’t do relationships.” He cupped her
chin again and tilted her head back so she had to meet his gaze
again, “Stop staring at my chest. It’s driving me crazy. I’m sick
of looking at the top of your head.”

“You’re very tall. You should be used to
looking at the tops of people’s heads.” She smirked. “Besides, it’s
a very nice chest.”

“Thank you.” Humor danced in his green eyes
again, “But we both know that’s not why you won’t look me in the
eyes.”

“We do? Why don’t you enlighten me then? Why
won’t I look you in the eyes?”

“Because I scare you a little. Because you
kind of like it. Because every time we’re in the same room you get
a little wet thinking of how hot we could be together.”

She swallowed hard. Her heart was trying to
pound straight out of her chest. She looked up into that gorgeous
face with the hard lines of his jaw and cheekbones. His sun-tanned
skin made his dark hair darker and his green eyes brighter.

He was so distinctly male. He looked like
what real men should look like. He looked like a nice distraction
from her awful, pitiful life and if she was reading the situation
correctly she might just have a chance of playing with fire without
getting burned.

“So you don’t do relationships. Just sex. No
dinners? No movies? No conversation?”

“There can be plenty of all that too if you
know how to do it right. Dirty talk. Porn. Whipped cream.” His
smile was salacious and her toes curled.

It had been so very long since she’d been
with a man that knew what he was doing. It had been so long since
she’d been with a man that could make her stomach flip flop and her
veins heat. So long because she’d never known one that wouldn’t
eventually break her heart.

“Do you have commitment issues?”

“No. I’ve just got plenty of commitments in
my life already. I don’t need anybody else I have to take care
of.”

“That sounds like a very honest answer.”

His eyes darkened, “I already told you I
wouldn’t lie to you.”

She was nosy enough to ask how long he’d been
this way but smart enough not to press the issue. Surely there were
other reasons. Most men had pitiful stories of lost loves dashing
their hearts to pieces so that they were broken and sex was all
they had left to offer. He didn’t seem like that guy but it wasn’t
really any of her business if he was.

Just like it wasn’t any of his business why
she might be open to such a bold proposition. She was bored. Her
life had been reduced to reality television and listening to her
father snore. She wasn’t sure how much longer she was going to be
in town but she knew she was leaving. The doctors said her father
had weeks, possibly a month. She couldn’t possibly form feelings
for a guy that barely seemed to like her even if he freely admitted
he wanted her naked. She didn’t want to feel alone anymore, not
tonight. Was that reason enough?

“Did you come here with a date tonight?”

“No.”

“So you came here alone looking for someone
to take home?”

“I came here alone hoping to find somebody to
distract me from picturing you naked on the hood of that fucking
Audi.” He leaned his head close to her, his eyes serious, “But then
you went ahead and walked in here looking so damn pretty I’m going
to end up with blue balls again without even touching you.”

She had to suck in air after an admission
like that. Okay, so she frustrated him. She annoyed him. But he
wanted her naked on the hood of her car. Yeah, she could work with
a man like that.

She was an adult. She hadn’t had decent sex
in a really long time. She knew he’d be great at it. She had
firsthand experience after all. He was exactly the distraction
she’d been waiting for.

“I’m leaving in a few weeks.”

“Ok.” He didn’t even flinch.

“So no strings? No commitments?”

“And no leaving me hanging with a raging hard
on. We start this again. You better be prepared to finish it.” He
brushed a strand of hair behind her ear and she realized they’d
already moved closer. His chest brushed against her breasts and
awareness tingled across her skin. Yeah, this had been decided long
before now. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

“I’m thinking of finishing what we started in
that parking lot.”

“Good. Get in my truck.”

A smile played on her lips, “In the truck?
Here?”

“No baby-doll.” His thumb brushed over her
bottom lip, “I’m going to take you home, which I would have offered
to do last time if you hadn’t been in such a rush to get away from
me.”

“Oh…” She shook her head, “You can’t take me
home. My dad’s…”

“I meant my home.” He smirked.

“Oh.” She swallowed hard.

“Bluebell?”

“Yeah?”

“Get in the damn truck before I shove you
against this railing and fuck you right here in front of half the
county.” His eyes darkened dangerously.

“Bossy.” She pushed away from the railing
just to be safe. “I kind of like that.”

“Good.”

“But I’m not getting in your truck.” She
shrugged apologetically, “I’m not leaving the Audi here.”

He growled and swiped a hand through his
hair, “Fine. You can follow me. Just stay close.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” She walked past
him without a backwards glance, “I know where the Triple Star is…
I’ll race you.”

“My truck against the Audi hardly seems fair
baby-doll.” He turned around with his hands on his hips and she saw
his eyes widen as they came to rest on the key hanging from her
fingers.

“I know. That’s why you’re driving the R8. I
do owe you one after all.”

Zach heard the knock on his door and quickly
finished shoving a pile of construction materials aside. He
couldn’t believe she’d actually handed the keys to the R8 over. He
couldn’t believe he’d actually allowed her to drive his truck
either. Nobody drove his truck. Not Devin, not Riley, nobody. But
it had been an offer he couldn’t refuse and the fact that she’d
known it, the fact that she’d grinned at him like she knew it would
only turn him on more had nearly made him come in his pants like an
overexcited high school kid.

He kept his strides at a normal pace though
as he walked to the door and eased it open, “There you are. I was
beginning to worry something had happened.”

“I drove the speed limit.” She giggled and
moved under the beam of the porch light, “I take it you
didn’t?”

Her blue eyes danced with amusement and
laughter. He liked when she looked him in the eyes. It’d been
driving him crazy all night that she wouldn’t really look at him.
He liked those big blue eyes.

He liked a lot of parts of Bluebell
Montgomery Carter and after watching her half the night he’d
decided to stop lying to himself about that. He wanted her. He’d
have her and then he’d be able to stop obsessing about running into
her in town, about strangling her for leaving him high and dry or
more likely about shoving her against the nearest hard surface and
finishing what he’d started three weeks ago.

“No baby-doll. I didn’t.” He eased the screen
door open, “Come on in.”

She brushed past him and took a couple steps
into the entryway. When she spun around her golden hair swished and
so did the edge of that sexy little dress. He knew what she was
seeing, piles of work supplies. A mess of construction littered
every surface. He thought she’d ask about it but she simply turned
and smiled up at him as he shut the door.

“You live here alone now?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” She pushed against his chest, pinning
him to the back of the door. He could have resisted. She was tall
but she was a tiny thing compared to him. Instead, he let her. “How
was the test drive?”

Her hands slid up his chest and his balls
which had been aching since she walked into the Roadhouse drew up
expectedly, “It was amazing. Thank you. We’re even now for
sure.”

“I don’t think so.” She pressed her body to
his chest and then went up on her tiptoes; sliding her breasts
against him as her mouth moved close to his ear, “There’s still
that other thing I owe you for…” Her lips pressed against the side
of his neck, “I wouldn’t feel comfortable unless I knew we were
even.”

Because she dropped to her heels and her
breasts slid back down his chest it took him an extra second to
process what she meant. When her hands slid back down, playing with
the hem of his shirt he did the math and he grinned. He knew there
was a reason he hadn’t been able to get this particular crazy
blonde out of his head. In one swift movement she pulled the pearl
snap apart and the pops rang out in quick succession.

She looked up at him and bit her lip shyly
despite her bold actions so far, “I’ve wanted to do that for weeks
now.”

He sucked in a breath as she moved to the
edge of his white undershirt and her nails scored his abdomen on
the way up. He’d had his fair share of women undress him over the
years. He’d had a lot of luck finding women that wanted to get him
naked but Bluebell touching him was different. She was teasing him.
He wasn’t sure he’d ever been with a woman that could tease him at
the same time she turned him on. He definitely liked it.

“All you had to do was ask.”

She laughed against his chest as she pressed
a kiss to his heated skin and pushed the shirt over his head. He
raised his arms to help and tossed it on the floor behind her. Her
light teasing touches stopped and she pulled away.

He furrowed his brow, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” She sucked in a gulp of air and
her eyes practically seared him as she drank him in. Her hand
reached out slowly and traced the black swirls of the big tattoo
that circled his bicep. Her light touches only aroused him further.
Her heated skin against his was like fire. “I want to trace these…
with my tongue.”

He groaned, “Baby I’m using up all my
willpower not to just grab you and finish this now. I don’t think
that’s a good idea.”

Her mouth settled over the point of the swirl
that ended a few inches above his left nipple and he flinched. She
laughed against his skin and he could feel her smile. At the same
time her hands ventured south down his sides and it was his turn to
suck in a breath.