Golden Trail (48 page)

He stared down at her wondering if her lip
gloss tasted like peaches at the same time wondering if she’d
attack him again after he spanked her fucking ass.

“I’m goin’ too!” Tripp shouted and
catapulted himself over the back of the couch.

Layne watched his son race up the stairs
then Jasper rolled off the couch, muttering, “I’m not gonna miss
this,” and he followed his brother.

Layne’s eyes went back to Rocky and she was
dropping her compact and lip gloss in her bag and, incidentally,
failing miserably at hiding her smile.

“Sweetcheeks,” he called, her smile
vanished, her head came up, tilted to the side, her eyes alight,
and she mumbled, “Hmm?”

“What’re you doin’?” he asked quietly.

“Didn’t you hear?” she asked back. “We’re
all
going to church.”

“What’re you doin’?” Layne repeated, her
eyes locked with his and she went into stare down.

He was pissed and she knew it so she
couldn’t hold it and whispered, “Layne.”

“I told you, you’re not on this guy’s
radar.”

“Layne –”

“I told you, this guy is a predator.”

“But –”

“Jas has been datin’ Keira for a few weeks
and he’s keepin’ her clear of this guy. You think, what you mean to
me, eighteen years I finally got that back, I’m not gonna do what I
gotta do to keep you clear?”

Her eyes went half-mast a half second after
they went intense, her mouth got soft then she swallowed before she
ran the tip of her tongue along her bottom lip then her teeth sank
into it. It sucked he was so fucking pissed at her because, that
look on her face, he
really
wanted to see if her lips tasted
like peaches.

She held his eyes and they went back into
stare down.

She broke it again by saying softly, “Then
you better get dressed to go to church, sweetheart.”

He stared at her.

He should have known. It’d been too easy to
talk her down that night when she’d come up with her fool plan to
confront the fake TJ Gaines. When Rocky got something in her head,
she never let it go. She’d been waiting for her opportunity and
here it was. He was cornered. With his mother and boys in the
house, they couldn’t have the showdown he needed to stop her.

He should have known.

Shit, he was out of practice. He was going
to have to step it up.

Layne leaned in and she braced as he did but
held her ground.

“I’ll get changed but, baby, fair warning.
You’re gonna pay for pullin’ this shit.”

He watched her eyes get wide right before he
turned and walked up the stairs.

* * * * *

The parking lot to the Christian Church was
jammed by the time Layne and his family arrived so he let them off
at the door, twisting his neck toward the backseat as he did,
giving Jasper a look that communicated his responsibility was
keeping Rocky out of trouble. Jasper read this loud and clear if
his grin was anything to go by, he nodded and Layne watched him
stick close to Rocky as they walked in the door.

By the time he parked and made it to the
crowded vestibule, he found Rocky, Vera and the boys deep in
conversation with a short, squat woman with a dark helmet of hair
and very large tits, so large, the blouse she was wearing opened at
the buttons, exposing her bra.

He moved in beside Rocky, sliding his arm
around her shoulders and Rocky looked up at him with a smile as the
woman exclaimed, “Oh my goodness! There you are!” and Layne’s eyes
moved to her. When they did, hers shot to Rocky. “Oh Rocky, the
girls in the office are right! He’s even more handsome close up!
You
lucky duck!
” she cried loudly.

At that, Layne watched Rocky’s dimple come
out.

“Sharon, let me introduce you to Tanner
Layne.” Rocky kept smiling at the woman and then turned that smile
to Layne. “Layne, this is
Sharon Reynolds.
”

She emphasized the “Sharon Reynolds”, Layne
found that name in his memory banks and looked back at the Church
office lady.

“Sharon,” he greeted.

“So nice to meet you and
so nice
to
have you and your Mom back at church.” Sharon turned to his sons.
“They used to come here all the time, a long time ago, I remember.
Or,” she paused, “at least, your Grandma did before she moved away
to Florida.” Her eyes went to Vera. “We sure missed your weekly
contributions, I can tell you that.” Then her antennae, obviously
always active and working overdrive, dinged, her head suddenly
jerked and her eyes focused on someone. “Oh! There’s Gray Lacey,”
she announced and everyone turned to look where she was looking.
“His offering has been light the last two weeks. He usually gives a
hundred dollars and now he’s only giving fifty. This is probably
because his wife Donna has been hitting the wine or, I should say,”
she paused again to lean in, her eyes never leaving her target, and
confided, “hitting it
more than usual.
I need to go speak to
him.” She turned back to them explaining, “Fifty dollars
is
fifty dollars and a member of this flock shouldn’t be spending that
fifty dollars on
booze
.”

Then she bustled away as they all watched
her.

Layne’s arm gave Rocky a squeeze and her
eyes came to him.

“Definitely the church needs a new office
lady,” he murmured.

“She’s harmless,” Rocky replied.

“I think, sweetcheeks, weekly offerings are
confidential and I also think that it’s not a law not to gossip but
it
is
a commandment and we’re standin’ in a building where
God pays a fair amount of attention.” Rocky pressed her lips
together but her eyes were dancing and she didn’t reply so Layne
went on. “Probably coulda asked her for the personnel file and she
would have handed it over.”

He heard Rocky’s quiet giggle then they all
heard, “Rocky!” and Layne turned to see Josie Judd bearing down on
them.

“Hey Josie,” Rocky smiled, moving out of
Layne’s arm to give her friend a hug and get one in return.

When they stepped away from each other,
Josie’s eyes surveyed the group and went back to Rocky.

“Jeez, you’re a miracle worker, honey,”
Josie noted. “I left Chip in his underpants on the couch counting
down the minutes to when he can crack open a beer and the kids are
all still in bed doin’ their zombie act which they only do on
Sunday mornings or on days when they have tests at school. How’d
you get these boys all dressed up and to church?”

Layne looked at his sons. Jasper was wearing
a pair of chinos and a blue shirt under the leather jacket his Mom
bought him last Christmas and Tripp was wearing the same except his
shirt was maroon and he had a navy sweater pulled over it. Layne
was wearing another suit and shirt that he’d never worn before that
Melody had given him.

“Um…” Rocky mumbled and Josie waved her hand
between them and kept talking.

“You can share your secrets without an
audience and
with
a bottle of wine,” she stated. “And also
when we sit down and talk about the bachelor auction. I had a gab
with her and Heidi’s in. Did you talk to Feb and Vi?”

“Bachelor auction?” Layne asked.

Rocky ignored him and answered Josie, “I had
a word with Vi yesterday, she’s in and she said she’d talk with
Feb, Cheryl and Jackie.”

“Bachelor auction?” Layne repeated.

“This is going to be
so fun!
” Josie
exclaimed. “I
love
it!”

Layne claimed Rocky with an arm around her
shoulders again, turned her into his side, dipped his head and
asked yet again, “Sweetcheeks, bachelor auction?”

“We’re doing a bachelor auction for Meghan
Reilly,” Josie answered before Rocky could and Layne looked at her.
“Gettin’ all the single boys at the police department and fire
station to volunteer. Havin’ a fancy dinner, a band, a casino and
sellin’ stuff in silent auctions. Rocky called me yesterday, it was
her idea and it’ll be a hoot.”

“Cool!” Tripp entered the conversation.

“You should invite kids. I could talk to
some of the football team, they’d go up for auction,” Jasper put
in.

Josie swung to him and clapped her hands.
“What a
great
idea! The more the merrier.”

“What’s this?” Vera asked and Layne looked
to his mother.

“Meghan Reilly, she’s sick and can’t afford
her medication,” Josie answered. “Things are not good, she’s
gettin’ behind and Rocky does charity gigs, usually it’s for
hospitals and clinics and stuff but this time she’s doin’ it just
for Meghan.”

Vera’s eyes hit Rocky but before she could
say more, Tripp butted in.

“You go up for auction, Jas, you better get
Keira to save up her allowance,” Tripp advised Jasper.

“My woman’ll take care of me,
Tripp-o-matic,” Jasper returned arrogantly and Layne’s eyes rolled
to the ceiling.

“You could go up for sale too, Dad,” Tripp
went on and Layne’s eyes rolled back to his boy. “You’d get top
dollar.”

“Think I’m off the market, Pal,” Layne said
quietly and felt Rocky’s body go tight before it relaxed against
his side just as Josie’s eyes shot to him and a huge smile spread
on her face.

“Yeah, Dad, but you aren’t actually
off
the market
and Roc’s loaded. I reckon she’d pay a whack for
you,” Tripp went on and every pair of eyes in their huddle turned
to him, including Rocky’s.

Fuck, but he was
not
going up for
auction. Firstly, because Rocky wasn’t loaded, she had a nest egg
but she didn’t need to be depleting it bidding on him and secondly,
because he was
not
going up for auction.

“We’ll talk about it later,” he muttered,
Josie giggled softly, Vera gave him a stare and Rocky looked down
at her shoes, that fall of hair that wasn’t tied back in the
ponytail at the nape of her neck not succeeding in hiding her
smile.

Vera saved him by announcing, “We should
probably find a pew.”

“Good idea,” Rocky murmured and looked at
Josie. “Sit with us?”

“You bet,” Josie replied and they all moved
into the sanctuary.

They were there approximately thirty seconds
when Rocky and Layne spied him at the same time.

He was at the front of the church, wearing
about the same outfit as Jasper except he had dark blue pants. Even
so, it was plain to see it wasn’t the same quality. Both Layne’s
boys cared about their appearance and their clothes, it was
essential to the high school experience and Jasper, mostly, but
Tripp also, had a role amongst their peers to lead the pack of high
school cool. Layne knew exactly how expensive their clothes were
since he’d paid for them.

The man at the front of the church’s clothes
were of lower quality but that was a deception, something Rutledge
had not yet learned. Layne knew this was a deception because the
man at the front of the church had more shit in his hair than Tripp
and a haircut that he didn’t get at a barber. He also had a tan
that wasn’t from the sun or from an olive skin tone. It was October
in Indiana and unless someone was fresh from vacation, no one had a
tan.

And he was extremely good-looking, out of a
magazine good-looking and he had an easy, very white smile that he
was shining on the flock of girls surrounding him.

Bleached teeth, carefully crafted tanning
bed tan and a fifty dollar haircut.

Definitely not a Youth Minister.

“Excuse me,” Rocky murmured and slid away
from him before he could catch her.

She wasn’t three strutting strides away
before Layne ordered a simple, “Tripp.”

“On it,” Tripp muttered and moved to follow
Rocky.

Rocky strutted naturally but Layne watched
and learned something new about his woman. When she meant business,
her strut changed, it became subtly more suggestive and a fuckuva
lot more watchable. She captured TJ Gaines’s attention ten pews
from the front and she kept it. He had teenaged girls hanging on
his every word and practically hanging off his every limb, but, for
Gaines, they’d vanished. Gaines was watching Rocky and even
standing at the front of a church, his look was openly carnal.

Nope, definitely not a Youth Minister.

Rocky rounded the front, hips swaying, ass
swinging, and didn’t even glance at him but smiled brightly at
someone in the second pew back. She stopped and greeted an old
woman Layne didn’t know, going so far as to put a knee to the
vacant front pew to lean in, take the old woman’s hand and have a
chat. This also meant that tight skirt, which Layne had noticed had
a slit up the back, stretched across her hips, thighs and an ass
which was now pointed straight out.

Gaines’s eyes locked on her ass and his look
kept the carnal but added hungry.

Fuck.

Rocky just hit his radar with a big, fucking
ping.

“Shit, Dad, she’s good,” Jasper muttered
from beside him.

Layne felt his jaw tighten and he held
himself back as Rocky’s attention was caught by a couple of the
girls, as she knew it would be, she squeezed the old lady’s hand
and turned to the girls and Gaines. He saw her head move around as
she greeted Gaines’s entourage and then, even though her back was
to Layne, he knew the second her eyes met Gaines’s because he
arranged his features to hide the hunger but they didn’t change to
kindly Youth Minister. Instead, they changed to blatant interest,
an interest she was meant to see, read and, Gaines hoped, act
on.

Layne tensed to move when Gaines held out
his hand and Rocky’s lifted hers to take it but Layne stopped when
Tripp did his thing.

He’d been talking to one of the girls but
the minute Rocky’s hand touched Gaines’s, Tripp didn’t hesitate. He
turned toward Layne and called, “Okay Dad, we’re comin’!” even
though Layne hadn’t said a word.

Then Tripp leaned in, grabbed Rocky’s hand,
said a few words to Gaines and the girls around him, turned and
tugged Rocky behind him as he led the way back to Layne, Jasper,
Vera and Josie, dragging Rocky behind him.