Love Brewing (Love Brothers #3) (9 page)

“I don’t have anything to wear. I’m not getting into the hay
butt-ass naked, thanks. I don’t care who’s here.”

She snagged his underwear and tossed them at him. After
another minute, she located the tank top she must have worn out to attack him
in the night and heaved that at his head. “There, now shut your whining and get
down so he can’t see you.”

“Di,” a deep voice called from below them. “Want some help
up there? If not, I’m gonna give Masie a quick once-over. She’s ready to drop
any minute.”

A strange and unfamiliar humming filled Dominic’s head. He
glared at Diana. She glared back. They stood for a few seconds,
hairy-eyeballing each other across the open space.

“Who,” he finally whispered once he could ascertain that the
guy had moved to the back of the barn, whistling and crooning to Diana’s
pregnant heifer. “The fuck….is that?”

“That, my selfish, single-minded friend,” she replied under
her breath, her cheeks flushed red, “is my
boyfriend
, Lee Tolliver, the
new veterinarian, fresh from the East Coast somewhere. I forget.”

He paused, at a total loss for words for a few seconds.

“But…you…we…I thought….” He bit the inside of his cheek,
furious in a way he had no reference for, since it came tinged with a distinct,
unfamiliar bite of jealousy.

She crossed her arms, ridiculous and perfect floating inside
his clothes. “You thought wrong. Oh my Lord, I just now used you for sex,
Dominic. How does it feel?” She raised an eyebrow at him, blew him a kiss and
then started for the ladder.

“But…when did this clown show up?” He wanted to keep her
talking to him and away from Dr. Perfect from New York or Wherever. Desperation
insinuated itself into his near-blinding fury. “Diana, wait. I…want to….” He
sucked in a breath, realizing at that moment he’d gotten exactly the treatment
he deserved.

She started down, then looked up and shot him a noncommittal
glance. “Remember, Jen and Dale are gonna have contractors out here this
afternoon. You have to clear out.”

He blinked, words clogging his throat. She seemed to study
him and his distress for a few seconds before adding, “You have your builder’s
license, right?”

“Why?”

“Because, genius, they might hire you to manage whatever
gentrifying she has in mind for this space and the build out for my production
barn out of the line of sight of potential brides and debutantes desiring a
quaint, Hicksville event.” She tilted her head. “I’ll let you stick around, if
you want.”

Her gaze darkened, pissing him off. He opened his mouth to
tell her to shove her barn project and her night attack up her ass.

“Di?” The saintly animal doctor intoned from below her.
“Honey?”

She put a finger to her lips. “Shhh,” she hissed. “Or I boot
you to the curb.”

He choked back words, figuring it for the best choice now,
but already planning where he could go next to get away from this, from her,
and from the distinct, wet noises of kissing going on below his feet.

One Year Later

“Hey,” Diana yelped when strong arms encircled her waist and
lips landed on her neck. “Cut it out.” When Lee plunged his finger into the
huge vat of chocolate batter in front of her, she smacked it away. He grinned
and stuck it in his mouth. Admiring the way he did something as innocuous as
lick his finger, she hip-bumped him out of her way. “Way to contaminate a
zillion Valentine’s Day cupcakes, dude.”

He filled a mug with coffee. “That’s me, contaminator of
romance.” She glanced over her shoulder at him. He met her gaze with a raised
eyebrow, sending a little shiver down her spine.

“Hush up. Make yourself useful. Go feed the horse and put
the cows out in the field.”

He cradled the coffee cup to his chest, not moving.

“And put on some clothes before you go. Dang, son, you’re
gonna scare the natives with that giant schlong. What is it with you and being
naked anyway?” She focused down at the bowl, biting her lip and trying to
square the strange combination of emotions she’d been living with for nearly a
year now.

Acknowledging that she’d rebounded from Dom yet again by
digging ever deeper into an ill-advised relationship with a perfectly nice and
much older guy, she tried to work out the ever-present kinks between her
shoulders. This new bakery crap kept her busier than ever, but she’d found a
bunch of new ways to use her spices that gave an edge to nearly everything she
concocted, so they’d discovered yet another popular Brantley’s product. Flip
side of course being that they had to buy a commercial baking oven and Diana
hovered on the verge of utter exhaustion every day, leaving her little time to
think much about the fact that Dominic still lived under her roof while he
managed the barn build-outs.

“Whoa!” She yelped when Lee picked her up from behind. She
held onto the bowl for a second, then let go, giggling when he nibbled her neck
and turning to face him. “That tickles. I’m busy, goddamn you.”

He responded by sticking his finger in the bowl and smearing
the cinnamon and chili pepper-infused dark chocolate mix down her cheeks. “I…am
so horny. Let’s go back to bed, farmer gal.”

“Get off me.” She swiped at the chocolate goo. But she
didn’t want him to, really. He was such a switch from Dom on so many
levels—which was both a relief and annoying. Lee let go of her long enough to
grab her shorts and yank them down, kicking them aside while tugging her shirt
and sports bra off.

“I need a shower,” she warned him, smiling when he pressed
her against the island and kissed her, reaching down to cup her ass letting his
lips trail up her neck. “This is pretty much not sanitary. What if the health
department shows up?”

“Please be quiet, will you? Just for a sec?” He grinned and
dipped out more chocolate, smearing it on her nipples. “Yum. Don’t mind if I
do.” He sucked and licked until she moaned, her hips moving in response. “What
do you want, Diana, hmm?” Lee muttered into her stomach, moving lower, gripping
her hips. “This, I think. Yes…this, definitely.” He crouched in front of her
and she grabbed the counter behind her, legs spread, letting him lick and suck
her there until she almost collapsed. “Oh God, Di, you taste so good.” He stood
up slowly, pulling her close as she shivered her way through the orgasm
aftermath. “So, about that going back to bed, thing?” he whispered into her
ear.

She studied him for a second. A tall man, almost six foot
five, Lee had a shock of coal-black hair and the deepest blue eyes she’d ever
seen. His jaw was darkened with stubble, his shoulders broad. His chest was the
sort of strong she hadn’t expected when she’d seen him at first, at least with
his clothes on. His physicality stayed hidden the same as his caretaker
personality, until she had apparently brought it out in him.

“What’s going on in that brain?” he asked, tilting her chin
up and kissing her gently. She pressed close, loving the sensation of his
arousal between them. “Talk to me?”

“No talking,” she insisted, stroking him exactly the way he
liked before letting him go, making him gasp, then turning around, holding on
to the island’s cool, metal edge.

“Whatcha want, honey?” His voice ramped her lust dial up to
a thousand.

She arched her back, loving the press of his erection
against her ass, shivering when he nibbled her shoulder, as a slow meltdown
began somewhere in her chest.

Do I love this man?

Very possibly.

“I want you to fuck me,” she said.

He pushed her over the island and filled her, bringing
groans from both their lips. “Harder,” she ground out, shoving back, angry for
some unknown reason. “Please, Lee.”

“No begging necessary.” Her hipbones banged against the
countertop edge. “Won’t last long.” He gave a hard thrust before draping over
her, hips moving, their torsos slick with sweat.

She smiled and rested her burning hot face on the cool
stainless steel. He pulled her up, their bodies still connected and kissed her
shoulder once, twice, and again. She had a moment of unreality—this moment with
a man who, for all intents and purposes, represented the sort of perfection
she’d always wanted.

“I love you,” he whispered. “So much.”

She opened her mouth to reply, but the words died on her
tongue. When she refocused forward, she spotted Dominic, dressed for his job as
foreman on their barn renovation, standing at the bottom of the steps glaring
at them. She smiled at him, and put her hands over Lee’s that currently cupped
her bare breasts then slid them up and around to grip his neck behind her so
Dom could see every inch of what they’d been doing.

She turned then, kissing Lee and getting dizzy, and a touch
sad when she realized the satisfaction didn’t come from kissing him but from
showing him off to Dominic.
Unfair
. When she disengaged and looked to
the space where Dom had been witnessing her post-coital snuggle session, it was
empty.

“Kind of a slut move, eh, Di?”

She wiped the sweat off her brow. “Be quiet and help me with
this.”

Dom grabbed the other end of the dead buck and they tossed
it into the ’gator wagon. “Drive it over to the new barn site. I can’t dress it
here.” She gestured at the old barn, now a mess of drywall, electrical supplies
and crap she hated. They’d raised the new barn first, and it sat, cold and
sterile, sans any personality whatsoever. But they’d moved the livestock there,
so the animals wouldn’t be unnerved by the chaos in their old homestead.

Hadn’t worked out all that well. The goat’s milk had dried
up so Lee had to find a new female with a couple of kids, claiming that Diana’s
goat would sense competition and start producing again. So far that theory
hadn’t worked either, so she’d been forced to take the mama goat’s milk.

Masie’s calf, a female, was a delightful thing and too smart
for her own good. She’d figured out how to jimmy open the new gate latch within
days, so they’d looked up one morning to find Masie Jr. calmly nibbling at the
lawn. A new latch had proven no problem, sending them to fetch her from the
neighbor’s yard, nearly four miles down Yellowbird Road.

Dom jumped behind the wheel while she gathered up her
deer-cleaning equipment. “I guess you’d know, wouldn’t you.” She settled into
the passenger’s seat.

“Huh?” He floored it across the field. She gripped the dash
and set her jaw.

“The slut move. It’s your specialty. I learned from the
best.”

He grunted, and pulled up outside the new barn’s main door.
They heaved the huge carcass out and onto the concrete pad, then he helped her
string it up by its hind legs in the doorway. A few hours of bloody, back-breaking
work later, she had the skin drying on a rack and the various cuts of venison
separated by their final destination—tenderloins headed to the smoker, chops
and roasts to the huge freezer.

“I gotta give ya that one. It was some show,” Dom eventually
admitted as they hosed down the concrete, diluting the blood and sending it
down the specially installed drains.

She ignored him, not even sure what she should say. It had
been indeed, and she’d loved every second of it.

“It really was none of your business,” she said, finally
dropping into a canvas camp chair. Her every bone and sinew quivered from the
exertion and her heart pounded way too fast for her taste at his proximity.
Damn the man. How she couldn’t just purge him with Lee Tolliver’s presence escaped
her understanding.

You could start with kicking him out of your house,
stupid
.

She shook her head, unwilling to think about that.

“Guess it kinda was, since y’all were going at it like
animals in clear view of God ‘n’ everybody, you know, in the kitchen?”

Dom popped open a can of beer and tossed one to her. She
caught it, opened it and took a drink, then smiled at him. “Nice work.”

He shrugged and smacked his lips, frowning down at the can.

Mama Brantley’s Secret Recipe
was on the simple
label, and it contained a sublime,
Kombucha
-style brew that he’d
concocted using her mama’s original Scoby and combining it with a ton of
peaches and a mild red ale. The resulting liquid he’d contracted through a
start-up brewery in Lexington, and had canned instead of bottled thanks to a
mobile canning operation that had approached him about doing the same for Love
Brewing products. The first batch had flown off local store shelves and he’d
convinced Dale and Jen to convert part of the building behind them into a small
brewing facility.

She still wasn’t quite sure how the whole thing had
transpired right under her unwilling nose.

“Too acidic,” he declared, as he poured the stuff out onto
the blood-stained dirt. She shook her head and drank the rest of hers. He
stayed silent, gaze on her, Diana knew, but she kept hers averted.

“So you gonna marry Doctor Horse?”

“His name is Lee. And since he hasn’t asked me to, I’m
guessing no.”

“Living in sin.” He made a tsking noise with his teeth.

“Go to hell,” she muttered, getting slowly to her feet, her
muscles and tendons creaking and groaning in protest.

“I think I’ve mentioned this, but I’m already there,
thanks.”

“Angelique is coming to dinner. Your folks are fighting
again and she can’t stand it.”

“She
needs
to get her ass back up to that dance
school.” Dom lifted his face up, taking a long breath of the winter night.
“Gonna snow. I can smell it.”

“You sense the weather now. Quite the Renaissance man.”

He stepped in front of her before she could head into the
barn and finish cleaning up.

“Excuse me.” She refused to meet his eyes. His fingers
encircled her upper arms, moved over her sweatshirt-clad shoulders and up to
her neck. “Don’t touch me.” She glared at him.

“I have to say something.” His familiar voice hypnotized,
despite her efforts not to acknowledge it. His lips hovered over hers.

“This has to be the grossest moment ever.” She kept her
shaking arms at her sides.

“What can I say, animal blood in your hair makes me horny.”
He smiled and kissed her gently before letting her go. “I don’t deserve you. He
does. I want you to be happy. There I said it.”

She frowned at him, conscious of her tingling nerve endings.
“That’s it?”

“Well, yeah, what did you expect?” One corner of his full
lips lifted. Her pulse quickened. She swallowed hard, not allowing the reply
she wanted to let fly escape her lips.

“Nothing.” She folded up the chair and tucked it into a
corner. “I’m gonna check on the goats.”

“Diana, wait.”

She couldn’t bring herself to turn and face him.

“I mean it. I thought for a second that we could, you know,
be together, but I don’t want to hurt you, and since that’s the only thing on
my record so far, I think you’re doing the right thing.”

She clenched her fingers into fists and kept her gaze toward
the giant pen holding her somewhat-overwhelming herd of cheese producers.

Dominic’s voice filled her brain like a fog, disorienting
her with his surprising, mature words. “I am sorry about your first husband
too, Di. I heard all about it thanks to my nosy brothers. He was a
prick…lied…to you....” He frowned and looked back up at the sky.

“Yeah, could be describing yourself, eh?” She moved away
when he reached for her. “It’s fine. He was a rebound for me, I guess.
Something else I can blame you for, were I seeking something else.”

“But he took your parents’ insurance money.” His fists were
balled up, like he wanted to pound something. “Told you he wanted to open your
dream restaurant or something. That’s…just….”

“That’s just my business, Dom. Something else in the
Diana-gets-screwed-yet-lives-and-learns column.” She shut her mind to it,
shoving it far, far away and focusing on the mess she was in now as opposed to
the mess a couple of years ago. “What about Kent? I know you’re still not using
your mobile phone. Angelique told me last time she was out here trying to
escape the sound of your parents fighting about you. How is he gonna—”

“In the recent words of a friend of mine,” he interrupted.
“None of your damn business.”

He stood there, miserable she knew, but Diana held back,
unwilling to allow anything like pity to enter her mind. “Okay, fine. But
he
cost you a relationship with your daddy. Don’t you think you owe it to yourself
to figure out if it’s really what you want?”

“I don’t,” Dom insisted through clenched teeth, fiddling
with the cooler. “And don’t bring it up again. It was a…fluke. A whim, and a
giant mistake. Sort of like Gina.”

Diana flinched.

“Touché,” she said a little too loudly, furious with him as
he rose and met her gaze with a hard one of his own. “You truly are a dickhead.
Honest to God, aren’t ya?” She crossed her arms, ignoring the bleating of the
goats behind her.