Love is a Battlefield: Games of Love, Book 1 (13 page)

His mother seemed delighted, giving a small squeak of approval and settling herself in an armchair. “Don’t mind me,” she said, picking up a pair of knitting needles and burying herself in something red and plush. “You two carry on like I’m not here.”

The grin on Julian’s face spread as he reached for Kate’s foot. The appendage acted of its own volition, gliding into his waiting hands like the wanton traitor it was.

“Allow me,” he said in a low voice, his other hand slipping up along the back of her calf, his fingers tracing a pattern that seemed somehow programmed to compel her body into a state of liquid complaisance. He cupped the sole of her shoe, pulling it off her foot at the heel and working toward her toes.

She watched, riveted, as he lifted the shoe away. His movements were slow and methodical, and he paused intermittently to allow a brush of his fingers to graze the low arch of her bare foot.

Without even pausing for a breath, he did it to the other foot, this time running the rough pad of his thumb over the little sheep tattoo. “Cute,” he murmured.

And then it was over, the physical separation complete and almost painful. His mother didn’t look up from her knitting once, and Julian rose, completely unfazed, to place the shoes near the door. Neither one of them seemed to notice the temperature in the room had risen at least ten degrees.

Julian returned to sit next to her on the couch, leaning into the corner with his arms spread out along the back. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon after our last conversation. To what do I owe this pleasure?”

Kate didn’t miss the pointed glance he cast at his mother, telling her to keep things polite. As if she could forget the woman was sitting there hanging on their every word.
Fine.
She could hide behind pleasantries too. In fact, she’d been bred to it. Her own mother ate passive aggression for breakfast.

“I have something for you.” She nodded toward the newspaper she’d brought, sliding it across the glass top coffee table toward him.

He didn’t pick it up. “That was nice. Thank you.” He looked her over with narrowed eyes. “You look well. I’m curious—did you experience any saddle soreness after the other night?”

Kate bolted straight up against the back of the couch, pressing her legs together as tight as they could possibly go. She’d worn a knee-length pencil skirt—a rather form-fitted one—to prevent any of the bruises dotting her inner thighs from showing. Only vague memories of riding the mechanical bull remained, but she distinctly remembered the pain the next morning. It was the throbbing pain of drunken folly.

“I’m fine, thank you,” she said tightly, checking to make sure Chika was still intent on her knitting. No one, in all the history of the world, had ever been more so. “I used to ride
horses
all the time when I was younger, so I’m used to it.”

“You rode horses?” Julian seemed genuinely interested. “That’s awfully rustic for someone like you.”

“Well, it’s not like I was blazing any trails,” Kate confessed. “Riding lessons were part of my education in grace.”

“That’s ridiculous. You can’t teach grace. You either have it or you don’t.”

Kate laughed out loud. “Tell that to my mother. She was cursed with a daughter boasting not two left feet, but three or four. Most of my childhood was spent with her trying to hack the extra ones off.”

Julian’s mouth turned down at the corners, but he didn’t say anything else. He just sat there looking calm.

“So…don’t you want to see what’s in the paper?” she tried.

“Not really. Why don’t you tell me about it?”

Kate scowled. If he didn’t see what she’d done, the plan lost at least ninety-five percent of its efficacy—not to mention her joy in delivering it. “You’ll be very pleased, I think.”

“Oh, believe me, Kate. I’m already quite pleased right now.”

He certainly looked it, the jerk. Only the worst kind of rogue would use his mother as a shield. And with such obvious delight.

“It’s only that I’ve been feeling so bad about everything.” Kate tried for a syrupy-sweet voice, cocking her head at him with wide-eyed innocence and placing a hand on his thigh, which was hard and tense. That got his attention. He sucked in a sharp breath, low enough so only she heard it.

“Oh?”

“I’ve been practically drowning in guilt.” She moved her hand higher.

“Guilt? Is that what you and Jada were drinking?”

Kate started to laugh but forced herself to stop with a heavy cough. “I decided the only thing to do is to make amends. Publicly.” She let go of his leg and nudged the paper again.

He took it this time, opening the pages and scanning the interior. He peered around the side, one eyebrow cocked. “I don’t see it.”

“Page five. The sports page.”

That was enough to get him going. He flipped quickly through, not stopping until he reached the thick middle section that highlighted both local and national sports scores.

She gave him a moment to take it all in. It was, after all, a half-page ad. An expensive half-page ad, even with Jada’s ample cleavage discount.

He didn’t emerge from the pages right away. In fact, he didn’t emerge at all, even when his knuckles grew pale with the effort of clutching the paper.

“Are you talking about the ad for the Games, dear?” Chika asked amiably. Kate whipped her head around to look at her. The woman was still furiously knitting and didn’t bother looking up. “I saw that this morning. It’s not exactly how I would have done the marketing, but it should draw an interesting crowd.”

Interesting. Yes, it would definitely be that.

It was a master stroke, if she did say so herself.
The Scottish Highland Games
, the ad read in big, bold letters,
where big boys play in tiny skirts
.
DRAG yourself in for a good SHOW.
The picture depicted a man wearing only a kilt, suspenders and a pair of thigh-high leather stiletto boots Jada professed a slavish jealousy over. The man was hugging a short, thick caber resting vertically against a wall, his leg wrapped around it like he was about to go for one heck of a splintery ride.

Julian was not amused.

Chika finally pulled her knitting down to her lap and looked over at Julian with mild amusement. “Jules, you ought to do something nice to thank this young lady. Lunch, I think. Why don’t you take her to that cafe over on Garland?”

“Lunch?” Julian echoed. Finally, an action. A reaction.

Apparently, a rather big one. After casting the paper to the side and practically leaping to his feet, Julian stomped all the way to the front door. He pushed it open with so much force it caused the front windows to rattle.

“Outside. Now.”

Kate looked nervously between Julian and his mother. “Er…inside is nice, I think.”

His lips were drawn into a tight line, and his eyes smoldered with the fury of a thousand black holes. He didn’t move as he spoke. No, not spoke. Seethed.

“What I have to say to you is not fit for my mother’s ears.”

“But they’re fit for mine?”

“They’ve been chosen
especially
for yours.”

He stood there holding the door open for what felt like ten minutes, not moving, not making a sound. The only break in the heavy silence was the snap of Chika’s needles, which had picked up again at a frantic pace.

Kate had no choice but to follow him.

He waited only until the door clicked into place behind them before grabbing her by her upper arms. Pressing her up against the wall of the porch, he brought his head down to hers, closer and closer. For the briefest second, she thought he was going to kiss her, his breath coming short and fast, his entire body tense and hard against hers.

Her own lips parted as he neared, and she arched her back to bring their bodies closer together. It was the only movement she could make, she rationalized, pinned as she was to the wall. It was either that or cower—and she wasn’t about to do that.

Last week, perhaps. Last week’s Kate would have been horrified to see to what depths she’d fallen over a silly plot of land. This week’s Kate didn’t care.

This week’s Kate really, really wanted to fight back.

She forced her eyes to meet his and held them there. She and Julian were alpha dogs, one large and intimidating and sexy as hell, the other standing on a front porch without her shoes.

With a sound halfway between a groan and a roar, he shoved himself away from the wall, balling his hands into fists at his sides. For the briefest moment, Kate thought that meant she won.

“Just tell me this,” he asked, his voice strained from what must have been immense self-control. So far, he had yet to use even a single word that might have brought a mother to blush. “Was it your idea to turn this into a public spectacle, or was it Jada’s?”

The question wasn’t fair. First of all, the advertisement had been plotted under the influence of several martinis as well as one or two shots of tequila. It might have been the bartender’s idea, for all Kate remembered. Secondly, she was getting a little tired of Julian assuming she was unable to make a decision without Jada perched on one shoulder, prodding her along with a miniature pitchfork in her ear. She could very well play the villain in her own melodrama—it was a fact she was coming to delight in.

“I’m capable of rational, independent thought, thank you very much. Jada didn’t make me do this—you did.”

“I made you do this? Me? Everyone in Spokane is going to see this ad. You have no idea how fast word will spread—the SHS is a pretty small group of people. Athletes. Vendors. Sponsors. This could ruin everything.”

Obstinate, obtuse man. That was the whole point.

“You still don’t get it, do you, Julian? That first night, you made the mistake of assuming you could dictate my actions to me. My whole life, everyone has assumed the same thing. Kate’s small. Kate’s quiet. Kate comes from a good family.” She ticked her fingers off as she spoke. She could keep going for hours. Sweet Kate. Nice Kate. Call-her-a-whore-and-she’ll-make-you-breakfast Kate.

She was tired of it. For the first time in her life, she was standing up for herself and for a project she cared about. It was the most fun she’d had in a long, long time.

And her pleasure in it had absolutely nothing to do with her opponent. Making this man so angry he hovered over her, all righteous fury and passion, his body tense and hot and so close—that was hardly her objective.

Hardly.

“All you have to do is move to a different location, and I’m out of your life forever,” she added.

“It’s a tea party, for Christ’s sake. You’re fucking with my livelihood over a tea party!”

A silence fell over them both, heavy and full of pressure, like they were descending from an airplane too fast.

Kate was the first to break it. “Don’t you dare call it a tea party again.”

He took a predatory step forward, planting his leg between hers. “Tea party.”

“Don’t.”

“Tea.” He leaned in closer, almost whispering the words. “Party.”

She thought for sure he was going to kiss her this time, and she had to force her hands to remain at her sides to keep them from winding around his body and holding on for dear life. She wouldn’t be the first to move. She wouldn’t.

She won. He was the first to move, but it wasn’t at all in the direction she’d been hoping for. He whirled around and stormed back through the front door, moving so fast he was almost a blur to Kate’s slightly bewildered eyes. The door slammed, shooting a gust that blew her hair and clothes in a ripple of cold air.

She stood there for a moment, blinking at the door, waiting for something to happen.

“Uh, Julian? My shoes?” She wasn’t sure whether or not to knock. There was no graceful way to demand one’s footwear after that escapade. “Mrs. Wallace?”

She turned at the sound of the large bay window overlooking the front yard being pulled open. She wasn’t able to see Julian from her place on the front porch, but she saw her beautiful Steve Madden shoes sailing through the air. They landed on the sidewalk, one making a scraping sound that was downright painful to her ears.

“Tea party!” he yelled one last time before drawing the window shut.

With as much dignity as she could muster, her head held so high she might have been stargazing, Kate walked down the pathway to grab her shoes. She fingered the angry scuff mark with a frown.

“You ruined them, you beast!” she yelled, shaking the offending item at the window. “I love these shoes.”

“Do I detect a lady in distress?” a voice behind her asked. It was a cultured voice, each syllable carefully wrought. Kate immediately recognized the result of years of speech training. That too had been part of her childhood education in grace.

She turned to find a sleek, red sports car idling almost silently in the street, the driver peering out the window at her through a pair of dark sunglasses.

“I’m fine, thank you. Just…getting my shoes.” She held a hand up to her eyes to shield the glare from the car’s side mirrors. “Really, there’s no problem.”

The car’s engine purred to a stop, and the man slid out. Kate knew in a moment he was one of the Highland athletes. There was a certain feral grace to all of them, like they had to knowingly contain their power and speed when consorting with the mortals. Plus, it was hard to imagine any man with such a perfectly triangular shape, all broad shoulders and tapered waist, not being some sort of powerhouse of human might.