Riding the Thunder (10 page)

Also, she didn't want the evening over, longing to be near Jago, drawn like the proverbial moth to a flame. The man hit her senses hard. Still, she remained leery of being alone with him—afraid of the wild woman lurking just under her skin, waiting to break free. Having Netta and Liam with them would provide a convenient buffer.

Liam rose, collected the empty beer bottles and dumped them in the trash. “Asha, you have a bungalow empty?”

“Always for you, brother dear.” Asha saw Netta's head snap up, the blue eyes fixed on Liam, hope banked in the crystalline depths. It dawned on Asha why her brother wanted to stay at the motel. “You're concerned about that creep Faulkner.”

Liam shrugged. “He's a bully. That sort never comes at you straightforward. However, he gets liquored up—one of his favorite pastimes—he might try to jump you in the dark. Too much the coward, he won't dare bother Jago or me, but he would come after a woman. I want you on your toes, lass.”

“I'm always careful, Liam. He doesn't scare me.” Asha shifted her glance, seeing her brothers concern reflected in Jago's stare. Fighting a sigh, she realized she could stare into those penetrating eyes all night. That bloody connection again. Unable to stand her vulnerability, she went to stack ashtrays.

“While I have your attention,”—Jago snatched back the one he was using and flicked his cigarillo into it—“how do I get access to the swimming pool? Laps before bed would make me sleep better. It's still early and I'm restless.”

Restless is the key word tonight,
Asha thought. “I don't have a lifeguard. I use college kids from the University of Kentucky during the summer; I haven't been able to hire a replacement.”

“I don't need a lifeguard, Asha. I promise not to run
around the pool or start water fights.” He crossed his heart and held up his right hand. “I'd just like the exercise.” Suddenly taking her wrist, he examined the marks left by Faulkner, his thumb brushing gently over the bruises already forming. His touch sent Asha's heart slamming against her ribs.

Liam championed Jago's request. “Come on, Sis, it's glassed-in and heated. You use it. Netta uses it. I use it.”

“You would aid and abet your enemy? He's here trying to buy your horse farm,” Asha pointed out. “Besides, neither Netta nor you will sue me.”

Jago reached across the counter for a pen and paper, quickly scribbled something and pushed it toward her.

“What's this?” Asha blinked at him.

He arched an eyebrow and exchanged longsuffering glances of male understanding with Liam.

Grumbling “T.M.,” she picked up the paper and read it aloud. “‘I shan't sue Asha Montgomerie if I drown in her swimming pool.' Cute.”

Netta took off her apron and wriggled her shoulders clearly to ease the stiffness. “It makes me feel positively ancient to go home on a Friday night and curl up with a hot water bottle. We should kick up our heels and live a little. Of course, around here that's hard to accomplish. The drive-in is the only action for miles.”

“A drive-in in the rain sounds like a good idea,” Liam teased with a wicked smile.

Asha suddenly envisioned the hushed interior of a car, Jago in the driver's seat, the windshield wipers slapping while the movie played unnoticed. The intoxicating scent of his citrus and bergamot cologne would mix with the heat of pure Jago Fitzgerald, wrap around her and drive her mad with wanting.

Maybe she'd be better off going to bed and reading a good funny romance or a sinister vampire tale. Dawn Thompson's
The Ravening
waited on the nightstand. If she were near Jago and those dark green eyes for too long, she
might do something foolish. Maybe do it twice. Three times.

“We could call it an early night—” Asha started, only everyone practically screamed at her.

“
No!
”

They couldn't have timed it more perfectly had they rehearsed it. Asha smirked, seeing their faces, all innocent grins.

Though Netta had flashed a dazzling smile, pleading was in her blue eyes. “We could . . . go for a swim,” she suggested hopefully, “and save the drive-in for tomorrow night.”

Liam nodded. “A swim sounds good. The drive-in can hold.”

Asha almost licked her finger and drew an imaginary hash mark in the air. Score one for the sassy blonde. Not only had she maneuvered Liam into a swim, she'd lassoed and was ready to brand him for Saturday.

Asha studied his countenance. Clearly, Liam wanted her to play the vanilla filling between the Oreo cookies of Netta and himself. Asha also was beginning to suspect he wasn't above tossing little sister under Jago's nose, hoping to influence the man over the purchase of the horse farm.

Another time she'd have been ticked at her brother seeking to use her in such an underhanded fashion. Since it involved Jago Fitzgerald, it didn't have quite the sting.

Yeah, baby, use me!

Asha watched Jago cut through the water with the grace of a Selkie. He turned under the surface, pushed off the wall and shot a third of the way down the pool before his next stroke. His legs were long, strong, his sculpted arms sliced forward rhythmically, showing he was an expert swimmer who could keep up that tempo endlessly. Pure poetry in motion. The man had the most beautiful shoulders she'd ever seen. A fool, she could stand here all night and watch, with hardly a thought in her head—except those of wanting.

Netta came up and hung an arm over Asha's shoulder. “Hmm, see something you crave, girlfriend?” she asked, grinning.

Both women cringed as Liam suddenly did a cannonball off the diving board, the splash from the pool spraying them. He surfaced, kicked off the wall and paced Jago, mirroring the man stroke-for-stroke.

“My brother will bust a gut before he admits he can't keep up.” Asha sniggered.

Netta cocked a questioning eyebrow. “What makes you think he can't? I'd say they're rather evenly matched.”

“Jago says he swims nearly every day. While Liam is active, he doesn't do any exercise regularly. That gives Jago the edge. Two-to-one that Liam quits first.” Asha shrugged.

“Done!” Netta did a pass with her hand, pointing to the chaise lounges. “Let's plop our fannies down and watch the show. Better than television, and less fattening than chocolate.”

“I thought there wasn't anything you liked more than chocolate.” Asha spread a towel and then stretched her legs out on a chaise.

“Sugarplum, if I had your brother near for 365 days a year, I'd give up chocolate in any form.” She studied Asha intently. “Do you have a problem with that?”

“You giving up chocolate?” Asha laughed, shifting her eyes to the swimmers, and enjoying the show.

“Would it create a sticky situation if I were to see Liam?” Netta's expression was serious.

“You mean you cannot see him?” Teasing, she waved a hand before Netta's eyes. “Maybe you're suffering an overdose of chocolate.”

“Get stuffed, Asha. I'm serious. You and I are nearly ten years apart in age, but our friendship isn't something I'd risk lightly.”

“I get along with you like a sister,” Asha said. “As far as Liam, you're adults—you don't need my approval.”

“I want it, though.” Netta glanced at Liam, who lagged a
meter behind Jago now. “I'm a couple years older than he is. I'll be forty come January.”

“That means anything? You don't look it. If I hadn't taken your job application, I'd guess you were about my age. As for my idiot brother, you have my blessings. You'd be good for him. Sometimes he's too wrapped up in the horse farm. I worry about him should this sale go through. Also, he's lonely, I think.”

Liam surfaced under the diving board, held on to the drain with his left hand, and snorted water from his nose. Jago did another lap, then surfaced to take hold with his right. Their words were low, but then their laughter rang out, filling the glasshouse.

“I won the bet.” Asha wiggled her toes.

“I'm telling you, if you don't latch on to Jago Fitzgerald and hogtie him, you've got rocks for brains, sugarplum. There aren't many with such elegance, raw sexual power, grace and smarts, and he's got them in spades.”

“Jago scares me, reminds me of a beautiful black wolf. He hangs back, watching, singling me out of the herd. It spooks me.”

“Yeah, I thought that when he showed up. I
told
you—he was waiting for you.”

“Why me?” Asha mused, slightly unsettled by the idea. Her little voice warned she needed to consider that further, but then her eyes met his across the pool, locking, and all thoughts fled her besotted brain.

“When you have the Big Bad Wolf cutting you from the pack, you learn to smile and play Little Red Riding Hood. ‘My what a big tongue you have—all the better to . . .'” Netta's sexy laughter taunted Asha. Rising, the blonde untied her robe. “Remember, wolves mate for life. Now, that drop dead gorgeous brother of yours reminds me of a Siberian tiger. That loose-gaited stalk belies all that muscle. Excuse me while I go bungle in the jungle.”

Netta strolled the length of the pool, long-legged and
barely covered in her baby-blue striped bikini. Her saunter was natural, with no jiggling, as if she'd learnt to walk with a book on her head like a runway model. Both men couldn't take their eyes off the sexy blonde. It wouldn't have surprised Asha if the water at that end of the pool rose ten degrees. Netta stepped up on the diving board, then jack-knifed perfectly into the water.

Jago turned back to Asha and lifted his brows, challenge in his dark eyes. Quite odd, she read his mind so clearly, that almost tangible link between them rising again. His unspoken question could not have been plainer—
Can you top that?

Asha was suddenly riddled with near crippling self-consciousness. When she'd changed in the bungalow, instead of donning her royal blue suit that she usually wore, the super sexy one she'd purchased years ago for a honeymoon trip to the Bahamas snagged her eye. The wedding had been cancelled two days after she'd bought it, when she'd caught her fiancé giving the stiff one to his blonde-bimbo secretary. The swimsuit had stayed forlornly at the back of her drawer for over five years, never worn, the original price tag still attached.

A black-gold maillot weave, the one-piece suit covered more of Asha's body than Netta's bikini—at least the front did. A deep scoop neck plunged low on her breasts and had French-cut legs, very flattering. The back was what tended to be not all there. The straps met on the shoulders and merged into an inch-wide strip that followed the line of her spine down to the thong bottom.

At least she'd been smart enough to put it on and give her reflection a hard inspection in the full-length mirror before coming to the pool. She'd lost seven pounds since she bought it, which only accented her 34D chest. Asha had never felt comfortable in a bikini, though surprisingly, she felt at ease, confident in this bit of nothing. Or had. Now she wished she'd played coward and gone with the more sedate suit that covered her arse!

Once more Jago demonstrated their fey connection. Turning his back to the pool wall, he stretched out his beautiful arms along the drain in a signal that he wasn't moving until she took off her black robe. This ability to read him unnerved her.

What would it feel like to make love to a man so attuned to you that his thoughts brushed your mind? The near telepathy would see her arousal stronger, as she would know what he felt, experienced, doubling their passion since he'd feed off her reactions, too.

Ignoring the hard fist to her womb, she slowly rose to her feet, meeting his dare. She untied the belt around her terry robe, and let it slide off her shoulders to pool around her feet. His smug smile vanished, and one of Jago's arms dropped off the edge of the drain.

“Hope he didn't skin it.” She chuckled. Shoulders squared, she sauntered the few paces to the side stairs where she entered the pool's shallow end, aware that Jago's eyes tracked her every move.

As she used the steps to enter into the tantalizingly warm water, Asha glanced down at the silken liquid gently lapping at her legs. Strangely lightheaded, a spinning sense of déjà vu overwhelmed her. She blinked.

Everything shifted.

The pool was no longer enclosed in the glasshouse, but open to the air. A soft spring breeze stirred the circle of red, blue, green and orange Japanese lanterns . . .

Laura listened to Gene Pitney crooning the poignant “Town Without Pity,” the record spinning on a player set up underneath the wrought-iron staircase that went straight to the roof of The Windmill's clubhouse. She half-heartedly took in the paper lanterns that ran along the rim of the sundeck, illuminating couples slow dancing in the deep shadows. Young men wore tuxedo jackets, while girls in full-skirted formals had their hair up in angel curls.

“Junior prom for Leesburg High,” she muttered.

Her sigh was dejected. Small wonder. The previous week had seen a flurry of activity in the small town. Excited for weeks, the girls had picked out formals and had their shoes dyed to match their gowns. Fearing not being able to get in for the all-important day, they had set up appointments well ahead of time to have their hair done at Juanita's Wash & Curl.

Laura failed to share the excitement of this night. Oh, her gown was beautiful—a pale yellow, a shade most girls couldn't wear without looking sallow. On her, it was perfect. Like her classmates, she'd also had her shoes dyed the same delicate shade of her formal.

“Just going through the motion,” she confessed to the soft night.

Drawing the line, she'd worn only one petticoat and not starched so it stood out like an ironing board. She had fixed her own hair, eschewing Juanita's beehive or angel curls specials, and wore it up, but in a simpler style, with a hint of the Victorian era. She felt pretty. Even so, she wished she was anywhere but here.