Rough Ride (2 page)

He muttered thanks, but she still stood there. With her sweet, vanilla icing-smelling, pink lips and down-home, darlin’-kind of smile. As if all that wasn’t bad enough, there were still her lashes. Hell, everybody had them, but there was something about hers when she blinked.

And she blinked just as she stepped inside, leaving him speechless. Leaving him peeking inside his trailer and watching as she put her things down on the couch. And put her hands on her narrow waist as she spun the room. He could do nothing but grip the door and try not to rip it from the hinges. Her hands landed on her hips. Nails were painted the same pink as her swimsuit. He’d just bet with the right amount of licking and looking, he’d find more than a couple of other things on her in that same pink shade.

And then she kicked off her shoes. “Well, I might as well have a look around while I’m here.”

What?
He managed to stumble through the doorway. “Why?”

She blinked up at him, her chin having to turn up high to look in his eyes. It elongated the curve of her neck and he wanted to know her skin on his lips right there on that spot. “An inspection. I do them every now and then. It’s in the rental agreement. So, while I’m here, I’ll take a quick walk through.”

“Uh.”
Shit. Shit. Shit.

She only beamed a smile at him. “I’ll start on one end and cross to the other. Then I’ll be done. I’m sure it’ll be painless.”

He rubbed the back of his neck, trying his damnedest not to notice anything about her as she turned away and started her inspection. How her skirt-thing swayed along her thighs and nearly showed her ass. How her back was slender, curving in for her hips. He turned his back to her to get control of himself and his jeans that were about to rip in two. “Sure.”

“I’m not holding you up from anything, am I?”

And just as fast, he was drawn back. A moth to the flame. Or in this case, a desperate man to a sensual voice. “Just a shower and supper.”

Her eyes somehow widened and lips parted. Mouth formed a perfect ‘
o’
. She glanced down as far as his chest then back to his face.

Hell.
That undressing by her eyes wasn’t new to him either. He’d been seeing it for nearly all of the seven months he’d been in town, but she was far too innocent. Way too soft-spoken to ever say anything about it. As long as she didn’t speak on the subject, it didn’t exist. They didn’t exist. This chemistry that crawled over his skin and made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up when she looked at him didn’t. Fucking. Exist.

She blinked and turned away. “I’ll, um, be quick.”

She walked down the hall toward the extra bedrooms he didn’t use and figured it best not to follow. The hallway was too damn skinny, the bedrooms even smaller. No way was he going down that rabbit hole. Small enclosed space. Him. Her. That scent coming from her. Her tempting skin and all those walls and empty floors available. He shook.

It took her seconds and she was back, smiling. “I don’t think you’ve even been on that end, have you?”

“No, ma’am.”

Her lips twitched as she walked by and damn it all to hell, he couldn’t help himself, he dropped his gaze again to her ass swaying in that nothing of a skirt. If it was a skirt. He still wasn’t sure if it wasn’t a thin hand towel. Or maybe a torn off piece of a sheet. She opened a few cabinets and frowned.

Then he frowned, because Gretchen didn’t frown. She smiled. She listened intently. In his dreams there were satisfied grins and moans as she whispered his name. There was never any frowning. He peeked over the counter, worried what might be in there, but found it empty. “Something wrong?”

She looked to him. “They’re empty.”

“I don’t use those.”

She went through a couple others, finding paper plates, forks, towels. The necessities. All he needed. No point in getting anything permanent. Then he’d have to take time to do something with it when it was time to go.

She dropped to a squat in front of the lower cabinets. The skirt dipped between her legs, but it was so short, it didn’t really hide anything. She faced the cabinets, so he couldn’t see up her legs with his Peeping-Tom-pervy eyes, but the rest of her thigh was all there for him to soak in. The bend of her legs where thigh met hips. How they’d look around his waist. Muscles clenched.

Sweat pooled in his lower back, soaked in his too tight and too hot jeans.

“Here’s some food.” She reached in and flipped through a few bags of chips then closed that and turned for the refrigerator. She cocked a brow up to him. “I see beer, deli-meat, mustard and cheese.”

“What more does a man need?”

She shook her head and opened the freezer and laughed. “Apparently stock in every frozen dinner company known to man. Do you really eat this shit?”

He stared at her, unused to strong language coming out of her mouth, not that he was used to hearing her talk very much at all. “Quick and easy.”

She frowned. “Not at all good for you. Not nearly enough for a man your size.”

He patted his stomach of rock hard abs. “I think I’m doing okay.”

She closed the refrigerator and walked toward his bedroom. “When’s the last time you had a real meal?”

He had no choice but to follow her. Not when she was talking to him and he wasn’t going to be as rude as to yell back from the kitchen. His momma would smack him from the grave. “Um, I ate at the diner in town for lunch.”

She spun around in the middle of his bedroom, her skirt flying up and swishing high around her thighs as she moved. “That doesn’t count.”

He leaned on the doorframe to make sure he didn’t cross the room just to show her how fine he was doing on his food. “You don’t think your friend feeds me well enough?”

She rolled her eyes. “Tonya doesn’t cook worth a damn. What you’re eating is all frozen foods slapped together. It’s a glorified frozen dinner meal that looks halfway decent on a plate. I’ve worked there. I’ve seen it. I get on to her for it, but her customers would croak if she dared to change one thing.”

He gave her a shrug. “Don’t change what’s working.”

She shook her head and flipped through a few cabinets in the bathroom. Didn’t look in them so much as just opened and closed. “I’ll have to fix you something.”

Oh no. Oh hell no. Not a good idea. “I don’t think you feeding me is in our rental agreement.”

“It’s not.”

“Do you cook for all your renters?”

Her lips curled up as she moved across the bedroom and returned to his side. “Only the ones who stare at my ass when my back is turned.”

His mouth opened, words waiting, but he shut it. Best to keep his trap shut before he stuck his foot in it.

She walked close to him. “Thank you.”

He swallowed. “For what?”

“For not denying it. I wasn’t positive, but I thought so.”

Hell.
“Gretchen.”

“Lane.” She walked in close and put her hands on his chest. Her fingers were short and slim, dwarfed against the width of his chest. Her pink painted fingernails were neatly trimmed and a stark, girly contrast to his filthy, dirt and oil streaked shirt. “I want to hear you say it.”

He was forced to clear his throat. “Hear me say what?”

“That you look at my ass.”

“Christ.” He dropped his head back and stared at the ceiling.

“Please,” she whispered.

Just shit. He dropped his gaze and sighed. “Fine. Yes, Gretchen. I stare at your ass. At your legs. Your tits. Every chance I get, I look at you. I think about putting my hands on you.” And now that he’d gotten started, he didn’t want to stop. Couldn’t stop. This has been building for months and he was about to boil over. This had to end and if it meant scaring her little doe-eyed face out of his trailer, then so be it. While he had the chance, he took her by the hips. “I wonder how your waist would feel against mine. If my hands are too worn from calluses and constant cuts that I wouldn’t be able to actually touch you because it would be too rough. Or if I wouldn’t be able to feel how soft your skin really is because work has worn my skin too thick. I wonder if I’d flatten you if I laid on top of you. Or if you’re limber enough for your legs to straddle me so I can sink all the way in. Happy now?”

Her eyes were wide, staring at him. Until she shook her head. Her wavy hair falling from her ponytail bounced around her face. Hands slid up to his shoulders. She raised on tip-toes, her clean, flower fresh body slid along his filthy one. Her chin angled up, lips parted and he lowered, meeting her the rest of the way, just as he’d dreamed and ached to do.

He covered her mouth with his and she sighed against him. Gretchen was everything he’d imagined. Tiny woman, yet powerful. So passionate. Her chest was hard against his, making him feel all of her deep, gasping breaths.

Her hips against him. Belly pressed to his cock. He dropped his hands and finally cupped her ass. The twin firm swells of her cheeks filled his hands and he squeezed, lifting her higher against him. Her arms came around his neck and he doubted she even stood on the ground anymore, but fuck it all, he was kissing Gretchen.

Kissing her hard. Determined. And she gave as much as he took. Nipping back. Licking his lips when she got the chance. Pressing her mouth across his, as though she’d never get enough, and he sure as hell didn’t think he would. No, he knew he wouldn’t get enough because this had to stop. They were not going to be a couple or together or anything at all. The hard, cold weight of disappointing reality dropped over his shoulders.

He lowered her down, pulled his mouth from hers and straightened. Her eyes lifted and his name whispered across her mouth, nearly undoing him. Almost had him picking her up and carrying her to his bed. No wait, he was filthy. Shower first.

Nearly.

Instead, he backed away from what shouldn’t be taken.

She hugged herself, her arms going across her chest and thankfully hiding her pebbled nipples. “Why do you fight this?”

“Because I’m not staying.”

She frowned. “But y’all are doing all that work at the manor. I thought…to live there. That y’all were going to drill soon.”

He nodded. “That’s the plan. I still plan to leave as soon as I can though. I have….” He thought for a moment, not wanting to lie about it. “Another life.”

There, that wasn’t a lie. He did have another life. It was a fairly shitty one, but a life nonetheless.

She rubbed her arms, her gaze drifted away and it was like he was socked in the gut. As if this wasn’t hard enough. And that was why he’d avoided this. Because he’d known what she’d been looking for and she’d just been drenched with the cold reality of truth.

She glanced to the side. “Oh. Well, everything looks good here. You take good care of the place. And now I need to run. I’m supposed to meet with friends.”

She walked far faster than he ever expected her short legs to take her and was gone from his house, his dirty handprints smeared across the white skirt covering her ass, and despite it all, he couldn’t help but smile.

Chapter
Two

Gretchen threw her car in park and stormed to the backyard of her best friend’s house. Flora, bless her, had a pitcher of sangria waiting. Her other best friend Tonya, was kicked back in a chair with a full glass. They were both in the shade of a large umbrella sitting just a few feet from the pool. Seeing them already had the bunched nerves in Gretchen’s neck relaxing and slowing down her stomping.

Which was a good thing, because she wasn’t exactly sure why she was angry to the point of stomping her feet like a child pitching a fit. Gretchen didn’t pitch fits, at least, not since she was a kid and wanted something really bad and was told she couldn’t have it. Okay, so maybe she knew why she was stomping around and reached for a chair.

Flora glanced her way and frowned. “What happened to you?”

Gretchen looked down to see black streaks of grime across the front of her cover-up from where Lane’s body had been plastered against her. Or, well, where the front of his jeans and t-shirt had been pressed to her. Where the long firm length of his hardness had pressed. The firm ridge of his zipper digging against her belly. A shiver worked through and then she remembered why she was here instead of rolling around on his bed.

She didn’t hide anything from her friends, but after she came walking up pitching her little mini-tantrum and feeling like a fool for it, a lie slid off her tongue. “I…I set my cup on the roof of my car and wasn’t thinking and leaned against my car to get it down. I have to take the time to wash it.”

Flora’s lip curled. “Ew, definitely do that. That’s a cute skirt.”

“Thank you.” Not too cute. Or maybe too cute and not sexy enough. If so, she’d probably still be against Lane and all those amazing muscles.

She turned around and dragged a chair to the table. Snickers sounded from behind her and she spun back to her friends. “What?”

Tonya swallowed. “So what happened to your ass?”

She frowned. “What about it?”

Flora bit her lip for a moment. “Did some someone slap you or did you fall down and someone thankfully caught you on the ass just in time?”

“What?” Gretchen pushed her skirt off and held it up to see two big, dirty, greasy handprints against the butt of her skirt. She swallowed. The fingers were curled on the fabric, reminding her all over again how he’d gripped and kept her against him. A shudder ran over her spine. There’d been so much heat and man. Until he pushed her away. And now she was inexplicably angry again. She dropped in a chair and looked across the table to see her friends staring at her, waiting for an explanation. Okay, so maybe angry wasn’t the right word. Humiliated sounded a lot more like it and she put her forehead on the table. “I need a really tall glass of that sangria.”

“Agreed. Maybe the alcohol will get the truth out of you.” Tonya slid a glass over.

With a sigh, Gretchen sat back and drank the sweet wine. It was stupid to try and hold anything back from her friends anyway. They’d been together for years. Her and Tonya since Jr. High and then Flora joined the crew when they were nineteen. Like sisters since. Besides, it wasn’t as if they didn’t know she’d been crushing all over Lane. He just had to be so frustratingly distant.