“We’re doing fine right here, don’t you think?”
She assumed he planned to come in with her, but she still looked less than sold on the suggestion. A persuasive smile snuck around the corner of her mouth—the mouth she refused to kiss him with—but he saw indecision in the slant of her brows. She shied away from anything too personal, including sharing a kiss…or sharing his bed. The front seat of his truck would keep things impulsive. Easier.
But he wasn’t quite that easy. “Inside.”
She let out a breath and ducked his gaze. “Okaaay.”
Wow. Score a win for him, he thought as she crawled off his lap and opened the passenger door. She did have some ability to compromise. Too bad he couldn’t reward her for it. When she climbed out, he started the truck.
Her mouth dropped open and then snapped shut. “You’re not coming?”
“Can’t, Reckless. You’ll just break my heart.”
For a long moment, she stared at him. Then she wrapped her arms around herself. “You don’t have a heart.”
Yeah, he was an asshole. She wouldn’t reach for him again in this lifetime. So be it. He could live with being considered a heartless asshole. He wasn’t as confident about being a temporary port in Roxy’s storm.
“Are you leaving on account of the waitress?”
The question, coupled with the glare in her narrowed eyes, set another fire low in his gut. Jealousy looked good on her, at least when directed his way. Especially since, if he was being honest, he’d deliberately courted it tonight. But taking his pent-up craving for Roxy and trying to satisfy it with another woman held no appeal. Even he wasn’t that big an asshole. “No.” He put the truck in gear.
“Then I don’t understand. Oh, wait”—the jealous outrage cooled to a guarded expression he didn’t like on her normally open face—“maybe I do. There’s an old saying. You bed down with dogs, you get up with fleas. What’s the matter, West?” She cocked her head. “Afraid you’re going to catch fleas?”
“Not even a little. I’d say you’re the scared one, since we both know you weren’t planning on getting anywhere near my bed. Don’t pick a fight. And don’t slam the—”
She slammed the door before he could finish and stalked toward the house. He waited while she disappeared down the steps. After a moment, he heard another slam, signifying she was safely inside.
He pulled away from the curb and started driving, not really sure where he was going, only sure he couldn’t park the truck and head inside knowing Roxy was one unreinforced interior door away. Follow through, in this case, meant keeping his distance until the rest of him got as strong and Roxy-proof as his better judgment. However long that took. He drove toward the river that bounded Bluelick’s eastern border.
The truck smelled like her—honeysuckle, cinnamon, and forbidden fruit. He could drive a thousand miles and never escape the potent blend. Instead, he took the narrow street leading up Overlook Road, past the occasional glowing window from one of the houses lining the winding route. The paved road transitioned to gravel and then a pitted dirt trail on the last part of the uphill climb, giving the tires, shocks, and his spine a workout as he bounced to the flat outcrop at the summit. He killed the engine. Silence reigned as he stepped out into the night. Then a symphony of insects resumed the nightly concert his arrival had interrupted.
He hauled himself over the tailgate and lay down in the bed of his truck. Stars riddled the sky overhead. The same stars he’d seen from the roof of the shitty Baltimore row house where he’d grown up, and the deck of a destroyer, and Times Square one freezing New Year’s Eve. He found the constancy reassuring. The constancy of his neglected hard-on? Not so much. He folded an arm behind his head and uncrossed his ankles, trying to get comfortable. Something small and wispy flew close to his face. He swatted it away, paused, and then brought his hand to his nose and inhaled. Roxy.
His cock responded like a beast scenting prey. Hunger flowed through his blood, into his groin, his balls. His stomach tightened. Giving in, he slid his fingers into his mouth. Her taste teased his tongue, faint but intoxicating.
He’d had her ready and willing. He could have spent all night with his mouth between her legs. Could have savored her orgasm as it ripened and burst over his tongue. But no, he’d put on the brakes and taken the high road. Where was his reward?
The stars didn’t answer, but his dick pounded with a forceful suggestion. Christ, she was turning him into some kind of deviant. He jerked his fly open, licked his palm, and fisted his Roxy-drenched fingers around his dumb-as-dirt dick that didn’t know when to quit. The stars blurred as he started the classic rub and tug. He let his eyelids drop and his fantasies run wild.
Enjoy it. This is the closest you’ll ever come to fucking her.
…
Roxy stood to the side of the crowded banquet room, resting her tray of cleared dishes on her shoulder, watching the increasingly antsy reception guests. Toasts had been made. Dinner completed. The room hummed louder as people filled an unplanned gap in the timeline with conversation and what was starting to resemble a second cocktail hour. Time to introduce the first dance and get the party started, but in the space by the dance floor where a DJ should have been set up, the bride, groom, and Mrs. Whelan, the event manager, stood speaking rapidly. Not a happy conversation judging by the way the bride’s impressive chest began to heave. Lou Ann Doubletree might have traded her last name for Tillman today, but her “Double D” nickname would stick for the rest of her life.
Lou Ann shook her head, flung her arms wide, and then stormed off toward the ladies’ lounge in a
