He drew a bullseye over one cheek and appreciated the way the smooth skin puckered with goose bumps. “Go out for ice cream with me tonight.”
Her smile wavered for an instant then slipped sideways into a smirk of pure challenge. “That depends.”
“On?” He retraced the bullseye.
This time instead of squirming for freedom, she lifted her hips and then lowered them so his ever-hardening cock nestled in what could easily become his happy place. “Someone recently told me going out for ice cream is a euphemism for having sex. Are we talking ice cream or are we talking a proper fucking?”
You could do a reasonable degree of crazy. “You’ll have to say yes to find out.”
“I guess that could be arranged, but”—she wiggled her hips—“what if I’m craving a treat right now?”
He pulled her up until she straddled him. “I guess that could be arranged, as well.”
Chapter Fourteen
“Whatever you’re on, girl, I need me a dose.”
Roxy laughed at Addy’s comment and continued wiping down the counter. “What can I say? The Sunday dinner shift is a goldmine. A morning of church makes people extra generous with their tips.”
Addy returned from switching the door sign from OPEN to CLOSED and dropped onto a stool between Melody Merritt-Bradley, one-time jilted fiancée, now happily married to the fire chief, and Ginny Buchanan, beauty salon owner and duly elected mayor of Bluelick, affectionately known as “Sweet Virginia” by her police chief husband, Shaun.
“Nope, that’s not it,” Addy said. “I don’t care how good a shift is or how many tips you rake in, it doesn’t leave you grinning like you slept with a banana in your mouth.”
Ginny, a flame-haired firecracker bearing a passing resemblance to Princess Ariel—if the Disney version had grown up on the working-class side of the tracks in a small southern town—propped her elbows on the counter and aimed an emerald green gaze at Roxy. “Uh-uh. Not a banana, but based on that smile, I’d hazard you had something in your mouth.”
Melody let out a mock gasp and thwacked her friend on the arm with the back of her hand. “Is that any way for the mayor to talk?”
Addy laughed, but on Melody’s other side, Ellie Longfoot, town doctor and petite counterpart to tall, rangy Tyler, scrunched her brow over her soulful brown eyes. “I don’t understand. Medically speaking, almost nothing you put in your mouth will enhance your smile.”
Ginny looked down the counter at her. “Seriously? This question from the woman married to Tyler Footlong Longfoot?”
“What’s Tyler got to do with…ohhhhh.” Her Bambi eyes widened as realization dawned. “A dick!” she whispered and pointed at Roxy. “You slept with a dick in your mouth.”
“I, um…” Roxy found herself in the crosshairs of four sets of eyes. The merriment dancing in the big, brown ones made her suspect Dr. Swann had deliberately played dumb. She took a final swipe at the counter and then folded her towel with more care than the task deserved. “I can neither confirm nor deny.” She had no regrets, but West wouldn’t appreciate her broadcasting his moment of weakness all over town.
“That’s a confirmation,” Addy said, almost reverently. “It’s been so long since I’ve had a dick anywhere near me, I didn’t recognize the smile.”
“The question is whose?” Ginny asked. “I think we’re going to have to induct her into our Sunday evening social hour at the salon and pry the intel out of her over a color treatment.” Her attention switched to Roxy. “What are you using for your streaks? Matrix? Redken? I can touch them up tonight while you spill your highly satisfied guts, and—”
Ginny broke off as someone knocked on the locked front door of the diner. They all turned as one to see West standing outside, holding a to-go tray of some sort. Through the glass, he pointed at her.
Roxy’s heart rolled over in her chest like a puppy begging for a belly rub. Down, girl. After a moment of silence, Ginny, Ellie, and Addy whooped and did a three-way fist bump. Melody hung her head. “Oh. My. God. I am never going to hear the end of this. Not from you. Or you. Or you.” She pointed at each woman in turn. “Or worst of all, Josh.” She looked at Roxy. “It’s not that I doubted your appeal, sweetie, but that particularly mouthwatering example of Bluelick man-candy has resisted Callie the cocktail waitress, Diana from the drug store, and Everett the law school friend who’s visited Roger and Doug twice since West arrived in town. The man was a nut nobody could crack, so to speak.”
“Well, she cracked him,” Addy gloated. “I clocked that chemistry from the first time he escorted her into the diner.”
“No. Nuh-uh. No cracking. No chemistry.” Roxy mentally sidestepped a fib by taking the comments on their face. She and West hadn’t cracked so much as a knuckle or conducted a single chemistry experiment during the course of fucking each other into oblivion. But she owed it to West to protect his privacy, not to mention his reputation. She smoothed a hand over the hair she’d pulled back into a ponytail before her shift. “It’s not what you think.”
“Really?” Ginny asked then winked at the ladies. “’Cause we think you’ve been on the receiving end of some serious BDE.”
Okay, it was exactly what they thought, but Addy spared her the need to deny the truth. She waved a hand at Roxy. “Go on. I’ll take care of the rest. You’re off the clock.”
“And on Officer Donovan’s nightstick,” Ginny teased. “May he put another smile on your face.”
Roxy grabbed her purse from beneath the counter and scurried to the entrance. Opening the door just enough to slip through, she called, “Night, girls!” and pulled it shut behind her. Sadly, not fast enough to muffle a chorus of extremely suggestive good nights.
Turning, she wound up flattened against West. His body heat seeped through her white work blouse. Denim-encased thighs
