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“Well, sure, sweetie. Is this cash, check or charge? I’ll need four forms of ID if you’re writing a check.”
Brooke handed her Jason’s credit card. “Charge, please. I’ll need the receipt.”
Jason knew the instant that Rita read his name on the card.
“Credit is so fast these days,” Rita murmured, folding up the shirt. “Just one quick slide and then, whoops, look what you’ve done.”
“I don’t believe in credit myself,” Brooke told her, noting the frilly bookmarks displayed on the counter, studying each one carefully. “It’s too easy to lose your head.”
Rita looked at Jason. “Isn’t it, though?”
This time Jason counted to ninety-nine in multiples of three. Still didn’t help.
After Rita handed the bag to Brooke, she smiled. “You’ll be staying with the Captain?”
“Oh, no,” Brooke laughed, as if the idea was ludicrous. “He’s my boss.”
Rita raised her brows. “Really?”
Brooke laughed again, not so quickly this time. “I needed a job, and he offered me a position at his house. Inventory. I think I’d like to organize things a bit better. It’s a little chaotic.” She pulled the package tight to her chest. “I’m new here. I’m trying to start off right. I know I’m a stranger, but I hope you’ll give me a chance.”
Seeing the sincerity in Brooke’s face, Rita thawed. Jason understood. “We don’t get much entertainment out here, so sometimes we make up our own.”
Brooke leaned in closer. “I know exactly what you mean. Maybe sometime I could come in and chat?”
Through the window, Jason could see the setting sun and he wanted nothing more than for this day to be through. “I think Rita wants to close up,” he told Brooke, in case she decided that now was a good time to chat.
Rita clucked her tongue. “They are always impatient, aren’t they?”
Brooke laughed and Jason hurried her out the door.
ON THE DRIVE BACK, Jason watched as Brooke took out her new shirt and laid it over her lap. Her fingers worked the buttons, and he realized that this was a woman who wasn’t used to a lot of clothes.
“I’m sorry about the sweater,” he apologized again, but this time, he felt like words weren’t enough.
“I wouldn’t have kept it,” she told him with a forgiving smile, as if it didn’t matter, but Jason knew she would have kept that sweater until she died. The right thing to do would be to buy her a new sweater. Something pretty. Something nice. Something extravagant.
“I’m sorry about what Rita was thinking,” he continued. Apparently, today was the day that apologies were flowing like wine. Sonya had always hated that he never apologized.
“She thought we were having sex. It’s not a big deal.” Brooke’s head was down, dark hair hiding her face from view.
“It wouldn’t be if it were true, but it’s not, so it is a big deal.” He sounded like the world’s biggest prude, but he didn’t mind. He didn’t know why he didn’t mind, but when Brooke smiled up at him, he knew he’d said the right thing.
“I can cook dinner for you if you like.”
Such nice words, such dangerous words. In the back of his head, Jason knew this wasn’t smart, but on the other hand, he didn’t want her to starve, either.
“I have a frozen pizza, not much else.” It wasn’t meant to be an invitation. But it was.
“A frozen pizza and a can of peas,” she reminded him with a smile that shot straight to places he’d rather not be thinking about right this second, but like a dog, he kept on thinking, anyway. He kept on panting, too, kept on remembering the sight of her perfect breasts.
A tiny voice urged him to take, but there was something in her eyes that held him back. He saw desire there, sure, but also he saw gratitude, and he felt as if he should lay out the ground rules before she did something they would both regret.
“Brooke?”
“Yes?”
Suddenly, a rabbit jumped across the road, and Jason swerved to avoid it. Brooke fell against him, her hand clutching his thigh, his engorged crotch.
Damn.
Quickly, her hand was gone, and Brooke shot to the opposite side of the bench seat. It was safer with her there.
Jason cleared his throat. “This is a very small town, and there are a lot of behaviors that are frowned upon.”
She glanced at him, a provocative smile on her provocative mouth. He wanted to taste that provocative mouth.
“Are we having the sex talk?” she asked.
“It’s not a sex talk,” he protested, then rubbed his face where his scar was starting to throb. “It’s more of an anti-sex talk. This is a dangerous situation and I know you think you’re attracted to me but, hell, Brooke. I don’t want a woman in my bed because I bought her a shirt.”
It was the wrong thing to say because off came her shirt. Jason tried desperately not to stare at the twin mounds of taut flesh. Failed. “Can we please wear our clothes?”
She turned, offering her breasts before him like some buffet plate. “It’s your shirt and you think I want to sleep with you because you gave me a shirt. Ergo, no shirt. No problem.”
His mouth grew dry, his cock started to ache and his foot was pushing as hard as it could on the gas. “Put on the shirt.”
She grinned and ran a hand through her hair, dark against her perfect ivory skin. “No.”
“Please,” he asked nicely, hearing the crack in his voice.
“No. I’m an adult, capable of following the call of my loins, and if your shirt is going to get in the way…”
Jason kept his eyes on the road, but it didn’t help distract him from his desire for her. Up ahead he could see his long, gravel drive. His bed, her laying across his bed, wearing nothing but him.
“Brooke,” he tried again, not looking. Damn. He was looking. The woman had the most perfect set of breasts on the planet, and apparently she wasn’t shy about showing them off.
This was probably how Hart got in trouble with her. They were probably somewhere in Vegas, she pulled off her shirt and kapow. Circuits were fried, good intentions were lost and sex was had. Halfway up the drive, he slammed on the brakes because he needed clothes on her before they made it to the house. In the truck, there were rules, gear-shifts. In the house, all bets were off.
“Is there a problem?” she asked, laying her arm across the back of the seat, so hot, so warm, so…
“Brooke,” he repeated, pleading, since all he wanted to do was touch her, kiss her, take her. Her fingers tiptoed across the edge of his seat, flicking against his neck. It was the first time she’d ever touched him.
Jason turned, met her eyes firmly. “No.”
She cocked her head. “You don’t want me?” She knew he did, but he couldn’t tell her. It was the last armament keeping him in check.
“I don’t want you.”
Her hand slid from his face to his hard-on. Softly, tortuously, she squeezed. “Liar.”
“This isn’t right.”
Brooke slid closer, her breasts brushing against his arm, and he could smell his soap on her, his shampoo. “Kiss me. Make it right.”
As she said the words, she licked her lips and that was all he could take.
Jason grabbed her, pulled her astride him, and devoured her mouth like the starving man he was. Her fingers stroked his hair, his face. So long, too long. He explored her mouth with his tongue, feeling her warm welcome. It was like drowning.
His hands grabbed her breasts, knowing exactly where to touch, and she arched into him, riding his cock like they were already there.
He wanted her already there. He wanted inside her. He wanted to feel her. All of her. With clumsy fingers he attacked her fly, feeling the metal give, sliding beneath the rough denim, finding…her.
His finger thrust inside her, and she nipped at his lip, and Jason knew he wouldn’t make it to the house.
It had been so long. She felt so good. His finger pushed harder, higher, feeling the wet heat. Each time he thrust, she rode him. Hard, sure…sweet.
A woman at a vulnerable place, a woman who needed respect and patience.
Sweetness.
Some of his calm returned and he kissed her again, trying to take things gentle and slow. Her mouth tasted like peppermint and fire and her hips kept arching toward him, riding him…loving him.
Patience?
He was going to die.
“Take me here, Captain. Please.”
Her hands poised over his fly, waiting.
And who was he to stay no? Resigned to his fate, Jason opened his one good eye, stared at his house, blinked twice, and then prayed that his vision was wrong.
Survival instincts kicked in, he pushed Brooke aside and fumbled for the damned shirt.
“What’s wrong?” asked the topless woman who didn’t think that modesty was a good thing.
Wrong? She had no idea of the trouble her breasts were about to get them into. Everything was wrong because approaching the truck in her ridiculous heels was Sonya.
Seeing the other woman, Brooke finally had the sense to cover herself. “Who’s that?” she asked, and he could hear the hurt in her voice. He hated the hurt.
“I’m Sonya Kincaid. Mrs. Sonya Kincaid.”
Brooke gasped, but before she could kill him Jason clarified the situation. “Ex. She’s my ex.”
5
OUT OF THE THREE OF THEM, Brooke was the only one completely relaxed. Inside the house, Sonya was perched on a barstool and the Captain brooded unhappily on his couch. Brooke pulled in a footstool from the porch and prepared to watch family dynamics in action. On television, families fought and then laughed, all in a thirty-minute interval punctuated with fast-food commercials. In shelters, families never fought, only stared ahead, silent and shuttered, not wanting to give anything away. Brooke suspected reality was somewhere in between.
She glanced curiously back and forth, until Sonya flushed pink.
“Could we have some privacy?” asked Jason’s former wife in a snippy voice that Brooke thought was stress rather than a natural condition.
“I could go out to the car,” Brooke offered cheerfully.
“She’s a guest,” the Captain said. “She stays.”
At his words, Brooke looked at Sonya and shrugged innocently.
“Why don’t you tell me why you’re here?” the Captain asked his former wife. Sonya Kincaid was very pretty in a very blond way and was wearing a sleek red suit that matched her lipstick perfectly. She wasn’t what Brooke would have expected of the Captain’s ex-wife. She was way too neat, but maybe that explained the divorce.
Sonya brushed at her skirt, which was immaculate like the rest of her. “Aunt Gladys called last night. I had been planning to drive out to see you anyway, so I decided it was time to stop by. She was concerned. We all are.”
The Captain scowled. “You drove out here for nothing.”
Sonya nodded at Brooke. “Apparently not.”
Sensing the tense undercurrents in the room, Brooke felt it was time to clarify the situation. “Primitive sexual urges are completely normal. No reason to worry about that. Giving in to our animalistic nature is inevitable.”
Sonya rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. You’re taking advantage of Jason, and there’s no one out here to put a stop to it.”
The Captain stood and glared at his former wife. “Get the hell out.” His voice was low, gruff, and it was the first time that Brooke felt a shiver of fear.
Quickly, Sonya gathered her purse and started for the door, but Brooke called out before she could leave.
“Wait. Don’t go like this. You walked in on an awkward situation. I’m sure that seeing your ex locked in a torrid embrace with someone new was difficult, and you’ve got a right to be a little bitchy.” Brooke winked at the Captain. “But we’re all mature adults here, and I know the Captain is a big enough man to forgive you.” Then she smiled at him. “Isn’t that right?”
Sonya didn’t seem happy, but at least her nostrils had lost that pinched look. She stared at the Captain, and Brooke waited, hoping that she’d done the right thing.
Finally the Captain waved a hand, and Sonya sat. “So why are you here?”
“Can we discuss this in private?” Sonya asked, apparently not one to learn from her mistakes.
“No. Brooke stays.”
Once again, Brooke shrugged innocently and Sonya sighed. “I want to talk to you about the test well.”
Test well? Now Brooke was intrigued. This was oil country, the land of black oil and undiscovered riches. Her home.
“No,” snapped the Captain, apparently not so intrigued.
“Why?” his former wife asked, a perfectly reasonable question in Brooke’s opinion.
“After the discharge, I moved out here to be by myself. The last thing I want is people hanging around here.”
“You need the money,” Sonya argued.
“You mean you need the money,” the Captain replied. “You have the house in Killeen. I have this place. You got the better deal. Case closed.”
