Wild, Hungry Hearts

by Unknown

  Esme gave Jude a discrete, forbearing glance as she shook the woman’s hand. Jude smiled, knowing exactly what she was thinking. The last descriptor Es would want used for her clothing was darling. Edgy, blatantly sexy, and mountain-tough, maybe, but never darling.

  “Now you look very familiar,” Sherry said bluntly, pointing at Jude.

  “I’ve been getting that a lot lately. Jude Beckett,” he said, extending his hand.

  “Of course! You’re Z’s brother.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Jude’s gaze bounced over to Esme, but he contained his surprise.

  “Yeah. That’s right. So, you know Z Beckett?”

  “Sure,” Sherry said matter-of-factly. A thought seemed to occur to her, and her face darkened. “But I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to say how I got to know him.” She gave Jude a significant, narrowed glance, as if she expected him to understand it.

  “Right,” Jude said, confused but not wanting to show his hand before he got any important information from the woman. “We actually drove here to visit Z. Unfortunately, I only have a P.O. box for his address. Do you happen to know where he lives?”

  “I don’t, I’m sorry,” Sherry said, looking regretful. She perked up. “I think I heard him say he was going to drive over to Elk Grove today to pick up some parts he needed right away for a bike. He probably won’t be back until this evening. But wait,” she said, snapping her fingers. “You should come to the Café tonight! The Vagabonds are in town, and they’re going to play tonight. They’re Z’s favorite.”

  “Of course,” Jude said, keeping his tone even. He had no idea that his brother loved a band called The Vagabonds, and his stomach had lurched at the concrete news that Z was a familiar at a bar.

  “I think they start at eight,” Sherry was telling Esme. “Now, I don’t really like loud music, but I know Z is particularly fond of that band. He’s certain to be there.”

  “Great,” Esme said, giving Jude a heartening glance. “We’ll be there, as well.”

  “Is there anything else I can help you two with?” Sherry asked, looking eagerly from Esme to him.

  “No, you’ve already been a huge help—”

  “We’ll take this,” Jude said, holding up the hangar. He smiled calmly at Esme when she rolled her eyes.

  “This vest is brilliant,” he told Esme a few minutes later as they walked out the door.

  “But—”

  “But,” he interrupted, landing a kiss on her opened mouth. He held her arm, urging her to pause on the sidewalk next to him. She looked up at him with shining eyes. “It doesn’t matter how many you have stocked in your warehouse. Those vests aren’t doing me any good,” he said quietly, pressing his forehead to hers. “Because the real prize is seeing you in it.”

  A half an hour later, they sat at a booth in a diner on the main street in Columbia.

  “What are you looking at?” Jude asked.

  She glanced up, guilty by habit at the idea of looking at her phone while she was on a date. But all she saw was Jude’s bland inquiring glance as he ate a bit of salad.

  “What?” Jude asked her when she suddenly smiled broadly.

  “Nothing,” she said, setting down her phone and taking a drink of her Diet Pepsi. She saw his lifted eyebrows as he poked at his salad. “Okay, if you really want to know. I had this automatic reaction when you asked me what I was looking at on my phone. I felt guilty at the idea of being rude by focusing on something other than the conversation and the guy I was with? And then I looked up…and it was just you.”

  “Just me,” he said, frowning.

  “Yeah. Just Jude. My old friend. Someone who wouldn’t take offense at the little things. Someone I’m so comfortable with that I don’t have to overthink everything, like whether or not I’m being insensitive by looking up something on my phone during lunch?” she tried to explain.

  A look of understanding crossed his face.

  “I thought maybe that might go away. With…” She waved vaguely between them before she picked up her turkey club. “Things changing between us.”

  “And you don’t think it has? Or will?”

  “I don’t know,” Esme mused, taking a small bite of her sandwich and chewing while she thought. “It was just nice, when I looked up at you after you asked me that question, that I had the thought that it was you, and of course you weren’t thinking I was insensitive and rude. Or if you were, you’d let me know soon enough, and we’d get through the storm. Always have before, anyway.” She grinned and took another bite of her sandwich. “I don’t know. It was just a moment.”

  When he didn’t reply immediately. Her smile faded.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Nothing.”

  She lifted her eyebrows in the same give me a break gesture he’d just given her.

  He threw the French fry he was about to eat back onto his plate. “I know you were a lot more worried about us losing our friendship if we slept together. But maybe I wasn’t worried enough. It would suck. If we ever had to start walking on eggshells around each other.” He balled up the paper napkin he’d been using and tossed it on the table. “I couldn’t imagine it before, that’s all. Us not being comfortable with each other. Us not being friends.”

  She put her sandwich on her plate, her appetite suddenly abandoning her. “Does that mean you can imagine it now?” she asked, a heavy sense of dread filtering into her awareness.

  “It means I’m in a position to appreciate it more. Our friendship.” He leaned back in the booth, his grim expression causing an icy shiver to run down her spine. “You were right. I wouldn’t want to lose it.”

  “Jude, you’re freaking me. Are you saying you’re regretting this—”

  “No,” he said sharply, blue eyes flashing. “I think…I think I’m saying I’m sorry. For minimizing what you were trying to tell me, the first few times we slept together. Our friendship is special. I shouldn’t have said you were stupid for worrying about losing it.” He glanced at her face and exhaled. He put his elbows on the table and leaned toward her. “Don’t look like that, Es. I’m not saying I regret a damn thing. I wouldn’t change anything that’s happened between us. Not a chance. It just hit me when you said that…”

  “What?” Esme asked breathlessly.

  “That I shouldn’t have been so careless with something so special. I don’t want to lose your friendship. But I’m not convinced I have to, either. Just because we’re sleeping together? Are you?”

  She shook her head, but that uncertainty bubble swelled in her chest.

  “I guess we’ll just have to figure it out as we go along?” he murmured, his small smile sending warmth through her chilled flesh.

  “Right,” she said, striving for lightness, trying to focus on the fact that he wasn’t regretful of their new relationship. He was just stating the obvious: they were going to have to take this thing day by day as they worked out the new rules of being together. “You probably can’t say that you’d always be okay with me texting someone or playing games when we’re out to lunch together, any more than I could say the same to you.”

  “Damn straight,” he muttered under his breath. They’re eyes met, and she laughed.

  She picked up her phone and jabbed it in his direction. “I never answered your question about what I was looking at, and it relates to our conversation. As it happens, I was not texting someone else or playing Final Fantasy on my phone. I was planning our afternoon.”

  “We know what we’re doing this afternoon,” he said firmly, his eyes going smoky as they ran over her face “We’re going back to the cabin.”

  “Or….” She flipped her phone so that he could see the screen. His gaze narrowed.

  “You want to go boarding?”

  “Why not? We have all day before we show up at the Café to find Z. Dodge Ridge Ski resort is less than an hour from here. We can stop at a discount store for pants and jackets, and we can rent equipment at the resort. Look at
all that fresh powpow,” she tempted, waving her phone.

  “Whoa. They got a huge drop,” Jude said, reaching for her phone and starting to read the details of the foot of fresh powder they’d gotten at the resort yesterday and last night. For half a minute, she completely lost him to the snow report and slope and half-pipe conditions. He eventually glanced up.

  “So you think we should work on the friendship portion of our relationship instead of the romantic one?” he asked wryly. “Is that what this urge to go snowboarding means?”

  “Do you really call either of them work?”

  “Nope. Just the opposite, in fact,” he said, handing back her phone. He pushed his plate away and put his elbows on the table. The feeling of warmth spread through her when she saw the gleam had come back into his blue eyes. “Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. At the count of three, we’re going to say our preference: Boarding, where we’ll be cold and sweaty, or back to the cabin, where we’ll be hot and—”

  “Sweaty,” Esme finished, smirking.

  “One, two, three—”

  “Cabin,” Esme said at the same moment Jude said, “boarding.”

  “I thought you’d say boarding.”

  “I thought you’d say cabin!” Esme laughed.

  Jude shrugged and leaned back in the booth. His crooked little grin seemed to slice right through her.

  “I wanted to say cabin. Trust me,” he added pointedly. “But after what we just talked about, I figured I owed our friendship something after being so careless about it before.”

  They had a blast boarding. The sun was bright, the snow soft and plentiful. Jude couldn’t remember laughing as hard as he did for a long, long time.

  “You’ve learned some awesome new tricks since I last hung with you, Beckett,” Esme told him afterward, when they were driving home. Recognizing that smartass hint of humor in her tone, he glanced over at her. Her tumbling, brown hair with blonde highlights streamed across her breasts and the ivory sweater she wore. She still wore her ski hat, plus the pair of sunglasses she’d bought at the ski shop. Her cheeks and lips were flushed from the sun. She looked fresh, sexy…so far out of his league, he had an urge to pull off the side of the road and have his way with her, just to prove to himself he was allowed to touch.

  It struck him in that moment that he’d always loved looking at Esme—what guy wouldn’t? But this was different. It was impossible for him to stop glancing at her…soaking in not only her physical beauty, but something he couldn’t quite put into words. When their eyes met, it was like everything seemed to click into place.

  Yeah, it was nuts.

  Since he wasn’t great at expressing those things, he settled for reaching for her hand and placing it on top of his thigh, and continuing their lighthearted conversation.

  “Since I’ve been on the slopes about five times in the past five years, I’m going to assume you’re referring to my tricks in bed,” he murmured.

  She scowled, but her laughter was golden. “I was talking about sex, even if it is totally conceited of you to realize it. But I wouldn’t have any idea if you’ve actually evolved in that department or not.” He felt her fingers slightly dig in to his thigh. “But I’ll admit…you’re definitely at the top of your game, in either place,” she added huskily.

  “The same to you,” he said, cupping her hand in his, and feeling her touch on his thigh all the way to his crotch.

  “I don’t know about that,” Esme said.

  “What do you mean?”

  He saw her shrug in his peripheral vision. “I haven’t exactly been adventuresome in the sex department,” she said quietly. He took a quick glance at her and saw her face had gone serious as she looked at the front window. “I mean, I’ve dated.” She seemed to hesitate. “But the truth is, my sex life is lame. Was lame, I should say.”

  “So you weren’t kidding when you said you had a bum rap about being a man killer?”

  He saw her wince. “I just…I let people think that because it was easier,” she confessed in a rush.

  “Easier for you.”

  Her temper flashed. “Yeah, easier for me. You have no idea how nosy and expectant people can be about your sex life when you’re a single female in your late twenties. It’s like people think they own it, or something.”

  “Okay, okay, sorry,” Jude said, throwing up his hand, knowing when it was best to surrender on a topic.

  She exhaled. “You don’t have to be sorry,” she mumbled.

  “Would you say you’ve had an adventuresome sex life?” she suddenly asked point blank.

  “Adventuresome?” he repeated flatly, recognizing potentially dangerous territory on the horizon.

  “Yeah. Like—this is just an example—I was talking to Sadie the other day,” she said slowly. “And she asked me if I thought Stephen and Mom and Dad had been a threesome. I couldn’t believe she asked me! That’s how inexperienced I am, I never even considered the possibility.”

  He glanced over at her cautiously. She looked a little slain.

  “It’s not surprising you were shocked,” he said. “Not just at the topic, but at the topic being applied to your mom and dad. It’s ridiculous.”

  “Right? You never thought that, did you? About Mom and Dad and Stephen?”

  “No way,” he said emphatically, frowning at the very idea.

  “Because I had this bad feeling when Sadie brought it up. Like…”

  “What?” Jude asked uneasily. His heartbeat had started to pound in his ears.

  “Like that she’d been involved in one,” Esme said quietly after a pause. “And that it hadn’t gone well at all.” He sensed her turning toward him and examining his profile.

  “Do you think that’s possible, Jude?”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  A bad feeling started to build in Jude as he drove back to the cabin.

  He’d never once considered the possibility that Esme knew about what had happened between Mat, Sadie and him when they were drunken eighteen-year-olds. He still believed she didn’t know. Given the fact that Sadie and Mat seemed even more uncomfortable with the memory than he was, he couldn’t imagine a scenario where Esme found out. A few days after it’d happened, Sadie had pulled him aside. Barely able to make eye contact with him, she’d tersely made him promise he’d never mention what had happened by that pool to anyone. Ever. He’d given his vow, and kept the secret all these years.

  But now, Esme and he were more than friends. He’d never really thought about it, before: how when a relationship changed, the idea of what you owed the person in regard to the truth altered, too. It was a new consideration, one he certainly didn’t have his head wrapped around yet.

  So when Esme had asked him point blank on the drive back if he thought it was possible that Sadie had been involved in a ménage a trois, he’d hedged.

  “That’s a hell of a question to ask,” he’d muttered.

  She’d sighed. “I know. I guess I just worry about Sadie sometimes. That Hollywood crowd she runs with is pretty fast. I can’t even comprehend the situations she probably has found herself in.”

  He’d squeezed her hand and glanced over at her. He thought he might have an idea from where her anxiety was stemming.

  “I don’t live in Hollywood, baby.”

  He’d seen brief surprise, and then relief break over her pretty face. She’d understood what he’d been trying to tell her. He may have enjoyed a damn good sex life in his adulthood, but he was no man-whore swinger. The last thing he wanted was for Esme to think that.

  They got back to the cabin well after six o’clock.

  “Can I go first in the shower?” Esme asked Jude. She held up a handful of her hair. “I have to shampoo this, and so that means I need time—”

  “To style,” he said blandly. “Don’t worry, I remember the eternity of waiting for you while you did your hair. I’ll catch up on the scores or something,” he said, pointing at the television screen.

  “Thanks,” sh
e said, going up on her tiptoes to kiss him. She leaned back slightly a moment later. There had been heat in his kiss, but a reserve she hadn’t felt before, too.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “I’m great,” he said, seizing her mouth in a quick sizzler before he turned her around with his hands on her shoulders. “Now go. Or we’ll never get out of here in time given that mess of hair. Es?” he called when she started toward the bedroom.

  “Yeah?”

  “Do me a favor? Wear the vest?”

  She shook her head at his audacity, even though she knew she’d do it. Would she ever be able to resist that wicked little grin of his?

  An hour and a half later, she saw him enter the bedroom through the round mirror on the large, old-fashioned vanity table. He’d showered a while ago, and had been watching what sounded like ESPN out in the living room.

  “I’m almost ready,” she told him as he walked up behind where she sat. She picked up her lipstick and unscrewed the top, thinking he was probably impatient at her for making them late. She caught his reflection in the mirror as she raised the lipstick to her mouth and froze.

  He stood behind her, his legs slightly spread in a pose that struck her as potently masculine. His stare on her in the mirror was downright feral.

  Slowly…deliberately, he moved her newly styled hair over one shoulder. He slid his hand along her bare shoulder and back. She shivered at his touch.

  “You look amazing,” he said, watching the trail of his own hand as he caressed her. “No one has skin softer than yours.”

  She swallowed thickly, his fierce expression and covetous caresses sending off fireworks in her blood. His hands slid over her shoulders. He gently squeezed her upper arms. She watched in the mirror, breathless, as one long finger stretched and fiddled with the clasp on the zipper between her breasts.

  “This thing fits you like a second skin,” Jude murmured. He ran one hand along the small shearling collar. “Is this stuff on the inside, too?”