She didn’t want sorting.
She wanted the job. Independence. A career she could be proud of because she didn’t feel like she had anything else.
“I still think about him,” she said and then stiffened against him. Her mouth! She hadn’t meant to say that at all.
“Me too.”
“What?” She stepped back; her mouth dropped open. She knew she looked like a bewildered, stupid carp, but she’d never once imagined August had been anything other than relieved.
The barely banked anger was back. And something else. A determination. She could see it in the set of his shoulders, the long line of his athletically honed body, the hard planes of his face and unsmiling mouth.
“What exactly did you picture during the phone call when you told me that our baby had died and that you were fine and taking a flight the next morning out of the country because you had just been offered the career opportunity of a lifetime?”
Had she really said it that way?
She didn’t remember that at all.
She remembered crying so hard after telling him that she’d thrown up and had curled up on the bathroom floor shaking and sobbing until her headache had hurt worse than anything else.
“Did you think I’d gone out for drinks? Toasted my new freedom?”
Well. Yeah. But maybe not so callous as that—exactly.
His eyes narrowed to slits. “You always know how to piss me off better than anyone, Cat. Even more than Axel. Congratulations.”
She didn’t answer. Just raised her eyebrows waiting for the rest like it didn’t matter, but her heart thundered so hard she felt a little faint and wondered if she’d be able to hear him through the drum solo.
“Look at you, baby. Your heart’s going a mile a minute. You’re trying to piss me off,” he said with unfortunate clarity. His hand cupped her slender neck and her pulse hammered into his palm. “Why, I wonder,” he mused, and then the cocky was back. She saw it happen. First in the way his eyes heated, and then his mouth quirked and softened and warmed. Then his gaze slid to her mouth.
“So many ways to engage me with those magic lips, and passion-filled body, but you’re trying to shove me away.”
“I’m trying to get you to see reason. Your marriage proposal is ridiculous. And insulting.”
“Ridiculous?” he mused, his thumb now playing with the pulse that would not cooperate and slow itself down. “Not how I would describe it.”
He sounded amused. Not angry or defensive. He’d changed. How? Why? Who had changed him in the past four years? Cat suddenly felt on shaky ground.
His palm slid down her body and rested on her waist. He bent and nuzzled her neck.
“Ri-di-cu-lous.” He nuzzled her and kissed his way down her neck with each syllable. “You taste and smell the same. Spicy and sweet and delicious,” he added. “But again, you’re wrong. My proposal makes sense.”
“Stop playing,” she hissed.
“No.” His voice husked and warmth bloomed low in her body, and spread liquid heat throughout her limbs. Catalina tried to bite back the sigh of pleasure as his lips whispered along her collarbone. “Too much fun. And you love it.”
“Not anymore.” She tried to focus on the thread of conversation and could feel herself failing.
He suckled on the sensitive area below her ear where her jaw met, and she arched and shivered in pleasure. The pressure increased, and pleasure cascaded through her. She should stop him. She should stop him. She should. He was going to leave a mark, but Cat couldn’t find it in herself to care.
“I did not know my Kitty Cat was such an awful liar. Good to know. I value honesty in a wife.”
He was lucky he was injured, or she would have kneed him in his… No she couldn’t do that. Even her imagination shrunk away from hurting him like that, but she’d never hesitated when other men had pushed her too far.
“Good luck with your hunt.” She contemplated shoving him away, but his mouth was starting a fire that was so disturbing that she had to press her thighs together hard.
“I have my prey in sight.” He smoothed her shirt off her shoulders, and it fluttered to the ground just leaving her braless in the pale blue tank. “God, you are so hot,” he hissed. “Beautiful.”
She wasn’t.
But he’d always said things like that. And sometimes she’d started to believe him.
Focus on the job.
“I’m happy we are finally talking, Cat.” He wound a stray curl around his finger. His expression was intense, and he looked like a beautiful god about to pass judgment on her. Inadvertently her gaze lit on his mouth, and desire crested deep inside of her, and she nearly moaned.
“We can’t do this,” she said. “We have to leave everything in the past.”
“The past is always with us, Cat. Yours. Mine. Ours. We can’t change what happened. But we can learn from it. Grow,” he said like the most self-actualized, motivational speaker ever. “And now we can face life—the joys and the problems—together.”
She blinked. “August, you can’t really think marriage would work between us. You’re not serious.”
“Deadly serious, Kitty Cat. We’re getting married.”
“You can’t just decide that.” She felt like she’d walked onto the set of the wrong movie. Her life didn’t go like this. She was usually getting shown the door out, not in.
“I’m not.” He smiled, cocky all over again, and even as nervous dismay skittered down her spine, she felt an answering…something. Alive, playful, yawning to wakefulness, eager to shed the years of grim determination and the stress of bottling up hurt and sorrow and hiding in work with no play. Cold with no warmth.
“Marriage will be our decision.” August nearly smirked. He bent down until their faces were aligned. “You’re going to be so blissed out in love with me that you’ll drag me to the courthouse. Probably by the end of this week.”
Now he was back to that full-blown but somehow annoying charming arrogance. She reached for something scathing, but instead laughed.
The sound startled her.
“You really hit your head,” she said, fighting an unexpected urge to smile. He always found ways to surprise and irritate her. “You’re being ridiculous.”
“I’m being practical. The wait time for a license is seventy-two hours in Texas. I checked.”
“Nobody gets married in this century as part of a business partnership.”
But dang he was distracting with his fresh, masculine scent, and the faint laugh lines that fanned out from his sooty-lashed blue eyes and the way his firm but sensuous lips nearly brushed hers. It was all she could do to not stand on her tiptoes and try to catch a kiss. What was wrong with her? Glutton for punishment. She knew what would happen if they worked together. She’d start to let him in.
First her mind. Then her heart. And then her body.
“Then we’ll be trendsetters,” August said. “Maybe we’ll sell it as part of the Verflucht story.”
“Clearly, somebody else in your empire does your marketing.”
“All me.” He pulled the elastic out of her messy bun and let it slide over his wrist.
He’d done that before, she recalled, her heart skipping a beat at the sweet, familiar action. She’d always been irked because she hated her tight curls that bounced around her head like a drunk and disorderly halo. She’d wanted sleek and silky hair. She’d gotten crazy.
But August had wanted her hair down always when they were alone. She’d started carrying extra elastics just so she could re-tame her hair after being with him, but as many as she bought, he’d stolen.
“Let’s make a bet, my Cat, on who caves first.” August’s grin was lazy. “Because this marriage plan is going to be nothing but all-out war.”
“Let’s focus on the Bluebonnet Festival and Verflucht’s soft opening,” she countered, pleased at how steady her voice sounded. “Then we need to direct our energy toward managing the growth of the vineyard, the blending, the
bottling, expanding the crew, branding and the tasting room. Not necessarily in that order.”
“Don’t think I’m up for multi-tasking?” His voice deepened, and Catalina could definitely hear the hint of challenge. “You know me better than that.”
How was he turning the tables on her?
She’d been so determined to keep the upper hand. To resist his sexual pull that seemed to pulse in time with her heart and her breathing. His lips were so close she could almost feel the buzz, and she could nearly taste the sweetness of his breath—pancakes, chocolate and coffee.
She felt a little dizzy.
“You know me, Cat. When I want something, I go for it. Nothing stops me. No one gets in my way. I get what I want, Cat. Always.”
“So do I,” she shot back, but her voice lacked power because there were a lot of things that had slipped through her fingers—August being only one example on a depressingly long list.
“I’m counting on that.” His lips brushed hers, once, twice.
“So, a business partnership only,” she said quickly. Her hand played along his belt buckle. He was already hard—straining against his jeans—and she was inexplicably pleased and aroused and definitely playing with fire. “Twenty-five percent.”
She’d never played hardball with August. She’d been so happy to be with him that she’d let him have his way with most everything. Not this time.
“Stop low-balling yourself, Cat. Take advantage of the situation.”
“Oh, and you’re the prize I should seek?” She held on to his belt and jeans and leaned back on the heels of her boots, levering her body so that she could boldly glare at him. “Arrogant much?”
She let her knuckles brush against the velvet tip of his straining cock. She shivered.
“Arrogant a lot,” he admitted.
He had a right to be. She trailed her thumb up and down his length against the zipper. He hissed in a breath. Swore.
“Is this a game?” he demanded.
“I haven’t yet decided.”
“I think you have, Cat, and I am up for the challenge.” He covered her hand as she splayed her hand over his hard length, and even though he was fully clothed, she was remembering what he felt like naked, how he tasted, what it felt like each time he’d position himself at her entrance and hold her hot gaze as he’d slide inside of her all the way. Didn’t matter if he took her fast or slow. He’d always stare at her with that intense and tender and wondrous look on her face that had made her feel so connected to him.
“Not exactly a game.” She dug deep for a nonchalance she was so far from feeling.
“Oh, it’s on. You, Catalina Clemmens, are going to be my bride.”
And then he kissed her, and Catalina forgot her own name, never mind the fact that she had been intent on resisting him.
Chapter Eight
At first August’s lips were just a promise—something she’d almost forgotten. His mouth descended so slowly, giving her time to pull away, but of course she didn’t. Her lips parted in surprise as he brushed his mouth against hers once, twice, and then whispered her name.
She tried to hold herself together. But not reacting to August’s fresh scent—pine and a hint of sandalwood—and the warmth of his nearness once again proved impossible.
He kissed her.
And Catalina came alive. She hadn’t been dead exactly inside, but now she was just so much more aware. She felt warm and vibrant and connected. Her blood felt effervescent and soon she was standing on her toes, arm looped around his neck kissing him back.
It had been so long. Four years. The longest they’d ever been apart. She’d never thought to touch him again. Be touched by him. And she wanted to soak it all in because she knew she couldn’t get lost in August again.
Cat was a survivor and she learned her lessons. August could not be trusted to stay—not in Last Stand and definitely not with her. But with one hand imprinting her ass he dragged her against the hard length of body, and she seized the moment and put all of her sorrow and anger and loneliness into the kiss.
He intoned her name over and over, first like a prayer and then it sounded more like a plea.
“Damn, we need a couch in here.” He moaned, his mouth fastening over the small nub of her nipple through her tank. “And if I don’t get full use of my arm and hand back soon, I’m going to go insane.”
His tone was so fierce and frustrated Cat laughed and then cried out as the moist heat and suction from his mouth combined with the cotton of her shirt to shoot pleasure through her entire body. He kicked her legs apart, and now his hand moved from kneading her ass against his erection she had unashamedly been grinding on to the fastening of her jeans.
“This sucks.” He pulled hard still kissing her as if she were water and he’d been hiking all day. “You taste and feel like heaven, but I’m only at fifty percent and can’t do all the things I want to do.”
“You’ll just have to be creative,” she teased. His answering grin tugged at her heart, and for a moment, they were like they used to be—friends, allies, easily getting swept away by passion that often hit nowhere near a bedroom.
And August had been so creative.
And she’d been so in love with him.
She couldn’t let herself feel like that again.
“August,” she said, not sure how to explain the rapid-fire thoughts and fears hitting her on all fronts.
“Don’t, baby. Don’t look at me like that. We need this. We need to get back to us.”
“Us?” she repeated. “It’s been four years and a lot has happened,” she said slowly, not liking where her mind was going.
“But we still got it.” He smiled at her, and his fingers that had already dealt with the top two buttons of her jeans instead drew her hand to the very strong evidence of his desire. “That part of me at least is at one hundred percent.”
“Always was,” she said softly.
She was doing it again. Falling in love when he was falling back in lust. Sex. Maybe he was having a dry spell. Hard to imagine, but maybe. And then here she came running at the first phone call. And was willing and eager within a couple of hours of seeing him again.
“Why do you really want to marry me as part of Verflucht’s business plan?” she demanded. Even saying the words was worthy of an epic eleven-year-old girl eye-roll.
The amusement and openness in his expression was gone in an instant, and while desire still lingered, she could practically see the shadows move across all the beautiful blue of his eyes.
“I don’t know if I’d phrase it exactly that particular way,” he said cautiously.
She’d heard that tone before. Hundreds of times. Cool. Logical. Confident. But holding back. Wanting more information than he was willing to give. It was his business voice. The one she’d heard on the phone and also in meetings that were disguised as casual dinners or get-togethers. But August was in information-seeking mode before he settled into deal-making mode.
And Cat didn’t want to be part of that deal.
But her brain was still scrambled by the kiss that still had her heart thumping and blood fizzing and pumping, and her body hadn’t yet clued in that happy time was off.
She opened her mouth to blast him—although she was probably angrier with herself than him. She knew herself better. This emotion swirling sickly in her stomach was why she hadn’t allowed herself to answer any of his texts or phone calls over the past few years.
She would fall again.
He would not.
But he’d give her a hell of a good ride.
And maybe she should take it. One last time to get him out of her system for good.
Like that would work.
“Whatever you are thinking, Kitty Cat, is definitely not good.” He traced her bottom lip with his thumb and then leaned forward and caught her lip with his, slipped his tongue inside.
Desire ignited, and she sighed.
“Talk to me, baby,” August encouraged like an ad fo
r the ultimate actualized twenty-first-century man. “Tell me what’s bothering you. Let’s solve your concerns together.”
Where to begin?
The urge to brush him off and flee was strong, but to hell with that. She’d run. She’d avoided him. She wanted this job. She wanted a home. She wanted stability. She wanted to build a life even if it came with the pain-in-the-ass remnants of her family and the bad rap that followed them like a dusty cloud.
A sound of two trucks and a couple of Gators cut through the morning.
“What the hell?” August turned, putting his body between hers and the door as if he could protect her from some sort of imagined danger.
She shoved him aside.
“It’s the vineyard crew. I need information before making a decision so I called a meeting.”
“Without telling me?”
Oops.
“It was just an initial meet and greet and quick tour of the vineyard to see where we stand.”
“Without me?” he demanded again. “That’s crap and you know it, Cat.”
“Calm down.” She ran her finger down his spine and brushed her knuckles against the small of his back before nearly slapping her own hand away.
He was the larger shareowner. Not her lover.
“It wasn’t meant as a power grab or anything dramatic like that. I just thought that after the accident yesterday and all your injuries you might want to sleep in or you’d need to head back to the doctor.”
Her excuse sounded a little lame even to her although she’d rallied well. His narrowed eyes told her he wasn’t buying what she was halfheartedly selling.
“I didn’t know you’d want to be involved at this level,” she muttered. “Besides, you’re injured.”
“What do you think my intent here is? To sit in the house on the hill and survey my domain?”
“Yeah. Kinda,” she flipped right back at him.
The air practically pulsed between them. Heated. Cat swore she could see it.
“Well, it’s not. I’m a hands-on owner,” he sniped back at her. “And by hands-on, I mean hands on everything.”
The look he shot her was so charged Cat nearly launched in the air.
A Bride for the Texas Cowboy Page 11