by Maisey Yates
“Nothing. But it’s a stress I don’t need right now.” Briefly she thought about telling the others why she’d taken a couple of months off. About the panic attacks and the anxiety that threatened every time she stepped into the ER. But she couldn’t face it, not after having to field questions and possible recriminations about stupid Garrett.
Hope turned her mug carefully in her hands. “It doesn’t have to be stressful. I mean...do you want to get it on with him?”
Automatically Charity wanted to say no, of course she didn’t want to get it on with him. But something stopped her. Because it wasn’t true. She really did want to get it on with him. She wanted more of that kiss. More of that hard body she’d felt pressed to hers. More of his hands on her hips, touching her. More of that hot mouth on hers...
She’d been dreaming of him ever since she’d been seventeen and now she had the opportunity to have what she’d always wanted...
“Oh yeah,” Pru said. “She really does want to get it on with him.”
Charity flushed. Hell. No point trying to deny it now.
“I didn’t want any complications getting in the way of me opening this store.” She turned and paced over to the counter once more. “All I wanted was to set up the shop and open it with you guys and not...” She stopped.
“What’s complicated about banging a hot guy?” Pru waved her wooden spoon for emphasis. “Casual sex is a thing.”
Hope was still frowning. “Have you ever had casual sex, Char?”
It wasn’t really the conversation she wanted to be having with her friends right now, but then she was the one who’d started it with her ill-advised confession about Garrett.
“No, she hasn’t,” Kit said before she could reply.
“Hey.” Charity glared at her.
Kit’s eyes went wide. “Did you see this, guys? I think Charity is actually angry with me.”
Great. And now they were going to have the “Charity never gets angry” conversation, were they?
“Can we not talk about this?” she snapped, pacing over to the table again.
“What else did you want to talk about?” Hope said. “You having casual sex with Garrett Roy?”
“I am not going to have casual sex with Garrett Roy,” she insisted.
“Why not?” Kit stared at her from over her potato. “He’s hot. You kissed him, and presumably it was good, otherwise you wouldn’t be blushing like that. And he must have enjoyed it too, otherwise he wouldn’t have told you to join him for a ‘drink’—emphasis my own.”
Charity gritted her teeth, turned, and paced back to the counter, trying to figure out exactly what her problem was. Because now she thought about it, there didn’t seem to be any reason why she shouldn’t take this further with Garrett.
Yes, he was unreasonably arrogant and extremely annoying, but how much of that was frustrated chemistry? He’d basically admitted that she was a problem for him, so maybe the most logical thing, for both of their peace of minds would be to sleep together and deal with it.
Yeah, really good plan. Nothing like sex to make something less complicated.
Charity ignored the doubtful thought.
“Um, I hate to be a downer,” Hope said, “but doesn’t casual sex come under the ‘no hookups’ rule?”
Kit gave an airy wave of her potato peeler. “I think this can be an exception. Emergency hookups are allowed.”
“Oh really?” Pru looked up from her sauce, narrowing her gaze at Kit. “And why are you deciding this suddenly, hmm?”
“It’s okay.” Charity held her hands up peaceably, the way she always did when she was trying to calm a situation. “I’ll take a slip. Rules are rules.”
Hope sipped at her tea. “I guess that means you’re going to sleep with him then.”
Charity wanted to tell her that she hadn’t decided yet, but of course that was a lie. Now the possibility of casual sex with Garrett had been raised and fully justified in her head, she literally couldn’t think of anything else.
Her only relationships had been serious ones, and only with other doctors, because no one else would put up with the crazy hours. She’d liked both men, but in the end the relentlessness of the profession had gotten to her. Going out with another doctor meant she could never escape medicine, and sometimes escape was what she wanted, even though she felt guilty about it.
Garrett wasn’t a doctor. He had nothing whatsoever to do with medicine. And despite what she’d been trying to prove earlier, they did have chemistry. A lot of chemistry.
Now was her chance to have the hot bad boy so why was she even hesitating?
She turned toward the kitchen door and strode out into the hallway, going into the living room.
“She’s getting a slip, guys,” Pru called out. “Girl means business.”
Charity reached into the vase on the mantel, pulled out one of the pieces of paper, then went back to the kitchen and paused in the doorway.
“You sure you want to do this?” Kit put her freshly peeled potato in the bowl beside her. “You’re risking some truly terrible dating advice in return for casual sex?”
Charity thought about Garrett. About the kiss. About his hot mouth and his large hands, and the hard feel of his body against hers.
Oh yes, she absolutely did.
She opened the piece of paper. “‘Stand on a busy street corner with a lasso.’”
Pru laughed. “Oh boy. The sex had better be phenomenal to be worth that.”
Charity had a feeling it would be. And how.
“No problem. I’ll do it tomorrow.” She folded the slip up and put it in her pocket. “Now, I’d better—”
“Go see a man about a lasso?” Hope finished, grinning.
“I wouldn’t mind seeing that particular man’s lasso,” Kit murmured.
“You mean, Browning West’s lasso,” Pru said.
Charity didn’t wait around to listen to Kit’s response.
She had better things to do.
* * *
GARRETT SAT IN his truck outside the Rusty Nail, staring balefully at the saloon doors and wondering just what the hell he thought he was doing.
Telling Charity to come and meet him at the bar had been a mistake. He should have handed back her purse then walked away, pushed that kiss to the back of his mind, and forgotten about it.
Except he hadn’t. His brain had been too full of the sweetness of her mouth, making him think about what she’d look like if he did more than kiss her. If he touched her, if he had her beneath him in bed.
And once that was in his head, all his common sense had flown out the window and he’d asked her to join him for a drink. Even though a drink wasn’t what he wanted and he thought she probably knew that.
Yeah, a mistake. But it was too late to drive away now, and besides, was working out this chemistry with Charity really a problem? It was only sex, and she wasn’t the doctor’s good-girl daughter any longer. Hell, she said she’d be returning to Seattle too, so it wasn’t as if she’d be hanging around town permanently or anything.
He’d just be up-front with her, tell her that casual was all he had to give. She could make her own decision about whether to sleep with him or not, and no problem if she didn’t. He’d be disappointed, but there were plenty of other women he could find as an alternative.
It didn’t have to be her.
Bullshit, it doesn’t.
Garrett ignored that particular thought. Opening the door of his truck, he got out.
A long twilight had fallen, Jasper Creek’s pretty main street full of flowerpots and flags all lit up with the pinks and golds and oranges of the sunset.
But none of those colors were as brilliant as the curls of the pretty woman approaching the doors to the bar now, a blue dress hugging her curves.
Charity.
A su
rge of satisfaction gripped him. Especially when she turned her head at his approach and her eyes gleamed as if finding him there was exactly what she’d been hoping for.
She looked so lovely, her red curls turned to fire by the long twilight, shifting on her feet and obviously nervous.
He liked that she was nervous. He liked that a lot.
“Oh, uh...hi,” she said, her fingers shifting on the strap of her purse.
He came to a stop and looked at her.
Pretty Charity Golding and she was here for him, John Roy’s no-good son.
“You want to get a drink?” he asked.
Her gaze flickered away from his and then came back again. And stayed there. “You don’t really want a drink, do you?”
He looked into her blue, blue eyes. “No, I don’t. What I’d really like is to take you to bed.”
She colored. “Ah.”
He held her gaze, feeling the tension build between them. “Don’t get me wrong. I’ll take a drink if that’s what you’d prefer. But you have to know that’s my final aim.”
She gave a little nod then stood aside as another couple entered the bar. “You said earlier that you didn’t want to start anything with me,” she murmured as the door banged shut behind the couple. “What changed your mind?”
He could have said many things to that. Flirtatious things that meant nothing. Or ignored her completely and pulled her in for a kiss then and there. But he didn’t.
“You did.” He had to give her the truth. “That kiss... I couldn’t let it go.”
She flushed. “I’m sorry about that, I was only trying to—”
He lifted a hand and laid a finger across her lovely mouth, silencing her. “Don’t apologize for that. Don’t ever apologize for that.” Her lips were as soft and as warm against his finger as they had been against his mouth earlier, and he could not wait to taste them again.
She nodded and he took his finger away, though reluctantly. “I didn’t want to be attracted to you, Garrett,” she said after a moment. “You have to know that. I didn’t come back to Jasper Creek for anything other than to open the yarn store and be with my friends.”
The imprint of her lips burned against his skin. “So why did you come to meet me?” It felt important to know, though really, her reasons didn’t matter. Only the fact that she was here did. But still, he didn’t take the question back.
“Well...” She hesitated a second then went on, “I came back to Jasper Creek to get away from medicine for a while. To have fun, to just...be happy. And honestly? You’re a problem for me like I’m a problem for you, so maybe we can deal with it like consenting adults.”
He almost grinned at the serious look on her face. “By having sex?”
“Yes.” She’d gone pink. “It’s quite logical when you think about it.”
Oh, he’d thought about it. A lot. And if she was going with logic to justify sleeping with him then who was he to argue? It was certainly a lot better than his own reasons.
“I agree wholeheartedly,” he said, his gaze lingering on the soft hollow of her throat, where her pulse raced.
“Okay.” Her voice had become breathless. “Just be aware that I’m not...very good at casual s-sex.”
Interesting how she stumbled over the word. Interesting too how it made things below his belt suddenly get a hell of a lot tighter, which it really shouldn’t. He was the king of casual sex and he’d never cared why his partners had chosen him or what their own experience was. As long as they both got off, he was good.
But her confession and the serious look on her face told him that casual sex was not something she did a lot of. And that choosing him to have it with meant something to her.
He meant something to her.
It was a dangerous thing to think though, so he ignored it.
“Luckily, I am,” he said. “Want to go back to my place?”
“Yes.” Her mouth curled in a tentative smile that reminded him all of a sudden of the shy tutor she’d once been, and it made his breath catch hard. “I think I’d like that very much.”
CHAPTER FIVE
JOHN ROY’S OLD place was about twenty minutes out from town—though perhaps she should be thinking of it as Garrett’s now—and Charity dreaded the drive. She felt self-conscious and weird, like she didn’t know what to do with her body. Didn’t know how to hold herself. Didn’t know what to say.
It felt like she was seventeen again, sitting in the kitchen with Garrett on a Tuesday afternoon, her heart beating furiously as she worked out a math problem with him sitting beside her, leaning in to watch her work. She’d been so conscious of him, of the muscular length of his body, his heat, and his scent of hay and sunshine and musk. It had made her mouth go dry, made her completely unable to concentrate.
She wished she’d had the confidence to say something then, but she’d had zero confidence when it came to boys. So she’d sat there, burning with need, saying nothing. Doing nothing.
If only she’d known then that years later she’d be sitting in his truck as they drove back to his ranch to have casual sex, and that she’d still be just as tongue-tied and awkward as she had been at seventeen.
Then again, perhaps it was better that she hadn’t known. At least then she’d have had the comforting illusion that one day she’d be an adult and magically all of this would become clear.
Except it wasn’t clear, and she found herself frantically trying to think of something to say, anything to relieve the suffocating tension in the truck, but every time she thought of something it seemed lame and boring and cringe-inducing.
She felt sweaty, like she had back in the ER the time of her first panic attack when a normal night shift full of overdoses, drunks, and assault victims had turned nasty. A guy had pulled a knife on her and security had been called; she’d gone into the bathroom to calm down and get herself into doctor mode and found she hadn’t been able to. The thought of going back out into the ER had made her heart beat way too fast, made her feel cold and shaky and sweaty.
She’d thought the feeling would go away in time, but it hadn’t. It had only got progressively worse. Really, the cancellation of Hope’s wedding couldn’t have come at a better time, because it had given her the perfect excuse to get away, to take some time out.
Perfect, except that she was on the verge of having a panic attack in Garrett’s truck right before having sex with him for the first time. How humiliating.
“Hey,” Garrett said quietly after a good ten minutes had passed. “You can relax. We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”
Oh great. So he’d picked up on her anxiety. She’d almost ruined her career and now she’d probably ruin this too.
She smoothed her dress. “I do want to do this. I’m just...nervous.”
He glanced at her in a flash of silver. “Why? It’s supposed to be fun, remember?”
Of course it was. But she could also feel a certain familiar pressure weighing down on her. The same pressure she used to feel whenever she sat down for an exam or had to hand her report card to her father. It was the pressure to do well, to live up to the expectations her dad had of her.
“I know.” She let out a shaky breath. Should she tell him the truth? Would he want to know? Would he laugh and tell her she was ridiculous? Would it ruin everything if she did?
“Just...performance anxiety,” she said, going for a casual tone. There, that would do it. Just a little performance anxiety, no big deal.
Garrett sat there, the very epitome of laid-back and relaxed, one hand on the wheel, the other resting negligently on one powerful thigh. He didn’t laugh. He didn’t even smile.
“Yeah, fair,” he said, treating her confession with absolute seriousness. “But you don’t have to perform for me, doc. Why would you think you had to?”
Charity looked down at her dress, the blue
fabric all creased by her nervous fingers. “Probably because most of my life has been about performance. That’s what a lot of medicine is at least, being calm and in control all the time. Having to look like you know what you’re doing even when you don’t.”
He nodded. “Well, sure. But this isn’t medicine. You’re not saving me from death or anything. Though,” he added, “I’m not sure that kiss of yours wouldn’t have brought a man back to life.”
Charity felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth. The tension in her shoulders slowly began to unwind and the cold feeling in the tips of her fingers and toes receded.
“In fact,” Garrett continued. “You don’t have to do a damn thing. I’ll do all the work, while you just lie back and enjoy it.”
A heated image came to her of doing just that, relaxing back on his bed and letting him take control. Letting him make all the decisions, working to figure out what was wrong and what treatment she needed. What he could do to make her feel better.
She could be the patient for once and let someone else take care of her...
Need unfolded inside her, aching and desperate. “Yes,” she said thickly. “I think I’d like that.”
She could feel him watching her, but she didn’t look at him. She felt a little too exposed for that.
“Okay,” he murmured in that quiet, deep voice. “That I can certainly do.”
The tension in the truck stayed taut, but it wasn’t a difficult tension now. It was more anticipation than anything else, and by the time they’d pulled up the gravel driveway to Garrett’s house, the anticipation had turned into a charged excitement.
Garrett got out of the truck, came around to her door and pulled it open. Then he took her hand, his fingers enfolding hers, warm and strong, and led her from the truck to the front porch and up the stairs.
Once they were inside, standing in the spacious, high-ceilinged hallway, he took her face between his hands and all her remaining uncertainty vanished as his mouth settled on hers.
Charity met the kiss with her own hunger and a desperation that felt too strong to contain, as if she’d underestimated just how much she’d wanted him. As if years of longing had built and built without her knowing, and now it was all flooding out of her and into him, all that desperate teenage desire she’d never quite managed to leave behind.