by Christa Wick
Ah, so that was it. They were trying to get me to be social for my own good. They’d been making a comment or two on my quiet mood lately, but I’d kept it all to myself.
They didn't know I was upset because the man I’d gone out of my way to save the other week had made a show of flirting with me, only to hot-foot it out back with Cherry right on his ass not minutes later.
The things she’d bragged about them doing when she returned had been enough to turn my stomach.
Didn’t make me stop thinking about him, though.
Pathetic as that was.
Sighing, I kissed Momma back, pulled my sunglasses down and followed Beau out to his truck.
Fifty minutes later, already abandoned by Beau as he rubbed elbows with the crew chiefs, I carried a paper plate sparsely populated with potato salad and barbecued ribs over to an unoccupied picnic table.
Sipping on a sweet tea and still hiding behind my sunglasses, I sensed someone sit down next to me almost immediately. I didn't look to see who it was, didn't know anyone I'd seen yet beyond Beau, and didn't feel at all like exchanging names for the tenth time with someone I probably wouldn't see again.
All I knew for the first few minutes was that the person was quiet and male—and tall by the look of his shadow falling across the table. Gender I knew by the scent of him, engine grease, a squirt of citrus and sandalwood blended together with a few deeper, masculine spices I couldn't name. He had a nice smell, the kind a girl could snuggle up to at the end of a long day.
Before my curiosity could get the better of me, I heard that noise—that small, short sound only one man I knew made and that had the power to flip my world upside down in a heartbeat.
Already scowling, I turned to look at Mr. Moneybags, his deep, drowning blue eyes crinkled at the corners like I was supposed to be pleasantly surprised at his appearance.
I felt my face pucker into something unpleasant but couldn't unscrew it any better than I could get my heart to slow down.
His hand moved to fill the small of my back as his voice rumbled low, sending all my nerve endings into overdrive. "You're not going to run away on me again, are you, sweetheart? Because I don't think my ego could take it a third time."
"Mister, I don't think anything could make a dent in that ego of yours," I told him plainly as I grabbed my tea and plate to leave.
His hand lassoed my hip as his big body leaned in. "Are you going to at least tell me why you keep running away from me?"
"Right after you tell me why you're so intent on continuing this charade. Is this some sort of mean game for you or something?" I sucked more air between my teeth. Biscuits and gravy! Now I had all but admitted my hurt feelings. With all my years of being the fat girl in class and at work, I knew nothing got a bully going like seeing blood, and I'd just shown this stranger my open wounds.
His brow crinkled, mouth drawing down as his blue eyes grew shaded. "What are you talking about? What game am I playing?"
I felt something brush along my side, realized it was his thumb moving slow and sweet like a caress, one that zipped all helter skelter to tease my nipples and down between my legs, my clit swelling all big and achy as I caught the warm smell of spices rising up from his skin as he flushed lightly.
"This. What you're doing right now!" I tried to stop my mouth, but failed miserably. "You’re pretending at flirting with me!"
Chewing my bottom lip, I worked hard to hold my tears back. I was twenty-four, a grown woman even if I did still live with Momma and Daddy. Grown—g-r-o-w-n. Not some stupid high school girl waiting on my doorstep in a prom dress because Bobby Jackson had pretended he liked me just so he and Cherry Thompson and a bunch of their jackhole friends could drive by the house ringing cow bells. I’d saved up for that dress for so long, only to end up with it covered in tears and balled up at the bottom of my closet not an hour later.
It had been humiliating and cruel.
And with our town being as small as it was, I had to still face them all every day.
The last thing I needed was to have an out-of-towner mistreat me as well.
Wrenching his hand from my side, I scooted down the table. To hell with it! It was time to put my big girl panties on because I wasn't going anywhere. I wasn’t going to run any more. And I sure as heck wouldn't let him see how badly he’d gotten to me.
If he saw, then Beau would see, too, and Beau had kicked Bobby Jackson's ass to the county line and back after that prom prank. That's not exactly the impression my big brother needed to make at a company picnic.
“Just stay away from me,” I told him as politely as I could manage.
"Little girl, you've got things all—"
Beau's big, booming baritone interrupted him. "Mr. McKinley, I see you found her!"
Confused as all get out, I looked from my brother's smiling face to the man sitting next to me. His cheeks had flushed a little darker but he forced an easygoing grin to his face.
"Yep, I did,” he replied with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Now, I'm just trying to get a ‘yes’ out of her. Though I don’t think negotiations are going so well."
I kept looking between the two men, my mouth open wide enough to pop a baseball into it.
What in blazes was going on?
And did Beau just call him Mr. McKinley? As in Hawk McKinley, the second in command of McKinley Oil Company? The one in line to take over as soon as his daddy Harrison decided to retire or kicked the bucket?
Closing my trap, I stared at him.
He still faced Beau, just giving me a view of his profile and the occasional side glance, but everything I knew about Hawk McKinley fit this man. Not that I knew a lot. I'd never seen his picture, just knew he was a good ten years older than me and that McKinley Oil was run out of offices in New York. Oh, and put all his family together and the McKinley clan had more money than the devil himself.
"My baby sister is a bunch of things, but foolish isn't one of them.” Beau laughed, his knuckles giving the table top a superstitious double tap just in case a June bug had crawled up my behind. “And she'd be a fool to say ‘no’ to working the site's office with you."
What the…
McKinley finally looked at me then, his smile jerking slightly askew as I did my damndest not to glare at him.
"You want to hire me?” I asked pleasantly through my gritted smile. “What on earth for?"
"Well." He cleared his throat, his smile tightening. "After seeing Beau work this week and him talking you up, I figured the only thing better than having one Kelly on my crew is having two."
5
Ginny
I took a deep breath in, carefully trying to navigate this strange conversation without accidentally putting my foot in it. "Two? Does that mean you got the job, Beau?"
"That's right." I could hear the happiness and flat-out pride in my big brother's voice. "You're looking at McKinley Oil's newest permanent hire."
"They couldn’t have hired a better guy." I smiled, my heart tucking deep inside my chest in search of a safe place. "Listen, Beau, could you give us a few minutes, I can't negotiate if I'm getting tag teamed like this."
Beau laughed again, the sound like rolling thunder. I knew what was going through his head. Not just my fall tuition but something for his sweetheart Shelly, something with a diamond and maybe a down payment on a place of their own so he could finally ask her to marry him.
"See, I told you she was something. You willing to beat what Roy pays and let her work her brain instead of her bunions, but she's all set to bend you to another condition or two."
Getting up, Beau beamed at me one last time, making me feel like McKinley had just stuck a salad fork in my chest and given it an extra twist for good measure.
I waited until my brother was out of earshot before I hissed at Hawk McKinley. "You are going to fix this.” I jabbed a finger at his hard pec. “I don't know how, but you are. Just, I don’t know, tell him there's some software the job requires that I have no expe
rience with or something."
"Suppose I could." Hawk slid across the bench seat until he was right up against me once more. "Excel?"
"Oh, please." I nudged him with my elbow to keep him from getting any closer. "My gran is almost seventy-five and she knows how to run Excel. Don't you go insulting me with Word or PowerPoint next. You could have at least come up with something like Visio."
Hawk still sat way too close, his proximity squeezing all the air from my lungs as his hand found that small valley low on my back once more. "So, you don't know Visio—"
"Of course I do." I rolled my eyes at him. He must really think I was some kind of dumb West Texas hick. I may have only been picking up two classes a semester at Midland, but I'd gotten through all my General Education classes and had started on business and accounting. I wanted to stick my tongue out and tell him Visio was so two semesters ago, but that didn't seem very mature.
"Well, little girl, it looks like you’re the perfect person to get the Tupperville office in shape."
Steam started to come out my ears, I'm sure of it.
"Look, Hawk McKinley. I'm not coming to work for you. So just quit with that nonsense. You're going to fix this. And while you’re at it, you're going to stop calling me ‘little girl.’ We both know I'm not—"
I snapped my mouth shut before I embarrassed myself anymore.
Show no weakness, remember?
I may have been foolish enough to have thought he’d actually been flirting with me before he’d gone off with Cherry that day, but fool me once, shame on him.
There wouldn’t be a twice.
"Ginny…" Hawk captured my hand, holding it so that it rested palm-to-palm with his much bigger hand.
Even sitting down, he towered over me by at least a foot and his broad shoulders dwarfed mine. So, yeah, he had the capacity to make me feel little, just like Beau made his sweet Shelly feel petite when she was every bit as big as me if not a little bigger. But I didn't have a smile that could melt an iceberg like Shelly did. I didn't put people at ease like she could. I was always charging in, head down, fists clenched…
Hawk leaned closer, his lips brushing my ear for a second. "No, sweetheart, I'm not fixing this. You don't want to work for me, fine. But you're going to have to come up with your own reasons. And either way, I'm nowhere close to finished negotiating with you."
I really didn't think this was part of the HR-approved McKinley recruiting program.
When his lips brushed over my jaw next, I sucked a breath in and told him so.
He just smiled and brushed some loose strands of hair off my shoulder.
It’s like he was working off some sort of professional billionaire player handbook.
"I’m serious, Mr. McKinley. You don't really want me to go to work for you."
His mouth quirked in a smile and he blinked like a cat between naps. "You're right, sort of. I’d far prefer you in my bed, but it seems like you're going to force me to take baby steps first."
Bed…baby steps?
Nope. Not falling for it.
I scanned the other tables at the picnic site and the crowd around the volleyball net and horseshoe spikes, my eyes landing at last on Cherry and her completely inappropriate picnic attire. Somehow, it was entirely fitting that she had found a way to be at the McKinley company picnic, standing alongside one of the young workers and rubbing her hands up and down his muscled arms.
"There." I jabbed a finger in Cherry's direction. "If you're looking for a hole to fill, you don't need to go through all this fuss, Mr. McKinley. You can go back and fill that one again."
The grunt he gave didn't sound anything like those sexy little hybrid purrs he seemed prone to.
"Ginny, I don't take a woman to bed unless I can picture sharing a child with her, if it comes down to it." He jabbed his finger in Cherry's direction. "I can't imagine sharing so much as a rabid honey badger with that woman. What in the hell would make you think I laid a hand on her?"
I blinked, actually believing him. A man couldn’t fake horrified anger like that. “S-she said you two… You left without eating and went back to Cherry’s usual blowjob spot.”
“The woman has a blowjob spot outside the steakhouse and you think I wanted any part of that?” His expression was thunderous. “After I made it damn clear it was you I wanted?”
I would have laughed my ass off if I wasn't so ready to cry. I pushed away from him, needing some space to think. Which I couldn’t do with him this close, looking and smelling so darn good.
"You're getting up and walking away from this table, Hawk McKinley."
I drew a shuddering breath in, my voice trembling and the tears building to the point I couldn't contain them much longer. "If you really, really meant what you just said about the job…and the…other stuff, you'll leave me alone right now—"
Hawk clearly had no intention of relenting.
A firm, but gentle hand around my elbow kept me from retreating any further. "I always say what I mean, and I meant what I said. So me walking away from you now that you’re finally not running from me is the last thing I intend to do. Just not happening, baby girl."
I stared at him, all my words and fury abandoning me. My lips started to quiver and I felt the first slide of a tear falling hot and fat down my cheek.
"Ginny…"
Hawk tried rubbing his palm along my arm to calm me. I shrank inward, refusing to look at him any longer. He looked sincere. Bobby Jackson had looked sincere, too. I could still hear the cow bells ringing if I cut out all the noise from the crowd around McKinley and me.
“Please,” I whispered quietly.
"Okay. I'll go. For now." Hawk jumped up from the table. "If it'll settle you, I'll go. But we're not done discussing this, Ginny. We'll take this at whatever pace you're comfortable…"
His hand brushed my shoulder. My whole body stiffened at his touch.
"Just go," I whispered, and he did.
6
Hawk
Damn it!
The two words cycled through my head as I tried to put as much distance between me and Ginny as I could without actually leaving my own company picnic.
How the hell did the situation spiral so far out of control like that?
Oh, right—I saw her standing there in the middle of my event, an invisible but palpable wall around her, and my cock sprang immediately to life even as her brother Beau kept talking about how smart she was.
Two redheads, I thought, my head spinning at how I hadn't put the similarities together the second I laid eyes on Beau.
It would have helped if my foreman, Red Addams, had actually introduced the man using his last name. But he just waved him over and started talking about how well Beau was fitting in with the permanent crew, how he knew his job every which way and was quick to pick up on equipment he was encountering for the first time.
Once I offered Beau a full-time job on the team, he had started talking up his sister. He didn't mention that she was a waitress. Instead, he went on about how she’d taken a bunch of classes at the college in Midland and knew every bit of office software there was to know.
She’d sounded perfect, and I’d been perfectly willing to hire her. In fact, I’d been ready to tell him I would give the green light to Red because I was on my way back to New York, but then Beau Kelly went and pointed out the woman I had been fantasizing about since she’d rescued me out on the road.
Virginia Kelly.
Feeling like it was more fate than chance, my stupidity had simply avalanched from there.
I’d pushed too hard, been way too explicit in saying what I wanted from her.
Damn it, I’d fucked up. And now that sweet woman was sitting back there with tears in her eyes.
The sight had gutted me alive.
It didn't help matters one bit that the female viper from the steakhouse had somehow wormed her way into a company event. The fact that she’d lied to Ginny and made her think things that simply weren’t true was even wor
se. Thank hell I’d at least gotten that cleared up.
I could tell there was bad blood between the women. I didn't know what it was, but I figured "Pudge Pie" was something that venom-filled woman probably said right to Ginny's face, not just behind her back.
If I was ever going to find out anything more about Ginny—straight from her mouth, this time—and if I hoped to have even a snowball’s chance in hell at cleaning the slate and getting a fresh start with her—I had one choice.
It was time to play hard ball.
7
Ginny
Telling Beau I needed to talk to Roy first and that the offer wasn't as good as it sounded because I had to factor in lost tips, too, I managed to keep my big brother mostly off the topic of my accepting Hawk McKinley's job offer the rest of the weekend.
He still kept trying to argue McKinley's case though, assuring me there was room for a bigger salary because Red Addams, the site foreman, had sent all of his former clerks home to their mommas crying like little girls, and every last one of them was a man.
But thankfully, Beau didn't do any of this around Momma and Daddy, both of whom would’ve asked a lot more questions than he did about why I wouldn’t take the job.
All in all, I’d been handling it just fine, just biding my time until Beau eventually gave up trying to wear me down.
But then I walked into the steakhouse come Monday morning to find myself unemployed.
All thanks to Hawk McKinley.
"I hate to lose you, Ginny; you’re the best waitress I’ve got. But Mr. McKinley was real convincing." Roy tossed an arm around my shoulder and gave me a paternal squeeze as I stared at him, my mouth working like a guppy freshly pulled from its fish bowl. "I can't hope to pay you that kind of money and he's right when he says the office job will look better on your resume once you finish classes up. How could I argue with that? You’ve got a future ahead of you, and I don’t want to stand in the way of that.”