by Alison Kent
“Just wondering about life. And chances.”
“I don’t have to wonder. I know.”
“Well?” Tyler prompted, watching emotions flicker like broken light over his brother’s face.
“If I hadn’t, I’d’ve been one son of a bitch to live with.”
“Hell, you already are,” Tyler said and turned to go get Sophie.
By the time he made it to the entryway, she and Harley had been swallowed by the crowd. Needing a drink to cool his throat he headed for the kitchen, which for the moment was empty, thank goodness. He drained a glass of water and set it on the counter, then braced his hands on the lip of the sink. Hanging his head, he breathed slowly, deeply, letting his arousal subside.
When he turned, he found Tamara Shotweiler leaning an elbow on the counter, her palomino mane of hair artfully draped over one shoulder so as not to spoil the deep cleavage staring him in the face.
“You look like a man in pain, Tyler Barnes.”
He straightened. “Tam. It’s been a long time.”
“Too long, from that look on your face.” She’d turned her back to the counter, braced her weight on both elbows. Her legs were long in turquoise jeans, her feet crossed at the ankle in expensive ostrich-skin boots. Tyler figured her vest was custom-made to draw attention to her spectacular figure.
Funny. She didn’t faze him a bit.
“I think that expression you saw was me wondering if I’m ever going to get the Kool-Aid off this floor.”
“Nice try, Ty. But we go back a long way. I’ve seen that look before.” She cocked her chin just so. “I know exactly what it means.”
He turned up a corner of his mouth. “Well, you got me there.”
“So, am I right?” she asked and shifted her shoulders back farther.
She was really a nice girl. He wondered what had happened to make her think she had to try this hard. “You’re right I just watched the woman I’m going to marry walk into the room and damn if I’m not still feeling it”
Her face darkened. “I didn’t know this was an engagement party, too.”
“We’re not officially engaged,” he admitted. No need to put Sophie on the hot seat. “But I do plan to make her my wife.”
“I wish you luck, then. Just wish I hadn’t waited so long to come home.”
There was a long story behind her confession. He’d always been a pretty good listener. “What made you decide to come back, Tam? Last I heard you’d just returned from a European honeymoon and had set up housekeeping in Bel Air.”
“What can I say? I missed the West Texas heat”
“Try again.”
She shook her head and straightened, brushed her hair back over her shoulder. Her smile was sad. “Not this time. You get back to your party. I think I hear Jim Beam calling my name.”
He started to go after her but caught sight of Lindy Coltrain waving him into the living room. He managed to snag a glimpse of Sophie’s back as Harley led her toward the master bedroom, no doubt to show off his tub.
He’d catch up with her in a minute after he’d dealt with Lindy. If he ever got to Lindy, he thought, waylaid by a half-dozen old friends wishing him well in his new practice. After sending one of his old high school running mates to check on Tamara, he finally reached Lindy.
She cocked her head of red curls to one side and let one brow gradually lift. “I was wondering if I was going to get a chance to see you tonight. Or if you were going to stand me up again.”
They’d been friends too long for him to take offense. “C’mon, Lindy. You’re not giving me points for good intentions.”
“Good intentions, huh? Isn’t that where the road to hell comes into play?” she asked, her blue eyes twinkling.
He rocked back on his heels, glanced down at the toes of his boots and before he could find a quick comeback, she’d linked her arm through his, holding him closer than he wanted to be held by anyone but Sophie.
“I’m just giving you a hard time, Ty. That storm caught more than a few folks off guard. And I caught a whiff of Dad and Lucas after they got home from working on the bridge out to Grandpa’s old place. Phew. If you were half as disgusting as they were, I’m glad you decided not to show up.”
“Well, I wasn’t quite as waterlogged as your dad or your brother. But it was a long day and I wasn’t fit company for anyone by the end of it,” he said, grimacing as he remembered the way he’d snapped at Sophie.
“So, how about it? Third time’s a charm? We could head out to Bo Star’s Dance Hall. Kick up our heels. Burn off some of the energy that’s keeping you so tense.” She squeezed his upper arm.
He caught sight of Sophie then as Harley herded her into the center of a group of women. Their eyes connected and he lifted his brows and his shoulders in apology.
“I don’t think so, Lindy,” he said. “My dance card’s full.”
Lindy slowly released her hold. He looked down to see that she’d followed his gaze to Sophie. Her cute-as-a-button freckled nose turned up in disappointment.
“Well, dang,” she said, smiling up at Tyler. “There go my chances of snagging a rich doctor.”
Tyler couldn’t help but laugh at her generous spirit. “If you want a rich doctor, Lindy, you’re looking in the wrong direction.”
“Maybe I just changed my mind about doctors period,” Lindy said as another of their high school friends walked in the front door. She bounced up and gave Tyler a kiss on the cheek.
“Uh, give my regards to Justin,” he said. Lindy ran off and he swore to make her his last distraction. Too late. He’d lost Sophie again.
He looked around the crowded room that was suddenly too crowded for his mood. And as the crowd increased, more friends arriving to wish him the best of luck, his mood darkened further.
He and Sophie had a lot to talk about and he was tired of waiting. The drive to Camelot from the cabin had taken less than ten minutes. Futures couldn’t be settled in such a short span of time.
And since he’d delivered her into Harley’s hands, he hadn’t seen her except for an occasional too brief glimpse. He wanted to see all of her. To take a really long slow look at what she did to that skirt and blouse and measure that slice of her belly he’d seen.
He made his way through the crowds, wondering if there was anyone in Brodie County not present in the room and if Gardner had built a house this big to make sure Camelot didn’t get stuck being the only entertainment capital of the county.
Tyler figured it served him right for being too wrapped up in the hospital plans to check out what his brother was doing. And how it would affect his future.
He laughingly brushed off at least five more come-ons and shook his head in self-amazement. Man, talk about a change of plans. It was funny what one blond, green-eyed pixie in the right place at the right time could do to a man.
Now if he could only find her in this madhouse and sneak them both the hell out of here.
TEN
HE FOUND HER TEN MINUTES later sitting on the edge of his bathtub, dangling her bare feet over the edge, looking for all the world like she’d just settled in for a long relaxing soak.
The crowd had thinned and she was alone and it was exactly how he wanted her.
“Why don’t you turn on the water?”
Swinging her shoes from one finger, she looked up and smiled. “I like it better this way. There’s a lot to be said for imagination.”
He could only hope their imaginations ran along the same path. “I saw you when you came in.”
“I saw you seeing me,” she said, running a finger along a ridge on the tub’s edge, watching the motion as if fascinated by the slow slide of skin over marble.
He was finding it hard not to lock the door and show her how much better skin could slide over skin when that tub was filled with water. Leaning his backside against the counter, he crossed his ankles and curled his hand around the marble edge. “You seem to have made the rounds tonight.”
“You have a
lot of friends.”
“Yep. Brodie County’s just one big happy family.”
“I know.” She swung around, hiked her skirt and straddled the wide ledge of the tub. The slinky black skirt rode high and left literally nothing to the imagination. Her panties were white.
He shifted, easing one hip onto the counter and releasing a groan in a long spill of breath.
This time she rubbed the marble with long strokes of her palm. Up, then back. Up, then back. “I saw a couple of your female friends who looked like they would be more than willing to become permanent family.”
He couldn’t find his voice to answer. Especially when she swung her other leg over the lip of the tub, crossed one knee over the other. The skirt remained high and her legs were so long and his button fly was killing him.
“I don’t think you’ll have a bit of trouble becoming engaged by the end of next year.” She leaned to the side, one hand splayed on the tub, the other draped over her knee, her sandals hanging from her fingertips. Slowly, she raised her gaze to his. “But I don’t want to talk about that right now.”
He wanted to talk about it. He wanted to tell her that he didn’t plan to wait until next year to be engaged. In fact, he planned to skip the engagement altogether and elope instead.
But he didn’t because this was a Sophie he hadn’t yet seen, soft and sexily vulnerable and plying her feminine wiles. He could wait. For some things, for talking. He could wait. For other things, he was running out of rein.
He didn’t look at her bare feet or her long legs or anywhere but at her face. “Then what is it you want to talk about?”
“Why do we have to talk at all?”
She stood. In one fluid, slow motion. The skirt’s hem slid to her ankles and slowly she crossed the tiled floor. She brushed against him where he stood and he caught her sweet scent in the air.
He didn’t move because his heart was pounding, his feet were rooted to the floor and he was afraid that the tiniest motion, a sharp brush of air, the ripple of a spoken word, would shatter the spell. But then she closed the bathroom door. The latch clicked, the lock snapped, and he turned at the command.
She stood with her back to the door, her shoes fallen, forgotten, her arms raised, her hands gripping the wooden clothes’ hook over her head. Her chest rose and fell with labored breaths, rapid, audible breaths, and the pulse jumping at the base of her throat pumped to the beat of his blood. Tiny diamond studs twinkled in her lobes when she lifted her chin. Her lower lip trembled but arousal flared wild in her eyes.
“No, we don’t have to talk,” he managed to get out. His gaze moved from her upraised arms down to her breasts roundly outlined beneath the black fabric to her bare stomach and her toes that curled into the heated floor. “I can think of a lot of things I’d rather do than talk.”
“Then do them,” she said. “Kiss me like you haven’t since that night on the floor. Kiss me like you love me, Tyler Barnes.”
Hadn’t he always? From that very first time? “Ah, darlin’, I thought you’d never ask.”
He stepped forward, stopped when only the width of a breath separated their bodies and cupped her raised elbows in his palms. He slid his hands down the underside of her arms and she trembled. He scooped his thumbs through her armpits down over her breasts and she moaned. Grazed her sides, the bare skin of her belly with his palms, and she whimpered. Then he raised the hem of her sweater to her chin.
Holding her arms high overhead, he teased her nipples with a bare brush of breath, a light sweep of his tongue. Her body shook. She moved to free her hands but he held her still and let his gaze roam. God, she was beautiful. The faint lighting cast her skin in the color of rich cream, the tips of her breasts in a darker, deeper peach. The sight was sweet and his body was hard but he still hadn’t kissed her.
He didn’t trust himself to kiss her the way she’d asked. To kiss her like he loved her would take more time than they had, more privacy than they had, and a softer surface than a wooden door to cushion the strength of his need.
That intensity was exactly what she was expecting, what she feared, so he did his damnedest to grant her request in the only way he could. He brushed his lips over hers with the pure simplicity of a loving kiss, measuring out tiny touches of lips and tongue, gentle nips of teeth.
While his mouth loved her tenderly, he took her all the way with his hands, shaping her breasts to fit his palms, tugging at her nipples, scraping them with the flat of his hand.
He brushed feather-light kisses along her jaw, pulled her close and reached for the back zipper of her skirt. The material glided to pool around her ankles. He ran his tongue around the shell of her ear, dried the damp trail with warm breath, and shoved her panties down to her knees. Then, lifting a boot between her legs, he took the scrap of white to the floor.
He knew she stood naked and knew what she looked like but he kept his eyes closed to keep his kisses sweet and gentle. The rest of him said, To hell with gentle, and hooked her leg around his hip, sliding his arm beneath her thigh until his fingers pressed the heat between her legs.
Her body was wild, yet he held his own still. He kissed her like he loved her, touched her like he loved her, demanding her body accept the truth she was denying in her mind. This was what love was, the warm glow as well as the fire.
When she came in his hand, he hushed her tiny whimpers and cries with his mouth. He gentled her, easing her back, letting her body calm. She rested her forehead against his shoulder until her breathing steadied.
Just as she found the strength to look up, to let him see what he swore was love in her eyes, a knock sounded on the door.
“Just a minute,” Tyler called as Sophie’s eyes went wide and horrified and she scrambled to right her clothes—and find the ones in a heap on the floor.
“Uncle Ty? Is that you?”
Tyler rolled his eyes. “Yeah, Ben-jo. It’s me.”
“Can I come in? I really gotta go,” Tyler’s middle nephew murmured, then added more vocally, “Now.”
Sophie panicked, her fingers shaking, fumbling with clothing. Tyler shushed her with a finger to her lips and shook his head.
“Ben-jo? How ’bout using one of the bathrooms upstairs?”
“I don’t got time, Uncle Ty. Puleeeeease.”
“All right. Let me unlock the door.”
No, Sophie mouthed, but Tyler reassured her. “Stay behind the door,” he whispered into her ear, reaching back to right her zipper.
While Sophie held her shoes clutched to her chest, Tyler opened the door. Ben shot past, followed by Cody, and both boys disappeared behind the privacy wall.
Sophie took advantage of the moment, slipped under Tyler’s arm and out into the empty bedroom. He grabbed her hand before she moved more than a step away.
“We’re not done here,” he growled.
“We’re done here,” she answered, nodding toward the bathroom.
“Yeah, but we’re not done.”
A totally un-Sophie hoydenish smile curled her upper lip.
“I’m done,” she said and scurried away.
Vixen. Tyler shut the door, leaned back against it, and closed his eyes. This was it. No more. He was herding everyone outta here and taking Sophie home. One way or another, they would finish this tonight.
At the sound of tiny whispers, he looked down. Ben and Cody stood side by side, Ben’s darker head bent down to his fair-haired brother’s. What were the rascals up to now? “Can I help you boys with something?”
Ben shot up straight, his green eyes wide. Cody covered his mouth with one hand. Tyler crossed his arms and put on a frown.
Finally, shuffling from one boot to another, Ben said, “You better hurry up and go, Uncle Ty.”
“Go where, Ben-jo?”
Cody giggled. “To da poddy, Unca Ty.”
Ben nodded, his face serious. “Momma says not to wait cuz it’s bad for your tummy. I think you better go now.”
Tyler took in the direction of bo
th boys’ gaze and realized they were eye level with his erection. Great.
“Thanks, boys.” Tyler opened the bathroom door. “I’ll do that.”
Ben followed Cody out the door. “He probly wants to be private like Momma and Daddy.”
“Dey ahways want pwivate,” Cody added sagely.
Tyler dosed the door and decided he’d just changed his mind about kids.
It wasn’t like her to be this nervous, this antsy, this unsure of herself. But since Tyler Barnes had come into her life, Sophie hadn’t been sure of much of anything except that for every answer she came up with today, tomorrow would bring two questions. She was tired of the uncertainty.
After she’d left the party with Harley and the baby, she’d changed back into her Sophie clothes, needing to meet Tyler tonight on her own turf and her own terms. Harley had driven her home. The party had been fun, the kiss she’d shared with Tyler in the bathroom the stuff of fantasies. But this was now and this was real and this was the beginning of the rest of her life.
Standing behind the love seat in the cabin’s main room, wearing her blue jeans, her work boots, and her scooped-and-scalloped long-sleeved white T-shirt, she surveyed the stage she’d set, one part of her listening for the bump and rattle of tires over the new bridge.
She looked out over the room at the flickering contrasts of light and shadow thrown by the low-burning fire. At the row of emergency candles she’d set into jar lids and lined across the footlocker’s brass edge. At the tiny Christmas bush she’d uprooted from the edge of the creek, planted in a silver pail and decorated with long stalks of winter grass tied into bows.
The mattress still lay in front of the fireplace, the sheets sun-dried and fresh. Orange peels, cloves, and cinnamon simmered in a pot on the stove. This night would be a celebration of discovery and it deserved a festive mood.
Because this was the first time she’d ever been in love.
The bridge beams bumped and so did her heart. An engine roared to match the rush of her blood. A door slammed and the sound punched her in the stomach. Footsteps pounded onto the porch and nailed her into place on the floor.