A Taste of Sugar

by Marina Adair

  She wanted someone who believed in her, challenged her, recognized just how hard she’d worked to get to where she was, and treated her as though what she did mattered. As though she mattered.

  “You,” she said, leaning over and covering his mouth with hers. “For as long as I can have you.”

  He groaned as his arms came around her, so big, and yet they managed to hold her softly against him. He took his time, exploring her mouth in a way that was coaxing and equally giving. Charlotte felt a shiver start way down in her toes and slide deliciously up her entire spine.

  “Are you cold?” he asked.

  No, she was just experiencing McGraw overload. “My reaction to daily kisses.”

  “I’d hug you, but I’m afraid we’d topple the boat.”

  Instead of opting to head straight to bed when she’d moved his things into her room, an invitation the old Jace would’ve taken, he’d told her to get showered and dress warmly. Then he’d surprised her by having their morning coffee out on his dad’s old boat. Although the word boat made it sound a lot bigger than it was. This was more of a dingy, with two rickety bench seats that faced each other and left barely enough room for one adult, let alone the both of them. Yet it was the perfect size for a romantic morning cruise around the lake since their knees were forced to fit together like puzzle pieces, and their thighs brushed every time the wind picked up or one of them shifted.

  “This should help.” He wrapped a blanket over their legs, then pulled a thermos out of the paper bag he’d loaded and opened the lid. He watched her watching him, and with a cute smile he wafted the steam her way. The heavenly aroma of steaming peppermint mixed with the chilled morning air, and her eyes slid shut in ecstasy. He handed her the thermos, and just when she thought her world couldn’t get any better, he reached back in the bag for his second surprise—whipped cream.

  “Is that for the coffee, or are we starting new morning ritual?” she asked with a teasing smile.

  “I’m open to either.”

  “I have a surprise, too.” She passed him the thermos, and he added a generous spray of whipped goodness as she dug through her own bag.

  “A string bikini?” he asked hopefully, taking a sip of coffee. “The kind that have those sexy peekaboo butts?”

  “Better.” She pulled out his copy of Hitched magazine. She flipped to the page she’d dog-eared that morning and showed him.

  “ ‘Ten questions every couple should ask before saying I Do ’ ” he read, then met her gaze. “I’ll answer first. ‘You spread out over the hood of my Chevelle, in nothing but moonlight, pearls, and my racing jacket.’ ” His studied her, his expression confused, then he shook his head. “Nope. Lose the jacket, just you on my car. Hair down. Wavy and kind of sex-rumpled.”

  “Sex-rumpled?”

  “Oh yeah,” he said in a tone that was all male appreciation. “Don’t forget the pearls.”

  She found her hand straying to the strand of pearls at her neck. They had originally belonged to her great-great-grandmother, Rose Holden, and had been passed down to Charlotte the day she’d turned sixteen. If she was lucky enough to have a daughter then she’d pass them on as well.

  “That’s not how this works. We ask each other questions. Questions from the list.” She held up the magazine.

  He opened his mouth and she could tell by the wicked twinkle in his eye as he stared at the pearls that he wasn’t done with his fantasy. Then said, “This is a boring game.”

  “It’s your magazine,” she pointed out. “You treated the other article as law, I thought this would be fun.”

  “My list had words like shenanigans and sexcapades. Yours uses”—he took the magazine, perused the questions, and handed it back—“comfort zones and emotional needs.” With a heartfelt sigh, he rowed them a little closer to shore. “Does it at least say that we ask them while in a string bikini with a peekaboo butt?”

  She flipped the magazine back over and pretended to study it thoroughly. “Nope. Sorry.”

  “Too bad. That would have been a good rule.”

  “I don’t know if you could pull off peekaboo bottoms.”

  His eyes went the length of her. “I’d be willing to suffer the humiliation to see you in one.”

  Charlotte felt her cheeks heat up, and not just the ones on her face. “First question.” She paused. “Do you want to ask first or be asked?”

  “I’m easy,” he said, and she rolled her eyes.

  “I’ll find a fun one.” She went to the middle of the list. “Okay, here’s one. ‘If you could be any superhero, who would it be?’ ” She shoved the magazine in her bag with a disappointed huff. “You’re right, this is boring. And the questions are too easy.”

  “It was just getting good, and that’s not an easy question at all.”

  He sounded so confident that Charlotte snorted. “Sideswipe. That red Transformer. A Lamborghini one minute, a crime-fighting robot with pile drivers for arms and a rocket pack the next. Fast, dangerous, and can fly. Every boy’s dream.”

  It was not, however, every boy’s favorite superhero. Charlotte didn’t even know if a Transformer counted as a superhero, but it was Jace’s favorite.

  “How the hell did you know that?” he asked, his expression clearly one of confusion, but Charlotte could also see a hint of shyness in there. Her big badass was flustered over the comment.

  “You sat behind me every week in Sunday school and I overheard you telling Brett that you wanted one for Christmas. I didn’t know who Sideswipe was so I went home and asked my dad to buy me one when he went to Atlanta. It took every penny of allowance I had saved up.”

  “Impressive,” he said gently, studying her as if trying to read between the lines of what she was saying about the past and how it connected to the now. “Now tell me why a girl who was into Barbie bought a car robot?”

  “First off, Barbie is amazing,” she said, glaring at him when he went to laugh. “She was a gorgeous blonde with big boobs and mile-long legs who managed to fly to the moon, get her PhD, serve overseas, save baby dolphins, wield a hammer, surf, speak a zillion languages, raise a sister, and still hold court at every party in town. She did all of that while having to prove she wasn’t a bimbo. How many male superheroes can say that?”

  “Not a single one I can think of,” he said, understanding lacing his expression at the similarities between Barbie and Charlotte, and now it was Charlotte’s turn to blush. “She is beyond impressive.” He said it as though she were impressive, and not just because she knew his favorite superhero. “But you still didn’t say why you were interested in what toy I was playing with.”

  She sighed. It was silly that after all these years she’d never admitted her crush. They’d been together such a short time and were too busy talking about the future and trying to figure out the present to even get into the past. “Why else would a girl spend her allowance to buy a toy car for a boy?”

  “You bought it for me?”

  “I was going to give it to you for Christmas, in the Secret Santa gift exchange because,” and here it went, “I thought you were cute.”

  “Cute, huh?” he said, tugging on her ankle, the boat swaying with his movement. “I never got it.”

  “I know,” the disappointed little girl in her who had come up with the perfect plan sighed. “I went to put it under the tree, then I heard you got it as a present from your mom and I hid it in my bag.”

  “You could have told me, I would have been more into your pigtails than a toy car anyway.” He teased and she cocked a disbelieving brow. “Okay, probably not, but now I would.” He ran his hand under the blanket and up her leg. “How old were you?”

  “I was in the fifth grade and you were in fourth. You had this cute spiky hair, and your mom had dressed you in Brett’s old suit, which was two inches too short in the legs.”

  He laughed. “I remember that. It was for Christmas pictures, and the week before I tore a hole through my church pants scaling the playground fe
nce. I was too afraid to tell my mom, so when Sunday came and there was no time to get new ones, I got Brett’s hand-me-downs.” He met her gaze. “You remembered all that?”

  “You fascinated me,” she admitted. “You were always up to something, getting into some kind of trouble, but you were also so sweet with your mom and grandma.”

  “I drove my mom crazy,” he said with a raw laugh.

  Charlotte found his hand under the blanket and linked their fingers. “I once overheard our moms talking. It was after you got caught trying to saddle Mr. Ferguson’s bull.”

  “Brett bet me that I couldn’t stay on for eight seconds,” he explained as though a bet was all the reason he needed to mount one of the most dangerous bulls in Sugar County. “I lasted nine.”

  “You also drove him through their fence and into my granddad’s garden. But instead of apologizing for your behavior, your mom said that you were a beautiful reminder that the best things in life don’t always come with instruction manuals. She admitted that while your curiosity and determination would get you into trouble, she knew it would also be your greatest strength, and out of all her boys, you were the one who was the most like your dad.”

  Jace swallowed hard, then stared out over the water, taking in the houses dotting the shoreline across the lake, his face reflective and unsure. After a long moment, he said, “She used to tell me I was just like my dad, but I figured she said that to all of us kids.”

  Charlotte tugged his hand, waiting until he looked at her. “She said you got your fascination for trouble from him, that it allowed you to play as hard as you loved, and it was her favorite part of you.”

  That was actually what had peaked Charlotte’s interest. Sure, her parents loved her, but they were never affectionate or outward with their feelings. She didn’t grow up in a home that embraced hugging or gave easy compliments. Until Jace, the only kind of love she knew was complicated, based around milestones and achievements, and always left her feeling empty.

  Lost.

  But the McGraws, they loved big and loud. And Jace was no exception.

  “Thank you,” he said, not bothering to hide his gratitude or emotion. “I really needed to hear that.” He cleared his throat, and glancing down at the article he scanned the page a few times, then looked up. “My turn. Did you know I was in the bar before I offered to buy you a drink?”

  “That isn’t one of the questions.” She snatched the magazine back.

  “No, but you’re right, we know the answers to these,” he said. “So we’re getting creative. I’m good at creative.” As she well knew. “So spill, I have it on good authority that you knew I was in the bar before I offered to buy you a drink.”

  Embarrassing fact number one: Charlotte not only knew he was in the bar, she went to the bar knowing he was going to be there.

  “Molly from the Gas and Go told me you were in town for the race.” Wanting to catch a glimpse of her childhood crush all grown up, she convinced her roommate to go with her, ditched the pearls and angora for denim and cowgirl boots, and went on a manhunt.

  He let loose a low whistle. “Oh my, Miss Peach, were you stalking me?”

  “No,” she lied. “I wanted to see what you’d turned out like.”

  Which brought her to embarrassing fact number two. When Jace walked in that door, crush didn’t begin to describe what she felt. Jace had become the man she’d always known he’d be. Big, badass, clouded in mystery, and so incredibly sexy it took everything she had to play it cool. Let him see her and approach her, which took an agonizing hour.

  “And?” He held out his arms, flexed those guns, and shot a set of double-barred dimples her way.

  “What do you think?” she said. “I let you buy me a drink, and I went home with you.”

  It was the first real risk she’d ever taken. The first time she’d ever gone after what she wanted without regard to her parents’ opinion. And it was the most exhilarating thing she’d ever experienced. Being with Jace was like skydiving naked through a tropical storm.

  “Are you telling me you picked up a man up at a bar? Wearing a teeny-tiny skirt and shitkickers?”

  “Yes. And since there is no room on this boat for your ego to get any larger, my turn.” She picked a question. “This is a two-parter. Who was your first kiss and your best kiss?”

  He ran a hand over his chin, and she could hear the rustle of his stubble. “First kiss. Eighth grader, Holy Cleavage Hanna Jacobs, behind Mable’s Market. She tasted like watermelon lip gloss and let me cop a feel. She stuffed her bra. It shattered my little world.”

  “Eighth grade, really?” She laughed. “I have you beat by a year. I never would have taken you for a late bloomer.”

  “I was in the fifth grade, Hanna was in eighth.” He waggled a brow, and Charlotte could practically feel the boat sink with the added weight of his ego. Then he got serious. “Best kiss. You. In the backseat of my sixty-seven Camaro the night we met. I had no idea they taught girls like you how to kiss like that.”

  “What do you mean ‘girls like me’?” she asked, and okay, if she was being honest, Charlotte had never kissed a man like that before, never understood before Jace that kissing was more than foreplay. With Jace, kissing was as sensual as sex. It wasn’t a side dish or a precursor, he treated it like the main dish. And there was something so intoxicating about that she gave herself over to it.

  “Look at you, baby. You are that woman. Beautiful, classy, put together in all the right ways—don’t look at me like that, I’m not done yet.” He scooted closer, linking their hands and bringing hers to his mouth. “You’re also sexy and funny and sweet and the kind of woman every guy dreams of marrying.”

  Charlotte froze at his words. Waited for the bitterness to creep in, for the anger and frustration she felt whenever she thought of their marriage. Instead she felt connected in a way that was new to her. New to them.

  “I’m also a terrible cook,” she added, afraid that he was about to add perfect to that list. “And I couldn’t carry a tune even if it was in a bag.”

  “Trust me, baby, when I say I know. You can’t bake worth a shit, either.”

  “Hey!” She tried to jerk her hand back but he held it to his lips, pressed a gentle kiss to her palm that had her bones melting. “You love my cinnamon snap cookies.” He made a face that looked like death warmed over and she laughed. “They can’t be that bad.”

  “Worse,” he said. “But you kiss like an angel and have the best ass I have ever had the pleasure of groping.” To prove it he slid his hands around her, getting two palms full and scooted her close, his knees parting to make way for her.

  The boat rocked, a little water sloshing inside, and she froze, afraid it would capsize. Now that she thought about it, this rickety old dingy was one wrong move from toppling. And the water looked cold.

  “And when you’re nervous you do this thing with your lower lip that gets me hard.” His gaze dropped her mouth and held. “Yeah, that right there. You do it when you’re turned on, too.”

  She put her hand to her mouth to cover the tell, but Jace caught her wrist, stopping her before she could finish. He trapped it against his chest, which was so hard she could feel the steady beat through his shirt. “Don’t hide who you are, Charlie. Not from me. Not from anyone.”

  He said it as though it was that easy, as though she could just decide she was ready to be brave and courage would magically appear. And she wanted that, so desperately, because pretending for so long had become exhausting. Confusing.

  “What if I don’t know who I am?” she admitted, because although she was some of the things he mentioned, she didn’t know how to reconcile the person she wanted to be with the person he was describing. She had spent so much of her life trying to be who she thought she should be, she wasn’t sure who she was anymore. All she knew was that she wanted to be that woman he was describing, the woman she saw when she looked through his eyes.

  “Baby, you’re a blonde bombshell with a k
iller rack and mile-long legs who has the heart and the smarts to take over the world. You can fly to the moon, deliver a baby, save a kid’s life, save the town from itself, and still hold court at every party in town. Just so long as you don’t serve those cinnamon snap cookies,” he said, and she tried to laugh past her tight throat.

  “You don’t have to decide who you want to be, you just have to decide what you want to do with all of those superpowers you’ve got in there.” He tapped her chest, right above her melting heart. “So what’s it going to be?”

  In her professional life Charlotte was confident, composed, able to make a life-or-death decision in the blink of an eye. In her personal life she was so afraid of disappointing others that she hesitated to put herself out there. That hesitation left room for doubt in herself and in her ability to make the right choices, and so she sat in limbo. Waiting for her life to begin, too scared to take the first step.

  But Jace was right. If she was going to live without regrets, she needed to be fearless. Channel the woman who kissed her secret crush in the back of his Camaro. Who saw something special and went for it.

  “I want to be all of those things.” She stood up and the boat shifted dangerously under the change in weight distribution. “And more.”

  “Whoa!” Jace gripped the rim of the dingy and tried to balance it out. “If you’re not careful, you’ll rock the boat and we’ll both go in headfirst.”

  Charlotte kicked off one shoe, then the other. Next came her socks. “I’m starting to realize that headfirst is the only way this will work.”

  * * *

  Headfirst worked for him, Jace thought, as Charlotte’s sweater, which was peach and soft-looking with little white buttons going up the center, hit the deck. Because that meant she was standing in the middle of his boat in a bright pink lacy bra, which did nothing to hide the fact that it was cold out, and a pair of hip-hugging jeans.

  She hooked her thumbs into the belt loops of the jeans and, hello, a simple slide down those mile-long legs later and Jace was staring at the sexiest pair of barely-there peekaboo panties. Also bright pink and lace.