by Maria Luis
“I don’t even want to know.”
“It rejuvenates the skin cells.” Without warning, she reached out and traced the side of his face, making his cock twitch in his pants. “Did you ever have a beard like your twin?”
“Like Owen?” How was she talking about his brother when he was still picturing her in the mud pit, buck-ass naked? Get your mind out of the gutter. “No—” He cleared his throat after hearing the guttural tinge to his voice. “I mean, last time I had the opportunity to grow a beard, I was twenty years old and about to join the police academy.”
“So you had one then?” Her voice piqued with curiosity, and she slipped off her tennis shoes to draw her socked feet onto the seat.
“I wish. No matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t grow one. Guess Owen got all the beard genes in the family.”
“You’ve got stubble.”
Gage let out a low chuckle. “You really know how to make a guy feel good about himself, don’t you.”
It wasn’t a question, and she didn’t treat it as one. She simply linked her arms around her shins, and dropped her cheek to her knees. Staring at him.
He wondered what she saw.
At the same time, he didn’t want to know.
When she spoke, the husky timbre of her voice reminded him of warm, lazy summer days. “You don’t strike me as the type of guy who likes false flattery.”
She’d certainly gotten the read on him. Not that he’d tell her that. “Every guy likes a little sweet talkin’ now and again.”
“You’re not from here.”
Gage tapped the steering wheel with his palm, internally debating with how much he wanted to reveal. From the way Lizzie stared at him openly, she expected some sort of answer. He reached for his LSU ball cap that sat on the dashboard and settled it over his head. “It’s complicated.”
“Depending on where we’re going, we have time.”
He was taking her to the Barataria Preserve, south of the city, a section of sanctioned land that remained nearly untouched by man. It was a place he often went to think, to get away from the grit and glitz of New Orleans. He’d figured that it was nothing at all like what Lizzie was used to; she didn’t seem the sort to leave New Orleans, unless it was to go somewhere fancy, like Vegas or L.A.
He wanted to strip her down. Pull back the layers and discover who she really was, beyond the white-toothed grins she gave her viewers. After delivering the warrant over in Central City, and talking to her brother, Gage had gone home and pulled up her YouTube channel.
Six million followers.
Gage didn’t even know six hundred people.
The videos were all kitschy—Chit Chat Get Ready with Me, or Hit or Miss Products from the Drugstore! or his least favorite, Fall Glam Date Night Tutorial. The day she’d come in to Inked had been the same day the latter video had been uploaded, and he hated thinking those plum-painted lips of hers were intended for someone else.
What had stuck out to him the most, however, was the fact that in every single video, Lizzie Danvers looked . . . unhappy. The glitter may have coated her eyelids, but her blue eyes didn’t gleam one bit.
Which brought him to . . . this, the Preserve, his choice of escape.
Hell if he knew if it’d help her at all. There was a pretty damn good chance she’d step out of the truck, note the bugs buzzing in the air, and demand her immediate return to New Orleans like the princess he accused her of being.
“Gage?”
Her soft voice snapped him back into reality. “Grew up in Hackberry, Louisiana.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard of it.”
He cracked a grin as he pulled off Lafitte Larose Highway and onto a narrow, winding road framed by large pine trees. “Most people haven’t. It’s past Lake Charles. Maybe an hour or so from the Louisiana-Texas border.”
“No wonder you don’t sound N’Orleans in the slightest. More Texas twang than anything else.”
He wasn’t sure if he should feel offended by that or not. “I haven’t lived in Hackberry in fourteen years, and even before that . . . Hackberry was a Monday through Friday deal, that’s it. The rest of the time I was here in the city.”
She laughed, and the sweet sound squeezed his lungs. “You’re a first-class mutt, Gage,” she teased, then grabbed the camera off the console. “Just like me.”
“Yeah?” He quirked a brow. “Don’t think I ever saw you in Hackberry. I’d remember.”
“Funny.” The camera made a quiet whirring sound, as though she’d turned it on. “No, but really. Grew up in Bayou St. John, right in the heart of N’Orleans. In my teens, we moved to the West Bank, which, I’ll have you know, is the best Bank.”
“You live on the Best Bank now?” Not that he was fishing for information or anything like that.
“Well, no.”
Gage pulled into a small cut-off that led to an empty parking lot. It was a Tuesday morning, and most people were at work, except for the two of them; Lizzie clearly made her own schedule and Gage wasn’t due in to the station until six that night. He had a few hours to wander in the wilderness, especially since he’d told Owen he wasn’t coming in today.
He parked the truck and turned to Lizzie. “The first time I met someone from the West Bank, he called it the Wank.”
Her pretty features cringed, and she bit her lower lip. “A Wanker,” she said with a slow nod. “I imagine the name spread a bit like the plague. One person started using it, and the next thing everyone knew, Wankers were taking over the streets, the jobs, the school systems.”
“Like the apocalypse?”
“Exactly like the apocalypse.”
Gage leaned in to mock-whisper, “I hear The Walking Dead ratings are dipping. Maybe we should let the show’s producers know to come down to N’Orleans for a reboot?”
For a moment, she only stared at him, her mouth pursed in a clear fight against a grin. And then she lost it, and Jesus, her laughter was the sexiest sound he’d ever heard.
He turned to her, resting his forearm on the top of the steering wheel. “If you play nice, I’ll make sure you’re cast in the lead Wanker role.”
That finished her off.
She clutched her belly, camera cradled against her chest, her forehead kissing her bent knees. “I can’t,” she choked out, “I can’t.”
“You’d be great,” Gage told her smoothly. “We’d get you your own star on that star street over in Hollywood. What do they call it again?”
“The Walk of Fame?”
“Yeah, that.”
She broke off into another peel of laughter, and Gage felt the absurd need to puff out his chest. He’d done that, making her laugh, wiping away the unhappiness in her eyes with pure, Wanker joy.
It’s going to be the best thirty days of my life.
Especially once he got Lizzie Danvers in his bed, preferably for more than a single night.
When her laughter faded into silence, she glanced over at him. “Does S.O.D. know how weird you are?”
“Trust me, princess, you gotta be a little weird to do what I do.”
8
Gage was charming.
Some might say too charming, but Lizzie rather thought he was just right.
The ancient wooden plank-boards creaked under their weight as they entered one of the few trails within the Preserve. The walkway was hardly wider than Lizzie’s arm span, raised above the murky, green water by no more than two feet, and the bayou surrounded them fully. Cypress trees rose up like skyscrapers, shielding the sky and the sun from view; the swampy water bubbled with frogs playing hide-and-seek with the lily pads. It was beautiful and earthy and Lizzie was determined to find them an alligator today.
Just one.
Although she stuck to humans with Naked You, she often took photos of nature just for herself. Her apartment was cluttered with prints, and her walls were a mosaic of architecture, naked bodies, and flat pastureland.
“So, how are we going to do this?”
Her four-figure Canon clicked, snapping a photo of a Cypress tree split down the middle, and Lizzie lowered the camera. “What do you mean?”
Gage’s strides were twice the length of hers, and he slowed his pace so she could close the distance between them. “Our first date,” he said, drawing her gaze down to his hands when he slipped his fingers into the pockets of his military-style cargo shorts. “Are you going to film us having fun? Should I throw you over my shoulder and pretend to toss you into the swamp?”
The dating challenge. Right. How could she forget?
Except that she had, for just a little bit. Gage Harvey made it easy to forget everything that wasn’t him. He commanded attention, both because of his looks and also because he had an air of authority about him. No doubt they’d taught him that back at S.O.D. school, along with how to drive fast.
Her stomach still felt a little queasy thanks to his maniac driving skills.
“I think we can leave out the part about tossing me into the water, thanks.” The bayou was pretty, but Lizzie didn’t particularly want to be doused in it. “I guess we could head back to the benches we spotted a few minutes ago. Maybe take a photo, do a quick livestream. You can turn on your charming behavior.”
“You look . . .” He stepped close, something she’d noticed he tended to do frequently. At first, she’d thought he wanted to intimidate her with his size. And maybe that had a little bit of truth to it because each time he approached and entered her space, Lizzie couldn’t stifle the sound of her breathing quickening, nor the way her face instantly tipped up to meet his. Always, his full lips lifted in a sexy grin, like he knew exactly what effect he had on her.
Now was no different.
Her heart picked up pace when his chest came within inches of hers. His baseball cap was tugged down low, and all she could see were shadows and the hard cut of his jawline and the sharp ridge of his nose.
“I look like what?” Breathless. She sounded so very breathless.
“Like you need to be charmed.”
She wasn’t prepared for his sneak attack. Thick arms wrapped around her backside, hauling her off the walkway and up into the air over his right shoulder.
With quick hands, she made a grab for her camera and clutched the strap with tight fingers. Don’t let go, don’t let go, don’t let go.
Her squeak mingled with the chirping birds and the soft swaying of the tree branches, though her demanding, “Put me down!” went ignored by the tattooed god who carried her.
Instead, the jerk only strolled down the raised planks as though he had all the time in the world.
His voice reverberated through her chest and stomach when he asked, “How’s the world look down there?”
She stared at his ass. “Full.”
Chuckling, he reached up to pat her butt. “Same here, princess, same here. Tell me, you think this would make for an excellent selfie? What do you think the caption would be?”
“New Orleans Police Officer Mistaken for Louisiana Tarzan.”
“Hmm, a possibility.” Her stomach bounced against his shoulder as he readjusted her weight. “I was thinking something more romantic, something along the lines of . . . When a Man Sweeps a Woman Off Her Feet.”
“Too literal.” Would it be odd if she palmed his butt, just to see if it was as firm as it looked? “Maybe, Man Tempts Woman with a Dip in the Bayou?”
“Now who’s being literal? I’m exposing you to a different world out here, princess. Expanding your experiences. What’s one thing you’ve always wanted to try?”
“Doggy-style.”
He stumbled.
She almost wouldn’t have believed it had she not been tossed like a sheep over his shoulder, but, thanks to her position, she had a prime vantage point to watch it all go down. Literally. The toe of his right tennis shoe hitting an uneven bend in the wooden plank; his attempt to save his balance, but her weight was too heavy, too lopsided on his body, and . . .
There was nothing she could do.
Nothing but shout, “Save the camera!”
And then down they tumbled, a tangle of limbs and four-letter words.
Gage landed first, a grunt bursting from his lips, somehow managing to twist their bodies so he took the brunt of the fall. Lizzie met the water stomach-first with a cliché splash! Splash!
His toned stomach acted like a buoy, stopping her fall.
Not that it helped much.
Her face kissed the green water, her nose, eyes, and mouth submerging beneath, just as her legs struck something hard. A Cypress root—she hoped.
Rich, masculine laughter greeted her when she jolted upward. The bayou was a foot deep, maybe two, but the fall had succeeded in dampening all of Gage’s clothes. His gray shirt was plastered to his chest, molding over his powerful frame and tantalizing her with shadows of all the inked artwork beneath the fabric. Droplets of water clung to his arms, his neck, to the rugged stubble on his face.
He looked like something out of a commercial for body soap.
Meanwhile, she had a sneaking suspicion that she could currently pass for the Swamp Monster.
“I think I may have swallowed some of the water,” Lizzie muttered, planting her hands on his hard stomach to leverage herself up onto her knees.
He laughed only harder, chin tipping back, eyes squeezed shut under the brim of his LSU hat.
“You can stop laughing now.”
Wrong thing to say.
He gripped her arms, drawing her over his lap with a tug and a pull. Lizzie was average in height, average in weight, but he managed to make her feel as light as a feather. Stop liking it so much.
Impossible.
“You’ve got something . . .” He lifted a hand and brushed her wet hair back from her face. “It looks like a caterpillar.”
Oh, God, would the humiliation never end?
“Please take it—”
He pulled back, and there, pinched between his index finger and his thumb, was her false eyelash.
It was official.
Her humiliation was complete.
Lizzie dropped her head to his wet shoulder. His clean scent had been masked with the smell of swamp, but considering that she smelled just as funky, well, it seemed a little ridiculous to issue a complaint. Instead, she asked, “Did my camera make it?”
With an arm around her waist like a band, he leaned them backward and his chin shifted across her head. “You’re lucky as all hell. It’s on the walkway, along with your backpack and everything we had in it.”
“It’s called karma. I let you have some of my coffee, and therefore my belongings were saved. Coffee unites the fallen.”
His chest expanded with a quiet chuckle, and Lizzie felt the brush of his chest against hers. No bra. She was small enough upstairs to go without one most days, and no matter the fact that they were sitting in dirty swamp water, her nipples were hard. Hard enough that if he glanced down, he’d see twin peaks poking at her shirt.
And that, officially, would be the end of her.
This is what happens when you ditched your padded bras.
A few years back, those add-two-cup sizes types of bras had been her best friend. Seriously, greatest investment ever—until an ex had mentioned that her chest was false advertisement. 34C in the streets and a 34A in the sheets.
“You good?”
Lizzie’s head snapped up at the sound of his voice. “Yup! Yup, so good. All set. I’m going to get up now. Maybe pretend that none of this happened and—”
She screeched.
Loudly.
Shrilly.
And clung to Gage’s body like a stripper on her first day on the job.
His arms locked around her back, drawing her so close to his chest she felt the tempo of his heart against her breastbone. “What? What is it?”
Her eyes slammed shut. “Something . . . slithered against my leg. It felt scaly.”
A small pause. Then, “Like a gator?”
“I don’t know
.” Her throat worked with a hard, nervous swallow. “Maybe.”
With one arm still wrapped around her, Gage dove his other valiantly into the water.
Like a hero.
Her hero.
Thank God for the nation’s first responders.
“Princess?”
Another hard swallow. Her fingers dug into the muscular balls of his shoulders. “Yes?”
“I found your gator.”
Her gaze tracked from his chest to his arm to his hand, and in it . . . a stick.
A wet stick, but a stick nonetheless.
Anxious laughter climbed her throat. “I think we’re done for the day.”
That big hand of his spread, fingers clutching her soaked shirt. “Pretty sure we’ve yet to take a photo documenting today’s date. Don’t let me down.”
“Now?” she said. “You want to take that photo now when we look like something out of a Brother’s Grimm fairytale?”
Without warning, he boosted her onto the raised pathway, setting her on her rear as he straightened and stretched. “Livestream,” he announced, “we’re totally doing this as a livestream.”
Absolutely, one-hundred percent no.
She told him just that, emphatically.
“You need to live a little, Lizzie.” Shaking his hands dry, Gage dropped to his haunches and unzipped her backpack. His purple LSU hat was the only part of him that wasn’t soaked and tinged green like Apple Jack’s cereal. A hat, which he twisted to the back. And then he flashed her a brilliant smile.
Dammit, he was too good-looking to reject.
Lizzie dragged her feet onto the planks.
Squish. Squish. Squish.
“I’m pretty sure you told me to expand my experiences twenty minutes ago, before I went head over heels into the bayou . . . that you promised not to toss me into.”
He lifted her cell phone from the backpack with a little wave and an exuberant hooah, reminding her immediately of her friend Anna’s husband, Luke, who’d been a lifer in the army before a career-ending injury. “Let’s do this.”
Lizzie snagged the phone from him. “I hate you. Just so you know.”