Trudy couldn’t help but wonder if this had something to do with Caroline’s aunt. The one who’d committed suicide when she was far too young. The one her family kept a shrine to. Had the decorator’s son killed himself? “I can only imagine.”
Caroline stepped away and reached for a Kleenex, wiping her eyes carefully to make sure her makeup wasn’t running. It was something to focus on other than that nightmare. A simple task, but Trudy knew it helped.
“I can’t…I won’t exploit her pain. That wasn’t what I wanted this story to be. As far as my editor is concerned, La Grange was a dead end. She isn’t here. Maybe they’ll leave her alone.”
“Caroline take a minute. Sit with me. We already have reservations for Saturday. You know what a pain it is to change them.”
Caroline shook her head. “I’ve already called and ordered a car so you don’t have to drive me. It should be here any minute. And I made a new reservation. Your brother can walk and you don’t need me interfering with your time with John so…”
Trudy took a breath and closed the door behind her, leaning against it. “Are you leaving because of the interview or because of what happened between you and Jefferson?”
“He told you?”
Trudy shrugged and bit her upper lip. “Sort of? Or…maybe I heard a crash and a shout and came in accidentally to find a certain tattooed woman in a cowboy hat being rogered by Jefferson.”
Caroline gasped and covered her mouth, staring at Trudy in shock for a moment.
Then Trudy giggled and Caroline’s eyes sparkled with suppressed mirth.
Trudy wasn’t sure who laughed first or loudest, but they were both lying on the bed holding their sides when it was done.
“Damn,” Caroline wheezed. “I was planning on telling you, I swear. You know, like maybe in a year or so.”
“This is me you’re talking to. I would’ve gotten it out of you by dinner and you know it.”
Caroline chuckled again. “Thank you for being such a good friend and not slap-fighting me for ravishing your brother.”
Trudy groaned. “Thank you for never mentioning it again in front of me. Ever. But you know you can tell me. Is that why you’re leaving?”
“Trudy, it’s everything. This place is not for me. I honestly don’t know how you suffered through your formative years.”
“It’s not so bad really.”
Her friend lifted up onto her elbow to study her intently. “Not so bad really? Wait a minute. You hate this place. You hate it so much you haven’t come back since you were legal. You love West Hollywood. The club. Me. Your newly blossoming music career.”
Trudy’s smile was tinged with sadness. “I love you. The rest is window dressing. The kind I’ve never entirely fit into. Even with the label’s offer. Don’t pretend you don’t realize it too.” She sat up. “I’m not saying La Grange is any better, or that I am even thinking of giving up my music. I’m saying maybe it doesn’t matter where you are as much as who you’re with.”
It was a lesson her mother had never learned.
Caroline’s expression showed traces of panic. “I can stay if you let me work on John. I bet I can convince him to move to California by the end of the week. Better yet go on tour with you. I’ll call in a few favors and get a team down here to transfer Troublemaker barbecue sauce out West and make it a household name. We can do this. It’s the two thousandsies. We can have it all.”
Trudy shook her head. “I know him, Caroline. Better now than I ever have. This is his home. His place…you should see it. He wouldn’t leave the life he’s made here behind. He wouldn’t be happy. Besides, he and Jefferson both have already had offers to mass-produce Troublemaker. They turned them down.”
“Well, don’t you dare go all nineteen-fifties on me and tell me you would leave your life. A woman’s life is as important as any man’s.”
“My life…without someone like John? Without someone who makes me feel beautiful and desired? Without someone who wants to protect me and cherish me until I’m old and gray? Is that the life you’re talking about?”
Trudy shrugged, but her throat was tight with emotion. “I’m not even sure why we’re debating this now. I’ve been offered a huge opportunity. Of course I should take it. Besides, he hasn’t said…he didn’t ask me to stay.”
Caroline frowned. “Are you kidding me? What is he waiting for, the rain to fall up?”
The tears on Trudy’s cheeks came as a surprise. “I don’t know,” she said as Caroline pulled her into her arms. “But I do know that…well, if he did ask, I think I might say yes. Find a way to be with him. To make it work.”
“You really love him.” It was more a revelation than a question.
“I really love him.”
“Damn.”
“I know.”
Chapter Nine
John had never experienced the passage of time so keenly. Everywhere he went, every errand he ran for supplies, the ticking of the clock seemed amplified. Every time the sun set he mourned the day’s swift passage. Each minute brought his heart that much closer to splintering in two.
Trudy was leaving tomorrow.
Her friend had left a few days ago and both Trudy and her brother had fallen into a funk. She’d used the injured Jefferson as an excuse not to spend the night with him again. Oh she’d still sleep with him and play with him, still follow his commands, but then she’d pick up her clothes to leave his bed like a cheap one-night stand.
She’d also taken to going for long rides on the older stallion she’d seen being born so long ago, the one she’d named Singer. She never asked John to come along, and when he offered she’d only smile and say she needed time to think.
She was saying goodbye, one distancing action at a time, and the final words would probably break him.
He couldn’t let this last night pass without trying to change her mind.
He opened the door to the kitchen of the main house and stopped abruptly when he realized everyone was there. Glory and Manly were devouring a plate of ribs while Diego handed Jefferson another beer. Jefferson took it absently, staring intently as Trudy pointed at something on the screen of his laptop.
“You have to go there,” she was saying. “Even if you only stay for a weekend. Caroline’s father has a place there. It’s one of the most beautiful coastlines I’ve ever seen.”
Jefferson waggled his brows. “Maybe you can convince her to come with us.”
Trudy snorted. “Keep dreamin’.”
“Oh he will,” Diego said with a smile. “Jefferson is never short on big dreams.”
Glory chuckled. “Brain cells on occasion, but not dreams.”
Faking a scowl, Jefferson told her, “You know I’m the boss of you right?”
“Trudy.” John hadn’t meant the name to come out so forcefully. It silenced the room faster than a gunshot. Every head turned in his direction.
Hell.
“John.” Her smile was subdued, but genuine. “We were hoping you’d join us. Diego made some really amazi—”
“Can we talk in private? I wanted to show you something.”
He watched her look over at her brother, who nodded with an unusual expression on his face. Had they been talking about him? Had Jefferson warned her away?
Trudy stood up and glanced around the table, her smile still subtly bashful around them. John knew why. “See you three later. And Diego, thank you so much for dinner. It’s good to see some men know how to properly feed themselves.” She ruffled her brother’s hair teasingly as she spoke, before turning toward John. “I’m ready to go.”
That’s what he was afraid of.
He held open the door as she walked by him, breathing her in. Trying to hold on to her elusive scent. The scent that was only her. Trudy. Bright and fresh and sexy.
His.
He got behind the wheel of Loco and as soon as her door was closed he shifted gears and started to drive. She would think he was taking her to his house, but that wasn’t h
is plan.
She was staring at him. Say something you idiot, he told himself. Anything. “How soon after you get back does the tour start?”
Not that. Why was he talking about her leaving when all he wanted her to do was stay?
“I don’t know.” Trudy sounded thoughtful. “I haven’t agreed to do it yet. And now? Well, Jefferson made me look at my bank statement yesterday. Apparently I’m comfortable and I should appreciate barbecue sauce more. I was thinking I might take some time and see what feels right. See if the tour is even something I need to do, since so many of my listeners are online. I haven’t stopped working for an actual vacation in my life. I always worked a day job and on my music at night. It might be nice not to have so much on my plate.”
Did that mean she was thinking of staying? “Oh.”
He read every damn night. Kept himself informed. He had a million words at his disposal and all he could say was Oh.
She turned in her seat, bending one leg, making no pretense of not staring. “Are you okay, John? You’re acting strange.”
“I’m fine.”
They rode in silence for long, tense minutes as he drove. When he passed his house, she stopped looking at him and started studying the land around them. He saw the fence line that signaled the end of the property and put the truck in park. “We have to walk from here.”
He’d lifted her over the fence before she spoke again. “Why are we sneaking on to the Giese’s property? You know Tommy, he’ll use the trespassing defense and hunt us down like deer.”
“Tommy ever comes near you again and trespassing’ll be the least of his worries. I think he knows it.”
She reached for his hand. “I love it when you get all macho and protective. So why are we here?”
He walked over to the dug-up earth peppered with orange flags and turned to face her. “The deal Norman was talking about? Jefferson wasn’t selling land because we needed money. We’re buying Norman’s property because he’s getting old, Tommy is good for nothing and we offered him his asking price. He can go live in Topeka with his sister and be happy. Tommy will either move with him or be run out of town on a rail. Either way, he won’t be our neighbor.”
Trudy’s eyes went so wide he almost smiled. God, she was so damn adorable. “You and Jefferson bought more land? The Giese land? It’s so… I mean it was always so…”
“Beautiful? I know. There’s a stream not too far from here, trees as far as the eye can see. And right here I was planning the first outbuilding.”
“Outbuilding?”
John nodded and his stomach clenched. “A little recording studio. The equipment’s been ordered for a while now—they were holding off on delivery until we had the space for building.”
“For you?” She was watching him closely now. “Planning some jazz piano sessions?”
She was trembling. He took both her hands in his, praying he would find the right words. That what he needed to say wouldn’t push her further away. “Troublemaker is doing well. The honey too. Well enough that, while we won’t allow it to be swallowed up by a monster company, we do realize we need to hire some new employees to keep up with the demand. They’ll need a place to stay. We can do that. We can do a lot of things, including regular flights to Los Angeles to see your brother. Caroline. Your friends at the club. Or regular flights for you to come back in between your tour stops, if that’s what you want. We’ll be able to afford to do whatever we want.”
He took a breath. “It’s for you, Trudy. It always has been. Isn’t it plain? The house by the pond with the music room. The damn logo on the sauce. It’s always been about you. I’ve always been waiting and I’ll keep doing it as long as you need me to. For you.”
She opened her mouth but before she could turn him down he kept talking. “And I know the town isn’t your idea of excitement. I know you’ll want to travel. Or maybe there will be more tours. I want that too, as long as I know you’ll be with me. I also know I sound insane. Obsessed. But that’s the truth. I am obsessed. I’ll do whatever it takes to make you happy.”
Trudy’s smile was a beautiful thing to behold. It gave him hope. “So would I be wrong if I thought the reason you’re obsessed, the reason everything you’ve done has been for me, might be because you love me?”
He uttered a sound of frustration. “Hell, haven’t you been listening to me, woman? Yes, I love you. I love you more than I have ever loved anyone or anything in my life. I’ve never been as happy as I have these last few weeks, not since you left. I want to grow old with you, and travel or not, have babies or not…as long as you’re with me, as long as I know you’re coming back to me, I’ll be home.”
She stepped away from his touch and dropped her hands to the hem of her T-shirt, pulling it over her head, leaving her in nothing but her shorts and the sheer black bra he loved.
“What are you doing?”
“Christening the recording studio,” she laughed. “I love you too, John. When I said it the other night and you didn’t say it back I thought the worst.”
“I didn’t want to hold you to something you said in the heat of the moment,” he muttered, moving closer to her as she slipped off her pants and unhooked her bra. “You know this isn’t officially our property yet.”
She scoffed. “Would the Big Bad and his gal Trouble let something like trespassing stop them from having a good time?”
The smile warmed his chest, filled him with joy before it reached his lips. “Probably not.”
When she was naked, Trudy held out her arms and bounced. Just once. Just for him. “Are you going to take me? I belong to you, you know.”
He tore off his clothes faster than he’d thought possible, stopping only long enough to grab the condom in his wallet. “No one has ever belonged to me before.”
“I guess there’s a first time for everything.”
John took her down to the ground, lying on his back with his hands on her hips as she rode him, his heated gaze unable to choose between the love shining in her eyes…and the breasts bobbing with every rock of her hips.
“Hey buddy, my eyes are up here.” Her words were breathless with need and laughter.
He sat up and pressed her chest to his, groaning as he kissed her, their tongues tangling, lips nibbling. Hungry for each other. Always.
Her moans grew louder and John used his strength to guide her body up and down his cock. Faster and harder until they were both moaning, both dying for release.
“Tell me again, baby,” he murmured against her mouth. “Tell me and I’ll let you come.”
“Oh God, John.” She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, her neck arching as he pumped her against his hips. “God yes. I’m yours. I love you. I belong to you.”
“Love you. Trudy I love you so—fuck.” Those words, her tight sex, threw him over the edge. She came with him, no doubt realizing he was too far gone to give his permission for anything.
They held each other for a long time afterward, caressing and kissing everywhere they could reach. Whispering plans.
A small part of John still doubted this could be happening. That it was real. “You won’t miss living in California?”
Trudy rested her forehead on his. “I’ll miss Caroline. I think you might have to suffer through a visit or two to California so I can visit my best friend. But there is no place I could miss more than I’d miss being like this with you. It took coming back to realize how much I’d changed. This town might be small, but it can’t be all bad if Big Bad John calls it home.”
“You’ll never regret it,” he swore. “So we’re agreed? Our two-week arrangement has been extended?”
Trudy chuckled, and his cock stirred at the sound. He would never get enough of her. “That depends, sir. How long—exactly—did you want the extension to be?”
“Fifty years might do the trick. Sixty if we eat our vegetables and get enough exercise.”
“Ha. I don’t think exercise is going to be a problem.” She untangled herse
lf from his embrace and stood, bending over to grab her clothes.
Then she started to run.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“To the pond,” she called back. “I want to be wild and go skinny-dipping. Try to keep up. If you’re fast enough you can pin me down again.”
Feeling like the kid who’d finally gotten everything he wanted for Christmas, John gathered his clothes and started running after her. And once he caught her he wouldn’t let her go until they’d finalized their new negotiations. He wanted to start the next fifty years off right. Wanted to make sure she was bound up in this promise tighter than any knot he could tie.
One that came with a ring.
Trudy was his. She always had been. And she was finally home to stay.
Keep reading for a Bonus Excerpt from Burn With Me,
R.G.’s newest Series from Samhain Publishing, coming out August 27th!
Available Now for Pre-order!
Plus Excerpts from Truly Scrumptious, Three for Me?, Four for Christmas, and Marley in Chains. Available Now!
Coming Soon: Burn With Me
By R. G. Alexander
From Samhain Publishing
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Fireborne, Book 1
Aziza Jane Stewart is living on borrowed time, and making a few mistakes in London seems like a good way to go out with a bang. But when two compelling strangers draw her into an ancient conflict, she realizes her curse isn’t about death at all…it’s about the power within her.
The sexy giant following her says he can smell trouble on her skin, the smokeless fire and magic of the demons he was born and bred to hunt. Brandon may be an enforcer, but his reaction to her is anything but adversarial. Ram, her new Jinn shadow, will do whatever it takes to come between them, and he’s just as hard for Aziza to resist.
Big Bad John (Bigger in Texas Series) Page 13