Sweet Mercy

by Jean Brashear

  He chuckled. “The town’s also a little short on good gossip right now.”

  “The two of us showing up together will fix that.”

  “I planned to go somewhere else.”

  “Oh.” Her grin faded. “Of course.”

  He stepped closer. “That’s not why. I just assumed you’d enjoy something besides Lorena’s or the Dairy Queen.”

  “Sure.” A new smile, somewhat forced. “That’s nice of you.”

  He’d hurt her. Was that his fate from now on? To hurt women who deserved better? “I’m not nice, Jezebel. But I don’t set out to be a bastard, either. There’s a place in Tyler that might not be Manhattan but is much more interesting than anything here.” He clenched his jaw. “But if you’d rather hit Lorena’s so that I can prove I’m not ashamed to be seen with you, then Lorena’s it is.”

  She tossed that godforsaken mane, and her hands fisted at her waist. “I’ve never been to Manhattan, but I’m also no fool, except perhaps for taking you up on this invitation. But I can’t recall the last time I enjoyed a meal out, so you’re on, buster.” Before he could find a response, she’d snapped her fingers imperiously. “Let’s go, Rufus.”

  The Amazon queen had chosen to reappear.

  All Gamble could do was watch as she punched the accelerator and zipped off.

  But at the gate, her brake lights flared. Jezebel threw open the door and seemed embarrassed. “Some exit. I forgot to put up the hoses and tools.”

  Gamble waved her off. “I’ve got it. See you in a couple of hours.”

  She said something he couldn’t quite make out as she left.

  Then it hit him. You are too a nice person.

  Gamble shook his head and found a laugh.

  And went to clean up Jezebel’s mess.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  INSANE.

  She was completely, irretrievably bonkers for ever agreeing to this, Jezebel realized as she stood in front of her closet with twenty minutes left, attempting to figure out what on earth to wear for this…not-date. Why hadn’t she asked for details, even the most basic clues?

  Because he’d been a breath away from changing his mind. Honesty demanded that she admit that.

  Why hadn’t she let him? What kind of masochist was she?

  Six-forty-two.

  She chewed at her lip, trying to recall when she’d last been this nervous.

  Someone banged on her door.

  She shrieked and grabbed the nearest hanger. Yanked off the red slip dress and slicked it over her head. “Just a minute,” she called out. She fumbled for shoes, then dropped the first ones. Green heels, uh, no. It wasn’t Christmas.

  Another knock. “I said—Oh, never mind,” she muttered. “He’ll just have to wait while I come back in and search some more.” She nearly tripped over Rufus and paused to soothe him. “I’m fine,” she told herself. “Calm, I swear it.”

  Even the dog knew she was lying. She yanked open the door. “You’re early—”

  It wasn’t Gamble.

  “I thought you were resting.” Darrell’s expression was thunderous. He held out a plate. “I made you supper.”

  “Oh. I, uh—”

  “She’s going out with me.” Gamble appeared behind Darrell.

  If Darrell’s eyebrows drew any closer together, they’d link. “You’re not sick.”

  “I didn’t exactly say…”

  “You told me you needed the night off. You never take time for yourself.”

  “She’s doing it now,” Gamble said. “You got a problem with it?”

  Darrell’s glare grew to encompass the other man. “Yeah. Jezebel don’t date, and she shouldn’t begin with you.”

  She waited for Gamble to protest that it wasn’t a date.

  He didn’t. “I believe that’s between Jezebel and me. Could have sworn you’re married.”

  With a rumble, Darrell moved to close the distance between them.

  Gamble didn’t back down.

  She darted between them. “Guys. Chill.” She turned to Darrell. “I didn’t lie to you. I do need a night off. You’re always telling me I work too hard.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  She cut him off. “So are you withdrawing your offer?”

  “Wouldn’t have made it if I’d had a clue you were going out with him.”

  “We’re not going out. We’re just—”

  Gamble slipped an arm around her waist. “What we are is none of his business.”

  Darrell’s nostrils flared, but she was too shaken by Gamble’s gesture to gather her wits and clarify.

  Even if she’d been sure what, exactly, she and Gamble were.

  “Told you before, you hurt her, and you answer to me,” Darrell said. “I understand a man grieving. I’d be lost without my Shirley. But Jezebel deserves better than a rebound.”

  Gamble’s grip tightened. His face was frozen in lines of strain. He didn’t answer, which was telling. He was, of course, on the rebound.

  But there was much more to him that Darrell didn’t see.

  “Darrell, I’m lucky to count you as my friend. I mean that.” And she did. “But you have to trust that I know what I’m doing.”

  His piercing gaze finally switched from Gamble to her. “Do you?” he challenged.

  No. I’m completely insane. He is going to hurt me.

  “Yes,” she answered. She mustered every ounce of conviction she could summon.

  Darrell shook his head sadly. “I disagree, but you ain’t listening.” His shoulders settled. “I got to get back.” He turned to go.

  She grabbed his arm. Kissed his cheek. “Thank you, my friend,” she whispered. “I might not be obeying, but I do hear you.”

  He sighed. “Guess that’s the best I can hope for right now.” He cast one more glare at Gamble. “The girl’s got plenty of folks who’ll be watching you, my man. Best do right by her.”

  Gamble’s jaw flexed, but he nodded. “I’m trying.”

  Clearly unconvinced, Darrell waved and ambled off.

  Leaving Jezebel staring after him as she wondered what she’d gotten herself into.

  “You look amazing.”

  She jolted. Glanced down. “I’m barefoot,” she observed.

  “I noticed. Cute toes.”

  Her head jerked up. His face was still drawn, but he was making an effort to get past the awkwardness.

  “My feet are too big to be cute.”

  “You have this ‘big’ complex, don’t you?”

  “Try being the girl so tall she has to stand on the back row with the boys in seventh grade…and she towers over all of them.”

  He grinned. “You’re shorter than me.”

  “Not that much. Most men find that intimidating.”

  He snorted. “Do I look intimidated?”

  She took her time scanning.

  Nope. What he looked was…hot. Black slacks and black T-shirt accentuated his shaggy black hair and framed those startling blue eyes. “I guess not.”

  “What I am is hungry. You have shoes, right?”

  “Somewhere.”

  His eyes warmed. “Why don’t you get them, and we’ll get this whatever-it-is on the road.”

  “Not a date,” she said.

  “Not yet,” he answered.

  Jezebel’s heart knocked hard within her chest. Speechless for one of the rare times in her life, she chose to scamper inside and simply grab her shoes.

  * * *

  AT HIS BEST, Gamble was aware that he’d never been what anyone would consider a conversationalist; however, he found his tongue all but frozen to the top of his mouth now. Usually, Jezebel required no help summoning words; she generally had enough for both of them.

  Tonight, though, the drive was silent.

  “Sorry I only have this truck,” he finally said.

  “What?” She dragged herself from her thoughts. “Oh.” She waved off his concern and smiled faintly. “I’m not a car snob.” When it seemed she might fal
l quiet once more, she made a second effort. “My requirements from a vehicle are simply that it run and have a radio.”

  “What about heater? A/C?”

  She shrugged. “Nope, music first. I can put on or take off clothes. Um—” She cast a sideways glance. “I mean, you know…well, I mean I didn’t mean…”

  For someone so dazzling, she was actually a little goofy. He grinned. “I didn’t read anything into your words just because you were once a stripper.”

  “You could really make some sense of that?”

  His smile widened. “It wouldn’t be the first time you babbled around me, Jezebel.” And he began to relax a little. She was talking now. Everything would work out.

  “I do not babble.” She faced the front and crossed her arms.

  “You do. Which is strange, in and of itself, as you’re the most terrifyingly resourceful, practical person I’ve ever met.”

  “I am not—” Her gaze whipped to him. “I am?”

  “Yes. I can’t say I like it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m not very damn comfortable lusting after a schoolmarm.”

  Her eyes were lasers now. He nearly groaned. From the echoing silence, he could tell he had her full and complete attention. The atmosphere in the cab of the truck grew dense. Thick with more than he could sort out.

  At last, she sniffed. “I’m hardly a schoolmarm. I’m barely educated.”

  “Doesn’t matter. Anyway, you’re as smart as anyone I’ve encountered.”

  Her jaw dropped. Then she bit her bottom lip, and he wanted to groan for a different reason.

  She faced front again, then wheeled back. “Really? You see me as smart?”

  “You don’t?”

  She stared at him for a long time. “No one has ever said that to me in my whole life,” she said softly.

  Inside him, warmth spread. “Doesn’t mean I’m wrong.” He glanced over, to see wonder stealing across her features. “Don’t you consider yourself an intelligent woman?” he repeated.

  Her voice was dreamy when she answered, “I guess I do.”

  She fell quiet again, but now, the silence didn’t feel so lonely.

  * * *

  THE PLACE he’d brought her to wasn’t swank or fussy; it was a blues joint that happened to serve great food, as well. More than half the faces were black and more than a few were old, life’s rough roads carved on their skin. She could read so much by simply watching their heads nod to the lyrics, their gnarled fingers tap out the soulful beat.

  When the band took a break, she and Gamble talked. She discovered a man with a wide range of interests. He might have lived most of his years in a tiny town, but his artistic vision and, she would guess, the severity of Charlotte’s health problems had given him insights beyond his age. In some ways, Gamble was an old man masquerading as a young buck… except the forces of nature and of his own body were conspiring to remind him that he was not ready for his twilight years. He was a male in his prime.

  And prime he definitely was. Sitting at a small table, their chairs only inches apart, she was intensely aware of Gamble as a man. A sexual being. She had to forcibly restrain herself from leaning toward him, a moon drawn into a sun’s orbit, though the gravitational forces would inevitably destroy it.

  She was not in his league. He was on the verge of real fame, not a small-town boy anymore. He might have spent his earlier life certain that Three Pines held all he needed, but she had to wonder how long he would have been content, even had Charlotte lived.

  Maybe his devotion to her would have kept him rooted there forever, but the fact remained that now he was a free agent, and a very talented one at that. All too soon, he would move on to the bigger stage, where he belonged.

  Her fantasy might be that vine-covered cottage with babies and puppies, but he was destined for more.

  He glanced at her just then and leaned nearer to whisper in her ear. “You okay?”

  Was she? She had a lump in her throat for what might have been, but he’d been right when he said she was practical to her core. She summoned a smile. “Yes. The music’s wonderful.”

  “Would you like to dance?”

  She remembered their first night. First dance. What had happened next.

  You’re playing with fire, girl.

  Probably. But I’ll have memories when he’s gone.

  “Yes,” she answered. “I believe I do.”

  * * *

  THEIR FIRST DANCE hadn’t lasted long, Gamble thought as he drew her into his arms. They’d gone from zero to hot sex with blinding speed. He planned to make this dance different.

  He couldn’t say exactly why they were on a date tonight, except that the longer he spent around Jezebel Hart, a woman he was so sure he’d pegged clearly at the start, the more he realized he had yet to discover about her. Her physical appearance smacked a guy in the head and left his ears ringing; it was a continuing surprise to find out what you saw on the surface was only the merest fraction of who she was.

  And he was dogged by the sense that they’d gotten this whole relationship backward.

  She really was, despite her protests and her past, more Victorian maiden than libertine. Maybe she had learned to use her body’s stun value as a tool or a defense, even a weapon, but the inner Jezebel was, in some ways, a prude.

  She was also a scrapper. And fascinating as hell.

  He was hard-pressed to credit what appealed to him most. Though she, like most women, he suspected, would balk at being called sturdy, that was exactly what Jezebel was, much like his mother, now that he considered it, and Lily, too. Realizing that he didn’t have to be on guard every second, after all those years of vigilance, was a huge relief, though to admit so pained him.

  But that didn’t mean that Jezebel was bulletproof. Her bossy manner hid a very tender heart. She deserved romance; what he’d gleaned about her earlier life told him she’d had little of it.

  The mournful, bluesy notes wrapped around them, and he heard Jezebel sigh.

  So he pulled her closer and let the music take over.

  * * *

  THE SILENCE in the truck on the way back hummed a different tune, more comfortable because they’d found much to like about each other, but also buzzing with the remembered feel of body against body, of curves brushed against angles. Palms transmitting the messages their voices feared to say.

  When he stopped in front of her door, he was grateful to note the bar shut down for the night and Darrell gone. He didn’t want the harsh glare of her self-appointed bodyguard to pierce the evening’s soft glow.

  In some ways, Gamble was more nervous than he’d ever been in his life, however absurd that might seem, given that they’d already been physically intimate with each other. That he was hardly inexperienced.

  But this night was different.

  For the first time since he’d been widowed, he would not simply have sex. Instead, he would make love.

  For Jezebel’s sake, he was intent on doing it right, but he had no idea what that meant.

  The dome light flared, and he realized that she was exiting. “Wait.”

  When she faced him, her eyes were huge. In them, he could see how unsettled she herself felt, and her comprehension of his disquiet. Somehow, through all their missteps, they had learned some things about each other. Had become friends, yes.

  But more than friends. He cared about Jezebel. He waited for the usual guilt to assault him, surprised to discover only twinges of it present.

  He thought she might care about him, too, and that should make his next move easier.

  It didn’t.

  She smiled sadly at his protracted silence. “It’s okay, Gamble. Really.” She slid from the seat. “I had a good time. Thank you.”

  “So did I.” Another gaping lull in conversation.

  “Maybe—”

  “Don’t assume—”

  They’d spoken at once.

  “Ladies first.” He gestured to her. />
  She lifted one shoulder. “I was only going to assure you that this doesn’t obligate you to anything. It was a lovely evening, but I recognize that it wasn’t really a date.”

  Unexpected anger surged. “What if I would like it to be one?”

  She seemed startled. “Do you?”

  He broke the connection. Stared out the windshield. Wondered.

  “Right,” she said. The door clicked shut faintly, and she crossed in front of the headlights. Pulled her key from her bag.

  She would let him go. Would demand nothing of him because she was so damn kind and generous. Defender of the weak, champion of lost causes—

  He leaped from the driver’s side. Bridged the distance in a few long strides. Clasped her arm and whirled her around.

  “I don’t have all the answers,” he growled. “I don’t know what the hell to do with my life or my cottage or much else, but I am sure of one thing, Jezebel.” Ruthlessly, he steadied his free hand, then tipped her chin up.

  Her eyes were wet. He’d made her cry again, damn it.

  Her frame shivered, but she forced it straight.

  Her courage shamed him.

  “I—” He swallowed. “I’m not good at words, Jezebel, but I wish I were. For the first time in longer than I can remember, this big hole inside me isn’t so huge anymore. Somehow you’re responsible.”

  He glanced away, then back. “I refuse to be one of your charity cases, but—” He stopped, seeking a path through the jumble.

  “But what?” she prompted.

  He made himself to meet her gaze. “I don’t want to leave tonight.”

  Her lashes swept down, hiding her thoughts.

  Then up. “You don’t have to.” She held out her hand.

  Gratefully, he took it. She turned. Stuck the key in the lock.

  “Jezebel.”

  She halted.

  “This is different. From before.”

  She nodded. “I believe you.”

  “I don’t…I can’t promise—”

  She revolved, smothered his words with her fingers. “You don’t have to,” she whispered.