She fit right in, Brenna thought. And Grant seemed to like having his sister around, which was nice, too. Elise did spend a lot of time at the ranch lately, but that was to be expected, Brenna supposed. She just hoped Elise didn’t accompany her back to the ranch today, because she was feeling mighty amorous in her cute spanky panties, and the guys were all out on runs with clients . . . which meant that she and Grant would have the lodge entirely to themselves.
And they hadn’t quite christened the shed yet. The kitchen, yes. Grant’s desk, yes. Her desk, oh yes. The sofa? Yep. But not the shed. Seemed a crime to not include it.
“All right,” Elise said, brandishing a long, thin stick at her. A shish kebab skewer. “I’m going to need you to hold this.”
Brenna frowned at it, curious. “What am I supposed to do with it?”
Elise stuck a hot dog on the end of the skewer. “Bend over and pretend to eat that.”
Brenna eyed it, then Elise. “You dirty, dirty girl. I like the way you think.” She winked and leaned over, flipping her skirt up so her panties were on full display, and pretended like she was about to take a bite out of the hot dog. In the background, she could hear Miranda giggling.
“Perfect,” Elise said, and put out a hand. “Now hold that pose.”
“And don’t deep throat it,” Miranda called out helpfully. “It’s not Grant.”
“Of course not,” Brenna called back. “It’s much too tiny. Grant’s got a lot more meat on his hot dog.”
Behind the camera, Elise made a gagging sound.
Brenna just grinned and slid her tongue out as if to lick the frank poised against her lips.
• • •
Brenna pulled Grant’s car up to the main lodge and pulled the bag of hot dogs out of the seat. Water was leaking from the opened package, and she winced at the sight of the droplets on the leather. She looked around for a napkin, didn’t find one, and shrugged and headed out of the car. She’d be back to wipe it later, or Grant’d be wondering why his lovely Audi smelled like wieners. A hot dog cookout for dinner sounded nice, though, so she’d taken the extras home.
She was still dressed in the pinup girl outfit, though most of her thick lipstick was gone. They’d gotten some fun shots, and Elise promised to email her some later after she’d touched them up. Brenna wanted a print of one of the hot dog ones so she could frame it and put it on Grant’s desk to replace the picture of Heather that had been permanently retired. Thinking of Grant put a bit of a bounce in her step as she imagined what he’d think of her frilly panties. And how he’d strip them off her.
When she got into the lodge, she looked around in surprise. Grant wasn’t at his normal seat, and it was during office hours. “Grant?” she called out, curious.
His head popped up over the couch. “You’re home?” His gaze went to her outfit and hair. “Holy shit.”
She grinned and gave her skirt a saucy little flick. “You like?”
“Definitely.” He looked extremely appreciative, his gaze moving up and down over her body. “Damn. I can’t wait to see those pictures.” He seemed momentarily distracted, then shook his head. “I didn’t know you were coming home so early, though—”
She started forward, amused. “Were you taking a nap? Because I can think of a few other uses for that couch right about now—”
A high-pitched yap interrupted her.
Brenna blinked in surprise, stopping short. “What was that?”
Grant hefted a small, squirming beige bundle into the air. “Your surprise.”
“My surprise?” She started forward again, staring at the squirming puppy in Grant’s hands. Short, fawn-colored fur covered a wriggling sausage body and tiny paws. Two bug eyes stared out in opposite directions from a wrinkly black muzzle. It was hideous. It was so adorable it made her want to pinch it. “You . . . got me a puppy? Why?”
He got to his feet and headed toward her. When he got to her side, he pushed the tiny puppy into her hands. It immediately began to lick her chin, then her fingers. “Because I remembered in the video that you showed me that you said you always wanted a dog. And I thought it might be a good way for you to get your feet wet with the whole ‘being tied down’ thing. This dog’s small enough that you can take him anywhere.”
Tears burned her eyes. He’d remembered that she’d said that? She hadn’t even remembered it. The puppy continued to lick her, and Brenna pulled it away from her to get a good look at it, and laughed through her tears. “It’s really damn ugly.”
“It’s a pug,” he told her, pleased at her reaction. He wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her close to him as she snuggled the puppy against her again. “They’re supposed to be very interesting personalities.”
“His eyes aren’t even facing the same direction,” she blubbered happily, unable to stop crying. Luckily, the puppy was there to lick away her tears. “He looks like Gollum from Lord of the Rings.”
Grant laughed. “Sounds like as good a name as any.” He leaned in to kiss her cheek, and then pulled away. “Why do you smell like hot dogs?”
“Because of the photos,” she told him, entranced with the puppy. “You got me a present?”
“Of course. I’ll get you a present every day for the rest of your life, if you like. But I know you wouldn’t like that.”
She smiled. He knew her well. Within twenty-four hours of the okay from him to “redecorate” his cabin, she’d removed all the furnishings except the bare essentials, and had denuded the house of most everything except a framed photo or two. She’d even cleaned out his cabinets, tossing extra canned soups and power bars. Hell, he could have sworn that he’d come in for breakfast yesterday morning and caught her throwing away plates.
It didn’t matter. She was more at ease in his newly spartan home, so he didn’t care if a few throw rugs or decor pieces were gone. The furniture was there, and Brenna was there. He had everything he needed.
“Gollum it is,” she said with a happy grin, and then leaned over to kiss him. “You’re the best man I’ve ever known.”
“I can’t say I don’t have an ulterior motive.”
“Oh?” She smiled, still cuddling the squirming puppy to her. “I think I can live with giving you a week of morning blowjobs.”
“That . . . wasn’t what I meant, though I’ll definitely take it.” Grant grinned and tugged at a curled purple lock of hair. “I was talking about your smile.”
“Oh.” She laughed. “Well, I suppose that’s important, too.” This was a good segue, though. “I bought you a present, too, but it’s not here. We’re getting it this weekend.”
He looked surprised at her words, and a pleased look crossed his face. “You got me something?”
“Something as big to you as this puppy is to me,” Brenna told him, holding Gollum aloft so he could lick Grant’s chin.
“Uh-oh,” Grant said warily. “Am I going to like this present?”
“Probably not,” she told him. “But I’ll be strapped to you the entire way down.”
“Entire way down?” His eyebrows shot up and a look of horror crossed his face. “What did you do?”
She gave him an innocent look. “I might have signed us up for a tandem skydiving session to get you over your fear of control.”
“You what?”
“Don’t shout.” She shoved the puppy in his face. “You’re going to scare Gollum.”
“Brenna,” he said in a warning tone.
“It’ll be good for us,” she said, leaning in to kiss him. “Don’t you want to be tied up to me?”
“Not if someone’s going to push us off a plane,” he grumbled.
She gave him a mock-pout and held the puppy up again. It began to lick Grant’s glasses. “Then I guess you’ll have to take Gollum back.”
He pushed the puppy’s head away and gave Brenna an exasperated look.
“You really want to do this?”
“Well, no,” Brenna said, pulling the puppy close and tucking it under her chin. She began to rock it against her chest. “I’ve never given it much thought. But since we’re all about conquering our fears to make ourselves better people, if I can get a puppy, you can go skydiving.”
“I’ll go,” he said slowly. “On two conditions.”
“What’s that?”
“First,” he said, and pulled up the edge of her skirt. “That you wear those panties for the rest of the day, because they are smoking hot.”
“Deal,” she said with a grin. “What’s the second condition?”
Grant gazed down at her with a look of infinite tenderness. “That you tell me you love me again.”
“I’ll tell you every day for the rest of our lives,” she vowed to him, and leaned in to give him a kiss.
“You still smell like hot dogs,” he murmured against her mouth.
“You sure do know how to sweet talk a woman,” she said.
And then no one spoke for a good long while.
Read on for a special preview of the next Bluebonnet novel
THE VIRGIN’S GUIDE TO MISBEHAVING
Coming soon from Berkley Sensation!
There were days, Elise Markham decided, in which the world seemed to be hideously unfair.
If the world was fair, she wouldn’t have been born with that awful port-wine stain on her entire left cheek. It didn’t matter that she’d had it lasered away in her teen years. When she looked in the mirror, she could swear she still saw traces of it there. And if she saw it, so did everyone else. If the world was fair, karma wouldn’t have then turned around and slapped her with scoliosis during puberty that involved wearing a bulky back brace and made her even shyer.
If the world was fair, that would have been enough and she wouldn’t have had to go through the other awful things teenage girls did, like pudgy thighs and pimples and braces. But she had.
All of which had told Elise by the age of thirteen that the world wasn’t fair, and she needed to stop wishing it was.
Because if the world was fair? Her new friends would not be trying to set her up on a blind date.
“What about that really quiet, tall officer?” Miranda asked, raising her margarita glass and licking the salt from the rim. “The one that’s the sheriff’s son. He’s not bad-looking. He gave me a ticket last month for speeding and I thought he was kind of cute. In a law-officer sort of way.”
Miranda and Brenna sat across from Elise in a cozy booth at Maya Loco, the only restaurant in tiny Bluebonnet. Beth Ann was at the bar, getting a refill on her drink and chatting with a friend. It was busy in the restaurant, a noisy hum of voices and clinking forks making it difficult to hold a quiet conversation.
Not that it stopped the women she was seated with. At her side in the booth, Brenna shook her head. She twirled her short red mixing straw in her drink as she spoke. “He hooked up with that weird blogger chick. Emily’s sister. You’re a few months too late.”
“Oh. Rats.” She screwed up her face. “I know this is a small town, but Jesus. There have to be some hot eligible men around here.”
“It’s really okay,” Elise said, but her voice was so quiet over the din of the restaurant happy hour that she wasn’t sure anyone heard her. “I don’t need to date.”
“I stole the last hottie,” Brenna said with a sly grin. She winked at Elise and adjusted her purple bangs on her forehead. “Lucky for me he’s into tattoos and kinky sex.”
Elise made a face at the same time that Miranda did. “Um.”
“That’s her brother, you sicko,” Miranda said. “Gross.”
“Doesn’t matter. She’d do him. He’s hot. Those uptight clothes and frumpy glasses? Mmm.” She fanned her face.
“Still her brother,” Miranda said.
Elise nodded. Brenna was weird. Sweet, but weird. No one could predict the things that came out of her mouth, so it was best for Elise to just sit back and let someone else correct Brenna when she spouted off. Not that Elise would ever say something to hurt Brenna’s feelings—her brother’s fiancée was strange, but Elise loved her. Brenna played to the beat of her own drum—she wore old T-shirts and ill-fitting clothing more often than not. Actually, most of the time it was Grant’s clothing, which was odd to see. But her uptight, once-lonely brother worshipped Brenna, and for that, Elise adored her as well.
“There’s got to be someone,” Miranda muttered.
“Someone for what?” Beth Ann slid into the booth next to Elise. Self-conscious at the appearance of the statuesque blonde, Elise straightened, careful to raise one shoulder above the other so it wouldn’t look like she was slumping. Of her three new friends, Beth Ann was the most intimidating. Miranda was pretty but scholarly. Brenna was cheery and strange, and dressed like a slob. But Beth Ann? Beth Ann was completely perfect, from her delicately manicured nails to her faint tan in November and her immaculate blond hair. She was also dressed in a dainty gingham dress topped with a matching cardigan and slingbacks.
She was intimidating, all right. But Beth Ann was also the sweetest person that Elise knew, and her partner in a new business venture.
“A man for Elise to date,” Miranda offered, delicately licking a large grain of margarita salt off of one finger. “Since we’re all paired up, we thought it might be a good idea to find Elise a man, too.”
Elise shook her head, voice whispering. “I really don’t—”
Miranda snapped her fingers, cutting off Elise’s thoughts. “I know! What about one of Colt’s brothers?”
“Oh, honey, no,” Beth Ann said in her sweet drawl. “Berry’s the only one close to her age and he’s not right for her. At all.”
Brenna leaned across the table toward Elise and gave her a mock-conspiratorial whisper. “Colt’s brothers are all named after guns. Berry’s short for Beretta. It’s all very redneck.”
“Honey,” Beth Ann said again, “she knows that. She grew up here, remember?” Of the four of the women at the table, only Brenna wasn’t originally from Bluebonnet.
“Actually I don’t know them all that well,” Elise said in a small voice. “I went to boarding school as soon as I was old enough.” And she’d never left the house much before that, too ashamed of the gigantic purple mark that had disfigured her cheek. Even now, she had to fight the urge to drag her long hair over that side of her face to hide it. “But it’s okay.” She did remember Grant’s stories about Colt’s poor-as-dirt family growing up. Not that she was a snob, but when Colt didn’t even want to associate with them, it was bad.
Beth Ann patted Elise’s hand. “We’ll find you a good man, honey. Don’t you worry. I have a few single clients. Let me think.”
God, she didn’t want anyone. Or rather, no one would want her. But her friends seemed determined to find her a man, which made her want to cringe and hide. She felt like a charity case, which only made things worse. Our poor ugly, shy friend can’t find a man? We’ll just have to find one for her.
The worst was that she knew they meant well, but it still hurt. It hurt that she was ungainly and unattractive enough to have to resort to charity. Being single and alone was so much easier. No hopes to get up. “I don’t really want to date right now, Beth Ann,” Elise said in a low, soft voice. “I just don’t think—”
“Nonsense,” Brenna interrupted. “You just sit in your room every night over at the bed and breakfast unless we drag you out. That’s not healthy.”
“That’s not true,” Elise protested, then bit her lip. Okay, so it was a little true. “Sometimes I go out and take photos.” But only at times that she wouldn’t risk running into too many of the nosy, well-meaning people of Bluebonnet. People that would stop and try to have a conversation with her.
Elise wasn’t good with conversations. Actually, she wasn’t good with small talk, period.<
br />
“You don’t want to date?” Miranda looked crestfallen. “Really?”
“I’m concentrating on business right now,” she said. “And besides, like Beth Ann said, I grew up here. There’s no one in town that interests me. No one here is my type.”
“So what’s your type?” Brenna wanted to know.
Her tongue felt glued to the roof of her mouth. Should she lie? She was a terrible liar. Really, the only thing she was excellent at was taking photos and avoiding people. But admitting her type would make it pretty obvious who she liked. More than liked, really. She had a schoolgirl crush on a man that was tall, dark, and handsome, covered in tattoos and had piercings, and drove a motorcycle.
But only one man in Bluebonnet matched that description. So Elise said nothing, because speaking would have betrayed her thoughts, and she had no desire to be humiliated like that. She simply shrugged her shoulders.
“Do you like tall men?” Brenna prompted.
“Let it go,” Beth Ann said, coming to Elise’s defense with a laugh. “If Elise doesn’t want someone in town, I can’t say I blame her.”
“We could always get her an out of towner,” Miranda said with a sly glance in her direction. At her side, Brenna gave a chortle and elbowed her, then nodded in the distance.
Beth Ann and Elise turned.
Coming across the crowded restaurant, beer in hand, was none other than the object of Elise’s crush, Rome Lozada. Oh no. Elise immediately turned away, feeling her face turn a bright, beet red that would make the remains of her old scar whiten on her face. Please no.
Oblivious to Elise’s distress, Brenna waved a hand. “Rome! Hey! Come sit with us!”
Elise whimpered in her throat. Luckily, the restaurant was too noisy for it to be overheard. She stared down at her iced tea, unable to work up the courage to lift it to her mouth, lest someone notice her movements. Maybe Rome was meeting friends and wouldn’t be sitting with them.
The Expert's Guide to Driving a Man Wild Page 27