What the hell is he trying to insinuate? Devin was thoroughly confused. The mayor was certainly an odd one. “Oh, I’m sure that they do. They offer all different levels of intensity. I just happen to like the firmer deep muscle treatment.”
Alessi breathed booze onto Devin’s neck. “I like it firmer, too.”
Devin was vastly relieved when the auctioneer called out, “Pens down! The silent auction has closed!”
“Damn!” cursed one of the women who was considering the Hardscrabble bid. “I thought it closed at eight-thirty!”
“No, they said it closed at eight, Regina!” harped the other one. “You never listen.”
“You never tell me anything,” sniped Regina.
Pivoting on one foot, Devin swiped up the bid sheet. Aha. Lacey Dvorak had easily won the bid, as she’d added about two hundred dollars to top the next highest bidder. Maybe she doesn’t even recognize me, and just likes to give money to the community. This idea was out the window when Devin turned back to the main dining room and smashed directly into Lacey.
Her voluptuous bosom remained plastered to his chest, as a crowd milled around, clamoring to see who’d won the bids, and crushed the two together. Lacey’s flowery perfume wafted up to Devin, and her pretty cornflower eyes sparkled brightly. “Oh! Devin Jonas! So good to finally meet you.”
This isn’t going to work. I can’t be near this woman without becoming aroused. He’d make sure to have his ranch manager show her the ropes when she came for her long weekend. The cook, wranglers, and hands could occupy the rest of her time. They’d be so shocked to have a pretty, straight woman on the land they’d stampede each other to get to her. How could that moronic yogurt shop guy have let her go? Devin had seen Ben earlier, not with the very young lingerie shop girl but with a different inappropriately young girl. “You’re Lacey, right? Looks like you won the bid.” He tried to distract Lacey by waving the bid sheet, but a worker came by and whipped it from his hand. Good. Don’t want her to see she left two hundred bucks on the table.
“Oh, I’m so glad,” she said sincerely. “I always wondered what goes on at a ranch. Is it all right if I bring my girlfriend as my plus one?”
Girlfriend? Dear God, no. Maybe that Ben idiot had driven Lacey to play for the other team! Well, that would solve his dilemma. Chase could lust all he wanted, Lacey would never reciprocate. “Oh, yeah. You can bring whoever you want, of course. There’s something about the ranch that just attracts lesbians for some reason. This is the sixth year I’ll be hosting a couple of women.”
“Oh, no,” Lacey assured him. She even placed a hand on his chest by way of protest. “We’re not lesbians. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” She had a lovely giggle, and her front incisors reminded him of a perky cartoon rabbit. He liked that she was somewhat “flawed” by current standards. It was tiring keeping up with Chase. One couldn’t walk down a street with Chase without a hundred people stopping dead in their tracks, inviting him to appear in their television commercials. It really didn’t enhance a guy’s feeling of security. “No, Katrina has been my best friend since childhood. Isn’t it funny how best friends seem to last longer than spouses or partners? Ah, well.”
Her pretty sigh made Devin want to put his arms around her and draw her close, and he knew his penis was elongating against his thigh. His boxer briefs and tight 501s helped keep things in check, but he knew from wide and unfortunate experience that an erection would still be noticeable a mile away. He’d better fade into the crowd fast. Instead, he found himself moronically saying, “I’m hoping that’s not always true. I’m hoping that a lover can be a best friend as well, that they don’t always come and go.”
Lacey looked wistfully at the pit of his throat. “Well, Katrina’s outlasted about ten boyfriends and a husband of mine. I know I need to just pick up my boot heels and move on, or whatever they say, but this is getting ridiculous.”
“Well,” said Devin, “you’re a gorgeous woman, and you seem very sweet and kind. Any man would be a moron to let you go.”
Lacey tilted her head and looked Devin in the eye. He could see a layer of pain beneath the false cheer she was affecting. “Well. You’re the sweet one for saying so. I have a bad feeling it’s only other gay men who agree with you.”
“No, I’m not—”
“It doesn’t really help,” Lacey said, leaning in confidentially and rubbing her satin-clad nipples against his chest, “that six months ago I agreed to auction myself off tonight, back when I was still married.” She laughed bitterly. “I know these dating auctions are a farce and most people don’t wind up actually going on the date and it’s all for charity, but still. It’s not going to help my self-esteem now that, obviously, my ex-husband isn’t going to bid on me but on some lingerie shop bimbo instead. I’ll probably wind up going for twenty-five dollars to some Folsom inmate who bids online.”
“That’s not true,” Devin said earnestly. “I saw Ben Pearson just a few minutes ago with some other girl, not Brittney from the lingerie shop.”
Devin instantly wished he could rewind this damned conversation by thirty seconds. He’d never seen anyone’s face literally fall that completely and utterly. She brought her hands to her face and seemed to be looking right through Devin to a spot about a mile away.
Devin put his hands on her bare shoulders. He hadn’t touched a woman in two years and her soft skin stiffened his cock even more fully. “I didn’t mean that, Lacey. I meant that I just saw him standing next to a gal who wasn’t Brittney.”
She recoiled from his touch. “God! I’ll be lucky to get the goddamned Folsom inmate! They probably don’t let death row inmates use the computer!” And she turned and ran off.
Devin wanted to kill himself. How could he have screwed up that encounter so badly? Now she not only thought he was gay, but she thought he was a gay asshole.
He had to make this up to Lacey in some way. He headed off to see the silent auction coordinator who had taken the bid sheet.
On his way he had a brief glimpse of Ben Pearson. Ben had his hand on the back of the new dark-haired girl, but he shot Devin a distinctly dirty look. There was no mistaking that look.
Ben narrowed his eyes at Devin because Devin had been talking to his ex-wife.
Chapter Five
Devin Jonas was right.
Ben, sitting about four enormous round tables away from Lacey, had bid on the model-perfect Cleopatra gal with the ski jump nose. She looked all of eighteen at the most, and another guy bidding on her looked to be her twenty-year-old brother. Maybe Ben had arranged the bidding war with the brother, as Ben made a big show out of jumping up and waving his paddle around whenever he wanted to outbid the brother, when he could’ve just sat there and touched his nose or whatever bidders did.
But he wasn’t bidding on Brittney. For whatever good that did.
“Let me ask around, find out who that girl is,” Katrina had said, and slipped away from their table.
Suddenly Lacey wanted to say, But you know what, Katrina? I don’t care. Ben’s life is a mess. Is now and always was. He parties till six in the morning and barely ever goes into his stupid yogurt shop. He’s thirty-five—a bit too old for his daddy to be bailing him out, isn’t he?
She didn’t even really want Ben anymore. After all, hadn’t she been the one who had walked out, to her own great financial disadvantage? She had known she couldn’t live that way anymore. Apparently Brittney had come to the same conclusion.
The auctioneer bellowed, “And the lovely Madison Simon of Pretty Jung Things has been won by the genteel, famous, all-around good guy Ben Pearson of Pearson Yogurt for fifteen hundred dollars. Ben’s Valentine’s Day will be made in heaven this year! Or should I say—heh-heh—Ben will be made in heaven this year?”
Lacey made a lip fart as Ben stood and took a bow like a prize fighter, fists clenched together in victory. She only bothered glancing at her ex for a split second before returning her eyes to the stage. Whatever.
Lacey put a hand on Katrina’s arm and looked her in the eyes. “Katrina. I don’t care anymore. Okay? I can’t keep mooning over a choice that I made myself, right? Look, Cal said he’d bid on me so I don’t look too heinously fat and unloved up there. And I think his dad might bid, too.” Saul Wakeman, the creepy guy who worked in the book shop, could always be counted on to drive bidding up, too. He probably liked Lacey because she was one of the few who came into his store anymore. He always gave up bidding after three hundred dollars, though.
“You could withdraw from the bidding.”
Lacey knew that the majority of the women putting themselves up for bids already knew who would bid—and win. There were barely ever any true wild cards, unexpected or exciting bids. It was all in the name of charity, all a tax write-off. And some show-offs did it for the recognition and popularity it gave them—like Ben. “I’m not withdrawing. Cal bidding on me isn’t any different than the years past when Ben did. It’s all pre-arranged. Now, can you take next Tuesday through Friday off your job? Tuesday is the real Valentine’s Day and I’d like to be out of town for it. Tell your boss it’s for charity. Who knows? Not all of those cowboys can be gay or married. Isn’t that your boss over there?”
“Yes, that’s her,” Katrina admitted. She worked at the county clerk’s office a few blocks from Delight Hardware. “The cowboy thing does sound fun. Will we have to sleep on the floor of a barn?”
“I don’t know, but if it means even a couple glances at that mouth-watering Roman god in the cowboy hat, I’m all in.”
Katrina grinned widely at her friend. “Well! It’s good to see you interested in someone other than that Neanderthal Ben.”
Lacey burst out into a genuine peal of laughter. “Neanderthal? Oh my God. That’s rich. He does look like a fucking Neanderthal with that low hairline. Good one, Katrina!”
Katrina’s face abruptly slackened. She grabbed Lacey’s hand with a claw of horror, and her eyes bugged out. “I see what you mean about the Roman god. Holy shit. He’s got an ass you could bounce a quarter off of.”
Still laughing, Lacey swiveled her head to view Devin Jonas. He stood in profile to them, talking to some ranching types, two of whom were pretty women in their thirties. A different aspect of Devin struck Lacey for the first time. Her gaydar wasn’t pinging. Never had, actually. She’d just assumed he was gay because he spent so much time with Chase and, well, had been known to kiss Chase. Now, gasping, she turned back to her friend, but Katrina was quicker on the draw.
“You’re thinking what I’m thinking. He’s not really gay. I know. This morning I was just remembering that two years ago he had a pretty serious relationship with a gal who lived in Rough and Ready. He’s been around forever, you know. He just must have gone to a different school than we did, and he’s a little older than us. He took over the ranch when his dad died when he was a teen.”
As much as Lacey liked dwelling on the picture of Devin Jonas sliding his tongue down a female abdomen—or any other abdomen, actually—the damned auctioneer was now blaring out, “Up next for your bidding pleasure in the annual Hell’s Delight Buy Yourself A Damned Valentine auction is Lacey Pearson.” Oh, God. He used my married name. The auctioneer shielded his eyes from the overhead lights as he looked at the audience like a ship’s captain. “Where are you, Lace? Where is my delightful morsel?”
Lacey groaned loudly. “Oh, God. Here we go.”
The usual drunken suspects whistled and catcalled as Lacey skipped up the four steps onto the stage. This part of the gala had never bothered her before, of course. She had always known that Ben would bid up to a thousand dollars on her, but he’d never had to go higher than three hundred and ten thanks to the bookstore guy.
This time, Lacey had to lean over and say into the auctioneer’s ear, “Lacey Dvorak.”
“What?”
“Lacey Dvorak. I divorced Ben Pearson.”
To her further mortification, the auctioneer strode to the front of the stage and shouted, “Gents! And you ladies from the Cultured Pearl motorcycle club, heh-heh! It’s Miss Lacey Dvorak now, much to poor old Ben’s chagrin, so shouldn’t this drive the numbers much higher?”
“Fifty bucks!” yelled the book shop guy.
A member of the Cultured Pearl bike club must’ve raised her paddle, for suddenly it was a hundred bucks. Then two hundred. Lacey felt like a goddamned sheep led to slaughter standing up there in the bright lights. I’m never doing this again. Never. Ever. Never, ever.
True to his word, Cal brought the bidding up to four hundred. Now Lacey wasn’t feeling so horrible. This was higher than Ben had ever had to go. Thank God for stepbrothers. Then another Cultured Pearl member brought it up to five hundred and ten. Lacey knew—or hoped—that these women were just kidding and bidding for the sake of charity. She was very afraid of motorcycles.
“Five hundred ten, who’ll give me five hundred fifty, five hundred fifty, who’ll give me…” The auctioneer paused his rapid-fire chant to gasp, “Seven hundred?” He shaded his eyes and squinted at someone in the audience. “Why, is that Mr. Jonas of the Hardscrabble Ranch? Mr. Jonas, you are too generous! Donating a vacation and now bidding on this lovely miss to help us get streetlights.”
Holy mother. The perhaps-not-terribly-gay Devin lounged, confident and relaxed as all hell, against a one of the Lion’s Club pillars. His lazy grin said he didn’t really care about Lacey and was just doing this for the stupid streetlights. The auctioneer assumed Devin was gay, the audience assumed he was gay, but they all cheered so loudly Lacey’s ears hurt. And she noticed she was smiling.
The drama escalated suddenly. Now Devin’s partner, that buff Chase Moran, was waving his paddle. The two men jokingly shoved each other, each in turn raising his paddle to rapidly bring the bid up to nine hundred. The leather-clad bidder must’ve had a bigger sense of humor, for she was practically beating the gay men with her paddle to outbid them.
“Nine hundred! Will you give me nine hundred fifty, do I hear nine hundred fifty—”
“A thousand!”
A collective gasp swept over the crowd. Ben Pearson was waving his paddle wildly as he was wont to do. Apparently he was drunk or something worse, and had been carried away with the excitement of the moment. He had always loved attention, and now he’d certainly gotten it.
“A thousand!” declared the auctioneer then resumed his prattle. “Do I hear a thousand and fifty…”
The tension only intensified from there. The biker woman dropped out—but not without throwing her paddle in disgust at Ben—and Chase Moran seemed content to leave the bidding to his partner.
Devin waved his paddle. Then Ben. Then Devin. Then Ben got up on his chair like the Statue of Liberty, and the bidding was up to a thousand three hundred.
Lacey had never known Ben was such a good actor—or cared that much about actual charity. Every time one man would raise the bid, the crowd would roar. Lacey even got into the spirit of things, pacing the stage like an auctioneer, raising her hands as though lifting up the crowd’s spirits. She laughed, she clapped—she genuinely was having a good time. She even stopped listening to the mindless droning patter of the auctioneer, it was so amusing to watch Devin, and then Ben, thrust their paddles into the air in a macho show of one-upmanship.
Devin was clearly having a good time, his friends and guys who must’ve been ranch hands or mates in his country and western band clapping him on the back and shaking him. Ben’s annoying party friends egged him on with seeming anger. They fist-pumped the air like an audience of British soccer fans. Ben was doing a very good job of appearing enraged by Devin’s taunting. It was entertaining to see Katrina and their girlfriends over on Devin’s side of the audience, smashed between the cowboys and guitarists or whoever they were. Thi
s was by far the most lively auction Lacey had seen in her years of attending this function.
“One thousand eight hundred!”
Ben’s face was red with pretend rage. He trembled with a clenched fist then bashed one of his moronic friends with the paddle before stalking off like a tin soldier, probably to the bar.
“Sold to the most generous Mr. Jonas of Hardscrabble Ranch for one thousand eight hundred! Sir, you are a paragon and a gentleman! I am confident that Miss Lacey Dvorak will give you your money’s worth under the lights of Jack London Street’s new lamps!” He held up Lacey’s fist now as the winning prizefighter, and she’d never been happier.
One thousand eight hundred! Not even Lisa Groper, the former homecoming queen, had ever gone for more than one thousand five hundred, and her husband was the area’s biggest realtor.
Devin came forward to the stage and reached a hand up to Lacey as she descended the steps. Well, that was to be expected. He’d just given the merchants association a huge chunk of change. Women she’d barely spoken to before were clutching her arm, exhorting things like, “You go, Lacey!” and “Ride that cowboy for me, girl!” Women who weren’t even members of the Cultured Pearl whispered racy things in her ear.
“He goes to my gym. He can bench press two hundred pounds.”
“Maybe you can ride both those cowboys at once, Lacey. I think Chase Moran comes with the deal.”
“You can tell he’s got a big donkey’s cock, Lacey. Watch out!”
The association always poured doubly stiff drinks in the hour preceding the live auction.
Katrina stuck her face close to Lacey’s. “That was a great one, Lace! Ben is seriously pissed off!”
That didn’t make any sense. Why would Ben be seriously pissed off?
Lacey remained quiet as Devin escorted her through the crowded dining room. Oddly, Chase was nowhere to be seen. The drunk gal was correct—the two men did seem to be attached at the wrist and ankles. Maybe Chase was letting Devin have his day in the sun. Get his money’s worth, as it were. Even Ben’s idiotic cronies were hooting and howling at the top of their lungs, so Devin probably couldn’t have heard a thing she said, anyway.
Three Hearts Beat as One (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 4