When Things Got Hot in Texas

by Lori Wilde

  She screamed. Jumped. Managed to hold on to the milk, but the cup went flying through the air.

  “It’s just me,” Clay said.

  She hadn’t stopped gasping for air, when another loud crash echoed from the living room. Following that clatter came a deep-aged voice. “Move, and I’ll blow you to smithereens.”

  She didn’t dare move. Clay didn’t take marching orders as well. He shot in front of her.

  “It’s us!” Clay snapped and hit the light switch.

  Brightness exploded in the room. Pete stood perched in the doorway. Jennifer’s first shock came from the shotgun pointed right at them. The second related to the man’s attire. Or his lack thereof. Pete stood naked with the exception of a pair of tighty-and-not-so-whities that looked two sizes too big and begged for a splash of bleach.

  “Put the gun down!” Clay seethed.

  Pete lowered the barrel. “I thought someone broke in.”

  “Well, they haven’t.” Clay exhaled.

  “Good night, then.” Pete turned.

  Jennifer watched the bare and bowlegged old man walk away. Her eyes widened at the sight of the baseball-sized hole in the back of his undies that exposed something loose and dangling. Pete finally reached the bedroom and shut the door.

  Clay moaned and pushed his palms into his eye sockets. “I can’t unsee that.”

  She laughed and then covered her mouth to keep the sound from bouncing all over the kitchen.

  Then Clay laughed and coughed to hide it.

  Their eyes met, and they laughed again.

  When they sobered, she suddenly realized he was shirtless. He looked really nice shirtless. She simply hadn’t appreciated it enough last night.

  His gaze lowered to take in her nightshirt. When his face rose, his right eyebrow lifted ever so slightly.

  She recalled there had been something written on the nightshirt, but hadn’t read it. Looking down she read, This is my sexy lingerie.

  “This isn’t mine,” she blurted out before she meant to. “Macy and Savanna. . . uh, sent some things they knew I could wear.”

  Then she realized how that might have sounded. As if she wanted him to know she did wear sexy lingerie. “I mean, I didn’t . . .”

  He grinned. “It’s good.” Night silence filled the kitchen and with it came awkwardness.

  “I should get back to bed.”

  He nodded.

  She’d almost gotten out when . . .

  “Uh, Jennifer?” His soft deep voice had her turning around.

  “Yes.”

  He held a glass in his hand. “Can I have a glass of milk before you go?”

  It took her a second to realize she was heading to the bedroom with his half-gallon of milk.

  Swallowing the embarrassment, she spoke, “I guess I could share.”

  His eyes lit up with laughter. “Why don’t you join me?”

  Her gaze shifted to his bare chest. “Oh,” he muttered and set his glass on the table. “I’ll get my shirt.”

  That might help. She grabbed a cup and settled into a kitchen chair. The man could multi-task, for he walked and dressed at the same time. Eyes wide, she watched as he slipped the tee over his head, tugged it over his shoulders, slid it down, past his flat abdomen, past his navel until it covered up his treasure trail of hair disappearing behind the zipper of his jeans.

  He dropped into a chair beside her and picked up the milk and filled his glass and her cup. “Can’t sleep?” he asked in an appropriate middle-of-the-night whisper.

  “No,” she said.

  His chair scuffed across the floor when he popped up. “You want me to heat your milk up?”

  She stared, still thinking about his treasure trail. “How did you know I like it hot?”

  Moving to the microwave, he stuck her cup in. “You had a cup, and my mom is an advocate of the hot-milk-sedative club.”

  “And you’re not?”

  He leaned against the counter while the hum of the appliances filled the room. Running a hand through his hair, he looked sleep-mussed and sexy. “Milk’s supposed to be cold.”

  The microwave dinged and he pulled it out. “But hey . . . to each his own.” He set the cup in front of her.

  “So you still have your mom?” she asked.

  Settling back into a chair, he paused just a flicker too long. “Yeah. She lives in McAllen, Texas. She calls me religiously every Sunday.”

  “You don’t see her?”

  “Yeah, I mean we’re both busy. I saw her . . . a couple of years ago.”

  Jennifer read some between-the-lines issues, but didn’t push. “You’re lucky . . . to still have her.” Jennifer pulled the milk closer.

  “Your mom?” he asked.

  “She . . . passed away when I was sixteen.”

  “What happened?” His voice lowered.

  She took a small sip of milk. It must be whole milk because it felt and tasted like warm cream on her lips. “A drunk driver happened.”

  “Sorry.” His voice lowered even more.

  “Me, too,” she answered quickly, set her cup down and made fast work of finding a conversational U-turn. “Jake told me your grandfather recently passed. Sorry.”

  He turned the milk in his hands. “Not recently, but thanks.”

  “Oh, I thought you inherited the place.”

  “I did. I . . . He died three years ago. It just wasn’t the right time to move then.” He took a sip of milk. His glass hadn’t landed back on the table when he asked, “Do you own your own interior design business?”

  Since she’d just taken a U-turn, she recognized his. She couldn’t complain.

  “I worked for an agency for three years after I graduated. But the owner kept design control over everyone’s work. She was good, but more times than not I preferred my ideas to hers. So, I quit and hung out my own shingle. It was slow for the first year, but a couple of my old clients looked me up and word of mouth spread and soon I was needing to turn down clients. This is the slowest I’ve been in five years.”

  “Economy?” he asked.

  “Blacklisted.”

  “By who?”

  “Mitchell. The child abuser I’m testifying against.”

  “Shit. But he’s been charged.”

  “Innocent until proven guilty.” She slumped back in the chair, turned her cup, and said something she’d been worrying about lately. “But honestly, there’s a part of me that’s afraid it might not make a difference.”

  “Why would you say that?”

  “The really wealthy--who are a big portion of my clientele--have secrets. They don’t want someone coming into their home and exposing those secrets. That’s what I did. I sort of broke the unwritten code of ethics of interior designers.”

  His gaze held hers. “And yet you did it anyway.”

  “It’s not like I had a choice.”

  He exhaled. “Yeah, you did. A lot of women put their careers first.” The sound of the fridge humming seemed loud in the flicker of silence. “It sucks that it had to happen.”

  “Yeah. But I’m not really sorry I did it. I knew the day I reported it that it’d probably be like this. But if things don’t pick up, I’m going to have to either find a new career or find a way to reinvent myself.”

  “I wish I could tell you I believed doing the right thing always paid off, but I don’t. Sometimes the right thing can turn out to be a wrong thing. Good deeds don’t go unpunished.”

  Their gazes met and held again. His words were like an appetizer to the story he wasn’t telling. “What happened?” she asked before she realized she might be stepping on toes.

  Glancing down at his half-empty glass, her question hung in the air unanswered.

  “I’m sorry.” The apology fell from her lips. “That’s none of my business.”

  Hesitation hung in the air and moved to awkwardness.

  “It’s late.” She reached for her cup. “We should--”

  “I’ll answer if you will.”
>
  There was a challenge in the green pools of his. Bright green, the same color as her cat’s. She missed her cat. She loved her cat. And she always loved a challenge.

  “What do you want to know?”

  Chapter 7

  Clay had a brief moment of panic. Did feeding his curiosity merit spilling his guts? “If you’re tired, we can just--”

  “No,” she said. “I’d rather talk.” She folded her fingers around the coffee mug. “What do you want to know?”

  Her diamond caught his eye. His curiosity weakened his own defense. “For starters, I heard you broke up with your fiancé. Yet you’re still wearing the ring. Are you thinking you two will get back together?” With that question out there, another rolled out. “Is that who’s been texting you tonight? You understand the rule of not telling anyone where you are includes him.”

  She sipped her milk as if contemplating his questions. “Yes, I broke up with my fiancé. No, I’m not going back to him. And no that wasn’t him who texted me. That was Savanna. At nine months pregnant she has to pee every hour. She guessed I wasn’t sleeping. I apologize if that woke you up. I’ll turn my phone’s volume down.”

  She held up her hand. “And this . . . It was a half-size too small. Charles was supposed to get it resized. He never got around to it. I tried to take it off.” Turning it, and the skin bunched up around her knuckle. “If I used soap and worked with it, I could get it off. But I’ve been kind of busy being on someone’s hit list.”

  Her answers were logical and made him feel a little illogical for asking. Pushing that aside, he asked, “You want it off? I’m an expert at that.”

  She looked puzzled. “An expert at removing too tight engagement rings? What do you do? Break couples up, or just dig rebound chicks.”

  He laughed. “Not quite. I’ve assisted in four ring-removal ceremonies with my mom. She gets thin, marries, puts on weight, then divorces.”

  Jennifer bit down on her lip. “Your mom’s been married four times?”

  “Five. This last one might stick.” He flippantly tossed it out there.

  “Sorry,” she said as if she’d personally gone through it herself. Or if some old childhood hurt had leaked out.

  “That was a long time ago. Let me see your hand.” He held out his.

  “How old were you when your parents divorced?”

  “Eleven.”

  “And you went through that many step-fathers?”

  “Not really. I mean, I stayed with my dad.” He wiggled his fingers.

  She slipped her hand into his. It felt small, smooth, the contours of her palm fit against his like pieces of a puzzle meant to come together. He got tingles in places that a simple touch shouldn’t bring on.

  He turned the ring. “It’s tight. Are you swollen?”

  When he looked up she was staring right at him. “Maybe . . . because of my wrist. Dishwashing soap might work,” she said, her voice soft as the night. As soft as her dark hair looked brushing against her cheek.

  “Actually, that’s not the best thing.” He stood and looked in the cabinet to see if they had any Windex or glass cleaner. They didn’t. In his fifty-dollar cleaning supplies shopping spree, he hadn’t worried about the windows.

  He went into the bathroom. There wasn’t any in that cabinet, either. Then he remembered the best ring removal elixir there was. It had been the last resort before taking his mom to the jewelry store and having the thing cut off. He opened the medicine cabinet.

  And smiled. “Thank you, Pete.” Luckily it was a new tube, too.

  Stepping out, he squirted a big dollop into his hand. After dropping the tube on the table, he picked up her hand and massaged it onto her ring finger.

  Gently, he moved the ring up and down.

  “It needs to stay on there for a second. It shrinks things and controls swelling.” With even strokes, he kept rubbing her finger.

  She lifted her hand and sniffed. “What is it.”

  He tried not to smile, unsuccessfully. “It works. That’s what’s important.”

  Her brows wrinkled, she looked curious and adorable. “What is it?”

  A laugh escaped his lips. “You don’t want to know.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  He pushed the tube over to her, but he didn’t let go of her hand. She read it and jerked her hand away from his and started flapping it up and down.

  “You put hemorrhoid cream on my hand? Ewww. Yuck.”

  Laughing, he caught her hand, and with one quick twist removed the ring. “You may wash your hands now.”

  She stared at him, and suddenly his humor must have been contagious. Laughter slipped off her lips. “I can’t believe you . . .” Rushing to the sink, she washed her hands. He went to stand right behind her and instinctively noted she didn’t even come to his shoulders. Normally, he went for taller women, but . . . now he wondered why.

  She looked back and up. “That’s gross.”

  “It was a new tube.” When she moved away from the sink, he dropped the ring into his jeans pocket, soaped up his hands, and rinsed.

  When he turned around, she was still standing there, flapping her wet hands in the air to dry and grinning.

  Chin held high, she grinned. “I guess I’ll have to buy you another tube.”

  “Oh. No. That was Pete’s.”

  “Right.”

  “I swear.”

  They stood there in that tiny kitchen laughing, and he felt certain the walls hadn’t been this entertained in years. He knew he hadn’t. But damn if he didn’t like her. The easy way she laughed. The unpretentious way she stood there wearing no makeup. The tease in her voice. The smile . . . Dadblast that smile.

  He’d had this with Sheri, hadn’t he? That comfortable place, the playful comradery, a breath away from being foreplay. Had they lost it when he shot the kid, or had it died when she became obsessed with her career?

  Jennifer looked up. “I think it’s my turn.”

  “Your turn?” He knew what she meant, but wished he didn’t. “I don’t have any rings stuck on my fingers.” He held out his hands.

  “No. My questions.” Her right eyebrow rose in suspicion. She was on to him.

  He still wasn’t throwing in the towel. “Fine, but you do know it’s three forty-five in the morning?”

  “No.” She looked at the clock. “Crap. How did that happen?”

  “When you drink this late, it’ll get you in trouble.” He grinned.

  A slight, feminine chuckle slipped off her lips, and damn if it wasn’t the prettiest sound he’d heard. In fact, he wanted to hear it close up. Wanted to feel it whisper across his mouth. He wanted. Oh, hell . . . he wanted.

  Wanting was dangerous. “Why don’t we try to get some sleep and pick this up tomorrow?” It was a ploy, a low one, because hell yeah, he hoped she’d forget. Maybe he needed to forget, too. Forget this wanting. Forget how much he liked her. He hadn’t felt this for any of the women he’d been with this last year.

  Jennifer Peterson crossed over some threshold he kept locked. How had she done that? Or was it not all her, but him? Was he ready? Was he finally moving past things?

  He didn’t feel ready. Or maybe he did. Shit, he didn’t even know anymore.

  “Tomorrow.” She met his gaze. “But I have the mind of an elephant.”

  “I’ll consider myself forewarned.” Gathering his glass and her mug, he set them in the sink.

  She turned around, and their eyes held another two or three seconds. He read her nightshirt again. This is my sexy lingerie.

  “Good night.” The words came out with a sweet smile.

  “Good night,” he said, then remembered. Pulling the ring out of his pocket, he said, “Here.” He reached for her hand and put it in her palm.

  And instantly he realized touching her had been a bad move.

  She looked down at the diamond, then up. “Thank you.”

  Her smile had him thinking things he shouldn’t. Like kissing her. Like following her in
to that bedroom. He inhaled to find resolve, but found her scent instead. Vanilla. Would she taste like that, too?

  “You’re welcome.” His voice rang deeper.

  Standing there, feeling emotional damaged, he watched her start toward the hall. His gaze caught on her every move. The nightshirt could fit three of her. It hung loose, offering not a clue to the feminine body beneath. The most alluring thing about the white cotton tent was the word sexy on the front. And he couldn’t even see that word right now.

  So why did his jeans suddenly feel too tight?

  It was after four when Bundy finally found a house with a black Chevy truck. The lights were off. He parked in the gravel drive, rolled his windows down and listened. The night was too quiet. Small-town quiet. Having grown up in one, he hated them. Give him the big city, where he could get lost in the crowd.

  In fact, this might be the last job he took in a small town. He almost felt claustrophobic. People actually made eye contact. He hated that. It was as if they’d remember him. In his line of work, that was dangerous.

  He got his gun from the passenger seat—his second gun—and eased out of the car slowly, hoping the guy didn’t own a dog. Not that a dog could stop him. There wasn’t another house for a mile. That was the good thing about small towns. The man could scream, and no one would hear him. And considering Bundy’s balls still hurt like a mother and one of his loose teeth had fallen out, Bundy planned on making him scream.

  Clay swore he’d only been asleep fifteen minutes when he woke up to Devil’s yowling. The dog was a lazy barker and only put out the effort when he deemed it necessary—meaning a squirrel or a possum must be pissing on his front porch.

  Groaning, Clay rolled over. Bad idea. A newly released sofa spring found its way from the inside of the cushion to poke him in the ribs. The jab had just enough oomph to chase away another level of slumber. That’s when he realized something was wrong.

  He opened one eye. First, it wasn’t dark. Sun, morning sun, poured through the window. Second, Devil’s bark came from outside. Pete must have already let the dog out. Third, and this one was bad—something was burning.

  Pushing up on one elbow, he inhaled. Ugg. Burnt eggs.