Cocky Bastard

by Penelope Ward

  It smelled spicy…and delicious. Unable to resist, I opened my mouth and let him feed it to me. “Mmm,” I said as I chewed the juicy link slowly, closing my eyes and savoring every bite. When I opened my lids, Chance’s gaze was fixated on my lips.

  “You want more?” he whispered huskily.

  Saliva gathered in my mouth. “Yes.”

  This time, he lifted a piece of bacon and fed it to me from his hand. I hated to admit it, but he was right about that sauce. It was so good on everything.

  “More?”

  I licked my lips. “Yeah.”

  Chance fed me three more bites. When I let out a moan, he dropped his fork, and it made a loud clanking sound. “Jesus Christ. The food is good. But it’s not that good.”

  My mouth was disgustingly full. “What do you mean?”

  “When was the last time you were really good and rooted?”

  “Rooted? What?”

  “Fucked, Princess. When was the last time you were properly fucked?”

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “There is no way you could possibly have that kind of reaction to food unless you were completely hard up.” He wiggled his brows. “Prince Harry didn’t quite do it for you, did he?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “Your face is turning redder than this sauce.” Chance leaned in and whispered, “Aubrey…when was the last time you had an orgasm during sex?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  His tone became more insistent. “How…long… has it been?”

  “College,” I practically coughed out. What the hell did I just admit? “I can’t believe I just told you that. Now, I’m embarrassed.”

  He let out a deep breath. “Don’t be. But I’m not gonna lie. I’m truly shocked. A woman like you should be with a man that knows what he’s doing.”

  “Why do you care? You keep saying that, a ‘woman like me.’ I didn’t even think you liked me very much.”

  Chance leaned back into the booth and glanced out the window before looking me in the eyes. “As much as you’re a pain in my ass…I do like you, Aubrey. You’re funny. Not funny ha ha…but funny. You’re conscientious. You’re quick-witted. You’re smart. You’re damn cute…” He looked down almost to stop himself from going any further. “What happened anyway?”

  “With what?”

  “Why are you running from that tool Harrison?” When I hesitated, he flagged down Bertha. “Can we have more coffee, please, gorgeous?”

  I didn’t know what came over me. Maybe it was the hot sauce. A part of me just wanted to let it all out. After Bertha poured two fresh mugs, I started to open up to him.

  “Harrison was a partner at the law firm I worked at back in Chicago. I was an associate. Patent and trademark law. He and I were a couple for a little over a year. We’d moved in together. About two months ago, I found out he was cheating on me with one of his interns. So, yeah…”

  “So, you moved out?”

  “Yeah. I also left my job. Harrison has spent every day of the past several weeks trying to convince me that I’m making a mistake, that I’m throwing away my career because he would have made me partner sooner than I could do it on my own. I left everything behind, took the first position I got, which happened to be at a small startup firm in Temecula. I’m scared. I don’t know anyone out West, and I don’t know if I’m making the right decision. I’m not even sure if being a lawyer is what I even want anymore. I feel very lost.” Admitting that last part made me start to tear up a little.

  Chance’s eyes held a serious intensity that I hadn’t previously seen from him. “What are you passionate about, Princess?”

  Thinking for a bit, there was only one thing that really came to mind. I let out a nervous laugh. “Not much except…animals. I love anything to do with them. I’d wanted to be a vet, but my father was a lawyer, and he pressured me to follow in his footsteps.”

  “You probably feel like you relate to them better than humans, huh?”

  “Sometimes I feel that way, yes.”

  He scratched his chin and smiled. “You’ll find your way. You will. The shit that happened back in Chicago is still too fresh for you to think straight. When you get out to California, the change of environment will do you good. You can take your time, look inside yourself and decide what it is you really want, then make a plan to get there. You are in control of your destiny—except in the next twenty-four hours. I’m in control of it for now.” He winked and flashed a devious smile. “You’re stuck with me whether you like it or not.”

  “I guess I am.” I smiled. This guy was starting to grow on me, and that was making me really uneasy. I didn’t even know anything about him. “Your turn. Who are you, Chance Bateman? How long have you been in the U.S.?”

  “I was born here, actually. I’m a citizen. I moved to Australia when I was five. My father was recruited into professional soccer in Australia to play and eventually coach. I grew up in that world.”

  “That’s really cool.”

  “It was for a while…until it wasn’t anymore.” He swallowed, his expression turning sullen.

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s a bit of a long story.”

  My phone rang, interrupting the conversation. It was Harrison. Shit. Shit. Shit.

  I flipped it around to show Chance the caller I.D.

  He took it from my grasp and answered, “Harry! You wanker!”

  Harrison’s voice was muffled. “Put Aubrey on the phone.”

  “Aubrey and I were just talking about you! We’re out to brekky, and she picks up one of these tiny sausage links and says, ‘See this here? This is just about Harry’s size.’”

  He sounded irate through the phone. “You fucking asshole. Tell Aubrey if she’s taking up with trash like you—”

  Chance hung up the phone. “Ready to go?”

  “That was awesome.” I high-fived him after he lifted his hand. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

  “Bye, Bertha!” Chance winked at our waitress.

  “Bye, hot stuff.”

  Rolling my eyes, I shook my head in laughter as I followed his hot ass out the door.

  It was a beautiful, clear afternoon. I told Chance I wanted to drive this round. In all honesty, I needed a break from staring at his eyes and stubble for a while. My unwanted attraction to him was really starting to make me uncomfortable. Having control of the radio was also a plus to being in the driver’s seat.

  “Michael Bolton? Really, Princess? You’re gonna make me sit through this?”

  “What? He’s good! His voice is…hearty…robust!”

  Chance started singing loudly over the lyrics to When a Man Loves a Woman. He sounded horrible. The impromptu duet between Chance and Michael was enough to make me switch to another song.

  Soon after, we stopped for gas, and Chance went inside the mini-mart to get us some snacks after he finished pumping my fuel.

  When he reentered the car with a large paper bag, I looked over at him and froze just as I was about to turn the ignition.

  He had powder under his nose.

  Shit! Was he a coke head? Had he gone to the bathroom to snort it?

  “Are you gonna start the car sometime today?” he chided.

  My breathing became labored as I geared myself up for a major disappointment. “Tell me the truth.”

  “Alright…”

  “Were you doing drugs in the bathroom?”

  His eyes darkened. “What the fuck?” He was angry. “Why would you ask me that?”

  “You have powder under your nose!”

  He closed his eyes and suddenly erupted in laughter that lasted for at least a minute. He’d never laughed so hard in the time I’d known him. Chance kept trying to speak but would keep losing it, having to clutch his chest. He looked at himself in the sun visor mirror and swiped the powder from above his lip.

  Practically shoving his finger into my mouth, he said, “Taste.”

&nb
sp; I pushed it away. “No!”

  “Taste!”

  I hesitantly ran the tip of my tongue along his finger. It tasted like grape Kool-Aid or something. “It’s sweet.”

  He opened the paper bag and took out one of those Pixy Stix with powdered sugar inside and threw it at me. “Your cocaine, madam.”

  Relief washed over me. I also felt stupid. “Pixy Stix? You like these?”

  “I love them, actually.”

  “That’s pure sugar. I haven’t eaten one of these since I was a kid.”

  “They were all out of Fun Dip, so these had to do.” He looked down. “I can’t believe you thought I was snorting coke. I’m not perfect by any means, but I’ve never done drugs in my life.” Chance looked seriously hurt by my assumption.

  I still hadn’t started the car. “I’m sorry for jumping to conclusions. It’s just…I don’t really know you.”

  “So, get to know me,” he said softly.

  We were silent for a while before I spoke, “Why are you headed to California?”

  “I live there.”

  I knew what I really wanted to ask but wasn’t sure why it mattered so much. My heart started to pound. “Who were you talking to on the phone this morning?”

  He looked startled by my question. “What?”

  “I overheard your conversation from my room. You were telling someone your plans for the day. You lied and said you were in Los Angeles.”

  It took him a while to answer. “It’s complicated, Aubrey.” Then, he seemed to shut down and turned toward the window.

  “Well, this was a good conversation. I’m glad I asked,” I said bitterly as I started the car and took off toward the highway.

  We sat in silence for a long while. Chance looked tense and kept sucking down the Pixy Stix one by one. After about a half-hour, I decided to break the ice. “How do you keep a body like that eating the way you do?”

  “Is that your way of saying you like my body? You like what you see?”

  “I didn’t say that exactly.”

  “Not exactly, but you implied it.”

  “Jackass.”

  “Lots and lots of sex, Aubrey. That’s how I do it.”

  “Really? That’s it?”

  “No. I just wanted to see your face turn that pretty shade of pink it does when you’re embarrassed.” He snickered. “In answer to your question, I work out a lot, and I don’t eat like this every day. But on road trips, all dietary rules go out the window. You need to be able to eat what you want to keep sane.”

  “Well, from what I see, you’re pretty insane, so it’s not working.”

  He smiled at me, and I returned it. The aftermath of our tense conversation from earlier finally seemed to have faded away. “Give me one of the packages of pretzels, please.”

  He took one out of the paper bag and handed it to me then looked behind his shoulder to my packed backseat. “What do you have in all these bags back here, anyway?”

  “Don’t touch my stuff.”

  “I bet there are some treasures in this junk that would tell me everything I ever needed to know about you.”

  He started to blindly grab things out of my bags. “Oh, a book! Happy Bitch: The girlfriend’s straight-up guide to losing the baggage and finding the fun, fabulous you inside.”

  “Put that back and don’t touch that bag again!”

  “Alright. But what exactly are you hiding in this one that’s so bad?”

  Shit.

  Chance kept digging. “What’s this now?”

  Oh no!

  He pulled out my lifelike flesh-toned vibrator. “Princess…is this a silicone cock in a bejeweled case? No wonder why you didn’t mind that Harry couldn’t do it for you. You were taking it into your own hands and into your own—”

  “Give me that!”

  He took it out of the case. “Oh…this thing is pathetic. We could do a lot better than that.”

  “Chance…seriously, I’m not joking. Hand it over…now!”

  “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. We all pleasure ourselves.”

  The events that followed seemed to happen in quick succession. He kept waving the dildo around as I tried to grab it. A truck driver that noticed it honked at us. The car was swerving. Then, I saw it. It was standing in the middle of the road with frightened eyes, frozen like a deer in headlights. I suddenly cut the wheel hard to the right, driving straight into an embankment, not knowing if I had killed him.

  Chapter Four

  “Is he breathing?” I held my own breath hovering over Chance until I saw the rise and fall of its little stomach. It had shaggy long hair and was spotted like a cow, but its eyes bulged from its head more like a frog. The poor goat was only a baby. One I’d just raced into with my car while fighting over a damn vibrator.

  At first, I didn’t actually think I’d hit him. But then I watched in horror as he fell straight over, all four legs standing straight up stiff, like something out of a bad movie. Now we were both standing over him, waiting for something to happen, neither of us quite sure what to do.

  Without warning, the goat flipped himself and was suddenly standing on all four feet. Startled, we both jumped back. Chance’s arms spanned wide as if to protect me from a killer beast.

  The baby goat took a few cautious steps, and then proceeded to walk directly into my BMW, as if the two-ton mass of steel wasn’t even there. “Oh my God. I must have hurt his head. Look how confused the poor thing is.” I reached out to touch the wounded animal, and Chance grabbed my arm, stopping me.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to pick him up. Look at him. He’s hurt. I ran him over.” I skirted around Chance and leaned down on one knee, extending my hand in peace to the sweet little goat. “And it’s all your fault.”

  “My fault?”

  “Yes, your fault. If you hadn’t been distracting me, I would have been paying more attention to the road, and this would have never happened.” The goat nuzzled into my hand. “Oh my God. Look how cute he is.” I petted the top of his head, and he snuggled even closer.

  “It’s not my fault. If you weren’t so uptight about your sexuality, you would have been calm when I found your magic wand.”

  I stopped petting the goat’s head. “I am not uptight about my sexuality.”

  Chance folded his arms across his chest. “Admit that you pleasure yourself then. I want to hear you say it.”

  “I will do no such thing.”

  “Uptight.”

  “Pervert.”

  “A pervert is someone who has sexual behavior that is wrong or unacceptable. That’s your problem. You think pleasuring yourself is wrong. I find it perfectly acceptable. In fact, I rather like the thought of you using your little magic wand.”

  I was pretty sure my eyes resembled the poor goat’s—bulging from my head. Just then, a truck whizzed by us. One of those double trailers that always made me nervous to drive near. A whoosh of wind in its wake reminded me how close to the road we actually were.

  “Come on. It’s dangerous out here,” Chance said.

  “What are we going to do with Esmerelda?”

  “Who?”

  “Him.” I scratched my nails behind the goat’s ear, and he made a low humming noise that sounded like he was saying, “mommmm.”

  “Let him go.” Chance waved his arm in the direction of the wooded area behind him. “Back where he came from. He’s fine.”

  “He’s not fine.”

  “Looks fine to me.”

  “I think he has a head injury.”

  Chance shook his head. “He’s fine. Watch.” He clapped his hands and made kissing sounds as if he were calling a dog. “Come on buddy. This way.”

  Esmerelda made no effort to move, quite content with her head pressed against my chest and her body between my legs.

  “You need to let go of him.”

  “I’m not holding him here.”

  “Not physically. But he’s got his head buried between your
cleavage and his body between your thighs. No male is going to walk away from that willfully.”

  “See. Told you. Pervert.”

  Another truck flew past. This time he sat on his horn as he breezed by, and I went from squatting down to tumbling back onto my ass. The goat…well, he took one step and fell over again—all four legs stood straight up in the air. I couldn’t believe I’d damaged such an adorable baby goat.

  “See. He’s hurt. We can’t leave him here.”

  “What do you expect us to do for him? Belt him into the backseat of the car and take him to a veterinarian for a full work up?”

  Two hours later, we were finally pulling off the highway in Sterling, Colorado to take our passenger to the Sterling Animal Hospital. It had taken Chance nearly a half-hour to unpack and repack the back of my car to make room. He wasn’t happy about it.

  “Snowflake?”

  “No.”

  “It’s from the children’s book…”

  “Heidi. Yes. I know.”

  “You do?”

  “What? You just assume I’m uneducated because I don’t walk around with a stick up my ass like your Harrison?”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  “Oh yeah? So what made you assume I wouldn’t know a classic literature story?”

  “I don’t know. You just don’t seem like the type.”

  “Well maybe you should stop typecasting people. Not everyone fits into neat little compartments you know.”

  We were both silent for a while, with only the woman’s voice from my GPS interrupting occasionally to direct us to turn.

  “Mutton.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “For the goat. A name.”

  “We are not naming him mutton! That’s sadistic.” We’d been arguing over names for the last hour or so. I favored names from Greek mythology or classic literature, whereas Chance wanted to name him one of the many dinners the poor baby could be turned into.

  We arrived at the animal hospital, pulling up to an open spot right in front of the door. I made Chance carry the little guy, even though the door was only about ten feet away. Holding Esmerelda Snowflake, he looked…hot.

  Was I that demented? Because I actually thought he was even sexier carrying a goat.