“I’d love to.”
He gets his camera equipment from the truck and sets up near the entrance to the north stable.
I put Griffin’s overnight bag in the downstairs guest bedroom. When I get back outside, Andie is pulling up in her truck. She doesn’t get out but gazes at the training pen, where Mickey is training one of the new boarded horses.
I cross the yard to her truck. “Hi.”
She doesn’t look at me. I look at the training pen again. Aaron is standing on the bottom rung of the fence, watching the horse.
“Andie?”
Whatever trance she’s in is broken. “He could be your twin, back when you were fifteen.”
“You think we look alike, huh? That’s what our parents always say.”
“It’s uncanny.”
I open her door, she gets out, and we go closer, standing on the other side of the pen from Aaron. “When I was a little younger than he is now, I fell in with the wrong crowd my freshman year in high school. Luckily for me, my best friend Sam wanted nothing to do with me when I was around the others. He gave me an ultimatum, him or them.”
“What did you do?”
“I chose them. I partied for an entire month straight. Drank, fought, and did all the stuff delinquents do. My parents knew something was wrong, but I was good at hiding it. One night after sneaking out and getting wasted, I crawled back through my window to find Sam and my parents sitting in my bedroom. He’d ratted me out. I was grounded for two months.”
She puts her hand on my arm. “Did you thank him later?”
“I don’t think I did, but I should have.”
“What happened to him? Are you still friends?”
“Aside from those two or three months, we were inseparable in high school. He was smart. Like genius smart. He went away to Tulane University. Last I saw on Facebook, he’s doing his residency at the Mayo Clinic.”
“He’s a doctor?”
“I knew he would be. He never let anything get in his way.”
“What did you want to be back then?”
“I’m twenty-five, and I still don’t know what I want to do with my life. You’re lucky you’ve known what you wanted since you were fifteen.”
“I have, haven’t I?” She straightens. “I’d better go. I only have a few minutes to eat before I’m due at the Double Duce.”
“See you tomorrow then? Or tonight if you want to join us. I’m cooking for Griffin and Aaron.” I chuckle. “Maybe not Aaron. Do you know my uncle has got him sleeping in the bunkhouse?”
“It’ll be good for him.”
“I hope Griffin knows what he’s doing.”
“Some kids need tough love, Maddox. It’s nice when parents recognize that.” She leaves.
Griffin comes over, his eyes following Andie to the guesthouse. “Got a renter?”
“She’s a friend. I’m helping her out.”
“A friend, huh? I’d say it’s more than your grandmother’s ranch holding your interest.” He fiddles with his camera, then holds it out.
I shield the sun from the digital screen. It’s a picture of Andie and me. Her hand is on my arm, and we’re looking at each other. Our body language makes me a complete liar. She’s more than a friend. Something inside me twists, no… hurts, when I think of leaving this place.
I hand him his camera. “I’d like a copy of that.”
Chapter Twenty-six
Andie
“It’s getting dark,” Maddox says. “We should go.”
“Just a few more minutes.” I line up the target and shoot. “This is fun.”
“I think I’ve created a monster. But shooting in the dark, or even at dusk, isn’t recommended.”
I fire off one more round and hand him my gun. “Fine, but you have to agree to bring me out here again.”
“With pleasure.”
Maddox unloads the guns, packs them away, and straps the bag to Tadpole. I get on Baby Blue and turn toward the ranch.
“We’re not going that way,” Maddox says.
I draw down my eyebrows. “I thought we were going to have supper.”
“We are. Follow me.” He turns Tadpole in the other direction.
We’re past the ridge, so I know we’re not going on another sunset picnic. We keep saying we’re casual. Friends even. But still, sometimes it feels like we’re so much more. We see each other all the time. Have supper together almost every night. Tell each other about our days. We even fool around. But we’ve never crossed the line we both claimed we’d be okay crossing.
It’s not like we haven’t had opportunities. We’ve had plenty of them. I know why I haven’t crawled into bed with him. Fear. Not the kind of fear I felt with Victor. I know Maddox would never hurt me—not in the same way Victor might have. My fear lies right in the smack center of my chest. Maddox is the whole package. Nice, handsome, generous. And I fear if we sleep together, my heart and my brain will travel so far past casual, it won’t even be in my taillights.
A building comes into view, and I realize where we’re going. “The hunting lodge? For supper? Maddox, it’s probably filled with rodents and cobwebs, and there’s no electricity.”
“Oh ye of little faith,” he says, smirking.
We tie up the horses out front. He holds out a hand, and I take it, carefully climbing the five steps to the porch while looking for the broken slat I once put my foot through when Viv and I were here a gazillion years ago. “Where’s the broken step?”
“I fixed it.”
“You fixed it?”
“I mend fences for a living now. One broken two-by-eight was a piece of cake.”
The front porch has been swept, there are no cobwebs in sight, and two clean rocking chairs are facing west.
“In case we wanted to watch the sunset.” We go inside. “Stay here.” Excitedly, he runs through the grand front hall, lighting candle after candle. He disappears into another room and I see a glow there, too. A minute later, he’s back. “What do you think?”
The place is empty, with the exception of an old piano covered with a sheet, a few paintings on the walls, and an ancient Victorian bookcase Vivian couldn’t bear to part with. Light from the candles dances along the walls and ceiling. I step into the next room. A large blanket has been laid on the floor. There are champagne flutes, vases of orchids, a large picnic basket, and more candles.
What I don’t see are rodent droppings, spider webs, and dust. “It must have taken an army to clean this place.”
“Aaron helped. We started last night and finished earlier today.”
“You did this in less than a day?”
“Only these two rooms and the porch. My uncle was with us. You should see some of the pictures he took of this old lodge. It makes me kind of sad that the new owner might tear it down.”
I run a finger along an oil painting. I’m not sure why Vivian kept it. It’s a portrait of the original owner and his family, which included Earl Thompson. She was never keen on the Thompsons, but she did respect history, and this old place has a lot of it.
“Why did you do all this?”
“You said no restaurants, and I was getting tired of eating in.”
He opens the picnic basket and pulls out clear wrap-covered plates of cheese, berries, and bread. “Are you hungry?”
“I’m starving.”
He smiles, reaches into a cooler, and pulls out a bottle of champagne. It’s not the only bottle in there. My heartbeat speeds up. I tell myself this is all an illusion. It’s temporary. This can’t go anywhere. It’s casual. But why, then, do I feel like Cinderella going to the ball?
“Let’s go outside and watch the sunset,” he says, handing me a glass. I follow him to the porch and we sit in the rocking chairs.
“It won’t be as good as seeing it from the ridge,” I say.
“I think you’re wrong.”
When I peek at him, he’s not staring at the sky. He’s looking at me.
Calm down, Cinderella, I tel
l myself.
He holds out his glass. “To sunsets and orchids and”—one of the horses neighs, and he raises his glass in their direction—“to horses.” We laugh. He locks eyes with me. “To you, Andie.”
I hold my drink up. “And to you for doing all this.”
“To us then.”
We drink in silence as the sun drops below the tree line.
He stands and offers me his hand. “We should probably go inside before the critters come out.” He leads me back to the blanket and food. We sit on the floor and pick at the delicacies. I try to ignore how romantic this is. How perfect he is. How naïve I am if I think none of this is affecting me.
“Tell me about the guy who burned you,” he says.
I pop a grape in my mouth.
“Oh, come on, Andie. I see you fighting it. You love it here, but you don’t want to. You mentioned once you’d been burned. Tell me, who was he?”
I eat another grape.
“You don’t want to talk about him, do you?”
I shake my head.
“Okay. Tell me what went through your head yesterday when you saw my cousin. It was like you were in a trance, the way you were watching him…”
“The resemblance between the two of you is uncanny, that’s all. He looks exactly like you did at fifteen.”
“I’m surprised you remember what I looked like. We only met the one time.”
“I thought you’d come back,” I confess.
He smiles. “So you thought about me?” I blush, and he laughs. “I thought about you, too. Hell, if I’m being honest, I did more than think about you. I was fifteen and you looked amazing in that pink cowboy hat. You were the inspiration for a large portion of my teenage fantasies.”
Did he just confess to what I think he confessed to? “That might be TMI.”
“Don’t look so shocked. Are you telling me you’ve never, you know, fantasized about me?”
I glance away, embarrassed. “I was a young girl.”
He moves closer. “Not back then, Andie. Now.” I lean back, and he climbs over me. “After our night in the stable, I can’t stop thinking about you.” His gaze travels to my neck. His fingers linger on the top button of my shirt. “Truth be told, it’s all I think about.” He leans down, his lips barely touching mine. “I think about these lips.” He kisses me, then he cups my breast over my shirt. “I think about touching you.” His hand works down my abdomen, over my jeans, and settles between my legs. “I think how I might die if I don’t make you come again.”
I pull his shirt off over his head and touch his bare skin. He’s right. I think about him. Dream about him. Fantasize about having him in every way. He removes my shirt, then my bra. He stares at my chest.
“You’re beautiful.”
I swallow. “So are you.”
His hands cup me, kneading my breasts. I run my fingers along the ridges of his abs, then along the waistband of his pants. I skim a finger under his jeans, touching the tip of his erection. He draws in a sharp breath.
He abruptly stands, kicks off his shoes, and pulls down his jeans and boxers. I stare as if it’s the first time I’ve ever seen such a thing. In some ways, it is. He’s a man, a cowboy, a protector. He’s everything I want and can never fully have. But he’s here now, and I want him more than anything.
I get up and remove my jeans and panties. The way he looks at me makes my heart pound. I’ve never felt so beautiful. So wanted and utterly desired. If my skin looks as satiny beautiful as his does in the candlelight, it’s no wonder he’s eating me with his eyes. I’m not even embarrassed, just completely turned on.
“God, Andie.” He steps toward me and we collide. His erection presses firmly against my stomach, creating tingles from head to toe. He pulls me so tightly against him, we practically become one.
We drop to our knees on the blanket. He traces my jaw, then weaves his hands into my hair. When we kiss, his penis jerks against me, and I’m reminded of my promise to reciprocate. I slip my hand around it. Moans escape his throat. I move my hand up and down, feeling a bead of wetness escape the tip.
We lay down, and he says, “I want that, but right now, I want this more.”
His lips find mine again, then they travel to my breasts, where he toys with my nipples. I squirm and groan. He smiles deviously before going farther south. His tongue skims across my stomach. I shake in anticipation and then feel a finger inside me. I press down on it. His tongue is on my clit, and I shudder. “Yes,” I breathe and arch into him.
His tongue does incredible things to me, running circles around the tiny bundle of nerves, then flicking it before lightly sucking as he works more fingers inside me. My thighs tighten and my insides burn, and I feel myself building. He lightens the pressure, giving me a reprieve, and I relax a moment before he starts again. I grab onto his hair and hold him right where he is. His tongue flits back and forth, and I explode, my walls pulsating against his fingers until he’s drawn every last quiver from me.
My hands go limp and I drop my head to the floor. I’m languid, utterly spent. Deliciously satiated.
He gazes into my eyes. “I want to make love to you.”
I bite my lip. “Yes.”
The instant the word leaves my mouth, he’s inside me, and the feeling is exquisite. He pumps slowly, then faster. He pulls out and starts again. He kisses my neck, my collarbone—every inch of skin his lips can reach. I can see he’s close. He tenses. One last thrust, and he arches back and grunts loudly, then he collapses on me.
I groan under his weight. He laughs and moves to one side. “Why did we wait so long to do that?”
He awkwardly reaches behind him for our glasses and tops them off, then we lie on our sides facing each other, both perched on an elbow, and finish the bottle.
“His name was Bobby Monahan.”
His eyebrows shoot up. “The one who burned you?”
“It was my own fault. I got too attached.”
“Who was he?”
“We went to vet school together. He tried to hook up with me the very first day, but I shut him down. I shut everyone down. I was there to study. I didn’t need distractions. So we became friends. By our third year, when he’d slept with every other woman in our class, he propositioned me. Said he wasn’t looking for a girlfriend, and he knew I didn’t want a relationship, making us the perfect non-couple.”
“And you agreed.”
I nod. “It had been a long time. I needed… stress relief.”
“Did you get it?”
“For almost a year we had this incredible friends-with-benefits thing. It was nice not to worry about dating, but we still got to go on dates. He treated me nicely. We had fun together. It was perfect really.”
“Until…”
I roll onto my back and close my eyes. “Until I went and fell in love with him. And stupid me, I told him.”
“Ah, man. What did he do?”
“He freaked. He said I’d broken our promise not to let that happen. He was mad at me.”
“Sounds like a douche.”
“The thing is, he wasn’t. He was right. He never led me to believe he wanted anything more. I knew I was going to end up in Texas, and he knew he was going to Wyoming. We swore we wouldn’t develop feelings. It was all my fault, because even after I started having those feelings, I let things continue.”
“What happened? Did he ghost you?”
“Quite the opposite. He remained my friend, but things were never the same. We couldn’t talk to each other like we had in the past. He loved me, but not in the way I loved him.”
“Are you still in love with him?”
“I haven’t seen him since graduation.”
He sits up and opens a new bottle. “You didn’t answer the question.”
“It’s been well over a year, and we ended things six months before that.”
“I take it your answer is yes then.”
I sit up. I haven’t thought about Bobby in months. “I’m not
in love with him. In all honesty, I was more hurt over losing my best friend than losing a boyfriend.”
“Was he the last guy you slept with?”
I shake my head. “Tony Ramsey, eight months ago. He was in town on a rodeo circuit.”
“A one-nighter?”
“More like a four-nighter.”
“Why, Dr. Shaw. Who knew you had it in you?”
I drink and spill a little. Wine tickles my belly as it rolls down my skin. I look down at myself and laugh. “Do you think it’s weird that we’re sitting here naked talking about my exes?”
He chuckles. “I’m enjoying it.”
“What about you? You said you didn’t leave anyone back in New York, but what about before? There must have been someone.”
“A long string of nobodies is more like it. I don’t date much. I can count on both hands how many times I’ve taken out a woman in the past year.”
“So it’s been a while for you.”
“I said I don’t date much, Andie. I didn’t say I was celibate.”
“What was the name of the last woman you were with?”
He looks off in the distance, like he has to think hard to remember. “Joanna Mills. No, Wells. Or maybe Willis.”
“You don’t remember her name?”
“We only went out once.”
“When?”
“February, I think.”
“Please don’t say you took her out on Valentine’s Day, slept with her, and never called her again.”
“It wasn’t Valentine’s Day, and it was she who never called me.”
My eyes wander down his body. “Foolish woman.”
His penis twitches and gets hard. “Like what you see, do you?”
“I don’t know. Do you like what you see?”
He brushes a hair off my forehead. “Hell yes, I do.”
“Do you think you’ll remember my name five months from now?”
He puts down his glass and mine and pins me to the floor. “Andie Shaw, I’ll remember your name on my death bed.”
Texas Orchids (The Devil's Horn Ranch Series) Page 21