Bent Not Broken (A Cedar Creek #1)

by Julia Goda

I uncrossed my arms to put my hands on my hips, threw a leg out to the side, and started tapping my foot. Woman code for “Oh, fuck no!” Cal’s head tipped down, taking in my stance, and came back up to my face. His lips were twitching. Twitching! The nerve! I narrowed my eyes, took a deep breath, ready to give him the what for, and said,

  “What—”

  That’s all that came out of my mouth, seeing as Cal had now reached me, but didn't stop. He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me roughly into his body. I was so stunned that all I could do was uncross my arms and put my hands on his chest to catch myself. Speechless, I stared up at him. Who acts like that?

  He tipped his head down to me and looked into my eyes.

  “Mornin’,” he rumbled.

  Then his eyes started roaming over my face, up to my hair, then back to my eyes. What I saw in his eyes then made me stop breathing and go completely still. H-o-l-y hell.

  His eyes were not warm. They were hot.

  Hotter than hot.

  They were scorching.

  And wanting.

  I felt a tingle between my legs and a shiver run through my body. Cal felt my shiver and his lips turned into a grin. Seriously! If I wouldn’t look like a complete idiot, I’d stomp my foot and growl. Instead, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath through my nose, trying to get control.

  “Ivey,” Cal prompted.

  I opened my eyes and tried to take a step back, but he tightened his arms around me, communicating his intention to keep me close. I tried again, but he just tightened his grip on me further.

  This, thank God, was making me mad again. How dare he! I didn't even know the guy, and he just came up to my house, grabbed me, and wouldn’t let me go? And that after a whole week of following me around, touching and hugging me, and giving me soft kisses for everyone in town to see? To hell with that!

  “Cal—” I started snapping at him, only to be interrupted.

  “Take you to dinner.”

  Huh? Dinner? So wrapped up in my snit, it took a second for that to sink in. The confusion must have showed on my face, since he again started grinning down at me.

  “Tonight.”

  Oh no. He was asking me out! Again! No, not asking. Telling me he was taking me out! No way. Not happening, Mr.!

  “I don’t date!” I snapped at his face.

  “You do now,” he arrogantly responded.

  “No, I do not,” I kept snapping, while also trying to push him away.

  I succeeded to get an inch of room between us until he yanked me back into his body. He moved one of his hands up to hold me at the back of my head, fingers in my hair. His head was coming down to mine, and for a split second I thought he was going to kiss me. And damn it all to hell I wanted him to. Badly. Just short of his mouth making contact, he stopped with his nose touching mine. My heartbeat was speeding up and I again stopped breathing.

  Then he gave it to me.

  “Know you don’t take men that live in town. I will be the only exception to that rule. Been patient this last week. I’m telling you now my patience has run out. I’m taking you to dinner tonight. We’re going to the restaurant in town to show everyone you’re mine. Your job today is calling your boy toy from a town over, tell him you’re done with him.”

  Wow. There was a lot there. I had so many things to say I didn’t know where to start. So I just kept staring at him, or glaring would be a better word.

  “Ivey,” Cal prompted, “did I make myself clear?”

  No. Absolutely not. He did not make himself clear. So that’s what came out of my mouth.

  “No, Cal, you did not make yourself clear. You can’t just come up to my house and order me to go out to dinner with you! And what I do or don’t do with my boy toy is none of your business!” I screeched in his face.

  “I see you didn’t get me.” I thought it wouldn’t be possible but he tightened his grip on me. Again.

  Then in a lower voice he stated, “I am making you my business. Starting last week, everything you do is my business. If I find out you are still meeting that guy or any guy, I will not be happy. And you will answer to me. Something you don’t wanna do. Now, dinner tonight. I’ll pick you up at six. Be ready.”

  At this I started struggling. He couldn’t be serious. But it was no use. His arms were like steel wrapped around me. I had nowhere to go.

  “I keep warning you about that attitude, babe,” he said before he slammed his mouth down on mine and took it in a fierce kiss. I continued to struggle for about a half second, for that was when he slid his tongue into my mouth and found mine. At the sensation of his tongue touching the tip of mine, I instantly melted into his arms. He felt it and deepened the kiss. Touching turned into tangling, tangling turned into sucking.

  Wow. I had always loved kissing, but this was something else.

  I gave in to him and kissed him back. Amazing. My hands in his hair, my chest pressed to his, I could feel him growl deep in his chest. Too soon, he tore his mouth from mine, abruptly ending the kiss. We were both breathing hard.

  “Jesus, baby.”

  I opened my eyes in a haze, completely lost in a fog and stared up at him. What just happened?

  Cal’s eyes roamed my face and he tipped up his lips.

  “You’ll be ready for me at six?” He asked.

  All I could do was nod.

  His head bend down again to give me a soft kiss on the lips before he let me go and moved away. He got in his truck, gave me a chin lift and a smile, and drove off. My eyes followed his truck down the lane and kept staring long after he was gone. Did that just happen? I blinked, took a deep breath, then turned around and stomped back to my Adirondack chair to finally finish my coffee.

  I didn’t realize that not once while Cal told and showed me exactly what he wanted from me, even got physical about it, not for a single moment, did I get scared.

  *****

  It was busy today. I hadn’t had a minute to myself since I opened the store. Which was good and bad at the same time. Good, because it didn’t give me time to think too much about what had happened this morning and what I was going to do about it. Bad, because I didn’t have enough time to think about what had happened this morning and what I was going to do about it. See! I was so totally screwed!

  Today of all days was one of the busiest days we had all month. You’d think all the new releases had come out in one day, that’s how busy it was. But I shouldn’t complain. I loved doing this. It was my dream come true. I also needed it to pay my bills. It was just that today, I really needed to talk to my best friend. Cal was getting to me, and the effect his kiss had on me this morning scared the living daylights out of me. I knew where Macy stood, she had made it very clear that she wanted him or someone like him for me, but I was freaking out and needed to talk to her about it.

  She knew something was going on with me when she walked in this morning. I was busy with a customer with more customers already lining up—what, nobody had anything better to do on a beautiful Saturday morning than perusing the bookstore asking a million questions?—when she caught my eye and her eyebrows went up, asking me silently if something was wrong. As I didn’t have time to confide in her, I just shook my head and shrugged my shoulders, telling her we’d talk later. The problem was that now it was later, but we still hadn’t had time to talk.

  The bell above the door rung, indicating another customer walking in. I normally greeted all my customers with at least a smile even when I was busy, but I was so wrapped up in this particularly annoying customer, who didn’t understand why her favourite book hadn’t been released in hard copy yet, so it could look fantastic on her book shelf, that I realized too late who it was and so didn’t have time to prepare. That’s why I jumped in surprise when I felt an arm snaking around my waist from behind. I tried to step away and turn around, but was foiled when said arm around my waist pulled my back into a hard body.

  Oh, no. Not again.

  With his mouth at my ear Cal whispered,
“Busy today, baby. That’s good. In more ways than one.” See! He had to be clairvoyant! He totally had me figured out!

  Then he kissed my temple and let me go.

  I was so shocked I couldn’t move.

  My annoying customer had stopped talking and was looking at me. In fact, it was so quiet in the store it was kind of creepy. I turned around slowly to see that yes, every single person in the store—and there were a lot, at least twenty people—was looking at me with wide eyes. Then almost collectively their heads turned and they looked at Cal’s retreating body, then back to me. Most of them were either smiling or looked like they were waiting for something to happen.

  I swallowed and looked around in a panic, trying to find Macy’s eyes. When I found them, her eyebrows had disappeared into her bangs. Yeah, tell me about it. Then I saw the change happen. Her eyes started to sparkle and her face split into a wide grin. Shit.

  “Um,” I stuttered, which seemed to snap everyone out of their trance. The store was hustling and bustling again within seconds, and I breathed a sigh of relief that everyone was pretending nothing had happened. I decided to follow their lead and deal with it later, much, much later.

  I turned back to my very annoying customer and explained to her again that unfortunately, she was going to have to wait for a few months for the hard copy of her favourite werewolf series to come out. That was just the way it was.

  When that was done, I tried to find Cal to give him a piece of my mind. Coming into my store and treating me in such an intimate way that the whole town was going to expect a wedding invitation by Monday! And I repeat, he did this in my store! Where everyone saw! So not cool.

  I turned into the fantasy section where I knew I would find Tommy and thus, his father, and there he was. Leaning against the shelf as if nothing had happened, looking down and listening to Tommy tell him all about how Frodo and Sam were going on this journey to save Middle Earth. Shit. I couldn’t make a scene in front of Tommy. Actually, I shouldn’t be making a scene at all, since I was still in my crowded bookstore. I was such an idiot!

  Tommy saw me standing at the end of the aisle before I could escape and immediately turned his attention toward me. “Ivey, did you know that the ring Bilbo found in the Hobbit is Sauron’s ring? And now Frodo has to make sure it’s safe and has to bring it to Rivendell? That is so cool!”

  Yes, it was indeed cool. I loved The Lord of the Rings. I was not much into fantasy, but that was one of my favourite books. Except the Tom Bombadil scene. I could have easily done without that one.

  “Yeah, honey, it’s cool,” I said to him, smiling.

  I looked up at his dad to see that—yes, again, arrgh!—he was grinning.

  My smile turned into a glare and he chuckled. I narrowed my eyes. This made him throw his head back and laugh a deep attractive laugh.

  Wow. Nice.

  While still in the throes of his laughter he stalked towards me to wrap me up in his arms.

  Wow. That was even nicer.

  Wrapped up by hard and strong and hot guy Cal Bennett while his body was shaking with laughter.

  Very nice.

  My glare had turned into wonder as I looked up at him, with yes, you guessed right, my mouth hanging open.

  Done laughing, his head came down to mine and he kissed me lightly on the forehead, then mumbled right there, “God, woman, you’re funny.”

  This catapulted me right back into my snit. Forgetting I was still in my store with people all around us, unbeknownst to me peeking around the corner, so they could watch the whole scene, I leaned into him and opened my mouth, “Cal!”

  Yep, that’s all that came out. Very original.

  Cal chuckled again, gave my forehead another kiss, then moved to stand beside me, his arm around my shoulders. All this he did pretending not to be affected by my glare.

  “Heard dad is finally taking you out to dinner tonight! Cool!”

  I closed my eyes and hung my head.

  Oh, dear Lord. Please let me be Hermione and give me a magical time turner, so instead of giving into his very hot kiss this morning I can kick his shin. Or let me be Doc Brown so I can build my own DeLorean time machine—

  Chuckling.

  And giggling.

  All around me.

  My head snapped up and my eyes grew wide. I stiffly turned around. Oh my God! Why me?

  “Time machine…”

  “What’s a time turner?”

  “He’s taking you to dinner?”

  “He kissed you? And it was hot?” This came from Macy in an over excited voice. I saw her jumping up and down, clapping, looking just like Lucy at the park when she had learned about my puppy.

  I stiffly turned back to face Cal to give him the glare of all glares. It should have instantly incinerated him, but alas! It looked like hot guys were resilient to female laser beam glares. Shit! Instead of writhing on the floor in agony, begging me to stop, he pulled me back into his body, gave me a peck on the lips, looked at his son, gave him a chin lift upon which Tommy handed his book to me and sauntered out the store, looked back to me, muttered, “Six o’clock. Be ready,” let me go, and followed his son.

  Shit, shit, shit! Now what did I do. Ice Bitch Ivey was sitting at home sulking and anyway, I couldn't bring her to my store. That would be rude and bad for business.

  So as every woman knew, there was only one option when you were too embarrassed to do anything else. Pretending it never happened. So I straightened my shoulders, took a deep breath, put a smile on my face, turned around, and got back to work.

  Chapter Ten

  Dinner

  Ivey

  It was 5:45pm. I was in my bathroom, finishing my hair and make-up. Why I was doing this I had no clue. I had had no intention of going out to dinner with Cal tonight. But Macy talked me into it.

  “What do you have to lose?” she asked me. “Look, Cal is known around town for being a good guy, a good dad. Does he like to get himself some? Sure, but he is not a player in the true sense of the word. He doesn’t go out with women from town, he never introduces Tommy to any of his women, none of his women have come here to throw a fit for him leaving them, which speaks for itself. From what I hear from the men coming over to our house on poker night, Cal is respected as a good, honest man. Larry explained to you how a man like him ticks, that he won’t give up. Let him take you to dinner and see what happens. If you like it, let him take you out again. If not, tell him to leave you alone. But Ivey, what Betty said to you is true. And maybe Cal finally got his head out of his ass and decided to do something about it. I have seen him look at you, time and time again. And babe, the way he looks at you, he wants to snatch you up and drag you to his cave.”

  That was exactly what I was afraid of.

  Obviously, I had told Macy what happened that morning with Cal. It had been proven that I couldn't ignore my attraction to him. That I had no control over my body when he was that close. Not when he pushed it. And I had a feeling he would be pushing it tonight.

  He was the kind of man that could break a woman.

  Not like I had been broken, but break a woman. If I let him in and he chewed me up and spit me out, I knew I wouldn’t recover. I also knew that if I didn’t go out with him tonight, he would keep coming after me until he succeeded. He wouldn’t give up, just like Larry had warned me.

  So I decided to listen to Macy and go to dinner with him. But with the intention to leave it at that. One night. One dinner. That was it. I was going to make him not like me, and then he would leave me alone and I could go back to living my life free of complications.

  Done with my hair and make-up, I walked into my closet to choose my outfit. Cedar Creek wasn’t a fancy town with fancy restaurants. It was a mountain town with diners and family restaurants. So no dressing up.

  I grabbed my nice dark grey cords, a tight black camisole and a flowy white long sleeve blouse, and got dressed.

  A knock on the door. I checked the clock on my bedside table. 5:58pm.
He was right on time. Early even.

  Dang it!

  I got up from the bed, where I had sat down to put on my boots, and went downstairs to open the door. At what I saw I stop breathing. Cal was standing on my front porch in his male beauty made even more beautiful by a cool as shit leather jacket over another plaid shirt with a white tee peeking out, both tucked into dark washed jeans, so you could see the cool as shit leather belt with its silver buckle, dark brown boots on his feet.

  Yum.

  When I looked up at him, I realized he had frozen solid. His eyes were travelling down, then up my body, and I saw his jaw clench. What? Am I not dressed right?

  “Is something wrong? Did I forget something?” I asked stupidly, looking down at myself.

  “No, babe. Next time try and keep in mind that I’m trying to go easy on you.”

  Huh? Next time? Go easy on me? I didn’t get it.

  “Babe, you look good enough to eat. Gonna have to stake my claim tonight, so that nobody gets any ideas.”

  Huh. I kinda liked that. That was a nice thing to say in a macho-man-hot-guy-compliment way. Though on the other hand, I had dressed casually to turn him off and not give him any ideas. And I wasn’t something anyone could claim.

  “Maybe I should go change,” I said in the hopes of throwing on some sweats. Maybe those would be a turn-off.

  “Fuck no. I know you’re upstairs taking your clothes off, I’m gonna want to be up there with you, which means we won’t make it to dinner.”

  Uh oh. Not a good idea.

  I stepped back from the door immediately to go grab my purse and my own leather jacket. This made him chuckle.

  “Good choice,” he said in a low voice.

  As soon as I had my jacket on, Cal grabbed my hand, lead me out the door, took the key out of my hand, turned around to lock my door, then pulled me down the front steps to his truck. There he opened the passenger door, grabbed me by my hips, and lifted me up on the seat. He didn’t wait until I was buckled in before he closed my door and walked around the front of the truck to get in on the driver’s side. All this he did without saying a single word, but communicated by pulling and grabbing my body to move it the way he needed it to.