by Lynda Chance
It was impossible.
And try as she might, Hannah attempted to stay away from the small strip of fencing that separated the border between the McIntyre and Turner lands. But almost every afternoon, when the weather allowed, she climbed on one of the four-wheelers and drove the fence line until she ended up at the place that overlooked Turner land. She did this for days and never saw anyone.
And then on Friday afternoon, she hit pay dirt.
Josh was working on the old well house that stood twenty or so feet over the fence line.
She saw him glance up when he heard the hum of the engine and nerves tightened in her stomach as he stood to his full height and turned toward where she approached the fence. She’d been waiting for this, no matter how much she lied to herself, and when he began wiping his forehead on his shirtsleeve and walking over to the fence, she let the engine idle and waited.
She couldn’t read the expression on his face, but she had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach that said it wasn’t good.
He stopped directly in front of her, and stood on the opposite side of the barbed-wire fence, his brilliant green eyes running over her. She stayed silent and concentrated on the tic in his cheek, and tried to calm her raging heartbeat.
His words when he spoke were low, controlled, and as smooth as whiskey. “I’m thinking this can’t be a coincidence, princess.”
Embarrassed by the truth, Hannah immediately thought to deny it, but she didn’t want to lie. She remained silent as she tried to think of a response that wouldn’t completely humiliate her.
She waited too long and he began to remonstrate, “I kind of had the idea I’d already made myself plain. Maybe you didn’t understand?” His words were low and heated and even though she heard the controlled anger, his voice washed through Hannah like cold water on a hot summer day.
“I’m sorry,” she managed to softly apologize.
Josh continued to stare at her without speaking, and then in a rush of movement, his booted foot stepped on the second rung of barbed-wire and forced it down as his gloved hand simultaneously pulled up the third rung, and that easily, in a move that ranchers had been using for decades, he bent down and slid unscathed through the treacherous wire and stood in front of Hannah.
He pulled the leather work gloves off one at a time and stuffed them in his back pocket. Then he reached out and cut the engine with a twist of the key.
He stood over her where she sat on the cracked vinyl seat of the four-wheeler, her body turned slightly to his. He was so close she could see the beads of perspiration on his face and smell the heady, delicious aroma from the sweat that drenched his t-shirt. The masculine combination was almost more than she could stand.
Her eyes started to slip closed in a sharp, shocking, agony of arousal.
They flew open again when she felt his rough fingers on her chin.
His eyes glittered down at her, his nostrils flaring.
“Hannah baby, we have to get this straight between us. Maybe I should have spelled it out better. Do you know anything about the deadbeat asshole who calls himself my father? He’s always drunk. He’s in and out of jail—all the time. The sheriff watches me like a hawk because he thinks I’m just like him. He expects me to cause trouble one way or the other.” His thumb caressed her chin gently in direct contrast to the fierceness of his voice. “Now what do you think the sheriff would do if I suddenly took up with the fifteen-year-old town princess?” His eyes glittered down at her, giving her a moment to digest his words before his hand tightened on her jaw once again and he continued, “You need to stay away from me. Don’t make this harder on me than it already is. You don’t know what it’s doing to my insides—knowing I can have you, but I can’t.” His fingers unclenched from around her jaw and then became caressing once again. “You understand?”
Hannah tried to answer. She licked her lips and opened her mouth to speak but the words stalled again as Josh’s eyes fell to her mouth and his fingers tightened on her face.
Her throat closed up and no words came.
His eyes tangled with hers and seconds slipped by until an agonized, ferocious look crossed his features and he bit out, “Repeat after me, princess. Josh wants me.”
Shock and heat hit her system and she gasped.
His fingers shifted, slipped into her hair and his voice hissed out, “I’m serious. Repeat it. Josh wants me.”
“Josh, please—”
“Now!” he barked and she jumped.
“Josh w-wants me,” her voice came out shaky and soft.
“Josh wants me so bad his guts are tied in knots of constant pain,” he pounded the words through his teeth and waited.
His eyes seared into hers and she attempted to answer. “Josh wants me s-so bad—” she found it impossible to say and her words dwindled off.
He reached up and his fingers twisted through her hair until he was holding her face in both of his strong hands. He continued to punch out his words in third person. “He thinks about me constantly.” As he spoke, his gaze ran over her lips, her nose, and the hair that he held in his hands. “He lives from one hour to the next for the day he can sink into me.”
Hannah’s insides were lacerated by his primal words. It was almost more than her youth and innocence could handle. At the same time, an exquisite pleasure infiltrated her system at what he was telling her. He was telling her the truth. He wanted her just as much as she wanted him. Her body shook as the depth of his need and what he was trying to convey to her sank in.
He continued in a harsh biting tone, “But I don’t want Josh to go to prison.”
She was silent as she trembled in his hold.
“Say it,” he bit out.
A single tear escaped from her eye.
“Say it,” he growled, even as his thumb shot out and wiped away the tear.
Hannah sucked in a shuddering breath. “I d-don’t want Josh to go to p-prison.” Her eyes closed as more tears welled over.
His hands lifted from her and he took a step back.
“Good girl,” he praised. “Do us both a favor and remember that the next time you come looking for me. Repeat it to yourself if it helps. I’m dead serious, Hannah. You may feel grown-up, you may even know what you want, but the State of Texas doesn’t agree with you.”
He took another step toward the fence and turned once more to stare into her eyes. His voice only softened slightly. “You have to have mercy on me, princess. There’s only so much I can take before I’ll snap, okay?”
Her eyes clung to his and she vowed to herself she wouldn’t come looking for him again. “Okay.”
****
True to his word, Josh stayed away from her. But for the next few weeks, Hannah knew he was there, in the background of her life. She didn’t go looking for him anymore, but it was a small town, and she saw him around occasionally. Heated looks would pass between them, and Hannah knew he was feeling the same pull that she was. He obviously was very serious about staying away from her, and it almost killed her. But she persevered because she didn’t have any other choice.
What made it even worse for her was the developing relationship between Ava and Ethan. Ethan had finally put it on the line with Ty, and now he and Ava were officially together. Hannah had heard everything, or at least she thought she’d heard everything. Ava told her in explicit detail how Ethan kissed, what he said to her, what he tried with her, and what she let him do. Hannah wasn’t jealous so much as she was envious. She was happy for Ava, but she wished she had the same chance for a relationship with Josh.
But it wasn’t happening. And to make matters worse, Kayla had made some kind of move that must have frustrated Ty, and now he and Kayla were pretty much together. So now whenever Hannah went to Ava’s house, she usually ended up being the fifth wheel.
And that sucked.
She didn’t see Josh at the Andersons anymore, and she knew he stayed away because of her. He was already pretty much a loner, and it almost broke her he
art that he was avoiding his friends because of her.
Soon, her sixteenth birthday was just days away. Her mother had wanted to throw her a sweet sixteen party, but that was absolutely the last thing that Hannah wanted. In fact, it horrified her completely. Who wanted a party when no one would show up? Maybe if she dwelled on it, she’d be sad. But she just couldn’t work up enough energy to care. All she thought about was schoolwork and Josh. That was an incredibly sad tribute to her boring life, but that’s the way it was.
That’s the way it always was. She thought about Josh, but she rarely saw him.
And when she did see him, the feelings he induced almost paralyzed her with need.
She was studying at a small table in the school library next to one of the sweetest, geekiest boys in the town. Steven was a junior, and he helped her with her advanced trigonometry. He was incredibly brilliant, and Hannah recognized that someday, he’d be one of those people who moved away from Redwood Falls and struck it rich somewhere like Dallas or Houston or Seattle by being involved with a start-up technology company. The guy had a lot of potential, but Hannah wasn’t interested in any guys but one. So as Steven sat beside her, she didn’t think anything of it, until she looked up from her notebook and saw Josh standing a few feet away, watching her with an arrested expression on his face.
For a few seconds he stood completely still and stared at her, his feet glued to the floor and his gaze fixated on her. Her breath seized up in her lungs as his eyes dropped to her lips and then slowly, to her breasts. The look on his face was exquisitely intoxicating as his features revealed a look of such intense hunger that it took her breath away. Her muscles tightened, a thousand butterflies going crazy in her stomach and she barely managed to take in enough oxygen to sustain her. She licked her lips and his eyes found hers again, his nostrils flaring. And then he glanced to her right and as his eyes fell on the boy she was sitting with, he visibly stiffened.
Steven, her study partner, must have felt the tension take hold of her because he glanced up from his math book and his gaze travelled in the direction she was looking. His shoulders jerked and he swallowed hard, as he no doubt realized that he was the reason Josh Turner stood glaring in their direction.
Josh stood erect with his shoulders squared as his eyes moved away from Steven, back to Hannah and then slowly, back to Steven again. His fists clenched and his mouth flattened as his gaze narrowed on the younger boy. There was a harsh, distinctive hardening of Josh’s green eyes and Hannah was quietly alarmed as his stance seemed to grow as he drew breath into his lungs, his chest and arms tensing in an aggressive manner. There was no question that he was pissed, even though he seemed to be trying to control it. The facial scars that always gave him an air of menace stood out more prominently than usual as his face filled with heat.
Not a word was spoken, but Hannah could almost feel the cold sweat break out on Steven. Josh never moved a step, never said a word, just stood and silently waited, his hostility more than apparent.
Steven received the silent message, and stood up with haste and left the room.
Josh’s eyes stayed on Steven until the door shut behind the other boy and then his gaze slid back to Hannah. Almost immediately, his posture relaxed as his eyes drank her in once again. His expression visibly softened, and even though she knew she should be upset by his display of ownership, she wasn’t. Her insides were like marshmallows, and since she couldn’t date him, touch him, or even talk to him, this was the only source of communication she had with him. His display of jealousy was like a balm washing through her.
Hannah had about ten sweet seconds of his eyes devouring her, his attention focused solely on her, and during those seconds, the realization came to her that this wasn’t just a high school crush for her. She wasn’t merely infatuated with him; this was an emotion deep in her soul that she was very much afraid would never go away.
****
Hannah’s birthday fell on a Thursday and when the bus dropped her off in front of her house, she immediately saw by the vehicles in the driveway that both Zachary and her parents were at home. Although she was pleased about finally turning sixteen, the only thing Hannah really cared about was turning seventeen, and the promise that Josh had made to her. She walked into the house to a loud chorus of ‘happy birthday’ and a bunch of ‘sweet sixteen’ nonsense. But she smiled and hugged her family. Zachary stood in the corner of the room and smiled at her, and after she’d opened the presents he’d gotten for her, a tiny, delicate diamond necklace and the latest cellular phone she’d been wanting, her mother started babbling and grabbed her hand and began leading her out the back door, with Zach and her father trailing behind.
Behind the house sat a gleaming, expensive-looking red car and as her mom stood next to it with a silly smile on her face, her father held out the keys for her. Hannah glanced at her smiling parents and then to Zach and then back again. “No way.”
“Way, sweetheart,” her father replied.
“Y’all got me a car?”
“Sure did. You want to take it for a drive?”
Zach spoke up, “I’ll go with you, squirt. You don’t want your mommy and daddy going for your first spin with you, do you?” he teased.
She glanced again at her parents. “It’s okay?”
“Sure. Just buckle up and be careful.”
As she got in the driver’s seat and Zach walked around to the passenger’s side, Hannah knew she should be feeling some serious excitement. But all she could think about was that the car would only make the kids at school even more jealous. But she didn’t ever want her parents to know how she felt, so she buckled up and smiled at Zach. “Okay, wow. Are you ready?”
“Yep.”
Hannah sighed. “They shouldn’t have spent so much.”
“They have no idea what you’re going through at school. You’re not going to tell them?”
Hannah shook her head. “Nope, I’m not. And don’t you tell them, either.” She adjusted the rear-view mirror and smiled over at her brother. “Are you ready for this?”
He smiled back. “You bet.”
Hannah carefully accelerated and took off, for the moment, forgetting about what all the other kids would think.
Chapter Eight
On Friday night, Josh sat beside his Uncle David in the waiting room outside Sheriff Thompson’s office. His elbows rested on his knees, and his head was buried in his hands, wanting only to hide not only from the looks they were receiving, but from the dead, frozen feeling in his gut. They were holding his father inside one of the jail cells, and Josh didn’t even try to count how many times this had happened or how he felt about it.
His uncle had given up on bailing Chris Turner out of jail several years before, and now only came in when the sheriff called to say that he’d been detained once again. Usually for drunk and disorderly, but there had been instances of driving while intoxicated and resisting arrest.
If it weren’t for his Uncle David insisting on coming here, Josh wouldn’t be here at all. His uncle never expected Josh to accompany him, and if it were up to Josh, his father could rot in jail for all he cared. But at eighteen, Josh felt like he needed to man-up and at least stand beside his uncle when he went to see the sheriff. Usually all his uncle did was apologize for whatever Chris had done, and then he’d shake the sheriff’s hand and listen as the lawman told them time and time again that it wasn’t their fault.
Josh ran his hand over his forehead again. He was having the week from hell, and now this. How much damn worse could his life get? All he wanted to do was go home, shut himself away in his room and sleep for a solid twenty-four hours. Maybe sleep would let him escape from the pure hell his week had been.
First, he’d found out that Katie was still having nightmares about the rape. She wouldn’t talk to his aunt about it, she wouldn’t go see the school counselor about it, hell, she wouldn’t even talk to him about it. He only found out because he’d gotten up in the middle of the night to use the
bathroom and heard her muffled crying from behind her bedroom door. He’d knocked and questioned her, and she’d panicked and made him promise again not to tell her parents. Shit.
And then, yesterday at school, Josh had heard rumors about Hannah’s birthday present. He felt damn guilty for having such an emotional reaction to a car when Katie was going through very real trauma, but it was just one more thing that made his life suck. Hannah got a new freakin’ car. Brand new. A red Audi. An Audi, for Christ’s sake. So now the girl he wanted was driving a fifty thousand dollar car, while he was driving a five hundred dollar truck. Yeah, that would work, sure.
Josh knocked his fist against his mouth in frustration as bitter sarcasm played out in his brain. He had so much to offer Hannah. Shit, after all, his family owned an entire section of land. Absolutely they did, six hundred and forty acres. Just awesome. Compare that shit to the sixty thousand acres that her dad owned, mortgage-free or so town gossip said, and he and Hannah were about even. Right.
And Josh for sure couldn’t forget about Hannah’s stunning, freakin’ beauty. He’d never seen a prettier girl. And look at him… just fucking look at him. Scars riddled his face and body. Scars from cigarettes being extinguished on his body. On his face. Yeah, maybe there might have been a chance at one time that he’d turn out good-looking. But his wonderful father had robbed him of that by holding down a burning cigarette on his face until it branded him.
And why not compare Hannah’s father to his while Josh was at it? Hannah’s father … the richest, most influential man in the county. And his father … the town drunk in the jail cell.
Holy fucking hell. Could his life get any worse?
Sure it could. Because he had his orders from Ava. If he didn’t show up at the Andersons’ house tomorrow night for Hannah’s surprise birthday party, then he would be the lowest life form imaginable. She’d send her brother out to find him, and Ava had made it plain that Ty would damn well do this favor for her because she owned dirt on him. Yeah. Josh knew what kind of shit Ty could come up with and he could well imagine how much of it Ava knew about.