“Would you please park your ass in the seat?” Justin snapped. “You about gave me a goddamned heart attack.”
Peering into his eyes, she realized he wasn’t faking his anger. She mouthed “I’m okay” and he exhaled.
Not that their passengers noticed.
Justin elbowed her.
She rolled her eyes. “I’m fine. Keep movin’, Daddy-o. We’re on Berlin time and if we’re late, I’m rolling on you.”
Stirling covered a laugh with a cough.
Callie half turned in the seat and looked from Liam to Stirling. Now they both looked a little…glazed. Wait, were they high?
“Do I have lipstick on my teeth or something?” Stirling said with total paranoia.
Jesus. They were both high. Well, they did work in a dispensary. And them being a little out of it would make this situation seem bizarre anyway, so no need to hold back. “No. And this will sound weird, but your mom has been telling me about all the awesome things you’ve done and how you were driven to succeed even when you were a kid.” She paused. “That sounds just like my little sister Chelsea. Not the dreads or the kickin’ clothes, but she has that same drive.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Chels is a soccer player, not a business whiz like you. She’s dying to play pro soccer now, but our mom is like…you are going to college first.”
“You shoulda listened to your mom too,” Justin said.
“There wasn’t money for me to go college. Besides, nothin’ wrong with bein’ a bartender.”
“You’re tendin’ bar tonight too?” Justin demanded. “On your night off from bartending?”
“Yep. See if you can keep up, old man.”
Justin grunted.
Callie’s cell phone buzzed.
Shit. She read the message KEEP STALLING from Mrs. G and showed it to Justin, in the guise of elbowing him as she said, “Change of plans. Take the shortcut.”
“What shortcut?”
“That one.” Callie pointed the opposite direction.
“That is not a shortcut.”
“Yes, it is! Turn now or we’ll miss it.”
Justin hit the brakes. He patted the steering wheel. “See this? This means I decide which way we’re going, shortstuff, not you. And we ain’t takin’ what you call the shortcut.”
Shortstuff? That was a new nickname. “You are so stubborn!”
“Like that’s news,” Justin scoffed.
They started moving again…at a crawl.
“You are doing this on purpose,” she said with false anger, ignoring the panicked whispers of their passengers.
“Safety first, little girl.”
“Omigod, I am not a little girl! You make me want to scream!”
Justin pointedly ignored her, a smug look on that handsome mug.
Despite this being a ruse, it brought to mind all of Callie’s frustrations with this man.
He just kept putzing along—in the ATV and he’d been doing the same damn thing with their relationship or whatever it was the past five weeks.
She truly wanted to scream at him to wake the fuck up and look at her. See her.
And this was her chance.
Callie leaned over and screamed in Justin’s ear.
It didn’t faze him at all.
He just muttered, “I can’t fucking believe you did that.”
Since their passengers were whispering back and forth, Callie angled closer so only Justin could hear her. “I’ve wanted to do that for five goddamned weeks.”
He shot her a look. “Yeah? Join the club.”
“I can’t do this with you right now. We have other things to deal with.”
“But we will be doin’ something about this later, Callie. Guaranteed. This time I ain’t letting it go.”
“Whatever.” She spun around and said, “So how long have you two been together?”
Liam said, “And she’s baaaaack,” under his breath…or what a high person considered a quiet tone, but both Justin and Callie heard him.
Justin snickered.
“Gosh, what’s it been…seven days?” Stirling cooed.
“Eight fantastic days,” Liam corrected with a growl.
And these two being so damn cutesy together…after not being together for very long…annoyed her. “Does London know you’ve got a boyfriend? Because I thought she planned to fix you up with someone.”
“Callie, shut up,” Justin snarled. “You don’t say shit like that to people. Your mama raised you better than that.”
“What? I’m just making conversation.”
The recreation center came into view as they rounded the corner.
“Here’s where we exit this crazy train,” Stirling said. “Let us out here. We’ll walk.”
“No can do. Our orders are front door delivery,” Justin said.
“Since when do you follow orders?” Callie demanded. “You do things on your own time frame—”
Stirling released an ear-piercing whistle.
Startled, Justin slammed on the brakes.
“Here’s a piece of advice.” Sterling bailed out and paused by the curb. “Working with family is the hardest thing you’ll do. I work with my brother every day. Sometimes I want to scream at him. But I don’t lit-er-al-ly scream at him. Our disagreements happen behind closed doors. Never in front of employees or customers. I can see that your dad embarrasses you, Calliope, and it probably sucks working together so closely because he treats you like a child—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa there. Justin is not my dad.”
Justin had lost his sense of humor about the entire thing. He pointed at Callie. “I told you that’s what people would think. I told you. That’s why—”
“You’re a chickenshit, Justin Donohue. And like I told you, I don’t care what people think. I’m getting out now too.”
He snapped, “Like hell you are,” and hit the gas.
Chapter Eight
“Justin, what are you doing? Stop this damn thing right now!”
“Nope.”
Callie tightened her grip on the roll bar because he was driving like a freakin’ maniac. “I’ll scream again.”
“Do it if it makes you feel better.”
“The only thing that’ll make me feel better is getting back to the barn and doing my goddamned job! This party is for the Gradskys’ daughter. If they ever have cause to fire me it’ll be if I don’t show up to work at a family party.”
Justin pulled out his phone.
“Put both of your hands back on the wheel right now!”
He didn’t—but he did slow down.
“Deke,” he barked into the phone. “Get to the barn and tell anyone who asks that you’re filling in as a bartender. Yes, now. Callie’s not feeling well and we’ve covered for you so it’s time for you to repay the favor.” His jaw tightened. “I don’t give a damn if Lana comes too, but get your ass down there now. That is not a request, that’s an order from your boss.” He hung up.
Do not get all swoony about how hot he is when he’s acting bossy.
She wasn’t surprised when he pulled up to her camper. There weren’t many places they could be alone.
Justin’s eyes challenged her. “You walkin’ in on your own? Because I swear to God, Callie, if you try and run, I’ll put you over my knee and spank you after I catch you.”
“It’d almost be worth it to see how fast you can run, old timer,” she retorted.
He exhaled. “I’m tryin’ hard to keep my cool, sweetness. Really fucking hard. So can we please just go inside?”
“Fine.” She dug her key out of her front pocket and opened the door.
When she stood aside to let him go in first, he grinned. “Nice try, baby girl, but I’ll be locking the door after we’re both inside.”
“Whatever.”
And Justin did lock the door behind him. He seemed at a loss as he faced her. Taking in his surroundings killed another thirty seconds. “This is a really great place, Callie.
Did you remodel it yourself?”
“Yes. And you were in here before.”
“Didn’t see much, if you’ll recall, since it was dark and we pretty much went straight to your bed.”
“Yeah. I guess you wouldn’t have taken time to look around before you ran out that night.”
There. Now the elephant was front and center in the room.
“I’m sorry. It was a dick move.”
“Wrong. It was a non-dicking move.”
Justin moved forward. Spun around. Moved back. “I can’t pace in here either.”
“Either?”
“It’s fourteen steps in my room at the bunkhouse before I have to turn around and start over. Trust me I’ve counted. I’ve done a lot of pacing in the past few weeks.” He looked at her. “Can we start now? Been killin’ me to just let it lie.”
“Killing you? We’ve been together every day for the past five weeks. Every day! You had plenty of time to start this conversation with me. Plenty.”
“I wanted it to be private.”
“Because God forbid that someone might overhear us.” She tried to sound mad…but it was just so damn humiliating that he didn’t want anyone to know they’d been together even one time.
“Callie—”
His near-patronizing tone had her bristling. “Tell me why, after we got naked together—which was inevitable from the moment we met—that you couldn’t even wait until you got off to run out like your ass was on fire?” She paused, trying to keep her voice from breaking. “Did I say something wrong? Did I do something you didn’t like? Even if I smelled bad or something, I need to know why that happened.” She fought another wave of mortification, hating that she sounded so damn vulnerable.
“You didn’t smell bad, for fuck’s sake.” He inhaled a deep breath and let it out. “It smells like you in here. Sweet and flowery and womanly. I love that.”
“Justin. That’s not helping.”
“This ain’t gonna be easy to admit, all right?” He unclenched his jaw. “I ran out because it hit me that I’d known you for three fucking days. I liked you, I lusted after you, I worked with you, I was pissed off that I’m too old for you…everything that was right and wrong between us became a loud noise in my head. A warning I couldn’t ignore. And yeah, it sucked that it didn’t start screaming at me until the worst possible moment.”
“When you were inside me,” she said bluntly.
He winced. “Like I said, worst possible moment. I wish I could say I had an attack of conscience or some altruistic shit and that’s why I stopped, but I’ve since figured out it was a panic attack.” His cheeks burned bright red. “Christ. I’m a forty-year-old man, not a kid. I’ve never had a panic attack in my life, not on the back of a bull, not when they interviewed me on TV. So the fact I experienced one when I was balls deep in a woman I wanted more than my next fucking breath…I had do what my head told me and not listen to my what my dick wanted.”
What could she even say to that? Him panicking made no sense to her, and the fact it made no sense to him either…Callie had to believe he wasn’t feeding her full of shit.
“Afterward, when I was still walkin’ around in a damn daze because I felt guilty for leaving you the way I had, I knew I couldn’t be with you until I straightened some things out. My issues. Not yours. None of this is your fault, Callie. I’ve had enough fuck and forget encounters to last me a lifetime.” When he finally looked at her, she saw his conflicting emotions had turned his eyes a stormy blue. “I didn’t want it to be that way with you.”
“What makes you think it would have been?” She swallowed the hard lump in her throat. “I told you I wasn’t looking for anything more than just fun naked times with you. I thought that’s what we both wanted.”
He nodded. “I did. I mean…I do. But that’s the worst thing I could’ve done, continuing to…be intimate with you as that greedy, selfish guy.”
And he still didn’t get it. “Wrong. Leaving how you did was the worst thing you could’ve done to me.” Goddammit why did her voice warble now when she needed to show him she could roll with the punches—even when his running out had felt like a punch in the gut. His claims that his actions were his issues didn’t change the fact that his issues brought her own insecurities to the surface.
Maybe it was a good thing he hadn’t stuck around to see them.
Needing a moment to regroup, Callie walked to the tiny kitchen and peered out the window. Dusk had fallen, blanketing the world in shades of pinkish orange. This was her favorite time of day—Justin’s too. She hadn’t known that five weeks ago. She hadn’t known anything about him except that overwhelming feeling of lust whenever they were together. So part of her did understand his abrupt and humiliating change of mind because they’d basically been strangers. Now they weren’t.
“Callie?”
“Sorry, just thinking.” She pulled out two bottles of water from the fridge, handed one to him and settled on the couch. “Park it. You’re making me nervous.”
He sat. “Talk to me.”
She sighed. “As weird as the panic attack thing is, I’m happy that you didn’t pull out the ‘I’m a special little snowflake’ excuse.”
“I don’t even know what the hell that is.”
“Come on, you know the lame-ass line that a guy uses, ‘you’re too hot, too sweet, too perfect, too special’ when he’s not into me. He makes it seem like he was doing me a favor by not fucking me.” She took a sip of water. “It blows.”
Justin scowled. “Sounds like all men are as goddamned dumb as I am when it comes to you.”
Oh. That was sort of…sweet.
“If I could charm my way out of this confusing mess with you, I would. That’s my default reaction.” His gaze bored into her. “But none of my actions around you are normal. I’ve had to face some hard truths about my age bein’ a factor.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning I judged you based on my life experiences when I was twenty-two. Just because I didn’t have my shit together and partied my ass off, doesn’t mean you’re the same. A twenty-two-year-old woman I dated when I was that same age turned out to be slightly psycho, especially after I broke things off with her. All this stuff was churning below the surface with me, stuff I’d forgotten about, but I needed to remember my past to deal with my present.”
His obsession with her age made more sense. “What conclusion did you come to?”
“I like you too much to stay away from you.”
Callie snorted. “That’s why you came into the bar and didn’t say a word to me? Because you liked me too much?”
Justin reached out, snagging a section of her hair. “I came to the bar because I like to watch you dance.”
“Looking and not touching cleared up your confusion?”
“Yeah, it did. I realized as much as I wanted your hot little body nine ways ’til Sunday, I wanted to get to know you first. Not in a dating type situation, because I totally would’ve fucked that up, but getting to know you as a coworker and a friend.”
“I’m not being flip when I say I never wanted to be your friend…but I liked it when you forced the issue.”
His eyebrow rose. “Forced the issue?”
“Lunch together every day ringing a bell?”
He fiddled with the piece of hair he’d grabbed. “Then you’ll really be pissed off that I forced the issue with Chuck and Berlin, asking them to assign you to arena one with me.”
“You asked them that?”
“They agreed. You’re better with stock than anyone else. I knew that Breck would snap you up to work with him, so I made sure I got to you first.”
Oh you got to me all right.
“During the mundane stuff, you talked to me. I was damn near giddy about that. Because it proved me right. That I liked you, not just because I lusted after you and was tryin’ to justify it.”
“Good for you, Justin. You’ve had several moments of personal growth in the past five weeks.�
��
He narrowed his eyes at her sarcasm.
“While you were judging me, I was just as busy judging myself. You thought I was easy because I went to bed with you three days after we met. You came into the bar and watched me work to convince yourself I acted too young to get involved with, or to convince yourself that I was old enough to know what I was doing and it’d be all right to fuck me as long as no one knew we were fucking.”
“You done?” he said coolly when she took a breath.
“I don’t know. If I think about it, it makes me sad.”
That threw him. “Sad? Not mad?”
“I’m sad for you because you’re so…worried about what other people think that you’re missing out on a good thing.” She locked her gaze to his. “Me. I am a good person. I work hard, I try and have a little fun when I can. I have goals and I’ve always been able to take care of myself. I’m not an old soul or any of that bullshit, but I haven’t had the life of a typical twenty-two-year-old. But all you see is the number when you look at me.”
“That might’ve been true five weeks ago, but it ain’t true now. As I’ve explained.” He stood and gently hauled her to her feet. “What do you see when you look at me, Callie?”
“Sex on legs,” she blurted out. “You think you’re the only one with lustful thoughts?”
Liquid heat replaced the wariness in his eyes. “Are we done talkin’ about this?”
“I am as long as we’re both finally on the same page.”
“Which page is that, sweetness?”
“Lots of exclusive nekkid time while we’re both here. No promises, no regrets.”
Justin granted her that dirty-wicked grin and fuck-me eyes and her stomach flipped. “Sign. Me. Up.” He captured her mouth and kissed her until her knees gave out.
Then he hooked his arms under her legs and carried into her bedroom.
After settling her on the edge of the bed, he pressed his back against the wall. “Undress yourself for me. Show me what I’m dyin’ to take.”
“Maybe I want you to undress me.”
Wound Tight: A Rough Riders/Blacktop Cowboys Crossover Page 9