“And don’t say ‘don’t knock it till you try it,’” I put in.
Izzy just laughed. “Actually, that’s one thing I haven’t done myself. But if I were going to, it would be with two guys, not another girl. I kissed a girl once, and I didn’t like it.”
Juneau and I stared at each other with matching looks of revulsion.
“Oh my god, no!” I said, shaking my hands. “No way! Two guys? God no.”
“Same,” Juneau said.
Izzy shrugged. “It sounds hot, but I feel like it would be a lot more work than it’s worth. I mean, guys aren’t hard to please, but they do get jealous.”
I glanced at my phone, sitting on the counter. “In unrelated news, I have to go switch my laundry. Who’s going to come with me to keep me company?”
“I should probably do a load or two,” Juneau said.
“Me too, actually,” Izzy said.
So we all three headed for the laundromat, and while our conversation wandered to other places, part of my mind kept wandering back to Izzy’s advice that I needed to get out of my comfort zone a little.
Problem was, Roman Badd wasn’t just a little outside my comfort zone, he was in an entirely different universe.
Which was, most likely, a large part of the appeal of the man.
That, and the fact that he could pick me up like I was a feather. And those devilishly blue eyes. And those muscles. And his rough, strong hands. And the unbelievably soft brush of his lips…
Argh. If only he wasn’t such an arrogant jerk.
4
Roman
* * *
Damn the girl. I just could not get her out of my fucking head.
I shouldn’t be this attracted to her. I mean, I’ve hooked up with not one, not two, but three Laker girls. Not at the same time, mind you, but still. I’ve hooked up with more than a few actresses, a backup dancer for some pop star…all of them insanely hot.
But this girl, man. What the hell was it about her? I don’t know how to put it without sounding like a dick, so I’ll just sound like a dick. Put her on stage with some of those other girls I’ve banged, and she wouldn’t measure up, not in the kind of hotness those girls embodied.
But Kitty is her own kind of hot. I don’t think she realizes exactly how sexy she is, either, which is maybe part of it. She’s not stuck on herself. She clearly has confidence, because it takes confidence to stand up to a guy like me the way she has. Twice now. But she just…god, I don’t know.
The other girls I’ve hooked up with, when you put them in casual clothes, their persona changes. I’ve noticed this. Get ’em all dressed up, made up, shaking their booties in the club, hunting for a guy to take ’em home, they have a kind of swagger about them, an attitude. Not confidence, exactly, but a put-on sultriness borne of the fact that they know how to lure a man with their assets. But remove the fancy outfits, the four-inch heels, the updo, the layers of makeup, take away their posse of girlfriends and the dim lighting of the club—put them in ratty sweatpants, a messy bun, and no makeup, and they just…I don’t know. They lose some part of their appeal.
And before you go getting your panties all in a bunch about me being a shallow, chauvinistic douchebag—which, admittedly, I am, most of the time—that observation is not about my opinion of their appearance, but about their behavior. They don’t have that same predatory confidence from the night before. It’s like when they get ready to go out, they put on armor, piece by piece. Which I totally get: when we get ready to jump into a wildfire, we gear up. Piece by piece, we put on our firefighting gear, and with each piece we’re putting on a kind of mental armor. We’re not the guy you’d meet in the bar anymore, and we’re not the guy you’d sleep with or have coffee with—we’re the firefighter, the warrior. So for some women, I think, it’s similar. Take away the armor, you take away some integral part of their public persona.
Kitty is different. She was exactly the same in what clearly was an outfit not meant for going out in public as she was in work clothes, with her apron and tray as her armor. She had the same energy about her, the same attitude, the same confidence.
Her beauty was the same. It’s a bone-deep beauty.
An essential loveliness in who she is, and in what she looks like. She doesn’t need fancy clothes or layers of makeup to be sexy and alluring.
The pajamas she was wearing when I ran into her on the street, though? Holy motherfucking shit. Those work jeans and the Badd’s tee were hiding a siren’s body.
Long, strong, sleek, smooth legs. A delicate waist that curved down to bell-like hips. A tight, firm, bubble of a heart-shaped ass that was busting out of those tease-tiny pale green booty shorts. God, that ass. The moment I saw it as she whirled around in her apartment I wanted, so badly, to just take a double handful of it and squeeze until she squeaked. Jesus, so fucking perfect. Her hair was long, fine, silky smooth and glossy, with the barest hint of waviness to it, although that may have been from being tied up in a bun. Her face was perfectly proportioned, heart-shaped to match her ass. And those eyes. Holy mother, those eyes. To call them brown wouldn’t be doing them justice. The brown of a freshly crafted mocha latte, with just as much sweetness and heat. But piss her off, and god, those eyes could blaze and spark like a territorial she-wolf’s—and I, obviously, was an expert at pissing her off. Last, but certainly not least…her tits. Even tragically hidden behind the world’s most boring plain white bra, her tits were epic. Not silicone injection huge—not the largest I’d ever seen, but great breasts are about a lot more than just size. It’s about shape, firmness, lift, bounce…I could give a dissertation on what makes boobs great, but I’ll restrain myself. Suffice it to say, hers were perfect. Big enough to be more than a handful, and I’ve got big hands. Obviously natural, firm, but jiggly enough that each movement sent my dick twitching in my shorts.
She wasn’t self-conscious in that outfit, but neither was she rocking it like she knew every guy who saw her would want her—the latter being the truth, seemingly unbeknownst to her.
“Roman?” Ramsey’s voice sliced through my daze, and I felt his hand smack into the back of my head. “You’re daydreaming, asshat. Get with it.”
I shook my head, trying to clear it of the image of Kitty in those shorts and that barely holding-together T-shirt. “Sorry. Sorry. Just—”
“Daydreaming about that waitress who shut you down,” Remington said. “We know.”
“She didn’t shut me down,” I snapped.
“Oh, bullshit!” Ramsey laughed. “Yes, she did! She shut you down twice. You came back talking about her nonstop and acting like a total bear. Which can only mean she shut you down, again.”
“She’s just playing hard to get,” I muttered, shaking my head. “It’s sexy.”
Remington laughed. “Hate to break it to you, bro, but I don’t think she’s playin’. I think you finally found a woman who is actually just immune to your, uhhh, charms. She don’t like you, Rome!”
Ram laughed with him. “The man has met his match.”
“We almost kissed, I’ll have you know,” I groused.
“Coming from someone who can get girls to fuck him without saying a word, we almost kissed counts as losing.” Ramsey moved up beside me, grabbed my hand, and lifted it, then brought it down so the hammer in my hand connected with the wall we were demolishing. “Now, get to work you damned lovesick puppy. This place won’t demo itself.”
We were in our newly acquired bar, ripping out the outdated decor. The place had obviously been decorated in the ‘70s, and hadn’t been updated since. The boys and I had done our share of off-season construction work, so we knew our way around a renovation. We figured the kitchen was good enough as is, since we didn’t plan on doing much by way of food service, which meant all we really had to do was rip out the ugly-ass wood paneling and ripped vinyl booths, build some new booths, find some old tables, throw up some antique saws and old rifles and deer heads on the walls, and we’d have ourselves a nice li
ttle rustic cabin bar. Suitable for Alaska, right?
So, we went back to work. And I did attempt to keep my head in the game, because I really did want this venture to work. I loved the rush and thrill and challenge of being a smokejumper, but after our friend Kevin’s death I’m finding it hard to go back to that work, and I know my brothers are, too.
Plus, Dad isn’t getting any younger, and he can’t keep living on his own in the bass-ackwards end of Oklahoma, drinking himself to death. We pulled rank on the old coot before we left to come up here—meaning, we went and sold the Oklahoma property, trailer and all, out from underneath him. He was fit to be tied, but it got him off his ass and out of the countryside. He’s currently “driving across the country to find himself again,” whatever the fuck that means. We used the funds from the sale of all those acres he owned to buy him a nice new pickup with a fancy little Airstream to go with it. Figured, he’d have to get out of Oklahoma, and maybe this way he’d eventually find his way up here.
Maybe not, but it was worth a try.
He’d been sober ninety days before we left, and seemed a hell of a lot healthier than when we’d first showed up. Small win, right? And, honestly, he seemed pretty excited about his new truck and trailer, and the prospect of being a vagabond again, like he used to be. Selling the property felt kinda ugly to us boys, especially since weren’t even on the deed, but we knew if Dad stayed in that trailer on that property, he’d end up relapsing, have another heart attack, and he’d be gone. He may not have been much of a father, but he’s all we’ve got and we want to keep his grumpy ass around a bit longer. Why? We’re not always sure, but it is the right thing to do, and while it may not seem like it most days, the three of us do have something resembling a moral compass. It might be cracked, but we’ve definitely got one.
We spent the next two weeks demoing the bar, building the new booths and tables, stripping and restaining the hardwood floor, putting in the new bar and stools, and a dozen other minor improvements, until the basic renovation was mostly finished. At which point the three of us had been together without a break for over three months, and we all knew we needed a little time apart before we killed each other. So, Remington called up a buddy and headed out for a couple weeks of hiking and fishing. Ramsey headed for Seattle to hook up with some drinking buddies from our hotshot days and I, of course, stayed in Ketchikan, because I was a sucker for punishment.
Over the past two weeks I’ve been working my ass off, and I’ve been so busy I haven’t done anything except work, eat, and sleep, much less have time to go to Badd’s Bar in the hopes of seeing Kitty. But that hasn’t stopped me from trying to figure out how to get Kitty to sleep with me.
But I think I’ve finally figured it out. I’ve been approaching her all wrong—she just needs a little…finesse.
I wasn’t nervous. I don’t get nervous. Even when I’m three seconds from jumping out of a perfectly good airplane into the heart of a blazing wildfire, I don’t get nervous.
Yet, for some odd reason, my heart was thumping a little, and my palms were clammy. And I’d been practicing all afternoon what I was going to say to her when she opened the door.
I was standing outside her apartment building, hesitating like a teenage dweeb.
Why would I be nervous? She’s just a girl, and I just wanted to get her naked and make her scream my name a few dozen times, that’s all.
“Fuck it,” I muttered. “Fuck it.”
I jabbed the button to ring her unit, holding it down for a few seconds. There was a long moment of silence, and I started to wonder if she wasn’t home. Maybe she’d gone out somewhere while I was busy grabbing the items in my hands—I’d figured out that she usually had Mondays off, so I’d timed my arrival to coincide with when I thought she’d be home alone.
I knew she had roommates, and I had no plans to let my brothers get wind of either of them or this situation could real messy real fast.
I was about to assume she was gone when a voice burst from the little speaker, tinny and irritated. “Yes? Who is it?”
“It’s Roman Badd.”
Another silence. “Really?”
I laughed. “No, not really. My name is Herbert, and I’m an accountant from Omaha.”
“What do you want?” I heard a tinge of humor in her voice, and I knew my comeback had gotten to her. But I also heard very real irritation and confusion in her voice.
“I told you what I want, Kitty.”
Another long silence. “You’re wasting your time, Roman.”
“I have wine and pizza.”
Yet another long silence. I could almost hear her cursing me in her head. “You’re so annoying.”
This was accompanied by the buzz and click of the door unlocking. I yanked the door open before it could lock again—and before she could change her mind—and headed up to her unit. I balanced the bottles on the flat box of pizza, holding the flowers I’d also purchased in the other hand.
Yes, flowers.
Actual flowers, fresh ones, arranged by a professional. Not roses, because I had a feeling we weren’t quite to the roses portion of the seduction just yet.
I stood outside her door, grinning like a fool. She opened the door a crack, peering through the tiny opening, just a slice of her face and one eye showing. “I’m not dressed.”
I grinned even wider. “Awesome. My kinda pizza party.”
Her eye narrowed, hardened. “Don’t be an ass. Just…wait there for two minutes, and then come in.” She hid behind the door and flipped the latch so it wouldn’t close. “Promise me.”
I rolled my eyes. “I promise I’ll wait here for two minutes.” Play nice, I reminded myself.
I heard bare feet on the floor, and mentally started counting backward from one-twenty…even as I edged up to the door and peeked through the crack, because I’d promised to wait, not that I wouldn’t peek.
Sadly, all I managed to see was a pale blue bath towel and a hint of wet hair as she vanished around a corner. But I also caught a whiff of that powerful female smell—shampoo, body lotion, wet hair. And that is a sexy smell. I don’t know why, but it is. An instant turn-on.
I did wait the full one hundred and twenty seconds before toeing the door open and entering. All I could smell was her, and I had to work hard to not picture her in nothing but a towel, gazing up at me as she all but begged me to—
I stopped myself. No, no, no—don’t be a dumbass. Slow it down or you’re going to blow this.
I slowly let out a breath, setting the pizza box on the counter. I wasn’t sure what to do with the flowers, so I just held them and waited.
Five minutes later, I heard a door open. A second later I felt a hike in my heart rate. It must be an abnormality--something I should get checked out by a doctor. I’m in perfect shape, the kind of shape elite Olympian athletes would be jealous of, so erratic jumps in heart rate shouldn’t happen. Nor should my palms sweat. I had my whole spiel practiced until it sounded natural, some saccharine pile of bullshit about starting with friendship and seeing where it led. I was ready to deliver.
She rounded the corner from the hallway, saw me standing by the refrigerator with a bright, colorful bouquet of flowers in my hand, wearing an actual polo shirt and nice jeans, and she stopped in her tracks.
And all my mental preparation went straight out of my head.
Her hair was still damp, but she’d brushed it out and left it loose, so it hung in a dark golden wave down her back, a few strands drifting in front of her eyes. She was wearing a dress, but she managed to make it look casual, somehow. White and filmy and clinging, with flowers in shades of blue and purple, thin straps that bared her shoulders, and a modest but sexy neckline. The hem came to mid-thigh, and she was barefoot. Simple, beautiful, modest, and incredible. My cock was ramrod stiff, and she was showing less skin now than when I’d seen her last. No makeup, or very little. Maybe some lip gloss, or a little color on her eyes. I don’t know, I know shit-all about makeup, only that I don�
��t really like too much of it and she was wearing just enough.
“Jesus, Kitty,” I murmured.
She frowned at me. “What?” Offended, almost. Or ready to be.
“You. Fuckin’ gorgeous.” Wow, super eloquent and not caveman at all. Way to go, Roman.
She snorted softly. “Thank you.” Her eyes went to the flowers. “What are those for?”
I had to force myself into motion. “You. They’re for you.”
She held her ground as I took a few steps toward her. “Why?”
“Because beautiful women deserve beautiful things.” I remembered part of what I’d intended to say. “And, um, because I know I come on a little strong sometimes. It’s just—it’s the only way I know, you know? I guess this is me trying to, uh, not come on quite so strongly.”
“A huge bouquet of flowers, two bottles of wine, and a box of pizza—out of the blue, after two weeks without a word—is you trying to not come on so strongly?”
I shrugged. “Yeah. I guess.”
She blinked. “Roman, I—”
I held up my hand. “Pizza. Wine. Conversation. Can we just start there?”
She hesitated, gazing at me as if trying to divine my intentions just by sheer eye contact and force of will. “Okay. But you’ll have to behave yourself, or you’re out of here.”
“I’ll do my best,” I answered.
But I was really thinking, “I’ll do my best to make you give in to the fact that you fucking want me.” But I didn’t say that, and I barely let myself think it for fear she’d somehow read my mind. But I doubt my intentions are unclear, seeing as I’m here with wine, flowers, and pizza. That’s not the action of a man interested in a casual friendship.
She shook her head at me, but only swept past leaving a swirl of woman smell behind. “I’ll get some plates. The corkscrew is in the drawer by the stove, wine glasses right above.”
Badd Kitty Page 6