by Lori Foster
Not that her adult life had been a whole lot more stable, except there was Jace. Always Jace. And Poppy, whom she was not, under any circumstances, getting rid of, even if it meant sleeping in a snowdrift in eastern Oregon in December.
Because friends took care of each other, no matter what. And Poppy was her friend. And Jace was her friend, so she expected him to extend her, and thus Poppy, the same courtesy.
He wouldn’t let them freeze in a snowdrift. Though he looked as if he was considering it.
“What would you cook?” he asked.
“Stew. And bread. I would bake you bread. And pies. Lots of pies. All the pie you could eat.”
He cleared his throat and shifted his weight. “Generous.”
“Well, yeah, I thought so.” Jace had plenty of room. His two-story, Craftsman-style home had gorgeous, exposed wood beams in the ceiling, making the space feel huge and expansive. His fireplace had a huge couch in front of it, and it really would just be sad to sit there alone. And a dog should definitely lie on the rug by the fire, too.
He also had four bedrooms and he didn’t need them all. He could certainly spare a corner of his house for a small redhead and her not-so-small dog.
“She’s not allowed on the furniture,” Jace said.
“Thank you!” She flung her arms around his neck and buried her face in his skin. And for a moment, she couldn’t help but be conscious of just how hard and muscular his body was. Or of the fact that his skin smelled like soap with a sheen of sweat over it, thanks to the long workday.
No. She wasn’t going there. Jace was her friend. Her attractive, hyper-masculine, sexy friend. But just her friend.
She had her occasional forgetful moments, often fueled by the scent of his skin or an unexpected smile that seemed to break through all the walls surrounding her heart and hit her square on.
But she knew friendship was the best place for them to be. He was her pillar. And without him...without him she would fall.
Which meant no risking the solid relationship they had for a little spark that was probably one-sided. Heck, it was almost certainly one-sided. If Jace wanted a woman, he didn’t sit around and wait. He went out and got her. Temporarily. Jace was a fling guy. And while she was sure being flung by him would be a good time, it wasn’t what she wanted.
Samantha was a bit more reserved in her relationships, but even with the great caution she exercised, they always seemed to sink like a bad soufflé. Nope. Definitely not moving Jace from FriendZone to BoyfriendZone. In her case, BoyfriendZone was always temporary, and it always ended in disaster.
She’d had all the relationships-ending-in-fiery-hellstorms-of-doom that she could possibly take for one lifetime. And not just with boyfriends. She hadn’t spoken to her mother in years. Jace was her rock. And cracking the foundation she built her life on was just not going to happen.
“Jace,” she said, pulling her face back so she could study him. He wasn’t smiling, but had a weird kind of intent look in his eyes.
“Yes?”
For just a second, a little tiny second, she thought about leaning in and brushing her lips against his. A friendly thank-you. An expression of gratitude.
But that would be stupid. And it wasn’t the kind of thing they did.
“Yes, Sam?” he asked again, his voice a little deeper, a little huskier than normal. Oh, my.
She pulled out of his embrace. “I’m going to make you some cupcakes.”
Chapter Two
Somehow, Jace had ended up with two guests for dinner. One beautiful. One decidedly not and lying far too close to the table for his liking.
But Sam had made dinner, in addition to the cupcakes from earlier, and that meant he couldn’t flip his lid over the damn hairy dog sprawled out nearby while he was trying to eat.
“Guess what,” Sam said, beaming, her round pale cheeks downright cherubic. Ironic, considering she made him think of sin, not salvation.
“What?”
“I had German chocolate cake leftover at the bakery. And a lemon cream pie. And now they’re in your fridge.”
He took a bite of homemade bread. “I appreciate it.” He really did. Samantha was the best baker around, in his opinion. She’d also been the best personal chef, the best hairdresser and the best dog groomer. Not necessarily in that order.
Samantha was always bursting. With ideas. With talent. It was the settling that was hard for her. The follow-through. But then, given her upbringing he could hardly blame her. By the time she’d come to Bend at the age of sixteen, she’d lived in nine states and twenty-one cities. She and her mother had rented the apartment above the mercantile where Jace worked, and he’d clicked with her instantly.
It had started, he could admit now, as a case of insta-lust like a corn-fed country boy had never known before. She was new and bright. She wore eclectic clothes and had hair that seemed to glow in the sun.
When she’d turned seventeen, she’d shown up at his parents’ house, much like she’d done tonight at his own house, in tears, telling him she didn’t want to move. That her mother had found a job in Washington state and was going north.
Mrs. Brown, who owned the mercantile, had let Sam stay on in the upstairs apartment. She had a way of taking in stray people and making them feel as if they belonged. She’d done the same for him when she’d given him his first job.
Mrs. Brown let Sam live there rent-free so she could finish school, so she could remain in the town she felt a part of.
It was too bad Jace hadn’t bought the store from Mrs. Brown when she’d offered, or Sam could have stayed in the old apartment. But when she’d been ready to retire and spend half the year in a warmer climate, his ranch had just been getting off the ground and he hadn’t been willing to take his focus off of his new enterprise for a moment.
It was, by extension, his fault that Sam and Poppy were bunking with him. Not that he minded Sam’s presence so much.
Unless you brought the sexual frustration issue into the picture. Though even when she wasn’t staying with him, she did a pretty good job of sexually frustrating the ever-loving hell out of him. Just last week they’d curled up on her couch to watch an action movie. And she’d put the damned popcorn bowl. In. His. Lap.
The ceramic shield over his cock was the equivalent of a Kevlar vest pitted against a 30-06 rifle. Not. Fucking. Helpful.
The constant promise of a hand job with no satisfaction. And she’d had no idea. She’d been all involved in the movie while he’d sat there with a hard-on so intense he was a little afraid it would break the popcorn bowl.
Yeah, so...he was already in hell where she was concerned.
Now hell had moved in. Complete with hound.
His own little ginger specter of sexual doom.
And none of that was fair because Samantha needed a friend. But not a friend who was hiding an erection that wouldn’t quit and casting aspersions on the round suppleness of her breasts.
Not right now. Which meant getting a grip on himself—literally in the shower if need be—and moving on without blaming her for what a sick freaking puppy he was where she was concerned.
“And tomorrow I’ll make you pancakes for breakfast,” she practically chirped. In truth, it had been a long time since a woman had made him breakfast. But usually when one did, it was a much-needed refueling after a night of sex. Not so for tomorrow’s pancakes.
He repeated that to himself. Enough times and his body might get the message.
“Great, but you don’t have to pay rent, Sam, in money or in foodstuffs.”
“No, I know. But I figured that I should do something. If not for you, Poppy and I wouldn’t have anywhere to go.”
He knew better than to suggest she not tie her fate to her pet. That would get the batter of his morning pancakes sneezed in.
>
“So where are your things? Do you need help moving?”
“All of my things are in the delivery van.”
Samantha’s only vehicle was a giant white van with colorful decals on the side and the words Samantha’s Sweets emblazoned on the side in swirling letters.
“Even your furniture?”
“No. I got a storage unit for that. Which, come to think of it, Poppy and I probably could have slept in if we’d gotten desperate.”
“Yeah, right, like I would have let you sleep in a cold, mouse-infested storage unit.”
“Mice?”
“I mean, I’m not that heartless, Sam, not even when it comes to dogs.”
“Mice? As in actual mice?”
“You’re welcome to stay here as long as you need.”
“Are they going to have babies in my couch?”
“What?”
“The mice,” she said, hazel eyes round.
“You sound concerned. I thought you liked vermin.”
“I like dogs,” she said. “And cats. And...fluffy vermin like hamsters. I draw the line at anything with a naked tail. No mice, rats or possums.”
“Hairless cats?”
“Ew, no.”
“See, I think I could get on board with a hairless cat. The kind of pet that doesn’t leave pieces of itself all over your house.”
She smiled, that impish smile that took him straight back to high school. And made his heart and body react just like the boy he’d been, not the man he was. The man who had decided, years ago, that Samantha was his friend and nothing more, in spite of occasional lapses in sanity.
Like when she stuck her hand into a bowl of popcorn that happened to be positioned on his lap.
“Yeah, sure, but it’s a cat. So it would probably bring pieces of other animals into the house for you to find.”
The idea disturbed him, which was doubtless what she intended.
“The dog doesn’t do that, right?”
She cocked her head to the side, her smile widening. “Not usually.”
“If it brings a rat into the house, I’m throwing it out into the barn.”
“The rat?”
“The dog.”
“The dog isn’t an it. She is a she and she has a name. As you well know, since I have owned her for five years and you’ve been in my life for every single day of those five years.”
“Fine. If Poppy brings a rat into my house, I won’t hesitate to kick her furry, purebred behind out to the barn. How about that?”
“You would let her in your barn?”
She had him there. “The stable. In a stall.”
“What if she barked and scared your horses?”
“Samantha, you’re making the image of you in a storage unit not seem that bad. I’m sorry,” he said before she even had a chance to react to his jackassedness. “That was uncalled for and I don’t want you sleeping in a storage unit on a nest of baby mice.”
“Jace, I know you worship at the altar of bleach and disinfectant spray. I have a certified kitchen and a food handler’s card, plus, I passed my last health inspection with a score of ninety-nine. So I don’t think you really have to worry. I shall not desecrate the temple of cleanliness.”
“I’m not that crazy, Sam. I’ll deal.”
“Darling, Jace, I’ve known you since we were sixteen. You are that crazy.”
“It’s better to care about being clean than to be attached to your dirt.”
He cringed, knowing they were having a shared memory. Of his childhood home, the piles of things, his mother’s overattachment to all of it. Her inability to throw one damn thing away.
For a while it had spilled over into his room. Until he’d reclaimed it. Until he’d thrown out every piece of garbage and disinfected every corner and told her anything that crossed the threshold was going in the dumpster. He had to have a haven, or he would have really gone insane.
But he’d had his bedroom. He’d had the store and Mrs. Brown. And he’d had Sam.
His room and the store had provided escape. Mrs. Brown had provided the tough love, the guidance, the financial help when he’d wanted to start his beef ranch.
Sam had provided the smiles. The laughter. Sam made everything feel a little bit lighter. A little more colorful.
It was just ungrateful to begrudge her or Poppy a place in his home. Of course, his opinion on that would likely continue to fluctuate depending on how messy the dog proved to be.
“All right, yeah,” he said. “I’m that crazy. But I like to have control over my house and I know you understand that.”
Samantha did understand that. She remembered what Jace’s house had been like. She’d known him for more than a year before he’d let her inside, and when he had, his humiliation had been palpable. It was the only time she’d seen her friend near tears—that moment he’d let her walk through the rubble that was his childhood home.
Through the trash his mother treasured more than she had her husband who’d left and her son who was slowly going insane living in it.
She stood and picked up her empty bowl, crossing to Jace’s spot and taking his bowl, too. “Don’t worry, Jace, I’ll be good,” she said, bending down and kissing his cheek.
The moment her lips touched Jace’s skin, she knew she’d made a big mistake. She didn’t just go around kissing him on the cheek. She’d done it before, but she didn’t make a habit of it. And for some reason, this time had sent a rush of heat over her skin, a flame through her veins.
Calm down, woman. It was a kiss on the cheek, not second base.
Her body didn’t get the memo. Her lips burned and her nipples tightened, begging silently for attention because they knew she sure as hell wasn’t going to beg for him to touch her.
Nope. She was not.
She cleared her throat. “I’ll even do dishes.”
She turned and headed toward the kitchen and Poppy stood and followed her, her tags jingling with each footstep. There was something perfect about this moment. Something so domestic and calm.
Except for the lingering crackle of fire on her lips. That wasn’t calm at all.
This moment, except the crackle, embodied all the things she’d always wanted but never had. But she would have her own home soon. And it would have Poppy. It wouldn’t have Jace, but he would still be in her life.
That was all that mattered.
For now, she had his big, beautiful kitchen. Spotless and perfect. Like everything else in his house. She’d always admired the way he’d transcended his upbringing. The way he’d made something so orderly out of the chaos he’d been raised in.
She was afraid she’d inherited her mother’s transient, hippie dippy nature. And in terms of her taste in incense, she didn’t mind. But the restlessness she felt, the dissatisfaction with her surroundings...those seemed to be ingrained deep in her.
But instead of moving, she bought a new lampshade and curtains. Her feet were itchiest when it came to jobs. She’d had more jobs than most people twice her age. Not because she couldn’t do the jobs she got, and not because the businesses she’d started had all failed, but because she’d simply never found anything to latch on to.
But Mrs. Brown had taught her to bake. Survival skills, the older woman had said. And that had always been a part of her life. So when the bakery downtown had gone up for sale, Sam had scraped together her meager life savings and poured herself into her new project with a vengeance. When she was bored, she infused buttercream frosting with lavender instead of selling everything.
The next big step in defeating her restlessness was buying a house. And then when she needed a change, she’d paint a wall.
She was rising above like a mother effing phoenix.
Then there was her love life. Me
n didn’t stick with her, much like she couldn’t stick with a career. Or rather hadn’t been able to. No men, same job for the past two years.
She deserved a trophy. The Deferred Orgasm Award for Excellence in Abstaining While Getting Your Crap Together. Yeah, she was on the upswing for sure. Except for this little hiccup. But as always, Jace had her back, so the disaster wasn’t too big.
That was Jace. Steady. And neat. So many things she wasn’t.
Which was why she needed him. One of the many reasons why.
“You don’t have to do dishes,” he said, following her into the kitchen. “You cooked.”
She started rinsing the bowls, smoothing away stew chunks with her thumb beneath the running water. “I want to.”
“Seriously, it’s fine.”
She glanced over at him. He was leaning against the counter, his relaxed posture at odds with the tension coming off of him. “Oh, my gosh. You don’t think I’ll do a good enough job on the dishes, do you?”
“That’s not it,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck, a sheepish expression on his handsome face.
“No, it totally is. Jace Colter. You don’t trust me to do dishes.”
“You’re scrubbing them with your thumb, Samantha.”
“They’re going in the dishwasher!”
“You have to pre-clean them correctly.”
“Holy frick, Jace. Your issues can be perfectly adorable, especially when they culminate in you wiping my kitchen table off after we have dinner at my place, or you vacuuming my couch before you sit on it, but this,” she said, holding up the bowl, “not so cute, my friend. It’s going in scalding hot water that will disinfect everything. It’s not like I let Poppy lick it.”
“You wouldn’t.”
She arched a brow and took the bowl out of the sink, lowering it slightly. “You don’t think?”
“Sam,” he growled.
“Rawr. Jace is mad.”
“I will put you on the Hide-A-Bed.” He took a step toward her, his scent attacking her like a sexy beacon of temptation again.