by A. D. Roland
Mattie dressed quickly in her usual blue jeans and a tank top. She eyed herself in the mirror as she brushed her hair. She was a big girl, a size fourteen, but she had a decent figure. Nobody had ever told her she was ugly, although K made sure she never thought of herself as pretty.
Not that it mattered. She didn’t look like Emeline. If she was taller, willowy, and an ice-cold bitch, he might see her as more. She tossed her brush down on the bed and went to the kitchen.
The sight of the huge Mexican guy making toast stopped her dead in her tracks. “Hey, yo, Mattie, right?” he boomed, grinning ear to ear. She managed a nod, still startled by finding a stranger in the kitchen. The smell of the toast was making her hungry, though. “Cool, cool, I’m Jose. I work for West.”
“Oh. Is he here?” Relieved that he wasn’t a stranger, Mattie leaned back against the fridge, relaxed.
“He’s out on the grounds somewhere. Said to tell you he’d be back for lunch.”
“Oh. I guess that means he wants me to have something ready.”
Jose laughed. “Yeah. One of his dreams has always been to have somebody waiting for him here with a pretty sandwich, like some kinda TV commercial. I been telling him for years it ain’t gonna be Emeline.”
“Oh dear heavens, you mustn’t say a bad thing about sweet Emeline,” Mattie said sarcastically, one hand over her heart.
Shaking his head and grinning, Jose retrieved his toast from the toaster. The fragrance nearly made her woozy. “I’ve blasphemed. Somebody shoot me now. I won’t be able to live with myself.”
Mattie rolled her eyes. “I just don’t understand how he seems to be completely blind to everything that nasty—”
The door swung open and West walked in. Mattie snapped her mouth shut, shaky from a sudden wave of self-disgust. He doesn’t care about me, but I keep offering myself to him like a common whore. Something like lust overcame the disgust, dancing up her thighs, through her belly.
He flashed her a quick smile that left her weak. He was so beautiful, standing in the square of bright, early morning sunlight. Did he have any idea how much he broke her heart?
“Morning, Mattie,” he said, with that slight southern drawl. His eyes were warm and friendly, rather than filled with distrust and resentment.
“Hey.”
Their eyes met across the kitchen. Mattie flushed and busied herself making toast. Jose disappeared into the office, and West took his place by the kitchen counter. He squeezed her shoulders. “You smell good.” He smelled like green growing things, sunshine, and sweat. “You sleep all right?”
Mattie shrugged and nodded, absorbed in buttering her toast. She started to say something. Realizing she didn’t have the foggiest clue what she was going to say, she snapped her mouth shut.
“Anyway,” West said, snagging a piece of her toast and taking a huge bite out of it with a wink. “I figured you might want to go grocery shopping or whatever. Come on in the office and I can show you the online banking stuff so you’ll know what we’re working with.”
“West, it’s okay. That’s your business. Just tell me what I can spend, and—”
“Mattie, while we’re married it’s a partnership. Besides, I’m going to need you to help me out with the nursery and stuff. You said you wanted to help me, so I’m taking you up on that. Your allowance from Ruth Ellen won’t start until next month.”
“Oh. Okay.” She took a bite of her remaining piece of toast and followed him into the office. Two desks and two computers were crammed into the tiny room. One was an old, bulky machine while the other was new and sleek. Jose was hunched over the keyboard of the older model, pecking stuff out with one finger, scowling at the hand-written spreadsheets beside him.
“Why two computers?” she asked, pulling a low stool up next to West’s chair in front of the new computer. The stool shuddered under her weight. West steadied her with a hand on her thigh. His touch took her breath away.
“Sorry, the leg’s broken. Don’t wiggle around too much.” West shrugged. “As for the computers, this one’s personal. I just don’t have room for it anywhere else in the house. I’m actually about to trash that piece of shit over there and get a laptop.”
“Cool.”
“Yeah.” He got on the Internet and pulled up his bank website. He scribbled down the account number and handed her the paper. “I’ll add you to the account when I go to town later.”
“You don’t have to.”
West nodded. “Yeah, I do.” He showed her the balance in his bank account. She winced and he nodded again. “Yeah, it’s bad. But the tenants pay rent in a week, so everything will be cool after the third.”
“How long have you been in business?”
“I helped my dad since I was old enough to steer a lawnmower. When he died, I took over and made it my own.” He opened up his email. He skimmed through the joke mail forwards sent en masse by Emeline and all her little friends, chewing on his lip. “I put my parents’ life insurance policy pay-out into this business. It was my dad’s dream. I gotta make it work.”
“Did you go to college?” Mattie propped her elbow up on the desk, resting her head on her hand.
“For a couple years. Never graduated or anything, though. Come outside with me. I’ve walked you through most of the place, but I’ll show you everything in depth, tell you all about my dad’s dream.” He held his hand out to her.
***
Mattie followed him out the crooked door that had been not-quite-professionally built into the wall. The second she stepped outside, the dogs swarmed her. She stiffened and clutched him painfully, trying her best to climb inside him. Her fear made the dogs even crazier, jumping up on her hips and licking her legs and elbows.
West held her close with one arm while he kicked and swatted at the stupid creatures. Hollering, he finally managed to run the worst of the pack off. When they were all sitting around, gazing at them with adoring, goofy, doggy-smiles, tongues hanging out of their mouths and tails swishing the dust up, he peeled Mattie off.
“You all right? I told you, they won’t bite you. They just want you to play.”
“I don’t like dogs!” She buried her face in his shoulder, refusing to budge. “You said they’re mostly strays. How do you know they aren’t dangerous?”
He patted her back and smoothed her hair. He couldn’t help breathing in her clean, crisp scent. Beneath his hand, her skin was smooth and soft, pale as anything. He’d have to remind her to put on sunscreen when she came outside. “I don’t just take in any dog that wanders on to my land. I work with a couple of rescue groups and take in foster animals. Half of these will be going to new homes in the next few weeks.”
An old memory, nearly forgotten, surfaced. When Elaine was four, maybe five, McKendrick had brought home a pit bull puppy. The little thing had been ferocious at only a few weeks old. It tore into Elaine within minutes, scarring the inside of her right thigh a few inches above her knee with its razor-sharp puppy teeth and claws.
Granted he hadn’t really had a chance to examine Mattie’s leg, but he couldn’t recall seeing the scar any of the times she’d worn a skirt.
Maybe the scar had faded with time. The incident had happened twenty years ago. West glanced down at his forearm. He had his own scar from the damn puppy. His hadn’t faded away. The scar was still there on the inside of his arm, just above his wrist, pink-white against his suntanned skin.
As he patted Mattie’s long dark blonde hair he wondered if there was the slightest chance that just maybe she was Elaine. She looked so much like a young Ruth Ellen, but nothing like a McKendrick.
West forced down the embittering feeling of suspicion and gave Mattie’s hair a sharp little tug. “You’re fine. I won’t let them hurt you. Okay?”
After a long moment, she nodded and let go of him. “I’m sorry. I just freak out around dogs.”
“It’s all right. These guys won’t hurt you. They just play too much.”
She wasn’t Elaine, but sh
e was helping him save his business. She could give a blow job like the best of them. His dick pulsed and made a half-hearted attempt at stiffening within his jeans. West groaned internally and pushed further away from Mattie. The last thing he needed was for her to see how she affected him. It would just encourage her even more.
She had no clue how close he’d come last night to flipping her over and taking her hard and fast.
He suppressed a grin. It might teach her a lesson. He wasn’t exactly sure what lesson, but it would be enough of one to teach her something...
Ah, crap.
No amount of redirecting his attention could keep the hard-on from forming. He walked ahead of her a few steps and adjusted his pants. Damn it, it was still obvious.
“So what are you going to show me?” she asked, hurrying to catch up with him as he walked down a dirt path that led off the main driveway.
All the dirty things I could do to you, he said silently. “Um, my stuff here. The stuff I grow.” Durrhhh...real smart answer, retard. His body sort of took over, and he pushed her up against the closest oak tree and kissed her hard. Her eyes opened wide in surprise, and she melted against the tree, pushing her hips against his.
He explored her mouth his tongue, tasting a hint of toothpaste. His tongue stroked over hers, eliciting a muffled moan from her throat.
He tore away from her lips and ground his hips against hers, seeking some relief from the intense pressure of his erection. “The things you do to me,” he whispered roughly into her ear, nuzzling her earlobe, then taking it between his teeth. He plunged his hand down the stiff waistband of her jeans, seeking her center. As he expected, it was hot and wet, waiting for him.
At his first touch, she cried out and clenched her thighs together, capturing his hand, clutching his biceps with bruising fingertips. In just a few strokes of his index finger over her clit, she came, biting down on his shoulder to stifle her funny little ah-ah-ah sob of pleasure. The pressure of his body against hers kept her from sliding to the ground when her knees wobbled and went weak.
“West, West, West,” she chanted softly as the tight contractions of her body slowed. She melted against his shoulder, panting. Her hands fluttered over the bulge of his erection, then unfastened his jeans and slipped into his boxers, as soft and as cool as silk.
A few tight tugs along his shaft, a whisper of fingertips over the tip, and he was gasping through ground teeth. Closing his hand over hers, he helped her find the right rhythm, as much as they could around boxers and stiff jeans.
He came in an embarrassingly short amount of time, gasping into her hair and squeezing her arms. Mattie gave him an evil little squeeze, pinching the tip of his dick just enough to make his over-sensitized nerves jolt.
“Bitch,” he grunted. She wiped her hand on the tree, then swiped it across her jeans.
“I still don’t understand why you don’t just have sex with me. Real sex. Not this horny teenager crap.”
Offended, shaken and weak, West walked away from her, buttoning and zipping his fly. He glanced over his shoulder, the afterglow ruined by her comments. “You are a bitch. Are you always that uptight after you come?”
“No. Only when I don’t get any dick.”
She turned around and stalked back to the trailer, scrubbing her hand against her pants, like it was dirty or something.
That hurt. A little emotionally shaky, West continued on to the small fernery. He knelt at the edge of the fern shade and fingered a long, feathery frond. Angry, he ripped the stalk out of the ground and crushed it in his fist.
Maybe it was time to give it up and stick to the landscaping. He knew he was good at that. This was his father’s dream, not his. Dad could have made it work. As it was, he didn’t have a single order. Hadn’t for nearly a week and a half.
There wasn’t anything West could do to save the place. He might be able to squeeze out another year, long enough to finish out the season. Finish out Mattie’s year, anyway. His heart just wasn’t in his work anymore. He could mow grass and plant flowers, plan landscaping and set up complicated irrigation systems, but growing the plants himself just wasn’t working.
Footsteps crunched over the mat of pine needle debris. He looked up to see Mattie approaching him. Instantly, he recognized Ruth Ellen’s pissed-off look. This woman was a dead ringer for the old woman in her younger years.
Who the hell is she, if she isn’t Elaine? She wasn’t Elaine. Wasn’t. Wasn’t any way in hell she could be Elaine.
“I need to use your truck,” she said coldly. “And I need some money for groceries.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“You don’t need to. I’m capable of driving to Wal-Mart by myself.”
“Not in my truck, you aren’t. You can’t even get the passenger door open.”
She huffed in irritation and spun around on her heel toward the trailer. “Fine. Whatever. I’m ready to go now, though.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He flicked her a sarcastic salute that ended with his middle finger. She rolled her eyes and turned around.
West followed her down the narrow trail, completely distracted from his mental anguish by the angry sway of her hips. Damn, she was hot when she was mad!
***
The ride to town was tense. West’s face was as hard as rock, as unyielding as the asphalt beneath the tires. He smoked cigarette after cigarette. Finally, Mattie couldn’t take anymore and broke the silence. “Are we even gonna be, you know, just friends?”
He shrugged, staring out the windshield. The wind whipped his longish hair into his face, around his ears. Mattie grabbed his sunglasses out of the console and handed them to him. He slid the snug, sexy, wraparounds on.
Mattie had to suppress a sigh. He was such a hunk of man-candy in those glasses.
“I just...I don’t want to get too involved with you. Mattie, it would be so easy to...I don’t know, fall for you or something, but I don’t want to deal with the emotions. It’ll get dirty and painful when its time for you to leave. I don’t want to deal with that.”
She nodded, looking down at her hands. Disappointed, she said, “I understand. But we can’t exist together like this for a year. It’s unrealistic. We live in the same house, sleep in the same bed, and have to share a bathroom. You owe me at least friendship for that.”
She didn’t miss the little smile that curved his lips up before he caught himself and resumed his stony poker face. “West, we’re mature adults. We can come to some sort of agreement. Whatever happens between us doesn’t have to be all mushy-gushy. Besides, I think I’ll be pretty good at helping you with the nursery and landscaping stuff. You need me as a friend.”
“You honestly think we can be just friends?” He looked at her at last, one eyebrow cocked, rising over the top edge of his slim sunglasses. “With all the stuff that has already happened between us?”
“Did any of that make you fall in love with me?”
Maybe she was imagining it, but she was pretty sure he flushed pink. Might have been the heat, or the sun, though.
“No! It’s complicated, Mattie.”
“No, it’s Emeline.”
“No.” He shook his head and sighed, slouching lower in his seat. “No, it’s not Emeline. Honestly, I’m getting over her. She’s just too immature. We want different things. Out of anybody I’ve ever met, you are the only woman I’ve ever met who wants the same things I do.”
She almost retorted, “How do you know what I want?” before she remembered their conversations in the grand foyer of the McKendrick house, waiting for Emeline. The talks they had in the Navigator while Em was shopping or at a club. The times at parties when they gravitated toward each other. They had talked, about so many things. It wasn’t until she proposed that they even argued.
“We were friends, West,” she reminded him. “Before all this. It was fun. A little bit of relief from everything else going on.”
“Yeah. I just don’t want it to get messy. We have an agreement already.
”
“But I can’t live with you and be like this! We’ve got to be at least friends, West. I won’t ask you for anything else.” The sunglasses slipped down his nose a little, revealing his startling blue eyes.
“Fine. Friends. But whatever else happens is no-strings-attached. No falling in love, no ridiculous stuff like that. Why’s it so important, Mattie?”
It wasn’t a prying question. The lines of his face had relaxed. Even though she couldn’t see his eyes, she imagined they were full of compassion. He had that tone in his voice that he got when he just wanted to talk.
“I’ve never really had many friends,” she said, looking down at her hands. Her cuticles were ragged and her skin was dry. “I grew up pretty isolated. When I tried to reach out to people, I usually got hurt.”
“That sucks.”
“It was my life until Carmen finally left me and I moved in with some friends.” “
Who’s Carmen?” Oh shit-balls-damn-hell! She did it again! “Nobody. Just somebody that I stayed with when I was a kid.”
“You’re lying.”
“I am not!”
He tugged his glasses down his nose and gave her a pointed glare. “You fidget when you lie, Mattie. Who’s Carmen?”
“She’s a woman who took care of me when I was a kid.”
“Did she work for the McKendricks?”
Mattie forced her hands to be still, her feet to stop shuffling in the sand on the rubber floormats. “I don’t know, West. She was usually too drunk for me to ask her for a resume.”
“Mattie, don’t insult my intelligence.”
“I don’t know what you want from me.”
“The truth would be nice.”
Mattie heaved a sigh and crossed her arms over her chest. “All you people think I’m a liar and just out for some money. You are all going to be so frickin’ shocked when those tests come back. Then, you know what? You can shove them where the sun don’t shine!”
West slugged her shoulder, taunting her. “Good to see we’re still friends.”