by Lori Garrett
My fingers tighten around the phone. I want to spend as much time as I can with Gunner, but if I have to give time up, dance is the only thing I’m willing to do it for.
“I do have the dress. I can be at your place in half an hour.”
“Great! I gotta call the rest of the girls. See you soon, hon!”
Jilly clicks off and I race around my room, stuffing things in my bag, my heart racing. I’ve never danced for money. I guess I should have asked how much money we’re getting. And what kind of party it is. I guess it doesn’t really matter, though. What’s important is that it’s a step in the right direction.
Of course, I have to be sure that when I tell Daddy about the job I mention that opportunities like this will only come up now and then in Piedmont. In New York City, these kinds of jobs will fill my schedule up and keep me employed.
I race to my Jeep, and have a hard time not speeding to Jilly’s house.
I can’t wait to dance again!
***
“Break!” Jilly yells.
The six of us all collapse, rubbing our legs and sides, groaning, and laughing. “Jilly, you can always join the army if your career in dance doesn’t take off. You’re a freaking drill sergeant,” Jerika moans.
Jilly puts her hands on her hips and glares. “If you’d done something other than watch reality TV and sext with your boyfriend this break, you’d be in better shape, Jerika. I don’t see Harlow complaining.”
Jerika pokes me with her shoe. “Um, that’s because Little Miss Celibate doesn’t have anything to distract her from her fierce dance regimen.”
My friends all laugh, because it’s an old joke. I just never dated much, and was always at the studio, working.
Of course, none of them know that I’ve been dancing my ass off in between the hottest sex sessions I’ve ever had, and I’d rather they still thought I of me as “Promise Ring Harlow.”
Unfortunately, I have zero poker face.
Alex, the one of us who’s has the most, ahem, varied experiences drops her jaw. “Girls! My inner sex goddess is so tingling. Harlow Mills is no longer a virgin.”
Everyone stares at me, and I know for a fact I’m probably scarlet.
I take a deep breath, look up, and announce, “Well, duh. I lost my virginity three years ago.”
The girls scream and crowd me, even Jilly, who said we’d only get ten minutes of downtime before we started back up. Why does she pick now to loosen up her military focus?
“Have you had a secret boyfriend?” Jerika asks.
“She’s obviously hiding something. Spill,” Madison insists. Becca and Alex nod behind her.
“There’s nothing to spill. And we have moves to learn. You were a half count off for the first part of the dance, Madison,” I point out, not caring that she shoots me stabby eyes.
I look to Jilly to back me up, but she just smiles. “Girl, you’ve been white as the fresh driven snow for as long as I’ve known you. Now you drop this bombshell and expect us to just get back to routine? Hell no! Spill. And that’s an order.”
“I did not drop any bombshell,” I protest, but the girls ignore my arguments and chant for me to tell. “You guys are so middle school. You know that, right?” I sigh when the chanting only picks up. “Fine! Just shut up, okay?” Everyone goes quiet and giggles, waiting. “Well, three years ago I fell in love with this guy over the summer. And it was crazy. Fantastic. At the end of the summer, he told me that he wasn’t good enough, that he wanted me to go my own way. It broke my heart.”
“Oh, honey,” Jilly says, putting a hand on my arm and biting her lip. I know she feels bad now for teasing me.
“It was terrible. I just blocked any thoughts of love out of my mind, which is part of the reason why I threw myself into dancing like crazy.”
Jerika grimaces. “Wow. I feel like a huge asshole for making fun of you. I had no idea, Har.”
I smile. “It’s okay. Because this summer, Daisy hunted him down. And he and...Um, well...we reconnected?” I push away the drama of the last three days, because I know, I just know, Gunner and I will get past it. Or maybe I just want to believe my own fairytale.
The entire group crows and shouts.
“She means, ‘We boned!’” Becca shouts.
“She means, ‘He gave me his hot beef injection!’” Alex yells, jumping up and pumping her hips.
“Who is this mystery stud?” Madison demands.
“Um, his name is Gunner Hunt,” I say.
Alex’s eyes go wide.
“Do you know something about him?” My heart hammers loud in my ears. Maybe Alex knows Rochelle? Maybe she’s going to tell me something I really don’t want to hear?
“No. Not a Gunner Hunt. I had an amazing weekend with a Greyson Hunt, but there are a million Hunts in Piedmont. Who knows if they’re even related. But if Gunner is as unfuckingbelievable in bed as Greyson is...” Alex closes her eyes and runs her hands over her body. “Holy shit, girl, I’m dying of jealousy right now!”
Jilly shakes her head. “Hunt is like the Smith of Piedmont. Okay, girls! Now that we know Harlow is having a very active social life with the mysterious Gunner Hunt, you should all be extra ashamed, because she’s still blowing every one of you out of the water. Don’t even look at the phone pile, Jerika! You know who gets phone privileges? Amazing dancers. Right now I see a whole lotta mediocre. Again from the top. Five, six, seven, eight...”
I glance over at the phone pile when Jilly’s back is turned. Has he called? What’s he going to say about Rochelle? Did she tell him we met? Damn Daisy and her three-day rule!
I dance my heart out and encourage my girls to do the same, in a small part because I love what I’m doing, and in a huge part because I need to get to that damn phone.
CHAPTER 10
GUNNER
The first time anyone ever handed me a beer was my at my eighth grade graduation. My Uncle Billy said, “Kid got farther than I ever managed. I’ll drink to that, and I think he should to!”
I had no mama to knock him upside the head, so I drank. And didn’t stop until the summer I met Harlow. I lost the desire to be drunk on alcohol once I’d been drunk off the taste of her, the feel of her body under mine.
When I sent her on her way, I couldn’t seem to drink enough, which is part of the reason I opened my bar. I slowed back down because I had too much responsibility to be wasted every day. But now that it’s been three fucking days since I’ve been able to hear her voice or see her face, I’m nursing a bottle of Jack Daniel’s Black Label, and even my favorite drink isn’t doing a damn thing.
Rochelle’s irritating voice doesn’t do anything to help.
“Hey, handsome. You look like death warmed over.”
I hold my arms out. “Didn’t I give you my credit card yesterday? Go buy yourself something and get out of my damn face, Rochelle.”
She sits down on the barstool next to me and smiles at Jared. “Vodka sour.” She watches him walk back to make her drink, looking him up and down and licking her lips appreciatively. She turns to look at me, a challenge in her icy eyes.
“What’s that look for?” I growl.
“You jealous that I’m checking Jared out?” she purrs.
I see Jared’s shoulders go stiff. He’s been with his girl, Rosie, since they were in junior high. He says that he can appreciate a good-looking female, but he’d never mess around.
“I don’t give a shit who you look at, Rochelle. But keep your hands off anyone I work with. I don’t need you turning everything here to shit.”
Jared drops the glass on the bar and rushes to the boxes waiting to be broken down in the storage room. Lucky bastard. I’m stuck staring at Rochelle. She sips her drink and stuffs a fifty in the tip jar, which makes me laugh. It’s probably my fucking fifty.
“You were supposed to meet me at the jewelry store. I waited for half an hour. Bought a nice necklace and two pairs of earrings I might never wear.”
“Why would you do
that?” I ask, knowing I shouldn’t bother. She wants me to ask because she loves the drama.
“I did it because fuck you, Gunner,” she hisses, leaning close to me. “You think I don’t know about your little blonde slut?”
I sit up and lean in. “You call her that one more time, and I’m kicking your ass out of this bar and my life for good. You hear me?”
“You don’t scare me, Gunner,” Rochelle says, but she backs up. “And I can’t even believe you’re messing around with that little princess. You’re just wasting your time on a spoiled little daddy’s girl who’s going to drop you the minute she meets her prince charming. I wouldn’t care if it was just some girl you were getting your rocks off with, but there’s this.” She reaches out and grabs my wrist, twisting it around so my tattoo is visible.
“What the hell is it to you, Rochelle?” I ask.
“Like I said, fine if you want to sow your wild oats or whatever. Trust me, I get that people like you and me just aren’t hardwired for monogamy. But if this little bitch gets in the way of my plans for our future—”
“Shut your damn mouth!” I roar, banging my fist on the bar so hard her drink sloshes over the rim.
Her jaw drops open. “Oh my God. I can’t believe it.”
“Believe what?”
“You still think this whole fairytale is going to work out? You still think your true love is going to turn her back on her daddy’s money and leave her cushy country club life to ride off into the sunset with you?” I force my face to stay blank, but Rochelle’s nasty laugh tells me I haven’t done a good job of hiding what’s in my head.
“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” I grit out.
She stops laughing. “Oh, Gunner. This is actually too pathetic to laugh about. Let me spell it out for you. I know it’s fun as hell to fuck the prom queen, and I bet she’s really loving slumming it. But look around.” She holds her hands out. “This piece of shit bar is your world. You think she’s going to say goodbye to daddy’s palace and move into your farmhouse? Or that she’s going to give up being the wife of some senator or stock broker so she can hang out in your shitty bar? Imagine how she’ll feel when she wants to dress up and go to church on Christmas Eve and finds out your family’s big tradition is to get lit and pass out around a bonfire made of furniture that got broke while you were brawling?”
“I’m not anything like my family,” I insist, but I don’t know why I bother. Rochelle knows me better than I know myself.
She puts a cool hand on my cheek. “You can pretend for now. But you’re tied to them for life. And their world, your world...our world—doesn’t include Harlow Mills. Stringing this thing along is just depressing. Stop kidding yourself, Gunner. And admit it: you and I have chemistry, we get each other, and we come from the same place. We just make sense. So stop fighting it.”
Rochelle leans over and kisses me.
“I can’t—” I begin, but she puts her fingers to my lips.
“Don’t,” she says. “I really do care about you, Gunner. I know it doesn’t seem that way, but I do. And I know you’re hung up on this girl, but I’m telling you as a friend—maybe your only friend—that this will only lead to disaster.”
“You don’t know that,” I bite out.
She throws back the dregs of her drink, slips off the barstool, and shrugs. “I’m not wrong. Maybe it’s been all honeymoon so far, but it won’t last, Gunner. And I’m telling you that it’s because it can’t last. Our world isn’t her world.”
I clench the neck of the bottle of Jack as Rochelle walks out the door.
“And Gunner?” she asks, her back to me. “I know exactly what you’re looking at. Murphy would be glad to ink that over for you anytime you want. Stop torturing yourself.”
She pushes through the door and I continue to stare at the tattoo of Harlow’s name on my wrist.
I slam the bottle of Jack on the counter and consider that maybe Rochelle has a point.
***
Her Jeep pulls up and I push myself off the chair I’ve been sitting in all night. The one by the bed where we made love like we couldn’t stop. Looking at it empty makes me consider how good it would feel to take a damn hatchet to it and make a nice fucking fire, turning all my memories to ash.
But I’m trying to grow past the need to destroy everything that doesn’t work my way. Otherwise I’d spend every day of my life sifting through ruins.
I’m at the door before she can knock, and she looks so damn gorgeous, it kicks the breath out of my lungs.
She’s wearing ripped up jean shorts that barely cover her ass, a tiny white tank top, and her feet are bare. I want to tell her it’s not safe to drive in bare feet. I want to tell her it’s not safe to come here, to my house, when I’m feeling like my world is falling apart. I can’t say a word, because her face is shining.
Like she’s been waiting to see me all day.
Like she gives a damn about me.
God that feels so good.
She runs up to me, her light hair picked up by the breeze the summer wind brings across the fields. “Hey there, stranger,” she says, biting her bottom lip and stopping short before she’s in my arms.
I could reach out and touch her, but I don’t.
I can’t.
“I was worried about you.” I’m not surprised at how dead my voice sounds.
“I’m so sorry, Gunner. That’s Daisy’s stupid ass rule. About calling. I guess I agreed to it. But that was before it applied to you.” She takes a step toward me, and I shift back.
The look of hurt and confusion in her eyes is a knife in my heart.
“You should have called before you showed up,” I tell her.
She tucks a piece of hair behind her ear. “Oh. Um, I met Rochelle.”
I close my eyes and swallow. “I heard.”
“But you called me...I thought maybe she wasn’t...maybe she isn’t...” She looks at me with pleading eyes because she wants me to tell her that Rochelle is just some jealous asshole who means nothing to me.
Which is so true and such a lie all at once.
“Rochelle and I have been on and off for a while,” I finally say.
“Oh.” She stares at her perfect little toes. “She said something about an engagement ring.”
“Did you see one on her finger?”
She shakes her head.
“So, you said you two are on and off. Just how off were you when we got together?” Her lip trembles.
“Haven’t slept with her in weeks.”
She looks up at me, eyes wide with hurt. “I’m not asking how long it’s been since you slept with her.”
“She’s more a friend than anything else.”
She steps closer, and I have nowhere left to back up to.
“Do you love her, Gunner?” she asks, her words a soft rush, her fingers hot on my arm. “Tell me. Because I’ll leave now.”
“I never loved her. I never loved any girl in my life like I love you, Harlow Mills,” I tell her, grabbing her around the waist and sinking my mouth to hers. “I missed you the last few days. And I want you. I know it’s a fucking bad idea. I know it’s the worst idea. But I want you. Tell me to let you go. Tell me to fuck off and never come near you again, and I’ll do it.”
“Take me to bed,” she says instead, wrapping her arms around my neck. “I love you. I don’t give a damn about girls you slept with. I don’t give a damn about anything but you, Gunner Hunt.”
I open the door and we fall in, my mouth rough on her sweet lips because I can’t get enough of her. I strip that tank off over her head and her tits jiggle out, full and soft. I dip my mouth and feast on one, then the other, squeezing and sucking. Her fingers undo the button and zipper of her tiny shorts and they drop off her hips. She’s not wearing a thing under them.
I lift her around the waist and set her back against the door, one arm under that sweet ass. My fingers find her and I press them in and out, over and over until she’s pa
nting hard and pumping against me.
“I ought to horsewhip you for going off and not calling, you damn fool. I was worried out of my mind.” I press my mouth to her neck, exposed for my taking by her back-bent head.
I’m shocked to hear her laugh. “You should spank me a little. I think I’d like that, actually.” Her eyes dance and she wiggles in my arms and turns, backside to me. “Was I a bad girl, Gunner?” She bats her lashes and shakes her ass.
I wrap one arm around her hips and rub the palm of my hand on her soft, rounded skin. “Don’t play with me, Harlow. I will absolutely spank you because you sure as hell deserve it.”
“Are you just talking a big game, or are you going to do it?” she asks, cocking an eyebrow.
I draw my hand back and rap her on the bottom, and she giggles. “I’m not made of porcelain. You can—Oh!”
I pull my hand back and slap her backside hard enough to leave a stinging red imprint. “Like that?” I ask.
“Yes! Yes!” She pushes back and I repeat, loving the way she moans at the sound of my hand on her plump ass. I reach my free hand forward, and her nipples are rock hard. I slide it down, and she’s so wet, her thighs are slippery. I slap her bottom one more time, and listen to her suck her breath in at my stinging touch. Then I turn her in my arms.
She’s biting her lip. “Why is it I want you so badly, Gunner? Why is it that I love it even when it hurts?”
I don’t know for sure if she’s talking about the fact that I spanked her ass or the fact that I broke her heart, but I’m ready to take her beyond all that pain either way.
“I have no clue, baby.” I hoist her against the door and undo my pants. I slide into her fast, my dick surrounded by her tight, soaked suction and push deep, kissing her through her moans and yelps. “But I know I can’t just walk away. I can’t.”
I ram into her, loving the way she squirms in my arms, her fingers tearing my shirt off and running up and down my chest and back. She bites and sucks, sometimes leaving little marks. I love every one. I love that she’s so damn passionate with me. So damn willing.