by Wylde, J. D.
He wrapped his arms around her as he stood behind her. “I think your breasts are perfect,” he softly told hear, reading her mind. “Just like you,” he added, pressing a gentle kiss to her temple. “You are perfect, you know.”
She dipped her head, suddenly shy. Only Bobby Wayne had ever thought her perfect.
“And you make me very happy.”
“Well, in that case, Mister Forsythe,” Lauren turned in his arms and slowly unsnapped his shirt. She tugged it from his jeans, pushing it off his broad shoulders and down his arms, before letting it drop to the floor. “I do believe you’re going to get that pleasure you’ve been wanting so badly,” she added, reaching for his belt buckle.
* * *
“We need to do that more often,” Bobby Wayne told her a while later as he tucked his shirt back into his jeans.
She totally agreed, pulling her own tee shirt over her head.
He ran his hands through his hair while she scrambled to drag her disheveled curls into a pony tail. “Sex with you does a number on my makeup and my hair,” she whined. “I look—”
“—Like a woman who just had a hell of a good time rockin’ her man’s world.”
“A mess – that’s what I was thinking.” She fussed with another attempt at a pony tail. “I look—”
“Beautiful? Happy?” He paused in buttoning the fly on his jeans. The lightness of his teasing words belied the uncertainty shadowing his eyes.
And Lauren stopped her whining; somehow knowing she was standing at the edge of something… wonderful. Something she’d wanted all her life. Something this man was ready to give her, if she’d just stick it out. She inhaled a long, slow, steadying breath as she waited for the doubt to push her toward the front door. But there was nothing but… happiness. And contentment. She was where she was supposed to be. She was with who she was supposed to be with.
She stepped closer. Tenderly touched the side of his handsome face. “I am happy,” she softly told him before pressing a gentle kiss to his mouth. “I’m very happy.”
“Good.” He breathed deep. Hauled her close. Hugged her hard and kissed her thoroughly. He dropped a Forsythe racing baseball cap on her head and tugged her haphazard pony tail through the opening in the back. “So what do you say we go buy us a bed to celebrate?”
* * *
The beautiful antique bed was delivered three days ago. Set up and christened in the newly remodeled master bedroom upstairs. The missing Civil-War-era dresser Bobby had bought her when they’d been married had been miraculously resurrected and returned to its rightful place.
In a way Lauren had been returned to her rightful place, too. She was happy here, in this house, with Bobby Wayne. The kind of happy that went beyond good sex, to that of two hearts that knew love and now beat as one. She hadn’t turned on a radio, or a television, and except for the clandestine outing when they’d gone out to buy the bed, she had no contact with the outside world.
Reality would eventually intrude on their happiness, but for now…
“You’re thinking too hard again,” Bobby Wayne whispered in a rough-edged voice still laced with sleep. Dawn was slowly rising over the Atlantic. Weak fingers of pale pre-dawn light were slipping through the sheer drapes that covered the long French windows.
“Actually,” She wiggled closer to him, sliding her hand down over his flat stomach to slip around his morning erection. “I’m thinking how very happy I am.”
He rolled her onto her back. Looked down at her. His hair was rumpled. His jaw dark with beard stubble. “I’m happy, too.” And when she expected him to slip into her, he held back.
Uncertainty gnawed on the edges of her happiness. “What’s wrong?” she whispered.
His eyes lost their lazy sleepiness, replaced instead with a burning intensity. The same look she saw when he was behind the wheel of the Number 35 Dunmyer Chevrolet. “I want my future more than vague.”
She swallowed. “That’s the one thing we haven’t talked about.”
“I know.”
“I don’t know what you want me to say.” What they had here was everything she’d longed for all her life, dreamed of when she’d been a kid moving in the dead of night, leaving behind all the things she couldn’t carry in a duct-taped, hand-me-down backpack. When she’d been a teenager hoping to live in one spot long enough to have a boyfriend who’d screw up enough courage to ask her to a school dance.
And Bobby Wayne was offering her all of that. And more.
“I want you in my life, Lauren.” He lifted a lock of her hair. Curled it around his finger. “I want you with me, by my side. I know my life is hectic and I’m not around all the time,” he rushed on, “and I know it’s real important to you havin’ someone around who’s always here for you. I know my schedule makes that impossible, but when I can be here, I will be. And when I’m not, I’ll still be right here.” His finger brushed over her heart.
“Bobby Wayne—”
“Will you at least think about bein’ here with me? I need that. I need you.”
Lauren’s heart started a wild gallop inside her chest. She tried to push herself up toward the headboard, but Bobby Wayne wasn’t letting her go. And there was a part of her, buried under her insecurities that reveled in that insight. That he never let her go. Even when she’d cut him free. “Exactly what are you saying?” she whispered.
“That I love you.”
“I love you, too.” And she did. He gave her a small smile.
Which meant he had more to say. Her breath caught in her chest.
“Don’t look so scared,” he softly told her.
“I’m not.” But she was. More scared than when she’d stood up all alone at the Charlotte Motor Speedway and sang the National Anthem a cappella in front of a hundred-and sixty-thousand racing fans.
“You don’t have to marry me.”
“But—” She’d marry him in a minute if he’d ask her again.
“You can live with me. I just don’t wanna live my life without you in it.”
“I don’t wanna live a life like that either.” Not anymore.
“So,” his smile grew. “You’ll stick around a while?”
She nodded her head, unable to speak. She’d stay forever.
He made no move to kiss her. Or make love to her. “What’s wrong?” she whispered.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever race again.”
He’d just spoken his deepest, darkest fear. She didn’t know what to say, what to do. She touched his hair. Her fingers slowly slid down his cheek, her gesture inadequate compared to the graveness of what he’d just told her – of what he was facing.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. A part of her didn’t want him to race, didn’t want him to put himself at risk or in danger week after week. Yet a bigger part of her knew the pain of losing something you loved. She knew the helplessness, the anger, the pain.
“I don’t know what my future holds.” He swallowed hard. “But I do know I wanna hold you, sugar. In my heart. In my soul. And in my arms. Can you give me that much?” he quietly asked, his love for her shining in the bright blue depths of his eyes.
The lonely only-child who’d tumbled all over West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Ohio with parents who tolerated each other at best had finally found her place. Had finally found where she belonged. “I think I can do that.”
“Well, okay then.” A lazy smile spread across his face, lighting his beautiful eyes. Eyes she wanted to look into every day for the rest of her life. “I think we should celebrate.”
“Oh, do you now?” Lauren playfully replied, cocking her hips to tease against his morning erection.
“Oh yeah,” Bobby Wayne told her, tempting her mouth with a sweetly, sexy kiss. “Definitely celebrate,” he added, before sinking deeply into her. “Maybe until dinner time.”
Chapter 9
Lauren woke to incessant pounding on their front door. She slid out of the bed. Slipped into his shirt and after buttoning it, quickly head
ed down the stairs. She opened the front door. Her breath backed up in her throat. “Jeremy?”
She couldn’t believe her business manager was standing here! And looking none too happy for his effort. “What are you doin’ here?” She tugged the collar of Bobby Wayne’s shirt closer, mindful of the fact she was naked underneath it.
“Yeah, yeah, big surprise, babe. What the hell are you doin’ here?” he demanded. “I left you a hundred messages on your phone. And you didn’t call me back once.”
“I told you. I had to go home.”
“Some humble home, babe,” he sneered, as he looked over her shoulder into the grand entry and beyond. He snorted. “So much for your humble roots. Your rambling childhood going from one double-wide to another.”
She lifted her chin. “You knew Bobby Wayne and I owned this house.”
“Oh, yeah. You and the infamous Bobby Wayne Forsythe.”
“You had no right to come here.” He wanted to be pissy? Well, she could be pissy, too. “And you have no right to talk about my relationship with him!”
“Oh, I have every right,” he fired back, pushing his face close to hers.
“Lauren? Who’s down there?”
“Nobody,” she called over her shoulder.
“Oh, nice one, babe.” Fury burned in Jeremy’s eyes as he grabbed her chin. “So now I’m nobody to you?”
She jerked her head from his grasp. “That’s not what I meant.” Bobby Wayne was walking around upstairs. He’d be pulling on his jeans and then a tee shirt. She had to get rid of Jeremy. They would have a final confrontation, but it wouldn’t be here.
And it wouldn’t be in front of Bobby Wayne.
“That’s not what you were sayin’ a month ago when you were screamin’ out my name.”
“I never screamed out your name!” she hissed, embarrassed and outraged he’d stoop to such lowness. And such lies!
“Look,” she pressed her palm to his chest. She had every intention of pushing him right back out the front door he’d barged in. “We’ll talk, okay? Just not here.”
He didn’t budge.
“You think you can just roll me over?” His ruddy face contorted with anger. “Use me and lead me on?” His voice rising.
“Jeremy, please,” she begged. She shot a worried glance over her shoulder. Bobby Wayne had never liked Jeremy. Had always thought him an opportunistic leech who’d never had her best interests at heart – and now she wondered if he might have been right.
“Oh, we’ll talk, babe. Right now.”
“No! We won’t.”
“We’ll talk about your picture all over the fuckin’ internet!”
“My picture is always out there somewhere.” She didn’t have to turn around to know Bobby Wayne was near. She could smell him. Could hear his boots hitting the treads as he jogged down the stairs. And there was the determined fire in Jeremy’s eyes confirming it, the glint that warned he was itching for a confrontation – and not just with her.
“Oh, yeah?” He swung his head toward her. “Is it always out there with you in bed with him?”
“What?” she gasped.
“What the hell are you doin’ here?” Bobby Wayne demanded, dropping a possessive arm over her shoulder.
“I might ask you the same thing,” Jeremy sneered.
“You don’t have the right,” Bobby Wayne fired back and the pissing contest was underway.
“What pictures in bed?” Lauren demanded, but Jeremy ignored her.
“Oh, that’s rich for a good ol’ boy who can only make left turns.”
“Hey!” Lauren hissed. “You have no right to diss on Bobby’s career.”
“Get the hell outta my house,” Bobby Wayne growled, pushing by her. “Or I’ll show you a right that’ll have you seein’ stars. If you’re lucky.”
“Stop this now!” She pushed her way between them. “What pictures?” she nearly shouted. What if someone had a telephoto lens trained on one of the windows in the house? She and Bobby Wayne hadn’t been very discreet, mainly because Harrington House sat in the middle of a lot of private property – their private property — but property that could have easily been trespassed upon to get intimate pictures of the two of them.
“These ones.” Jeremy gleefully flipped open his notebook. His finger shooting picture after picture across the screen. Pictures of her and Bobby Wayne when they’d been out on their shopping day. Pictures of them laughing… kissing… holding onto each other like two people in love. Someone had recognized them even behind sunglasses and hats. And she’d foolishly thought their disguises ingenious.
God! She was such a fool.
“Who the hell took these pictures?” Bobby Wayne demanded. “I’ll sue ’em for invasion of privacy.”
“I don’t understand.” Someone had breached their privacy.
“They’re pretty self-explanatory, babe.”
Lauren’s head snapped up.
“All the guys who’d come onto you while we were on the road and you never jumped on one of their invites.” He shook his head slowly side to side. “All the time you led me on—”
“I never led you on, Jeremy.”
“What the hell’s he talkin’ about?” Bobby Wayne demanded.
“Oh, hell, yeah, you did, babe. And I was actually crazy enough about you to be worried sick. And here you are,” he sneered as his arm swung wide, his finger sliding across the notepad’s screen to show more pictures. “Putting out for him, the asshole who broke your heart.”
“Hey!” Bobby Wayne shouldered by her, but Lauren pushed him back. She grabbed the notepad from Jeremy’s hand. She stared at the slideshow of pictures of her and Bobby Wayne when they’d gone to purchase his bed. Pictures of him on top of her. Her slipping off his cowboy hat like a woman slowly unwrapping a treasured gift. Pictures of her lying underneath him with her fingers sliding into his hair, looking up into his face with all her love for him pooling in her eyes. And him looking down at her with the same love in his eyes. And his, sexy possessive smile as his fingers slipped into her hair. The whole world reduced to just him… and her… and the love they felt for each other.
“Oh my god,” she whispered, as she stared at the photo and reality sunk in. They were pictures taken from all angles, each one an erotic work of art from a gifted photographer, not just a fluke fan picture taken from a phone and posted on one of their rabid fan websites. But more than the talent and quality of the camera and the photographer who took them was the look in Bobby Wayne’s eyes. And hers.
Looks filled with love and desire and genuine caring.
“Do you know how many fuckin’ phone calls I fielded in the last three days?” Jeremy snarled. “How many newspapers and reporters called me wanting to know about your big reconciliation here?”
“That’s none of your fuckin’ business.” Bobby Wayne pushed against Lauren’s shoulder.
“Bobby Wayne!” She could handle this herself.
And still he pushed against her. “Get the hell outta here.”
“Jeremy, please, just go,” she begged, as her heart pounded in her chest.
But he didn’t. He stood toe to toe with her. “You were supposed to be tellin’ this asshole goodbye, remember?”
Bobby Wayne stopped pushing against her and Lauren was helpless to stop the train wreck about to happen.
“You said you were over him.”
“I never said that!”
Bobby Wayne stood stiff behind her.
“Yes, you did.”
“No, I didn’t!” And Lauren’s heart was thundering around in her chest, pinging off her rib cage, plummeting through her stomach. This wasn’t supposed to be happening! She wanted more time with Bobby Wayne. And private time with Jeremy to tell him things were over. “Just go, please!”
“We’re supposed to be out on the road. You and me, babe. Together.”
“Is that true, Lauren?” Bobby Wayne tersely demanded.
“No!” She told Bobby Wayne. “I never said
that, Jeremy. I told you I wanted out. I left the tour.” How much more did she have to do to make her point any clearer?
“You and me, babe. We were goin’ places.”
“Is that true?” Bobby Wayne demanded. His voice was a gruff growl near her ear.
Lauren turned to Bobby Wayne. “Please,” she begged as tears filled her eyes. “I can explain.”
“What’s to explain? I’m the asshole you wanted rid of.” And she saw the hurt in his eyes.
“That’s not true, Bobby Wayne.” Lauren’s heart was twisted into a pain-filled knot in her chest.
“Is that why you came back?” Gone was the soft glow of love in his eyes, replaced with fury. “Is that why you came back here? To be rid of me?”
“Why else?” Jeremy taunted. “It isn’t like you cared about her. It isn’t like you came after her. You didn’t want her and I do. And she’s with me now. In every way.”
“Jeremy!” Lauren spun around. “Go! Now!” She pushed at his chest.
“Is that true?” Bobby Wayne grabbed her arm. Spun her around. He glared down at her. “Were you fuckin’ him and then fuckin’ me?”
Her head snapped back at his crude description of their love. “Bobby Wayne, please.”
“All that talk upstairs, that was just bullshit?”
“No. No!” Tears sprang into her eyes. “I love—”
“That’s right, asshole,” Jeremy talked over her. “She’s back on the road as soon as she unloads you and this little humble abode—”
“Jeremy! Go!” she pointed a finger toward the door.
“Hey! I’m just sayin’ what he needs to hear. What you should have been tellin’ him instead of fu—”
“Go!” she yelled, giving him one hard push. The tinniest bit of weight lifted from her chest when he marched out the front door.
It was short lived.
Bobby Wayne spun her around. “You’re goin’ back out on the road?” he demanded as soon as the door slammed shut.