Sexy as Sin (Sinful, Montana Book 3)

by Rosalind James

  “Not really.” He pulled on a flannel button-down shirt, and she considered standing up to put her hands on his chest, but felt too lazy to do it. Instead, she put a hand behind her neck and lay back on the bed, and saw his attention zoom straight in. He was so easy. She gave him a slow smile, and he stopped buttoning. “Wait,” he said, “what were we talking about? Stop looking at me like that.”

  “Mm.” She put a stockinged foot on the bed and turned toward him a little, then parted her legs. Just a bit. Just a suggestion. He liked these stretch jeans. “Getting you ready for your birthday, that’s all. We’re talking about your sisters. Quit thinking about taking my clothes off and focus, boy.”

  He paused for a long moment, then said, “Pam’s fine, but things tend to get a little tense with Carla. Fortunately, being four hours away means it’s not as often.”

  “Is it the money?” she asked, forgetting to be sexy.

  “Of course it’s the money. At first, I splashed out more on everybody when I came home, but it didn’t make anything easier. Just the opposite, so I toned it down. And now I’m an asshole for not doing more. Oh, well. Like I said, Pam’s fine, and so is her husband. Friend of mine from way back.”

  “Steve. The electrician, and she’s a teacher. Their kids are Jason and Jennifer. Both at University.”

  “You’ve got it.” He put a hand down and pulled her to sitting, and as always, his assurance gave her a rush. After that, he put a hand on the bed and the other one behind her head, and kissed her like he wanted to. “You’re teasing. Don’t think I haven’t noticed. Look how weight-bearing I am, though. What’s my birthday present?”

  She moved her mouth over to the strong column of his neck, breathed in his cedar-and-spice scent, brushed her lips over his skin, got her hands under the soft flannel shirt, and traced her fingers over the ridges of his abs while he sucked in his breath. He was so good at keeping her tingling, and tonight, she was going to do the same for him. It was his birthday, after all.

  “Your birthday present?” she asked, getting her tongue and teeth into the action on his neck. “You said I had to wait until cake to give it to you.” Not that her pressie was exciting. It was a gray-and-black, merino-and-cashmere scarf chosen by Azra, and it had cost more than she ever spent on anything. Although, as she never spent much, that didn’t mean what it might have. What did you give a man who had everything? A scarf, it appeared. Beyond that, you did your best. On that note, she decided to put forth some more effort. The payoff was always better when you’d anticipated it, and it was his birthday. She sent her hand down on an exploratory mission, discovered that, yes, he did like having his neck kissed, and murmured, “You have to wait . . . all . . . the way until cake. Sure you can do it?”

  “Not that one,” he said. “The one I get later.”

  “Oh.” She smiled against him and did some more touching. “That? That’s whatever you want. It’s your birthday. You choose. Though I was wondering . . . maybe you want to think through all those fantasies you had in this bed growing up, and see which one I could make come true. Unless it’s a threesome. I’m not giving you a threesome, birthday or no.”

  He sighed. “Shoot. That was it.” When she jerked her head back, he laughed, gave her a slap on the hip, and said, “You do tend to be noisy, though. Exactly how excited could I get you before you gave us away?”

  There was no way she was letting him have the last word, not on this one. “I reckon,” she said, climbing off the bed and heading toward the door with the kind of sway in her step that she’d never been able to manage, because nobody had ever made her feel as desired as he did, “that you can think about that.” She left the room, then poked her head back around the door and purred, “Give it your best effort, sailor. I’ve only got this one gift to give.”

  If that didn’t work, she had nothing. But she thought it would work.

  An hour or so later, she was thinking about the future with some longing. It was good to meet his family. Of course it was. There were undercurrents, though. There was the moment when his mom had said, “The elk steaks are thanks to Steve. He got a tag this year.” They were bloody enormous, sirloins that practically overhung the plate. Sixty grams of protein, easily.

  Steve, a quiet man with watchful blue eyes, said, “Yeah. I went out with my dad. Still nobody like him for tracking elk. He was sorry you couldn’t make it over, by the way, Brett. Said he’d think you were getting conceited, but you’d probably just forgotten how to kick back and be that other guy, the one who used to work in the mill and thought an elk tag was the ticket to the good times. Next year for sure, he says. October. You could put it on your calendar.”

  Brett said, “I’ll try to get away,” and Willow thought, Why is that actually a ‘no’? It obviously wasn’t the first hunting trip Brett had been on with the two of them, and he liked Steve. Was it that he needed to put some distance between himself and the young man he’d been? Somebody too needy, maybe? She knew without him telling her that those years had been rough, because they’d been the same for her. Surely, though, you didn’t have to walk away from the people who cared about you.

  Or did you? Because after that, he withdrew some more, doing his usual thing: listening, and asking questions. About his niece and nephew, mainly. Willow thought about the bleakness in his voice when he’d told her about Claire, what it must feel like to turn forty-three and not have had that dream come true, and wanted to hold him.

  She was still thinking about it as his mother carried a cake out of the kitchen, frosted with chocolate, its top adorned with a celebration’s worth of sparkler candles. Brett sat good-naturedly for the usual off-key rendition of “Happy Birthday,” then blew out the candles and said, “Good thing I’ve still got some lung power. You could’ve started a fire with that, Mom.”

  “However old you get,” she said, “I’m thirty-two years older. Hold that thought,” and he laughed.

  “Like you’d worry,” his sister, Pam, said. “You just get better looking. It’s not fair. Kids. They take your body away and never give it back.”

  “On that note,” Brett said, as his mother plated slices of a cake that, Willow had a feeling, had come from a box, but that Brett would eat every bite of anyway, “Willow and I ran into Nia in Portland. She’s pregnant. Having a baby girl.”

  His mum put the knife down, and her face lit up. “Oh, that’s good news. I’m so glad to hear that. When’s she due? I’ll send her a card now anyway. Every good thought helps. Is she still living in the same place? Her and Aaron?”

  Brett smiled. It looked painful to Willow, because it was. “You’d know more about that than I would,” he said. Under the table, Willow’s knee touched his, and when he dropped his hand beneath the tablecloth, she took it. “She’s still got some mad.”

  His mum didn’t say anything, just handed him his slice of cake. Pam said, “What does she have to be mad about? I’ve never understood that. It was nobody’s fault. I had a miscarriage myself between my two kids. It was awful, but I didn’t beat Steve up about it, or myself, either. Why would I? I hope she’s having an amnio, though. She has to be pushing forty. Chromosomal abnormalities galore once you get up there.”

  “Pammy,” her mother said. Just the word, but it was enough. Pam looked confused, but she shut up.

  Brett took a bite of cake, then said, “She said they were . . .” He always remembered everything, but now, he looked blank. He looked at Willow. “She said something about that. What was it?”

  “Said they’d done all the testing,” Willow said, “and that they were . . . monitoring.” Her hand curled around his, and she thought, I’ve got you, boy. And I’m holding on. She decided to add, “Though I can’t see her deciding she’d only take a perfect baby. When she’s holding her at last, she’ll have won the Lotto. That was the idea I got. Pretty rapt about the whole thing, and you can see why.” Brett had brought it up. He wanted it out there. The least she could do was help.

  “It’s not a
bout a perfect baby,” Pam said, bristling a little. “I was saying, I hope she doesn’t have to go through that again, because the odds get higher, that’s all. The man’s age matters, too, and I’ll bet she didn’t marry somebody any younger than she was. I’m a teacher. Down’s kids are some of the sweetest people you’ll ever meet, but is it harder? You bet it is. But oh, well. Nobody’s ever ready for kids anyway, no matter what they think. No matter how perfect your baby seems, they’ve all got their challenges. It doesn’t get any easier, either. Jennifer’s going to give me gray hair all by herself.”

  Willow still had Brett’s hand. “Oh?” she asked, saving him from talking. He hated not being under control, even with his family. “She’s nineteen, right? Nineteen’s not always easy, hey.”

  “Yeah,” Steve said. “But she’ll be all right.” His eyes were on Brett, too. Right now, Willow could tell that all Brett wanted for his birthday was for everybody to stop looking at him.

  Pam snorted. “You say that like it’s sure to happen. So far, she seems to be majoring in, ‘All the Fun I Can Have in College.’ We told her, ‘Bring those grades up, sister, or you can just come on home. We didn’t save for twenty years for you to screw it up.’ We’ll see how it goes.”

  Brett said, “I wanted to ask you something. Whether it would be all right for me to send her a new saxophone for her birthday.”

  “Let me guess,” Pam said. “One that costs two thousand dollars.”

  “Something like that,” he said, keeping it calm. “Which isn’t the point. I read up on it, and the quality of your instrument makes a big difference. She’s worked hard, and I’d like to encourage her passion.”

  Pam said, “No. Not really OK. She’s acting entitled enough right now.” And squash, there went Brett again.

  “It’s a great thought,” Steve put in, “if she buckles down. Right now, though? Next thing you know, she’d be wondering why it wasn’t a Mercedes at Christmas. It’ll be better if she earns it.”

  “Which means,” Pam said, “that I’ve heard her talk about her rich uncle one too many times with her friends. No. Send her your usual extravagant gift card and fabulous sweater or whatever. Do they have fabulous sweaters in Australia?” she asked Willow. “Or am I thinking of New Zealand? The one you have on is pretty good. Both of them are.”

  Willow was wearing the red one, the first she’d bought. Brett liked it, and it wasn’t too sexy for meeting the family. She was also wearing the long coat/sweater thing, because she couldn’t get warm enough here. “Both countries do,” she said, grateful for a semi-neutral topic. “Have merino sheep, that is, because I think that’s what you mean. This one is merino and silk. And, yes, it was a gift from Brett. A sweet one.” She didn’t tell them that it was also true for everything else she was wearing, or that she’d used his credit card for the outing. She had clothes of her own. Heaps of them. Just not winter clothes. She also hoped they were all as ignorant as she’d been about the price of flower necklaces made of diamonds. She hadn’t wanted not to wear it. That would have been a slap in Brett’s face, and it wasn’t as if it were a ring, after all.

  Life was so confusing. Cooking was so much easier.

  “A sweater’s better,” Steve said, “for now. Sorry, brother. Nice of you to offer.”

  “No problem,” Brett said, inscrutable once more. “That’s why I asked.”

  Brett left Willow with his mom and Pam, drinking tea at the kitchen table, shrugged into his coat, and headed outside with King. The air was crisp and frigid, the stars showing bright.

  “Cold one for sure tomorrow,” Steve said. He was standing on the porch in the dark, the glowing tip of his cigarette the only thing visible in the shadows. “Makes driving easier, anyway. Going over that pass to Montana in the snow is no fun at all. Although I guess you might be flying out.”

  “Yep,” Brett said. Beside him, King came back up the stairs after having watered a tree, and flopped down on the frozen boards with a sigh. I thought we were doing something exciting, his resignation said. This isn’t what I had in mind.

  “Your mom liked you coming for your birthday,” Steve said. “That was a good effort. Made her day.”

  “She need anything?” Brett asked. Steve was always the one he asked. No prickles. “Time to get that gardening service, you think?”

  Steve considered that, which was one of the things Brett liked about him. He’d been flashier once, but he’d always thought things through. In high school, a year ahead of Brett, Steve had caught Brett’s pitches and his passes, but he’d been the one who’d scored the athletic scholarship. When he’d come home again a year later with a blown-out knee and an explanation that “College wasn’t for me, it turned out. Maybe later,” and had gone to work in the mill with Brett, he’d been more philosophical about it than you’d expect.

  There was more than one path to a good life, for sure. You could also ask for worse than your best friend marrying your big sister, and having him stick around.

  “No,” Steve said. “She’s still liking doing the yard. My dad says you need a reason to get up in the morning. That’s as good a reason as any. I’ll let you know, though.”

  “I appreciate you and Pam being here to take care of things,” Brett said.

  “Brother,” Steve said, “we appreciate you shelling out for it.” His teeth flashed in the darkness. “I don’t need to be buying any extra washers and dryers. Had to replace ours a while back. I remember when they lasted twenty years easy. Now, you’re lucky to get ten, and they’re about five times as expensive. What the hell.”

  “I’m not saying it,” Brett said.

  “What? That you’re still good for that tuition fund? Nah. I want to be able to call you an asshole if I need to. Can’t do that if I owe you.”

  That one made Brett laugh. “Fair enough.”

  “Sorry about the sax,” Steve said. “I don’t know. I leave that kind of thing up to Pam, mostly. But still.” He was silent a minute, then went on. “It’s not that I want Jen to have things as tough as we did. If she doesn’t have to go through hard times—I’m glad. They weren’t a lot of fun. But it’s taking her longer to grow up, that’s for damn sure. Could be our folks were right about hard times building character. Wouldn’t that be a kick in the pants.”

  “Yeah,” Brett said. “But then, your dad was right about a lot of things.”

  “Another kick in the pants.” Steve exhaled a plume of smoke. “The older I get, the smarter the old man looks. Hey. I should’ve asked. Do you want one?” He held up the cigarette.

  “Nope,” Brett said. “I don’t need to pick up that habit again.”

  “Seems like the only habit you’ve got left is work,” Steve said. “Won’t drink a beer. Don’t smoke. Don’t hunt anymore. Barely even take a day off, from what I’ve seen. But I like that girl.”

  “Willow.”

  “Yeah. Chef, huh? She good?”

  “She’s great.”

  “Got a business in Australia, though. How does that work out?”

  Brett sighed, leaned up against the house, and took the weight off his leg. “It’d be nice if just once, you didn’t put your finger on the sore spot.”

  “Hey, what are friends for? She not impressed by the diamonds and the houses and all? She didn’t say anything about that necklace, but I’m guessing that was you all the way, and you probably didn’t buy that thing at Zales, down at the mall.”

  “I think,” Brett said, “that she wants me instead.” He shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense. That she wants me more than the . . . stuff. I just don’t know how much.” Man, he hated talking about his feelings.

  Steve smoked a minute in silence, then said, “Could be scary.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Could also be the real thing.”

  “That too.”

  “How long has it been?”

  Brett had to smile. “That’s the crazy part. Going on four weeks. But I swear, I looked at her the first time and saw
it. Her life force. Is that nuts? Like she had a . . . a string attaching me to her. Spiderman’s web shooters. Something like that. Never had that happen to me in my life. And I think she saw me the same way. It’s crazy to be sure, but I’m sure anyway. I don’t know if she is.”

  Steve stubbed out his cigarette on the bottom of his boot, stuck the butt in his pocket, and said, “She’s got more to lose, you think? And it’d be easier if you weren’t so rich?”

  “That, for sure.” Brett took a breath, then said it. “And I don’t know about that. I could have more to lose.”

  Steve put a hand on his shoulder. Still older. Still taller. Possibly still faster. Still his best friend. “Well, brother,” he said, “if that’s how you feel, you’d better go for it. You’re a hell of a guy. Always have been. Always will be. Why else would I still be hanging out with a rich asshole like you? I’m guessing she knows it, too. It’s kind of a . . .” He waved a hand. “Whatever. That the right woman is the one who doesn’t want to quit her job and let you take care of her. The one who’s put off by the money instead of grabbing for it.”

  “Paradox,” Brett said. “Yep.”

  “She’s wearing the necklace, though,” Steve said. “Held your hand under the table, too, when you talked about Nia and the baby. I don’t know a thing about any business except the electrical kind, and I’ve got one house that’s still got a mortgage on it, but I know a couple things. One is that no matter what you think, my dad’s the same guy he’s always been, and it doesn’t matter that you haven’t been hunting with us in ten years. He’s still going to be tickled to have you show up. You know how you made your mom’s day today? You’d make his just the same. He’s not keeping score, man. He already knows you’re not perfect. Next time, don’t overthink it. Just show up. I know another thing, too. The woman who holds your hand under the table like that, because she’s paying attention? That’s probably the right one. Pretty sure the old man would tell you the same. Time to give it your best shot. Maybe even time to go for broke.”