Hell, he couldn’t help it. He burst into laughter and she gave in to a giggle, too, as she reached into the fridge for a pair of long-necked bottles. Apple ale. Nonalcoholic. Niall had stopped stocking the hard shit years ago after his grandsons had gotten fucked up on the contents of the liquor cabinet one too many times. Both Abram and McGuinty had set their drugs of choice aside but neither abstained from alcohol. They trusted themselves to court it casually. Burke couldn’t say the same for himself.
“I’m serious,” she said, handing him the bottles. “Get out there. Sofia might like a break from poker hustling and Abram says there’s a walking path.”
Not inclined to argue, because he’d like nothing more than to take Sofia someplace private, he strode through the house.
“Mind reader,” McGuinty praised, swiping one of the ales from Burke’s hand when he stepped into the flower-and plant-overrun backyard. “Thanks, guy.”
“Wasn’t for you, jackass.”
“Naw?” The man twisted off the cap and turned up the bottle without apology and scanned the folks scattered throughout the yard and gathered at the card table. “Hannah’s spoken for. So’s Louisa, Sandy, and Kirsten. Gretchen Pruitt’s got a lobsterman and she’d smack you with her purse. The ladies from the senior center are more Grandpa’s speed, but, hey, if that’s what you like…”
“You skipped Sofia Mercer.”
“No, I didn’t. Just wanted to see what kind of look you’d get on your face when you singled her out.” He shook his head. “Careful with that. She comes with a lot.”
“I’m only bringing her a drink.”
“You’re a fucking lousy liar, Burke.” McGuinty swaggered to the poker table and clapped his grandfather on the shoulder. “Wolf’s taking my chair. I lost all the cash in my wallet to the shark.”
Sofia smirked up at McGuinty and when her gaze drifted to Burke the smirk transformed into that sexy lopsided smile that threw his libido like a switch. “Hey.”
“Hey.” He came around to deliver the apple ale and saw an impressive Siberian husky lying at Sofia’s feet. “Tish, what’s up?”
Ears perked, the dog rose and slapped her front paws to his stomach, panting up at him. Indulging, he scratched her under the chin. “I could skip the card game and spoil the hell out of you all afternoon. What do you say?”
“Oh, no you don’t,” Sofia interrupted, drawing out the words with a wicked look that gripped him tight. She pointed to a chair. “I want to test your poker skills first.”
Indulging Sofia now, he sat beside her and waited for Niall Slattery to deal a fresh round. Chatter crisscrossed the table and he managed not to lose himself completely in the woman’s bubble-gum fragrance. Jesus, it was making him crazy not to have the authority to reach right over and kiss her in front of every set of eyes out here.
Somehow he played, lasting as others folded until only Niall and Sofia stood in the way of victory.
“I think,” Sofia said solemnly, glancing from Burke to the burly grizzled widower in the flat cap whom she called “Grandpa” as naturally as if it were true, “that you two fellows are ready to fold.”
Niall upped his bet, challenging in a gravelly voice, “Nobody bests me three times in a row, no matter how pretty she is.” He winked a pale green eye and she beamed across at him.
Burke suddenly didn’t care who won; the sooner the game ended, the sooner he could have her to himself. “I’m out,” he said, laying down his cards. “Fold.”
“All in,” Sofia said next to him, nudging her stack of chips forward.
He folded. She was all in. He wasn’t ignorant to the symbolism of that.
Sofia and Niall faced off, then she finally revealed a busted hand. Triumphant, Niall stood and pumped a fist as onlookers erupted in cheers at his hard-won victory. Sofia, in a fluttery high-necked dress that stopped barely past her hips, pranced through the grass to throw her arms around Niall in a congratulatory hug.
Burke waited, Tish at his side, as she toasted people with her bottle and laughed, and at last she came to him. “Joss’s pies are cooling and Hannah says dinner won’t be ready for a bit,” she reported. “Want to walk to the pond with me?”
He couldn’t remember getting a sweeter, more sincere invitation. He took her hand, leading her away, not allowing himself to get caught up in how the gesture looked or what it meant. Screw all that, because it felt incredible to touch her and even common sense wouldn’t deprive him.
Tish followed them as they moved farther from the farmhouse, toward taller grass, thicker trees, and the glimmer of a pond up ahead. He heard Hannah ask, “Where’re they sneaking off?”
“I wouldn’t worry about it.” This from Abram. “Tish won’t let them get too naughty.”
“Joking, right? She was Luz’s dog.”
Sofia laughed a little but stayed beside him on the dirt path as chaperone Tish trotted behind them.
“I think every man in that yard’s got a crush on you,” he said, holding a leafy branch out of her way.
She plucked a leaf, then rolled its stem between her fingers. “And which one should I have a crush on?” She traced the point of that damn leaf across her lips.
Hell. Burke closed in, framing her, boxing her in against a tall, arching oak. The bark scraped his palms, but he didn’t care when her sugary scent was filling him and she was staring at his mouth with naked anticipation. Lowering his guard, taking a chance, he confessed. “Me,” he told her, seizing her mouth. Hell, hell, hell, this is good. So hot, pulling his hair, yanking him in closer. Deeper. Rougher…“No-damn-body else, Sofia. Just me.”
*
“We’re closed. Read the sign.” Lights glowed and the register hadn’t been counted yet, but it was two a.m. on the dot and Bautista wasn’t changing his mind. He pointed to the CLOSED sign hanging on the door. The woman on the other side didn’t budge.
Whatever Joss Vail had to say, whatever troubles she thought she’d drown at the bottom of a glass, he couldn’t take in. Not tonight. The club was preparing to ride out to Florida, and he required a special frame of mind for that. What she brought to his doorstep would heap on complications he didn’t want.
When he put his back to the door, she pounded with her fist.
“¡Qué mierda!” He disengaged the locks and threw the door open. “Is it worth it, busting glass to get a drink?”
“I’m not here for a drink, and you know it.” Joss patted a pocketbook against her hip and the sequins on her short gold dress shimmered. “But yes, I’ll humor you. Let’s go to the bar. Bourbon neat.”
“I’m not going to let you sit here and get wasted when I shouldn’t have let you in to start with.”
“If you didn’t want me here, I wouldn’t be here.” Her blue stare challenged him, and part of him was glad that the fire in her spirit had come back. The recklessness was back, too, and it rode on the tails of ire. “Bourbon neat, if you didn’t hear me before. I had mango sparkling water with dinner. Ask all the people who were at Grandpa Slattery’s farmhouse. That’s where I was when I got this text.” She bounced onto a stool and tapped her phone. “Come here. Read this.”
“Do you want me to pour a drink or read a text message? I won’t do both.”
“The text,” she said, swinging a pair of long legs and offering him the stool. “I can get my own drink.”
Unless Caro had educated her on the liquor he carried and where he required it all be stored, she wouldn’t have an easy time finding her way. Bautista took a seat and read the screen.
OMG!!! Pete was beaten. Did you know? They said some guys tried to mug him. Cops don’t know who did it. Crazy times.
Joss had apparently given up the quest for bourbon neat and opened a bottle of Absolut. She took a swallow, shuddered, and when Bautista muttered an obscenity she took another. “I think that text doesn’t surprise you. I think you have everything to do with this,” she said finally, coming around and pointing the bottle at him. “Look at me.”
&n
bsp; “Where?” He took the bottle and set it on the bar. “Where do you want me to look? At the bruise next to your eye? Try to cover it all you want, but it’s still there. When someone hurts another person, they don’t bounce right back.”
“Oh my God,” she whispered. “It was you. You hurt Peter.”
“Clean hands.” Powerful words, but probably some of the most overused in his vocabulary.
“Then you sent someone else to do it. How dare you interfere in my life?”
“What did you feel when you found out somebody had gotten to that bastard? Did you hurt for him, or were you satisfied even a little? Answer me.”
Joss reached for the vodka but he nudged it out of the way. “It—it wasn’t fair that he could use me and hit me and walk away. It was unjust and I hated it.”
“Answer me, Joss.”
“I was relieved. But that was before it sank in and before I suspected what you’d done. Sofia told me about you and your motorcycle club. I know you have no regard for the law.”
“The law let Peter Bernard walk away a free man after he abused you.”
“Cutting corners does me no favors. My life imploded before and I’ve been so careful to avoid a repeat. Leave me alone, Bautista. Your duty is to Sofia. Luz was her aunt, not mine. I’m nothing to you.”
“You’ll do anything to play life safe, even if it means being used? Explain that. Tell me what I don’t know. If I’m in the wrong, I’ll admit it.”
“Admit it?” She didn’t appear convinced. “You’d contact the NYPD and turn yourself in for organizing a beating? Somehow I think you’re lying.”
“Is that what you want, then? Lawful justice for Peter?”
“No.” She shuddered again, but it wasn’t because of the bite in her vodka. “Why do this?”
“For you. He shouldn’t have hit you and turned you inside out.”
“They all do, eventually. I can’t stop making the same mistake. What is that, insanity?”
“It’s insanity if you keep making that same mistake but expect a different outcome. It’s possible to get close to a man who’s no good for you and still walk away without being crushed.”
“Bad men are bad men for a reason. They all crush. They never care.”
“That’s a generalization and it ain’t always the truth, Joss. I’m one of the bad ones. I never said I wasn’t. But I don’t crush. I care.”
Sliding off the stool, because he knew she’d defy his care and probably call him a dick again on her way out the door, he wasn’t prepared when she pushed him against the bar.
She didn’t use her hands but launched her entire body into him. He tried to step around her and all that golden sparkle, but she gripped his collar and pulled him down to her.
Landing was chaos and bliss. It was too soon to want another woman, yet it seemed as if forever stood between this moment and the last time he’d touched his fiancée. He couldn’t lick into Joss’s mouth and taste Luz. He couldn’t settle his hands at Joss’s hips and pretend that he was gripping Luz’s curves.
“I know it hurts,” Joss said, her lips moving over his. “I lost so much, too. The hurt’s so deep. I can’t breathe through it.”
Gilded and warm, she locked herself around him and he carried her past the bar, past the restrooms.
In his office, she slid to her feet and started for his chair.
“No,” he said quietly. Not there. No one else would ride him there.
“Okay.” Joss waited a moment, her lips dark and wet, her hair tousled. He thought he could end this now, delicately put a stop to the recklessness, but she peeled down her gold dress and walked naked to him. Her pain lay against his, and then she had his pants open and slipped a hand inside to curl around his stiff flesh. “Thank you.”
Thank you.
It’d been too long since someone had meant those words the way she did.
CHAPTER 15
Considering what happened the last time Sofia had come to Burke’s boat with a proposition, she suggested he meet her on neutral territory. A full week hadn’t passed since their kiss in the woods but she was so hard up for another taste of his mouth that she might jump him on sight if she didn’t keep her priorities in order.
Eaves’s lighthouse, Bellini Beach Light, established in 1821, was small and certainly not the most impressive that East Coast America had to offer, but it and the old, scuffed-up Ferris wheel nearby made for some interesting historical tourist attractions. Closed to tours tonight, it was locked against visitors, but its blinking beam would rest like a comforting hand over the water.
A solemn moon and teardrop stars loomed over her as she pedaled to the parking lot. Unsurprisingly his truck wasn’t in the lot. She’d asked him to rent a bike to travel the dunes and meet her at the lighthouse.
Sand dusted the wheels of the ten-speed as she took a marked trail she hadn’t thought about in years. She was instantly reacquainted with it once she found it. The trail appeared private and deserted now, but before the sun dropped it must be crowded with tourists and volunteers.
Caro had mentioned the increasing difficulty in scheduling outdoor sunset boudoir sessions, because everyone wanted to be on Bellini Beach.
Sofia couldn’t imagine stripping in front of a camera at all, let alone doing so on the beach in natural light. There were faint silvery marks on her hips from an adolescent growth spurt that’d given her curves. Then there was her scar, currently throbbing and forewarning rain on the horizon.
The sky was clear and the air huffed a chilly breeze, but she trusted her body’s barometer and it was beginning to drop.
Pedaling through a pine forest and over a sand dune to the lighthouse would challenge her stamina, but she was invigorated—and very excited about the snacks and blankets piled high in the bike’s basket.
Meeting a guy at a lighthouse with a picnic basket and blankets in tow could be construed as a date, but this was an appointment on neutral ground to discuss a business matter. The beach was a beautiful, calm milieu and she hoped levelheadedness would prevail. Since their encounter at Grandpa Slattery’s place, from the moment Burke said “Just me” in a fierce whisper, she had hunted opportunities to see him, reasons to want him, excuses to pretend he’d stay. That was the unfortunate truth about doing the wrong thing—it was so beautifully easy.
As the trees thinned and fireflies winked a game of hide-and-seek, she saw tire tracks pressed into the sand, and her enthusiasm inched up.
Blush was almost ready for the public. The web designer had refreshed the e-commerce site, merchandise was fully stocked, and the people at the stationery store had given them a discount on printed materials.
Those were all classified as the easy parts of taking the reins of a small business. Bautista had agreed to lend Sofia his legal services. The only fly remaining in the ointment was the vacant Cape Foods building. Every day that she passed it, whether jogging with Tish for exercise or pushing a shopping cart of laundry across the street or swinging by Au Naturel to chat about anything and nothing with Caro, the place mocked her. Inside it were memories, but she didn’t desire it for nostalgia’s sake. An erotic bakery between a sex shop and a boudoir photography studio, and a spacious nightclub underneath them, was brilliant. They could capitalize on cross-promotional efforts and Society Street’s central tourist-hub location.
An empty commercial building plunked between two naughty, sex-oriented businesses was so damaging that it’d serve their block better to have it not exist at all.
The most appealing option was to occupy it.
Would Burke meet her partway? They had once been best friends. They were maddeningly attracted to each other now. Did that count for nothing when money and property ownership came into play?
The lighthouse rose into the night from rock and sand with a wildflower gate tracing its brick walkway. It wasn’t pristine. Made distinct by its ring of large blue diamond patterns painted over solid white, the lighthouse carried a gentle dullness—a weariness. I
t watched over the water and seemed to ask for absolutely nothing in return.
Was it a vista like this that slanted people’s reality and nudged them toward hasty romances and impossible dreams? Because as Sofia gazed at the small fenced house that stood close by, she thought she could fall in love here.
Salty air tickled her nose as she sped up the last hundred or so yards, focusing on the bike she saw ahead and the man standing beside it.
Burke’s leather jacket hung open, offering white cotton and hard muscle beneath. She toed the bike’s kickstand and went to him. The breeze ushered his clean scent straight to her and the arrow struck her every vulnerable point. Both her arms reached out, diving into the jacket to wrap around his waist. “Hi.”
“Hi.” Burke’s lips hovered at the top of her head and he dropped a kiss there. “No. Hell, no. That’s not good enough.”
A hug? A chaste kiss? Who were they lying to?
His hands stroked her, one and then the other, and when she raised her chin he caught her, turning her need into a vicious thing.
“Mmmm.” The frustrated sound was part sigh, part growl. Her teeth snapped his lip.
“Was that payback?” he groaned as their mouths slid together in a wet, hot dance. Their first kiss had ended in a bite, but this was different. They’d just begun.
“An accident. I can’t strategize right now. I just want you on me. In me.” Brazen words, but dragged up from a place of honesty. “Let me tell you something about my bucket list. The first goal is to own a business. I didn’t imagine Blush, but sometimes reality modifies dreams for the better.”
“What’s next on your list?”
“As I wrote it when I was nineteen? ‘Trade my V-card for lots of sex.’” She studied him for a reaction but no emotion slipped. “Angry sex, thank-you sex, birthday sex, morning sex, I-just-ate-a-good-piece-of-cake sex—I wanted it all and thought I’d be ready for it if I only got a chance to live. During that first post-transplant year I pushed myself to be strong. I kept at it, past the fifth year, past the tenth year, but yeah, in some ways I withdrew. My cardiologist and psychiatrist insist I’m good to go, and I’m aware of the risks…but I guess I didn’t want to challenge myself like that.”
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