Turning my head, I blink, seeing not one, but two pretty young blondes. Blinking again, I smirk when I realize that there is actually only one. I’m just that fucking drunk.
“Hey,” I mutter, lifting my bottle to my lips and drink again.
“You know my friends dared me to come over here, I don’t usually approach men,” she says breathily.
It’s a lie, I have no doubt, a line that she uses. She’s a pretty little thing, and I’m surprised that I haven’t fucked her yet. Hell, maybe I have and I just don’t remember. It’s entirely possible, I’m so drunk, I don’t think I could remember at this point anyway.
“Yeah?” I ask, dipping my chin slightly as I lift my hand.
Extending my index finger, I touch her collarbone, gliding it along her smooth skin. Sticking out my tongue, I lick my bottom lip before I flick my gaze up to meet hers. Her lips are parted and her eyes are glazed over as she stares at me.
I could probably take her out back, fuck her against the bar in the dark. I know for a fact there are no lights in the back of the building. Something niggles at the back of my mind. She looks really young, maybe I shouldn’t do that, it’s probably a douchey thing to do.
Flicking my gaze behind her, I see her little gaggle of friends. One of them is leaning against another, her head tipped back, drunker than me. She’s wearing a sash and a plastic crown. I can’t read what it says, but I’ve seen enough of them in my day to know that she’s the bride and this is probably a bridesmaid.
“You here for a bachelorette party?” I ask. She hums, nodding her head. Shifting my gaze back to meet hers, I tilt my head to the side. “How old are y’all?”
She licks her bottom lip, sinking her teeth in the plump flesh as her gaze flicks from mine to the floor, then lifts back to meet mine again.
“I’m twenty-one,” she whispers.
I’ve never felt like a dirty old man quite like I do right now. “Go on back to your girls, yeah?”
She shakes her head, leaning in so that her lips are next to my ear and her hand slides up my thigh, squeezing.
“It was a dare, but you’re sexier up close. You sure you don’t want to go out back, or somewhere else?”
Pinching my eyes closed, I think about the offer. I should jump on it. I should go out back and fuck her against the building, show her that just because my face might be attractive doesn’t mean I’m a decent guy and to watch who she offers herself to in the future.
Sliding my hand around her waist, then up her back, I tangle my fingers in her hair and tug her head back. Touching my mouth to the center of her throat, I drag my lips up her neck and toward her chin, she moans.
“You can’t handle me, little girl. Go on back to your friends,” I rasp against her chin.
She tries to straighten her head, but I don’t let her. I keep a tight grip in her hair. “I want it, Ford Matthews.”
“Yeah? You know who I am, does that mean you know my reputation?”
Her entire body shivers. “You want to watch a Sterling LaRue movie in the background? You want to call me Sterling, whatever you want to do, I’m ready. God, you’re like a legend in bed. I heard you’re so rough that you leave a woman’s body not only bruised, but aching for days after.”
Releasing my hold on her hair, she tumbles backward and I don’t even flinch or try to catch her. She straightens and narrows her brown eyes at me. I don’t bother staying around to listen to her bitch me out for being a dick.
Instead, I stand to my feet, and walk past her, toward the back of the bar. Digging my phone out of my pocket, I look for Louis’ number. I know he’s in town and he’s the only one of my friends who doesn’t have to work tomorrow, aside from Beaumont, but he’s got a six-month-old at home.
“You okay?”
“If by being drunk off my ass and being at Pardners is okay, then yeah, I’m okay.” Louis chuckles and I hear Tulip’s voice in the background. “I didn’t know who else to call. Wyatt and Rylan have to work tomorrow and Beaumont has the baby…”
“You did the right thing. Sit tight and I’ll be over in a few. Want Tulip to drive your truck home?”
Shaking my head, I let it fall back against the metal of the building with a thud. “Nah, I’ll figure out a way to get it tomorrow. I don’t want to put her out.”
“It’s no problem, Ford,” I hear her say in the background.
Fuck me, but she’s a nice girl. I should have gone after a girl like her, should have made someone sweet like her my wife instead of sitting around being bitter and fucking every girl that spread her legs for me like it was a goddamn competition.
“Tell her to sleep, she’s pregnant, she don’t need to be runnin’ around town late in the dark with all the deer out and about. She wants to help me out in the daylight tomorrow, I’ll take her up on it,” I mutter.
Louis chuckles, but I know he appreciates me turning her offer down. I would if she was my woman. “See you in about thirty, brother,” he grunts before he ends the call.
“You know, you’re a total asshole,” a feminine voice murmurs from beside me.
Turning my head, I tilt my chin down to look into the brown eyes from inside. “What’re you doin’ out here?” I ask, feeling really fucking woozy.
She smirks, licking her bottom lip as she takes another step closer to me. “I decided that I wanted a taste of asshole tonight.”
“Why’s that?” I ask, tilting my head to the side.
She reaches out, grabbing my belt buckle and tugging my hips forward slightly. “Seems everyone talks about how fantastic Ford Matthews is, and here we are, all alone.”
“You shouldn’t. I’m a fuck’ve a lot older than you, girl.”
She hums, rising to her toes, and slides her lips along the underside of my jaw. “I like that, maybe your hand won’t shake when you touch my pussy.”
“Fuck,” I groan.
“Exactly.”
STEPHANIE
Feeling a renewed sense of not only energy but also purpose, I inhale a deep breath as I guide my car over to the side of the road in front of Ford’s gate. Shifting the car into park, I turn it off, but don’t make an immediate move to get out of the vehicle.
I sit and stare at his gate, wondering why he hasn’t added a nicer one. Why he hasn’t updated the entrance at all, it is completely frozen in time, except unlike the inside of my parents’ home, it hasn’t been kept up at all, oh and he added a metal piece hanging down of his initials.
My phone rings next to me and I reach for it, grateful for the moment of distraction before I attempt to walk down Ford’s bumpy ass dirt driveway. I smile when I see that it’s Damion on the other end.
“Hey,” I greet softly. He groans, and that’s when I know that this isn’t a happy call, this is going to be more bad news. “Sock it to me,” I mutter.
“The pictures aren’t going away. The tabloids haven’t backed down, they want interviews. It was leaked that Sebastian was the one who sold the photos to the press. Everyone is having a fucking field day, and he’s been everywhere, talking to everyone,” he emphasizes.
Closing my eyes, I drop my head, my forehead banging against the steering wheel as I let out a whimper. “Why, Damion, why?” I grumble.
“Because he’s a washed-up has-been. The only reason he was up your ass was because he wanted to ride your coattails, the second he got a tiny bit of popularity from that, he was off fucking those nasty assed whores. When you dumped his ass, even if you didn’t go public with it, everyone knew and his prospects dried up. So, here we are,” he snaps.
“Thanks for not holding back on how stupid and naïve I was,” I mutter.
Damion hums. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Trusting people is really hard, and you thought that another actor would be a good choice. He understands your life, wouldn’t get jealous at the hours and grueling schedule. It made sense on paper. Plus, he’s really pretty, so there’s that.”
“I don’t want pretty,” I whisper.
He laughs softly. “You want your cowboy and, honey, you should take him.”
“He is so angry at me,” I admit.
Damion clears his throat. “He’s not. Angry at how shit went down? Possibly. But not at you, for wanting to find your happiness. You were both eighteen years old,” he points out.
“I’m sitting in front of his ranch gate right now, trying to decide if I’m going to walk down his road or not.”
“Oh my God, it’s seriously like a song. Are you going to walk barefoot down his dirt road, tell me you are,” he squeals.
I can’t hold back my giggle, it pours out of me. Throwing back my head, I let it out, loving the way that it bounces off the sides of my car interior. Once I’ve calmed down, I shake my head. I really like Damion, I just wish that he liked me for me and not because he’s forced to since I pay his wages.
“Okay, you’re going to go to him, straddle him and have some fucking fun,” he snaps. “But before you do that, we need to set up interviews.”
“I don’t want to do them,” I grunt.
“Grace will be calling you this afternoon and she’s going to set them up for you if you don’t tell her who you’re willing to talk to. And you know Grace, she’s going to have you everywhere, some of those people are fucking assholes.”
“Okay, I’ll think about who I want to talk to,” I sigh.
“Good, and you’re going to ride that cowboy?” he asks.
“Hanging up now, Damion,” I say. He laughs as I end the call.
A smile tips my lips as I open my car door and throw caution to the wind. Today, I’m wearing another pair of tight jeans and a button-up silk blouse tucked into the high waistline of my jeans.
On my feet are flat booties, instead of high-heeled ones, and I put my hair in a high ponytail again. As I was putting it up, I told myself it was because it’s hot as hell in Texas, but the real reason is because I loved the way that Ford wrapped his fist around it, the way he pulled my head back by my hair as he kissed me.
I loved it, more than I ever thought possible.
I unwind the chain from the gate, opening it just enough to slip my body through, then wrap it around again to keep the animals from escaping. I look ahead along the road and tilt my head to the side.
I can’t even see the house from here, I don’t remember not being able to see the main house from the gate, but then again, there’s a lot I don’t remember about this place it seems or maybe I’ve just forgotten.
Walking down the road, I have to keep my head down, he wasn’t kidding when he said that it would completely fuck up my car. The dips and bumps are the worst I’ve ever seen before. Why would he spend so much time on his fencing and his barn and apparently no time on his road?
Sweat trickles between my breasts as I make my way toward the barn and house. When it’s finally in view, I freeze in my tracks. I hadn’t looked at the house before, it’s gorgeous. It looks like the perfect white farmhouse, like something you see in a magazine, or in a movie. But that’s not what has me frozen in my spot.
Ford has a fucking ax in his hand and he’s chopping wood—shirtless.
Fucking shit, the way his muscles flex with each swing of that ax has my thighs trembling, my knees knock together and I’m completely unable to move.
“Shit,” I whisper to myself.
Damion might be right. I might have to ride that cowboy, because I don’t think I’ll be able to think straight until I get this pent-up need out of my body.
Chapter Nine
STEPHANIE
“You standin’ way over there watching me for a reason?” Ford calls out.
My entire body jerks and my feet finally unstick from the dirt before they carry me closer to him. Inhaling a deep breath, I try to calm my racing heart.
Why? Why do I feel like this around him?
I can’t even remember the last time that I was nervous around a man. Yet, here I am, a ball of nerves around a man that I have known longer than any other on this earth.
“Can I help you today?” I ask, my mouth completely dry as he continues to work, the sweat dripping down his chest.
He stands, facing me, his eyes roaming over my body as his lips twitch into a smile. My eyes travel down to his chest, pausing at the thick scar that travels down the center of his chest, stopping before it gets to his belly.
Taking a step forward, I bite the inside of my cheek. “What happened?” I breathe.
He dips his chin, taking another step toward me, dropping the ax to the ground before he closes the distance between us and is only a few inches away from me.
“Ford?” I ask, my eyes unable to leave the thick scar, one that I’ve never seen before.
He doesn’t speak right away. “Don’t, Stevie.”
“Stephanie,” I murmur.
“Huh?”
“I’m not Stevie, not anymore,” I say a bit louder.
He nods, his finger touching the underside of my chin, tipping my head back. Lifting my eyes from his scar, I look up into his gaze. He smirks, his lips tipping up on one side as his gaze searches my own.
“Okay, Stephanie, then. You sure you’re not Sterling?” he asks.
Reaching out, I touch the center of his chest, his scar, but I don’t look down. Keeping my eyes on his, I shake my head slightly. “I know who I’m not and I’m not Sterling either,” I say, trying to sound strong.
“Do you know who you are?”
His question should be simple, but it’s not. It’s probably the most confusing question that he could ever ask me. Pressing my lips together, I shrug a shoulder.
“I don’t,” I admit softly, saying it aloud to him is really hard, but I do.
He nods once, his eyes searching mine, still searching, but never showing me anything. “I had heart surgery about six years ago. Some defect that was never detected. Thought I was having a goddamn heart attack,” he says.
“Ford,” I whisper. “Your parents…”
“Gone by then.”
“Who took care of you?”
I don’t know why I ask him that, I have no right to know. But it should have been me, I should have been the one to hold his hand when his parents passed, when he was in the hospital, every moment for the past seventeen years I should have been by his side. I wasn’t. The guilt that I feel about that slides up my throat, threatening to choke the life from me.
“Not a kid. Wyatt and Beaumont stopped by here and there,” he says with a shrug of his shoulder.
His finger is still beneath my chin, I don’t want him to step away, to move because it feels good having him this close to me. In fact, I’m sorry that I pushed him away yesterday. I want his mouth on mine, I want to trace that scar with my tongue as an apology for not being with him.
“What are you really doing here?” he asks, his voice gruff and demanding.
I don’t take my eyes from his, shifting closer to him, I slide my hand up the center of his chest and wrap my fingers around the side of his neck.
“I told myself it was to help you, to talk about yesterday, about everything.”
“But?”
“I wanted to see you again,” I whisper. “I didn’t like how we left things. I do want to talk to you, explain to you that my leaving had absolutely nothing to do with you. I ran, plain and simple. It was a selfish move, especially refusing to talk to you.”
“Yeah, it was,” he grunts. He sighs, turning his head to the side as he dips his chin, looking at the ground. “But you were young,” he murmurs. He lifts his head, looking down at me again. “Can’t change what happened, honey. Can’t change a single fucking thing about it. Replaying it on repeat does nothing but open up that wound over and over again. We need to stop, both of us.”
“Yeah,” I sigh, jerking my head. My eyes fill with unshed tears as I look up at him. “Most of the time I wish that I could go back and change a million things.”
“Does us no good to think about what might have been,” he rasps, taking a step back
from me.
I feel the loss of him like a living, breathing thing. I want his touch, need to smell him, to taste the salt of his skin, I just want all of his strong body pressed against mine. I almost reach out for him, but decide against being that desperate.
He turns away from me, but I decide that I don’t really miss him that much when I get the view of his ass in those tight jeans. Tilting my head to the side, I watch him walk away, bending over to pick up his ax, then disappearing into the barn.
“I have to go out and work on the fence,” he calls out. “You want to go on the Gator or ride Starlight?”
His words don’t register immediately. Not until he’s out of the barn, his t-shirt covering his broad torso and thick muscles. A shiver rolls through me that I’m unable to suppress. Lifting my eyes to meet his, I feel my face heat at the expression he’s wearing as he watches me—cocky asshole.
“The Gator,” I snap.
Ford chuckles, then jerks his chin toward the ATV that is already loaded up with wood and tools.
“You’re already loaded up, you weren’t even going to take your horse, were you?” I ask as I make my way toward the machine.
“No.” He chuckles. “But I would have if that’s what you wanted to do,” he says with a shoulder shrug.
He starts the engine, effectively cutting off anything else that I could say to him. I’m glad for it, I’m not sure what I could ever say to that. The mixed signals that I’m receiving from this man are out of this world, but I can’t deny the fluttering feeling that bubbles up in my belly being near him.
The fact that he would have taken his horse just because I wanted to ride, it reminds me of the Ford from the past. He says he’s not the same boy that he once was, but I can see so many pieces of that boy in everything that he does.
We ride toward the back of the property in silence. I’m glad for the quiet as I take in the land that I once knew like the back of my hand. It hasn’t changed much, but I feel like a stranger as we ride over the small hills and bumps.
I may remember the land, but it sure as hell doesn’t remember me. I’m a stranger, a foreigner, and call me crazy, but she is pissed to have me here.
COWBOY (Unfit Hero Book 5) Page 7