by Smith, CP
Pulling back slowly so he could watch the lust clear from her eyes, Joe winked when a tiny shudder wracked her body.
“I have a feelin’ you’re a very arrogant man.”
Joe smiled wickedly. “It’s not arrogance if it’s true.”
He watched with satisfaction as she threw back her head and laughed huskily, the sound washing over him in waves, just like it had a year ago. Only this time, he didn’t have to wonder if the woman was as warm as her voice.
_______________
Ray’s was an old tavern that had been on Tybee Island for more than one hundred years. The current proprietor, Ray Bush, ran the tavern along with his son, Ray Jr. Ray Sr. was a salty man of a particular age that I tried to visit every time I came to the Island for a long weekend. His food was greasy but delicious, and his drinks were straight forward. Ray didn’t serve sissy drinks. If you wanted a buzz, you slid up to the bar and ordered a shot or a beer. If a tourist wandered into the hole-in-the-wall and ordered something fruity with an umbrella, Ray would point to a sign that read: We don’t serve sissy drinks. Ray was cantankerous and funny, and one of the best parts of Tybee Island.
I pulled Joe through the door and right up to the bar when we arrived. I needed a shot of Southern Comfort to settle my nerves after everything Joe had said. I felt off-kilter because dreaming about Joe and actually being with Joe were two different things. I was in over my head—not that I would ever admit it to Eunice or Calla Lily—because Joe was way more male than I was accustomed to.
If truth be told, most of the men I’d dated in the past—thanks to my father’s interference—were safe because they didn’t make my stomach quake with their nearness. Or my heart thunder like a thoroughbred at the sight of them. They were perfectly ordinary men who took me to dinner to show off their polite manners, and their bank accounts, then turned into wolves with wayward hands the moment we were alone in a car. They didn’t respect me as a woman but saw me as a plaything from the most influential family in Savannah. I wasn’t wined and dined because they found me intriguing and wanted to get to know me better; they wined and dined me hoping for a step up the social ladder with my father. I was a prize of sorts. The ultimate achievement if you could get me on your hook. After years of feeling like an object rather than a person, I’d given up on love. This also left me out of practice with men. Oh, I could give great advice when it came to matters of the heart, but putting it to practical use where Joe was concerned . . . Let’s just say I was in over my head. Way over my head. The ‘crick done rose and my foot was caught on a root’ over my head. So, I needed a drink to calm my racing heart before I made a fool out of myself.
I sank onto a barstool and waved at Ray, who was talking to a customer at the end of the bar. The stools were cracked, the wood dark with age like their owner, and that suited me just fine. The whole bar suited me. It was timeworn and dimly lit with pictures of Ray and his family thrown up haphazardly, as if he saw a spot and thought, “It needs a picture.” The tables were small and rickety, the windows clouded with years of smoke and grease. Most would enter the bar and think it needed an update or ten, if not a thorough cleaning, but I treasured every inch of the unpretentious space. After growing up in a gilded cage of my father’s choosing, anything old and worn rather than sparkling and priceless gave me comfort.
Including Ray.
Big and barrel-chested, he had ruddy features and white hair he kept high and tight in a military cut, with a long white beard. He could pass for Santa if the Island needed him, though he might scare a child or two with his aggressive personality. His age was unknown. He’d been admitting to seventy for more years than I could count. But I figured if he was seventy, then I was twenty-nine. Neither of us revealed our real age, and that suited me just fine too.
Until today. I had to tell Joe he was flirting with a woman much older than him and pray he didn’t mind the age difference.
Joe threw his leg over the stool next to mine, then turned to face me, leaning an elbow on the scarred surface of the bar. Ray raised a brow at Joe, looked at me with a smirk, then leaned down and grabbed a bottle from somewhere underneath the bar before heading in our direction. I never brought men with me when I visited Ray, so I knew he would interrogate me.
“Usual, Sunshine?” Ray asked, looking between Joe and me.
“If you’d be so kind.”
Ray’s mouth pulled into a grin, mostly showing off pink gums. “Well, now,” he grumbled. “Seein’ as you asked so nicely.”
A shot glass landed hard in front of me, and I jumped. As Ray poured the amber liquid into the glass, his eyes shot to Joe. “Same for you?”
“Beer. Anything on tap.”
“You a friend of Sunshine’s?” He pulled a glass out and filled it expertly from the tap, stopping right before the foam spilled over the edge.
Joe glanced at me and winked. “Something like that.”
My lips twitched. “Ray, this is Joe. He’d like to try your crab cakes.”
Ray scanned Joe before reaching his hand out, assessing Joe like a good father should. “I’m Ray.”
“Joe Rouger,” Joe answered, taking Ray’s hand in a firm grip.
“Sunshine here is like a daughter to me. You get what I’m sayin’?”
I held my breath to see what Joe would say. If I was honest, I’d brought Joe to Ray’s for this very reason. Ray treated me better than my own father, so his opinion was important. He could read a man better than most. If he took to Joe, then I knew without a doubt Joe was a good man.
“I get what you’re saying, but you don’t have anything to worry about from me.”
The two men held each other’s attention for a few moments longer, then Ray smiled. “You’ll do. Two orders of cakes comin’ right up.”
I watched Ray hobble away, then turned my back to the bar and leaned on it. I glanced at Joe and found him smiling softly at me. “What?”
He reached out, tugged my ponytail, then his fingers drifted to my face and he caressed the side of my cheek. “You inspire people to defend you. That says a lot about what type of woman you are.”
I could feel a blush run up my cheeks like it always did when I’m flustered. If I didn’t learn to control my emotions around Joe, he’d know exactly what I was thinking, and that wouldn’t do, because a woman had to have her secrets.
“What about you, Joe? What kind of man are you?”
He rose from his stool and stood in front of me, fencing me in against the bar as if he were trying to contain me, then he leaned in until his mouth was near my ear. I could feel his hot breath on my neck, so I turned my head so I could read his expression. He pulled back and looked at me. His eyes were serious as he scanned my face, so I braced for what he was about to tell me. “I try to be a good man, though some might question that considering I own a strip club.”
I blinked.
Of all the admissions he could have given me, that wasn’t one I would have expected. Visions of scantily-clad women bounced around in my head. They were curvy, clinging to Joe like boa constrictors, and they were less than half my age with pert breasts and firm backsides. I was immediately jealous and insecure, which stuck in my craw.
“And do you date these women?” I asked a tad snippily. My reaction to his working so closely with sexy, under-clothed women didn’t seem to go unnoticed.
“I give them a safe place to work and a 401k,” he began, grinning at my reaction. “I don’t sample the employees. Most are women who’ve been scraping out a living just to get by. They need someone to look out for them, not hit on them.”
That put me in my place nice and tidy. I spun around to hide my embarrassment, knocking his arms away in the process. I grabbed a handful of peanuts, throwing them into my mouth before I put my foot there again, watching Joe out of the corner of my eye as he leaned back with a satisfied look on his face.
When his smile grew wider, I turned and raised a brow. “What?”
He shrugged. “I wasn’t s
ure how you’d react. Most women can be prickly about strip clubs. But your immediate reaction wasn’t disgust but jealousy,”—he leaned forward with an arrogant expression masking his features— “and I like that a fuck of a lot.”
My back shot ramrod straight. He had read me too easily.
Hell’s bells!
Momma said it was essential to keep a man guessing, or they would have the upper hand, so I bit my lip and tried to think of a way to gain it back. Fibbing through my pearly whites was the only answer that came quickly. “I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, Joe Rouger.” I sniffed indignantly, like my mother always did when my father accused her of something. I’d never understood the action, but it got her out of trouble more often than not. “I don’t get jealous. I was merely confirmin’ your, um, integrity. Most women who strip have had a rough life, so they don’t need some smooth-talkin’ Adonis messin’ with their heads, is all.”
I punctuated that statement by picking up my shot glass and throwing the Comfort back like I didn’t have a care in the world. I ended up half-choking on the burn setting fire to my throat and gasped for dear life. I needed water or my insides would self-combust, so I grabbed Joe’s beer and tried to quench the hellfire in my throat.
“Jesus,” Joe mumbled, then jumped up and moved behind the bar. Within seconds, I had a glass of water in front of me. “Drink this, baby.”
After a coughing fit to end all coughing fits, I turned and threw laser-heated eyes at Ray. “That was moonshine, Ray Bush!”
The old coot, who was now off my Christmas list, flipped me a salute before his head dropped back and he laughed loud and hard from his big round belly. When I could see again, I found Joe watching me from across the bar top. He was trying not to laugh. “He knows I hate moonshine. Thinks it’s funny to trick me into drinkin’ it.” I leaned over the counter and found the bottle he’d poured my shot from. The label said Southern Comfort and the liquid was amber, but the smaller label at the bottom had For Sunshine written in marker. “What did you do, you old fool? Mix the shine with iced tea?”
Ray laughed louder.
“Just you wait!” I shouted over his howling.
Ray Jr. came out from the kitchen to see what all the fuss was about. He looked between his father and me and shook his head. The younger Bush was in his fifties. He was a nice looking man with salt and pepper hair and a goatee. His body was a little soft around the middle from sampling the tavern’s food too much, but overall, he wasn’t hard on the eyes. For my part, there was no attraction, but Ray Sr. made no bones about the fact he thought we should date.
“You’re too late,” Ray Sr. grumbled at his son, laughing between gasps of air at my discomfort. “If I told ya once, I told ya a thousand times that Sunshine would get snatched up if you didn’t make a move. Now she’s here with a man in tow.” Ray looked my direction and winked. “If I were twenty years younger, I’d have made my own move.”
I looked back at Joe. “I’d like to say his behavior is out of the norm, but it’s not. The man has no filter.”
Joe walked out from behind the bar and leaned against the wood next to me, smiling and shaking his head. “I’m cluing in to that. Anything I need to know about Ray Jr.?” He asked the last bit with a hint of anger.
I looked back at both Bush men. They were watching us. “Only that he can’t help who his father is.”
With a slowness that made my heart skip a beat, Joe took hold of my hand and raised it to his lips. “Anyone else I need to know about?”
I watched with rapt attention as his tongue snaked out and tasted the skin on the back of my hand. Tiny tingles ran down my spine at the mere brush of his lips. If I could bottle whatever it was that made Joe sexy, I’d be richer than Midas.
“No. Anyone I need to know about?” I responded a tad breathlessly.
Joe shook his head, then turned my hand over until my palm was open. He traced my heart line and lifeline with a single finger, sending shivers throughout my body. “I find I only have a taste for a certain Southern belle.”
Lordy, I was so in over my head with this man. Momma would say a gentleman should take things slow, but with each passing second, I found I didn’t give a flying flip what Momma would say. She didn’t have the best track record when it came to men, considering she was still married to my father. But I also knew I’d be all kinds of a ninny to just fall into bed with him until I knew more about him.
I curled my fingers around Joe’s and raised his hand to my mouth. He watched like a hawk as I nipped the end of one of his fingers. “I’m not hungry for crab cakes anymore.” Dark, soulful eyes turned black with lust as they watched my mouth taste his skin in return. So dark, I could count the flecks of gold in each. They seemed to ignite like fire, glittering with the same hunger I felt. “But I’d be foolish to jump into bed with a man I barely know.”
Without taking his eyes off mine, he threaded our fingers then pulled me toward him. Inches from my face, his eyes grew intense. “I was married for eighteen miserable years to a woman I didn’t love for the sake of my boys. Trust me, Sweetcheeks, I’m not looking for a quick fuck. I’m looking for a lifetime of passion. To spend the rest of my days falling asleep with the same woman wrapped around my body.”
I swallowed hard. Yes, I was in so much trouble.
“I need to tell you somethin’,” I rushed out, then took a deep breath for courage. “I’m older than I look. A lifetime isn’t as long as you may think.” Joe had to be close to ten years younger than me, so he needed to know he was crawling into bed with a grandmother. Well, at least a woman who was old enough to be a grandmother. I’m all for telling a fib here and there to keep from hurting someone’s feelings. It’s one thing to lie about your age in the face of a snotty rival, and another fib entirely when AARP’s sending you membership applications and the man courting you has no clue. One should really be truthful with the man they’re sleeping with.
Joe’s mouth twitched at my outburst. “If you must know, I’ve always had a thing for older women.”
“Trust me,” Ray Sr. called out, “she’s too young for you. Might as well leave her for me.”
I whipped my head around so fast my ponytail smacked me in the face. “You’re on the three-strikes rule if I hear one more word from you!”
Ray didn’t seem threatened. “You brought him here for my approval, didn’t ya?”
I glanced at Joe then back at Ray. “So?”
“So, quit lookin’ for reasons it won’t work. Who the heck cares how much older you are than him?”
I blinked. “I’m not lookin’ for—”
“Sure, you are, darlin’. That no-good father of yours gave you the cold shoulder for so long, you’re programed for disappointment.”
He had a point, but I’d never admit to it.
“Maybe Joe cares if I’m older. Did you think of that?” I snipped.
“Ask him,” Ray grumbled. “But I already know his answer. A woman like you?” He shook his head. “He ain’t worthy of you if he gives a flyin’ fig.”
I looked at Joe to gauge his reaction and found him smirking at me. He didn’t seem concerned by an age difference. “How much older do you like your women?” I held my breath. Joe seemed to know a lot about me, so maybe he already knew how big our age difference was.
“By my calculations? I’d say six months.”
I puzzled over his answer for a moment, then it dawned on me what he meant. “You’re not six months younger than me. Six years maybe. Sixteen, I might even believe. But not six months.”
With a grin that said he thought I was cute—I’d have to correct that assumption because a lady was not cute—he pulled out his wallet and dug through it. He handed me his driver’s license, and I looked at the date of birth. There it was in black and white. Holy cow! Joe was six months younger than me.
“You’ve held up well.” I scanned Joe from head to toe and took in his hard lines and lean muscles. The veins in his arms made my heart beat
faster, until I leaned to the side and checked out his firm posterior. Perfection! “Real well.”
With a thud, plates landed on the bar brimming with crab cakes, rice, and hushpuppies, causing me to jump. “Ray! I brought Joe here to impress him, not scare him away.”
“You’ve got company,” Ray grumbled, jerking his head to indicate behind me.
Puzzled, I turned in my seat and scanned the room. I might have missed Eunice if it weren’t for the T-shirt. She was wearing her prized The Virgin Tour concert T-shirt from 1985. I’d know that tee anywhere. And the woman behind the dark sunglasses trying to hide behind a menu.
What on earth?
“Sister?”
Eunice hunched her shoulders lower behind the menu.
“Eunice!” I shouted louder.
She hesitated for a moment, then dropped the menu and pulled off her sunglasses, setting a glare on Ray that would cower most men. With a regal air that was wasted on the bar patrons in general, Eunice stood and made her way over to Joe and me. I crossed my arms as she walked over and tried to guess her mood. She looked pensive for some reason.
“We need to talk,” she blurted out, as she walked up and then kept right on going to the women’s bathroom without even looking at Joe.
I glanced in his direction to excuse myself, but his eyes were on Eunice, as well as a scowl.
“I’ll be right back. You can start without me.”
I took two steps away from the stool, but Joe paused me with his hand at my wrist. “Don’t make any decisions without talking to me first.”
He’d caught Eunice’s mood as well. “I’m sure it’s nothin’.”
“Just promise me that no matter what she has to say, you’ll talk with me first.”
My heart began to pound in my chest. I was close to finding something I’d wanted all my life, and all of a sudden, it felt like it was slipping through my fingers with Eunice’s presence. “I promise.”
Quick as a flash, quicker than I’d seen any man move, Joe reached up and tagged me around the neck, pulling my head to his.