by Mari Carr
Belinda brought back their beers and Porter lifted his bottle, tapping it against hers. “Here’s to those who’ve seen us at our best and seen us at our worst and can’t tell the difference.”
“Hear, hear!” Adele added, laughing.
They each took a sip, then turned to glance at the stage as the band resumed their places. They started playing a slow, country ballad, and Porter gave her a cocky grin as he stood up and held his hand out to her.
“Come on, Addie. I’ve been waiting all night to get my arms around you.”
She stood up, placing her hand in his. He led them to the dance floor, chiseling out a small section just for them.
Now, like all the other times they’d danced together, Porter wrapped his arms around her, pulled her to him, and moved nice and slow, swaying to the beat. The world melted away around them as she placed her cheek on his chest and got lost in his arms. She liked his strength and his confidence, and the way he hummed along with the music.
There was nothing better on the planet than dancing with Porter. As the song came to an end, she lifted her head, ready to offer him a smile and her thanks.
Porter had other things in mind. The second her eyes met his, he was there, his lips brushing against hers in a kiss that was as hot as it was gentle. It didn’t last more than a few seconds, but it packed a punch.
When they broke apart, he held her gaze. “Wanna head back to the table or keep dancing?”
The band was playing a faster tune, one that wasn’t conducive to her simply swaying in his arms. At least at the table, she could instigate a game of footsie.
“Table.”
The night had been so damn perfect and as more time passed, she felt certain that if she went home with Porter, if the sex with him lived up to all the gossip, she was going to be seriously screwed come morning when her one night in his bed was over.
Regardless, if he asked her to spend the night with him…she was going to say yes.
Actually, she was going to say hell yes.
She wanted Porter with a need that was becoming downright painful, and horniness was definitely winning the race against practicality and pragmatism at the moment.
He placed his arm around her, his large hand resting at the small of her back, and led her off the dance floor. They’d only managed a few steps through the crowd before his hand drifted just a little bit lower and he swatted her ass playfully.
Or at least, he probably thought it was playful. All it really did was send her mind straight to the gutter. She was going to have to fight hard to resume her seat at the booth rather than bend over the table and invite him to spank her like he meant it.
Yeah. She was a goner.
There was no way she was going to deny herself this night with him. She’d had way too many fantasies about the cowboy not to see if the real deal lived up to all the press.
She wanted him, and he’d made it pretty clear tonight that he wanted her too.
Adele had offered him that lame excuse about not wanting to mess up the friendship, but she knew that wasn’t a true danger. Neither of them was prone to that sort of drama.
If she could manage to keep her growing feelings for him under control, there was no reason they couldn’t spend tonight in each other’s arms and then, in the morning, they’d return to the same comfortable, easy friendship they had come to enjoy lately.
She was an adult.
She could do this.
Probably.
Maybe.
They were halfway to their booth when she spotted her cousin, Tyson, and his significant others, Harley and Caleb, sitting together at a table nearby. They waved them over.
“I thought that was you, Adele,” Tyson said, rising to give her a quick hug before holding out his hand to shake. “Good to see you, Porter. Y’all out on a date?”
Adele grinned, even as she waved and said, “Yep. Hey, Harley. Hey, Caleb.”
Harley and Caleb smiled and said hello to Porter as well.
Chances were damn good that by the time she got to work tomorrow afternoon, everyone in her family would know she’d been out on the town with Porter Cormack. She’d joked with Porter that there were no secrets in Maris, and that was accurate. Primarily because it was her family sharing all the gossip at the restaurant.
Porter drew her close and even pressed a quick kiss to the side of her head. “Finally wore her down,” he said. “Convinced her she’s been dating idiots.”
She expected Tyson to laugh, but instead he nodded. “You’re not kidding, man. Still trying to figure out why she’d say yes to a date with Doug Milligan.”
“Vodka. A lot of fucking vodka,” Adele said, laughing. It was pointless to pretend she had a leg to stand on when it came to that date. She’d actually gone out for happy hour with Macie—which had turned into a happy five hours—gotten three sheets to the wind, and donned a pair of drunk goggles that somehow made Doug, the swaggering, leather-clad, chain-smoking biker seem like someone she wouldn’t mind going out with.
“Well, I’m glad to see your taste in men has finally improved. Been worried about your choices ever since Keith left town. It’s about time you went out with a good guy,” Tyson said, and Adele realized Porter was the first man her overprotective older cousin had actually approved of since Keith moved to St. Louis. Which was strange considering Tyson was as aware of Porter’s permanent bachelor, one-night-stand reputation as the rest of Maris.
“Hey, Port, think you could give me a hand?” Belinda stepped up to their group, looking equal parts worried and pissed off.
“What’s going on?” Porter asked.
She pointed toward the bar. “Couple of your ranch hands are talking shit and I’m pretty sure it’s about to blow up.”
Porter growled. “Goddamn it. Every fucking weekend with these two.” He glanced at Adele. “I’ll just be a second, okay, darlin’?”
Adele nodded.
“Need a hand?” Caleb said, rising.
“Yeah. I wouldn’t mind. Eddie is a mean-ass drunk. Might take a couple of us to drag him out of here.”
Tyson, Caleb, and Porter excused themselves as Adele sat down with Harley.
“Just another Saturday night in Maris,” Harley joked.
“Yep. Bunch of liquored-up rednecks looking to blow off steam.”
“So,” Harley said. “You and Porter?”
Adele shrugged, hoping she was able to downplay her feelings enough. Every woman in town knew Porter was king of the one-night stands. Adele wasn’t about to make a jackass of herself, pretending there was a chance this could be more. “He asked me out. I said yes.”
“Y’all looked pretty chummy out there on the dance floor.”
Adele grinned and shook her head. “You and I both know this is a one-time deal.”
Harley frowned as she considered that. “I don’t know about that. He seems pretty into you.”
Adele dismissed her friend’s assertion, refusing to let those words sink in too deep. “He’s a charmer. Plain and simple.”
“You gonna let yourself be charmed?” Harley asked.
“Hell yeah. My mama didn’t raise a fool.”
Harley lifted her beer in a mock toast. “You go girl. Be good for you to indulge your wild side. I know you’ve been missing Keith.”
Adele nodded, though it suddenly felt like she hadn’t missed Keith in a long time. Not since…that barn dance last spring.
The two of them were laughing at some of the crazy moves a couple of drunk cowboys were making on the dance floor when Patty Winslow stopped by their table. “Hey, Adele, Harley.”
“Hi, Patty,” Adele said.
“Harley, I was hoping I could talk to you a minute about changing the time for Ronnie’s guitar lesson next week.”
Harley owned and operated her own music store on Main Street, just a few doors down from Sparks Barbeque. She also gave guitar and banjo lessons.
“I’m gonna head back to my table to wait for Porter,” Adele sa
id, rising. “My beer’s getting warm.”
Harley waved goodbye as Adele headed back to her table. She wasn’t alone more than a few minutes before Porter rejoined her.
“Sorry about that. That Eddie is all hat and no cattle. Same thing…every weekend. Swaggering fool drinks too much, then picks a fight or picks up a woman.”
Adele lifted her beer and took a drink. “You cowboys are all alike. Always looking to blow off some steam on the weekends one way or the other.”
Porter’s eyes narrowed, not in anger but interest. “You gonna blow off some steam with me, Addie?”
She tilted her head, playing coy. “I haven’t decided yet.”
Liar liar, pants on fire.
Porter was undaunted. Of course. The man could read her like a book, and it wasn’t like she was doing a good job of hiding her interest.
“Why don’t you keep chewing that over while we talk?”
“What do you wanna talk about?” she asked.
“How come you’re not hitched yet? Thought you and that guy you dated last year—”
“Keith,” she added.
He nodded. “Thought you two were pretty serious. What happened?”
“I see we’ve entered the obligatory first date sharing of romantic histories phase of the evening,” she joked.
“That’s a requirement?”
Adele snorted. “I thought it was. What do you usually talk about when you’re out with a woman for the first time?”
“All the things I’m going to do to her in bed later.”
Adele laughed loudly, trying to remember when she’d ever had this much fun on a date before. “Cocky bastard. Although…that doesn’t sound like such a bad topic of conversation. I vote we talk about that.”
Porter chuckled. “Just answer my question, darlin’. You’re gorgeous, sexy as hell, funny, and smart. So what happened with Keith?”
“Life happened.”
“What’s that mean?”
“I loved Keith, and we were good together. We dated for four years and I could really see us building a life together. In my head, I’d picked out the wedding dress, named the kids, bought the rocking chairs for the front porch. The whole shebang.” Adele hadn’t meant to confess all of that. To a commitment-phobe like Porter, maybe realizing that was what she wanted from a man would scare him off, make him reconsider taking her home tonight.
“And then life happened?” Porter prodded when she stopped talking.
“He got transferred to St. Louis for work.”
“He didn’t ask you to go with him?”
Adele picked at the label on her beer bottle, as she considered the decision she’d made over a year earlier. She’d spent so many sleepless nights since then wondering if she had made the right decision.
“He asked. He begged actually. Offered marriage…the whole shebang,” she repeated. “And I considered it. Really considered it. But in the end, I knew I couldn’t leave Maris. I’d never be happy living in a big city. I’ve grown too fond of wide-open spaces, of living a stone’s throw from my family, of making Sparks Barbeque a success with Macie and my cousins.”
“The restaurant has put Maris on the map,” he said, and she smiled, feeling the same sense of pride she always did when she considered her beloved business.
“I realized that future I’d imagined for me and Keith all took place in Maris. I like living in a small town where everyone knows everything about everybody else.”
Porter nodded and she knew he got it…way deep down. She’d figured that out over dinner as they shared story after story about their hometown. From the way Porter talked about the people and the places, she’d felt a genuine connection to him in a way she never had with Keith who, even though he’d been born and raised in Maris, had never loved the place enough to want to raise his own family and grow old here.
“Must have been a tough decision to make.”
“It was,” she admitted. “Because I loved—I love—Keith. I think I always will. This past year has been harder than I expected, but lately...” She stopped just short of admitting that she’d been questioning her decision a hell of a lot less since those dances with him.
Porter let her statement drop unfinished. She suspected it was because he knew what she’d been about to say, but she wasn’t sure if he let her off the hook simply because of that or because he didn’t want to hear her say it aloud.
They both fell silent for a few minutes. Adele wasn’t sure what was going through Porter’s mind, but as for herself, she was pleased to discover she wasn’t sad about Keith anymore.
Her heart was no longer broken.
Hell, it didn’t even feel cracked.
“For what it’s worth,” he said at last, “I think you made the right decision.”
She smiled. “So do I,” she admitted. “And now, it’s your turn.”
Porter gave her a crooked grin. “Got the idea the other night that there wasn’t too much you didn’t already know about my past relationships. Magic tongue, rope, and all that.”
She rolled her eyes. “That’s sex. Not feelings.”
“I don’t know. Feels pretty good to me,” he teased.
“Stop deflecting and get ready to spend a few minutes on the hot seat. How come you never got married?”
“Never wanted to.”
It was a simple, straightforward answer. And maybe Porter believed that was the truth. But there’d been a flicker in his eyes as he’d responded that told her there was something more there.
“Why not?” she countered.
Porter lifted one shoulder casually. “I don’t think that me staying single was a conscious decision as much as something that just happened. Coop and I have been best friends since the cradle, and I watched him fall in love and get married at twenty-two. I remember thinking back then that he was a fool to settle down that young. That he’d thrown away some of his best years, tying himself to just one woman.”
“Spoken like a true manwhore,” she said, winking at him.
“That description fit pretty good when I was in my twenties, early thirties. I wasn’t much better than those yahoos I just helped Belinda toss out of here. But then…”
Porter paused for a moment and Adele remained quiet, trying to figure out if he was resistant to finish what he started or simply looking for the words. Obviously, he was having a deep thought, his smile fading, replaced by a sadness she’d never seen in his eyes.
“But then,” he started at last, “Coop’s wife, Sharon, got cancer.”
“The two of you were close,” Adele said.
“Yeah.” He nodded. “She and Coop were my best friends, my family.” Porter’s gaze locked with hers, his expression too serious. “Sometimes…the three of us…Coop and me…we shared her.”
Adele’s eyes widened. “You slept together? The three of you?”
He frowned. “It’s not exactly unheard of. I mean your cousins Jeannette and Tyson—”
Adele cut him off. “I didn’t mean that in a judgmental way. Honestly. I’m just…surprised. I…” She smirked. “I truly believed there were no secrets in Maris.”
“Everybody’s got secrets, Addie. Even in a town as small as Maris. The trick to keeping them is not to tell your dad.”
“Touché,” she said, agreeing with him completely. TJ Sparks was the root of the Maris grapevine.
Porter’s expression lightened, but he didn’t smile. She wished he would. Instead, he continued his explanation. “I don’t want you to get the wrong impression about what was going on with us. Coop and Sharon were the couple. They were married and in love and their relationship was rock solid. It was just…every now and then…Sharon needed both of us.”
“Were you in love with her?” Adele asked, though the question cost her something. What was happening between them would be a lot simpler if she could paint Porter as a womanizer, someone incapable of love and commitment. Discovering he had this softer, sweeter side was just going to make it that much
harder to walk away from him. And she had to walk away. Because there was no doubt in her mind he would. If she wanted to come out of this relatively unscathed, she needed to be the first to step away come morning.
“Not in love,” he clarified. “But I did love her. Her death ripped a hole in my heart.”
Adele studied his face, her own heart aching as she considered his loss. “I get that. It was the same for Macie when her best friend, Johnnie, died. She was devastated when he passed away. So…” She wondered if she should admit to knowing another one of his secrets. Finally, she decided she liked being this open, this honest with him. It was a refreshing change after spending the last year playing dating games with losers. “So I guess it makes sense that you and Macie turned to each other.”
Porter reared back, clearly shocked. “You know I slept with Macie?”
Adele grinned and rolled her eyes. “We’re sisters. We tell each other everything. I knew the two of you had slept together ten minutes after you left her place. And it probably only took that long because she couldn’t find her phone to call me sooner.”
“She always loses her phone.” Porter shook his head, rubbing his jaw, drawing her attention to his five-o’clock shadow. “It was just one night, Addie. And there was a lot of whiskey involved.”
“Macie told me, though I think she used the word shitfaced. I’m glad the two of you were there for each other.”
Porter reached across the table, grasping her hand in his. “You sure you’re okay with it?”
Adele nodded because it was the truth. She couldn’t explain why she suffered some pretty serious jealousy when it came to every single one of Porter’s one-night-stand women, but with Macie, she felt none of that.
Maybe it was because she’d been there after Johnnie died and she had hated seeing her sister so torn apart. Adele recalled actually feeling some gratitude to Porter at the time because Macie had turned a corner after that, had started the healing process.
Or maybe it was because she knew that what Macie and Porter had shared had been about grief and loneliness, and not about romantic feelings. Macie was one million percent in love with her husband, Coop, and not a threat where Porter was concerned.