Tomboy (The Hartigans)

by Avery Flynn

  The glare probably would have worked—he gave great stink eye—but she was onto him. Zach “The Most-Hated Man in Harbor City” Blackburn was a secret softie.

  “Too bad.” She lifted one shoulder and then let it drop. “It’s nonnegotiable. Some of us have bills to pay.”

  He opened his mouth and then closed it quick, as if he didn’t want whatever he was about to say to come out. “Fine.”

  Pushing aside the need to examine what it was that he was trying to keep a lid on—because this was Zach Blackburn, a business acquaintance in this weird situation and not a friend—she picked up the empty guacamole serving bowl. “And I’ll need the recipe for this.”

  Up went the eyebrow with the metal bar through it. “I have to marry into the Lopez family to get that.”

  “We all have to make sacrifices.” She grinned at him. “And don’t worry, I’ll be your best man.”

  That made him laugh. It was a good laugh deep and full. “You’re a pain in the ass.”

  “No kidding. Deal?” She held out her hand, which was kind of hard to do in the little booth, since they were already so close together.

  His gaze flicked down to her hand, his jaw squared, and his body tensed. The air around them went from being normal oxygen to something heavier that was filled with an electric promise. Then he looked back up at her, something dark, dangerous, and downright delicious in his hard eyes.

  Holy shit. Her pulse picked up, and she almost dropped her hand down to her lap.

  His larger hand engulfed hers before she could pull it back. “Deal.”

  All of the you’re-in-danger-girl alarms went off in her head at the same time that her body was sending oh-yeah-scoot-closer vibes. When she was back home, she was definitely going to have to give herself a stern talking-to about the realities of the situation, which was that this was a mutually beneficial arrangement. Nothing more.

  Riiiiiiiight, Fallon.

  And that was the moment when she realized she just might be well and truly fucked, which meant there was only one thing to do now. Get the man out of her system so she could do this whole Lady Luck thing without losing her head—or her heart. Her panties, however? Those white cotton briefs were goners.

  …

  Taking Fallon on a tour of the kitchen so she could see the guacamole being made hadn’t been his idea. Mama had insisted after the two women had started talking about the restaurant’s food. And that was how he’d ended up squashed in a corner with Fallon directly in front of him—her ass practically pressed against him in all the very right wrong places—as one of the line cooks showed them how he made the guacamole.

  It wasn’t a fast process. Okay, maybe it was, but it felt like forever when Zach had to keep his hands mostly to himself—and he did. She was Lady Luck. He was a loser with mountains of debt. Remembering that, though, got harder the longer he stood there, his fingers resting lightly on her hips because there was nowhere else to put them in the cramped quarters.

  Really, perv? That’s what you’re going with?

  Yeah, he couldn’t even lie to himself about it because they might be putting in anchovies and ground-up mouth guards in the guacamole and he wouldn’t notice. All he could take in was every single little detail about Fallon, from the curve of her hip to the fact that her breath hitched every time a busboy walked by and she had to step back closer to him so the employee could get by with his tub full of dishes.

  “And that,” the cook said with a final sprinkle of cilantro. “Is how you make Mama’s guacamole.”

  Zach hoped Fallon had gotten the recipe because he’d missed all of it.

  “Excuse me,” a busboy coming in from the dining room said almost at the same time as another busboy coming from the opposite direction said it.

  They met in the sliver of space between Fallon and the prep table. The resulting face-off meant she had to scoot back against him while he tried to make his six-foot-three-inch frame fit in a space so tight a gymnast would feel squashed. And since he was good but not so much so that he could subvert the laws of space and time, there was nothing to be done but try to angle so his dick wasn’t pressed right up against Fallon’s high, round ass.

  Still, she brushed against his cock, which was pretty much all the encouragement it needed to start to stiffen against his thigh. Maybe she wouldn’t notice. The fact that this was the first time in his life he’d ever hoped a woman didn’t notice his junk didn’t do his ego any fucking favors.

  “You really like guacamole, huh?” she asked as she looked back over her shoulder at him, her voice huskier than it had been moments ago.

  Busted. He searched her face for signs of her being offended. Instead of shock or annoyance, though, there was nothing but heated curiosity mixed with lust in her gaze, which made his blood rush south.

  “Yes.” He shifted his stance so he was more directly behind her, while still keeping an inch or two of space between them. “It’s totally my kink.”

  The right side of her mouth curled up in a half smile as she took a half step back, so they were pressed up against each other again. “Brings new meaning to food porn.”

  He sucked in a quick breath and prayed for the strength of his zipper. “Did you have to say porn?”

  It was bad enough that her jeans didn’t do a damn thing except make him imagine all the dirty nurse fantasies he’d never had until he’d met Fallon. The last thing he needed to be thinking about was what she watched or read when she wanted to get off. He clenched his teeth together, hard enough he might have to go see the team dentist, in a vain attempt to get that mental image out of his head.

  “Why?” The tip of Fallon’s pink tongue snuck out and wet her full bottom lip as she looked back at him. “You don’t like porn, or you don’t like women who like porn outside of a male-gaze type thing?”

  The pained groan that escaped from him said everything he couldn’t at that moment because they were in the middle of Mama’s kitchen as the cooks, the busboys, and the waiters sped around in organized chaos that reminded him of a hockey game. Not even the reminder of all that was on the line for him could bring his dick back under control, though. Not when Fallon was pressed up against him and asking him about porn.

  “I’ll take that as a you like it a little bit too much.” She grinned, turning her attention back to the activity in the busy kitchen, but she didn’t reverse that half step she’d taken earlier, even though the busboys were long gone.

  Instead, she stayed there pressed against him, the back of her thighs against his, the roundness of her ass pressed against his dick, and her back touching his chest. If he wanted to, he could have dipped his head just the slightest bit and whispered in her ear. But that’s not what he wanted to do. What he had in mind was much louder. He wanted to make her scream as she came all over his dick.

  It wasn’t fair. He was trying not to fuck this thing with Lady Luck up—and with him needing Fallon to win games, banging her would definitely screw them over no matter how bad he wanted to (and damn did he want to) because the one thing he still excelled at was pissing people off. He couldn’t afford to make Fallon mad—too bad it was hard as hell to remember that when she was this close.

  “I’m trying to be good,” he said, almost more to himself than to her.

  She leaned back against him, tilting her chin upward so that braid of hers slid down his chest. “And here I’d heard you were very good at being the best kind of bad.”

  The comment delivered with just the lightest increase in pressure of her ass against his cock was more than he could take. He was weak. He was horny. He wanted to fuck her six ways to Sunday and had pretty much since the first time he saw her when she walked into that bar to relieve him from being Lucy’s wingman with enough attitude to make the chip on his shoulder seem small in comparison. His resolve snapped in two like a pencil, and he tightened his grip on her hips, pulling her back against him. It was almost enough.

  “If we walk out of here together right now,” he
said, the gravel in his tone showing just how close to the edge of saying fuck it and tossing her over his shoulder that he was. “There’s only one way tonight ends.”

  “How’s that?” she asked.

  “Naked. Sweaty. Drained. Exhilarated. Probably sore. Definitely satisfied.”

  A promise? A warning? It was all that and more.

  She half closed her eyes and shivered against him. “Let’s go, Zach.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Breaking: Blackburn and Lady Luck Spotted During Cozy Dinner for Two

  Okay, hockey fans. I’m not about to turn The Biscuit into a love lives of the rich and famous, but this is hockey-related. A few minutes ago, an Ice Knights fan who just happened to be at Mama’s Place in Waterbury caught sight of none other than Zach Blackburn and his own Lady Luck getting mighty cozy. Of course, the fan snuck a pic and Tweeted it out. The shots included one of Blackburn feeding her the metro area’s most famous guacamole. Yeah, yeah, I know what you’re thinking—that’s a little extra. It is! But…well, hockey fans, I stan it and judging by how much social media has exploded about the couple, now coined #TeamZuck, since Lady Luck was first spotted at his house, I’m not the only one.

  @DailyDoseOfSugar: OMG! Just met Zach and Lady Luck at the clinic meet and greet today they are adorbs together! #TeamZuck

  @Don’tGiveAPuck: ‍I am HERE for #TeamZuck. We need to get these 2 together for real!

  @HannahB: I am more invested in #TeamZuck than my relationship with my own boyfriend. Sorry, Andy.

  Not that the assholes of Harbor City have stopped assholing.

  @Parkerd6280: You’d figure with those man hands she could feed herself. #TeamZuck #TeamCouldDoBetter

  @MascaraMama: Girl, you better up your game or he’s gonna look elsewhere. And there will be plenty of us waiting in the wings looking like we just walked outta a magazine. #TeamZuck #ImHereZach #RealTalk

  I reached out to Blackburn’s agent, Kyle Jackson, to find out if this thing with Lady Luck is more than a publicity stunt gone all so right in the eyes of Harbor City’s romantics. His answer was less than satisfying.

  “Mr. Blackburn is focused on hockey and doing whatever it takes to give the Ice Knights fans an amazing experience at the arena. I won’t be commenting on his private life.”

  Yep, that’s it, two sentences that say nothing.

  And don’t bother to rush down to Mama’s Place to catch a glimpse of them and get the real story. My sources (okay, Twitter), tell me they left minutes ago—together.

  You know what that says to me, hockey fans? That this relationship is on and like @Don’tGiveAPuck, I am HERE for it.

  Chapter Thirteen

  They no more than made it into Zach’s house before he swung the door shut, picked Fallon up, and did a spin move that had her sandwiched between the wall and him. His mouth against hers was like a one-milliliter shot of epinephrine surging through her body. Every nerve in her was screaming oh-my-God-finally. And his hands on her ass? If she thought about how good that felt when they were still fully dressed, she just might orgasm right on the spot, and there was no way she was feeding his ego like that.

  The whole point of this was to get Zach Blackburn out of her system in the most efficient way possible. The fact that it involved orgasms—yes, with an S—was just an added benefit.

  She might regret going about it like this—hell, odds were she totally would—but it all felt too good now to think about that. Plus, there was that thing he was doing with his tongue in her mouth and his hands on her body as he pressed that big hard cock of his—sadly still covered in denim—against her core that pretty much obliterated any thought of changing her mind.

  An electric pulse hummed through her body, and she tightened her legs around his hips and brought herself closer to him, reaching for some kind of relief. It was better but so not there yet.

  Breaking the kiss, she unwrapped her legs. “Let me down.”

  Uncertainty flashed across his face, but he didn’t hesitate, allowing her feet to touch the floor.

  “Everything okay?” he asked, moving his hands off her and taking a step back, giving her more than enough space to make a run for the door. “You don’t have to do this.”

  And there it was again, a glimpse of that soft center that totally fucked with her, and all of Harbor City’s, perception of him as a complete and unapologetic asshole. It would be so much easier if he were that guy. Then she wouldn’t have to say this next part.

  “I want to be upfront on one thing.”

  “As long as it’s not that you have a Cajun Rage tattoo,” he said, reaching out and curling the end of her braid around his fingers. “I’m sure we can work through it.”

  She narrowed her eyes and flipped him off. “Don’t even joke about that.”

  If he noticed that she’d given him the bird, he didn’t show it. The man was having a moment with her braid, and she had to admit seeing it wrapped around his fingers was giving her ideas, the kind that made her breath catch.

  “So what’s your one thing?” he asked.

  It took her a second to pull back from the mental image of her standing naked and facing the wall while Zach tugged her hair and fucked her from behind. Damn, it was getting hot in here.

  Annoyed by how easy it was to get distracted by this man, she straightened her spine and lifted her chin, daring him to disagree with her. “Tonight doesn’t mean a thing. I’m getting you out of my system.”

  Up went that pierced eyebrow, and the smile that curved his lips was anything but sweet. “Are you saying you think about me when you get yourself off?”

  Only while she was in the shower naked and soapy and on her bed in that hoodie that smelled of him and every time she’d slipped her fingers beneath her underwear and played with her clit. That wasn’t information to be shared with him, though. A woman had to have a code, and hers was opposed to sharing her masturbation mental material with the subject of said fantasies.

  “You wish,” she said, both words coming out way too soft to be anything but an affirmative.

  Damn it, girl. Where is your bitchtitude when you need it?

  He took a step closer, his hands going to her hips, but left space between their bodies that only emphasized how close they were. “I think you do, and now you have a bunch of fantasies you’d like to see happen in real life.” He popped the button of her jeans. “But only for tonight.”

  That was as far as he took it—the back of his thumbs against the bare skin of her waist—and it took away her ability to focus on anything else for the moment, as if every nerve in her body had temporarily relocated to those two small spots. It was impossible to come just from an almost-touch. She wasn’t even close to it. Still, she’d been in the middle of fucking guys before and been less turned on than at this moment with Zach. Her heart was racing, her nipples were puckered so much they ached, and the throbbing between her legs grew with every shaky breath she inhaled while he just stood there and watched.

  “You aren’t going to get attached, are you?” You asking him or yourself, girl?

  He dipped his head lower but still maintained that breath of space between them. “Worried about breaking my heart?”

  “I don’t think that’s gonna be a problem.” The urge to raise herself up on her tiptoes and close the distance between them was an all-powerful swirl of want and need inside her, desperate to be released—but she had to be sure first. “This is just to get you out of my system. We’re clear?”

  His gaze dipped down to her mouth before raising back up. “Without a doubt.”

  Fucking A. This was her last moment to walk away, clear the front door, and drive off in her car. On so many levels this was just about the dumbest thing she could do. He was Zach effing Blackburn, and she was a nurse from working-class Waterbury with a bitchy attitude who wouldn’t know her way around a Sephora or a Victoria’s Secret if she had a map. If she gave more than thirty seconds’ thought to what the women he usually slept with looked l
ike, she’d be out the door. It sucked to admit it, and she’d never say it out loud, but, yeah, sometimes that comparison thing snuck through her defenses at the worst fucking time.

  “I don’t know what you’re thinking right now, but it doesn’t look good,” he said, his low voice warm and smooth like honey. “If you don’t want to be here, you don’t have to worry about protecting my feelings.”

  She shook her head. “That’s not it.”

  “Thank God,” he said, toying with the end of her braid again.

  But still, he didn’t take it any further. Part of her kind of wished he’d make the next move. But he wasn’t going to. For one night only, this was her show—and if that was how it was going to be, then so be it.

  “I want to see you naked,” she said, her hands sneaking up underneath the hem of his T-shirt, pushing it higher.

  She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting, but it hadn’t been for him to take two steps back, leaving her hands just hovering in the air instead of pressed against the hard muscle of his abs. Her huff of complaint was barely past her lips before he reached down and whipped off his shirt.

  Thank God for the wall behind her because, even though she’d seen his bare chest before, it wasn’t with the knowledge that she was about to get to touch it. That made a difference. She couldn’t explain it exactly, but the taking of things from theoretical to real made her feel like she was on the top peak of a roller coaster, unsure if the safety bar was going to keep her safe. Unsettling? Hell yes. Enough to make her want to stop? Fuck no—especially not when she couldn’t look away from him.

  Zach’s shoulders were broad and strong, colorful tattoos covered his pecs and one arm all the way down to his elbow, and the soft overhead foyer light caught on the metal bars piercing his nipples. As he kicked off his shoes, her gaze dropped lower to the lined perfection of his abs and the sparse happy trail that disappeared behind his jeans.

  “Like what you see?” he asked, bringing his fingers up to the button of his jeans.