“I did start thinking about things on Saturday, yes. What I started thinking was that Lusty is beginning to feel safe.”
Maybe that was
too
much information
. She shook her head as if she hadn’t said precisely what she meant. “It feels like home.”
Kelsey met her gaze. On her face, Carrie read compassion and another emotion she couldn’t quite identify. “I’m glad you feel at home here, Carrie. And you should know that Lusty takes care of her own.”
“I got that impression at the ceremony.” Just thinking about little Benny Rose—soon to be Kendall, too, because Adam was going to legally adopt him—made her smile. “It was the way the whole town seems to have adopted Benny.” After the actual ceremony, the almost seven-year-old had gone around, from table to table, visiting with everyone. Ginny had told her how everyone had rallied to donate clothes and toys for her son, when she’d left him behind at the restaurant, to protect him.
Ginny had also told her how they’d pretty much done the same for Benny’s mom as well, when Kelsey, Matt, and Adam had fetched her back to Lusty.
“Mind you, the folks here can sometimes be a bit sneaky when they’re doing their whole caretaker thing.” Kelsey’s smile softened, and she placed a hand on her baby bump. “Samantha Kendall, who’s the magistrate, made me Benny’s temporary guardian after Ginny left him here. My men were courting me at the time and had pretty much figured out there were issues from my past I hadn’t dealt with. I’d built a pretty formidable wall around myself after my husband and son were both murdered. My men had already weakened it, but Benny Rose finished the job of tearing it down in just a few short hours.”
When Carrie had answered the ad in the Waco paper, she’d conducted an online search on the restaurant, and its owner.
She’d come across the article in the Waco paper that had raved about the eatery and delved into Kelsey’s tragic past.
Now she wondered, for just a moment, if Kelsey was giving her some sort of warning. Perhaps she was, in a generic kind of way.
There’d been no newspaper article about
her
past. As far as the authorities were concerned, the only thing that had happened ten years ago was that a foster kid had run away from her foster home, never to return again.
“It all worked out in the end,” Tracy said.
“Yeah.” Kelsey stretched that one word out, and Carrie figured she didn’t need any more information than that.
“I’d better get some drinks out to my customers.”
Kelsey shook her head. “Yes, and I’d better get these orders filled instead of standing around daydreaming.”
“I’ll give you a hand.” Tracy washed her hands at the sink, and then grabbed another pair of latex gloves.
Michelle was coming into the kitchen as she headed back to the dining room. More people had come in for lunch, and for the next half hour or so Carrie was kept busy.
She didn’t begrudge the work, or the steady influx of diners. She mentally laughed at herself. Other times she’d tried to escape talking to the brothers Benedict and now, when she wanted to spend a few minutes chatting with them, she couldn’t get near them except to deliver their meals.
Finally the rush eased. She had time to take the tea around again, offering free refills. When she approached Chase and Brian, she sighed. They were still there, seemingly in deep conversation with each other.
Despite wanting to give them the chance to ask her out, she decided she’d best just refill their glasses, take their empty plates, and move on. She definitely didn’t want to interrupt them.
Chase reached out and touched her wrist. “Can you take a small break and sit with us for a moment, sugar?”
She’d kept their table for last. She figured she had a few minutes before she needed to start delivering checks so her customers could be on their way. She also knew Kelsey never minded if one of her staff wanted to sit for a moment with their customers.
“I can take five minutes.”
“Sit down, darlin’. I’ll get you a glass and you can have some of that tea you’ve been pouring for everyone else all day.”
Brian was up like a shot, made his way over to the drink station, and was back in seconds with a clean glass.
Carrie sat, and Chase poured her the tea.
“How long until Kelsey finds herself another waitress, do you think?” Chase asked.
“Your guess is as good as mine. There’re a couple of young girls who’ve applied to come on as summer help. Kelsey’s waiting until Ginny gets home to let them start.”
“Makes sense,” Brian said. “If the kids have never worked before, it’ll likely be a while before they’re any real help at all.”
“Exactly. I don’t mind pitching in. There’s still time to help in the kitchen between meals. A lot of the cooking happens before the actual meal rush.” She realized they’d always kept their conversations centered around her. She thought it was well past time for her to take an equal interest in them. “How’s the ranch coming? It was deserted until you decided to take it on, wasn’t it?”
“Unoccupied,” Chase corrected. “We’re getting there. We’re nearly done riding the fence line and making repairs to it. The barn is ready to house the mares we plan to buy, and we almost have a solid business plan in place. There’s just one thing we’d like to see to, but we don’t have time. Brian and I were talking about it, and we think you can help.”
“I don’t know anything about ranching.” Carrie shrugged. She didn’t have to feign disappointment. She wasn’t sure if she regretted her lack of cow punching experience, or if she had wanted the men to ask her a more personal kind of question.
“What we need doesn’t have anything to do with ranching, darlin’. We heard you telling mom at the ceremony the other day that you do have experience as an interior decorator, and that’s what we’d like you to help us with,” Brian said.
Chase put his hand on her wrist again, and Carrie couldn’t deny the sizzle and snap that worked its way up her arm. He stroked the inside of her wrist with his thumb and it was all she could do not to moan and shiver.
“You have to rescue us, sugar. We’re living in 1930s bordello hell.”
“Oh my God, it really
does
look like a 1930s bordello!”
Carrie had been certain Chase and Brian had hit her with a unique variation of the “come over and look at my etchings” line.
Apparently, they were serious.
Bummer.
“You thought we were just shooting you a line to get you alone at our place,” Brian said.
Carrie didn’t often blush, but she felt her cheeks heat and knew a moment’s difficulty meeting either of their gazes.
She inhaled deeply, then womanned up, and looked him dead in the eye. “Yes, I did.”
Chase nodded. “Smart woman. We
were
shooting you a line to get you alone here. You came anyway, even suspecting that’s what we were doing. This gives us a great deal of hope, so we’re being honest. But, we also really do need help with this house.”
Oh, boy
. She
had
given them a message of intent in coming out to their lair, as it were. And, okay, that was what she’d meant to do. She
had
told herself she was going to say yes if they asked her out, and they did and she did.
She just wasn’t altogether certain what the hell was supposed to happen next. She looked from them, to the room around her.
From the outside, their ranch house, although large, had appeared…normal. Shaded porch on the front, two story, and constructed of a combination of stone and wood, the building had seemed to call to her homebody instincts. She’d expected open rooms, wood floors, and large, masculine furniture.
What she was looking at was red and gold brocade-upholstered Queen Anne–style furniture, with a couple of pieces of Louis XIV thrown in, a rich Aubusson carpet in pink, teal, and gold, and a gold-painted grand piano that Liberace would have enjoyed.
“I don’t know where to start.” She turned to look at the brothers Benedict and gasped slightly. She hadn’t even noticed them moving so close to her.
“Oh, that’s easy. You start right here.” Chase reached for her, his hands hot as they clamped onto her upper arms. He pulled her gently toward him, giving her plenty of time to stop what was about to happen.
Panic once more flared to life, but she killed it dead. She wanted this, even if she wasn’t one hundred percent certain she knew what all “this” would turn out to be.
The heat of his body pulsed against hers. She inhaled deeply and could smell woodsy soap and man. When he slid his hands down her body and around, so that they held her ass, she slipped her arms around his neck.
“Hello, sugar.” His soft greeting puffed against her face as he moved in on her.
“Hey, cowboy.” She could smell him, was surrounded by him, and was filled suddenly with a deep, hungry craving for him.
He grinned, his eyes mesmerizing, and then he settled his mouth on hers.
Soft and gentle, his lips sipped at hers, brushing back and forth with a tenderness she never expected. He tasted hot, savory, and she wanted more. Unable to prevent it, a humming, yummy kind of sound vibrated out from her throat.
He eased back, just a little. “Okay so far? Wanna go a bit deeper?”
“Yes, and yes. I need more.”
“Hang on to me then, sugar. Here we go.”
Oh she’d been so right about that deep basso timbre of his voice and how it tickled all her nerve endings, nipples to clit. She wondered at his warning even as she let her hands caress the top of his back and his shoulders.
He eased her hips closer, and she felt the ridge of his erect cock press against her stomach.
He groaned and then put his mouth on hers again. This time, he plundered.
With lips and tongue, Chase surrounded her with passion and drenched her in a warm, wet tasting that seduced the strength from her legs and fired her libido. His tongue swirled in her mouth again and again, and Carrie felt herself melting into him. Her heart pounded, her flesh felt electrified, and his flavor seeped into her bloodstream. This was passion, raw and new, and something never sampled.
Her brain short-circuited, her intellect’s final words,
I get it
, the beginning and the middle and the end of everything. She pressed against his body, close, and then closer still as her head tilted back, her lips opened wide, and she began to drink him in as thoroughly as he drank her.
She whimpered when he weaned his lips from hers and when he edged back just slightly. She opened her eyes. Her gaze met his and there was no mistaking the lust she read there.
And then two hands touched her shoulders, stroked down, and turned her in to another solid masculine chest.
“Come here, darlin’. I’ve been wanting to taste you forever.” Brian gave her no time to think. There was only time to feel, and to respond in kind.
Carrie moaned, leaned into him, and opened her mouth wide to receive his kiss.
Tart and tangy, hot and wet and wonderful, Brian Benedict proved as thorough a kisser, as magical a seducer as his brother.
She’d never kissed two men in such rapid succession, and the reality of two distinct masculine flavors on her tongue, the realization of two hot, hard, denim-covered cocks pressing against her at the same time was an attraction she nearly couldn’t grasp.
Her nipples peaked as her tongue danced a slow and sexy tango with his. Her panties felt damp and Carrie gave in to the urge to flex her pelvic floor muscles, as if she held one of their cocks within her already and needed to caress it.
She felt hot, hungry, and horny. As the brothers Benedict continued to touch and caress, to kiss and sip, she reveled in the wonder of wanting, and being wanted.
“Shh, darlin’. We didn’t mean to let things get so far out of hand.” Brian gathered her in and held her while Chase stroked her back in a slow, gentle caress.
She trembled and figured that was what had pulled them from the brink.
“Come here, sugar. We’ll sit and snuggle for a bit.”
Carrie squeaked when Chase so easily picked her up in his arms. He carried her the short distance to the sofa and sat down, holding her on his lap.
Carrie sighed. There was such pleasure in the simple fact of being cuddled. She couldn’t help but nuzzle her face on his chest and snuggle in even deeper. Brian had walked away, but before she could wonder where he’d gone, he returned and handed her a bottle of water.
“Thanks.” She uncapped it and took a long drink. The trembling had stopped, but she had no intention of leaving her perch—unless it was to climb onto the lap of the man who sat next to them.
Brian lifted her legs and placed them on his lap. Then he removed her sneakers and socks, and began to massage her feet.
Carrie groaned, the pleasure nearly bone-melting. “Oh, God, you have about an hour to stop that.”
“Just enjoy, darlin’, it’s the least I can do in repayment for that oral delight.”
“May I say, sugar, you are one hell of a kisser.”
“Ha! That wasn’t me. That was all the two of you. Y’all got some serious talent there. I swear, too much more of that and my clothes would have melted right off my body.”