She Drives Me Crazy (10 page)

Johnny knew he'd regret what he was about to do, but he was determined to do it anyway. He didn't give her time to figure out what he meant. Instead, he showed her. Before she could protest, he slid his fingers into her short tangle of hair, cupping her head and tugging her mouth to his. She gasped a little, deep in her throat, just before their lips touched. Then the same old spark ignited. He fell into that hot, burning place where thought didn't exist, only sensation.

Only
her
.

When she parted her lips, he took full advantage, inhaling her, sweeping his tongue against hers to savor the taste of warm, sweet coffee and hot, sweeter Emma.

In his memories, she'd always tasted like strawberries. Now there was no slick lip gloss. Nor had any tears fallen down her cheeks to make her skin taste salty like it had on prom night. There was only Emma, who had driven him crazy with lust from the first time he'd seen that flash of gold on her ankle when they'd both been practically kids.

She tilted her head, inviting him deeper. He accepted the invitation, his entire body seeming to spark and burn. Hers felt equally hot beneath his hands. He cupped her hip, dropped his other hand down her spine until his fingers brushed the small of her back. She whimpered against his lips, pressing herself hard against him as she slipped her arms around his neck.

"Tell me again how I'm deluding myself," he muttered as he drew his mouth away from hers to suck in a shaky breath. He didn't wait for her answer as he bent lower, to taste the hot pulse point on her throat, then the vulnerable spot where her neck met her shoulder.

"You're deluding yourself," she mumbled, twisting against him even harder, bringing the vee of her legs in contact with his. Her moan of pleasure drowned out his own.

"So it wasn't memorable?" he asked, nibbling her collarbone, even as he cupped her waist with his hands, then began to tug her T-shirt free of her shorts.

"No. Completely forgettable," she replied, as she just as greedily stroked his sides.

"Truly awful, huh?"

"Uh-huh." She sounded nearly incoherent. "Hate to tell you this, but it really sucked."

Yeah. Sucked. Now didn't that bring up a few interesting visuals? He wanted to suck on the tender place at the back of her knee. On the soft skin where her thigh met her ass. On those sweet, pouty nipples pressing hard against the cotton of her shirt. For a start, anyway.

"As bad as it is right now?" he continued. Though almost out of his mind with want for her, he still silently dared her to admit the truth—she'd
loved
it then. Following her admission, they could proceed to how bad she
wanted
it now.

"Every bit as bad."

Picking her up by the waist, he turned around and sat her on the sturdy, butcher block table. He pushed her knees apart and stepped between them. "You make me crazy," he mumbled. "And you make me want to kiss those lies right out of your mouth."

"Don't you dare kiss me again," she growled back.

Then she made a mockery of her own words by wrapping her fingers in his hair and pulling him down for another kiss. A slow, deep, welcoming one that reminded him of the slow, deep, welcoming way they'd made love in the gazebo.

His hands moved of their own accord, under the loose T-shirt, sliding up her sides. No impediment whatsoever. Her smooth skin tingled under his hands as he edged up and around, tracing patterns on her bare back and her rib cage. Coming closer and closer to the front, until she started to shake and moan.

He really didn't know how far they might have gone. One second they were on the verge of clothes hitting the floor and him showing her the meaning of the words multiple orgasm all over again, like he had ten years ago. The next there was a ringing sound and Emma Jean was sliding away from him, shimmying back on the table.

"Oh, my God," she said, looking mortified.

Her eyes were glazed, her mouth full, pouty and swollen. Her shirt was twisted, almost hanging off her shoulder and he could see a faint red mark on her neck where he'd been nibbling on her a few moments before. Her heaved-in breaths made her chest rise and fall until his hands clenched with the need to touch her, cup her,
have
her.

"What was that?" she finally whispered.

"I think it was the doorbell. And I think I'm going to have to do bodily injury to whoever rang it."

She glared. "I didn't mean the doorbell. I mean
that
." She pointed to his body, then to hers. "This. Us!"

Her anger and embarrassment finally sunk through the hazy red cloud of lust and satisfaction permeating his brain. Emma still wasn't ready to admit a thing. Not about their past. Not about what had just happened. Stubborn as ever.

"I think that was called a lousy moment."

Her face reddened. "You kissed me."

"You kissed me back."

She opened her mouth to deny it, then jerked it closed, unable to do so.

"If prom night was a
moment
, then I guess that kiss happened at the speed of light." He tsked. "Or maybe not at all."

"Not at all would have been better."

"When'd you get to be such a damn liar?"

"When'd you get to be such a damn caveman?"

They were both panting, staring at each other across the width of the table. Emma's choppy breaths drew his attention back to her loose cotton T-shirt, which had slipped down off one shoulder. The skin there was reddened… from his touch. From her excitement. From the heat sparking around them both. He wanted to kiss the spot, both to soothe away the redness…and to nip at her again because she made him insane, and hot, and ready to lose his mind.

He'd never wanted like this before. Never been stupid with it before—at least not since prom night. Christ, of all times to start acting like a Walker again, it had to be here. Now. With
her
.

"You think I'm a caveman?" he finally asked, wanting her to admit that, though he'd started it, she'd ended up every bit as much a participant in their embrace as he'd been. "You're saying I forced you? That you had no active part in this at all?"

Her mouth opened. Closed. Then she nibbled on her bottom lip. Finally she admitted, "Maybe I did. But you were still lousy to do it. You kissed me to try to prove something, and all you proved was that we both have overactive libidos and long-term memory problems."

He raised an inquisitive brow.

She continued. "Because if there are any two people in the world who have no business kissing on my grandmother's kitchen table, it's you and me."

Her words rushed out, choppy, thick with frustration and anger and maybe even a hint of vulnerability.

It was the vulnerability, combined with the redness on her shoulder and the brightness in her eyes, that made him try to make light of what had been the most explosive moment of his year. "It was just a kiss, Emma Jean. Your grandma's kitchen table is a hundred years old and I'm sure it's withstood a lot more."

She didn't relax. Instead, she just continued to glare at him until they both flinched at the insistent ringing of the doorbell. Johnny had almost forgotten what had driven them apart to begin with.

Whoever was ringing had apparently grown impatient because the ding-dongs were incessant. "I'll get it."

Not waiting for her reply, he turned and went to answer the door. He didn't want to stand there for one more moment, knowing the spark of righteous indignation in her eye would have him ready to prove something to her all over again.

Like the fact that she was a screamer.

Hearing her clumping along after him within a second or two, he felt a sharp stab of regret for forgetting her injured ankle. "I said I'd get it, Emma Jean," he said as she followed him out of the kitchen. "Stay there."

She passed him in the hall, ignoring his command.

When Emma opened the door, Johnny somehow wasn't surprised to see Claire Deveaux standing outside. Next to her, on the porch, stood her daughter, who was reaching out to jab at the doorbell again with the tip of her index finger.

"Enough, Eve, the door's open," Claire said with a sigh.

Eve, a tough little cookie whose daddy doted on her before the whole town, was wearing a pink ballerina outfit. She looked like she'd rather be wearing a tool belt. Her ferocious frown dared him to make one crack about how pretty she was. He had a feeling if he did, she'd head-butt him in the gut or kick his ankles.

"Oh, my God, Claire!" Emma shrieked. She dropped the cane and threw herself into Claire's arms, the two of them hugging and jabbering a mile a minute.

The longer they ignored the kid, the more she frowned and pouted. Johnny crouched down until he was face-to-face with her. "My mother used to tell me when I stuck my lip out that far that a bird was going to land on it and peck at my nose."

She sucked the lip in, catching it between her teeth. Giving him a closemouthed grin, she raised a cocky eyebrow.

He grinned back. "Better."

"Oh, Claire, is this your baby?" Emma said, staring down at Eve in amazement.

Claire nodded, then put her hand on her daughter's shoulder. "Yes, this is Eve. And she has something to say to you."

Eve scuffed her little ballet shoe clad foot on the wooden porch and scowled up at her mother.

"Go on," Claire prompted.

"I'm sorry you fell in the blue stuff I spilled at the store," she mumbled. The girl sounded as pained at having to apologize as she would have at having to eat a plateful of brussels sprouts.

Johnny chuckled as a look of understanding slowly spread across Emma's face. She bent down to face the child. "It's okay, I'm sure you didn't spill it on purpose. Everybody has accidents."

Eve's eyes widened into twin saucers. Then she glared up at her mother. "You said big girls don't have accidents."

Claire sighed and shook her head. "We try not to, sugar. And she didn't mean
that
kind of accident!"

"She's adorable," Emma said as she straightened up to face Claire. "I still can't believe it. You, a mother." Then she grinned. "And married. You swore you'd never get married."

Claire gave her a cheeky grin. "Ahh, ahh, I didn't say never. Remember the article we read in
Cosmopolitan
magazine in senior year? I said the only way I'd get married was if I ever found a man who could do
that
." She cast a glance at Johnny and her face pinkened.

As Emma laughed, Johnny rubbed a hand over his brow. He did
not
want to know what they were talking about, particularly because Claire's husband, Tim, was a friend of his. He wondered how he'd ever be able to face him again without being tempted to ask the guy if he could lick his eyebrows.

"Can you come in and visit?"

"I'm sorry, no," Claire replied after casting a curious glance between him and Emma. "I have to get her to ballet class. Another round of 'terrorize the ballerinas' is on the schedule for this morning. But I wanted to stop by and say welcome home, and see if you need anything."

"Johnny brought me a few things this morning."

Johnny instantly saw the look of knowing amusement on the other woman's face and mentally cringed. He could almost hear her now—
still looking out for Emma Jean
?

Nope. Uh-uh. Not this guy. No matter what had almost happened back in the kitchen, he was definitely not sticking around to get kicked in the teeth again by Miss Emma Jean Frasier. It was time for this ol' boy to get outta here.

"Gotta go," he muttered. "Take care of yourself, Emma." With a friendly nod to Claire, a wink at Eve and barely a glance at Emma Jean, he walked down the front steps, got into his SUV and drove away.

"Tell me everything."

Emma raised a brow as Claire grabbed her daughter's hand and walked into the house. "I thought you had to get to ballet class."

Claire shrugged and plopped onto the stuffed sofa in the front room, which Grandma Emmajean had always called her sunroom. "That was when I thought Johnny was staying." She turned to her daughter. "Baby, you don't mind if we're late to dance class today, do you?"

Eve shook her head, hard, sending a riot of light brown curls dancing on her forehead. "I don't never wanna go back there." She stuck out her bottom lip and scowled as she explained. "Courtney Foster kicked me with her tap shoe and broke my leg."

Claire let out a loud sigh. "Eve, that was almost a year ago, your very first lesson and you don't even take tap anymore."

The child's frown didn't ease one bit. Emma had seen New York City cops who didn't look as fierce.

"Besides, you did not have a broken leg," Claire con-tinued. "And it was an
accident
." She met Emma's stare and rolled her eyes. "Unlike when you retaliated by punching Courtney in the nose."

Emma bit her lip to hold back a laugh. Remembering Claire's propensity for slugging anyone she thought needed it, she figured this was proof positive of the old "what goes around comes around" caveat.

Not that Emma could complain. After all, Claire had decked Daneen Brady on her behalf the first week of senior year. She'd told Emma that if she was too ladylike to blacken the eye of the girl who'd called her a man-stealing tramp, Claire was not. All three of them: the man-stealing tramp—Emma; the brawler—Claire; and the all-around bitch of the high school universe—Daneen, had gotten detention. What a start to her only year in public school.