She's All Tied Up: Club 3, Book 2 (10 page)

He strode away, the picture of a successful young businessman. George smiled after him and then turned back to Carlie, his gaze searching. “You mad at me?”

“Oh, Daddy,” she said. “Of course not. Well, maybe just a teensy bit. But I’ll get over it.”

They exchanged a smile, because both of them knew she’d inherited his inability to carry a grudge. He leaned sideways, bumping her arm with his. “Good. Seth will help sort it out. And I’ll tell your mother in the future to stay the hell out of it between you girls.” Not that this would work, but since they both knew this, Carlie forbore to mention it.

“I like Tiffany,” he added. “She thinks Seth could walk across the Willamette without using one of the bridges.”

Carlie gave him a look of deep affection. He would like whatever guy she ended up with too, as long as he treated her well. That was the simple yardstick with which her father measured the people in his children’s lives.

“I like her too,” she said. “Or I will once this wedding is over.”

George nodded. “Tiffany and her mother are very much…immersed in the process.”

They exchanged a guilty grin. That was putting it mildly.

“When you get married,” he said, “I’m emptying the savings account set up for you, and you can elope to an undisclosed tropical location and blow it all on your honeymoon.”

Carlie nodded. This was a good alternative to having Paula plan her wedding and having to live with her while she did so.

“Speaking of that,” her father added. “Dating anyone?”

She bit her lip, concentrating on folding her napkin neatly beside her plate. “Um, I’ve met someone. Daisy’s boyfriend, Dack? Jake is his best friend. It’s nothing steady, though. We’re just getting to know each other.” She thought of the ways in which she planned to let Jake get to know her, and blushed, her cheeks hot.

Her father hummed encouragingly.

“They own the fitness center I belong to,” she added. “Big Iron Fitness. Jake manages it for the partnership.”

“Really? I’ve driven by the place.” George looked impressed. Then he checked his watch and sighed. “Better get going, honey. You okay?”

Carlie rose and leaned over to hug him. “I’m okay, Dad. Thanks.”

Or she would be, once she knew what Tiffany’s response was to having her fiancé school her on his sister’s feelings. And once she got through her Saturday night “date” with Gerry. And then her first appearance at Club 3.

Yikes. Maybe it was time to move to Seattle.

Chapter Seven

Carlie heard the voices outside her car, but she kept her head down, sobbing into her sodden tissue. She jumped as knuckles rapped on her car window. Oh no. Even though it was dark, someone had spotted her. Geez, how humiliating was this? Saturday night, and most others her age were out on a date, or partying with friends.

What was she doing? Crying alone in her car in a parking lot.

She wasn’t really sure why she’d ended up here in the small parking area of Club 3 instead of back at her condo. She’d fled from the fiasco of her latest attempt to date and found herself driving familiar streets to Big Iron Fitness.

Not wanting to sit in the brightly lit gym parking lot, she’d driven back here like a small animal diving into the dark safety of a burrow. She’d hoped no one would even notice her in this shadowed corner of the lot, facing the club. She wasn’t going in tonight, that was for sure. Unless it was Crybaby Night, red, swollen eyes a must.

“Carlie,” ordered a deep, familiar voice. “Open up.”

Oh,
double
no. Of all the people to find her like this. Jake.

“Carlie. Open it.” Now he sounded adamant, as if he’d break in if needed.

Reluctantly, she fumbled for the lock button on her car door, and the locks popped. The door opened, warm summer night air wafting in.

She swiped at her wet face with the tissues and then with the back of her hand, keeping her head tipped forward so she could hide behind the curtain of her hair. Delaying the moment when she had to face him.

“Yeah, I got it,” he said over her head. “Thanks, guys. You can head out.”

Other voices answered faintly, then car doors slammed and a motor revved up. Carlie drew a deep, shuddering breath.

“Carlie? What’s going on?” Jake asked quietly, his voice nearer. “What happened?”

She shook her head. “I-I just…”

“Damn it. Are you hurt?” his deep voice was hard now. Her hair was pulled back from her face, her chin grasped in a huge, calloused hand. He turned her head, and a bright light arrowed into her eyes. Ack, he had a penlight.

She squinted her eyes shut, protesting wordlessly and he loosened his grip, his palm cupping her wet cheek. “Talk to me, or I call the cops.”

“No.” She shook her head. “You can’t—it’s not…”

“Carlie. Talk. To. Me. Are you hurt?”

“No, not physically.”

“Have you been sexually assaulted? Did someone try to force you?” His voice was quiet, but still powerful enough to drive steel spikes.

She shook her head, hard, her hair swishing. “No. No, honestly. Just another really, really crappy night in my love life. Or lack of one.”

He was silent for a moment. “Fuck. All right, sit tight, baby. I’m gonna go around and get in the other side. Okay?”

“Okay.” That sounded really nice, actually.

He strode around her car, a hard, uncompromising silhouette in the lights around the parking area.

She fumbled in the console for another tissue and wiped under her eyes. Geez, she probably looked like a crazed raccoon with mascara and shadow beneath her eyes and her face wet with tears.

The car dipped under Jake’s weight as he settled into the seat beside her and turned to her, setting his near hand on the back of her seat. His wide mouth was limned in the parking lot lights, the upper half of his face in shadow, only the glitter of his eyes visible.

Good, that meant if she sat up straight, her eyes would be in shadow too, and he couldn’t see their puffy pinkness—she hoped. She hadn’t seen him for a week, and she’d hoped the next time they met it would be under entirely different circumstances. Like inside Club 3, with her ready for a night of sexy fun. Not her whining about her problems
again
.

“Now, talk to me.” It was an order, but strangely, as usual when he spoke to her that way, Carlie found it very reassuring. She
had
to tell him, no choice. She nodded and sniffled, twisting her tissue in her hands in her lap.

“My…my company, EbiTeck, has a lot of formal functions. Dinner dances and such. We’re all expected to put in an appearance. Usually, it’s kind of fun. T-tonight, I didn’t have a date, so I agreed to go with Ger—with one of the sales reps. He’s known as being a player, but I thought, you know, one evening, I can h-handle him.”

She paused, and Jake waited. She had the crazy feeling he would wait all night if necessary for her to gather the courage to finish her story. Which helped her do so. She took another deep breath and went on.

“Everything was fine until the owner left and the guys started doing shots. I wanted to leave, but I stopped to chat with one of the other women. W-when I walked through the bar, G-Gerry was waiting for me. H-he said…right in front of the other guys, he s-said he was going to do me a favor and—and ‘do me’, because I probably couldn’t get anyone else to do it.” He’d laughed so hard he’d nearly fallen off his bar stool. “‘Get it?’ he’d asked. ‘Do you a favor and do you?’”

The leather seat behind her head quivered. She turned her head and saw that Jake’s arm was shaking with the force of his grip on the seat back. His jaw flexed, the muscles standing out in a fascinating ridge. And he was making that utterly sexy, alpha male growling sound again, deep in his chest.

“And then?” he rumbled.

She blinked. Remembered and huffed a laugh that turned into a sob. “Then h-his friends snickered. And I-I picked up a drink and threw it in his face, and I ran.”

Jake nodded, once. “All right. You did good.”

“Good?” she demanded incredulously. “It was like high school all over again. That—that
jerk
. And his jerky little minions. Bunch of little jerky computer geeks.
I have to
work
with them.”

“Jerk?” Jake repeated dryly. “That’s the best you can do? Baby, we gotta teach you to swear.”

“I don’t curse,” she said and then added truthfully on a sniff, “Well, not very much.”

He nodded, his mind clearly not on her words. “What’d you say this asshole’s name is? Ger—something? Gerald, Gerhart, Gerry. Gerry, huh?”

Carlie swiped her sodden tissues over her damp face. “Yeah. But, well…thanks for listening.”

Even if this just completed her cycle of humiliation with him. Geez, now he knew even the players didn’t really want her. Time to snap out of this cycle of self-pity, or he’d think she had an “L” tattooed on her forehead. She turned to him and tried a smile.

“Behind that scowl, you’re a nice guy, Jake Stone. But you can’t do anything about this. I’m going to have to handle it.”

Jake reached absently for a long curl that had fallen over her shoulder, looping it around his finger.

“Don’t kid yourself, Carlie. I’m exactly what I appear—a mean, bad-tempered sonuvabitch. And yeah, I can do something. You don’t have to handle this alone. I got it.”

“You ‘got it’?” she repeated. “Um…why?”

He cocked his head. “Because you’re a woman, you’re Daisy’s friend, you’re a member of my gym and now my club, you don’t have a man to do it for you, so I will. Nobody talks to you like that.”

He let the curl go and watched it spring back. Then he carefully brushed it back over her shoulder. His thumb strayed to her cheek, and he rubbed it very gently along the line of her jaw. Carlie couldn’t control the shiver of sensation that raced through her any more than she could the pleasure at his calm assertion that he wanted to come to her aid.

His jaw tightened, and he looked up into her eyes. Carlie held her breath at the raw power of that gaze. Something else had entered the space between them. Something heated and powerful and absolutely nothing to do with crying over a bad date.

“You afraid of me?” he rasped.

She shook her head instantly. Then she reached out her own hand and daringly touched his face, the way he had touched hers. He hadn’t shaved. His skin was hot under her questing fingertips, the short whiskers surprisingly soft over the hard frame of his jaw. She wanted to touch his mouth too.

“No,” she whispered. “Well, a little…sometimes. When you put on your dom face. But while I appreciate your offer, I don’t want you getting in trouble on my account.”

His wide mouth twitched. “My dom face?”

Her tummy flipped. Should she not have said that?

He reached up and engulfed her hand in his, then totally rocked her world by turning his head to brush his nose and mouth over the inside of her wrist. Arousal shivered through her at the heat of his lips, the warmth of his breath on her sensitive skin, the brush of barely there masculine whiskers. Heat furled deep inside her, and it was a good thing she was sitting, because her knees felt funny…all loose. Not her pussy, though—it was clenching with need. She squirmed in her seat, pressing her thighs together, then froze as his gaze tracked every subtle movement.

Watching her over their hands, he brushed his lips farther up her wrist, pushing back her loose sleeve as he went. Satisfaction edged his gaze. Oh yes, he knew exactly how much she liked what he was doing.

She had never experienced such an erotic moment, and all this man was doing was kissing her arm, for goodness’ sake. He held her in his thrall, and she welcomed it.

“See, the thing about me being a dom,” he said, his deep voice soft, “is you don’t get to decide whether I confront the little prick—I do.”

She blinked, struggling to focus on his words as well as what he was doing. “But, Jake… Gerry’s exactly the kind of guy that will call the cops if you try to intimidate him.”

“You think I’m worried about the cops?” He brushed his lips over her skin again, and her fingers curled into her palm against the urge to—to do something rash. Like sink onto his chest and beg him for a kiss on her mouth instead of wasting them on her arm.

She tried to focus. “Well, you should be. I mean with the club and all.”

A deep
huh-huh
in his chest shocked her out of her arousal. He was laughing at her? It was a very nice laugh, but he should be taking this seriously.

“Baby, you’d be shocked as hell how many active duty cops and military folks belong to the club. No, I’m not worried about the cops. Not like I’m gonna maim him.”

Her face heated. “Oh,” she said primly. Really? Cops and soldiers liked to misbehave too? Although he was a Marine, so she guessed she shouldn’t be surprised there were others.

“But back to me being a dom,” he went on, his thumb stroking the area he’d just kissed. “I
am
one, through and through. I’m possessive as hell, and I don’t share my toys. Are you following me here, baby?”

That deep, velvety voice made her feel petite, feminine and completely retro—all things of which she should disapprove, not crave.

“Um, not entirely.” Had she missed something again? Was this where he scowled and stomped away again because she’d missed her cue?