Shrinking Violet (Colors #2) (12 page)

His body was a work of art, and the sexually repressed part of my brain wanted to take that art and defile it in the most delicious ways, to lick those muscled ridges like a popsicle.

The two of us stood in lustful silence as we watched Carson unloading bales of hay from the back of Kal’s pickup. His skin had a perfect golden tan to it. The muscles on his back tensed and flexed as he picked up each heavy bale. If the view from the back was beautiful then the front was what fantasies were made of. Hard pecs traveled down to chiseled abs the likes of which I’d never seen. Was that…one, two, three, four…yep, no standard issue six-pack for Carson Langford. The man was sporting an eight-pack. My fingers itched to trail down that defined V that dipped down into the waistband of his jeans.

“He better be packing,” Lana spoke from beside me, her gaze still firmly on the window. “Dear God, I
hope
he’s packing. If he’s carrying anything less than six inches with that body, it’d be like a slap in the face from God.”

An indelicate snort escaped me as I keeled over with laughter. There were a ton of reasons why I loved Lana so much, and the random things that spilled from her mouth were just one of them.

“What? You know it’s the truth!”

I went back to the dishes, trying my hardest to drag my mind from the gutter. It had been over a month since Carson kissed me in the parking lot of Miller’s and with every day that passed, my desire only continued to grow. Over the weeks, we’d managed to develop somewhat of a friendship, but the attraction was still there, hanging heavily between us. It was the ever-present elephant in the room whenever we were near each other. I didn’t
want
to be captivated by him. Truth be told, what I was feeling scared the living hell out of me. But I’d be damned if I could get it to turn off.

From the corner of my eye, I could see Lana resting her hip against the counter. Her arms were crossed over her chest, and I had no doubt her expression was chock-full of curiosity. I knew an inquisition was coming.

“So, what’s the deal with you two?”

Called it
.

My head dipped down, concentrating on washing dishes as though it was the most fascinating thing on Earth. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, what a load of bullshit!” she shouted.

“You know, I
do
have a little kid running around here. You mind watching your language?”

“She’s out in the chicken coop with Milly, gathering eggs. Her virgin ears are safe…for now.”

I dropped the last plate in the drying rack and reached for a dishtowel to dry my hands. I turned to face Lana and mimicked her stance. “Aren’t you supposed to be training Thunder right now?”

Thunder was a black stallion Uncle Kal had just purchased for breeding. The horse was bigger than any I’d ever seen before. He was imposing in size and had a shitty attitude. I’d been leery of allowing Willow anywhere near the stables since Uncle Kal brought him to the ranch. I didn’t like Thunder one bit, and I was pretty damn sure the feeling was mutual. Unfortunately for me, my Doodle Bug seemed enamored with the all-black beast from the moment he stepped from the trailer. If someone didn’t keep a constant watch on her, she’d take off in his direction in a heartbeat.

“Eh, that ornery bastard can wait a few more minutes. It won’t kill him. Now, answer my question.”

“We’re…friends, I guess,” I answered hesitantly. It wasn’t quite a lie, but not quite the truth either.

“Friends,” Lana deadpanned with a dry look on her face that said
are you shitting me right now?

I walked to the kitchen table and plopped down in one of the wooden chairs with a dejected sigh. “I don’t know, Lana. Honestly, I have no idea what’s going on. I keep telling myself I just want us to be friends, but then I’m around him and I just…”

“You just what?” she asked as she took a seat in the chair next to me.

“Lose my mind,” I answered solemnly. “It’s like I can’t think straight when I’m around him. And when he’s
not
around, all I can do is wish he was. It’s this twisted cycle I can’t seem to pull myself out of.”

“That’s called
liking someone
, Cass. It’s not a foreign concept, and it sure as hell isn’t a bad thing.” Lana laughed.

“It is for me!” I argued. “I’m a mess when it comes to relationships, Lana! I’ve already told you this. You know all about the things I’ve done. How can you honestly say my feelings for Carson are a good thing?”

Reaching over, Lana put her hands on my shoulders and looked me directly in the eyes. “Because you aren’t that girl anymore. I’m not going to lie to you, Cassidy. Yes, you did some pretty reprehensible stuff when you were younger. But the difference between now and then is that you go out of your way to make sure you never make the same mistakes you made back then.
That’s
why I think you and Carson are a good thing.”

“Lana, the last relationship I was in—”

“We aren’t talking about that asshole,” she interrupted. “You hear me?”

“He’s not the only one at fault in this, and you know it. Hell, I don’t blame Seth for bailing on me one bit. What I did was so beyond the scope of shitty that it jumped straight into the realm of fucked-up.”

Her face pinched in a sour look as her eyes narrowed. “What’d I say about not talking about that asshole?”

My hands went up in mock surrender. “All right, all right. No more talking about Seth.”

“Good girl.” She grinned excitedly. “Now, let’s talk more about how you should totally get in Hotty McRancher’s pants…you know, strictly for measurements, of course.”

“Of course.” I laughed. “He almost kissed me the other day,” I whispered, suddenly afraid someone would come in and overhear our conversation.

“
No shit?!
” Lana screeched at the top of her lungs. I was fairly certain she busted my ear drum. “Wait…what do you mean,
almost
? Was it hot? I bet it was hot. Tellmetellmetellme!”

It had been so long since I sat down with a girlfriend to gossip about a boy. I actually found myself getting excited to tell Lana all about it. Just as I opened my mouth to fill her in on the steamiest almost-kiss I’d ever had in my life, there was a knock at the front door.

I opened the door to a beautiful blonde girl with red-rimmed, dark blue eyes. She looked like she’d been crying. She was a tiny little thing, but from the looks of her I’d guess she was in her late teens to twenty. Looking past her tear-streaked mascara, I could see she had shadows behind those navy blue eyes that made her seem older. I could definitely sympathize with those shadows.

“Hi, can I help you?”

“Hi. I’m, uh…I’m looking for Carson Langford. Can you tell me if he’s here?”

“Yeah, sure. Come on in and I’ll go get him.”

I stepped back to let her through the door. As she walked past, I snuck a better look at her. She was really pretty in that fresh-faced, girl-next-door kind of way.

“I’m Cassidy.”

“Oh, yeah.” She smiled sadly, trying to hide the fact that she was clearly upset. “Carson’s told me a lot about you. Nice to meet you. I’m Navie. Carson and I live together.”

It was like brakes screeching in my head.
Live together?

What the hell?

That excited fire that began to burn in my belly just moments before was extinguished quick as lightning. Carson lived with another woman. Carson had a live-in girlfriend he never told me about.

Oh, my God! I saw him at Miller’s right after he’d hooked up with another girl!

My stomach twisted in painful knots as I looked in disbelief at the pretty girl standing in front of me. Jealousy raged like a forest fire in my blood but I managed to tamp it down, concentrating instead on Carson’s poor girlfriend. From the looks of her, it appeared she’d caught on to him playing around.

“Let me go get Carson for you. I’ll be right back; just make yourself comfortable.”

Her grin was genuine, her relief palpable. “Thank you so much.”

As I made my way through the kitchen toward the back door, Lana stood from the table. “Who was it?”

“Carson’s girlfriend,” I answered between clenched teeth.

“Are you fucking
kidding me
?!”

“Nope, and if I get a chance, I’m going to rip his balls off and feed them to him.”

How dare he kiss me…how
dare
he act like there was something between us when he had a live-in girlfriend the whole time!

“I’m right behind you, babe.”

With Lana on my heels, I stomped toward the barn, anger and sadness swirling around in my chest.

I was beginning to regret the day Carson Langford stepped foot on Willow Ranch. Maybe I could get Uncle Kal to kick his ass for me.

The sight of Cassidy coming my way at a fast clip would have typically excited me, but her scowl combined with that murderous glare in her eyes caused my steps to falter. I had no idea what happened to put that look on her face, but whatever it was couldn’t be good.

When she got close enough, I reached out to touch her, only to have her jerk away from me. “Hey, what’s the matter, sweetheart?”

Before she could answer, Lana came running up behind her. She looked like she was trying to melt the skin off my face with her eyes. “Oh, you’re such a dick!”

My head pulled back in shock. “What? What the hell did I do?”

“There’s someone here to see you,” Cassidy said in a sugar-sweet voice that belied her expression. A chill went up my spine and a sense of impending doom hovered around us, I just didn’t understand why.

“For me?” I asked in surprise. “Who?”

“Your
girlfriend
, asshole,” Lana hissed. “That’s who.”

What the ever-loving hell?
“Huh? What girlfriend?”

Cassidy’s response dripped with sarcasm. “Oh, you know…the one you
live
with.”

It took my brain a few seconds to process what she’d just said. “Who…You mean Navie? Is she okay?”

“Oh,
now
he remembers,” Lana scoffed in disgust, but all I could concentrate on was the fact that Navie was at the ranch. If she came to see me while I was working, something had to be wrong.

“Where is she?” I rushed out, needing to get to her and make sure she was okay.

At the desperation in my voice, Cassidy’s eyes narrowed further. “You know, you really are an asshole. I can’t believe I actually thought you were a decent guy. I’m such an idiot.”

“Cassidy,” I rushed out, my frustration beginning to grow. “Navie isn’t my girlfriend, okay? Now, where is she?”

“You expect me to believe that? You’ve lost your damn mind if you think I’m going to fall for that bullshit. You’ve been flirting with me for over a month. I saw you hooking up with another girl in a
bar
, for Christ’s sake. What kind of man does that when he’s got someone at home waiting on him? You’re a—”

With that, I lost my cool completely and shouted, “Enough!” My concern for Navie compounded with each barbed insult Cassidy hurled at me sent me over the edge. “You want to think I’m an asshole without giving me the benefit of the doubt, that’s on you. But I don’t have time to deal with this shit. Where is she?”

There was only one person on the planet I held above all others, and that was Navie…my
only
family. That meant I refused to stand there and take Cassidy’s tongue-lashing, especially when she’d already made her snap-judgment to paint me as the bad guy.

She must have sensed the volatile shift in my mood because she took a step back, the anger seeping from her expression, her face growing cautious. “She’s in the living room. She looks like she’s upset. I think she was crying.”

“
Shit
,” I hissed, taking off at a run. I heard Lana say something about me being busted and trying to cover my ass, but I didn’t care enough to defend myself. Navie was at the ranch and she was upset. That was the only thing I could concentrate on.

“Navie!” I shouted the second I hit the back door. I rushed through the kitchen and into the living room, coming to an abrupt halt when I saw her sitting on the couch, shoulders hunched with tears in her eyes. “What happened? Are you okay?”

Her dark blue eyes hit me, full of sadness and…was that guilt? “I’m so sorry,” she whispered with a shake of her head. “It’s all my fault.”