His fingers curled and he watched her walk away. Years more of keeping her neck in line or a few uncomfortable evenings. He pulled in a deep breath. “Deal.”
She stopped and turned around. Her eyes wide on her face. “
What?
”
“I said, deal.” He swallowed. “During the day, you’re mine. You do what I say. At night, I’m all yours.”
Chapter Two
Tiffany stared at the two story, stone whitewashed building. The corners along the top of the building had elegant looking curls with apples carved in the stone. It was a classic, town-square courthouse building. The windows were long and browned with age like sad eyes. The doors coated with a bronzed reflective surface mirrored her appearance. A last chance to get a look at yourself and your freedom.
Funny. This time she was going for a job and hoping for a better chance…the last time she stood here, she was nearly pissing her panties and waiting to be locked up in Juvie. Those sad, pitiful windows had been stern and disapproving reflecting the law. She shuddered, thankful that event hadn’t been put on her record. Drag racing tractors down Apple Dumplin’ Road at midnight really had been a stupid idea…even if she had banked a hundred bucks.
Apple Trail had been rough and fantastic, often revolving around how often she’d been required to visit this very building. Here it was again, straightening her life out once more. Lessons were taught to her here better than any parent could have, even if they’d been alive.
A loud caw cried out and the raking noise shuddered clean down to her heels. She turned just in time to see a huge brown bird land and perch on the limb of a blooming magnolia tree. Beady eyes stared her down. Coarse feathers ruffled out in warning.
A vulture. Fantastic. Well, that was a new addition to her visits here. She hurried up the white steps and gripped the big brass handles of the ancient glass door and tugged it open.
That old familiar scent of a library book rolled over. Why the courthouse smelled of a library book she never understood, but that crisp, quiet essence was there each time she’d passed through these doors.
She rubbed sweating palms down her jean covered hips and followed the length of freshly waxed white marble floors.
Click-clack-click
of her heels echoed through the open center, announcing her presence, making sure she was not caught sneaking in. She winced and tried staying on her toes.
And then she spotted a long, lean shadow. The figure of a head and broad shoulders thinned down to hips and legs in that cowboy stance. John Wayne wasn’t standing at the end of the shadow, but that in-charge stance reflected in his shadow was there.
A lawman. No nonsense. Shadow met brown boots. And the cowboy image stopped. Impeccably pressed slacks. Tan belt with a gold buckle of a star smartly showing off his years of hard work. Ivory button up shirt hiding his body all the way up to shoulders and then just him. His face. Carved jaw and cheek bones. Hard eyes and the softest lips she’d ever seen.
The face of the man who troubled her the most.
Mike Gable. Correction—Chief Deputy Sherriff Mike Gable. Second in charge of Union County. The man in charge of Apple Trail, Arkansas. Young for his position, but respected more than the actual County Sherriff stationed in the next town by nearly half the people in the county. Mike was rumored to take that spot one day. Tiffany didn’t care. It wasn’t his position that hackled her.
He’d been itching her into chills since tenth grade. Way back then when he’d been the hot Senior, star-quarterback, straight-A teacher's pet and all around go-to-guy. It was long before he sat behind the wheel of his first patrol car, well before he pulled her over for speeding in said patrol car, and certainly before he started butting into her life and telling her how to live it.
She’d never grown out of her feelings. Her school girl crush was as strong now as then. On one hand she wanted to shove him in the nearest room and kiss him senseless, on the other, she wanted to kick him in the ass and shatter that huge stick he had rammed up there. It wasn’t a sense of betterment and entitlement he walked around with. Just an overwhelming mark of no fun. And that would be fine, if she didn’t want to rip his clothes off his body and knowing at the same time, he would never let her. How could she possibly be so attracted to such a stick in the mud? She couldn’t explain it.
One thing for certain, she didn’t like it. She didn’t want to want someone who was so clearly disgusted by her every move.
“Tiffany.” He glanced down her body and nodded. “You’re early.”
She tugged on her pink cotton shirt, knowing she’d just passed some test, but still feeling like she was miserably failing simply by showing up. “Only a few minutes.”
“Right.” He closed a file in his hands. The paperwork snipped with a wisp. “This way. Mary Sue Watkins will be training you on the equipment and the job.”
“You’re not doing it?” Was she hopeful or disappointed? Couldn’t say. And that scared her more. Every time she saw him, she just wanted something. She didn’t know what. A sign or clue, a hint that he wasn’t perfect. That his life wasn’t perfect. That he struggled too. She just wanted
something.
A connection to explain her strong physical reaction.
His eyes met hers and then shifted away with a clearing of his throat. “I swore I wouldn’t be hovering over you. It’s Mary Sue’s job anyway. She’ll be on maternity leave in a couple months and we were needing a temporary replacement.”
Temporary.
When her shoulders wanted to collapse and her chin smack her chest, she forced herself straight. As everything in her life, she didn’t know why she had been hoping this stint would be different. She started forward, ready for more temporary. Hey, at least she knew what to expect. “Sure.”
He grabbed the knob of a dark oak door and paused with a look at her. “I like Mary Sue. She’s efficient and polite. I expect you to treat her well and not cause problems.”
When something vile and full of cursing starting to vibrate her voice box, she pressed her lips closed and swallowed it down. “I can’t image there being a problem.”
And then a brown haired woman looked up from a desk and Tiffany’s belly landed in her heels.
Tiffany just didn’t realize until now exactly who Mary Sue Watkins was. She had known, of course. She just hadn’t put it all together until she saw the wide, innocent blue eyes. Curly, short cropped brown hair and cutesy outfit.
And now Tiffany was in hell. That vulture outside knew and was waiting on her to jump out the window and flatten herself on the concrete.
Mary Sue was adorable. Sweet. Classy.
Everything Tiffany was not.
Mary Sue had sat in the front row. Tiffany behind her and occasionally cheated off her paper in school. All right, had cheated off her paper every chance she got. The girl had a bark as strong as the Easter Bunny whereas Tiffany bellowed like a shotgun bringing down a flock of ducks.
She could remember one distinct memory of entering the high school girl’s bathroom. Mary Sue had been washing her hands. Their eyes met in the mirror and Mary Sue grabbed her things and hauled ass out, even leaving the water running in the sink as if Tiffany might kill her with only a glance.
This woman put Tiffany’s nerves on edge with her short breaths because for some reason or another, Tiffany terrified this girl. She didn’t know why or how, but more than one time in school, Tiffany had thought back and wondered what she might have done to this girl, only to come up short for answers.
Tiffany swallowed. She could do this. She could survive Mary Sue’s whispered talk and jumpy, shy movements without feeling she was terrifying the girl into an early grave.
Mary Sue smiled and came from around the chest-high counter. “Hi.”
Lord have mercy, Mike may have said Mary Sue had a few more months before she was due, but the woman looked nine months pregnant. That’s all Tiffany needed tacked on her reputation.
Tiffany McBride scared poor Mary Sue Watkins into early labor! She nearly lost the baby over it.
This was a joke. She glanced to Mike for conformation, but Mike put his large hand on her lower back nudged her forward. “Tiffany’s going to replace you while you’re out with the baby.”
The papers in Mary Sue’s hands fluttered to the floor and so did the girl’s jaw. She recovered quickly enough with a start and rubbed her belly. Her eyes averted. “Baby moved and startled me.”
Tiffany squatted and gathered up the paperwork and wanted to hide under the nearest desk. Would they notice if she dropped to all fours and crawled out of the room? This was going to be loads of fun. Couldn’t she have Mike’s overbearing, nonstop correcting presence instead? His dark eyes to see herself in. Hard, unapproving jaw she wanted to kiss. Carefully styled hair she wanted to rake her fingers through.
Heat filled her cheeks. Gracious, where had that come from? Acting like the adult she was supposed to be, Tiffany stood and held out the papers.
With thin and shaking fingers, Mary Sue took them and clutched them to her chest as if they were the baby in her belly.
Peachy.
Mike looked between them. “Show her the ropes. Is that paperwork from the weekend?”
Mary Sue nodded.
“That’s probably a good place to start.”
Mary Sue’s eyes widened to the size of the homemade pies she no doubt daily baked. Her hand soothed down the back of the white paper as though she petted them. “Y-yes, sir.”
Mike turned on his heels and walked through the doorway at his back, closing the door after he was through it.
Tiffany turned back to Mary Sue and found her watching. There must be some way to break the ice here.
I’m the devil waiting to cart you off to hell
nearly slipped over her tongue, but she managed to stop it. “I’m going to do my best not to screw this up.”
Mary Sue bit her lower lip. Real brilliant there, Tiffany.
Seconds ticked by. Literally. There was a small clock on the wall
tick-tocking
off as they stared at one another. Tiffany glanced around, waiting and realized she was going to have to nudge Mary Sue out of her shock or else they might be like this until quitting time. “Mike said to start with that paperwork.”
Mary Sue glanced over her shoulder to a different doorway behind her and then back at the papers in her hand. She pulled in a heavy breath and rushed out a single word. “Yes.”
Chapter Three
Mike was in for it. What had he been thinking?
At night,
I’m yours.
It was a fucking disaster waiting to happen. As he stood on the steps outside the courthouse with her, the sunset firing her blonde hair to shimmering strands of spun gold as she stared down the street to the exact place he didn’t want to go.
End Of The Trail. Apple Trail’s only bar. The place he often caught her up to her neck in drunks while hustling money out of them.
“We’re going to grab a couple beers and play some pool. And that’s it.” Smug smile planted on her face and made those damnable dimples that he now knew had a matching pair on her ass, dot her face. His tongue grew thick and dry with desire to lick the imprint on her cheek before possessing her mouth.
That was the problem. The dimples. Her cursed dimples. And pink lips. Eyes like honey graham crackers and blonde hair curling around her face. A face of sweet innocence when she was anything but.
He swallowed, needing out of the public eye in case he lost his mind that was hanging by a thread. “My job is an appointed position.”
She stared at him.
“And a public one.” And this was all true and he wasn’t ashamed to use it. This was all but desperate, knee begging pleading to insist on not going to the bar and being drawn into her typical antics he usually had to pull her out of. By their stated “rules” he wouldn’t be able to stop any trouble she might attempt.
Still she only stared with those huge, big, massive-sized brown eyes staring up at him. Only the slight gleam in them and the wry turn of her lips hinted of a naughty girl underneath. And her lashes too. Her long feathery brown lashes slowly lowering and raising. And that body with those lush sinful curves created surely with the Forbidden Fruit in mind. Pure attractive, tempting wickedness.
He rubbed the back of his neck and focused on anything but his cock and what he’d like to do with it. “It’s an erection year—
election
year. Everything I do reflects on the Sherriff and the county. And if Jimmy Michaels doesn’t get reelected as Sherriff in the fall, his replacement could remove me. I’m not saying I won’t agree to going there. We had a deal. Just don’t expect to get me slobbering drunk. I’ll draw the line at anything that could risk my position and that of others.”
A breath filled her lungs and she nodded. “Change of plans then. We’ll go to your house.”
His house? Damn it.
His jaws threatened to shatter at the pressure they were holding. What had he been thinking? Public where he’d have the pressure of watching eyes to keep his hands to himself would have been damn near perfect.
Now they would be at his house.
Alone.
Together. Fuck, he just couldn’t think around her. And when did he start mentally cussing this much? “I’m not saying I won’t go there and play a game with you.”
“No, no. It’s fine.” Her hand that could do so much to his body with the slightest touch waved temptingly in front of his face. “I’m not setting out to publicly humiliate you. I just want you to have some fun for once.”
He frowned. “I have fun all the time.”
She shook her head and turned around. “Sure you do. Do you have a DVD player?”
“Yes.” Because his mom gave him one for Christmas. He’d never used it. He didn’t have time for TV. He didn’t mention it was still in the box and stashed…somewhere. The hall closet, he was fairly sure. Behind his winter coats.
“Great. Let’s go to the video store.” She trotted down the steps.
“You’re going to trade in a pool game for a movie?” As in, make him trade in from a public hands-to-himself-why-did-he-talk-himself-out-of-that to his house, on his couch, just the two of them? In the dark.
She stopped and looked back at him. “How often do you take off your shoes and just watch a movie?” When he didn’t give an answer, she shook her head. Her eyes were heavy with sadness. “What I thought. I’ll get the movie. You do have popcorn and stuff, don’t you?”
He had popcorn. He didn’t know what else counted as stuff, but he wasn’t interested in getting hammered at home either. He had to be a work in the morning and didn’t want to do it with a hangover. As far as he was concerned, “stuff” meant water. Or tea. “Yeah.”
She flashed him one of those heart stopping grins. Which was, you know, just one of her usual grins.
“Meet you at your house in a bit.” She turned and trotted down the stairs.
In her tight jeans, her ass didn’t bounce, but it was still a fine sight. Christ, he was getting a boner on the steps of the Courthouse. And he was worried
she
might embarrass him.
He climbed in his truck and drove straight home. There was no stopping anywhere. He couldn’t get her out of his mind. Her voice all day long from the next room had driven him into mad distraction. He’d hardly accomplished a thing. Scratch that. He probably set a record for holding the longest boner.
And why could he still smell her perfume? Fifteen minutes apart and he shouldn’t be smelling her. Or remembering her uncertain, nearly fearful eyes as she stared at Mary Sue. He’d always known Tiffany to tackle anything life dished her, sometimes literally, but as she’d stared at the little wisp of pregnant and harmless Mary Sue, there was no mistaking her intimidated fear.
He parked in his drive and rested his head on the steering wheel for a few minutes. He could get through this and keep his hands to himself.
His fingers curled around the steering wheel, remembering the heat of her back when he’d made the overwhelming, god-awful mistake of touching her. He didn’t touch when he wasn’t dragging her ass out of one situation or another. His fingertips twitched, recalling the turn of her hips under his palm. The heat and nervous dampness that had reached him.
“Son-of-a-bitch.” If he put on his thickest pair of gloves when it was ninety degrees outside would she notice? He yanked the door open and got out and headed inside. Better to get the DVD dug out and plugged in like it’d been that way for years before she got there.
The box was in the back of the closet, tucked in behind his rarely used set of golf clubs with a layer of dust over the top of the box. He’d just gotten it plugged in and checked when he heard the whine of an engine. Being he lived out of town on a fifty acre lot with his house tucked in the center of his property, it had to be her.
He tossed the empty DVD box out the backdoor and headed towards the front of his house. Maybe if he saw her first at a distance rather than opening the door and having her just there, he’d warm up to her and be able to keep his hands to himself. Or at the very least, not maul her to the tile floor.
He adjusted his nonstop hard dick and tugged his shirt down in the best attempt he had to hide it and jerked the door open. Oh, hell.
Worst. Timing. Ever.
She was jogging up the front of the steps. Her tits were bouncing in her shirt. No, he couldn’t see the swells in her high-cut cotton shirt, but hell, he’d seen them yesterday. And it didn’t take an artist to paint in the image. He glanced to her face as the wind took her hair and whipped it out to the side. The summer heat had her skin flushed. A smile was on her lips. A bag was over her shoulder.
A bag? An overnight bag?
He swallowed and pushed the door open wide to give her plenty of room.
She walked past, a chuckle purred from her throat as she patted his chest. “Relax, Mike. It’s a just a movie. You’re not going to die from relaxing.”
Her fingers slid across his chest and she continued in. Her nails scraped over the thin fabric, the touch barely a whisper against his skin crawled all over his body in shuddering waves.
No, he wouldn’t die from relaxing. That was for damn sure. The honey scent of her skin filled him anew. There would be no relaxing so long as she was here. There was a very good chance he’d die from all his blood leaving his body to throb in his cock.
He shut the door and followed after. Having been in his house before, during campaign parties and other gatherings, she knew her way around. He found her in the kitchen.
Bent over into the refrigerator. The door hid her body. Or most of it. Her ass was showing along with her legs. And legs. And legs... in her tight jeans. Since when were jeans made that fucking tight? She stood and looked at him.
Her brow was pulled down in puzzlement. “You don’t have any coke?”
He shrugged. “There’s tea.”
She rolled her eyes. “Goodness. How can you eat popcorn without coke?”
She pulled the tea out and shut the door and stopped suddenly. “You do have salt for the popcorn, don’t you?”
“Yes.” Maybe that’s what he needed. Pour a salt shaker down his throat to remove the imagined taste of her sweet skin.
Physical relief swept over her. “At least we have that.”
He reached for the red sack with the movie. “What did you get?”
She slapped his hand away. “Wait and see. Get the drinks and I’ll do the popcorn.”
He pulled a glass out of the cabinet. He turned back, and the plastic cup slipped from his fingers. Tiffany pulled her pink shirt over her head and revealed a tight, white shirt on underneath. She shook her head. Long hair swept from side to side. The white undershirt cut low. The edges of her pale satin bra peeked above the shirt. Her tits were pressed together and gave her a cleavage his tongue wanted to explore. The shirt hugged her tiny waist and she might as well have been naked and just wearing paint.
She turned for the microwave. Her foot tapped the floor and she punched buttons, unaware he stood there frozen. She dropped her hands to her hips as the microwave started. The strap of her shirt fell off her shoulder only to disappointingly catch on her arm.
He snapped out of it and bent for the dropped cup. He needed air. Just a few minutes of space to get his head back on his shoulders and out of his pants. He turned away and grabbed ice, hoping the cool frost from the freezer would calm his blood. It didn’t. He could smell her in the kitchen over the buttery popcorn. Even though he’d never gone there, he could swear thick honey coming from her skin coated his tongue.
He sat their glasses on the counter and she turned immediately, filling them both with tea.
Right away she took a drink and then gagged. Her eyes bulged, cheeks full. She slapped a hand over her mouth.
“Tiffany?”
She ran for the sink and spit it out coughing. He patted her back. “Was it bad? I just made it yesterday and it was fine.”
She turned. He couldn’t help but notice her breasts brushing his chest. His hand, that had been on her back, was now on her hip. Of the flecks of green bits in her golden eyes. Of her…sharply drawn together eyebrows.
She slapped him on the arm. “Lord, Mike. Unsweet? Jesus.”
Unsweet. That was it? The worry slipped out. Awareness of everything about her took it’s place. Unsweet tea was what he liked. He liked it even more as a bit dripped down her chin. Licking it away would be a fine idea. The sugar of her skin would blend well with the bitter tea on his tongue. Or probably it would just be her tasting good. She swiped it off with the back of her hand, taking away the idea.
Overly aware of his hand on her hip, of his fingers curling around her side and lying over the top of her ass, he pulled his hand away. And immediately regretted it. He shook his head, wishing for some clear thoughts. “I have some sweetener in the pantry.”
She remained in her spot. “Water’s fine.”
“Okay.” He stood there like a moron still. Doing nothing but staring and waiting and wanting his hands back on her. But he couldn’t put his hands back on her.
Her eyes averted and he knew the moment was about to be gone. After all these years of being frustrated by her, here was his moment. Just as fast as it came, it was gone. She scratched her ear and stepped back.
She stared off at the hardwood floors of his kitchen. “Why don’t you go change and I’ll get us started.”
He glanced down the front of him. “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”
“It’s work clothes. Go put some pajama pants on. Get comfortable. That’s the idea.”
Pajama pants. So he could sit there with a pitched tent all night? Why exactly had he mentioned not wanting to go to the bar again? This was worse. Far, Far worse.
She looked up at him. “You have to do what I say, remember?”
Like hell, but he nodded as if that was going to happen. He went to his room and changed to a pair of jeans. If he could get them both on, he’d wear two pair just to have the reinforced zipper. At the rate he was going, he’d be splitting the seams. Never in his life had he been so hard and his cock only seemed to be getting more and more interested. This was going to be one long ass night. He stripped off his nice shirt, but left his undershirt on, put his shoes away in the closet and turned to stare at the bed.
Powerless to stop it, the image of Tiffany lying there filled his head. Long blonde hair fanned over his pillows. Lean tanned legs on his white sheets. Full breasts arched toward the ceiling, nipples pebbled and wanting his mouth. Cheeks flushed. Breath gasping. His cock pounded in painful heated throbs.
He tugged at his too tight jeans. God it was a vice in there. He shuffled his legs, looking for ease, but only having it build up to more. His balls were stuffed and squeezed. He leaned on his dresser, aching for relief, but not gaining any. Gut twisted and sweat coated him.