I give a long, hard blink before doing another visual sweep. Lying naked, save for strategically placed wadded up rolls of fish, is beautiful, well-endowed, blessed by God Daisy Pembrooke. Her gaze is set straight ahead, staring at the ceiling as if her life depended on it. Her muscles are tense. I know those thighs more than I know my own, and right about now, she’s ready to turn to stone.
Jody waves a hand in front of my face. “Everything okay?”
I take a moment just soaking in Daisy’s unblemished skin, the untouched canvas I’m beginning to salivate over. The fact her gorgeous body is on display for everyone to see stirs me to anger. No, I am most certainly not okay.
“You know—” I turn to the short redhead who’s been chatting my ear off for the last twenty minutes about a documentary I’m pretty sure I have no interest in. But something brought me here tonight, and that was the future growth of the store. If I’m ever going to expand, a little exposure couldn’t hurt. “I think I need a minute. I’m on the verge of making a decision.”
“You need a minute alone!” Her entire face lights up like a Christmas tree. She’s made no secret about how badly she wants Think Ink as a part of her production. You’d think it were a lottery win the way she salivates over it. “I can take a lot of things, and a hint is one of them. I’ll be at the bar. You want a cold one? It’s on me!” She trots off, hopeful that she cinched the deal.
A few malingerers gather rolls off Daisy’s thighs before wandering off, leaving us alone for a moment—a small miracle in and of itself.
I step in close to that beautiful face and lean over fully, blocking her line of vision.
Her eyes widen with fright before squeezing shut.
“What the hell is going on?” I whisper.
“I can’t talk,” she grits it through her teeth.
An entire herd of dudes dressed in monkey suits head over, each with a beer in hand, laughing their asses off before they ever get here, and I glare at them before they hit ground zero.
“Get up,” I growl, unsure if I’ve said the words out loud, but I damn well meant it.
Daisy shakes her head ever so slightly as the dudes gather around, hungry for a bite, but it’s not the sushi they’re looking at. Nope. The entire male mob is momentarily hypnotized by Daisy’s upper torso. It’s true. Daisy has a set of tits that can make a grown man cry. Hell, I’m about to cry, or flip a table. Not this one. I’d like to hurt someone right about now, and it’s sure not Daisy.
“You think they’re real?” One of the suits bumps elbows with the douche next to him.
“My bet’s on plastic.” His buddy shakes his head. “All the beautiful ones are.”
I know for a fact Daisy’s rack is anything but manufactured in some silicone warehouse. I’ve seen those girls bumping and jumping like jackhammers when she’s sitting on my lap, riding me like she’s doling out a punishment. It was far from that. In fact, my balls missed the hell out of her last night. What was that about? I thought she’d be a little grateful for the fact I freed her from her wax prison. I’ll admit, a part of me wanted to run when I saw that clotted up mess. But another, far more aroused part of me, wanted to free her so she could make her way onto my face once again. It’s her favorite seat in the house. I don’t blame her. It’s the one that suits her best. I freeze solid for a moment. The idea of me suiting her best somehow crosses that invisible line I’ve drawn in the sexual sand.
What the hell am I doing here hovering over her like some white knight? Daisy is a strong woman, emotionally and physically. I can attest to both. She doesn’t need me to babysit. If she wants perfect strangers fondling her while they feast off questionably raw fish, then, that’s her business.
I turn to walk away, but my feet have screwed themselves into the floorboards.
“Hey”—one suit says to the next with a shit-eating gleam in his eye—“I dare you to flick her nipple.”
“Are you kidding?” The trained monkey balks at the idea.
Good move, dude. I offer him a curt nod. I’d hate to knife your balls off. It’d pain me as much as it would you.
“I can’t flick her tit. It’s covered in a freaking doily.” He knocks his buddy in the shoulder, and the idiot sloshes his drink onto Daisy’s stomach.
Lava courses through my veins in a visceral manner that I haven’t felt since that night so long ago.
“Hey, man, watch it.” I nod over to the suit with the beer.
“Sure thing.” He pulls the glass back while studying his buddy intently.
Suit number two does a quick glance around—little does he know the only person who matters is standing right in front of him. Daisy doesn’t need security. She’s got me.
“Don’t try anything, dude. ’Kay?” I grunt it out low, infused with a threat, but the suit just giggles to himself like a schoolgirl and snatches the leaf off Daisy’s crotch before I can process it.
“Fucker!” I lunge over Daisy’s body and pull him to the side where I knee him in the stomach time and time again.
Daisy bolts up and screams, sending food off all four limbs like a sea of flying leeches.
“Come here.” I whip off my jacket and cover her, helping her to the exit as a crowd amasses from nowhere.
“What’s the matter with you?” she shrieks in my face. “This was my job.” Those last few words dissolve in a whimper. Her eyes harden over the dickhead who saw fit to expose her more than needed. “And you!” She stomps over to him with my jacket cinched to her chest. “You are a ridiculous human being who obviously never left the seventh grade!” She snatches the leaf from his hand. “I believe this belongs to me.” Daisy heads toward the door before backtracking. “And as for you, Jet”—her eyes circle over my features with such fury I brace myself for the slap—“thank you.” She takes off, leaving a trail of sushi rolls to the door.
Jody comes up, breathless, with a beer in each hand. “Talk about your psychos. What was that about?”
“She’s not a psycho. Some idiot was about to assault her.”
Jody cuts a hard look around. “No offense, but men can be pigs.”
Does Daisy think I’m a pig?
“I’d better go.” I take off after her like I should have ten seconds ago.
“Wait!” Jody calls out after me. “I didn’t mean it! You’re totally not a pig!”
The jury is still out on that one.
But it’s not her opinion that counts.
All the way home I wonder where the heck Daisy could have gone. There wasn’t a sign of her car by the time I hit the parking lot, but in my defense, the lot was huge. I could’ve missed it. As soon as I see that silver Honda parked in front of the house, my entire body exhales. It’s as if a weight has been lifted off my chest, and it has. I’m glad to know she’s safe and sound—where she’s supposed to be. For whatever reason, it feels right having her here. When I saw her taking care of Lucky that night in the bar, it warmed me. I hadn’t felt that much affection for another person outside of my family for as long as I can remember.
The house is dark when I enter, save for the seam of light coming from under her door. I flick on every lamp from the front door to my bedroom just to let her know I’m here. Electricity, or the lack thereof, has been our subliminal language. Daisy and I haven’t exactly sought out a conversation with one another. I head down the hall, and my breathing picks up as if I’ve just run a marathon. I can feel her weight behind that door, pressing against my chest like a boulder. The only way to alleviate the pressure is to open it up, make sure she’s all right.
I give a gentle knock without thinking twice. “Everything okay in there?”
“Yes. Go away.” She might have intended for it to come out hostile, but it came out wounded, and it tears me up to hear it.
“If you need anything, you know where to find me.” My hand finds a home over the door, and I pat it softly as if I’m touching her skin. “You know”—I swallow hard—“I may not look like it, but I’m a good listener
.”
An entire eternity of silence drifts by before I head into my bedroom. I flick on the TV, landing it on my favorite reality show about a bunch of dudes who create custom bikes and try my hardest to veg out.
A gentle knock comes over the door before it opens and in walks Daisy wrapped in a pink fuzzy robe, frilly PJs peeking out from underneath. She looks sweet, innocent, and judging by that injured look on her face, her ego took a major blow tonight.
“What are we watching?” She climbs up next to me and sits close enough to where our thighs touch, but far enough for me to know that anything else is up for negotiation. I’m fine with it. Just having her here, next to me in any capacity, feels like more than enough.
“Anything you want.” I toss her the remote. It might as well have been my heart. I’ve never given up the remote before, and that meager act of surrender stuns me to the core. I’d ask why the hell am I being so nice. Why the hell do I feel lighter than air when she’s in the room with me and heavier than the planet when she’s not—but I think I know. I shake the pseudo psychoanalysis out of my head for now.
A soft laugh strums through her, and she snuggles up to my arm. “I’m not here to change your world.” She plants the remote carefully back into my hand.
“You need me to listen?”
She shakes her head, her chest heaves with the faintest sniffle. “Just thought it’d be nice to sit here a while. You smell good.”
“I do?” The thirteen-year-old in me gets the urge to sniff my pits, but I wisely resist. “You smell good.” I lean into her playfully. “Like strawberries and vanilla.”
“That sounds like a smoothie.”
I run my hand down the length of her thigh. “You are pretty smoothie.”
“Very funny.” She smacks me over the chest lightly. “You were pretty smoothie yourself tonight. Can I ask what you were doing there?”
“Only if I can ask the same.” I’m not trying to pigeonhole her. I just can’t wrap my head around why she would keep putting herself in these compromising situations.
“Deal.” She gives my arm a firm squeeze, and a jolt of electricity presses in with each of her fingers. “You first.”
“Some production company wants me to participate in a documentary. Hometown boy lifts himself up from the bootstraps kind of a thing.”
“Really?” Daisy backs up to get a better look at me, but I’m the one who’s drinking in her features, especially those cherry-stained lips. I miss them. I miss those long legs wrapped around me—her mouth over the most eager part of me, my face buried in her chest. But here we are, having a conversation, and a part of me feels like this is the missing puzzle piece—as if just chilling out with a girl was what I was wanting all along. At least some of the time.
“Yes, really. That chick’s been hounding me for weeks. Lucky doesn’t think I should do it.” I lean my head against the wall and roll the back of my head against it. “I don’t know. I don’t like people digging into my shit. I’m pretty private.”
“I can kill that for you if you like.” She wrinkles her nose, and my dick twitches as if that’s all it takes. And with Daisy, that might be all it takes. “I’m an expert at taking a good thing and burning it to cinder. I sort of have the Midas touch but backward. What’s the opposite of gold?”
“Mold.”
“There you go.” She tosses her hand into the air. “Everything I touch turns to mold.”
We share a quiet laugh.
“That’s not true. I can promise you that.”
“Oh, yeah?” Daisy threads her fingers in the back of my hair and gives a little tug. “How can you be so sure?”
I tug the lip of my jeans and pretend to inspect the goods. “Still gold.”
Daisy belts out a laugh that reverberates off the ceiling, her chest ripples as she throws her body into it.
Something in me loosens, as if I’ve let go of a breath I’ve been holding for years. The simple act of making Daisy happy has my adrenaline pumping. There’s something. Just knowing that I’ve evoked that belly laugh in her makes me feel as if I’ve won an Olympian feat.
Her fingers slip over my chest, dipping under my T-shirt as she curls up against me. Daisy sighs as she wraps her arm over my chest and nestles her head into the crook of my arm.
“You really should do it—the documentary.” She glances up with those butterfly wings she calls lashes.
In all honesty, I’m not sure what’s happening. I’ve had dozens, hundreds of girls in my bed, and not one of them has donned a pink fuzzy robe, holding me as if it were the most natural thing in the world. My dick keeps perking with hope, but I’m pretty sure that’s not where this is headed. Surprisingly, I’m fine with it, more than fine. This is almost as good. Hell, it is.
“Oh, hey!” She scratches her nails over my chest with the epiphany. “You should do something like that.” She blinks toward the television. “God knows I love me some reality TV. If you had those bustling biceps jumping while inflicting pain in people, you’d have them hooked by the millions.”
My ego expands when she mentions my muscles. I wish it didn’t, but apparently, that thirteen-year-old in me is back, and he likes to have his ego stroked.
“Huh.” I lean back and watch as the boys on the show do their thing. “Isn’t this rigged, though?”
“Oh, honey, I don’t think so.” Her arm tightens around me, and my body catches fire. The way she said honey made me melt a little on the inside. I’d die before I told anyone, but I’m loving the hell out of whatever’s happening between the two of us. “They’re just going on about their business,” she whispers. “You could do that. You just need to forget that the cameras are there. I bet it would drive up business a hundred percent. You’d have to expand, or franchise. People are always looking to get into a lucrative opportunity.”
Her words soak in as I try to envision what it might be like having a set of cameras follow me around all day.
“Drive up business a hundred percent?” I whisper. “That would be criminal to turn down.”
“Who knows what that documentary could lead to? It would totally be criminal to turn down this opportunity.” Her nails glide over my chest one more time, and a shiver runs down my spine straight through to my balls.
“Your turn. What possessed you to turn into a human serving platter?” Without hesitating, I wrap my arm around her shoulders, and she freezes. I’m hoping it’s her fear of the subject matter that has her turning to stone, and not the fact I’ve decided to get into the act.
Her head wilts over my chest. “Let’s just say that I went astray when I tried to pull myself up by the bootstraps. Some of us aren’t as good at it as you are.” A dull laugh rattles her. “Oh, the press is interested in broadcasting my hardship story, too. My parents are especially glued to the screen.” Her body quivers as if staving off tears. “My brothers aren’t too impressed either.”
“I’m sorry.” They’re not just meaningless words I’m spouting off. I mean it with everything in me. I hate that she’s fumbled, and now the world is peering into her mistakes. “Everyone goes through a tough time sooner or later. It’s just yours happens to be in the public eye.” I pull her in tight, closing in the gap. “Are your parents in Hollow Brook?”
“No, thank God.” She glances up, the gloss on her lips catching the light. I want to kiss it off, lick it off, touch my finger over her mouth if she’d let me. I don’t think we’re there tonight, but that would be pretty incredible if we were. Daisy and I seem to be engineering things backward in the bedroom. “They’re about forty miles out in Friar’s Corner. Ever heard of it?”
I shake my head. “I’ve pretty much laid low in Hollow Brook. Jepson is about as far as I venture out.”
“I don’t blame you. Nothing good ever comes out of Friar’s Corner.”
“Not true. You came out of there.”
“Ha-ha.” She gives my hip a quick pinch while looking up at me with those silver-blue eyes. “You’re just g
unning to get laid.”
“Not true.” I give her own hip a light pinch. My eyes lock over hers. The instant those baby blues link with mine I’m done. I can feel the power draining out of me. A part of me begs to look away, but I can’t. It’s too much. Something is happening, and it’s too damn strong for me to wrap my head around. “I mean it,” I whisper. “You’re pretty great. Friar’s Corner can’t be that bad.”
“I’m an embarrassment.” Daisy buries her face in my chest. “I’m the personification of everything that’s wrong with that place. No hope and desperation beyond repair equals dancing dreams dashed and thrashed at the foot of the U.S. Senate.” She looks up, her eyes stained red as blood. “There’s not a darn thing I can’t ruin, Jet.” She blinks back tears, her lips quiver with agony. “You’d better believe that if I don’t leave soon, I’ll take you down with me.” She shakes her head. “And that, my friend, is something I could never forgive myself for.”
Daisy relaxes against my chest as we stare blankly at the television as if we cared about the images flickering before us.
“There’s no way you can ruin anything with me.” I press a careful kiss over the top of her head.
Daisy can’t ruin a thing in my life.
I’ve done that myself.
That night, Daisy sleeps in my arms, safe and sound from her worries and fears from the nightmare her life has morphed into. I wish I could wipe away all of the grime, help her in some way escape the stronghold of negativity she’s locked in, but for the life of me I can’t figure out how to do it. Believe me, I stayed up half of the night trying.
Friday arrives with the crisp bite of a storm brewing on the horizon. As soon as the sun sets, I head over to the WB campus for the big game to watch Rex do his thing. I do a quick scan over by the bleachers looking for Cade and Owen, looking for Lucky—hell, I’m looking for Daisy.
A pair of cool hands covers my eyes from behind, and my heart thumps once with that schoolboy brand of hope I haven’t felt since I was a kid. I spin around to find Lucky’s smiling face staring back at me.
Dirty Kisses Page 11
