by Melody Anne
She couldn’t help her eye roll at those words. She jammed her finger against the enormous clubhouse that was the focus of his project. “How much would a wedding at this place cost?”
He chuckled. “It wouldn’t be cheap,” he admitted.
“That’s exactly my point. I’m not faulting you for having money. I fight for causes, but believe it or not, I like capitalism. I believe that anyone can rise above in this country, change their circumstances, and can have the American dream. But I also believe there are many of us who love our lives just as they are. There are many of us who don’t dream of becoming a millionaire. But we do dream of going to a great park at an affordable cost where we’re not going to be mugged or find used needles lying around. The wealthy provide jobs and great locations for people to go, but they also take things they have no right to take. We can have balance. That’s what makes this country so wonderful.”
She’d used this argument many times before and most people dismissed her. Hudson appeared to be listening. She needed to keep the faith that he’d give her a chance.
“I told you I grew up poor. I loved my life, and because I had my brothers there was never a time I was afraid to go anywhere, so I wouldn’t know what that is like. But I can see your point,” he told her as he moved away from the drawing table and went to the trailer door, stepping outside.
She wasn’t sure what to think, so she followed. He moved away from the trailer and looked over the land she’d grown up on.
“It’s beautiful isn’t it?” she asked. It didn’t get old looking out at the grounds, the trees, the grass, and the flowers. She loved listening to the frogs and crickets, the birds and other creatures that moved around day and night. “I’ve always loved Washington. I’m not a big fan of the city, but the rest of the state is paradise.”
“I agree with you. I love what the city has to offer, but I’ll take a night in the middle of nowhere with a tent, a fishing pole, and a fire any day of the week over five-o’clock traffic.”
“We didn’t really need to camp, living on this land. But we had many, many fires. And I grew up with a fishing pole in my hand. I remember the first trout I caught. I was beyond excited but a bit horrified when gramps cut it up and fried it. That had been my first lesson in where my food came from. At first I thought he was a monster for killing something that had been alive. But he explained the circle of life to me and how we all work together to survive. I still have a hard time with it sometimes, and that’s why I try to waste as little as possible, but at the same time, I appreciate how it all works so that humans and animals can both thrive.”
“I had those same lessons from my mother while growing up. I think all kids should hear them,” Hudson told her.
“Will you at least give me a chance to buy the land back? Can you wait to start building?”
He didn’t look at her as he stared out across the fields. She wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. But she was a patient woman. She’d spent years interviewing those who didn’t want to talk, and she knew sometimes the best thing a journalist could do was wait for the other person to speak. So even though it killed her to not keep arguing her point, she waited.
“Maybe we can come up with a compromise,” he finally said after a couple of minutes had passed.
She was suspicious of what his idea of compromise was, but he definitely had the upper hand in this situation. This could come back and bite her in the butt, however she was left with little choice but to work with whatever he was willing to offer. She didn’t have legal ties to this land. He wasn’t obligated to humor her. Maybe he was simply saying what she wanted to hear in order to wait her out until she gave up. But she had to hear what he had to say.
“What kind of compromise are you thinking of?” she asked. She refused to look at him while she spoke. She didn’t want him to see her desperation and it was dang hard for her to look at him without thinking of their passionate night together.
She had a feeling if she spent too much time around Hudson Anderson she might be willing to agree to anything he wanted . . . again and again and again. That wasn’t a good situation — not at all. She had to keep her eyes on the prize — the land.
“I think what I’m doing is great. That doesn’t mean I couldn’t make some changes. But you think it’s a corporate sell out. So maybe we can try to meet in the middle,” he told her.
“How can we meet in the middle?” she asked. “I have no idea what that means.”
He turned and she had no choice but to lift her eyes to his. The impact of his gaze took her breath away as she’d known it would. Dang it, this man had charisma. She knew what that word meant, but she’d never fully understood it until being in Hudson’s presence.
“We try to convince each other that our way is the right way,” he said with a confident smile.
With that smile her shoulders stiffened. He really thought he was so charming he’d get his way. He truly believed that if he set his mind to it, he’d have her eating out of his hand. She was sure he’d never been turned down for something he truly wanted.
“And if we can’t meet in the middle?” she asked.
“If I can’t change your mind, I’ll sell it to you.”
Her eyes widened. She hadn’t been expecting that. “But,” he added, holding his finger up. Her grin disappeared. “But, you have to convince me you aren’t being stubborn. You have to change my mind in order for that to happen. I think I’ll be the one to change your mind in the end,” he finished with confidence.
She stuck out her hand. There was no way that was happening, not when she knew she was right. “Let’s make it official,” she said.
He looked at her hand, his smile matching hers. She realized he was a pretty even match for her. This man believed in himself as much as she believed in herself. What did that mean for either of them?
He took her fingers in his, but he didn’t shake. He held her hand, his thumb caressing her palm, causing goosebumps over her arms and neck, and her breath to hitch. His eyes held her captive. Never breaking their gazes, he pulled her hand up and ran his lips across the top of her knuckles, making her stomach clench as heat flooded her.
She couldn’t have spoken in those few seconds for all of the money in the world. He could’ve said I’ll give you the land right this second if you utter a single word, and not one would’ve passed through her tight throat. She felt as if she was making a deal with the devil — and the devil just so happened to be encased in the six-foot-plus beautiful frame of a man who was too charming for his own good.
“It’s a deal,” he said, his voice husky, her hand still clasped in his. She didn’t have the strength to pull away from him. His eyes dilated, and she had no doubt lustful thoughts were written all over her face and no doubt he was remembering how well their bodies fit together just as she was.
Without another word, he tugged on her hand, making her fall against him. She let out a breath she hadn’t been aware she’d been holding as he let go of her hand and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her against his hard body.
“On second thought, let’s seal this deal the correct way. I’ve wanted to do this from the second you walked back into my life.” She got no further warning before his head descended. A millisecond of a thought of stopping him vanished as his hot breath rushed over her lips.
And then he kissed her. His warm lips slid across hers . . . once, twice, then a third time. His fingers flexed against her back as her stomach fluttered and her core sprang to life.
Her arms lifted, winding behind his neck as she stretched against him, utterly lost in the moment. His tongue traced her bottom lip, and she sighed against his mouth, her brain shutting down and her body taking over.
With that sigh of surrender, his arms tightened around her and he kissed her like she wanted to be kissed — like he’d kissed her right before carrying her into his bedroom. His mouth closed over hers and his tongue darted inside as he tugged her hips against his, leaving no
doubt about how turned on he was.
She groaned against his mouth, her body on fire, her mind a complete blank, and her worries floating away in the slight breeze of the cool morning. She was willing to do anything he wanted as long as he continued making her feel this good. She’d only felt like this one other time in her life — and that had been with him.
It was that thought that woke her up.
With a gasp, she pulled away. His eyes opened, their dark color glazed, his mouth open, his cheeks flushed. He seemed as confused as she was as their gazes locked. She tugged against his hold, and he immediately released her. She staggered back, knowing it wouldn’t take much for her to beg him to take her into his trailer and show her the same pleasure he’d shown her a month before.
“That can’t happen again,” she finally panted. Her body was on fire, and she still couldn’t catch her breath.
“I don’t mind that happening again — not at all,” he countered. “Why should we fight something when we both know how good it is?”
“No!” she said, grateful she was getting her voice back. “We made a mistake a month ago, and I don’t repeat mistakes. However, we’re still on for the other part of our deal, as long as there’s no more touching.” He moved forward as if he was going to change her mind, and she made a quick retreat. She had no doubt he could change her mind faster than she could blink.
“I’m first,” she said, moving farther away from him. Then she halted and held up a hand. “You have to follow the rules.” She used her most serious voice — the tone she’d used when blocking a building from wrecking balls.
He stopped and grinned. It wasn’t a reassuring grin. It was a predator’s smile, and she had no doubt she was the one being hunted.
“I’ll follow the rules . . .” he said slowly. But his grin grew. “. . . for now.”
“Good. I’ll be here at eight tomorrow to pick you up,” she said, taking a few more steps away.
“Where are we going?” he asked. His smile didn’t diminish even a little.
“You’ll find out,” she said as she left. She’d gotten a reprieve, and she was taking it.
The only question now was how she was going to survive this mission without losing her mind . . . or surrendering her body.
Chapter Sixteen
Hudson pulled up to his work trailer at seven thirty in the morning, figuring that would give him time to go over a few things in his office, and of course, make coffee.
Even though he was half an hour early, there was Daisy, a smile on her lips as she sat on his trailer steps. She stood as he climbed from his truck. He’d been grumpy all morning, but at the sight of her, he felt his heart rate pick up and anticipation wash through him.
“Good morning,” she said. “I’m glad you’re early. I want to get to the place so you can see the entire process.”
“You’re obviously a morning person,” he said with a bit of a chuckle as he skirted around her and opened his office door. “I wouldn’t know that since you were gone the only morning I had with you.”
She rolled her eyes as she swatted her hand through the air, blowing off his sentence as if it wasn’t important. Was she going to simply pretend they hadn’t had sex? If she could, he could as well. Okay, maybe not pretend, but he could act as if they were a brand-new couple, anticipating the moment they fell into a bed together.
“I love mornings,” she told him, as she stayed right on his heels. “But I love evenings too. I could do without the middle part of the day. I like to start a morning off with a good workout to increases the happy drugs in my body and then dive into work. I’m usually a few hours into my day by the time most people are leaving their homes. But there’s nothing better than sitting by the river as the sun goes down, reflecting on the day I just had.”
“You know I don’t like to waste too much time on sleep as you learned on our plane ride,” he said, deciding he wanted to reference that time as much as possible so it never strayed far from her mind. “But we never did find out how much sleep you normally get,” he said as he moved over to his coffee pot.
“In the summer it’s decidedly less, because I hate wasting daylight. There’s a lot of life to live,” she said. She wasn’t looking at him, but eyeing his coffee-making supplies. He had her hooked on his one kitchen skill, a phenomenal cup of coffee. He could grill, too, but that’s where his culinary talents ended.
“So you were making fun of me for my lack of sleep, but it’s okay for you to go without?” he said with a laugh.
“Of course. I don’t even mind being a hypocrite,” she said with a laugh. He chuckled. She was certainly honest — just one more thing he truly enjoyed about her.
“I didn’t see your car. Are we walking to this place we’re going to?” he asked as the coffee finished brewing and he began putting their sugary treat together.
“My car doesn’t have a lot of room in it. I figure we can take your truck, even though it does suck a lot of fuel and pollutes our natural resources. But it can carry items so if anything needs hauled, it’s a win at least,” she told him. She added a thank you as he handed over her cup. She took a sip and sighed, making his body harden. That happened a lot around this woman.
She was so damn enthusiastic, and he remembered well what a wildcat she was in the bedroom. This woman was surprising him by the minute. She loved mornings, nights, and coffee, and he remembered how she went to a whole new level when she had an orgasm. He decided right then and there that he was going to have her back in his bed . . . and very soon.
“I guess we’ll take my truck then,” he said.
“Can we go now?” She was practically bouncing on her feet.
“You really think I’m going to go to one event with you and my entire world will change?” he asked. But he followed her out the door, closed the office, and walked to his truck. She made it to the passenger side and was climbing in before he had a chance to open the door. He’d have to be faster.
“I’m going to need an address,” he told her. “I don’t understand the big mystery as I’m about to find out where were going in just a few minutes.”
Hudson wasn’t fond of surprises. But then again, he wasn’t disclosing his plans on how to change her mind, so this was tit for tat.
“I’ll tell you where to turn,” she said.
He started the truck, turned it around, and headed for the main road.
“What got you into a life of fighting for causes?” he asked. “You’re obviously smart, know what you’re talking about, and have a passion for life. You could pretty much do anything, but you choose to do a lot of volunteer work. With the talent you obviously have, I don’t get it.”
“My parents gave their entire lives to service. And even though I had dreams, I wanted to make them proud,” she began. “Though it started out wanting to do it for my parents, I’ve discovered I love the fight. So many people give up because it’s a hard battle. That just makes me want to do it so much more. It’s rare I can save a building, or help a cause, but when I’m successful I feel as if I’ve won a gold medal.”
“Do you ever feel like giving up? It’s got to be frustrating to lose so often,” he pointed out. He wasn’t saying it out of spite, he was truly curious. She directed him down the road as they continued talking.
“There are times I wonder why I do it. I try to protect a building, but it gets torn down and I’m hauled to jail. Or I try to save an apartment complex and make sure an owner treats his tenants fairly, but the landlord manages to find loopholes to screw those who barely make ends meet as it is. I think a society without morality is a sad place to live. But then I get a win, I help that one place, or help those people nobody else even saw, and it keeps me going through all of the bad.”
“I’ve been raised to believe if you do the right thing, good things will come your way. And if you do bad, it will eventually catch up to you. Do you think some of those people get into situations because of people like you fighting their battles for them?
Do you think it makes them lazier if they don’t have to do it for themselves? That would be like that saying ‘If you give a man a fish he eats for a day, if you teach him to fish, he eats for life.’”
“I think there will always be people who take advantage of others. But I don’t think that’s the majority of those out there. I think people are born into situations they can do nothing about; they don’t know their rights or how to fight for them. If there aren’t people like me, they never learn.” She sounded reasonable. There was no censure in her voice, no anger. He could understand why she was listened to.
“I wasn’t born into the best of circumstances, but my brothers and I all made something of ourselves,” he pointed out.
“And I think there are a lot of people like you who make that happen. But you didn’t do it alone. You either had good parents motivating you or someone at school pushing you. One other thing people never talk about is someone like you had something you were born with that others don’t. You had strength of mind and body. It’s hard for you to imagine why everyone else isn’t like that.”
“I disagree,” he told her. “Yes, we were determined. But what makes that different from other people? Was it that we just weren’t lazy?”
She huffed as she rolled her eyes. “Turn left and pull into the parking lot on the right.”
He came around the corner and found an old school. The grounds were a bit of a mess, a bunch of people were in trucks unloading tools, and tents were being set up along the street.
“No doubt there are lazy people. The more technology we get, the less people have to work. But being lazy isn’t the only issue, though I know a lot of people use it as a go-to. Circumstances play a big role. If you have motivation and you have the right people in your life telling you there can be a different way, the world opens up to you. But if you’re in a well with slick walls and no rope, how are you supposed to climb out of it?”
He stopped his truck and turned to look at her. He grinned. “That’s probably the best analogy I’ve ever heard,” he admitted. “You’ve definitely given me something to consider.”
