Nobody But You

by Jill Shalvis

  “Five-oh-one?” Hud asked.

  “That’s a pussy game,” Aidan said. He and the others had come up behind them. Everyone but Kenna and the guy she was with.

  Penny jabbed an elbow into Aidan’s stomach, hard by the choking cough Aidan let out. “Excuse me?” she said. “Pussy game?”

  Aidan grimaced. “You know what I mean.”

  “No,” she said. “I don’t. Maybe we should call it a dickhead game.”

  “Kincaids play crickets,” Gray said over the ensuing battle. He stepped past Penny and Aidan, right up close to Hud and Jacob.

  Jacob assumed his oldest half brother was going to reach for some darts, but instead he came toe-to-toe with him, eyes swirling with emotion.

  “You’re home,” Gray said, voice a little thick.

  Jacob managed a nod.

  “Hud told us,” Gray said. “But I needed to see you with my own eyes. You staying?”

  “I’m on leave,” Jacob said. “I have to finish my stint.”

  “So this is what, a onetime thing, then?” Gray asked.

  Jacob heard someone suck in a breath. Penny, he thought, because not one of the four of them—the brothers—appeared to be breathing.

  Up until Brett died, he’d never allowed himself to imagine coming home and staying. But from the moment he’d set foot on this mountain, he’d wanted nothing else. He shook his head. “Not just a onetime thing.”

  Hud’s shoulders fell from his ears, and when that happened, Aidan and Gray relaxed as well.

  Not Jacob. He felt like he’d been strung up on tenterhooks and left hanging.

  But then Gray stepped up to him, wrapped his arms around him, and lifted him in a huge bear hug, feet hanging off the floor.

  The air left Jacob’s lungs forcibly with an “oomph” and he caught a flash of Hud’s grin.

  “Jesus,” Gray said, dropping Jacob. “What the hell did they feed you over there? You’re as big as a mountain.”

  “That’s what I asked,” Hud said, casually reaching out and giving Jacob a shove that had him bumping into Aidan.

  Aidan was solid enough to keep them both upright as he made a show of looking Jacob over. “I don’t know, man,” he said to Gray. “Still looks a bit scrawny to me.”

  “I’ll fatten him up!” Penny cried gleefully, jumping up and down. “With my fabulous homemade double-fudge brownies!” Shoving her way through the four big men, she stood in front of Jacob, her hands on her hips. “Hi,” she said. “Remember me?”

  “You were my hottie English tutor,” Jacob said. “And Gray used to try to get me to ask you if you liked him. He’d bribe me with whatever cash he had, and I’d promise to do it. Instead, I pocketed the money and told you he was an idiot and that you shouldn’t look at him twice.”

  Penny laughed in delight. “I’ll have you know, I married that idiot.” She flashed her diamond at him. “Eight years ago. He’s my idiot now.”

  Gray slid his arms around her from behind and kissed her jaw. They all had a groove, a pace. They all knew each other so well and he…didn’t.

  That was when Penny flung herself at him.

  Jacob barely caught her and let her hug him for what felt like a damn long time. Finally, with a sigh, she pulled back and sniffed, swiping at a tear. She pointed at Jacob, her mascara slightly smudged. “If you leave and don’t come home when you’re finished, I’m coming after you myself, you hear me?”

  “I hear you,” he said quietly, his chest feeling tight. For years, his life had depended on his instincts, and they were honed sharp. Survival had been harshly ingrained. Emotions had no place in that life.

  He’d gone a whole lot of years purposely feeling nothing. And then Brett had died and had set off a tsunami of all he’d been holding in. He wanted to be here and was gratified Aidan, Gray, and Penny were receptive to that, but Hud hadn’t said a damn word.

  And it was Hud he needed to hear from the most. He forced himself to look at his twin.

  Hud’s eyes were closed. Once upon a time that wouldn’t have mattered. They’d been able to read each other blind. They’d shared everything. But Jacob couldn’t get a bead on him now to save his own life. “Where’s Kenna?” he asked, hoping to give Hud a minute.

  Aidan and Gray exchanged looks.

  “What?” Jacob asked.

  “She’s got plans,” Aidan said. “She had to leave.”

  “Or she’s pissed at me,” Jacob said.

  “Or that,” Aidan agreed.

  “Don’t sweat it,” Gray said. “She’s always pissed at one of us. She’ll come around.”

  Aidan nodded.

  Hud still didn’t speak, making it clear that Kenna wasn’t the only one pissed at him. “I’ll go see her in the morning.”

  “That’d be good,” Penny said softly, not missing the silent and tense exchange between Hud and Jacob. “She could use some one-on-one time with you, I think.”

  Awkward silence while everyone divided a look between Hud and Jacob.

  “So we playing darts or standing around holding hands?” Hud finally asked.

  Penny sighed. She didn’t say anything, but the sigh spoke volumes, mostly that she thought men were ridiculous.

  “Crickets,” Jacob said decisively, and palmed the darts.

  “Now, see, that’s what I’m talking about,” Gray said, slinging an arm around Jacob’s neck, hooking him in. “Crickets. Kincaids play crickets.” He jostled Jacob. “Missed you, man.” And with that simple sentence slaying Jacob straight through, Gray let him go, snatched the darts, and stepped up to go first.

  Jacob didn’t move, couldn’t. “So…we’re good?”

  “Yeah,” Aidan said. “Though you’re still a dumbass.”

  Gray nodded.

  Penny beamed.

  But Hud didn’t speak, didn’t give any indication that he’d heard Jacob’s question at all, and Jacob knew.

  They weren’t all good.

  Chapter 8

  Sophie dreamed about hot, drugging kisses and Jacob’s warm, hard, perfect body. She woke up at the crack of dawn overheated, and for a bonus, also sporting a splitting headache. Thank you, Scotch.

  Not.

  No, scratch that. She blamed Lucas. For everything.

  Feeling better about reassigning the blame, she pulled on sweats and did the only thing she knew to do. She walked to McDonald’s, because nothing fixed a hangover like a carbo-load of greasy hash browns and pancakes.

  She doubled the order and walked to the lake, making excellent time because she was hungry. She was on the dock when her phone rang with a number she didn’t recognize. “Hello?” she answered warily.

  “Sexy Sophie…”

  She sighed. “Hey, Jimbo.”

  “How’s it shaking, babe?”

  “Terrific, great, couldn’t be better.”

  He laughed.

  And she sighed again. “Okay, so I know I told Brooklyn to give you my number, but it was a weak moment. I don’t think I could ever really go through with this sort of thing.”

  “Trust me, sweet cheeks, it’s easy. All you’ve gotta do is be encouraging. And maybe let out a few moans here and there.”

  “Encouraging?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Talk ’em through it. Tell them what you’re wearing—that’s always a conversation starter.”

  Sophie looked down at her sweats. And they weren’t the cute Victoria’s Secret kind of sweats either. More like the Walmart midnight shopper kind. “Well…”

  “Lie,” Jimbo said, reading her mind.

  “And the encouragement part?” she asked.

  “Just say stuff like…” He affected a woman’s voice. “‘Oh, I’ve been hoping you’d call. I’ve been bad, so very bad. I need a spanking,’ and then you throw in a ‘Thank you, sir, may I have another’ and you’re golden.”

  She was nearly boggled right out of her hangover. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I never kid about business.”

  “But�
��people don’t say any of that stuff in a real life, do they?”

  He just laughed. “Look at it like it’s an acting job, all right? It’s all just a gig. Like playing Fifty Shades with your boyfriend. And don’t even try to tell me you haven’t done that.”

  If Lucas had tried to play Fifty Shades with her, she’d have killed him and no one would have ever found his body. And thinking about Lucas reminded her that even thinking of phone sex as a job was all his fault, making her groan.

  “Yes!” Jimbo said with glee. “Just like that, only a little louder. Also, it helps if you pant a little. And add in a soft, helpless whimper once in a while, like you’re totally into it.”

  Sophie sighed and nearly fell overboard when Jimbo laughed and yelled, “Yes! That’s it, baby, just like that. Come on, give me just one little ‘do me harder!’ and I’ll know you’re ready for the big league.”

  There was no way she was going to do this, but she had to laugh at his enthusiasm for his job. Must be nice to love what you did for a living. “People can’t be serious about this.”

  “As a heart attack.” But he was laughing, too, teasing her. He knew she wasn’t going to really take this job.

  And because he was being a good sport, and because she was hungover and feeling a what-the-hell ’tude, she teased too. “Oh, Jimbo, I’ve been a very, very bad girl,” she said in her best frog-in-throat, can’t-catch-my-breath voice, throwing in a ragged, broken moan that might have sounded like a cat in heat. “Please, sir, I need a spanking.”

  She waited for his laugh, but it didn’t come. In fact, there was nothing but static. “Hello?”

  “Da-aaaamn, woman.” He sounded seriously impressed. “You’re a natural. You sure I can’t talk you into this? I mean, there ain’t no insurance coverage with this gig or anything, but I could get you some good, cold, hard cash.”

  Sophie managed a laugh that hurt her aching head, and disconnected. That’s when she felt it, a disturbance in the force field. She’d felt it the other day, too, an odd tingle of awareness as she slowly turned and, yep, found Jacob standing on the dock only a few feet away, staring at her.

  He was in board shorts and a T-shirt, snug across his shoulders, loose across his abs, looking like an ad for Hot Lake Living. If she hadn’t known better, she’d say he looked surprised as hell behind his dark lenses and stern but sexy mouth, but she did know better. Jacob Kincaid didn’t do surprised.

  What he did do was stealth. She hadn’t even heard him coming. “How do you do that, walk on the dock without a sound?”

  “‘I’ve been a very, very bad girl’?” he asked.

  Shit on a stick! Her brain raced for something to say, anything. “Wow,” she said. “I didn’t peg you for having a drug problem.”

  He arched a brow. “So you didn’t just also moan, ‘Please, sir, I need a spanking’?”

  “Okay,” she said. “Fine, you caught me. I’m a porn star. I know, it’s a huge disappointment, right? Get in line behind my mother.”

  He smiled.

  “Hey,” she said. “I could totally be a porn star if I wanted to be!”

  At that, he out-and-out laughed. And if she hadn’t been hungover as shit, hot and sweaty from the walk for food, and maybe still a little turned on from last night, she might’ve been able to find the humor in this. Instead, she narrowed her eyes. “Was there a reason you were eavesdropping on me?”

  “Is it eavesdropping when you’re having public sex?”

  “I wasn’t—” She cut herself off and took a deep breath. “I wasn’t having public sex!”

  “Asking for a spanking, then. I especially liked the ‘please, sir’ part.” He shifted closer and then closer still, so that he blocked out the early-morning sun with his broad shoulders and she could see nothing but the dark of his eyes. “I’ll be happy to put you over my knee,” he said in a voice of pure sex. “If you asked real nice.”

  “Bite me,” she said, even as her pulse raced.

  “That too.”

  “Argh!” She slapped a hand against his chest. “You’re annoying as hell—anyone ever tell you that?”

  His lips twitched. “Not exactly the ‘thank you, sir, may I have another’ type, I see.”

  “In your dreams.” Deciding to ignore his sexy ass, she boarded the boat and sat, digging into the hash browns. “Oh, my God,” she murmured, this time in sheer pleasure. So good.

  He just stared at her. “Are you having sex with the hash browns now? Do you need a moment alone with them?”

  She flipped him the bird.

  He grinned and boarded, sitting next to her without asking.

  “Is that all you men think about?” she asked. “Sex?”

  “No.” He paused. “Maybe.”

  Outwardly she rolled her eyes. Inwardly she quivered.

  “Who were you on the phone with?” he asked.

  “My sister’s got a friend who has a…lucrative business out of Vegas. She knows I need more work, so she told the guy I was looking. That was my audition.”

  “Define lucrative business.”

  “Phone sex.”

  “No,” he immediately said.

  She stared at him in disbelief. “I’m not taking the job. Although I have no idea why it would matter to you.”

  She never even saw him coming. All she knew was that in the next heartbeat, he’d slid a big hand to the nape of her neck and pulled her in and kissed her.

  His mouth didn’t feel stern now. It felt warm and giving, and she made an utterly involuntarily helpless little murmur and pressed against him, seeking more, seeking things she hadn’t even realized she wanted.

  And then suddenly his mouth was gone.

  She staggered back a step and stared up at him. “Wha…?”

  “Do you know now?” he asked in a low, sexy voice. “Why it would matter to me?”

  She bit her lower lip.

  “Do you, Sophie?”

  She closed her eyes and then opened them and pointed at him. “You are a big complication, you know that?”

  “Ditto, babe.” Reaching out, he lightly tugged on a strand of her hair. “Thanks for sharing last night.”

  “I didn’t mean to,” she said. “I didn’t mean to drink that bottle at all.”

  He smiled. “I meant you. Thanks for sharing some of you.”

  “Oh,” she said brilliantly, both annoyed at him for making her talk about it and also oddly pleased and moved by him saying so.

  “Don’t look so surprised,” he said. “I like you. I like you a lot.”

  If him saying thanks for sharing had stunned her, this just about paralyzed her. And then there was the way she reacted to his body, his touch, his voice. She offered him one of her two bags.

  Sitting back, he opened his and peered inside, breaking into a smile. “Hash browns and pancakes,” he said reverently.

  She took a deep breath. “For the hangover,” she managed, maybe a little more defensively then she’d have liked.