“Did someone else call or come looking for you?”
“No. She just wanted to stop in and make sure I was okay.”
He frowned. “She doesn’t like me.”
“She doesn’t know you like I do,” Zoe said.
Her words seemed to cause him to flinch.
“You tell her everything, did you?”
Zoe explained exactly what she told Dixie, and when she finished, he leaned forward.
“Good.” His gaze met hers, and he said, “I think I’ll call it a night.” He popped up.
“But it’s early,” she said.
“I think I’ll read.”
“Why don’t… we could play Scrabble.”
His gaze tightened. “Scrabble?”
“I saw the game in the hall closet.”
His brow creased with a frown that didn’t quite go to his lips. “I’m not the best person to play Scrabble with.”
“Why, you’re not any good at it?” she baited him.
“No. I’m good, it’s just…”
She recalled what else he’d said he was good at. “Super, I’m pretty good at it, too.”
His brows tightened again. “People hate playing word games with me.”
“Why, because you’re too smart?” She arched an eyebrow.
“Yeah.” He looked uncomfortable admitting it. She knew exactly how he felt, too. And she realized another thing they had in common. “What was your score?”
“At Scrabble?” he asked.
“No, IQ.”
He hesitated. “A hundred and eighty.”
“Hmm, then maybe you don’t want to play with me.” She saw doubt in his eyes.
“What was your score?” he asked.
She decided not to lie. “Officially, it was a hundred and seventy, but—”
“I’m impressed,” he said.
“But I purposely missed several questions.”
He reared back on the heels of his shoes and studied her.
She retrieved the Scrabble game from the closet.
“Why?” He watched her open the box. When she set aside the black cloth bag that held the letters, she met his gaze. He stepped closer. “Was it because you didn’t want people to treat you like a freak?”
She pulled out the board. She considered just agreeing with him because he was partially correct—she had learned early on that being smart set her apart from most of the other kids. But that wasn’t the whole story.
She took in a breath. “That and because I didn’t want to be that different from my parents.” She realized how that might have sounded, and she added, “They weren’t slow, they were normal. I already had so many differences from them. My hair, my eye color, my body structure.”
She sat down on the sofa and unfolded the board. “I think, deep down, I already knew all this and didn’t want any more evidence thrown in my face.” When she looked up, she saw the serious expression on his face and didn’t want the mood to go there.
She slapped her hand on top of her knees. “What do you say? One game?” And a little more time to convince him to make a move on her.
She saw the answer flash in his eyes. He was going to turn her down. Her chest ached, and she knew if he walked away from her now, she wouldn’t get the courage to do this. She’d talk herself out of it.
“We could make it interesting… put a wager on the table.” She smiled.
“I thought you were broke.”
Her gut tightened. “Okay, let’s make it really interesting.” She saw puzzlement in his eyes. Before she realized what she intended to say, she’d said it. “Let’s wager our clothes.” Feeling her cheeks grow hot, she looked down and fiddled with the wooden shelves that held the letters. She could feel him staring. What the hell had she done?
She waited for him to laugh at her.
“Strip Scrabble?” His voice sounded deeper than before.
“Yup.” Still not looking up, the embarrassment spread all the way to her toes.
She heard him mutter something under his breath. He sat in the leather chair across the coffee table. “I did warn you that I’m good at it, right?”
She forced herself to look up. “As did I.”
Their eyes met, her heart raced, and she offered him the black bag. “Let’s see who goes first.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“HELP A GUY OUT. Give me her number,” Rick said into his cell phone as he sat on his bed. He couldn’t stop thinking about Ellen. He went back and forth between the kiss to the tears in her eyes when she drove off.
“My wife will kill me,” Tony said. “She wants you to stay away from Ellen.”
“Why would she…?” Was that why Ellen was so adamant about not going out with him? Tony’s wife was bad-mouthing him. “What did she tell Ellen about me?”
“Hell, I don’t know. But you can’t blame LeAnn. You don’t have a good record.”
“It’s my fault that women treat me like shit? That Candy took my kid away?”
“No, but it’s your fault for picking the wrong women. The only women you’ve ever brought around LeAnn have either been strippers or dressed like they were. What the hell does that say about you? And when you’re not dating some skank, you’re bad-mouthing women in general. You come off like a bastard.”
“She took my kid.”
“Yeah, and it’s a raw deal. But can’t you see that if you’d found someone halfway decent to have a kid with, this wouldn’t have happened?”
“I wanted to help her.” Rick rubbed his forehead. For all Candy’s flaws, he’d loved her.
“I know. That’s your problem. You’ve got a thing for women in trouble. And if they’re a little slutty, you fall twice as hard. Not that slutty is all bad, but you know what I mean.” Tony chuckled as if to make light of the situation.
But there was nothing light about it. “Okay, fine. You’re right. I’ve got a problem picking women. And hell, maybe LeAnn was right to warn Ellen about me, but this isn’t about a hookup.” Then he remembered the kiss and how soft she’d felt in his arms. But he didn’t want to call Ellen to talk about the kiss; he wanted to apologize. Ellen knew all about being a parent, and he needed someone he could go to. He was afraid he might have ruined that.
“I’m not stupid, Rick.”
“It’s about Ricky.” He hadn’t mentioned any of this to Tony, because he was scared Tony would say that it was his fault, just like he’d always done. And hell, maybe Tony was right, but damn it, Rick was trying to do the right thing now.
It wasn’t too late. Hopefully.
“What about Ricky?” Tony asked.
“I got a court date next week for full custody. My lawyer said I needed to show the judge I was serious. I need help, Tony. And Ellen’s a mom. She met me for dinner tonight, helping me figure out the whole parenting thing.”
“Why didn’t you ask for LeAnn’s help?”
He almost said because she didn’t have kids, but Rick remembered that LeAnn and Tony had lost their baby. LeAnn probably knew a thing or two, but… “She doesn’t like me, Tony. I’m not saying I blame her, but it’s the truth. Help me out here.”
“You’re my best friend, and my partner, I’d take a bullet for you, but what you’re asking will get my ass in trouble with my wife.”
“If the question comes up about where I got her number, I’ll tell her that I’m a cop and can get anything. Come on, do me this one favor.”
Tyler reached into the bag to grab a letter. What kind of game was she playing? And he didn’t mean Strip Scrabble. He meant the game she was playing with him. Was this her way of saying yes to his two-week proposal? He almost said, let’s skip the game and go to the bedroom. But he spotted a flicker of nervousness in her gaze. If this was how she wanted it to go… Hell, Strip Scrabble had to be fun.
He pulled out an H. Eight out of twenty-five, the odds were in his favor for being first. He’d have her naked and in his arms before she could say double-word score.
She
slipped her hand into the bag and pulled out a C.
“I guess you’re lucky,” he said.
She smiled but still looked nervous. “That’s what keeps the game interesting. Luck.” She looked at his swollen hand. “You sure you don’t need to keep those on ice?”
“I’m sure.” He hadn’t thought about his hand since she’d mentioning stripping. “So how does this work?”
“I think I’ll take a glass of wine.” She stood up.
“Nervous?” He grinned at her, not to tease her but hoping to soothe her.
“A little,” she confessed. “Then again, I think you saw everything earlier.”
He laughed. “Pretty much.”
Her cheeks grew slightly rosy. “You want some wine?” She started for the kitchen.
“Yes.” And this time he didn’t stop himself from enjoying the way her butt moved. But holy hell, he wanted her naked and in his arms.
He stood up and tugged on his jeans, knowing things were going to get interesting, and tight. Not that he planned on trying to hide anything. He couldn’t. She’d see it all when he lost his jeans. Having forgotten underwear both times he’d gone to his place, he was going commando. Not that he was into underwear all that much when he was at home.
A smile brushed his lips when he thought about her learning that little fact.
He’d settled back down when she came in with two glasses of red wine and passed him one. “We’ll use the point system,” she said. “Twenty points equals an article of clothing.”
He wondered if she’d played this game before and wanted to believe she hadn’t. Then he wondered about her romantic past. Considering she didn’t take sex lightly, he figured she didn’t have a long list of former lovers. He liked thinking that, too.
He pulled out her seven letters. “So what does the winner get, besides keeping their clothes?”
She hesitated as she lined up her tiles on the wooden base. “I don’t know; I’ve never played this before.”
A lightness filled his chest. “How about breakfast in bed tomorrow?”
She cut her baby blues up and grinned. “I make a mean banana sandwich.”
He laughed. “I think the winner sets the menu.”
Before Tyler had lined up his tiles, he had six possible words. Unfortunately, none were going to get him a piece of clothing, unless he landed on one of the double-word squares.
He watched her study her letters and smile. “You look confident.”
He loved the humor in her eyes. “I am,” she said. “You do know that the first person who plays earns a double-word score?”
“Really?”
“Really. Would you like to see the Scrabble rules?” She picked up the rule pamphlet.
“I trust you.” And even if he didn’t, he wanted to get to the part where they took off their clothes. Things were already tight in his jeans.
She set out her first word—zephyr. She looked up. “It means—”
“I know what it means.” He smiled and then calculated her score. The E landed on the double letter. With the double-word square added in, she’d earned fifty points. And he’d lost two articles of clothing.
She looked up with a wicked smile.
He countered that smile with one of his own because he’d just figured out his word, and Zoe was about to lose two articles of clothing herself.
Just to make it more fun, he stood and unbuttoned his shirt. Slowly. He stared right at her when he did it, too. By God, he wanted her to enjoy it. Plus, if he set the bar in the presentation of the clothes removed, hopefully, she’d follow his path and put on a show as well. He opened the shirt, one side at a time, giving her a look at his T-shirt-covered abs. Then winking at her, he slipped his long-sleeve shirt off his shoulders.
He gave the shirt a few swings in the air and then tossed it on the sofa.
She laughed at his little performance. While he contemplated which garment should go next, he ran his hand down his chest to the clasp of his jeans, and then up again. He honestly didn’t know what constituted sexy for a woman, but he knew what he liked when watching a woman take off her clothes, and he wasn’t above playing the game.
Her eyes followed his hand up and then down. His gut tightened with desire to get this game moving along, but teasing her was fun. Dropping back in the chair, he removed his tennis shoes.
She looked at him in puzzlement, but she didn’t say anything.
“You can hold the applause,” he said. “But you can stick bills in my socks anytime.” He held up his socked foot.
“Too bad I’m broke.” She rolled her eyes and then reached into the black velvet bag.
When he started putting down his tiles, she said, “Let me finish. No reason to hurry.”
Except that she was going to be taking off her clothes.
He waited, impatiently, for her to replace her tiles. Finally, she looked up, and he took his turn. He used her H in zephyr, and laid out the word hazards. With the double-word score, that gave him two pieces of clothing.
He smiled. “Would you like my suggestions on what should go first?”
She scowled, but he could see the tease twinkling in her blue eyes. She pulled her legs up on the sofa and slowly unlaced her shoe. When she got one off, she lifted it up. “One.” As she started to work on the other, she added, “And this one will be two.”
“No,” he said. “I counted my shoes as one. They come in a pair.”
She grinned like a little vixen. “Which was an unfortunate mistake on your part. Is a shoe not an article of clothing?”
He studied her suspiciously. “So this is how you’re going to play it.”
“Just playing by the rules.” Then she shrugged oh so innocently.
“And who wrote these rules?”
“I did, of course.” She bent down to finish unlacing her other shoe.
“Come on,” he said. “At least give me your shirt.”
She continued to work on her laces. “Sorry, the participant removing the clothes gets to choose the article.” She took off her other shoe.
He studied the sexy, flirty way she held her shoulders and tilted her head. She was having fun. So was he.
He smiled. “You do know that’s just going to make me work harder.” And get harder.
“One would hope,” she teased. “For someone with a hundred and eighty IQ, you’re not looking so good.”
He laughed. “We just got started.”
While he drew out his tiles, she refocused on the board. Then using his R, she finished her turn with the word frisky.
“Hmm. Interesting word choice.” He went to work figuring out how many clothes she’d earned. With the double-word square, it gave her twenty, with the double letter she made it up to thirty. With her ten in reserve, she’d earned herself two more articles of clothing.
He tried to decide the best move—or he should say, the best removal. He could shock her and remove his pants, which would definitely up the tension, or he could tease her more.
He propped up his right ankle on his left thigh and made a production out of removing his sock. Tossing it with the shirt, he stood up, reached for his fly, undid the button, took the zipper down just a bit, and then pulled it back up.
She watched him, unable to hide the touch of embarrassment that had her cheeks getting red. He decided he enjoyed teasing her. Then he reached into the waistband of his jeans and pulled out the hem of his tee. Slowly, swaying and flexing his muscles as he did it, he pulled the shirt over his head.
She’d seen him without a shirt on last night, and he knew she enjoyed it, too.
“Meet your approval?” he asked.
Her face brightened. “It’s okay.”
“Just okay?” He put his hand over his heart. “I’m crushed.”
She grinned. “It’s nice.”
“Better. But I was hoping for more.” He sat down and refocused on the game.
He gave his word choices another quick check. The best option was the word
query. It would give him a triple-word score and earn him fifty-one points and two articles of clothing.
He placed his letters, grinning the whole time. “Take it off,” he said when he finished. “And let’s make it interesting this time.”
She grinned and reached for the button on the top of her blouse.
He rubbed his hands together. “Oh, yeah, good choice.”
She rolled her eyes. “But I’m kidding.” She pulled her foot up and lowered her sock.
“Now that’s just mean.”
She added a little seductive smile as she slowly pulled the sock off. After removing the second sock, she held both her feet up in the air and wiggled her naked toes.
“Damn, you’re cute,” he said.
“Hmm. Cute. I was hoping for something more.”
“Give me more than socks, and you might get more than cute.”
Giggling, she lowered her feet, and he said, “Hey, keep your naked feet where I can see them. I should have some thrill since I’m sitting here without my shirt.”
She laughed. “Foot fetish, huh? I’ve heard about your kind.” She propped her feet up on the coffee table beside the game board.
He adjusted his chair and put his own bare foot beside hers. The sides of their feet brushed against each other. She had tiny feet, feminine, with light pink–painted toenails. He ran his big toe up to her ankle and back down again. It felt good. Maybe he did have a foot fetish.
When he looked up, she was staring at their feet, too. Her expression told him she liked it as much as he did. And if she liked that, wait until he got his hands on her body.
She glanced back at the board. After studying her letters, she went with the word suave. It got her eighteen points, and with her seven points left over it got her one article of clothing.
She looked up with a glint of challenge in her eyes. He ran his big toe down the side of her foot again. How quickly could he get this game to the good level? He decided not to push his luck. Best to get her partially naked first. Bending at the waist, he pulled off his other sock.
He sat his right foot on the table, next to hers. “Mine aren’t as pretty as yours, but my second toe is longer than my first, and you do know what that means, right?”
Blame It on Texas Page 26
