DebonairDyke

by Roxy Harte

  “No, Shade. You got it wrong. I told you I needed my stuff before I even met Jessica.”

  “Riiight.”

  I can tell by the look on his face that he’s pissed. One of his pet peeves is that he’s always losing friends to relationships and Shade pissed comes to no good end. “I’m telling you the truth.”

  Jessica calls out again and I know she’s giving up finding me and will leave soon. “Just let me go talk to her for a second, then she’ll go away and we’ll have the rest of the night to catch up.”

  “Whatever,” he says, flopping down on the mattress. Assured he’s not going to make a scene, which he’s done plenty of times with other women in the city, I race down the stairs, around the building and into the garage.

  Chapter Twelve

  The Elephant in the Room

  I collide with her as she’s coming out through the open bay. “Jessica.”

  Startled, she steps back. “I looked everywhere.”

  I point up. “Private bathroom upstairs.”

  Smirking, she laughs. “Except there.”

  “What are you doing here?” I have a sudden vision of her smiled and relaxed, lying back against my bed, arms raised above her head, t-shirt and bra pushed above her breasts, and I’m lowering my lips to suck her nipple.

  “My grandmother wants you.”

  My breath leaves in a rush. Dreamkiller. I try to force my best fake smile. “What does the lovely Mrs. Morrison need today?”

  Jessica arches a brow and it’s such a sexy quirk, I want to kiss her forehead, her cheekbones, her eyelids. Stop! She isn’t even my type. She’s blonde. And I am so not into the plastic doll fantasy.

  She chuckles. “You did see her list, right?”

  “Oooh. The list. But you did explain I spent the whole day on the fence, right?”

  “And she appreciates your assistance more than you know.” Jessica looks suddenly sad and serious. “I think she’s just lonely and I can’t spend every evening there with her.”

  What she doesn’t say is that it’s because she’s busy with her kids. Why didn’t she tell me she had children? Is she ever going to tell me? “I told her I was free Sundays.”

  Her shoulders slump.

  “But I’ll check in on her later tonight. I’ll see if there is anything small and not too time-consuming I can fix while I’m there.”

  Jessica’s face brightens. “Really?”

  I can’t help but smile back at her. “Really.”

  I’m surprised speechless when she leans in and kisses my cheek. She whispers, her breath warm on my skin, “Thank you, Danni.”

  I stand gaping, watching her walk away, again. She kissed me. It’s a full minute before I realize she’s always on foot. Walking. What’s normal in the city seems foreign here. It’s a long distance between places in Kansas. So unless she lives near… Or works close by… I suddenly realize I know absolutely nothing about this woman who makes my senses come alive.

  Maybe it isn’t the most reputable thing to do, but I follow her. Two blocks later I’m standing at the edge of town in front of a two-story house, paint peeling badly, and a wisp of a fenced yard, the small patch of green masquerading as a yard littered with bright-colored toys. I march up the steps and knock on the door she entered only moments before.

  I can hear her voice, talking to someone, and the thoughts boyfriend and spouse jump to mind, although Mom didn’t mention a husband, only kids and, of course, her horrid reputation. A second voice, also a woman’s, brings me no great comfort. “Don’t like boys, Danni, and I haven’t figured out what you are yet.”

  I almost run, not wanting to find out if my competition is another woman, but decide now is not the time for cowardice and I need to know if what I’m feeling is at all reciprocated. Not that I know what I’m feeling, other than I think about her incessantly—

  “Same time tomorrow, Jess?”

  “A little earlier? I was almost late today and I cannot lose another job.”

  “You got it. Jobs are too hard to find around here.” The door opens and a middle-aged woman comes out. She gives me a long look before hollering into the depths of the house, “Jess, there’s a,”pause of confusion as she looks closer, “someone here to see you.”

  “Name’s Danni,” I introduce myself. “I work at the garage.”

  She smiles then. “You’re Danni?”

  “I am.”

  “Well then, I won’t linger. I would have if you’d been anyone else. Never can be too careful nowadays.”

  As she walks down the concrete steps, Jessica comes to the door. “Danni?” she says in a comically confused voice. She glances at the woman who was leaving but now seems stalled mid-step, opens the door and lifts her hand with a bright smile. “Night, Cheryl. I’ll see you tomorrow,” she says before pulling me inside and closing the door. “What are you doing here? How did you even know where I live?”

  “It’s a really small town, sweetheart. You weren’t hard to find.” She bites her bottom lip, clearly at a loss, and I realize just how uncomfortable I’ve made her by showing up at her house. “I shouldn’t have come.”

  “A little warning would have been nice. The place is a disaster and…”

  I look around the small living room and it’s spotless, a few small toys here and there but isn’t that expected? I finish the sentence for her, “And your kids are home?”

  Her shoulders slump. “Yeah, they are.”

  “Cheryl’s their babysitter?”

  She nods and crosses her arms. I hear a squeal of laughter upstairs followed by its echo.

  “I should go.”

  She stops me with a touch on my arm. “I should have told you I have kids. It’s just every time I mention them to anyone I’m vaguely interested in they run so fast and far a first date isn’t even an option.”

  My ego boosts a little higher, not that it was needed. I smile and respond with my normal cockiness, “So you’re vaguely interested?”

  “Very. Vaguely,” she assures me.

  I shrug. “I’ll take vaguely.”

  She laughs and drops her gaze to the ground. She blushes beautifully, her cheeks brightening and filling with color. I catch her chin and make her meet my gaze. “I just wanted to know if I have a chance.”

  “A chance?”

  “You know, that if I asked you out on a date you wouldn’t turn me down cold.”

  “A date?”

  “Dinner? Movie?”

  “This is still Kansas, Danni. The same small-minded place that ran you off a decade ago. We can’t go out.”

  I frown, every inch of my face getting in on the act. “So the answer’s no?”

  “Why would you even want to go out on a date with me? Isn’t dinner and a date just foreplay anyway? Why not just invite me to the garage and do me in the backseat of a—”

  I press my fingertips to her lips. She heard Janice’s tale too. Obviously. And she sounds jealous? Interesting. “Don’t. If I wanted that it would have happened the same day you asked me if I had a dick implant.”

  She grimaces. I manage to drop my hand.

  “That was a stupid comment. I have the habit of being a little too direct sometimes.”

  “It’s okay. I have the same problem usually.”

  She finally relaxes. I can see it in her shoulders. “Sweet tea?” she asks, turning away, and I’m smart enough to follow her into the kitchen. She pours two glasses without my answering and I sit down at her small kitchen table without being invited. Seems we’ve given up on formalities and are just going with it. I don’t know where it is going to take us, but I’m happy to be along for the ride.

  She sets a glass in front of me and joins me at the table. “Seems we’re a little too much alike.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Before you came to town, I was the biggest slut for miles.” She lifts her tea and sips. I choke on mine. “Don’t deny your reputation, Dapper Dan. It’s only reasonable you’d bring your debonai
r ways here and start spreading legs and breaking hearts.”

  I swallow. “You saw the website?”

  “Janice is hell-bent on creating a name for you around here. Makes a person wonder if you are really selling your mechanic skills or if gigolo is closer to the truth.”

  We are definitely getting off on the wrong foot here. “Wow. I should go.”

  I stand to do just that but she grabs my hand. “Can’t take the heat? If you can’t face the truth about who you are, then you certainly aren’t going to be able to accept me for all my faults—past, present and future. So why even bother going on that first date?”

  I sit back down and take a deep breath. “You’re right. I am a slut in New York.”

  “And Janice?”

  I shake my head. “In my defense, I was fresh off the bus and still thinking with New York mentality. She took me by surprise. And she’s very persuasive.”

  “Oh-h I know Janice.” Jessica finally smiles, even though it’s more smirk than cheer. I relax, no longer feeling under fire. We both sip tea. “So what do I need to know about Jessica other than vicious high school rumors and that you have two children?” Another shrill sound comes from above, more shriek than laughter. Jessica doesn’t even blink so I guess it’s a normal sound that doesn’t indicate immediate response is required. “Small children by the sound of them.”

  She actually laughs. “They’re five. Not so small, just very high-pitched. You get used to it.”

  I do the math. It’s pretty easy. She had them shortly after high school. A tingle lifts the hair on the base of my neck even before she says, “The high school rumor is true.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The night I turned Bobby Kruegger down for the hundredth time, I decided I needed to be taken completely seriously. I wanted him to know that not only did I not want to have sex with him but that I was willing to have sex with everyone except him.”

  I’m more shocked than I’ve ever been in my life. My voice squeaks, “You had a gang bang with the entire football team.”

  “Just the starting line.” She waves her hand dismissively, as if it was nothing. “The point is, I chose to make a statement.”

  “A belittling one,” I say with too much judgment.

  “An empowering one. Do you know how much strength it takes to spread your legs again and again? Knowing the reputation you’re causing yourself? Just to make a point?”

  I push back from the table with some force, not cool, not couth, but I’m completely and utterly disgusted by what she’s telling me. I need to get out of this room. I need to wrap my head around this. I realize I’m one second away from blowing it with this girl and do have the presence of mind to realize that I do not want to do that. Even knowing the ugly truth. “And the part about not liking boys?”

  “I don’t like boys. I’ve known I’m a lesbian since I was about thirteen, and trust me, it’s easier being known as the town tramp than having that truth get out. You of all people should understand that.”

  Fortunately, I do. “God, Jessica. What that night must have been like for you.”

  “It wasn’t pleasant.”

  “So if you’re a lesbian—?”

  “How did I end up with my twin boys?”

  I smirk. “As long as we’re being honest with each other.”

  “It was one of the guys that night.”

  “Do you know which one? Does he know? Does he have a relationship with the kids?” My questions fly at her like gunfire.

  “Yes. No. No.”

  I have to rethink the order of my questions. She knows who he is. “Does he still live in town?”

  “No. Thank god! He moved away right after graduation. I doubt he even knew I was pregnant and if anyone else ever put two and two together nothing was ever said and that was a blessing in this town, rumor control central that it is.”

  “But you’re certain?” Two sets of blue eyes suddenly peek around the corner, and I am struck by the bright copper hair spiked from the tops of both of their heads. “Let me guess, only one of them had red hair?”

  “You got it.”

  She bribes the boys back to their room with homemade cookies and glasses of milk, which leaves the room suddenly too quiet and my thoughts too loud. Am I up to this? This being what? A relationship? I clearly don’t see Jessica as a one-night stand. I hope she isn’t the next ex-girlfriend who leaves me with yet another gaping, unhealable hole in my chest. The truth is I fall in love too fast and too easily. I ignore all the warning signs that trouble lies ahead, but usually I’ve already fallen so hard and fast that any would-be warning signs pop up after the fact, and I don’t even heed them then. So here I am facing a multitude of red flags and we haven’t even shared a proper kiss, meaning tongue involved, and I care too much.

  Can this happen? In this town? And there are kids involved. If anyone finds out that I’m even thinking about sex with Jessica let alone an ongoing relationship…

  The answer is this cannot happen. Right?

  The evil voice in the back of my head taunts she’s a lesbian—if not me it will be another woman, maybe someone who doesn’t give a damn about the outcome. I have a twisted conscience but one that’s right on the money. The only way to minimize the risk is to control it.

  “That is some heavy-duty thinking you have going on there.”

  I jerk back to awareness. “Arguing with myself.”

  “Run screaming? Don’t run?”

  I stand up and wrap my arms around her waist. Ducking my head closer, I whisper, “Kiss you now? Kiss you later?”

  She stills, completely. I don’t think she’s even breathing. And then suddenly she’s trembling. Fear? Excitement?

  I kiss her, tongue and all. It registers in my brain that this is our first official proper kiss and I need to make sure it’s memorable, but then her tongue is filling my mouth and her fingers are twining into my short hair. She seems starved…and I’ve never been kissed with so much raw need and hunger. I’m left breathless. Holy cow.

  “You can say that again.”

  “I said that out loud?”

  “Uh-huh,” she says, eyes a little glazed, lips wet and dark pink. “And I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment.”

  “Normally I’d skip the dinner and movie part and move straight to the bedroom from here.”

  “But I have two very awake and curious children upstairs.”

  “And I don’t want to skip the foreplay. I want to wine you and dine you.”

  “Small town, Danni. That might fly in New York—”

  “I wish people would stop telling me what does and doesn’t fly around here. If no one challenges small-mindedness, nothing ever changes.”

  She takes a step backward and I don’t like the sudden distance between us.

  “I’d have completely agreed with you five years ago. Thrown all caution to the wind and unashamedly walked down Main Street holding your hand, but I have kids now and I have to think about them first.”

  “Clandestine meetings?”

  “Are you okay with that?”

  “For now. Just tell me where and when.”

  She bites her bottom lip. “Your garage is on my way home from work.”

  “My bedroom is on your way home from work then. Staircase on the back of the garage will lead you right to it.”

  “Tomorrow? Seven o’clock?”

  “Sounds perfect.”

  “I’ll tell Cheryl I’m working over.”

  “But she knows about me, right?”

  “Sure, she knows about you. She might have even guessed I have a little crush on you. But she doesn’t need to know the truth.” She softens the disappointment that not a single soul will know about our relationship by caressing my cheek. “No one really knows who feeds the rumor mill around here, but it has to be assumed that everyone does. I just don’t want to take any chances. At least not until we know if we’re even compatible.”

  “You’re worried about what’s bet
ween my legs?”

  She blushes absolutely scarlet.

  “I promise, I still have all my girl parts and I’ll leave the strap-on locked in the underwear drawer if you think it’s going to be too much.”

  She reaches between my legs and finds the bulge. “This is as much a part of you as anything else. I’m not going to ask you to hide it away. I just have to make peace with it…if I can…that’s all.”

  And I was naïve enough to believe the biggest elephant in the room was how many people we’ve each slept with.

  * * * * *

  Shade is sound asleep when I finally get back to the garage and appears he’ll stay that way a while. I’m not surprised he’s exhausted. It’s a twenty-two-hour drive from New York and even if he took adequate rest stops he had to be beat, and then I ran his ass up and down the garage stairs moving my shit all afternoon.

  I let him sleep. I’m not up to the argument I know is coming with Shade.

  Not that I’m up to Mrs. Morrison either, I discover too late. With me cornered in her living room, she reminds me more and more of General Patton. Her jowls quiver a little when she says, “You probably wonder why I asked you here.”

  I can tell by her tone this isn’t going to be good.

  “It’s come to my attention you’ve been spending some time with my granddaughter.”

  How do these rumors get started? She’d offered me a chair and I hadn’t taken it. Now I sit. Since she’s already seated, I don’t appear too rude, or at least I hope I don’t.

  “Actually, ma’am, I have barely shared more than a few words with Jessica.”

  “Hmmm.” She looks at me over the top of her glasses. She knows I’m lying.

  “I mean, I bumped into her at the drugstore last week, and she dropped by here when I was mending the fence, but that’s hardly what you meant.”

  “You know exactly what I meant and I want to know exactly what your intentions are. I’m certain you’ve heard the rumors about the girl by now and I don’t want you to get the impression she’s that kind of girl.”

  “No ma’am, I’d never think such a thing.”

  “And while she’s made her share of mistakes and has two brats to show for it, she’s living the straight and narrow now…far as I can see.”