Boy Toy

by Jenny Gardiner

  “Can I get you an iced tea? I think it’s going to be hot today—you’ll need to stay hydrated.” She lifted the pitcher on the table in front of her and poured two glasses. Izzy took a long, slow sip, which cooled her throat going down and felt so refreshing even before she’d lifted a finger to do work. “So how long have you two been dating?”

  Izzy spat out the tea, making quick work to pretend she was stupidly choking on the drink, not the words. After wiping the tea from her mouth and shirt, she held up her hands.

  “Oh no, I’m afraid you’ve got that wrong.” She shook her head. “We only just met. I’m here helping out as, well, kind of a favor. Like a payback favor.”

  Eleanor frowned. “I feel bad that you’re working for me to pay him back.”

  “No worries. I’m happy to help out. It was kind of, well, I guess a huge misunderstanding, but it means I did something stupid and, ugh, never mind. Suffice it to say, he and I are virtual strangers.”

  The sound of boots on the porch steps prompted her to turn and see Sully approaching. He still hadn’t shaved that scruff and it looked so freaking sexy, she wanted to run her hands along it. Wait—where did that stupid notion come from?

  “Hi, babe, sorry I’m late,” Sully said as he came up and out of nowhere, hugged her tight, and planted his lips on hers. Time came to a complete standstill as Izzy realized that a) his lips were on hers, b) his lips felt amazing on hers, c) he had the audacity to slip his tongue between her willing, betraying lips and before she knew it their tongues were dueling as well as their personalities seemed to, and d) she wanted nothing more than to stay here doing this for, oh, ever.

  My God, the man could kiss. Her pulse quickened, her chest kind of heaving into his as her breathing became heavy. He had her pulled so close to him if she didn’t do something immediately, she was going to end up with her back against the wall of Eleanor Mullaney’s cedar shake siding with her skirt hiked up above her hips and her boots locked at the ankles around Sully’s firm, just-the-right-size ass, which her hands were mysteriously grasping at right now. Right when she thought she’d shamelessly go to plan B up against the wall, Sully unceremoniously broke away.

  “Oh, Eleanor, I’m so sorry. That was terribly rude of me. But I needed to say hello to my friend Izzy who I was so excited to see.” He made air quotes when he said the word “friend.” What the hell was he playing at?

  She squinted at him.

  “Sully, so great to see you.” Eleanor got up and hugged him. “I don’t expect I’ll get quite the same greeting as Miss Izzy here. Who was telling me you two are virtual strangers.” She gave him a wink.

  He nodded. “Yeah, well, it’s early days, Eleanor, and Izzy wants to keep her cards close to her chest. You know how these things go.”

  Izzy attempted to set the record straight but was met with resistance. “You’ve got it all wrong,” she said. “It’s only about this pair of boots I have to pay him back for—”

  “Are those not the sexiest boots you’ve ever seen, Eleanor?” Sully said as he licked his lips. He licked his freaking lips. God help her she was not going to get through this day in an innocent fashion if he kept doing things like that.

  Chapter Ten

  Sully wasn’t quite sure how it was that he randomly went for the jugular with Isabelle Strong but damn, was he grateful he’d had the gumption to do it. Because wow, when his lips settled on hers, and she let him slip his tongue inside her mouth, there were fireworks behind his eyelids and his pulse sped up to NASCAR level. Maybe it was the way her jeans fit so snugly and emphasized that squeezable booty he’d eyed when she walked away from him. Or maybe it was those sexy boots that were emblematic of what got him so juiced up to begin with. Who knows? What he’d experienced during that kiss was so beyond his expectations, it was as if he’d tasted the best dessert on the menu and wanted to dine on it regularly.

  He’d been halfway prepared for her to slap him for being so forward, but instead he was pleasantly surprised that she pretty much immediately yielded to his quite uncharacteristic impulses. Sure, he’d been happily going home with a host of willing women this past year, but it wasn’t like him to up and mash his face to a woman who’d expressed overt annoyance with him.

  Maybe deep down he wanted to prove to her he wasn’t the bad guy. Because he wasn’t the bad guy! He was a dude trying to make his way in the world, minding his business. Albeit now all of a sudden being treated like some bizarre hero, which he most decidedly wasn’t. For crying out loud, all he wanted was to give the damned ring away.

  Right now, he needed to get Izzy away from Eleanor so that things didn’t turn sour. And maybe he could try to get to know her while she seemed quasi-receptive. He reached for her hand and linked fingers with hers. She looked at him like he’d sprouted a horn from his forehead.

  “We’d better get to work—we’ve got hours ahead of us,” he said. “Let’s go out in my truck. I’ve got all the tools we’ll need in the bed.”

  Yep, he had all the tools he’d need in any sort of bed with this one. As long as she didn’t keep a pair of loppers handy for when she decided to get explosive.

  He helped her into the cab where she got to sit next to Blizzard, who lavished her with kisses while Sully waved off Eleanor.

  “You two lovebirds have fun!” she said, holding her hand up and waving with her fingers.

  He hopped into the driver’s seat and shut the door, pulling away and hoping for no repercussions. He learned quickly that he was living in a fantasy world if he expected none.

  She turned toward him. “What the hell was that?”

  He squinted, running his tongue along his teeth as he pondered the right response.

  “What?”

  “That!” She shoved her arm toward the house in dramatic fashion like she was thrusting a fencing épée into her opponent. And it was sort of a lunge with a verbal sword.

  “You mean when she called us lovebirds?” He grinned.

  “I mean that and when you wove your fingers with mine as if we were a piece of damned tapestry. And when you jammed your tongue down my throat like you were fishing for my breakfast in my stomach.”

  He belted out a laugh.

  “Touché. Bonus points for colorful descriptions.” He pointed at her seat belt, which was not secured across her body. “We’re going off-road now so you might want to buckle up.”

  She pulled hard on the belt and latched it in, then continued. “One minute she’s asking if I’m sweet on you—like I’m at some taffy pull with my Aunt Gertrude—and I no sooner get out the ‘no way in hell’ response when you show up and tongue thrust me into the next county! Out of thin air, I might add.”

  “That sounds so cold and clinical.” He shifted gears on the truck as they drove across the property in search of the fences they were going to fix. “Not to mention painfully unromantic. I prefer to think of it this way: for some reason, the spirit moved me to kiss you. And when I kissed you, it felt so good and so right that I decided to see if you were enjoying it as much as I was. And usually when that happens, the kisser ventures into what could be hostile territory, but it’s more like the kisser is hoping it’s going to be friendly terrain.”

  “Are we talking war zone here or a make-out session?”

  He grinned. “The way I see it, it kind of started like a war zone, but then it morphed into a make-out session.”

  She scrunched up her nose and buried her face in her hands. “Oh God. What have I done?”

  “Um, you enjoyed a little kiss with me?”

  She shook her head. “Yeah, but this”—she pointed at him then at herself—“is not okay. It’s not good. It’s weird.”

  He held up his hand. “If your goal was to chip away at my fragile male ego, you’re succeeding.”

  “It’s not you, it’s me.” She sighed.

  “Wait a minute. Didn’t I hear Zoey say you came here to meet me? You were all set on some grand romance with the ring man, weren’t you? And now
it’s wrong?”

  “Yeah, but I realized that was stupid. And then, well, everything went all off the rails with us, and so it’s like, it’s not right.”

  He shook his head. There was no reasoning with this woman at the moment. He’d have to devise a better strategy. In the meantime, it was time to mend some fences. Perhaps both literally and figuratively.

  Chapter Eleven

  Izzy was so glad they got to the first break in the fence so they could redirect the conversation to something a little less tetchy. Or at least a little more user-friendly for her purposes. She hopped out of the cab, not even waiting for Sully to come around and help her out. The less physical contact, the better at this point. She knew this because she was unwilling to admit even to herself how much that kiss affected her. Yikes. The minute his mouth was on hers felt like a revelation. Like there was every other guy she’d ever kissed, and then there was Sully’s kiss, which felt like it was the first time and the thousandth time and each time was better than the time before.

  He surprised her immensely when he went from tame to all in as he had. The minute his tongue slid into her mouth, she had it bad. Way bad. Like she was hard-pressed not to imagine how much she wanted to do with that talented tongue of his—a tongue that left her wanting more. It didn’t help matters that he looked so hot in his beat-up blue jeans and work boots and a T-shirt that fit tightly across his chest and his biceps and ugh, she had to gnaw on her fingers to stop the image from further distracting her.

  Sully climbed up into the back of the pickup and tossed down a bunch of tools she supposed were necessary for the task at hand while Blizzard ran around and chased blowing grass and butterflies, barking as if it was his job.

  “So, is this what we need to conduct the delicate fence surgery?” She winked at him and lowered her voice to sound like an announcer. “We can rebuild him.”

  “Are you seriously quoting from The Six Million Dollar Man?”

  “I don’t know why, but my mother used to always say that to me if I broke something when I was a kid. She’d try to make light of it so I wouldn’t get upset.”

  “Your mom sounds like a sweet woman.”

  “She’s awesome. The best. When I was a little girl I figured she was my playmate. We had so much fun together. Still do. My father left her when I was a baby, so it was only the two of us. And for my whole life, she’s been my number one cheerleader.”

  “I’d love to meet her sometime,” he said as he grabbed a shovel and handed it to Izzy along with a pair of work gloves.

  She tried to imagine what it would be like to bring her mother out here to Montana to meet Sully. Like if they were girlfriend and boyfriend and they dated and after a while it was time to meet the parents. Which made her realize she hadn’t met the parents of the last several guys she dated. How bad was that? She couldn’t even get past what might be considered the first base of relationships: family introductions.

  She glanced over at Sully who was speaking to her, much to her own oblivion.

  “So, this post is down here,” he said, pointing at what was obviously a post that got knocked down by something, considering it was lying on the ground. “We have to remove the base of the post that is still in the ground.” He handed her one of the shovels and grabbed the other one. “It’s going to require some elbow grease, but the good news is you’ve got some crazy sexy biceps on you that tells me you work out religiously at the gym, so I’m sure it’ll be a breeze.” He gave her a sly wink.

  Crazy sexy biceps, eh? He was right. She spent an inordinate amount of time at the gym. Sometimes it was to scout out men she could date—yeah, sad to admit that. But she worked hard to get the physique she had and she was flattered he’d noticed. Now to prove her biceps justified the gym membership.

  She started digging, pushing the spade into the soil right at the edge of the post, but it was not budging.

  “You could try shoveling in toward the side of that buried post, and get the point in there to use it as a lever to pop it out.”

  Well, wasn’t he clever? She took his advice and dug down at an angle and voila—it lifted right out.

  “Now we need to make space to put the replacement post in.” Sully held up a long, large tool that looked like something you might use as a torture device. “This is called a post-hole digger, and with your hands together up here, you dig it in, then do this to open it up.”

  Wow—it worked surprisingly well. This was going to be much easier work than she thought.

  Next Sully helped her measure replacement posts and rails, and he cut them to size with a chainsaw he’d brought along.

  “You put the post in, line it up with the rail, put in dirt at the base of the post, then pack it hard with this rubber mallet.”

  “Wow, how’d you learn to do stuff like this?”

  “I grew up on a farm out in the country in southwest Virginia,” he said. “I learned early on to help with chores like this. Farm life isn’t easy, and everyone needs to chip in to manage it well.”

  “How many of you were there?”

  “I was one of four kids. My mother taught school and my father worked construction. They ran the farm in their off-hours.”

  “So you did learn the value of a hard-day’s work.”

  “And then some,” he said. “I got to where I am by working my ass off. So that now I don’t have to work my ass off. Unless I feel like it. Case in point.” He spread his arms out around them.

  “Yeah, well, you’d be one of the few men I know who is hardworking.”

  “Ouch.”

  She shook her head. “That’s probably unfair. I’m sure there are guys I know who work their butts off, but the ones who linger in my mind tend to be the standouts with laziness. Or maybe it’s annoyingness that I’m conflating with laziness.”

  “Annoyingness? I didn’t even know that was a word.”

  “If it’s not, it should be.”

  He pulled out his phone and entered the word into a dictionary app. He shook his head. “Well, I’ll be damned, you’re right. It is a word.”

  “It was inevitably going to become a word considering there are probably enough women in the world annoyed with the chronic annoyingness of the men in their lives.”

  “So what happened to the last guy you dated?”

  She laughed a half laugh. “Dating might be a stretch. I mean yeah, we were together for a few months, but all the effort came from me. His efforts were concentrated on making sure he watched as many football games in a four-day period as possible. There wasn’t room in his life for football and me.” She groaned. “But then I have to be honest about this. He was so not for me. For instance, he had this small penis vehicle—a big ole pickup truck.”

  Sully lifted a brow and looked over at his enormous pickup nearby.

  Izzy slapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh crap. I didn’t mean it like that. I mean, well, you’ve got a truck because you need a truck. You’re driving off-road and you’re hauling tools and you probably do things like kayaking and camping and stuff, so you have a need. See, HR guy—”

  “HR guy?”

  She hung her head. “Yep. Cliché, no? Hooking up with a guy from the office? Anyhow, HR guy had this penis-compensation vehicle, a huge pickup, the kind with the big wheel hubs that make it that much harder to park in a city parking lot, right? And the thing is, it’s not like he needed it. No one who lives in LA needs such a massive truck except a guy who is compensating. Or if he hauls trash for a living.”

  She continued yapping away about HR guy for a few minutes but noticed things had gone silent. She looked up to see Sully standing in front of her. He’d taken off his shirt, and for a minute there, Izzy wanted nothing more than to lick the sweat glistening off his tanned chest. He reached out and tucked a hank of her hair behind her ear.

  “I’m not sure if I shouldn’t do what I did before, but to be fair, this time I’m going to ask you.”

  His eyes fixed on her icy-blue ones, and they
stood there for what seemed like minutes.

  “Permission to come aboard, Captain?”

  If only he meant that in the literal sense. She stared at him for a beat longer, then nodded ever so slowly.

  He reached over and softly placed his finger beneath her chin, pulling her face gently toward his own. When they were a mere hairbreadth away from each other, he said in a soft whisper, “Now that I’ve got you where I want you, I have to ask: may I kiss you with my tongue?”

  Which was a question she’d never had anyone pose to her, but he’d done it with such gentlemanly intent, well, hell, what was she to say? Hell to the yes? Hell yeah.

  She didn’t want to appear too overly zealous, so she instead slowly opened her mouth and angled her head to meet his mouth with her own. The minute their mouths met, she melted into his body. It could have been the heat, or it could have been his heat. Or it could have been that she wanted to get closer to that tanned, slick chest of his to map all the lines and contours of his beautiful torso with her fingers. If she was going to hell for her stupidity, she might as well enjoy it on the way down.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sully had indeed removed his shirt because he was hot. As a bonus, she clearly got turned on seeing him in the nude from the waist up. His one regret was that he had no way to get her in the same condition. He’d have to settle for what he could get. Which right now meant a command performance of what happened back at Eleanor’s house, only this time with intent on both sides.

  He heard a soft thunk and looked over to see Izzy had let her shovel fall to the ground. God he’d love to have that be the two of them falling to the ground and scrabbling to remove each other’s clothes. But he had to take things slowly with her, so instead he was savoring the moment as his tongue slid along the smooth surface of her straight, white teeth, then delved farther into her mouth to find her tongue probing for his, then stroking his tongue with long, slow swirls. Sully couldn’t stop himself from letting out a long, low moan as Izzy reached out and ran her hands across his chest, dragging them along his torso, stroking from beneath his arms down to his waist, teasing him with fingers that could so easily slip beneath the edge of his waistband.