Caught Up

by Rya Stone

  “So almost getting scalped was my fault?” Unbelievable. “Just take me back to my motel.” She spun and started walking in the direction of his truck.

  “Cassie!”

  She turned but didn’t stop. Walking backward, she shrugged. “What could you possibly have to say to me?”

  He stalked toward her. Slow, deliberate. Predatory. And just like an animal, he growled, low in his throat. “Look at me.”

  She shouldn’t have done it, but she did. She met those blue, blue eyes and saw the hurt there. Her jaw trembled. She was so damn attracted to Jason Lucas, and she shouldn’t be. Couldn’t be. Maybe from afar, maybe in her dreams, but not this, this was too gritty, too real.

  She spun and ran. Yeah, ran, weak ankle and all. They were in junior high, remember?

  He caught her. She knew he would. She even wanted him to. Strong arms wrapped around her, a better safety shield than she’d ever had.

  “Cassie,” he whispered into her hair. “Baby—”

  “Don’t call me that. Just please…don’t.”

  He swept the hair away from her ear in a move so tender her heart contracted. “Don’t run from me. You won’t get far. And I’ll always catch you. Always.”

  Oh God.

  When he picked her up this time, she melted right into him.

  …

  Jase barreled past Cassie’s attempt to block him from entering her motel room.

  “You need to go.”

  “No.” He backed her into the wall beside the dresser. “You didn’t say a damn thing the whole ride here.” He’d never, ever laid his hands on a woman, but that hadn’t stopped him from fantasizing about planting his boot in Sasha’s face the entire, silent ride back to Cassie’s motel. “Did she hurt you?”

  “No, she didn’t hurt me.”

  “She did.” Jase threaded his hands through the hair at Cassie’s temples. “That doesn’t happen again. No one touches you again. Ever.”

  “That’s going to be true once I ditch this town.”

  He worked his fingers in slow circles against her scalp. “Is that what you want?”

  She lied again. “That’s all I want in the whole world.”

  “No, it’s not.” He knew something deep drove her, something so deep she’d agreed to what had turned into a disaster of a date. He didn’t know what it was, but he aimed to find out. He just had to keep her safe in the meantime.

  He held her desperate gaze for a long moment before bending his face to her neck. His lips skimmed from collarbone to ear, taking in her scent, her fear, and desperately wondering if she felt the same electric shocks spiking straight southward.

  “Please…”

  “Ask me anything, Cassie, but don’t ask me to stop.” His teeth grazed her earlobe, and at her intake of breath, those shocks became a live wire, connecting every inch of flesh from his mouth to his groin. “Don’t ask me to stop touching you, because I don’t know if I can.”

  He’d always been proud of his ability to resist. But he hadn’t resisted her. And now the power was hers. She had him completely, and there was no way he was leaving without tasting her again. He needed it. God, he hadn’t known how much he needed it.

  She clutched the front of his shirt, and he groaned. Then, everything blew up in his face.

  “What’s going on around here? And how are you involved?”

  He pulled away, masking his irritation. Because those were the last questions he wanted to answer while he had his greedy hands on her sweet curves. “What?”

  “I need to know if your hands are dirty.” She swallowed and squeezed her eyes shut, as if bracing herself for the answer. “And I need to know before this goes any further.”

  He removed her hands from his shirt. Lacing them through his, he pinned them to the wall on either side of her head. There was no way around this.

  “No, my hands aren’t exactly clean,” he admitted. “I grew up hard and fast. Then I went to war.” And returned miraculously unscathed. As fucked up as it sounded, he credited his unconventional upbringing for the fact that he hadn’t come home with full-blown PTSD. That didn’t mean he slept easy when he laid it down day after an exhausting day.

  Except for last night.

  And the night before. And—

  Cassie lowered her gaze to his chest, to the dog tags hidden under his shirt. Her. He’d closed his eyes thinking about her, even if it was just the promise of her. A dizzying sensation engulfed him. From the nearness of her warm, soft body, from the pressure of her hands, tiny and trapped within his, trusting, but not.

  “My hands aren’t dirty in the way you’re imagining. And they’ll never hurt you,” he whispered fiercely. “I promise you that.”

  “Why did you tell me to stay away from your brother?” she asked. “From the Neelys?”

  He hadn’t lied to her, but at the same time, his hands weren’t sparkling clean, either. And Cassie stood in their grasp, hurting and afraid. Because of his past. Because Clint’s problems had become his own again in a way he hadn’t imagined.

  “Tell me,” she demanded.

  “There are things that go on in this county…” Things I can’t talk about. “Things I don’t want you a part of…” Even that little admission set the room to spinning, and his tainted blood pounded through his veins.

  “That’s not good enough,” she insisted. And she probably had no idea how her set jaw made her mouth fuller, poutier.

  “That’s all I’m going to give you,” he said. “Besides this.” He lowered his mouth to hers and whispered against her lips. “Open for me.” Make this room stop spinning.

  Tracing the seam of her lips with his tongue, he slid his hands down her outstretched arms. His fingers played over her neck, the hollow of her collarbone, and when her tongue flicked out to meet his, intense arousal gripped his core. But it was the sweet moan when he pressed his hips to hers that completely shattered any sort of gentlemanly resistance. But the room had stilled. And the deeper he plunged into the kiss, the more the chaos around him faded.

  Cassie tore her mouth from his, panting. “Please…”

  Not yet. And he wrapped a hand around her throat so she knew. Her soft gasp, the movement of her hips…they let him know she understood, that she wasn’t going anywhere yet.

  On a mission of its own, his other hand coursed down, over her chest, and as he licked up her neck, Cassie twisted her fingers into his shirt. Christ, she was just as turned on as he was. But her sounds…

  The little moans as his lips planted hungry kisses down her neck, the hiss in his ear as he traced the outline of her bra cup…

  He imagined himself deep inside her, the same hand clasped around her neck, possessive and utterly in control. Except he felt completely the opposite. Those needy, wanting sounds begged him to his knees, where he could further explore—

  “Jase…”

  I know, baby…

  Even his toes tingled, aching for more than a tease, for more than he knew she’d allow. How far…?

  His thumb zeroed in on a perfect, pebble-sized nipple and circled. Her mouth parted, and he didn’t know if she meant to slap him or sigh. He pinched, and she hissed in a breath. Her hips moved against his in an undeniable way, and when the rest of his fingers sank into her flesh it was too indecent to be called a caress. “I’ve needed my hands right here since I met you.”

  “I thought…” She was struggling to form a sentence. A good sign. So was her ragged breath in his ear as he bent to kiss her neck. “I thought…ass.”

  “That, too.” He ran his knuckles up the inside of her thigh. “And these legs wrapped around my waist. And this mouth all over me.” The next kiss wasn’t gentle, either, nor was his hand, sliding under her skirt, over the front of her lace panties. She pressed her body to his, moaning. But he wanted her shuddering and shaking, begging for him not to stop. He hooked his thumb under the edge of her panties. From her inner thigh to the hollow of her hip to the bottom of her plump ass, his work-hardened
hands had never felt something so soft, so yielding to a rough touch, and that right there…

  Man. Knees.

  How was he still standing?

  Her hands sank into his hair. “I can’t.”

  His hand splayed over her ass, pulling her hard into his thigh. “You want me.” Tell me you do because… “I need it from your lips. Your body tells me you do, but—”

  “I can’t.” He got it. But her hand encouraging his at her breast said she wanted something, and his own arousal, hard against her hip, grew even harder as his fingers delved down the center of her ass. He could smell how much she did want him, but what he discovered between her legs shocked him. Oh, she wanted him. “You don’t want this,” he whispered. “You need this. Why’re you fighting so hard?”

  She answered with a whimper. She was reeling, too, spun out by his breath in her ear, by his fingers stroking her from behind. It aroused him beyond belief, but he had to know and stopped suddenly. “Six months…”

  “What?”

  His gaze roamed her face, not quite understanding. “Six months you’ve been here, and I only saw you for the first time last week. You don’t go out, except for work. Other than that, you’re here, with your files and your books.”

  “I don’t get—”

  “A woman like you? I would have seen you. I would have heard about you. How long has it been?”

  “Has what been?”

  He whispered roughly, right in her face. “Since a man touched you like this?”

  A shudder rippled across her skin, and she screwed her eyes shut, silently acknowledging that she liked the dirty things he said to her. “How long?” he whispered, gently fisting her hair with the hand he’d shoved down her panties.

  “Like this?” She opened her eyes and swallowed. “Never.” It was no more than a breath.

  He shifted and nestled between her legs. Cassie threw her head back, but he was the one who saw stars as he ground into the heat between her legs. It wasn’t just him who—

  “Never,” she breathed again.

  “Why’d you have to say that?” With a growl, he tore her from the wall and stumbled to the bed. He dropped her on her back, and her hair splayed wildly over the comforter. Flushed and swollen lipped, she stared into his ravenous eyes, unblinking. It was bold and vulnerable and so fucking beautiful it hurt somewhere deep inside. He had no idea how he restrained himself, how he didn’t tear her clothes in a frenzy to give her what she needed. She was so wet, so ready. For him. “Tomorrow night,” he whispered. “My place.”

  “You’ll read the lease?” she said, breathless.

  He nodded. If that’s what she needed to stay close to him. Because he needed that, too. He just hadn’t known how much until tonight.

  Chapter Eight

  “I’m getting close, Mom.”

  To what, she wasn’t sure anymore and didn’t want to divulge anything further about her possible override in Kyle’s presence. His curious gaze marked every step as she paced her room, cell phone to her ear, but what was she supposed to have done? Left him outside when he’d come banging on her door at the butt-crack of dawn?

  “So your meeting went well?” her mother asked.

  Aside from the hair pulling, yes. Too well, in fact.

  She cleared her throat. “We’re making progress.” She didn’t admit which kind of progress. She couldn’t even get Jase to read the lease. She couldn’t stay away from him, either. In fact, she’d cancelled her weekend trip home to spend Saturday night with him. Her mother had more than understood about the last-minute meeting with an important landowner. But what she’d done with that landowner laid heavy on her conscience as she listened to her mother’s raspy breathing.

  Kyle gave her a sympathetic smile and finally averted his eyes. And he didn’t know the half of it.

  “Okay, baby.”

  “Okay,” she repeated, as if that would make it all better. “I love you, and I’ll see you soon, Mama.”

  “How is she?” Kyle asked when she’d signed off.

  “Hanging in there. And don’t look at me like that,” Cassie muttered over her coffee. She was already on her second cup. Jase hangovers were no joke. “I said I was sorry I didn’t text you back.”

  “Text me back? I called like eighteen times!” Fuming Smurf. It would have been funny had she been in a laughing mood.

  “I put my phone on vibrate.”

  “Why the hell would you do that?” Kyle asked, snatching a paper cup in pursuit of his own caffeine fix.

  “Because I didn’t want Jase to hear us texting.”

  “Well, that’s beside the point. Last I knew you were at Saxon Lake, headed for a body bag.”

  And so it went until Cassie spilled it. Well, most of it anyway. “I think I made a pretty big scene last night. The locals are already talking about it, I’m sure. At least most of the prospect is already leased.”

  “Ye-ah,” Kyle intoned, “except for the biggest tract.”

  “Who’s working the Neely tract? Jim?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  She shook her head, not sure where she was going with this. “There’s something between them and the Lucases. I don’t know what.”

  “There’s also something going on between the Neelys and a guy named Coy Martin.”

  “Coy Martin? Who is he?”

  Kyle shrugged. “Someone who filed an option to purchase half of the Neely’s property. It was signed by the widow and son the day after Neely died.”

  “Seriously? Sounds sketchy.” As if Marian County needed another dose of that.

  “No kidding.”

  “Do you know anything about this guy?”

  Kyle shook his head. “Return address on the document was a Marian PO box. No home number, and none of the clerks had ever heard of him.”

  “Jim will have to find him.”

  Kyle nodded. “The option is only for thirty days. Too close to a lease signing not to have to hammer out surface damage terms with the new landowner.” He paused. “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know. I’m just trying to figure all this out.” Why, she had no idea. The Neely tract wasn’t hers to worry about, and the Lucas brothers were more than enough to keep her hands full. Neither of those things stopped her from wondering who this Coy Martin was or why Jase kept warning her away from the Neelys. A connection between the two seemed unlikely, but in her mind, she kept trying to make the puzzle pieces fit.

  “The only thing you need to figure out is how to get a lease from Jason Lucas,” Kyle said. “Hell, have a fling with him if that will do it.”

  Cassie let out a long breath, remembering the effects of his breath on her skin. “I’m not a fling kind of girl.”

  “You’re also not a fighting kind of girl.”

  “I know. And Kyle, it was some redneck-crazy. Hair pulling, nails, the works. And at my age? I still haven’t wrapped my head around it.”

  “Age doesn’t matter, I’m proof of that.”

  “Kyle…”

  “Still trying to babysit me?”

  Of course, she worried about him. In this profession? Hell, she worried about him in any profession in South Texas.

  “When are you meeting with him again?” Kyle asked.

  “Tonight.”

  And she wasn’t sure if the next twelve hours would be ample prep time.

  …

  Cassie once again spread the contents of the Lucas file over Jase’s dinette table. “Another company is after your brother’s interest.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, good for him, bad for me.”

  “Why’s that, baby?”

  She tried her damnedest not to look at Jase, who leaned a hip into the table, right at eye level. “No ‘baby’ while we’re talking business.”

  “After?” he asked, and though she didn’t risk verification, she just knew he wore that sexy, lip-curling grin.

  “We’ll see. I make no promises.” Yep. Grinning. “Anyway,” she said
, fighting to keep her hormones under control, “I need to head this off now, and what I need from you is an idea why I can’t get anywhere with this, but all of a sudden Clint’s talking to someone else.” She shook her head. “It doesn’t make sense.”

  “Nothing Clint does makes a lot of sense.”

  “Does he not like talking to women?”

  Jase chuckled deeply, and those dark waves tumbled past his shoulders. “Believe me, he likes talking to women.”

  “Just not me.” She already knew this to be true and didn’t bother fashioning her response into a question.

  “There’s probably a reason for that.”

  “Which is?”

  He still hadn’t wiped that smirk off his face. “Not his type.”

  “What’s his type?”

  “Easy.”

  “Easy,” she repeated. “Like how easy?”

  “Cash transaction easy?”

  Cassie leaned back in her seat and placed a hand on her hip. “Really? Your brother makes prostitutes drive out there?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  She narrowed her eyes, both hands on her hips now. “You didn’t think I was a—” That was it. She socked him in the shoulder then crossed her arms and glared. Why was she entertaining him? She had a job to do, she had an override to land, she…

  Liked him. Really, really liked him.

  She liked the gentle country boy behind the roughneck. She liked how he could spit at someone’s feet while cradling her in his arms, how he could put his hand around her neck and make her melt. Even the unknowns, the unanswered questions that pointed to things dark and deep intrigued her.

  “You should know,” he said, suddenly serious, “you in that skirt and top, in those shoes, imagining you with Clint, the shoes still on…it was killing me, easy or not.”

  Um, it had been pretty darn easy for him to slide his hands into her panties last night. The memory made her squirm. Hell, all of it made her squirm. “We need to get back to business. Could you sit down or something?”