by Stacey Keith
“More?” She stared up at him in alarm. It had never been about her before. No one had ever made any kind of an effort. Not like Jake had.
“Princess, I’m just getting started.”
* * * *
Sitting astride Delilah with her trembling thighs, Maggie had trouble forming a coherent thought, let alone knowing exactly where she was. What had Jake just done to her?
Jake looked over at her with a Cheshire Cat grin. Soooo pleased with himself. Well, maybe he had a reason to be. Men had orgasms if you left the door open and there happened to be a stiff breeze. For her, things were different.
She’d never had an encounter like that one. She’d never had orgasms like the ones he gave her. And the fact that it was Jake—the one man who would never stick around to give her those orgasms in perpetuity—had her worried about her chances of ever being happy with anyone else.
“You still look pretty dazed,” Jake said. “Gotta say I’m kind of loving it.”
The moon showed clear and bright over the prairie. She liked seeing the glow of his cigarette and hearing the horses’ bridles jingling. Crickets sawed away in the tall grasses that edged the trail. There were lights in the far distance, which told her they were almost back to the ranch. What if the staff saw her looking like this? Patting the back of her head, she said, “I have leaves in my hair, don’t I?”
“A bunch of leaves,” he said, unrepentant. “They look great on you, too.”
Jake’s eyes sought hers and everything inside her fell apart all over again.
“Let’s grab some dinner,” he said. “After that we can see what develops.”
Like more orgasms that ruin you for life? I’m in.
“What do you do for an encore?” she asked playfully.
“Bad things,” he replied. His voice was silky smooth in the darkness. “Things you’ll end up begging me to do to you again later on.”
She started tingling, which annoyed her because it gave him such an advantage. “Do you have to look so pleased with yourself?”
“A man’s only good at the things he likes,” Jake said philosophically. “What things do you like to do, Magdalene?”
Heat rushed to Maggie’s face. She found herself imagining all kinds of scenarios—things she may have thought about secretly but never had the nerve to ask for. Certainly not from Todd. He was the kind of man who promised you the moon, but delivered you a bug zapper. And boy, had she ever been zapped.
“I don’t know what I like,” she told him truthfully. “Not until I try it.”
Jake gave a low whistle. “That leaves the door wide open then, doesn’t it?”
As they got closer to the house, Atlas and Delilah picked up speed. Maggie heard car doors slamming and voices. Strangely familiar ones. What on earth…?
She recognized Cassidy’s voice first. “I think there’s a can of biscuit dough in the freezer, Mom.”
Then her mother, clear as day, replying, “Don’t bother, Cassidy, honey. I picked up dinner rolls on the way over.”
My mother? What was her mother doing here? What were Mason and Cassidy doing here? Sweat sheeted Maggie’s face. Then she had an awful thought. Priscilla knew she would never agree to a family dinner that included Jake. Not this soon. So had Priscilla made Mason and Cassidy come all the way to Cuervo for dinner just to have an excuse to meet Jake—who conveniently happened to be staying here?
Maggie sucked in her breath. She smelled a Priscilla-sized rat. She’d been expecting her mother to try something. But this?
“Oh, my God,” Maggie said, frantically raking leaves out of her hair. The last thing on earth she wanted was for her parents to know what she’d been up to in the woods with Jake.
“What’s wrong?” Jake asked.
“My mother!” she burst out, too bothered to hide the truth from him. “She found out you and I were dating. Ever since, she’s been conniving to meet you. I told her absolutely not.”
“Do I embarrass you?” he deadpanned. “It’s the hair, isn’t it? Too short?”
“You don’t know my mother,” she said hotly. “She’s like one of those dogs that won’t stop sniffing your crotch.”
“Your mother is going to sniff my crotch?”
“Jake! I’m serious. Quit trying to make a joke out of this.”
“Maybe I don’t mind meeting your mother,” he said. “You don’t need to protect me, you know.”
It’s too soon, she wanted to scream. You’re not ready to meet my family. And I know for a fact that I’m not ready for them to meet you. Besides, this was her life. Priscilla had no right. The only good thing about this was the chance to see Cassidy and Lexie.
Well, and Mason. But only if he was still making Cassidy happy.
“Are you sure?” she asked, chewing worriedly on her lip. “Do you know what you’re getting yourself into?” Do you know what it means to have parents who want to know every damn thing about your personal business?
“An older, wilier version of you?” He winked, but it mortified her to think it might be true. “I’m pretty sure I can handle it.”
Maggie had looked forward to dinner alone with Jake—and to an evening of naughty adventures. Her gaze skated over his sexy, pleasure-giving lips. Disappointment sat heavily on her.
When they turned the corner, sure enough, there was Mason’s SUV and her dad’s Chrysler Plymouth. Maggie pulled up on the reins to stop Delilah, who kept dancing with impatience. Then she dismounted and the stable boy led away their horses.
She and Jake stood together in the courtyard. They stared inside the dining room window, where her entire family had blithely gathered to murder her sex life.
“Wow,” she said. “I can’t believe you’re going in there.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Well, this should be interesting.
Jake walked into the dining room, surveyed Maggie’s family, and found them surveying him right back. He’d dealt with far worse as far as families went. One time in high school he’d brought home a girl and tried to smuggle her upstairs to his bedroom. His mother stood outside his door and screamed, “I know you’ve got your little whore in there!”
So a nice family like the Robys? No problem.
“You must be Jake.” Priscilla smiled up at him. “I hope you don’t mind us crashing in on you like this.”
Mason stood behind Cassidy’s chair, both hands on her shoulders. Next to Cassidy was her daughter, Lexie, who gazed at him curiously. Maggie’s father, Doak, sat at the head of the table. Doak wore a mechanic’s jumpsuit. Mason had said that Doak was a retired fire chief who loved working on cars. Jake remembered meeting all of Maggie’s people at the wedding.
Jake swung his gaze back to Mason and Cassidy, who couldn’t have looked more embarrassed and apologetic.
“I’m the guest here,” Jake said. “So that makes me the party crasher. You can’t fault Mason for wanting to eat in his own home, can you?”
Maggie crossed her arms. She leveled a poisonous glare at Priscilla. “Nobody told me you were coming.”
“Mom said she told you,” Cassidy replied.
All eyes turned toward Priscilla, who had the grace to blush. “My stars, did I forget to tell you? Well, no point fussing at me now.”
Doak shook his head. “Priss strikes again.”
Jake decided he liked Doak. Man of few words. Testicles firmly intact.
“Come sit down,” Priscilla said to Jake, straight to business. She pulled out a chair for him. If he took it, he’d be wedged between her and Doak, but across the table from Maggie. He gazed at Maggie’s wide dark eyes and pink lips. He thought what she might do with those lips and—nope, wrong time, wrong place, buddy.
Jake went around the table first and pulled out the chair for her. Everyone noticed it. Even Mason shook his head, as though this small courtesy confirmed what they all su
spected.
Small towns. Jake had forgotten. Your business was everyone’s business.
He took the seat across from Maggie. Lexie was bouncing around her chair, gabbing about her new school in Dallas. Cute kid, but damn, she talked a lot.
“So Jake,” Priscilla said, “I hear you bought the Regal and you’re fixing it up.”
Jake exchanged glances across the table with Maggie. She had something that looked like a love bite on her neck. Jesus, did he put that there? All he wanted was to get her naked again and give her a repeat of this afternoon, only with condoms. What kind of moron went trail riding with the woman he was hot for and didn’t bring condoms?
If he didn’t pop soon, he’d probably have a goddamn stroke.
Priscilla was looking at him. They were talking about something, weren’t they? Jake racked his brain. Ah, yes.
“We’re working on two projects in Cuervo,” he told Priscilla and Doak, who was also listening, his blue eyes gentle and with only a little tiny bit of that Touch my daughter and I’ll kill you vibe. “There’s an empty lot just outside of town that we closed on last week. We’re thinking about building a techpark. An incubator.”
“An incubator?” Priscilla repeated. “Isn’t that for chickens?”
“No, Mom,” Maggie said. “It’s a place where tech geniuses get together to hatch ideas. A lot more lucrative than chicken farming.”
Jake looked at her, impressed “Not everyone knows what an incubator is.”
“Oh, Maggie’s always been whip-smart,” Priscilla said. “Of all my girls, she got the best grades. One time she came home with a C and cried herself sick. I didn’t think she’d make it to school the next day.”
“Is that right?” A smile tugged at Jake’s lips. “Were you a good girl, Magdalene? Home by curfew?”
“I wasn’t that good,” Maggie insisted. “I still had a personality, you know. And I almost never made my bed.”
Priscilla reached over and patted Maggie’s hand. “That was April’s bed, honey. You made her bed so she wouldn’t get in trouble. See? And you thought I wasn’t paying attention.”
Maggie looked so horrified by her own goodness, Jake had to laugh. As the older sibling himself, he’d had to cover for Dillon a million times. On Christmas one year, Dillon was playing in Loretta’s car. When he pulled the car out of park, it rolled down a small hill and smashed the front bumper on a tree stump. Jake took the heat for that—he had to. Dillon was too young to handle a beating. Remembering that just made him angry, so he pushed the thought aside.
“Where is April?” Maggie asked.
“On a date,” Priscilla said.
Mrs. Birch came in carrying a big glass bowl full of salad. She set it on the table and then distributed salad plates.
“So, Jake, tell us about where you grew up.” Priscilla lifted the salad bowl, scooped some lettuce onto her plate and then passed the bowl to him. “Do your folks still live in Texas?”
Jake knew Maggie had perked up at the question. But this was what he hated about social engagements and why he’d mostly done a good job of avoiding them. The conversation always got around to him somehow. People were nosy.
If he were back in Dallas, all he’d have to do was make a cutting remark or weaponize his silence. But he wasn’t on his turf right now. Different rules applied. If he wanted Maggie’s family to like him, he had to pretend to be a normal guy who didn’t freeze up in the presence of a personal question.
Mason, Cassidy and Lexie had their own thing going on at their end of the table. Mason couldn’t save him. Jake speared a few leaves of lettuce onto his plate. Even if he were a normal guy, he wouldn’t want to talk about his family. Not when everything was so raw and depressing and wrong.
But Priscilla and Maggie were looking right at him. If he came up with a lie or a distraction, they would detect it at once. Maybe he could offer them something safe, something small. “I don’t know my father,” he said. “Last I heard, he lived in Illinois.”
“Do you have sisters or brothers?” Priscilla asked.
Jake could feel his blood pressure inching up, but forced himself to remain calm. Maggie chewed slowly, listening. He could practically see her brain sifting and sorting, trying to piece it all together. Trying to do what they all tried to do, which was to figure him out.
He hated his private business being laid out for other people to see. He hated feeling as though they pitied him—or worse, judged him as he judged himself. Even thinking about his brother put him on edge. His brother the traitor. I did everything for you, you ungrateful little shit.
Something cold wormed its way inside his stomach and stuck there. All the pleasure of the afternoon deserted him. Instead of being charmed by Maggie’s family, he found himself annoyed by them, annoyed and needing to get the hell out.
Abruptly, he stood. “I have to make a phone call.”
Mason stopped talking to Cassidy and turned to see what was going on.
“Right this minute?” Priscilla asked, clearly bewildered. “We’re about to eat.”
Maggie looked as surprised as Priscilla, which made him angrier.
Jake walked out of the dining room and then out of the house. He went back to the horse trail and the comforting darkness.
Sometimes the darkness saved you. Sometimes the darkness ate you. Sometimes the darkness just lived inside you like a disease.
He stood there, the ranch with its warm, lighted windows behind him and the moonlit trail stretching out for miles ahead. His heart kept thundering, but not from the pleasure of getting away. It felt like a parched, shrunken thing. He kept pulling it in one direction while the damn thing kept dragging him in the other.
He had no business socializing with nice families like Maggie’s. Board meetings and conference calls and the occasional cheap, meaningless fling were more his speed. How stupid was he to think he could be…he hunted for the word…domesticated.
Jake was good with things, but he’d never been good with people. Not people who asked questions, who took an interest. He was now and would forever be just one thing: a loner.
He tapped a cigarette out of his pack and lit it. The smoke spiraled lazily into the night sky. He thought about earlier in the day when Maggie went galloping away in a cloud of dust.
He thought about her sitting in the house now, wondering why he’d been such a rude fucking asshole.
Screw it. Jake went to his car and fished the keys out of his visor. Time to clear his head. All this was doing was making him more pissed off.
His brother’s words came back to him. You got no chance of ever having a healthy relationship. Not with me, not with anyone.
Maybe Dillon was right. Sanctimonious fuck. But no point trying to change now. Jake started the car, backed up and took off.
* * * *
From the front porch, Maggie watched Jake’s taillights vanish down the road. She’d heard him start the car and then rushed out to see where he was going.
There was a hollow ache inside her chest that felt familiar. Almost like the day she came home from the grocery store and found Todd’s packed suitcases being hauled outside by her best friend, Avery, pregnant at the time and struggling to hoist the heavy bags into his truck. Todd was on the phone trying to enter a bronc busting in Abilene. He’d actually held up his finger, asking Maggie to wait.
Now Jake had taken off for no reason. And that ache in her chest was starting to burn. It was trying to tell her something. It was trying to warn her that even men who weren’t actively cheating on you couldn’t be trusted to stay.
Was this part of that “no guarantees” thing she’d signed up for? Because it felt like she’d been stabbed over and over again in the stomach.
The door opened behind her and Maggie tensed, thinking it was Priscilla come to ask more questions. Priscilla had meant well. She always did. A
kinder, stronger, braver woman Maggie would never know. But it was hard watching her mother make excuses for Jake’s horrible behavior. Now instead of being angry with Priscilla for organizing this disaster, Maggie felt bad that her mother had been so rudely treated. He probably had a business emergency, Priscilla said after he’d been gone a while. I’m sure he’ll be back.
When it was Mason who stepped outside, Maggie gave a sigh of relief.
“Maggie, I’m really sorry,” he said, the gentleness of his tone washing over her. “When your mom called and guilted us into coming down to spend a day or two with family, we had no idea…well, that you and Jake had a thing going. We interrupted.”
Maggie swallowed down a lump in her throat. Lumps in the throat were for other people, not for her. “What makes you think I’m seeing Jake?” she asked. Bad enough that she felt this shitty. Maybe she still had a shot at hiding it.
“Don’t be mad, but you’ve got grass stains all over your, uh, where you sit. Also the…” He traced a circle around his own head to show her that her hair was a mess.
She slid her hands back and forth across the porch railing. “Guess there’s no convincing you I just took a tumble off Delilah, eh?”
“Jake already told me that he liked you,” Mason confessed. “We talked at the wedding.”
Maggie gazed over the silvery fields and told herself she should be angry about what had happened. Just because Jake had great sex skills didn’t make him good boyfriend material. Jake probably looked at sex as just another thing he needed to know how to do well in order to get what he wanted.
Even though there was a clenched fist inside her chest, an even bigger fist was pounding her over the head, reminding her that good-looking, sexy men were nothing but trouble. Only the stupid or the desperate—or in her case, the desperately stupid—walked into that same trap twice.
“I’ve known Jake for ten years,” Mason said. “He’s a genius at business. But I don’t know one damn thing about his family because he almost never talks about it.”
“Do you know anything?” she asked, hating that she’d even asked the question. If she were smart, she wouldn’t care. If she were smart, she’d go back inside and act like nothing had happened.
