Roundabout Road (Saving the Sinners of Preacher's Bend Book 2)

by Willow, Jevenna

  This time it was Liddy who completely ignored Debra. Instead, she slammed a murdering gaze into Jake’s raised mercury orbs. He’d just betrayed her beyond all forms of betrayal imaginable.

  Her life? She figured it was now well on its way to being completely over.

  Debra left before Liddy had the actual courage to call the bastard out on what he’d done to her.

  “Why did you do that? You know I get only one phone call. Why did you give me yours’? You were supposed to give me Julia’s!”

  “I wasn’t ready for you to leave just yet.”

  “Wasn’t ready? Why you . . .” Liddy was so angry she slammed her fist into his sore arm with a bit of power behind the punch, hoping to make the man feel her wrath.

  Jake was on his feet within seconds. He had her in an angered grip a half second later, and there was mutiny in his eyes.

  “We . . . are not done here, Liddy.”

  “Oh, yeah? I think we are so done here!” Her thoughts spat out quickly, she figured this as foolish on her part considering she was now locked up in a tiny holding cell with a really big man who looked ready to explode. And, who’d likely kill her with his bare hands if given half the chance, any witness long gone.

  But Jake simply ignored the pain she gave him. “If Theo said no annulment, then we have sixty-plus hours to figure out exactly what it is we are going to do—without Theo finding out about what we are up too. So, yeah, we have unfinished business. I thought it best you stayed with me to finish our unfinished business; but you had better apologize for hitting me on the arm, and soon, or our business will be finished quicker than you could’ve imagined . . . Mrs. Giotti.”

  He really had no need to sneer on her name.

  Without thinking, Liddy moved her head down and brushed her lips over the raw wound on his right arm, kissing a snake she’d probably kissed a thousand times over in her lifetime.

  The shock of his warm flesh touching hers was quite substantial.

  “There. Now that was much better.” Jake’s arrogance showed through his slightly cold exterior. “Now you can kiss another part of me that’s hurting.”

  “What other part?” she so innocently, so foolishly asked.

  He moved his hands to her shoulders and shoved her down to her knees, hard. Easy enough to do, since Jake could bench press 280lbs with one arm tied behind his back, but very had to accept when it happened to her.

  “The part really missing you all these years.”

  Her gaze rose, as did her eyebrows; but her mouth remained clamped shut.

  “It’s been hurting something fierce since the moment you let me touch you. The least you can do is soothe away some of its pain.”

  Biting on her lower lip, Jake’s fingers dug painfully into her shoulders. His eyes blazed down into hers; Liddy’s filled with unshed tears to the sudden onrush of unwanted memories stifling her mind.

  “Forget how, Liddy?” he taunted.

  She tried to stand up, but he was much stronger than she. Standing on her two feet would now be up to him. Yet, remaining on her knees was far better for the time being; as she closed her eyes and allowed the memories to drown her. Of course she didn’t forget. The bastard!

  Jake quickly hauled her up to his bared chest. Her treacherous body slammed into his. His hands found the back of her head and his mouth attached to hers, open and waiting.

  Seconds later, Liddy was left panting; with Jake looking at her as if he no longer knew her name or could even recall his.

  He turned . . . and hit the concrete wall with his fist.

  She could hear the crack of bone; yet he wouldn’t show pain toward what he’d done.

  “Damnit, Liddy! Ten years and you can still hurt me this badly?”

  What was she to say to this? I’m sorry? Because, at the moment, she wasn’t sorry for anything he desired her to be sorry for.

  She wasn’t sorry for hurting him or for punching him on the arm as she had. She wasn’t sorry he likely broke his hand against a concrete wall because he had a trigger-finger temper usually flaring at will. And she wasn’t sorry for wanting him out of her life yesterday, and all the yesterdays before.

  She was, however, truly sorry for herself: for still loving this man, still wanting him so badly, even being forced to her knees in a holding cell had been a complete and sudden turn on.

  She was ever so sorry for actually wishing she could be bold enough to kiss him exactly where he wanted to be kissed, chickening out at the last second.

  Unfortunately, Jake could read her every thought through her eyes now staring up at him. His voice lowered. His temper died out. He angled her very close to his being.

  “How can you still do this to me?” he wondered aloud, never needing any answer from her; asked, more than likely just to get it out of his system. “Why can you still hurt me so badly?”

  She tried to look away but something held her gaze to his. Something trapped her eyes to those silver-gray orbs turned liquid mercury.

  “Is this Mack guy everything you want in your life, Liddy?” Jake’s voice was raspy, breaking up, turned thoughtful; a bit reluctant, to a certain degree.

  For a moment, she’d barely recognized it as his.

  Liddy chomped down on her lower lip, stalling for time. She’d thought at one time in her life Mack Wells as everything she could have ever wanted in a man: a provider, a husband. If ever the time came, father material. Christ! The guy had tons of money, tremendous power in a rather elite circle of life, political influence to die for, and a great big name flashed in large neon lights. Those lights had drawn her in. In Miami, folks loved to sue. She would’ve been rich.

  Now Liddy knew better. She knew everything she should have always known. The man holding her, suddenly taking the rubber band out of her hair, staring into her soul, was everything she’d ever wanted in her life. Was, and would always be everything she’d ever wanted in her life.

  Everything she would ever need.

  Jake let her hair fall over her shoulders. His fingers entwined through the thick golden tresses.

  Her answer came out as, “You are. Damnit, Jake! You’re everything I had any need for.”

  “I don’t want to be your need, Liddy. I need to be the want you can’t live without.”

  She bit down on her lip even harder, drawing her head back to stare at him.

  “I mean it. This will go no further if you can’t let yourself admit what you did to me was wrong.”

  He wouldn’t back down and she had nowhere to go except the guided path of truth.

  Liddy shook her head, but the tears fell in spite of the fact all she had to do was say the words. “What I did to you was wrong. What I’ve been doing to you the last ten years was . . .”

  She never got out the rest because his mouth sealed over hers. Strong, relentless, the kiss lasted five whole minutes.

  Once breathless, he drew back. “Then you had better pray for a miracle to save you, Mrs. Giotti. Or you’ll soon find yourself making love to a husband you’d wanted to get rid of ten years ago.” His lips brushed against the top of her head this time. “I sure as hell waited long enough for you to come back to me. A man can only take so much torture.”

  He wanted to talk about torture? Didn’t he realize her being here, each remembering their lives together, remembering what had been good about them—setting aside all the bad—was torture to her? Didn’t he understand she wanted him so badly, her undies had wetted? Or just one touch, and now many, had tightened her core to unbearable? Good God! All he’d have to do was set his hand there, and she would explode into a billion shards of brittle glass.

  Torture?

  Goddamnit! Liddy knew how big he was, and how well he fit. Torture meant something entirely different to her, than it did him. Jake had no idea at all what the word meant. No idea at all!

  “Jake?”

  “Yes?”

  “Are there . . .” Liddy paused, sighing in her head. Could she really do it? Set aside the
bad for one more moment of the good?

  Ah hell!

  Added words then spoken as, “Are there any cameras watching us right now?” As said, the undies already wet and the body inflamed beyond redemption.

  “None, as far as I can tell. Why do you ask?” He raised his left brow, baiting her.

  Liddy shrugged her shoulders as if it really did not matter what she was about to say to him would rock his world. “Then don’t you think we should end this, once and for all?”

  He pushed her body far enough away only to get a good long look at her face, flaring his nostrils.

  “Don’t be teasing me in this way, Little Darlin’. It’s not very nice. And it won’t end as prettily as you want it to, if you are.”

  “Who said I was teasing you, Jake? I’m dead serious. Make love to me, right here, now. Who’s ever going to find out? Once we get it out of our system . . .”

  He quibbled, “Once?” raising a telltale brow to warn her of the substantial flaw in her plan.

  “Okay, twice, three times. However many times it takes the both of us to get it out of our systems . . .”

  “Well, shit, Liddy!” he slipped out, grinning devilishly.

  “But . . .,” she stopped at, holding up her hand. Very sure-footed, that upon her decision she would not regret this later on in life.

  Her husband eyed her suspiciously. “But what?”

  “Once we do this, you have to give me the respect of deciding what it is I want, and which way I want to go. Okay, Jake? You can’t pressure me into staying here. You can’t pressure me into changing my mind about you, either. And you won’t be allowed to sway the jury’s verdict—meaning the rest of Preacher’s Bend—as I know you’ll try.”

  He let go of only one of her arms and ran a hand through his hair. “Really sucks sour grapes, doesn’t it? Lacing the offer with ultimatums? Only someone like you would dare think to do this to a man.”

  “It might suck sour grapes, Jake. But it’s going to be your one and only offer. Take it, or leave it.”

  Jake nodded. “Fine, I’ll take it. But when we are done here—done with getting this out of our systems—as you say,” he warned, holding back a sly grin, “—you’ll not be able to walk away as easily as you did ten years ago, if able to walk at all.” His added snort increased the arrogance level to almost intolerable.

  Her eyes drifted to his bare chest, then lowered, and the imagination wandered to the huge bulge in his pants, but she quickly bypassed any disagreeableness to a peacock of a man preening his feathers in front of her face.

  Her gaze rose and trapped his. “You don’t plan on fighting fairly, do you Mr. Giotti?”

  “Not on your life, Mrs. Giotti.”

  Did she really think this man would fight fair? Come on, now. Really? This was Jake Giotti. After all, she wasn’t about to fight fairly herself. So why would she have expected her estranged husband to play by the rules?

  She would get what she wanted from him. And Jake?

  He was the epitome of an unfair fight, the copied definition of a very dangerous man. The more she knew this, the more it truly floored her she actually offered him what she had. Sex. Not just once, but as many times as it took to get it out of their systems. In return, would be her unquestioned freedom. Relief from a throbbing core desiring a man’s thick shaft shoved inside it would be a good thing. Oh, and she’d probably have a guilt trip from Hell, once this happened, and once he signed those annulment papers.

  Good God! Was she insane? To head back to the past and have back what they once had? Yes. Insanity came and went in her family. The malady likely stemmed from the tracks, the drinking, and the foolish choices every Humphrey ever made since the beginning of time.

  But Liddy was the only Humphrey who had Jake Giotti within her midst, and the one about to end their war once and for all. As his mouth moved down to hers, their fates became sealed by an indrawn breath.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Are there any ground rules?” he asked, tugging her tank top over her head and groaning loudly; his eyes very appreciative of her two newest assets dead center of sight.

  Mack had only wanted the best, and by how much he’d paid her plastic surgeon, they were the best.

  “Any ground rules?” she muttered between the sudden nibbles to her left earlobe, as her husband bent down to take liberty to her ear. Perhaps to take his mind off something bigger and better than he’d remembered.

  Jake knew she would turn to mush if he nibbled her earlobe. He was using this to his advantage. He could ask her just about anything, and likely get whatever he desired once the Goosebumps started to rise.

  “What . . . ever . . . do you . . . mean by rules?” she whispered out. God help her! Both arms covered in gooseflesh?

  A tingle of euphoria rushed throughout Liddy’s system, and drained any further resolve as his lips slid down the side of her neck, over her throat, then back to her mouth.

  “For starters, is there a time limit I should know about?” His mouth found her eyelid. He kissed it tenderly. Then her right gained equal attention. Each lid closed, with a heartfelt sigh hitting her right between the lungs.

  God, she missed this. Him. The intimacy. The tenderness. Jake had never been a man to make love with little regard to how she felt. He was being gentle, she supposed, to remind her of how it had been between them and exactly what she’d let slip away because of ill-fated lies.

  “Specific areas I am not allowed touching?” He pulled his head back, eyeing her enlarged breasts yet again; and grinning shamelessly to anticipated ample treat.

  “No ground rules, Jake. It’ll be just you, me, and nothing standing in our way.” The palm of her right hand pressed against his muscular torso, as a really deep breath was taken to steady her nerves for what she was about to let happen. No way in hell was she ready for any of this. But a promise was a promise. And she promised him this, if he in turn gave her the promise of freedom of choice, which he had.

  “So? No rules? I can touch anything I want?” Jake held her away from his inflamed body momentarily; his hands moved to the top of her shoulders. “No time limits? Nothing standing in our way?” He cocked his head to one side. “Literally . . . I can do just about anything I want to?”

  She nodded, licking her dry lips. She wanted him to do anything and everything imaginable to her. Her core was near explosive.

  “Just who the hell are you, and what did you do with my wife? Where’s the Liddy Giotti I know?” he voiced, pushing her to arm’s length away.

  “Very funny, Jake.”

  “It wasn’t supposed to be funny, Liddy.” His husky sex-starved voice sobered with the reality of their situation.

  Taking another deep breath, she asked, “Then what was it supposed to be?”

  Jake drew her back into his arms. Bare breasts now touched bare chest. God! That felt great. Truly great. It had been such a long time. Such wasted time.

  Perhaps, for the both of them, time would choose to stand still.

  “This was supposed to be difficult on you, Liddy.” His hands moved to the back of her head, encompassing her skull.

  Liddy tried to pull away from this. But Jake would not let her. “This is difficult, Jake. Very difficult.”

  “Why? We both know how to do this. We’re both consenting adults. You do remember how to do this, right? ” His smile poured vinegar into the open wound.

  “Not that! I mean you . . . here . . . us, together. Me, here, after all the years gone.”

  Jake’s sexy smile faded quickly. “Are you somehow trying to back out on this?”

  “No.”

  “Then shut the hell up and kiss me, Liddy.”

  Of which she did; over, and over, and over again until she was blue in the face. She kissed his lips. Her mouth caressed his warm skin. His shoulders gained its due. The large Boa, the man’s knuckles, each shared equally.

  When Jake pushed her to the floor, and he followed, she kissed him with such a passion built up,
for a moment she felt dizzy. Dizzy with relief. She was never very good at playing cat and mouse games with any man. And even if she did try her hand at it, with this man . . . he always won, hands down.

  Jake’s hands went to the zipper of her jeans. As her heart stammered in her throat, she leaned back, sat on the floor, and allowed him to remove the faded material. Her white tank top hadn’t taken as long.

  Jake’s bloodied dress shirt was already on the floor. He stood quickly, removed his tailored suit pants, kicking off his loafers.

  Liddy felt so exposed in her bikini underwear, but her eyes were glued to the huge bulge trapped in white briefs, that any coldness without clothing dissipated quickly.

  He then rejoined her on the floor, easing her into his arms. Her mouth found his and locked on like a heat-seeking missile. He drew back and with a sly grin dipped his fingers into the lacey trim of her panties, sliding his hand until he could reach her heat.

  And damn, if there wasn’t a ton of heat down there.

  His mouth found hers, Jake darting in his tongue, dragging it along the roof of her mouth, as his fingers centered to her parting legs, and without voiced invitation he plunged one finger deep into her.

  Liddy’s gasp got swallowed up by his mouth.

  He crocked his finger, easing her closer. He was only checking if she was ready for his demanding size. Finding her suitable, he removed his finger and centered his body over hers. He wasted no time for his own pleasure; easing his hard cock into her welcoming fold.

  The first thrust was quick—a quick remembrance—and then all others seemed to heighten their togetherness.

  “God, I’ve missed this. You,” he muttered.

  Liddy’s internal grip on his manhood drew out his smile as he pressed her harder to the floor. He couldn’t seem to find what he was looking for, but doing a damn good job while searching for it.

  “I’ve missed this from you . . . so damn much.”