A decent good-bye, noncommittal. As he started his truck, he remembered that he’d invited her to do laundry at his house tonight.
He wasn’t sure she’d show up. While that shouldn’t have mattered because they weren’t having a relationship and he’d already told her he didn’t want one, he knew he’d miss her if she skipped his place to go to the laundromat.
Shit.
* * * * *
Double shit. Randi hadn’t called his cell though David had given her the number. He didn’t know if she was coming tonight.
He’d been thinking about her all day.
“I’m talking to you. Where’s your head, David?”
In his pants. In Randi’s pants. It wasn’t prudent to tell his father that. Luckily, they’d finished the cutting over an hour ago, and all they had left was clearing the scrap and heading to the dumps. Jace had some wedding crap to attend to with Taylor, and Mitch lit out half an hour ago, too.
“Sorry, Dad, what was it?”
“I asked if you would talk to your brother. Some bug’s been up his butt the last couple of weeks.”
“And which butt would that be, Jace or Mitch?” David didn’t really want to know.
“Mitch. Take him out for a drink and find out what’s up with him, would ya?”
David snorted and shook his head. Mr. Fix-It. Talk with your brother and fix him up. He hadn’t fixed things with Jace. He wouldn’t even try with Mitch.
“Can’t do it, Dad. Got a date.” He threw an armload of branches onto the pile in the trailer.
His dad raised one eyebrow. “Should I be telling your mother anything important?”
“It’s a date. That’s all. Not someone serious.” He’d screwed Randi, that was all. All that intensity crap was just that—crap. He didn’t even know her. She was a good lay.
The thought made him wince.
His dad waggled his eyebrows, but laid off. “Tomorrow then, or Friday. I’m sure Mitch’ll hold till you get to him.”
Mitch could rot in his own self-made hell.
David sucked in a breath. Anger, seething, had risen so quickly it took his breath away. His gut ached with it, his blood boiled, his muscles tensed. He gritted his teeth.
“Later, Dad. Gotta go.”
He eased his bunched fists. In a minute, he’d start yelling at his old man like a maniac. And for nothing. It wasn’t his dad’s fault that David couldn’t get his shit together, much less Mitch, for that matter.
He took one more deep breath, then another. If Randi didn’t show, she didn’t show. He didn’t give a damn. Yes, she was more than a good lay, more than a screw, but they still weren’t serious together.
And Mitch could handle his own goddamn bug.
“That’s it.” He slapped the side of the trailer, flipped the tarp over the load, and tied it down. “Can you handle the dump on your own, Dad?”
“Sure.”
“Good. I’ve got something to take care of.”
He stopped at home long enough to shower off and change his clothes. It was four o’clock. Randi hadn’t gotten home last night until close to six, which meant she’d probably still be working at her parents’ shop. He’d find her there.
Dinner was still on, as far as he was concerned. He’d pleasure her again, better than last night. He wanted her to burn, hot, hotter, until this thing between them burned itself out. He needed her to burn the flare of anger from his soul.
Chapter Seven
The shop was dark and cramped, the three aisles narrow, the shelves filled with cans, bottles, and packages jammed with candy. The checkerboard linoleum was clean but dingy. Two register stands stood to the left at the front of the store, and in the back, the refrigerated section hummed.
“May I help you?”
Short, plump, and white-haired, the woman was probably the same age as his mother, but the lines at her mouth drooped as if she frowned more than smiled.
“I was looking for Randi.”
“Papa, he’s looking for Randi.” Her voice rang out with a sing-song Scandinavian lilt. The name sounded softer and more feminine coming from her lips.
For a moment, David wanted desperately to perfect the lilt gracing the name.
Randi’s father was no less round, but taller, and he had twenty years on his wife. He must have been middle-aged when Randi was born.
They stared at him with blue eyes identical to Randi’s.
The man spoke first. “You’re looking for my daughter?”
“Yes. She works here, right?” Somehow he felt like a sixteen-year-old showing up for a prom date and driving his dad’s car for the first time.
“And you are?”
“David Jackson.”
“And how do you know Randi?”
Carnally. Exquisitely. “Her car broke down the other day, and I helped her into town.” He couldn’t say why, but he knew in his gut that saying she ran out of gas would be the worst explanation he could give.
The old man grunted out a Norwegian word and flapped his hand. “That cursed truck. She’s in the back. Working.”
It would have been better to call her on her cell. He had a feeling he wasn’t going to make it past Papa. “I’ll only take a moment of her time, sir.”
Eyeing him, the old man seemed to think about the “sir,” then finally waved his hand, this time in the direction of a swing door at the back of the shop.
Low-pitched whispering followed him down the aisle. Various meats and cheeses filled a dairy case, and on the bottom row, tubes of caviar. He still hadn’t licked the stuff from any luscious body parts beyond her throat and back.
Tonight, he’d perform that duty. Tonight, he’d bury himself inside her enough times to quench this craving.
With a sudden intense need that bordered on insanity, he wanted her now. Manic. She screwed with his emotions as well as his mind. She was dangerous in ways he hadn’t dreamed.
But he wanted her. Badly. Tonight was too damn far away.
* * * * *
The warehouse was hot, muggy, and dusty. Randi had opened the windows along the rafters and turned on the fans, but hot air only produced more hot air. She’d stripped off her blouse sometime after the last UPS pickup, and now wore only a thin camisole and her shorts. Pops would pitch a fit, but no customers would come back here to see her.
Sitting on the top step of the ladder, she fanned the top of her camisole. Her makeup was melting. She’d prayed for air conditioning every night the first six months she’d come home, but Pops said it would cost a fortune to cool the warehouse. Perishables, including chocolate, were stored in a refrigerated room, but canned or bottled goods filled the racks around her.
Come on, she’d wanted to scream. The warehouse isn’t that big. Pops hadn’t listened. He never listened.
Today he was on the warpath. She’d forgotten a special order he’d left on the bench that should have gone out yesterday.
I told you and told you how important this was.
She’d been thinking about David. And Pops had taped the note to the calculator, which she never used, instead of amidst the sticky notes lining the worktable’s cubby holes.
She’d been a day late and a dollar short all her life. She’d overnighted the package, and it would still get there at the same time. She’d pay for it out of her own pocket.
Picking up her clipboard from the shelf, she got to her overheated feet. The tennies were boiling her hush puppies, but sandals were a no-no in the warehouse. What if she dropped something? Huffing out a breath of air, she began staging an order in the basket hanging from the side of the ladder.
Something tickled her leg just above her knee. Without looking, she swatted at the irritating insect. The thing skimmed the back of her legs, both legs, then delved straight up through the bottom of her shorts.
David grinned up at her. “I couldn’t resist those cheeks peeking out at me.”
“You are so bad.” He was oh-so good. Last night had definitely driven the point ho
me. “What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to remind you about dinner and laundry.”
She’d been trying not to think about it. That peck he’d given her this morning had spoken of run-and-hide. Then again, she’d done her own run-and-hide into the shower. Only she’d hoped he’d follow her. Instead, she’d found him dressed and ready to go in the living room.
“You could have called.” She thrust her chin at the cell phone sitting on the countertop.
“But then I wouldn’t have gotten to do this.” He pressed higher, squeezing her bottom.
She slapped at his hand playfully. “Stop that. What if my dad walks out here?”
“We’re two aisles over. We’ll hear him before he sees us.”
She almost smiled, but that would spoil the game. “He walks very softly.”
“Then let’s hide so I can put my hands all over you.”
“Noo...”
Hoisting himself onto the second step, he grabbed the clipboard out of her hand, set it on a shelf, then lifted her down with a tight grip on her waist.
“You’re kidding, right?”
His eyes burned. “I want to touch you. Now.”
He captured her chin in his hand and took her mouth with a deep kiss, all tongue, robbing her of her breath.
“Now. Let me touch you. I can wait for the rest later.”
“Just a quickie,” then she grabbed his hand and practically hauled him back toward the freezer.
David wanted her. She didn’t care about anything else. She hadn’t from the moment she first laid eyes on him.
Cool air rushed over her body as she threw open the walk-in’s door. It felt so good. He felt good at her back as he hustled her inside, then closed them in.
“Does it lock?”
“No.”
“All right. I’ll be quick. I swear.”
He backed her up against the wall inside the door. There wasn’t a speck of light, just hot hands sliding up her shorts.
“Christ,” he murmured against her throat, all warm breath and questing lips. He overwhelmed her, turned her upside down. She dug her fingers into his shoulders, then glided through his hair, begging for his kiss.
Taking her lips with his mouth and tongue, he lifted her, pulling her legs to his waist. Openmouthed, he devoured her. Pinned to the wall, her legs wide, she rode the ridge of his erection. He rocked into her, making love to her despite the layers of cloth between them. His hands found their way beneath her camisole, captured her breasts in an almost painful grip. Then his mouth followed his hands, sucking her nipple hard, kissing it, biting lightly. Electric shocks traveled straight down her center, pulsing in her clitoris.
He backed off slightly to yank the snap of her shorts.
“David.” She gasped, tugging down her top to cover her breasts. “David.”
He didn’t listen to her protests, undoing her zipper by pulling on her waistband. She wasn’t even sure if she was objecting.
“So hot, so freaking hot.” He shoved his hand into her thong, a finger as deep into her as her shorts would allow.
She panted, hot and needy. “David, please.”
“Come. I want to hear you.”
“David.”
“Come on, baby.” He worked her, whispering encouragement.
“We can’t.” But she was so very close. Just a throb away, just a mindless scream, just a—
The door slammed open, and a pool of light spilled across the interior, passing just beyond their feet.
“Randi, what are you doing?”
Holy ever-lovin’ Moly, dear God, I’m dead.
Jerking his hand out of her shorts, David pressed deeper against her to hide the gape of her open zipper.
“Pops.”
Her legs slid down David’s until her feet touched the floor. Her shorts were undone, and the scent of sex was all over them. She wanted to die.
Her father simply closed the door on them.
David let out the breath he’d been holding. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go that far.”
He righted Randi’s camisole over her breasts and belly, then reached down to zip her shorts.
Somewhere between touching her on the ladder and shutting them both inside the refrigerator, he’d gone from hot and hard to totally out of control.
“I’m sorry.” It was easier to beg forgiveness when he couldn’t see her eyes.
“It’s okay. But you better leave.” Her hands shook against him as she took over the task of fastening her shorts.
And suddenly he couldn’t stand not seeing her eyes. “Where’s the damn light switch?”
All she did was open the door a crack to allow in a stream of light. It wasn’t enough to gauge her full expression, but it was enough to reveal the stark lines at her mouth.
“It’s okay,” she repeated. “I’m twenty-eight years old, and I’ve been married.” She shrugged. “This is just embarrassing. He’ll get over it.”
“I’ll tell him it was my fault.”
She gently pushed away from him. “I think it’s better for me if you just sneak out the back door so I can handle it.”
He’d never sneaked out the back way in his life.
Shit. His MO was sneaking out the front door while she slept.
“Please. For me,” she begged, her hand on his wrist. “Let me do it my way.”
It didn’t set well that her way was the easy way for him.
She pushed him away so she could once more smooth her top, then ran her fingers through her mussed hair. Her lips were plump and swollen, her nipples still peaked beneath the cotton.
She spread her hands. “Please, David, just go.”
Two more minutes and he would have had his cock out of his jeans and buried inside her. Without a condom. With her parents only yards away.
He’d lost it. Completely. He hadn’t cared when she’d told him to stop. He’d only wanted her like a wild man, the need to burn them up together greater than his common sense. Greater than anything.
She was right. He had to go. He had to clear his head.
Easing out the back door, he didn’t even say he’d call her. Outside, with the late afternoon sun blazing down on his head, he stopped, leaning back against the wall. Searching for something. Some sort of explanation.
Things had gone totally out of control the day he found Jace in Taylor’s bed. No, long before that. Life had gone to hell the day Lou died. Nothing had been the same since. Nothing ever would be. Taylor and Jace’s marriage just made the whole situation worse.
He didn’t have a goddamn clue what to do about Randi any more than he knew how to fix what had happened to them all the day they laid his brother in the ground.
* * * * *
There was nothing else to do but go out and meet her fate. Just as she had the day she came crawling back home to tell her parents she’d left Mick.
With one last deep breath, she opened the walk-in. Her dad probably wouldn’t talk to her for a few days. Maybe a month. But he’d get over it eventually, he always had. Even if it took a year. As a last desperate attempt at reclaiming her modesty, she grabbed her shirt off the stool and pulled it on.
She smelled her father before she saw him. He’d worn bay rum cologne for as long as she could remember, the scent part of her childhood—the good, when he patted her head for high grades at school, and the bad, when the only communication they shared was the waft of bay rum as he passed her in the hallway of the small house she grew up in.
The burn of embarrassment still flamed in her cheeks as she turned to him. “Pops, I—”
“You hussy.” His complexion was more apoplectic than hers felt. A vein throbbed at his temple, and his white hair stood on end as if he’d tugged at the roots. “How dare you comport yourself in such a manner in my store?” He stabbed his chest with a thick forefinger. “My store. My work. My reputation might have been ruined in this town.”
He’d called her a hussy. From him, it was tantamount to calling
her a whore. She shoved aside the pain.
“I don’t think any customers would have walked into the freezer, Pops.”
“That is not the point. You could have scandalized your mother. Did you think of that? How she would have felt walking in on that...” He sputtered, trying to find the word. “Walking in on that filth.”
He had a point. She hadn’t thought of that, at all.
“You are a disgrace to this family. You have always been a disgrace. I have tried and tried to teach you properly, but you do not listen. You do not care.”
“Pops, I do listen. I just forget sometimes. And I make mistakes.”
He slashed his hand through the air. “Do not make excuses. No more. I am done speaking to you since it does no good.”
David stepped from an aisle of racks. “Mr. Andersen, I’m to blame for what happened. It wasn’t Randi’s fault.”
David. He hadn’t left her. She almost sagged with relief. But how much had he heard?
The finger-pointing switched from Randi to David. “And you, I do not even know you, and you do horrible things to my daughter in my store. I do not accept your explanations.”
This time the old man stabbed David in the chest for punctuation. David resisted the urge to break a finger already crippled with arthritis.
“Sir, I understand how you feel, but you’re overreacting.”
“Overreacting?” The elderly man’s eyes bugged out of his head. “Overreacting, do you say? I do not speak to you either, despoiler of young women. I do not speak to you ever.” Still glaring at David, he pointed yet again at Randi. “And never again do I speak to this harlot.”
His blood boiled. If the man had been anyone but Randi’s own father, David would have belted him. They’d been caught in a compromising position, but Christ, the old man was going way too far. For Randi’s sake, he held on to his rising temper.
“Let’s calm down. You don’t have any right to call your own daughter a harlot.”
Randi’s dad threw his hands in the air, waving them almost in supplication or impotence, his rage was so great. “She is my daughter no more.”
The moment was almost surreal. “Sir, we need to be reasonable and drop the name-calling.”
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