Just Right: The Bradfords, Book 1

by Erin Nicholas

  Good Lord, she didn’t understand men at all.

  They drove several blocks without another word.

  “Why did you break up?” Ben finally asked.

  Ben’s tone of voice was certainly not casual and when she glanced at him again, she could see the tightly clenched jaw and the spark of jealousy in his eyes. Too bad.

  “It was never intended, by either of us, to be a long-term thing,” she said. “But, eventually, I got tired of going out all the time. And John realized he was more attracted to women who shared his interests. It burned itself out.”

  She thought about John with same emotion she always associated with him. Affection. Nothing more or less.

  She’d had a lot of time since John had dropped her off on her father’s doorstep from his stretch limo to think back on the relationship. What it boiled down to, no matter what angle she approached from, was that she and John had each come to the relationship for a multitude of reasons other than sex. But they’d both assumed that sex was supposed to be part of it, and that the other was expecting it, so they went through the motions.

  “Were you a virgin for John?” Ben asked caustically.

  Ben’s tone suggested that she had saved herself for John…or had stolen from Ben the chance to be her first. Again, all about him.

  She frowned. “No. Tim Hubert took me to prom my junior year and I jumped him on the couch in his parents’ basement afterward.”

  She glanced at Ben to find him studying her as if trying to figure out if she was telling him the truth. She rolled her eyes.

  “If I was trying to bother you I would have made up a bigger number of victims and made things a bit more exciting than on a plaid couch in a prom dress, don’t you think?”

  Ben didn’t look amused. At all.

  “And was it blah with Tim, too?”

  That annoyed her. “You know what, Ben? Why don’t you shut up?”

  Chapter Ten

  Ben looked at her in surprise. Up until that moment, Jessica had been encouraging and positive, even when she was being firm and sassy. She didn’t say things like shut up and she certainly didn’t say them with such petulance in her voice.

  She’d been frustrated with him before. He knew that. But she had never dismissed him. Her tone now was of dismissal, like she did want him to shut up and leave her alone.

  But that was simply not going to happen.

  “Pull over.”

  She looked at him. “What?”

  “I said, pull over,” Ben repeated, more firmly. “Now.”

  “Ben, you’re being grumpy because I—”

  “Jessica, pull the damn car over right now!”

  She took her annoyance out on the car brake, bringing his truck to an abrupt stop.

  “What are you—”

  “Pull in there.”

  He pointed ahead to a dirt alley about a hundred yards from the massive house that sat up a slight rise off to the right of where they were stopped.

  Jessica followed his instructions, turning in and bumping along the narrow path for about twenty feet before stopping.

  She shoved the gearshift into park and turned to face him. “I don’t know what you’re trying—”

  “Turn off the lights.”

  She did, angrily.

  “Anything else?” she asked with fake sweetness.

  “Yeah. Come here.” His command was soft, but very firm.

  Her frown deepened. “Excuse me?”

  Ben couldn’t have put to words exactly what he was feeling. Jealousy seemed to be the most logical, but that seemed too simple an explanation. This woman was important to him and he wanted to be important to her. He knew that John Shepard, no matter how much money he’d spent on her, hadn’t appreciated her. It didn’t sound like he’d even pleasured her. Which, strangely, made Ben happy and pissed him off at the same time. It wasn’t just the other guy. It was that Jessica had been cheated and she deserved the best. With him.

  “I said come here.”

  “Where?” she asked, looking less irritated and more wary now.

  Ben spread his arms. “Right here. Now.”

  She hesitated long enough for him to grow impatient. He reached out, looped his arm around her waist and pulled her onto his lap.

  Round eyes met his. Her skirt hiked up high as her legs spread to straddle to his. “What are you doing?”

  “I can’t take you to Paris tonight and I can’t give you thousands of dollars to spend on shoes, but I sure as hell can give you an orgasm.”

  He held the back of her head in one hand as he took her mouth with all of the frustration and jealousy and anger he felt. But most of the anger was on her behalf and he was a very smart man. He knew he was holding one of the sexiest, smartest, best women he’d ever met and he was going to savor every minute.

  He gentled his mouth and kissed her until she was breathing hard and had the front of his shirt clenched in her fists.

  “Did John-boy ever do you in a car?” he asked against her mouth.

  She tried to shake her head, but Ben wouldn’t let her head move enough. “No,” she whispered.

  “Up against the pyramids in Egypt?”

  He felt her small smile against his lips. “No. It was always a bed, always dark, him always on top.”

  Ben moved his hand to her thigh and moved it to cup her buttock. “That’s great. I don’t know how I’d top the pyramid thing.”

  And the angry tension left her body all at once. She melted into him, moving her mouth against his, her tongue stroking across his bottom lip until he opened and took possession of her mouth.

  She pulled back two minutes later. “It’s not a competition. With you it’s—”

  “It’s going to be different in every way,” he interrupted. “It’s going to be everything it wasn’t with him.”

  “It already is,” she said with a soft smile.

  But that wasn’t good enough. Ben was pretty sure he was already one up with the dressing room stunt earlier, but he wasn’t finished. When he was done with her, she wouldn’t remember how to spell John Shepard.

  “Tell me what you want me to do to you.”

  She sat back in his lap. “What do you mean?”

  “You’ve never told a man what you like, what you want, what will give you the most satisfaction. Tell me.” Just thinking about her telling him where she wanted to be touched was enough to make him hard. But more, the idea of giving her pleasure she’d never come close to made his heart pound.

  She bit her bottom lip, watching his face and Ben wondered if she’d be too embarrassed to say her thoughts out loud. Or if she wouldn’t know what she wanted.

  “Jessica, I can—”

  “Lick my nipples.”

  He almost swallowed his tongue. He watched, speechless as she stripped the tiny T-shirt off and arched her back, bringing her breasts to his face.

  “You’ve got the best nipples I’ve ever seen,” Ben said gruffly, cupping one breast in his hand.

  “Yeah, we might have to talk about your sexual past too, eventually. But right now I want that orgasm you promised me,” she said, letting her head fall back.

  He lifted her breast, bringing her nipple to his lips where he obligingly licked. Again and again.

  She went from holding her breath to breathing raggedly.

  He moved to the other breast, but licked only once before sucking gently, then more firmly as she put her hand at the back of his head to urge him on.

  “What else?” he asked, somehow.

  “I don’t know if I’m going to be big into foreplay,” she said, breathlessly.

  “Whatever you want.” Ben ran a thumb over one of her stiff nipples.

  She moaned and wiggled on his lap. “Touch me…”

  “Where?” he urged as she shifted.

  “You know,” she whispered.

  “Say it.”

  “I’ll show you instead.”

  Part of him wanted to hear it, but he certainly wasn
’t complaining when she moved his hand between her legs, shifted her knee so he could better reach and then pressed him against her heat.

  “There,” she purred as he slid a finger under the edge of the thong and inside of her. “Right there.”

  How any man could have had her all to himself for ten months, every night, and not managed to take the time to fully enjoy her was beyond him. But he wasn’t complaining about being the first and only.

  Or was he…

  “Did you have an orgasm with Tim Hubert on his basement couch?” Ben asked, stroking in and out even as he spoke.

  She shook her head. “No. Not until you.”

  He’d wanted it. He’d assumed it for a few minutes. But hearing it, not until you, made him harder than he’d ever been in his life. He wanted to be her only everything.

  “Hold on tight, darlin’,” he said, increasing the pressure and rhythm.

  The yard light about ten feet from the car spotlighted her breasts and face, the sexiest sight he’d ever seen.

  She slumped against him a moment later. He smiled against the top of her head, feeling more content than he could ever remember feeling. He ran his fingertips up and down the bumps of her spine, loving the soft heat of her naked body, her breath warming his neck as her breathing returned to normal.

  “See, I think this has got to be better than up against a pyramid,” she finally said. “Those stones have to be rough.”

  He chuckled. “I fully intend to show you how it can be against lots of surfaces.”

  She shivered. “When?”

  He laughed and she lifted her head. “I might be able to make it until we can get to my apartment.”

  She glanced out the window. “Where are we exactly?”

  “You were driving.”

  She brushed her hair back and frowned. “I was thinking so much about our conversation that I might have made a wrong turn. Or two.”

  Ben suddenly kissed her deeply and with a fierce tenderness. Jessica felt tears sting her eyelids and blinked rapidly against them. How dumb to cry at a time like this. Especially because she hadn’t felt this good in ten years—or ever. She laughed before she could help it though.

  Ben looked down at her, a smile that she let herself imagine was loving tugged at his lips.

  “I’ve never inspired laughter.”

  “I was thinking that Sam might have been right.”

  “About?”

  “Maybe I did need to get laid. I feel great.”

  Ben gave a snort of laughter, as she slid to her seat.

  “I intend to keep you feeling great,” he said and the low promise in his voice made her shiver.

  “Tonight?” she asked hopefully.

  “And then some.”

  “I’ll have Sam send you a nice thank you gift.”

  Ben smiled and leaned forward, looking into her eyes directly. “He already did. He sent it to Charlie’s bar a few nights ago.”

  Her heart expanded and she realized that the sex was good because Ben was awesome at this, but it was incredible because she was in love with him.

  A sudden sharp rapping against the window made them both jump.

  Jessica grabbed her shirt and held it against her breasts as the dark shadow of a person moved to the window next to Ben and a bright beam of light hit him in the face.

  “Hell,” Ben muttered.

  Jessica’s heart was pounding and her thoughts were spinning but she reached for and pushed the button to lock the car doors.

  The shadow rapped on the window again. “Police. Lower your window.”

  Police? She glanced at Ben.

  He reached for the window control.

  “Ben! You don’t know…”

  “Relax.” He lowered the window half an inch. “Can I see some ID?”

  The man produced a badge, which he shone his flashlight on.

  “He’s legit,” Ben told her. “Put your shirt on.”

  “I’m going to need to ask you to step out of the car,” the cop said.

  Jessica tried three times to get her shirt turned right-side-out and on before she accomplished covering the breasts the policeman had to have already seen.

  Both policemen, she corrected as she got out of the car and faced two uniformed officers. She went to stand beside Ben. He took her hand.

  “This is a private driveway,” the first cop informed them. “Were you aware of that?”

  Jessica looked up at the back of the house on top of the hill. “We thought it was an alley, at best.”

  “It’s not,” the younger of the two officers said. “It’s the service drive to Mr. Benson’s estate. Those are his prize-winning strawberries.” The cop pointed to the patch of green leaves that they were parked in the middle of. “And that’s his son’s room. His son who just got a telescope for his birthday. A telescope he was using when you all pulled in.”

  Jessica closed her eyes and groaned. Of course. She would have to pull into the service driveway of some guy whose son had a telescope.

  Twenty minutes later they were sitting in a jail cell.

  Evidently they’d not only been cited for public indecency—in other words, the bad influence they’d inadvertently had on the young Mr. Benson—but trespassing and destruction of property. In fact, the older Mr. Benson was much more irritated by the loss of his famous strawberries than he was about his son’s view of Jessica’s naked breasts. But he was irritated enough by all of it to press charges.

  The worst part, it turned out, was being cooped up in the jail cell with Ben.

  It wasn’t only the pleasant, sitting-in-jail-is-no-big-deal tone of voice he was using, though she found that incredibly annoying. Jessica swore that if Ben shared one more piece of Hollywood trivia with her from the year-old gossip magazine he was flipping through, she was going to beat him with one of her hooker boots.

  Her short temper was also fueled by being caught half-naked, having sex in a car like a horny teenager.

  “Did you know that Brad Pitt dumped Jennifer Aniston for Angelina Jolie?”

  “Of course. Everyone knows that!” Jessica snapped. “It happened forever ago.”

  “What’s eating you?” he asked over the top of the magazine.

  “Being arrested!”

  “We did do all the stuff they said we did,” Ben said casually, flipping the magazine page.

  “It was harmless!”

  “Not to the strawberries.” Ben’s eyes stayed on the page in front of him as he made the flippant comment.

  She didn’t want to fight with him, especially on the very night they’d finally become lovers.

  But she reconsidered beating him with one of her hooker boots when he started to whistle “Jailhouse Rock”.

  “Dr. Torres, you are a man among men,” a voice boomed down the hallway. A familiar voice. An obnoxious, I’m-lovin’-this voice. “You’re seriously up for Man of the Year.”

  Jessica groaned. “I thought you called Sam.”

  “Sam said he’d handle it,” Ben said with a shrug. He laid the magazine aside and got to his feet.

  He smiled over her head at the men coming down the hall.

  Without even turning around she knew that Dooley led the way. Mac was there too. Dooley rarely went anywhere entertaining without Mac. When she reluctantly turned she saw Kevin was with them too. At least he looked concerned.

  “Hey, guys,” Ben greeted. “Where’s Bradford?”

  “He was working when you called. Picked up an extra shift so he could hang out with that new nurse,” Mac said with a grin.

  “She’s not even twenty-one yet!” Jessica exclaimed.

  Mac’s grin widened. “I know.”

  Jessica rolled her eyes. “Why didn’t he tell us he couldn’t come?”

  “Because he likes us.” Dooley wrapped his big hands around the metal bars of their cell and peered in. “He knew we’d want to see this.”

  Jessica was grateful that she’d been able to grab the scrub top out of the T
ease bag before they were hauled in to jail. Though it covered her breasts and stomach, most of her skirt showed and all of the boots. She would have gone barefoot, even on the questionable cleanliness of the jail floor, if she’d known Kevin would be here. He was likely shocked at her.

  “Are you okay?” Kevin asked.

  She nodded, not meeting his eyes. She was fine if they didn’t count humiliation as a problem. And Dooley and Mac didn’t.

  “I’m impressed, Ben. Seriously,” Dooley said with sincerity. “Not only did you get into her pants—you got rid of the pants all together. You deserve a trophy or something.”

  Jessica’s cheeks burned. “We were shopping,” she said, not exactly denying that she and Ben had been doing exactly what the guys thought they’d been doing, but not admitting it either.

  “Must have been before you climbed on his lap in the front seat of the car.”

  Jessica’s eyes widened. “How did you—”

  Mac grinned. “Wes Foster and I are buddies.”

  The cop who’d arrested them. Of course.

  “Are you going to get us out of here?” she asked wearily, realizing the story of this night was going to spread through the ER like crazy. This was far worse than the night they’d seen her dressed up in front of Charlie’s bar. That had been their idea and she’d been doing a favor for a friend—and her brother. As far as they knew, that night she’d been acting a part with honorable intentions. Tonight was real and not-so-honorable.

  “Wes is on his way. He had paperwork to do for the bail.” Dooley smiled.

  Finally, the door at the end of the hall opened and keys jangled as Wes came through it.

  “I’ll write you a check for the bail,” Ben said to the guys as they gathered on the sidewalk in front of the police station.

  “We know you’re good for it,” Dooley said, checking Jessica out again.

  Ben sighed and stepped forward. Dooley was about an inch shorter, but twenty pounds heavier. Still, Ben leaned in. “Your eyes don’t go below Jessica’s chin again and nobody at the hospital hears about tonight. Got it?”

  Wow. Jessica smiled at Dooley’s wide-eyed stare.

  “You don’t want the notoriety, the reputation, the acclaim?” Dooley asked. “The trophy?”