Just One Taste

by Kimberly Kincaid

  “The only person I knew all the way through school was Gabe.” Kat stepped over the crumbling border to the garden, kneeling down in the overgrown brush to start pulling weeds. Jesse measured her expression, taking a few swings at a nearby fallen branch before answering.

  “You two are close.”

  “Yeah.” She rolled her eyes slightly, but the affection she felt for Gabe was obvious in her laugh. “I think he’d be a typical protective brother no matter what. But the colonel and I didn’t exactly get along, and with our mom gone and a steady diet of get-up-and-go courtesy of the Army, I didn’t really have anyone else.”

  A twinge of familiarity stole down Jesse’s spine, and he doubled his focus on the tree branch at his feet. “Let me guess. Rebellious teenage daughter?”

  Kat prefaced her answer with a laugh that surprised him. “Try rebellious daughter, period. Between my being a girl and my offbeat way of looking at just about everything, I don’t think the colonel had a clue what to do with me, other than try to force me to conform. But even through all the head-butting, Gabe’s always had my back. Sometimes a little too much.”

  “Sounds about right for your brother.” The guy had never once scaled back on his loyalty to Jesse or anyone else, not even when things got hairy on ops.

  Or when things got even hairier back at home.

  “Funny.” She two-handed an overgrown vine from the garden bed, the muscles in her lithe forearms flexing as she tossed it into the bag and went back for another. “Gabe said the same thing about you.”

  And hell if that wasn’t a reminder and a half that Jesse had no freaking business admiring any part of his buddy’s little sister.

  He swung the axe, shoulders starting to sing at the repetitive up-and-over. Time to think with the upstairs head. “So you guys stayed here for summer vacations, huh?”

  “Mmm-hmm.” The next vine came out of the ground with a decisive yank, sending a spray of dirt over the brown paper bag. Kat threaded her arms over the front of her shirt, and so much for neutral.

  “Sorry. Didn’t mean to pry.”

  Dropping her chin toward her knotted-up stance, she surprised him by starting to laugh. “You know what, it’s fine. I really shouldn’t be so touchy about it. It’s just . . . being out here is tough for me. This place reminds me of all the times I had to pack up and leave when the summer was over. It brings back a lot of memories.”

  Jesse’s mind winged back to the earlier look of vulnerability covering her pretty features, and all of a sudden, keeping his distance was the last thing in his logbook. “Got a good one you feel like sharing?”

  “You want me to tell you one of my childhood memories?” she asked, but he countered the you-can’t-be-serious expression on her face with one that said he was anything but joking.

  “Sure. I get that you and your father didn’t exactly mesh, and that you hated moving around, but if you spent your summers here, you’re bound to have at least a few good memories of the place, right?”

  For a minute, the only thing that passed between them was silence and yard work. Then the minute slid into two, and damn it, Jesse should’ve just kept his trap shut like always. It wasn’t as if he didn’t get how overwhelming past memories could be. She probably wanted to share hers about as much as he wanted a root canal. He turned to tell Kat not to worry about it, but she beat him to the one-two.

  “The summer I was twelve, I planted a bunch of flowers and vegetables in this garden. It was kind of my pet project.”

  Jesse’s chin popped up, and he slid a calculating glance over the garden border. “You planted the whole thing?” The space had to be fifteen by fifteen, easy.

  “It was kind of ambitious,” she agreed. “But I had nothing but time. Well, that and determination, I guess.”

  “That’s kind of a ballsy project for a twelve-year-old. How did you figure out what to plant?” Jesse asked, keeping up his rhythm with the axe even though his attention was lasered in on her answer.

  “Gabe had just gotten his learner’s permit, and I made him take me to the library. I came home with as many gardening books as I could carry. God, he was so irritated with me.”

  “A trip to the library hardly seems like something to get touchy about.”

  The edges of Kat’s lips turned up into a smile that told Jesse he was going to need either a whole lot more manual labor or a freak freezing rain shower to make it out of the yard with his loyalty to Gabe in one piece. “The library, he was okay with. It was all the dirt I left in his Mustang after we went to the nursery a few days later that pissed him off.”

  Jesse’s thoughts winged to the Challenger parked around front, and he stopped swinging the axe long enough to put a palm over the front of his T-shirt. “Ouch. A man’s car is sacred.”

  Kat rocked back on the heels of her hiking boots, her smile becoming a full-blown grin. “I’m pretty sure Gabe relayed that message to me about a thousand times that day.”

  “I bet it didn’t stop him from eating the vegetables you grew.” Man, there was nothing quite like a ripe, fat tomato still warm from the vine to mellow a guy right out.

  “A few things, I guess. But I didn’t really go garden variety in my garden, if you know what I mean. Most of the offerings were pretty eclectic.”

  Jesse’s newfound love of food mixed with the enticing draw of Kat’s expression were both driving his curiosity. “Such as?”

  She dug her hands into another section of weeds with a shrug. “Bush beans, Swiss chard, pattypan squash, Chinese eggplants. Oh, and tricolor sage.”

  Whoa. “Did you have something against regular old tomatoes and radishes?”

  “Aside from the fact that they were regular, you mean?”

  “Fair enough,” he conceded. He didn’t get the impression she’d ever been much of a conformist, even at twelve. “Still, it’s pretty impressive that you managed a garden this size for an entire summer.”

  “‘Managed’ might be a bit generous.” Kat paused to sling air quotes around the word with her earth-covered garden gloves. “Even though I researched the proper way to plant everything, my selections were completely helter-skelter. It knocked the colonel off his rocker, of course. But having something I could actually tend to and take care of with my own hands, something that made this place special, like a home . . . I know it sounds crazy, but growing those plants saved me that summer.”

  The expression on her face, so honest and naturally beautiful as she sat surrounded by leaves and sunshine and clean earth, propelled his thoughts right out of his mouth. “That doesn’t sound crazy at all.”

  In fact, Jesse knew exactly what it felt like to be saved by something unexpected.

  Kat looked up, their gazes connecting them in a brief moment of understanding before she dropped her attention to the patch of weeds at her feet. “Anyway, I guess we should get to it. We’ve got a ton of work to do out here.”

  “Right.” Jesse hefted the axe upward, his shoulders squeezing tight. “Sure thing.”

  But all the manual labor in the Blue Ridge wasn’t going to cancel out the fact that he wanted just one taste of Kat McMarrin. Just like all the want on the planet wasn’t going to cancel out the reasons he couldn’t have her.

  Chapter Five

  “I can’t be 100 percent certain, but I think my arms might fall off.” Kat pulled her work gloves from her hands, flexing her fingers with a combination laugh-groan that Jesse swore was going to undo him right there on the lawn.

  “Yeah, we’ve had a long day. The yard looks pretty good, though.” They’d actually made way more progress as a team than Jesse had expected. But it had been all too easy to get into a rhythm of conversation with Kat as they worked, to the point that the talking—even though she’d done most of it—had made the labor fly by practically unnoticed.

  And the more Jesse discovered about her, the more he wanted to discover. One project at a time.

  “The yard looks better,” Kat amended, wrinkling her sun-burnishe
d nose at him as they headed for the shed. “Thanks in no small part to you.”

  Jesse held the door to the shed open, ushering her through before removing his own work gloves with a few well-placed tugs. “It’s not as if I’m without motive, you know. You and Gabe are letting me stay here rent-free for a month.”

  “Well, it’s obvious that you take your promises seriously. It’s quite admirable, actually.”

  “It’s no big deal,” he said, his shoulders tightening to a slow burn around his neck. Damn, he must’ve done more work today than he’d realized.

  Between the low light in the shed and the evening shadows starting to set in around them, Kat’s eyes looked nearly navy blue as they widened. “Are you kidding me? It’s a very big deal. You did more work in a day than I’d have been able to manage in a week by myself.”

  Well hell. There was no denying she had the mettle to go with the pedigree of being a colonel’s daughter. “You did just fine on your own.”

  Her head snapped up, her expression less stubborn now than surprised. “Thank you. But I think you did too.” Kat cranked the knob on the aging utility sink, letting the water run over her hands for a minute before adding, “In fact, it might not be such a bad idea for us to fix this place up together from now on.”

  Jesse’s shoulders pinched even harder beneath his T-shirt. “Why would you want to do that?”

  Kat’s laugh had her honesty written all over it. “Why not? We’re both stuck here, and we make a good team. The work is less tedious when we’re together.” She moved aside to give him access to the sink, leaving a trail of musky jasmine in the close quarters of the shed. “Plus, I had a good time today. What can I say—I like you.”

  The twinge in Jesse’s muscles became a full-on throb. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

  “Us working together?”

  “You liking me.”

  He finished at the sink, pushing past the door to the shed to gather in a deep draw of evening air. But rather than dropping the subject or shying away from his gruff response to her suggestion, Kat kept up with him, stride for stride.

  “You’re a little tough on yourself, don’t you think?” Rather than emerging on the shrapnel-sharp edges of accusation, her question hit him with the full force of her candor, and shit, fuck, and every swear word in the book, he needed to cut this whole thing short before he couldn’t.

  “I think it’s getting late.” He went for his tried-and-true shrug to cut the rest of the conversation loose, but his shoulder locked down on the move halfway through. Pain speared, hot and sharp, from his deltoid to his elbow, and he froze with a curse.

  “Jesse?” Kat jerked to a stop at his side, fingers curling around his forearm in concern. “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing,” he grated, trying to suck in a breath to ease the pain as he rolled the joint in a clumsy half arc.

  Kat didn’t buy the lie for a second. Not that he’d expected her to. “Is the pain in the front of your shoulder?” She slid her fingers from his forearm to the divot of his elbow, and damn it, his muscles vetoed the protest forming in his mouth.

  “Frontal deltoid, through the top of the biceps. It’s probably just a strain. No big deal.”

  “Not to bust your bubble, but you spent ten hours swinging an axe over your head today. Chances are, no big deal went out the window at around lunchtime.” Her fingers climbed from his elbow to his biceps, but her eyes never left his. “Has your shoulder been bothering you before today? Other than being tight, I mean?”

  “No. And it’s not tight.”

  One gold-blond brow kicked up, along with the corner of her mouth. “Remember that arm-crossing thing I do when I’m uncomfortable?”

  Jesse’s chin lowered in confusion. “Yeah.”

  “Let’s just say I’m not the only one with a tell. Come on, let’s see what we’re dealing with here.”

  Kat stepped in toward him, wrapping her right forearm under his to cradle it flush to her rib cage. Without wasting time or effort, she lifted the sleeve of his T-shirt, pressing the pads of her left fingers into the spot where his shoulder met his arm.

  “Ah.” His hiss slipped out between clenched teeth as the pain responded to Kat’s gentle touch. Okay, so maybe his shoulder was a little tight. But he’d been through worse, and deserved worse still.

  “Feels like your tendon is pretty knotted up,” Kat said, her hands moving in careful assessment. “Nothing a little direct pressure shouldn’t ease.”

  She moved her fingers to the top of his biceps, but before she could unravel his pain, Jesse grabbed her palm with his free hand.

  “Stop.”

  Her gasp registered dimly after the fact. Still he didn’t let go.

  But Kat didn’t let go, either.

  “No.”

  “Kat, I mean it. I—”

  She cut him off with nothing more than the willpower in her stare. “I mean it too, Jesse. Now stop being a pain in the ass and let me help you a little.”

  He blew out a breath and closed his eyes, letting go of her hand. “You really don’t have to do this, you know.”

  “Right.” Her soft wisp of laughter tickled his cheek. “Because letting you sit here in pain is a viable option.”

  “It’s a sore tendon.” Emphasis on the sore, but still . . . “Not exactly the end of the world.”

  Kat’s right fingers shifted to cup his elbow, her left creating the perfect amount of strength and friction on his skin as she brushed them over the top of his arm. “Maybe not. But I can still help you, if you let me.”

  She alternated varying degrees of pressure against the front of his shoulder, the tension in his muscles releasing little by little with each pass. Her hands were enticingly warm despite the cool twilight breeze coming in off the lake, and he drew in a deep breath of one as he gave in to the other. Kat’s fingers circled and swept, mixing the unexpected comfort of the day they’d spent together with a darker, more undeniable need.

  “See?” she whispered, and Jesse opened his eyes just in time for her smile to be the first thing he saw. “That wasn’t so bad.”

  “The last time you did that, I almost kissed you,” he said, refusing to move even though he knew damn well he should. But Kat was the only person who’d been able to make him relax—even a little bit—since he’d been home, and denying how deep-down good he felt with her hands on his skin was simply impossible.

  Her eyes glittered with both desire and surprise, but her blush gave away her embarrassment. “You mean I almost kissed you.”

  “No, Kat.” Jesse captured her cheek in his palm, slanting his mouth over hers until he could feel the warmth of her exhale, and damn it. Something this out of bounds shouldn’t feel so freaking right. “I almost kissed you. Only this time, I’m not stopping.”

  He brought his mouth down on hers without hesitation, capturing her heated breath along with the kiss. Kat arched up to meet him more fully, her lips slipping open in an eager bid to deepen the connection, and any chance Jesse had of taking just one taste was blown to bits. His shoulder pulsed with a residual ache as he thrust his fingers upward into her hair, but the response of her honeyed sigh only made him hold on tighter.

  Tugging the bandana from the crown of Kat’s head, he slid his tongue over hers, building a rhythm both fast and hot. She willingly opened to every glide, every thrust and nibble and taste, and Christ, how had he ever resisted this woman?

  “Jesse, please,” Kat whispered, her breath vibrating against his skin as he sucked the full sweep of her bottom lip between his own. She lowered her hands to grip the waistband of his jeans, anchoring her hips against his already rock-hard cock, and he wanted everything about her all at once.

  “Come here.” Sinking his fingers through the belt loops on her shorts, Jesse locked Kat into place, swinging her back to the tall, thick oak tree standing a few paces away. The solid surface gave him leverage, and he used it to divide the space between her hips with the frame of his body.
Kat widened her stance even farther in response, another sultry-sweet sigh rolling past her lips before she canted upward to nip the curve of his mouth.

  “Kat.” Jesse’s hand shot beneath the back of her thigh of its own lust-drenched volition. “Don’t do that,” he warned, his fingers tightening at the hem of the shorts he’d wanted to rip off her all damned day.

  Her mouth parted into a provocative smile that Jesse felt more than he saw, her lips on his jaw, her forehead brushing the bridge of his nose. “Or what?” She teased his bottom lip with the edge of her teeth, sliding them back and forth to send a bolt of stinging pleasure over his already sensitive skin, but he pulled back just before she could repeat the move.

  “Or I’m going to find out if you like it when the tables are turned.”

  Dropping his mouth, Jesse strung a trail of hot, openmouthed kisses over Kat’s throat. He reached up to knot his free hand in the fall of her hair, taking full advantage of the access to her neck. Slowly, he kissed the tender length of her skin, tasting the wild beat of the pulse point by her shoulder, teasing the soft spot where her chin flowed into her jaw. He worked his tongue, then his teeth, over the shell of her ear, his cock growing impossibly harder as her breath turned to short bursts over his shoulder. Kat arched to press against him at every point of contact, her ear to his mouth, the tight buds of her nipples to his chest, and her far-flung abandon destroyed yet another level of his control.

  Pushing forward, Jesse tightened his grasp on the back of Kat’s thigh, boldly stroking the fold where her leg met the gorgeous swell of her ass. She hooked her leg over his hip in a hungry invitation for his touch, bowing back until the only barrier between his hand and her heat was the too-thin cotton of her panties.

  “Oh God,” she moaned, and he thrust against her with both his hips and his fingers just to hear the sound again. “Take them off and touch me. Please.”

  What little control he’d been clinging to snapped in half. Jesse slid his hands to the top of her shorts, reaching directly for the row of tiny buttons below her navel. He damn near skipped the pleasantries in favor of just tearing them from their moorings so he could get to her bare, hot skin, but finally, finally, the last button slipped free....