by Joya Ryan
It was all hers. Not her family’s. Definitely not her mother’s idea of a “prestigious career path,” but the little bakery was all Natalie’s. And she loved it.
A buzz came from her phone. She glanced at the screen. Speaking of her mother… She kept a tight grip on the bourbon bottle with one hand and held her phone with the other to read the text.
How’s the date going? A suitable gentleman, I hope? You tweezed your eyebrows and are remembering your manners, correct?
Natalie sighed and took a big swig of bourbon. It wasn’t so much the way her mother treated her like a child that bothered her; it was that she treated her like half a person. Like Natalie would never be a “whole” person unless she had a “suitable gentleman.” A fact that had never bothered her—much—before. But come on, everyone she knew was getting hitched to the loves of their lives. And here she was, having a hard time just finding someone who didn’t make her want to claw her eyes out.
She hit a few keys and responded to her mother.
Texting during a date is rude. And, yes, I have manners.
She smirked. She’d never be a pain in the ass to her mother on purpose, but she couldn’t handle her right now. Because the truth was, while Natalie didn’t “need” a man the way her mother wanted her to, she was getting fed up with the loneliness. And the constant berating from her mother about how she’d die a spinster.
It didn’t help that she was the “local” girl and had been in the friend zone with most of the men in town since about second grade. But she loved her town, loved her shop, and wouldn’t ever move. She’d find the kind of happiness she wanted, right here in Beaufort.
“Fuckin’ friend zone,” she muttered, and took another hefty swallow of alcohol.
And tonight, just when she’d thought the night couldn’t get any worse, the one man that got to her like no one else had shown up.
Easton Ambrose.
“What the hell was I thinking?” she mumbled around another swallow. Another awful date with a boring guy who looked at her like she was little more than adorable at best. Which super sucked, since she’d spent her last paycheck on that dress from her friend Michelle’s boutique. Deep down, she knew that no dress or makeup could change her curse.
No one wanted her. Not like that.
And the guys who might want her…well, her big brother Matt was the town’s pride and joy. The man had practically ridden out of here on a float when he left for college. East had taken it upon himself to annoy the shit out of her in Matt’s absence.
Hold on. East hadn’t just annoyed her tonight. He’d intervened. Was that another reason why so many guys gave her such a wide berth? Because for big brother Matt and big pseudo-brother East, no one was ever going to be good enough for her?
She took another swig.
They were probably right. They just had it backward. She was the one who would never be good enough. She was plain at best. Quirky at worst. And somewhere in between, she was sick of it. Her few experiences with sex were anything but stellar, but damn it, she wanted to feel something. Everyone around here, her best friends, were all happy and settling down. Even her own brother was getting married.
She didn’t need all of that. Not marriage. Not kids. Not even commitment. She just wanted a chance at that whole passion thing everyone seemed to be raving about. It looked…nice.
Better than nice.
She’d seen the way her friend Chloe’s husband kissed her neck whenever she was within a few inches of him. Watched how her other friend Michelle had her ass squeezed by her fiancé constantly because he couldn’t seem to keep his hands off her.
“Must be nice,” Natalie said to her bottle of bourbon, and took another drink. Yeah, must be nice. To be wanted like that. Treated like you were…sexy. Desirable. Just once she wanted to feel that.
She’d had high hopes for her date tonight. But he’d turned out to be a dud, and then stupid Easton Ambrose with his stupid muscles and stupid smile came in and made her feel weird. Not just weird—more like hot and buzzing. But what else was new? He’d made her feel that way since she was a teenager.
But between her brother being his best friend, and East never looking at her twice except to flick her forehead or tug her pigtail, she’d determined a long time ago that they were just bound to be enemies. Mostly because the man irritated her like no other. He’d been the senior varsity quarterback of the football team when she’s been a freshman band geek. And not much had changed. Well, other than East had somehow gotten sexier, and she’d given up playing the clarinet. God, going through puberty with the hottest man on the planet under the same roof had been no easy feat.
He was blunt and cocky and so damn good looking it hurt to look at him sometimes. Even if he weren’t basically her second older brother, her mother wouldn’t call him “a suitable gentleman.” But he was more of a member of her own family than she was. Hell, her parents had taken him in and raised him like their own child! Maybe that was why they’d always treated East with class and respect. He was family to them, and family deserved unconditional love.
As if her mother was summoned by her thoughts, her phone buzzed again. And again. Nope. She wasn’t looking at that now. Wasn’t dealing with her mother or her ideas on how Natalie was failing at life and love.
At least here she was far away from East, and that ridiculous look he’d given her in the bar. What had that been about, anyway? It had almost looked like…jealousy. Well, screw him and any hint of jealousy. He had no right.
“Dick,” she mumbled.
“If that’s what you’re after, all you have to do is ask,” East said from the entry of her shop. She spun to face him. He had his forearm casually resting against the doorframe, and the light of the hallway haloed him like he was Christ himself. And damn…he looked good. A Stetson, white T-shirt, and dark jeans had never looked more perfect on a man. She wanted to punch him in the throat. How dare he stand there looking like…that!
“Actually.” She cleared her throat and lifted her chin. “I was just thinking of you, and ‘dick’ was the most suitable word that came to mind.”
He raised a brow. “That right? Well, I’m glad you think of my dick. Gotta admit, I would have taken you more for a good girl whose thoughts were full of rainbows and unicorns.”
That fueled the fire she had been tamping down. One, because she wasn’t thinking of his dick. Okay, maybe she was. Kind of. Whatever! He didn’t need to know that. And second, “I’m not a good girl! Now get out of here.”
“Sorry, can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s my responsibility to make sure you’re okay.”
She rolled her eyes. Was that why he’d followed her? Because he was worried about her? The guy needed to realize he was the reason she was upset in the first place.
“I’m fine. I don’t need your ‘saving’ or your pity. Now leave.”
“Sweet thing like you shouldn’t be left alone in your state of distress,” he said with a touch of sarcasm in his voice.
He was doing the same thing he’d done all their lives. Teasing her. Flicking little words and retorts that got under her skin. God, he knew her so well. He got a rise out of her, and that fire made her forget about being awkward and pushed her to simply speak her mind. Not that knowing this made it any easier to resist. He wanted to challenge her? Game on. He was going down.
She set the bottle on the counter, squared her shoulders, and hit him with a hard glare she could feel all the way to her toes. Power. She harnessed whatever kind she had, and she took aim at that big playboy pain in her ass.
“Easton Ambrose…” Her voice came out as a deep rasp that clearly got his attention because he straightened his posture. “Call me a good girl one more time, and I’ll show you just how wrong you are.”
There was a spell of silence, but even in the low light, she could see his perfect smile. “Oh darlin’, you’re all things good.” He took a step inside, and the door closed behind hi
m. Her blood heated another degree. Challenge. He wasn’t backing down. He was coming after her. Again. And she’d rise. She would rise this time.
“And sweet,” he said, adding that extra bit of What are you going to say to that? attitude. He came up to the counter. The only thing separating them was that, a triple tier of her best cupcakes sitting near the register for presentation tomorrow morning, and the bottle of bourbon.
That and the fact that he was all but her brother. If only they didn’t have this history—
Whoa. Where had that thought came from? What did it matter what he was to her? He was off-limits. Period.
“In fact,” he said, “you’re so good and so sweet, I think you’ll go down in history as the Best Friend of Beaufort.” With that, he swiped his finger along one of her pristine gourmet cupcakes on display and licked the frosting from his finger.
Oh, he was really fucking with her now.
“You prick!” she said, and grabbed up the now-ruined mini chocolate cake.
“Come on, Nat, lighten up. I’ll pay for it.”
But that wasn’t the point. He was standing there, in her shop, eating her frosting, telling her she was sweet? Telling her she was nothing more than Beaufort’s town buddy? No. She couldn’t take it anymore. She was face-to-face with the last man who’d ever call her sweet again. Especially when she was feeling anything but.
“You have no idea who I really am.” She stepped toward him. “I’m capable of way, way more than sweet.”
East shot her a look like he was examining a baby duck trying to fly for the first time. But just before she bought into that look, she saw a flash of lust in his eyes, especially when those eyes landed on her mouth, then her breasts. But he recovered quickly and patted the top of her head. “Just because you got a new dress, doesn’t change anything. You’re still sweet, darlin’.”
His words made her anger rise, but his gaze told a different story. Had he just done a double take? He had! He’d totally just checked her out! She wasn’t certain the first time, but she was now.
Easton Ambrose wanted her.
Her!
Holee-crap-on-a-cracker!
“Maybe not,” she said, determined to not only challenge him right back, but to force his acknowledgment. “But you seem to appreciate the dress.”
He snapped his eyes away and shrugged like he hadn’t just been staring down her body. “Just wondering where the rest of it was. You think your brother would let you—”
“My brother lets me do nothing. I let myself do what I want. Because I’m a grown woman. When are you going to stop being an idiot?”
“Oh, I’m the idiot?” His voice rose a tad. “You’re the one out there chasing a loser guy who apparently can’t see jack shit.”
She moved around the counter to face him head on, because it’d be easier to scratch his eyes out if she were toe-to-toe with him.
“Actually…” She nudged his chest with a pointed finger. “I ran from him because you’re right—he couldn’t see what was right in front of him.” She tapped his chest again, her other hand still holding the cupcake he’d desecrated. She knew they were talking about different things now. But she didn’t care. It was time to call a spade a spade. Or an East an East.
“Don’t push me, Natalie. That’s not very nice.” He was so close, looming over her, his warm breath hitting her mouth and his clean masculine scent surrounding her.
“I don’t feel very nice right now.” She tapped his shoulder again just to prove a point, and he gave a low growl. “Oh?” she said with mock concern. “Does that not feel good? Getting bossed around? Someone telling you what you are and what you’re not?” She tapped him again, and this time he took a step back, so she took a step forward until he was only a foot away from the counter.
“I’m warning you—”
“I warned you, Easton. Call me sweet again, and I promise you’ll regret it.”
He snarled at her. “You’re not sweet…you’re sugar incarnate.”
That was it. She shoved the cupcake at his mouth, effectively shutting him up, and the big search-and-rescuer was left wide-eyed and speechless. But only for a moment, because when he registered that she’d just shoved food in his face, he swallowed a piece down and glared hard.
“Ballsy move there, darlin’.” He ran one thumb along his lower lip then sucked off the frosting he’d collected. “But I’m a retaliation kind of guy.” With that, he grabbed the largest vanilla cupcake on the top tier of the display and smashed it into her cleavage, frosting first.
She gasped sharply and looked down at herself. “You son of a bitch!”
“That’s not news, darlin’,” he said with an easy chuckle.
She pushed him hard, but he caught her arms and spun her until her butt was against the counter’s edge. Instead of shoving another cupcake at him, she shoved her tongue into his mouth.
What shocked her wasn’t how amazing he tasted, or how good his mouth felt. It was how quickly her body registered him as a deep, desperate want. And he seemed to register her back. Because there was no hesitation. His talented tongue devoured her like he had no care in the world about who she was or how sweet—or not-so-sweet—she felt.
Her entire body ignited like fireworks popping off in succession. She was ravenous. Needy. Horny. And pissed.
She nipped at his lower lip then sucked his top one. He groaned, and his hands instantly landed on her ass and hefted her up to fully sit on the counter.
“Not so sweet now, am I?” she said, and bit his lip hard.
He lifted her briefly to swat her ass once, then dropped her back on the counter with a loud thud. Damn he was strong, lifting and working her body like she weighed nothing.
“You’re a vicious little thing,” he rasped in her ear.
She clawed at his shirt, and he buried his head in her breasts and licked and nibbled on the frosting that covered them. She cupped the back of his neck and leaned away to give him better access. Which he took. The man had a mouth on him that made her whole body light up like a furnace. He licked along her neck, then lower, and he shoved aside the deep V of her dress and bared her still bra-covered breasts. The brim of his Stetson scratched her throat as he sucked along the exposed flesh of her chest. He was making a mess of her and her new dress. But when he brought one breast out of her bra and sucked hard on her nipple, she didn’t care in the least. Fulfilling this forbidden fantasy was wrong on so many levels, but with his mouth on her, it felt so right.
“I still think you’re sweet,” East growled, blindly grabbing another cupcake from the display and slapping another heap of the cake and frosting on the top of her thighs. She wiggled in his arms, but he kept her right on him and spread her legs and stepped between them.
“Well, I still think you’re a pain.” She tugged him close for a kiss.
He squeezed her thighs until she yipped. “I think you like my version of pain.” He bit her neck, and she moaned. Maybe she did like it. A lot. She’d never been so turned on before. Never wanted someone so badly. But she knew, even through her foggy thoughts…
“You are so so wrong for me,” she said.
Shit. Was he going to stop now? Should he stop now? If anyone from her family saw them like this—
“Testify, darlin’,” he agreed, his thumb digging into her frosting-covered thighs while he sucked at her breast.
Okay, so they were both on the same page. Kind of. Because he didn’t stop kissing her, and she sure as hell wasn’t about to stop letting him. Every breath, every touch of his hands, and she knew this was that thing she’d been looking for.
Passion.
It was amazing and heady and deliciously weighty. And she felt it settle all over her like her own personal gravity of bliss, and she wanted to roll around in it like a warm blanket and never let it go. Jesus, this was drugging. She could see how people became addicted to sex. Not that she and East had even had sex yet—God, “yet” implied she wanted it to happen—but just the h
ot and heavy frosting-fondling was enough to make her hips rock to press her center against his jean-clad erection.
“Look at you,” he said, and ran his fingers through the frosting on her leg and up her inner thigh. “You’re close already, and I’ve barely touched you.”
“Barely touched me?” She looked down. “You’ve covered me in frosting and there’s going to be bruises on my ass and thighs from your manhandling.”
“Well, say the word, darlin’, and I’ll stop all the handling,” he teased just as his sugary fingers found her panties.
“You stop and I’ll kill you.”
“You’re hot when you’re giving out threats, Little Natalie.”
Little Natalie. The mocking name he’d given her when they were teenagers to let her know he was older and always knew better. Well, she’d grown up since then, and she wasn’t going to let him lord anything over her anymore. Certainly not tonight.
She reached between them and grabbed his hard cock through his jeans. He instantly stilled.
“If you call me Little Natalie again, I’ll start calling you Little Easton.” She squeezed harder, and he gritted his teeth, biting back a hiss. “And not in the good way.”
He growled and nipped along her neck. “There’s nothing little about me,” he said, and he thrust his hips toward her so that her grip on his shaft had no choice but to move along it. Oh yeah, there was nothing little about him. She could attest to that. The hard cock in her grasp was impressive, and she hadn’t even properly seen or felt all of it yet.
But East didn’t seem to mind how hard she was gripping him, so she rubbed along the steel rod in his jeans, then grabbed him even harder.
“Fuck, baby,” he said, switching from the “darlin’” she was used to. Watching his face tense with pleasure while he called her “baby” was so…hot. It made her feel sexy, like the woman she wanted to be.
