A Piece of Texas Trilogy

by Peggy Moreland

  She didn’t know what to make of Sam Forrester. He both baffled and intrigued her. She didn’t particularly care for the rough way he’d treated her earlier when she’d confronted him about the mess he’d made of her yard. But, in retrospect, she supposed she’d had it coming. She had slapped at him, as he’d accused her of doing.

  Yet, in spite of now knowing that he could become physical when provoked, she wasn’t afraid of him. That knowledge was simply something she’d keep in mind the next time she decided to go toe-to-toe with him.

  But she was still a little miffed about the “anal-retentive” comment.

  She wasn’t obsessive, she told herself. She simply appreciated order. She supposed growing up in a home in which disorder reigned might have influenced her desire for neatness. But she certainly didn’t consider that a personality fault. To her it was a virtue, a method of survival.

  She frowned thoughtfully as she considered again his offer to serve as a mentor of sorts for her nephew. A man who was willing to befriend a troubled teenager couldn’t be all bad, she told herself. But what she couldn’t figure out was why he would want to do something like that. He didn’t know Craig, had no ties to him. Why would he care one way or the other what happened to him?

  As she continued to stare, the door to the apartment opened, and her thoughts shattered as Sam stepped out. She gaped when she saw that he was wearing swim trunks and carried a towel draped over his shoulder. Sliding farther down in her chair, she watched him cross to the spa. The lights in the backyard were off, but the lights in the pool and spa were on, offering enough illumination for her to see his movements…as well as his physique.

  A slow shiver chased down her spine as she remembered being held against that body that afternoon. The damp heat that had seeped through her blouse, the muscled wall of chest crushed against her breasts. She shivered again at the memory as he tossed the towel onto a chair and sat down on the spa’s stone edge. He dipped his fingers into the water, testing the temperature, then glanced toward the house.

  She froze, realizing that with the lamp on she was clearly visible. A smile spread across his face as he spotted her, and he motioned for her to join him. She considered ignoring the invitation, planning to tell him, if questioned later, that she had dozed off in the chair and hadn’t seen him.

  He robbed her of that excuse by rising and striding toward the house. Prepared to send him on his way, she met him at the French door that opened to the outside.

  He greeted her with a friendly smile. “Come on out and join me. The water’s just right.”

  It was an effort, but she managed to keep her gaze fixed on his face and not let it slip to the magnificent view of his chest. “Thanks, but I was just about to head upstairs for the night.”

  “It’s too early to go to bed,” he chided. “Besides, you’ll sleep better after relaxing in the spa for a while.”

  “No, really, I…”

  He leveled a finger at her nose. “You have exactly five minutes to change into a swimsuit,” he warned. “Then I’m coming after you.”

  Before she could refuse again, he turned and walked away. Frowning, she closed the door. She considered locking it but knew that would be a waste of time, since she’d given him a key to her house in order for him to have access to the kitchen and laundry room.

  Surely he wouldn’t make good his threat, she told herself.

  “Four minutes, thirty seconds,” he called loudly.

  Convinced that he would, she ran for the stairs and raced up to change into her swimsuit.

  Breathless and with only seconds to spare, she hurried outside to find Sam already sitting in the spa. Chest-deep in the bubbling water, his arms spread along the spa’s stone edge, he watched her approach.

  Feeling uncomfortably conspicuous, she unwrapped the towel she’d cinched at her waist and carefully folded it before placing it on the chair with his.

  As she turned for the spa, she saw the amusement on his face and stopped. “What?”

  He tipped his head toward the towel. “Are you sure you got all the wrinkles out? You might have missed one or two.”

  She jutted her chin, remembering his anal-retentive comment. “Just because I’m careful with my things doesn’t make me anal.”

  “Uh-huh. Whatever you say.” Water sluiced down his body as he rose and offered her a hand. “You’re going to thank me for this later,” he assured her as he helped her into the water.

  “I wouldn’t hold my breath,” she muttered and snatched her hand from his. She sank onto the circular bench opposite him. Jets churned the warm water around her, making her skin tingle and the underwater lights dance beneath the surface.

  With a contented sigh he dipped his head back and closed his eyes. “Heaven, huh?”

  “It does feel good,” she said, willing to concede only that much.

  “Nothing eases sore muscles faster than a good soak in a spa. Other than a full-fledged massage,” he amended, then lifted his head to peer at her through one eye. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to give me one?”

  The smile she offered him was saccharine-sweet. “You’re right. I wouldn’t.”

  “I’d return the favor.”

  She shook her head, then couldn’t help but laugh when he slid beneath the water, his face a mask of dejection.

  Moments later he reemerged, slicking his hair back from his face.

  She lifted a brow. “Kind of shallow for swimming, don’t you think?”

  He blinked the water from his eyes. “Wasn’t trying to swim. I was checking out your legs.”

  She snatched her knees up and hugged them against her breasts. “If I’d known you’d invited me out here to ogle me, I would’ve stayed inside.”

  His smile smug, he reared back, splaying his arms along the spa’s stone edge again. “Honey, me ogling you is the least of your worries.”

  She tried to frown but couldn’t help but laugh. Pushing out a hand, she shot a spray of water at him. “You’re incorrigible.”

  “No,” he corrected, dragging a hand down his face. “I’m just a man who recognizes a pretty woman when he sees one.”

  “Much more of your bull, and I’ll need boots.”

  He shot her a wink. “No bull, ma’am. Just fact.”

  Deciding it best to ignore him, she slid farther down the wall of the tub and propped her feet against the bench opposite her, wanting to take advantage of the spa’s therapeutic effects. The new position aimed jets of water at her upper back and shoulders, pulsing away at the tension knotted there. She would have purred her pleasure, but she refused to give Sam the opportunity to say I told you so.

  “Tell me about your family,” he said after a moment.

  She opened her eyes wide enough to narrow them at him. “Why?”

  “It might give me some insight into what’s troubling Craig.”

  At the mention of her nephew she sat up, frowning thoughtfully as she swept her hair up to knot it on top of her head. “We don’t have much family left. You already know about my father and brother. My mother died about five years ago, which just leaves Craig, Patrice and me.”

  “How did your mother die?”

  “The official ruling was suicide, but I prefer to believe she grieved herself to death.”

  “Over the loss of your father?”

  Uncomfortable with the subject, she plucked a leaf from the bubbling water, trying to think how best to answer.

  He lifted a brow at the action.

  “That’s not being anal,” she informed him and dropped the leaf over the side of the tub. “It would end up in the filter anyway, which I have to clean out. I was just saving myself some time.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Flattening her lips, she directed the conversation back to his question. “And yes, my mother never got over losing my father. She never gave up hope, either. She always believed he’d come home some day.”

  “Was Craig close to her?”

  She shook her he
ad. “No. Mom was so consumed with finding my dad she didn’t have time for much else.”

  “She searched for him?”

  “She didn’t go to Vietnam, if that’s what you mean. But she spent hours and hours combing through reports about POWs and MIAs, hoping to find some mention or reference of my dad.” Knowing what most people thought of her mother’s obsession, she grimaced. “You probably think she was crazy.”

  “Not in the least. A woman who loved her husband as deeply as your mother obviously did deserves my admiration, not my scorn.”

  Though surprised by his response, she didn’t pursue it, as she preferred not to talk about her parents. “Tell me about your family,” she said instead.

  “Not much to tell. I’m an only child. My parents divorced when I was fifteen. Dad moved to Atlanta, remarried and has three kids.”

  She gave him a chiding look. “And you said you didn’t have siblings.”

  “Since I’ve never been allowed to see or talk to them, I don’t consider them siblings.”

  “You’ve never even seen them?” she asked incredulously.

  “Nope. My stepmother’s rule. She likes to pretend I don’t exist, that my dad’s life began when he married her.”

  “And he puts up with that?”

  “Not entirely. He and I get together a couple of times a year. At a neutral location,” he added. “Never at their home.”

  Stunned, she sank back against the tile wall. “What a bitch.”

  “You won’t get an argument out of me.”

  “What about your mother?” she asked after a moment. “Where is she?”

  “In Seattle. Moved there after I graduated from high school. According to her, that was as far away from Dad as she could get without falling into the ocean.”

  She winced. “I take it their divorce was unpleasant.”

  “Their marriage was unpleasant.”

  “Fifteen,” she said, thinking out loud. “That’s a difficult age to have your parents divorce. It must have been hard on you.”

  “No worse than living with them while they were married.”

  She gave him a doubtful look. “Was it really that bad? I mean, I never lived with both my parents. Not that I remember, anyway. But I’d think there has to be something positive to be gained from having lived as a family, even if it was only for a short time.”

  He shook his head. “Can’t prove it by me. My parents fought like cats and dogs. Rather than be caught in the crossfire, I stayed away from home as much as possible.”

  “But you said you and your father rebuilt cars together,” she said in confusion. “Surely that would require you spending time together.”

  “We did. But only at his shop. That was the one place he could escape Mom.”

  She studied him curiously, intrigued by this part of his life he was sharing. “How did you react to their divorce?”

  “Went a little wild. Was in trouble more often than not.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  “You name it, I did it at one time or another.” He shook his head. “There was a guy I ran with. Ty Bodean. He was rotten to the core, though I was too blind to see at the time. The two of us pretty much terrorized the town. It’s a wonder somebody didn’t kill us just to put us out of our misery.”

  As she listened, she found it easy to believe that he was once a bad boy. “You seem to have turned out all right.”

  “Thanks to Ty’s half brother. He was always riding us about Ty’s and my behavior and how we were going to screw up our lives if we didn’t straighten up. Ty mostly tuned him out, but he never gave up on him. Or me, for that matter.

  “The night we graduated from high school, Ty and I thought it would be fun to shoot the windows out of some of the stores downtown. Cops caught us and hauled us to jail. Ty called his half brother and he came and bailed us out. Ty thought he would just take us home, give us the standard lecture and that would be the end of it. Instead he drove us to the prison in McAllister and had the warden give us the grand tour. When we were done, he sat us both down and told us that he hoped we liked what we had seen because that was going to be our home if we didn’t change our ways.

  “Ty laughed off the warning, but I sure as hell didn’t. Seeing the inside of that prison shook me clean to the bone. I guess his half brother realized there was hope for me yet, because he started spending time with me, talking to me about things. More by his example than anything else, I began to see what a lowlife I had become and decided to clean up my act.” He opened his hands. “So here I am, a reformed rake.”

  She released a long breath, having been caught up by his story. “Wow. You’re lucky he cared enough to take you under his wing.”

  “Nobody knows that better than me. Fact is, I owe him my life.”

  She looked at him curiously. “That’s why you offered to help Craig, isn’t it? Because of what your friend’s half-brother did for you?”

  He shrugged. “Partly.” Smiling, he scooted around on the bench and draped an arm along the edge of the tub behind her. “But mostly I did it because the kid’s got a good-looking aunt.”

  With him so close, she could see nothing but his face. The chiseled line of cheekbone, smoky blue eyes, the sensual curve of his lips. Sure that he was about to kiss her, she nervously wet her lips. “I thought you said you were a reformed rake.”

  His lips curved higher, revealing the most adorable dimples.

  “Even a reformed rake slips now and again.” Cupping a hand at her cheek, he touched his lips to hers, withdrew with a low hum of pleasure, then returned for a second taste.

  “Sweet,” he murmured, tracing his tongue along her lower lip. Angling his body more fully toward hers, he pushed his fingers through her hair and took the kiss deeper, holding her face to his.

  God help me, she thought weakly. Though every nerve in her body demanded she respond, intellectually she knew what a mistake that would be. Sam worked for her, and any kind of intimacy, no matter how innocent, could jeopardize their business relationship.

  If that wasn’t reason enough for her to put an end to this foolishness, he was a virtual stranger. She didn’t know him. Not in the sense a woman needed to know a man before making out in a hot tub with him. More importantly, she didn’t trust men. After the hell Louis had put her through, she had learned to keep her guard up when dealing with the male species.

  In spite of all the reasons pointing her away from Sam, she found herself melting against him until every thought leaked from her mind save one. Him. The pleasure evoked by his lips. The strength in the hands that held her to him. The knee wedged firmly against her thigh. The tickle of stubble that rasped her chin and upper lip.

  Much too soon, he dragged his mouth from hers. Disappointed that he’d ended the kiss, she forced open her eyes and found his gaze on her.

  He stroked a thumb along her cheekbone, his smile slow, sexy. “Even better than I’d imagined.”

  It took her a moment to find her voice. “W-what?”

  “Kissing you.” He slid his hands down her back and looped them low at her waist. “And, believe me, what I’d imagined was already topping the charts.”

  Both pleased and embarrassed, she dropped her gaze, unsure what to say.

  He saved her a reply by rising and taking her hand. “We better head in.”

  He climbed from the spa, then turned and helped her out. Plucking her towel from the chair, he draped it over her shoulders, then used its ends as a rope and tugged her to him for one last kiss.

  Drawing back he smiled down at her. “Good night, Leah.”

  Finding it difficult to tear her gaze from his, she murmured, “’Night, Sam,” then spun and hurried for the house before she did something really stupid.

  Like drag him upstairs and chain him to her bed.

  Three

  Sam had known a lot of women in his life, but not a one of them had ever dominated his thoughts the way Leah did. He seldom thought of her without sex slipping i
nto his mind, too. Legs that seemed to stretch forever. A firm, taut body. Lips ripe for kissing. Breasts begging to be touched.

  “Thinking with your Johnson,” he muttered under his breath as he strained to remove the frozen spark plugs from the Mustang’s engine. And when a man let his Johnson do his thinking, he was asking for trouble. What he needed to do was focus on his real reason for being here: getting the information for Mack. He’d been a guest in her apartment for over a week and wasn’t one whit closer to finding out what he needed to know.

  The spark plug gave and the loss of pressure had him pitching forward. Heaving a weary sigh, he ducked from beneath the hood and dragged an arm across the sweat that dripped into his eyes. He cut a wistful glance at the pool, thinking a swim would feel really good about now. His gaze slid to the spa, and an image of Leah rose in his mind, her damp hair twisted up on top of her head, her breasts pushing at the scrap of fabric that covered them. With a groan, he dropped the wrench and headed for the house, hoping a cold drink of water would cool his thoughts.

  At the back door he toed off his boots, knowing Leah would pitch a walleyed fit if he tracked grease onto her pristine floors. Once inside, he poured himself a glass of cold water from the container in the fridge, tipped the glass back and emptied it in three long gulps.

  His thirst quenched for the moment, he backhanded the moisture from his mouth, propped his hips against the edge of the cabinet and looked around. As usual, the kitchen was neat as a pin, with not so much as a dish towel out of place.

  It was also eerily quiet, as was the rest of the house. Not surprising, since Leah was at work and Craig at school.

  Slowly becoming aware of a loud, rhythmic ticking sound in the silence, curious, he walked through the house, tracing it to the entry hall, where a stately grandfather clock stood like a sentry against one wall. Obviously an antique, the heavily carved piece consisted of two sections, the uppermost framing the face of the clock. In the glass-encased lower portion a brass pendulum slowly swung from side to side.

  Satisfied that he’d identified the ticking sound and that the house wasn’t about to blow up, he headed back to the kitchen. As he passed through the den, he slowed, his gaze drawn to the wall of bookshelves on his right. Wondering what kind of literature appealed to a woman like Leah, he moved to stand before the unit and scanned the books’ spines. Gardening, psychology, interior design, biographies and a couple of paperback mystery novels. Amused by the wide range of subject matter, he started to turn away but stopped when he spotted a photo album lying on the bottom shelf.