by Anna Jeffrey
He lifted her to the level of the seat, but before he could slide her onto it, she looked at him eye-to-eye, mere inches between their faces. “Oh, my gosh,” she said softly. “Your eye is so red. And it’s watering. Are you okay?”
Her breath touched his lips and smelled of peppermint. Her breast and the beat of her heart rhythmically pressed against his chest. He felt a shift in his shorts and his world turned upside down. He had the damnedest urge to kiss her shiny pink lips.
A few seconds passed before he came to his senses. He had to untangle from her. He did not like what being so close to her was doing to him. “It’s fine. Just slide onto the seat.”
At last, she was seated. His eye burned like fire. He dabbed at it with his shirtsleeve as he slammed the door. Cussing under his breath, he rounded the truck’s front end again and climbed behind the wheel, turned the truck around and drove the short distance back to the ranch house in silence, fighting the confusing action and reaction going on behind his fly.
As he approached the house, his two border collies rose from sleeping on the front porch and began to bark. He came to a stop on the driveway in front of the house and the dogs bounded toward them. The two orange barn cats raced along with them. He scooted out of the truck, rounded the frontend again and opened the passenger door.
The visitor slid out, landing on the ground with a one-footed hop, hanging on to her shoe and her purse. The dogs barked and danced around them. The cats meowed. Her shoulders scrunched all the way up to her earlobes, one palm flew up and her jaw clenched. Evidently, she didn’t like animals.
Pic gave a loud whistle. “Frissy! Fancy! Settle down!”
His dad came out of the house, walking toward them. He whistled, too. “Fancy! Get back on the porch!”
Both dogs continued to bark and bounce around them. The visitor inched closer to Pic’s side. He glanced down at her, saw a little quiver in her chin. Was she afraid of dogs? He shoved the question out of his mind and amidst the commotion, raised his voice. “Dad, this is—” He stopped. Though she had said her name, he hadn’t understood it.
She stuck her right hand out to Dad. “Hello,” she said, her voice elevated above the dogs’ barks. “My name is Zochimilka Amiyala McLaren.”
Pic still didn’t catch her name. In the sing-song way she said it, it all ran together.
Dad took Miss What’s-Her-Name’s hand with his right hand, bent and grabbed Fancy’s collar with his left and leveled a narrow-lidded look at the visitor. “You don’t say.”
Dad hadn’t caught her name either.
“Frissy, c’mere,” Pic said and whistled again. The border collie finally calmed and took a seat on her haunches beside his boot, panting, her tongue lolling. The two cats sat down beside her.
“Mrs. Lockhart told me I could take pictures of this ranch,” Miss What’s-Her-Name said.
Fancy whined and twisted, pulling against Dad’s grip on her collar. “Drake’s wife? You’re friends with Drake’s wife?”
“Drake?” Miss What’s-Her-Name said, a puzzled expression on her face.
Since Dad and Mom were separated and had been living in different locations for years, obviously Dad thought the visitor meant the oldest Lockhart son’s new wife. “Dad, I think she means Mom,” Pic said.
Dad released Fancy’s collar, straightened and jammed his fists against his waist. “My wife told you to come here and take pictures?”
“Well…yes….She said you wouldn’t mind.”
“I guess that depends on what you want to take pictures of. And for what reason.”
“Oh….Well…” Miss What’s-Her-Name looked around. “Is there someone I can speak to about it?”
His father’s gaze traveled down and up the new arrival in a thorough assessment. The man had a refined eye for a good-looking woman. “Dad, she’s got a flat tire back on the driveway. Can you get Smoky or somebody to go fix her up?”
“Smoky’s not here right now,” he said, continuing to study the visitor. “Won’t be back for a couple hours.”
“Oh,” Miss What’s-Her-Name said again. “Well, that isn’t a problem. I don’t mind waiting. I’m planning on being here a few days. Mrs. Lockhart told me I could stay as long as I need to.”
“Is that right,” Dad said. A statement, not a question.
Evidently, Mom hadn’t clued him in about sending a photographer. Nevertheless, Pic knew his dad. If the visitor said Mom had sent her, Dad would go along with it. He gestured toward the front door. “Then I guess you’d better come on into the house and tell me what’s going on. It’s a little cooler inside.”
“Let me put my shoe on,” she said, sliding her foot into her sandal.
Pic’s eye continued to burn and water. As Miss What-s-Her-Name squatted and dealt with the buckles on her shoe, Pic thought of Johnnie Sue. She would know what to do for his eye.
After Miss What’s-Her-Name was ready, she and Dad walked toward the front door chatting. Pic lagged behind, Frissy and Fancy and the cats trotting beside him. Even with slightly blurred vision, he couldn’t keep from admiring how well Miss What’s- Her-Name’s heart-shaped bottom filled out her shorts and the sexy sway of her hips.
Inside the house, he left Dad and her in the entry and found Johnnie Sue in the kitchen. She stood on her tiptoes and closely examined his eye through the lower half of her bifocals. “I don’t think it’s hurt bad. Probably just irritated. Sit down and I’ll get something to put in it.” She left the kitchen and returned with a small bottle. “Sit down and let me squeeze a few drops of this into it. It’ll make it feel better.”
Though the housekeeper hadn’t been with them long, she mothered him and Dad as if they were her kids. Following her instructions, he sat down at the breakfast table. After a few drops of the liquid from the little bottle, his eye did feel better and he could see better.
He picked up his hat and walked into the living room where Miss What’s-Her-Name and his dad were talking. The old man was showering her with his country boy charm. Pic wouldn’t put it past him to try to get in her pants.
She turned and smiled up at him, sans sunglasses and he was captured. Her eyes were the color of coffee, the irises indiscernible from the pupils, a different shade from Mandy’s light brown eyes. Black, thick spidery lashes framed them. It happened again—that unsettling shift in the world.
“Thank you so much for your help,” she said and it dawned on Pic where he had heard that breathy little voice. She sounded like Marilyn Monroe in old movies he had seen on TV.
He mentally regrouped. He had to get to town. “Uh, you’re welcome, ma’am.” He turned to his father. “Dad, I’m late. I gotta go.”
Dad waved him away and Pic backed out of the conversation.
He left the house, setting on his hat and mumbling to himself, “It’s only because I’m so damned horny.”
He climbed back into his truck, shoved on his sunglasses and started over on his trip to Drinkwell. He plucked his phone off his belt and keyed in Mandy’s number. She answered on the first burr.
“I got delayed, darlin’, but I’m on my way.”
“Don’t speed and get a ticket. It isn’t that important.”
Mandy, his safe harbor when his high-octane family became overwhelming, was sweet and patient, always understanding. “I won’t. See ya soon.”
He disconnected, made the sharp right turn onto the county road and pressed the accelerator. In the rearview mirror a distance behind him, a black SUV trailed him. “Shit,” he mumbled. He yanked his phone off his belt and speed-dialed a number. A male voice answered. “Yessir, Mr. Lockhart.”
“I’m only going in to Drinkwell to my girlfriend’s house, Marcus. I’m armed. I don’t think it’s necessary to follow me.”
“Just doing our job, Mr. Lockhart. We’ll try to stay out of your way.”
“Just so you’ll know, I’m planning on going to Stephenville and back and I’m planning on being at Mandy’s house ’til Sunday.”
; “I understand, sir.”
“Did you see a green Volkswagen on the driveway a few minutes ago?”
“Yessir. We alerted Mr. Lockhart at the house. And Ryan is nearby.”
Pic sighed. Dad didn’t know Whats-Her-Name from Adam, but he probably told Marcus to just send her on to the house. And Pic had actually allowed her into his truck and driven her there. He wasn’t very good at this security crap. Even after two months, half the time, he forgot about it or forgot to be concerned for his own safety. “Okay, thanks.”
He disconnected, annoyance pecking at him over how they had gotten into this situation in the first place. Sometime in February, after delving into who could have set Kate’s barn on fire, Blake Rafferty and Jack Dawson, Texas Rangers who were also family friends, had floated the theory that someone was out for revenge against the Lockhart family. Dad, Pic and his siblings had all scoffed. The cops hadn’t been able to explain exactly what the danger was or the motive.
Then, three weeks after Drake got married, he and his wife were T-boned at a stop sign by a hit and run Hummer traveling at high speed. Drake’s truck had slammed into a concrete embankment so hard it was totaled and he had been bruised up. Shannon had stayed overnight in a Fort Worth hospital. So far, neither the rig that hit them nor the driver had been found. Blake Rafferty considered the collision a blatant case in point of the threat against the whole family.
After that, he had insisted that all of the Lockharts be more conscious of security. And now, two months later, a subtle edginess and even a siege mentality had seeped into the lives of the whole family. Even Kate was now carrying a pistol and Drake had hired the private security company to watch over everybody.
Pic didn’t doubt the bodyguards could do the job. The ones he had met were tough-looking dudes and Drake had said they were ex-military special ops types. At first, Pic had hated having his and his family’s security threatened and their freedoms curtailed, but after two months, he was starting to get used to it.
He tried to redirect his thoughts to the weekend and the time he would spend with Mandy, but all the way to town, Amanda Breckenridge wasn’t who filled his head. Who had planted herself inside his brain was today’s guest—those mysterious midnight eyes, the shape of her nipples behind that little white top, the scent of her and her perfume, the voice that made him think of a woman just waking up all soft and ready to fuck. All of that and the total, utter femaleness of Whatever-Her-Name-Was.
Chapter 5
Pic pulled into Mandy’s driveway with his dick so swelled he was almost in pain. How would he be able to get through a forty-five-mile drive to Stephenville, supper and a rodeo performance? He adjusted himself, willing his arousal to calm down, then opened the jockey box and grabbed Mandy’s birthday present.
A Fort Worth jeweler had told him ruby was her birthstone. Pic didn’t know much about jewelry, other than that his mother owned a safe deposit box full of it. But after looking over the pieces locked in the jewelry store’s showcase, somehow, one or two tiny rubies hadn’t seemed enough for a woman who was as important to him as Mandy was. So he had selected a pendant with rubies and diamonds both.
He reached for the small duffel he had brought with him. He kept a razor and other personal items at her house, so changes of clothing were all he ever needed to bring. He glanced behind himself and sure enough, Marcus was parked in front of a vacant lot down the street. Shaking his head, he scooted out of the truck.
As he neared Mandy’s door, she came outside and met him on the wooden porch with a big smile, her expressive brown eyes dancing with delight. She had perfect white teeth and full lips that perpetually tipped up in a smile. “Hi, stranger.”
He lifted off his hat and kissed her. He had meant it to be a hello peck, but the next thing he knew, his hat, his duffel and her present had hit the porch floor. He had both arms around her, his tongue was buried in her mouth all the way to her tonsils and he was clutching her firm little ass and pressing her belly against his erection.
When they parted, she looked up at him, breathless and grinning mischievously. “My goodness, you’re really glad to see me, aren’t you?”
“God, Mandy, it’s been too friggin’ long.” He went for her mouth again.
She turned her face away and pushed against his chest with her palms. “Pic, stop. We’re on my front porch. And one of those security guys is bound to be lurking somewhere watching us.” She added with a laugh, “Not to mention my neighbors.”
On a mental sigh, he reined himself in. She was right. He had become so accustomed to the presence of Marcus or Chris that half the time he ignored them. But more than that, he was well aware that his and Mandy’s relationship already kept Drinkwell’s gossip mill humming without adding a new tale. He released her reluctantly. “I’m about to bust. Could we just…go into the house?”
“Let’s do,” she said, opening the front door. “We shouldn’t give everyone a show.”
He picked up his stuff and like a hungry puppy, followed her inside. He barely had time to drop everything before she turned into his arms and they were kissing again. “We should wait until later to go to Stephenville,” she mumbled between ravenous tongue kisses.
Code words! Oh, yeah. She was as horny as he was. “God, baby, I was afraid you weren’t gonna say that.”
“Come on.” Grasping his hand, she led him straight through the living room toward her bedroom. “What happened to your eye?”
“Nothing. I just bumped it.”
Unable to keep his hands off her, he stopped her and pulled her against him, kissing her again, running his hands over her well-honed body until she pushed him away and reached for his hand again. “Come on. Hurry. Before you lose focus.”
He huffed. “Like that’s gonna happen.”
By the time they passed through her bedroom doorway, she had tugged her T-shirt over her head and he was unbuttoning his cuffs. She dropped her shirt onto a chest at the foot of the bed and reached behind herself for her bra hooks. “What made you so late?”
“Somebody going to the ranch had a flat tire on the driveway.” Still fumbling with his shirt buttons, he ogled her breasts covered by a blue lace bra.
“You’re all clean. You don’t look like you changed a tire.” She laughed, shedding her bra and dropping it on top of her shirt.
He salivated at the sight of her breasts. Her rosy nipples already stood in little peaks. All he could think of was getting them into his mouth. He stared at them as he yanked off his shirt and tossed it on top of her shirt and bra. “You’re beautiful, Mandy,” he said hoarsely.
“Hah. I love hearing you say that, but nothing’s changed. I’m still as flat-chested as a boy.”
He unclipped the 9MM he carried inside his waistband and laid it on her dresser, then sank to the edge of the bed to pry off his boots, at the same time watching her kick off her shoes and slide her skirt past her hips. It pooled at her feet, she stepped out of it wearing only her tiny panties. She often made those jokes about being built like a boy, but he saw nothing boyish about her toned body.
Her panties were blue lace—little things that barely covered her woman’s hair. “I do love blue,” he muttered, getting to his feet. He went to her, took her in his arms and pressed her body against his in a big hug, her breasts smoldering hot against his bare chest. A granite hard-on strained against his zipper.
Her hands slid up his biceps, her arms draped around his shoulders. She looked up at him with that dark message in her eyes that only added more heat to the simmer in his veins. “I know,” she said softly. “Everything you own is blue. Why do you think I wore it?”
He nuzzled the curve of her neck, the scent of woman driving straight to his dick, as if he needed more stimulation. “You smell so good….”
She tilted her head back, giving him access to her smooth throat. “I’ve missed you so much.”
“Me, too, baby,” he replied huskily, trailing his open mouth down her throat while he plucked her firm n
ipple with his thumb and fingers, stretching it and making it even firmer.
Her breath hissed between her teeth. “Oh, Pic. I love when you do that.”
His ego soared. He had never had a woman who responded to his touch the way she did. He cupped her breast in his palm and lifted it. “Do you still like when I do this?” He bent down and drew the elongated nipple into his mouth, gently pulled at it with his teeth, stabbed at it with his tongue.
She released a keening sound as her fingers combed through his hair. “Yesss.”
He moved his mouth to her other breast and gave it the same treatment, earning her little sighs and moans. His pants felt as if they were two sizes too small, which only added to the urgency pushing him. “Shit, baby, I gotta get outta these jeans.”
He set her away, unbuckled and unzipped, freeing his engorged cock and shuddering with relief. His erection jutted like a flagpole. No wonder. All the blood in his brain had drained to it. He shucked his jeans and shorts and kicked them aside.
Mandy’s gaze targeted his dick with such a heated look he got even harder. She clasped him, his full arousal filling her small hand. He groaned as another surge of adrenaline shot through his veins.
“You’re so hard,” she said.
“Tell me about it.” He hauled her against him again, their bodies squeezed together in a tight clench and their mouths joined in voluptuous kisses. Between them, she hung on to his dick, threatening his control.
“It makes me crazy when you’re like this,” she breathed between kisses.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me….I feel like I’m about to spin clear outta control.”
She pushed away from him. “Don’t lose control yet. Let me fix the bed first.”
She turned, bent forward and turned back the covers, then reached for the pillows, giving him a full view of her ass.
His heart was galloping. The lust that had been driving him for more than an hour overpowered him. Every other thought save burying his throbbing cock inside her left his mind. Before she could straighten, he stepped closer and bent over her, grasping the pillow she held and throwing it aside. “Baby, you gotta go first,” he said hoarsely. “When I get inside you, I might not last two minutes.” He wrapped his arm around her middle and lifted her. “Get on the bed.”
