Now I snorted because that was true. Riley and I hadn’t exactly censored ourselves around her growing up or ever really. That had been part of the problem with me and her. Staying away from her was the only way to keep how I felt to myself.
There were no more Zoey outbursts at dinner for which I was incredibly thankful. I wasn’t sure I could’ve controlled my reaction again. But I was confused by Zoey’s attitude toward me in general. She wasn’t mean exactly. More cold. Everything she talked about remained superficial.
She couldn’t have thought I’d taken advantage of her four years ago, could she? I didn’t see how.
That sure as hell wasn’t how I remembered the encounter. I didn’t force her to do anything and I’d been the one to stop it from going any further so I had no idea what her fucking problem was. I’d only meant for it to be a kiss because I couldn’t imagine going my entire life, with the very real possibility of early death, without knowing what she felt like that once.
“You’re not driving home are you?” Mr. Goodrich looked pointedly at his daughter as he asked.
“I’m fine,” she waved him off.
“You’ve had five glasses of wine. You’re not driving.” Mr. Goodrich was old school Army, not career, and became a lawyer when he got out. Everything about him said don’t argue and for anyone not blood related keep your hands off his daughter. He’d idled at scary when I was a kid and not much had changed now that I was an adult. “Your mother and I are staying in the city. Riley?”
“Yeah, I’ll take her,” he said with a sigh as if driving Zoey home was the last thing he wanted to do. It probably was.
“Weren’t you going to see Alaina?” I asked. Shut up, shut up, shut up. I really shouldn’t have said anything. “I can drive Zoey home.” Oh, god, it was like I had no control over my own mouth. Her usually soft blue eyes blazed with fury when her gaze fell on me.
“I’m fine,” she bit out.
“It’s settled, Zoey. You’re not dying in a drunk driving accident. Wyatt will get you home safely.” Mr. Goodrich’s word was final when it came to most things in that family. It was the military persona he’d honed early on that the others didn’t push unless they had to. Zoey usually pushed more than any of them.
When I looked over at her to check for a reaction, she swept her pink tongue over those full lips to capture the last drop of wine that had settled there. My body sprung to life partly from neglect and partly because I imagined just what she might do with that tongue.
It was going to be a long ass ride home.
Chapter Three
Zoey
Being alone in an enclosed space with Wyatt fucking McCann would have been hard enough stone cold sober. But with alcohol in my system, it was even worse. My body had been on high alert since I’d seen him earlier that day and everybody knew how wine might’ve added to that. I wasn’t technically drunk yet had enough liquid courage running through my veins to make me feel so much bolder than normal. Almost like now nothing could stop me from getting the answers I’d wanted four years ago. I was suddenly a woman on a mission.
“So, do you want to tell me why you disappeared four years ago after almost having sex with me?” The car swerved to the right quickly before Wyatt regained control. I braced myself against the dash to keep from hitting the door.
“Wow, you go right for the jugular don’t you?” he asked.
“Always.” It was true. I rarely pulled punches anymore, preferring to “shoot from the him” as my father liked to say. “Well?”
“That’s not exactly what happened but I shouldn’t have let it get as far as it did. You’re Riley’s kid sister and I’m a lot older than you.”
“I’m not a kid, Dickhead,” I shot back.
“God, what a mouth.”
“Very talented mouth. Or so I’ve been told.” I raised an eyebrow at him and waited for a response. His jaw tensed and his knuckles turned white from the tightened grip on the steering wheel.
“Don’t say shit like that to me, Zoey.”
“Why not? Isn’t that how buddies talk? Didn’t you run through all your conquests to pass the time when you were in the desert or mountains or where ever you were? Isn’t that what you military people do?”
“No.” The word came out clipped and hard.
Everything I said was pissing him off. Worse yet, I knew it and didn’t care. I could see it in the way his full lips thinned as he clenched his jaw. But some reaction was better than none. I gave him a pinched face look that hopefully conveyed just how much I didn’t believe him because I’d hung around guys my entire life and knew better. Hell, I’d heard more than I cared to admit from Riley and him when they were teenagers, when they didn’t know I was listening and sometimes when they did.
“Fine,” he sighed. “I may have mentioned one but she was not a conquest as you called it. Why don’t you lay back and go to sleep.”
“Have you thought about me at all since then?” I asked quietly but hated how vulnerable it sounded. “Even a little bit?” Vulnerable, needy, and insecure were things I’d promised I’d never be again after the incident. Yet here I was sounding like all of those things.
“Of course I have. But Riley’s my best friend. He would’ve kicked my ass if he found out I’d even touched you.”
“Kicked your ass?” She smirked. That would’ve been a pretty even match yet it still gave me a small bit of satisfaction to think of my brother fighting the guy that shattered my heart.
“I would’ve let him. I was twenty-two. In the Marines. I couldn’t leave some girl behind not to mention the dirty old man it would’ve made me. You were eighteen, Zoey.”
A lump the size of a grapefruit rose in my throat but I refused to cry. I wouldn’t allow it and had gotten really good at forcing my emotions to be shielded by titanium. But even I had to admit that those words cut me deeply.
“Some girl? You better get me out of this car in the next two minutes or it’s going to get really fucking ugly.”
His eyebrows shot up but I wasn’t about to elaborate. All I knew was that I needed to get away from him. Over the years, I’d imagined what it might be like to see him again, how that conversation would go because even though I would’ve preferred it, avoiding him forever wasn’t an option.
After he pulled into my parent’s driveway, I threw the passenger door open before the car had come to a complete stop. At that point, I would’ve jumped out without him even slowing down. Tuck and roll, Grandma.
“Zoey, come on,” he called out after his car door shut behind me. He followed me up the short walkway to the house. When I didn’t answer he said, “What exactly did I do here to light your fuse?”
“Nothing,” I called over my shoulder. “Nothing at all, Wyatt. Chalk it up to some girl throwing a temper tantrum or having too much to drink. Now go home. Or better yet, go find the girl that was worth you remembering.”
The damn deadbolt on the front door gave me a little bit of trouble. The key went in but not all the way and wouldn’t turn the gears. It was the lock. It wasn’t the alcohol and it wasn’t the adrenaline pumping through my body from the confrontation. It was the lock and I wouldn’t admit to anything else. Finally the damn thing gave away and I got through door then slammed it behind me. I took several deep breaths before scrambling up to my bedroom where I kicked my shoes off so hard that they thumped against the wall on the other side of the room. For a brief moment I’d imagined kicking them at Wyatt.
How could he call her some girl as if I didn’t matter? At the very least we’d been friends and while my very young mind had maybe hoped for more, my new-found maturity knew he wasn’t the guy for me.
Chapter Four
Wyatt
Why had I said I’d leave behind some girl? Zoey wasn’t just some girl. She was the girl. When she’d slammed the front door shut I resisted the urge to punch the car door only because I didn’t want to have to fix the dent later. Seemed like every time I talked to that woman things were
left worse than before. Though, this time, I could’ve kicked my own ass for referring to her as if she hadn’t mattered.
That night I tossed and turned instead of sleeping. Between feeling unfamiliar in the apartment above my parent’s garage having spent the better part of a decade in a barracks somewhere, and being unable to stop picturing Zoey’s ass in that damn skirt, my chance of a decent night’s sleep was nil. I’d only been in town twenty-four hours and was already completely twisted up over her. Zoey was all woman now.
My only plan became to steer clear of Zoey Goodrich as much as possible but even I knew I couldn’t avoid her completely. When my phone rang a little after nine a knot formed in my stomach so heavily that I considered not answering it. It was a sixth sense intuition sort of feeling that said I’d regret answering the call. Being in a war, intuition and gut instinct became your best friends so I should have trusted them. And when I saw the caller ID, Riley, I really didn’t want to answer. I did anyway.
“Hey, could you do me a huge solid?” Riley sounded like he’d just woken up. Fuck, I hoped Riley had just woken up otherwise he’d been doing something else and that wasn’t something a guy wanted in his head about his best friend.
“I suppose.” As long as it doesn’t involve your sister.
“I need you to go with Zoey to look at some apartments.”
Of course.
This was going to be worse than being on the battlefield. On the battlefield, I didn’t want to give in. With Zoey, I fought every urge in my body that pushed me to touch her, taste her, run my tongue over every surface of her body. Fuck. I’d need a cold shower before getting near her.
“Why?” I asked instead to try to hide my awkward silence.
“I just want to make sure she gets someplace safe. And I need to go sign the final papers on the garage because the guy I’m buying it from has to leave town. I’ll owe you a beer.”
You’ll owe me a lot fucking more.
“I guess.”
Riley rattled off the details of where they were supposed to meet. I nodded absently and raked my fingers through my morning hair.
“Shit,” Riley interrupted himself, “you’ll have to pick her up because Mom’s driving her car home today. Remember she left it at the restaurant last night?”
“Fine.” I sighed.
Since Riley hadn’t given me much warning, I enlisted the old tried-and-true shower-in-less-than-three-minutes skill I’d learned and perfected in the service and was out the door within ten minutes of the phone call. Wouldn’t take long to get over to the Goodrich’s anyway.
It was pretty obvious that Zoey was less than pleased to see me waiting in the driveway when she came out of the house. Her steps faltered at the edge of the front door where she caught herself from falling and paused for fifteen seconds. Today she was dressed more like a college kid in worn jeans and a thin sweater. She was still carrying her jacket, which she’d need even though the weather was actually somewhat mild. It was Michigan after all. That shit could change in a heartbeat.
I wouldn’t have been able to handle it if she’d been wearing that skimpy shit with her ass hanging out. Not to mention she had on sensible shoes. Shoes you could walk in. She was so small without the help of the heels she’d been at the restaurant that I could’ve tucked her under my arm and her head would’ve laid perfectly at the dip in my shoulder. Those loose curls that hung down her back made me wonder what it would be like to sink my fingers inside. I needed to work on my self-control.
“What are you doing here?” Her words forced me to look away from her face. I glanced around us just so I wouldn’t look like a fucking creeper, staring at her.
“Riley got called away so I’m your big strong savior that’s going to take you to look at apartments. He stressed safety.” I shrugged to try to play it off as normal.
She rolled her eyes at me then slid into his car. Having her close gave me more of a sense of peace than I’d had since the first time I shipped out.
The first place we checked out was a dump. No way would I have even let her consider it. The second was ok but not the level of security that Riley seemed to want. The third was a possibility. Partly because the landlord had mistaken them for a young married couple and that assumption did shit inside me that I couldn’t yet acknowledge. Surprisingly, through it all, we’d both kept out tongues under control and went almost the entire day without sniping at each other.
I’d been worried one of us would draw blood before we got back to her parent’s house.
“So, thanks for going with me today,” she said meeting me in front of his car. “Riley kind of overreacts. I’m a big girl, I could have done this myself but I was glad to have the company.”
“Why is he being like that? He wasn’t when I was last home.”
Zoey shrugged. “Things change, Wyatt. Shit happens.”
She’s hiding something.
For whatever reason I didn’t yet understand, Zoey headed toward the garage instead of the house. It made me wonder if she didn’t want to be alone with me in the house. As if we couldn’t be trusted alone near her bedroom. I knew desire when I saw it and more than once it’d been in her eyes. Especially when that landlord referred to us as a couple.
“What kind of shit?” I asked right as she tugged the garage door open.
“You know it bothers the hell out of me that I couldn’t get those lug nuts loosened. Riley kept telling me to use my body weight but I think he tightened them extra tightly. But damn I wanted to prove to him that I can take care of myself.”
“Zoey,” I said quietly because I couldn’t wait another minute. Two fucking days in town was apparently the limit on my control. Moving in right behind her, I knew she’d feel the heat of my body without my having to touch her but still I didn’t stop until contact was made. By contact, my erection brushed against her back. If she’d put her winter coat on she wouldn’t have felt anything. “I’m sorry I called you ‘some girl’. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“It’s fine.” She shrugged. “I’m sure there have been plenty since then to make you forget.” She swallowed hard and even with her back still to me, I could hear it. “But I remember because it was literally the best kiss I’ve had in my life.”
She shouldn’t have said that. All it did was make my body burn with a desire that I had no right to. The beginner hard-on turned into a full one. When she spun toward me her arm brushed my cock and it was like being zapped with a nine-volt battery. A feeling that hit every hidden depth of my heart.
Chapter Five
Zoey
Such a simple thing. My arm brushed the front of his pants but feeling what he was packing and that he was hard for me made my knees weak. And Wyatt had nothing to be embarrassed about in that area as far as I could tell from that one little touch. Suddenly and irrationally, a flash of jealousy passed through me. Jealous over the untold women who’d already been the place I knew I’d never get to go. In his arms, in his bed.
“So why’d you do it? Drive by kiss me?” I asked, my arms hanging at my sides because I literally didn’t know what to do with them. Saying that he only kissed me was making light of the other stuff, the feeling behind it for me, but I seriously didn’t know what else to call it.
“Hey, Zo, can we talk in a minute? Because I feel like if I don’t kiss you right fucking now my entire body is going to explode.”
My heart sort of burst wide open.
Leaning down, he cupped my face between both of his large hands. His fingers almost touched at the back of my head then leaned in closer. My nervous energy was so intense that I worried it would make me do something dumb. Like laugh right in his face at the worst moment or accidentally donkey kick him in the balls. Thankfully neither happened. His plump lips pushed against mine softly at first. That only lasted a few seconds before his tongue licked across the seam of my mouth demanding entrance.
When his tongue slid against mine, I was transported to four years before when he’d first
kissed me in my bedroom upstairs. It felt exactly the same. My knees buckled but his arm was already in place to catch me. Wyatt consumed my senses, nipping at my bottom lip before diving back in for more. Kissing, licking, nipping over and over until my body felt like Play-doh ready for him to shape.
“You still taste like cherry,” he said breathlessly.
“What?” I pulled back breathlessly, my head buzzing from lightness. “You remember that?”
“It’s haunted my fucking dreams every night,” he said back, those brown eyes smoldering, seeing through any façade I’d put up. Boy did I try to look unaffected. I’d never pull it off but still, I tried.
Him saying that I’d haunted his dreams was all I needed to hear. I launched herself at Wyatt, who luckily had lightening flash reflexes. I wrapped my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist putting the pressure of him exactly where I burned for it the most. When my lungs felt like they were going to explode from the demands his mouth made against mine, Wyatt pushed me back so that I became pinned between him and the wall. His hands crawled up my shirt until they fully cupped my breasts. His thumbs crossed over each cloth covered nipple making them tighten at his command. The way my body responded was almost embarrassing. Almost.
When his fingers dropped to the button on my jeans, every muscle stiffened.
“What are you doing?” I asked barely getting the words out.
“I need to touch you. Let me.”
The pleasure those words brought just about made me come undone right then. His eyes surveyed my face, probably seeing the eagerness.
“Has it been long, Zoey?” he asked quietly.
“Too fucking long,” I admitted back.
Wyatt pushed my feet to the floor with a groan. Like letting me move was the last thing he wanted to do and my shaky legs could barely hold me up anyway. He spun me around so that my back pressed firmly against his front, not even air could get between us, and Wyatt flicked the button on my jeans open.
Making Her Mine (Finding Love Book 1) Page 2
