by Maisey Yates
“Has Jack been helpful?”
Being forced to think of Jack while tugging the slippery, soft fabric of the dress up over her mostly bare body made her skin feel hypersensitized. “Yes. He’s been very...helpful.” Oh yes, Jack had been very helpful in a few very specific ways. Such as turning her on to a point that was nearly painful.
She felt as though her voice was thick with that unspoken comment.
“Not driving you crazy?” This question came from Sadie.
“Or bothering you?” This one from Liss, and it was spoken a little bit more sharply than necessary, in Kate’s opinion.
“Why is my interaction with Jack suddenly so interesting?” She reached behind her back and pulled the zipper up, then stepped out of the dressing room and into the main area of the store. She caught her reflection in the wall of mirrors across from her and stopped, blinking rapidly.
She couldn’t remember the last time she’d worn a dress. If she ever had. She’d worn jeans and boots to homecoming. She hadn’t gone to prom.
She hadn’t had a date for either.
“Kate, that looks beautiful,” Sadie said, her face getting all soft.
Kate turned her focus to Sadie. And it was Kate’s turn to stare. Sadie was beautiful. Her blond hair tumbled past her bare shoulders, light makeup on her face. Simple. And the wedding dress she had chosen had that same light, simple beauty that her future sister-in-law possessed in spades. A layer of lace sat over a heavier silk layer, which conformed to her curves, while the lace flowed out gently, delicate and sheer, catching the sunlight that was streaming through the window. There were a few scattered beads sewn in, just enough to add a little shimmer. It reminded Kate of webs, heavy with dew in the early morning, strung between wildflowers in the fields on the ranch, catching the light just so and making the ordinary into something that was worth stopping and staring at.
“Oh, Sadie,” Kate said, her heart feeling too big for her chest. She was having what might have been the first girly moment of her life. She was about to cry. Over a dress.
But it wasn’t that simple. It was more than that. It was everything it represented. “Eli is going to... I don’t even know.”
Kate looked over at Liss, who was wearing a short cream-colored dress with orange flowers in a style that flowed over her rounded stomach. And she was crying. There was no almost about it. “Damn pregnancy hormones,” she sniffled.
For some reason Liss’s comment twisted the moment. And Kate looked between the woman her brother was about to marry and the woman her other brother had married, was having a child with. She was acutely aware of how much things had changed. How much they were changing still.
She’d clung to the ranch, to Eli and Connor, to the safety of sameness for a long time. Because in her life change had rarely been good. So she had held on tightly to the only things that were good. Family. Stability.
Which, more than money, might be the real reason she hadn’t gone pro a couple years ago.
She’d been afraid to do any leaving. And now she was afraid of being left behind.
She thought that if she stayed rooted to the spot resolutely enough, she could keep things stable. Keep the world from turning itself over again, leaving everything scattered and out of order. Leaving her to try and rebuild yet again with reduced materials.
But it hadn’t worked. Things were changing again. They were just doing it around her, leaving her feeling unsure of her place. Unsure if she even had one.
These thoughts, these concerns, felt treacherous in a way. Because she loved Sadie; she loved Liss. She wanted Connor and Eli to be happy.
But it didn’t make all of this any less unknown or scary.
Didn’t make her feel any more certain about her place in all of it.
It left her feeling desperate to race forward and try to get ahead of it all. To make a change, to make a move, that would help her feel like she was keeping up.
“Do you hate your dress that much?”
Kate snapped out of her internal crisis long enough to realize that Sadie was talking to her. “I don’t hate it.”
“You look upset,” Sadie said.
“I’m just... I’m really happy for you. I’m happy for you and Eli. And you and Connor,” she said, turning to Liss. “I’m emotional about it.” The flat tone of her voice undermined the statement.
Sadie laughed and reached out and patted Kate’s cheek. “I guess this is the Kate Garrett version of emotion?”
Kate cleared her throat. “Yeah, sort of unrefined. Like the woman herself.”
“Refined just means that all the dangerous, interesting bits have been sifted out. Never refine, Kate. It would be disappointing,” Sadie said, her blue eyes suddenly serious.
Kate felt doubly bad about her moment of fear over Sadie’s upcoming marriage to Eli. Because Sadie was wonderful in every way. Sadie had a way of making Kate see things differently.
Also, Sadie had taught her how to bake quiche.
An invaluable skill if there ever was one.
This wasn’t the kind of change she needed to be afraid of. But understanding that didn’t make her feel less stagnant. Still didn’t make her feel any less of a desire to move.
Maybe that was why this change was so scary. It made her feel so conscious of how far behind she was.
Of the fact that while she stayed in her comfortable little place, the people around her would move forward, with or without her.
“Okay, next dress,” Sadie said, all of her authority firmly back in place. “I don’t think these are the ones.”
Kate was relieved. Because ruffles.
She turned and walked back into the dressing room, trying to shake the heaviness of the moment off her chest. She was just trying on dresses. She needed to get a grip.
The next dress had no straps at all. It was a deep cranberry color, the neckline shaped a bit like a heart. She shrugged off what she was wearing and starting getting into the new one.
“What the hell bra are you supposed to wear with this?” she called out.
“Not one,” Sadie shouted back.
“That’s not going to work,” Kate said.
For some reason she could only think about how she would feel wearing this in front of Jack. She would feel naked with just the dress on and nothing underneath it but a pair of panties.
“Just put it on.”
Kate unhooked her bra and threw it on the floor, obeying Sadie’s command. She held the dress over her breasts and reached behind herself, struggling with the zipper while fighting to keep the fabric in place. Finally, she gave up and turned it sideways, then zipped it up and twisted it so it faced the front.
There was no mirror in the dressing room, so she had no idea how it looked. She gritted her teeth and swept the curtain aside, walking out into the main area. Liss and Sadie assessed her, far too closely for her liking.
“You have to adjust your girls, Kate,” Sadie said.
“Excuse me, what?” Kate asked.
“Hoist your boobs up,” Liss supplied helpfully.
Kate could see in the mirror that her face now matched the dress. “Why would I do that?”
“So that the dress fits properly,” Sadie said, her tone even. “And so men can ogle your cleavage.”
Kate nearly choked. “And I want that?”
“Kate Garrett,” Sadie scolded, “this is not the time for you to go acting maidenly and modest. We have checked out construction-worker ass together.”
“That’s different than trying to get them to check me out.”
Sadie waved a hand. “It is not.”
“I’m not sure Eli would appreciate you giving me such advice.”
“He isn’t here. And I don’t ask him permission for everything. I don’t ask him permiss
ion for anything. And I certainly hope you don’t.”
“Of course I don’t.” But she worried an awful lot about his approval.
“Okay,” Liss said, “lean forward.”
“Like this?” Kate bent slightly at the waist.
“Yes. You reach down into the top of your dress and pull your boob up and push it in toward the center of the neckline.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes, I am serious. This is a valuable life skill. Now do it.”
Kate turned away from Sadie and Liss and reached down beneath the fabric of her dress, following Liss’s instructions.
“Okay, do your other boob.”
Kate cringed but did as she was told. “Done.”
“Now straighten up and admire your work.”
Kate did, then turned to face the mirror. She watched her eyes widen, watched her mouth drop open in shock, because she scarcely recognized the woman she was looking at.
First of all, she was a woman and not a girl.
Kate knew she was a woman, but there were a whole lot of days when she didn’t exactly feel like one. There was no denying it now.
The color was rich and brought out a lick of brandy color in her brown eyes, reflecting a similar shade in her hair. The dress left her shoulders bare and exposed a healthy amount of pale, slender leg that she had never before given a whole lot of thought to. But the bit that really shocked her was her cleavage. And the fact that she had achieved it. Now that she had done as Sadie and Liss had told her, the dress no longer sat over her curves. The dress was now shaping itself to her body, the dark berry color shocking against the pale white of her breasts, which looked rounder and fuller than she had ever imagined they could.
There was nothing ambiguous about this. It screamed out to anyone who saw that she was a woman. A woman who wanted to be looked at. A woman who was worthy of being looked at.
A woman Jack would have to look at.
Her breath caught.
“That’s the one,” Sadie murmured.
“Oh yeah,” Liss agreed.
“You can wear cowgirl boots with it,” Sadie said. “They would look cute.”
“Uh-huh.” But Kate wasn’t really listening anymore, because her mind was stuck on what Jack’s face might look like when he saw her in this dress. On what he would think of her. On how he would react.
On whether or not he would be able to tell her no again.
She needed to change. And this was a change. But it wasn’t enough.
She was ready to do something, something crazy, something reckless.
She was tired of sitting still. She was tired of being where she was.
She wanted Jack. And she was going to have him. The Kate standing in front of her right now could have him.
“Yes,” she said, finding her voice again. “This is definitely the one.”
CHAPTER NINE
JACK MONAGHAN’S DAY had been terrible from moment one. It started when he opened his eyes. He didn’t feel rested, and he was hard. That wasn’t unusual, not at all. Just your standard-issue morning erection easily solved in a routine morning shower.
But this was no generic morning erection. At almost the exact moment he became aware of it, the events from the night before flashed back through his mind. Kate. Her mouth, her lips, her tongue. Her hands. Her body.
And no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t banish those images from his mind. And he could not make his erection a generic one. He grabbed ahold of himself in the shower with the mind to get some relief. But then Kate joined him.
He couldn’t even picture her naked. Because he still had no idea what her body looked like.
And what kind of idiocy was that? Fantasizing about a woman when he didn’t even have a handle on what her figure would be like. Literally or metaphorically.
Kate was slim and strong, capable. She had a bit of light muscle tone in her arms from all of the hard work she did. A stubborn set to her jaw, brown eyes that were shot through with golden flame, and hair that hung lank and straight no matter how much humidity blanketed the air.
Oh yeah, and she was the virginal younger sister of his two best friends, and she kissed like a wicked little goddess.
There were a lot of things he didn’t know, but apparently, he knew enough to fantasize.
To imagine what it would be like if it wasn’t his hand wrapped around his cock but hers.
Yeah, he’d given up at that point. He’d gotten out of the shower, unsatisfied and in a foul temper. He’d gone on about his ranch chores in the same manner. Hard and pissed off about it.
He’d figured if he couldn’t work his sexual frustration out in the preferred method, he would do it with actual physical labor. Too bad it hadn’t worked.
It was a gray day, the air cool and wet. Even so, by the time he headed back from the barn to his house, sweat was rolling down his chest and back.
He let out a long sigh when his boot hit the bottom step that led up to the deck. For some reason as he walked up the heavy wooden steps, he remembered the feel of the hollow metal steps that had led to the front door of the single-wide trailer he’d grown up in on the outskirts of Copper Ridge.
He paused when he reached the top, moving his fingertips over the railing. It was hard to believe how far he’d come. From the place he’d been too ashamed to invite his friends to, to a custom-built home on a successful ranch.
He took a lot of things for granted. That he could talk his way out of trouble. That he could get laid if he wanted to. He didn’t take this for granted. Never. Not one day of his life.
The front door of the house opened and his housekeeper, Nancy, stepped out, practically wringing her hands. “There’s someone here to see you, Jack.”
Jack frowned. “Inside?”
She nodded. “I told him you were busy, but he said he would wait.”
Nancy was friendly, and the presence of a visitor wouldn’t normally have her acting nervous. That was enough to make Jack’s stomach tense. He wasn’t sure why. Unless he was about to get served or something, but he couldn’t think of a reason.
There were no outstanding debts or bills to be paid, not anymore. So it wasn’t that, either. Though a holdover from a childhood spent in poverty was a lingering anxiety about bills and bill collectors that was hard to shake.
His mail sometimes made him nervous. Because a stack of envelopes had never meant anything good when he was a kid. It had meant stress. It had meant his mother closing the bedroom door and crying. She didn’t think he knew, but he did.
For some reason this moment reminded him a lot of that.
“Did you get his name?” Jack said, striding across the deck and following Nancy into the house.
If Nancy answered, Jack didn’t hear, because the moment he saw the tall lean figure of a man in a white Stetson, facing away from him, Jack knew exactly who it was.
“What the hell do you want?” He had never spoken to this man in his life. Had never seen him any closer than across a crowded bar or the street. But he knew who he was. And he knew he didn’t like him.
The stranger turned and Jack felt a strange release of tension in his muscles. It was both a relief and an utter horror that the man in front of him was just an aging gray-haired human with lines around his eyes and mouth, rather than the imposing monster his mind often chose to play stand-in.
A relief because who wanted to face a monster? And a horror because it meant dealing with the fact that a very average man held so much control over what Jack did and why.
“I came to talk to you.”
Jack looked around the room and noticed Nancy had made herself scarce. “Well, you don’t want to engage in father-son bonding. I know that much. Because I took a fuck-ton of money from you to keep quiet about
our relationship. Such as it is.”
“You got that damn straight. I’m not here to talk to you about that. We’re never going to talk about that.”
The moment felt surreal. Jack was, for the first time in thirty-three years, face-to-face with his father. There had been no warning and no fanfare. Just the specter that hovered over Jack’s every action and decision made manifest in his living room.
“Then what are you here to talk about?”
“I came to talk to you about a horse.”
The hair on the back of Jack’s neck prickled. “None of mine are for sale.”
“I don’t want your horses. I just wanted to tell you in person that Damion Matthews isn’t choosing your stallion to sire Jazzy Lady’s foal.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“I know the two of you had been in talks. Just about to sign an agreement.”
“Yes,” Jack bit out.
“Then you punched his son in the face, and he’s not real happy with you. I’d rather not take a win just because your low-class bastard genes took over your better instincts in a bar fight, but make no mistake, I will take it.”
Fire burned through Jack’s blood. “I’m only a bastard because you don’t know how to keep it in your pants.”
“You’re a bastard because you were born one. That kind of blood outs itself eventually. Genetics are important. You don’t breed a Thoroughbred to an overused plow horse. The same is true for people. You’re the end result of that.”
Jack had a sudden flash of what would happen if he lost his temper. If he hauled off and punched Nathan West in his smug face. He would probably get arrested. Probably by Eli. And whatever reputation he wanted to cultivate would be completely destroyed.
Yeah, none of that made him feel less inclined to do it.
But his feet stayed rooted to the spot, and his hands stay down at his sides, clenched into fists.
“I didn’t think we were going to talk about me,” Jack said, a hint of the violence pounding through his body evident in his tone.
“Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing, boy. I’m well aware. You starting this ranch, stepping on my turf. There was a day when there would’ve been no question as to which breeder people would come to, and now there is. But it won’t last. It can’t last. You’re not wired to be better than you are.”
