by Amy Andrews
The dress was sexy. She was sexy.
And then, to compound his stupidity, he’d let himself be dragged into a conversation about kissing and the merits of making out. He’d told himself he was just trying to impart an important message—but it’d been hard to not think about kissing her as he’d spoken, making out with her, and damn if that hadn’t got his motor running.
Between the dress and images of them fooling around, he’d been hard as the table beneath his elbows, and he’d thanked God for the cover of heavy denim across his crotch.
Just thinking about it caused his dick to stir.
A flash of light grabbed his attention as he turned back to the bar. Through the pane of glass in the front door, he could see heavy rain as it fell in front of the streetlight opposite.
Which also made him think of Della.
They’d been out in the light rain on Tuesday, and he’d mentioned driving at night in the rain would be a good idea, and there it was—the perfect opportunity. Despite his dick going rogue. Pulling his phone from his back pocket, he sent her a text.
It’s raining. You want to go out for a lesson?
It was entirely possible she was sound asleep and wouldn’t answer, but if she was awake, then why not? Who knew if they’d get this chance again before she took her test?
Her instant Hell yes! reply brought a smile to his face. Not asleep, then. Her next text was just as fast. What about Jack’s?
Tucker tapped a response. Bryce is here.
Bryce, who was one of Annie’s short-order cooks during the day, worked the kitchen at Jack’s from six till close and ran the bar if Tucker ever needed time off. Like an overnight trip to Denver. He could easily hold down the fort tonight.
Tucker strode to the end of the bar and stuck his head out the back. “Hey, Bryce? You okay to take over and close for me?”
“Sure thing.” He put the knife down and wiped his hands on his apron.
“Thanks.”
Tucker sent another quick text. Pick you up in ten.
Three little dots appeared on the screen, and he waited for her reply. No need. Arlo’s going to drive me over.
Without thinking about it, he fired off another text. Maybe you should ask Arlo to take you?
It made sense, if Arlo was coming out anyway. And this way she could get her lesson while Tucker avoided being in cupcake hell. The last thing his hair-trigger dick needed right now was to be in close confines with Della while the rain drizzled down and his pickup smelled like an episode of The Great British Baking Show.
Her reply was speedy. Did you hit your head? Bug-eyed emoji. I do not want my first drive with my brother to be at *night* with a *wet road*. Hair-on-fire emoji.
He laughed, and, selecting the fire-extinguisher emoji, he tapped out, C u soon.
Ten minutes later, the door swung open to reveal Arlo, who stood aside to let Della enter first. She was in baggy track pants and sneakers and a hoodie that looked big enough to fit two people, her straight hair pushed back behind her ears.
Objectively, there was nothing sexy about this outfit, but there were parts of Tucker that vehemently disagreed.
“It’s still raining,” she announced, practically skipping to the bar, her cheeks flushed from the cool night air, an excited glow to her eyes.
“Yeah, I can see that.”
Her hair was darker on top around the center part, where it was damp, and he was pretty sure there was a raindrop in her eyelashes. He had no idea why that was sexy—it just was. And his body hummed like a fucking nuclear power plant as she rested her arms on the bar.
Tucker shifted his attention to Arlo. “You stayin’?”
“Thought I’d get a beer.” Arlo’s gaze traveled around the bar, in that cop way of his, scoping out any potential trouble spots.
“Evening, Arlo. Evening, Della.” Ray lifted his cocktail in salute.
“Evening, Mr. Carmody.” Arlo nodded his head. “Mrs. Forbes.” He turned back to the bar. “How’s the date going?”
“There’s a lot of giggling going on.”
Della sighed. “They look so sweet together.”
Arlo gave a soft snort. “Ray looks like the cat that got the canary.”
“Why wouldn’t he?” Tucker asked. “He’s eighty-two and got more game than you.”
Arlo picked up the beer that Bryce had opened for him. “And how many dates you been on lately, stud?”
Unfortunately, thanks to Arlo, two more than he’d wanted, even if it had been just observing from across the street like some creeper.
Della tapped the bar. “Okay, okay, mandatory manly smack-talk session over. C’mon, Tucker.” She pierced him with an impatient look. “I don’t want it to stop raining.”
“Don’t think there’s much chance of that.” Arlo pulled out his phone, consulting a weather app.
“Excellent.” Della waggled her fingers at Tucker. “Keys?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Tucker dug in his pocket and handed over the keys.
“You might as well drive straight home after the lesson,” Arlo said to his sister. “I’ll just drink this and head back.”
“Sure.” She smiled. “See you soon.” Without waiting for Tucker, she headed for the door.
There was no sexy little swing to her hips, no interesting sashay, but Tucker couldn’t take his eyes off that little skip in her step, the way she practically levitated out of the bar.
“Rain’s going to get heavy. It’ll be slippery, she needs to be careful.”
Arlo’s quiet statement dragged Tucker’s attention off Della’s ass—not that he could make it out, thanks to the length of the hoodie. He glared at his friend, annoyed by his need to state the fucking obvious. “Do I look like an idiot?”
“Well…” Arlo shrugged. “Now that you mention it.” He smiled around the lip of his beer bottle as he took a swig.
Tucker plastered a screw-you smile on his face as he flipped Arlo the bird.
“I’m just sayin’… You know wet roads give me the fucking heebie-jeebies.”
Yeah. Tucker knew that rain and slippery roads were partly responsible for Arlo’s missing leg. As was his savior complex. “Which is why she needs to know how to handle them.”
“I know that,” Arlo muttered, irritation creeping into his voice.
“Okay then.” Tucker undid his apron and tossed it on the serving area behind the bar. “Well, I’m going to go and do that now.”
Arlo raised an eyebrow. “Are you still here?”
“Hey, you know, you should be a cop,” Tucker said. “You can be a real asshole.”
Arlo grinned. “That’s chief asshole to you.”
They were about halfway to the lake when the rain started to hammer down. The first fifteen minutes, it’d been moderate, but now it was severely restricting visibility. Tucker was pleased he didn’t have to tell Della to reduce her speed. She did that automatically as she flicked the wipers up another notch.
“Yikes, I can barely see a thing.”
Her knuckles blanched white around the steering wheel. “You’re doing great,” he encouraged. “Are you worried?”
“A little.”
A sign marking a scenic area a mile ahead loomed out of the darkness. “Pull over up there,” he instructed.
“It’s okay. I can keep going.” But her knuckles whitened further as the intensity of the rainfall seemed to turn itself up yet another notch.
“Sure,” Tucker conceded. “But part of driving in the rain or any kind of inclement weather is knowing when it’s too dangerous to continue. You’re better to wait the weather out, if it’s safe to do so, than to keep going, especially if your gut is telling you to stop.”
A streak of lightning cracked and thundered around them, temporarily lighting the distant tree line around the lake, and her knuckles prac
tically burst through her skin. “Okay.”
A couple of minutes later, she turned into the deserted scenic outlook, parking and turning the engine off, leaving nothing but the sound of the rain drumming on the roof. Out in front of them was a view of the lake, but Tucker couldn’t see past the hood.
“It’s loud.” She raised her voice a little as she turned her face.
“Yep.” And yet he swore he could hear his breathing above the racket. He swore he could hear hers, too.
It was probably just the sudden plunge into darkness heightening his senses. With the headlights and dash lights cutting out, their degree of visibility had reduced even further, making him excruciatingly aware that he was cocooned in this cab with the cupcake queen.
Alone. In the dark. With nothing to do.
It was…intimate, and the thought of that itched under his skin. Soon the windows would fog up, and it’d be even cozier.
“Is it stuffy in here already, or is that just my imagination?” she asked, her voice husky.
The heating had been going full-on when Della had turned the car off, but, given how cold it was outside, it wouldn’t take long to dissipate. “You can turn the engine on, if you like—get some air circulating?”
“No, it’s fine.”
Before he could make another suggestion of cracking her window open a little, Della was undoing her seatbelt and pulling down the zipper of her hoodie to reveal a white form-fitting top that hugged everything inside it like plastic wrap. He couldn’t tell if it was a tank or a tee, but the intimacy level increased tenfold.
That top practically glowed in the dark like a fucking beacon.
“How long do you think this downpour will last?” she asked.
Grateful for something to think about other than that shirt, Tucker pulled out his phone and checked the weather radar. An ominous-looking band of blue and orange was tracking overhead. “It’s quite broad, but it seems to be moving fast, so hopefully not too long.”
“Okay.” Her breath hitched.
He searched her profile. “You okay?”
“Ah-huh.”
A cold hand clutched Tucker’s gut. Was being alone in the dark with a guy triggering her somehow? “There’s a flashlight in the glove box?”
She let out a wobbly laugh. “Thanks. I’m fine.” She smiled at him. “You wanna play I spy?”
“I don’t know about you, but all I can see is rain bouncing off glass.”
“I spy with my little eye something beginning with R?” The sky lit up again, temporarily illuminating the cab before plunging them back into the dark. “I spy with my little eye something beginning with L.”
He laughed. “This is going to be a very short game.”
She laughed, too, and the huskiness resonated around the cab, warm and throaty, upping the intimacy yet again. He was pleased for that middle-seat distance between them because she seemed a little shaky right now, and that tugged at him in all kinds of male-bullshit ways.
“Have you heard any more from Bailey?” Nothing like talking about Della’s dating exploits to take a mental machete to that tug.
“Yep.” She reached into the pocket of her hoodie and pulled out her phone. “He’s been sending me these snaps of his favorite foods all week.” She navigated for a beat or two and handed the phone over. “Here.”
Tucker took it reluctantly. He may have chosen Bailey, but that didn’t mean he wanted to see every picture he’d sent her, and, by the time he’d perused them, he really wished he hadn’t.
They were putting a serious itch up his spine.
There was a taco shot. And a shot of a shiny, purple eggplant. Two frosted cupcakes with chocolate buttons in the middle. A close up of a frilly-looking oyster. Lastly, sent yesterday, there was a hot dog taken in the most suggestive way possible, with a close up of one end and the mustard dripping off the wiener.
Either Tucker had a dirty mind—which, to be fair, did err on the side of filthy—and was reading too much into these innocent images, or Bailey was sending pornographic food pics.
Until now, Tucker wouldn’t have thought food was up to that kind of manipulation. Which just went to prove there was no end to the douchebaggery of some men.
He glanced at Della, who didn’t seem to have a problem with the images. But goddamn it, he was annoyed. He’d vetted this guy, and now he was sending Della nefarious dick, boob, and hoo-ha pics. Screw him.
“Um…do you notice anything…kinda weird about these pictures?”
Della frowned as Tucker handed the phone back, and he watched her swipe through the pics again. “No. But that hot dog is making me hungry.”
Tucker grimaced. “Look closer.” This would go much easier if he didn’t have to spell it out for her. He still hadn’t recovered from the mermaid thing.
She swiped through them again. “Nope.” She shook her head. “Sorry, you’re going to have to help me out.”
For a moment, Tucker contemplated letting it slide. But he didn’t trust a guy who was sending food porn. How long before the dick pics arrived? “I think Bailey is using food to send you sexually suggestive messages.”
“What?” She gave a half laugh. “Don’t be ridiculous.” Glancing at the screen again, she toggled between the images, slowly at first, then more quickly.
“Tacos and oysters and cupcakes?” Tucker said. “Eggplants and hot dogs?”
She blinked again before looking up at him. “Eww.” She wrinkled her nose. “If that’s true, that’s kinda gross.”
Tucker laughed at the expression on her face. “Right?”
“Why would he do that?”
“He probably thinks he’s being really cool and sophisticated.” Instead of a grubby little dipshit. “What did you say when he sent the eggplant?”
“I said…” She scrolled to the image on the screen, pausing for a moment before she relayed the message. “I said I loved the taste of eggplant.”
Tucker’s head fell back against the headrest. “Oh Jesus.”
“Well, I do.” She glared at him. “I thought we were talking about eggplant.”
“What about the oyster?”
More scrolling. “I said I wasn’t a fan.”
“And he said?”
The light from the screen illuminated her face, showing off the pink in her cheeks. “I could eat oyster all day.”
Tucker’s jaw clenched. Eating oyster may well be a quality all dudes should have, but that didn’t make Bailey any less of a dirty little fucker. “Probably time to kick him to the curb. What do you think?”
“Definitely.”
“Sorry.”
She shrugged, apparently not too upset at the prospect. “It’s fine. He was nice, but there wasn’t much of a spark, you know?”
Tucker nodded, sparks lighting up his system like switches flicking on as their gazes met and held. Yeah, he knew sparks. “Well—” He forced himself to look away, to glance out his window. It was almost completely fogged up now, but he could still make out the rain bucketing down, and he could certainly hear it beating on the roof of the cab. “Looks like we have something to occupy our time, at least.” Feeling more composed, he returned his attention to Della. “Let’s find you another date.”
She grinned, and those sparks flared into spot fires. “Sounds like a plan.”
Moving from behind the steering wheel, she started to wiggle across. Alarm surged through Tucker’s veins, intensifying the heat load through his system. “What are you doing?”
Stopping mid-wiggle, she frowned. “We could keep passing the phone back and forth, but it would be easier for me to sit closer so we can both see at once.”
Which, of course, made perfect sense, but he didn’t think it’d be easier for him at all. Tucker found the degree of difficulty for even basic human functioning increased exponentially the closer De
lla was to his person.
In any event, she didn’t wait for him to respond, just wiggled the rest of the way. Tucker averted his gaze as she completed the maneuver. Her top was too tight to allow any interesting jiggling, but the way she was lifting her hips to pull the excess hoodie material from under her butt was not good for his pulse.
“Okay,” she said, finally settling into the middle seat. “Let’s see who’s around tonight, shall we?”
Her thigh and his thigh were a good handspan apart, but her arm brushed his as she navigated to Tinder, and his belly muscles reacted with a quick, sharp pull. Tucker swallowed as the aroma of cupcake tickled his nostrils. Was it her shampoo or perfume?
“Hello there, Lester,” Della said.
Tucker inspected the guy on the screen. He was twenty-nine, worked in IT, and lived in Boulder. His profile picture was him with a snowboard. His bio was short and to the point. “Size fourteen shoes. Just sayin’,” Tucker read out loud. Jesus. Why did twenty-somethings feel the need to brag about their dick size to the entire world? “Swipe left.”
She swiped, and a new face appeared on the screen. “Niall,” Della continued. “Twenty-six. He’s a dental nurse and lives in Dodge City.”
The guy on the screen had chosen a blurry black-and-white image that could have been lifted from America’s most-wanted list. Fucking hell. “Why on earth would he choose that picture?” Tucker asked. “He looks like a serial killer. Swipe left. Quickly.”
She laughed. “Hey, come on now. He says he likes computer games and loves his mom.”
“Which means he still lives at home. Probably in the basement.”
“Oh, but look.” She scrolled to the rest of his bio. “He’s also into dinosaurs and stamp collecting and—”
“And?” Tucker prompted.
“Taxidermy.”
Tucker hooted out a laugh. “Why does that not surprise me?”
Della swiped left again. “Ooh, Joel. Now, he looks nice.”
He did. Tall and blond and all-American, laughing at the camera in his football gear, his helmet shoved under his arm, his hair all messy from his helmet. Tucker hated him on sight. “Isn’t he a bit too…pretty?”
