Tempting in Texas

by Delores Fossen

  “Look, we’re not a normal family,” Cait continued, brushing her hand over Adam’s arm. “But you’re more than welcome into it. Not just for these next few months, either. You’re welcome here anytime for as long as you want.”

  Adam stayed quiet a few moments and then finally glanced at her, then at Hayes. His mouth twitched a little in what might have been the start of a smile. “Never thought I’d be in a family with Slade McClendon. I mean, I know he’s not blood kin, but Hadley said he’ll sort of be like my uncle-in-law when she marries Leyton.”

  Yep, Hayes would indeed be family, and Cait figured that once all of his sisters had married her brothers, then the eyes of the town would be on him and her to make it a finished “set.” Well, those eyes would be on them if he stayed. After her “If I’m not careful, I could fall in love with you,” Hayes might be in a hurry to get out of Dodge.

  Adam stood and surprised Cait by giving her a hug. It was probably the fastest hug in the history of that particular gesture, but it felt like a warm fuzzy blanket. Hayes stood as well and gave his sister a hug. Not a fast one, though. Hadley held on awhile.

  “You’ll let me know if Sunshine calls you back tonight,” Hadley said.

  Cait heard the worry in Hadley’s voice. Saw it, too, on Hayes’s face. Well, crud. Apparently, he’d had another run-in with his mother while she’d been napping.

  Hayes and she waited on the porch while Hadley and Adam went to Hadley’s car. Cait waited until they’d driven away before she turned to him.

  “Sunshine called you?” she asked.

  He nodded, scrubbed his hand over his stubbled chin. “Right before Hadley and Adam arrived. In fact, I was out here on the porch talking to her when they drove up.”

  Considering the weariness in his eyes, she didn’t have to guess that the conversation with his mom hadn’t gone well. Then again, chats with Sunshine never went well.

  “Oh, the irony of your mother’s name,” Cait muttered, motioning for him to follow her back inside after she had to swat a persistent whining mosquito. “I doubt Em had a clue how her daughter would turn out when she put that cheery name on the birth certificate.”

  Hayes made a sound of agreement, but that was his only response until they were back in the house with the door closed. “Sunshine told me if she didn’t have permission to film the wedding by tomorrow, then she’d release Ivy’s emails.”

  Cait thought about the timing of that. The wedding was still a week and a half away. Not much time to arrange for a camera crew, but this was Sunshine. The woman probably already had a crew on tap.

  “If she goes ahead and releases the emails,” Hayes went on, “Sunshine could have something else up her sleeve. Something to try to get my sisters to cave in and meet her demands. Because once the emails are out there, she loses her leverage. She’d need a backup plan.”

  Cait wished that weren’t true, but it made sense in a twisted kind of way. “Or she could extend the deadline. Because even if she has something else, the emails are a big hammer for her right now.”

  “Yes,” he agreed. There wasn’t any anger in his voice, just the frustration and fatigue. “I’ll call Ivy’s parents in the morning and give them a heads-up.”

  She was betting that wouldn’t be a fun call. Those people had already been through enough, but Sunshine didn’t give a rat’s ass about that. It was all about her, her, her.

  Cait went to the kitchen, got them both a beer and peered into the oven. Yep, it was a chicken baking, all right, complete with little red potatoes and baby carrots. And it would apparently be ready soon since there was only twenty minutes left on the timer.

  “You cooked,” she commented. “And you shopped.”

  Cait had figured out that last one because there was a grocery bag on the counter. Hayes must have driven into town to get the fixings for the meal. Good thing, too, because if he’d relied on what was in her fridge or pantry, they’d be having peanut butter sandwiches and some grapes that were just a day or two from turning into raisins.

  “And you dealt with Adam,” she added, which was a much bigger deal than all the other things combined.

  Hayes nodded, and he gave a short-lived smile. “I can do things.”

  Maybe it was because of that dream she’d had about him, but that sounded sexual. Of course, Hayes was the walking, talking definition of sexual.

  “Hadley said we should trick Sunshine into signing a contract,” Hayes went on, leaning against the counter while he sipped his beer. “She thought we could get Sunshine to agree to only film the wedding in certain spots, and then we’d all make sure none of us was in those spots.”

  “Clever,” Cait concluded. “Hadley can be sneaky like that.”

  The plan probably wasn’t something Sunshine would even consider, but Cait thought of the logistics of such an idea. Logistics that wouldn’t be in their favor. The wedding was at Em’s ranch in a tent that would be set up between the house and the barn. There’d be a lot of going back and forth, so an equally sneaky camera crew could figure out a way to get plenty of shots of the brides and grooms.

  “Yeah, I’m worried about Hadley’s sneakiness,” he murmured, and Hayes stared down into his beer as if it might hold some solutions for all of this.

  Cait wished she had a fix, but without proof to haul Sunshine into the station and charge her with extortion, she could only stand back and watch. And what she was watching was the face of an exhausted man.

  “You should have been the one taking the nap,” she pointed out. “You can grab a quick one before dinner if you want.” She winced. “A quick nap,” Cait clarified.

  Hayes lifted his eyes, slowly, and his gaze connected with hers. It was as if Pandora’s box had just opened. A box filled with all the heat and emotions they’d been bottling up for days.

  He moved toward her, setting his beer aside in the same motion. The moment the bottle landed on the countertop, he had his arm around her and pulled her against him. His mouth landed solidly on hers.

  This kiss shouldn’t have been this much of a shock, and it sure as heck shouldn’t have been this hot. Five seconds ago, they’d been talking about naps. Now her mouth was being taken by someone who knew exactly how to do it.

  Hayes didn’t wait to deepen the kiss. Nope. He moved straight in, tongue to tongue. She tasted the beer, but beneath it, that was all Hayes. She certainly wasn’t an expert at kissing him, but Cait was pretty sure she’d be able to pick that taste out of a kissing lineup.

  His lips glided over hers, creating a delicious pressure. A pressure that he moved to other parts when he pulled her against him. Cait set down her own beer so she could hook her arms around his neck.

  Their eyes met for just a split second, and she saw the heat in his. And the surprise. Maybe surprise because the kiss wasn’t supposed to be like this.

  Or maybe because Hayes hadn’t thought she would be like this.

  Oh, he’d wanted her, of course. The heat was proof of that. So was his erection that she brushed against. But in his “conqueror of all available women” mind, maybe he hadn’t believed that she could be more than just a conquest. Maybe there was something else there.

  Then again, her own need might be blinding her to reality.

  That this was just sexual attraction and nothing more.

  She couldn’t let herself believe it was more because that way led her down a path where she’d repeat things like, If I’m not careful, I could fall in love with you. It could lead to a whole boatload of pain and regret. Or worse. No regret, just the pain, and if that happened, then Hayes would ruin her for any other man. Some people came back from things like that, but Cait knew she wouldn’t.

  Still, she didn’t stop this.

  She took the kiss Hayes was doling out, added some moves of her own until it wasn’t enough. Until she needed more. That was the problem with making out
. More was always right there, crooking its finger to invite you to the next level. Hayes went to the next level by sliding his hand between them and over her breasts.

  Hayes had touched her like this before, and maybe that’s why he only lingered a second before he lifted her top and unhooked her bra. He’d done this before, too, but that thought flew out of mind when he lowered his head and took her nipple into his mouth.

  This, they hadn’t done.

  This, she hadn’t believed could spin her from “next” to “now.”

  It was obvious, though, that Hayes didn’t intend to give her “now.” He lingered there, tongue kissing her nipples while his left hand went to her butt. He squeezed her, shifting and aligning them so that the front of his jeans was against the front of hers. Zipper to zipper.

  She felt his erection again, felt the delicious flicks of fire when her center rubbed against the long, hard length of him. This was “next,” a couple of notches up from what he’d already done to her, and he still didn’t stop.

  He moved his hand from her butt to her stomach. Then lower. And lower. Until his hand was between his erection and her. Normally, she wouldn’t have considered that a good replacement, but it turned out that Hayes was just as clever with his hand on her jeans as he was with his tongue in her mouth. Which he did again. Touching her and kissing.

  This was like the dream. The slow, slippery slide of heat. The knife-edge of need that was already starting to urge her on to take this higher and higher until she got some release from the heat. She had one of the hottest guys on the planet against her, and she wanted to make the most of it.

  Hayes definitely made the most of it. He unzipped her, sliding his hand down into her jeans and to the front of her panties. The pleasure shot through her. No more slow slide. This was a fast ride down a mountain, and it didn’t seem to matter to her body that there was still a millimeter of fabric between his fingers and her. Nope. It didn’t matter because Cait felt that need soar. Too hard, too fast. She couldn’t tamp it down and had no choice but to give in to it.

  To give in to Hayes.

  The orgasm came, rippling through her with that blinding pleasure that a good orgasm could. And this was a good one. So good that it was many long moments—maybe even a month—before she realized that it would have been even better if Hayes had been inside her.

  Intending to remedy that “inside her” part now, Cait pushed him back just enough so she could go after his zipper. Her body was still pulsing, her heartbeat throbbing, but she still managed to cut through that and hear the sound he made. Not pleasure.

  Pain.

  Her gaze flew to his face, and, yes, that was a grimace of pain. Which he quickly tried to hide. No way, though, for him to hide that he moved his hand from her panties and to his side. The one with the cracked ribs.

  Crap. How could she have forgotten he was still on the mend? Apparently, amazing foreplay and an orgasm could do that. But Cait sure as heck remembered it now.

  “I’m sorry,” she said just as the timer on the oven went off. It wasn’t a quick beep-beep reminder, either, but an impatient shrill pulse of noise.

  Cait gently untangled herself from Hayes and crossed the kitchen to turn off both the timer and the oven itself. It didn’t take long, but it was enough for her to catch her breath. And re-zip her jeans. While her back was still to him, she also fixed her bra and top.

  “I’m okay,” Hayes said when she turned around to face him.

  Because he still had an erection, Cait stayed put, anchoring herself in place to keep some distance between them. Her body was urging her to give him a hand job or figure out a way to take care of that erection with her on top of him in bed. But sex, and orgasms, tensed a person’s muscles, and it could turn a “hurts so bad” into an actual bad kind of hurting way.

  “You will be okay,” she assured him. “But I think you should take another week before we do any bed gymnastics.”

  The corner of his mouth lifted in one of those smiles to let her know he wouldn’t mind some pain. It melted her resolve a little, but Cait quickly latched back on to it.

  “Another week,” she repeated.

  That would be five days before the wedding, so Hayes would still be around. Of course, it wouldn’t give them much time for a full-fledged fling, but they could squeeze in a few rounds of sex before he left. If he was healthy enough, they could get all those rounds done in one day.

  He stared at her a long time, obviously debating this. She could have put a superfast end to the debate by poking at his ribs again, but Cait went another route. She motioned toward the oven.

  “I’m starving,” she lied. The orgasm had satiated multiple parts of her, including her stomach. Still, she was sure her appetite would likely return in spades once she started eating.

  Hayes finally nodded. Cursed, too. The profanity was a low, husky grumble under his breath. Sexy as hell. Then again, just his breathing was sexy.

  “Oh, and that whole thing about me saying I could fall in love with you,” she tossed out there as she grabbed an oven mitt. Taking out the chicken gave her an excuse to have her back turned to him again. Best to finish this part of the conversation while he wasn’t looking at her. “It was total BS.”

  Hayes stayed quiet for a moment. “Total,” he repeated.

  It wasn’t a question. Nor was there any snark in his tone. But Cait heard what she hadn’t wanted him to see on her face.

  That the total BS was a big fat lie.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  HAYES SAT AT the kitchen table and waited. His sisters had called a 9:00 a.m. family meeting, but it would be another fifteen minutes or so before they showed up. Maybe, just maybe, he’d be awake by then.

  He was pretty sure he was now immune to the caffeine in his coffee because it sure as hell wasn’t working. Even after two huge mugs of it, he was still fuzzy-headed, still feeling a couple of steps off.

  It was too bad that he couldn’t have a sleep transfusion, since apparently he wasn’t going to get a good night’s rest without something like that. There were just too many things on his mind. Sunshine’s deadline, which was today. The possible cancellation of Outlaw Rebels. His still-healing ribs.

  And Cait.

  Yeah, she was definitely on his mind.

  Their make-out session the night before had had an abrupt ending because of his pain, and while he’d gotten his fill of the chicken dinner, the rest of the evening had left him with an edgy need that felt like a throbbing pulse all over his body. Not pain. Nope. But an itch in desperate need of scratching.

  Cait was probably feeling some of that throbbing, too. She’d gotten off, but a hand job was no substitute for the real thing, and he was betting that he was on her mind, as well. At least he hoped he was. Because it would suck if he was the only one of them who was dealing with raging hormones and doubt. That doubt was so strong that Hayes knew he should reconsider seeing her again.

  If I’m not careful, I could fall in love with you.

  Yeah, those weren’t good words for her to say, or for him to hear. She’d tried to cover them, of course, but Hayes thought she’d blurted out the truth when she had said them. He also wasn’t sure that Cait could be careful enough to guard her feelings. Not that she would automatically fall in love with him. Nope. But they were getting closer, no denying it, and with closeness came sex. Sex could lead to...well, all sorts of things other than just climaxes.

  He had just about convinced himself to put some emotional distance between them when he heard the sound of jingling bells.

  Cait.

  She was here at the ranch and wearing the accessories to feed the duck. That brought Hayes to his feet. It cleared out some of the cobwebs, too, and gave him a full kick of heat. Heat that quickly cooled when Tony, not Cait, came jingling into the kitchen.

  As usual, Em’s fiancé was smiling, and he was
moving as many parts of himself as a man his age could manage to move, no doubt to heighten the noise from the bells. Some of the bracelets obviously hadn’t fit around his wrists and ankles, so he had them dangling from the belt and his fingers.

  “You’re feeding Slackers this morning?” Hayes asked him.

  “I am. Cait and Em swear the bells keep him at bay.”

  Hayes figured that assortment of jangles would keep almost anything at bay. Probably not him, though, if Cait was wearing them. Considering his reaction when he’d thought she had come over, not much of anything was going to put him off her.

  “You can tell me this is none of my beeswax,” Tony said, rinsing out his coffee cup and putting it in the dishwasher. “But you’ve got the look of a troubled man.”

  That certainly wasn’t a newsflash. Hayes figured he’d been troubled, and looked it, at least three-fourths of his time in Lone Star Ridge. But he immediately rethought that. Yeah, Sunshine was being a pain in his ass, and he was worried about the show, his own head and Sunny’s pregnancy. But there’d been plenty of bright spots on this stay, too. Cait was one of those bright spots and so was Em and his sisters. Hayes was still deciding if Tony would land in the bright-spot column or the trouble one.

  “We’re having a family meeting about Sunshine this morning,” Hayes answered. “And it is your beeswax since you’ll soon be marrying Em.” Though he did scowl at having to use the word beeswax. “Em’s been more of a mother to me than Sunshine ever was, and I’m feeling more than a bit protective of her.”

  Hayes paused, tried to give the man some hard-ass eye to let Tony know he’d better not be just dicking around with Em. But it was next to impossible to give hard-ass anything to a man wearing a boyish grin and a thousand jingle bells.

  “I do so love Em.” Tony’s voice took on a dreamy quality, and there was no mistaking what Hayes heard. It was the voice of a besotted man. “You know that feeling you get when there’s no other woman for you? The glow? The warmth? The feeling that all is right with the world?” He didn’t give Hayes a chance to answer. “Well, I got that the first time I saw Em.”