“Seriously, though … Why a treehouse?”
They’d moved pillows and blankets out to the small balcony through the doors. He couldn’t have asked for a more perfect night. He couldn’t have asked for anything more. She’d trust him enough to get on the back of his bike and she’d trusted him enough to stay with him after two rounds of sex.
He wasn’t old, but he wasn’t young, either. But damn if he hadn’t come like a twenty-something.
And he could come more. Planned on it, in fact.
He had provisions for the night if she wanted to stay. He would take her back to the club in the morning to pick up her car. He wanted his one night, though. He wanted everything, every hour filled with them connecting in a way they never had.
She was everything he’d imagined. She was more than he could have hoped for.
“Mac?”
“Sorry. Daydreaming.” He shrugged. “About the treehouse? I don’t know. I’ve just always loved them. I love being able to see from up here all the way out there.”
There was a break in the trees and mountains in the distance. They were surrounded by mountains, but the view was different than most. It was spectacular, soft and hazy. “I told you my family owns the land. When I was a kid, I had a small treehouse right here. I say treehouse, but it was more like a lean to. I spent many nights in the summer and fall out here. I’d pack some food for a couple days and camp.”
“What would you do?”
“Read. I read a lot.”
She grinned and it lit up the night. “Detective stories?”
“Yep. Comics. Mystery novels. Crime thrillers.”
“Weren’t some of those too old for a kid?”
“They were, but I didn’t care. My mom was cool with it too as long as I didn’t use the language that was inside them and act like I was too good to follow her rules.”
“And did you?”
“Yes. And let me tell you, I do not like the taste of soap. Even now, I won’t use bar soap for anything.”
Jackie laughed. Or was it a giggle? He couldn’t tell and it didn’t really matter. For the first time ever, she was relaxed around him. “So, there is something you’re afraid of.”
“Not afraid, just …” He shuddered and she laughed more. God, he loved the look on her face. Carefree and happy. He loved the sound of her laughter, too. He hadn’t been privy to too much of it. She usually saved that side of herself for friends and she’d never invited him into that circle.
Maybe he’d have a seat at the table now.
“You want to tell me the truth about you and Trae?”
“If I do, will you believe it?”
“Yes. He has a thing for you, doesn’t he?”
“He does.”
“Do you have one for him?”
“Nope. Never have. He’s the brother of one of my very best friends and that’s all he’s ever been. I mean, yes, he’s my friend, a very good friend, but that’s all.”
“And how will he feel about us?” He could see the question in her eyes and when she started to open her mouth, he shook his head. “Yes, there’s an us. Don’t even start thinking there isn’t.”
She gave a short nod. “He’ll deal with it and get over it. Trae is a flirt and he’s always had girls hanging on him. He’s going to be just fine.”
“You sound sure of that. Don’t get me wrong, I hope you’re right, but I saw the way he looked at you and the way he held you. Didn’t look like something he’d be getting over too quick if he’s been harboring feelings for a long time.”
“You said you’d believe me.”
“And I do.”
“Then trust me. He knew I was coming after you today. Maybe he’s finally realized that I’m never going to feel that way about him.”
“As you feel for me? Or as he feels for you?”
“Yes.”
It would be childish to fist pump the air, but that’s exactly what Mac wanted to do. He’d won the girl. She was the first one he’d ever had to fight for, the first and only one he’d ever wanted to fight for.
“You asked me before what my grandfather would have thought about you. Do you still want to know?”
“I do.”
“He’d have loved you.”
“How do you know?”
“My grandmother was a dancer.” He watched her eyes. They were so expressive. They told him things long before her lips uttered the words. This time was no different.
“What kind of dancer?”
He didn’t answer her right away. He only lifted a brow and waited. Waited for her mouth to form that pretty little ‘O’. “They met after the war. He and some buddies went to a little place one of them had heard about and that’s where they met. They fell in love, but my grandfather couldn’t convince her to leave. She didn’t feel she was good enough for him. Sound familiar?”
“Why did she dance?”
“Family debts.” Jackie nodded and Mac continued. “My grandfather told her that if she ever left, she could come to him and he’d be waiting.”
“He was, wasn’t he?”
“He was. Three years. It took her three years to leave and come South. She brought her little brother and little sister with her and was afraid he’d turn her away. She said she’d planned to ask for money and then she’d go away, but he took them all in. He was already Sheriff by that time. He married her soon after and the rest is history.”
“That’s sweet.”
“It was, yes.”
“That’s why you didn’t give up, either, isn’t it?”
“That and because I was in love with you. Dammit, Jackie. You know I’m in love with you. And it’s not something I intend to get over. Ever.”
“You said one night.”
“I lied.”
“I didn’t have to strip or dance, like your grandmother. I didn’t have to hook.”
“I know.”
“I did it for the money. College wasn’t right for me. Until later when I took night courses at a business school.”
“I know you did it for the money. I don’t care.”
“I like what I do.”
“I like what you do, too.”
“You do?”
“God, woman … How could you ask me that? I haven’t taken any man out back and beat the shit out of him, have I? I don’t care if they look. I don’t care if they admire. I don’t care if they want you. I do care that you’re mine and make no mistake about that. Especially after this. You are mine. And to prove it …”
He crawled between her legs on the makeshift bed and wrapped his lips around her pussy. She quivered immediately. He lifted his head, but only slightly. His breath would fan her clit and keep the quivering going. “When was the last time a man licked you, ate you, made you come on his tongue and swallowed your cream?”
He wasn’t disappointed. He saw the tremble beneath the skin of her belly.
“Tell me, Princess? When?”
“Never.”
“Jesus… Who did you lose your virginity to? A caveman? Nevermind. Not important. My sweet Princess. Stripper. Hooker. Club owner. Mine.” He kissed the inside of her thigh. “Let’s see if I can make you scream loud enough the whole county hears it.”
He licked his way back to her cunt and used the pointed tip of his tongue to lash her clit. He used his fingers to fuck her deep inside, coating every inch of her pussy with her wetness and what was left over from the last time he came in her.
So focused on the task at hand, on making the trembling in her belly turn into a quake that shook her entire body … She gripped his head and pulled his mouth deeper into her.
She used his nose, his lips, his tongue. She rode him. She gasped and whimpered. She moaned and cried out. Her juices ran from his bottom lip to his chin through his beard.
God, she was beautiful. He couldn’t see her face, couldn’t see anything but the sweet soft skin of her lower belly. But he didn’t need to see anything. He heard it. He felt it.
She found pleasure with him.
She’d kept herself to herself. She didn’t believe she’d ever want or find a man who wanted her for her.
She let herself go with him. She gave herself to him.
He latched onto her clit as best he could with her wild movements and when her legs hooked themselves over his shoulders and pulled him in even deeper … Her hold threatening to cut off his ability to breathe … He came. His cock erupting with cum and he groaned into her sex.
She yanked his hair and screamed his name. The sound echoed throughout his treehouse and out the French doors into the woods.
She eased her hold on him after several moments and dropped her legs wide.
Weak and drained and happier than he’d ever been in all his adult life, he pulled himself up over her.
His face and beard were soaked. There were multiple wet spots between their legs.
And his chest constricted when he looked down into her face to find tears once again streaming down her cheeks.
She tore him up inside. This woman who was so strong and so independent that she hadn’t trusted any man with her sexual pleasure except him … She humbled and moved him.
He settled to the side of her and gathered her to his chest.
He was never letting her go.
Nope. Not ever.
Instead, he planned to marry her.
* * * * *
Jackie sat on the back of Mac’s bike and stared up at the treehouse. He was closing things up and then they’d be on their way back into town. Jaz had called her more than half a dozen times and if he went to her house and didn’t find her, he would indeed start searching. She hoped Trevor had confided in Mandi that Jackie was with Mac.
To be honest, she didn’t want to leave the woods and she’d never been a woodsy type of person. But she’d never been anywhere so enchanted than the treehouse Mac had built. He’d given her a fairytale filled with tenderness, cleansing tears, delicious orgasms, and revealing conversations she’d never had with anyone else. Not even Jaz. Not even Mandi.
She’d given Mac everything.
She’d trusted him with her truths, her past, her present, her body.
She’d trusted him with her heart.
He’d told her he loved her. He’d told her he was in love with her. He’d told her there was a them now. And he was right. There was.
She owed him the words. She owed him the same heart on the line words that he’d given her.
She’d been so afraid that he wouldn’t stick, that he wouldn’t want to stay with her if she opened up. He offered her one night and she wanted more. He promised her there would be more.
She owed him the words.
She didn’t know when it had happened that the former hooker had fallen in love with the small town Sheriff. She didn’t know how it was even possible. But there she was, on the back of his bike, watching him climb down the ladder.
It was still early, but the sun was beginning to glitter through the branches of the surrounding trees. She was older and wiser than when she’d taken five grand to have sex with a stranger all those years ago.
She was older and wiser, but she might just believe in fairytales again.
She might just believe in knights with angel wing tattoos and smiles that promised heaven.
“What are you thinking about?” Mac asked, joining her at the bike. “You look like you’re up to something.”
“Nope.”
“Uh huh.”
“Let’s go. I’m starving. I need a shower. And I need some caffeine.”
“I hear ya. Your place or mine?”
Jackie smiled and shrugged. Our place, she thought.
Because she planned to marry him.